awyer acting in the name
of Monsieur Conyncks, who will not disavow the act, will serve an
injunction upon them. Six days hence, by which time your uncle will have
returned, the family council can be called together, and Gabriel put
in possession of his legal rights, for he is now eighteen. You and your
brother being thus authorized to use those rights, you will demand your
share in the proceeds of the timber. Monsieur Claes cannot refuse you
the two hundred thousand francs on which the injunction will have been
put; as to the remaining hundred thousand which is due to you, you
must obtain a mortgage on this house. Monsieur Conyncks will demand
securities for the three hundred thousand belonging to Felicie and Jean.
Under these circumstances your father will be obliged to mortgage his
property on the plain of Orchies, which he has already encumbered to the
amount of three hundred thousand francs. The law gives a retrospective
priority to the claims of minors; and that will save you. Monsieur
Claes's hands will be tied for the future; your property becomes
inalienable, and he can no longer borrow on his own estates because they
will be held as security for other sums. Moreover, the whole can be
done quietly, without scandal or legal proceedings. Your father will be
forced to greater prudence in making his researches, even if he cannot
be persuaded to relinquish them altogether."

"Yes," said Marguerite, "but where, meantime, can we find the means of
living? The hundred thousand francs for which, you say, I must obtain a
mortgage on this house, would bring in nothing while we still live
here. The proceeds of my father's property in the country will pay the
interest on the three hundred thousand francs he owes to others; but how
are we to live?"

"In the first place," said Emmanuel, "by investing the fifty thousand
francs which belong to Gabriel in the public Funds you will get,
according to present rates, more than four thousand francs' income,
which will suffice to pay your brother's board and lodging and all his
other expenses in Paris. Gabriel cannot touch the capital until he is of
age, therefore you need not fear that he will waste a penny of it, and
you will have one expense the less. Besides, you will have your own
fifty thousand."

"My father will ask me for them," she said in a frightened tone; "and I
shall not be able to refuse him."

"Well, dear Marguerite, even so, you can evade that by robbing yourself.