I

The Comte de Bonzag, on the ruined esplanade of his Chateau de Keragouil, frowned into the distant crepuscle of haystack and multiplied hedge, crumpling in his nervous hands two annoying slips of paper. The rugged body had not one more pound of flesh than was absolutely necessary to hold together the long, pointed bones. The bronzed, haphazard face was dominated by a stiff comb of orange-tawny hair, which faithfully reproduced the gaunt unloveliness of generations of Bonzags. But there lurked in the rapid advance of the nose and the abrupt, obstinate eyes a certain staring defiance which effectively limited the field of comment.

At his back, the riddled silhouette of ragged towers and crumbling roof reflected against the gentle skies something of the windy raiment of its owner. It was a Gascon chateau, arrogant and threadbare, which had never cried out at a wound, nor suffered the indignity of a patch. About it and through it, hundreds of swallows, its natural inheritors, crossed and recrossed in their vacillating flight.

Out of the obscurity of the green pastures that melted away into the near woods, the voice of a woman suddenly rose in a tender laugh.

The Comte de Bonzag sat bolt upright, dislodging from his lap a black spaniel, who tumbled on a matronly hound, whose startled yelp of indignation caused the esplanade to vibrate with dogs, that, scurrying from every cranny, assembled in an expectant circle, and waited with hungry tongues the intentions of their master.

The Comte, listening attentively, perceived near the stable his entire domestic staff reclining happily on the arm of Andoche, the Sapeur-Pompier, the hero of a dozen fires.

“No, there are no longer any servants!” he exclaimed, with a bitterness that caused a stir in the pack; then angrily he shouted with all his forces: “Francine! Hey, there, Francine! Come here at once!”

The indisputable fact was that Francine had asked for her wages. Such a demand, indelicate in its simplest form, had been further aggravated by a respectful but clear ultimatum. It was pay, or do the cooking, and if the first was impossible, the second was both impossible and distasteful.

The enemy duly arrived, dimpled and plump, an honest thirty-five, a solid widow, who stopped at the top of the stairs with the distant respect which the Comte de Bonzag inspired even in his creditors.

“Francine, I have thought much,” said the Comte, with a conciliatory look. “You were a little exaggerated, but you were in your rights.”

“Ah, Monsieur lé Comte, six months is long when one has a child who must be ”

“We will not refer again to our disagreement,” the Comte said, interrupting her sternly. “I have simply called you to hear what action I have decided on.”

“Oh, yes, M’sieur; thank you, M’sieur lé Comte.”

“Unluckily,” said Bonzag, frowning, “I am forced to make a great sacrifice. In a month I could probably have paid all I have a great uncle at Valle-Temple who is exceedingly ill. But however, we will hold that for the future. I owe you, my good Francine, wages for six months sixty francs, representing your service with me. I am going to give you on account, at once, twenty francs, or rather something immeasurably more valuable than that sum.” He drew out the two slips of paper, and regarded them with affection and regret. “Here are two tickets for the Grand Lottery of France, which will be drawn this month, ten francs a ticket. I had to go to Chantreuil to get them; number 77,707 and number 200,013. Take them they are yours.”

“But, M’sieur lé Comte,” said Francine, looking stupidly at the tickets she had passively received. “It’s it’s good round pieces of silver I need.”

“Francine,” cried de Bonzag, in amazed indignation, “do you realize that I probably have given you a fortune and that I am absolving you of all division of it with me!”

“But, M’sieur ”

“That there are one hundred and forty-five numbers that will draw prizes.”

“Yes, M’sieur lé Comte; but ”

“That there is a prize of one quarter of a million, one third of a million ”

“All the same ”

“That the second prize is for one-half a million, and the first prize for one round million francs.”

“M’sieur says?” said Francine, whose eyes began to open.

“One hundred and forty-five chances, and the lowest is for a hundred francs. You think that isn’t a sacrifice, eh?”

“Well, Monsieur lé Comte,” Francine said at last with a sigh, “I’ll take them for twenty francs. It’s not good round silver, and there’s my little girl ”

“Enough!” exclaimed de Bonzag, dismissing her with an angry gesture. “I am making you an heiress, and you have no gratitude! Leave me and send hither Andoche.”

He watched the bulky figure waddle off, sunk back in his chair, and repeated with profound dejection; “No gratitude! There, it’s done: this time certainly I have thrown away a quarter of a million at the lowest!”

Presently Andoche, the Sapeur-Pompier, the brass helmet under his arm, appeared at the top of the steps, smiling and thirsty, with covetous eyes fastened on the broken table, at the carafe containing curacoa that was white and “Triple-Sec.”

“Ah, it’s you, Andoche,” said the Comte, finally, drawn from his abstraction by a succession of rapid bows. He took two full-hearted sighs, pushed the carafe slightly in the direction of the Sapeur-Pompier, and added: “Sit down, my good Andoche. I have need to be a little gay. Suppose we talk of Paris.”

It was the cue for Andoche to slip gratefully into a chair, possess the carafe and prepare to listen.

II

At the proper age of thirty-one, the Comte de Bonzag fell heir to the enormous sum of fifteen thousand francs from an uncle who had made the fortune in trade. With no more delay than it took the great Emperor to fling an army across the Alps, he descended on Paris, resolved to repulse all advances which Louis Napoleon might make, and to lend the splendor of his name and the weight of his fortune only to the Cercle Royale. Two weeks devoted to this loyal end strengthened the Bourbon lines perceptibly, but resulted in a shrinkage of four thousand francs in his own. Next remembering that the aristocracy had always been the patron of the arts, he determined to make a rapid examination of the coulisses of the opera and the regions of the ballet. A six-days’ reconnaissance discovered not the slightest signs of disaffection; but the thoroughness of his inquiries was such that the completion of his mission found him with just one thousand francs in pocket. Being not only a Loyalist and a patron of the arts, but a statesman and a philosopher, he turned his efforts toward the Quartier Latin, to the great minds who would one day take up the guidance of a more enlightened France. There he made the discovery that one amused himself more than at the Cercle Royale, and spent considerably less than in the arts, and that at one hundred francs a week he aroused an enthusiasm for the Bourbons which almost attained the proportions of a riot.

The three months over, he retired to his estate at Keragouil, having profoundly stirred all classes of society, given new life to the cause of His Majesty, and regretting only, as a true gentleman, the frightful devastation he had left in the hearts of the ladies.

Unfortunately, these brilliant services to Parisian society and his king had left him without any society of his own, forced to the consideration of the difficult problem of how to keep his pipe lighted, his cellar full, and his maid-of-all-work in a state of hopeful expectation, on nothing a year.

Nothing daunted, he attacked this problem of the family bankruptcy with the vigor and the daring of a D’Artagnan. Each year he collected laboriously twenty francs, and invested them in two tickets for the Great Lottery, valiantly resolved, like a Gascon, to carry off both first and second prizes, but satisfied as a philosopher if he could figure among the honorable mentions. Despite the fact that one hundred and forty-five prizes were advertised each year, in nineteen attempts he had not even had the pleasure of seeing his name in print. This result, far from discouraging him, only inflamed his confidence. For he had dipped into mathematics, and consoled himself by the reflection that, according to the law of probabilities, each year he became the more irresistible.

Lately, however, one obstacle had arisen to the successful carrying out of this system of finance. He employed one servant, a maid-of-all-work, who was engaged for the day, with permission to take from the garden what she needed, to adorn herself from the rose-bushes, to share the output of La Belle Etoile, the cow, and to receive a salary of ten francs a month. The difficulty invariably arose over the interpretation of this last clause. For the Comte was not regular in his payments, unless it could be said that he was regular in not paying at all.

So it invariably occurred that the maid-of-all-work from a state of unrest gradually passed into open rebellion, especially when the garden was not productive and the roses ceased to bloom. When the ultimatum was served, the Comte consulted his resources and found them invariably to consist of two tickets of the Lottery of France, cash value twenty francs, but, according to the laws of probability, increasingly capable of returning one million, five hundred thousand francs. On one side was the glory of the ancient name, and the possibility of another descent on Paris; opposed was the brutal question of soup and ragout. The man prevailed, and the maid-of-all-work grudgingly accepted the conditions of truce. Then the news of the drawing arrived and the domestic staff departed.

This comedy, annually repeated, was annually played on the same lines. Only each year the period intervening between the surrender of the tickets and the announcement of the lottery brought an increasing agony. Each time as the Comte saw the precious slips finally depart in the hands of the maid-of-all-work, he was convinced that at last the laws of probability must fructify. Each year he found a new meaning in the cabalistic mysteries of numbers. The eighteenth attempt, multiplied by three, gave fifty-four, his age. Success was inevitable: nineteen, a number indivisible and chaste above all others, seemed specially designated. In a word, the Comte suffered during these periods as only a gambler of the fourth generation is able to suffer.

At present the number twenty appeared to him to have properties no other number had possessed, especially in the reappearance of the zero, a figure which peculiarly attracted him by its symmetry. His despair was consequently unlimited.

Ordinarily the news of the lottery arrived by an inspector of roads, who passed through Keragouil a week or so after the announcement in the press; for the Comte, having surrendered his ticket, was only troubled lest he had won.

This time, to the upsetting of all history, an Englishman on a bicycle trip brought him a newspaper, an article almost unknown to Keragouil, where the shriek of the locomotive had yet to penetrate.

The Comte de Bonzag, opening the paper with the accustomed sinking of the heart, was startled by the staring headlines:

RESULTS OF THE LOTTERY

A glance at the winners of the first and second prizes reassured him. He drew a breath of satisfaction, saying gratefully; “Ah, what luck! God be praised! I’ll never do that again!”

Then, remembering with only an idle curiosity the one hundred and forty-three mediocre prizes on the list, he returned to the perusal. Suddenly the print swam before his eyes, and the great esplanade seemed to rise. Number 77,707 had won the fourth prize of one hundred thousand francs; number 200,013, a prize of ten thousand francs.

III

The emotion which overwhelmed Napoleon at Waterloo as he beheld his triumphant squadrons go down into the sunken road was not a whit more complete than the despair of the Comte de Bonzag when he realized that the one hundred and ten thousand francs which the laws of probability had finally produced was now the property of Francine, the cook.

One hundred and ten thousand francs! It was colossal! Five generations of Bonzags had never touched as much as that. One hundred and ten thousand francs meant the rehabilitation of the ancient name, the restoration of the Chateau de Keragouil, half the year at Paris, in the Cercle Royale, in the regions of art, and among the great minds that were still young in the Quartier and all that was in the possession of a plump Gascony peasant, whose ideas of comfort and pleasure were satisfied by one hundred and twenty francs a year.

“What am I going to do?” he cried, rising in an outburst of anger. Then he sat down in despair. There was nothing to do. The fact was obvious that Francine was an heiress, possessed of the greatest fortune in the memory of Keragouil. There was nothing to do, or rather, there was manifestly but one way open, and the Comte resolved on the spot to take it. He must have back the lottery tickets, though it meant a Comtesse de Bonzag.

Fortunately for him, Francine knew nothing of the arrival of the paper. Though it was necessary to make haste, there was still time for a compatriot of D’Artagnan. There was, of course, Andoche, the Sapeur-Pompier; but a Bonzag who had had three months’ experience with the feminine heart of Paris was not the man to trouble himself over a Sapeur-Pompier. That evening, in the dim dining-room, when Francine arrived with the steaming soup, the Comte, who had waited with a spoon in his fist and a napkin knotted to his neck, plunged valiantly to the issue.

“Ah, what a good smell!” he said, elevating his nose. “Francine, you are the queen of cooks.”

“Oh, M’sieur lé Comte,” Francine stammered, stopping in amazement. “Oh, M’sieur lé Comte, thanks.”

“Don’t thank me; it is I who am grateful.”

“Oh, M’sieur!”

“Yes, yes, yes! Francine ”

“What is it, M’sieur lé Comte?”

“To-night you may set another cover opposite me.”

“Set another cover?”

“Exactly.”

Francine, more and more astonished, proceeded to place on the table a plate, a knife and a fork.

“M’sieur lé Cure is coming?” she said, drawing up a chair.

“No, Francine.”

“Not M’sieur lé Cure? Who, then?”

“It is for you, Francine. Sit down.”

“I? I, M’sieur lé Comte?”

“Sit down. I wish it.”

Francine took three steps backward and so as to command the exit, stopped and stared at her master, with mingled amazement and distrust.

“My dear Francine,” continued the Comte, “I am tired of eating alone. It is bad for the digestion. And I am bored. I have need of society. So sit down.”

“M’sieur orders it?”

“I ask it as a favor, Francine.”

Francine, with open eyes, advanced doubtfully, seating herself nicely on the chair, more astonished than complimented, and more alarmed than pleased.

“Ah, that is nicer!” said the Comte, with an approving nod. “How have I endured it all these years! Francine, you may help yourself to the wine.”

The astonished maid-of-all-work, who had swallowed a spoon of soup with great discomfort, sprang up, all in a tremble, stammering with defiant virtue:

“M’sieur lé Comte does not forget that I am an honest woman!”

“No, my dear Francine; I am certain of it. So sit down in peace. I will tell you the situation.”

Francine hesitated, then, reassured by the devotion he gave to his soup, settled once more in her chair.

“Francine, I have made up my mind to one thing,” said the Comte, filling his glass with such energy that a red circle appeared on the cloth. “This life I lead is all wrong. A man is a sociable being. He needs society. Isolation sends him back to the brute.”

“Oh, yes, M’sieur lé Comte,” said Francine, who understood nothing.

“So I am resolved to marry.”

“M’sieur will marry!” cried Francine, who spilled half her soup with the shock.

“Perfectly. It is for that I have asked you to keep me company.”

“M’sieur you M’sieur wants to marry me!”

“Parbleu!”

“M’sieur M’sieur wants to marry me!”

“I ask you formally to be my wife.”

“I?”

“M’sieur wants wants me to be Comtesse de Bonzag?”

“Immediately.”

“Oh!”

Springing up, Francine stood a moment gazing at him in frightened alarm; then, with a cry, she vanished heavily through the door.

“She has gone to Andoche,” said the Comte, angrily to himself. “She loves him!”

In great perturbation he left the room promenading on the esplanade, in the midst of his hounds, talking uneasily to himself.

“Peste, I put it to her a little too suddenly! It was a blunder. If she loves that Sapeur-Pompier, eh? A Sapeur-Pompier, to rival a Comte de Bonzag faugh!”

Suddenly, below in the moonlight, he beheld Andoche tearing himself from the embrace of Francine, and, not to be seen, he returned nervously to the dining-room.

Shortly after, the maid-of-all-work returned, calm, but with telltale eyes.

“Well, Francine, did I frighten you?” said the Comte, genially.

“Oh, yes, M’sieur lé Comte ”

“Well, what do you want to say?”

“M’sieur was in real earnest?”

“Never more so.”

“M’sieur really wants to make me the Comtesse de Bonzag?”

“Dame! I tell you my intentions are honorable.”

“M’sieur will let me ask him one question?”

“A dozen even.”

“M’sieur remembers that I am a widow ”

“With one child, yes.”

“M’sieur, pardon me; I have been thinking much, and I have been thinking of my little girl. What would M’sieur want me to do?”

The Comte reflected, and said generously: “I do not adopt her; but, if you like, she shall live here.”

“Then, M’sieur,” said Francine, dropping on her knees, “I thank M’sieur very much. M’sieur is too kind, too good ”

“So, it is decided then,” said the Comte, rising joyfully.

“Oh, yes, M’sieur.”

“Then we shall go to-morrow,” said the Comte. “It is my manner; I like to do things instantly. Stand up, I beg you, Madame.”

“To-morrow, M’sieur?”

“Yes, Madame. Have you any objections?”

“Oh, no, M’sieur lé Comte; on the contrary,” said Francine, blushing with pleasure at the twice-repeated “Madame.” Then she added carefully: “M’sieur is quite right; it would be better. People talk so.”

IV

The return of the married couple was the sensation of Keragouil, for the Comte de Bonzag, after the fashion of his ancestors, had placed his bride behind him on the broad back of Quatre Diables, who proceeded with unaltered equanimity. Along the journey the peasants, who held the Comte in loyal terror, greeted the procession with a respectful silence, congregating in the road to stare and chatter only when the amiable Quatre Diables had disappeared in the distance.

Disdaining to notice the commotion he produced, the Comte headed straight for the courtyard, where Quatre Diables, recognizing the foot block, dropped his head and began to crop the grass. The new Comtesse, fatigued by the novel position, started gratefully to descend by the most natural way, that is, by slipping easily over the rear anatomy of the good-natured Quatre Diables. But the Comte, feeling the commotion behind, stopped her with a word, and, flinging his left leg over the neck of his charger, descended gracefully to the block, where, bowing profoundly, he said in gallant style:

“Madame, permit me to offer you my hand.”

The Comtesse, with the best intentions in the world, had considerable difficulty in executing the movement by which her husband had extricated himself. Luckily, the Comte received her without yielding ground, drew her hand under his arm, and escorted her ceremoniously into the chateau, while Quatre Diables, liberated from the unusual burden, rolled gratefully to earth, and scratched his back against the cobblestones.

“Madame, be so kind as to enter your home.”

With studied elegance, the Comte put his hat to his breast, or thereabout, and bowed as he held open the door.

“Oh, M’sieur lé Comte; after you,” said Francine, in confusion.

“Pass, Madame, and enter the dining-room. We have certain ceremonies to observe.”

Francine dutifully advanced, but kept an eye on the movements of her consort. When he entered the dining-room and went to the sideboard, she took an equal number of steps in the same direction. When, having brought out a bottle and glasses, he turned and came toward her, she retreated. When he stopped, she stopped, and sat down with the same exact movement.

“Madame, I offer you a glass of the famous Keragouil Burgundy,” began the Comte, filling her glass. “It is a wine that we De Bonzags have always kept to welcome our wives and to greet our children. Madame, I have the honor to drink to the Comtesse de Bonzag.”

“Oh, M’sieur lé Comte,” said Francine, who, watching his manner, emptied the goblet in one swallow.

“To the health of my ancestors!” continued the Comte, draining the bottle into the two goblets. “And now throw your glass on the floor!”

“Yes, M’sieur,” said Francine, who obeyed regretfully, with the new instinct of a housewife.

“Now, Madame, as wife and mistress of Keragouil, I think it is well that you understand your position and what I expect of you,” said the Comte, waving her to a seat and occupying a fauteuil in magisterial fashion. “I expect that you will learn in a willing spirit what I shall teach you, that you may become worthy of the noble position you occupy.”

“Oh, M’sieur may be sure I’ll do my best,” said Francine, quite overcome.

“I expect you to show me the deference and obedience that I demand as head of the house of Bonzag.”

“Oh, M’sieur lé Comte, how could you think ”

“To be economical and amiable.”

“Yes, indeed, M’sieur.”

“To listen when I speak, to forget you were a peasant, to give me three desserts a week, and never, madame, to show me the slightest infidelity.”

At these last words, Francine, already overcome by the rapid whirl of fortune, as well as by the overcharged spirits of the potent Burgundy, burst into tears.

“And no tears!” said De Bonzag, withdrawing sternly.

“No, M’sieur; no,” Francine cried, hastily drying her eyes. Then dropping on her knees, she managed to say: “Oh, M’sieur pardon, pardon.”

“What do you mean?” cried the Comte, furiously.

“Oh, M’sieur forgive me I will tell you all!”

“Madame Madame, I don’t understand,” said the Comte, mastering himself with difficulty. “Proceed; I am listening.”

“Oh, M’sieur lé Comte, I’ll tell you all. I swear it on the image of St. Jacques d’Acquin.”

“You have not lied to me about your child?” cried Bonzag in horror.

“No, no, M’sieur; not that,” said Francine. Then, hiding her face, she said: “M’sieur, I hid something from you: I loved Andoche.”

“Ah!” said the Comte, with a sigh of relief. He sat down, adding sympathetically: “My poor Francine, I know it. Alas! That’s what life is.”

“Oh, M’sieur, it’s all over; I swear it!” Francine cried in protest. “But I loved him well, and he loved me oh, how he loved me, M’sieur lé Comte! Pardon, M’sieur, but at that time I didn’t think of being a comtesse, M’sieur lé Comte. And when M’sieur spoke to me, I didn’t know what to do. My heart was all given to Andoche, but well, M’sieur, the truth is, I began to think of my little girl, and I said to myself, I must think of her, because, M’sieur, I thought of the position it would give her, if I were a Comtesse. What a step in the world, eh? And I said, you must do it for her! So I went to Andoche, and I told him all yes, all, M’sieur that my heart was his, but that my duty was to her. And Andoche, ah, what a good heart, M’sieur he understood we wept together.” She choked a minute, put her handkerchief hastily to her eyes, “Pardon, M’sieur; and he said it was right, and I kissed him I hide nothing, M’sieur will pardon me that, and he went away!” She took a step toward him, twisting her handkerchief, adding in a timid appeal: “M’sieur understands why I tell him that? M’sieur will believe me. I have killed all that. It is no more in my heart. I swear it by the image of St. Jacques d’Acquin.”

“Madame, I knew it before,” said the Comte, rising; “still, I thank you.”

“Oh, M’sieur, I have put it all away I swear it!”

“I believe you,” interrupted the Comte, “and now no more of it! I also am going to be frank with you.” He went with a smile to a corner where stood the little box, done up in rope, which held the trousseau of the Comtesse de Bonzag. “Open that, and give me the lottery-tickets I gave you.”

“Hanh? You M’sieur says?”

“The lottery-tickets ”

“Oh, M’sieur, but they’re not there ”

“Then where are they?”

“Oh, M’sieur, wait; I’ll tell you,” said Francine, simply. “When Andoche went off ”

“What!” cried the Comte, like a cannon.

“He was so broken up, M’sieur, I was so afraid for him, so just to console him, M’sieur to give him something I gave him the tickets.”

“You gave him the tickets! The lottery-tickets!”

“Just to console him yes, M’sieur.”

The lank form of the Comte de Bonzag wavered, and then, as though the body had suddenly deserted the clothes, collapsed in a heap on the floor.