The baroness dared not say more.  Her son’s answer seemed to her more indicative of madness than his silence of grief.  She saw no hope, no light in the darkness that surrounded them.

The baron’s last hours and death had prevented the rector from bringing Mademoiselle des Touches to Calyste, as he seemed bent on doing, for reasons which he did not reveal.  But on this day, while mother and son still sat on the garden bench, Calyste quivered all over on perceiving Felicite through the opposite windows of the court-yard and garden.  She reminded him of Beatrix, and his life revived.  It was therefore to Camille that the poor stricken mother owed the first motion of joy that lightened her mourning.

“Well, Calyste,” said Mademoiselle des Touches, when they met, “I want you to go to Paris with me.  We will find Beatrix,” she added in a low voice.

The pale, thin face of the youth flushed red, and a smile brightened his features.

“Let us go,” he said.

“We shall save him,” said Mademoiselle des Touches to the mother, who pressed her hands and wept for joy.

A week after the baron’s funeral, Mademoiselle des Touches, the Baronne du Guenic and Calyste started for Paris, leaving the household in charge of old Zephirine.

XVII

A DEATH:  A MARRIAGE

Felicite’s tender love was preparing for Calyste a prosperous future.  Being allied to the family of Grandlieu, the ducal branch of which was ending in five daughters for lack of a male heir, she had written to the Duchesse de Grandlieu, describing Calyste and giving his history, and also stating certain intentions of her own, which were as follows:  She had lately sold her house in the rue du Mont-Blanc, for which a party of speculators had given her two millions five hundred thousand francs.  Her man of business had since purchased for her a charming new house in the rue de Bourbon for seven hundred thousand francs; one million she intended to devote to the recovery of the du Guenic estates, and the rest of her fortune she desired to settle upon Sabine de Grandlieu.  Felicite had long known the plans of the duke and duchess as to the settlement of their five daughters:  the youngest was to marry the Vicomte de Grandlieu, the heir to their ducal title; Clotilde-Frederique, the second daughter, desired to remain unmarried, in memory of a man she had deeply loved, Lucien de Rubempre, while, at the same time, she did not wish to become a nun like her eldest sister; two of the remaining sisters were already married, and the youngest but one, the pretty Sabine, just twenty years old, was the only disposable daughter left.  It was Sabine on whom Felicite resolved to lay the burden of curing Calyste’s passion for Beatrix.

During the journey to Paris Mademoiselle des Touches revealed to the baroness these arrangements.  The new house in the rue de Bourbon was being decorated, and she intended it for the home of Sabine and Calyste if her plans succeeded.