“Nothing,” answered the baroness.
And yet, as she could scarcely breathe, she rose and went towards a looking-glass. “I am frightful to-night,” she said. Debray rose, smiling, and was about to contradict the baroness upon this latter point, when the door opened suddenly. M. Danglars appeared; Debray reseated himself. At the noise of the door Madame Danglars turned round, and looked upon her husband with an astonishment she took no trouble to conceal. “Good-evening, madame,” said the banker; “good-evening, M. Debray.”
Probably the baroness thought this unexpected visit signified a desire to make up for the sharp words he had uttered during the day. Assuming a dignified air, she turned round to Debray, without answering her husband. “Read me something, M. Debray,” she said. Debray, who was slightly disturbed at this visit, recovered himself when he saw the calmness of the baroness, and took up a book marked by a mother-of-pearl knife inlaid with gold. “Excuse me,” said the banker, “but you will tire yourself, baroness, by such late hours, and M. Debray lives some distance from here.”
Debray was petrified, not only to hear Danglars speak so calmly and politely, but because it was apparent that beneath outward politeness there really lurked a determined spirit of opposition to anything his wife might wish to do. The baroness was also surprised, and showed her astonishment by a look which would doubtless have had some effect upon her husband if he had not been intently occupied with the paper, where he was looking to see the closing stock quotations. The result was, that the proud look entirely failed of its purpose.
“M. Lucien,” said the baroness, “I assure you I have no desire to sleep, and that I have a thousand things to tell you this evening, which you must listen to, even though you slept while hearing me.”
“I am at your service, madame,” replied Lucien coldly.
“My dear M. Debray,” said the banker, “do not kill yourself to-night listening to the follies of Madame Danglars, for you can hear them as well to-morrow; but I claim to-night and will devote it, if you will allow me, to talk over some serious matters with my wife.” This time the blow was so well aimed, and hit so directly, that Lucien and the baroness were staggered, and they interrogated each other with their eyes, as if to seek help against this aggression, but the irresistible will of the master of the house prevailed, and the husband was victorious.
“Do not think I wish to turn you out, my dear Debray,” continued Danglars; “oh, no, not at all. An unexpected occurrence forces me to ask my wife to have a little conversation with me; it is so rarely I make such a request, I am sure you cannot grudge it to me.” Debray muttered something, bowed and went out, knocking himself against the edge of the door, like Nathan in “Athalie.”
“It is extraordinary,” he said, when the door was closed behind him, “how easily these husbands, whom we ridicule, gain an advantage over us.”
Lucien having left, Danglars took his place on the sofa, closed the open book, and placing himself in a dreadfully dictatorial attitude, he began playing with the dog; but the animal, not liking him as well as Debray, and attempting to bite him, Danglars seized him by the skin of his neck and threw him upon a couch on the other side of the room. The animal uttered a cry during the transit, but, arrived at its destination, it crouched behind the cushions, and stupefied at such unusual treatment remained silent and motionless. “Do you know, sir,” asked the baroness, “that you are improving? Generally you are only rude, but to-night you are brutal.”
“It is because I am in a worse humor than usual,” replied Danglars. Hermine looked at the banker with supreme disdain. These glances frequently exasperated the pride of Danglars, but this evening he took no notice of them.
“And what have I to do with your ill-humor?” said the baroness, irritated at the impassibility of her husband; “do these things concern me? Keep your ill-humor at home in your money boxes, or, since you have clerks whom you pay, vent it upon them.”