第108章 CHAPTER XXVII. RASTADT.(3)

Bonnier looked up to her with a triumphant smile. "You are mine, then, Victoria," he said, "for you shall have those papers! I surrender that infamous and treacherous man to your revenge!"

She stretched out her hands toward him with a cry of boundless joy.

"Give me the papers," she exclaimed; "give them to me, and I will thank you as only love is able to thank!"

Bonnier looked a long while at her, and his face, usually so gloomy, was now radiant with happiness and delight.

"To-morrow, my charming fairy," he said, "to-morrow you shall have the papers which are to open hell to your enemy, and heaven to your enraptured friend. But you must give me also a proof of your confidence and love; you must come to me and call in person for the papers. I give you the highest proof of my love by delivering to you documents that do not belong to me, but to the republic. Then give me likewise the highest proof of your love. Come to me!"

She cast a long and glowing glance on him. "I shall come!" she whispered.

And Victoria kept her word. Early on the following morning a closely-veiled lady was seen to glide into the castle of Rastadt, where the three French ambassadors were living at that time. Bonnier received her in person at the foot of the wide staircase, and gave her his arm in order to conduct her to the rooms occupied by himself. They exchanged not a word with each other, but walked silently through the sumptuous apartments and finally entered Bonnier's study.

"We are at the goal--here I bid you welcome, my fairy queen!" exclaimed Bonnier. "Remove now these odious veils. Let me now at length see your beautiful features!"

He violently tore off her black veils, and Victoria suffered it smilingly, and looked at him with a wondrous air of joy and happiness.

"Are you content now?" she asked, in her superb, sonorous voice.

"Has the proud lord of creation now prepared a new and satisfactory triumph for himself? The poor slave whom he loves must come to him and beg him for love and happiness!"

She had crossed her hands on her breast, and half kneeling down before Bonnier, she looked up to him with a fascinating mixture of archness and passion.

Bonnier lifted her up and wanted to imprint a kiss upon her lips, but she violently pushed him back.

"No," she said, "let us be sensible as long as we can. First we must attend to our business."

"Business!" exclaimed Bonnier. "What have we to do with business?

Leave business to the diplomatists and their clerks. Why should lips so charming and beautiful pronounce this cold and dismal word?"

"If I spoke of business, I meant revenge," said Victoria, fervently.

"Give me the papers, Bonnier--the papers that are to ruin Thugut!"

Bonnier took her head between his hands and looked at her with flaming eyes.

"Then you hate him still? You still desire to take revenge on him?" he asked.

"Yes, I hate him!" she exclaimed, "and the happiest day of my life will be the one on which I see him hurled down from his proud eminence, and sneaking alone, miserable, and despised into obscurity."

"One might, indeed, really believe that she is in earnest, and that truth alone could utter such words," muttered Bonnier, who constantly held her head in his hands, and thus gazed at her. "Swear to me, Victoria, swear to me by what is most sacred to you, that you hate Thugut, and that you desire to ruin him!"

"I swear it by what is most sacred to me," she said, solemnly; "I swear it by your love!" "That is the best and most unequivocal oath, and I will believe you," said Bonnier, laughing.

"Then you will now give me those papers?" she asked.

"Yes," he said, bluntly, "I will give them to you. Come, my angel, you are right? let us first speak of business matters. There, sit down here at my desk. Oh, henceforth this spot will be sacred to me, for your heavenly person has consecrated it. Let me sit down here by your side, and thus we will lay our dispatches before each other, like two good and conscientious diplomatists. Look here! this portfolio contains your revenge and your satisfaction. This portfolio contains the papers proving that Thugut has received large sums of money from Russia and England for the purpose of instigating the Emperor of Austria against France, and that his pretended patriotic indignation is after all nothing but the paid role of a comedian. I have abstracted this portfolio from the archives of our embassy. Do you understand me, Victoria? I have stolen it for you!"

"Let me see the papers!" exclaimed Victoria, trembling with impatience.

Bonnier opened the portfolio and drew a paper from it. But on looking at it, a dark cloud passed over his face, and he shook his head indignantly.

"What a miserable fool I was to make such a mistake!" he ejaculated angrily. "I have taken the wrong portfolio. This one does not contain the papers you are looking for."