II
Bertrand Moncrif, brooding, absorbed in thoughts, said little or nothing while the coach swung along at a very brisk pace. Marguerite, who always had plenty to think about, did not feel in the mood to try and make conversation. She was very sorry for the young man, who in very truth must have suffered also from remorse. His lack of ardour—obviously only an outward lack—toward his fiancée and the members of her family, must to a certain extent have helped to precipitate the present catastrophe. Coolness and moroseness on his part gave rise to want of confidence on the other. Régine, heartsick at her lover’s seeming indifference, was no doubt all the more ready to lavish love and self-sacrifice upon the young brother. Marguerite was sorry enough for the latter—a young fool, with the exalté Latin temperament, brimming over with desires for self-immolation as futile as they were senseless—but her generous heart went out to Régine de Serval, a girl who appeared redestined to sorrow and disappointments, endowed with an exceptionally warm nature and cursed with the inability to draw wholehearted affection to herself. She worshipped Bertrand Moncrif; she idolised her mother, her brother, her sister. But though they, one and all, relied on her, brought her the confidences of their troubles and their difficulties, it never occurred to any one of them to give up something—a distraction, a fancy, an ideal—for the sake of silent, thoughtful Régine.
Marguerite allowed her thoughts thus to dwell on these people, whom her husband’s splendid sacrifice on their behalf had rendered dear. Indeed, she loved them like she loved so many others, because of the dangers which he had braved for their sakes. Their lives had become valuable because of his precious one, daily risked because of them. And at the back of her mind there was also the certainty that if these two young fools did put their mad project in execution and endeavoured to return to Paris, it would again be the gallant Scarlet Pimpernel who would jeopardise his life to save them from the consequences of their own folly.