File No. 113 by Émile Gaboriau (summer beach reads .txt) 📕

“She is never absent from my thoughts.”

“You have not given up your idea of going to see her?”

“Of course not.”

“Alas, Gaston! you forget that she whom you once loved is now the wife of another, and possibly the mother of a large family. How do you know that she will consent to see you? Why run the risk of destroying her domestic happiness, and planting seeds of remorse in your own bosom?”

“I know I am a fool; but my folly is dear to me, and I would not cure it if I could.”

The quiet determination of Gaston’s tone convinced Louis that all remonstrances would be unavailing.

Yet he remained the same in his manner and behavior, apparently engrossed in pleasure parties; but, in reality, his only thought was the mail. He always managed to be at the door when the postman came, so that he was the first to receive his brother’s letters.

When he and Gaston were out together at the time of the postman’s visit, he would hurry into the house first, so as to look over the letters which were always laid in a card-basket on the hall table.

His watchfulness was at last rewarded.

The following Sunday, among the letters handed to him by the postman, was one bearing the postmark of Beaucaire.

He quickly slipped it into his pocket; and, although he was on the point of mounting his horse to ride with Gaston, he said that he must run up to his room to get something he had forgotten; this was to gratify his impatient desire to read the letter.

He tore it open, and, seeing “Lafourcade” signed at the bottom of three closely written pages, hastily devoured the contents.

After reading a detailed account of events entirely uninteresting to him, Louis came to the following passage relating to Valentine:

Mlle. de la Verberie’s husband is an eminent banker named André Fauvel. I have not the honor of his acquaintance, but I intend going to see him shortly. I am anxious to submit to him a project that I have conceived for the benefit of this part of the country. If he approves of it, I shall ask him to invest in it, as his name will be of great assistance to the scheme. I suppose you have no objections to my referring him to you, should he ask for my endorsers.

Louis trembled like a man who had just made a narrow escape from death. He well knew that he would have to fly the country if Gaston received this letter.

But though the danger was warded off for the while, it might return and destroy him at any moment.

Gaston would wait a week for an answer, then he would write again; Lafourcade would instantly reply to express surprise that his first letter had not been received; all of this correspondence would occupy about twelve days. In those twelve days Louis would have to think over some plan for preventing Lafourcade’s visit to Paris; since, the instant he mentioned the name of Clameran to the banker, everything would be discovered.

Louis’s meditations were interrupted by Gaston, who called from the lower passage:

“What are you doing, Louis? I am waiting for you.”

“I am coming now,” he replied.

Hastily thrusting Lafourcade’s letter into his trunk, Louis ran down to his brother.

He had made up his mind to borrow a large sum from Gaston, and go off to America; and Raoul might get out of the scrape as best he could.

The only thing which now disturbed him was the sudden failure of the most skilful combination he had ever conceived; but he was not a man to fight against destiny, and determined to make the best of the emergency, and hope for better fortune in his next scheme.

The next day about dusk, while walking along the pretty road leading from the foundery to Oloron, he commenced a little story which was to conclude by asking Gaston to lend him two hundred thousand francs.

As they slowly went along arm in arm, about half a mile from the foundery they met a young laborer who bowed as he passed them.

Louis dropped his brother’s arm, and started back as if he had seen a ghost.

“What is the matter?” asked Gaston, with astonishment.

“Nothing, except I struck my foot against a stone, and it is very painful.”

Gaston might have known by the tremulous tones of Louis’s voice that this was a lie. Louis de Clameran had reason to tremble; in this workman he recognized Raoul de Lagors.

Instinctive fear paralyzed and overwhelmed him.

The story he had planned for the purpose of obtaining the two hundred thousand francs was forgotten; his volubility was gone; and he silently walked along by his brother’s side, like an automaton, totally incapable of thinking or acting for himself.

He seemed to listen, he did listen; but the words fell upon his ear unmeaningly; he could not understand what Gaston was saying, and mechanically answered “yes” or “no,” like one in a dream.

Whilst necessity, absolute necessity, kept him here at Gaston’s side, his thoughts were all with the young man who had just passed by.

What had brought Raoul to Oloron? What plot was he hatching? Why was he disguised as a laborer? Why had he not answered the many letters which Louis had written him from Oloron? He had ascribed this silence to Raoul’s carelessness, but now he saw it was premeditated. Something disastrous must have happened at Paris; and Raoul, afraid to commit himself by writing, had come himself to bring the bad news. Had he come to say that the game was up, and they must fly?

But, after all, perhaps he was mistaken in supposing this to be his accomplice. It might be some honest workman bearing a strong resemblance to Raoul.

If he could only run after this stranger, and speak to him! But no, he must walk on up to the house with Gaston, quietly, as if nothing had happened to arouse his anxiety. He felt as if he would go mad if his brother did not move