Honore de Balzac by An Historical Mystery_The Gondreville Mystery Read Free Book Online Page B

tenderness for his boy, instantly understood the
meaning of her tears. She had cursed the part which her beauty and her
father's will had forced her to take; but now happiness, in the midst of
this great storm, played, with a beautiful flame like a vivid lightning
about them. And it was lightning! Each thought of the last ten years of
misconception, and they blamed themselves only. Michu stood motionless,
his elbow on his gun, his chin on his hand, lost in deep reverie. Such
a moment in a man's life makes him willing to accept the saddest moments
of a painful past.
    Marthe, agitated by the same thoughts as those of her husband, was also
troubled in heart by the danger of the Simeuse brothers; for she now
understood all, even the faces of the two Parisians, though she still
could not explain to herself her husband's gun. She darted forward like
a doe, and soon reached the road to the chateau. There she was surprised
by the steps of a man following behind her; she turned, with a cry, and
her husband's large hand closed her mouth.
    "From the hill up there I saw the silver lace of the gendarmes' hats.
Go in by the breach in the moat between Mademoiselle's tower and the
stables. The dogs won't bark at you. Go through the garden and call the
countess by the window; order them to saddle her horse, and ask her to
come out through the breach. I'll be there, after discovering what the
Parisians are planning, and how to escape them."
    Danger, which seemed to be rolling like an avalanche upon them, gave
wings to Marthe's feet.

Chapter IV - Laurence de Cinq-Cygne
*
    The old Frank name of the Cinq-Cygnes and the Chargeboeufs was Duineff.
Cinq-Cygne became that of the younger branch of the Chargeboeufs after
the defence of a castle made, during their father's absence, by five
daughters of that race, all remarkably fair, and of whom no one expected
such heroism. One of the first Comtes de Champagne wished, by bestowing
this pretty name, to perpetuate the memory of their deed as long as the
family existed. Laurence, the last of her race, was, contrary to Salic
law, heiress of the name, the arms, and the manor. She was therefore
Comtesse de Cinq-Cygne in her own right; her husband would have to take
both her name and her blazon, which bore for device the glorious answer
made by the elder of the five sisters when summoned to surrender the
castle, "We die singing." Worthy descendant of these noble heroines,
Laurence was fair and lily-white as though nature had made her for a
wager. The lines of her blue veins could be seen through the delicate
close texture of her skin. Her beautiful golden hair harmonized
delightfully with eyes of the deepest blue. Everything about her
belonged to the type of delicacy. Within that fragile though active
body, and in defiance as it were of its pearly whiteness, lived a
soul like that of a man of noble nature; but no one, not even a close
observer, would have suspected it from the gentle countenance and
rounded features which, when seen in profile, bore some slight
resemblance to those of a lamb. This extreme gentleness, though noble,
had something of the stupidity of the little animal. "I look like a
dreamy sheep," she would say, smiling. Laurence, who talked little,
seemed not so much dreamy as dormant. But, did any important
circumstance arise, the hidden Judith was revealed, sublime; and
circumstances had, unfortunately, not been wanting.
    At thirteen years of age, Laurence, after the events already related,
was an orphan living in a house opposite to the empty space where
so recently had stood one of the most curious specimens in France
of sixteenth-century architecture, the hotel Cinq-Cygne. Monsieur
d'Hauteserre, her relation, now her guardian, took the young heiress to
live in the country at her chateau of Cinq-Cygne. That brave provincial
gentleman, alarmed at the death of his brother, the Abbe d'Hauteserre,
who was shot in the open square as he was about to escape in the dress
of a peasant, was not in a