Once again Madame Caroline found herself alone. Hamelin had remained in Paris until the early days of November on account of the formalities connected with the final constitution of the company, with its capital of one hundred and fifty millions of francs; and he it was who by Saccard\'s desire went to Ma?tre Lelorrain\'s, in the Rue Sainte-Anne, to make the fresh declarations which the law required, alleging that all the shares had been subscribed and the capital paid in, which was not true. Then he started for Rome, where he was to spend a couple of months, having some important matters which he did not speak of to study there—doubtless that famous visionary scheme of installing the Pope at Jerusalem, as well as a more weighty and practical idea, that of transforming the Universal into a Catholic bank, based on the interests of all Christendom, a vast machine which would crush the Jew bankers and sweep them off the face of the earth. And from Rome he meant to betake himself to the East again, having to return thither to attend to the railway line from Broussa to Beyrout. He went off delighted with the rapid prosperity of the Universal, and feeling absolutely convinced that it was firmly established, though at the same time he experienced some secret anxiety at its amazing success. In a conversation which he had with his sister on the day before his departure he only laid stress upon one point, which was that she must resist the general infatuation and sell their shares should the quotations ever exceed two thousand two hundred francs; for he wished to protest personally against a higher rise, deeming it both foolish and dangerous.
As soon as she was alone again, Madame Caroline felt yet more disturbed by the burning atmosphere in which she lived. The shares reached the price of two thousand two hundred francs during the first week in November; and all around her she found rapture, thanksgiving, and unlimited hope. Dejoie was brimming over with gratitude, and the Beauvilliers ladies now treated her as an equal, for was she not the friend of the demigod who was about to restore their ancient house? A chorus of benedictions went up from the happy multitude of speculators both great and small, for daughters were at last supplied with dowries, the poor were suddenly enriched, ensured of incomes in their old age, whilst the wealthy burned with insatiable delight at becoming more wealthy still. \'Twas an unique moment that followed the close of that Exhibition in Paris, now so thoroughly intoxicated with pleasure and power, a moment of faith in happiness, of conviction in endless good luck. All stocks and shares had gone up in price, the most valueless found credulous purchasers; a plethora of equivocal concerns inflated the market, congested it to the point of apoplexy; whilst, underneath, all sounded hollow, revealed the real exhaustion of a régime which had indulged in much enjoyment, which had spent milliards upon great public works, and had fattened many huge financial institutions whose gaping coffers were discharging their contents in all directions. Amid such general vertigo a smash up was bound to follow at the first crack, and Madame Caroline doubtless had some such anxious presentiment when she felt her heart pain her at each fresh leap in the price of Universals. No bad rumour as yet circulated; you detected but a slight quivering among the astonished, subdued \'bears.\' Still she was perfectly conscious of a feeling of uneasiness, of something which was already undermining the edifice. What it was could not be told, as nothing precise manifested itself, and so she was forced to wait, face to face with the splendour of the triumph which was still increasing despite those slight shocks, those signs of instability portending a catastrophe.
Moreover, she now had another worry. The officials of the[Pg 273] Institute of Work were at last satisfied with Victor, who had become silent and crafty; and if she had not yet told everything to Saccard it was from a singular feeling of embarrassment, which made her suffer from the shame that he would feel when she should tell her story, and caused her to postpone its narration from day to day. On the other hand, Maxime, to whom out of her own pocket she about this time refunded the two thousand francs which he had lent her, waxed merry over the balance of four thousand, for which Busch and La Méchain were ever clamouring. They were robbing her, said he, and his father would be furious. Accordingly, from that time forward she turned a deaf ear to the repeated demands of Busch, who insisted on being paid the remainder of the promised sum. After numerous applications he finally became angry, especially as his old idea of blackmailing Saccard had come back to him since the financier\'s rise to a position of wealth and influence, a position which placed him, Busch believed, at his mercy, as he must now necessarily fear scandal. So one day, exasperated at deriving nothing from such a fine affair, he resolved to apply to him direct, and wrote him a letter, asking him to be good enough to come to his office, to look into some old papers which had been found in a house in the Rue de la Harpe. He gave the number of the house and made so clear an allusion to the old story that he felt sure Saccard would be seized with anxiety and hasten to obey the summons. This letter, however, was forwarded to the Rue Saint-Lazare, and fell into the hands of Madame Caroline, who recognised the writing on the envelope. She trembled, and wondered for a moment whether she ought not to run to Busch\'s office and try to buy him off. Then she reflected that he had perhaps written to Saccard about something else, and that at any rate this would be a way of ending the matter. In her emotion she was even pleased to think that the task of revealing the affair should fall upon another. In the evening, however, when Saccard returned home and opened the letter in her presence she simply saw a grave expression come over his face, and thought that the letter must refer to some money complication. In reality he had[Pg 274] experienced profound surprise, and his throat had contracted at the thought of falling into such filthy hands, which he could guess must be plotting some baseness. Still, he put the letter into his pocket with an easy gesture, and decided to call upon Busch as he was requested to do.
Several days passed, however, the second fortnight of November arrived, and each morning Saccard postponed his visit, more and more bewildered by the torrent which was bearing him along. The quotation of two thousand three hundred francs had just been reached and he was delighted, albeit feeling that resistance was being offered at the Bourse, and indeed becoming more and more pronounced as the rise continued. Evidently some group of \'bears\' was taking up position, entering upon the struggle timidly as yet, venturing as a rule on mere outpost skirmishes, although on two occasions he found himself obliged to give orders to buy under cover of borrowed names, so that there might be no pause in the upward march of the quotations. The system of making the Bank buy up its own shares, speculate with them, and thus devour itself, was at last being put into practice.
One evening, thoroughly stirred by his passionate fever, Saccard could not help speaking of the matter to Madame Caroline. \'I fancy that things will soon be getting warm,\' said he; \'we have become too strong, and they find us in their way. I can scent Gundermann. I know his tactics: he will begin selling regularly, so much to-day, so much to-morrow, increasing the amount until he succeeds in shaking us.\'
Interrupting him, she said gravely: \'If he has any Universals he does right to sell.\'
\'What! he does right to sell!\'
\'No doubt, my brother told you so. All quotations above two thousand francs are absurd.\'
He looked at her, and, quite beside himself, gave vent to an angry outburst: \'Sell them! Dare to sell your own shares! Yes, play against me, since you want me to be defeated!\'
She blushed slightly, for, truth to tell, she had only the day before sold a thousand of her shares in obedience to her brother\'s orders; and this sale, like some tardy act of honesty,[Pg 275] had eased her feelings. As Saccard did not put any direct questions to her, she did not confess the matter to him, but her embarrassment increased when he added: \'For instance, there were some defections yesterday, I am sure of it. Quite a large parcel of shares came into the market, and quotations would certainly have fallen if I hadn\'t intervened. It wasn\'t Gundermann who made such a stroke as that. His system is a slower one, though the result in the long run is more crushing. Ah! my dear, I am quite confident, but still I can\'t help trembling, for it\'s nothing to defend one\'s life in comparison with having to defend one\'s money and that of others.\'
And indeed from that moment Saccard ceased to be his own master. He belonged to the millions which he was making, still triumphing, yet ever on the verge of defeat. He no longer even found time to see the Baroness Sandorff, who felt that he was breaking away from her and relapsed into her former ignorance and doubts. Since their intimacy had begun she had gambled with almost a certainty of winning and had made much money, but she now clearly saw that he was unwilling to answer her, and even feared that he might be lying to her. Either because her luck had turned, or he had indeed been amusing himself by starting her on a false scent, a day came when she lost by following his advice. Her faith was then badly shaken. If he thus misled her, who would guide her? And the worst was that the secret hostility to the Universal at the Bourse, so slight at first, was now growing day by day. There were still only rumours; no precise statement was made; no genuine fact impaired the Bank\'s credit. Only it was tacitly allowed that there must be something the matter, that the worm was in the fruit, though this did not prevent the rise of the stock from continuing, from becoming more and more formidable every day.
However, after a deal in Italians which proved disastrous, the Baroness, decidedly anxious, resolved to call at the office of \'L\'Espérance\' to try to make Jantrou talk.
\'Come, what\'s the matter?\' she said to him. \'You must[Pg 276] know. Universals have just gone up another twenty francs and yet there are rumours afloat—no one can tell me exactly what, but at all events nothing very good.\'
Jantrou\'s perplexity was, however, as great as her own. Placed at the fountain-head of information, in case of need manufacturing reports himself, he jokingly compared his position to that of a clock-maker who lives among hundreds of clocks and yet never knows the correct time. Thanks to his advertising agency, he was in everybody\'s confidence, but the result of this was that he could never form a firm opinion, for the information which he received on one hand was generally contradicted, reduced to nought, by that which he received on another.
\'I know nothing,\' he replied, \'nothing at all.\'
\'You mean that you don\'t want to tell me.\'
\'No, upon my word, I really know nothing. Why, I was even thinking of calling on you to question you! Has Saccard ceased to be obliging, then?\'
She made a gesture which confirmed him in his suspicion; and, still looking at her, he went on talking, venting his thoughts aloud: \'Yes, it\'s annoying, for I relied on you. For, you see, if there is to be a catastrophe, one ought to be forewarned of it, so as to have time to turn round. Oh! I don\'t think there need be any hurry; the Bank still stands firm as yet. Only such queer things happen sometimes.\' As he thus gazed at her and chattered, a plan suddenly took shape in his head, and all at once he resumed: \'I say, since Saccard drops you, you ought to cultivate Gundermann\'s acquaintance.\'
Such was her surprise that for a moment she remained without speaking. \'Why Gundermann?\' she asked at last. \'I know him a little; I\'ve met him at the De Roivilles\' and the Kellers\'.\'
\'So much the better if you know him. Go to see him on some pretext or other, talk to him, and try to get on friendly terms with him. Just think of it—to become Gundermann\'s confidante and rule the world!\'
\'But why Gundermann?\' she repeated.
Thereupon he explained that Gundermann was certainly[Pg 277] at the head of the group of \'bears\' who were beginning to man?uvre against the Universal. This he knew; he had proof of it. So, as Saccard was no longer obliging, would it not be simple prudence to make friends with his enemy, without, however, breaking with him? With a foot in each camp, she would be sure of being in the conqueror\'s company on the day of battle. And he suggested this treachery to her with an amiable air, like a good adviser. With a woman at work for him, he felt that he would be able to sleep in peace. \'Come, what do you say?\' he added; \'let us make a bargain. We will warn each other, we will tell each other everything we hear.\'
Thereupon he grasped her hand, which she relinquished to him, already losing her contempt for him, forgetting the lackey that he had been, no longer realising into what low debauchery he had fallen, his face bloated, his handsome beard reeking of absinthe, his new coat soiled with spots, his shiny hat damaged by the plaster of some disreputable stairway.
She called upon Gundermann the very next day. Since Universals had reached the figure of two thousand francs he had indeed been leading a bear movement, but with the utmost discretion, never going to the Bourse, nor sending even an official representative thither. His argument was that a share in any company is in the first place worth its price of issue, and secondly the interest which it may yield, this depending upon the prosperity of the company, the success attending its enterprises. There is therefore a maximum value which cannot be reasonably increased. As soon as that value is exceeded through popular infatuation, the prudent course is to play for a fall in the certainty that it must come. Still, despite his convictions, despite his absolute belief in logic, he was surprised by Saccard\'s rapid conquests, surprised to find that he had become such a power all at once, and was already beginning to frighten the big Jew bankers. It was necessary to lay this dangerous rival low as soon as possible, not only in order to regain the eight millions lost on the morrow of Sadowa, but especially in order to avoid[Pg 278] having to share the sovereignty of the market with such a terrible adventurer, whose reckless strokes seemed to succeed in defiance of all common sense, as if by miracle. And so, full of contempt for passion, Gundermann, mathematical gambler, man-numeral that he was, carried his phlegm, his frigid obstinacy still further, ever and ever selling Universals despite their continuous rise, and losing larger and larger sums at each successive settlement, with the fine sense of security of a wise man who simply puts his money into a savings\' bank.
When the Baroness at last managed to enter the banker\'s room amid the scramble of employees and remisiers, the hail of papers which had to be signed and of telegrams which had to be read, she found Gundermann suffering from a fearful cough which seemed to be tearing his throat away. Nevertheless he had been there since six o\'clock in the morning—coughing and spitting, worn out with fatigue, it is true, but steadfast all the same. That day, as a foreign loan was to be issued on the morrow, the spacious room was invaded by an even more eager crowd than usual, and two of the banker\'s sons and one of his sons-in-law had been deputed to receive this whirlwind; whilst on the floor, near the narrow table which he had reserved for himself in the embrasure of a window, three of his grandchildren, two girls and a boy, were quarrelling with shrill cries over a doll, an arm and a leg of which had already been torn off and lay there beside them.
The Baroness at once brought forward the pretext which she had devised to explain her visit. \'Cher monsieur,\' said she, \'I have come to pester you, which needs a deal of courage. It is with reference to a charity lottery——\'
He did not allow her to finish, for he was very charitable, and always bought two tickets, especially when ladies whom he had met in society thus took the trouble to bring them to him. However, he had to keep her waiting for a moment, for an employee came to submit some papers to him. They spoke of vast sums of money in hurried words.
\'Fifty-two millions, you say? And the credit was?\'
\'Sixty millions, monsieur.\'
[Pg 279]
\'Well, carry it to seventy-five millions.\'
Then he was returning to the Baroness, when he overheard a word or two of a conversation between his son-in-law and a remisier, and this started him off again. \'Not at all,\' he interrupted. \'At the rate of five hundred and eighty-seven fifty, that makes ten sous less per share.\'
\'Oh! monsieur,\' said the remisier, humbly, \'it would only make forty-three francs less!\'
\'What, forty-three francs! Why, it is enormous! Do you think that I steal money? Every one his due; I know no rule but that!\'
At last, so that they might talk at their ease, he decided to take the Baroness into the dining-room, where the table was already laid for breakfast. He was not deceived by that pretext of a lottery, for, thanks to obsequious spies, who kept him informed, he knew how intimate she was with Saccard, and strongly suspected that she had come on some matter of serious interest. Consequently he did not stand on ceremony. \'Come now!\' he exclaimed, \'tell me what you have to say.\'
But she pretended surprise. She had nothing to say to him; she simply wished to thank him for his kindness.
\'Then you have not been charged with a commission for me?\' he asked, seemingly disappointed, as if he had thought for a moment that she had come with a secret mission from Saccard, some invention or other of that madman.
Now that they were alone, she looked at him with a smile, with that deceptive, ardent air of hers by which so many men had been caught. \'No,\' she said, \'no, I have nothing to say to you, and since you are so very kind, I would rather ask something of you.\' And then, leaning forward, she made her confession, spoke of her deplorable marriage to a foreigner, who had understood neither her nature nor her needs; and explained how she had been obliged to have recourse to gambling in order to keep up her position. And finally, she expatiated on her solitude, on the necessity of being advised and guided through the quicksands of the Bourse, where so heavy a penalty attends each false step. \'But I thought,\' he interrupted, \'that you were already advised by somebody.\'
[Pg 280]
\'Oh, somebody!\' she murmured with a gesture of profound disdain. \'No, nobody—I have nobody. It is your advice that I should like to have, the advice of the master. And it really would not cost you anything to be my friend, just to say a word to me, merely one word every now and then. If you only knew how happy you would make me, how grateful I should be to you!\'
Speaking in this wise, she sought to fascinate him by glance and gesture, but all to no avail. He remained cold, impassive, like one who has no passions. And whilst he listened to her he took some grapes, one by one, from a fruit-stand on the table, and ate them in a languid, mechanical way. This was the only excess which he allowed himself, the indulgence of his most sensual moments, the penalty for which was days of suffering, for his digestive organs were so impaired that a rigorous milk diet had been prescribed for him. Looking at the Baroness, he gave her the cunning smile of a man who knows that he is invincible; and without wasting further time, coming straight to the point, he said: \'Well, you are very charming, and I should really like to oblige you. So on the day, my beautiful friend, when you bring me some good advice, I promise to give you some in return. Come and tell me what others are doing, and I\'ll tell you what I shall do. It is understood, eh?\'
He had risen, and she was obliged to return with him into the adjoining room. She had perfectly understood the bargain which he proposed, the spying and treachery which he required of her. But she was unwilling to answer, and made a pretence of reverting to the subject of the lottery; whilst he, with a shake of his head, seemed to be adding that he did not really need any help, since the logical, inevitable dénouement would come just the same, though perhaps not quite so fast. And when she at last went off his attention was immediately turned to other important matters, amid all the extraordinary tumult prevailing in that market of capital, what with the procession of Boursiers, the gallop of his employees, and the play of his grandchildren, who had just[Pg 281] torn the doll\'s head off with shouts of triumph. Seated at his narrow table, he became absorbed in the study of a sudden idea, and heard nothing more.
The Baroness Sandorff returned twice to the office of \'L\'Espérance\' to acquaint Jantrou with what she had done, but she did not find him there. At last Dejoie admitted her one day when his daughter Nathalie sat talking with Madame Jordan on a bench in the passage. A diluvian rain had been falling since the day before; and in the wet gray weather the old building, overlooking a dark well-like courtyard, seemed frightfully melancholy. Such was the darkness that the gas had been lighted, and Marcelle, waiting for Jordan, who had gone in search of some money, to pay a new instalment to Busch, listened sadly to Nathalie as the latter chatted away like a vain magpie, with the dry voice and sharp gestures of a precocious Parisian girl.
\'You understand, madame, papa won\'t sell. There is a lady who is urging him to do so, trying to frighten him. I do not give her name, because surely it is hardly her place to frighten people. It is I who am now preventing papa from selling. Sell indeed! when the price is still going up! To do that one would need to be a regular simpleton, don\'t you think so?\'
\'No doubt!\' Marcelle simply answered.
\'The price, you know, has now got to two thousand five hundred francs,\' continued Nathalie. \'I keep the accounts because papa scarcely knows how to write. And so our eight shares represent twenty thousand francs already. That\'s nice, is it not? First of all, papa wanted to stop at eighteen thousand, that was his figure—six thousand for my dowry, and twelve thousand for himself, enough for a little income of six hundred francs a year, which he would have well earned with all these emotions. But is it not lucky that he didn\'t sell, since we have already got two thousand francs more? And now we want more still, we want enough to give papa an income of a thousand francs at the very least. And we shall get it; Monsieur Saccard has told us so. He is so nice, is Monsieur Saccard!\'
[Pg 282]
Marcelle could not help smiling. \'Then you no longer intend to marry?\' she said.
\'Yes, yes, when the rise comes to an end. We were in a hurry, Theodore\'s father especially, on account of his business. But it would be silly, wouldn\'t it, to stop up the source when the money keeps pouring out of it? Oh! Theodore understands it all very well, especially as the larger papa\'s income gets, the more capital there will be for us by-and-by. That\'s worth considering—and so we are all waiting. We have had the six thousand francs for months, and I might have married, but we prefer to let them increase and multiply. Do you read the articles in the newspapers about the shares?\'
Without waiting for a reply, she went on: \'Papa brings me the papers and I read them every evening. He has already seen them and I have to read them over to him again. One could never tire of them, they make such beautiful promises! I have my head so full of them when I go to bed that I dream about them all night. Papa tells me, too, that he sees things in his sleep which are very good signs. The night before last we had the same dream, of five-franc pieces which we were picking up by the shovelful in the street. It was very amusing.\'
Again she paused in her cackle to ask: \'How many shares have you got?\'
\'We, not one!\' answered Marcelle.
Nathalie\'s fair little face, crowned with light wavy hair, assumed an expression of intense compassion. Ah! the poor people who had no shares! And her father having called her to ask her to carry some proofs to a contributor, on her way back to the Batignolles, she went off, affecting the importance of a capitalist, who now came to the office almost every day in order to ascertain the Bourse quotations at the earliest possible moment.
Left alone on her bench, Marcelle fell back into a melancholy reverie, she who was usually so gay and brave. Mon Dieu! how dark it was, what a gloomy day it was! and to think that her poor husband was running about the streets in that diluvian rain! He had such contempt for money, felt[Pg 283] such uneasiness at the very idea of occupying himself with it, that it cost him a great effort to ask it even of those who owed it to him! Then becoming absorbed, hearing nothing, she recalled her experiences since waking in the morning; while all around her feverish work went on in connection with the paper—contributors rushing past, \'copy\' coming and going, doors slamming and bells ringing incessantly.
To her it had been an evil day. In the first place she had scarcely washed and was still in her morning wrap when at nine o\'clock, just as Jordan had gone out to investigate an accident which he was to report, she was astounded to see Busch make his appearance, accompanied by two very dirty-looking men, perhaps process servers, perhaps bandits, she never could tell exactly which. That abominable fellow Busch, undoubtedly taking advantage of the fact that there was only a woman to contend with, declared that they meant to seize everything if she did not pay him on the spot. And she argued the matter in vain, being unacquainted with any of the legal formalities. He affirmed so stoutly that judgment had been signified and the placard posted that she was left in bewilderment, believing at last in the possibility of these things happening without one knowing of them. However, she did not surrender, but explained that her husband would not return even to lunch, and that she would allow nothing to be touched until he should come back. Then, between these three shady personages and this young woman with her hair hanging over her shoulders, there ensued a most painful scene, the men already making an inventory of the goods, and she locking the cupboards, and placing herself in front of the door as though to prevent them from taking anything away. To think of it! Her poor little home which she was so proud of, those few sticks of furniture which she was ever dusting and polishing, those hangings in the bedroom which she had put up herself! As she shouted to them with warlike bravery, they would have to pass over her body if they wished to take those things away. And she called Busch rogue and thief to his very face. Yes! a thief who wasn\'t ashamed to demand seven hundred and thirty francs and fifteen centimes,[Pg 284] without counting the fresh costs, for a claim which he had picked out of some heap of rags and old iron bought for a hundred sous! To think that they had already paid the thief four hundred francs in instalments and that he talked of carrying off their furniture to pay himself the other three hundred and odd francs which he wished to rob them of! Yet he knew perfectly well that they were honest people and would have paid him at once had they only possessed the sum. And he profited by the circumstance that she was alone, unable to answer, ignorant of legal matters, to come there and frighten her and make her weep. He was a rogue, a thief, a thief! Quite infuriated, Busch shouted even louder than she did, slapping his chest and asking: Was he not an honest man? Had he not paid sterling money for the claim? He had fulfilled all the formalities of the law and meant to make an end of the matter. However, when one of the two dirty men began opening the chest of drawers in search of the linen, Marcelle\'s demeanour became so terrific, she threatened so stoutly to bring everyone in the house and in the street to the spot, that the Jew slightly calmed down; and at last after another half-hour\'s wild discussion he consented to wait until the morrow, furiously swearing, however, that he would then remove everything if she did not keep her promise to him. Oh! what burning shame it had been, a shame from which she still suffered—those horrid men in her rooms, wounding all her feelings, even her modesty, searching her very bed, and quite infecting the happy chamber, whose window she had been obliged to leave wide open after their departure.
But another and a deeper sorrow awaited Marcelle that day. The idea had occurred to her of at once hastening to her parents to borrow the needed sum of them: in this way, when her husband came back at night, she would not have to fill him with despair, but would be able to make him laugh by telling him of the scene of the morning. She already saw herself describing the great battle, the ferocious assault made upon their household, the heroic way in which she had repulsed the attack. Her heart beat very fast as she[Pg 285] entered the little residence in the Rue Legendre, that comfortable house in which she had grown up, and where it now seemed to her she would find only strangers, so different, so icy was the atmosphere. As her parents were sitting down to table, she accepted their invitation to breakfast, in order to put them in better humour. Throughout the meal the conversation ran upon the rise in Universals, the price of which had gone up another twenty francs only the day before; and Marcelle was astonished to find her mother more feverish, more greedy even than her father, she who at the outset had trembled at the very idea of speculation; whereas now, with the violence of a conquered woman, it was she who chided him for his timidity, in her anxious eagerness for great strokes of luck. They had scarcely begun eating, when she flew into a tantrum: she was astounded at hearing him talk of selling their seventy-five shares at the unhoped-for figure of two thousand five hundred and twenty francs, which would have yielded them a hundred and eighty-nine thousand francs, in truth a pretty profit, more than a hundred thousand francs above the price at which they bought the stock. Yet this did not satisfy her. \'Sell!\' said she, \'when the "C?te Financière" promised the figure of three thousand francs!\' Had he gone mad? For the \'C?te Financière\' was known for its old-time honesty; he himself often repeated that with this newspaper as a guide one could sleep soundly. Oh! no, indeed, she would not let him sell! She would sooner sell their house to buy more shares. And Marcelle, silent, with her heart compressed at hearing them so passionately bandy these big figures, wondered how she might venture to ask for a loan of five hundred francs in this house which gambling had invaded, and where little by little she had seen rise the flood of financial newspapers that now submerged it, enveloped it with the intoxicating glamour of their puffs.
At last, at dessert, she ventured to speak out. She and her husband were in need of five hundred francs, they were on the point of being sold up, and surely her parents would not abandon them in such disaster. Her father at once[Pg 286] lowered his head and darted a glance of embarrassment at her mother. But the latter was already refusing the request in a firm voice. Five hundred francs, indeed! where did she expect them to find them? All their capital was invested in their operations; and besides, she reverted to her old-time diatribes. When a girl has married a pauper, a man who writes books and articles, she must put up with the consequence of her folly, and not fall back for support upon her parents. No! she—the mother—had not a copper for idlers, who with their pretended contempt for money only dreamed of living on that of other people. And thereupon she allowed her daughter to depart; and Marcelle went off in despair, her heart bleeding at the great change that had taken place in her mother, formerly so reasonable and so kind.
Once in the street Marcelle had walked along in an almost unconscious state, her eyes fixed on the ground as though she hoped to find the money there. Then the idea of applying to Uncle Chave suddenly occurred to her, and she immediately betook herself to his little lodging in the Rue Nollet, so as to catch him before he went off to the Bourse. She found him smoking his pipe all alone; and on hearing of her trouble he became greatly distressed and even angry with himself, exclaiming that he never had a hundred francs before him, for he no sooner won a trifle at the Bourse than like a dirty pig he went and spent it. Then, on hearing of the Maugendres\' refusal, he began to thunder against them, horrid beasts that they were! He no longer associated with them, said he, since the rise of their shares had driven them crazy. Hadn\'t his sister contemptuously called him a higgler by way of ridiculing his prudent system of operations, and this simply because he had advised her in a friendly spirit to sell and realise? Ah! well, she would get no pity from him when the fall came and she found herself in a pickle!
Once more in the street, with her pocket still empty, Marcelle had to resign herself to the unpleasant course of calling at the newspaper office to acquaint her husband with what had occurred that morning. It was absolutely necessary that Busch should be paid. Having heard her story, Jordan,[Pg 287] whose book had not yet been accepted by any publisher, had started off to hunt for money, through the streets of muddy Paris in that rainy weather—not knowing where to apply—at friends\' houses or at the offices of the newspapers he wrote for, but vaguely relying upon some chance meeting. Although he had begged her to go home again, she was so anxious that she had preferred to remain waiting for him on that bench.
Dejoie, seeing her alone after his daughter\'s departure, ventured to bring her a newspaper. \'If Madame would like to read this,\' said he, \'just to while away the time.\'
But she refused the offer with a wave of the hand; and, as Saccard arrived at that moment, she assumed a brave air, and gaily explained that she had sent her husband on a bothersome errand in the neighbourhood which she had not cared to undertake herself. Saccard, who had a feeling of friendship for the young couple, insisted that she should go into his office, where she could wait more comfortably. But she declined the offer, saying that she was very well where she was. And he ceased to press the matter, in the surprise he experienced at suddenly finding himself face to face with the Baroness Sandorff, who was leaving Jantrou\'s office. However, they both smiled, with an air of amiable understanding, like people who merely exchange a bow, in order not to parade their intimacy.
Jantrou had just told the Baroness that he no longer dared to give her any advice. His perplexity was increasing, since the Universal still stood firm in spite of the growing efforts of the \'bears.\' Undoubtedly Gundermann would eventually win, but Saccard might last a long time, and perhaps there was yet a lot of money to be made by clinging to him. He, Jantrou, had decided to postpone any rupture and to keep on good terms with both sides. The best plan for her to adopt, he said, was to try to retain Saccard\'s confidence, and either keep the secrets which he might confide to her for herself, or else sell them to Gundermann, should it be to her advantage to do so. And Jantrou offered this advice in a jesting sort of way, without affecting any of the mysteriousness of a conspirator;[Pg 288] whilst she, on her side, laughed and promised to give him a share in the affair.
\'So now she is trying her fascinations on you!\' exclaimed Saccard in his brutal way as he entered Jantrou\'s office.
The editor feigned astonishment. \'Whom are you talking about? Oh, the Baroness! But, my dear master, she adores you. She was telling me so just now!\'
Saccard shrugged his shoulders. Love matters were of no interest to him just then. Walking to and fro, pausing at times in front of the window to watch the fall of that seemingly endless rain, he vented all his nervous delight. Yes, Universals had risen another twenty francs on the previous day. But how the deuce was it that people still persisted in selling? There would have been a rise of thirty francs but for a heap of shares which had fallen on the market soon after business began. He could not explain it, ignorant as he was that Madame Caroline, fighting against that senseless rise, in obedience to the orders left with her by her brother, had again sold a thousand shares. However, with success still increasing, Saccard ought not to have complained; and yet an inward trembling, produced by secret fear and anger, disturbed him. The dirty Jews had sworn to ruin him, he exclaimed; that rogue Gundermann had just put himself at the head of a syndicate of \'bears\' in order to crush him. He had been told so at the Bourse, where folks declared that the syndicate disposed of three hundred millions of francs. Ah, the brigands! And there were other reports—reports which he did not venture to repeat aloud, but which were each day growing more precise, allegations with regard to the stability of the Universal, and predictions of approaching difficulties, though as yet the blind confidence of the public had not been shaken.
However, the door opened, and Huret with his air of feigned simplicity came in.
\'Ah! so here you are, Judas!\' said Saccard.
Having learnt that Rougon had decided to abandon his brother, Huret had become reconciled to the minister; for he was convinced that as soon as Saccard should have Rougon[Pg 289] against him, a catastrophe would be inevitable. To earn his pardon, he had now re-entered the great man\'s service, again doing his errands and exposing himself to kicks and insults in order to please him. \'Judas!\' he repeated, with the shrewd smile that sometimes lighted up his heavy peasant face; \'at any rate, a good-natured Judas, who comes to give some disinterested advice to the master whom he has betrayed.\'
But Saccard, as if unwilling to hear him, shouted by way of affirming his triumph: \'Two thousand five hundred and twenty yesterday, two thousand five hundred and twenty-five to-day! Those are the last quotations, eh?\'
\'I know; I have just sold.\'
At this blow the wrath which Saccard had been concealing under a jesting air burst forth. \'What! you have sold? So it\'s perfect then! You drop me for Rougon, and you go over to Gundermann!\'
The Deputy looked at him in amazement. \'To Gundermann, why so? I simply look after my interests. I\'m not a dare-devil, you know. I prefer to realise as soon as there is a decent profit. And that is perhaps the reason why I have never lost.\'
He smiled again like a prudent, cautious Norman farmer, garnering his crop in a cool collected way.
\'To think of it! A director of the Bank!\' continued Saccard violently. \'Whom can we expect to have confidence? What must folks think on seeing you sell in that fashion when the shares are still rising? I am no longer surprised that people should assert that our prosperity is artificial, and that the day of the downfall is at hand. These gentlemen, the directors, sell, so let us all sell. That spells panic!\'
Huret made a vague gesture. In point of fact, he did not care a button what might happen henceforth; he had made sure of his own pile, and all that remained for him to do now was to fulfil the mission entrusted to him by Rougon with as little unpleasantness for himself as possible. \'I told you, my dear fellow,\' said he, \'that I had come to give you a piece of disinterested advice. Here it is. Be careful; your[Pg 290] brother is furious, and he will leave you altogether in the lurch if you allow yourself to be beaten.\'
Restraining his anger, Saccard asked impassively: \'Did he send you to tell me that?\'
After hesitating for a moment, the Deputy thought it best to confess that it was so. \'Well, yes, he did. Oh! you cannot suppose that the attacks made upon him in "L\'Espérance" have anything to do with his irritation. He is above such personal considerations. Still, it is none the less true that the Catholic campaign in your paper is, as you yourself must realise, of a nature to embarrass him in his present policy. Since the beginning of all these unfortunate complications with regard to Rome he has had the entire clergy on his back. He has just been obliged to have another bishop censured by the Council of State for issuing an aggressive pastoral letter. And you choose for your attacks the very moment when he has so much difficulty to prevent himself from being swamped by the Liberal evolution brought about by the reforms of January 19—reforms which, as folks say, he has only decided to carry out in order that he may prudently circumscribe them. Come, you are his brother, and can you imagine that your conduct pleases him?\'
\'Of course,\' answered Saccard sneeringly, \'it is very wrong on my part. Here is this poor brother of mine, who, in his rage to remain a Minister, governs in the name of the principles which he fought against yesterday, and lays all the blame upon me because he can ............