had awarded to Corentin the treatment of a venomous
beast. Old d'Hauteserre's spirit was aroused; he remem-
bered that he was a chevalier; all the blood in his body
rushed to his face; he regretted that he no longer wore a
sword. The servants at first were ready to jump for joy.
The vengeance so ardently desired had descended and
smitten one of those men. But their rejoicing was of
brief duration, it was supplanted by frightful doubts and
fears: they could still hear the gendarmes carrying on their
perquisition in the rooms above.
The spy —a. noun of multitude in which are confounded
all the shades of difference that distinguish the men of the
police, for the general public does not trouble itself to dis-
criminate between the diverse employments and dignities of
those who occupy positions in the great sanitarium so indis-
pensable to governments — the spy, I say, is magnificent and
remarkable in this, that he always preserves his equanimity;
he has the Christian humility of the priest, scorn and con-
tempt are to him as naught, and he, for his part, sets them
up as a barrier between him and a foolish and stubborn gen-
eration that refuses to understand him; his brow is of brass
for insult and injury, he moves forward to his end like some
great animal whose mighty carapace is impervious save by
artillery; but, in further resemblance to the animal, let him
be wounded once in his self-esteem, his fury will be the
greater, he will bellow the louder, that he had believed his
cuirass to be impenetrable. That cut of the whip across his
fingers, irrespective of the mere physical pain, was to Corentin
the cannon-ball that comes crashing through the carapace;
that exhibition of loathing and contempt, coming from that
high-minded and sublime girl, humiliated him, not in the
eyes of that little world alone but in his own. Peyrade,
the man from Provence, darted toward the hearth. Lau-
116 BALZAC'S WORKS
reace aimed a kick at him, but he caught her foot, raised
it from the floor, and compelled her, for decorum's sake,
to reseat herself in the easy chair in which she had lately
been slumbering. It was a farce coming as an interlude
between the acts of. a tragedy, a contrast which is not in-
frequent in human afiEairs. Peyrade burned his hand iu
securing possession of the blazing casket, but he had it
safe; he deposited it on the .floor and sat down on it.
These trifling events succeeded one another rapidly, with-
out a word being spoken. Corentin, the smart of whose
castigation had somewhat subsided, kept Mile, de Cinq-
Cygne in her chair by holding her hands.
"I trust, belle citoyeune, that you will not oblige me
to have recourse to force," said he with his offensive
courtesy.
Peyrade's action had resulted in extinguishing the fire
by shutting off the supply of air.
"Gendarmes, this way!" he shouted, without changing
his uncouth position.
"Will you promise to be good?" Corentin insolently
asked Laurence, picking up his poniard, but carefully
avoiding all appearance of threatening her with it.
"The contents of that box do not concern the govern-
ment," said she with a trace of sadness in her air and ac-
cent. "When you have read the letters that it contains
you will be ashamed, low and degraded though you are,
that you violated their secrets. — But does shame or rev-
erence for anything survive in you?" she added after a
pause.
The cur^ gave Laurence a look as if to say, "In the
name of God, be calm!"
Peyrade rose. The bottom of the box, where it had
been in contact with the coals, was almost entirely con-
sumed and left its imprint on the carpet. The top was
charred, the sides were ready to give way. That grotesque
parody of a Scsevola, who had just offered as a sacrifice to
the tutelary divinity of the police, Fear, the seat of his
A MOST MYSTERIOUS CASE 117
apricot-colored small clothes, drew apart the two sides of
the box as he might have spread open the covers of a book,
and out upon the green cloth of the card-table there fell
three letters and two locks of hair. The dawn of a tri-
umphant smile was on his face as he looked at Corentin,
when he saw that the hair was white, of two different
shades of whiteness. Corentin left Mile, de Cinq-Cjgne
and came over to read the letter from which the tresses
had fallen.
Laurence also rose, and came and stood beside the two
detectives.
"Oh! read it out," said she; "it shall be your punish-
ment."
And as the}^ still read only with their eyes, she herself
read the following letter:
"Dear Laurence— My husband and 1 have been in-
formed of your noble conduct on the day of our arrest.
We know that you love our dear twins with an affection
as tender and as impartial as that which we bear them;
we have therefore selected you to be the depositary of a
trust that will be to them at the same time a source of
pleasure and of sadness. The headsman has just been
with us to cut oft" our hair, for in a few moments we are
to die, and he has promised to see that you receive the
only souvenirs of us that we have it in our power to leave
to our beloved orphans. Preserve these relics of us then,
to give to them in happier days. We place here for each
of them a last kiss, with our fond benediction. Our last
thought will be, first for our sons, then for you, and
finally of God! Love them well.
"Berthe de Cinq-Cygne.
"Jean de Simeuse."
All eyes were wet with tears when the reading was
completed.
Laurence looked sternly at the two agents and in a
steady voice said to them:
118 BALZAC'S WORKS
"You are less capable of pity than the headsman!"
Corentin tranquilly replaced the tresses in the letter
and laid the letter on the table, placing a basket filled
with counters on top of it that it might not be blown
away. Such cold-bloodedness appeared revolting amid
the general emotion. Peyrade unfolded the other two
letters.
"Oh, as for those," said Laurence, "their terms are
almost similar. You have heard the last will and testa-
ment, now for the manner of its execution. Hereafter my
heart will have secrets for no one. That is all."
"ANDER^fACH, 1794. — Before the Battle.
"My dear Laurence — My love for you is for life, and
I wish that you should know it, but I also wish you to
know, in case I remain on the field to-morrow, that my
brother Paul-Marie loves you no less than I do. My only
comfort in dying will be the certainty that some day you
will be able to make my dear brother your husband without
seeing me racked by jealousy, as would surely be the case
if you should prefer him to me in the lifetime of us both.
After all, such a preference would appear to me quite nat-
ural, for perhaps he is a better man than I am — " etc.
"Marie-Paul."
"Here is the other," she said, with a charming color in
her cheeks.
"Andernach. — Be/ore the Battle.
"Dear, kind Laurence — I know that I am a sober,
serious sort of chap, and that Marie-Paul, with his vivacity
and good humor, is a great deal more likely to find favor in
your eyes than I am. The day will come, sooner or later,
when you will have to choose between us: well, although I
love you with an affection — "
"You were in correspondence with emigres!" exclaimed
Peyrade, interrupting the reading, and holding up the let.
A MOST MYSTERIOUS CASE 119
ters between his eye and the light to see if there were not
other matter interlined in sympathetic ink.
"Yes," returned Laurence, refolding the precious letters,
now yellow with age. "But by what right do you thus
violate my domicile, my personal liberty, and all the
domestic virtues ? ' '
"Ah! just so!" said Peyrade. "By what right, eh?
We'll show you by what right, my pretty aristocrat," he
continued, drawing from his pocket an order issued by the
Minister of Justice and countersigned by the Minister of
the Interior. "There, citoyenne, that is what the min-
isters evolved from under their nightcap."
"We might ask you,^' said Corentin, in a tone intended
only for her ear, "by what right you harbor assassins of the
First Consul on your premises. The cut across the knuckles
that you gave me but now might justify me in some day
lending a hand to send those young gentlemen your cousins
to the scaffold — I who came here to serve them — "
Merely by the movement of his lips and by the look
which Laurence gave Corentin, the cure understood what
was said by the great unacknowledged artiste, and he made
the Comtesse a cautionary signal that was seen only by
Goulard. Peyrade was sounding the casket with his finger-
nails to see if it liad not a false bottom.
"Oh! mon Dieu!" exclaimed Laurence, snatching the
box from Peyrade, "do not break it — see here."
She took a pin and pressed it against the head of one of
the carved figures: the two boards, moved by a spring, fell
apart, and that which was hollow disclosed two miniatures
of German workmanship painted on ivory, the likenesses
of the two MM. de Simeuse in the uniform of Condi's
army. Corentin, who found himself confronted by an ad-
versary worthy of his steel, drew Peyrade by a gesture to a
corner, and the pair conferred in private.
"You could throw that into the fire!" said the Abbe
Goujet to Laurence, indicating by a glance the Marquise's
letter and the locks of hair.
120 BALZAC'S WORKS
The young girl shrugged her shoulders significantly in
reply. The cure understood that she had made that sacri-
fi'-e of all that was dearest to her to amuse the spies and
gain time, and cast his eyes upward in silent admiration,
"I hear Gothard crying. Where did they arrest him?"
she asked in a tone loud enough to be heard by every one.
"1 do not know," replied the cure.
"Had he gone to the farm?"
"The farm!" said Peyrade to Corentin. "It will be
â– well to send a party up there."
"Not so," rejoined Corentin, "that girl would not have
placed her cousins' fate in the keeping of a farmer. She is
amusing us. Do as 1 bid you, so that, after having made
the mistake of coming here, we may at least go away a
little wiser than we were before."
Corentin came and stood before the fire, tucking up the
long and pointed tails of his coat to warm his legs; his air,
tone and manner were those of a man making a social visit.
"Mesdames, you are at liberty to seek your beds, as are
the servants. Monsieur ie Maire, we have no further need
of your assistance. The strictness of our orders did not
allow us to act otherwise than we have done; but when all
the walls, which appear to be of considerable thickness,
shall have been sounded and examined, we shall relieve
you of our presence."
The mayor made his bow to the company and went his
way. The curd and Mile. Goujet manifested no intention
of leaving. The servants could not make up their mind to
go to bed without knowing more of how matters were to
end for their young mistress. Mme. d'Hauteserre, who,
ever since Laurence's arrival, had been scrutinizing her
with the eager curiosity of a despairing mother, now rose,
took her by the arm, led her to a corner, and in a low voice
asked —
"Have you seen them ?"
"How could I have allowed your boys to come under
our roof without your knowing it?" Laurence answered.
A MOST MYSTERIOUS CASE 121
"Durieu," she said, "go and see if there is a possibility of
saving my poor Stella; she is breathing still."
"She has had a hard day's Work, I suppose?'' inquired
Corentin.
"She covered fifteen leagues in three hours," she replied,
addressing the cure, who looked at her with silent stupefac-
tion. "I went out at half -past nine, and when I returned it
was well after one."
She glanced at the clock, which told the hour to be half-
past two.
"So," Corentin observed, "you do not deny that you
have ridden fifteen leagues?"
"No," she replied. "1 admit that my cousins and the
MM. d'Hauteserre, in their entire innocence, were intending
to petition not to be excepted from the amnesty, and were
returning to Cinq-Cygne. And when I had reason to be-
lieve that the Sieur Malin was concocting some villanous,
underhand scheme to injure them, I rode hard and fast to
warn them to return to Germany, where they will be before
the telegraph at Troyes can get word to the officials at
the frontier. If 1 have committed a crime the law will
punish me."
This answer, which had been thoroughly considered and
was so consistent in all its parts, somewhat disturbed the
convictions of the agent, whom the young Comtesse was
observing out of the corner of her eye. At that critical
moment, when every eye was bent with rapt attention on
those two faces, when the glances of all were travelling
back and forth, from Corentin to Laurence and from Lau-
rence to Corentin, the sound of a horse approaching at a
sharp gallop from the direction of the forest was heard upon
the highway, and immediately afterward, the rider having
turned in at the gate, upon the paved road that led across
the lawn. All countenances wore an expression of poignant
anxiety.
Peyrade entered the room, his eyes sparkling with joy.
He strode hastily to his colleague's side and said to him, in
(F)— Vol 17
122 BALZAO'S WORKS
a voice sufiBciently loud for tlie Comtesse to hear — "We
have Michul"
Laurence, to whose cheeks fatigue, suspense, and the
terrible tension of all her mental faculties had given an
unwonted rosy color, recovered her pallor and sank down
iu an almost fainting condition, as if a thunderbolt had
fallen on her, upon a fauteuil. The Durieu woman, Mile.
Goujet and Mme. d'flauteserre hastened to her side, for she
seemed to be strangling; she motioned to them to cut the
brandebourgs of her habit.
"She swallowed the bait — they are making for Paris,"
said Corentin to Feyrade. "We will modify our instruc-
tions accordingly."
They went out, leaving a gendarme at the door of the
salon. The infernal cleverness of the two men had scored
for them a horrible advantage in the contest; they had
entrapped Laurence by means of one of their commonest
stratagems.
At six o'clock in the morning, just as it was growing
light, the two agents returned. After a careful examination
of the sunken road, they pronounced it certain that horses
had passed that way to enter the forest. They were waiting
for the report of the captain of gendarmerie whose duty it
was to reconnoitre the district. Leaving the chateau sur-
rounded by a detachment commanded by a corporal, they
went off to the village to get some breakfast at the inn-
keeper's, first, however, having given orders to release
Gothard, whose answer to every question put to him was
still a flood of tears, and Catherine, who persevered in her
attitude of silent immobility. Catherine and Gothard came
to the salon and kissed the hands of their mistress, who lay
stretched at length in her comfortable berg^re. Durieu
came in to announce that Stella would not die, but that
she would need careful attendance.
The mayor, prowling about the village in an uneasy and
inquiring frame of mind, fell in with Peyrade and Corentin.
He would not hear of men of their condition breakfasting in
A MOST MYSTERIOUS CASE 123
a dirty little village inn, and insisted on their going home
with him. The abbey was distant a quarter of a league.
As the three men were walking along the road toward their
destination, Peyrade let fall the remark that the corporal
from Arcis had not sent them any news oi Michu and
Violette.
"We have people of quality to deal with," said Coren-
tin; "they are more than a match for us. I've no doubt
that that priest knows more about the business than he
would care to tell."
Mme. Goulard was just ushering the two employes into
a great, bare, unwarmed dining-room when the lieutenant of
gendarmerie, evidently laboring under considerable excite-
ment, presented himself.
"We have just picked up the Arcis corporal's horse
wandering in the forest without a rider," said he to
Peyrade.
"Lieutenant," cried Corentin, "go with all speed to
Michu 's pavilion; find out what they are up to there! 1
am afraid the corporal has met with foul play."
These tidings had the efiect of impairing the appetite of
the participants in the mayor's hospitality. The Parisians
bolted their food with the celerity of hunters taking their
noonday snack, and were trundled back to the chateau in
their "one-horse shay," in order that they might be on
hand to respond promptly to any call for their services.
When the two men next appeared in the salon, into which
they had introduced trouble, terror, dismay, and so much
mental anguish of every kind, they found there, grouped
around the fire, and to appearance tranquil and uncon-
cerned, Laurence in robe de chambre, the old gentleman
and his wife, and the Abb^ Goujet and his sister.
"If they had caught Michu," Laurence said to herself,
"they would have brought him here. It is too bad that 1
could not have been more mistress of myself, that I had to
help confirm those wretches in their suspicions; but it is
not too late to mend matters. — Do you intend to keep us
124 BALZAC'S WORKS
prisoners mticb longer?" she asked the two detectives with
a laughing, offhand air.
"How can she know anything of our apprehensions con-
cerning Michu ? No one from outside has found his way
into the chateau. She is making game of us!" was the
meaning of the glance exchanged by the two spies.
"We shall not bother you much longer," Corentin re-
plied. "In three hours from now we expect to bid you
good -by, with apologies for having disturbed your solitude."
There was no answer. This disdainful silence had the
effect of redoubling Corentin's inward rage, as to whom
Laurence and the cure, the two dominating intelligences of
that little world, had been comparing notes. Gothard and
Catherine drew up the table to the fire and set out the
breakfast, of which the cure and his sister partook.
Neither masters nor servants paid the least attention to
the two spies, who went out and walked in the garden or
on the road, occasionally revisiting the salon.
At half-past two o^clock the lieutenant returned.
"I found the corporal," he informed Corentin, "lying in
the road that leads from the pavilion of Cinq-Cygne to the
farm of Bellache; he was uninjured save for a dreadful con-
tusion on the head, the result most likely of his fall. He
was stripped off backward so suddenly from his horse and
thrown to the ground so violently, he says, that he can give
no explanation of how it happened; his feet lost the stir-
rups, otherwise he must have been killed; his maddened
horse would have dragged him. We left him to the care
of Michu and Violette — "
"What! you don't mean to tell me that Michu is at
home?" queried Corentin, darting a look at Laurence.
The Comtesse smiled imperceptibly, like a woman enjoy-
ing her revenge.
"I just now saw him and Violette putting the finishing
touches to a bargain that they began to discuss yesterday
afternoon," replied the lieutenant. "They struck me as
being pretty drunk, but that is not to be wondered at, for
A MOST MYSTERIOUS CASE 125
they were drinking all night and have not yet reached an
agreement."
"Did Violette tell you that?" cried Corentin.
"Yes," answered the lieutenant.
"Ah, to get a thing done one must do it himself!" ex-
claimed Peyrade, glancing at Corentin, who appeared no
less than his colleague to distrust the lieutenant's sagacity.
The younger man nodded assent to his senior's proposition.
"What o'clock was it when you reached Michu's pavil-
ion ?" Corentin inquired. He had noticed that Mile, de
Cinq-Cygne had glanced at the clock on the mantel-shelf.
"Two o'clock, or thereabout," replied the lieutenant.
Laurence cast a radiant look on M. and Mme. d'Haute-
serre, the Abb^ Goujet and his sister, to whom the sky just
then appeared of a brighter azure; the joy of triumph
sparkled in her eyes, her cheeks were rosy red, tears trem-
bled on her lashes. This young girl, strong and brave in
adversity, could weep only in her moments of pleasure. At
that moment she was sublime, and especially for the cur^,
who, on most occasions repelled by the excessive virility of
Laurence's character, now discerned in it all the tenderness
of the true woman; but that sensibility, which she kept
locked so closely in her heart, was like a treasure deep-
buried in the earth under a block of granite.
A gendarme appeared to inquire if admittance should be
given to Michu's son, who was there with a message from
his father for the gentlemen from Paris. Corentin nodded
his head affirmatively. Fran9ois Michu, that precocious
youngster in whom thus early traits of the paternal cun-
ning and astuteness were developing, was in the courtyard,
where Grothard, now in the enjoyment of his liberty once
more, was enabled to have a moment's converse with him
under the eye of the gendarme. One portion of his com-
mission the sharp little Michu successfully acquitted him-
self of by slipping something into Gothard's hand unper-
ceived by the gendarme. Gothard followed in the wake
of Frangois when the latter was summoned to the salon
126 BALZAC'S WORKS
and, approaching Mile, de Cinq-Cygne, innocently deliv-
ered her wedding ring to her, entire, which she kissed de-
voutly, for she knew that it was Michu's purpose, in send-
ing her that token, to convey to her the information that
the four gentlemen were in safety.
"My pa wants to know what he is to do with the officer
man, who is very sick ?"
"What ails him?" inquired Peyrade.
"Dunno; somethin' the matter with his head, 1 guess;
had a tumble off his horse. For a gindarme, who is s' posed
to know how to ride, that don't look very well, but I s'pose
his horse must 'a' stumbled. He's got a hole in the back
of his head, oh, a hole as big as your fist! Seems as if
he must 'a' fallen on a rock. Poor man ! he may be a
gindarme, he suffers all the same. I couldn't bear to look
at him."
The captain of the Troyes gendarmerie came riding into
the courtyard, dismounted, and beckoned to Corentin, who,
as soon as he recognized him, hurried to the window and
threw it up in order to save time.
"What is it?"
"We have come back like a pack of Dutchmen! Right
in the middle of the great avenue of the forest we came on
the carcasses of five horses that had been ridden to death,
that had dropped from exhaustion; their hides were a reek-
ing lather of sweat. I gave directions not to bury them
until we have ascertained where they came from and who
furnished them. The forest is surrounded, and those who
are inside will have to stay there, for they cannot get out."
"At what hour do you suppose those riders entered the
forest?"
"About half-past twelve."
"I don't want so much as a rabbit to leave this forest
unseen!" said Corentin to the officer. "I will leave Pey-
rade with you; I am going now to see the poor corporal.
— Remain for a while with the mayor," he added, for the
ear of the Provengal; "I will send a capable man to relieve
A MOST MYSTERIOUS CASE 127
you. We shall need the assistance of the people of the
neighborhood; scan all their faces carefully."
He turned to the company, and in a voice that boded
no good exclaimed :
^^Au revoir /"
No one rose or saluted the agents as they retired.
"What do you suppose Fouche will say to a domiciliary
visit that ended in nothing?" Peyrade asked as he assisted
Corentin to his place in the ramshackle cabriolet.
"Oh! the end is not yet," Corentin replied; "the gentle-
men must be in the forest."
He glanced up at Laurence, who was watching them
through the small panes of the great window of the salon.
"I made one woman eat humble pie who had stirred my
bile overmuch, and she was every bit as good as this minx.
See if I don't make her pay for that cut of the whip if she
ever crosses my path again!"
"The other woman was ajille,'^ remarked Peyrade, "and
this one is of a station — "
"What difference does that make? All are fish that
swim in the sea!" Corentin replied, motioning to the gen-
darme who was driving to lay the lash on the skeleton post-
horse.
Ten minutes later the chateau of Cinq-Cygne was entirely
and completely evacuated.
"How was it managed, the affair of the gendarme?"
Laurence asked Frangois Michu, whom she had seated at
the table and was regaling with sundry dainties.
"Father and mother told me that no one was to be
allowed in our house, that it was a matter of life and
death. So, when I heard horses running and rampaging
in the wood, 1 knew that there were some of those dogs of
gendarmes about, and made up my mind that they should
stay away from our house. I went up to the garret and got