He grasped his head and sat down on an old cane chair; a few tears rolled from his eyes.

“Monsieur is quite right,” said Lemulquinier; “it is all the fault of that rascally sun which is too feeble,—­the coward, the lazy thing!”

Master and valet paid no further attention to Marguerite.

“Leave us, Mulquinier,” she said.

“Ah!  I see a new experiment!” cried Claes.

“Father, lay aside your experiments,” said his daughter, when they were alone.  “You have one hundred thousand francs to pay, and we have not a penny.  Leave your laboratory; your honor is in question.  What will become of you if you are put in prison?  Will you soil your white hairs and the name of Claes with the disgrace of bankruptcy?  I will not allow it.  I shall have strength to oppose your madness; it would be dreadful to see you without bread in your old age.  Open your eyes to our position; see reason at last!”

“Madness!” cried Balthazar, struggling to his feet.  He fixed his luminous eyes upon his daughter, crossed his arms on his breast, and repeated the word “Madness!” so majestically that Marguerite trembled.

“Ah!” he cried, “your mother would never have uttered that word to me.  She was not ignorant of the importance of my researches; she learned a science to understand me; she recognized that I toiled for the human race; she knew there was nothing sordid or selfish in my aims.  The feelings of a loving wife are higher, I see it now, than filial affection.  Yes, Love is above all other feelings.  See reason!” he went on, striking his breast.  “Do I lack reason?  Am I not myself?  You say we are poor; well, my daughter, I choose it to be so.  I am your father, obey me.  I will make you rich when I please.  Your fortune? it is a pittance!  When I find the solvent of carbon I will fill your parlor with diamonds, and they are but a scintilla of what I seek.  You can well afford to wait while I consume my life in superhuman efforts.”

“Father, I have no right to ask an account of the four millions you have already engulfed in this fatal garret.  I will not speak to you of my mother whom you killed.  If I had a husband, I should love him, doubtless, as she loved you; I should be ready to sacrifice all to him, as she sacrificed all for you.  I have obeyed her orders in giving myself wholly to you; I have proved it in not marrying and compelling you to render an account of your guardianship.  Let us dismiss the past and think of the present.  I am here now to represent the necessity which you have created for yourself.  You must have money to meet your notes—­do you understand me?  There is nothing left to seize here but the portrait of your ancestor, the Claes martyr.  I come in the name of my mother, who felt herself too feeble to defend her children against their father; she ordered me to resist you.  I come in the name of my brothers and my sister; I come, father, in the name of all the Claes, and I command you to give up your experiments, or earn the means of pursuing them hereafter, if pursue them you must.  If you arm yourself with the power of your paternity, which you employ only for our destruction, I have on my side your ancestors and your honor, whose voice is louder than that of chemistry.  The Family is greater than Science.  I have been too long your daughter.”