CHAPTER II

THE HEIR TO VIVEY

While these events were happening at Vivey, the person whose name excited
the curiosity and the conversational powers of the villagers--Marie-
Julien de Buxieres--ensconced in his unpretentious apartment in the Rue
Stanislaus, Nancy, still pondered over the astonishing news contained in
the Auberive notary's first letter. The announcement of his inheritance,
dropping from the skies, as it were, had found him quite unprepared, and,
at first, somewhat sceptical. He remembered, it is true, hearing his
father once speak of a cousin who had remained a bachelor and who owned a
fine piece of property in some corner of the Haute Marne; but, as all
intercourse had long been broken off between the two families, M. de
Buxieres the elder had mentioned the subject only in relation to barely
possible hopes which had very little chance of being realized. Julien
had never placed any reliance on this chimerical inheritance, and he
received almost with indifference the official announcement of the death
of Claude Odouart de Buxieres.

By direct line from his late father, he became in fact the only
legitimate heir of the chateau and lands of Vivey; still, there was a
strong probability that Claude de Buxieres had made a will in favor of
some one more within his own circle. The second missive from Arbillot
the notary, announcing that the deceased had died intestate, and
requesting the legal heir to come to Vivey as soon as possible, put a
sudden end to the young man's doubts, which merged into a complex
feeling, less of joy than of stupefaction.