Under the Empire, between two wars, he had found time to marry Mademoiselle Gillenormand. The old bourgeois, thoroughly indignant at bottom, had given his consent with a sigh, saying:
"The greatest families are forced into it." In 1815, Madame Pontmercy, an admirable woman in every sense, by the way, lofty in sentiment and rare, and worthy of her husband, died, leaving a child.
This child had been the colonel''s joy in his solitude; but the grandfather had imperatively claimed his grandson, declaring that if the child were not given to him he would disinherit him.
The father had yielded in the little one''s interest, and had transferred his love to flowers.
Moreover, he had renounced everything, and neither stirred up mischief nor conspired.
He shared his thoughts between the innocent things which he was then doing and the great things which he had done. He passed his time in expecting a pink or in recalling Austerlitz.
M. Gillenormand kept up no relations with his son-in-law. The colonel was "a bandit" to him.
M. Gillenormand never mentioned the colonel, except when he occasionally made mocking allusions to "his Baronship."⊥思⊥兔⊥在⊥線⊥閱⊥讀⊥
It had been expressly agreed that Pontmercy should never attempt to see his son nor to speak to him, under penalty of having the latter handed over to him disowned and disinherited. For the Gillenormands, Pontmercy was a man afflicted with the plague. They intended to bring up the child in their own way.