Robert Tournay Part 3

"My dear child," put in Madame de Remur, "it would do no good to give them bread to-day; they would be hungry again to-morrow. The trouble is with the finances. When they are set right everything will go well; and the people can buy all the bread they want, and you can have your diamond crescent," and the speaker smiled at the chevalier and shrugged her white shoulders.

"Yes, but," persisted the countess, raising her pretty eyebrows, "when _will_ the finances be set right? The people cannot go forever without bread."

"Nor can women go forever without diamonds," laughed Madame de Remur.

"Women with your eyes, fair Diane, have no need of other diamonds," said the Marquis de St. Hilaire debonairely. The lady smiled graciously at the compliment. She was a young and attractive widow and she looked at St. Hilaire not unkindly.

"We have frequently had financial crises in the past," said d'Arlincourt, "and gotten safely over them; and so we should to-day, were it not for the host of philosophical writers who have broken loose; who call the people's attention to their ills, and foment trouble where there is none. Of course you will understand that I make the usual exception as to present company," he added, bowing slightly to the philosopher. But the latter seemed lost in thought and did not appear to hear the count's remark. The poet took up the conversation in a low tone.

"Should we not look to these very men, these philosophers, these encyclopaedists, to point the way out of the difficulty?" and he turned from one to the other with a shrug.

"Bah, no! They are the very ones to blame, I tell you," repeated d'Arlincourt.

"My dear count," cried Madame d'Arlincourt, "I cannot permit you to speak slightingly of our philosophers. They are all the fas.h.i.+on now. The door of every salon in Paris is open to them. The other night, at a great reception given by the d.u.c.h.ess de Montmorenci, half the invited guests were philosophers, poets, encyclopaedists. They say that even some of the n.o.bility were overlooked in order to make room for the men of letters."

The Marquis de St. Hilaire threw a small cake to the spaniel that sat on its haunches begging for it.

"We cannot very well overlook this new order of n.o.bility of the ink-and-paper that has exerted such an influence during the last generation," he said carelessly.

"I should not overlook them if I had my way," cried the Count d'Arlincourt. "I should lock them safely up in the Bastille."

"Oh!" cried the ladies in one breath; "barbarian!"

"These men are doubtless responsible for the inflamed state of the public mind," said St. Hilaire, again taking up the conversation.

"Of course they are," agreed the count.

"And so are Calonne and Brienne," continued the marquis. "They mismanaged affairs during their terms of office."

Here the philosopher smiled an a.s.sent.

"But the blame rests more heavily upon other shoulders than those of scribbling writers or corrupt officials," and the marquis paused to look around the table.

"I am all attention," cried the Countess d'Arlincourt, prepared for something amusing. "Upon whom does it rest?"

"Upon the n.o.bility themselves," answered St. Hilaire.

For a moment there was silence; then came a storm of protests from all sides, only the chevalier and the philosopher making no audible reply, although the latter said to himself:--

"You are right, monsieur le marquis."

"St. Hilaire is in one of his mad fits," de Lacheville exclaimed.

"If it were not for the n.o.bility there would be no poetry, no wit,"

murmured the poet.

"The n.o.bility is the mainstay of the throne, the vitality of the country," said d'Arlincourt.

"What have _we_ done?" cried the ladies in concert. "We ask for nothing better than to have everybody contented and happy." And they shrugged their pretty white shoulders as if to throw off the burden that St.

Hilaire had placed there.

"Look at me," exclaimed St. Hilaire, rising and speaking with an animation he had not shown before. He was a man of twenty-five with a face so handsome that dissipation had not been able to mar its beauty.

"I am a type of my cla.s.s."

"An honor to it," said the poet.

"Thank you; then you will agree that the cap which I put on will fit other heads as well. I have wasted two fortunes."

"St. Hilaire is in one of his remorseful moods," whispered de Lacheville in the ear of Madame de Remur.

"I have spent them in riotous living with men like myself." Here he looked at de Lacheville.

"I feel deeply honored, my dear marquis," said the latter, bowing.

"When I wanted more money I knew where to get it."

"Happy fellow," called out de Lacheville with a laugh.

"I went to the steward who managed my estates. I have estates, or rather had them, for they are now mortgaged to the last notch, in Normandy, Picardy, Auvergne and Poitou--I would say to my steward, 'I need more money.'"

"'Very well, monsieur le marquis, but I must put on the screws a little to get it.'

"'Put on a dozen if you like, but get me the funds.'

"'It shall be done, monsieur le marquis.'

"Again and again I went to him for money. He always responded in the same manner, but each time the screws had to be turned a little tighter.

Do you suppose my peasants love me for that? No, they hate me just as yours hate you, de Lacheville, and yours hate you, d'Arlincourt." De Lacheville laughed, and the count lifted up his hand in denial. "I knew that the day of reckoning would come," St. Hilaire went on. "Every time I went to Monsieur Rignot, my steward, every time he put on the screws at my request, I knew it was bringing us nearer the final smash."

"Us!" repeated d'Arlincourt, with a gesture of impatience.

"Yes, us," said St. Hilaire; "we are all in the same boat, but we have all done the same thing in a greater or less degree. We shall all have to pay the penalty."

"There is where I differ with you, my dear marquis," said the Count d'Arlincourt; "I am willing to take what responsibility falls to me by right, but I emphatically refuse to pay the penalty of your follies."

"My follies are but those of my cla.s.s. You may have been an exception yourself, d'Arlincourt, but that will not save you."

"What penalties must we pay? Save him from what?" demanded the pretty countess, looking at St. Hilaire with her large blue eyes.

"From the revolution," was the answer. There was a general exclamation of surprise. D'Arlincourt took up the word.

"Like all men given to excess,--pardon the remark, marquis, but you have yourself admitted it,--you exaggerate the present unquiet state of affairs. The people will not revolt. They have no real cause. If you had made such a statement twenty years ago during the ascendancy of the infamous du Barry I might not have contradicted you. But now the people as a ma.s.s are loyal. They love their king."

"I still affirm," said St. Hilaire, "that the time is ripe for a revolution. Sooner or later it must come."

The chevalier from the further end of the table said quietly; "It _has_ come."

"Surely you are not serious," said d'Arlincourt, turning to the chevalier, "in calling the disturbance of the past few days a revolution. Why, I have seen more serious revolts than this blow into nothing. Our Paris mob is a fickle creature, demanding blood one moment and the next moment throwing up its cap with delight if you show it a colored picture."