There will be several voting days, and you
will be elected by ballot--"
"How can that be?" asked Savarus.
"By winning the Rouxey lawsuit you will gain eighty Legitimist votes;
add them to the thirty I can command, and you have a hundred and ten.
Then, as twenty remain to you of the Boucher committee, you will have
a hundred and thirty in all."
"Well," said Albert, "we must get seventy-five more."
"Yes," said the priest, "since all the rest are Ministerial. But, my
son, you have two hundred votes, and the Prefecture no more than a
hundred and eighty."
"I have two hundred votes?" said Albert, standing stupid with
amazement, after starting to his feet as if shot up by a spring.
"You have those of Monsieur de Chavoncourt," said the Abbe.
"How?" said Albert.
"You will marry Mademoiselle Sidonie de Chavoncourt."
"Never!"
"You will marry Mademoiselle Sidonie de Chavoncourt," the priest
repeated coldly.
"But you see--she is inexorable," said Albert, pointing to Francesca.
"You will marry Mademoiselle Sidonie de Chavoncourt," said the Abbe
calmly for the third time.
This time Albert understood. The Vicar-General would not be implicated
in a scheme which at last smiled on the despairing politician. A word
more would have compromised the priest's dignity and honor.
"To-morrow evening at the Hotel de Rupt you will meet Madame de
Chavoncourt and her second daughter. You can thank her beforehand for
what she is going to do for you, and tell her that your gratitude is
unbounded, that you are hers body and soul, that henceforth your
future is that of her family.
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