“The French officer in the service of Ali Pasha of Yanina alluded to three weeks since in l’Impartial, who not only surrendered the castle of Yanina, but sold his benefactor to the Turks, styled himself truly at that time Fernand, as our esteemed contemporary states; but he has since added to his Christian name a title of nobility and a family name. He now calls himself the Count of Morcerf, and ranks among the peers.”
Thus the terrible secret, which Beauchamp had so generously destroyed, appeared again like an armed phantom; and another paper, deriving its information from some malicious source, had published two days after Albert’s departure for Normandy the few lines which had rendered the unfortunate young man almost crazy.
Chapter 86. The Trial
At eight o’clock in the morning Albert had arrived at Beauchamp’s door. The valet de chambre had received orders to usher him in at once. Beauchamp was in his bath.
“Here I am,” Albert said.
“Well, my poor friend,” replied Beauchamp, “I expected you.”
“I need not say I think you are too faithful and too kind to have spoken of that painful circumstance. Your having sent for me is another proof of your affection. So, without losing time, tell me, have you the slightest idea whence this terrible blow proceeds?”
“I think I have some clew.”
“But first tell me all the particulars of this shameful plot.”
Beauchamp proceeded to relate to the young man, who was overwhelmed with shame and grief, the following facts. Two days previously, the article had appeared in another paper besides l’Impartial, and, what was more serious, one that was well known as a government paper. Beauchamp was breakfasting when he read the paragraph. He sent immediately for a cabriolet, and hastened to the publisher’s office. Although professing diametrically opposite principles from those of the editor of the other paper, Beauchamp—as it sometimes, we may say often, happens—was his intimate friend. The editor was reading, with apparent delight, a leading article in the same paper on beet-sugar, probably a composition of his own.