Julie hesitated, and resolved to take counsel. Yet, through a singular impulse, it was neither to her mother nor her brother that she applied, but to Emmanuel. She hastened down and told him what had occurred on the day when the agent of Thomson & French had come to her father’s, related the scene on the staircase, repeated the promise she had made, and showed him the letter. “You must go, then, mademoiselle,” said Emmanuel.
“Go there?” murmured Julie.
“Yes; I will accompany you.”
“But did you not read that I must be alone?” said Julie.
“And you shall be alone,” replied the young man. “I will await you at the corner of the Rue de Musee, and if you are so long absent as to make me uneasy, I will hasten to rejoin you, and woe to him of whom you shall have cause to complain to me!”
“Then, Emmanuel?” said the young girl with hesitation, “it is your opinion that I should obey this invitation?”
“Yes. Did not the messenger say your father’s safety depended upon it?”
“But what danger threatens him, then, Emmanuel?” she asked.
Emmanuel hesitated a moment, but his desire to make Julie decide immediately made him reply.
“Listen,” he said; “to-day is the 5th of September, is it not?”
“Yes.”
“To-day, then, at eleven o’clock, your father has nearly three hundred thousand francs to pay?”
“Yes, we know that.”
“Well, then,” continued Emmanuel, “we have not fifteen thousand francs in the house.”
“What will happen then?”
“Why, if to-day before eleven o’clock your father has not found someone who will come to his aid, he will be compelled at twelve o’clock to declare himself a bankrupt.”
“Oh, come, then, come!” cried she, hastening away with the young man. During this time, Madame Morrel had told her son everything. The young man knew quite well that, after the succession of misfortunes which had befallen his father, great changes had taken place in the style of living and housekeeping; but he did not know that matters had reached such a point. He was thunderstruck. Then, rushing hastily out of the apartment, he ran up-stairs, expecting to find his father in his study, but he rapped there in vain.
While he was yet at the door of the study he heard the bedroom door open, turned, and saw his father. Instead of going direct to his study, M. Morrel had returned to his bed-chamber, which he was only this moment quitting. Morrel uttered a cry of surprise at the sight of his son, of whose arrival he was ignorant. He remained motionless on the spot, pressing with his left hand something he had concealed under his coat. Maximilian sprang down the staircase, and threw his arms round his father’s neck; but suddenly he recoiled, and placed his right hand on Morrel’s breast. “Father,” he exclaimed, turning pale as death, “what are you going to do with that brace of pistols under your coat?”
“Oh, this is what I feared!” said Morrel.
“Father, father, in heaven’s name,” exclaimed the young man, “what are these weapons for?”
“Maximilian,” replied Morrel, looking fixedly at his son, “you are a man, and a man of honor. Come, and I will explain to you.”
And with a firm step Morrel went up to his study, while Maximilian followed him, trembling as he went. Morrel opened the door, and closed it behind his son; then, crossing the anteroom, went to his desk on which he placed the pistols, and pointed with his finger to an open ledger. In this ledger was made out an exact balance-sheet of his affair’s. Morrel had to pay, within half an hour, 287,500 francs. All he possessed was 15,257 francs. “Read!” said Morrel.
The young man was overwhelmed as he read. Morrel said not a word. What could he say? What need he add to such a desperate proof in figures? “And have you done all that is possible, father, to meet this disastrous result?” asked the young man, after a moment’s pause. “I have,” replied Morrel.
“You have no money coming in on which you can rely?”
“None.”
“You have exhausted every resource?”
“All.”
“And in half an hour,” said Maximilian in a gloomy voice, “our name is dishonored!”