The Queens Necklace | Page 6

should put on a double coat of rouge before visiting you;" and turning again to Cagliostro, "then, sir, you have the art of renewing your youth? For although you say you are three or four thousand years old, you scarcely look forty."
"Yes, madame, I do possess that secret."
"Oh, then, sir, impart it to me."
"To you, madame? It is useless; your youth is already renewed; your age is only what it appears to be, and you do not look thirty."
"Ah! you flatter."
"No, madame, I speak only the truth, but it is easily explained: you have already tried my receipt."
"How so?"
"You have taken my elixir."
"I?"
"You, countess. Oh! you cannot have forgotten it. Do you not remember a certain house in the Rue St. Claude, and coming there on some business respecting M. de Sartines? You remember rendering a service to one of my friends, called Joseph Balsamo, and that this Joseph Balsamo gave you a bottle of elixir, recommending you to take three drops every morning? Do you not remember having done this regularly until the last year, when the bottle became exhausted? If you do not remember all this, countess, it is more than forgetfulness--it is ingratitude."
"Oh! M. Cagliostro, you are telling me things----"
"Which were only known to yourself, I am aware; but what would be the use of being a sorcerer if one did not know one's neighbor's secrets?"
"Then Joseph Balsamo has, like you, the secret of this famous elixir?"
"No, madame, but he was one of my best friends, and I gave him three or four bottles."
"And has he any left?"
"Oh! I know nothing of that; for the last two or three years, poor Balsamo has disappeared. The last time I saw him was in America, on the banks of the Ohio: he was setting off on an expedition to the Rocky Mountains, and since then I have heard that he is dead."
"Come, come, count," cried the marshal; "let us have the secret, by all means."
"Are you speaking seriously, sir?" said Count Haga.
"Very seriously, sire,--I beg pardon, I mean count;" and Cagliostro bowed in such a way as to indicate that his error was a voluntary one.
"Then," said the marshal, "Madame Dubarry is not old enough to be made young again?"
"No, on my conscience."
"Well, then, I will give you another subject: here is my friend, M. Taverney--what do you say to him? Does he not look like a contemporary of Pontius Pilate? But perhaps, he, on the contrary, is too old."
Cagliostro looked at the baron. "No," said he.
"Ah! my dear count," exclaimed Richelieu; "if you will renew his youth, I will proclaim you a true pupil of Medea."
"You wish it?" asked Cagliostro of the host, and looking round at the same time on all assembled.
Every one called out, "Yes."
"And you also, M. Taverney?"
"I more than any one," said the baron.
"Well, it is easy," returned Cagliostro; and he drew from his pocket a small bottle, and poured into a glass some of the liquid it contained. Then, mixing these drops with half a glass of iced champagne, he passed it to the baron.
All eyes followed his movements eagerly.
The baron took the glass, but as he was about to drink he hesitated.
Every one began to laugh, but Cagliostro called out, "Drink, baron, or you will lose a liquor of which each drop is worth a hundred louis d'ors."
"The devil," cried Richelieu; "that is even better than tokay."
"I must then drink?" said the baron, almost trembling.
"Or pass the glass to another, sir, that some one at least may profit by it."
"Pass it here," said Richelieu, holding out his hand.
The baron raised the glass, and decided, doubtless, by the delicious smell and the beautiful rose color which those few drops had given to the champagne, he swallowed the magic liquor. In an instant a kind of shiver ran through him; he seemed to feel all his old and sluggish blood rushing quickly through his veins, from his heart to his feet, his wrinkled skin seemed to expand, his eyes, half covered by their lids, appeared to open without his will, and the pupils to grow and brighten, the trembling of his hands to cease, his voice to strengthen, and his limbs to recover their former youthful elasticity. In fact, it seemed as if the liquid in its descent had regenerated his whole body.
A cry of surprise, wonder, and admiration rang through the room.
Taverney, who had been slowly eating with his gums, began to feel famished; he seized a plate and helped himself largely to a ragout, and then demolished a partridge, bones and all, calling out that his teeth were coming back to him. He eat, laughed, and cried for joy, for half an hour, while the others remained gazing at him in stupefied wonder; then little by little he failed again, like a