"The deuce!" I exclaimed, quite alarmed this time.
"Well, that was a stunner, wasn't it, my dear boy?"
"It was indeed! Whatever did you do?"
"I separated them, carrying Gretchen back at once to her carriage."
"Then now I understand the chill which seemed to be over us all
dinner-time. So, after I went out, you had a heavy downfall?"
"Pfuiii!" my uncle began again.
This last sigh seemed to lose itself in such a vista of painful
souvenirs, that the whole of Théramène's narrative would certainly have
taken less time to tell. I proceeded as quickly as I could, foreseeing
that my intervention would be necessary.
"Had I not better run over to my aunt Gretchen's?" I asked him.
"Yes, I certainly think you had. I promised that, except in case of
Ernest's illness proving serious, they should all leave Paris to-morrow!
You may still have time to arrange that this evening," he added, looking
at the clock.
"All right, I'm off!" I replied, rising up.
As I was about to go out, he called me back.
"Ah! above all," he continued sharply, "don't forget to tell Eudoxia
to-morrow that it is you who have undertaken this business, and that as
for me, I have not stirred from here!"
"That's quite understood, uncle," I answered, laughing to myself at the
blue funk he was in.
Needless to add, I did not lose any time. In a quarter of an hour I was
at Passy. It so happened that a favourable crisis had come over Ernest
and relieved him, and he gave no further cause for anxiety. My aunt
Gretchen, who had gone through all this business as a blind man might
pass under an arch, without knowing anything about it, did not evince
the least surprise on hearing that my uncle "having received a telegram
which had obliged him to leave Paris that evening, had commissioned me
in his absence to send her off immediately to Amsterdam." She entrusted
me with no end of compliments for the Countess of Monteclaro, whose
acquaintance she was charmed to have made.
The next morning she was rolling away in the express, delighted to have
made such an agreeable and enjoyable visit.
A week has now passed since this affair, and beyond that my uncle is
still quite humiliated by a malicious sort of gaiety affected by my
aunt, who often calls him "The Pasha," instead of "The Captain," which
is the title she always gave him formerly, everything has resumed the
harmonious tranquillity of the best regulated household. Attentions,
politenesses, gallantries, &c., are quite the order of the day. Only he
is ruining me with all the presents he lavishes upon her; and I have
been forced to make serious complaints on the subject to my aunt, who
has laughed insanely at them, maintaining that it is "the sinner's
ransom." Still, some kind of restrictions are necessary in families, and
I have warned her that, if it continues, I shall stop "the late
Barbassou's" credit, seeing that he is dead.