The Deputy of Arcis

“Then you think I had better see him?”

“Better see him! why, my good friend, you ought to go to him at once.”

“Wouldn’t it be better if he talked with you?”

“Oh! no, no!” exclaimed Vinet. “I may be the man to put the question in the Chamber; and if Desroches were seen with me, I should lose my virginity.”

So saying, he took leave of Maxime with some haste, on the ground that he ought then to be at the Chamber.

“But I,” said Maxime, running after him, – “suppose I want to consult you in the matter?”

“I leave to-night for my district, to get things into order before the opening of the new session.”

“But about bringing up the question which you say may devolve on you?”

“I or another. I will hasten back as soon as I can; but you understand, I must put my department in order for a six months’ absence.”

“A good journey to you, then, Monsieur le procureur-general,” replied Maxime, sarcastically.

Left to himself, Monsieur de Trailles had a period of discouragement, resulting from the discovery that these two political Bertrands meant that his paw should pull the chestnuts from the fire. Rastignac’s behavior particularly galled him. His mind went back to their first interview at Madame Restaud’s, twenty years earlier, when he himself held the sceptre of fashion, and Rastignac, a poor student, neither knew how to come into a room nor how to leave it. [See “Pere Goriot.”] And now Rastignac was peer of France and minister, while he, Maxime, become his agent, was obliged with folded arms to hear himself told that his plot was weak and he must carry it out alone, if at all.

But this discouragement did not last.

“Yes!” he cried to himself, “I will carry it out; my instinct tells me there is something in it. What nonsense! – a Dorlange, a nobody, to attempt to checkmate Maxime de Trailles and make a stepping-stone of my defeat! To my solicitor’s,” he said to the coachman, opening the door of the carriage himself.

Desroches was at home; and Monsieur de Trailles was immediately admitted into his study.

Desroches was a lawyer who had had, like Raffaelle, several manners. First, possessor of a practice without clients, he had made fish of every case that came into his net; and he felt himself, in consequence, little respected by the court. But he was a hard worker, well versed in all the ins and outs of chicanery, a keen observer, and an intelligent reader of the movements of the human heart. Consequently he had made for himself, in course of time, a very good practice; he had married a rich woman, and the moment that he thought himself able to do without crooked ways he had seriously renounced them. In 1839 Desroches had become an honest and skilful solicitor: that is to say, he assumed the interests of his clients with warmth and ability; he never counselled an openly dishonorable proceeding, still less would he have lent a hand to it. As to that fine flower of delicacy to be met with in Derville and some others like him, besides the sad fact that it is difficult to keep its fragrance from evaporating in this business world of which Monsieur de Talleyrand says, “Business means getting the property of others,” it is certain that it can never be added to any second state of existence. The loss of that bloom of the soul, like that of other virginities, is irreparable. Desroches had not aspired to restore it to himself. He no longer risked anything ignoble or dishonest, but the good tricks admitted the code of procedure, the good traps, the good treacheries which could be legitimately played off upon an adversary, he was very ready to undertake.

Desroches was moreover a man of parts and witty; loving the pleasures of the table, and like all men perpetually the slaves of imperious toil, he felt the need of vigorous amusement, taken on the wing and highly spiced. While purifying after a fashion his judicial life, he still continued the legal adviser of artists, men of letters, actresses, courtesans, and elegant bohemians like Maxime de Trailles, because he liked to live their life; they were sympathetic to him as he to them. Their witty argot, their easy morals, their rather loose adventures, their expedients, their brave and honorable toil, in a word, their greatness and their weakness, – he understood it all marvellously well; and, like an ever-indulgent providence, he lent them his aid whenever they asked for it. But in order to conceal from his dignified and more valuable clients whatever might be compromising in the clientele he really preferred, Desroches had his days of domesticity when he was husband and father, especially on Sundays. He appeared in the Bois de Boulogne in a modest caleche beside his wife (whose ugliness revealed the size of her dot), with three children on the front seat, who were luckless enough to resemble their mother. This family picture, these virtuous Dominical habits, recalled so little the week-day Desroches, dining in cafes with all the male and female viveurs of renown, that one of them, Malaga, a circus-rider, famous for her wit and vim, remarked that lawyers ought not to be allowed to masquerade in that way and deceive the public with fictitious family joys.

It was to this relative integrity that de Trailles now went for counsel, as he never failed to do in all the many difficulties he encountered in life. Following a good habit, Desroches listened, without interrupting, to the long explanation of the case submitted to him. As Maxime hid nothing from this species of confessor, he gave his reasons for wishing to injure Sallenauve, representing him, in all good faith, as having usurped the name under which he was elected to the Chamber, – his hatred making him take the possibility for positive evidence.

In his heart, Desroches did not want to take charge of an affair in which he saw not the slightest chance of success; but he showed his lax integrity by talking over the affair with his client as if it were an ordinary case of legal practice, instead of telling him frankly his opinion that this pretended “case” was a mere intrigue. The number of things done in the domain of evil by connivance in speech, without proceeding to the actual collusion of action, are incalculable.

“In the first place,” said Desroches, when the matter was all explained, “a civil suit is not to be thought of. Your Romilly peasant-woman might have her hands full of proofs, but she has no ground herself to stand upon; she has no legal interest in contesting the rights of this recognized natural son.”

“Yes, that is what Vinet said just now.”

“As for the criminal case, you could, no doubt, compel it by giving information to the police authorities of this alleged imposture – ”

“Vinet,” interrupted Maxime, “inclined to the criminal proceeding.”

“Yes, but there are a great many objections to it. In the first place, in order that the complaint be received at all, you must produce a certain amount of proof; then, supposing it is received, and the authorities are determined to pursue the case, you must have more evidence of criminality than you have now; and, moreover, supposing that you can show that the so-called Marquis de Sallenauve committed a fraud, how will you prove that the so-called son was privy to it? He might have been the dupe of some political schemer.”

“But what interest could such a schemer have in giving Dorlange the many advantages he has derived from the recognition?”

“Ah! my dear fellow, in political manners all queer proceedings are possible; there is no such fertile source for compilers of causes celebres and novelists. In the eyes of the law, you must remember, the counterfeiting of a person is not always a crime.”

“How so?” asked Maxime.

“Here,” said Desroches, taking up the Five Codes; “do me the favor to read Article 5 of the Penal Code, the only one which gives an opening to the case you have in mind.”

Maxime read aloud the article, which was as follows: —

“‘Any functionary or public officer who, in the exercise of his function, shall commit forgery – either by false signatures, by alterations of deeds, writings, or signatures, or by counterfeiting persons – ’ There, you see,” said Maxime, interrupting himself, – “‘by counterfeiting persons – ‘”

“Go on,” insisted Desroches.

“‘ – by counterfeiting persons,’” resumed de Trailles, “‘either by writings made or intercalated in the public records or other documents, shall be punished by imprisonment at hard labor for life.’”

Maxime lingered lovingly over the last words, which gave his revenge a foretaste of the fate that awaited Sallenauve.

“My dear count,” said Desroches, “you do as the barristers do; they read to the jury only so much of a legal document as suits their point of view. You pay no attention to the fact that the only persons affected by this article are functionaries or public officers.”

Maxime re-read the article, and convinced himself of the truth of that remark.

“But,” he objected, “there must be something elsewhere about such a crime when committed by private individuals.”

“No, there is not; you can trust my knowledge of jurisprudence, – the Code is absolutely silent in that direction.”

“Then the crime we wish to denounce can be committed with impunity?”

“Its repression is always doubtful,” replied Desroches. “Judges do sometimes make up for the deficiency of the Code in this respect. Here,” he added, turning over the leaves of a book of reference, – “here are two decisions of the court of assizes, reported in Carnot’s Commentary on the Penal Code: one of July 7, 1814, the other April 24, 1818, – both confirmed by the court of appeals, which condemn for forgery, by ‘counterfeiting persons,’ individuals who were neither functionaries nor public officers: but these decisions, unique in law, rest on the authority of an article in which the crime they punish is not even mentioned; and it is only by elaborate reasoning that they contrived to make this irregular application of it. You can understand, therefore, how very doubtful the issue of such a case would be, because in the absence of a positive rule you can never tell how the magistrates might decide.”

“Consequently, your opinion, like Rastignac’s, is that we had better send our peasant-woman back to Romilly and drop the whole matter?”

“There is always something to be done if one knows how to set about it,” replied Desroches. “There is a point that neither you nor Rastignac nor Vinet seems to have thought of; and that is, to proceed in a criminal case against a member of the national representation, except for flagrant crime, requires the consent and authority of the Chamber.”

“True,” said Maxime, “but I don’t see how a new difficulty is going to help us.”

“You wouldn’t be sorry to send your adversary with the galleys,” said Desroches, laughing.

“A villain,” added Maxime, “who may make me lose a rich marriage; a fellow who poses for stern virtue, and then proceeds to trickery of this kind!”

“Well, you must resign yourself to a less glorious result; but you can make a pretty scandal, and destroy the reputation of your man; and that ought, it seems to me, to serve your ends.”

“Of course, – better that than nothing.”

“Well, then, here’s what I advise. Don’t let your peasant-woman lodge her complaint before the criminal court, but make her place in the hands of the president of the Chamber of deputies a simple request for permission to proceed. Probably the permission will not be granted, and the affair will have to stop at that stage; but the matter being once made known will circulate through the Chambers, the newspapers will get hold of it and make a stir, and the ministry, sub rosa, can envenom the vague accusation through its friends.”

“Parbleu! my dear fellow,” cried Maxime, delighted to find a way open to his hatred, “you’ve a strong head, – stronger than that of these so-called statesmen. But this request for permission addressed to the president of the Chamber, who is to draw it up?”

“Oh! not I,” said Desroches, who did not wish to mix himself up any farther in this low intrigue. “It isn’t legal assistance that you want; this is simply firing your first gun, and I don’t undertake that business. But you can find plenty of briefless barristers always ready to put their finger in the political pie. Massol, for instance, can draw it up admirably. But you must not tell him that the idea came from me.”

“Oh! as for that,” said Maxime, “I’ll take it all on my own shoulders. Perhaps in this form Rastignac may come round to the project.”

“Yes, but take care you don’t make an enemy of Vinet, who will think you very impertinent to have an idea which ought, naturally, to have come into the head of so great a parliamentary tactician as himself.”

“Well, before long,” said Maxime, rising, “I hope to bring the Vinets and Rastignacs, and others like them, to heel. Where do you dine this evening?” he added.

“In a cave,” replied Desroches, “with a band.”

“Where’s that?”

“I suppose, in the course of your erotic existence, you have had recourse to the good offices of a certain Madame de Saint-Esteve?”

“No,” replied Maxime, “I have always done my own business in that line.”

“True,” said Desroches, “you conquer in the upper ranks, where, as a general thing, they don’t use go-betweens. But, at any rate, you have heard of Madame de Saint-Esteve?”

“Of course; her establishment is in the rue Neuve-Saint-Marc, and it was she who got that pot of money out of Nucingen for La Torpille. Isn’t she some relation to the chief of detective police, who bears the same name, and used to be one of the same kind as herself?”

“I don’t know about that,” said Desroches, “but what I can tell you is that in her business as procuress – as it was called in days less decorous than our own – the worthy woman has made a fortune, and now, without any serious change of occupation, she lives magnificently in the rue de Provence, where she carries on the business of a matrimonial agency.”

“Is that where you are going to dine?” asked Maxime.

“Yes, with the director of the London opera-house, Emile Blondet, Finot, Lousteau, Felicien Vernon, Theodore Gaillard, Hector Merlin, and Bixiou, who was commissioned to invite me, as it seems they are in want of my experience and capacity for business!”

“Ah ca! then there’s some financial object in this dinner?”

“No; it merely concerns a theatrical venture, – the engagement of a prima donna; and they want to submit the terms of the contract to my judgment. You understand that the rest of the guests are invited to trumpet the affair as soon as the papers are signed.”

“Who is the object of all this preparation?”

“Oh! a star, – destined, they say, to European success; an Italian, discovered by a Swedish nobleman, Comte Halphertius, through the medium of Madame de Saint-Esteve. The illustrious manager of the London opera-house is negotiating this treaty in order that she shall make her first appearance at his theatre.”

“Well, adieu, my dear fellow; a pleasant dinner,” said Maxime, preparing to depart. “If your star shines in London, it will probably appear in our firmament next winter. As for me, I must go and attend to the sunrise in Arcis. By the bye, where does Massol live?”

“Faith! I couldn’t tell you that. I never myself trust him with a case, for I will not employ barristers who dabble in politics. But you can get his address from the ‘Gazette des Tribuneaux’; he is one of their reporters.”

Maxime went to the office of that newspaper; but, probably on account of creditors, the office servant had express orders not to give the barrister’s address, so that, in spite of his arrogant, imperious manner, Monsieur de Trailles obtained no information. Happily, he bethought him that he frequently saw Massol at the Opera, and he resolved to seek him there that evening. Before going to dinner, he went to the lodgings in the rue Montmartre, where he had installed the Romilly peasant-woman and her counsel, whom Madame Beauvisage had already sent to Paris. He found them at dinner, making the most of the Beauvisage funds, and he gave them an order to come to his apartment the next day at half-past eleven without breakfasting.

In the evening he found Massol, as he expected, at the opera-house. Going up to the lawyer with the slightly insolent manner which was natural to him, he said, —

“Monsieur, I have an affair, half legal, half political, which I desire to talk over with you. If it did not demand a certain amount of secrecy, I would go to your office, but I think we could talk with more safety in my own apartment; where, moreover, I shall be able to put you in communication with other persons concerned in the affair. May I hope that to-morrow morning, at eleven o’clock, you will do me the favor to take a cup of tea with me?”

If Massol had had an office, he might possibly not have consented, for the sake of his legal dignity, to reverse the usual order of things; but as he perched rather than lodged in any particular place, he was glad of an arrangement which left his abode, if he had any, incognito.

“I shall have the honor to be with you at the hour named,” he replied ceremoniously.

“Rue Pigalle,” said Maxime, “No. 6.”

“Yes, I know,” returned Massol, – “a few steps from the corner of the rue de la Rochefoucauld.”

VIII. SOME OLD ACQUAINTANCES

A few evenings after the one on which Sallenauve and Marie-Gaston had taken Jacques Bricheteau to Saint-Sulpice to hear the Signora Luigia’s voice, the church was the scene of a curious little incident that passed by almost wholly unperceived. A young man entered hastily by a side-door; he seemed agitated, and so absorbed in some anxiety that he forgot to remove his hat. The beadle caught him by the arm, and his face became livid, but, turning round, he saw at once that his fears were causeless.

“Is your hat glued on your head, young man?” said the beadle, pompously.

“Oh, pardon me, monsieur,” he replied, snatching it off; “I forgot myself.”

Then he slipped into the thickest of the crowd and disappeared.

A few seconds after the irruption of this youth the same door gave access to a man around whose powerful, seamed face was the collar of a white beard, which, combined with a thick shock of hair, also white but slightly reddish in tone and falling almost to his shoulders, gave him very much the air of an old Conventional, or a Bernardin de Saint-Pierre who had had the small-pox. His face and his hair placed him in the sixties, but his robust figure, the energetic decision of his movements, and, above all, the piercing keenness of the glance which he cast about him on entering the church, showed a powerful organization on which the passage of years had made little or no impression. No doubt, he was in search of the young fellow who had preceded him; but he did not commit the mistake of entering the crowd, where he knew of course that the youth had lost himself. Like a practised hunter, he saw that pursuit was useless, and he was just about to leave the church when, after a short organ prelude, the contralto of the signora delivering its solemn notes gave forth that glorious harmony to which is sung the Litany of the Virgin. The beauty of the voice, the beauty of the chant, the beauty of the words of the sacred hymn, which the fine method of the singer brought out distinctly, made a singular impression on the stalwart stranger. Instead of leaving the church, he put himself in the shadow of a column, against which he leaned as he stood; but as the last notes of the divine canticle died away among the arches of the church, he knelt on the pavement, and whoever had chanced to look that way would have seen two heavy tears rolling slowly down his cheeks. The benediction given, and the crowd dispersing, he rose, wiped his eyes, and, muttering, “What a fool I am!” left the church. Then he went to the Place Saint-Sulpice, and, beckoning to a coach on the stand, he said to the driver, —

“Rue de Provence, my man, quick! there’s fat in it.”

Reaching the house, he went rapidly up the stairway, and rang at the door of an apartment on the first floor.

“Is my aunt at home?” he inquired of the Negro who opened it. Then he followed the man, and was presently ushered into a salon where the Negro announced, —

“Monsieur de Saint-Esteve.”

The salon which the famous chief of the detective police now entered was remarkable for the luxury, but still more for the horribly bad taste, of its appointments. Three women of advanced age were seated round a card-table earnestly employed in a game of dominoes. Three glasses and an empty silver bowl which gave forth a vinous odor showed that the worship of double-sixes was not without its due libations.

“Good evening, mesdames,” said the chief of police, sitting down; “for I have something to say to each of you.”

“We’ll listen presently,” said his aunt; “you can’t interrupt the game. It won’t be long; I play for four.”

“White all round!” said one of the hags.

“Domino!” cried the Saint-Esteve. “I win; you have four points between you two, and the whites are all out. Well, my dear, what is it?” she said, turning to her nephew, after a rather stormy reckoning among the witches was over.

“You, Madame Fontaine,” said the chief of police, addressing one of the venerable beings, whose head was covered with disorderly gray hair and a battered green bonnet, – “you neglect your duty; you have sent me no report, and, on the contrary, I get many complaints of you. The prefect has a great mind to close your establishment. I protect you on account of the services you are supposed to render us; but if you don’t render them, I warn you, without claiming any gifts of prediction, that your fate-shop will be shut up.”

“There now!” replied the pythoness, “you prevented me from hiring Mademoiselle Lenormand’s apartment in the rue de Tournon, and how can you expect me to make reports about the cooks and clerks and workmen and grisettes who are all I get where I am? If you had let me work among the great folks, I’d make you reports and plenty of them.”

“I don’t see how you can say that, Madame Fontaine,” said Madame de Saint-Esteve. “I am sure I send you all my clients. It was only the other day,” continued the matrimonial agent, “I sent you that Italian singer, living with a deputy who is against the government; why didn’t you report about that?”

“There’s another thing,” said the chief of police, “which appears in several of the complaints that I received about you, – that nasty animal – ”

“What, Astaroth?” said Madame Fontaine.

“Yes, that batrachian, that toad, to come down to his right name. It seems he nearly killed a woman who was pregnant – ”

“Well, well,” interrupted the sorceress, “if I am to tell fortunes alone, you might as well guillotine me at once. Because a fool of a woman lay-in with a dead child, must toads be suppressed in nature? Why did God make them?”

“My dear woman,” said the chief, “did you never hear that in 1617 a learned man was put to death for having a toad in a bottle?”

“Yes, I know that; but we are not in those light ages,” replied Madame Fontaine, facetiously.

“As for you, Madame Nourrisson, the complaint is that you gather your fruit unripe. You ought to know by this time the laws and regulations, and I warn you that everything under twenty-one years of age is forbidden. I wonder I have to remind you of it. Now, aunt, what I have to say to you is confidential.”

Thus dismissed, two of the Fates departed.

Since the days when Jacques Collin had abdicated his former kingship and had made himself, as they say, a new skin in the police force, Jacqueline Collin, though she had never put herself within reach of the law, had certainly never donned the robe of innocence. But having attained, like her nephew, to what might fairly be called opulence, she kept at a safe and respectful distance from the Penal Code, and under cover of an agency that was fairly avowable, she sheltered practices more or less shady, on which she continued to bestow an intelligence and an activity that were really infernal.

“Aunt,” said Vautrin, “I have so many things to say to you that I don’t know where to begin.”

“I should think so! It is a week since I’ve seen you.”

“In the first place, I must tell you that I have just missed a splendid chance.”

“What sort of chance?” asked Jacqueline.