her director's opinion, wished to crush the Church. The Left benches for
her meant the popular upheaval and the scaffolds of 1793.

"What would your uncle, that sainted man who hears us, say to this?"
exclaimed Chesnel. Mme. du Croisier made no reply, but the great tears
rolled down her checks.

"You have already been the cause of one poor boy's death; his mother
will go mourning all her days," continued Chesnel; he saw how his words
told, but he would have struck harder and even broken this woman's heart
to save Victurnien. "Do you want to kill Mlle. Armande, for she would
not survive the dishonor of the house for a week? Do you wish to be the
death of poor Chesnel, your old notary? For I shall kill the Count in
prison before they shall bring the charge against him, and take my
own life afterwards, before they shall try me for murder in an Assize
Court."

"That is enough! that is enough, my friend! I would do anything to put a
stop to such an affair; but I never knew M. du Croisier's real character
until a few minutes ago. To you I can make the admission: there is
nothing to be done."

"But what if there is?"

"I would give half the blood in my veins that it were so," said she,
finishing her sentence by a wistful shake of the head.

As the First Consul, beaten on the field of Marengo till five o'clock
in the evening, by six o'clock saw the tide of battle turned by Desaix's
desperate attack and Kellermann's terrific charge, so Chesnel in the
midst of defeat saw the beginnings of victory. No one but a Chesnel,
an old notary, an ex-steward of the manor, old Maitre Sorbier's junior
clerk, in the sudden flash of lucidity which comes with despair, could
rise thus, high as a Napoleon, nay, higher. This was not Marengo, it
was Waterloo, and the Prussians had come up; Chesnel saw this, and was
determined to beat them off the field.

"Madame," he said, "remember that I have been your man of business for
twenty years; remember that if the d'Esgrignons mean the honor of the
province, you represent the honor of the bourgeoisie; it rests with you,
and you alone, to save the ancient house. Now, answer me; are you
going to allow dishonor to fall on the shade of your dead uncle, on the
d'Esgrignons, on poor Chesnel? Do you want to kill Mlle. Armande weeping
yonder? Or do you wish to expiate wrongs done to others by a deed which
will rejoice your ancestors, the intendants of the dukes of Alencon, and
bring comfort to the soul