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The Queen's Necklace, a novel by Alexandre Dumas |
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Chapter 87. The Turtles Are Caged |
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_ CHAPTER LXXXVII. THE TURTLES ARE CAGED Beausire, on entering the house, made a noise to attract Oliva's attention, for, though he knew nothing about her later escapades, he knew enough about the ball at the Opera, and the morning at M. Mesmer's, to make him fear letting her be seen by strangers. Accordingly, Oliva, hearing the dogs bark, looked out, and, seeing Beausire returning with two strangers, did not come to meet him as usual. Unfortunately the servant asked if he should call madame. The men rallied him about the lady whom he had concealed; he let them laugh, but did not offer to call her. They dined; then Beausire asked where they had met him before. "We are," replied they, "friends of one of your associates in a little affair about the Portuguese embassy." Beausire turned pale. "Ah!" said he: "and you came on your friend's part?" "Yes, dear M. Beausire, to ask for 10,000 francs." "Gentlemen," replied Beausire, "you cannot think I have such a sum in the house." "Very likely not, monsieur; we do not ask for impossibilities. How much have you?" "Not more than fifty or sixty louis." "We will take them to begin with." "I will go and fetch them," said Beausire. But they did not choose to let him leave the room without them, so they caught hold of him by the coat, saying: "Oh no, dear M. Beausire, do not leave us." "But how am I to get the money if I do not leave you?" "We will go with you." "But it is in my wife's bedroom." "Ah," cried one of them, "you hide your wife from us!" "Are we not presentable?" asked the other. "We wish to see her." "You are tipsy, and I will turn you out!" said Beausire. They laughed. "Now you shall not even have the money I promised," said he, emboldened by what he thought their intoxication; and he ran out of the room. They followed and caught him; he cried out, and at the sound a door opened, and a woman looked out with a frightened air. On seeing her, the men released Beausire, and gave a cry of exultation, for they recognized her immediately who resembled the Queen of France so strongly. Beausire, who believed them for a moment disarmed by the sight of a woman, was soon cruelly undeceived. One of the men approached Oliva, and said: "I arrest you." "Arrest her! Why?" cried Beausire. "Because it is M. de Crosne's orders." A thunderbolt falling between the lovers would have frightened them less than this declaration. At last Beausire said, "You came to arrest me?" "No; it was a chance." "Never mind, you might have arrested me, and for sixty louis you were about to leave me at liberty." "Oh no, we should have asked another sixty; however, for one hundred we will do so." "And madame?" "Oh, that is quite a different affair." "She is worth two hundred louis," said Beausire. They laughed again, and this time Beausire began to understand this terrible laugh. "Three hundred, four hundred, a thousand--see, I will give you one thousand louis to leave her at liberty!" They did not answer. "Is not that enough? Ah, you know I have money, and you want to make me pay. Well, I will give you two thousand louis; it will make both your fortunes!" "For 100,000 crowns we would not give up this woman. M. de Rohan will give us 500,000 francs for her, and the queen 1,000,000. Now we must go. You doubtless have a carriage of some kind here; have it prepared for madame. We will take you also, for form's sake; but on the way you can escape, and we will shut our eyes." Beausire replied, "Where she goes, I will go; I will never leave her." "Oh, so much the better; the more prisoners we bring M. de Crosne, the better he will be pleased." A quarter of an hour after, Beausire's carriage started, with the two lovers in it. One may imagine the effect of this capture on M. de Crosne. The agents probably did not receive the 1,000,000 francs they hoped for, but there is reason to believe they were satisfied. M. de Crosne went to Versailles, followed by another carriage well guarded. He asked to see the queen, and was instantly admitted. She judged from his face that he had good news for her, and felt the first sensation of joy she had experienced for a month. "Madame," said M. de Crosne, "have you a room here where you can see without being seen?" "Oh yes--my library." "Well, madame, I have a carriage below, in which is some one whom I wish to introduce into the castle unseen by any one." "Nothing more easy," replied the queen, ringing to give her orders. All was executed as he wished. Then she conducted M. de Crosne to the library, where, concealed from view behind a large screen, she soon saw enter a form which made her utter a cry of surprise. It was Oliva, dressed in one of her own favorite costumes--a green dress with broad stripes of black moiree, green satin slippers with high heels, and her hair dressed like her own. It might have been herself reflected in the glass. "What says your majesty to this resemblance?" asked M. de Crosne, triumphantly. "Incredible," said the queen. She then thought to herself, "Ah! Charny; why are you not here?" "What does your majesty wish?" "Nothing, sir, but that the king should know." "And M. de Provence see her? shall he not, madame?" "Thanks, M. de Crosne, you hold now, I think, the clue to the whole plot." "Nearly so, madame." "And M. de Rohan?" "Knows nothing yet." "Ah!" cried the queen; "in this woman, doubtless, lies all his error." "Possibly, madame; but if it be his error it is the crime of some one else." "Seek well, sir; the honor of France is in your hands." "Believe me worthy of the trust. At present, the accused parties deny everything. I shall wait for the proper time to overwhelm them with this living witness that I now hold." "Madame de la Motte?" "Knows nothing of this capture. She accuses M. de Cagliostro of having excited the cardinal to say what he did." "And what does M. de Cagliostro say?" "He has promised to come to me this morning. He is a dangerous man, but a useful one, and attacked by Madame de la Motte, I am in hopes he will sting back again." "You hope for revelations?" "I do." "How so, sir? Tell me everything which can reassure me." "These are my reasons, madame. Madame de la Motte lived in the Rue St. Claude, and M. de Cagliostro just opposite her. So I think her movements cannot have been unnoticed by him; but if your majesty will excuse me, it is close to the time he appointed to meet me." "Go, monsieur, go; and assure yourself of my gratitude." When he was gone the queen burst into tears. "My justification begins," said she; "I shall soon read my triumph in all faces; but the one I most cared to know me innocent, him I shall not see." M. de Crosne drove back to Paris, where M. de Cagliostro waited for him. He knew all; for he had discovered Beausire's retreat, and was on the road to see him, and induce him to leave France, when he met the carriage containing Beausire and Oliva. Beausire saw the count, and the idea crossed his mind that he might help them. He therefore accepted the offer of the police-agents, gave them the hundred louis, and made his escape, in spite of the tears shed by Oliva; saying, "I go to try and save you." He ran after M. de Cagliostro's carriage, which he soon overtook, as the count had stopped, it being useless to proceed. Beausire soon told his story; Cagliostro listened in silence, then said, "She is lost." "Why so?" Then Cagliostro told him all he did not already know--all the intrigues in the park. "Oh! save her," cried Beausire; "and I will give her to you, if you love her still." "My friend," replied Cagliostro, "you deceive yourself; I never loved Mademoiselle Oliva; I had but one aim--that of weaning her from the life of debauchery she was leading with you." "But----" said Beausire. "That astonishes you--know that I belong to a society whose object is moral reform. Ask her if ever she heard from my mouth one word of gallantry, or if my services were not disinterested." "Oh, monsieur! but will you save her?" "I will try, but it will depend on yourself." "I will do anything." "Then return with me to Paris, and if you follow my instructions implicitly, we may succeed in saving her. I only impose one condition, which I will tell you when I reach home." "I promise beforehand. But can I see her again?" "I think so, and you can tell her what I say to you." In two hours they overtook the carriage containing Oliva, and Beausire bought for fifty louis permission to embrace her, and tell her all the count had said. The agents admired this violent love, and hoped for more louis, but Beausire was gone. Cagliostro drove him to Paris. We will now return to M. de Crosne. This gentleman knew a good deal about Cagliostro, his former names, his pretensions to ubiquity and perpetual regeneration, his secrets in alchemy and magnetism, and looked upon him as a great charlatan. "Monsieur," said he to Cagliostro, "you asked me for an audience; I have returned from Versailles to meet you." "Sir, I thought you would wish to question me about what is passing, so I came to you." "Question you?" said the magistrate, affecting surprise. "On what?" "Monsieur," replied Cagliostro, "you are much occupied about Madame de la Motte, and the missing necklace." "Have you found it?" asked M. de Crosne, laughing. "No, sir, but Madame de la Motte lived in the Rue St. Claude----" "I know, opposite you." "Oh, if you know all about Oliva, I have nothing more to tell you." "Who is Oliva?" "You do not know? Then, sir, imagine a young girl very pretty, with blue eyes, and an oval face, a style of beauty something like her majesty, for instance." "Well, sir?" "This young girl led a bad life; it gave me pain to see it; for she was once in the service of an old friend of mine, M. de Taverney--but I weary you." "Oh no, pray go on." "Well, Oliva led not only a bad life, but an unhappy one, with a fellow she called her lover, who beat and robbed her." "Beausire," said the magistrate. "Ah! you know him. You are still more a magician than I am. Well, one day when Beausire had beaten the poor girl more than usual, she fled to me for refuge; I pitied her, and gave her shelter in one of my houses." "In your house!" cried M. de Crosne in surprise. "Oh! why not? I am a bachelor," said Cagliostro, with an air which quite deceived M. de Crosne. "That is then the reason why my agents could not find her." "What! you were seeking this little girl? Had she then been guilty of any crime?" "No, sir, no; pray go on." "Oh! I have done. I lodged her at my house, and that is all." "No, sir, for you just now associated her name with that of Madame de la Motte." "Only as neighbors." "But, sir, this Oliva, whom you say you had in your house, I found in the country with Beausire." "With Beausire? Ah! then I have wronged Madame de la Motte." "How so, sir?" "Why just as I thought I had hopes of reforming Oliva, and bringing her back to an honest life, some one carried her away from me." "That is strange." "Is it not? And I firmly believed it to be Madame de la Motte. But as you found her with Beausire, it was not she, and all her signals and correspondence with Oliva meant nothing." "With Oliva?" "Yes." "They met?" "Yes, Madame de la Motte found a way to take Oliva out every night." "Are you sure of this?" "I saw and heard her." "Oh, sir, you tell me what I would have paid for with one thousand francs a word. But you are a friend of M. de Rohan?" "Yes." "You ought to know how far he was connected with this affair." "I do not wish to know." "But you know the object of these nightly excursions of Madame de la Motte and Oliva?" "Of that also I wish to be ignorant." "Sir, I only wish to ask you one more question. Have you proofs of the correspondence of Madame de la Motte and Oliva?" "Plenty." "What are they?" "Notes which Madame de la Motte used to throw over to Oliva with a cross-bow. Several of them did not reach their destination, and were picked up either by myself, or my servants, in the street." "Sir, you will be ready to produce them, if called upon?" "Certainly; they are perfectly innocent, and cannot injure any one." "And have you any other proofs of intimacy?" "I know that she had a method of entering my house to see Oliva. I saw her myself, just after Oliva had disappeared, and my servants saw her also." "But what did she come for, if Oliva was gone?" "I did not know. I saw her come out of a carriage at the corner of the street. My idea was that she wished to attach Oliva to her, and keep her near her." "And you let her do it?" "Why not? She is a great lady, and received at court. Why should I have prevented her taking charge of Oliva, and taking her off my hands?" "What did she say when she found that Oliva was gone?" "She appeared distressed." "You suppose that Beausire carried her off?" "I suppose so, for you tell me you found them together. I did not suspect him before, for he did not know where she was." "She must have let him know herself." "I think not, as she had fled from him. I think Madame de la Motte must have sent him a key." "Ah! what day was it?" "The evening of St. Louis." "Monsieur, you have rendered a great service to me and to the state." "I am happy to hear it." "You shall be thanked as you deserve. I may count on the production of the proofs you mention?" "I am ready, sir, to assist justice at all times." As Cagliostro left, he muttered, "Ah, countess! you tried to accuse me--take care of yourself." Meanwhile, M. de Breteuil was sent by the king to examine Madame de la Motte. She declared that she had proofs of her innocence, which she would produce at the proper time; she also declared, that she would only speak the truth in the presence of the cardinal. She was told that the cardinal laid all the blame upon her. "Tell him then," she said, "that I advise him not to persist in such a foolish system of defense." "Whom then do you accuse?" asked M. Breteuil. "I accuse no one," was her reply. A report was spread at last that the diamonds were being sold in England by M. Reteau de Villette. This man was soon found and arrested, and brought over and confronted with Jeanne. To her utter confusion, he acknowledged that he had forged a receipt from the jewelers, and a letter from the queen at the request of Madame de la Motte. She denied furiously, and declared that she had never seen M. Reteau. M. de Crosne produced as witness a coachman, who swore to having driven her, on the day named, to the house of M. Reteau. Also, one of the servants of M. de Cagliostro deposed to having seen this man on the box of Jeanne's carriage on the night that she came to his master's house. Now, Jeanne began to abuse the count, and accused him of having inspired M. de Rohan with the ideas inimical to the royal dignity. M. de Rohan defended him, and Jeanne at once plainly accused the cardinal of a violent love for the queen. M. de Cagliostro requested to be incarcerated, and allowed to prove his innocence publicly. Then the queen caused to be published all the reports made to the king about the nocturnal promenades, and requested M. de Crosne to state all that he knew about it. This public avowal overturned all Jeanne's plans, and she denied having assisted at any meetings between the queen and the cardinal. This declaration would have cleared the queen, had it been possible to attach any credence to what this woman said. While Jeanne continued to deny that she had ever been in the park, they brought forward Oliva at last, a living witness of all the falsehoods of the countess. When Oliva was shown to the cardinal the blow was dreadful. He saw at last how infamously he had been played upon. This man, so full of delicacy and noble passions, discovered that an adventuress had led him to insult and despise the Queen of France; a woman whom he loved, and who was innocent. He would have shed all his blood at the feet of Marie Antoinette to make atonement. But he could not even acknowledge his mistake without owning that he loved her--even his excuse would involve an offense; so he was obliged to keep silent, and allow Jeanne to deny everything. Oliva confessed all without reserve. At last Jeanne, driven from every hold, confessed that she had deceived the cardinal, but declared that it was done with the consent of the queen, who watched and enjoyed the scene, hidden behind the trees. To this story she kept; the queen could never disprove it, and there were plenty of people willing to believe it true. _ |
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