“That is how history is written!” replied Claude Vignon. “Don’t you know that her fortune was used to free the Baron du Guenic’s estates? Ah! if she only knew that Calyste now belongs to her ex-friend,” (Maxime pushed the critic’s foot, motioning to Rochefide), “she would issue from her convent, I do believe, to tear him from her.”
“Upon my word, Rochefide, if I were you,” said Maxime, finding that his warning did not stop Vignon, “I should give back my wife’s fortune, so that the world couldn’t say she attached herself to Calyste from necessity.”
“Maxime is right,” remarked Madame Schontz, looking at Arthur, who colored high. “If I have helped you to gain several thousand francs a year, you couldn’t better employ them. I shall have made the happiness of husband and wife; what a feather in my cap!”
“I never thought of it,” replied the marquis; “but a man should be a gentleman before he’s a husband.”
“Let me tell you when is the time to be generous,” said Maxime.
“Arthur,” said Aurelie, “Maxime is right. Don’t you see, old fellow, that generous actions are like Couture’s investments? — you should make them in the nick of time.”
At that moment Couture, followed by Finot, came in; and, soon after, all the guests were assembled in the beautiful blue and gold salon of the hotel Schontz, a title which the various artists had given to their inn after Rochefide purchased it for his Ninon II. When Maxime saw La Palferine, the last to arrive, enter, he walked up to his lieutenant, and taking him aside into the recess of a window, gave him notes for twenty thousand francs.
“Remember, my boy, you needn’t economize them,” he said, with the particular grace of a true scamp.
“There’s none but you who can double the value of what you seem to give,” replied La Palferine.
“Have you decided?”
“Surely, inasmuch as I take the money,” said the count, with a mixture of haughtiness and jest.
“Well, then, Nathan, who is here to-night, will present you two days hence at the house of Madame la Marquise de Rochefide.”
La Palferine started when he heard the name.
“You are to be madly in love with her, and, not to rouse suspicion, drink heavily, wines, liqueurs! I’ll tell Aurelie to place you beside Nathan at dinner. One thing more, my boy: you and I must meet every night, on the boulevard de la Madeleine at one in the morning — you to give me an account of progress, I to give you instructions.”
“I shall be there, my master,” said the young count, bowing.
“Why do you make us dine with that queer fellow dressed like the head-waiter of a restaurant?” whispered Maxime to Madame Schontz, with a sign toward Fabien du Ronceret.
“Have you never met the Heir? Du Ronceret of Alencon.”
“Monsieur,” said Maxime to Fabien, “I think you must know my friend d’Esgrignon?”
“Victurnien has ceased to know me for some time,” replied Fabien, “but we used to be very intimate in our youth.”
The dinner was one of those which are given nowhere but in Paris by these great female spendthrifts, for the choiceness of their preparations often surprise the most fastidious of guests. It was at just such a supper, at the house of a courtesan as handsome and rich as Madame Schontz, that Paganini declared he had never eaten such fare at the table of any sovereign, nor drunk such wines with any prince, nor heard such witty conversation, nor seen the glitter of such coquettish luxury.
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