d himself to her? She had accepted him knowing him to be rich.
She would take him still if he were poor; but had he any right to demand
such a sacrifice? Would it not be better to keep this money in trust, to
be restored to the poor at some future date.
And in his soul, where selfishness put on a guise of honesty, all these
specious interests were struggling and contending. His first scruples
yielded to ingenious reasoning, then came to the top again, and again
disappeared.
He sat down again, seeking some decisive motive, some all-sufficient
pretext to solve his hesitancy and convince his natural rectitude.
Twenty times over had he asked himself this question: "Since I am this
man's son, since I know and acknowledge it, is it not natural that I
should also accept the inheritance?"
But even this argument could not suppress the "No" murmured by his
inmost conscience.
Then came the thought: "Since I am not the son of the man I always
believed to be my father, I can take nothing from him, neither during
his lifetime nor after his death. It would be neither dignified nor
equitable. It would be robbing my brother."
This new view of the matter having relieved him and quieted his
conscience, he went to the window again.
"Yes," he said to himself, "I must give up my share of the family
inheritance. I must let Pierre have the whole of it, since I am not his
father's son. That is but just. Then is it not just that I should keep
my father's money?"
Having discerned that he could take nothing of Roland's savings, having
decided on giving up the whole of this money, he agreed; he resigned
himself to keeping Marechal's; for if he rejected both he would find
himself reduced to beggary.
This delicate question being thus disposed of he came back to that of
Pierre's presence in the family. How was he to be got rid of? He was
giving up his search for any practical solution when the whistle of a
steam-vessel coming into port seemed to blow him an answer by suggesting
a scheme.
Then he threw himself on his bed without undressing, and dozed and
dreamed till daybreak.
At a little before nine he went out to ascertain whether his plans were
feasible. Then, after making sundry inquiries and calls, he went to his
old home. His mother was waiting for him in her room.
"If you had not come," she said, "I should never have dared to go down."
In a minute Roland's voice was heard on the stairs: "Are we to have
nothing to eat
|