He ordered the dismissal of Chupin.

The latter resisted, swearing that he would not leave Sairmeuse unless he was forcibly expelled, or unless he received the order from the lips of the duke himself.

This obstinate resistance was reported to the duke.  It made him hesitate; but the necessity of the moment, and a word from Martial, decided him.

He sent for Chupin and told him that he must not visit Sairmeuse again under any pretext whatever, softening the harshness of expulsion, however, by the offer of a small sum of money.

But Chupin sullenly refused the money, gathered his belongings together, and departed, shaking his clinched fist at the chateau, and vowing vengeance on the Sairmeuse family.  Then he went to his old home, where his wife and his two boys still lived.

He seldom left the house, and then only to satisfy his passion for hunting.  At such times, instead of hiding and surrounding himself with every precaution, as he had done, before shooting a squirrel or a few partridges, in former times, he went boldly to the Sairmeuse or the Courtornieu forests, shot his game, and brought it home openly, almost defiantly.

The rest of the time he spent in a state of semi-intoxication, for he drank constantly and more and more immoderately.  When he had taken more than usual, his wife and his sons generally attempted to obtain money from him, and if persuasions failed they resorted to blows.

For he had never given them the reward of his treason.  What had he done with the twenty thousand francs in gold which had been paid him?  No one knew.  His sons believed he had buried it somewhere; but they tried in vain to wrest his secret from him.

All the people in the neighborhood were aware of this state of affairs, and regarded it as a just punishment for the traitor.  Mme. Blanche overheard one of the gardeners telling the story to two of his assistants: 

“Ah, the man is an old scoundrel!” he said, his face crimson with indignation.  “He should be in the galleys, and not at large among respectable people.”

“He is a man who would serve your purpose,” the voice of hatred whispered in Blanche’s ear.

“But how can I find an opportunity to confer with him?” she wondered.  Mme. Blanche was too prudent to think of hazarding a visit to his house, but she remembered that he hunted occasionally in the Courtornieu woods, and that it might be possible for her to meet him there.

“It will only require a little perseverance and a few long walks,” she said to herself.

But it cost poor Aunt Medea, the inevitable chaperon, two long weeks of almost continued walking.

“Another freak!” groaned the poor relative, overcome with fatigue; “my niece is certainly crazy!”

But one lovely afternoon in May Blanche discovered what she sought.

It was in a sequestered spot near the lake.  Chupin was tramping sullenly along with his gun and glancing suspiciously on every side!  Not that he feared the game-keeper or a verbal process, but wherever he went, he fancied he saw Balstain walking in his shadow, with that terrible knife in his hand.