LITMIR.BIZ

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he said, his countenance dark.

      De Batz read, sighed, and shrugged. 'What can I do? If the sacrifice could have been avoided, I should have avoided it. I am no butcher of chickens. You know that I should not hesitate to sacrifice myself. Let that be my justification for consenting to sacrifice another.'

      'It is no justification. You are master of yourself. Your fate is in your own hands.'

      'Is any man's fate in his own hands? Besides, here the fate of a people is concerned.' His voice grew harshly imperious. 'Ruthlessness becomes a sacred duty.'

      'What reply am I to make?'

      'None. That will be kindest. The poor child seems to hope that she is something to you. In that hope she writes. Your silence will dispel it. She will the more readily submit to her destiny.'

      André-Louis, seated dejectedly on the striped settee, took his head in his hands. 'That foul Capuchin,' he groaned. 'As God lives, he shall bitterly repent it.'

      'Of course he will. But he is no more responsible than the girl herself. In a sense he is as much a victim, although he does not yet perceive of what. But he will.'

      'And the Freys? These inhuman brothers who for the sake of their own profit throw their sister to that beast!'

      'They shall also repent. Take comfort in that.'

      'And you, then? You who are responsible for it all?'

      'I?' Erect and tense, de Batz looked at him with brooding eyes. 'I am in God's hands. At least, however impure the course I take, I take it from no impurity of motive. I serve an idea, not myself. In this I am purer than you are. Perhaps on that account I am immune from the scruples that trouble you.'

      André-Louis thought of Aline, of his hopes of her which were the mainspring of his share in these tortuous activities. To bring his hopes to fruition he was prepared to go to almost any lengths, but not to the length of sacrificing an innocent child to the evil lust of that beast Chabot. Aline herself would shrink from him in horror, her purity outraged, if she thought him capable of adopting such means to reach her. Yet, as de Batz had pointed out, he was powerless now to prevent this thing.

      The anger surging in him from that impotence came to be concentrated on Chabot. Because of Léopoldine he would pursue him the more ruthlessly, and already he perceived the means by which he could discredit and smash him utterly.

      He was in that mood of vindictiveness when later in the day he was visited by Delaunay and Julien.

      De Batz was absent, and André-Louis sat pencil in hand at his writing-table on which there was a litter of papers. He sat in shirt and breeches and with the venetians closed to exclude the sunlight, for the early September day was stiflingly hot. He was at work on the details of the scheme which he had conceived for the speedy ruin of Chabot. Delaunay came to issue something in the nature of an ultimatum. He and Julien desired to know when the operations in émigré property on a large scale were to take place. Months had gone since first the matter had been mooted, and so far little had been done. They had been guided entirely by the wishes of the Citizen de Batz. But unless there were some prospect of real activity, they proposed to operate independently.

      'And thereby run your heads into the lunette of the guillotine,' André-Louis lounged in his chair, one leg thrown over the arm of it, and looked up at them with a mocking eye. 'Well, well! To be sure they are your own heads, and you may do as you please with them.'

      'Will you tell me for what we are waiting?' Delaunay asked, his habitual stolidity unimpaired by the young man's raillery.

      André-Louis tapped the writing-table with his pencil. 'The ground is still insufficiently prepared. Chabot has not yet been persuaded to come into the enterprise.'

      'To Hell with Chabot!' said Julien fervently.

      'By all means,' André-Louis agreed. 'But not until we have done with him. You forget that his eminence is to be our shield. You are too impatient. Difficult enterprises are to be prepared slowly and executed quickly. That is the way to succeed in them.'

      Delaunay fell to grumbling in his deep, slow voice. 'Devil take it all! At this rate it will be next summer before we may look for the harvest.'

      André-Louis was thoughtful, his half-closed eyes upon the papers on the table before him. He unhooked his leg from the arm of his chair, and sat up.

      'You are pressed, eh, Delaunay? The Descoings begins to find your promises lean fare? She is impatient of more solid nourishment? If that's your trouble, I have here something else, something that offers an immediate return.'

      'That's the proposal for me,' said Julien.

      'And, faith, for me! What is it?'

      André-Louis expounded briefly a scheme which for some days now had been engaging his attention. It concerned the India Company—the Compagnie des Indes—one of the few commercial enterprises in France whose credit had remained unimpaired by the upheaval of the revolution.

      'Under the law of the 8th Frimaire of the Year One, the shares of a company become subject to the payment of certain dues on the occasion of each transfer of ownership. Have you observed that the India Company has been evading this law? I see that you haven't. You want to grow rich, yet you don't know where to look for wealth. The Company, let me tell you, has replaced its shares by bonds similar to those issued by the State. Of these no transfers are required. All that is necessary is accomplished by a simple entry in the Company's register. Thus the tax is successfully evaded.'

      He took up a sheet that was covered with figures. 'It's a simple form of fraud, and its success lies in its simplicity. I have computed that as a result the State has already been swindled of over two millions.'

      He paused, and looked up at the representatives, who stared back at him in round-eyed silence, until at last Delaunay broke out:

      'But how the devil are we to profit by that?'

      'By denouncing the fraud in the Convention, and foreshadowing some decree that will sow terror in the hearts of the shareholders.'

      'And then?'

      'The price of the stock will fall to nothing. That will be your time to buy it. After you have bought, you will frame the decree. Indeed, you may frame two decrees: one that will completely ruin the Company, and another that will deal indulgently with its transgression. You will then give the directors to choose between the two. You offer the indulgent one at a certain price—say, a quarter of a million. With ruin as the only alternative, the directors must pay. Then, with the restoration of confidence, the shares will quickly rise again. You sell at twenty, fifty, perhaps a hundred times what you paid for them. In this way you will make two separate profits, and the second one may be enormous. It will be limited only by the courage with which you buy.' He smiled up into their bulging eyes. 'Simple, isn't it?'

      Julien pronounced him a remorseless rogue and swore under his breath to express his amazed appreciation of this rascally scheme. Delaunay's habitual stolidity gave way to laughter in which there was a scared note.

      'You're a fine fellow, on my soul! I imagined that I knew something of finance. But this ...'

      'This is the fruit of genius. Chabot becomes more than ever necessary to us.'

      'Chabot?' Delaunay's face lengthened.

      André-Louis was firm and emphatic. 'Not only Chabot, but some other prominent and popular Montagnard. Bazire, for instance, whom you would have brought in before. He, too, stands close to Robespierre, and carries weight.'

      'But why?'

      'It is necessary.' André-Louis got up, and faced them standing. His manner increased in authority. 'A commission will have to be appointed for the purpose of framing the two decrees which you will require. You must take care in advance that you have at hand the right men to compose it, men whose interests in the matter will be identical with your own. That is why these others must be brought in before-hand.'

      The object was clear to them at once. 'If Chabot should refuse?' Delaunay asked.

      'Conquer

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