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

acted like a charm. Ah, you are a partner worth having. I congratulate you upon your success. Forty thousand francs in four months!”

“Yes,” said Raoul carelessly. “I got about that much from pawnbrokers.”

“Pests! Then you must have a nice little sum laid by.”

“That is my business, uncle, and not yours. Remember our agreement. I will tell you this much: Mme. Fauvel and Madeleine have turned everything they could into money; they have nothing left, and I have had enough of my role.”

“Your role is ended. I forbid you to hereafter ask for a single centime.”

“What are you about to do? What has happened?”

“The mine is loaded, nephew, and I am awaiting an opportunity to set fire to it.”

Louis de Clameran relied upon making his rival, Prosper Bertomy, furnish him this ardently desired opportunity.

He loved Madeleine too passionately to feel aught save the bitterest hate toward the man whom she had freely chosen, and who still possessed her heart.

Clameran knew that he could marry her at once if he chose; but in what way? By holding a sword of terror over her head, and forcing her to be his. He became frenzied at the idea of possessing her person, while her heart and soul would always be with Prosper.

Thus he swore that, before marrying, he would so cover Prosper with shame and ignominy that no honest person would speak to him. He had first thought of killing him, but, fearing that Madeleine would enshrine and worship his memory, he determined to disgrace him.

He imagined that there would be no difficulty in ruining the unfortunate young man. He soon found himself mistaken.

Though Prosper led a life of reckless dissipation, he preserved order in his disorder. If in a state of miserable entanglement, and obliged to resort to all sorts of makeshifts to escape his creditors, his caution prevented the world from knowing it.

Vainly did Raoul, with his pockets full of gold, try to tempt him to play high; every effort to hasten his ruin failed.

When he played he did not seem to care whether he lost or won; nothing aroused him from his cold indifference.

His friend Nina Gypsy was extravagant, but her devotion to Prosper restrained her from going beyond certain limits.

Raoul’s great intimacy with Prosper enabled him to fully understand the state of his mind; that he was trying to drown his disappointment in excitement, but had not given up all hope.

“You need not hope to beguile Prosper into committing any piece of folly,” said Raoul to his uncle; “his head is as cool as a usurer’s. He never goes beyond a certain degree of dissipation. What object he has in view I know not. Perhaps, when he has spent his last napoleon, he will blow his brains out; he certainly never will descend to any dishonorable act. As to tampering with the money-safe intrusted to his keeping⁠—”

“We must force him on,” replied Clameran, “lead him into extravagances, make Gypsy call on him for costly finery, lend him plenty of money.”

Raoul shook his head, as if convinced that his efforts would be vain.

“You don’t know Prosper, uncle: we can’t galvanize a dead man. Madeleine killed him the day she discarded him. He takes no interest in anything on the face of the earth.”

“We can wait and see.”

They did wait; and, to the great surprise of Mme. Fauvel, Raoul once more became an affectionate and dutiful son, as he had been during Clameran’s absence. From reckless extravagance he changed to great economy. Under pretext of saving money, he remained at Vésinet, although it was very uncomfortable and disagreeable there in the winter. He said he wished to expiate his sins in solitude. The truth was, that, by remaining in the country, he insured his liberty, and escaped his mother’s visits.

It was about this time that Mme. Fauvel, charmed with the improvement in Raoul, asked her husband to give him some employment.

M. Fauvel was delighted to please his wife, and at once offered Raoul the place of corresponding clerk with a salary of five hundred francs a month.

The appointment pleased Raoul; but, in obedience to Clameran’s command, he refused it, saying his vocation was not banking.

This refusal so provoked the banker, that he told Raoul, if he was so idle and lazy, not to call on him for money again, or expect him to do anything to assist him. Raoul seized this pretext for ostensibly ceasing his visits.

When he wanted to see his mother, he would come in the afternoon, when he knew that M. Fauvel would be from home; and he only came often enough to keep informed of what was going on in the household.

This sudden lull after so many storms appeared ominous to Madeleine. She was more certain that ever that the plot was now ripe, and would suddenly burst upon them, without warning. She did not impart her presentiment to her aunt, but prepared herself for the worst.

“What can they be doing?” Mme. Fauvel would say; “can they have ceased to persecute us?”

“Yes: what can they be doing?” Madeleine would murmur.

Louis and Raoul gave no signs of life, because, like expert hunters, they were silently hiding, and watching for a favorable opportunity of pouncing upon their victims.

Never losing sight of Prosper for a day, Raoul had exhausted every effort of his fertile mind to compromise his honor, to insnare him into some inextricable entanglement. But, as he had foreseen, the cashier’s indifference offered little hope of success.

Clameran began to grow impatient at this delay, and had fully determined to bring matters to a crisis himself, when one morning, about three o’clock, he was aroused by Raoul.

He knew that some event of great importance must have happened, to make his nephew come to his house at this hour of the morning.

“What is the matter?” he anxiously inquired.

“Perhaps nothing; perhaps everything. I have just left Prosper.”

“Well?”

“I had him, Mme. Gypsy, and three other friends to dine with me. After dinner, I made up a game of baccarat, but Prosper took no interest in it, although he was quite