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diff --git a/1455-0.txt b/1455-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..d3b0802 --- /dev/null +++ b/1455-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3638 @@ +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1455 *** + +THE HATED SON + + +By Honore De Balzac + + + +Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley + + + + + DEDICATION + + To Madame la Baronne James Rothschild. + + + + + +THE HATED SON + + + + + +PART I. HOW THE MOTHER LIVED + + + + +CHAPTER I. A BEDROOM OF THE SIXTEENTH CENTURY + + +On a winter’s night, about two in the morning, the Comtesse Jeanne +d’Herouville felt such violent pains that in spite of her inexperience, +she was conscious of an approaching confinement; and the instinct which +makes us hope for ease in a change of posture induced her to sit up +in her bed, either to study the nature of these new sufferings, or to +reflect on her situation. She was a prey to cruel fears,--caused less +by the dread of a first lying-in, which terrifies most women, than by +certain dangers which awaited her child. + +In order not to awaken her husband who was sleeping beside her, the poor +woman moved with precautions which her intense terror made as minute as +those of a prisoner endeavoring to escape. Though the pains became +more and more severe, she ceased to feel them, so completely did she +concentrate her own strength on the painful effort of resting her two +moist hands on the pillow and so turning her suffering body from a +posture in which she could find no ease. At the slightest rustling of +the huge green silk coverlet, under which she had slept but little since +her marriage, she stopped as though she had rung a bell. Forced to watch +the count, she divided her attention between the folds of the rustling +stuff and a large swarthy face, the moustache of which was brushing her +shoulder. When some noisier breath than usual left her husband’s lips, +she was filled with a sudden terror that revived the color driven from +her cheeks by her double anguish. + +The prisoner reached the prison door in the dead of night and trying +to noiselessly turn the key in a pitiless lock, was never more timidly +bold. + +When the countess had succeeded in rising to her seat without awakening +her keeper, she made a gesture of childlike joy which revealed the +touching naivete of her nature. But the half-formed smile on her burning +lips was quickly suppressed; a thought came to darken that pure brow, +and her long blue eyes resumed their sad expression. She gave a sigh +and again laid her hands, not without precaution, on the fatal conjugal +pillow. Then--as if for the first time since her marriage she found +herself free in thought and action--she looked at the things around her, +stretching out her neck with little darting motions like those of a bird +in its cage. Seeing her thus, it was easy to divine that she had once +been all gaiety and light-heartedness, but that fate had suddenly mown +down her hopes, and changed her ingenuous gaiety to sadness. + +The chamber was one of those which, to this day octogenarian porters +of old chateaus point out to visitors as “the state bedroom where Louis +XIII. once slept.” Fine pictures, mostly brown in tone, were framed +in walnut, the delicate carvings of which were blackened by time. The +rafters of the ceiling formed compartments adorned with arabesques in +the style of the preceding century, which preserved the colors of the +chestnut wood. These decorations, severe in tone, reflected the light +so little that it was difficult to see their designs, even when the sun +shone full into that long and wide and lofty chamber. The silver lamp, +placed upon the mantel of the vast fireplace, lighted the room so feebly +that its quivering gleam could be compared only to the nebulous stars +which appear at moments through the dun gray clouds of an autumn night. +The fantastic figures crowded on the marble of the fireplace, which was +opposite to the bed, were so grotesquely hideous that she dared not fix +her eyes upon them, fearing to see them move, or to hear a startling +laugh from their gaping and twisted mouths. + +At this moment a tempest was growling in the chimney, giving to every +puff of wind a lugubrious meaning,--the vast size of the flute putting +the hearth into such close communication with the skies above that the +embers upon it had a sort of respiration; they sparkled and went out at +the will of the wind. The arms of the family of Herouville, carved in +white marble with their mantle and supporters, gave the appearance of +a tomb to this species of edifice, which formed a pendant to the bed, +another erection raised to the glory of Hymen. Modern architects would +have been puzzled to decide whether the room had been built for the bed +or the bed for the room. Two cupids playing on the walnut headboard, +wreathed with garlands, might have passed for angels; and columns of +the same wood, supporting the tester were carved with mythological +allegories, the explanation of which could have been found either in the +Bible or Ovid’s Metamorphoses. Take away the bed, and the same tester +would have served in a church for the canopy of the pulpit or the +seats of the wardens. The married pair mounted by three steps to this +sumptuous couch, which stood upon a platform and was hung with curtains +of green silk covered with brilliant designs called “ramages”--possibly +because the birds of gay plumage there depicted were supposed to +sing. The folds of these immense curtains were so stiff that in the +semi-darkness they might have been taken for some metal fabric. On the +green velvet hanging, adorned with gold fringes, which covered the foot +of this lordly couch the superstition of the Comtes d’Herouville had +affixed a large crucifix, on which their chaplain placed a fresh branch +of sacred box when he renewed at Easter the holy water in the basin at +the foot of the cross. + +On one side of the fireplace stood a large box or wardrobe of choice +woods magnificently carved, such as brides receive even now in the +provinces on their wedding day. These old chests, now so much in request +by antiquaries, were the arsenals from which women drew the rich and +elegant treasures of their personal adornment,--laces, bodices, +high collars and ruffs, gowns of price, alms-purses, masks, gloves, +veils,--in fact all the inventions of coquetry in the sixteenth century. + +On the other side, by way of symmetry, was another piece of furniture, +somewhat similar in shape, where the countess kept her books, papers, +and jewels. Antique chairs covered with damask, a large and greenish +mirror, made in Venice, and richly framed in a sort of rolling +toilet-table, completed the furnishings of the room. The floor was +covered with a Persian carpet, the richness of which proved the +gallantry of the count; on the upper step of the bed stood a little +table, on which the waiting-woman served every night in a gold or silver +cup a drink prepared with spices. + +After we have gone some way in life we know the secret influence exerted +by places on the condition of the soul. Who has not had his darksome +moments, when fresh hope has come into his heart from things that +surrounded him? The fortunate, or the unfortunate man, attributes an +intelligent countenance to the things among which he lives; he listens +to them, he consults them--so naturally superstitious is he. At +this moment the countess turned her eyes upon all these articles of +furniture, as if they were living beings whose help and protection she +implored; but the answer of that sombre luxury seemed to her inexorable. + +Suddenly the tempest redoubled. The poor young woman could augur nothing +favorable as she listened to the threatening heavens, the changes of +which were interpreted in those credulous days according to the ideas +or the habits of individuals. Suddenly she turned her eyes to the two +arched windows at the end of the room; but the smallness of their panes +and the multiplicity of the leaden lines did not allow her to see the +sky and judge if the world were coming to an end, as certain monks, +eager for donations, affirmed. She might easily have believed in such +predictions, for the noise of the angry sea, the waves of which beat +against the castle wall, combined with the mighty voice of the tempest, +so that even the rocks appeared to shake. Though her sufferings were now +becoming keener and less endurable, the countess dared not awaken her +husband; but she turned and examined his features, as if despair +were urging her to find a consolation there against so many sinister +forebodings. + +If matters were sad around the poor young woman, that face, +notwithstanding the tranquillity of sleep, seemed sadder still. The +light from the lamp, flickering in the draught, scarcely reached beyond +the foot of the bed and illumined the count’s head capriciously; so that +the fitful movements of its flash upon those features in repose produced +the effect of a struggle with angry thought. The countess was scarcely +reassured by perceiving the cause of that phenomenon. Each time that a +gust of wind projected the light upon the count’s large face, casting +shadows among its bony outlines, she fancied that her husband was about +to fix upon her his two insupportably stern eyes. + +Implacable as the war then going on between the Church and Calvinism, +the count’s forehead was threatening even while he slept. Many furrows, +produced by the emotions of a warrior life, gave it a vague resemblance +to the vermiculated stone which we see in the buildings of that period; +his hair, like the whitish lichen of old oaks, gray before its time, +surrounded without grace a cruel brow, where religious intolerance +showed its passionate brutality. The shape of the aquiline nose, which +resembled the beak of a bird of prey, the black and crinkled lids of the +yellow eyes, the prominent bones of a hollow face, the rigidity of the +wrinkles, the disdain expressed in the lower lip, were all expressive +of ambition, despotism, and power, the more to be feared because +the narrowness of the skull betrayed an almost total absence of +intelligence, and a mere brute courage devoid of generosity. The face +was horribly disfigured by a large transversal scar which had the +appearance of a second mouth on the right cheek. + +At the age of thirty-three the count, anxious to distinguish himself +in that unhappy religious war the signal for which was given on +Saint-Bartholomew’s day, had been grievously wounded at the siege of +Rochelle. The misfortune of this wound increased his hatred against the +partisans of what the language of that day called “the Religion,” but, +by a not unnatural turn of mind, he included in that antipathy all +handsome men. Before the catastrophe, however, he was so repulsively +ugly that no lady had ever been willing to receive him as a suitor. The +only passion of his youth was for a celebrated woman called La Belle +Romaine. The distrust resulting from this new misfortune made him +suspicious to the point of not believing himself capable of inspiring a +true passion; and his character became so savage that when he did have +some successes in gallantry he owed them to the terror inspired by +his cruelty. The left hand of this terrible Catholic, which lay on +the outside of the bed, will complete this sketch of his character. +Stretched out as if to guard the countess, as a miser guards his hoard, +that enormous hand was covered with hair so thick, it presented such +a network of veins and projecting muscles, that it gave the idea of a +branch of birch clasped with a growth of yellowing ivy. + +Children looking at the count’s face would have thought him an ogre, +terrible tales of whom they knew by heart. It was enough to see the +width and length of the space occupied by the count in the bed, to +imagine his gigantic proportions. When awake, his gray eyebrows hid his +eyelids in a way to heighten the light of his eye, which glittered with +the luminous ferocity of a wolf skulking on the watch in a forest. Under +his lion nose, with its flaring nostrils, a large and ill-kept moustache +(for he despised all toilet niceties) completely concealed the upper +lip. Happily for the countess, her husband’s wide mouth was silent +at this moment, for the softest sounds of that harsh voice made her +tremble. Though the Comte d’Herouville was barely fifty years of age, +he appeared at first sight to be sixty, so much had the toils of war, +without injuring his robust constitution, dilapidated him physically. + +The countess, who was now in her nineteenth year, made a painful +contrast to that large, repulsive figure. She was fair and slim. Her +chestnut locks, threaded with gold, played upon her neck like russet +shadows, and defined a face such as Carlo Dolce has painted for his +ivory-toned madonnas,--a face which now seemed ready to expire under +the increasing attacks of physical pain. You might have thought her the +apparition of an angel sent from heaven to soften the iron will of the +terrible count. + +“No, he will not kill us!” she cried to herself mentally, after +contemplating her husband for a long time. “He is frank, courageous, +faithful to his word--faithful to his word!” + +Repeating that last sentence in her thoughts, she trembled violently, +and remained as if stupefied. + +To understand the horror of her present situation, we must add that +this nocturnal scene took place in 1591, a period when civil war raged +throughout France, and the laws had no vigor. The excesses of the +League, opposed to the accession of Henri IV., surpassed the calamities +of the religious wars. License was so universal that no one was +surprised to see a great lord kill his enemy in open day. When a +military expedition, having a private object, was led in the name of the +King or of the League, one or other of these parties applauded it. It +was thus that Blagny, a soldier, came near becoming a sovereign prince +at the gates of France. Sometime before Henri III.’s death, a court lady +murdered a nobleman who made offensive remarks about her. One of the +king’s minions remarked to him:-- + +“Hey! vive Dieu! sire, she daggered him finely!” + +The Comte d’Herouville, one of the most rabid royalists in Normandy, +kept the part of that province which adjoins Brittany under subjection +to Henri IV. by the rigor of his executions. The head of one of the +richest families in France, he had considerably increased the revenues +of his great estates by marrying seven months before the night on which +this history begins, Jeanne de Saint-Savin, a young lady who, by a not +uncommon chance in days when people were killed off like flies, had +suddenly become the representative of both branches of the Saint-Savin +family. Necessity and terror were the causes which led to this union. +At a banquet given, two months after the marriage, to the Comte and +Comtesse d’Herouville, a discussion arose on a topic which in those days +of ignorance was thought amusing: namely, the legitimacy of children +coming into the world ten months after the death of their fathers, or +seven months after the wedding day. + +“Madame,” said the count brutally, turning to his wife, “if you give me +a child ten months after my death, I cannot help it; but be careful that +you are not brought to bed in seven months!” + +“What would you do then, old bear?” asked the young Marquis de Verneuil, +thinking that the count was joking. + +“I should wring the necks of mother and child!” + +An answer so peremptory closed the discussion, imprudently started by +a seigneur from Lower Normandy. The guests were silent, looking with a +sort of terror at the pretty Comtesse d’Herouville. All were convinced +that if such an event occurred, her savage lord would execute his +threat. + +The words of the count echoed in the bosom of the young wife, then +pregnant; one of those presentiments which furrow a track like lightning +through the soul, told her that her child would be born at seven months. +An inward heat overflowed her from head to foot, sending the life’s +blood to her heart with such violence that the surface of her body felt +bathed in ice. From that hour not a day had passed that the sense of +secret terror did not check every impulse of her innocent gaiety. The +memory of the look, of the inflections of voice with which the +count accompanied his words, still froze her blood, and silenced her +sufferings, as she leaned over that sleeping head, and strove to see +some sign of a pity she had vainly sought there when awake. + +The child, threatened with death before its life began, made so vigorous +a movement that she cried aloud, in a voice that seemed like a sigh, +“Poor babe!” + +She said no more; there are ideas that a mother cannot bear. Incapable +of reasoning at this moment, the countess was almost choked with the +intensity of a suffering as yet unknown to her. Two tears, escaping from +her eyes, rolled slowly down her cheeks, and traced two shining lines, +remaining suspended at the bottom of that white face, like dewdrops on +a lily. What learned man would take upon himself to say that the child +unborn is on some neutral ground, where the emotions of its mother do +not penetrate during those hours when soul clasps body and communicates +its impressions, when thought permeates blood with healing balm or +poisonous fluids? The terror that shakes the tree, will it not hurt the +fruit? Those words, “Poor babe!” were they dictated by a vision of the +future? The shuddering of this mother was violent; her look piercing. + +The bloody answer given by the count at the banquet was a link +mysteriously connecting the past with this premature confinement. That +odious suspicion, thus publicly expressed, had cast into the memories of +the countess a dread which echoed to the future. Since that fatal gala, +she had driven from her mind, with as much fear as another woman would +have found pleasure in evoking them, a thousand scattered scenes of her +past existence. She refused even to think of the happy days when her +heart was free to love. Like as the melodies of their native land make +exiles weep, so these memories revived sensations so delightful that +her young conscience thought them crimes, and sued them to enforce still +further the savage threat of the count. There lay the secret of the +horror which was now oppressing her soul. + +Sleeping figures possess a sort of suavity, due to the absolute repose +of both body and mind; but though that species of calmness softened +but slightly the harsh expression of the count’s features, all illusion +granted to the unhappy is so persuasive that the poor wife ended +by finding hope in that tranquillity. The roar of the tempest, now +descending in torrents of rain, seemed to her no more than a melancholy +moan; her fears and her pains both yielded her a momentary respite. +Contemplating the man to whom her life was bound, the countess +allowed herself to float into a reverie, the sweetness of which was so +intoxicating that she had no strength to break its charm. For a moment, +by one of those visions which in some way share the divine power, there +passed before her rapid images of a happiness lost beyond recall. + +Jeanne in her vision saw faintly, and as if in a distant gleam of dawn, +the modest castle where her careless childhood had glided on; there were +the verdant lawns, the rippling brook, the little chamber, the scenes +of her happy play. She saw herself gathering flowers and planting them, +unknowing why they wilted and would not grow, despite her constancy in +watering them. Next, she saw confusedly the vast town and the vast house +blackened by age, to which her mother took her when she was seven years +old. Her lively memory showed her the old gray heads of the masters who +taught and tormented her. She remembered the person of her father; she +saw him getting off his mule at the door of the manor-house, and taking +her by the hand to lead her up the stairs; she recalled how her prattle +drove from his brow the judicial cares he did not always lay aside +with his black or his red robes, the white fur of which fell one day by +chance under the snipping of her mischievous scissors. She cast but one +glance at the confessor of her aunt, the mother-superior of a convent +of Poor Clares, a rigid and fanatical old man, whose duty it was to +initiate her into the mysteries of religion. Hardened by the severities +necessary against heretics, the old priest never ceased to jangle the +chains of hell; he told her of nothing but the vengeance of Heaven, and +made her tremble with the assurance that God’s eye was on her. Rendered +timid, she dared not raise her eyes in the priest’s presence, and ceased +to have any feeling but respect for her mother, whom up to that time she +had made a sharer in all her frolics. When she saw that beloved mother +turning her blue eyes towards her with an appearance of anger, a +religious terror took possession of the girl’s heart. + +Then suddenly the vision took her to the second period of her childhood, +when as yet she understood nothing of the things of life. She thought +with an almost mocking regret of the days when all her happiness was to +work beside her mother in the tapestried salon, to pray in the church, +to sing her ballads to a lute, to read in secret a romance of chivalry, +to pluck the petals of a flower, discover what gift her father would +make her on the feast of the Blessed Saint-John, and find out the +meaning of speeches repressed before her. Passing thus from her childish +joys through the sixteen years of her girlhood, the grace of those +softly flowing years when she knew no pain was eclipsed by the +brightness of a memory precious though ill-fated. The joyous peace +of her childhood was far less sweet to her than a single one of the +troubles scattered upon the last two years of her childhood,--years that +were rich in treasures now buried forever in her heart. + +The vision brought her suddenly to that morning, that ravishing morning, +when in the grand old parlor panelled and carved in oak, which served +the family as a dining-room, she saw her handsome cousin for the first +time. Alarmed by the seditions in Paris, her mother’s family had sent +the young courtier to Rouen, hoping that he could there be trained to +the duties of the magistracy by his uncle, whose office might some day +devolve upon him. The countess smiled involuntarily as she remembered +the haste with which she retired on seeing this relation whom she did +not know. But, in spite of the rapidity with which she opened and +shut the door, a single glance had put into her soul so vigorous an +impression of the scene that even at this moment she seemed to see it +still occurring. Her eye again wandered from the violet velvet mantle +embroidered with gold and lined with satin to the spurs on the boots, +the pretty lozenges slashed into the doublet, the trunk-hose, and the +rich collaret which gave to view a throat as white as the lace around +it. She stroked with her hand the handsome face with its tiny pointed +moustache, and “royale” as small as the ermine tips upon her father’s +hood. + +In the silence of the night, with her eyes fixed on the green silk +curtains which she no longer saw, the countess, forgetting the storm, +her husband, and her fears, recalled the days which seemed to her +longer than years, so full were they,--days when she loved, and was +beloved!--and the moment when, fearing her mother’s sternness, she +had slipped one morning into her father’s study to whisper her girlish +confidences on his knee, waiting for his smile at her caresses to say +in his ear, “Will you scold me if I tell you something?” Once more she +heard her father say, after a few questions in reply to which she spoke +for the first time of her love, “Well, well, my child, we will think +of it. If he studies well, if he fits himself to succeed me, if he +continues to please you, I will be on your side.” + +After that she had listened no longer; she had kissed her father, and, +knocking over his papers as she ran from the room, she flew to the great +linden-tree where, daily, before her formidable mother rose, she met +that charming cousin, Georges de Chaverny. + +Faithfully the youth promised to study law and customs. He laid aside +the splendid trappings of the nobility of the sword to wear the sterner +costume of the magistracy. + +“I like you better in black,” she said. + +It was a falsehood, but by that falsehood she comforted her lover for +having thrown his dagger to the winds. The memory of the little schemes +employed to deceive her mother, whose severity seemed great, brought +back to her the soulful joys of that innocent and mutual and sanctioned +love; sometimes a rendezvous beneath the linden, where speech could +be freer than before witnesses; sometimes a furtive clasp, or a stolen +kiss,--in short, all the naive instalments of a passion that did not +pass the bounds of modesty. Reliving in her vision those delightful days +when she seemed to have too much happiness, she fancied that she kissed, +in the void, that fine young face with the glowing eyes, that rosy +mouth that spoke so well of love. Yes, she had loved Chaverny, poor +apparently; but what treasures had she not discovered in that soul as +tender as it was strong! + +Suddenly her father died. Chaverny did not succeed him. The flames +of civil war burst forth. By Chaverny’s care she and her mother found +refuge in a little town of Lower Normandy. Soon the deaths of other +relatives made her one of the richest heiresses in France. Happiness +disappeared as wealth came to her. The savage and terrible face of Comte +d’Herouville, who asked her hand, rose before her like a thunder-cloud, +spreading its gloom over the smiling meadows so lately gilded by the +sun. The poor countess strove to cast from her memory the scenes of +weeping and despair brought about by her long resistance. + +At last came an awful night when her mother, pale and dying, threw +herself at her daughter’s feet. Jeanne could save Chaverny’s life by +yielding; she yielded. It was night. The count, arriving bloody from +the battlefield was there; all was ready, the priest, the altar, the +torches! Jeanne belonged henceforth to misery. Scarcely had she time to +say to her young cousin who was set at liberty:-- + +“Georges, if you love me, never see me again!” + +She heard the departing steps of her lover, whom, in truth, she never +saw again; but in the depths of her heart she still kept sacred his last +look which returned perpetually in her dreams and illumined them. Living +like a cat shut into a lion’s cage, the young wife dreaded at all hours +the claws of the master which ever threatened her. She knew that in +order to be happy she must forget the past and think only of the future; +but there were days, consecrated to the memory of some vanished joy, +when she deliberately made it a crime to put on the gown she had worn on +the day she had seen her lover for the first time. + +“I am not guilty,” she said, “but if I seem guilty to the count it is as +if I were so. Perhaps I am! The Holy Virgin conceived without--” + +She stopped. During this moment when her thoughts were misty and her +soul floated in a region of fantasy her naivete made her attribute to +that last look with which her lover transfixed her the occult power of +the visitation of the angel to the Mother of her Lord. This supposition, +worthy of the days of innocence to which her reverie had carried her +back, vanished before the memory of a conjugal scene more odious than +death. The poor countess could have no real doubt as to the legitimacy +of the child that stirred in her womb. The night of her marriage +reappeared to her in all the horror if its agony, bringing in its train +other such nights and sadder days. + +“Ah! my poor Chaverny!” she cried, weeping, “you so respectful, so +gracious, YOU were always kind to me.” + +She turned her eyes to her husband as if to persuade herself that that +harsh face contained a promise of mercy, dearly brought. The count was +awake. His yellow eyes, clear as those of a tiger, glittered beneath +their tufted eyebrows and never had his glance been so incisive. The +countess, terrified at having encountered it, slid back under the great +counterpane and was motionless. + +“Why are you weeping?” said the count, pulling away the covering which +hid his wife. + +That voice, always a terror to her, had a specious softness at this +moment which seemed to her of good augury. + +“I suffer much,” she answered. + +“Well, my pretty one, it is no crime to suffer; why did you tremble when +I looked at you? Alas! what must I do to be loved?” The wrinkles of his +forehead between the eyebrows deepened. “I see plainly you are afraid of +me,” he added, sighing. + +Prompted by the instinct of feeble natures the countess interrupted the +count by moans, exclaiming:-- + +“I fear a miscarriage! I clambered over the rocks last evening and tired +myself.” + +Hearing those words, the count cast so horribly suspicious a look upon +his wife, that she reddened and shuddered. He mistook the fear of the +innocent creature for remorse. + +“Perhaps it is the beginning of a regular childbirth,” he said. + +“What then?” she said. + +“In any case, I must have a proper man here,” he said. “I will fetch +one.” + +The gloomy look which accompanied these words overcame the countess, +who fell back in the bed with a moan, caused more by a sense of her fate +than by the agony of the coming crisis; that moan convinced the count of +the justice of the suspicions that were rising in his mind. Affecting +a calmness which the tones of his voice, his gestures, and looks +contradicted, he rose hastily, wrapped himself in a dressing-gown which +lay on a chair, and began by locking a door near the chimney through +which the state bedroom was entered from the reception rooms which +communicated with the great staircase. + +Seeing her husband pocket that key, the countess had a presentiment of +danger. She next heard him open the door opposite to that which he had +just locked and enter a room where the counts of Herouville slept when +they did not honor their wives with their noble company. The countess +knew of that room only by hearsay. Jealousy kept her husband always with +her. If occasionally some military expedition forced him to leave her, +the count left more than one Argus, whose incessant spying proved his +shameful distrust. + +In spite of the attention the countess now gave to the slightest noise, +she heard nothing more. The count had, in fact, entered a long gallery +leading from his room which continued down the western wing of the +castle. Cardinal d’Herouville, his great-uncle, a passionate lover of +the works of printing, had there collected a library as interesting for +the number as for the beauty of its volumes, and prudence had caused +him to build into the walls one of those curious inventions suggested by +solitude or by monastic fears. A silver chain set in motion, by means of +invisible wires, a bell placed at the bed’s head of a faithful servitor. +The count now pulled the chain, and the boots and spurs of the man on +duty sounded on the stone steps of a spiral staircase, placed in the +tall tower which flanked the western corner of the chateau on the ocean +side. + +When the count heard the steps of his retainer he pulled back the rusty +bolts which protected the door leading from the gallery to the tower, +admitting into the sanctuary of learning a man of arms whose stalwart +appearance was in keeping with that of his master. This man, scarcely +awakened, seemed to have walked there by instinct; the horn lantern +which he held in his hand threw so feeble a gleam down the long library +that his master and he appeared in that visible darkness like two +phantoms. + +“Saddle my war-horse instantly, and come with me yourself.” + +This order was given in a deep tone which roused the man’s intelligence. +He raised his eyes to those of his master and encountered so piercing a +look that the effect was that of an electric shock. + +“Bertrand,” added the count laying his right hand on the servant’s +arm, “take off your cuirass, and wear the uniform of a captain of +guerrillas.” + +“Heavens and earth, monseigneur! What? disguise myself as a Leaguer! +Excuse me, I will obey you; but I would rather be hanged.” + +The count smiled; then to efface that smile, which contrasted with the +expression of his face, he answered roughly:-- + +“Choose the strongest horse there is in the stable and follow me. We +shall ride like balls shot from an arquebuse. Be ready when I am ready. +I will ring to let you know.” + +Bertrand bowed in silence and went away; but when he had gone a few +steps he said to himself, as he listened to the howling of the storm:-- + +“All the devils are abroad, jarnidieu! I’d have been surprised to +see this one stay quietly in his bed. We took Saint-Lo in just such a +tempest as this.” + +The count kept in his room a disguise which often served him in his +campaign stratagems. Putting on the shabby buff-coat that looked as +thought it might belong to one of the poor horse-soldiers whose pittance +was so seldom paid by Henri IV., he returned to the room where his wife +was moaning. + +“Try to suffer patiently,” he said to her. “I will founder my horse if +necessary to bring you speedy relief.” + +These words were certainly not alarming, and the countess, emboldened by +them, was about to make a request when the count asked her suddenly:-- + +“Tell me where you keep your masks?” + +“My masks!” she replied. “Good God! what do you want to do with them?” + +“Where are they?” he repeated, with his usual violence. + +“In the chest,” she said. + +She shuddered when she saw her husband select from among her masks a +“touret de nez,” the wearing of which was as common among the ladies of +that time as the wearing of gloves in our day. The count became entirely +unrecognizable after he had put on an old gray felt hat with a broken +cock’s feather on his head. He girded round his loins a broad leathern +belt, in which he stuck a dagger, which he did not wear habitually. +These miserable garments gave him so terrifying an air and he approached +the bed with so strange a motion that the countess thought her last hour +had come. + +“Ah! don’t kill us!” she cried, “leave me my child, and I will love you +well.” + +“You must feel yourself very guilty to offer as the ransom of your +faults the love you owe me.” + +The count’s voice was lugubrious and the bitter words were enforced by a +look which fell like lead upon the countess. + +“My God!” she cried sorrowfully, “can innocence be fatal?” + +“Your death is not in question,” said her master, coming out of a sort +of reverie into which he had fallen. “You are to do exactly, and for +love of me, what I shall now tell you.” + +He flung upon the bed one of the two masks he had taken from the chest, +and smiled with derision as he saw the gesture of involuntary fear which +the slight shock of the black velvet wrung from his wife. + +“You will give me a puny child!” he cried. “Wear that mask on your face +when I return. I’ll have no barber-surgeon boast that he has seen the +Comtesse d’Herouville.” + +“A man!--why choose a man for the purpose?” she said in a feeble voice. + +“Ho! ho! my lady, am I not master here?” replied the count. + +“What matters one horror the more!” murmured the countess; but her +master had disappeared, and the exclamation did her no injury. + +Presently, in a brief lull of the storm, the countess heard the gallop +of two horses which seemed to fly across the sandy dunes by which the +castle was surrounded. The sound was quickly lost in that of the waves. +Soon she felt herself a prisoner in the vast apartment, alone in the +midst of a night both silent and threatening, and without succor against +an evil she saw approaching her with rapid strides. In vain she sought +for some stratagem by which to save that child conceived in tears, +already her consolation, the spring of all her thoughts, the future of +her affections, her one frail hope. + +Sustained by maternal courage, she took the horn with which her husband +summoned his men, and, opening a window, blew through the brass tube +feeble notes that died away upon the vast expanse of water, like a +bubble blown into the air by a child. She felt the uselessness of that +moan unheard of men, and turned to hasten through the apartments, hoping +that all the issues were not closed upon her. Reaching the library she +sought in vain for some secret passage; then, passing between the long +rows of books, she reached a window which looked upon the courtyard. +Again she sounded the horn, but without success against the voice of the +hurricane. + +In her helplessness she thought of trusting herself to one of the +women,--all creatures of her husband,--when, passing into her oratory, +she found that the count had locked the only door that led to their +apartments. This was a horrible discovery. Such precautions taken +to isolate her showed a desire to proceed without witnesses to some +horrible execution. As moment after moment she lost hope, the pangs of +childbirth grew stronger and keener. A presentiment of murder, joined +to the fatigue of her efforts, overcame her last remaining strength. She +was like a shipwrecked man who sinks, borne under by one last wave less +furious than others he has vanquished. The bewildering pangs of her +condition kept her from knowing the lapse of time. At the moment when +she felt that, alone, without help, she was about to give birth to her +child, and to all her other terrors was added that of the accidents to +which her ignorance exposed her, the count appeared, without a sound +that let her know of his arrival. The man was there, like a demon +claiming at the close of a compact the soul that was sold to him. +He muttered angrily at finding his wife’s face uncovered; then after +masking her carefully, he took her in his arms and laid her on the bed +in her chamber. + + + + +CHAPTER II. THE BONESETTER + + +The terror of that apparition and hasty removal stopped for a moment +the physical sufferings of the countess, and so enabled her to cast +a furtive glance at the actors in this mysterious scene. She did not +recognize Bertrand, who was there disguised and masked as carefully as +his master. After lighting in haste some candles, the light of which +mingled with the first rays of the sun which were reddening the window +panes, the old servitor had gone to the embrasure of a window and stood +leaning against a corner of it. There, with his face towards the wall, +he seemed to be estimating its thickness, keeping his body in such +absolute immobility that he might have been taken for a statue. In the +middle of the room the countess beheld a short, stout man, apparently +out of breath and stupefied, whose eyes were blindfolded and his +features so distorted with terror that it was impossible to guess at +their natural expression. + +“God’s death! you scamp,” said the count, giving him back his eyesight +by a rough movement which threw upon the man’s neck the bandage that had +been upon his eyes. “I warn you not to look at anything but the wretched +woman on whom you are now to exercise your skill; if you do, I’ll fling +you into the river that flows beneath those windows, with a collar round +your neck weighing a hundred pounds!” + +With that, he pulled down upon the breast of his stupefied hearer the +cravat with which his eyes had been bandaged. + +“Examine first if this can be a miscarriage,” he continued; “in which +case your life will answer to me for the mother’s; but, if the child is +living, you are to bring it to me.” + +So saying, the count seized the poor operator by the body and placed him +before the countess, then he went himself to the depths of a bay-window +and began to drum with his fingers upon the panes, casting glances +alternately on his serving-man, on the bed, and at the ocean, as if he +were pledging to the expected child a cradle in the waves. + +The man whom, with outrageous violence, the count and Bertrand had +snatched from his bed and fastened to the crupper of the latter’s +horse, was a personage whose individuality may serve to characterize the +period,--a man, moreover, whose influence was destined to make itself +felt in the house of Herouville. + +Never in any age were the nobles so little informed as to natural +science, and never was judicial astrology held in greater honor; for +at no period in history was there a greater general desire to know +the future. This ignorance and this curiosity had led to the utmost +confusion in human knowledge; all things were still mere personal +experience; the nomenclatures of theory did not exist; printing was done +at enormous cost; scientific communication had little or no facility; +the Church persecuted science and all research which was based on the +analysis of natural phenomena. Persecution begat mystery. So, to the +people as well as to the nobles, physician and alchemist, mathematician +and astronomer, astrologer and necromancer were six attributes, all +meeting in the single person of the physician. In those days a superior +physician was supposed to be cultivating magic; while curing his patient +he was drawing their horoscopes. Princes protected the men of genius who +were willing to reveal the future; they lodged them in their palaces +and pensioned them. The famous Cornelius Agrippa, who came to France +to become the physician of Henri II., would not consent, as Nostradamus +did, to predict the future, and for this reason he was dismissed by +Catherine de’ Medici, who replaced him with Cosmo Ruggiero. The men +of science, who were superior to their times, were therefore seldom +appreciated; they simply inspired an ignorant fear of occult sciences +and their results. + +Without being precisely one of the famous mathematicians, the man whom +the count had brought enjoyed in Normandy the equivocal reputation +which attached to a physician who was known to do mysterious works. +He belonged to the class of sorcerers who are still called in parts of +France “bonesetters.” This name belonged to certain untutored geniuses +who, without apparent study, but by means of hereditary knowledge and +the effect of long practice, the observations of which accumulated in +the family, were bonesetters; that is, they mended broken limbs and +cured both men and beasts of certain maladies, possessing secrets said +to be marvellous for the treatment of serious cases. But not only had +Maitre Antoine Beauvouloir (the name of the present bonesetter) a father +and grandfather who were famous practitioners, from whom he inherited +important traditions, he was also learned in medicine, and was given to +the study of natural science. The country people saw his study full of +books and other strange things which gave to his successes a coloring +of magic. Without passing strictly for a sorcerer, Antoine Beauvouloir +impressed the populace through a circumference of a hundred miles with +respect akin to terror, and (what was far more really dangerous for +himself) he held in his power many secrets of life and death which +concerned the noble families of that region. Like his father and +grandfather before him, he was celebrated for his skill in confinements +and miscarriages. In those days of unbridled disorder, crimes were so +frequent and passions so violent that the higher nobility often found +itself compelled to initiate Maitre Antoine Beauvouloir into secrets +both shameful and terrible. His discretion, so essential to his safety, +was absolute; consequently his clients paid him well, and his hereditary +practice greatly increased. Always on the road, sometimes roused in the +dead of night, as on this occasion by the count, sometimes obliged to +spend several days with certain great ladies, he had never married; in +fact, his reputation had hindered certain young women from accepting +him. Incapable of finding consolation in the practice of his profession, +which gave him such power over feminine weakness, the poor bonesetter +felt himself born for the joys of family and yet was unable to obtain +them. + +The good man’s excellent heart was concealed by a misleading appearance +of joviality in keeping with his puffy cheeks and rotund figure, the +vivacity of his fat little body, and the frankness of his speech. He was +anxious to marry that he might have a daughter who should transfer his +property to some poor noble; he did not like his station as bonesetter +and wished to rescue his family name from the position in which the +prejudices of the times had placed it. He himself took willingly enough +to the feasts and jovialities which usually followed his principal +operations. The habit of being on such occasions the most important +personage in the company, had added to his natural gaiety a sufficient +dose of serious vanity. His impertinences were usually well received in +crucial moments when it often pleased him to perform his operations with +a certain slow majesty. He was, in other respects, as inquisitive as a +nightingale, as greedy as a hound, and as garrulous as all diplomatists +who talk incessantly and betray no secrets. In spite of these defects +developed in him by the endless adventures into which his profession led +him, Antoine Beauvouloir was held to be the least bad man in Normandy. +Though he belonged to the small number of minds who are superior to +their epoch, the strong good sense of a Norman countryman warned him +to conceal the ideas he acquired and the truths he from time to time +discovered. + +As soon as he found himself placed by the count in presence of a woman +in childbirth, the bonesetter recovered his presence of mind. He felt +the pulse of the masked lady; not that he gave it a single thought, but +under cover of that medical action he could reflect, and he did reflect +on his own situation. In none of the shameful and criminal intrigues in +which superior force had compelled him to act as a blind instrument, +had precautions been taken with such mystery as in this case. Though his +death had often been threatened as a means of assuring the secrecy of +enterprises in which he had taken part against his will, his life had +never been so endangered as at that moment. He resolved, before all +things, to find out who it was who now employed him, and to discover +the actual extent of his danger, in order to save, if possible, his own +little person. + +“What is the trouble?” he said to the countess in a low voice, as he +placed her in a manner to receive his help. + +“Do not give him the child--” + +“Speak loud!” cried the count in thundering tones which prevented +Beauvouloir from hearing the last word uttered by the countess. “If +not,” added the count who was careful to disguise his voice, “say your +‘In manus.’” + +“Complain aloud,” said the leech to the lady; “cry! scream! Jarnidieu! +that man has a necklace that won’t fit you any better than me. Courage, +my little lady!” + +“Touch her lightly!” cried the count. + +“Monsieur is jealous,” said the operator in a shrill voice, fortunately +drowned by the countess’s cries. + +For Maitre Beauvouloir’s safety Nature was merciful. It was more a +miscarriage than a regular birth, and the child was so puny that it +caused little suffering to the mother. + +“Holy Virgin!” cried the bonesetter, “it isn’t a miscarriage, after +all!” + +The count made the floor shake as he stamped with rage. The countess +pinched Beauvouloir. + +“Ah! I see!” he said to himself. “It ought to be a premature birth, +ought it?” he whispered to the countess, who replied with an affirmative +sign, as if that gesture were the only language in which to express her +thoughts. + +“It is not all clear to me yet,” thought the bonesetter. + +Like all men in constant practice, he recognized at once a woman in her +first trouble as he called it. Though the modest inexperience of +certain gestures showed him the virgin ignorance of the countess, the +mischievous operator exclaimed:-- + +“Madame is delivered as if she knew all about it!” + +The count then said, with a calmness more terrifying than his anger:-- + +“Give me the child.” + +“Don’t give it him, for the love of God!” cried the mother, whose almost +savage cry awoke in the heart of the little man a courageous pity which +attached him, more than he knew himself, to the helpless infant rejected +by his father. + +“The child is not yet born; you are counting your chicken before it is +hatched,” he said, coldly, hiding the infant. + +Surprised to hear no cries, he examined the child, thinking it dead. The +count, seeing the deception, sprang upon him with one bound. + +“God of heaven! will you give it to me?” he cried, snatching the hapless +victim which uttered feeble cries. + +“Take care; the child is deformed and almost lifeless; it is a seven +months’ child,” said Beauvouloir clinging to the count’s arm. Then, with +a strength given to him by the excitement of his pity, he clung to the +father’s fingers, whispering in a broken voice: “Spare yourself a crime, +the child cannot live.” + +“Wretch!” replied the count, from whose hands the bonesetter had +wrenched the child, “who told you that I wished to kill my son? Could I +not caress it?” + +“Wait till he is eighteen years old to caress him in that way,” replied +Beauvouloir, recovering the sense of his importance. “But,” he +added, thinking of his own safety, for he had recognized the Comte +d’Herouville, who in his rage had forgotten to disguise his voice, “have +him baptized at once and do not speak of his danger to the mother, or +you will kill her.” + +The gesture of satisfaction which escaped the count when the child’s +death was prophesied, suggested this speech to the bonesetter as the +best means of saving the child at the moment. Beauvouloir now hastened +to carry the infant back to its mother who had fainted, and he pointed +to her condition reprovingly, to warn the count of the results of his +violence. The countess had heard all; for in many of the great crises +of life the human organs acquire an otherwise unknown delicacy. But the +cries of the child, laid beside her on the bed, restored her to life +as if by magic; she fancied she heard the voices of angels, when, under +cover of the whimperings of the babe, the bonesetter said in her ear:-- + +“Take care of him, and he’ll live a hundred years. Beauvouloir knows +what he is talking about.” + +A celestial sigh, a silent pressure of the hand were the reward of the +leech, who had looked to see, before yielding the frail little creature +to its mother’s embrace, whether that of the father had done no harm to +its puny organization. The half-crazed motion with which the mother hid +her son beside her and the threatening glance she cast upon the count +through the eye-holes of her mask, made Beauvouloir shudder. + +“She will die if she loses that child too soon,” he said to the count. + +During the latter part of this scene the lord of Herouville seemed to +hear and see nothing. Rigid, and as if absorbed in meditation, he stood +by the window drumming on its panes. But he turned at the last words +uttered by the bonesetter, with an almost frenzied motion, and came to +him with uplifted dagger. + +“Miserable clown!” he cried, giving him the opprobrious name by which +the Royalists insulted the Leaguers. “Impudent scoundrel! your science +which makes you the accomplice of men who steal inheritances is all that +prevents me from depriving Normandy of her sorcerer.” + +So saying, and to Beauvouloir’s great satisfaction, the count replaced +the dagger in its sheath. + +“Could you not,” continued the count, “find yourself for once in +your life in the honorable company of a noble and his wife, without +suspecting them of the base crimes and trickery of your own kind? Kill +my son! take him from his mother! Where did you get such crazy ideas? +Am I a madman? Why do you attempt to frighten me about the life of that +vigorous child? Fool! I defy your silly talk--but remember this, since +you are here, your miserable life shall answer for that of the mother +and the child.” + +The bonesetter was puzzled by this sudden change in the count’s +intentions. This show of tenderness for the infant alarmed him far more +than the impatient cruelty and savage indifference hitherto manifested +by the count, whose tone in pronouncing the last words seemed to +Beauvouloir to point to some better scheme for reaching his infernal +ends. The shrewd practitioner turned this idea over in his mind until a +light struck him. + +“I have it!” he said to himself. “This great and good noble does not +want to make himself odious to his wife; he’ll trust to the vials of the +apothecary. I must warn the lady to see to the food and medicine of her +babe.” + +As he turned toward the bed, the count who had opened a closet, stopped +him with an imperious gesture, holding out a purse. Beauvouloir saw +within its red silk meshes a quantity of gold, which the count now flung +to him contemptuously. + +“Though you make me out a villain I am not released from the obligation +of paying you like a lord. I shall not ask you to be discreet. This man +here,” (pointing to Bertrand) “will explain to you that there are rivers +and trees everywhere for miserable wretches who chatter of me.” + +So saying the count advanced slowly to the bonesetter, pushed a chair +noisily toward him, as if to invite him to sit down, as he did himself +by the bedside; then he said to his wife in a specious voice:-- + +“Well, my pretty one, so we have a son; this is a joyful thing for us. +Do you suffer much?” + +“No,” murmured the countess. + +The evident surprise of the mother, and the tardy demonstrations of +pleasure on the part of the father, convinced Beauvouloir that there +was some incident behind all this which escaped his penetration. He +persisted in his suspicion, and rested his hand on that of the young +wife, less to watch her condition than to convey to her some advice. + +“The skin is good, I fear nothing for madame. The milk fever will come, +of course; but you need not be alarmed; that is nothing.” + +At this point the wily bonesetter paused, and pressed the hand of the +countess to make her attentive to his words. + +“If you wish to avoid all anxiety about your son, madame,” he continued, +“never leave him; suckle him yourself, and beware of the drugs of +apothecaries. The mother’s breast is the remedy for all the ills of +infancy. I have seen many births of seven months’ children, but I never +saw any so little painful as this. But that is not surprising; the child +is so small. You could put him in a wooden shoe! I am certain he doesn’t +weight more than sixteen ounces. Milk, milk, milk. Keep him always on +your breast and you will save him.” + +These last words were accompanied by a significant pressure of the +fingers. Disregarding the yellow flames flashing from the eyeholes +of the count’s mask, Beauvouloir uttered these words with the serious +imperturbability of a man who intends to earn his money. + +“Ho! ho! bonesetter, you are leaving your old felt hat behind you,” said +Bertrand, as the two left the bedroom together. + +The reasons of the sudden mercy which the count had shown to his son +were to be found in a notary’s office. At the moment when Beauvouloir +arrested his murderous hand avarice and the Legal Custom of Normandy +rose up before him. Those mighty powers stiffened his fingers and +silenced the passion of his hatred. One cried out to him, “The property +of your wife cannot belong to the house of Herouville except through +a male child.” The other pointed to a dying countess and her fortune +claimed by the collateral heirs of the Saint-Savins. Both advised him +to leave to nature the extinction of that hated child, and to wait the +birth of a second son who might be healthy and vigorous before getting +rid of his wife and first-born. He saw neither wife nor child; he saw +the estates only, and hatred was softened by ambition. The mother, who +knew his nature, was even more surprised than the bonesetter, and she +still retained her instinctive fears, showing them at times openly, for +the courage of mothers seemed suddenly to have doubled her strength. + + + + +CHAPTER III. THE MOTHER’S LOVE + + +For several days the count remained assiduously beside his wife, showing +her attentions to which self-interest imparted a sort of tenderness. +The countess saw, however, that she alone was the object of these +attentions. The hatred of the father for his son showed itself in every +detail; he abstained from looking at him or touching him; he would rise +abruptly and leave the room if the child cried; in short, he seemed to +endure it living only through the hope of seeing it die. But even this +self-restraint was galling to the count. The day on which he saw that +the mother’s intelligent eye perceived, without fully comprehending, +the danger that threatened her son, he announced his departure on the +morning after the mass for her churching was solemnized, under pretext +of rallying his forces to the support of the king. + +Such were the circumstances which preceded and accompanied the birth of +Etienne d’Herouville. If the count had no other reason for wishing the +death of this disowned son poor Etienne would still have been the +object of his aversion. In his eyes the misfortune of a rickety, sickly +constitution was a flagrant offence to his self-love as a father. If +he execrated handsome men, he also detested weakly ones, in whom mental +capacity took the place of physical strength. To please him a man should +be ugly in face, tall, robust, and ignorant. Etienne, whose debility +would bow him, as it were, to the sedentary occupations of knowledge, +was certain to find in his father a natural enemy. His struggle with +that colossus began therefore from his cradle, and his sole support +against that cruel antagonist was the heart of his mother whose love +increased, by a tender law of nature, as perils threatened him. + +Buried in solitude after the abrupt departure of the count, Jeanne +de Saint-Savin owed to her child the only semblance of happiness that +consoled her life. She loved him as women love the child of an illicit +love; obliged to suckle him, the duty never wearied her. She would not +let her women care for the child. She dressed and undressed him, finding +fresh pleasures in every little care that he required. Happiness glowed +upon her face as she obeyed the needs of the little being. As Etienne +had come into the world prematurely, no clothes were ready for him, +and those that were needed she made herself,--with what perfection, you +know, ye mothers, who have worked in silence for a treasured child. The +days had never hours long enough for these manifold occupations and the +minute precautions of the nursing mother; those days fled by, laden with +her secret content. + +The counsel of the bonesetter still continued in the countess’s mind. +She feared for her child, and would gladly not have slept in order to +be sure that no one approached him during her sleep; and she kept his +cradle beside her bed. In the absence of the count she ventured to send +for the bonesetter, whose name she had caught and remembered. To her, +Beauvouloir was a being to whom she owed an untold debt of gratitude; +and she desired of all things to question him on certain points relating +to her son. If an attempt were made to poison him, how should she foil +it? In what way ought she to manage his frail constitution? Was it well +to nurse him long? If she died, would Beauvouloir undertake the care of +the poor child’s health? + +To the questions of the countess, Beauvouloir, deeply touched, replied +that he feared, as much as she did, an attempt to poison Etienne; but +there was, he assured her, no danger as long as she nursed the child; +and in future, when obliged to feed him, she must taste the food +herself. + +“If Madame la comtesse,” he said, “feels anything strange upon her +tongue, a prickly, bitter, strong salt taste, reject the food. Let the +child’s clothes be washed under her own eye and let her keep the key of +the chest which contains them. Should anything happen to the child send +instantly to me.” + +These instructions sank deep into Jeanne’s heart. She begged Beauvouloir +to regard her always as one who would do him any service in her power. +On that the poor man told her that she held his happiness in her hands. + +Then he related briefly how the Comte d’Herouville had in his youth +loved a courtesan, known by the name of La Belle Romaine, who had +formerly belonged to the Cardinal of Lorraine. Abandoned by the +count before very long, she had died miserably, leaving a child named +Gertrude, who had been rescued by the Sisters of the Convent of Poor +Clares, the Mother Superior of which was Mademoiselle de Saint-Savin, +the countess’s aunt. Having been called to treat Gertrude for an +illness, he, Beauvouloir, had fallen in love with her, and if Madame la +comtesse, he said, would undertake the affair, she should not only more +than repay him for what she thought he had done for her, but she would +make him grateful to her for life. The count might, sooner or later, +be brought to take an interest in so beautiful a daughter, and might +protect her indirectly by making him his physician. + +The countess, compassionate to all true love, promised to do her best, +and pursued the affair so warmly that at the birth of her second son she +did obtain from her husband a “dot” for the young girl, who was married +soon after to Beauvouloir. The “dot” and his savings enabled the +bonesetter to buy a charming estate called Forcalier near the castle +of Herouville, and to give his life the dignity of a student and man of +learning. + +Comforted by the kind physician, the countess felt that to her were +given joys unknown to other mothers. Mother and child, two feeble +beings, seemed united in one thought, they understood each other long +before language could interpret between them. From the moment when +Etienne first turned his eyes on things about him with the stupid +eagerness of a little child, his glance had rested on the sombre +hangings of the castle walls. When his young ear strove to listen and to +distinguish sounds, he heard the monotonous ebb and flow of the sea +upon the rocks, as regular as the swinging of a pendulum. Thus places, +sounds, and things, all that strikes the senses and forms the character, +inclined him to melancholy. His mother, too, was doomed to live and die +in the clouds of melancholy; and to him, from his birth up, she was the +only being that existed on the earth, and filled for him the desert. +Like all frail children, Etienne’s attitude was passive, and in that he +resembled his mother. The delicacy of his organs was such that a sudden +noise, or the presence of a boisterous person gave him a sort of fever. +He was like those little insects for whom God seems to temper the +violence of the wind and the heat of the sun; incapable, like them, +of struggling against the slightest obstacle, he yielded, as they +do, without resistance or complaint, to everything that seemed to him +aggressive. This angelic patience inspired in the mother a sentiment +which took away all fatigue from the incessant care required by so frail +a being. + +Soon his precocious perception of suffering revealed to him the power +that he had upon his mother; often he tried to divert her with caresses +and make her smile at his play; and never did his coaxing hands, his +stammered words, his intelligent laugh fail to rouse her from her +reverie. If he was tired, his care for her kept him from complaining. + +“Poor, dear, little sensitive!” cried the countess as he fell asleep +tired with some play which had driven the sad memories from her mind, +“how can you live in this world? who will understand you? who will love +you? who will see the treasures hidden in that frail body? No one! Like +me, you are alone on earth.” + +She sighed and wept. The graceful pose of her child lying on her knees +made her smile sadly. She looked at him long, tasting one of those +pleasures which are a secret between mothers and God. Etienne’s weakness +was so great that until he was a year and a half old she had never +dared to take him out of doors; but now the faint color which tinted the +whiteness of his skin like the petals of a wild rose, showed that life +and health were already there. + +One morning the countess, giving herself up to the glad joy of all +mothers when their first child walks for the first time, was playing +with Etienne on the floor when suddenly she heard the heavy step of a +man upon the boards. Hardly had she risen with a movement of involuntary +surprise, when the count stood before her. She gave a cry, but +endeavored instantly to undo that involuntary wrong by going up to him +and offering her forehead for a kiss. + +“Why not have sent me notice of your return?” she said. + +“My reception would have been more cordial, but less frank,” he answered +bitterly. + +Suddenly he saw the child. The evident health in which he found it wrung +from him a gesture of surprise mingled with fury. But he repressed his +anger, and began to smile. + +“I bring good news,” he said. “I have received the governorship of +Champagne and the king’s promise to be made duke and peer. Moreover, +we have inherited a princely fortune from your cousin; that cursed +Huguenot, Georges de Chaverny is killed.” + +The countess turned pale and dropped into a chair. She saw the secret of +the devilish smile on her husband’s face. + +“Monsieur,” she said in a voice of emotion, “you know well that I loved +my cousin Chaverny. You will answer to God for the pain you inflict upon +me.” + +At these words the eye of the count glittered; his lips trembled, but +he could not utter a word, so furious was he; he flung his dagger on the +table with such violence that the metal resounded like a thunder-clap. + +“Listen to me,” he said in his strongest voice, “and remember my words. +I will never see or hear the little monster you hold in your arms. He +is your child, and not mine; there is nothing of me in him. Hide him, I +say, hide him from my sight, or--” + +“Just God!” cried the countess, “protect us!” + +“Silence!” said her husband. “If you do not wish me to throttle him, see +that I never find him in my way.” + +“Then,” said the countess gathering strength to oppose her tyrant, +“swear to me that if you never meet him you will do nothing to injure +him. Can I trust your word as a nobleman for that?” + +“What does all this mean?” said the count. + +“If you will not swear, kill us now together!” cried the countess, +falling on her knees and pressing her child to her breast. + +“Rise, madame. I give you my word as a man of honor to do nothing +against the life of that cursed child, provided he lives among the rocks +between the sea and the house, and never crosses my path. I will give +him that fisherman’s house down there for his dwelling, and the beach +for a domain. But woe betide him if I ever find him beyond those +limits.” + +The countess began to weep. + +“Look at him!” she said. “He is your son.” + +“Madame!” + +At that word, the frightened mother carried away the child whose heart +was beating like that of a bird caught in its nest. Whether innocence +has a power which the hardest men cannot escape, or whether the count +regretted his violence and feared to plunge into despair a creature so +necessary to his pleasures and also to his worldly prosperity, it is +certain that his voice was as soft as it was possible to make it when +his wife returned. + +“Jeanne, my dear,” he said, “do not be angry with me; give me your hand. +One never knows how to trust you women. I return, bringing you fresh +honors and more wealth, and yet, tete-Dieu! you receive me like an +enemy. My new government will oblige me to make long absences until I +can exchange it for that of Lower Normandy; and I request, my dear, that +you will show me a pleasant face while I am here.” + +The countess understood the meaning of the words, the feigned softness +of which could no longer deceive her. + +“I know my duty,” she replied in a tone of sadness which the count +mistook for tenderness. + +The timid creature had too much purity and dignity to try, as some +clever women would have done, to govern the count by putting calculation +into her conduct,--a sort of prostitution by which noble souls feel +degraded. Silently she turned away, to console her despair with Etienne. + +“Tete-Dieu! shall I never be loved?” cried the count, seeing the tears +in his wife’s eyes as she left the room. + +Thus incessantly threatened, motherhood became to the poor woman a +passion which assumed the intensity that women put into their guilty +affections. By a species of occult communion, the secret of which is in +the hearts of mothers, the child comprehended the peril that threatened +him and dreaded the approach of his father. The terrible scene of which +he had been a witness remained in his memory, and affected him like an +illness; at the sound of the count’s step his features contracted, and +the mother’s ear was not so alert as the instinct of her child. As he +grew older this faculty created by terror increased, until, like the +savages of America, Etienne could distinguish his father’s step and hear +his voice at immense distances. To witness the terror with which the +count inspired her thus shared by her child made Etienne the more +precious to the countess; their union was so strengthened that like two +flowers on one twig they bent to the same wind, and lifted their heads +with the same hope. In short, they were one life. + +When the count again left home Jeanne was pregnant. This time she gave +birth in due season, and not without great suffering, to a stout boy, +who soon became the living image of his father, so that the hatred of +the count for his first-born was increased by this event. To save her +cherished child the countess agreed to all the plans which her husband +formed for the happiness and wealth of his second son, whom he named +Maximilien. Etienne was to be made a priest, in order to leave the +property and titles of the house of Herouville to his younger brother. +At that cost the poor mother believed she ensured the safety of her +hated child. + +No two brothers were ever more unlike than Etienne and Maximilien. The +younger’s taste was all for noise, violent exercises, and war, and +the count felt for him the same excessive love that his wife felt for +Etienne. By a tacit compact each parent took charge of the child of +their heart. The duke (for about this time Henri IV. rewarded the +services of the Seigneur d’Herouville with a dukedom), not wishing, he +said, to fatigue his wife, gave the nursing of the youngest boy to +a stout peasant-woman chosen by Beauvouloir, and announced his +determination to bring up the child in his own manner. He gave him, +as time went on, a holy horror of books and study; taught him the +mechanical knowledge required by a military career, made him a good +rider, a good shot with an arquebuse, and skilful with his dagger. When +the boy was big enough he took him to hunt, and let him acquire the +savage language, the rough manners, the bodily strength, and the +vivacity of look and speech which to his mind were the attributes of an +accomplished man. The boy became, by the time he was twelve years old, +a lion-cub ill-trained, as formidable in his way as the father himself, +having free rein to tyrannize over every one, and using the privilege. + +Etienne lived in the little house, or lodge, near the sea, given to him +by his father, and fitted up by the duchess with some of the comforts +and enjoyments to which he had a right. She herself spent the greater +part of her time there. Together the mother and child roamed over the +rocks and the shore, keeping strictly within the limits of the boy’s +domain of beach and shells, of moss and pebbles. The boy’s terror of his +father was so great that, like the Lapp, who lives and dies in his snow, +he made a native land of his rocks and his cottage, and was terrified +and uneasy if he passed his frontier. + +The duchess, knowing her child was not fitted to find happiness except +in some humble and retired sphere, did not regret the fate that was thus +imposed upon him; she used this enforced vocation to prepare him for a +noble life of study and science, and she brought to the chateau Pierre +de Sebonde as tutor to the future priest. Nevertheless, in spite of +the tonsure imposed by the will of the father, she was determined that +Etienne’s education should not be wholly ecclesiastical, and took pains +to secularize it. She employed Beauvouloir to teach him the mysteries of +natural science; she herself superintended his studies, regulating them +according to her child’s strength, and enlivening them by teaching him +Italian, and revealing to him little by little the poetic beauties of +that language. While the duke rode off with Maximilien to the forest and +the wild-boars at the risk of his life, Jeanne wandered with Etienne +in the milky way of Petrarch’s sonnets, or the mighty labyrinth of the +Divina Comedia. Nature had endowed the youth, in compensation for his +infirmities, with so melodious a voice that to hear him sing was +a constant delight; his mother taught him music, and their tender, +melancholy songs, accompanied by a mandolin, were the favorite +recreation promised as a reward for some more arduous study required by +the Abbe de Sebonde. Etienne listened to his mother with a passionate +admiration she had never seen except in the eyes of Georges de Chaverny. +The first time the poor woman found a memory of her girlhood in the +long, slow look of her child, she covered him with kisses; and she +blushed when Etienne asked her why she seemed to love him better at that +moment than ever before. She answered that every hour made him dearer +to her. She found in the training of his soul, and in the culture of +his mind, pleasures akin to those she had tasted in feeding him with her +milk. She put all her pride and self-love into making him superior +to herself, and not in ruling him. Hearts without tenderness covet +dominion, but a true love treasures abnegation, that virtue of strength. +When Etienne could not at first comprehend a demonstration, a theme, a +theory, the poor mother, who was present at the lessons, seemed to +long to infuse knowledge, as formerly she had given nourishment at the +child’s least cry. And then, what joy suffused her eyes when Etienne’s +mind seized the true sense of things and appropriated it. She proved, as +Pierre de Sebonde said, that a mother is a dual being whose sensations +cover two existences. + +“Ah, if some woman as loving as I could infuse into him hereafter the +life of love, how happy he might be!” she often thought. + +But the fatal interests which consigned Etienne to the priesthood +returned to her mind, and she kissed the hair that the scissors of the +Church were to shear, leaving her tears upon them. Still, in spite of +the unjust compact she had made with the duke, she could not see Etienne +in her visions of the future as priest or cardinal; and the absolute +forgetfulness of the father as to his first-born, enabled her to +postpone the moment of putting him into Holy Orders. + +“There is time enough,” she said to herself. + +The day came when all her cares, inspired by a sentiment which seemed +to enter into the flesh of her son and give it life, had their reward. +Beauvouloir--that blessed man whose teachings had proved so precious to +the child, and whose anxious glance at that frail idol had so often made +the duchess tremble--declared that Etienne was now in a condition +to live long years, provided no violent emotion came to convulse his +delicate body. Etienne was then sixteen. + +At that age he was just five feet, a height he never passed. His skin, +as transparent and satiny as that of a little girl, showed a delicate +tracery of blue veins; its whiteness was that of porcelain. His eyes, +which were light blue and ineffably gentle, implored the protection of +men and women; that beseeching look fascinated before the melody of +his voice was heard to complete the charm. True modesty was in every +feature. Long chestnut hair, smooth and very fine, was parted in the +middle of his head into two bandeaus which curled at their extremity. +His pale and hollow cheeks, his pure brow, lined with a few furrows, +expressed a condition of suffering which was painful to witness. His +mouth, always gracious, and adorned with very white teeth, wore the sort +of fixed smile which we often see on the lips of the dying. His hands, +white as those of a woman, were remarkably handsome. The habit of +meditation had taught him to droop his head like a fragile flower, and +the attitude was in keeping with his person; it was like the last grace +that a great artist touches into a portrait to bring out its latent +thought. Etienne’s head was that of a delicate girl placed upon the +weakly and deformed body of a man. + +Poesy, the rich meditations of which make us roam like botanists through +the vast fields of thought, the fruitful comparison of human ideas, the +enthusiasm given by a clear conception of works of genius, came to be +the inexhaustible and tranquil joys of the young man’s solitary and +dreamy life. Flowers, ravishing creatures whose destiny resembled his +own, were his loves. Happy to see in her son the innocent passions which +took the place of the rough contact with social life which he never +could have borne, the duchess encouraged Etienne’s tastes; she brought +him Spanish “romanceros,” Italian “motets,” books, sonnets, poems. The +library of Cardinal d’Herouville came into Etienne’s possession, the +use of which filled his life. These readings, which his fragile health +forbade him to continue for many hours at a time, and his rambles among +the rocks of his domain, were interspersed with naive meditations which +kept him motionless for hours together before his smiling flowers--those +sweet companions!--or crouching in a niche of the rocks before some +species of algae, a moss, a seaweed, studying their mysteries; seeking +perhaps a rhythm in their fragrant depths, like a bee its honey. He +often admired, without purpose, and without explaining his pleasure to +himself, the slender lines on the petals of dark flowers, the delicacy +of their rich tunics of gold or purple, green or azure, the fringes, so +profusely beautiful, of their calyxes or leaves, their ivory or velvet +textures. Later, a thinker as well as a poet, he would detect the reason +of these innumerable differences in a single nature, by discovering the +indication of unknown faculties; for from day to day he made progress +in the interpretation of the Divine Word writing upon all things here +below. + +These constant and secret researches into matters occult gave to +Etienne’s life the apparent somnolence of meditative genius. He would +spend long days lying upon the shore, happy, a poet, all-unconscious of +the fact. The sudden irruption of a gilded insect, the shimmering of the +sun upon the ocean, the tremulous motion of the vast and limpid mirror +of the waters, a shell, a crab, all was event and pleasure to that +ingenuous young soul. And then to see his mother coming towards him, +to hear from afar the rustle of her gown, to await her, to kiss her, to +talk to her, to listen to her gave him such keen emotions that often a +slight delay, a trifling fear would throw him into a violent fever. In +him there was nought but soul, and in order that the weak, debilitated +body should not be destroyed by the keen emotions of that soul, Etienne +needed silence, caresses, peace in the landscape, and the love of +a woman. For the time being, his mother gave him the love and the +caresses; flowers and books entranced his solitude; his little kingdom +of sand and shells, algae and verdure seemed to him a universe, ever +fresh and new. + +Etienne imbibed all the benefits of this physical and absolutely +innocent life, this mental and moral life so poetically extended. +A child by form, a man in mind, he was equally angelic under either +aspect. By his mother’s influence his studies had removed his emotions +to the region of ideas. The action of his life took place, therefore, +in the moral world, far from the social world which would either +have killed him or made him suffer. He lived by his soul and by his +intellect. Laying hold of human thought by reading, he rose to thoughts +that stirred in matter; he felt the thoughts of the air, he read the +thoughts on the skies. Early he mounted that ethereal summit where alone +he found the delicate nourishment that his soul needed; intoxicating +food! which predestined him to sorrow whenever to these accumulated +treasures should be added the riches of a passion rising suddenly in his +heart. + +If, at times, Jeanne de Saint-Savin dreaded that coming storm, he +consoled herself with a thought which the otherwise sad vocation of +her son put into her mind,--for the poor mother found no remedy for his +sorrows except some lesser sorrow. + +“He will be a cardinal,” she thought; “he will live in the sentiment +of Art, of which he will make himself the protector. He will love Art +instead of loving a woman, and Art will not betray him.” + +The pleasures of this tender motherhood were incessantly held in check +by sad reflections, born of the strange position in which Etienne was +placed. The brothers had passed the adolescent age without knowing each +other, without so much as even suspecting their rival existence. The +duchess had long hoped for an opportunity, during the absence of her +husband, to bind the two brothers to each other in some solemn scene by +which she might enfold them both in her love. This hope, long cherished, +had now faded. Far from wishing to bring about an intercourse between +the brothers, she feared an encounter between them, even more than +between the father and son. Maximilien, who believed in evil only, +might have feared that Etienne would some day claim his rights, and, so +fearing, might have flung him into the sea with a stone around his neck. +No son had ever less respect for a mother than he. As soon as he could +reason he had seen the low esteem in which the duke held his wife. If +the old man still retained some forms of decency in his manners to the +duchess, Maximilien, unrestrained by his father, caused his mother many +a grief. + +Consequently, Bertrand was incessantly on the watch to prevent +Maximilien from seeing Etienne, whose existence was carefully concealed. +All the attendants of the castle cordially hated the Marquis de +Saint-Sever (the name and title borne by the younger brother), and those +who knew of the existence of the elder looked upon him as an avenger +whom God was holding in reserve. + +Etienne’s future was therefore doubtful; he might even be persecuted +by his own brother! The poor duchess had no relations to whom she could +confide the life and interests of her cherished child. Would he not +blame her when in his violet robes he longed to be a father as she had +been a mother? These thoughts, and her melancholy life so full of secret +sorrows were like a mortal illness kept at bay for a time by remedies. +Her heart needed the wisest management, and those about her were cruelly +inexpert in gentleness. What mother’s heart would not have been torn +at the sight of her eldest son, a man of mind and soul in whom a noble +genius made itself felt, deprived of his rights, while the younger, hard +and brutal, without talent, even military talent, was chosen to wear +the ducal coronet and perpetuate the family? The house of Herouville +was discarding its own glory. Incapable of anger the gentle Jeanne de +Saint-Savin could only bless and weep, but often she raised her eyes to +heaven, asking it to account for this singular doom. Those eyes filled +with tears when she thought that at her death her cherished child would +be wholly orphaned and left exposed to the brutalities of a brother +without faith or conscience. + +Such emotions repressed, a first love unforgotten, so many sorrows +ignored and hidden within her,--for she kept her keenest sufferings from +her cherished child,--her joys embittered, her griefs unrelieved, all +these shocks had weakened the springs of life and were developing in her +system a slow consumption which day by day was gathering greater force. +A last blow hastened it. She tried to warn the duke as to the results of +Maximilien’s education, and was repulsed; she saw that she could give no +remedy to the shocking seeds which were germinating in the soul of her +second child. From this moment began a period of decline which soon +became so visible as to bring about the appointment of Beauvouloir to +the post of physician to the house of Herouville and the government of +Normandy. + +The former bonesetter came to live at the castle. In those days such +posts belonged to learned men, who thus gained a living and the leisure +necessary for a studious life and the accomplishment of scientific +work. Beauvouloir had for some time desired the situation, because his +knowledge and his fortune had won him numerous bitter enemies. In spite +of the protection of a great family to whom he had done great services, +he had recently been implicated in a criminal case, and the intervention +of the Governor of Normandy, obtained by the duchess, had alone saved +him from being brought to trial. The duke had no reason to repent this +protection given to the old bonesetter. Beauvouloir saved the life of +the Marquis de Saint-Sever in so dangerous an illness that any other +physician would have failed in doing so. But the wounds of the duchess +were too deep-seated and dated too far back to be cured, especially as +they were constantly kept open in her home. When her sufferings warned +this angel of many sorrows that her end was approaching, death was +hastened by the gloomy apprehensions that filled her mind as to the +future. + +“What will become of my poor child without me?” was a thought renewed +every hour like a bitter tide. + +Obliged at last to keep her bed, the duchess failed rapidly, for she was +then unable to see her son, forbidden as he was by her compact with his +father to approach the house. The sorrow of the youth was equal to that +of the mother. Inspired by the genius of repressed feeling, Etienne +created a mystical language by which to communicate with his mother. He +studied the resources of his voice like an opera-singer, and often he +came beneath her windows to let her hear his melodiously melancholy +voice, when Beauvouloir by a sign informed him she was alone. Formerly, +as a babe, he had consoled his mother with his smiles, now, become a +poet, he caressed her with his melodies. + +“Those songs give me life,” said the duchess to Beauvouloir, inhaling +the air that Etienne’s voice made living. + +At length the day came when the poor son’s mourning began. Already he +had felt the mysterious correspondences between his emotions and the +movements of the ocean. The divining of the thoughts of matter, a power +with which his occult knowledge had invested him, made this phenomenon +more eloquent to him than to all others. During the fatal night when he +was taken to see his mother for the last time, the ocean was agitated by +movements that to him were full of meaning. The heaving waters seemed to +show that the sea was working intestinally; the swelling waves rolled in +and spent themselves with lugubrious noises like the howling of a dog in +distress. Unconsciously, Etienne found himself saying:-- + +“What does it want of me? It quivers and moans like a living creature. +My mother has often told me that the ocean was in horrible convulsions +on the night when I was born. Something is about to happen to me.” + +This thought kept him standing before his window with his eyes sometimes +on his mother’s windows where a faint light trembled, sometimes on the +ocean which continued to moan. Suddenly Beauvouloir knocked on the door +of his room, opened it, and showed on his saddened face the reflection +of some new misfortune. + +“Monseigneur,” he said, “Madame la duchesse is in so sad a state that +she wishes to see you. All precautions are taken that no harm shall +happen to you in the castle; but we must be prudent; to see her you will +have to pass through the room of Monseigneur the duke, the room where +you were born.” + +These words brought the tears to Etienne’s eyes, and he said:-- + +“The Ocean _did_ speak to me!” + +Mechanically he allowed himself to be led towards the door of the tower +which gave entrance to the private way leading to the duchess’s room. +Bertrand was awaiting him, lantern in hand. Etienne reached the library +of the Cardinal d’Herouville, and there he was made to wait with +Beauvouloir while Bertrand went on to unlock the other doors, and make +sure that the hated son could pass through his father’s house without +danger. The duke did not awake. Advancing with light steps, Etienne and +Beauvouloir heard in that immense chateau no sound but the plaintive +groans of the dying woman. Thus the very circumstances attending the +birth of Etienne were renewed at the death of his mother. The same +tempest, same agony, same dread of awaking the pitiless giant, who, +on this occasion at least, slept soundly. Bertrand, as a further +precaution, took Etienne in his arms and carried him through the duke’s +room, intending to give some excuse as to the state of the duchess if +the duke awoke and detected him. Etienne’s heart was horribly wrung by +the same fears which filled the minds of these faithful servants; but +this emotion prepared him, in a measure, for the sight that met his eyes +in that signorial room, which he had never re-entered since the fatal +day when, as a child, the paternal curse had driven him from it. + +On the great bed, where happiness never came, he looked for his beloved, +and scarcely found her, so emaciated was she. White as her own laces, +with scarcely a breath left, she gathered up all her strength to clasp +Etienne’s hand, and to give him her whole soul, as heretofore, in a +look. Chaverny had bequeathed to her all his life in a last farewell. +Beauvouloir and Bertrand, the mother and the sleeping duke were all +once more assembled. Same place, same scene, same actors! but this was +funereal grief in place of the joys of motherhood; the night of death +instead of the dawn of life. At that moment the storm, threatened by the +melancholy moaning of the sea since sundown, suddenly burst forth. + +“Dear flower of my life!” said the mother, kissing her son. “You were +taken from my bosom in the midst of a tempest, and in a tempest I am +taken from you. Between these storms all life has been stormy to me, +except the hours I have spent with you. This is my last joy, mingled +with my last pangs. Adieu, my only love! adieu, dear image of two souls +that will soon be reunited! Adieu, my only joy--pure joy! adieu, my own +beloved!” + +“Let me follow thee!” cried Etienne. + +“It would be your better fate!” she said, two tears rolling down her +livid cheeks; for, as in former days, her eyes seemed to read the +future. “Did any one see him?” she asked of the two men. + +At this instant the duke turned in his bed; they all trembled. + +“Even my last joy is mingled with pain,” murmured the duchess. “Take him +away! take him away!” + +“Mother, I would rather see you a moment longer and die!” said the poor +lad, as he fainted by her side. + +At a sign from the duchess, Bertrand took Etienne in his arms, and, +showing him for the last time to his mother, who kissed him with a last +look, he turned to carry him away, awaiting the final order of the dying +mother. + +“Love him well!” she said to the physician and Bertrand; “he has no +protectors but you and Heaven.” + +Prompted by an instinct which never misleads a mother, she had felt the +pity of the old retainer for the eldest son of a house, for which his +veneration was only comparable to that of the Jews for their Holy City, +Jerusalem. As for Beauvouloir, the compact between himself and the +duchess had long been signed. The two servitors, deeply moved to +see their mistress forced to bequeath her noble child to none but +themselves, promised by a solemn gesture to be the providence of their +young master, and the mother had faith in that gesture. + +The duchess died towards morning, mourned by the servants of the +household, who, for all comment, were heard to say beside her grave, +“She was a comely woman, sent from Paradise.” + +Etienne’s sorrow was the most intense, the most lasting of sorrows, and +wholly silent. He wandered no more among his rocks; he felt no strength +to read or sing. He spent whole days crouched in the crevice of a rock, +caring nought for the inclemency of the weather, motionless, fastened to +the granite like the lichen that grew upon it; weeping seldom, lost in +one sole thought, immense, infinite as the ocean, and, like that ocean, +taking a thousand forms,--terrible, tempestuous, tender, calm. It +was more than sorrow; it was a new existence, an irrevocable destiny, +dooming this innocent creature to smile no more. There are pangs which, +like a drop of blood cast into flowing water, stain the whole current +instantly. The stream, renewed from its source, restores the purity of +its surface; but with Etienne the source itself was polluted, and each +new current brought its own gall. + +Bertrand, in his old age, had retained the superintendence of the +stables, so as not to lose the habit of authority in the household. His +house was not far from that of Etienne, so that he was ever at hand to +watch over the youth with the persistent affection and simple wiliness +characteristic of old soldiers. He checked his roughness when speaking +to the poor lad; softly he walked in rainy weather to fetch him from his +reverie in his crevice to the house. He put his pride into filling the +mother’s place, so that her child might find, if not her love, at least +the same attentions. This pity resembled tenderness. Etienne bore, +without complaint or resistance, these attentions of the old retainer, +but too many links were now broken between the hated child and other +creatures to admit of any keen affection at present in his heart. +Mechanically he allowed himself to be protected; he became, as it were, +an intermediary creature between man and plant, or, perhaps one might +say, between man and God. To what shall we compare a being to whom all +social laws, all the false sentiments of the world were unknown, and who +kept his ravishing innocence by obeying nought but the instincts of his +heart? + +Nevertheless, in spite of his sombre melancholy, he came to feel the +need of loving, of finding another mother, another soul for his soul. +But, separated from civilization by an iron wall, it was well-nigh +impossible to meet with a being who had flowered like himself. +Instinctively seeking another self to whom to confide his thoughts and +whose life might blend with his life, he ended in sympathizing with +his Ocean. The sea became to him a living, thinking being. Always in +presence of that vast creation, the hidden marvels of which contrast +so grandly with those of earth, he discovered the meaning of many +mysteries. Familiar from his cradle with the infinitude of those liquid +fields, the sea and the sky taught him many poems. To him, all was +variety in that vast picture so monotonous to some. Like other men whose +souls dominate their bodies, he had a piercing sight which could +reach to enormous distances and seize, with admirable ease and without +fatigue, the fleeting tints of the clouds, the passing shimmer of the +waters. On days of perfect stillness his eyes could see the manifold +tints of the ocean, which to him, like the face of a woman, had its +physiognomy, its smiles, ideas, caprices; there green and sombre; here +smiling and azure; sometimes uniting its brilliant lines with the +hazy gleams of the horizon, or again, softly swaying beneath the +orange-tinted heavens. For him all-glorious fetes were celebrated at +sundown when the star of day poured its red colors on the waves in a +crimson flood. For him the sea was gay and sparkling and spirited when +it quivered in repeating the noonday light from a thousand dazzling +facets; to him it revealed its wondrous melancholy; it made him weep +whenever, calm or sad, it reflected the dun-gray sky surcharged with +clouds. He had learned the mute language of that vast creation. The flux +and reflux of its waters were to him a melodious breathing which uttered +in his ear a sentiment; he felt and comprehended its inward meaning. +No mariner, no man of science, could have predicted better than he the +slightest wrath of the ocean, the faintest change on that vast face. By +the manner of the waves as they rose and died away upon the shore, he +could foresee tempests, surges, squalls, the height of tides, or calms. +When night had spread its veil upon the sky, he still could see the sea +in its twilight mystery, and talk with it. At all times he shared +its fecund life, feeling in his soul the tempest when it was angry; +breathing its rage in its hissing breath; running with its waves as +they broke in a thousand liquid fringes upon the rocks. He felt himself +intrepid, free, and terrible as the sea itself; like it, he bounded and +fell back; he kept its solemn silence; he copied its sudden pause. In +short, he had wedded the sea; it was now his confidant, his friend. In +the morning when he crossed the glowing sands of the beach and came upon +his rocks, he divined the temper of the ocean from a single glance; he +could see landscapes on its surface; he hovered above the face of +the waters, like an angel coming down from heaven. When the joyous, +mischievous white mists cast their gossamer before him, like a veil +before the face of a bride, he followed their undulations and caprices +with the joy of a lover. His thought, married with that grand expression +of the divine thought, consoled him in his solitude, and the thousand +outlooks of his soul peopled its desert with glorious fantasies. He +ended at last by divining in the motions of the sea its close communion +with the celestial system; he perceived nature in its harmonious whole, +from the blade of grass to the wandering stars which seek, like seeds +driven by the wind, to plant themselves in ether. + +Pure as an angel, virgin of those ideas which degrade mankind, naive as +a child, he lived like a sea-bird, a gull, or a flower, prodigal of the +treasures of poetic imagination, and possessed of a divine knowledge, +the fruitful extent of which he contemplated in solitude. Incredible +mingling of two creations! sometimes he rose to God in prayer; sometimes +he descended, humble and resigned, to the quiet happiness of animals. To +him the stars were the flowers of night, the birds his friends, the sun +was a father. Everywhere he found the soul of his mother; often he saw +her in the clouds; he spoke to her; they communicated, veritably, by +celestial visions; on certain days he could hear her voice and see her +smile; in short, there were days when he had not lost her. God seemed to +have given him the power of the hermits of old, to have endowed him +with some perfected inner senses which penetrated to the spirit of all +things. Unknown moral forces enabled him to go farther than other men +into the secrets of the Immortal labor. His yearnings, his sorrows were +the links that united him to the unseen world; he went there, armed with +his love, to seek his mother; realizing thus, with the sublime harmonies +of ecstasy, the symbolic enterprise of Orpheus. + +Often, when crouching in the crevice of some rock, capriciously curled +up in his granite grotto, the entrance to which was as narrow as that of +a charcoal kiln, he would sink into involuntary sleep, his figure softly +lighted by the warm rays of the sun which crept through the fissures and +fell upon the dainty seaweeds that adorned his retreat, the veritable +nest of a sea-bird. The sun, his sovereign lord, alone told him that +he had slept, by measuring the time he had been absent from his watery +landscapes, his golden sands, his shells and pebbles. Across a light +as brilliant as that from heaven he saw the cities of which he read; he +looked with amazement, but without envy, at courts and kings, battles, +men, and buildings. These daylight dreams made dearer to him his +precious flowers, his clouds, his sun, his granite rocks. To attach him +the more to his solitary existence, an angel seemed to reveal to him the +abysses of the moral world and the terrible shocks of civilization. He +felt that his soul, if torn by the throng of men, would perish like a +pearl dropped from the crown of a princess into mud. + + + + + +PART II. HOW THE SON DIED + + + + +CHAPTER IV. THE HEIR + + +In 1617, twenty and some years after the horrible night during which +Etienne came into the world, the Duc d’Herouville, then seventy-six +years old, broken, decrepit, almost dead, was sitting at sunset in an +immense arm-chair, before the gothic window of his bedroom, at the place +where his wife had so vainly implored, by the sounds of the horn wasted +on the air, the help of men and heaven. You might have thought him a +body resurrected from the grave. His once energetic face, stripped of +its sinister aspect by old age and suffering, was ghastly in color, +matching the long meshes of white hair which fell around his bald head, +the yellow skull of which seemed softening. The warrior and the fanatic +still shone in those yellow eyes, tempered now by religious sentiment. +Devotion had cast a monastic tone upon the face, formerly so hard, but +now marked with tints which softened its expression. The reflections of +the setting sun colored with a faintly ruddy tinge the head, which, in +spite of all infirmities, was still vigorous. The feeble body, wrapped +in brown garments, gave, by its heavy attitude and the absence of all +movement, a vivid impression of the monotonous existence, the terrible +repose of this man once so active, so enterprising, so vindictive. + +“Enough!” he said to his chaplain. + +That venerable old man was reading aloud the Gospel, standing before the +master in a respectful attitude. The duke, like an old menagerie lion +which has reached a decrepitude that is still full of majesty, turned to +another white-haired man and said, holding out a fleshless arm covered +with sparse hairs, still sinewy, but without vigor:-- + +“Your turn now, bonesetter. How am I to-day?” + +“Doing well, monseigneur; the fever has ceased. You will live many years +yet.” + +“I wish I could see Maximilien here,” continued the duke, with a smile +of satisfaction. “My fine boy! He commands a company in the King’s +Guard. The Marechal d’Ancre takes care of my lad, and our gracious Queen +Marie thinks of allying him nobly, now that he is created Duc de Nivron. +My race will be worthily continued. The lad performed prodigies of valor +in the attack on--” + +At this moment Bertrand entered, holding a letter in his hand. + +“What is this?” said the old lord, eagerly. + +“A despatch brought by a courier sent to you by the king,” replied +Bertrand. + +“The king, and not the queen-mother!” exclaimed the duke. “What is +happening? Have the Huguenots taken arms again? Tete-Dieu!” cried the +old man, rising to his feet and casting a flaming glance at his three +companions, “I’ll arm my soldiers once more, and, with Maximilien at my +side, Normandy shall--” + +“Sit down, my good seigneur,” said Beauvouloir, uneasy at seeing the +duke give way to an excitement that was dangerous to a convalescent. + +“Read it, Maitre Corbineau,” said the old man, holding out the missive +to his confessor. + +These four personages formed a tableau full of instruction upon human +life. The man-at-arms, the priest, and the physician, all three standing +before their master, who was seated in his arm-chair, were casting +pallid glances about them, each presenting one of those ideas which end +by possessing the whole man on the verge of the tomb. Strongly illumined +by a last ray of the setting sun, these silent men composed a picture +of aged melancholy fertile in contrasts. The sombre and solemn chamber, +where nothing had been changed in twenty-five years, made a frame for +this poetic canvas, full of extinguished passions, saddened by death, +tinctured by religion. + +“The Marechal d’Ancre has been killed on the Pont du Louvre by order of +the king, and--O God!” + +“Go on!” cried the duke. + +“Monsieur le Duc de Nivron--” + +“Well?” + +“Is dead!” + +The duke dropped his head upon his breast with a great sigh, but was +silent. At those words, at that sigh, the three old men looked at each +other. It seemed to them as though the illustrious and opulent house of +Herouville was disappearing before their eyes like a sinking ship. + +“The Master above,” said the duke, casting a terrible glance at the +heavens, “is ungrateful to me. He forgets the great deeds I have +performed for his holy cause.” + +“God has avenged himself!” said the priest, in a solemn voice. + +“Put that man in the dungeon!” cried the duke. + +“You can silence me far more easily than you can your conscience.” + +The duke sank back in thought. + +“My house to perish! My name to be extinct! I will marry! I will have a +son!” he said, after a long pause. + +Though the expression of despair on the duke’s face was truly awful, the +bonesetter could not repress a smile. At that instant a song, fresh as +the evening breeze, pure as the sky, equable as the color of the ocean, +rose above the murmur of the waves, to cast its charm over Nature +herself. The melancholy of that voice, the melody of its tones shed, +as it were, a perfume rising to the soul; its harmony rose like a vapor +filling the air; it poured a balm on sorrows, or rather it consoled them +by expressing them. The voice mingled with the gurgle of the waves so +perfectly that it seemed to rise from the bosom of the waters. That song +was sweeter to the ears of those old men than the tenderest word of love +on the lips of a young girl; it brought religious hope into their souls +like a voice from heaven. + +“What is that?” asked the duke. + +“The little nightingale is singing,” said Bertrand; “all is not lost, +either for him or for us.” + +“What do you call a nightingale?” + +“That is the name we have given to monseigneur’s eldest son,” replied +Bertrand. + +“My son!” cried the old man; “have I a son?--a son to bear my name and +to perpetuate it!” + +He rose to his feet and began to walk about the room with steps in turn +precipitate and slow. Then he made an imperious gesture, sending every +one away from him except the priest. + +The next morning the duke, leaning on the arm of his old retainer +Bertrand, walked along the shore and among the rocks looking for the son +he had so long hated. He saw him from afar in a recess of the granite +rocks, lying carelessly extended in the sun, his head on a tuft of mossy +grass, his feet gracefully drawn up beneath him. So lying, Etienne was +like a swallow at rest. As soon as the tall old man appeared upon the +beach, the sound of his steps mingling faintly with the voice of the +waves, the young man turned his head, gave the cry of a startled bird, +and disappeared as if into the rock itself, like a mouse darting so +quickly into its hole that we doubt if we have even seen it. + +“Hey! tete-Dieu! where has he hid himself?” cried the duke, reaching the +rock beside which his son had been lying. + +“He is there,” replied Bertrand, pointing to a narrow crevice, the edges +of which had been polished smooth by the repeated assaults of the high +tide. + +“Etienne, my beloved son!” called the old man. + +The hated child made no reply. For hours the duke entreated, threatened, +implored in turn, receiving no response. Sometimes he was silent, with +his ear at the cleft of the rock, where even his enfeebled hearing could +detect the beating of Etienne’s heart, the quick pulsations of which +echoed from the sonorous roof of his rocky hiding-place. + +“At least _he_ lives!” said the old man, in a heartrending voice. + +Towards the middle of the day, the father, reduced to despair, had +recourse to prayer:-- + +“Etienne,” he said, “my dear Etienne, God has punished me for disowning +you. He has deprived me of your brother. To-day you are my only child. +I love you more than I love myself. I see the wrong I have done; I know +that you have in your veins my blood with that of your mother, whose +misery was my doing. Come to me; I will try to make you forget my +cruelty; I will cherish you for all that I have lost. Etienne, you are +the Duc de Nivron, and you will be, after me, the Duc d’Herouville, peer +of France, knight of the Orders and of the Golden Fleece, captain of a +hundred men-at-arms, grand-bailiff of Bessin, Governor of Normandy, +lord of twenty-seven domains counting sixty-nine steeples, Marquis de +Saint-Sever. You shall take to wife the daughter of a prince. Would you +have me die of grief? Come! come to me! or here I kneel until I see you. +Your old father prays you, he humbles himself before his child as before +God himself.” + +The hated son paid no heed to this language bristling with social +ideas and vanities he did not comprehend; his soul remained under the +impressions of unconquerable terror. He was silent, suffering great +agony. Towards evening the old seigneur, after exhausting all formulas +of language, all resources of entreaty, all repentant promises, was +overcome by a sort of religious contrition. He knelt down upon the sand +and made a vow:-- + +“I swear to build a chapel to Saint-Jean and Saint-Etienne, the patrons +of my wife and son, and to found one hundred masses in honor of the +Virgin, if God and the saints will restore to me the affection of my +son, the Duc de Nivron, here present.” + +He remained on his knees in deep humility with clasped hands, praying. +Finding that his son, the hope of his name, still did not come to him, +great tears rose in his eyes, dry so long, and rolled down his withered +cheeks. At this moment, Etienne, hearing no further sounds, glided to +the opening of his grotto like a young adder craving the sun. He saw the +tears of the stricken old man, he recognized the signs of a true grief, +and, seizing his father’s hand, he kissed him, saying in the voice of an +angel:-- + +“Oh, mother! forgive me!” + +In the fever of his happiness the old duke lifted his feeble offspring +in his arms and carried him, trembling like an abducted girl, toward +the castle. As he felt the palpitation of his son’s body he strove to +reassure him, kissing him with all the caution he might have shown in +touching a delicate flower; and speaking in the gentlest tones he had +ever in his life used, in order to soothe him. + +“God’s truth! you are like my poor Jeanne, dear child!” he said. “Teach +me what would give you pleasure, and I will give you all you can desire. +Grow strong! be well! I will show you how to ride a mare as pretty and +gentle as yourself. Nothing shall ever thwart or trouble you. Tete-Dieu! +all things bow to me as the reeds to the wind. I give you unlimited +power. I bow to you myself as the god of the family.” + +The father carried his son into the lordly chamber where the mother’s +sad existence had been spent. Etienne turned away and leaned against the +window from which his mother was wont to make him signals announcing +the departure of his persecutor, who now, without his knowing why, had +become his slave, like those gigantic genii which the power of a +fairy places at the order of a young prince. That fairy was Feudality. +Beholding once more the melancholy room where his eyes were accustomed +to contemplate the ocean, tears came into those eyes; recollections of +his long misery, mingled with melodious memories of the pleasures he had +had in the only love that was granted to him, maternal love, all +rushed together upon his heart and developed there, like a poem at once +terrible and delicious. The emotions of this youth, accustomed to live +in contemplations of ecstasy as others in the excitements of the world, +resembled none of the habitual emotions of mankind. + +“Will he live?” said the old man, amazed at the fragility of his heir, +and holding his breath as he leaned over him. + +“I can live only here,” replied Etienne, who had heard him, simply. + +“Well, then, this room shall be yours, my child.” + +“What is that noise?” asked the young man, hearing the retainers of +the castle who were gathering in the guard-room, whither the duke had +summoned them to present his son. + +“Come!” said the father, taking him by the hand and leading him into the +great hall. + +At this epoch of our history, a duke and peer, with great possessions, +holding public offices and the government of a province, lived the life +of a prince; the cadets of his family did not revolt at serving him. +He had his household guard and officers; the first lieutenant of his +ordnance company was to him what, in our day, an aide-de-camp is to a +marshal. A few years later, Cardinal de Richelieu had his body-guard. +Several princes allied to the royal house--Guise, Conde, Nevers, and +Vendome, etc.--had pages chosen among the sons of the best families,--a +last lingering custom of departed chivalry. The wealth of the Duc +d’Herouville, and the antiquity of his Norman race indicated by his name +(“herus villoe”), permitted him to imitate the magnificence of families +who were in other respects his inferiors,--those, for instance, of +Epernon, Luynes, Balagny, d’O, Zamet, regarded as parvenus, but living, +nevertheless, as princes. It was therefore an imposing spectacle for +poor Etienne to see the assemblage of retainers of all kinds attached to +the service of his father. + +The duke seated himself on a chair of state placed under a “solium,” + or dais of carved word, above a platform raised by several steps, +from which, in certain provinces, the great seigneurs still delivered +judgment on their vassals,--a vestige of feudality which disappeared +under the reign of Richelieu. These thrones, like the warden’s benches +of the churches, have now become objects of collection as curiosities. +When Etienne was placed beside his father on that raised platform, he +shuddered at feeling himself the centre to which all eyes turned. + +“Do not tremble,” said the duke, bending his bald head to his son’s ear; +“these people are only our servants.” + +Through the dusky light produced by the setting sun, the rays of which +were reddening the leaded panes of the windows, Etienne saw the +bailiff, the captain and lieutenant of the guard, with certain of their +men-at-arms, the chaplain, the secretaries, the doctor, the majordomo, +the ushers, the steward, the huntsmen, the game-keeper, the grooms, +and the valets. Though all these people stood in respectful attitudes, +induced by the terror the old man inspired in even the most important +persons under his command, a low murmur, caused by curiosity and +expectation, made itself heard. That sound oppressed the bosom of the +young man, who felt for the first time in his life the influence of +the heavy atmosphere produced by the breath of many persons in a closed +hall. His senses, accustomed to the pure and wholesome air from the sea, +were shocked with a rapidity that proved the super-sensitiveness of +his organs. A horrible palpitation, due no doubt to some defect in the +organization of his heart, shook him with reiterated blows when his +father, showing himself to the assemblage like some majestic old lion, +pronounced in a solemn voice the following brief address:-- + +“My friends, this is my son Etienne, my first-born son, my heir +presumptive, the Duc de Nivron, to whom the king will no doubt grant +the honors of his deceased brother. I present him to you that you may +acknowledge him and obey him as myself. I warn you that if you, or any +one in this province, over which I am governor, does aught to displease +the young duke, or thwart him in any way whatsoever, it would be better, +should it come to my knowledge, that that man had never been born. You +hear me. Return now to your duties, and God guide you. The obsequies +of my son Maximilien will take place here when his body arrives. The +household will go into mourning eight days hence. Later, we shall +celebrate the accession of my son Etienne here present.” + +“Vive monseigneur! Long live the race of Herouville!” cried the people +in a roar that shook the castle. + +The valets brought in torches to illuminate the hall. That hurrah, the +sudden lights, the sensations caused by his father’s speech, joined +to those he was already feeling, overcame the young man, who fainted +completely and fell into a chair, leaving his slender womanly hand +in the broad palm of his father. As the duke, who had signed to +the lieutenant of his company to come nearer, saying to him, “I am +fortunate, Baron d’Artagnon, in being able to repair my loss; behold my +son!” he felt an icy hand in his. Turning round, he looked at the new +Duc de Nivron, and, thinking him dead, he uttered a cry of horror which +appalled the assemblage. + +Beauvouloir rushed to the platform, took the young man in his arms, +and carried him away, saying to his master, “You have killed him by not +preparing him for this ceremony.” + +“He can never have a child if he is like that!” cried the duke, +following Beauvouloir into the seignorial chamber, where the doctor laid +the young heir upon the bed. + +“Well, what think you?” asked the duke presently. + +“It is not serious,” replied the old physician, showing Etienne, who was +now revived by a cordial, a few drops of which he had given him on a +bit of sugar, a new and precious substance which the apothecaries were +selling for its weight in gold. + +“Take this, old rascal!” said the duke, offering his purse to +Beauvouloir, “and treat him like the son of a king! If he dies by your +fault, I’ll burn you myself on a gridiron.” + +“If you continue to be so violent, the Duc de Nivron will die by your +own act,” said the doctor, roughly. “Leave him now; he will go to +sleep.” + +“Good-night, my love,” said the old man, kissing his son upon the +forehead. + +“Good-night, father,” replied the youth, whose voice made the +father--thus named by Etienne for the first time--quiver. + +The duke took Beauvouloir by the arm and led him to the next room, +where, having pushed him into the recess of a window, he said:-- + +“Ah ca! old rascal, now we will understand each other.” + +That term, a favorite sign of graciousness with the duke, made the +doctor, no longer a mere bonesetter, smile. + +“You know,” said the duke, continuing, “that I wish you no harm. You +have twice delivered my poor Jeanne, you cured my son Maximilien of an +illness, in short, you are a part of my household. Poor Maximilien! I +will avenge him; I take upon myself to kill the man who killed him. The +whole future of the house of Herouville is now in your hands. You alone +can know if there is in that poor abortion the stuff that can breed a +Herouville. You hear me. What think you?” + +“His life on the seashore has been so chaste and so pure that nature is +sounder in him than it would have been had he lived in your world. But +so delicate a body is the very humble servant of the soul. Monseigneur +Etienne must himself choose his wife; all things in him must be the +work of nature and not of your will. He will love artlessly, and will +accomplish by his heart’s desire that which you wish him to do for the +sake of your name. But if you give your son a proud, ungainly woman +of the world, a great lady, he will flee to his rocks. More than that; +though sudden terror would surely kill him, I believe that any sudden +emotion would be equally fatal. My advice therefore is to leave Etienne +to choose for himself, at his own pleasure, the path of love. Listen to +me, monseigneur; you are a great and powerful prince, but you understand +nothing of such matters. Give me your entire confidence, your unlimited +confidence, and you shall have a grandson.” + +“If I obtain a grandson by any sorcery whatever, I shall have you +ennobled. Yes, difficult as it may be, I’ll make an old rascal into a +man of honor; you shall be Baron de Forcalier. Employ your magic, white +or black, appeal to your witches’ sabbath or the novenas of the Church; +what care I how ‘tis done, provided my line male continues?” + +“I know,” said Beauvouloir, “a whole chapter of sorcerers capable of +destroying your hopes; they are none other than _yourself_, monseigneur. +I know you. To-day you want male lineage at any price; to-morrow you +will seek to have it on your own conditions; you will torment your son.” + +“God preserve me from it!” + +“Well, then, go away from here; go to court, where the death of the +marechal and the emancipation of the king must have turned everything +topsy turvy, and where you certainly have business, if only to obtain +the marshal’s baton which was promised to you. Leave Monseigneur Etienne +to me. But give me your word of honor as a gentleman to approve whatever +I may do for him.” + +The duke struck his hand into that of his physician as a sign of +complete acceptance, and retired to his own apartments. + +When the days of a high and mighty seigneur are numbered, the physician +becomes a personage of importance in the household. It is, therefore, +not surprising to see a former bonesetter so familiar with the Duc +d’Herouville. Apart from the illegitimate ties which connected him, by +marriage, to this great family and certainly militated in his favor, his +sound good sense had so often been proved by the duke that the old man +had now become his master’s most valued counsellor. Beauvouloir was the +Coyctier of this Louis XI. Nevertheless, and no matter how valuable his +knowledge might be, he never obtained over the government of Normandy, +in whom was the ferocity of religious warfare, as much influence +as feudality exercised over that rugged nature. For this reason the +physician was confident that the prejudices of the noble would thwart +the desires and the vows of the father. + + + + +CHAPTER V. GABRIELLE + + +Great physician that he was, Beauvouloir saw plainly that to a being so +delicately organized as Etienne marriage must come as a slow and gentle +inspiration, communicating new powers to his being and vivifying it with +the fires of love. As he had said to the father, to impose a wife on +Etienne would be to kill him. Above all it was important that the young +recluse should not be alarmed at the thought of marriage, of which he +knew nothing, or be made aware of the object of his father’s wishes. +This unknown poet conceived as yet only the beautiful and noble passion +of Petrarch for Laura, of Dante for Beatrice. Like his mother he was all +pure love and soul; the opportunity to love must be given to him, and +then the event should be awaited, not compelled. A command to love would +have dried within him the very sources of his life. + +Maitre Antoine Beauvouloir was a father; he had a daughter brought +up under conditions which made her the wife for Etienne. It was so +difficult to foresee the events which would make a son, disowned by his +father and destined to the priesthood, the presumptive heir of the +house of Herouville that Beauvouloir had never until now noticed the +resemblance between the fate of Etienne and that of Gabrielle. A sudden +idea which now came to him was inspired more by his devotion to those +two beings than by ambition. + +His wife, in spite of his great skill, had died in child-bed leaving him +a daughter whose health was so frail that it seemed as if the mother +had bequeathed to her fruit the germs of death. Beauvouloir loved +his Gabrielle as old men love their only child. His science and his +incessant care had given factitious life to this frail creature, which +he cultivated as a florist cultivates an exotic plant. He had kept her +hidden from all eyes on his estate of Forcalier, where she was protected +against the dangers of the time by the general good-will felt for a man +to whom all owed gratitude, and whose scientific powers inspired in the +ignorant minds of the country-people a superstitious awe. + +By attaching himself to the house of Herouville, Beauvouloir had +increased still further the immunity he enjoyed in the province, and had +thwarted all attempts of his enemies by means of his powerful influence +with the governor. He had taken care, however, in coming to reside at +the castle, not to bring with him the flower he cherished in secret at +Forcalier, a domain more important for its landed value than for +the house then upon it, but with which he expected to obtain for his +daughter an establishment in conformity with his views. While promising +the duke a posterity and requiring his master’s word of honor to approve +his acts, he thought suddenly of Gabrielle, of that sweet child whose +mother had been neglected and forgotten by the duke as he had also +neglected and forgotten his son Etienne. + +He awaited the departure of his master before putting his plan into +execution; foreseeing that, if the duke became aware of it, the enormous +difficulties in the way would be from the first insurmountable. + +Beauvouloir’s house at Forcalier had a southern exposure on the slope of +one of those gentle hills which surround the vales of Normandy; a thick +wood shielded it from the north; high walls and Norman hedges and deep +ditches made the enclosure inviolable. The garden, descending by an easy +incline to the river which watered the valley, had a thick double hedge +at its foot, forming an natural embankment. Within this double hedge +wound a hidden path, led by the sinuosities of the stream, which the +willows, oaks, and beeches made as leafy as a woodland glade. From the +house to this natural rampart stretched a mass of verdure peculiar to +that rich soil; a beautiful green sheet bordered by a fringe of rare +trees, the tones of which formed a tapestry of exquisite coloring: +there, the silvery tints of a pine stood forth against the darker green +of several alders; here, before a group of sturdy oaks a slender poplar +lifted its palm-like figure, ever swaying; farther on, the weeping +willows drooped their pale foliage between the stout, round-headed +walnuts. This belt of trees enabled the occupants of the house to go +down at all hours to the river-bank fearless of the rays of the sun. + +The facade of the house, before which lay the yellow ribbon of a +gravelled terrace, was shaded by a wooden gallery, around which climbing +plants were twining, and tossing in this month of May their various +blossoms into the very windows of the second floor. Without being really +vast, this garden seemed immense from the manner in which its vistas +were cut; points of view, cleverly contrived through the rise and fall +of the ground, married themselves, as it were, to those of the valley, +where the eye could rove at will. Following the instincts of her +thought, Gabrielle could either enter the solitude of a narrow space, +seeing naught but the thick green and the blue of the sky above the +tree-tops, or she could hover above a glorious prospect, letting her +eyes follow those many-shaded green lines, from the brilliant colors +of the foreground to the pure tones of the horizon on which they lost +themselves, sometimes in the blue ocean of the atmosphere, sometimes in +the cumuli that floated above it. + +Watched over by her grandmother and served by her former nurse, +Gabrielle Beauvouloir never left this modest home except for the parish +church, the steeple of which could be seen at the summit of the hill, +whither she was always accompanied by her grandmother, her nurse, and +her father’s valet. She had reached the age of seventeen in that sweet +ignorance which the rarity of books allowed a girl to retain without +appearing extraordinary at a period when educated women were thought +phenomenal. The house had been to her a convent, but with more freedom, +less enforced prayer,--a retreat where she had lived beneath the eye of +a pious old woman and the protection of her father, the only man she had +ever known. This absolute solitude, necessitated from her birth by the +apparent feebleness of her constitution, had been carefully maintained +by Beauvouloir. + +As Gabrielle grew up, such constant care and the purity of the +atmosphere had gradually strengthened her fragile youth. Still, the wise +physician did not deceive himself when he saw the pearly tints around +his daughter’s eyes soften or darken or flush according to the emotions +that overcame her; the weakness of the body and the strength of the soul +were made plain to him in that one indication which his long experience +enabled him to understand. Besides this, Gabrielle’s celestial beauty +made him fearful of attempts too common in times of violence and +sedition. Many reasons had thus induced the good father to deepen the +shadows and increase the solitude that surrounded his daughter, whose +excessive sensibility alarmed him; a passion, an assault, a shock of any +kind might wound her mortally. Though she seldom deserved blame, a mere +word of reproach overcame her; she kept it in the depths of her heart, +where it fostered a meditative melancholy; she would turn away weeping, +and wept long. + +Thus the moral education of the young girl required no less care than +her physical education. The old physician had been compelled to cease +telling stories, such as all children love, to his daughter; the +impressions she received were too vivid. Wise through long practice, he +endeavored to develop her body in order to deaden the blows which a +soul so powerful gave to it. Gabrielle was all of life and love to her +father, his only heir, and never had he hesitated to procure for her +such things as might produce the results he aimed for. He carefully +removed from her knowledge books, pictures, music, all those creations +of art which awaken thought. Aided by his mother he interested Gabrielle +in manual exercises. Tapestry, sewing, lace-making, the culture of +flowers, household cares, the storage of fruits, in short, the most +material occupations of life, were the food given to the mind of this +charming creature. Beauvouloir brought her beautiful spinning-wheels, +finely-carved chests, rich carpets, pottery of Bernard de Palissy, +tables, prie-dieus, chairs beautifully wrought and covered with +precious stuffs, embroidered line and jewels. With an instinct given by +paternity, the old man always chose his presents among the works of that +fantastic order called arabesque, which, speaking neither to the +soul nor the senses, addresses the mind only by its creations of pure +fantasy. + +Thus--singular to say!--the life which the hatred of a father had +imposed on Etienne d’Herouville, paternal love had induced Beauvouloir +to impose on Gabrielle. In both these children the soul was killing the +body; and without an absolute solitude, ordained by cruelty for one and +procured by science for the other, each was likely to succumb,--he to +terror, she beneath the weight of a too keen emotion of love. But, alas! +instead of being born in a region of gorse and moor, in the midst of an +arid nature of hard and angular shapes, such as all great painters have +given as backgrounds to their Virgins, Gabrielle lived in a rich and +fertile valley. Beauvouloir could not destroy the harmonious grouping of +the native woods, the graceful upspringing of the wild flowers, the cool +softness of the grassy slopes, the love expressed in the intertwining +growth of the clustering plants. Such ever-living poesies have a +language heard, rather than understood by the poor girl, who yielded to +vague misery among the shadows. Across the misty ideas suggested by +her long study of this beautiful landscape, observed at all seasons and +through all the variations of a marine atmosphere in which the fogs +of England come to die and the sunshine of France is born, there rose +within her soul a distant light, a dawn which pierced the darkness in +which her father kept her. + +Beauvouloir had never withdrawn his daughter from the influence of +Divine love; to a deep admiration of nature she joined her girlish +adoration of the Creator, springing thus into the first way open to the +feelings of womanhood. She loved God, she loved Jesus, the Virgin and +the saints; she loved the Church and its pomps; she was Catholic after +the manner of Saint Teresa, who saw in Jesus an eternal spouse, a +continual marriage. Gabrielle gave herself up to this passion of strong +souls with so touching a simplicity that she would have disarmed the +most brutal seducer by the infantine naivete of her language. + +Whither was this life of innocence leading Gabrielle? How teach a mind +as pure as the water of a tranquil lake, reflecting only the azure of +the skies? What images should be drawn upon that spotless canvas? Around +which tree must the tendrils of this bind-weed twine? No father has ever +put these questions to himself without an inward shudder. + +At this moment the good old man of science was riding slowly on his mule +along the roads from Herouville to Ourscamp (the name of the village +near which the estate of Forcalier was situated) as if he wished to keep +that way unending. The infinite love he bore his daughter suggested a +bold project to his mind. One only being in all the world could make +her happy; that man was Etienne. Assuredly, the angelic son of Jeanne +de Saint-Savin and the guileless daughter of Gertrude Marana were twin +beings. All other women would frighten and kill the heir of Herouville; +and Gabrielle, so Beauvouloir argued, would perish by contact with any +man in whom sentiments and external forms had not the virgin delicacy of +those of Etienne. Certainly the poor physician had never dreamed of such +a result; chance had brought it forward and seemed to ordain it. But, +under, the reign of Louis XIII., to dare to lead a Duc d’Herouville to +marry the daughter of a bonesetter! + +And yet, from this marriage alone was it likely that the lineage +imperiously demanded by the old duke would result. Nature had destined +these two rare beings for each other; God had brought them together by +a marvellous arrangement of events, while, at the same time, human ideas +and laws placed insuperable barriers between them. Though the old man +thought he saw in this the finger of God, and although he had forced +the duke to pass his word, he was seized with such fear, as his thoughts +reverted to the violence of that ungovernable nature, that he returned +upon his steps when, on reaching the summit of the hill above Ourscamp, +he saw the smoke of his own chimneys among the trees that enclosed his +home. Then, changing his mind once more, the thought of the illegitimate +relationship decided him; that consideration might have great influence +on the mind of his master. Once decided, Beauvouloir had confidence in +the chances and changes of life; it might be that the duke would die +before the marriage; besides, there were many examples of such marriage; +a peasant girl in Dauphine, Francoise Mignot, had lately married the +Marechal d’Hopital; the son of the Connetable Anne de Montmorency +had married Diane, daughter of Henri II. and a Piedmontese lady named +Philippa Duc. + +During this mental deliberation in which paternal love measured all +probabilities and discussed both the good and the evil chances, striving +to foresee the future and weighing its elements, Gabrielle was walking +in the garden and gathering flowers for the vases of that illustrious +potter, who did for glaze what Benvenuto Cellini did for metal. +Gabrielle had put one of these vases, decorated with animals in relief, +on a table in the middle of the hall, and was filling it with flowers +to enliven her grandmother, and also, perhaps, to give form to her +own ideas. The noble vase, of the pottery called Limoges, was filled, +arranged, and placed upon the handsome table-cloth, and Gabrielle was +saying to her grandmother, “See!” when Beauvouloir entered. The young +girl ran to her father’s arms. After this first outburst of affection +she wanted him to admire her bouquet; but the old man, after glancing at +it, cast a long, deep look at his daughter, which made her blush. + +“The time has come,” he said to himself, understanding the language of +those flowers, each of which had doubtless been studied as to form and +as to color, and given its true place in the bouquet, where it produced +its own magical effect. + +Gabrielle remained standing, forgetting the flower begun on her +tapestry. As he looked at his daughter a tear rolled from Beauvouloir’s +eyes, furrowed his cheeks which seldom wore a serious aspect, and fell +upon his shirt, which, after the fashion of the day, his open doublet +exposed to view above his breeches. He threw off his felt hat, adorned +with an old red plume, in order to rub his hand over his bald head. +Again he looked at his daughter, who, beneath the brown rafters of that +leather-hung room, with its ebony furniture and portieres of silken +damask, and its tall chimney-piece, the whole so softly lighted, was +still his very own. The poor father felt the tears in his eyes and +hastened to wipe them. A father who loves his daughter longs to keep her +always a child; as for him who can without deep pain see her fall under +the dominion of another man, he does not rise to worlds superior, he +falls to lowest space. + +“What ails you, my son?” said his old mother, taking off her spectacles, +and seeking the cause of his silence and of the change in his usually +joyous manner. + +The old physician signed to the old mother to look at his daughter, +nodding his head with satisfaction as if to say, “How sweet she is!” + +What father would not have felt Beauvouloir’s emotion on seeing the +young girl as she stood there in the Norman dress of that period? +Gabrielle wore the corset pointed before and square behind, which +the Italian masters give almost invariably to their saints and their +madonnas. This elegant corselet, made of sky-blue velvet, as dainty as +that of a dragon-fly, enclosed the bust like a guimpe and compressed it, +delicately modelling the outline as it seemed to flatten; it moulded the +shoulders, the back, the waist, with the precision of a drawing made by +an able draftsman, ending around the neck in an oblong curve, adorned +at the edges with a slight embroidery in brown silks, leaving to view +as much of the bare throat as was needed to show the beauty of her +womanhood, but not enough to awaken desire. A full brown skirt, +continuing the lines already drawn by the velvet waist, fell to her feet +in narrow flattened pleats. Her figure was so slender that Gabrielle +seemed tall; her arms hung pendent with the inertia that some deep +thought imparts to the attitude. Thus standing, she presented a living +model of those ingenuous works of statuary a taste for which prevailed +at that period,--works which obtained admiration for the harmony of +their lines, straight without stiffness, and for the firmness of +a design which did not exclude vitality. No swallow, brushing the +window-panes at dusk, ever conveyed the idea of greater elegance of +outline. + +Gabrielle’s face was thin, but not flat; on her neck and forehead ran +bluish threads showing the delicacy of a skin so transparent that the +flowing of the blood through her veins seemed visible. This excessive +whiteness was faintly tinted with rose upon the cheeks. Held beneath a +little coif of sky-blue velvet embroidered with pearls, her hair, of an +even tone, flowed like two rivulets of gold from her temples and played +in ringlets on her neck, which it did not hide. The glowing color of +those silky locks brightened the dazzling whiteness of the neck, and +purified still further by its reflections the outlines of the face +already so pure. The eyes, which were long and as if pressed between +their lids, were in harmony with the delicacy of the head and body; +their pearl-gray tints were brilliant without vivacity, candid without +passion. The line of the nose might have seemed cold, like a steel +blade, without two rosy nostrils, the movements of which were out +of keeping with the chastity of that dreamy brow, often perplexed, +sometimes smiling, but always of an august serenity. An alert little ear +attracted the eye, peeping beneath the coif and between two curls, and +showing a ruby ear-drop, the color of which stood vigorously out on the +milky whiteness of the neck. This was neither Norman beauty, where flesh +abounds, nor French beauty, as fugitive as its own expressions, nor the +beauty of the North, cold and melancholy as the North itself--it was the +deep seraphic beauty of the Catholic Church, supple and rigid, severe +but tender. + +“Where could one find a prettier duchess?” thought Beauvouloir, +contemplating his daughter with delight. As she stood there slightly +bending, her neck stretched out to watch the flight of a bird past the +windows, he could only compare her to a gazelle pausing to listen for +the ripple of the water where she seeks to drink. + +“Come and sit here,” said Beauvouloir, tapping his knee and making a +sign to Gabrielle, which told her he had something to whisper to her. + +Gabrielle understood him, and came. She placed herself on his knee with +the lightness of a gazelle, and slipped her arm about his neck, ruffling +his collar. + +“Tell me,” he said, “what were you thinking of when you gathered those +flowers? You have never before arranged them so charmingly.” + +“I was thinking of many things,” she answered. “Looking at the flowers +made for us, I wondered whom we were made for; who are they who look at +us? You are wise, and I can tell you what I think; you know so much you +can explain all. I feel a sort of force within me that wants to exercise +itself; I struggle against something. When the sky is gray I am half +content; I am sad, but I am calm. When the day is fine, and the flowers +smell sweet, and I sit on my bench down there among the jasmine and +honeysuckles, something rises in me, like waves which beat against my +stillness. Ideas come into my mind which shake me, and fly away like +those birds before the windows; I cannot hold them. Well, when I have +made a bouquet in which the colors blend like tapestry, and the red +contrasts with white, and the greens and the browns cross each other, +when all seems so abundant, the breeze so playful, the flowers so many +that their fragrance mingles and their buds interlace,--well, then I am +happy, for I see what is passing in me. At church when the organ plays +and the clergy respond, there are two distinct songs speaking to each +other,--the human voice and the music. Well, then, too, I am happy; +that harmony echoes in my breast. I pray with a pleasure which stirs my +blood.” + +While listening to his daughter, Beauvouloir examined her with sagacious +eyes; those eyes seemed almost stupid from the force of his rushing +thoughts, as the water of a cascade seems motionless. He raised the veil +of flesh which hid the secret springs by which the soul reacts upon +the body; he studied the diverse symptoms which his long experience had +noted in persons committed to his care, and he compared them with those +contained in this frail body, the bones of which frightened him by their +delicacy, as the milk-white skin alarmed him by its want of substance. +He tried to bring the teachings of his science to bear upon the future +of that angelic child, and he was dizzy in so doing, as though he stood +upon the verge of an abyss; the too vibrant voice, the too slender bosom +of the young girl filled him with dread, and he questioned himself after +questioning her. + +“You suffer here!” he cried at last, driven by a last thought which +summed up his whole meditation. + +She bent her head gently. + +“By God’s grace!” said the old man, with a sigh, “I will take you to the +Chateau d’Herouville, and there you shall take sea-baths to strengthen +you.” + +“Is that true, father? You are not laughing at your little Gabrielle? I +have so longed to see the castle, and the men-at-arms, and the captains +of monseigneur.” + +“Yes, my daughter, you shall really go there. Your nurse and Jean shall +accompany you.” + +“Soon?” + +“To-morrow,” said the old man, hurrying into the garden to hide his +agitation from his mother and his child. + +“God is my witness,” he cried to himself, “that no ambitious +thought impels me. My daughter to save, poor little Etienne to make +happy,--those are my only motives.” + +If he thus interrogated himself it was because, in the depths of his +consciousness, he felt an inextinguishable satisfaction in knowing that +the success of his project would make Gabrielle some day the Duchesse +d’Herouville. There is always a man in a father. He walked about a long +time, and when he came in to supper he took delight for the rest of the +evening in watching his daughter in the midst of the soft brown poesy +with which he had surrounded her; and when, before she went to bed, +they all--the grandmother, the nurse, the doctor, and Gabrielle--knelt +together to say their evening prayer, he added the words,-- + +“Let us pray to God to bless my enterprise.” + +The eyes of the grandmother, who knew his intentions, were moistened +with what tears remained to her. Gabrielle’s face was flushed with +happiness. The father trembled, so much did he fear some catastrophe. + +“After all,” his mother said to him, “fear not, my son. The duke would +never kill his grandchild.” + +“No,” he replied, “but he might compel her to marry some brute of a +baron, and that would kill her.” + +The next day Gabrielle, mounted on an ass, followed by her nurse on +foot, her father on his mule, and a valet who led two horses laden with +baggage, started for the castle of Herouville, where the caravan arrived +at nightfall. In order to keep this journey secret, Beauvouloir +had taken by-roads, starting early in the morning, and had brought +provisions to be eaten by the way, in order not to show himself at +hostelries. The party arrived, therefore, after dark, without being +noticed by the castle retinue, at the little dwelling on the seashore, +so long occupied by the hated son, where Bertrand, the only person the +doctor had taken into his confidence, awaited them. The old retainer +helped the nurse and valet to unload the horses and carry in the +baggage, and otherwise establish the daughter of Beauvouloir in +Etienne’s former abode. When Bertrand saw Gabrielle, he was amazed. + +“I seem to see madame!” he cried. “She is slim and willowy like her; she +has madame’s coloring and the same fair hair. The old duke will surely +love her.” + +“God grant it!” said Beauvouloir. “But will he acknowledge his own blood +after it has passed through mine?” + +“He can’t deny it,” replied Bertrand. “I often went to fetch him +from the door of the Belle Romaine, who lived in the rue +Culture-Sainte-Catherine. The Cardinal de Lorraine was compelled to give +her up to monseigneur, out of shame at being insulted by the mob when +he left her house. Monseigneur, who in those days was still in his +twenties, will remember that affair; bold he was,--I can tell it now--he +led the insulters!” + +“He never thinks of the past,” said Beauvouloir. “He knows my wife is +dead, but I doubt if he remembers I have a daughter.” + +“Two old navigators like you and me ought to be able to bring the ship +to port,” said Bertrand. “After all, suppose the duke does get angry and +seize our carcasses; they have served their time.” + + + + +CHAPTER VI. LOVE + + +Before starting for Paris, the Duc d’Herouville had forbidden the castle +servants under heavy pains and penalties to go upon the shore where +Etienne had passed his life, unless the Duc de Nivron took any of them +with him. This order, suggested by Beauvouloir, who had shown the duke +the wisdom of leaving Etienne master of his solitude, guaranteed to +Gabrielle and her attendants the inviolability of the little domain, +outside of which he forbade them to go without his permission. + +Etienne had remained during these two days shut up in the old seignorial +bedroom under the spell of his tenderest memories. In that bed his +mother had slept; her thoughts had been confided to the furnishings of +that room; she had used them; her eyes had often wandered among those +draperies; how often she had gone to that window to call with a cry, a +sign, her poor disowned child, now master of the chateau. Alone in that +room, whither he had last come secretly, brought by Beauvouloir to kiss +his dying mother, he fancied that she lived again; he spoke to her, he +listened to her, he drank from that spring that never faileth, and from +which have flowed so many songs like the “Super flumina Babylonis.” + +The day after Beauvouloir’s return he went to see his young master and +blamed him gently for shutting himself up in a single room, pointing out +to him the danger of leading a prison life in place of his former free +life in the open air. + +“But this air is vast,” replied Etienne. “The spirit of my mother is in +it.” + +The physician prevailed, however, by the gentle influence of affection, +in making Etienne promise that he would go out every day, either on the +seashore, or in the fields and meadows which were still unknown to +him. In spite of this, Etienne, absorbed in his memories, remained yet +another day at his window watching the sea, which offered him from that +point of view aspects so various that never, as he believed, had he +seen it so beautiful. He mingled his contemplations with readings +in Petrarch, one of his most favorite authors,--him whose poesy went +nearest to the young man’s heart through the constancy and the unity of +his love. Etienne had not within him the stuff for several passions. He +could love but once, and in one way only. If that love, like all that is +a unit, were intense, it must also be calm in its expression, sweet and +pure like the sonnets of the Italian poet. + +At sunset this child of solitude began to sing, in the marvellous voice +which had entered suddenly, like a hope, into the dullest of all ears to +music,--those of his father. He expressed his melancholy by varying the +same air, which he repeated, again and again, like the nightingale. This +air, attributed to the late King Henri IV., was not the so-called air +of “Gabrielle,” but something far superior as art, as melody, as the +expression of infinite tenderness. The admirers of those ancient tunes +will recognize the words, composed by the great king to this air, which +were taken, probably, from some folk-song to which his cradle had been +rocked among the mountains of Bearn. + + “Dawn, approach, + I pray thee; + It gladdens me to see thee; + The maiden + Whom I love + Is rosy, rosy like thee; + The rose itself, + Dew-laden, + Has not her freshness; + Ermine has not + Her pureness; + Lilies have not + Her whiteness.” + +After naively revealing the thought of his heart in song, Etienne +contemplated the sea, saying to himself: “There is my bride; the only +love for me!” Then he sang too other lines of the canzonet,-- + + “She is fair + Beyond compare,”-- + +repeating it to express the imploring poesy which abounds in the +heart of a timid young man, brave only when alone. Dreams were in that +undulating song, sung, resung, interrupted, renewed, and hushed at last +in a final modulation, the tones of which died away like the lingering +vibrations of a bell. + +At this moment a voice, which he fancied was that of a siren rising from +the sea, a woman’s voice, repeated the air he had sung, but with all the +hesitations of a person to whom music is revealed for the first time. +He recognized the stammering of a heart born into the poesy of harmony. +Etienne, to whom long study of his own voice had taught the language of +sounds, in which the soul finds resources greater than speech to express +its thoughts, could divine the timid amazement that attended these +attempts. With what religious and subtile admiration had that unknown +being listened to him! The stillness of the atmosphere enabled him to +hear every sound, and he quivered at the distant rustle of the folds of +a gown. He was amazed,--he, whom all emotions produced by terror sent to +the verge of death--to feel within him the healing, balsamic sensation +which his mother’s coming had formerly brought to him. + +“Come, Gabrielle, my child,” said the voice of Beauvouloir, “I forbade +you to stay upon the seashore after sundown; you must come in, my +daughter.” + +“Gabrielle,” said Etienne to himself. “Oh! the pretty name!” + +Beauvouloir presently came to him, rousing his young master from one of +those meditations which resemble dreams. It was night, and the moon was +rising. + +“Monseigneur,” said the physician, “you have not been out to-day, and it +is not wise of you.” + +“And I,” replied Etienne, “can _I_ go on the seashore after sundown?” + +The double meaning of this speech, full of the gentle playfulness of a +first desire, made the old man smile. + +“You have a daughter, Beauvouloir.” + +“Yes, monseigneur,--the child of my old age; my darling child. +Monseigneur, the duke, your father, charged me so earnestly to watch +your precious health that, not being able to go to Forcalier, where she +was, I have brought her here, to my great regret. In order to conceal +her from all eyes, I have placed her in the house monseigneur used to +occupy. She is so delicate I fear everything, even a sudden sentiment or +emotion. I have never taught her anything; knowledge would kill her.” + +“She knows nothing!” cried Etienne, surprised. + +“She has all the talents of a good housewife, but she has lived as the +plants live. Ignorance, monseigneur, is as sacred a thing as knowledge. +Knowledge and ignorance are only two ways of living, for the human +creature. Both preserve the soul and envelop it; knowledge is +your existence, but ignorance will save my daughter’s life. Pearls +well-hidden escape the diver, and live happy. I can only compare my +Gabrielle to a pearl; her skin has the pearl’s translucence, her soul +its softness, and until this day Forcalier has been her fostering +shell.” + +“Come with me,” said Etienne, throwing on a cloak. “I want to walk on +the seashore, the air is so soft.” + +Beauvouloir and his master walked in silence until they reached a spot +where a line of light, coming from between the shutters of a fisherman’s +house, had furrowed the sea with a golden rivulet. + +“I know not how to express,” said Etienne, addressing his companion, +“the sensations that light, cast upon the water, excites in me. I have +often watched it streaming from the windows of that room,” he added, +pointing back to his mother’s chamber, “until it was extinguished.” + +“Delicate as Gabrielle is,” said Beauvouloir, gaily, “she can come and +walk with us; the night is warm, and the air has no dampness. I will +fetch her; but be prudent, monseigneur.” + +Etienne was too timid to propose to accompany Beauvouloir into the +house; besides, he was in that torpid state into which we are plunged +by the influx of ideas and sensations which give birth to the dawn of +passion. Conscious of more freedom in being alone, he cried out, looking +at the sea now gleaming in the moonlight,-- + +“The Ocean has passed into my soul!” + +The sight of the lovely living statuette which was now advancing towards +him, silvered by the moon and wrapped in its light, redoubled the +palpitations of his heart, but without causing him to suffer. + +“My child,” said Beauvouloir, “this is monseigneur.” + +In a moment poor Etienne longed for his father’s colossal figure; he +would fain have seemed strong, not puny. All the vanities of love and +manhood came into his heart like so many arrows, and he remained +in gloomy silence, measuring for the first time the extent of his +imperfections. Embarrassed by the salutation of the young girl, he +returned it awkwardly, and stayed beside Beauvouloir, with whom he +talked as they paced along the shore; presently, however, Gabrielle’s +timid and deprecating countenance emboldened him, and he dared to +address her. The incident of the song was the result of mere chance. +Beauvouloir had intentionally made no preparations; he thought, wisely, +that between two beings in whom solitude had left pure hearts, love +would arise in all its simplicity. The repetition of the air by +Gabrielle was a ready text on which to begin a conversation. + +During this promenade Etienne was conscious of that bodily buoyancy +which all men have felt at the moment when a first love transports their +vital principle into another being. He offered to teach Gabrielle +to sing. The poor lad was so glad to show himself to this young girl +invested with some slight superiority that he trembled with pleasure +when she accepted his offer. At that moment the moonlight fell full upon +her, and enabled Etienne to note the points of her resemblance to his +mother, the late duchess. Like Jeanne de Saint-Savin, Beauvouloir’s +daughter was slender and delicate; in her, as in the duchess, sadness +and suffering conveyed a mysterious charm. She had that nobility of +manner peculiar to souls on whom the ways of the world have had no +influence, and in whom all is noble because all is natural. But in +Gabrielle’s veins there was also the blood of “la belle Romaine,” which +had flowed there from two generations, giving to this young girl the +passionate heart of a courtesan in an absolutely pure soul; hence the +enthusiasm that sometimes reddened her cheek, sanctified her brow, and +made her exhale her soul like a flash of light, and communicated the +sparkle of flame to all her motions. Beauvouloir shuddered when +he noticed this phenomenon, which we may call in these days the +phosphorescence of thought; the old physician of that period regarded it +as the precursor of death. + +Hidden beside her father, Gabrielle endeavored to see Etienne at her +ease, and her looks expressed as much curiosity as pleasure, as much +kindliness as innocent daring. Etienne detected her in stretching her +neck around Beauvouloir with the movement of a timid bird looking out +of its nest. To her the young man seemed not feeble, but delicate; she +found him so like herself that nothing alarmed her in this sovereign +lord. Etienne’s sickly complexion, his beautiful hands, his languid +smile, his hair parted in the middle into two straight bands, ending +in curls on the lace of his large flat collar, his noble brow, furrowed +with youthful wrinkles,--all these contrasts of luxury and weakness, +power and pettiness, pleased her; perhaps they gratified the instinct +of maternal protection, which is the germ of love; perhaps, also, they +stimulated the need that every woman feels to find distinctive signs in +the man she is prompted to love. New ideas, new sensations were rising +in each with a force, with an abundance that enlarged their souls; both +remained silent and overcome, for sentiments are least demonstrative +when most real and deep. All durable love begins by dreamy meditation. +It was suitable that these two beings should first see each other in the +softer light of the moon, that love and its splendors might not dazzle +them too suddenly; it was well that they met by the shores of the +Ocean,--vast image of the vastness of their feelings. They parted filled +with one another, fearing, each, to have failed to please. + +From his window Etienne watched the lights of the house where Gabrielle +was. During that hour of hope mingled with fear, the young poet found +fresh meanings in Petrarch’s sonnets. He had now seen Laura, a delicate, +delightful figure, pure and glowing like a sunray, intelligent as an +angel, feeble as a woman. His twenty years of study found their meaning, +he understood the mystic marriage of all beauties; he perceived how much +of womanhood there was in the poems he adored; in short, he had so long +loved unconsciously that his whole past now blended with the emotions of +this glorious night. Gabrielle’s resemblance to his mother seemed to +him an order divinely given. He did not betray his love for the one in +loving the other; this new love continued HER maternity. He contemplated +that young girl, asleep in the cottage, with the same feelings his +mother had felt for him when he was there. Here, again, was a similitude +which bound this present to the past. On the clouds of memory the +saddened face of his mother appeared to him; he saw once more her feeble +smile, he heard her gentle voice; she bowed her head and wept. The +lights in the cottage were extinguished. Etienne sang once more the +pretty canzonet, with a new expression, a new meaning. From afar +Gabrielle again replied. The young girl, too, was making her first +voyage into the charmed land of amorous ecstasy. That echoed answer +filled with joy the young man’s heart; the blood flowing in his veins +gave him a strength he never yet had felt, love made him powerful. +Feeble beings alone know the voluptuous joy of that new creation +entering their life. The poor, the suffering, the ill-used, have joys +ineffable; small things to them are worlds. Etienne was bound by many +a tie to the dwellers in the City of Sorrows. His recent accession to +grandeur had caused him terror only; love now shed within him the balm +that created strength; he loved Love. + +The next day Etienne rose early to hasten to his old house, where +Gabrielle, stirred by curiosity and an impatience she did not +acknowledge to herself, had already curled her hair and put on her +prettiest costume. Both were full of the eager desire to see each other +again,--mutually fearing the results of the interview. As for Etienne, +he had chosen his finest lace, his best-embroidered mantle, his +violet-velvet breeches; in short, those handsome habiliments which we +connect in all memoirs of the time with the pallid face of Louis XIII., +a face oppressed with pain in the midst of grandeur, like that of +Etienne. Clothes were certainly not the only point of resemblance +between the king and the subject. Many other sensibilities were in +Etienne as in Louis XIII.,--chastity, melancholy, vague but real +sufferings, chivalrous timidities, the fear of not being able to express +a feeling in all its purity, the dread of too quickly approaching +happiness, which all great souls desire to delay, the sense of the +burden of power, that tendency to obedience which is found in natures +indifferent to material interests, but full of love for what a noble +religious genius has called the “astral.” + +Though wholly inexpert in the ways of the world, Gabrielle was conscious +that the daughter of a doctor, the humble inhabitant of Forcalier, was +cast at too great a distance from Monseigneur Etienne, Duc de Nivron and +heir to the house of Herouville, to allow them to be equal; she had as +yet no conception of the ennobling of love. The naive creature thought +with no ambition of a place where every other girl would have longed to +seat herself; she saw the obstacles only. Loving, without as yet knowing +what it was to love, she only felt herself distant from her pleasure, +and longed to get nearer to it, as a child longs for the golden grapes +hanging high above its head. To a girl whose emotions were stirred at +the sight of a flower, and who had unconsciously foreseen love in the +chants of the liturgy, how sweet and how strong must have been the +feelings inspired in her breast the previous night by the sight of +the young seigneur’s feebleness, which seemed to reassure her own. But +during the night Etienne had been magnified to her mind; she had made +him a hope, a power; she had placed him so high that now she despaired +of ever reaching him. + +“Will you permit me to sometimes enter your domain?” asked the duke, +lowing his eyes. + +Seeing Etienne so timid, so humble,--for he, on his part, had magnified +Beauvouloir’s daughter,--Gabrielle was embarrassed with the sceptre he +placed in her hands; and yet she was profoundly touched and flattered +by such submission. Women alone know what seduction the respect of +their master and lover has for them. Nevertheless, she feared to deceive +herself, and, curious like the first woman, she wanted to know all. + +“I thought you promised yesterday to teach me music,” she answered, +hoping that music might be made a pretext for their meetings. + +If the poor child had known what Etienne’s life really was, she would +have spared him that doubt. To him his word was the echo of his mind, +and Gabrielle’s little speech caused him infinite pain. He had come +with his heart full, fearing some cloud upon his daylight, and he met +a doubt. His joy was extinguished; back into his desert he plunged, no +longer finding there the flowers with which he had embellished it. With +that prescience of sorrows which characterizes the angel charged +to soften them--who is, no doubt, the Charity of heaven--Gabrielle +instantly divined the pain she had caused. She was so vividly aware of +her fault that she prayed for the power of God to lay bare her soul +to Etienne, for she knew the cruel pang a reproach or a stern look was +capable of causing; and she artlessly betrayed to him these clouds as +they rose in her soul,--the golden swathings of her dawning love. One +tear which escaped her eyes turned Etienne’s pain to pleasure, and he +inwardly accused himself of tyranny. It was fortunate for both that +in the very beginning of their love they should thus come to know the +diapason of their hearts; they avoided henceforth a thousand shocks +which might have wounded them. + +Etienne, impatient to entrench himself behind an occupation, led +Gabrielle to a table before the little window at which he himself had +suffered so long, and where he was henceforth to admire a flower more +dainty than all he had hitherto studied. Then he opened a book over +which they bent their heads till their hair touched and mingled. + +These two beings, so strong in heart, so weak in body, but embellished +by all the graces of suffering, were a touching sight. Gabrielle was +ignorant of coquetry; a look was given the instant it was asked for, +the soft rays from the eyes of each never ceasing to mingle, unless from +modesty. The young girl took the joy of telling Etienne what pleasure +his voice gave her as she listened to his song; she forgot the meaning +of his words when he explained to her the position of the notes or their +value; she listened to HIM, leaving melody for the instrument, the +idea for the form; ingenuous flattery! the first that true love meets. +Gabrielle thought Etienne handsome; she would have liked to stroke the +velvet of his mantle, to touch the lace of his broad collar. As for +Etienne he was transformed under the creative glance of those earnest +eyes; they infused into his being a fruitful sap, which sparkled in his +eyes, shone on his brow, remade him inwardly, so that he did not +suffer from this new play of his faculties; on the contrary they were +strengthened by it. Happiness is the mother’s milk of a new life. + +As nothing came to distract them from each other, they stayed together +not only this day but all days; for they belonged to one another from +the first hour, passing the sceptre from one to the other and playing +with themselves as children play with life. Sitting, happy and content, +upon the golden sands, they told each other their past, painful for him, +but rich in dreams; dreamy for her, but full of painful pleasure. + +“I never had a mother,” said Gabrielle, “but my father has been good as +God himself.” + +“I never had a father,” said the hated son, “but my mother was all of +heaven to me.” + +Etienne related his youth, his love for his mother, his taste for +flowers. Gabrielle exclaimed at his last words. Questioned why, she +blushed and avoided answering; then when a shadow passed across that +brow which death seemed to graze with its pinion, across that visible +soul where the young man’s slightest emotions showed, she answered:-- + +“Because I too love flowers.” + +To believe ourselves linked far back in the past by community of tastes, +is not that a declaration of love such as virgins know how to give? Love +desires to seem old; it is a coquetry of youth. + +Etienne brought flowers on the morrow, ordering his people to find rare +ones, as his mother had done in earlier days for him. Who knows the +depths to which the roots of a feeling reach in the soul of a solitary +being thus returning to the traditions of mother-love in order to bestow +upon a woman the same caressing devotion with which his mother had +charmed his life? To him, what grandeur in these nothings wherein were +blended his only two affections. Flowers and music thus became the +language of their love. Gabrielle replied to Etienne’s gifts by nosegays +of her own,--nosegays which told the wise old doctor that his ignorant +daughter already knew enough. The material ignorance of these two +lovers was like a dark background on which the faintest lines of their +all-spiritual intercourse were traced with exquisite delicacy, like the +red, pure outlines of Etruscan figures. Their slightest words brought +a flood of ideas, because each was the fruit of their long meditations. +Incapable of boldly looking forward, each beginning seemed to them +an end. Though absolutely free, they were imprisoned in their own +simplicity, which would have been disheartening had either given a +meaning to their confused desires. They were poets and poem both. Music, +the most sensual of arts for loving souls, was the interpreter of their +ideas; they took delight in repeating the same harmony, letting their +passion flow through those fine sheets of sound in which their souls +could vibrate without obstacle. + +Many loves proceed through opposition; through struggles and +reconciliations, the vulgar struggle of mind and matter. But the first +wing-beat of true love sends it far beyond such struggles. Where all is +of the same essence, two natures are no longer to be distinguished; like +genius in its highest expression, such love can sustain itself in the +brightest light; it grows beneath the light, it needs no shade to bring +it into relief. Gabrielle, because she was a woman, Etienne, because he +had suffered much and meditated much, passed quickly through the regions +occupied by common passions and went beyond it. Like all enfeebled +natures, they were quickly penetrated by Faith, by that celestial glow +which doubles strength by doubling the soul. For them their sun was +always at its meridian. Soon they had that divine belief in themselves +which allows of neither jealousy nor torment; abnegation was ever ready, +admiration constant. + +Under these conditions, love could have no pain. Equal in their +feebleness, strong in their union, if the noble had some superiority of +knowledge and some conventional grandeur, the daughter of the physician +eclipsed all that by her beauty, by the loftiness of her sentiments, by +the delicacy she gave to their enjoyments. Thus these two white doves +flew with one wing beneath their pure blue heaven; Etienne loved, he was +loved, the present was serene, the future cloudless; he was sovereign +lord; the castle was his, the sea belonged to both of them; no vexing +thought troubled the harmonious concert of their canticle; virginity +of mind and senses enlarged for them the world, their thoughts rose +in their minds without effort; desire, the satisfactions of which are +doomed to blast so much, desire, that evil of terrestrial love, had +not as yet attacked them. Like two zephyrs swaying on the same +willow-branch, they needed nothing more than the joy of looking at each +other in the mirror of the limpid waters; immensity sufficed them; +they admired their Ocean, without one thought of gliding on it in the +white-winged bark with ropes of flowers, sailed by Hope. + +Love has its moment when it suffices to itself, when it is happy in +merely being. During this springtime, when all is budding, the lover +sometimes hides from the beloved woman, in order to enjoy her more, to +see her better; but Etienne and Gabrielle plunged together into all the +delights of that infantine period. Sometimes they were two sisters in +the grace of their confidences, sometimes two brothers in the boldness +of their questionings. Usually love demands a slave and a god, but these +two realized the dream of Plato,--they were but one being deified. They +protected each other. Caresses came slowly, one by one, but chaste +as the merry play--so graceful, so coquettish--of young animals. The +sentiment which induced them to express their souls in song led them to +love by the manifold transformations of the same happiness. Their joys +caused them neither wakefulness nor delirium. It was the infancy of +pleasure developing within them, unaware of the beautiful red flowers +which were to crown its shoots. They gave themselves to each other, +ignorant of all danger; they cast their whole being into a word, into a +look, into a kiss, into the long, long pressure of their clasping hands. +They praised each other’s beauties ingenuously, spending treasures of +language on these secret idylls, inventing soft exaggerations and more +diminutives than the ancient muse of Tibullus, or the poesies of Italy. +On their lips and in their hearts love flowed ever, like the liquid +fringes of the sea upon the sands of the shore,--all alike, all +dissimilar. Joyous, eternal fidelity! + +If we must count by days, the time thus spent was five months only; if +we may count by the innumerable sensations, thoughts, dreams, glances, +opening flowers, realized hopes, unceasing joys, speeches interrupted, +renewed, abandoned, frolic laughter, bare feet dabbling in the sea, +hunts, childlike, for shells, kisses, surprises, clasping hands,--call +it a lifetime; death will justify the word. There are existences that +are ever gloomy, lived under ashen skies; but suppose a glorious day, +when the sun of heaven glows in the azure air,--such was the May of +their love, during which Etienne had suspended all his griefs,--griefs +which had passed into the heart of Gabrielle, who, in turn, had fastened +all her joys to come on those of her lord. Etienne had had but one +sorrow in his life,--the death of his mother; he was to have but one +love--Gabrielle. + + + + +CHAPTER VII. THE CRUSHED PEARL + + +The coarse rivalry of an ambitious man hastened the destruction of this +honeyed life. The Duc d’Herouville, an old warrior in wiles and policy, +had no sooner passed his word to his physician than he was conscious of +the voice of distrust. The Baron d’Artagnon, lieutenant of his company +of men-at-arms, possessed his utmost confidence. The baron was a man +after the duke’s own heart,--a species of butcher, built for strength, +tall, virile in face, cold and harsh, brave in the service of the +throne, rude in his manners, with an iron will in action, but supple in +manoeuvres, withal an ambitious noble, possessing the honor of a soldier +and the wiles of a politician. He had the hand his face demanded,--large +and hairy like that of a guerrilla; his manners were brusque, his speech +concise. The duke, in departing, gave to this man the duty of watching +and reporting to him the conduct of Beauvouloir toward the new +heir-presumptive. + +In spite of the secrecy which surrounded Gabrielle, it was difficult +to long deceive the commander of a company. He heard the singing of two +voices; he saw the lights at night in the dwelling on the seashore; +he guessed that Etienne’s orders, repeated constantly, for flowers +concerned a woman; he discovered Gabrielle’s nurse making her way on +foot to Forcalier, carrying linen or clothes, and bringing back with her +the work-frame and other articles needed by a young lady. The spy then +watched the cottage, saw the physician’s daughter, and fell in love +with her. Beauvouloir he knew was rich. The duke would be furious at the +man’s audacity. On those foundations the Baron d’Artagnon erected the +edifice of his fortunes. The duke, on learning that his son was falling +in love, would, of course, instantly endeavor to detach him from the +girl; what better way than to force her son into a marriage with a noble +like himself, giving his son to the daughter of some great house, the +heiress of large estates. The baron himself had no property. The scheme +was excellent, and might have succeeded with other natures than those of +Etienne and Gabrielle; with them failure was certain. + +During his stay in Paris the duke had avenged the death of Maximilien by +killing his son’s adversary, and he had planned for Etienne an alliance +with the heiress of a branch of the house of Grandlieu,--a tall and +disdainful beauty, who was flattered by the prospect of some day bearing +the title of Duchesse d’Herouville. The duke expected to oblige his son +to marry her. On learning from d’Artagnon that Etienne was in love with +the daughter of a miserable physician, he was only the more determined +to carry out the marriage. What could such a man comprehend of love,--he +who had let his own wife die beside him without understanding a single +sigh of her heart? Never, perhaps, in his life had he felt such violent +anger as when the last despatch of the baron told him with what rapidity +Beauvouloir’s plans were advancing,--the baron attributing them wholly +to the bonesetter’s ambition. The duke ordered out his equipages and +started for Rouen, bringing with him the Comtesse de Grandlieu, her +sister the Marquise de Noirmoutier, and Mademoiselle de Grandlieu, under +pretext of showing them the province of Normandy. + +A few days before his arrival a rumor was spread about the country--by +what means no one seemed to know--of the passion of the young Duc de +Nivron for Gabrielle Beauvouloir. People in Rouen spoke of it to the Duc +d’Herouville in the midst of a banquet given to celebrate his return to +the province; for the guests were glad to deliver a blow to the despot +of Normandy. This announcement excited the anger of the governor to the +highest pitch. He wrote to the baron to keep his coming to Herouville a +close secret, giving him certain orders to avert what he considered to +be an evil. + +It was under these circumstances that Etienne and Gabrielle unrolled +their thread through the labyrinth of love, where both, not seeking +to leave it, thought to dwell. One day they had remained from morn to +evening near the window where so many events had taken place. The hours, +filled at first with gentle talk, had ended in meditative silence. +They began to feel within them the wish for complete possession; and +presently they reached the point of confiding to each other their +confused ideas, the reflections of two beautiful, pure souls. During +these still, serene hours, Etienne’s eyes would sometimes fill with +tears as he held the hand of Gabrielle to his lips. Like his mother, but +at this moment happier in his love than she had been in hers, the hated +son looked down upon the sea, at that hour golden on the shore, black +on the horizon, and slashed here and there with those silvery caps which +betoken a coming storm. Gabrielle, conforming to her friend’s action, +looked at the sight and was silent. A single look, one of those by which +two souls support each other, sufficed to communicate their thoughts. +Each loved with that love so divinely like unto itself at every instant +of its eternity that it is not conscious of devotion or sacrifice +or exaction, it fears neither deceptions nor delay. But Etienne and +Gabrielle were in absolute ignorance of satisfactions, a desire for +which was stirring in their souls. + +When the first faint tints of twilight drew a veil athwart the sea, and +the hush was interrupted only by the soughing of the flux and reflux +on the shore, Etienne rose; Gabrielle followed his motion with a vague +fear, for he had dropped her hand. He took her in one of his arms, +pressing her to him with a movement of tender cohesion, and she, +comprehending his desire, made him feel the weight of her body enough +to give him the certainty that she was all his, but not enough to be a +burden on him. The lover laid his head heavily on the shoulder of his +friend, his lips touched the heaving bosom, his hair flowed over the +white shoulders and caressed her throat. The girl, ingenuously loving, +bent her head aside to give more place for his head, passing her arm +about his neck to gain support. Thus they remained till nightfall +without uttering a word. The crickets sang in their holes, and the +lovers listened to that music as if to employ their senses on one sense +only. Certainly they could only in that hour be compared to angels who, +with their feet on earth, await the moment to take flight to heaven. +They had fulfilled the noble dream of Plato’s mystic genius, the dream +of all who seek a meaning in humanity; they formed but one soul, they +were, indeed, that mysterious Pearl destined to adorn the brow of a star +as yet unknown, but the hope of all! + +“Will you take me home?” said Gabrielle, the first to break the +exquisite silence. + +“Why should we part?” replied Etienne. + +“We ought to be together always,” she said. + +“Stay with me.” + +“Yes.” + +The heavy step of Beauvouloir sounded in the adjoining room. The doctor +had seen these children at the window locked in each other’s arms, but +he found them separated. The purest love demands its mystery. + +“This is not right, my child,” he said to Gabrielle, “to stay so late, +and have no lights.” + +“Why wrong?” she said; “you know we love each other, and he is master of +the castle.” + +“My children,” said Beauvouloir, “if you love each other, your happiness +requires that you should marry and pass your lives together; but your +marriage depends on the will of monseigneur the duke--” + +“My father has promised to gratify all my wishes,” cried Etienne +eagerly, interrupting Beauvouloir. + +“Write to him, monseigneur,” replied the doctor, “and give me your letter +that I may enclose it with one which I, myself, have just written. +Bertrand is to start at once and put these despatches into monseigneur’s +own hand. I have learned to-night that he is now in Rouen; he has +brought the heiress of the house of Grandlieu with him, not, as I think, +solely for himself. If I listened to my presentiments, I should take +Gabrielle away from here this very night.” + +“Separate us?” cried Etienne, half fainting with distress and leaning on +his love. + +“Father!” + +“Gabrielle,” said the physician, holding out to her a smelling-bottle +which he took from a table signing to her to make Etienne inhale its +contents,--“Gabrielle, my knowledge of science tells me that Nature +destined you for each other. I meant to prepare monseigneur the duke +for a marriage which will certainly offend his ideas, but the devil has +already prejudiced him against it. Etienne is Duc de Nivron, and you, my +child, are the daughter of a poor doctor.” + +“My father swore to contradict me in nothing,” said Etienne, calmly. + +“He swore to me also to consent to all I might do in finding you a +wife,” replied the doctor; “but suppose that he does not keep his +promises?” + +Etienne sat down, as if overcome. + +“The sea was dark to-night,” he said, after a moment’s silence. + +“If you could ride a horse, monseigneur,” said Beauvouloir, “I should +tell you to fly with Gabrielle this very evening. I know you both, and +I know that any other marriage would be fatal to you. The duke would +certainly fling me into a dungeon and leave me there for the rest of my +days when he heard of your flight; and I should die joyfully if my death +secured your happiness. But alas! to mount a horse would risk your life +and that of Gabrielle. We must face your father’s anger here.” + +“Here!” repeated Etienne. + +“We have been betrayed by some one in the chateau who has stirred your +father’s wrath against us,” continued Beauvouloir. + +“Let us throw ourselves together into the sea,” said Etienne to +Gabrielle, leaning down to the ear of the young girl who was kneeling +beside him. + +She bowed her head, smiling. Beauvouloir divined all. + +“Monseigneur,” he said, “your mind and your knowledge can make you +eloquent, and the force of your love may be irresistible. Declare it to +monseigneur the duke; you will thus confirm my letter. All is not lost, +I think. I love my daughter as well as you love her, and I shall defend +her.” + +Etienne shook his head. + +“The sea was very dark to-night,” he repeated. + +“It was like a sheet of gold at our feet,” said Gabrielle in a voice of +melody. + +Etienne ordered lights, and sat down at a table to write to his father. +On one side of him knelt Gabrielle, silent, watching the words he wrote, +but not reading them; she read all on Etienne’s forehead. On his +other side stood old Beauvouloir, whose jovial countenance was deeply +sad,--sad as that gloomy chamber where Etienne’s mother died. A secret +voice cried to the doctor, “The fate of his mother awaits him!” + +When the letter was written, Etienne held it out to the old man, who +hastened to give it to Bertrand. The old retainer’s horse was waiting in +the courtyard, saddled; the man himself was ready. He started, and met +the duke twelve miles from Herouville. + +“Come with me to the gate of the courtyard,” said Gabrielle to her +friend when they were alone. + +The pair passed through the cardinal’s library, and went down through +the tower, in which was a door, the key of which Etienne had given to +Gabrielle. Stupefied by the dread of coming evil, the poor youth left +in the tower the torch he had brought to light the steps of his beloved, +and continued with her toward the cottage. A few steps from the +little garden, which formed a sort of flowery courtyard to the humble +habitation, the lovers stopped. Emboldened by the vague alarm which +oppressed them, they gave each other, in the shades of night, in the +silence, that first kiss in which the senses and the soul unite, and +cause a revealing joy. Etienne comprehended love in its dual expression, +and Gabrielle fled lest she should be drawn by that love--whither she +knew not. + +At the moment when the Duc de Nivron reascended the staircase to the +castle, after closing the door of the tower, a cry of horror, uttered by +Gabrielle, echoed in his ears with the sharpness of a flash of lightning +which burns the eyes. Etienne ran through the apartments of the chateau, +down the grand staircase, and along the beach towards Gabrielle’s house, +where he saw lights. + +When Gabrielle, quitting her lover, had entered the little garden, she +saw, by the gleam of a torch which lighted her nurse’s spinning-wheel, +the figure of a man sitting in the chair of that excellent woman. At +the sound of her steps the man arose and came toward her; this had +frightened her, and she gave the cry. The presence and aspect of the +Baron d’Artagnon amply justified the fear thus inspired in the young +girl’s breast. + +“Are you the daughter of Beauvouloir, monseigneur’s physician?” asked +the baron when Gabrielle’s first alarm had subsided. + +“Yes, monsieur.” + +“I have matters of the utmost importance to confide to you. I am the +Baron d’Artagnon, lieutenant of the company of men-at-arms commanded by +Monseigneur the Duc d’Herouville.” + +Gabrielle, under the circumstances in which she and her lover stood, was +struck by these words, and by the frank tone with which the soldier said +them. + +“Your nurse is here; she may overhear us. Come this way,” said the +baron. + +He left the garden, and Gabrielle followed him to the beach behind the +house. + +“Fear nothing!” said the baron. + +That speech would have frightened any one less ignorant than Gabrielle; +but a simple young girl who loves never thinks herself in peril. + +“Dear child,” said the baron, endeavoring to give a honeyed tone to his +voice, “you and your father are on the verge of an abyss into which +you will fall to-morrow. I cannot see your danger without warning you. +Monseigneur is furious against your father and against you; he suspects +you of having seduced his son, and he would rather see him dead than +see him marry you; so much for his son. As for your father, this is the +decision monseigneur has made about him. Nine years ago your father was +implicated in a criminal affair. The matter related to the secretion of +a child of rank at the time of its birth which he attended. Monseigneur, +knowing that your father was innocent, guaranteed him from prosecution +by the parliament; but now he intends to have him arrested and delivered +up to justice to be tried for the crime. Your father will be broken on +the wheel; though perhaps, in view of some services he has done to his +master, he may obtain the favor of being hanged. I do not know what +course monseigneur has decided on for you; but I do know that you can +save Monseigneur de Nivron from his father’s anger, and your father from +the horrible death which awaits him, and also save yourself.” + +“What must I do?” said Gabrielle. + +“Throw yourself at monseigneur’s feet, and tell him that his son loves +you against your will, and say that you do not love him. In proof of +this, offer to marry any man whom the duke himself may select as your +husband. He is generous; he will dower you handsomely.” + +“I can do all except deny my love.” + +“But if that alone can save your father, yourself, and Monseigneur de +Nivron?” + +“Etienne,” she replied, “would die of it, and so should I.” + +“Monseigneur de Nivron will be unhappy at losing you, but he will live +for the honor of his house; you will resign yourself to be the wife of +a baron only, instead of being a duchess, and your father will live out +his days,” said the practical man. + +At this moment Etienne reached the house. He did not see Gabrielle, and +he uttered a piercing cry. + +“He is here!” cried the young girl; “let me go now and comfort him.” + +“I shall come for your answer to-morrow,” said the baron. + +“I will consult my father,” she replied. + +“You will not see him again. I have received orders to arrest him and +send him in chains, under escort, to Rouen,” said d’Artagnon, leaving +Gabrielle dumb with terror. + +The young girl sprang to the house, and found Etienne horrified by the +silence of the nurse in answer to his question, “Where is she?” + +“I am here!” cried the young girl, whose voice was icy, her step heavy, +her color gone. + +“What has happened?” he said. “I heard you cry.” + +“Yes, I hurt my foot against--” + +“No, love,” replied Etienne, interrupting her. “I heard the steps of a +man.” + +“Etienne, we must have offended God; let us kneel down and pray. I will +tell you afterwards.” + +Etienne and Gabrielle knelt down at the prie-dieu, and the nurse recited +her rosary. + +“O God!” prayed the girl, with a fervor which carried her beyond +terrestrial space, “if we have not sinned against thy divine +commandments, if we have not offended the Church, not yet the king, we, +who are one and the same being, in whom love shines with the light that +thou hast given to the pearl of the sea, be merciful unto us, and let us +not be parted either in this world or in that which is to come.” + +“Mother!” added Etienne, “who art in heaven, obtain from the Virgin that +if we cannot--Gabrielle and I--be happy here below we may at least die +together, and without suffering. Call us, and we will go to thee.” + +Then, having recited their evening prayers, Gabrielle related her +interview with Baron d’Artagnon. + +“Gabrielle,” said the young man, gathering strength from his despair, “I +shall know how to resist my father.” + +He kissed her on the forehead, but not again upon the lips. Then he +returned to the castle, resolved to face the terrible man who had +weighed so fearfully on his life. He did not know that Gabrielle’s house +would be surrounded and guarded by soldiers the moment that he quitted +it. + +The next day he was struck down with grief when, on going to see her, he +found her a prisoner. But Gabrielle sent her nurse to tell him she would +die sooner than be false to him; and, moreover, that she knew a way +to deceive the guards, and would soon take refuge in the cardinal’s +library, where no one would suspect her presence, though she did not as +yet know when she could accomplish it. Etienne on that returned to +his room, where all the forces of his heart were spent in the dreadful +suspense of waiting. + +At three o’clock on the afternoon of that day the equipages of the duke +and suite entered the courtyard of the castle. Madame la Comtesse de +Grandlieu, leaning on the arm of her daughter, the duke and Marquise de +Noirmoutier mounted the grand staircase in silence, for the stern brow +of the master had awed the servants. Though Baron d’Artagnon now knew +that Gabrielle had evaded his guards, he assured the duke she was a +prisoner, for he trembled lest his own private scheme should fail if the +duke were angered by this flight. Those two terrible faces--his and the +duke’s--wore a fierce expression that was ill-disguised by an air of +gallantry imposed by the occasion. The duke had already sent to his son, +ordering him to be present in the salon. When the company entered it, +d’Artagnon saw by the downcast look on Etienne’s face that as yet he did +not know of Gabrielle’s escape. + +“This is my son,” said the old duke, taking Etienne by the hand and +presenting him to the ladies. + +Etienne bowed without uttering a word. The countess and Mademoiselle de +Grandlieu exchanged a look which the old man intercepted. + +“Your daughter will be ill-matched--is that your thought?” he said in a +low voice. + +“I think quite the contrary, my dear duke,” replied the mother, smiling. + +The Marquise de Noirmoutier, who accompanied her sister, laughed +significantly. That laugh stabbed Etienne to the heart; already the +sight of the tall lady had terrified him. + +“Well, Monsieur le duc,” said the duke in a low voice and assuming a +lively air, “have I not found you a handsome wife? What do you say to +that slip of a girl, my cherub?” + +The old duke never doubted his son’s obedience; Etienne, to him, was the +son of his mother, of the same dough, docile to his kneading. + +“Let him have a child and die,” thought the old man; “little I care.” + +“Father,” said the young man, in a gentle voice, “I do not understand +you.” + +“Come into your own room, I have a few words to say to you,” replied the +duke, leading the way into the state bedroom. + +Etienne followed his father. The three ladies, stirred with a curiosity +that was shared by Baron d’Artagnon, walked about the great salon in a +manner to group themselves finally near the door of the bedroom, which +the duke had left partially open. + +“Dear Benjamin,” said the duke, softening his voice, “I have selected +that tall and handsome young lady as your wife; she is heiress to the +estates of the younger branch of the house of Grandlieu, a fine old +family of Bretagne. Therefore make yourself agreeable; remember all the +love-making you have read of in your books, and learn to make pretty +speeches.” + +“Father, is it not the first duty of a nobleman to keep his word?” + +“Yes.” + +“Well, then, on the day when I forgave you the death of my mother, dying +here through her marriage with you, did you not promise me never to +thwart my wishes? ‘I will obey you as the family god,’ were the words +you said to me. I ask nothing of you, I simply demand my freedom in a +matter which concerns my life and myself only,--namely, my marriage.” + +“I understood,” replied the old man, all the blood in his body rushing +into his face, “that you would not oppose the continuation of our noble +race.” + +“You made no condition,” said Etienne. “I do not know what love has to +do with race; but this I know, I love the daughter of your old friend +Beauvouloir, and the granddaughter of your friend La Belle Romaine.” + +“She is dead,” replied the old colossus, with an air both savage and +jeering, which told only too plainly his intention of making away with +her. + +A moment of deep silence followed. + +The duke saw, through the half-opened door, the three ladies and +d’Artagnon. At that crucial moment Etienne, whose sense of hearing was +acute, heard in the cardinal’s library poor Gabrielle’s voice, singing, +to let her lover know she was there,-- + + “Ermine hath not + Her pureness; + The lily not her whiteness.” + +The hated son, whom his father’s horrible speech had flung into a gulf +of death, returned to the surface of life at the sound of that voice. +Though the emotion of terror thus rapidly cast off had already in that +instant, broken his heart, he gathered up his strength, looked his +father in the face for the first time in his life, gave scorn for scorn, +and said, in tones of hatred:-- + +“A nobleman ought not to lie.” + +Then with one bound he sprang to the door of the library and cried:-- + +“Gabrielle!” + +Suddenly the gentle creature appeared among the shadows, like the lily +among its leaves, trembling before those mocking women thus informed +of Etienne’s love. As the clouds that bear the thunder project upon +the heavens, so the old duke, reaching a degree of anger that defies +description, stood out upon the brilliant background produced by the +rich clothing of those courtly dames. Between the destruction of his son +and a mesalliance, every other father would have hesitated, but in this +uncontrollable old man ferocity was the power which had so far solved +the difficulties of life for him; he drew his sword in all cases, as the +only remedy that he knew for the gordian knots of life. Under present +circumstances, when the convulsion of his ideas had reached its height, +the nature of the man came uppermost. Twice detected in flagrant +falsehood by the being he abhorred, the son he cursed, cursing him more +than ever in this supreme moment when that son’s despised, and to him +most despicable, weakness triumphed over his own omnipotence, infallible +till then, the father and the man ceased to exist, the tiger issued from +its lair. Casting at the angels before him--the sweetest pair that ever +set their feet on earth--a murderous look of hatred,-- + +“Die, then, both of you!” he cried. “You, vile abortion, the proof of +my shame--and you,” he said to Gabrielle, “miserable strumpet with the +viper tongue, who has poisoned my house.” + +These words struck home to the hearts of the two children the terror +that already surcharged them. At the moment when Etienne saw the +huge hand of his father raising a weapon upon Gabrielle he died, and +Gabrielle fell dead in striving to retain him. + +The old man left them, and closed the door violently, saying to +Mademoiselle de Grandlieu:-- + +“I will marry you myself!” + +“You are young and gallant enough to have a fine new lineage,” whispered +the countess in the ear of the old man, who had served under seven kings +of France. + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of The Hated Son, by Honore de Balzac + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK 1455 *** |