The latter took a decanter at hazard, and poured out a glass of Madeira, which he drank off at a draught.Just be fore he had felt a strange kind of shivering; to this had succeeded a sort of weakness.He hoped the wine would revive him.
After wiping his mouth with the back of his dirty hand, he returned to the table, and said to Father d'Aigrigny: "What did you tell me about M.
Hardy?"
"That being ruined in fortune, he would be the more eager to obtain this immense inheritance," answered Father d'Aigrigny, inwardly much offended at the imperious tone.
"M.Hardy think of money?" said Rodin, shrugging his shoulders."He is indifferent to life, plunged in a stupor from which he only starts to burst into tears.Then he speaks with mechanical kindness to those about him.I have placed him in good hands.He begins, however, to be sensible to the attentions shown him, for he is good, excellent, weak;
and ii is to this excellence, Father d'Aigrigny, that you must appeal to finish the work in hand."
"I?" said Father d'Aigrigny, much surprised.
"Yes; and then you will find that the result I have obtained is considerable, and--"
Rodin paused, and, pressing his hand to his forehead, said to himself:
"It is strange!"
"What is the matter?" said the princess, with interest.
"Nothing, madame," answered Rodin, with a shiver; "it is doubtless the wine I drank; I am not accustomed to it.I feel a slight headache; but it will pass."
"Your eyes are very bloodshot, my good father, said the princess.
"I have looked too closely into my web," answered the Jesuit, with a sinister smile; "and I must look again, to make Father d'Aigrigny, who pretends to be blind, catch a glimpse of my other flies.The two daughters of Marshal Simon, for instance, growing sadder and more dejected every day, at the icy barrier raised between them and their father; and the latter thinking himself one day dishonored if he does this, another if he does that; so that the hero of the Empire has become weaker and more irresolute than a child.What more remains of this impious family? Jacques Rennepont? Ask Morok, to what a state of debasement intemperance has reduced him, and towards what an abyss he is rushing!--There is my occurrence-sheet; you see to what are reduced all the members of this family, who, six weeks ago, had each elements of strength and union! Behold these Renneponts, who, by the will of their heretical ancestor, were to unite their forces to combat and crush our Society!--There was good reason to fear them; but what did I say? That I would act upon their passions.What have I done? I have acted upon their passions.At this hour they are vainly struggling in my web--they are mine--they are mine--"
As he was speaking, Rodin's countenance and voice had undergone a singular alteration; his complexion, generally so cadaverous, had become flushed, but unequally, and in patches; then, strange phenomenon! his eyes grew both more brilliant and more sunken, and his voice sharper and louder.The change in the countenance of Rodin, of which he did not appear to be conscious, was so remarkable, that the other actors in this scene looked at him with a sort of terror.
Deceived as to the cause of this impression, Rodin exclaimed with indignation, in a voice interrupted by deep gaspings for breath: "It is pity for this impious race, that I read upon your faces? Pity for the young girl, who never enters a church, and erects pagan altars in her habitation? Pity for Hardy, the sentimental blasphemer, the philanthropic atheist, who had no chapel in his factory, and dared to blend the names of Socrates, Marcus, Aurelius, and Plato, with our Savior's? Pity for the Indian worshipper of Brahma? Pity for the two sisters, who have never even been baptized? Pity for that brute, Jacques Rennepont? Pity for the stupid imperial soldier, who has Napoleon for his god, and the bulletins of the Grand Army for his gospel? Pity for this family of renegades, whose ancestor, a relapsed heretic, not content with robbing us of our property, excites from his tomb, at the end of a century and a half, his cursed race to lift their heads against us?
What! to defend ourselves from these vipers, we shall not have the right to crush them in their own venom?--I tell you, that it is to serve heaven, and to give a salutary example to the world, to devote, by unchaining their own passions, this impious family to grief and despair and death!"
As he spoke thus, Rodin was dreadful in his ferocity; the fire of his eyes became still more brilliant; his lips were dry and burning, a cold sweat bathed his temples, which could be seen throbbing; an icy shudder ran through his frame.Attributing these symptoms to fatigue from writing through a portion of the night, and wishing to avoid fainting, he went to the sideboard, filled another glass with wine, which he drank off at a draught, and returned as the cardinal said to him: "If your course with regard to this family needed justification, my good father, your last word would have victoriously justified it.Not only are you right, according to your own casuists, but there is nothing in your proceedings contrary to human laws.As for the divine law, it is pleasing to the Lord to destroy impiety with its own weapons.
Conquered, as well as the others, by Rodin's diabolical assurance, and brought back to a kind of fearful admiration, Father d'Aigrigny said to him: "I confess I was wrong in doubting the judgment of your reverence.
Deceived by the appearance of the means employed, I could not judge of their connection, and above all, of their results.I now see, that, thanks to you, success is no longer doubtful."
"This is an exaggeration," replied Rodin, with feverish impatience; "all these passions are at work, but the moment is critical.As the alchemist bends over the crucible, which may give him either treasures or sudden death--I alone at this moment--"
Rodin did not finish the sentence.He pressed both his hands to his forehead, with a stifled cry of pain.