Pride: One of the Seven Cardinal Sins

"Can you blame me, monsieur?"

"Blame you, my poor child, no, no. The only blame attaches to the unscrupulous persons whose baseness almost compelled you to take such a step – a step I not only approve but admire, for you yourself do not realise how much courage and nobility of character you evinced."

A rather elderly man, approaching the divan upon which M. de Maillefort was seated, leaned over the back of it, and said to the hunchback, in a low tone:

"My dear marquis, Morainville and Hauterive are at your service. They are standing by the window opposite you."

"Very well, my dear friend. A thousand thanks for your kindness and theirs! You have informed them of the condition of affairs, have you not?"

"Fully."

"And they make no objection?"

"How could they in a case like this?"

"Then all is well," responded the marquis.

Then turning to Mlle. de Beaumesnil, he asked:

"For which quadrille did M. de Mornand engage you?"

"For the next, monsieur," replied Ernestine, much surprised at the question.

"You hear, my friend," said M. de Maillefort to the gentleman who had just spoken to him.

"Very well, my dear marquis."

And M. de Maillefort's friend, after having made quite a détour, rejoined Messrs. Morainville and d'Hauterive, and said a few words to which both gave a nod of assent.

"My dear child," remarked the marquis, again turning to Mlle. de Beaumesnil, "I have been watching over you for some time past without appearing to do so, for though you never saw me at your mother's house during your childhood, I was one of your mother's friends – most devoted friends."

"Ah, monsieur, I ought to have mistrusted that sooner, for you have been so grossly maligned to me."

"That was very natural under the circumstances. Now, a word or two upon a more important matter. M. de la Rochaiguë has often spoken of M. de Mornand as a suitor for your hand, has he not? and has also assured you that you could not make a better choice?"

"Yes, monsieur."

"My poor child!" said the marquis, compassionately; then he continued, in his usual sarcastic tone:

"And Mlle. Helena, in her turn, saintly, devout creature that she is, has said the very same thing about M. Célestin de Macreuse, another extremely devout and saintly personage."

But the orphan, noting the bitter and cynical smile that played about the lips of the marquis as he spoke of the saintliness of the abbé's disciple, ventured to say:

"You have a poor opinion of M. de Macreuse, perhaps, marquis?"

"Perhaps? No, my opinion on that subject is very decided."

"I admit that I, too, distrusted M. de Macreuse," began Mlle. de Beaumesnil.

"So much the better," interrupted the marquis, hastily. "The wretch caused me far more anxiety than any of the others. I was so afraid that you would be duped by his pretended melancholy and his hypocrisy, but fortunately such persons not unfrequently excite the instinctive distrust of the honest and ingenuous."

"But you need feel no such apprehensions, I assure you," resumed Ernestine, triumphantly. "I must undeceive you on that point."

"Undeceive me?"

"In regard to M. de Macreuse? Yes."

"And why, pray?"

"Because there are no real grounds for any distrust. M. de Macreuse is a sincere and honourable man, plain-spoken almost to rudeness, in fact."

"My child, you frighten me," exclaimed M. de Maillefort, in such accents of alarm that Mlle. de Beaumesnil was thunderstruck. "Do not conceal anything from me, I beseech you," continued the hunchback. "You can have no conception of the diabolical cunning of a man like that. I have seen such hypocrites deceive the shrewdest people, – and you, my poor innocent child!"

Mlle. de Beaumesnil, impressed by M. de Maillefort's evident anxiety, and having perfect confidence in him now, proceeded to give him the gist of her recent conversation with the pious young man.

"He mistrusted your motive, my child," said the hunchback, after a moment's reflection, "and, seeing that he had been caught in a trap, audaciously resolved to turn the tables on you by pretending that he had been putting you to a similar test. I tell you that such men positively appall me."

"Good Heavens! is it possible, monsieur?" exclaimed the terrified girl. "Oh, no, he cannot be so utterly base! Besides, I am sure you would think very differently if you had seen him. Why, the tears positively came to his eyes when he spoke of the bitter grief the loss of his mother had caused him."

"The loss of his mother!" repeated the marquis. "Ah, you little know – "

Then suddenly checking himself, he added:

"There he is now! Ah, it was certainly Heaven that sent him here just at this moment. Listen and judge for yourself, my poor dear child. Ah, your innocent heart little suspects the depths of degradation to which avarice reduces such souls as his."

Then elevating his voice loud enough to make himself distinctly heard by those around him, he called out to Macreuse, who was just then crossing the ballroom in order to steal another glance at Mlle. de Beaumesnil:

"M. de Macreuse, one word, if you please."

The abbé's protégé hesitated a moment before responding to the summons, for he both hated and feared the marquis, but seeing every turned eye upon him, and encouraged by the success of his late ruse with Ernestine, he straightened himself up, and approaching M. de Maillefort, said coldly:

"You did me the honour to call me, M. le marquis."

"Yes, I did you that honour, monsieur," replied the marquis, sardonically, and without taking the trouble to rise from his seat; "and yet you are not at all polite to me, nor to the other persons who happen to have the pleasure of your company."

On hearing these words, quite a number of persons gathered around the two men, for the satirical and aggressive spirit of the marquis was well known.

"I do not understand you, M. le marquis," replied M. de Macreuse, much annoyed, and evidently fearing; some disagreeable explanation. "So far as I know I have not been lacking in respect towards you or any other person present."

"I hear that you have had the misfortune to lose your mother, monsieur," said the marquis, in his rather shrill, penetrating voice.

"Monsieur," stammered M. de Macreuse, apparently stupefied by these words.

"Would it be indiscreet in me to ask when you lost madame, your mother – if you know."

"Monsieur!" faltered this model young man, blushing scarlet. "Such a question – "

"Is very natural, it seems to me, besides being rendered almost necessary by the lack of respect of which I complain, not only in my own name, but in the name of all your acquaintances."