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diff --git a/1950.txt b/1950.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..f1150e9 --- /dev/null +++ b/1950.txt @@ -0,0 +1,7734 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman of Thirty, by Honore de Balzac + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: A Woman of Thirty + +Author: Honore de Balzac + +Translator: Ellen Marriage + +Release Date: November, 1999 [Etext #1950] +Posting Date: March 6, 2010 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN OF THIRTY *** + + + + +Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny + + + + + +A WOMAN OF THIRTY + + +By Honore De Balzac + + + +Translated by Ellen Marriage + + + + + DEDICATION + + To Louis Boulanger, Painter. + + + + + +A WOMAN OF THIRTY + + + + +I. EARLY MISTAKES + +It was a Sunday morning in the beginning of April 1813, a morning which +gave promise of one of those bright days when Parisians, for the first +time in the year, behold dry pavements underfoot and a cloudless sky +overhead. It was not yet noon when a luxurious cabriolet, drawn by two +spirited horses, turned out of the Rue de Castiglione into the Rue de +Rivoli, and drew up behind a row of carriages standing before the newly +opened barrier half-way down the Terrasse de Feuillants. The owner of +the carriage looked anxious and out of health; the thin hair on his +sallow temples, turning gray already, gave a look of premature age to +his face. He flung the reins to a servant who followed on horseback, +and alighted to take in his arms a young girl whose dainty beauty had +already attracted the eyes of loungers on the Terrasse. The little lady, +standing upon the carriage step, graciously submitted to be taken by the +waist, putting an arm round the neck of her guide, who set her down upon +the pavement without so much as ruffling the trimming of her green rep +dress. No lover would have been so careful. The stranger could only be +the father of the young girl, who took his arm familiarly without a word +of thanks, and hurried him into the Garden of the Tuileries. + +The old father noted the wondering stare which some of the young men +gave the couple, and the sad expression left his face for a moment. +Although he had long since reached the time of life when a man is fain +to be content with such illusory delights as vanity bestows, he began to +smile. + +"They think you are my wife," he said in the young lady's ear, and he +held himself erect and walked with slow steps, which filled his daughter +with despair. + +He seemed to take up the coquette's part for her; perhaps of the two, he +was the more gratified by the curious glances directed at those little +feet, shod with plum-colored prunella; at the dainty figure outlined by +a low-cut bodice, filled in with an embroidered chemisette, which only +partially concealed the girlish throat. Her dress was lifted by her +movements as she walked, giving glimpses higher than the shoes of +delicately moulded outlines beneath open-work silk stockings. More than +one of the idlers turned and passed the pair again, to admire or to +catch a second glimpse of the young face, about which the brown tresses +played; there was a glow in its white and red, partly reflected from the +rose-colored satin lining of her fashionable bonnet, partly due to the +eagerness and impatience which sparkled in every feature. A mischievous +sweetness lighted up the beautiful, almond-shaped dark eyes, bathed +in liquid brightness, shaded by the long lashes and curving arch of +eyebrow. Life and youth displayed their treasures in the petulant face +and in the gracious outlines of the bust unspoiled even by the fashion +of the day, which brought the girdle under the breast. + +The young lady herself appeared to be insensible to admiration. Her +eyes were fixed in a sort of anxiety on the Palace of the Tuileries, +the goal, doubtless, of her petulant promenade. It wanted but fifteen +minutes of noon, yet even at that early hour several women in gala dress +were coming away from the Tuileries, not without backward glances at the +gates and pouting looks of discontent, as if they regretted the lateness +of the arrival which had cheated them of a longed-for spectacle. Chance +carried a few words let fall by one of these disappointed fair ones to +the ears of the charming stranger, and put her in a more than common +uneasiness. The elderly man watched the signs of impatience and +apprehension which flitted across his companion's pretty face with +interest, rather than amusement, in his eyes, observing her with a close +and careful attention, which perhaps could only be prompted by some +after-thought in the depths of a father's mind. + + + +It was the thirteenth Sunday of the year 1813. In two days' time +Napoleon was to set out upon the disastrous campaign in which he was +to lose first Bessieres, and then Duroc; he was to win the memorable +battles of Lutzen and Bautzen, to see himself treacherously deserted by +Austria, Saxony, Bavaria, and Bernadotte, and to dispute the dreadful +field of Leipsic. The magnificent review commanded for that day by the +Emperor was to be the last of so many which had long drawn forth the +admiration of Paris and of foreign visitors. For the last time the Old +Guard would execute their scientific military manoeuvres with the pomp +and precision which sometimes amazed the Giant himself. Napoleon was +nearly ready for his duel with Europe. It was a sad sentiment which +brought a brilliant and curious throng to the Tuileries. Each mind +seemed to foresee the future, perhaps too in every mind another thought +was dimly present, how that in the future, when the heroic age of France +should have taken the half-fabulous color with which it is tinged for +us to-day, men's imaginations would more than once seek to retrace the +picture of the pageant which they were assembled to behold. + +"Do let us go more quickly, father; I can hear the drums," the young +girl said, and in a half-teasing, half-coaxing manner she urged her +companion forward. + +"The troops are marching into the Tuileries," said he. + +"Or marching out of it--everybody is coming away," she answered in +childish vexation, which drew a smile from her father. + +"The review only begins at half-past twelve," he said; he had fallen +half behind his impetuous daughter. + +It might have been supposed that she meant to hasten their progress by +a movement of her right arm, for it swung like an oar blade through the +water. In her impatience she had crushed her handkerchief into a ball in +her tiny, well-gloved fingers. Now and then the old man smiled, but the +smiles were succeeded by an anxious look which crossed his withered face +and saddened it. In his love for the fair young girl by his side, he +was as fain to exalt the present moment as to dread the future. "She is +happy to-day; will her happiness last?" he seemed to ask himself, for +the old are somewhat prone to foresee their own sorrows in the future of +the young. + +Father and daughter reached the peristyle under the tower where the +tricolor flag was still waving; but as they passed under the arch by +which people came and went between the Gardens of the Tuileries and the +Place du Carrousel, the sentries on guard called out sternly: + +"No admittance this way." + +By standing on tiptoe the young girl contrived to catch a glimpse of +a crowd of well-dressed women, thronging either side of the old marble +arcade along which the Emperor was to pass. + +"We were too late in starting, father; you can see that quite well." A +little piteous pout revealed the immense importance which she attached +to the sight of this particular review. + +"Very well, Julie--let us go away. You dislike a crush." + +"Do let us stay, father. Even here I may catch a glimpse of the Emperor; +he might die during this campaign, and then I should never have seen +him." + +Her father shuddered at the selfish speech. There were tears in the +girl's voice; he looked at her, and thought that he saw tears beneath +her lowered eyelids; tears caused not so much by the disappointment as +by one of the troubles of early youth, a secret easily guessed by an old +father. Suddenly Julie's face flushed, and she uttered an exclamation. +Neither her father nor the sentinels understood the meaning of the cry; +but an officer within the barrier, who sprang across the court towards +the staircase, heard it, and turned abruptly at the sound. He went to +the arcade by the Gardens of the Tuileries, and recognized the young +lady who had been hidden for a moment by the tall bearskin caps of the +grenadiers. He set aside in favor of the pair the order which he himself +had given. Then, taking no heed of the murmurings of the fashionable +crowd seated under the arcade, he gently drew the enraptured child +towards him. + +"I am no longer surprised at her vexation and enthusiasm, if _you_ are +in waiting," the old man said with a half-mocking, half-serious glance +at the officer. + +"If you want a good position, M. le Duc," the young man answered, "we +must not spend any time in talking. The Emperor does not like to be kept +waiting, and the Grand Marshal has sent me to announce our readiness." + +As he spoke, he had taken Julie's arm with a certain air of old +acquaintance, and drew her rapidly in the direction of the Place du +Carrousel. Julie was astonished at the sight. An immense crowd was +penned up in a narrow space, shut in between the gray walls of the +palace and the limits marked out by chains round the great sanded +squares in the midst of the courtyard of the Tuileries. The cordon of +sentries posted to keep a clear passage for the Emperor and his staff +had great difficulty in keeping back the eager humming swarm of human +beings. + +"Is it going to be a very fine sight?" Julie asked (she was radiant +now). + +"Pray take care!" cried her guide, and seizing Julie by the waist, he +lifted her up with as much vigor as rapidity and set her down beside a +pillar. + +But for his prompt action, his gazing kinswoman would have come into +collision with the hindquarters of a white horse which Napoleon's +Mameluke held by the bridle; the animal in its trappings of green velvet +and gold stood almost under the arcade, some ten paces behind the rest +of the horses in readiness for the Emperor's staff. + +The young officer placed the father and daughter in front of the crowd +in the first space to the right, and recommended them by a sign to the +two veteran grenadiers on either side. Then he went on his way into +the palace; a look of great joy and happiness had succeeded to his +horror-struck expression when the horse backed. Julie had given his hand +a mysterious pressure; had she meant to thank him for the little service +he had done her, or did she tell him, "After all, I shall really see +you?" She bent her head quite graciously in response to the respectful +bow by which the officer took leave of them before he vanished. + +The old man stood a little behind his daughter. He looked grave. He +seemed to have left the two young people together for some purpose of +his own, and now he furtively watched the girl, trying to lull her +into false security by appearing to give his whole attention to the +magnificent sight in the Place du Carrousel. When Julie's eyes turned +to her father with the expression of a schoolboy before his master, he +answered her glance by a gay, kindly smile, but his own keen eyes had +followed the officer under the arcade, and nothing of all that passed +was lost upon him. + +"What a grand sight!" said Julie in a low voice, as she pressed her +father's hand; and indeed the pomp and picturesquesness of the spectacle +in the Place du Carrousel drew the same exclamation from thousands +upon thousands of spectators, all agape with wonder. Another array of +sightseers, as tightly packed as the ranks behind the old noble and +his daughter, filled the narrow strip of pavement by the railings which +crossed the Place du Carrousel from side to side in a line parallel with +the Palace of the Tuileries. The dense living mass, variegated by the +colors of the women's dresses, traced out a bold line across the +centre of the Place du Carrousel, filling in the fourth side of a vast +parallelogram, surrounded on three sides by the Palace of the Tuileries +itself. Within the precincts thus railed off stood the regiments of the +Old Guard about to be passed in review, drawn up opposite the Palace +in imposing blue columns, ten ranks in depth. Without and beyond in the +Place du Carrousel stood several regiments likewise drawn up in parallel +lines, ready to march in through the arch in the centre; the Triumphal +Arch, where the bronze horses of St. Mark from Venice used to stand in +those days. At either end, by the Galeries du Louvre, the regimental +bands were stationed, masked by the Polish Lancers then on duty. + +The greater part of the vast graveled space was empty as an arena, ready +for the evolutions of those silent masses disposed with the symmetry +of military art. The sunlight blazed back from ten thousand bayonets in +thin points of flame; the breeze ruffled the men's helmet plumes till +they swayed like the crests of forest-trees before a gale. The mute +glittering ranks of veterans were full of bright contrasting colors, +thanks to their different uniforms, weapons, accoutrements, and +aiguillettes; and the whole great picture, that miniature battlefield +before the combat, was framed by the majestic towering walls of the +Tuileries, which officers and men seemed to rival in their immobility. +Involuntarily the spectator made the comparison between the walls of +men and the walls of stone. The spring sunlight, flooding white masonry +reared but yesterday and buildings centuries old, shone full likewise +upon thousands of bronzed faces, each one with its own tale of perils +passed, each one gravely expectant of perils to come. + +The colonels of the regiments came and went alone before the ranks of +heroes; and behind the masses of troops, checkered with blue and silver +and gold and purple, the curious could discern the tricolor pennons on +the lances of some half-a-dozen indefatigable Polish cavalry, rushing +about like shepherds' dogs in charge of a flock, caracoling up and down +between the troops and the crowd, to keep the gazers within their proper +bounds. But for this slight flutter of movement, the whole scene might +have been taking place in the courtyard of the palace of the Sleeping +Beauty. The very spring breeze, ruffling up the long fur on the +grenadiers' bearskins, bore witness to the men's immobility, as the +smothered murmur of the crowd emphasized their silence. Now and again +the jingling of Chinese bells, or a chance blow to a big drum, woke +the reverberating echoes of the Imperial Palace with a sound like the +far-off rumblings of thunder. + +An indescribable, unmistakable enthusiasm was manifest in the expectancy +of the multitude. France was about to take farewell of Napoleon on the +eve of a campaign of which the meanest citizen foresaw the perils. The +existence of the French Empire was at stake--to be, or not to be. The +whole citizen population seemed to be as much inspired with this thought +as that other armed population standing in serried and silent ranks in +the enclosed space, with the Eagles and the genius of Napoleon hovering +above them. + +Those very soldiers were the hope of France, her last drop of blood; and +this accounted for not a little of the anxious interest of the scene. +Most of the gazers in the crowd had bidden farewell--perhaps farewell +for ever--to the men who made up the rank and file of the battalions; +and even those most hostile to the Emperor, in their hearts, put up +fervent prayers to heaven for the glory of France; and those most weary +of the struggle with the rest of Europe had left their hatreds behind as +they passed in under the Triumphal Arch. They too felt that in the hour +of danger Napoleon meant France herself. + +The clock of the Tuileries struck the half-hour. In a moment the hum of +the crowd ceased. The silence was so deep that you might have heard a +child speak. The old noble and his daughter, wholly intent, seeming to +live only by their eyes, caught a distinct sound of spurs and clank of +swords echoing up under the sonorous peristyle. + +And suddenly there appeared a short, somewhat stout figure in a green +uniform, white trousers, and riding boots; a man wearing on his head a +cocked hat well-nigh as magically potent as its wearer; the broad red +ribbon of the Legion of Honor rose and fell on his breast, and a short +sword hung at his side. At one and the same moment the man was seen by +all eyes in all parts of the square. + +Immediately the drums beat a salute, both bands struck up a martial +refrain, caught and repeated like a fugue by every instrument from the +thinnest flutes to the largest drum. The clangor of that call to arms +thrilled through every soul. The colors dropped, and the men presented +arms, one unanimous rhythmical movement shaking every bayonet from +the foremost front near the Palace to the last rank in the Place du +Carrousel. The words of command sped from line to line like echoes. The +whole enthusiastic multitude sent up a shout of "Long live the Emperor!" + +Everything shook, quivered, and thrilled at last. Napoleon had mounted +his horse. It was his movement that had put life into those silent +masses of men; the dumb instruments had found a voice at his coming, +the Eagles and the colors had obeyed the same impulse which had brought +emotion into all faces. + +The very walls of the high galleries of the old palace seemed to cry +aloud, "Long live the Emperor!" + +There was something preternatural about it--it was magic at work, a +counterfeit presentment of the power of God; or rather it was a fugitive +image of a reign itself so fugitive. + +And _he_ the centre of such love, such enthusiasm and devotion, and so +many prayers, he for whom the sun had driven the clouds from the sky, +was sitting there on his horse, three paces in front of his Golden +Squadron, with the grand Marshal on his left, and the Marshal-in-waiting +on his right. Amid all the outburst of enthusiasm at his presence not a +feature of his face appeared to alter. + +"Oh! yes. At Wagram, in the thick of the firing, on the field of +Borodino, among the dead, always as cool as a cucumber _he_ is!" said +the grenadier, in answer to the questions with which the young girl +plied him. For a moment Julie was absorbed in the contemplation of that +face, so quiet in the security of conscious power. The Emperor noticed +Mlle. de Chatillonest, and leaned to make some brief remark to Duroc, +which drew a smile from the Grand Marshal. Then the review began. + +If hitherto the young lady's attention had been divided between +Napoleon's impassive face and the blue, red, and green ranks of troops, +from this time forth she was wholly intent upon a young officer moving +among the lines as they performed their swift symmetrical evolutions. +She watched him gallop with tireless activity to and from the group +where the plainly dressed Napoleon shone conspicuous. The officer rode a +splendid black horse. His handsome sky-blue uniform marked him out amid +the variegated multitude as one of the Emperor's orderly staff-officers. +His gold lace glittered in the sunshine which lighted up the aigrette on +his tall, narrow shako, so that the gazer might have compared him to a +will-o'-the-wisp, or to a visible spirit emanating from the Emperor to +infuse movement into those battalions whose swaying bayonets flashed +into flames; for, at a mere glance from his eyes, they broke and +gathered again, surging to and fro like the waves in a bay, or again +swept before him like the long ridges of high-crested wave which the +vexed Ocean directs against the shore. + +When the manoeuvres were over the officer galloped back at full speed, +pulled up his horse, and awaited orders. He was not ten paces from Julie +as he stood before the Emperor, much as General Rapp stands in Gerard's +_Battle of Austerlitz_. The young girl could behold her lover in all his +soldierly splendor. + +Colonel Victor d'Aiglemont, barely thirty years of age, was tall, +slender, and well made. His well-proportioned figure never showed to +better advantage than now as he exerted his strength to hold in the +restive animal, whose back seemed to curve gracefully to the rider's +weight. His brown masculine face possessed the indefinable charm of +perfectly regular features combined with youth. The fiery eyes under the +broad forehead, shaded by thick eyebrows and long lashes, looked like +white ovals bordered by an outline of black. His nose had the delicate +curve of an eagle's beak; the sinuous lines of the inevitable black +moustache enhanced the crimson of the lips. The brown and tawny shades +which overspread the wide high-colored cheeks told a tale of unusual +vigor, and his whole face bore the impress of dashing courage. He was +the very model which French artists seek to-day for the typical hero +of Imperial France. The horse which he rode was covered with sweat, the +animal's quivering head denoted the last degree of restiveness; his hind +hoofs were set down wide apart and exactly in a line, he shook his long +thick tail to the wind; in his fidelity to his master he seemed to be a +visible presentment of that master's devotion to the Emperor. + +Julie saw her lover watching intently for the Emperor's glances, and +felt a momentary pang of jealousy, for as yet he had not given her a +look. Suddenly at a word from his sovereign Victor gripped his horse's +flanks and set out at a gallop, but the animal took fright at a shadow +cast by a post, shied, backed, and reared up so suddenly that his rider +was all but thrown off. Julie cried out, her face grew white, people +looked at her curiously, but she saw no one, her eyes were fixed upon +the too mettlesome beast. The officer gave the horse a sharp admonitory +cut with the whip, and galloped off with Napoleon's order. + +Julie was so absorbed, so dizzy with sights and sounds, that +unconsciously she clung to her father's arm so tightly that he could +read her thoughts by the varying pressure of her fingers. When Victor +was all but flung out of the saddle, she clutched her father with a +convulsive grip as if she herself were in danger of falling, and the +old man looked at his daughter's tell-tale face with dark and painful +anxiety. Pity, jealousy, something even of regret stole across every +drawn and wrinkled line of mouth and brow. When he saw the unwonted +light in Julie's eyes, when that cry broke from her, when the convulsive +grasp of her fingers drew away the veil and put him in possession of +her secret, then with that revelation of her love there came surely some +swift revelation of the future. Mournful forebodings could be read in +his own face. + +Julie's soul seemed at that moment to have passed into the officer's +being. A torturing thought more cruel than any previous dread contracted +the old man's painworn features, as he saw the glance of understanding +that passed between the soldier and Julie. The girl's eyes were wet, her +cheeks glowed with unwonted color. Her father turned abruptly and led +her away into the Garden of the Tuileries. + +"Why, father," she cried, "there are still the regiments in the Place du +Carrousel to be passed in review." + +"No, child, all the troops are marching out." + +"I think you are mistaken, father; M. d'Aiglemont surely told them to +advance----" + +"But I feel ill, my child, and I do not care to stay." + +Julie could readily believe the words when she glanced at his face; he +looked quite worn out by his fatherly anxieties. + +"Are you feeling very ill?" she asked indifferently, her mind was so +full of other thoughts. + +"Every day is a reprieve for me, is it not?" returned her father. + +"Now do you mean to make me miserable again by talking about your death? +I was in such spirits! Do pray get rid of those horrid gloomy ideas of +yours." + +The father heaved a sigh. "Ah! spoiled child," he cried, "the best +hearts are sometimes very cruel. We devote our whole lives to you, you +are our one thought, we plan for your welfare, sacrifice our tastes to +your whims, idolize you, give the very blood in our veins for you, and +all this is nothing, is it? Alas! yes, you take it all as a matter of +course. If we would always have your smiles and your disdainful love, we +should need the power of God in heaven. Then comes another, a lover, a +husband, and steals away your heart." + +Julie looked in amazement at her father; he walked slowly along, and +there was no light in the eyes which he turned upon her. + +"You hide yourself even from us," he continued, "but, perhaps, also you +hide yourself from yourself--" + +"What do you mean by that, father?" + +"I think that you have secrets from me, Julie.--You love," he went on +quickly, as he saw the color rise to her face. "Oh! I hoped that you +would stay with your old father until he died. I hoped to keep you with +me, still radiant and happy, to admire you as you were but so lately. So +long as I knew nothing of your future I could believe in a happy lot for +you; but now I cannot possibly take away with me a hope of happiness for +your life, for you love the colonel even more than the cousin. I can no +longer doubt it." + +"And why should I be forbidden to love him?" asked Julie, with lively +curiosity in her face. + +"Ah, my Julie, you would not understand me," sighed the father. + +"Tell me, all the same," said Julie, with an involuntary petulant +gesture. + +"Very well, child, listen to me. Girls are apt to imagine noble and +enchanting and totally imaginary figures in their own minds; they have +fanciful extravagant ideas about men, and sentiment, and life; and then +they innocently endow somebody or other with all the perfections of +their day-dreams, and put their trust in him. They fall in love with +this imaginary creature in the man of their choice; and then, when it +is too late to escape from their fate, behold their first idol, the +illusion made fair with their fancies, turns to an odious skeleton. +Julie, I would rather have you fall in love with an old man than with +the Colonel. Ah! if you could but see things from the standpoint of ten +years hence, you would admit that my old experience was right. I know +what Victor is, that gaiety of his is simply animal spirits--the gaiety +of the barracks. He has no ability, and he is a spendthrift. He is one +of those men whom Heaven created to eat and digest four meals a day, to +sleep, to fall in love with the first woman that comes to hand, and to +fight. He does not understand life. His kind heart, for he has a kind +heart, will perhaps lead him to give his purse to a sufferer or to a +comrade; _but_ he is careless, he has not the delicacy of heart which +makes us slaves to a woman's happiness, he is ignorant, he is selfish. +There are plenty of _buts_--" + +"But, father, he must surely be clever, he must have ability, or he +would not be a colonel--" + +"My dear, Victor will be a colonel all his life.--I have seen no one who +appears to me to be worthy of you," the old father added, with a kind of +enthusiasm. + +He paused an instant, looked at his daughter, and added, "Why, my poor +Julie, you are still too young, too fragile, too delicate for the cares +and rubs of married life. D'Aiglemont's relations have spoiled him, just +as your mother and I have spoiled you. What hope is there that you two +could agree, with two imperious wills diametrically opposed to +each other? You will be either the tyrant or the victim, and either +alternative means, for a wife, an equal sum of misfortune. But you are +modest and sweet-natured, you would yield from the first. In short," he +added, in a quivering voice, "there is a grace of feeling in you +which would never be valued, and then----" he broke off, for the tears +overcame him. + +"Victor will give you pain through all the girlish qualities of your +young nature," he went on, after a pause. "I know what soldiers are, my +Julie; I have been in the army. In a man of that kind, love very seldom +gets the better of old habits, due partly to the miseries amid which +soldiers live, partly to the risks they run in a life of adventure." + +"Then you mean to cross my inclinations, do you, father?" asked Julie, +half in earnest, half in jest. "Am I to marry to please you and not to +please myself?" + +"To please me!" cried her father, with a start of surprise. "To please +_me_, child? when you will not hear the voice that upbraids you so +tenderly very much longer! But I have always heard children impute +personal motives for the sacrifices that their parents make for +them. Marry Victor, my Julie! Some day you will bitterly deplore his +ineptitude, his thriftless ways, his selfishness, his lack of delicacy, +his inability to understand love, and countless troubles arising through +him. Then, remember, that here under these trees your old father's +prophetic voice sounded in your ears in vain." + +He said no more; he had detected a rebellious shake of the head on his +daughter's part. Both made several paces towards the carriage which was +waiting for them at the grating. During that interval of silence, the +young girl stole a glance at her father's face, and little by little her +sullen brow cleared. The intense pain visible on his bowed forehead made +a lively impression upon her. + +"Father," she began in gentle tremulous tones, "I promise to say no more +about Victor until you have overcome your prejudices against him." + +The old man looked at her in amazement. Two tears which filled his eyes +overflowed down his withered cheeks. He could not take Julie in his arms +in that crowded place; but he pressed her hand tenderly. A few minutes +later when they had taken their places in the cabriolet, all the anxious +thought which had gathered about his brow had completely disappeared. +Julie's pensive attitude gave him far less concern than the innocent joy +which had betrayed her secret during the review. + + + +Nearly a year had passed since the Emperor's last review. In early March +1814 a caleche was rolling along the highroad from Amboise to Tours. +As the carriage came out from beneath the green-roofed aisle of walnut +trees by the post-house of la Frilliere, the horses dashed forward with +such speed that in a moment they gained the bridge built across the Cise +at the point of its confluence with the Loire. There, however, they come +to a sudden stand. One of the traces had given way in consequence of the +furious pace at which the post-boy, obedient to his orders, had urged on +four horses, the most vigorous of their breed. Chance, therefore, gave +the two recently awakened occupants of the carriage an opportunity of +seeing one of the most lovely landscapes along the enchanting banks of +the Loire, and that at their full leisure. + +At a glance the travelers could see to the right the whole winding +course of the Cise meandering like a silver snake among the meadows, +where the grass had taken the deep, bright green of early spring. To the +left lay the Loire in all its glory. A chill morning breeze, ruffling +the surface of the stately river, had fretted the broad sheets of water +far and wide into a network of ripples, which caught the gleams of the +sun, so that the green islets here and there in its course shone like +gems set in a gold necklace. On the opposite bank the fair rich meadows +of Touraine stretched away as far as the eye could see; the low hills +of the Cher, the only limits to the view, lay on the far horizon, a +luminous line against the clear blue sky. Tours itself, framed by the +trees on the islands in a setting of spring leaves, seemed to rise like +Venice out of the waters, and her old cathedral towers soaring in air +were blended with the pale fantastic cloud shapes in the sky. + +Over the side of the bridge, where the carriage had come to a stand, the +traveler looks along a line of cliffs stretching as far as Tours. +Nature in some freakish mood must have raised these barriers of rock, +undermined incessantly by the rippling Loire at their feet, for a +perpetual wonder for spectators. The village of Vouvray nestles, as +it were, among the clefts and crannies of the crags, which begin +to describe a bend at the junction of the Loire and Cise. A whole +population of vine-dressers lives, in fact, in appalling insecurity in +holes in their jagged sides for the whole way between Vouvray and Tours. +In some places there are three tiers of dwellings hollowed out, one +above the other, in the rock, each row communicating with the next by +dizzy staircases cut likewise in the face of the cliff. A little girl +in a short red petticoat runs out into her garden on the roof of another +dwelling; you can watch a wreath of hearth-smoke curling up among +the shoots and trails of the vines. Men are at work in their almost +perpendicular patches of ground, an old woman sits tranquilly spinning +under a blossoming almond tree on a crumbling mass of rock, and smiles +down on the dismay of the travelers far below her feet. The cracks in +the ground trouble her as little as the precarious state of the old +wall, a pendant mass of loose stones, only kept in position by the +crooked stems of its ivy mantle. The sound of coopers' mallets rings +through the skyey caves; for here, where Nature stints human industry of +soil, the soil is everywhere tilled, and everywhere fertile. + +No view along the whole course of the Loire can compare with the rich +landscape of Touraine, here outspread beneath the traveler's eyes. The +triple picture, thus barely sketched in outline, is one of those scenes +which the imagination engraves for ever upon the memory; let a poet +fall under its charm, and he shall be haunted by visions which shall +reproduce its romantic loveliness out of the vague substance of dreams. + +As the carriage stopped on the bridge over the Cise, white sails came +out here and there from among the islands in the Loire to add new grace +to the perfect view. The subtle scent of the willows by the water's +edge was mingled with the damp odor of the breeze from the river. The +monotonous chant of a goat-herd added a plaintive note to the sound +of birds' songs in a chorus which never ends; the cries of the boatmen +brought tidings of distant busy life. Here was Touraine in all its +glory, and the very height of the splendor of spring. Here was the +one peaceful district in France in those troublous days; for it was +so unlikely that a foreign army should trouble its quiet that Touraine +might be said to defy invasion. + +As soon as the caleche stopped, a head covered with a foraging cap was +put out of the window, and soon afterwards an impatient military man +flung open the carriage door and sprang down into the road to pick a +quarrel with the postilion, but the skill with which the Tourangeau was +repairing the trace restored Colonel d'Aiglemont's equanimity. He went +back to the carriage, stretched himself to relieve his benumbed muscles, +yawned, looked about him, and finally laid a hand on the arm of a young +woman warmly wrapped up in a furred pelisse. + +"Come, Julie," he said hoarsely, "just wake up and take a look at this +country. It is magnificent." + +Julie put her head out of the window. She wore a traveling cap of sable +fur. Nothing could be seen of her but her face, for the whole of her +person was completely concealed by the folds of her fur pelisse. +The young girl who tripped to the review at the Tuileries with light +footsteps and joy and gladness in her heart was scarcely recognizable in +Julie d'Aiglemont. Her face, delicate as ever, had lost the rose-color +which once gave it so rich a glow. A few straggling locks of black hair, +straightened out by the damp night air, enhanced its dead whiteness, +and all its life and sparkle seemed to be torpid. Yet her eyes glittered +with preternatural brightness in spite of the violet shadows under the +lashes upon her wan cheeks. + +She looked out with indifferent eyes over the fields towards the +Cher, at the islands in the river, at the line of the crags of Vouvray +stretching along the Loire towards Tours; then she sank back as soon as +possible into her seat in the caleche. She did not care to give a glance +to the enchanting valley of the Cise. + +"Yes, it is wonderful," she said, and out in the open air her voice +sounded weak and faint to the last degree. Evidently she had had her way +with her father, to her misfortune. + +"Would you not like to live here, Julie?" + +"Yes; here or anywhere," she answered listlessly. + +"Do you feel ill?" asked Colonel d'Aiglemont. + +"No, not at all," she answered with momentary energy; and, smiling at +her husband, she added, "I should like to go to sleep." + +Suddenly there came a sound of a horse galloping towards them. Victor +d'Aiglemont dropped his wife's hand and turned to watch the bend in the +road. No sooner had he taken his eyes from Julie's pale face than +all the assumed gaiety died out of it; it was as if a light had been +extinguished. She felt no wish to look at the landscape, no curiosity to +see the horseman who was galloping towards them at such a furious pace, +and, ensconcing herself in her corner, stared out before her at the +hindquarters of the post-horses, looking as blank as any Breton peasant +listening to his _recteur's_ sermon. + +Suddenly a young man riding a valuable horse came out from behind the +clump of poplars and flowering briar-rose. + +"It is an Englishman," remarked the Colonel. + +"Lord bless you, yes, General," said the post-boy; "he belongs to the +race of fellows who have a mind to gobble up France, they say." + +The stranger was one of the foreigners traveling in France at the time +when Napoleon detained all British subjects within the limits of the +Empire, by way of reprisals for the violation of the Treaty of Amiens, +an outrage of international law perpetrated by the Court of St. James. +These prisoners, compelled to submit to the Emperor's pleasure, were not +all suffered to remain in the houses where they were arrested, nor yet +in the places of residence which at first they were permitted to choose. +Most of the English colony in Touraine had been transplanted thither +from different places where their presence was supposed to be inimical +to the interests of the Continental Policy. + +The young man, who was taking the tedium of the early morning hours on +horseback, was one of these victims of bureaucratic tyranny. Two years +previously, a sudden order from the Foreign Office had dragged him from +Montpellier, whither he had gone on account of consumptive tendencies. +He glanced at the Comte d'Aiglemont, saw that he was a military man, and +deliberately looked away, turning his head somewhat abruptly towards the +meadows by the Cise. + +"The English are all as insolent as if the globe belonged to them," +muttered the Colonel. "Luckily, Soult will give them a thrashing +directly." + +The prisoner gave a glance to the caleche as he rode by. Brief though +that glance was, he had yet time to notice the sad expression which lent +an indefinable charm to the Countess' pensive face. Many men are deeply +moved by the mere semblance of suffering in a woman; they take the look +of pain for a sign of constancy or of love. Julie herself was so much +absorbed in the contemplation of the opposite cushion that she saw +neither the horse nor the rider. The damaged trace meanwhile had been +quickly and strongly repaired; the Count stepped into his place again; +and the post-boy, doing his best to make up for lost time, drove +the carriage rapidly along the embankment. On they drove under the +overhanging cliffs, with their picturesque vine-dressers' huts and +stores of wine maturing in their dark sides, till in the distance uprose +the spire of the famous Abbey of Marmoutiers, the retreat of St. Martin. + +"What can that diaphanous milord want with us?" exclaimed the Colonel, +turning to assure himself that the horseman who had followed them from +the bridge was the young Englishman. + +After all, the stranger committed no breach of good manners by riding +along on the footway, and Colonel d'Aiglemont was fain to lie back in +his corner after sending a scowl in the Englishman's direction. But in +spite of his hostile instincts, he could not help noticing the beauty of +the animal and the graceful horsemanship of the rider. The young man's +face was of that pale, fair-complexioned, insular type, which is almost +girlish in the softness and delicacy of its color and texture. He was +tall, thin, and fair-haired, dressed with the extreme and elaborate +neatness characteristic of a man of fashion in prudish England. Any one +might have thought that bashfulness rather than pleasure at the sight +of the Countess had called up that flush into his face. Once only Julie +raised her eyes and looked at the stranger, and then only because she +was in a manner compelled to do so, for her husband called upon her to +admire the action of the thoroughbred. It so happened that their glances +clashed; and the shy Englishman, instead of riding abreast of the +carriage, fell behind on this, and followed them at a distance of a few +paces. + +Yet the Countess had scarcely given him a glance; she saw none of the +various perfections, human and equine, commended to her notice, and +fell back again in the carriage, with a slight movement of the eyelids +intended to express her acquiescence in her husband's views. The Colonel +fell asleep again, and both husband and wife reached Tours without +another word. Not one of those enchanting views of everchanging +landscape through which they sped had drawn so much as a glance from +Julie's eyes. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont looked now and again at her sleeping husband. While she +looked, a sudden jolt shook something down upon her knees. It was her +father's portrait, a miniature which she wore suspended about her neck +by a black cord. At the sight of it, the tears, till then kept back, +overflowed her eyes, but no one, save perhaps the Englishman, saw them +glitter there for a brief moment before they dried upon her pale cheeks. + +Colonel d'Aiglemont was on his way to the South. Marshal Soult was +repelling an English invasion of Bearn; and d'Aiglemont, the bearer of +the Emperor's orders to the Marshal, seized the opportunity of taking +his wife as far as Tours to leave her with an elderly relative of his +own, far away from the dangers threatening Paris. + +Very shortly the carriage rolled over the paved road of Tours, over the +bridge, along the Grande-Rue, and stopped at last before the old mansion +of the _ci-devant_ Marquise de Listomere-Landon. + +The Marquise de Listomere-Landon, with her white hair, pale face, and +shrewd smile, was one of those fine old ladies who still seem to wear +the paniers of the eighteenth century, and affects caps of an extinct +mode. They are nearly always caressing in their manners, as if the +heyday of love still lingered on for these septuagenarian portraits +of the age of Louis Quinze, with the faint perfume of _poudre a la +marechale_ always clinging about them. Bigoted rather than pious, and +less of bigots than they seem, women who can tell a story well and talk +still better, their laughter comes more readily for an old memory than +for a new jest--the present intrudes upon them. + +When an old waiting-woman announced to the Marquise de Listomere-Landon +(to give her the title which she was soon to resume) the arrival of a +nephew whom she had not seen since the outbreak of the war with Spain, +the old lady took off her spectacles with alacrity, shut the _Galerie +de l'ancienne Cour_ (her favorite work), and recovered something like +youthful activity, hastening out upon the flight of steps to greet the +young couple there. + +Aunt and niece exchanged a rapid glance of survey. + +"Good-morning, dear aunt," cried the Colonel, giving the old lady a +hasty embrace. "I am bringing a young lady to put under your wing. +I have come to put my treasure in your keeping. My Julie is neither +jealous nor a coquette, she is as good as an angel. I hope that she will +not be spoiled here," he added, suddenly interrupting himself. + +"Scapegrace!" returned the Marquise, with a satirical glance at her +nephew. + +She did not wait for her niece to approach her, but with a certain +kindly graciousness went forward herself to kiss Julie, who stood there +thoughtfully, to all appearance more embarrassed than curious concerning +her new relation. + +"So we are to make each other's acquaintance, are we, my love?" the +Marquise continued. "Do not be too much alarmed of me. I always try not +to be an old woman with young people." + +On the way to the drawing-room, the Marquise ordered breakfast for her +guests in provincial fashion; but the Count checked his aunt's flow of +words by saying soberly that he could only remain in the house while the +horses were changing. On this the three hurried into the drawing-room. +The Colonel had barely time to tell the story of the political and +military events which had compelled him to ask his aunt for a shelter +for his young wife. While he talked on without interruption, the older +lady looked from her nephew to her niece, and took the sadness in +Julie's white face for grief at the enforced separation. "Eh! eh!" her +looks seemed to say, "these young things are in love with each other." + +The crack of the postilion's whip sounded outside in the silent old +grass-grown courtyard. Victor embraced his aunt once more, and rushed +out. + +"Good-bye, dear," he said, kissing his wife, who had followed him down +to the carriage. + +"Oh! Victor, let me come still further with you," she pleaded coaxingly. +"I do not want to leave you----" + +"Can you seriously mean it?" + +"Very well," said Julie, "since you wish it." The carriage disappeared. + +"So you are very fond of my poor Victor?" said the Marquise, +interrogating her niece with one of those sagacious glances which +dowagers give younger women. + +"Alas, madame!" said Julie, "must one not love a man well indeed to +marry him?" + +The words were spoken with an artless accent which revealed either a +pure heart or inscrutable depths. How could a woman, who had been the +friend of Duclos and the Marechal de Richelieu, refrain from trying to +read the riddle of this marriage? Aunt and niece were standing on the +steps, gazing after the fast vanishing caleche. The look in the young +Countess' eyes did not mean love as the Marquise understood it. The good +lady was a Provencale, and her passions had been lively. + +"So you were captivated by my good-for-nothing of a nephew?" she asked. + +Involuntarily Julie shuddered, something in the experienced coquette's +look and tone seemed to say that Mme. de Listomere-Landon's knowledge +of her husband's character went perhaps deeper than his wife's. Mme. +d'Aiglemont, in dismay, took refuge in this transparent dissimulation, +ready to her hand, the first resource of an artless unhappiness. Mme. +de Listomere appeared to be satisfied with Julie's answers; but in her +secret heart she rejoiced to think that here was a love affair on hand +to enliven her solitude, for that her niece had some amusing flirtation +on foot she was fully convinced. + +In the great drawing-room, hung with tapestry framed in strips of +gilding, young Mme. d'Aiglemont sat before a blazing fire, behind a +Chinese screen placed to shut out the cold draughts from the window, +and her heavy mood scarcely lightened. Among the old eighteenth-century +furniture, under the old paneled ceiling, it was not very easy to be +gay. Yet the young Parisienne took a sort of pleasure in this entrance +upon a life of complete solitude and in the solemn silence of the old +provincial house. She exchanged a few words with the aunt, a stranger, +to whom she had written a bride's letter on her marriage, and then sat +as silent as if she had been listening to an opera. Not until two hours +had been spent in an atmosphere of quiet befitting la Trappe, did she +suddenly awaken to a sense of uncourteous behavior, and bethink herself +of the short answers which she had given her aunt. Mme. de Listomere, +with the gracious tact characteristic of a bygone age, had respected +her niece's mood. When Mme. d'Aiglemont became conscious of her +shortcomings, the dowager sat knitting, though as a matter of fact she +had several times left the room to superintend preparations in the +Green Chamber, whither the Countess' luggage had been transported; now, +however, she had returned to her great armchair, and stole a glance from +time to time at this young relative. Julie felt ashamed of giving way +to irresistible broodings, and tried to earn her pardon by laughing at +herself. + +"My dear child, _we_ know the sorrows of widowhood," returned her aunt. +But only the eyes of forty years could have distinguished the irony +hovering about the old lady's mouth. + +Next morning the Countess improved. She talked. Mme. de Listomere no +longer despaired of fathoming the new-made wife, whom yesterday she had +set down as a dull, unsociable creature, and discoursed on the delights +of the country, of dances, of houses where they could visit. All that +day the Marquise's questions were so many snares; it was the old habit +of the old Court, she could not help setting traps to discover her +niece's character. For several days Julie, plied with temptations, +steadfastly declined to seek amusement abroad; and much as the old +lady's pride longed to exhibit her pretty niece, she was fain to +renounce all hope of taking her into society, for the young Countess was +still in morning for her father, and found in her loss and her mourning +dress a pretext for her sadness and desire for seclusion. + +By the end of the week the dowager admired Julie's angelic sweetness +of disposition, her diffident charm, her indulgent temper, and +thenceforward began to take a prodigious interest in the mysterious +sadness gnawing at this young heart. The Countess was one of those women +who seem born to be loved and to bring happiness with them. Mme. de +Listomere found her niece's society grown so sweet and precious, that +she doted upon Julie, and could no longer think of parting with her. +A month sufficed to establish an eternal friendship between the two +ladies. The dowager noticed, not without surprise, the changes that took +place in Mme. d'Aiglemont; gradually her bright color died away, and +her face became dead white. Yet, Julie's spirits rose as the bloom faded +from her cheeks. Sometimes the dowager's sallies provoked outbursts of +merriment or peals of laughter, promptly repressed, however, by some +clamorous thought. + +Mme. de Listomere had guessed by this time that it was neither Victor's +absence nor a father's death which threw a shadow over her niece's life; +but her mind was so full of dark suspicions, that she found it difficult +to lay a finger upon the real cause of the mischief. Possibly truth is +only discoverable by chance. A day came, however, at length when +Julie flashed out before her aunt's astonished eyes into a complete +forgetfulness of her marriage; she recovered the wild spirits of +careless girlhood. Mme. de Listomere then and there made up her mind +to fathom the depths of this soul, for its exceeding simplicity was as +inscrutable as dissimulation. + +Night was falling. The two ladies were sitting by the window which +looked out upon the street, and Julie was looking thoughtful again, when +some one went by on horseback. + +"There goes one of your victims," said the Marquise. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont looked up; dismay and surprise blended in her face. + +"He is a young Englishman, the Honorable Arthur Ormand, Lord Grenville's +eldest son. His history is interesting. His physician sent him to +Montpellier in 1802; it was hoped that in that climate he might recover +from the lung complaint which was gaining ground. He was detained, like +all his fellow-countrymen, by Bonaparte when war broke out. That monster +cannot live without fighting. The young Englishman, by way of amusing +himself, took to studying his own complaint, which was believed to be +incurable. By degrees he acquired a liking for anatomy and physic, and +took quite a craze for that kind of thing, a most extraordinary taste +in a man of quality, though the Regent certainly amused himself with +chemistry! In short, Monsieur Arthur made astonishing progress in his +studies; his health did the same under the faculty of Montpellier; he +consoled his captivity, and at the same time his cure was thoroughly +completed. They say that he spent two whole years in a cowshed, living +on cresses and the milk of a cow brought from Switzerland, breathing as +seldom as he could, and never speaking a word. Since he come to Tours +he has lived quite alone; he is as proud as a peacock; but you have +certainly made a conquest of him, for probably it is not on my account +that he has ridden under the window twice every day since you have been +here.--He has certainly fallen in love with you." + +That last phrase roused the Countess like magic. Her involuntary start +and smile took the Marquise by surprise. So far from showing a sign of +the instinctive satisfaction felt by the most strait-laced of women when +she learns that she has destroyed the peace of mind of some male +victim, there was a hard, haggard expression in Julie's face--a look of +repulsion amounting almost to loathing. + +A woman who loves will put the whole world under the ban of Love's +empire for the sake of the one whom she loves; but such a woman can +laugh and jest; and Julie at that moment looked as if the memory of some +recently escaped peril was too sharp and fresh not to bring with it a +quick sensation of pain. Her aunt, by this time convinced that Julie +did not love her nephew, was stupefied by the discovery that she loved +nobody else. She shuddered lest a further discovery should show her +Julie's heart disenchanted, lest the experience of a day, or perhaps +of a night, should have revealed to a young wife the full extent of +Victor's emptiness. + +"If she has found him out, there is an end of it," thought the dowager. +"My nephew will soon be made to feel the inconveniences of wedded life." + +The Marquise now proposed to convert Julie to the monarchical doctrines +of the times of Louis Quinze; but a few hours later she discovered, or, +more properly speaking, guessed, the not uncommon state of affairs, and +the real cause of her niece's low spirits. + +Julie turned thoughtful on a sudden, and went to her room earlier than +usual. When her maid left her for the night, she still sat by the fire +in the yellow velvet depths of a great chair, an old-world piece of +furniture as well suited for sorrow as for happy people. Tears flowed, +followed by sighs and meditation. After a while she drew a little table +to her, sought writing materials, and began to write. The hours went by +swiftly. Julie's confidences made to the sheet of paper seemed to cost +her dear; every sentence set her dreaming, and at last she suddenly +burst into tears. The clocks were striking two. Her head, grown heavy as +a dying woman's, was bowed over her breast. When she raised it, her +aunt appeared before her as suddenly as if she had stepped out of the +background of tapestry upon the walls. + +"What can be the matter with you, child?" asked the Marquise. "Why are +you sitting up so late? And why, in the first place, are you crying +alone, at your age?" + +Without further ceremony she sat down beside her niece, her eyes the +while devouring the unfinished letter. + +"Were you writing to your husband?" + +"Do I know where he is?" returned the Countess. + +Her aunt thereupon took up the sheet and proceeded to read it. She had +brought her spectacles; the deed was premeditated. The innocent writer +of the letter allowed her to take it without the slightest remark. It +was neither lack of dignity nor consciousness of secret guilt which left +her thus without energy. Her aunt had come in upon her at a crisis. She +was helpless; right or wrong, reticence and confidence, like all things +else, were matters of indifference. Like some young maid who had heaped +scorn upon her lover, and feels so lonely and sad when evening comes, +that she longs for him to come back or for a heart to which she can pour +out her sorrow, Julie allowed her aunt to violate the seal which honor +places upon an open letter, and sat musing while the Marquise read on:-- + + "MY DEAR LOUISA,--Why do you ask so often for the fulfilment of as + rash a promise as two young and inexperienced girls could make? + You say that you often ask yourself why I have given no answer to + your questions for these six months. If my silence told you + nothing, perhaps you will understand the reasons for it to-day, as + you read the secrets which I am about to betray. I should have + buried them for ever in the depths of my heart if you had not + announced your own approaching marriage. You are about to be + married, Louisa. The thought makes me shiver. Poor little one! + marry, yes, in a few months' time one of the keenest pangs of + regret will be the recollection of a self which used to be, of the + two young girls who sat one evening under one of the tallest + oak-trees on the hillside at Ecouen, and looked along the fair + valley at our feet in the light of the sunset, which caught us in + its glow. We sat on a slab of rock in ecstasy, which sobered down + into melancholy of the gentlest. You were the first to discover that + the far-off sun spoke to us of the future. How inquisitive and how + silly we were! Do you remember all the absurd things we said and + did? We embraced each other; 'like lovers,' said we. We solemnly + promised that the first bride should faithfully reveal to the + other the mysteries of marriage, the joys which our childish minds + imagined to be so delicious. That evening will complete your + despair, Louisa. In those days you were young and beautiful and + careless, if not radiantly happy; a few days of marriage, and you + will be, what I am already--ugly, wretched, and old. Need I tell + you how proud I was and how vain and glad to be married to Colonel + Victor d'Aiglemont? And besides, how could I tell you now? for I + cannot remember that old self. A few moments turned my girlhood to + a dream. All through the memorable day which consecrated a chain, + the extent of which was hidden from me, my behavior was not free + from reproach. Once and again my father tried to repress my + spirits; the joy which I showed so plainly was thought unbefitting + the occasion, my talk scarcely innocent, simply because I was so + innocent. I played endless child's tricks with my bridal veil, my + wreath, my gown. Left alone that night in the room whither I had + been conducted in state, I planned a piece of mischief to tease + Victor. While I awaited his coming, my heart beat wildly, as it + used to do when I was a child stealing into the drawing-room on + the last day of the old year to catch a glimpse of the New Year's + gifts piled up there in heaps. When my husband came in and looked + for me, my smothered laughter ringing out from beneath the lace in + which I had shrouded myself, was the last outburst of the + delicious merriment which brightened our games in childhood..." + +When the dowager had finished reading the letter, and after such a +beginning the rest must have been sad indeed, she slowly laid her +spectacles on the table, put the letter down beside them, and looked +fixedly at her niece. Age had not dimmed the fire in those green eyes as +yet. + +"My little girl," she said, "a married woman cannot write such a letter +as this to a young unmarried woman; it is scarcely proper--" + +"So I was thinking," Julie broke in upon her aunt. "I felt ashamed of +myself while you were reading it." + +"If a dish at table is not to our taste, there is no occasion to disgust +others with it, child," the old lady continued benignly, "especially +when marriage has seemed to us all, from Eve downwards, so excellent an +institution... You have no mother?" + +The Countess trembled, then she raised her face meekly, and said: + +"I have missed my mother many times already during the past year; but I +have myself to blame, I would not listen to my father. He was opposed to +my marriage; he disapproved of Victor as a son-in-law." + +She looked at her aunt. The old face was lighted up with a kindly look, +and a thrill of joy dried Julie's tears. She held out her young, +soft hand to the old Marquise, who seemed to ask for it, and the +understanding between the two women was completed by the close grasp of +their fingers. + +"Poor orphan child!" + +The words came like a final flash of enlightenment to Julie. It seemed +to her that she heard her father's prophetic voice again. + +"Your hands are burning! Are they always like this?" asked the Marquise. + +"The fever only left me seven or eight days ago." + +"You had a fever upon you, and said nothing about it to me!" + +"I have had it for a year," said Julie, with a kind of timid anxiety. + +"My good little angel, then your married life hitherto has been one long +time of suffering?" + +Julie did not venture to reply, but an affirmative sign revealed the +whole truth. + +"Then you are unhappy?" + +"On! no, no, aunt. Victor loves me, he almost idolizes me, and I adore +him, he is so kind." + +"Yes, you love him; but you avoid him, do you not?" + +"Yes... sometimes... He seeks me too often." + +"And often when you are alone you are troubled with the fear that he may +suddenly break in on your solitude?" + +"Alas! yes, aunt. But, indeed, I love him, I do assure you." + +"Do you not, in your own thoughts, blame yourself because you find it +impossible to share his pleasures? Do you never think at times that +marriage is a heavier yoke than an illicit passion could be?" + +"Oh, that is just it," she wept. "It is all a riddle to me, and can you +guess it all? My faculties are benumbed, I have no ideas, I can scarcely +see at all. I am weighed down by vague dread, which freezes me till +I cannot feel, and keeps me in continual torpor. I have no voice with +which to pity myself, no words to express my trouble. I suffer, and I am +ashamed to suffer when Victor is happy at my cost." + +"Babyish nonsense, and rubbish, all of it!" exclaimed the aunt, and a +gay smile, an after-glow of the joys of her own youth, suddenly lighted +up her withered face. + +"And do you too laugh!" the younger woman cried despairingly. + +"It was just my own case," the Marquise returned promptly. "And +now Victor has left you, you have become a girl again, recovering a +tranquillity without pleasure and without pain, have you not?" + +Julie opened wide eyes of bewilderment. + +"In fact, my angel, you adore Victor, do you not? But still you would +rather be a sister to him than a wife, and, in short, your marriage is +emphatically not a success?" + +"Well--no, aunt. But why do you smile?" + +"Oh! you are right, poor child! There is nothing very amusing in all +this. Your future would be big with more than one mishap if I had not +taken you under my protection, if my old experience of life had not +guessed the very innocent cause of your troubles. My nephew did +not deserve his good fortune, the blockhead! In the reign of our +well-beloved Louis Quinze, a young wife in your position would very +soon have punished her husband for behaving like a ruffian. The selfish +creature! The men who serve under this Imperial tyrant are all of them +ignorant boors. They take brutality for gallantry; they know no more of +women than they know of love; and imagine that because they go out +to face death on the morrow, they may dispense to-day with all +consideration and attentions for us. The time was when a man could love +and die too at the proper time. My niece, I will form you. I will put an +end to this unhappy divergence between you, a natural thing enough, but +it would end in mutual hatred and desire for a divorce, always supposing +that you did not die on the way to despair." + +Julie's amazement equaled her surprise as she listened to her aunt. She +was surprised by her language, dimly divining rather than appreciating +the wisdom of the words she heard, and very much dismayed to find what +this relative, out of great experience, passed judgment upon Victor as +her father had done, though in somewhat milder terms. Perhaps some quick +prevision of the future crossed her mind; doubtless, at any rate, she +felt the heavy weight of the burden which must inevitably overwhelm +her, for she burst into tears, and sprang to the old lady's arms. "Be my +mother," she sobbed. + +The aunt shed no tears. The Revolution had left old ladies of the +Monarchy but few tears to shed. Love, in bygone days, and the Terror at +a later time, had familiarized them with extremes of joy and anguish in +such a sort that, amid the perils of life, they preserved their dignity +and coolness, a capacity for sincere but undemonstrative affection +which never disturbed their well-bred self-possession, and a dignity of +demeanor which a younger generation has done very ill to discard. + +The dowager took Julie in her arms, and kissed her on the forehead with +a tenderness and pity more often found in women's ways and manner than +in their hearts. Then she coaxed her niece with kind, soothing words, +assured her of a happy future, lulled her with promises of love, and +put her to bed as if she had been not a niece, but a daughter, a +much-beloved daughter whose hopes and cares she had made her own. +Perhaps the old Marquise had found her own youth and inexperience and +beauty again in this nephew's wife. And the Countess fell asleep, happy +to have found a friend, nay a mother, to whom she could tell everything +freely. + +Next morning, when the two women kissed each other with heartfelt +kindness, and that look of intelligence which marks a real advance in +friendship, a closer intimacy between two souls, they heard the sound +of horsehoofs, and, turning both together, saw the young Englishman ride +slowly past the window, after his wont. Apparently he had made a certain +study of the life led by the two lonely women, for he never failed +to ride by as they sat at breakfast, and again at dinner. His horse +slackened pace of its own accord, and for the space of time required +to pass the two windows in the room, its rider turned a melancholy look +upon the Countess, who seldom deigned to take the slightest notion of +him. Not so the Marquise. Minds not necessarily little find it difficult +to resist the little curiosity which fastens upon the most trifling +event that enlivens provincial life; and the Englishman's mute way of +expressing his timid, earnest love tickled Mme. de Listomere. For her +the periodically recurrent glance became a part of the day's routine, +hailed daily with new jests. As the two women sat down to table, both of +them looked out at the same moment. This time Julie's eyes met Arthur's +with such a precision of sympathy that the color rose to her face. The +stranger immediately urged his horse into a gallop and went. + +"What is to be done, madame?" asked Julie. "People see this Englishman +go past the house, and they will take it for granted that I--" + +"Yes," interrupted her aunt. + +"Well, then, could I not tell him to discontinue his promenades?" + +"Would not that be a way of telling him that he was dangerous? You might +put that notion into his head. And besides, can you prevent a man from +coming and going as he pleases? Our meals shall be served in another +room to-morrow; and when this young gentleman sees us no longer, there +will be an end of making love to you through the window. There, dear +child, that is how a woman of the world does." + +But the measure of Julie's misfortune was to be filled up. The two women +had scarcely risen from table when Victor's man arrived in hot haste +from Bourges with a letter for the Countess from her husband. The +servant had ridden by unfrequented ways. + +Victor sent his wife news of the downfall of the Empire and the +capitulation of Paris. He himself had gone over to the Bourbons, and all +France was welcoming them back with transports of enthusiasm. He could +not go so far as Tours, but he begged her to come at once to join him at +Orleans, where he hoped to be in readiness with passports for her. +His servant, an old soldier, would be her escort so far as Orleans; he +(Victor) believed that the road was still open. + +"You have not a moment to lose, madame," said the man. "The Prussians, +Austrians, and English are about to effect a junction either at Blois or +at Orleans." + +A few hours later, Julie's preparations were made, and she started out +upon her journey in an old traveling carriage lent by her aunt. + +"Why should you not come with us to Paris?" she asked, as she put her +arms about the Marquise. "Now that the Bourbons have come back you would +be--" + +"Even if there had not been this unhoped-for return, I should still have +gone to Paris, my poor child, for my advice is only too necessary to +both you and Victor. So I shall make all my preparations for rejoining +you there." + +Julie set out. She took her maid with her, and the old soldier galloped +beside the carriage as escort. At nightfall, as they changed horses for +the last stage before Blois, Julie grew uneasy. All the way from Amboise +she had heard the sound of wheels behind them, a carriage following hers +had kept at the same distance. She stood on the step and looked out +to see who her traveling companions might be, and in the moonlight saw +Arthur standing three paces away, gazing fixedly at the chaise which +contained her. Again their eyes met. The Countess hastily flung herself +back in her seat, but a feeling of dread set her pulses throbbing. It +seemed to her, as to most innocent and inexperienced young wives, that +she was herself to blame for this love which she had all unwittingly +inspired. With this thought came an instinctive terror, perhaps a sense +of her own helplessness before aggressive audacity. One of a man's +strongest weapons is the terrible power of compelling a woman to think +of him when her naturally lively imagination takes alarm or offence at +the thought that she is followed. + +The Countess bethought herself of her aunt's advice, and made up her +mind that she would not stir from her place during the rest of the +journey; but every time the horses were changed she heard the Englishman +pacing round the two carriages, and again upon the road heard the +importunate sound of the wheels of his caleche. Julie soon began to +think that, when once reunited to her husband, Victor would know how to +defend her against this singular persecution. + +"Yet suppose that in spite of everything, this young man does not love +me?" This was the thought that came last of all. + +No sooner did she reach Orleans than the Prussians stopped the chaise. +It was wheeled into an inn-yard and put under a guard of soldiers. +Resistance was out of the question. The foreign soldiers made the three +travelers understand by signs that they were obeying orders, and that +no one could be allowed to leave the carriage. For about two hours the +Countess sat in tears, a prisoner surrounded by the guard, who smoked, +laughed, and occasionally stared at her with insolent curiosity. At +last, however, she saw her captors fall away from the carriage with a +sort of respect, and heard at the same time the sound of horses entering +the yard. Another moment, and a little group of foreign officers, +with an Austrian general at their head, gathered about the door of the +traveling carriage. + +"Madame," said the General, "pray accept our apologies. A mistake has +been made. You may continue your journey without fear; and here is a +passport which will spare you all further annoyance of any kind." + +Trembling the Countess took the paper, and faltered out some vague words +of thanks. She saw Arthur, now wearing an English uniform, standing +beside the General, and could not doubt that this prompt deliverance +was due to him. The young Englishman himself looked half glad, half +melancholy; his face was turned away, and he only dared to steal an +occasional glance at Julie's face. + +Thanks to the passport, Mme. d'Aiglemont reached Paris without further +misadventure, and there she found her husband. Victor d'Aiglemont, +released from his oath of allegiance to the Emperor, had met with a +most flattering reception from the Comte d'Artois, recently appointed +Lieutenant-General of the kingdom by his brother Louis XVIII. +D'Aiglemont received a commission in the Life Guards, equivalent to +the rank of general. But amid the rejoicings over the return of the +Bourbons, fate dealt poor Julie a terrible blow. The death of the +Marquise de Listomere-Landon was an irreparable loss. The old lady died +of joy and of an accession of gout to the heart when the Duc d'Angouleme +came back to Tours, and the one living being entitled by her age to +enlighten Victor, the woman who, by discreet counsels, might have +brought about perfect unanimity of husband and wife, was dead; and Julie +felt the full extent of her loss. Henceforward she must stand alone +between herself and her husband. But she was young and timid; there +could be no doubt of the result, or that from the first she would +elect to bear her lot in silence. The very perfections of her character +forbade her to venture to swerve from her duties, or to attempt to +inquire into the cause of her sufferings, for to put an end to them +would have been to venture on delicate ground, and Julie's girlish +modesty shrank from the thought. + +A word as to M. d'Aiglemont's destinies under the Restoration. + +How many men are there whose utter incapacity is a secret kept from +most of their acquaintance. For such as these high rank, high office, +illustrious birth, a certain veneer of politeness, and considerable +reserve of manner, or the _prestige_ of great fortunes, are but so many +sentinels to turn back critics who would penetrate to the presence +of the real man. Such men are like kings, in that their real figure, +character, and life can never be known nor justly appreciated, because +they are always seen from too near or too far. Factitious merit has a +way of asking questions and saying little; and understands the art of +putting others forward to save the necessity of posing before them; +then, with a happy knack of its own, it draws and attaches others by +the thread of the ruling passion of self-interest, keeping men of far +greater abilities to play like puppets, and despising those whom it has +brought down to its own level. The petty fixed idea naturally prevails; +it has the advantage of persistence over the plasticity of great +thoughts. + +The observer who should seek to estimate and appraise the negative +values of these empty heads needs subtlety rather than superior wit for +the task; patience is a more necessary part of his judicial outfit +than great mental grasp, cunning and tact rather than any elevation or +greatness of ideas. Yet skilfully as such usurpers can cover and +defend their weak points, it is difficult to delude wife and mother +and children and the house-friend of the family; fortunately for them, +however, these persons almost always keep a secret which in a manner +touches the honor of all, and not unfrequently go so far as to help to +foist the imposture upon the public. And if, thanks to such domestic +conspiracy, many a noodle passes current for a man of ability, on the +other hand many another who has real ability is taken for a noodle to +redress the balance, and the total average of this kind of false coin in +circulation in the state is a pretty constant quantity. + +Bethink yourself now of the part to be played by a clever woman quick to +think and feel, mated with a husband of this kind, and can you not see +a vision of lives full of sorrow and self-sacrifice? Nothing upon +earth can repay such hearts so full of love and tender tact. Put a +strong-willed woman in this wretched situation, and she will force a +way out of it for herself by a crime, like Catherine II., whom men +nevertheless style "the Great." But these women are not all seated upon +thrones, they are for the most part doomed to domestic unhappiness none +the less terrible because obscure. + +Those who seek consolation in this present world for their woes often +effect nothing but a change of ills if they remain faithful to their +duties; or they commit a sin if they break the laws for their pleasure. +All these reflections are applicable to Julie's domestic life. + +Before the fall of Napoleon nobody was jealous of d'Aiglemont. He was +one colonel among many, an efficient orderly staff-officer, as good a +man as you could find for a dangerous mission, as unfit as well could +be for an important command. D'Aiglemont was looked upon as a dashing +soldier such as the Emperor liked, the kind of man whom his mess usually +calls "a good fellow." The Restoration gave him back his title of +Marquis, and did not find him ungrateful; he followed the Bourbons into +exile at Ghent, a piece of logical loyalty which falsified the horoscope +drawn for him by his late father-in-law, who predicted that Victor would +remain a colonel all his life. After the Hundred Days he received the +appointment of Lieutenant-General, and for the second time became a +marquis; but it was M. d'Aiglemont's ambition to be a peer of France. He +adopted, therefore, the maxims and the politics of the _Conservateur_, +cloaked himself in dissimulation which hid nothing (there being nothing +to hide), cultivated gravity of countenance and the art of asking +questions and saying little, and was taken for a man of profound wisdom. +Nothing drew him from his intrenchments behind the forms of politeness; +he laid in a provision of formulas, and made lavish use of his stock of +the catch-words coined at need in Paris to give fools the small change +for the ore of great ideas and events. Among men of the world he was +reputed a man of taste and discernment; and as a bigoted upholder of +aristocratic opinions he was held up for a noble character. If by chance +he slipped now and again into his old light-heartedness or levity, +others were ready to discover an undercurrent of diplomatic intention +beneath his inanity and silliness. "Oh! he only says exactly as much as +he means to say," thought these excellent people. + +So d'Aiglemont's defects and good qualities stood him alike in good +stead. He did nothing to forfeit a high military reputation gained by +his dashing courage, for he had never been a commander-in-chief. Great +thoughts surely were engraven upon that manly aristocratic countenance, +which imposed upon every one but his own wife. And when everybody else +believed in the Marquis d'Aiglemont's imaginary talents, the Marquis +persuaded himself before he had done that he was one of the most +remarkable men at Court, where, thanks to his purely external +qualifications, he was in favor and taken at his own valuation. + +At home, however, M. d'Aiglemont was modest. Instinctively he felt +that his wife, young though she was, was his superior; and out of this +involuntary respect there grew an occult power which the Marquise was +obliged to wield in spite of all her efforts to shake off the burden. +She became her husband's adviser, the director of his actions and his +fortunes. It was an unnatural position; she felt it as something of a +humiliation, a source of pain to be buried in the depths of her heart. +From the first her delicately feminine instinct told her that it is a +far better thing to obey a man of talent than to lead a fool; and that +a young wife compelled to act and think like a man is neither man nor +woman, but a being who lays aside all the charms of her womanhood along +with its misfortunes, yet acquires none of the privileges which our +laws give to the stronger sex. Beneath the surface her life was a bitter +mockery. Was she not compelled to protect her protector, to worship a +hollow idol, a poor creature who flung her the love of a selfish husband +as the wages of her continual self-sacrifice; who saw nothing in her but +the woman; and who either did not think it worth while, or (wrong quite +as deep) did not think at all of troubling himself about her pleasures, +of inquiring into the cause of her low spirits and dwindling health? And +the Marquis, like most men who chafe under a wife's superiority, +saved his self-love by arguing from Julie's physical feebleness a +corresponding lack of mental power, for which he was pleased to pity +her; and he would cry out upon fate which had given him a sickly girl +for a wife. The executioner posed, in fact, as the victim. + +All the burdens of this dreary lot fell upon the Marquise, who still +must smile upon her foolish lord, and deck a house of mourning with +flowers, and make a parade of happiness in a countenance wan with secret +torture. And with this sense of responsibility for the honor of +both, with the magnificent immolation of self, the young Marquise +unconsciously acquired a wifely dignity, a consciousness of virtue which +became her safeguard amid many dangers. + +Perhaps, if her heart were sounded to the very depths, this intimate +closely hidden wretchedness, following upon her unthinking, girlish +first love, had roused in her an abhorrence of passion; possibly she had +no conception of its rapture, nor of the forbidden but frenzied bliss +for which some women will renounce all the laws of prudence and the +principles of conduct upon which society is based. She put from her like +a dream the thought of bliss and tender harmony of love promised by Mme. +de Listomere-Landon's mature experience, and waited resignedly for the +end of her troubles with a hope that she might die young. + +Her health had declined daily since her return from Touraine; her +life seemed to be measured to her in suffering; yet her ill-health was +graceful, her malady seemed little more than languor, and might well be +taken by careless eyes for a fine lady's whim of invalidism. + +Her doctors had condemned her to keep to the sofa, and there among +her flowers lay the Marquise, fading as they faded. She was not strong +enough to walk, nor to bear the open air, and only went out in a closed +carriage. Yet with all the marvels of modern luxury and invention about +her, she looked more like an indolent queen than an invalid. A few of +her friends, half in love perhaps with her sad plight and her fragile +look, sure of finding her at home, and speculating no doubt upon her +future restoration to health, would come to bring her the news of the +day, and kept her informed of the thousand and one small events which +fill life in Paris with variety. Her melancholy, deep and real though it +was was still the melancholy of a woman rich in many ways. The Marquise +d'Aiglemont was like a flower, with a dark insect gnawing at its root. + +Occasionally she went into society, not to please herself, but in +obedience to the exigencies of the position which her husband aspired to +take. In society her beautiful voice and the perfection of her singing +could always gain the social success so gratifying to a young woman; but +what was social success to her, who drew nothing from it for her heart +or her hopes? Her husband did not care for music. And, moreover, she +seldom felt at her ease in salons, where her beauty attracted homage not +wholly disinterested. Her position excited a sort of cruel compassion, +a morbid curiosity. She was suffering from an inflammatory complaint not +infrequently fatal, for which our nosology as yet has found no name, a +complaint spoken of among women in confidential whispers. In spite of +the silence in which her life was spent, the cause of her ill-health +was no secret. She was still but a girl in spite of her marriage; the +slightest glance threw her into confusion. In her endeavor not to blush, +she was always laughing, always apparently in high spirits; she would +never admit that she was not perfectly well, and anticipated questions +as to her health by shame-stricken subterfuges. + +In 1817, however, an event took place which did much to alleviate +Julie's hitherto deplorable existence. A daughter was born to her, and +she determined to nurse her child herself. For two years motherhood, +its all-absorbing multiplicity of cares and anxious joys, made life +less hard for her. She and her husband lived necessarily apart. Her +physicians predicted improved health, but the Marquise herself put no +faith in these auguries based on theory. Perhaps, like many a one for +whom life has lost its sweetness, she looked forward to death as a happy +termination of the drama. + +But with the beginning of the year 1819 life grew harder than ever. Even +while she congratulated herself upon the negative happiness which she +had contrived to win, she caught a terrifying glimpse of yawning depths +below it. She had passed by degrees out of her husband's life. Her fine +tact and her prudence told her that misfortune must come, and that not +singly, of this cooling of an affection already lukewarm and wholly +selfish. Sure though she was of her ascendency over Victor, and certain +as she felt of his unalterable esteem, she dreaded the influence of +unbridled passions upon a head so empty, so full of rash self-conceit. + +Julie's friends often found her absorbed in prolonged musings; the less +clairvoyant among them would jestingly ask her what she was thinking +about, as if a young wife would think of nothing but frivolity, as +if there were not almost always a depth of seriousness in a mother's +thoughts. Unhappiness, like great happiness, induces dreaming. Sometimes +as Julie played with her little Helene, she would gaze darkly at her, +giving no reply to the childish questions in which a mother delights, +questioning the present and the future as to the destiny of this little +one. Then some sudden recollection would bring back the scene of the +review at the Tuileries and fill her eyes with tears. Her father's +prophetic warnings rang in her ears, and conscience reproached her that +she had not recognized its wisdom. Her troubles had all come of her +own wayward folly, and often she knew not which among so many were the +hardest to bear. The sweet treasures of her soul were unheeded, and not +only so, she could never succeed in making her husband understand +her, even in the commonest everyday things. Just as the power to love +developed and grew strong and active, a legitimate channel for +the affections of her nature was denied her, and wedded love was +extinguished in grave physical and mental sufferings. Add to this that +she now felt for her husband that pity closely bordering upon contempt, +which withers all affection at last. Even if she had not learned from +conversations with some of her friends, from examples in life, from +sundry occurrences in the great world, that love can bring ineffable +bliss, her own wounds would have taught her to divine the pure and deep +happiness which binds two kindred souls each to each. + +In the picture which her memory traced of the past, Arthur's frank face +stood out daily nobler and purer; it was but a flash, for upon that +recollection she dared not dwell. The young Englishman's shy, silent +love for her was the one event since her marriage which had left a +lingering sweetness in her darkened and lonely heart. It may be that all +the blighted hopes, all the frustrated longings which gradually clouded +Julie's mind, gathered, by a not unnatural trick of imagination, about +this man--whose manners, sentiments, and character seemed to have so +much in common with her own. This idea still presented itself to her +mind fitfully and vaguely, like a dream; yet from that dream, which +always ended in a sigh, Julie awoke to greater wretchedness, to keener +consciousness of the latent anguish brooding beneath her imaginary +bliss. + +Occasionally her self-pity took wilder and more daring flights. She +determined to have happiness at any cost; but still more often she lay a +helpless victim of an indescribable numbing stupor, the words she heard +had no meaning to her, or the thoughts which arose in her mind were so +vague and indistinct that she could not find language to express them. +Balked of the wishes of her heart, realities jarred harshly upon her +girlish dreams of life, but she was obliged to devour her tears. To +whom could she make complaint? Of whom be understood? She possessed, +moreover, that highest degree of woman's sensitive pride, the exquisite +delicacy of feeling which silences useless complainings and declines to +use an advantage to gain a triumph which can only humiliate both victor +and vanquished. + +Julie tried to endow M. d'Aiglemont with her own abilities and virtues, +flattering herself that thus she might enjoy the happiness lacking in +her lot. All her woman's ingenuity and tact was employed in making the +best of the situation; pure waste of pains unsuspected by him, whom +she thus strengthened in his despotism. There were moments when misery +became an intoxication, expelling all ideas, all self-control; but, +fortunately, sincere piety always brought her back to one supreme hope; +she found a refuge in the belief in a future life, a wonderful thought +which enabled her to take up her painful task afresh. No elation of +victory followed those terrible inward battles and throes of anguish; +no one knew of those long hours of sadness; her haggard glances met +no response from human eyes, and during the brief moments snatched by +chance for weeping, her bitter tears fell unheeded and in solitude. + +One evening in January 1820, the Marquise became aware of the full +gravity of the crisis, gradually brought on by force of circumstances. +When a husband and wife know each other thoroughly, and their relation +has long been a matter of use and wont, when the wife has learned to +interpret every slightest sign, when her quick insight discerns thoughts +and facts which her husband keeps from her, a chance word, or a remark +so carelessly let fall in the first instance, seems, upon subsequent +reflection, like the swift breaking out of light. A wife not seldom +suddenly awakes upon the brink of a precipice or in the depths of the +abyss; and thus it was with the Marquise. She was feeling glad to have +been left to herself for some days, when the real reason of her solitude +flashed upon her. Her husband, whether fickle and tired of her, or +generous and full of pity for her, was hers no longer. + +In the moment of that discovery she forgot herself, her sacrifices, all +that she had passed through, she remembered only that she was a mother. +Looking forward, she thought of her daughter's fortune, of the future +welfare of the one creature through whom some gleams of happiness came +to her, of her Helene, the only possession which bound her to life. + +Then Julie wished to live to save her child from a stepmother's terrible +thraldom, which might crush her darling's life. Upon this new vision of +threatened possibilities followed one of those paroxysms of thought at +fever-heat which consume whole years of life. + +Henceforward husband and wife were doomed to be separated by a whole +world of thought, and all the weight of that world she must bear alone. +Hitherto she had felt sure that Victor loved her, in so far as he could +be said to love; she had been the slave of pleasures which she did +not share; to-day the satisfaction of knowing that she purchased his +contentment with her tears was hers no longer. She was alone in the +world, nothing was left to her now but a choice of evils. In the calm +stillness of the night her despondency drained her of all her strength. +She rose from her sofa beside the dying fire, and stood in the lamplight +gazing, dry-eyed, at her child, when M. d'Aiglemont came in. He was in +high spirits. Julie called to him to admire Helene as she lay asleep, +but he met his wife's enthusiasm with a commonplace: + +"All children are nice at that age." + +He closed the curtains about the cot after a careless kiss on the +child's forehead. Then he turned his eyes on Julie, took her hand and +drew her to sit beside him on the sofa, where she had been sitting with +such dark thoughts surging up in her mind. + +"You are looking very handsome to-night, Mme. d'Aiglemont," he +exclaimed, with the gaiety intolerable to the Marquise, who knew its +emptiness so well. + +"Where have you spent the evening?" she asked, with a pretence of +complete indifference. + +"At Mme. de Serizy's." + +He had taken up a fire-screen, and was looking intently at the gauze. He +had not noticed the traces of tears on his wife's face. Julie shuddered. +Words could not express the overflowing torrent of thoughts which must +be forced down into inner depths. + +"Mme. de Serizy is giving a concert on Monday, and is dying for you to +go. You have not been anywhere for some time past, and that is enough +to set her longing to see you at her house. She is a good-natured +woman, and very fond of you. I should be glad if you would go; I all but +promised that you should----" + +"I will go." + +There was something so penetrating, so significant in the tones of +Julie's voice, in her accent, in the glance that went with the words, +that Victor, startled out of his indifference, stared at his wife in +astonishment. + +That was all, Julie had guessed that it was Mme. de Serizy who had +stolen her husband's heart from her. Her brooding despair benumbed her. +She appeared to be deeply interested in the fire. Victor meanwhile still +played with the fire-screen. He looked bored, like a man who has enjoyed +himself elsewhere, and brought home the consequent lassitude. He yawned +once or twice, then he took up a candle in one hand, and with the +other languidly sought his wife's neck for the usual embrace; but Julie +stooped and received the good-night kiss upon her forehead; the formal, +loveless grimace seemed hateful to her at that moment. + +As soon as the door closed upon Victor, his wife sank into a seat. Her +limbs tottered beneath her, she burst into tears. None but those who +have endured the torture of some such scene can fully understand the +anguish that it means, or divine the horror of the long-drawn tragedy +arising out of it. + +Those simple, foolish words, the silence that followed between the +husband and wife, the Marquis' gesture and expression, the way in which +he sat before the fire, his attitude as he made that futile attempt to +put a kiss on his wife's throat,--all these things made up a dark hour +for Julie, and the catastrophe of the drama of her sad and lonely life. +In her madness she knelt down before the sofa, burying her face in it +to shut out everything from sight, and prayed to Heaven, putting a new +significance into the words of the evening prayer, till it became a cry +from the depths of her own soul, which would have gone to her husband's +heart if he had heard it. + +The following week she spent in deep thought for her future, utterly +overwhelmed by this new trouble. She made a study of it, trying to +discover a way to regain her ascendency over the Marquis, scheming how +to live long enough to watch over her daughter's happiness, yet to live +true to her own heart. Then she made up her mind. She would struggle +with her rival. She would shine once more in society. She would feign +the love which she could no longer feel, she would captivate her +husband's fancy; and when she had lured him into her power, she +would coquet with him like a capricious mistress who takes delight in +tormenting a lover. This hateful strategy was the only possible way out +of her troubles. In this way she would become mistress of the situation; +she would prescribe her own sufferings at her good pleasure, and reduce +them by enslaving her husband, and bringing him under a tyrannous yoke. +She felt not the slightest remorse for the hard life which he should +lead. At a bound she reached cold, calculating indifference--for her +daughter's sake. She had gained a sudden insight into the treacherous, +lying arts of degraded women; the wiles of coquetry, the revolting +cunning which arouses such profound hatred in men at the mere suspicion +of innate corruption in a woman. + +Julie's feminine vanity, her interests, and a vague desire to inflict +punishment, all wrought unconsciously with the mother's love within +her to force her into a path where new sufferings awaited her. But her +nature was too noble, her mind too fastidious, and, above all things, +too open, to be the accomplice of these frauds for very long. Accustomed +as she was to self-scrutiny, at the first step in vice--for vice it +was--the cry of conscience must inevitably drown the clamor of the +passions and of selfishness. Indeed, in a young wife whose heart is +still pure, whose love has never been mated, the very sentiment of +motherhood is overpowered by modesty. Modesty; is not all womanhood +summed up in that? But just now Julie would not see any danger, anything +wrong, in her life. + +She went to Mme. de Serizy's concert. Her rival had expected to see a +pallid, drooping woman. The Marquise wore rouge, and appeared in all the +splendor of a toilet which enhanced her beauty. + +Mme. de Serizy was one of those women who claim to exercise a sort of +sway over fashions and society in Paris; she issued her decrees, saw +them received in her own circle, and it seemed to her that all the world +obeyed them. She aspired to epigram, she set up for an authority in +matters of taste. Literature, politics, men and women, all alike were +submitted to her censorship, and the lady herself appeared to defy the +censorship of others. Her house was in every respect a model of good +taste. + +Julie triumphed over the Countess in her own salon, filled as it was +with beautiful women and women of fashion. Julie's liveliness and +sparkling wit gathered all the most distinguished men in the rooms about +her. Her costume was faultless, for the despair of the women, who one +and all envied her the fashion of her dress, and attributed the moulded +outline of her bodice to the genius of some unknown dressmaker, for +women would rather believe in miracles worked by the science of chiffons +than in the grace and perfection of the form beneath. + +When Julie went to the piano to sing Desdemona's song, the men in the +rooms flocked about her to hear the celebrated voice so long mute, and +there was a deep silence. The Marquise saw the heads clustered thickly +in the doorways, saw all eyes turned upon her, and a sharp thrill of +excitement quivered through her. She looked for her husband, gave him +a coquettish side-glance, and it pleased her to see that his vanity was +gratified to no small degree. In the joy of triumph she sang the first +part of _Al piu salice_. Her audience was enraptured. Never had Malibran +nor Pasta sung with expression and intonation so perfect. But at the +beginning of the second part she glanced over the glistening groups +and saw--Arthur. He never took his eyes from her face. A quick shudder +thrilled through her, and her voice faltered. Up hurried Mme. de Serizy +from her place. + +"What is it, dear? Oh! poor little thing! she is in such weak health; I +was so afraid when I saw her begin a piece so far beyond her strength." + +The song was interrupted. Julie was vexed. She had not courage to sing +any longer, and submitted to her rival's treacherous sympathy. There was +a whisper among the women. The incident led to discussions; they guessed +that the struggle had begun between the Marquise and Mme. de Serizy, and +their tongues did not spare the latter. + +Julie's strange, perturbing presentiments were suddenly realized. +Through her preoccupation with Arthur she had loved to imagine that with +that gentle, refined face he must remain faithful to his first love. +There were times when she felt proud that this ideal, pure, and +passionate young love should have been hers; the passion of the young +lover whose thoughts are all for her to whom he dedicates every moment +of his life, who blushes as a woman blushes, thinks as a woman might +think, forgetting ambition, fame, and fortune in devotion to his +love,--she need never fear a rival. All these things she had fondly and +idly dreamed of Arthur; now all at once it seemed to her that her dream +had come true. In the young Englishman's half-feminine face she read +the same deep thoughts, the same pensive melancholy, the same passive +acquiescence in a painful lot, and an endurance like her own. She saw +herself in him. Trouble and sadness are the most eloquent of love's +interpreters, and response is marvelously swift between two suffering +creatures, for in them the powers of intuition and of assimilation of +facts and ideas are well-nigh unerring and perfect. So with the violence +of the shock the Marquise's eyes were opened to the whole extent of +the future danger. She was only too glad to find a pretext for her +nervousness in her chronic ill-health, and willingly submitted to be +overwhelmed by Mme. de Serizy's insidious compassion. + +That incident of the song caused talk and discussion which differed with +the various groups. Some pitied Julie's fate, and regretted that such a +remarkable woman was lost to society; others fell to wondering what the +cause of her ill-health and seclusion could be. + +"Well, now, my dear Ronquerolles," said the Marquis, addressing Mme. de +Serizy's brother, "you used to envy me my good fortune, and you used to +blame me for my infidelities. Pshaw, you would not find much to envy in +my lot, if, like me, you had a pretty wife so fragile that for the past +two years you might not so much as kiss her hand for fear of damaging +her. Do not you encumber yourself with one of those fragile ornaments, +only fit to put in a glass case, so brittle and so costly that you are +always obliged to be careful of them. They tell me that you are afraid +of snow or wet for that fine horse of yours; how often do you ride him? +That is just my own case. It is true that my wife gives me no ground for +jealousy, but my marriage is purely ornamental business; if you think +that I am a married man, you are grossly mistaken. So there is some +excuse for my unfaithfulness. I should dearly like to know what you +gentlemen who laugh at me would do in my place. Not many men would be so +considerate as I am. I am sure," (here he lowered his voice) "that Mme. +d'Aiglemont suspects nothing. And then, of course, I have no right to +complain at all; I am very well off. Only there is nothing more trying +for a man who feels things than the sight of suffering in a poor +creature to whom you are attached----" + +"You must have a very sensitive nature, then," said M. de Ronquerolles, +"for you are not often at home." + +Laughter followed on the friendly epigram; but Arthur, who made one of +the group, maintained a frigid imperturbability in his quality of an +English gentleman who takes gravity for the very basis of his being. +D'Aiglemont's eccentric confidence, no doubt, had kindled some kind of +hope in Arthur, for he stood patiently awaiting an opportunity of a word +with the Marquis. He had not to wait long. + +"My Lord Marquis," he said, "I am unspeakably pained to see the state of +Mme. d'Aiglemont's health. I do not think that you would talk jestingly +about it if you knew that unless she adopts a certain course of +treatment she must die miserably. If I use this language to you, it is +because I am in a manner justified in using it, for I am quite certain +that I can save Mme. d'Aiglemont's life and restore her to health +and happiness. It is odd, no doubt, that a man of my rank should be +a physician, yet nevertheless chance determined that I should study +medicine. I find life dull enough here," he continued, affecting a cold +selfishness to gain his ends, "it makes no difference to me whether I +spend my time and travel for the benefit of a suffering fellow-creature, +or waste it in Paris on some nonsense or other. It is very, very seldom +that a cure is completed in these complaints, for they require constant +care, time, and patience, and, above all things, money. Travel is +needed, and a punctilious following out of prescriptions, by no means +unpleasant, and varied daily. Two _gentlemen_" (laying a stress on +the word in its English sense) "can understand each other. I give you +warning that if you accept my proposal, you shall be a judge of my +conduct at every moment. I will do nothing without consulting you, +without your superintendence, and I will answer for the success of my +method if you will consent to follow it. Yes, unless you wish to be Mme. +d'Aiglemont's husband no longer, and that before long," he added in the +Marquis' ear. + +The Marquis laughed. "One thing is certain--that only an Englishman +could make me such an extraordinary proposal," he said. "Permit me to +leave it unaccepted and unrejected. I will think it over; and my wife +must be consulted first in any case." + +Julie had returned to the piano. This time she sang a song from +_Semiramide, Son regina, son guerriera_, and the whole room applauded, a +stifled outburst of wellbred acclamation which proved that the Faubourg +Saint-Germain had been roused to enthusiasm by her singing. + +The evening was over. D'Aiglemont brought his wife home, and Julie +saw with uneasy satisfaction that her first attempt had at once been +successful. Her husband had been roused out of indifference by the part +which she had played, and now he meant to honor her with such a passing +fancy as he might bestow upon some opera nymph. It amused Julie that +she, a virtuous married woman, should be treated thus. She tried to play +with her power, but at the outset her kindness broke down once more, and +she received the most terrible of all the lessons held in store for her +by fate. + +Between two and three o'clock in the morning Julie sat up, sombre and +moody, beside her sleeping husband, in the room dimly lighted by the +flickering lamp. Deep silence prevailed. Her agony of remorse had lasted +near an hour; how bitter her tears had been none perhaps can realize +save women who have known such an experience as hers. Only such natures +as Julie's can feel her loathing for a calculated caress, the horror +of a loveless kiss, of the heart's apostasy followed by dolorous +prostitution. She despised herself; she cursed marriage. She could have +longed for death; perhaps if it had not been for a cry from her child, +she would have sprung from the window and dashed herself upon the +pavement. M. d'Aiglemont slept on peacefully at her side; his wife's hot +dropping tears did not waken him. + +But next morning Julie could be gay. She made a great effort to look +happy, to hide, not her melancholy, as heretofore, but an insuperable +loathing. From that day she no longer regarded herself as a blameless +wife. Had she not been false to herself? Why should she not play a +double part in the future, and display astounding depths of cunning in +deceiving her husband? In her there lay a hitherto undiscovered latent +depravity, lacking only opportunity, and her marriage was the cause. + +Even now she had asked herself why she should struggle with love, when, +with her heart and her whole nature in revolt, she gave herself to the +husband whom she loved no longer. Perhaps, who knows? some piece of +fallacious reasoning, some bit of special pleading, lies at the root of +all sins, of all crimes. How shall society exist unless every +individual of which it is composed will make the necessary sacrifices +of inclination demanded by its laws? If you accept the benefits of +civilized society, do you not by implication engage to observe the +conditions, the conditions of its very existence? And yet, starving +wretches, compelled to respect the laws of property, are not less to be +pitied than women whose natural instincts and sensitiveness are turned +to so many avenues of pain. + +A few days after that scene of which the secret lay buried in the +midnight couch, d'Aiglemont introduced Lord Grenville. Julie gave the +guest a stiffly polite reception, which did credit to her powers of +dissimulation. Resolutely she silenced her heart, veiled her eyes, +steadied her voice, and she kept her future in her own hands. Then, when +by these devices, this innate woman-craft, as it may be called, she +had discovered the full extent of the love which she inspired, Mme. +d'Aiglemont welcomed the hope of a speedy cure, and no longer opposed +her husband, who pressed her to accept the young doctor's offer. Yet she +declined to trust herself with Lord Grenville until after some further +study of his words and manner, she could feel certain that he had +sufficient generosity to endure his pain in silence. She had absolute +power over him, and she had begun to abuse that power already. Was she +not a woman? + +Montcontour is an old manor-house build upon the sandy cliffs above the +Loire, not far from the bridge where Julie's journey was interrupted in +1814. It is a picturesque, white chateau, with turrets covered with +fine stone carving like Mechlin lace; a chateau such as you often see +in Touraine, spick and span, ivy clad, standing among its groves +of mulberry trees and vineyards, with its hollow walks, its stone +balustrades, and cellars mined in the rock escarpments mirrored in the +Loire. The roofs of Montcontour gleam in the sun; the whole land glows +in the burning heat. Traces of the romantic charm of Spain and the south +hover about the enchanting spot. The breeze brings the scent of bell +flowers and golden broom, the air is soft, all about you lies a sunny +land, a land which casts its dreamy spell over your soul, a land of +languor and of soft desire, a fair, sweet-scented country, where pain is +lulled to sleep and passion wakes. No heart is cold for long beneath its +clear sky, beside its sparkling waters. One ambition dies after another, +and you sink into serene content and repose, as the sun sinks at the end +of the day swathed about with purple and azure. + + + +One warm August evening in 1821 two people were climbing the paths cut +in the crags above the chateau, doubtless for the sake of the view from +the heights above. The two were Julie and Lord Grenville, but this Julie +seemed to be a new creature. The unmistakable color of health glowed in +her face. Overflowing vitality had brought a light into her eyes, which +sparkled through a moist film with that liquid brightness which gives +such irresistible charm to the eyes of children. She was radiant with +smiles; she felt the joy of living and all the possibilities of life. +From the very way in which she lifted her little feet, it was easy to +see that no suffering trammeled her lightest movements; there was no +heaviness nor languor in her eyes, her voice, as heretofore. Under the +white silk sunshade which screened her from the hot sunlight, she looked +like some young bride beneath her veil, or a maiden waiting to yield to +the magical enchantments of Love. + +Arthur led her with a lover's care, helping her up the pathway as if she +had been a child, finding the smoothest ways, avoiding the stones for +her, bidding her see glimpses of distance, or some flower beside the +path, always with the unfailing goodness, the same delicate design in +all that he did; the intuitive sense of this woman's wellbeing seemed to +be innate in him, and as much, nay, perhaps more, a part of his being as +the pulse of his own life. + +The patient and her doctor went step for step. There was nothing strange +for them in a sympathy which seemed to have existed since the day when +they first walked together. One will swayed them both; they stopped as +their senses received the same impression; every word and every glance +told of the same thought in either mind. They had climbed up through the +vineyards, and now they turned to sit on one of the long white stones, +quarried out of the caves in the hillside; but Julie stood awhile gazing +out over the landscape. + +"What a beautiful country!" she cried. "Let us put up a tent and live +here. Victor, Victor, do come up here!" + +M. d'Aiglemont answered by a halloo from below. He did not, however, +hurry himself, merely giving his wife a glance from time to time when +the windings of the path gave him a glimpse of her. Julie breathed +the air with delight. She looked up at Arthur, giving him one of those +subtle glances in which a clever woman can put the whole of her thought. + +"Ah, I should like to live here always," she said. "Would it be possible +to tire of this beautiful valley?--What is the picturesque river called, +do you know?" + +"That is the Cise." + +"The Cise," she repeated. "And all this country below, before us?" + +"Those are the low hills above the Cher." + +"And away to the right? Ah, that is Tours. Only see how fine the +cathedral towers look in the distance." + +She was silent, and let fall the hand which she had stretched out +towards the view upon Arthur's. Both admired the wide landscape made up +of so much blended beauty. Neither of them spoke. The murmuring voice of +the river, the pure air, and the cloudless heaven were all in tune with +their thronging thoughts and their youth and the love in their hearts. + +"Oh! _mon Dieu_, how I love this country!" Julie continued, with growing +and ingenuous enthusiasm. "You lived here for a long while, did you +not?" she added after a pause. + +A thrill ran through Lord Grenville at her words. + +"It was down there," he said, in a melancholy voice, indicating as he +spoke a cluster of walnut trees by the roadside, "that I, a prisoner, +saw you for the first time." + +"Yes, but even at that time I felt very sad. This country looked wild to +me then, but now----" She broke off, and Lord Grenville did not dare to +look at her. + +"All this pleasure I owe to you," Julie began at last, after a long +silence. "Only the living can feel the joy of life, and until now have +I not been dead to it all? You have given me more than health, you have +made me feel all its worth--" + +Women have an inimitable talent for giving utterance to strong feelings +in colorless words; a woman's eloquence lies in tone and gesture, manner +and glance. Lord Grenville hid his face in his hands, for his tears +filled his eyes. This was Julie's first word of thanks since they left +Paris a year ago. + +For a whole year he had watched over the Marquise, putting his whole +self into the task. D'Aiglemont seconding him, he had taken her first to +Aix, then to la Rochelle, to be near the sea. From moment to moment he +had watched the changes worked in Julie's shattered constitution by +his wise and simple prescriptions. He had cultivated her health as +an enthusiastic gardener might cultivate a rare flower. Yet, to all +appearance, the Marquise had quietly accepted Arthur's skill and care +with the egoism of a spoiled Parisienne, or like a courtesan who has +no idea of the cost of things, nor of the worth of a man, and judges of +both by their comparative usefulness to her. + +The influence of places upon us is a fact worth remarking. If melancholy +comes over us by the margin of a great water, another indelible law +of our nature so orders it that the mountains exercise a purifying +influence upon our feelings, and among the hills passion gains in depth +by all that it apparently loses in vivacity. Perhaps it was the light of +the wide country by the Loire, the height of the fair sloping hillside +on which the lovers sat, that induced the calm bliss of the moment +when the whole extent of the passion that lies beneath a few +insignificant-sounding words is divined for the first time with a +delicious sense of happiness. + +Julie had scarcely spoken the words which had moved Lord Grenville so +deeply, when a caressing breeze ruffled the treetops and filled the air +with coolness from the river; a few clouds crossed the sky, and the soft +cloud-shadows brought out all the beauty of the fair land below. + +Julie turned away her head, lest Arthur should see the tears which she +succeeded in repressing; his emotion had spread at once to her. She +dried her eyes, but she dared not raise them lest he should read the +excess of joy in a glance. Her woman's instinct told her that during +this hour of danger she must hide her love in the depths of her heart. +Yet silence might prove equally dangerous, and Julie saw that Lord +Grenville was unable to utter a word. She went on, therefore, in a +gentle voice: + +"You are touched by what I have said. Perhaps such a quick outburst +of feeling is the way in which a gracious and kind nature like yours +reverses a mistaken judgment. You must have thought me ungrateful when +I was cold and reserved, or cynical and hard, all through the journey +which, fortunately, is very near its end. I should not have been worthy +of your care if I had been unable to appreciate it. I have forgotten +nothing. Alas! I shall forget nothing, not the anxious way in which you +watched over me as a mother watches over her child, nor, and above +all else, the noble confidence of our life as brother and sister, the +delicacy of your conduct--winning charms, against which we women are +defenceless. My lord, it is out of my power to make you a return----" + +At these words Julie hastily moved further away, and Lord Grenville made +no attempt to detain her. She went to a rock not far away, and there +sat motionless. What either felt remained a secret known to each alone; +doubtless they wept in silence. The singing of the birds about them, +so blithe, so overflowing with tenderness at sunset time, could only +increase the storm of passion which had driven them apart. Nature took +up their story for them, and found a language for the love of which they +did not dare to speak. + +"And now, my lord," said Julie, and she came and stood before Arthur +with a great dignity, which allowed her to take his hand in hers. "I am +going to ask you to hallow and purify the life which you have given back +to me. Here, we will part. I know," she added, as she saw how white his +face grew, "I know that I am repaying you for your devotion by requiring +of you a sacrifice even greater than any which you have hitherto +made for me, sacrifices so great that they should receive some better +recompense than this.... But it must be... You must not stay in France. +By laying this command upon you, do I not give you rights which shall be +held sacred?" she added, holding his hand against her beating heart. + +"Yes," said Arthur, and he rose. + +He looked in the direction of d'Aiglemont, who appeared on the opposite +side of one of the hollow walks with the child in his arms. He had +scrambled up on the balustrade by the chateau that little Helene might +jump down. + +"Julie, I will not say a word of my love; we understand each other too +well. Deeply and carefully though I have hidden the pleasures of my +heart, you have shared them all, I feel it, I know it, I see it. And +now, at this moment, as I receive this delicious proof of the constant +sympathy of our hearts, I must go.... Cunning schemes for getting rid of +him have crossed my mind too often; the temptation might be irresistible +if I stayed with you." + +"I had the same thought," she said, a look of pained surprise in her +troubled face. + +Yet in her tone and involuntary shudder there was such virtue, such +certainty of herself, won in many a hard-fought battle with a love that +spoke in Julie's tones and involuntary gestures, that Lord Grenville +stood thrilled with admiration of her. The mere shadow of a crime had +been dispelled from that clear conscience. The religious sentiment +enthroned on the fair forehead could not but drive away the evil +thoughts that arise unbidden, engendered by our imperfect nature, +thoughts which make us aware of the grandeur and the perils of human +destiny. + +"And then," she said, "I should have drawn down your scorn upon me, +and--I should have been saved," she added, and her eyes fell. "To be +lowered in your eyes, what is that but death?" + +For a moment the two heroic lovers were silent, choking down their +sorrow. Good or ill, it seemed that their thoughts were loyally one, +and the joys in the depths of their heart were no more experiences apart +than the pain which they strove most anxiously to hide. + +"I have no right to complain," she said after a while, "my misery is of +my own making," and she raised her tear-filled eyes to the sky. + +"Perhaps you don't remember it, but that is the place where we met each +other for the first time," shouted the General from below, and he waved +his hand towards the distance. "There, down yonder, near those poplars!" + +The Englishman nodded abruptly by way of answer. + +"So I was bound to die young and to know no happiness," Julie continued. +"Yes, do not think that I live. Sorrow is just as fatal as the dreadful +disease which you have cured. I do not think that I am to blame. No. My +love is stronger than I am, and eternal; but all unconsciously it grew +in me; and I will not be guilty through my love. Nevertheless, though I +shall be faithful to my conscience as a wife, to my duties as a mother, +I will be no less faithful to the instincts of my heart. Hear me," she +cried in an unsteady voice, "henceforth I belong to _him_ no longer." + +By a gesture, dreadful to see in its undisguised loathing she indicated +her husband. + +"The social code demands that I shall make his existence happy," she +continued. "I will obey, I will be his servant, my devotion to him +shall be boundless; but from to-day I am a widow. I will neither be a +prostitute in my own eyes nor in those of the world. If I do not belong +to M. d'Aiglemont, I will never belong to another. You shall have +nothing, nothing save this which you have wrung from me. This is the +doom which I have passed upon myself," she said, looking proudly at him. +"And now, know this--if you give way to a single criminal thought, M. +d'Aiglemont's widow will enter a convent in Spain or Italy. By an evil +chance we have spoken of our love; perhaps that confession was bound to +come; but our hearts must never vibrate again like this. To-morrow you +will receive a letter from England, and we shall part, and never see +each other again." + +The effort had exhausted all Julie's strength. She felt her knees +trembling, and a feeling of deathly cold came over her. Obeying a +woman's instinct, she sat down, lest she should sink into Arthur's arms. + +"_Julie!_" cried Lord Grenville. + +The sharp cry rang through the air like a crack of thunder. Till then he +could not speak; now, all the words which the dumb lover could not utter +gathered themselves in that heartrending appeal. + +"Well, what is wrong with her?" asked the General, who had hurried up at +that cry, and now suddenly confronted the two. + +"Nothing serious," said Julie, with that wonderful self-possession which +a woman's quick-wittedness usually brings to her aid when it is most +called for. "The chill, damp air under the walnut tree made me feel +quite faint just now, and that must have alarmed this doctor of mine. +Does he not look on me as a very nearly finished work of art? He +was startled, I suppose, by the idea of seeing it destroyed." With +ostentatious coolness she took Lord Grenville's arm, smiled at her +husband, took a last look at the landscape, and went down the pathway, +drawing her traveling companion with her. + +"This certainly is the grandest view that we have seen," she said; "I +shall never forget it. Just look, Victor, what distance, what an expanse +of country, and what variety in it! I have fallen in love with this +landscape." + +Her laughter was almost hysterical, but to her husband it sounded +natural. She sprang gaily down into the hollow pathway and vanished. + +"What?" she cried, when they had left M. d'Aiglemont far behind. +"So soon? Is it so soon? Another moment, and we can neither of us be +ourselves; we shall never be ourselves again, our life is over, in +short--" + +"Let us go slowly," said Lord Grenville, "the carriages are still some +way off, and if we may put words into our glances, our hearts may live a +little longer." + +They went along the footpath by the river in the late evening light, +almost in silence; such vague words as they uttered, low as the murmur +of the Loire, stirred their souls to the depths. Just as the sun sank, +a last red gleam from the sky fell over them; it was like a mournful +symbol of their ill-starred love. + +The General, much put out because the carriage was not at the spot where +they had left it, followed and outstripped the pair without interrupting +their converse. Lord Grenville's high minded and delicate behavior +throughout the journey had completely dispelled the Marquis' suspicions. +For some time past he had left his wife in freedom, reposing confidence +in the noble amateur's Punic faith. Arthur and Julie walked on together +in the close and painful communion of two hearts laid waste. + +So short a while ago as they climbed the cliffs at Montcontour, there +had been a vague hope in either mind, an uneasy joy for which they dared +not account to themselves; but now as they came along the pathway by the +river, they pulled down the frail structure of imaginings, the child's +cardcastle, on which neither of them had dared to breathe. That hope was +over. + +That very evening Lord Grenville left them. His last look at Julie made +it miserably plain that since the moment when sympathy revealed the full +extent of a tyrannous passion, he did well to mistrust himself. + +The next morning, M. d'Aiglemont and his wife took their places in the +carriage without their traveling companion, and were whirled swiftly +along the road to Blois. The Marquise was constantly put in mind of the +journey made in 1814, when as yet she know nothing of love, and had +been almost ready to curse it for its persistency. Countless forgotten +impressions were revived. The heart has its own memory. A woman who +cannot recollect the most important great events will recollect through +a lifetime things which appealed to her feelings; and Julie d'Aiglemont +found all the most trifling details of that journey laid up in her mind. +It was pleasant to her to recall its little incidents as they occurred +to her one by one; there were points in the road when she could even +remember the thoughts that passed through her mind when she saw them +first. + +Victor had fallen violently in love with his wife since she had +recovered the freshness of her youth and all her beauty, and now he +pressed close to her side like a lover. Once he tried to put his arm +round her, but she gently disengaged herself, finding some excuse or +other for evading the harmless caress. In a little while she shrank from +the close contact with Victor, the sensation of warmth communicated by +their position. She tried to take the unoccupied place opposite, but +Victor gallantly resigned the back seat to her. For this attention she +thanked him with a sigh, whereupon he forgot himself, and the Don Juan +of the garrison construed his wife's melancholy to his own advantage, +so that at the end of the day she was compelled to speak with a firmness +which impressed him. + +"You have all but killed me, dear, once already, as you know," said +she. "If I were still an inexperienced girl, I might begin to sacrifice +myself afresh; but I am a mother, I have a daughter to bring up, and I +owe as much to her as to you. Let us resign ourselves to a misfortune +which affects us both alike. You are the less to be pitied. Have you +not, as it is, found consolations which duty and the honor of both, +and (stronger still) which Nature forbids to me? Stay," she added, "you +carelessly left three letters from Mme. de Serizy in a drawer; here they +are. My silence about this matter should make it plain to you that in me +you have a wife who has plenty of indulgence and does not exact from you +the sacrifices prescribed by the law. But I have thought enough to see +that the roles of husband and wife are quite different, and that the +wife alone is predestined to misfortune. My virtue is based upon firmly +fixed and definite principles. I shall live blamelessly, but let me +live." + +The Marquis was taken aback by a logic which women grasp with the clear +insight of love, and overawed by a certain dignity natural to them at +such crises. Julie's instinctive repugnance for all that jarred upon her +love and the instincts of her heart is one of the fairest qualities of +woman, and springs perhaps from a natural virtue which neither laws nor +civilization can silence. And who shall dare to blame women? If a woman +can silence the exclusive sentiment which bids her "forsake all other" +for the man whom she loves, what is she but a priest who has lost his +faith? If a rigid mind here and there condemns Julie for a sort of +compromise between love and wifely duty, impassioned souls will lay it +to her charge as a crime. To be thus blamed by both sides shows one of +two things very clearly--that misery necessarily follows in the train of +broken laws, or else that there are deplorable flaws in the institutions +upon which society in Europe is based. + + + +Two years went by. M. and Mme. d'Aiglemont went their separate ways, +leading their life in the world, meeting each other more frequently +abroad than at home, a refinement upon divorce, in which many a marriage +in the great world is apt to end. + +One evening, strange to say, found husband and wife in their own +drawing-room. Mme. d'Aiglemont had been dining at home with a friend, +and the General, who almost invariably dined in town, had not gone out +for once. + +"There is a pleasant time in store for you, _Madame la Marquise_," said +M. d'Aiglemont, setting his coffee cup down upon the table. He looked +at the guest, Mme. de Wimphen, and half-pettishly, half-mischievously +added, "I am starting off for several days' sport with the Master of +the Hounds. For a whole week, at any rate, you will be a widow in good +earnest; just what you wish for, I suppose.--Guillaume," he said to the +servant who entered, "tell them to put the horses in." + +Mme. de Wimphen was the friend to whom Julie had begun the letter upon +her marriage. The glances exchanged by the two women said plainly that +in her Julie had found an intimate friend, an indulgent and invaluable +confidante. Mme. de Wimphen's marriage had been a very happy one. +Perhaps it was her own happiness which secured her devotion to Julie's +unhappy life, for under such circumstances, dissimilarity of destiny is +nearly always a strong bond of union. + +"Is the hunting season not over yet?" asked Julie, with an indifferent +glance at her husband. + +"The Master of the Hounds comes when and where he pleases, madame. We +are going boar-hunting in the Royal Forest." + +"Take care that no accident happens to you." + +"Accidents are usually unforeseen," he said, smiling. + +"The carriage is ready, my Lord Marquis," said the servant. + +"Madame, if I should fall a victim to the boar--" he continued, with a +suppliant air. + +"What does this mean?" inquired Mme. de Wimphen. + +"Come, come," said Mme. d'Aiglemont, turning to her husband; smiling at +her friend as if to say, "You will soon see." + +Julie held up her head; but as her husband came close to her, she +swerved at the last, so that his kiss fell not on her throat, but on the +broad frill about it. + +"You will be my witness before heaven now that I need a firman to obtain +this little grace of her," said the Marquis, addressing Mme. de Wimphen. +"This is how this wife of mine understands love. She has brought me to +this pass, by what trickery I am at a loss to know.... A pleasant time +to you!" and he went. + +"But your poor husband is really very good-natured," cried Louisa de +Wimphen, when the two women were alone together. "He loves you." + +"Oh! not another syllable after that last word. The name I bear makes me +shudder----" + +"Yes, but Victor obeys you implicitly," said Louisa. + +"His obedience is founded in part upon the great esteem which I have +inspired in him. As far as outward things go, I am a model wife. I make +his house pleasant to him; I shut my eyes to his intrigues; I touch not +a penny of his fortune. He is free to squander the interest exactly as +he pleases; I only stipulate that he shall not touch the principal. At +this price I have peace. He neither explains nor attempts to explain my +life. But though my husband is guided by me, that does not say that I +have nothing to fear from his character. I am a bear leader who daily +trembles lest the muzzle should give way at last. If Victor once took +it into his head that I had forfeited my right to his esteem, what would +happen next I dare not think; for he is violent, full of personal pride, +and vain above all things. While his wits are not keen enough to enable +him to behave discreetly at a delicate crisis when his lowest passions +are involved, his character is weak, and he would very likely kill me +provisionally even if he died of remorse next day. But there is no fear +of that fatal good fortune." + +A brief pause followed. Both women were thinking of the real cause of +this state of affairs. Julie gave Louisa a glance which revealed her +thoughts. + +"I have been cruelly obeyed," she cried. "Yet I never forbade him to +write to me. Oh! _he_ has forgotten me, and he is right. If his life had +been spoiled, it would have been too tragical; one life is enough, is it +not? Would you believe it, dear; I read English newspapers simply to +see his name in print. But he has not yet taken his seat in the House of +Lords." + +"So you know English." + +"Did I not tell you?--Yes, I learned." + +"Poor little one!" cried Louisa, grasping Julie's hand in hers. "How can +you still live?" + +"That is the secret," said the Marquise, with an involuntary gesture +almost childlike in its simplicity. "Listen, I take laudanum. That +duchess in London suggested the idea; you know the story, Maturin made +use of it in one of his novels. My drops are very weak, but I sleep; I +am only awake for seven hours in the day, and those hours I spend with +my child." + +Louisa gazed into the fire. The full extent of her friend's misery was +opening out before her for the first time, and she dared not look into +her face. + +"Keep my secret, Louisa," said Julie, after a moment's silence. + +Just as she spoke the footman brought in a letter for the Marquise. + +"Ah!" she cried, and her face grew white. + +"I need not ask from whom it comes," said Mme. de Wimphen, but the +Marquise was reading the letter, and heeded nothing else. + +Mme. de Wimphen, watching her friend, saw strong feeling wrought to the +highest pitch, ecstasy of the most dangerous kind painted on Julie's +face in swift changing white and red. At length Julie flung the sheet +into the fire. + +"It burns like fire," she said. "Oh! my heart beats till I cannot +breathe." + +She rose to her feet and walked up and down. Her eyes were blazing. + +"He did not leave Paris!" she cried. + +Mme. de Wimphen did not dare to interrupt the words that followed, +jerked-out sentences, measured by dreadful pauses in between. After +every break the deep notes of her voice sank lower and lower. There was +something awful about the last words. + +"He has seen me, constantly, and I have not known it.--A look, taken by +stealth, every day, helps him to live.--Louisa, you do not know!--He +is dying.--He wants to say good-bye to me. He knows that my husband has +gone away for several days. He will be here in a moment. Oh! I shall +die: I am lost.--Listen, Louisa, stay with me!--_I am afraid!_" + +"But my husband knows that I have been dining with you; he is sure to +come for me," said Mme. de Wimphen. + +"Well, then, before you go I will send _him_ away. I will play the +executioner for us both. Oh me! he will think that I do not love him any +more--And that letter of his! Dear, I can see those words in letters of +fire." + +A carriage rolled in under the archway. + +"Ah!" cried the Marquise, with something like joy in her voice, "he is +coming openly. He makes no mystery of it." + +"Lord Grenville," announced the servant. + +The Marquise stood up rigid and motionless; but at the sight of Arthur's +white face, so thin and haggard, how was it possible to keep up the +show of severity? Lord Grenville saw that Julie was not alone, but he +controlled his fierce annoyance, and looked cool and unperturbed. Yet +for the two women who knew his secret, his face, his tones, the look +in his eyes had something of the power attributed to the torpedo. Their +faculties were benumbed by the sharp shock of contact with his horrible +pain. The sound of his voice set Julie's heart beating so cruelly that +she could not trust herself to speak; she was afraid that he would see +the full extent of his power over her. Lord Grenville did not dare to +look at Julie, and Mme. de Wimphen was left to sustain a conversation +to which no one listened. Julie glanced at her friend with touching +gratefulness in her eyes to thank her for coming to her aid. + +By this time the lovers had quelled emotion into silence, and could +preserve the limits laid down by duty and convention. But M. de Wimphen +was announced, and as he came in the two friends exchanged glances. Both +felt the difficulties of this fresh complication. It was impossible to +enter into explanations with M. de Wimphen, and Louisa could not think +of any sufficient pretext for asking to be left. + +Julie went to her, ostensibly to wrap her up in her shawl. "I will be +brave," she said, in a low voice. "He came here in the face of all the +world, so what have I to fear? Yet but for you, in that first moment, +when I saw how changed he looked, I should have fallen at his feet." + +"Well, Arthur, you have broken your promise to me," she said, in a +faltering voice, when she returned. Lord Grenville did not venture to +take the seat upon the sofa by her side. + +"I could not resist the pleasure of hearing your voice, of being near +you. The thought of it came to be a sort of madness, a delirious frenzy. +I am no longer master of myself. I have taken myself to task; it is +no use, I am too weak, I ought to die. But to die without seeing you, +without having heard the rustle of your dress, or felt your tears. What +a death!" + +He moved further away from her; but in his hasty uprising a pistol fell +out of his pocket. The Marquise looked down blankly at the weapon; all +passion, all expression had died out of her eyes. Lord Grenville stooped +for the thing, raging inwardly over an accident which seemed like a +piece of lovesick strategy. + +"_Arthur!_" + +"Madame," he said, looking down, "I came here in utter desperation; I +meant----" he broke off. + +"You meant to die by your own hand here in my house!" + +"Not alone!" he said in a low voice. + +"Not alone! My husband, perhaps----?" + +"No, no," he cried in a choking voice. "Reassure yourself," he +continued, "I have quite given up my deadly purpose. As soon as I came +in, as soon as I saw you, I felt that I was strong enough to suffer in +silence, and to die alone." + +Julie sprang up, and flung herself into his arms. Through her sobbing +he caught a few passionate words, "To know happiness, and then to +die.--Yes, let it be so." + +All Julie's story was summed up in that cry from the depths; it was +the summons of nature and of love at which women without a religion +surrender. With the fierce energy of unhoped-for joy, Arthur caught her +up and carried her to the sofa; but in a moment she tore herself from +her lover's arms, looked at him with a fixed despairing gaze, took his +hand, snatched up a candle, and drew him into her room. When they stood +by the cot where Helene lay sleeping, she put the curtains softly aside, +shading the candle with her hand, lest the light should dazzle the +half-closed eyes beneath the transparent lids. Helene lay smiling in her +sleep, with her arms outstretched on the coverlet. Julie glanced from +her child to Arthur's face. That look told him all. + +"We may leave a husband, even though he loves us: a man is strong; he +has consolations.--We may defy the world and its laws. But a motherless +child!"--all these thoughts, and a thousand others more moving still, +found language in that glance. + +"We can take her with us," muttered he; "I will love her dearly." + +"Mamma!" cried little Helene, now awake. Julie burst into tears. Lord +Grenville sat down and folded his arms in gloomy silence. + +"Mamma!" At the sweet childish name, so many nobler feelings, so many +irresistible yearnings awoke, that for a moment love was effaced by the +all-powerful instinct of motherhood; the mother triumphed over the woman +in Julie, and Lord Grenville could not hold out, he was defeated by +Julie's tears. + +Just at that moment a door was flung noisily open. "Madame d'Aiglemont, +are you hereabouts?" called a voice which rang like a crack of thunder +through the hearts of the two lovers. The Marquis had come home. + +Before Julie could recover her presence of mind, her husband was on the +way to the door of her room which opened into his. Luckily, at a sign, +Lord Grenville escaped into the dressing-closet, and she hastily shut +the door upon him. + +"Well, my lady, here am I," said Victor, "the hunting party did not come +off. I am just going to bed." + +"Good-night, so am I. So go and leave me to undress." + +"You are very cross to-night, Madame la Marquise." + +The General returned to his room, Julie went with him to the door and +shut it. Then she sprang to the dressing-close to release Arthur. All +her presence of mind returned; she bethought herself that it was quite +natural that her sometime doctor should pay her a visit; she might have +left him in the drawing-room while she put her little girl to bed. She +was about to tell him, under her breath, to go back to the drawing-room, +and had opened the door. Then she shrieked aloud. Lord Grenville's +fingers had been caught and crushed in the door. + +"Well, what is it?" demanded her husband. + +"Oh! nothing, I have just pricked my finger with a pin." + +The General's door opened at once. Julie imagined that the irruption was +due to a sudden concern for her, and cursed a solicitude in which love +had no part. She had barely time to close the dressing-closet, and Lord +Grenville had not extricated his hand. The General did, in fact, appear, +but his wife had mistaken his motives; his apprehensions were entirely +on his own account. + +"Can you lend me a bandana handkerchief? The stupid fool Charles leaves +me without a single one. In the early days you used to bother me with +looking after me so carefully. Ah, well, the honeymoon did not last very +long for me, nor yet for my cravats. Nowadays I am given over to the +secular arm, in the shape of servants who do not care one jack straw for +what I say." + +"There! There is a bandana for you. Did you go into the drawing-room?" + +"No." + +"Oh! you might perhaps have been in time to see Lord Grenville." + +"Is he in Paris?" + +"It seems so." + +"Oh! I will go at once. The good doctor." + +"But he will have gone by now!" exclaimed Julie. + +The Marquis, standing in the middle of the room, was tying the +handkerchief over his head. He looked complacently at himself in the +glass. + +"What has become of the servants is more than I know," he remarked. "I +have rung the bell for Charles, and he has not answered it. And your +maid is not here either. Ring for her. I should like another blanket on +my bed to-night." + +"Pauline is out," the Marquise said drily. + +"What, at midnight!" exclaimed the General. + +"I gave her leave to go to the Opera." + +"That is funny!" returned her husband, continuing to undress. "I thought +I saw her coming upstairs." + +"She has come in then, of course," said Julie, with assumed impatience, +and to allay any possible suspicion on her husband's part she pretended +to ring the bell. + + + +The whole history of that night has never been known, but no doubt it +was as simple and as tragically commonplace as the domestic incidents +that preceded it. + +Next day the Marquise d'Aiglemont took to her bed, nor did she leave it +for some days. + +"What can have happened in your family so extraordinary that every one +is talking about your wife?" asked M. de Ronquerolles of M. d'Aiglemont +a short time after that night of catastrophes. + +"Take my advice and remain a bachelor," said d'Aiglemont. "The curtains +of Helene's cot caught fire, and gave my wife such a shock that it will +be a twelvemonth before she gets over it; so the doctor says. You marry +a pretty wife, and her looks fall off; you marry a girl in blooming +health, and she turns into an invalid. You think she has a passionate +temperament, and find her cold, or else under her apparent coldness +there lurks a nature so passionate that she is the death of you, or +she dishonors your name. Sometimes the meekest of them will turn out +crotchety, though the crotchety ones never grow any sweeter. Sometimes +the mere child, so simple and silly at first, will develop an iron will +to thwart you and the ingenuity of a fiend. I am tired of marriage." + +"Or of your wife?" + +"That would be difficult. By-the-by, do you feel inclined to go to +Saint-Thomas d'Aquin with me to attend Lord Grenville's funeral?" + +"A singular way of spending time.--Is it really known how he came by his +death?" added Ronquerolles. + +"His man says that he spent a whole night sitting on somebody's window +sill to save some woman's character, and it has been infernally cold +lately." + +"Such devotion would be highly creditable to one of us old stagers; but +Lord Grenville was a youngster and--an Englishman. Englishmen never can +do anything like anybody else." + +"Pooh!" returned d'Aiglemont, "these heroic exploits all depend upon the +woman in the case, and it certainly was not for one that I know, that +poor Arthur came by his death." + + + + +II. A HIDDEN GRIEF + +Between the Seine and the little river Loing lies a wide flat country, +skirted on the one side by the Forest of Fontainebleau, and marked out +as to its southern limits by the towns of Moret, Montereau, and Nemours. +It is a dreary country; little knolls of hills appear only at rare +intervals, and a coppice here and there among the fields affords +for game; and beyond, upon every side, stretches the endless gray or +yellowish horizon peculiar to Beauce, Sologne, and Berri. + +In the very centre of the plain, at equal distances from Moret and +Montereau, the traveler passes the old chateau of Saint-Lange, standing +amid surroundings which lack neither dignity nor stateliness. There are +magnificent avenues of elm-trees, great gardens encircled by the moat, +and a circumference of walls about a huge manorial pile which represents +the profits of the _maltote_, the gains of farmers-general, legalized +malversation, or the vast fortunes of great houses now brought low +beneath the hammer of the Civil Code. + +Should any artist or dreamer of dreams chance to stray along the roads +full of deep ruts, or over the heavy land which secures the place +against intrusion, he will wonder how it happened that this romantic +old place was set down in a savanna of corn-land, a desert of chalk, +and sand, and marl, where gaiety dies away, and melancholy is a natural +product of the soil. The voiceless solitude, the monotonous horizon line +which weigh upon the spirits are negative beauties, which only suit with +sorrow that refuses to be comforted. + +Hither, at the close of the year 1820, came a woman, still young, well +known in Paris for her charm, her fair face, and her wit; and to the +immense astonishment of the little village a mile away, this woman of +high rank and corresponding fortune took up her abode at Saint-Lange. + +From time immemorial, farmers and laborers had seen no gentry at the +chateau. The estate, considerable though it was, had been left in charge +of a land-steward and the house to the old servants. Wherefore the +appearance of the lady of the manor caused a kind of sensation in the +district. + +A group had gathered in the yard of the wretched little wineshop at the +end of the village (where the road forks to Nemours and Moret) to see +the carriage pass. It went by slowly, for the Marquise had come +from Paris with her own horses, and those on the lookout had ample +opportunity of observing a waiting-maid, who sat with her back to the +horses holding a little girl, with a somewhat dreamy look, upon her +knee. The child's mother lay back in the carriage; she looked like +a dying woman sent out into the country air by her doctors as a last +resource. Village politicians were by no means pleased to see the +young, delicate, downcast face; they had hoped that the new arrival at +Saint-Lange would bring some life and stir into the neighborhood, +and clearly any sort of stir or movement must be distasteful to the +suffering invalid in the traveling carriage. + +That evening, when the notables of Saint-Lange were drinking in the +private room of the wineshop, the longest head among them declared that +such depression could admit of but one construction--the Marquise +was ruined. His lordship the Marquis was away in Spain with the Duc +d'Angouleme (so they said in the papers), and beyond a doubt her +ladyship had come to Saint-Lange to retrench after a run of ill-luck on +the Bourse. The Marquis was one of the greatest gamblers on the face of +the globe. Perhaps the estate would be cut up and sold in little lots. +There would be some good strokes of business to be made in that case, +and it behooved everybody to count up his cash, unearth his savings +and to see how he stood, so as to secure his share of the spoil of +Saint-Lange. + +So fair did this future seem, that the village worthies, dying to know +whether it was founded on fact, began to think of ways of getting at the +truth through the servants at the chateau. None of these, however, could +throw any light on the calamity which had brought their mistress into +the country at the beginning of winter, and to the old chateau of +Saint-Lange of all places, when she might have taken her choice of +cheerful country-houses famous for their beautiful gardens. + +His worship the mayor called to pay his respects; but he did not see the +lady. Then the land-steward tried with no better success. + +Madame la Marquise kept her room, only leaving it, while it was set +in order, for the small adjoining drawing-room, where she dined; if, +indeed, to sit down to a table, to look with disgust at the dishes, and +take the precise amount of nourishment required to prevent death from +sheer starvation, can be called dining. The meal over, she returned +at once to the old-fashioned low chair, in which she had sat since the +morning, in the embrasure of the one window that lighted her room. + +Her little girl she only saw for a few minutes daily, during the dismal +dinner, and even for a short time she seemed scarcely able to bear the +child's presence. Surely nothing but the most unheard-of anguish could +have extinguished a mother's love so early. + +None of the servants were suffered to come near, her own woman was +the one creature whom she liked to have about her; the chateau must be +perfectly quiet, the child must play at the other end of the house. The +slightest sound had grown so intolerable, that any human voice, even the +voice of her own child, jarred upon her. + +At first the whole countryside was deeply interested in these +eccentricities; but time passed on, every possible hypothesis had been +advanced to account for them and the peasants and dwellers in the little +country towns thought no more of the invalid lady. + +So the Marquise was left to herself. She might live on, perfectly +silent, amid the silence which she herself had created; there was +nothing to draw her forth from the tapestried chamber where her +grandmother died, whither she herself had come that she might die, +gently, without witnesses, without importunate solicitude, without +suffering from the insincere demonstrations of egoism masquerading as +affection, which double the agony of death in great cities. + +She was twenty-six years old. At that age, with plenty of romantic +illusions still left, the mind loves to dwell on the thought of death +when death seems to come as a friend. But with youth, death is coy, +coming up close only to go away, showing himself and hiding again, till +youth has time to fall out of love with him during this dalliance. There +is that uncertainty too that hangs over death's to-morrow. Youth plunges +back into the world of living men, there to find the pain more pitiless +than death, that does not wait to strike. + +This woman who refused to live was to know the bitterness of these +reprieves in the depths of her loneliness; in moral agony, which death +would not come to end, she was to serve a terrible apprenticeship to the +egoism which must take the bloom from her heart and break her in to the +life of the world. + +This harsh and sorry teaching is the usual outcome of our early sorrows. +For the first, and perhaps for the last time in her life, the Marquise +d'Aiglemont was in very truth suffering. And, indeed, would it not be an +error to suppose that the same sentiment can be reproduced in us? Once +develop the power to feel, is it not always there in the depths of our +nature? The accidents of life may lull or awaken it, but there it is, of +necessity modifying the self, its abiding place. Hence, every sensation +should have its great day once and for all, its first day of storm, +be it long or short. Hence, likewise, pain, the most abiding of our +sensations, could be keenly felt only at its first irruption, its +intensity diminishing with every subsequent paroxysm, either because we +grow accustomed to these crises, or perhaps because a natural instinct +of self-preservation asserts itself, and opposes to the destroying force +of anguish an equal but passive force of inertia. + +Yet of all kinds of suffering, to which does the name of anguish belong? +For the loss of parents, Nature has in a manner prepared us; physical +suffering, again, is an evil which passes over us and is gone; it lays +no hold upon the soul; if it persists, it ceases to be an evil, it is +death. The young mother loses her firstborn, but wedded love ere long +gives her a successor. This grief, too, is transient. After all, these, +and many other troubles like unto them, are in some sort wounds and +bruises; they do not sap the springs of vitality, and only a succession +of such blows can crush in us the instinct that seeks happiness. Great +pain, therefore, pain that arises to anguish, should be suffering so +deadly, that past, present, and future are alike included in its grip, +and no part of life is left sound and whole. Never afterwards can +we think the same thoughts as before. Anguish engraves itself in +ineffaceable characters on mouth and brow; it passes through us, +destroying or relaxing the springs that vibrate to enjoyment, leaving +behind in the soul the seeds of a disgust for all things in this world. + +Yet, again, to be measureless, to weigh like this upon body and soul, +the trouble should befall when soul and body have just come to their +full strength, and smite down a heart that beats high with life. Then it +is that great scars are made. Terrible is the anguish. None, it may +be, can issue from this soul-sickness without undergoing some dramatic +change. Those who survive it, those who remain on earth, return to the +world to wear an actor's countenance and to play an actor's part. They +know the side-scenes where actors may retire to calculate chances, shed +their tears, or pass their jests. Life holds no inscrutable dark places +for those who have passed through this ordeal; their judgments are +Rhadamanthine. + +For young women of the Marquise d'Aiglemont's age, this first, this most +poignant pain of all, is always referable to the same cause. A woman, +especially if she is a young woman, greatly beautiful, and by nature +great, never fails to stake her whole life as instinct and sentiment and +society all unite to bid her. Suppose that that life fails her, suppose +that she still lives on, she cannot but endure the most cruel pangs, +inasmuch as a first love is the loveliest of all. How comes it that this +catastrophe has found no painter, no poet? And yet, can it be painted? +Can it be sung? No; for the anguish arising from it eludes analysis +and defies the colors of art. And more than this, such pain is never +confessed. To console the sufferer, you must be able to divine the past +which she hugs in bitterness to her soul like a remorse; it is like an +avalanche in a valley; it laid all waste before it found a permanent +resting-place. + +The Marquise was suffering from this anguish, which will for long remain +unknown, because the whole world condemns it, while sentiment cherishes +it, and the conscience of a true woman justifies her in it. It is with +such pain as with children steadily disowned of life, and therefore +bound more closely to the mother's heart than other children more +bounteously endowed. Never, perhaps, was the awful catastrophe in which +the whole world without dies for us, so deadly, so complete, so cruelly +aggravated by circumstance as it had been for the Marquise. The man whom +she had loved was young and generous; in obedience to the laws of the +world, she had refused herself to his love, and he had died to save a +woman's honor, as the world calls it. To whom could she speak of her +misery? Her tears would be an offence against her husband, the origin +of the tragedy. By all laws written and unwritten she was bound over to +silence. A woman would have enjoyed the story; a man would have schemed +for his own benefit. No; such grief as hers can only weep freely in +solitude and in loneliness; she must consume her pain or be consumed by +it; die or kill something within her--her conscience, it may be. + +Day after day she sat gazing at the flat horizon. It lay out before her +like her own life to come. There was nothing to discover, nothing to +hope. The whole of it could be seen at a glance. It was the visible +presentment in the outward world of the chill sense of desolation which +was gnawing restlessly at her heart. The misty mornings, the pale, +bright sky, the low clouds scudding under the gray dome of heaven, +fitted with the moods of her soul-sickness. Her heart did not contract, +was neither more nor less seared, rather it seemed as if her youth, in +its full blossom, was slowly turned to stone by an anguish intolerable +because it was barren. She suffered through herself and for herself. How +could it end save in self-absorption? Ugly torturing thoughts probed +her conscience. Candid self-examination pronounced that she was double, +there were two selves within her; a woman who felt and a woman who +thought; a self that suffered and a self that could fain suffer no +longer. Her mind traveled back to the joys of childish days; they had +gone by, and she had never known how happy they were. Scenes crowded up +in her memory as in a bright mirror glass, to demonstrate the deception +of a marriage which, all that it should be in the eyes of the world, was +in reality wretched. What had the delicate pride of young womanhood +done for her--the bliss foregone, the sacrifices made to the world? +Everything in her expressed love, awaited love; her movements still were +full of perfect grace; her smile, her charm, were hers as before; why? +she asked herself. The sense of her own youth and physical loveliness +no more affected her than some meaningless reiterated sound. Her very +beauty had grown intolerable to her as a useless thing. She shrank +aghast from the thought that through the rest of life she must remain an +incomplete creature; had not the inner self lost its power of receiving +impressions with that zest, that exquisite sense of freshness which is +the spring of so much of life's gladness? The impressions of the future +would for the most part be effaced as soon as received, and many of the +thoughts which once would have moved her now would move her no more. + +After the childhood of the creature dawns the childhood of the heart; +but this second infancy was over, her lover had taken it down with him +into the grave. The longings of youth remained; she was young yet; but +the completeness of youth was gone, and with that lost completeness the +whole value and savor of life had diminished somewhat. Should she not +always bear within her the seeds of sadness and mistrust, ready to +grow up and rob emotion of its springtide of fervor? Conscious she must +always be that nothing could give her now the happiness so longed for, +that seemed so fair in her dreams. The fire from heaven that sheds +abroad its light in the heart, in the dawn of love, had been quenched +in tears, the first real tears which she had shed; henceforth she must +always suffer, because it was no longer in her power to be what once +she might have been. This is a belief which turns us in aversion and +bitterness of spirit from any proffered new delight. + +Julie had come to look at life from the point of view of age about to +die. Young though she felt, the heavy weight of joyless days had fallen +upon her, and left her broken-spirited and old before her time. With a +despairing cry, she asked the world what it could give her in exchange +for the love now lost, by which she had lived. She asked herself whether +in that vanished love, so chaste and pure, her will had not been more +criminal than her deeds, and chose to believe herself guilty; partly +to affront the world, partly for her own consolation, in that she had +missed the close union of body and soul, which diminishes the pain of +the one who is left behind by the knowledge that once it has known and +given joy to the full, and retains within itself the impress of that +which is no more. + +Something of the mortification of the actress cheated of her part +mingled with the pain which thrilled through every fibre of her heart +and brain. Her nature had been thwarted, her vanity wounded, her woman's +generosity cheated of self-sacrifice. Then, when she had raised all +these questions, set vibrating all the springs in those different +phases of being which we distinguish as social, moral, and physical, +her energies were so far exhausted and relaxed that she was powerless to +grasp a single thought amid the chase of conflicting ideas. + +Sometimes as the mists fell, she would throw her window open, and would +stay there, motionless, breathing in unheedingly the damp earthly scent +in the air, her mind to all appearance an unintelligent blank, for the +ceaseless burden of sorrow humming in her brain left her deaf to earth's +harmonies and insensible to the delights of thought. + +One day, towards noon, when the sun shone out for a little, her maid +came in without a summons. + +"This is the fourth time that M. le Cure has come to see Mme. la +Marquise; to-day he is so determined about it, that we did not know what +to tell him." + +"He has come to ask for some money for the poor, no doubt; take him +twenty-five louis from me." + +The woman went only to return. + +"M. le Cure will not take the money, my lady; he wants to speak to you." + +"Then let him come!" said Mme. d'Aiglemont, with an involuntary shrug +which augured ill for the priest's reception. Evidently the lady meant +to put a stop to persecution by a short and sharp method. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont had lost her mother in her early childhood; and as a +natural consequence in her bringing-up, she had felt the influence of +the relaxed notions which loosened the hold of religion upon France +during the Revolution. Piety is a womanly virtue which women alone can +really instil; and the Marquise, a child of the eighteenth century, had +adopted her father's creed of philosophism, and practised no religious +observances. A priest, to her way of thinking, was a civil servant of +very doubtful utility. In her present position, the teaching of religion +could only poison her wounds; she had, moreover, but scanty faith in the +lights of country cures, and made up her mind to put this one gently but +firmly in his place, and to rid herself of him, after the manner of the +rich, by bestowing a benefit. + +At first sight of the cure the Marquise felt no inclination to change +her mind. She saw before her a stout, rotund little man, with a ruddy, +wrinkled, elderly face, which awkwardly and unsuccessfully tried to +smile. His bald, quadrant-shaped forehead, furrowed by intersecting +lines, was too heavy for the rest of his face, which seemed to be +dwarfed by it. A fringe of scanty white hair encircled the back of his +head, and almost reached his ears. Yet the priest looked as if by nature +he had a genial disposition; his thick lips, his slightly curved nose, +his chin, which vanished in a double fold of wrinkles,--all marked him +out as a man who took cheerful views of life. + +At first the Marquise saw nothing but these salient characteristics, +but at the first word she was struck by the sweetness of the speaker's +voice. Looking at him more closely, she saw that the eyes under the +grizzled eyebrows had shed tears, and his face, turned in profile, wore +so sublime an impress of sorrow, that the Marquise recognized the man in +the cure. + +"Madame la Marquise, the rich only come within our province when +they are in trouble. It is easy to see that the troubles of a young, +beautiful, and wealthy woman, who has lost neither children nor +relatives, are caused by wounds whose pangs religion alone can soothe. +Your soul is in danger, madame. I am not speaking now of the hereafter +which awaits us. No, I am not in the confessional. But it is my duty, +is it not, to open your eyes to your future life here on earth? You +will pardon an old man, will you not, for importunity which has your own +happiness for its object?" + +"There is no more happiness for me, monsieur. I shall soon be, as you +say, in your province; but it will be for ever." + +"Nay, madame. You will not die of this pain which lies heavy upon you, +and can be read in your face. If you had been destined to die of it, you +would not be here at Saint-Lange. A definite regret is not so deadly +as hope deferred. I have known others pass through more intolerable and +more awful anguish, and yet they live." + +The Marquise looked incredulous. + +"Madame, I know a man whose affliction was so sore that your trouble +would seem to you to be light compared with his." + +Perhaps the long solitary hours had begun to hang heavily; perhaps in +the recesses of the Marquise's mind lay the thought that here was a +friendly heart to whom she might be able to pour out her troubles. +However, it was, she gave the cure a questioning glance which could not +be mistaken. + +"Madame," he continued, "the man of whom I tell you had but three +children left of a once large family circle. He lost his parents, his +daughter, and his wife, whom he dearly loved. He was left alone at last +on the little farm where he had lived so happily for so long. His three +sons were in the army, and each of the lads had risen in proportion to +his time of service. During the Hundred Days, the oldest went into +the Guard with a colonel's commission; the second was a major in the +artillery; the youngest a major in a regiment of dragoons. Madame, those +three boys loved their father as much as he loved them. If you but knew +how careless young fellows grow of home ties when they are carried +away by the current of their own lives, you would realize from this one +little thing how warmly they loved the lonely old father, who only lived +in and for them--never a week passed without a letter from one of the +boys. But then he on his side had never been weakly indulgent, to lessen +their respect for him; nor unjustly severe, to thwart their affection; +or apt to grudge sacrifices, the thing that estranges children's hearts. +He had been more than a father; he had been a brother to them, and their +friend. + +"At last he went to Paris to bid them good-bye before they set out for +Belgium; he wished to see that they had good horses and all that they +needed. And so they went, and the father returned to his home again. +Then the war began. He had letters from Fleurus, and again from Ligny. +All went well. Then came the battle of Waterloo, and you know the rest. +France was plunged into mourning; every family waited in intense anxiety +for news. You may imagine, madame, how the old man waited for tidings, +in anxiety that knew no peace nor rest. He used to read the gazettes; +he went to the coach office every day. One evening he was told that the +colonel's servant had come. The man was riding his master's horse--what +need was there to ask any questions?--the colonel was dead, cut in +two by a shell. Before the evening was out the youngest son's servant +arrived--the youngest had died on the eve of the battle. At midnight +came a gunner with tidings of the death of the last; upon whom, in those +few hours, the poor father had centered all his life. Madame, they all +had fallen." + +After a pause the good man controlled his feelings, and added gently: + +"And their father is still living, madame. He realized that if God had +left him on earth, he was bound to live on and suffer on earth; but he +took refuge in the sanctuary. What could he be?" + +The Marquise looked up and saw the cure's face, grown sublime in its +sorrow and resignation, and waited for him to speak. When the words +came, tears broke from her. + +"A priest, madame; consecrated by his own tears previously shed at the +foot of the altar." + +Silence prevailed for a little. The Marquise and the cure looked out at +the foggy landscape, as if they could see the figures of those who were +no more. + +"Not a priest in a city, but a simple country cure," added he. + +"At Saint-Lange," she said, drying her eyes. + +"Yes, madame." + +Never had the majesty of grief seemed so great to Julie. The two words +sank straight into her heart with the weight of infinite sorrow. The +gentle, sonorous tones troubled her heart. Ah! that full, deep voice, +charged with plangent vibration, was the voice of one who had suffered +indeed. + +"And if I do not die, monsieur, what will become of me?" The Marquise +spoke almost reverently. + +"Have you not a child, madame?" + +"Yes," she said stiffly. + +The cure gave her such a glance as a doctor gives a patient whose life +is in danger. Then he determined to do all that in him lay to combat the +evil spirit into whose clutches she had fallen. + +"We must live on with our sorrows--you see it yourself, madame, and +religion alone offers us real consolation. Will you permit me to come +again?--to speak to you as a man who can sympathize with every trouble, +a man about whom there is nothing very alarming, I think?" + +"Yes, monsieur, come back again. Thank you for your thought of me." + +"Very well, madame; then I shall return very shortly." + +This visit relaxed the tension of soul, as it were; the heavy strain +of grief and loneliness had been almost too much for the Marquise's +strength. The priest's visit had left a soothing balm in her heart, his +words thrilled through her with healing influence. She began to feel +something of a prisoner's satisfaction, when, after he has had time +to feel his utter loneliness and the weight of his chains, he hears a +neighbor knocking on the wall, and welcomes the sound which brings a +sense of human friendship. Here was an unhoped-for confidant. But +this feeling did not last for long. Soon she sank back into the old +bitterness of spirit, saying to herself, as the prisoner might say, that +a companion in misfortune could neither lighten her own bondage nor her +future. + +In the first visit the cure had feared to alarm the susceptibilities +of self-absorbed grief, in a second interview he hoped to make some +progress towards religion. He came back again two days later, and from +the Marquise's welcome it was plain that she had looked forward to the +visit. + +"Well, Mme. la Marquise, have you given a little thought to the great +mass of human suffering? Have you raised your eyes above our earth and +seen the immensity of the universe?--the worlds beyond worlds which +crush our vanity into insignificance, and with our vanity reduce our +sorrows?" + +"No, monsieur," she said; "I cannot rise to such heights, our social +laws lie too heavily upon me, and rend my heart with a too poignant +anguish. And laws perhaps are less cruel than the usages of the world. +Ah! the world!" + +"Madame, we must obey both. Law is the doctrine, and custom the practice +of society." + +"Obey society?" cried the Marquise, with an involuntary shudder. "Eh! +monsieur, it is the source of all our woes. God laid down no law to +make us miserable; but mankind, uniting together in social life, have +perverted God's work. Civilization deals harder measure to us women than +nature does. Nature imposes upon us physical suffering which you have +not alleviated; civilization has developed in us thoughts and feelings +which you cheat continually. Nature exterminates the weak; you condemn +them to live, and by so doing, consign them to a life of misery. The +whole weight of the burden of marriage, an institution on which society +is based, falls upon us; for the man liberty, duties for the woman. We +must give up our whole lives to you, you are only bound to give us a +few moments of yours. A man, in fact, makes a choice, while we blindly +submit. Oh, monsieur, to you I can speak freely. Marriage, in these +days, seems to me to be legalized prostitution. This is the cause of my +wretchedness. But among so many miserable creatures so unhappily yoked, +I alone am bound to be silent, I alone am to blame for my misery. My +marriage was my own doing." + +She stopped short, and bitter tears fell in the silence. + +"In the depths of my wretchedness, in the midst of this sea of +distress," she went on, "I found some sands on which to set foot and +suffer at leisure. A great tempest swept everything away. And here am I, +helpless and alone, too weak to cope with storms." + +"We are never weak while God is with us," said the priest. "And if your +cravings for affection cannot be satisfied here on earth, have you no +duties to perform?" + +"Duties continually!" she exclaimed, with something of impatience in +her tone. "But where for me are the sentiments which give us strength +to perform them? Nothing from nothing, nothing for nothing,--this, +monsieur, is one of the most inexorable laws of nature, physical or +spiritual. Would you have these trees break into leaf without the sap +which swells the buds? It is the same with our human nature; and in me +the sap is dried up at its source." + +"I am not going to speak to you of religious sentiments of which +resignation is born," said the cure, "but of motherhood, madame, +surely--" + +"Stop, monsieur!" said the Marquise, "with you I will be sincere. Alas! +in future I can be sincere with no one; I am condemned to falsehood. +The world requires continual grimaces, and we are bidden to obey +its conventions if we would escape reproach. There are two kinds of +motherhood, monsieur; once I knew nothing of such distinctions, but I +know them now. Only half of me has become a mother; it were better for +me if I had not been a mother at all. Helene is not _his_ child! Oh! do +not start. At Saint-Lange there are volcanic depths whence come lurid +gleams of light and earthquake shocks to shake the fragile edifices of +laws not based on nature. I have borne a child, that is enough, I am a +mother in the eyes of the law. But you, monsieur, with your delicately +compassionate soul, can perhaps understand this cry from an unhappy +woman who has suffered no lying illusions to enter her heart. God will +judge me, but surely I have only obeyed His laws by giving way to the +affections which He Himself set in me, and this I have learned from my +own soul.--What is a child, monsieur, but the image of two beings, the +fruit of two sentiments spontaneously blended? Unless it is owned by +every fibre of the body, as by every chord of tenderness in the heart; +unless it recalls the bliss of love, the hours, the places where two +creatures were happy, their words that overflowed with the music of +humanity, and their sweet imaginings, that child is an incomplete +creation. Yes, those two should find the poetic dreams of their intimate +double life realized in their child as in an exquisite miniature; it +should be for them a never-failing spring of emotion, implying their +whole past and their whole future. + +"My poor little Helene is her father's child, the offspring of duty and +of chance. In me she finds nothing but the affection of instinct, the +woman's natural compassion for the child of her womb. Socially speaking, +I am above reproach. Have I not sacrificed my life and my happiness to +my child? Her cries go to my heart; if she were to fall into the water, +I should spring to save her, but she is not in my heart. + +"Ah! love set me dreaming of a motherhood far greater and more complete. +In a vanished dream I held in my arms a child conceived in desire before +it was begotten, the exquisite flower of life that blossoms in the soul +before it sees the light of day. I am Helene's mother only in the sense +that I brought her forth. When she needs me no longer, there will be an +end of my motherhood; with the extinction of the cause, the effects will +cease. If it is a woman's adorable prerogative that her motherhood +may last through her child's life, surely that divine persistence of +sentiment is due to the far-reaching glory of the conception of the +soul? Unless a child has lain wrapped about from life's first beginnings +by the mother's soul, the instinct of motherhood dies in her as in the +animals. This is true; I feel that it is true. As my poor little one +grows older, my heart closes. My sacrifices have driven us apart. And +yet I know, monsieur, that to another child my heart would have gone +out in inexhaustible love; for that other I should not have known what +sacrifice meant, all had been delight. In this, monsieur, my instincts +are stronger than reason, stronger than religion or all else in me. Does +the woman who is neither wife nor mother sin in wishing to die when, for +her misfortune, she has caught a glimpse of the infinite beauty of love, +the limitless joy of motherhood? What can become of her? _I_ can tell +you what she feels. I cannot put that memory from me so resolutely but +that a hundred times, night and day, visions of a happiness, greater +it may be than the reality, rise before me, followed by a shudder which +shakes brain and heart and body. Before these cruel visions, my feelings +and thoughts grow colorless, and I ask myself, 'What would my life have +been _if_----?'" + +She hid her face in her hands and burst into tears. + +"There you see the depths of my heart!" she continued. "For _his_ +child I could have acquiesced in any lot however dreadful. He who died, +bearing the burden of the sins of the world will forgive this thought +of which I am dying; but the world, I know, is merciless. In its ears +my words are blasphemies; I am outraging all its codes. Oh! that I could +wage war against this world and break down and refashion its laws +and traditions! Has it not turned all my thoughts, and feelings, and +longings, and hopes, and every fibre in me into so many sources of pain? +Spoiled my future, present, and past? For me the daylight is full of +gloom, my thoughts pierce me like a sword, my child is and is not. + +"Oh, when Helene speaks to me, I wish that her voice were different, +when she looks into my face I wish that she had other eyes. She +constantly keeps me in mind of all that should have been and is not. I +cannot bear to have her near me. I smile at her, I try to make up to +her for the real affection of which she is defrauded. I am wretched, +monsieur, too wretched to live. And I am supposed to be a pattern wife. +And I have committed no sins. And I am respected! I have fought down +forbidden love which sprang up at unawares within me; but if I have kept +the letter of the law, have I kept it in my heart? There has never been +but one here," she said, laying her right hand on her breast, "one and +no other; and my child feels it. Certain looks and tones and gestures +mould a child's nature, and my poor little one feels no thrill in the +arm I put about her, no tremor comes into my voice, no softness into my +eyes when I speak to her or take her up. She looks at me, and I cannot +endure the reproach in her eyes. There are times when I shudder to think +that some day she may be my judge and condemn her mother unheard. Heaven +grant that hate may not grow up between us! Ah! God in heaven, +rather let the tomb open for me, rather let me end my days here at +Saint-Lange!--I want to go back to the world where I shall find my other +soul and become wholly a mother. Ah! forgive me, sir, I am mad. Those +words were choking me; now they are spoken. Ah! you are weeping too! You +will not despise me--" + +She heard the child come in from a walk. "Helene, my child, come here!" +she called. The words sounded like a cry of despair. + +The little girl ran in, laughing and calling to her mother to see a +butterfly which she had caught; but at the sight of that mother's tears +she grew quiet of a sudden, and went up close, and received a kiss on +her forehead. + +"She will be very beautiful some day," said the priest. + +"She is her father's child," said the Marquise, kissing the little one +with eager warmth, as if she meant to pay a debt of affection or to +extinguish some feeling of remorse. + +"How hot you are, mamma!" + +"There, go away, my angel," said the Marquise. + +The child went. She did not seem at all sorry to go; she did not +look back; glad perhaps to escape from a sad face, and instinctively +comprehending already an antagonism of feeling in its expression. A +mother's love finds language in smiles, they are a part of the divine +right of motherhood. The Marquise could not smile. She flushed red as +she felt the cure's eyes. She had hoped to act a mother's part before +him, but neither she nor her child could deceive him. And, indeed, when +a woman loves sincerely, in the kiss she gives there is a divine honey; +it is as if a soul were breathed forth in the caress, a subtle flame +of fire which brings warmth to the heart; the kiss that lacks this +delicious unction is meagre and formal. The priest had felt the +difference. He could fathom the depths that lie between the motherhood +of the flesh and the motherhood of the heart. He gave the Marquise a +keen, scrutinizing glance, then he said: + +"You are right, madame; it would be better for you if you were dead----" + +"Ah!" she cried, "then you know all my misery; I see you do if, +Christian priest as you are, you can guess my determination to die and +sanction it. Yes, I meant to die, but I have lacked the courage. The +spirit was strong, but the flesh was weak, and when my hand did not +tremble, the spirit within me wavered. + +"I do not know the reason of these inner struggles, and alternations. I +am very pitiably a woman no doubt, weak in my will, strong only to love. +Oh, I despise myself. At night, when all my household was asleep, I +would go out bravely as far as the lake; but when I stood on the brink, +my cowardice shrank from self-destruction. To you I will confess my +weakness. When I lay in my bed, again, shame would come over me, and +courage would come back. Once I took a dose of laudanum; I was ill, but +I did not die. I thought I had emptied the phial, but I had only taken +half the dose." + +"You are lost, madame," the cure said gravely, with tears in his voice. +"You will go back into the world, and you will deceive the world. You +will seek and find a compensation (as you imagine it to be) for your +woes; then will come a day of reckoning for your pleasures--" + +"Do you think," she cried, "that _I_ shall bestow the last, the most +precious treasures of my heart upon the first base impostor who can +play the comedy of passion? That I would pollute my life for a moment +of doubtful pleasure? No; the flame which shall consume my soul shall be +love, and nothing but love. All men, monsieur, have the senses of +their sex, but not all have the man's soul which satisfies all the +requirements of our nature, drawing out the melodious harmony which +never breaks forth save in response to the pressure of feeling. Such a +soul is not found twice in our lifetime. The future that lies before +me is hideous; I know it. A woman is nothing without love; beauty is +nothing without pleasure. And even if happiness were offered to me a +second time, would not the world frown upon it? I owe my daughter an +honored mother. Oh! I am condemned to live in an iron circle, from which +there is but one shameful way of escape. The round of family duties, a +thankless and irksome task, is in store for me. I shall curse life; but +my child shall have at least a fair semblance of a mother. I will give +her treasures of virtue for the treasures of love of which I defraud +her. + +"I have not even the mother's desire to live to enjoy her child's +happiness. I have no belief in happiness. What will Helene's fate be? +My own, beyond doubt. How can a mother ensure that the man to whom she +gives her daughter will be the husband of her heart? You pour scorn +on the miserable creatures who sell themselves for a few coins to any +passer-by, though want and hunger absolve the brief union; while another +union, horrible for quite other reasons, is tolerated, nay encouraged, +by society, and a young and innocent girl is married to a man whom she +has only met occasionally during the previous three months. She is sold +for her whole lifetime. It is true that the price is high! If you allow +her no compensation for her sorrows, you might at least respect her; but +no, the most virtuous of women cannot escape calumny. This is our fate +in its double aspect. Open prostitution and shame; secret prostitution +and unhappiness. As for the poor, portionless girls, they may die or go +mad, without a soul to pity them. Beauty and virtue are not marketable +in the bazaar where souls and bodies are bought and sold--in the den of +selfishness which you call society. Why not disinherit daughters? Then, +at least, you might fulfil one of the laws of nature, and guided by your +own inclinations, choose your companions." + +"Madame, from your talk it is clear to me that neither the spirit of +family nor the sense of religion appeals to you. Why should you hesitate +between the claims of the social selfishness which irritates you, and +the purely personal selfishness which craves satisfactions--" + +"The family, monsieur--does such a thing exist? I decline to recognize +as a family a knot of individuals bidden by society to divide the +property after the death of father and mother, and to go their separate +ways. A family means a temporary association of persons brought together +by no will of their own, dissolved at once by death. Our laws have +broken up homes and estates, and the old family tradition handed down +from generation to generation. I see nothing but wreck and ruin about +me." + +"Madame, you will only return to God when His hand has been heavy upon +you, and I pray that you have time enough given to you in which to make +your peace with Him. Instead of looking to heaven for comfort, you +are fixing your eyes on earth. Philosophism and personal interest +have invaded your heart; like the children of the sceptical eighteenth +century, you are deaf to the voice of religion. The pleasures of this +life bring nothing but misery. You are about to make an exchange of +sorrows, that is all." + +She smiled bitterly. + +"I will falsify your predictions," she said. "I shall be faithful to him +who died for me." + +"Sorrow," he answered, "is not likely to live long save in souls +disciplined by religion," and he lowered his eyes respectfully lest the +Marquise should read his doubts in them. The energy of her outburst had +grieved him. He had seen the self that lurked beneath so many forms, +and despaired of softening a heart which affliction seemed to sear. The +divine Sower's seed could not take root in such a soil, and His gentle +voice was drowned by the clamorous outcry of self-pity. Yet the good man +returned again and again with an apostle's earnest persistence, brought +back by a hope of leading so noble and proud a soul to God; until the +day when he made the discovery that the Marquise only cared to talk with +him because it was sweet to speak of him who was no more. He would +not lower his ministry by condoning her passion, and confined the +conversation more and more to generalities and commonplaces. + +Spring came, and with the spring the Marquise found distraction from her +deep melancholy. She busied herself for lack of other occupation with +her estate, making improvements for amusement. + +In October she left the old chateau. In the life of leisure at +Saint-Lange she had recovered from her grief and grown fair and fresh. +Her grief had been violent at first in its course, as the quoit hurled +forth with all the player's strength, and like the quoit after many +oscillations, each feebler than the last, it had slackened into +melancholy. Melancholy is made up of a succession of such oscillations, +the first touching upon despair, the last on the border between pain +and pleasure; in youth, it is the twilight of dawn; in age, the dusk of +night. + +As the Marquise drove through the village in her traveling carriage, she +met the cure on his way back from the church. She bowed in response to +his farewell greeting, but it was with lowered eyes and averted face. +She did not wish to see him again. The village cure had judged this poor +Diana of Ephesus only too well. + + + + +III. AT THIRTY YEARS + +Madame Firmiani was giving a ball. M. Charles de Vandenesse, a young man +of great promise, the bearer of one of those historic names which, in +spite of the efforts of legislation, are always associated with the +glory of France, had received letters of introduction to some of the +great lady's friends in Naples, and had come to thank the hostess and to +take his leave. + +Vandenesse had already acquitted himself creditably on several +diplomatic missions; and now that he had received an appointment as +attache to a plenipotentiary at the Congress of Laybach, he wished to +take advantage of the opportunity to make some study of Italy on the +way. This ball was a sort of farewell to Paris and its amusements and +its rapid whirl of life, to the great eddying intellectual centre and +maelstrom of pleasure; and a pleasant thing it is to be borne along +by the current of this sufficiently slandered great city of Paris. Yet +Charles de Vandenesse had little to regret, accustomed as he had been +for the past three years to salute European capitals and turn his back +upon them at the capricious bidding of a diplomatist's destiny. Women +no longer made any impression upon him; perhaps he thought that a real +passion would play too large a part in a diplomatist's life; or perhaps +that the paltry amusements of frivolity were too empty for a man +of strong character. We all of us have huge claims to strength of +character. There is no man in France, be he ever so ordinary a member of +the rank and file of humanity, that will waive pretensions to something +beyond mere cleverness. + +Charles, young though he was--he was scarcely turned thirty--looked at +life with a philosophic mind, concerning himself with theories and +means and ends, while other men of his age were thinking of pleasure, +sentiments, and the like illusions. He forced back into some inner depth +the generosity and enthusiasms of youth, and by nature he was generous. +He tried hard to be cool and calculating, to coin the fund of wealth +which chanced to be in his nature into gracious manners, and courtesy, +and attractive arts; 'tis the proper task of an ambitious man, to play a +sorry part to gain "a good position," as we call it in modern days. + +He had been dancing, and now he gave a farewell glance over the rooms, +to carry away a distinct impression of the ball, moved, doubtless, to +some extent by the feeling which prompts a theatre-goer to stay in +his box to see the final tableau before the curtain falls. But M. de +Vandenesse had another reason for his survey. He gazed curiously at the +scene before him, so French in character and in movement, seeking to +carry away a picture of the light and laughter and the faces at +this Parisian fete, to compare with the novel faces and picturesque +surroundings awaiting him at Naples, where he meant to spend a few +days before presenting himself at his post. He seemed to be drawing the +comparison now between this France so variable, changing even as you +study her, with the manners and aspects of that other land known to him +as yet only by contradictory hearsay tales or books of travel, for the +most part unsatisfactory. Thoughts of a somewhat poetical cast, albeit +hackneyed and trite to our modern ideas, crossed his brain, in response +to some longing of which, perhaps, he himself was hardly conscious, a +desire in the depths of a heart fastidious rather than jaded, vacant +rather than seared. + +"These are the wealthiest and most fashionable women and the greatest +ladies in Paris," he said to himself. "These are the great men of the +day, great orators and men of letters, great names and titles; artists +and men in power; and yet in it all it seems to me as if there were +nothing but petty intrigues and still-born loves, meaningless smiles +and causeless scorn, eyes lighted by no flame within, brain-power in +abundance running aimlessly to waste. All those pink-and-white faces are +here not so much for enjoyment, as to escape from dulness. None of the +emotion is genuine. If you ask for nothing but court feathers properly +adjusted, fresh gauzes and pretty toilettes and fragile, fair women, if +you desire simply to skim the surface of life, here is your world for +you. Be content with meaningless phrases and fascinating simpers, and do +not ask for real feeling. For my own part, I abhor the stale intrigues +which end in sub-prefectures and receiver-generals' places and +marriages; or, if love comes into the question, in stealthy compromises, +so ashamed are we of the mere semblance of passion. Not a single one of +all these eloquent faces tells you of a soul, a soul wholly absorbed by +one idea as by remorse. Regrets and misfortune go about shame-facedly +clad in jests. There is not one woman here whose resistance I should +care to overcome, not one who could drag you down to the pit. Where will +you find energy in Paris? A poniard here is a curious toy to hang from a +gilt nail, in a picturesque sheath to match. The women, the brains, and +hearts of Paris are all on a par. There is no passion left, because +we have no individuality. High birth and intellect and fortune are all +reduced to one level; we all have taken to the uniform black coat by way +of mourning for a dead France. There is no love between equals. Between +two lovers there should be differences to efface, wide gulfs to fill. +The charm of love fled from us in 1789. Our dulness and our humdrum +lives are the outcome of the political system. Italy at any rate is the +land of sharp contrasts. Woman there is a malevolent animal, a dangerous +unreasoning siren, guided only by her tastes and appetites, a creature +no more to be trusted than a tiger--" + +Mme. Firmiani here came up to interrupt this soliloquy made up of vague, +conflicting, and fragmentary thoughts which cannot be reproduced in +words. The whole charm of such musing lies in its vagueness--what is it +but a sort of mental haze? + +"I want to introduce you to some one who has the greatest wish to make +your acquaintance, after all that she has heard of you," said the lady, +taking his arm. + +She brought him into the next room, and with such a smile and glance +as a Parisienne alone can give, she indicated a woman sitting by the +hearth. + +"Who is she?" the Comte de Vandenesse asked quickly. + +"You have heard her name more than once coupled with praise or blame. +She is a woman who lives in seclusion--a perfect mystery." + +"Oh! if ever you have been merciful in your life, for pity's sake tell +me her name." + +"She is the Marquise d'Aiglemont." + +"I will take lessons from her; she had managed to make a peer of France +of that eminently ordinary person her husband, and a dullard into a +power in the land. But, pray tell me this, did Lord Grenville die for +her sake, do you think, as some women say?" + +"Possibly. Since that adventure, real or imaginary, she is very much +changed, poor thing! She has not gone into society since. Four years of +constancy--that is something in Paris. If she is here to-night----" +Here Mme. Firmiani broke off, adding with a mysterious expression, "I am +forgetting that I must say nothing. Go and talk with her." + +For a moment Charles stood motionless, leaning lightly against the +frame of the doorway, wholly absorbed in his scrutiny of a woman who had +become famous, no one exactly knew how or why. Such curious anomalies +are frequent enough in the world. Mme. d'Aiglemont's reputation was +certainly no more extraordinary than plenty of other great reputations. +There are men who are always in travail of some great work which never +sees the light, statisticians held to be profound on the score of +calculations which they take very good care not to publish, politicians +who live on a newspaper article, men of letters and artists whose +performances are never given to the world, men of science, much as +Sganarelle is a Latinist for those who know no Latin; there are the men +who are allowed by general consent to possess a peculiar capacity for +some one thing, be it for the direction of arts, or for the conduct +of an important mission. The admirable phrase, "A man with a special +subject," might have been invented on purpose for these acephalous +species in the domain of literature and politics. + +Charles gazed longer than he intended. He was vexed with himself for +feeling so strongly interested; it is true, however, that the lady's +appearance was a refutation of the young man's ballroom generalizations. + +The Marquise had reached her thirtieth year. She was beautiful in spite +of her fragile form and extremely delicate look. Her greatest charm lay +in her still face, revealing unfathomed depths of soul. Some haunting, +ever-present thought veiled, as it were, the full brilliance of eyes +which told of a fevered life and boundless resignation. So seldom +did she raise the eyelids soberly downcast, and so listless were her +glances, that it almost seemed as if the fire in her eyes were reserved +for some occult contemplation. Any man of genius and feeling must have +felt strangely attracted by her gentleness and silence. If the mind +sought to explain the mysterious problem of a constant inward turning +from the present to the past, the soul was no less interested in +initiating itself into the secrets of a heart proud in some sort of +its anguish. Everything about her, moreover, was in keeping with these +thoughts which she inspired. Like almost all women who have very long +hair, she was very pale and perfectly white. The marvelous fineness of +her skin (that almost unerring sign) indicated a quick sensibility which +could be seen yet more unmistakably in her features; there was the same +minute and wonderful delicacy of finish in them that the Chinese artist +gives to his fantastic figures. Perhaps her neck was rather too long, +but such necks belong to the most graceful type, and suggest vague +affinities between a woman's head and the magnetic curves of the +serpent. Leave not a single one of the thousand signs and tokens by +which the most inscrutable character betrays itself to an observer of +human nature, he has but to watch carefully the little movements of a +woman's head, the ever-varying expressive turns and curves of her neck +and throat, to read her nature. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont's dress harmonized with the haunting thought that +informed the whole woman. Her hair was gathered up into a tall coronet +of broad plaits, without ornament of any kind; she seemed to have bidden +farewell for ever to elaborate toilettes. Nor were any of the small arts +of coquetry which spoil so many women to be detected in her. Perhaps +her bodice, modest though it was, did not altogether conceal the dainty +grace of her figure, perhaps, too, her gown looked rich from the +extreme distinction of its fashion, and if it is permissible to look for +expression in the arrangement of stuffs, surely those numerous straight +folds invested her with a great dignity. There may have been some +lingering trace of the indelible feminine foible in the minute care +bestowed upon her hand and foot; yet, if she allowed them to be seen +with some pleasure, it would have tasked the utmost malice of a rival to +discover any affectation in her gestures, so natural did they seem, so +much a part of old childish habit, that her careless grace absolved this +vestige of vanity. + +All these little characteristics, the nameless trifles which combine to +make up the sum of a woman's prettiness or ugliness, her charm or lack +of charm, can only be indicated, when, as with Mme. d'Aiglemont, a +personality dominates and gives coherence to the details, informing +them, blending them all in an exquisite whole. Her manner was perfectly +in accord with her style of beauty and her dress. Only to certain women +at a certain age is it given to put language into their attitude. Is it +joy or is it sorrow that teaches a woman of thirty the secret of that +eloquence of carriage, so that she must always remain an enigma which +each interprets by the aid of his hopes, desires, or theories? + +The way in which the Marquise leaned both elbows on the arm of her +chair, the toying of her interclasped fingers, the curve of her throat, +the indolent lines of her languid but lissome body as she lay back in +graceful exhaustion, as it were; her indolent limbs, her unstudied pose, +the utter lassitude of her movements,--all suggested that this was a +woman for whom life had lost its interest, a woman who had known +the joys of love only in dreams, a woman bowed down by the burden of +memories of the past, a woman who had long since despaired of the future +and despaired of herself, an unoccupied woman who took the emptiness of +her own life for the nothingness of life. + +Charles de Vandenesse saw and admired the beautiful picture before +him, as a kind of artistic success beyond an ordinary woman's powers of +attainment. He was acquainted with d'Aiglemont; and now, at the first +sight of d'Aiglemont's wife, the young diplomatist saw at a glance a +disproportionate marriage, an incompatibility (to use the legal jargon) +so great that it was impossible that the Marquise should love her +husband. And yet--the Marquise d'Aiglemont's life was above reproach, +and for any observer the mystery about her was the more interesting on +this account. The first impulse of surprise over, Vandenesse cast +about for the best way of approaching Mme. d'Aiglemont. He would try a +commonplace piece of diplomacy, he thought; he would disconcert her by a +piece of clumsiness and see how she would receive it. + +"Madame," he said, seating himself near her, "through a fortunate +indiscretion I have learned that, for some reason unknown to me, I have +had the good fortune to attract your notice. I owe you the more thanks +because I have never been so honored before. At the same time, you are +responsible for one of my faults, for I mean never to be modest again--" + +"You will make a mistake, monsieur," she laughed; "vanity should be left +to those who have nothing else to recommend them." + +The conversation thus opened ranged at large, in the usual way, over a +multitude of topics--art and literature, politics, men and things--till +insensibly they fell to talking of the eternal theme in France and all +the world over--love, sentiment, and women. + +"We are bond-slaves." + +"You are queens." + +This was the gist and substance of all the more or less ingenious +discourse between Charles and the Marquise, as of all such +discourses--past, present, and to come. Allow a certain space of time, +and the two formulas shall begin to mean "Love me," and "I will love +you." + +"Madame," Charles de Vandenesse exclaimed under his breath, "you have +made me bitterly regret that I am leaving Paris. In Italy I certainly +shall not pass hours in intellectual enjoyment such as this has been." + +"Perhaps, monsieur, you will find happiness, and happiness is worth +more than all the brilliant things, true and false, that are said every +evening in Paris." + +Before Charles took leave, he asked permission to pay a farewell call +on the Marquise d'Aiglemont, and very lucky did he feel himself when +the form of words in which he expressed himself for once was used in all +sincerity; and that night, and all day long on the morrow, he could not +put the thought of the Marquise out of his mind. + +At times he wondered why she had singled him out, what she had +meant when she asked him to come to see her, and thought supplied an +inexhaustible commentary. Again it seemed to him that he had discovered +the motives of her curiosity, and he grew intoxicated with hope or +frigidly sober with each new construction put upon that piece of +commonplace civility. Sometimes it meant everything, sometimes nothing. +He made up his mind at last that he would not yield to this inclination, +and--went to call on Mme. d'Aiglemont. + +There are thoughts which determine our conduct, while we do not so much +as suspect their existence. If at first sight this assertion appears to +be less a truth than a paradox, let any candid inquirer look into his +own life and he shall find abundant confirmation therein. Charles went +to Mme. d'Aiglemont, and so obeyed one of these latent, pre-existent +germs of thought, of which our experience and our intellectual gains and +achievements are but later and tangible developments. + +For a young man a woman of thirty has irresistible attractions. There +is nothing more natural, nothing better established, no human tie of +stouter tissue than the heart-deep attachment between such a woman as +the Marquise d'Aiglemont and such a man as Charles de Vandenesse. You +can see examples of it every day in the world. A girl, as a matter +of fact, has too many young illusions, she is too inexperienced, the +instinct of sex counts for too much in her love for a young man to feel +flattered by it. A woman of thirty knows all that is involved in +the self-surrender to be made. Among the impulses of the first, put +curiosity and other motives than love; the second acts with integrity of +sentiment. The first yields; the second makes deliberate choice. Is +not that choice in itself an immense flattery? A woman armed with +experience, forewarned by knowledge, almost always dearly bought, seems +to give more than herself; while the inexperienced and credulous girl, +unable to draw comparisons for lack of knowledge, can appreciate +nothing at its just worth. She accepts love and ponders it. A woman is a +counselor and a guide at an age when we love to be guided and obedience +is delight; while a girl would fain learn all things, meeting us with a +girl's _naivete_ instead of a woman's tenderness. She affords a single +triumph; with a woman there is resistance upon resistance to overcome; +she has but joy and tears, a woman has rapture and remorse. + +A girl cannot play the part of a mistress unless she is so corrupt +that we turn from her with loathing; a woman has a thousand ways of +preserving her power and her dignity; she has risked so much for love, +that she must bid him pass through his myriad transformations, while her +too submissive rival gives a sense of too serene security which palls. +If the one sacrifices her maidenly pride, the other immolates the honor +of a whole family. A girl's coquetry is of the simplest, she thinks that +all is said when the veil is laid aside; a woman's coquetry is endless, +she shrouds herself in veil after veil, she satisfies every demand of +man's vanity, the novice responds but to one. + +And there are terrors, fears, and hesitations--trouble and storm in the +love of a woman of thirty years, never to be found in a young girl's +love. At thirty years a woman asks her lover to give her back the esteem +she has forfeited for his sake; she lives only for him, her thoughts are +full of his future, he must have a great career, she bids him make it +glorious; she can obey, entreat, command, humble herself, or rise in +pride; times without number she brings comfort when a young girl can +only make moan. And with all the advantages of her position, the woman +of thirty can be a girl again, for she can play all parts, assume a +girl's bashfulness, and grow the fairer even for a mischance. + +Between these two feminine types lies the immeasurable difference which +separates the foreseen from the unforeseen, strength from weakness. The +woman of thirty satisfies every requirement; the young girl must satisfy +none, under penalty of ceasing to be a young girl. Such ideas as these, +developing in a young man's mind, help to strengthen the strongest of +all passions, a passion in which all spontaneous and natural feeling is +blended with the artificial sentiment created by conventional manners. + +The most important and decisive step in a woman's life is the very +one that she invariably regards as the most insignificant. After her +marriage she is no longer her own mistress, she is the queen and +the bond-slave of the domestic hearth. The sanctity of womanhood is +incompatible with social liberty and social claims; and for a woman +emancipation means corruption. If you give a stranger the right of entry +into the sanctuary of home, do you not put yourself at his mercy? How +then if she herself bids him enter it? Is not this an offence, or, to +speak more accurately, a first step towards an offence? You must +either accept this theory with all its consequences, or absolve illicit +passion. French society hitherto has chosen the third and middle course +of looking on and laughing when offences come, apparently upon the +Spartan principle of condoning the theft and punishing clumsiness. +And this system, it may be, is a very wise one. 'Tis a most appalling +punishment to have all your neighbors pointing the finger of scorn +at you, a punishment that a woman feels in her very heart. Women are +tenacious, and all of them should be tenacious of respect; without +esteem they cannot exist, esteem is the first demand that they make +of love. The most corrupt among them feels that she must, in the first +place, pledge the future to buy absolution for the past, and strives +to make her lover understand that only for irresistible bliss can she +barter the respect which the world henceforth will refuse to her. + +Some such reflections cross the mind of any woman who for the first time +and alone receives a visit from a young man; and this especially when, +like Charles de Vandenesse, the visitor is handsome or clever. And +similarly there are not many young men who would fail to base some +secret wish on one of the thousand and one ideas which justify the +instinct that attracts them to a beautiful, witty, and unhappy woman +like the Marquise d'Aiglemont. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont, therefore, felt troubled when M. de Vandenesse was +announced; and as for him, he was almost confused in spite of the +assurance which is like a matter of costume for a diplomatist. But not +for long. The Marquise took refuge at once in the friendliness of manner +which women use as a defence against the misinterpretations of fatuity, +a manner which admits of no afterthought, while it paves the way to +sentiment (to make use of a figure of speech), tempering the transition +through the ordinary forms of politeness. In this ambiguous position, +where the four roads leading respectively to Indifference, Respect, +Wonder, and Passion meet, a woman may stay as long as she pleases, but +only at thirty years does she understand all the possibilities of the +situation. Laughter, tenderness, and jest are all permitted to her at +the crossing of the ways; she has acquired the tact by which she finds +all the responsive chords in a man's nature, and skill in judging the +sounds which she draws forth. Her silence is as dangerous as her speech. +You will never read her at that age, nor discover if she is frank or +false, nor how far she is serious in her admissions or merely laughing +at you. She gives you the right to engage in a game of fence with her, +and suddenly by a glance, a gesture of proved potency, she closes the +combat and turns from you with your secret in her keeping, free to offer +you up in a jest, free to interest herself in you, safe alike in her +weakness and your strength. + +Although the Marquise d'Aiglemont took up her position upon this neutral +ground during the first interview, she knew how to preserve a high +womanly dignity. The sorrows of which she never spoke seemed to hang +over her assumed gaiety like a light cloud obscuring the sun. When +Vandenesse went out, after a conversation which he had enjoyed more than +he had thought possible, he carried with him the conviction that this +was like to be too costly a conquest for his aspirations. + +"It would mean sentiment from here to yonder," he thought, "and +correspondence enough to wear out a deputy second-clerk on his +promotion. And yet if I really cared----" + +Luckless phrase that has been the ruin of many an infatuated mortal. In +France the way to love lies through self-love. Charles went back to Mme. +d'Aiglemont, and imagined that she showed symptoms of pleasure in his +conversion. And then, instead of giving himself up like a boy to the joy +of falling in love, he tried to play a double role. He did his best +to act passion and to keep cool enough to analyze the progress of this +flirtation, to be lover and diplomatist at once; but youth and hot blood +and analysis could only end in one way, over head and ears in love; for, +natural or artificial, the Marquise was more than his match. Each time +he went out from Mme. d'Aiglemont, he strenuously held himself to his +distrust, and submitted the progressive situations of his case to a +rigorous scrutiny fatal to his own emotions. + +"To-day she gave me to understand that she has been very unhappy and +lonely," said he to himself, after the third visit, "and that but for +her little girl she would have longed for death. She was perfectly +resigned. Now as I am neither her brother nor her spiritual director, +why should she confide her troubles to _me_? She loves me." + +Two days later he came away apostrophizing modern manners. + +"Love takes on the hue of every age. In 1822 love is a doctrinaire. +Instead of proving love by deeds, as in times past, we have taken to +argument and rhetoric and debate. Women's tactics are reduced to three +shifts. In the first place, they declare that we cannot love as they +love. (Coquetry! the Marquise simply threw it at me, like a challenge, +this evening!) Next they grow pathetic, to appeal to our natural +generosity or self-love; for does it not flatter a young man's vanity to +console a woman for a great calamity? And lastly, they have a craze for +virginity. She must have thought that I thought her very innocent. My +good faith is like to become an excellent speculation." + +But a day came when every suspicious idea was exhausted. He asked +himself whether the Marquise was not sincere; whether so much suffering +could be feigned, and why she should act the part of resignation? She +lived in complete seclusion; she drank in silence of a cup of sorrow +scarcely to be guessed unless from the accent of some chance exclamation +in a voice always well under control. From that moment Charles felt a +keen interest in Mme. d'Aiglemont. And yet, though his visits had come +to be a recognized thing, and in some sort a necessity to them both, +and though the hour was kept free by tacit agreement, Vandenesse still +thought that this woman with whom he was in love was more clever than +sincere. "Decidedly, she is an uncommonly clever woman," he used to say +to himself as he went away. + +When he came into the room, there was the Marquise in her favorite +attitude, melancholy expressed in her whole form. She made no movement +when he entered, only raised her eyes and looked full at him, but the +glance that she gave him was like a smile. Mme. d'Aiglemont's manner +meant confidence and sincere friendship, but of love there was no trace. +Charles sat down and found nothing to say. A sensation for which no +language exists troubled him. + +"What is the matter with you?" she asked in a softened voice. + +"Nothing.... Yes; I am thinking of something of which, as yet, you have +not thought at all." + +"What is it?" + +"Why--the Congress is over." + +"Well," she said, "and ought you to have been at the Congress?" + +A direct answer would have been the most eloquent and delicate +declaration of love; but Charles did not make it. Before the candid +friendship in Mme. d'Aiglemont's face all the calculations of vanity, +the hopes of love, and the diplomatist's doubts died away. She did not +suspect, or she seemed not to suspect, his love for her; and Charles, +in utter confusion turning upon himself, was forced to admit that he had +said and done nothing which could warrant such a belief on her part. For +M. de Vandenesse that evening, the Marquise was, as she had always been, +simple and friendly, sincere in her sorrow, glad to have a friend, proud +to find a nature responsive to her own--nothing more. It had not entered +her mind that a woman could yield twice; she had known love--love lay +bleeding still in the depths of her heart, but she did not imagine that +bliss could bring her its rapture twice, for she believed not merely +in the intellect, but in the soul; and for her love was no simple +attraction; it drew her with all noble attractions. + +In a moment Charles became a young man again, enthralled by the splendor +of a nature so lofty. He wished for a fuller initiation into the secret +history of a life blighted rather by fate than by her own fault. Mme. +d'Aiglemont heard him ask the cause of the overwhelming sorrow which had +blended all the harmonies of sadness with her beauty; she gave him one +glance, but that searching look was like a seal set upon some solemn +compact. + +"Ask no more such questions of me," she said. "Four years ago, on +this very day, the man who loved me, for whom I would have given up +everything, even my own self-respect, died, and died to save my name. +That love was still young and pure and full of illusions when it came to +an end. Before I gave way to passion--and never was a woman so urged by +fate--I had been drawn into the mistake that ruins many a girl's life, +a marriage with a man whose agreeable manners concealed his emptiness. +Marriage plucked my hopes away one by one. And now, to-day, I have +forfeited happiness through marriage, as well as the happiness styled +criminal, and I have known no happiness. Nothing is left to me. If I +could not die, at least I ought to be faithful to my memories." + +No tears came with the words. Her eyes fell, and there was a slight +twisting of the fingers interclasped, according to her wont. It was +simply said, but in her voice there was a note of despair, deep as +her love seemed to have been, which left Charles without a hope. The +dreadful story of a life told in three sentences, with that twisting of +the fingers for all comment, the might of anguish in a fragile woman, +the dark depths masked by a fair face, the tears of four years of +mourning fascinated Vandenesse; he sat silent and diminished in the +presence of her woman's greatness and nobleness, seeing not the physical +beauty so exquisite, so perfectly complete, but the soul so great in +its power to feel. He had found, at last, the ideal of his fantastic +imaginings, the ideal so vigorously invoked by all who look on life as +the raw material of a passion for which many a one seeks ardently, and +dies before he has grasped the whole of the dreamed-of treasure. + +With those words of hers in his ears, in the presence of her sublime +beauty, his own thoughts seemed poor and narrow. Powerless as he felt +himself to find words of his own, simple enough and lofty enough to +scale the heights of this exaltation, he took refuge in platitudes as to +the destiny of women. + +"Madame, we must either forget our pain, or hollow out a tomb for +ourselves." + +But reason always cuts a poor figure beside sentiment; the one being +essentially restricted, like everything that is positive, while the +other is infinite. To set to work to reason where you are required to +feel, is the mark of a limited nature. Vandenesse therefore held his +peace, sat awhile with his eyes fixed upon her, then came away. A prey +to novel thoughts which exalted woman for him, he was in something the +same position as a painter who has taken the vulgar studio model for +a type of womanhood, and suddenly confronts the _Mnemosyne_ of the +Musee--that noblest and least appreciated of antique statues. + +Charles de Vandenesse was deeply in love. He loved Mme. d'Aiglemont with +the loyalty of youth, with the fervor that communicates such ineffable +charm to a first passion, with a simplicity of heart of which a man only +recovers some fragments when he loves again at a later day. Delicious +first passion of youth, almost always deliciously savored by the woman +who calls it forth; for at the golden prime of thirty, from the poetic +summit of a woman's life, she can look out over the whole course of +love--backwards into the past, forwards into the future--and, knowing +all the price to be paid for love, enjoys her bliss with the dread of +losing it ever present with her. Her soul is still fair with her waning +youth, and passion daily gathers strength from the dismaying prospect of +the coming days. + +"This is love," Vandenesse said to himself this time as he left the +Marquise, "and for my misfortune I love a woman wedded to her memories. +It is hard work to struggle against a dead rival, never present to +make blunders and fall out of favor, nothing of him left but his better +qualities. What is it but a sort of high treason against the Ideal to +attempt to break the charm of memory, to destroy the hopes that survive +a lost lover, precisely because he only awakened longings, and all that +is loveliest and most enchanting in love?" + +These sober reflections, due to the discouragement and dread of failure +with which love begins in earnest, were the last expiring effort of +diplomatic reasoning. Thenceforward he knew no afterthoughts, he was the +plaything of his love, and lost himself in the nothings of that strange +inexplicable happiness which is full fed by a chance word, by silence, +or a vague hope. He tried to love Platonically, came daily to breathe +the air that she breathed, became almost a part of her house, and went +everywhere with her, slave as he was of a tyrannous passion compounded +of egoism and devotion of the completest. Love has its own instinct, +finding the way to the heart, as the feeblest insect finds the way +to its flower, with a will which nothing can dismay or turn aside. If +feeling is sincere, its destiny is not doubtful. Let a woman begin to +think that her life depends on the sincerity or fervor or earnestness +which her lover shall put into his longings, and is there not sufficient +in the thought to put her through all the tortures of dread? It is +impossible for a woman, be she wife or mother, to be secure from a young +man's love. One thing it is within her power to do--to refuse to see him +as soon as she learns a secret which she never fails to guess. But +this is too decided a step to take at an age when marriage has become a +prosaic and tiresome yoke, and conjugal affection is something less than +tepid (if indeed her husband has not already begun to neglect her). Is a +woman plain? she is flattered by a love which gives her fairness. Is she +young and charming? She is only to be won by a fascination as great +as her own power to charm, that is to say, a fascination well-nigh +irresistible. Is she virtuous? There is a love sublime in its +earthliness which leads her to find something like absolution in the +very greatness of the surrender and glory in a hard struggle. Everything +is a snare. No lesson, therefore, is too severe where the temptation is +so strong. The seclusion in which the Greeks and Orientals kept and keep +their women, an example more and more followed in modern England, is the +only safeguard of domestic morality; but under this system there is +an end of all the charm of social intercourse; and society, and good +breeding, and refinement of manners become impossible. The nations must +take their choice. + +So a few months went by, and Mme. d'Aiglemont discovered that her life +was closely bound with this young man's life, without overmuch confusion +in her surprise, and felt with something almost like pleasure that she +shared his tastes and his thoughts. Had she adopted Vandenesse's ideas? +Or was it Vandenesse who had made her lightest whims his own? She was +not careful to inquire. She had been swept out already into the current +of passion, and yet this adorable woman told herself with the confident +reiteration of misgiving; + +"Ah! no. I will be faithful to him who died for me." + +Pascal said that "the doubt of God implies belief in God." And similarly +it may be said that a woman only parleys when she has surrendered. A day +came when the Marquise admitted to herself that she was loved, and +with that admission came a time of wavering among countless conflicting +thoughts and feelings. The superstitions of experience spoke their +language. Should she be happy? Was it possible that she should find +happiness outside the limits of the laws which society rightly or +wrongly has set up for humanity to live by? Hitherto her cup of life had +been full of bitterness. Was there any happy issue possible for the +ties which united two human beings held apart by social conventions? And +might not happiness be bought too dear? Still, this so ardently desired +happiness, for which it is so natural to seek, might perhaps be found +after all. Curiosity is always retained on the lover's side in the suit. +The secret tribunal was still sitting when Vandenesse appeared, and his +presence put the metaphysical spectre, reason, to flight. + +If such are the successive transformations through which a sentiment, +transient though it be, passes in a young man and a woman of thirty, +there comes a moment of time when the shades of difference blend into +each other, when all reasonings end in a single and final reflection +which is lost and absorbed in the desire which it confirms. Then the +longer the resistance, the mightier the voice of love. And here endeth +this lesson, or rather this study made from the _ecorche_, to borrow a +most graphic term from the studio, for in this history it is not so much +intended to portray love as to lay bare its mechanism and its dangers. +From this moment every day adds color to these dry bones, clothes them +again with living flesh and blood and the charm of youth, and puts +vitality into their movements; till they glow once more with the beauty, +the persuasive grace of sentiment, the loveliness of life. + + + +Charles found Mme. d'Aiglemont absorbed in thought, and to his "What is +it?" spoken in thrilling tones grown persuasive with the heart's soft +magic, she was careful not to reply. The delicious question bore witness +to the perfect unity of their spirits; and the Marquise felt, with a +woman's wonderful intuition, that to give any expression to the sorrow +in her heart would be to make an advance. If, even now, each one +of those words was fraught with significance for them both, in what +fathomless depths might she not plunge at the first step? She read +herself with a clear and lucid glance. She was silent, and Vandenesse +followed her example. + +"I am not feeling well," she said at last, taking alarm at the pause +fraught with such great moment for them both, when the language of the +eyes completely filled the blank left by the helplessness of speech. + +"Madame," said Charles, and his voice was tender but unsteady with +strong feeling, "soul and body are both dependent on each other. If you +were happy, you would be young and fresh. Why do you refuse to ask of +love all that love has taken from you? You think that your life is over +when it is only just beginning. Trust yourself to a friend's care. It is +so sweet to be loved." + +"I am old already," she said; "there is no reason why I should not +continue to suffer as in the past. And 'one must love,' do you say? +Well, I must not, and I cannot. Your friendship has put some sweetness +into my life, but beside you I care for no one, no one could efface my +memories. A friend I accept; I should fly from a lover. Besides, would +it be a very generous thing to do, to exchange a withered heart for a +young heart; to smile upon illusions which now I cannot share, to cause +happiness in which I should either have no belief, or tremble to lose? +I should perhaps respond to his devotion with egoism, should weigh and +deliberate while he felt; my memory would resent the poignancy of his +happiness. No, if you love once, that love is never replaced, you see. +Indeed, who would have my heart at this price?" + +There was a tinge of heartless coquetry in the words, the last effort of +discretion. + +"If he loses courage, well and good, I shall live alone and faithful." +The thought came from the very depths of the woman, for her it was the +too slender willow twig caught in vain by a swimmer swept out by the +current. + +Vandenesse's involuntary shudder at her dictum plead more eloquently for +him than all his past assiduity. Nothing moves a woman so much as the +discovery of a gracious delicacy in us, such a refinement of sentiment +as her own, for a woman the grace and delicacy are sure tokens of truth. +Charles' start revealed the sincerity of his love. Mme. d'Aiglemont +learned the strength of his affection from the intensity of his pain. + +"Perhaps you are right," he said coldly. "New love, new vexation of +spirit." + +Then he changed the subject, and spoke of indifferent matters; but he +was visibly moved, and he concentrated his gaze on Mme. d'Aiglemont as +if he were seeing her for the last time. + +"Adieu, madame," he said, with emotion in his voice. + +"_Au revoir_," said she, with that subtle coquetry, the secret of a very +few among women. + +He made no answer and went. + +When Charles was no longer there, when his empty chair spoke for him, +regrets flocked in upon her, and she found fault with herself. Passion +makes an immense advance as soon as a woman persuades herself that she +has failed somewhat in generosity or hurt a noble nature. In love there +is never any need to be on our guard against the worst in us; that is +a safeguard; a woman only surrenders at the summons of a virtue. "The +floor of hell is paved with good intentions,"--it is no preacher's +paradox. + +Vandenesse stopped away for several days. Every evening at the +accustomed hour the Marquise sat expectant in remorseful impatience. +She could not write--that would be a declaration, and, moreover, her +instinct told her that he would come back. On the sixth day he was +announced, and never had she heard the name with such delight. Her joy +frightened her. + +"You have punished me well," she said, addressing him. + +Vandenesse gazed at her in astonishment. + +"Punished?" he echoed. "And for what?" He understood her quite well, +but he meant to be avenged for all that he had suffered as soon as she +suspected it. + +"Why have you not come to see me?" she demanded with a smile. + +"Then you have seen no visitors?" asked he, parrying the question. + +"Yes. M. de Ronquerolles and M. de Marsay and young d'Escrignon came +and stayed for nearly two hours, the first two yesterday, the last this +morning. And besides, I have had a call, I believe, from Mme. Firmiani +and from your sister, Mme. de Listomere." + +Here was a new infliction, torture which none can comprehend unless they +know love as a fierce and all-invading tyrant whose mildest symptom is +a monstrous jealousy, a perpetual desire to snatch away the beloved from +every other influence. + +"What!" thought he to himself, "she has seen visitors, she has been +with happy creatures, and talking to them, while I was unhappy and all +alone." + +He buried his annoyance forthwith, and consigned love to the depths of +his heart, like a coffin to the sea. His thoughts were of the kind that +never find expression in words; they pass through the mind swiftly as +a deadly acid, that poisons as it evaporates and vanishes. His brow, +however, was over-clouded; and Mme. d'Aiglemont, guided by her woman's +instinct, shared his sadness without understanding it. She had hurt him, +unwittingly, as Vandenesse knew. He talked over his position with her, +as if his jealousy were one of those hypothetical cases which lovers +love to discuss. Then the Marquise understood it all. She was so deeply +moved, that she could not keep back the tears--and so these lovers +entered the heaven of love. + +Heaven and Hell are two great imaginative conceptions formulating our +ideas of Joy and Sorrow--those two poles about which human existence +revolves. Is not heaven a figure of speech covering now and for +evermore an infinite of human feeling impossible to express save in its +accidents--since that Joy is one? And what is Hell but the symbol of +our infinite power to suffer tortures so diverse that of our pain it is +possible to fashion works of art, for no two human sorrows are alike? + +One evening the two lovers sat alone and side by side, silently watching +one of the fairest transformations of the sky, a cloudless heaven taking +hues of pale gold and purple from the last rays of the sunset. With the +slow fading of the daylight, sweet thoughts seem to awaken, and soft +stirrings of passion, and a mysterious sense of trouble in the midst of +calm. Nature sets before us vague images of bliss, bidding us enjoy +the happiness within our reach, or lament it when it has fled. In those +moments fraught with enchantment, when the tender light in the canopy +of the sky blends in harmony with the spells working within, it is +difficult to resist the heart's desires grown so magically potent. Cares +are blunted, joy becomes ecstasy; pain, intolerable anguish. The pomp +of sunset gives the signal for confessions and draws them forth. Silence +grows more dangerous than speech for it gives to eyes all the power of +the infinite of the heavens reflected in them. And for speech, the least +word has irresistible might. Is not the light infused into the voice and +purple into the glances? Is not heaven within us, or do we feel that we +are in the heavens? + +Vandenesse and Julie--for so she had allowed herself to be called +for the past few days by him whom she loved to speak of as +Charles--Vandenesse and Julie were talking together, but they had +drifted very far from their original subject; and if their spoken words +had grown meaningless they listened in delight to the unspoken thoughts +that lurked in the sounds. Her hand lay in his. She had abandoned it to +him without a thought that she had granted a proof of love. + +Together they leaned forward to look out upon a majestic cloud country, +full of snows and glaciers and fantastic mountain peaks with gray stains +of shadow on their sides, a picture composed of sharp contrasts between +fiery red and the shadows of darkness, filling the skies with a fleeting +vision of glory which cannot be reproduced--magnificent swaddling-bands +of sunrise, bright shrouds of the dying sun. As they leaned Julie's hair +brushed lightly against Vandenesse's cheek. She felt that light contact, +and shuddered violently, and he even more, for imperceptibly they both +had reached one of those inexplicable crises when quiet has wrought +upon the senses until every faculty of perception is so keen that the +slightest shock fills the heart lost in melancholy with sadness that +overflows in tears; or raises joy to ecstasy in a heart that is lost +in the vertigo of love. Almost involuntarily Julie pressed her lover's +hand. That wooing pressure gave courage to his timidity. All the joy of +the present, all the hopes of the future were blended in the emotion +of a first caress, the bashful trembling kiss that Mme. d'Aiglemont +received upon her cheek. The slighter the concession, the more dangerous +and insinuating it was. For their double misfortune it was only too +sincere a revelation. Two noble natures had met and blended, drawn +each to each by every law of natural attraction, held apart by every +ordinance. + +General d'Aiglemont came in at that very moment. + +"The Ministry has gone out," he said. "Your uncle will be in the +new cabinet. So you stand an uncommonly good chance of an embassy, +Vandenesse." + +Charles and Julie looked at each other and flushed red. That blush was +one more tie to unite them; there was one thought and one remorse in +either mind; between two lovers guilty of a kiss there is a bond quite +as strong and terrible as the bond between two robbers who have murdered +a man. Something had to be said by way of reply. + +"I do not care to leave Paris now," Charles said. + +"We know why," said the General, with the knowing air of a man who +discovers a secret. "You do not like to leave your uncle, because you do +not wish to lose your chance of succeeding to the title." + +The Marquise took refuge in her room, and in her mind passed a pitiless +verdict upon her husband. + +"His stupidity is really beyond anything!" + + + + +IV. THE FINGER OF GOD + +Between the Barriere d'Italie and the Barriere de la Sante, along the +boulevard which leads to the Jardin des Plantes, you have a view of +Paris fit to send an artist or the tourist, the most _blase_ in matters +of landscape, into ecstasies. Reach the slightly higher ground where the +line of boulevard, shaded by tall, thick-spreading trees, curves with +the grace of some green and silent forest avenue, and you see spread +out at your feet a deep valley populous with factories looking almost +countrified among green trees and the brown streams of the Bievre or the +Gobelins. + +On the opposite slope, beneath some thousands of roofs packed close +together like heads in a crowd, lurks the squalor of the Faubourg +Saint-Marceau. The imposing cupola of the Pantheon, and the grim +melancholy dome of the Val-du-Grace, tower proudly up above a whole +town in itself, built amphitheatre-wise; every tier being grotesquely +represented by a crooked line of street, so that the two public +monuments look like a huge pair of giants dwarfing into insignificance +the poor little houses and the tallest poplars in the valley. To your +left behold the observatory, the daylight, pouring athwart its windows +and galleries, producing such fantastical strange effects that the +building looks like a black spectral skeleton. Further yet in the +distance rises the elegant lantern tower of the Invalides, soaring +up between the bluish pile of the Luxembourg and the gray tours of +Saint-Sulpice. From this standpoint the lines of the architecture are +blended with green leaves and gray shadows, and change every moment with +every aspect of the heavens, every alteration of light or color in the +sky. Afar, the skyey spaces themselves seem to be full of buildings; +near, wind the serpentine curves of waving trees and green footpaths. + +Away to your right, through a great gap in this singular landscape, +you see the canal Saint-Martin, a long pale stripe with its edging +of reddish stone quays and fringes of lime avenue. The long rows of +buildings beside it, in genuine Roman style, are the public granaries. + +Beyond, again, on the very last plane of all, see the smoke-dimmed +slopes of Belleville covered with houses and windmills, which blend +their freaks of outline with the chance effects of cloud. And still, +between that horizon, vague as some childish recollection, and the +serried range of roofs in the valley, a whole city lies out of sight: a +huge city, engulfed, as it were, in a vast hollow between the pinnacles +of the Hopital de la Pitie and the ridge line of the Cimetiere de l'Est, +between suffering on the one hand and death on the other; a city sending +up a smothered roar like Ocean grumbling at the foot of a cliff, as if +to let you know that "I am here!" + +When the sunlight pours like a flood over this strip of Paris, purifying +and etherealizing the outlines, kindling answering lights here and there +in the window panes, brightening the red tiles, flaming about the golden +crosses, whitening walls and transforming the atmosphere into a gauzy +veil, calling up rich contrasts of light and fantastic shadow; when the +sky is blue and earth quivers in the heat, and the bells are pealing, +then you shall see one of the eloquent fairy scenes which stamp +themselves for ever on the imagination, a scene that shall find as +fanatical worshipers as the wondrous views of Naples and Byzantium or +the isles of Florida. Nothing is wanting to complete the harmony, the +murmur of the world of men and the idyllic quiet of solitude, the voices +of a million human creatures and the voice of God. There lies a whole +capital beneath the peaceful cypresses of Pere-Lachaise. + +The landscape lay in all its beauty, sparkling in the spring sunlight, +as I stood looking out over it one morning, my back against a huge +elm-tree that flung its yellow flowers to the wind. At the sight of the +rich and glorious view before me, I thought bitterly of the scorn with +which even in our literature we affect to hold this land of ours, and +poured maledictions on the pitiable plutocrats who fall out of love with +fair France, and spend their gold to acquire the right of sneering at +their own country, by going through Italy at a gallop and inspecting +that desecrated land through an opera-glass. I cast loving eyes on +modern Paris. I was beginning to dream dreams, when the sound of a kiss +disturbed the solitude and put philosophy to flight. Down the sidewalk, +along the steep bank, above the rippling water, I saw beyond the +Ponte des Gobelins the figure of a woman, dressed with the daintiest +simplicity; she was still young, as it seemed to me, and the blithe +gladness of the landscape was reflected in her sweet face. Her +companion, a handsome young man, had just set down a little boy. A +prettier child has never been seen, and to this day I do not know +whether it was the little one or his mother who received the kiss. In +their young faces, in their eyes, their smile, their every movement, you +could read the same deep and tender thought. Their arms were interlaced +with such glad swiftness; they drew close together with such marvelous +unanimity of impulse that, conscious of nothing but themselves, they did +not so much as see me. A second child, however--a little girl, who had +turned her back upon them in sullen discontent--threw me a glance, and +the expression in her eyes startled me. She was as pretty and engaging +as the little brother whom she left to run about by himself, sometimes +before, sometimes after their mother and her companion; but her charm +was less childish, and now, as she stood mute and motionless, her +attitude and demeanor suggested a torpid snake. There was something +indescribably mechanical in the way in which the pretty woman and her +companion paced up and down. In absence of mind, probably, they were +content to walk to and fro between the little bridge and a carriage that +stood waiting nearby at a corner in the boulevard, turning, stopping +short now and again, looking into each other's eyes, or breaking into +laughter as their casual talk grew lively or languid, grave or gay. + +I watched this delicious picture a while from my hiding-place by the +great elm-tree, and should have turned away no doubt and respected their +privacy, if it had not been for a chance discovery. In the face of the +brooding, silent, elder child I saw traces of thought overdeep for her +age. When her mother and the young man at her side turned and came +near, her head was frequently lowered; the furtive sidelong glances +of intelligence that she gave the pair and the child her brother were +nothing less than extraordinary. Sometimes the pretty woman or her +friend would stroke the little boy's fair curls, or lay a caressing +finger against the baby throat or the white collar as he played at +keeping step with them; and no words can describe the shrewd subtlety, +the ingenuous malice, the fierce intensity which lighted up that pallid +little face with the faint circles already round the eyes. Truly there +was a man's power of passion in the strange-looking, delicate little +girl. Here were traces of suffering or of thought in her; and which +is the more certain token of death when life is in blossom--physical +suffering, or the malady of too early thought preying upon a soul as yet +in bud? Perhaps a mother knows. For my own part, I know of nothing more +dreadful to see than an old man's thoughts on a child's forehead; even +blasphemy from girlish lips is less monstrous. + +The almost stupid stolidity of this child who had begun to think +already, her rare gestures, everything about her, interested me. I +scrutinized her curiously. Then the common whim of the observer drew +me to compare her with her brother, and to note their likeness and +unlikeness. + +Her brown hair and dark eyes and look of precocious power made a rich +contrast with the little one's fair curled head and sea-green eyes and +winning helplessness. She, perhaps, was seven or eight years of age; the +boy was full four years younger. Both children were dressed alike; but +here again, looking closely, I noticed a difference. It was very slight, +a little thing enough; but in the light of after events I saw that it +meant a whole romance in the past, a whole tragedy to come. The little +brown-haired maid wore a linen collar with a plain hem, her brother's +was edged with dainty embroidery, that was all; but therein lay the +confession of a heart's secret, a tacit preference which a child can +read in the mother's inmost soul as clearly as if the spirit of God +revealed it. The fair-haired child, careless and glad, looked almost +like a girl, his skin was so fair and fresh, his movements so graceful, +his look so sweet; while his older sister, in spite of her energy, in +spite of the beauty of her features and her dazzling complexion, looked +like a sickly little boy. In her bright eyes there was none of the humid +softness which lends such charm to children's faces; they seemed, like +courtiers' eyes, to be dried by some inner fire; and in her pallor there +was a certain swarthy olive tint, the sign of vigorous character. Twice +her little brother came to her, holding out a tiny hunting-horn with a +touching charm, a winning look, and wistful expression, which would +have sent Charlet into ecstasies, but she only scowled in answer to his +"Here, Helene, will you take it?" so persuasively spoken. The little +girl, so sombre and vehement beneath her apparent indifference, +shuddered, and even flushed red when her brother came near her; but +the little one seemed not to notice his sister's dark mood, and his +unconsciousness, blended with earnestness, marked a final difference +in character between the child and the little girl, whose brow was +overclouded already by the gloom of a man's knowledge and cares. + +"Mamma, Helene will not play," cried the little one, seizing an +opportunity to complain while the two stood silent on the Ponte des +Gobelins. + +"Let her alone, Charles; you know very well that she is always cross." + +Tears sprang to Helene's eyes at the words so thoughtlessly uttered +by her mother as she turned abruptly to the young man by her side. The +child devoured the speech in silence, but she gave her brother one of +those sagacious looks that seemed inexplicable to me, glancing with a +sinister expression from the bank where he stood to the Bievre, then at +the bridge and the view, and then at me. + +I was afraid lest my presence should disturb the happy couple; I slipped +away and took refuge behind a thicket of elder trees, which completely +screened me from all eyes. Sitting quietly on the summit of the bank, I +watched the ever-changing landscape and the fierce-looking little girl, +for with my head almost on a level with the boulevard I could still see +her through the leaves. Helene seemed uneasy over my disappearance, +her dark eyes looked for me down the alley and behind the trees with +indefinable curiosity. What was I to her? Then Charles' baby laughter +rang out like a bird's song in the silence. The tall, young man, with +the same fair hair, was dancing him in his arms, showering kisses upon +him, and the meaningless baby words of that "little language" which +rises to our lips when we play with children. The mother looked on +smiling, now and then, doubtless, putting in some low word that came +up from the heart, for her companion would stop short in his full +happiness, and the blue eyes that turned towards her were full of +glowing light and love and worship. Their voices, blending with the +child's voice, reached me with a vague sense of a caress. The three +figures, charming in themselves, composed a lovely scene in a glorious +landscape, filling it with a pervasive unimaginable grace. A delicately +fair woman, radiant with smiles, a child of love, a young man with the +irresistible charm of youth, a cloudless sky; nothing was wanting in +nature to complete a perfect harmony for the delight of the soul. I +found myself smiling as if their happiness had been my own. + +The clocks struck nine. The young man gave a tender embrace to his +companion, and went towards the tilbury which an old servant drove +slowly to meet him. The lady had grown grave and almost sad. The child's +prattle sounded unchecked through the last farewell kisses. Then the +tilbury rolled away, and the lady stood motionless, listening to the +sound of the wheels, watching the little cloud of dust raised by its +passage along the road. Charles ran down the green pathway back to the +bridge to join his sister. I heard his silver voice calling to her. + +"Why did you not come to say good-bye to my good friend?" cried he. + +Helene looked up. Never surely did such hatred gleam from a child's +eyes as from hers at that moment when she turned them on the brother who +stood beside her on the bank side. She gave him an angry push. Charles +lost his footing on the steep slope, stumbled over the roots of a tree, +and fell headlong forwards, dashing his forehead on the sharp-edged +stones of the embankment, and, covered with blood, disappeared over the +edge into the muddy river. The turbid water closed over a fair, bright +head with a shower of splashes; one sharp shriek after another rang in +my ears; then the sounds were stifled by the thick stream, and the poor +child sank with a dull sound as if a stone had been thrown into the +water. The accident had happened with more than lightning swiftness. I +sprang down the footpath, and Helene, stupefied with horror, shrieked +again and again: + +"Mamma! mamma!" + +The mother was there at my side. She had flown to the spot like a bird. +But neither a mother's eyes nor mine could find the exact place where +the little one had gone under. There was a wide space of black hurrying +water, and below in the bed of the Bievre ten feet of mud. There was +not the smallest possibility of saving the child. No one was stirring at +that hour on a Sunday morning, and there are neither barges nor anglers +on the Bievre. There was not a creature in sight, not a pole to plumb +the filthy stream. What need was there for me to explain how the +ugly-looking accident had happened--accident or misfortune, whichever +it might be? Had Helene avenged her father? Her jealousy surely was +the sword of God. And yet when I looked at the mother I shivered. What +fearful ordeal awaited her when she should return to her husband, the +judge before whom she must stand all her days? And here with her was an +inseparable, incorruptible witness. A child's forehead is transparent, +a child's face hides no thoughts, and a lie, like a red flame set within +glows out red that colors even the eyes. But the unhappy woman had not +thought as yet of the punishment awaiting her at home; she was staring +into the Bievre. + + + +Such an event must inevitably send ghastly echoes through a woman's +life, and here is one of the most terrible of the reverberations that +troubled Julie's love from time to time. + +Several years had gone by. The Marquis de Vandenesse wore mourning for +his father, and succeeded to his estates. One evening, therefore, after +dinner it happened that a notary was present in his house. This was +no pettifogging lawyer after Sterne's pattern, but a very solid, +substantial notary of Paris, one of your estimable men who do a stupid +thing pompously, set down a foot heavily upon your private corn, and +then ask what in the world there is to cry out about? If, by accident, +they come to know the full extent of the enormity, "Upon my word," cry +they, "I hadn't a notion!" This was a well-intentioned ass, in short, +who could see nothing in life but deeds and documents. + +Mme. de Aiglemont had been dining with M. de Vandenesse; her husband +had excused himself before dinner was over, for he was taking his two +children to the play. They were to go to some Boulevard theatre or +other, to the Ambigu-Comique or the Gaiete, sensational melodrama being +judged harmless here in Paris, and suitable pabulum for childhood, +because innocence is always triumphant in the fifth act. The boy and +girl had teased their father to be there before the curtain rose, so he +had left the table before dessert was served. + +But the notary, the imperturbable notary, utterly incapable of asking +himself why Mme. d'Aiglemont should have allowed her husband and +children to go without her to the play, sat on as if he were screwed to +his chair. Dinner was over, dessert had been prolonged by discussion, +and coffee delayed. All these things consumed time, doubtless precious, +and drew impatient movements from that charming woman; she looked not +unlike a thoroughbred pawing the ground before a race; but the man of +law, to whom horses and women were equally unknown quantities, simply +thought the Marquise a very lively and sparkling personage. So enchanted +was he to be in the company of a woman of fashion and a political +celebrity, that he was exerting himself to shine in conversation, +and taking the lady's forced smile for approbation, talked on with +unflagging spirit, till the Marquise was almost out of patience. + +The master of the house, in concert with the lady, had more than once +maintained an eloquent silence when the lawyer expected a civil reply; +but these significant pauses were employed by the talkative nuisance in +looking for anecdotes in the fire. M. de Vandenesse had recourse to +his watch; the charming Marquise tried the experiment of fastening her +bonnet strings, and made as if she would go. But she did not go, and the +notary, blind and deaf, and delighted with himself, was quite convinced +that his interesting conversational powers were sufficient to keep the +lady on the spot. + +"I shall certainly have that woman for a client," said he to himself. + +Meanwhile the Marquise stood, putting on her gloves, twisting her +fingers, looking from the equally impatient Marquis de Vandenesse to the +lawyer, still pounding away. At every pause in the worthy man's fire of +witticisms the charming pair heaved a sigh of relief, and their looks +said plainly, "At last! He is really going!" + +Nothing of the kind. It was a nightmare which could only end in +exasperating the two impassioned creatures, on whom the lawyer had +something of the fascinating effect of a snake on a pair of birds; +before long they would be driven to cut him short. + +The clever notary was giving them the history of the discreditable ways +in which one du Tillet (a stockbroker then much in favor) had laid +the foundations of his fortune; all the ins and outs of the whole +disgraceful business were accurately put before them; and the narrator +was in the very middle of his tale when M. de Vandenesse heard the clock +strike nine. Then it became clear to him that his legal adviser was very +emphatically an idiot who must be sent forthwith about his business. He +stopped him resolutely with a gesture. + +"The tongs, my lord Marquis?" queried the notary, handing the object in +question to his client. + +"No, monsieur, I am compelled to send you away. Mme. d'Aiglemont wishes +to join her children, and I shall have the honor of escorting her." + +"Nine o'clock already! Time goes like a shadow in pleasant company," +said the man of law, who had talked on end for the past hour. + +He looked for his hat, planted himself before the fire, with a +suppressed hiccough; and, without heeding the Marquise's withering +glances, spoke once more to his impatient client: + +"To sum up, my lord Marquis. Business before all things. To-morrow, +then, we must subpoena your brother; we will proceed to make out the +inventory, and faith, after that----" + +So ill had the lawyer understood his instructions, that his impression +was the exact opposite to the one intended. It was a delicate matter, +and Vandenesse, in spite of himself, began to put the thick-headed +notary right. The discussion which followed took up a certain amount of +time. + +"Listen," the diplomatist said at last at a sign from the lady, "You are +puzzling my brains; come back to-morrow, and if the writ is not issued +by noon to-morrow, the days of grace will expire, and then--" + +As he spoke, a carriage entered the courtyard. The poor woman turned +sharply away at the sound to hide the tears in her eyes. The Marquis +rang to give the servant orders to say that he was not at home; but +before the footman could answer the bell, the lady's husband reappeared. +He had returned unexpectedly from the Gaiete, and held both children by +the hand. The little girl's eyes were red; the boy was fretful and very +cross. + +"What can have happened?" asked the Marquise. + +"I will tell you by and by," said the General, and catching a glimpse +through an open door of newspapers on the table in the adjoining +sitting-room, he went off. The Marquise, at the end of her patience, +flung herself down on the sofa in desperation. The notary, thinking it +incumbent upon him to be amiable with the children, spoke to the little +boy in an insinuating tone: + +"Well, my little man, and what is there on at the theatre?" + +"_The Valley of the Torrent_," said Gustave sulkily. + +"Upon my word and honor," declared the notary, "authors nowadays are +half crazy. _The Valley of the Torrent_! Why not the Torrent of the +Valley? It is conceivable that a valley might be without a torrent in +it; now if they had said the Torrent of the Valley, that would have +been something clear, something precise, something definite and +comprehensible. But never mind that. Now, how is the drama to take place +in a torrent and in a valley? You will tell me that in these days the +principal attraction lies in the scenic effect, and the title is a +capital advertisement.--And did you enjoy it, my little friend?" he +continued, sitting down before the child. + +When the notary pursued his inquiries as to the possibilities of a drama +in the bed of a torrent, the little girl turned slowly away and began to +cry. Her mother did not notice this in her intense annoyance. + +"Oh! yes, monsieur, I enjoyed it very much," said the child. "There is a +dear little boy in the play, and he was all alone in the world, because +his papa could not have been his real papa. And when he came to the top +of the bridge over the torrent, a big, naughty man with a beard, dressed +all in black, came and threw him into the water. And then Helene began +to sob and cry, and everybody scolded us, and father brought us away +quick, quick----" + +M. de Vandenesse and the Marquise looked on in dull amazement, as if all +power to think or move had been suddenly paralyzed. + +"Do be quiet, Gustave!" cried the General. "I told you that you were not +to talk about anything that happened at the play, and you have forgotten +what I said already." + +"Oh, my lord Marquis, your lordship must excuse him," cried the notary. +"I ought not to have asked questions, but I had no idea--" + +"He ought not to have answered them," said the General, looking sternly +at the child. + +It seemed that the Marquise and the master of the house both perfectly +understood why the children had come back so suddenly. Mme. d'Aiglemont +looked at her daughter, and rose as if to go to her, but a terrible +convulsion passed over her face, and all that could be read in it was +relentless severity. + +"That will do, Helene," she said. "Go into the other room, and leave off +crying." + +"What can she have done, poor child!" asked the notary, thinking to +appease the mother's anger and to stop Helene's tears at one stroke. "So +pretty as she is, she must be as good as can be; never anything but a +joy to her mother, I will be bound. Isn't that so, my little girl?" + +Helene cowered, looked at her mother, dried her eyes, struggled for +composure, and took refuge in the next room. + +"And you, madame, are too good a mother not to love all your children +alike. You are too good a woman, besides, to have any of those +lamentable preferences which have such fatal effects, as we lawyers have +only too much reason to know. Society goes through our hands; we see its +passions in that most revolting form, greed. Here it is the mother of a +family trying to disinherit her husband's children to enrich the others +whom she loves better; or it is the husband who tries to leave all his +property to the child who has done his best to earn his mother's hatred. +And then begin quarrels, and fears, and deeds, and defeasances, and sham +sales, and trusts, and all the rest of it; a pretty mess, in fact, it +is pitiable, upon my honor, pitiable! There are fathers that will spend +their whole lives in cheating their children and robbing their wives. +Yes, robbing is the only word for it. We were talking of tragedy; oh! +I can assure you of this that if we were at liberty to tell the real +reasons of some donations that I know of, our modern dramatists would +have the material for some sensational _bourgeois_ dramas. How the wife +manages to get her way, as she invariably does, I cannot think; for in +spite of appearances, and in spite of their weakness, it is always the +women who carry the day. Ah! by the way, they don't take _me_ in. I +always know the reason at the bottom of those predilections which the +world politely styles 'unaccountable.' But in justice to the husbands, I +must say that _they_ never discover anything. You will tell me that this +is a merciful dispens--" + +Helene had come back to the drawing-room with her father, and was +listening attentively. So well did she understand all that was said, +that she gave her mother a frightened glance, feeling, with a child's +quick instinct, that these remarks would aggravate the punishment +hanging over her. The Marquise turned her white face to Vandenesse; and, +with terror in her eyes, indicated her husband, who stood with his eyes +fixed absently on the flower pattern of the carpet. The diplomatist, +accomplished man of the world though he was, could no longer contain his +wrath, he gave the man of law a withering glance. + +"Step this way, sir," he said, and he went hurriedly to the door of the +ante-chamber; the notary left his sentence half finished, and followed, +quaking, and the husband and wife were left together. + +"Now, sir" said the Marquise de Vandenesse--he banged the drawing-room +door, and spoke with concentrated rage--"ever since dinner you have done +nothing but make blunders and talk folly. For heaven's sake, go. You +will make the most frightful mischief before you have done. If you are +a clever man in your profession, keep to your profession; and if by any +chance you should go into society, endeavor to be more circumspect." + +With that he went back to the drawing-room, and did not even wish +the notary good-evening. For a moment that worthy stood dumfounded, +bewildered, utterly at a loss. Then, when the buzzing in his ears +subsided, he thought he heard someone moaning in the next room. +Footsteps came and went, and bells were violently rung. He was by no +means anxious to meet the Marquis again, and found the use of his +legs to make good his escape, only to run against a hurrying crowd of +servants at the door. + +"Just the way of all these grand folk," said he to himself outside in +the street as he looked about for a cab. "They lead you on to talk with +compliments, and you think you are amusing them. Not a bit of it. They +treat you insolently; put you at a distance; even put you out at the +door without scruple. After all, I talked very cleverly, I said nothing +but what was sensible, well turned, and discreet; and, upon my word, he +advises me to be more circumspect in future. I will take good care +of that! Eh! the mischief take it! I am a notary and a member of my +chamber!--Pshaw! it was an ambassador's fit of temper, nothing is sacred +for people of that kind. To-morrow he shall explain what he meant by +saying that I had done nothing but blunder and talk nonsense in his +house. I will ask him for an explanation--that is, I will ask him +to explain my mistake. After all is done and said, I am in the wrong +perhaps---- Upon my word, it is very good of me to cudgel my brains like +this. What business is it of mine?" + +So the notary went home and laid the enigma before his spouse, with a +complete account of the evening's events related in sequence. + +And she replied, "My dear Crottat, His Excellency was perfectly right +when he said that you had done nothing but blunder and talk folly." + +"Why?" + +"My dear, if I told you why, it would not prevent you from doing the +same thing somewhere else to-morrow. I tell you again--talk of nothing +but business when you go out; that is my advice to you." + +"If you will not tell me, I shall ask him to-morrow--" + +"Why, dear me! the veriest noodle is careful to hide a thing of that +kind, and do you suppose that an ambassador will tell you about +it? Really, Crottat, I have never known you so utterly devoid of +common-sense." + +"Thank you, my dear." + + + + +V. TWO MEETINGS + +One of Napoleon's orderly staff-officers, who shall be known in this +history only as the General or the Marquis, had come to spend the spring +at Versailles. He made a large fortune under the Restoration; and as +his place at Court would not allow him to go very far from Paris, he had +taken a country house between the church and the barrier of Montreuil, +on the road that leads to the Avenue de Saint-Cloud. + +The house had been built originally as a retreat for the short-lived +loves of some _grand seigneur_. The grounds were very large; the gardens +on either side extending from the first houses of Montreuil to the +thatched cottages near the barrier, so that the owner could enjoy all +the pleasures of solitude with the city almost at his gates. By an odd +piece of contradiction, the whole front of the house itself, with the +principal entrance, gave directly upon the street. Perhaps in time past +it was a tolerably lonely road, and indeed this theory looks all the +more probable when one comes to think of it; for not so very far away, +on this same road, Louis Quinze built a delicious summer villa for Mlle. +de Romans, and the curious in such things will discover that the +wayside _casinos_ are adorned in a style that recalls traditions of the +ingenious taste displayed in debauchery by our ancestors who, with all +the license paid to their charge, sought to invest it with secrecy and +mystery. + +One winter evening the family were by themselves in the lonely house. +The servants had received permission to go to Versailles to celebrate +the wedding of one of their number. It was Christmas time, and the +holiday makers, presuming upon the double festival, did not scruple to +outstay their leave of absence; yet, as the General was well known to be +a man of his word, the culprits felt some twinges of conscience as they +danced on after the hour of return. The clocks struck eleven, and still +there was no sign of the servants. + +A deep silence prevailed over the country-side, broken only by the sound +of the northeast wind whistling through the black branches, wailing +about the house, dying in gusts along the corridors. The hard frost had +purified the air, and held the earth in its grip; the roads gave back +every sound with the hard metallic ring which always strikes us with +a new surprise; the heavy footsteps of some belated reveler, or a cab +returning to Paris, could be heard for a long distance with unwonted +distinctness. Out in the courtyard a few dead leaves set a-dancing +by some eddying gust found a voice for the night which fain had been +silent. It was, in fact, one of those sharp, frosty evenings that wring +barren expressions of pity from our selfish ease for wayfarers and +the poor, and fills us with a luxurious sense of the comfort of the +fireside. + +But the family party in the salon at that hour gave not a thought to +absent servants nor houseless folk, nor to the gracious charm with which +a winter evening sparkles. No one played the philosopher out of season. +Secure in the protection of an old soldier, women and children gave +themselves up to the joys of home life, so delicious when there is no +restraint upon feeling; and talk and play and glances are bright with +frankness and affection. + +The General sat, or more properly speaking, lay buried, in the depths +of a huge, high-back armchair by the hearth. The heaped-up fire burned +scorching clear with the excessive cold of the night. The good father +leaned his head slightly to one side against the back of the chair, in +the indolence of perfect serenity and a glow of happiness. The languid, +half-sleepy droop of his outstretched arms seemed to complete his +expression of placid content. He was watching his youngest, a boy of +five or thereabouts, who, half clad as he was, declined to allow his +mother to undress him. The little one fled from the night-gown and cap +with which he was threatened now and again, and stoutly declined to part +with his embroidered collar, laughing when his mother called to him, +for he saw that she too was laughing at this declaration of infant +independence. The next step was to go back to a game of romps with his +sister. She was as much a child as he, but more mischievous; and she +was older by two years, and could speak distinctly already, whereas his +inarticulate words and confused ideas were a puzzle even to his parents. +Little Moina's playfulness, somewhat coquettish already, provoked +inextinguishable laughter, explosions of merriment which went off like +fireworks for no apparent cause. As they tumbled about before the +fire, unconcernedly displaying little plump bodies and delicate white +contours, as the dark and golden curls mingled in a collision of rosy +cheeks dimpled with childish glee, a father surely, a mother most +certainly, must have understood those little souls, and seen the +character and power of passion already developed for their eyes. As the +cherubs frolicked about, struggling, rolling, and tumbling without fear +of hurt on the soft carpet, its flowers looked pale beside the glowing +white and red of their cheeks and the brilliant color of their shining +eyes. + +On the sofa by the fire, opposite the great armchair, the children's +mother sat among a heap of scattered garments, with a little scarlet +shoe in her hand. She seemed to have given herself up completely to the +enjoyment of the moment; wavering discipline had relaxed into a +sweet smile engraved upon her lips. At the age of six-and-thirty, or +thereabouts, she was a beautiful woman still, by reason of the rare +perfection of the outlines of her face, and at this moment light and +warmth and happiness filled it with preternatural brightness. + +Again and again her eyes wandered from her children, and their tender +gaze was turned upon her husband's grave face; and now and again the +eyes of husband and wife met with a silent exchange of happiness and +thoughts from some inner depth. + +The General's face was deeply bronzed, a stray lock of gray hair scored +shadows on his forehead. The reckless courage of the battlefield could +be read in the lines carved in his hollow cheeks, and gleams of rugged +strength in the blue eyes; clearly the bit of red ribbon flaunting at +his button-hole had been paid for by hardship and toil. An inexpressible +kindliness and frankness shone out of the strong, resolute face which +reflected his children's merriment; the gray-haired captain found it not +so very hard to become a child again. Is there not always a little love +of children in the heart of a soldier who has seen enough of the seamy +side of life to know something of the piteous limitations of strength +and the privileges of weakness? + +At a round table rather further away, in a circle of bright lamplight +that dimmed the feebler illumination of the wax candles on the +chimney-piece, sat a boy of thirteen, rapidly turning the pages of a +thick volume which he was reading, undisturbed by the shouts of the +children. There was a boy's curiosity in his face. From his _lyceens_ +uniform he was evidently a schoolboy, and the book he was reading was +the _Arabian Nights_. Small wonder that he was deeply absorbed. He sat +perfectly still in a meditative attitude, with his elbow on the table, +and his hand propping his head--the white fingers contrasting strongly +with the brown hair into which they were thrust. As he sat, with the +light turned full upon his face, and the rest of his body in shadow, he +looked like one of Raphael's dark portraits of himself--a bent head and +intent eyes filled with visions of the future. + +Between the table and the Marquise a tall, beautiful girl sat at her +tapestry frame; sometimes she drew back from her work, sometimes she +bent over it, and her hair, picturesque in its ebony smoothness and +darkness, caught the light of the lamp. Helene was a picture in herself. +In her beauty there was a rare distinctive character of power and +refinement. Though her hair was gathered up and drawn back from her +face, so as to trace a clearly marked line about her head, so thick and +abundant was it, so recalcitrant to the comb, that it sprang back in +curl-tendrils to the nape of her neck. The bountiful line of eyebrows +was evenly marked out in dark contrasting outline upon her pure +forehead. On her upper lip, beneath the Grecian nose with its +sensitively perfect curve of nostril, there lay a faint, swarthy shadow, +the sign-manual of courage; but the enchanting roundness of contour, the +frankly innocent expression of her other features, the transparence +of the delicate carnations, the voluptuous softness of the lips, the +flawless oval of the outline of the face, and with these, and more than +all these, the saintlike expression in the girlish eyes, gave to her +vigorous loveliness the distinctive touch of feminine grace, that +enchanting modesty which we look for in these angels of peace and love. +Yet there was no suggestion of fragility about her; and, surely, with +so grand a woman's frame, so attractive a face, she must possess a +corresponding warmth of heart and strength of soul. + +She was as silent as her schoolboy brother. Seemingly a prey to the +fateful maiden meditations which baffle a father's penetration and even +a mother's sagacity, it was impossible to be certain whether it was the +lamplight that cast those shadows that flitted over her face like thin +clouds over a bright sky, or whether they were passing shades of secret +and painful thoughts. + +Husband and wife had quite forgotten the two older children at that +moment, though now and again the General's questioning glance traveled +to that second mute picture; a larger growth, a gracious realization, +as it were, of the hopes embodied in the baby forms rioting in the +foreground. Their faces made up a kind of living poem, illustrating +life's various phases. The luxurious background of the salon, the +different attitudes, the strong contrasts of coloring in the faces, +differing with the character of differing ages, the modeling of the +forms brought into high relief by the light--altogether it was a page of +human life, richly illuminated beyond the art of painter, sculptor, or +poet. Silence, solitude, night and winter lent a final touch of majesty +to complete the simplicity and sublimity of this exquisite effect of +nature's contriving. Married life is full of these sacred hours, which +perhaps owe their indefinable charm to some vague memory of a better +world. A divine radiance surely shines upon them, the destined +compensation for some portion of earth's sorrows, the solace which +enables man to accept life. We seem to behold a vision of an enchanted +universe, the great conception of its system widens out before our eyes, +and social life pleads for its laws by bidding us look to the future. + +Yet in spite of the tender glances that Helene gave Abel and Moina after +a fresh outburst of merriment; in spite of the look of gladness in +her transparent face whenever she stole a glance at her father, a deep +melancholy pervaded her gestures, her attitude, and more than all, her +eyes veiled by their long lashes. Those white, strong hands, through +which the light passed, tinting them with a diaphanous, almost fluid +red--those hands were trembling. Once only did the eyes of the mother +and daughter clash without shrinking, and the two women read each +other's thoughts in a look, cold, wan, and respectful on Helene's part, +sombre and threatening on her mother's. At once Helene's eyes were +lowered to her work, she plied her needle swiftly, and it was long +before she raised her head, bowed as it seemed by a weight of thought +too heavy to bear. Was the Marquise over harsh with this one of her +children? Did she think this harshness needful? Was she jealous of +Helene's beauty?--She might still hope to rival Helene, but only by the +magic arts of the toilette. Or again, had her daughter, like many a girl +who reaches the clairvoyant age, read the secrets which this wife (to +all appearance so religiously faithful in the fulfilment of her duties) +believed to be buried in her own heart as deeply as in a grave? + +Helene had reached an age when purity of soul inclines to pass +over-rigid judgments. A certain order of mind is apt to exaggerate +transgression into crime; imagination reacts upon conscience, and a +young girl is a hard judge because she magnifies the seriousness of the +offence. Helene seemed to think herself worthy of no one. Perhaps +there was a secret in her past life, perhaps something had happened, +unintelligible to her at the time, but with gradually developing +significance for a mind grown susceptible to religious influences; +something which lately seemed to have degraded her, as it were, in her +own eyes, and according to her own romantic standard. This change in +her demeanor dated from the day of reading Schiller's noble tragedy of +_Wilhelm Tell_ in a new series of translations. Her mother scolded her +for letting the book fall, and then remarked to herself that the passage +which had so worked on Helene's feelings was the scene in which Wilhelm +Tell, who spilt the blood of a tyrant to save a nation, fraternizes in +some sort with John the Parricide. Helene had grown humble, dutiful, and +self-contained; she no longer cared for gaiety. Never had she made so +much of her father, especially when the Marquise was not by to watch +her girlish caresses. And yet, if Helene's affection for her mother had +cooled at all, the change in her manner was so slight as to be almost +imperceptible; so slight that the General could not have noticed it, +jealous though he might be of the harmony of home. No masculine insight +could have sounded the depths of those two feminine natures; the one +was young and generous, the other sensitive and proud; the first had +a wealth of indulgence in her nature, the second was full of craft and +love. If the Marquise made her daughter's life a burden to her by +a woman's subtle tyranny, it was a tyranny invisible to all but the +victim; and for the rest, these conjectures only called forth after the +event must remain conjectures. Until this night no accusing flash of +light had escaped either of them, but an ominous mystery was too surely +growing up between them, a mystery known only to themselves and God. + +"Come, Abel," called the Marquise, seizing on her opportunity when the +children were tired of play and still for a moment. "Come, come, child; +you must be put to bed--" + +And with a glance that must be obeyed, she caught him up and took him on +her knee. + +"What!" exclaimed the General. "Half-past ten o'clock, and not one of +the servants has come back! The rascals!--Gustave," he added, turning to +his son, "I allowed you to read that book only on the condition that you +should put it away at ten o'clock. You ought to have shut up the book +at the proper time and gone to bed, as you promised. If you mean to +make your mark in the world, you must keep your word; let it be a second +religion to you, and a point of honor. Fox, one of the greatest English +orators, was remarkable, above all things, for the beauty of his +character, and the very first of his qualities was the scrupulous +faithfulness with which he kept his engagements. When he was a child, +his father (an Englishman of the old school) gave him a pretty strong +lesson which he never forgot. Like most rich Englishmen, Fox's father +had a country house and a considerable park about it. Now, in the park +there was an old summer-house, and orders had been given that this +summer-house was to be pulled down and put up somewhere else where there +was a finer view. Fox was just about your age, and had come home for the +holidays. Boys are fond of seeing things pulled to pieces, so young +Fox asked to stay on at home for a few days longer to see the old +summer-house taken down; but his father said that he must go back to +school on the proper day, so there was anger between father and son. +Fox's mother (like all mammas) took the boy's part. Then the father +solemnly promised that the summer-house should stay where it was till +the next holidays. + +"So Fox went back to school; and his father, thinking that lessons would +soon drive the whole thing out of the boy's mind, had the summer-house +pulled down and put up in the new position. But as it happened, the +persistent youngster thought of nothing but that summer-house; and as +soon as he came home again, his first care was to go out to look at the +old building, and he came in to breakfast looking quite doleful, and +said to his father, 'You have broken your promise.' The old English +gentleman said with confusion full of dignity, 'That is true, my boy; +but I will make amends. A man ought to think of keeping his word before +he thinks of his fortune; for by keeping his word he will gain fortune, +while all the fortunes in the world will not efface the stain left on +your conscience by a breach of faith.' Then he gave orders that the +summer-house should be put up again in the old place, and when it had +been rebuilt he had it taken down again for his son to see. Let this be +a lesson to _you_, Gustave." + +Gustave had been listening with interest, and now he closed the book at +once. There was a moment's silence, while the General took possession of +Moina, who could scarcely keep her eyes open. The little one's languid +head fell back on her father's breast, and in a moment she was fast +asleep, wrapped round about in her golden curls. + +Just then a sound of hurrying footsteps rang on the pavement out in the +street, immediately followed by three knocks on the street door, waking +the echoes of the house. The reverberating blows told, as plainly as +a cry for help that here was a man flying for his life. The house dog +barked furiously. A thrill of excitement ran through Helene and Gustave +and the General and his wife; but neither Abel, with the night-cap +strings just tied under his chin, nor Moina awoke. + +"The fellow is in a hurry!" exclaimed the General. He put the little +girl down on the chair, and hastened out of the room, heedless of his +wife's entreating cry, "Dear, do not go down--" + +He stepped into his own room for a pair of pistols, lighted a dark +lantern, sprang at lightning speed down the staircase, and in another +minute reached the house door, his oldest boy fearlessly following. + +"Who is there?" demanded he. + +"Let me in," panted a breathless voice. + +"Are you a friend?" + +"Yes, friend." + +"Are you alone?" + +"Yes! But let me in; _they_ are after me!" + +The General had scarcely set the door ajar before a man slipped into the +porch with the uncanny swiftness of a shadow. Before the master of +the house could prevent him, the intruder had closed the door with a +well-directed kick, and set his back against it resolutely, as if he +were determined that it should not be opened again. In a moment the +General had his lantern and pistol at a level with the stranger's +breast, and beheld a man of medium height in a fur-lined pelisse. It +was an old man's garment, both too large and too long for its present +wearer. Chance or caution had slouched the man's hat over his eyes. + +"You can lower your pistol, sir," said this person. "I do not claim +to stay in your house against your will; but if I leave it, death is +waiting for me at the barrier. And what a death! You would be answerable +to God for it! I ask for your hospitality for two hours. And bear this +in mind, sir, that, suppliant as I am, I have a right to command with +the despotism of necessity. I want the Arab's hospitality. Either I +and my secret must be inviolable, or open the door and I will go to my +death. I want secrecy, a safe hiding-place, and water. Oh! water!" he +cried again, with a rattle in his throat. + +"Who are you?" demanded the General, taken aback by the stranger's +feverish volubility. + +"Ah! who am I? Good, open the door, and I will put a distance between +us," retorted the other, and there was a diabolical irony in his tone. + +Dexterously as the Marquis passed the light of the lantern over the +man's face, he could only see the lower half of it, and that in nowise +prepossessed him in favor of this singular claimant of hospitality. +The cheeks were livid and quivering, the features dreadfully contorted. +Under the shadow of the hat-brim a pair of eyes gleamed out like flames; +the feeble candle-light looked almost dim in comparison. Some sort of +answer must be made however. + +"Your language, sir, is so extraordinary that in my place you +yourself--" + +"My life is in your hands!" the intruder broke in. The sound of his +voice was dreadful to hear. + +"Two hours?" said the Marquis, wavering. + +"Two hours," echoed the other. + +Then quite suddenly, with a desperate gesture, he pushed back his +hat and left his forehead bare, and, as if he meant to try a final +expedient, he gave the General a glance that seemed to plunge like +a vivid flash into his very soul. That electrical discharge of +intelligence and will was swift as lightning and crushing as a +thunderbolt; for there are moments when a human being is invested for a +brief space with inexplicable power. + +"Come, whoever you may be, you shall be in safety under my roof," the +master of the house said gravely at last, acting, as he imagined, upon +one of those intuitions which a man cannot always explain to himself. + +"God will repay you!" said the stranger, with a deep, involuntary sigh. + +"Have you weapons?" asked the General. + +For all answer the stranger flung open his fur pelisse, and scarcely +gave the other time for a glance before he wrapped it about him again. +To all appearance he was unarmed and in evening dress. Swift as the +soldier's scrutiny had been, he saw something, however, which made him +exclaim: + +"Where the devil have you been to get yourself in such a mess in such +dry weather?" + +"More questions!" said the stranger haughtily. + +At the words the Marquis caught sight of his son, and his own late +homily on the strict fulfilment of a given word came up to his mind. In +lively vexation, he exclaimed, not without a touch of anger: + +"What! little rogue, you here when you ought to be in bed?" + +"Because I thought I might be of some good in danger," answered Gustave. + +"There, go up to your room," said his father, mollified by the +reply.--"And you" (addressing the stranger), "come with me." + +The two men grew as silent as a pair of gamblers who watch each other's +play with mutual suspicions. The General himself began to be troubled +with ugly presentiments. The strange visit weighed upon his mind already +like a nightmare; but he had passed his word, there was no help for +it now, and he led the way along the passages and stairways till they +reached a large room on the second floor immediately above the salon. +This was an empty room where linen was dried in the winter. It had +but the one door, and for all decoration boasted one solitary shabby +looking-glass above the chimney-piece, left by the previous owner, and a +great pier glass, placed provisionally opposite the fireplace until +such time as a use should be found for it in the rooms below. The four +yellowish walls were bare. The floor had never been swept. The huge +attic was icy-cold, and the furniture consisted of a couple of rickety +straw-bottomed chairs, or rather frames of chairs. The General set the +lantern down upon the chimney-piece. Then he spoke: + +"It is necessary for your own safety to hide you in this comfortless +attic. And, as you have my promise to keep your secret, you will permit +me to lock you in." + +The other bent his head in acquiescence. + +"I asked for nothing but a hiding-place, secrecy, and water," returned +he. + +"I will bring you some directly," said the Marquis, shutting the door +cautiously. He groped his way down into the salon for a lamp before +going to the kitchen to look for a carafe. + +"Well, what is it?" the Marquise asked quickly. + +"Nothing, dear," he returned coolly. + +"But we listened, and we certainly heard you go upstairs with somebody." + +"Helene," said the General, and he looked at his daughter, who raised +her face, "bear in mind that your father's honor depends upon your +discretion. You must have heard nothing." + +The girl bent her head in answer. The Marquise was confused and smarting +inwardly at the way in which her husband had thought fit to silence her. + +Meanwhile the General went for the bottle and a tumbler, and returned to +the room above. His prisoner was leaning against the chimney-piece, +his head was bare, he had flung down his hat on one of the two chairs. +Evidently he had not expected to have so bright a light turned upon him, +and he frowned and looked anxious as he met the General's keen eyes; +but his face softened and wore a gracious expression as he thanked +his protector. When the latter placed the bottle and glass on the +mantel-shelf, the stranger's eyes flashed out on him again; and when +he spoke, it was in musical tones with no sign of the previous guttural +convulsion, though his voice was still unsteady with repressed emotion. + +"I shall seem to you to be a strange being, sir, but you must pardon the +caprices of necessity. If you propose to remain in the room, I beg that +you will not look at me while I am drinking." + +Vexed at this continual obedience to a man whom he disliked, the General +sharply turned his back upon him. The stranger thereupon drew a white +handkerchief from his pocket and wound it about his right hand. Then +he seized the carafe and emptied it at a draught. The Marquis, staring +vacantly into the tall mirror across the room, without a thought of +breaking his implicit promise, saw the stranger's figure distinctly +reflected by the opposite looking-glass, and saw, too, a red stain +suddenly appear through the folds of the white bandage. The man's hands +were steeped in blood. + +"Ah! you saw me!" cried the other. He had drunk off the water and +wrapped himself again in his cloak, and now scrutinized the General +suspiciously. "It is all over with me! Here they come!" + +"I don't hear anything," said the Marquis. + +"You have not the same interest that I have in listening for sounds in +the air." + +"You have been fighting a duel, I suppose, to be in such a state?" +queried the General, not a little disturbed by the color of those broad, +dark patches staining his visitor's cloak. + +"Yes, a duel; you have it," said the other, and a bitter smile flitted +over his lips. + +As he spoke a sound rang along the distant road, a sound of galloping +horses; but so faint as yet, that it was the merest dawn of a sound. The +General's trained ear recognized the advance of a troop of regulars. + +"That is the gendarmerie," said he. + +He glanced at his prisoner to reassure him after his own involuntary +indiscretion, took the lamp, and went down to the salon. He had scarcely +laid the key of the room above upon the chimney-piece when the hoof +beats sounded louder and came swiftly nearer and nearer the house. The +General felt a shiver of excitement, and indeed the horses stopped at +the house door; a few words were exchanged among the men, and one +of them dismounted and knocked loudly. There was no help for it; the +General went to open the door. He could scarcely conceal his inward +perturbation at the sight of half a dozen gendarmes outside, the metal +rims of their caps gleaming like silver in the moonlight. + +"My lord," said the corporal, "have you heard a man run past towards the +barrier within the last few minutes?" + +"Towards the barrier? No." + +"Have you opened the door to any one?" + +"Now, am I in the habit of answering the door myself--" + +"I ask your pardon, General, but just now it seems to me that--" + +"Really!" cried the Marquis wrathfully. "Have you a mind to try joking +with me? What right have you--?" + +"None at all, none at all, my lord," cried the corporal, hastily putting +in a soft answer. "You will excuse our zeal. We know, of course, that a +peer of France is not likely to harbor a murderer at this time of night; +but as we want any information we can get--" + +"A murderer!" cried the General. "Who can have been--" + +"M. le Baron de Mauny has just been murdered. It was a blow from an axe, +and we are in hot pursuit of the criminal. We know for certain that he +is somewhere in this neighborhood, and we shall hunt him down. By your +leave, General," and the man swung himself into the saddle as he spoke. +It was well that he did so, for a corporal of gendarmerie trained to +alert observation and quick surmise would have had his suspicions at +once if he had caught sight of the General's face. Everything that +passed through the soldier's mind was faithfully revealed in his frank +countenance. + +"Is it known who the murderer is?" asked he. + +"No," said the other, now in the saddle. "He left the bureau full of +banknotes and gold untouched." + +"It was revenge, then," said the Marquis. + +"On an old man? pshaw! No, no, the fellow hadn't time to take it, that +was all," and the corporal galloped after his comrades, who were almost +out of sight by this time. + +For a few minutes the General stood, a victim to perplexities which need +no explanation; but in a moment he heard the servants returning home, +their voices were raised in some sort of dispute at the cross-roads +of Montreuil. When they came in, he gave vent to his feelings in an +explosion of rage, his wrath fell upon them like a thunderbolt, and all +the echoes of the house trembled at the sound of his voice. In the +midst of the storm his own man, the boldest and cleverest of the +party, brought out an excuse; they had been stopped, he said, by the +gendarmerie at the gate of Montreuil, a murder had been committed, and +the police were in pursuit. In a moment the General's anger vanished, +he said not another word; then, bethinking himself of his own singular +position, drily ordered them all off to bed at once, and left them +amazed at his readiness to accept their fellow servant's lying excuse. + +While these incidents took place in the yard, an apparently trifling +occurrence had changed the relative positions of three characters in +this story. The Marquis had scarcely left the room before his wife +looked first towards the key on the mantel-shelf, and then at Helene; +and, after some wavering, bent towards her daughter and said in a low +voice, "Helene your father has left the key on the chimney-piece." + +The girl looked up in surprise and glanced timidly at her mother. The +Marquise's eyes sparkled with curiosity. + +"Well, mamma?" she said, and her voice had a troubled ring. + +"I should like to know what is going on upstairs. If there is anybody up +there, he has not stirred yet. Just go up--" + +"_I_?" cried the girl, with something like horror in her tones. + +"Are you afraid?" + +"No, mamma, but I thought I heard a man's footsteps." + +"If I could go myself, I should not have asked you to go, Helene," said +her mother with cold dignity. "If your father were to come back and did +not see me, he would go to look for me perhaps, but he would not notice +your absence." + +"Madame, if you bid me go, I will go," said Helene, "but I shall lose my +father's good opinion--" + +"What is this!" cried the Marquise in a sarcastic tone. "But since you +take a thing that was said in joke in earnest, I now _order_ you to go +upstairs and see who is in the room above. Here is the key, child. When +your father told you to say nothing about this thing that happened, he +did not forbid you to go up to the room. Go at once--and learn that a +daughter ought never to judge her mother." + +The last words were spoken with all the severity of a justly offended +mother. The Marquise took the key and handed it to Helene, who rose +without a word and left the room. + +"My mother can always easily obtain her pardon," thought the girl; "but +as for me, my father will never think the same of me again. Does she +mean to rob me of his tenderness? Does she want to turn me out of his +house?" + +These were the thoughts that set her imagination in a sudden ferment, as +she went down the dark passage to the mysterious door at the end. When +she stood before it, her mental confusion grew to a fateful pitch. +Feelings hitherto forced down into inner depths crowded up at the +summons of these confused thoughts. Perhaps hitherto she had never +believed that a happy life lay before her, but now, in this awful +moment, her despair was complete. She shook convulsively as she set the +key in the lock; so great indeed was her agitation, that she stopped for +a moment and laid her hand on her heart, as if to still the heavy throbs +that sounded in her ears. Then she opened the door. + +The creaking of the hinges sounded doubtless in vain on the murderer's +ears. Acute as were his powers of hearing, he stood as if lost in +thought, and so motionless that he might have been glued to the wall +against which he leaned. In the circle of semi-opaque darkness, dimly +lit by the bull's-eye lantern, he looked like the shadowy figure of +some dead knight, standing for ever in his shadowy mortuary niche in +the gloom of some Gothic chapel. Drops of cold sweat trickled over the +broad, sallow forehead. An incredible fearlessness looked out from every +tense feature. His eyes of fire were fixed and tearless; he seemed to +be watching some struggle in the darkness beyond him. Stormy thoughts +passed swiftly across a face whose firm decision spoke of a character +of no common order. His whole person, bearing, and frame bore out the +impression of a tameless spirit. The man looked power and strength +personified; he stood facing the darkness as if it were the visible +image of his own future. + +These physical characteristics had made no impression upon the General, +familiar as he was with the powerful faces of the group of giants +gathered about Napoleon; speculative curiosity, moreover, as to the +why and wherefore of the apparition had completely filled his mind; but +Helene, with feminine sensitiveness to surface impressions, was struck +by the blended chaos of light and darkness, grandeur and passion, +suggesting a likeness between this stranger and Lucifer recovering from +his fall. Suddenly the storm apparent in his face was stilled as if by +magic; and the indefinable power to sway which the stranger exercised +upon others, and perhaps unconsciously and as by reflex action upon +himself, spread its influence about him with the progressive swiftness +of a flood. A torrent of thought rolled away from his brow as his face +resumed its ordinary expression. Perhaps it was the strangeness of this +meeting, or perhaps it was the mystery into which she had penetrated, +that held the young girl spellbound in the doorway, so that she could +look at a face pleasant to behold and full of interest. For some moments +she stood in the magical silence; a trouble had come upon her never +known before in her young life. Perhaps some exclamation broke from +Helene, perhaps she moved unconsciously; or it may be that the hunted +criminal returned of his own accord from the world of ideas to the +material world, and heard some one breathing in the room; however it +was, he turned his head towards his host's daughter, and saw dimly in +the shadow a noble face and queenly form, which he must have taken for +an angel's, so motionless she stood, so vague and like a spirit. + +"Monsieur..." a trembling voice cried. + +The murderer trembled. + +"A woman!" he cried under his breath. "Is it possible? Go," he cried, "I +deny that any one has a right to pity, to absolve, or condemn me. I +must live alone. Go, my child," he added, with an imperious gesture, "I +should ill requite the service done me by the master of the house if I +were to allow a single creature under his roof to breathe the same air +with me. I must submit to be judged by the laws of the world." + +The last words were uttered in a lower voice. Even as he realized with +a profound intuition all the manifold misery awakened by that melancholy +thought, the glance that he gave Helene had something of the power of +the serpent, stirring a whole dormant world in the mind of the strange +girl before him. To her that glance was like a light revealing unknown +lands. She was stricken with strange trouble, helpless, quelled by a +magnetic power exerted unconsciously. Trembling and ashamed, she went +out and returned to the salon. She had scarcely entered the room before +her father came back, so that she had not time to say a word to her +mother. + +The General was wholly absorbed in thought. He folded his arms, and +paced silently to and fro between the windows which looked out upon the +street and the second row which gave upon the garden. His wife lay the +sleeping Abel on her knee, and little Moina lay in untroubled slumber in +the low chair, like a bird in its nest. Her older sister stared into the +fire, a skein of silk in one hand, a needle in the other. + +Deep silence prevailed, broken only by lagging footsteps on the stairs, +as one by one the servants crept away to bed; there was an occasional +burst of stifled laughter, a last echo of the wedding festivity, or +doors were opened as they still talked among themselves, then shut. A +smothered sound came now and again from the bedrooms, a chair fell, the +old coachman coughed feebly, then all was silent. + +In a little while the dark majesty with which sleeping earth is invested +at midnight brought all things under its sway. No lights shone but the +light of the stars. The frost gripped the ground. There was not a sound +of a voice, nor a living creature stirring. The crackling of the fire +only seemed to make the depth of the silence more fully felt. + +The church clock of Montreuil had just struck one, when an almost +inaudible sound of a light footstep came from the second flight of +stairs. The Marquis and his daughter, both believing that M. de Mauny's +murderer was a prisoner above, thought that one of the maids had come +down, and no one was at all surprised to hear the door open in the +ante-chamber. Quite suddenly the murderer appeared in their midst. The +Marquis himself was sunk in deep musings, the mother and daughter were +silent, the one from keen curiosity, the other from sheer astonishment, +so that the visitor was almost half-way across the room when he spoke to +the General. + +"Sir, the two hours are almost over," he said, in a voice that was +strangely calm and musical. + +"_You here_!" cried the General. "By what means----?" and he gave wife +and daughter a formidable questioning glance. Helene grew red as fire. + +"You!" he went on, in a tone filled with horror. "_You_ among us! A +murderer covered with blood! You are a blot on this picture! Go, go +out!" he added in a burst of rage. + +At that word "murderer," the Marquise cried out; as for Helene, it +seemed to mark an epoch in her life, there was not a trace of surprise +in her face. She looked as if she had been waiting for this--for him. +Those so vast thoughts of hers had found a meaning. The punishment +reserved by Heaven for her sins flamed out before her. In her own eyes +she was as great a criminal as this murderer; she confronted him with +her quiet gaze; she was his fellow, his sister. It seemed to her that in +this accident the command of God had been made manifest. If she had been +a few years older, reason would have disposed of her remorse, but at +this moment she was like one distraught. + +The stranger stood impassive and self-possessed; a scornful smile +overspread his features and his thick, red lips. + +"You appreciate the magnanimity of my behavior very badly," he said +slowly. "I would not touch with my fingers the glass of water you +brought me to allay my thirst; I did not so much as think of washing my +blood-stained hands under your roof; I am going away, leaving nothing +of _my crime_" (here his lips were compressed) "but the memory; I have +tried to leave no trace of my presence in this house. Indeed, I would +not even allow your daughter to--" + +"_My daughter_!" cried the General, with a horror-stricken glance at +Helene. "Vile wretch, go, or I will kill you--" + +"The two hours are not yet over," said the other; "if you kill me or +give me up, you must lower yourself in your own eyes--and in mine." + +At these last words, the General turned to stare at the criminal in dumb +amazement; but he could not endure the intolerable light in those eyes +which for the second time disorganized his being. He was afraid of +showing weakness once more, conscious as he was that his will was weaker +already. + +"An old man! You can never have seen a family," he said, with a father's +glance at his wife and children. + +"Yes, an old man," echoed the stranger, frowning slightly. + +"Fly!" cried the General, but he did not dare to look at his guest. "Our +compact is broken. I shall not kill you. No! I will never be purveyor to +the scaffold. But go out. You make us shudder." + +"I know that," said the other patiently. "There is not a spot on French +soil where I can set foot and be safe; but if man's justice, like God's, +took all into account, if man's justice deigned to inquire which was the +monster--the murderer or his victim--then I might hold up my head among +my fellows. Can you not guess that other crimes preceded that blow from +an axe? I constituted myself his judge and executioner; I stepped in +where man's justice failed. That was my crime. Farewell, sir. Bitter +though you have made your hospitality, I shall not forget it. I shall +always bear in my heart a feeling of gratitude towards one man in the +world, and you are that man.... But I could wish that you had showed +yourself more generous!" + +He turned towards the door, but in the same instant Helene leaned to +whisper something in her mother's ear. + +"Ah!..." + +At the cry that broke from his wife, the General trembled as if he had +seen Moina lying dead. There stood Helene and the murderer had turned +instinctively, with something like anxiety about these folk in his face. + +"What is it, dear?" asked the General. + +"Helene wants to go with him." + +The murderer's face flushed. + +"If that is how my mother understands an almost involuntary +exclamation," Helene said in a low voice, "I will fulfil her wishes. She +glanced about her with something like fierce pride; then the girl's eyes +fell, and she stood, admirable in her modesty. + +"Helene, did you go up to the room where----?" + +"Yes, father." + +"Helene" (and his voice shook with a convulsive tremor), "is this the +first time that you have seen this man?" + +"Yes, father." + +"Then it is not natural that you should intend to--" + +"If it is not natural, father, at any rate it is true." + +"Oh! child," said the Marquise, lowering her voice, but not so much but +that her husband could hear her, "you are false to all the principles of +honor, modesty, and right which I have tried to cultivate in your +heart. If until this fatal hour you life has only been one lie, there is +nothing to regret in your loss. It can hardly be the moral perfection of +this stranger that attracts you to him? Can it be the kind of power that +commits crime? I have too good an opinion of you to suppose that--" + +"Oh, suppose everything, madame," Helene said coldly. + +But though her force of character sustained this ordeal, her flashing +eyes could scarcely hold the tears that filled them. The stranger, +watching her, guessed the mother's language from the girl's tears, +and turned his eagle glance upon the Marquise. An irresistible power +constrained her to look at this terrible seducer; but as her eyes met +his bright, glittering gaze, she felt a shiver run through her frame, +such a shock as we feel at the sight of a reptile or the contact of a +Leyden jar. + +"Dear!" she cried, turning to her husband, "this is the Fiend himself. +He can divine everything!" + +The General rose to his feet and went to the bell. + +"He means ruin for you," Helene said to the murderer. + +The stranger smiled, took one forward stride, grasped the General's arm, +and compelled him to endure a steady gaze which benumbed the soldier's +brain and left him powerless. + +"I will repay you now for your hospitality," he said, "and then we shall +be quits. I will spare you the shame by giving myself up. After all, +what should I do now with my life?" + +"You could repent," answered Helene, and her glance conveyed such hope +as only glows in a young girl's eyes. + +"_I shall never repent_," said the murderer in a sonorous voice, as he +raised his head proudly. + +"His hands are stained with blood," the father said. + +"I will wipe it away," she answered. + +"But do you so much as know whether he cares for you?" said her father, +not daring now to look at the stranger. + +The murderer came up a little nearer. Some light within seemed to glow +through Helene's beauty, grave and maidenly though it was, coloring and +bringing into relief, as it were, the least details, the most delicate +lines in her face. The stranger, with that terrible face still blazing +in his eyes, gave one tender glance to her enchanting loveliness, then +he spoke, his tones revealing how deeply he had been moved. + +"And if I refuse to allow this sacrifice of yourself, and so discharge +my debt of two hours of existence to your father; is not this love, love +for yourself alone?" + +"Then do you too reject me?" Helene's cry rang painfully through the +hearts of all who heard her. "Farewell, then, to you all; I will die." + +"What does this mean?" asked the father and mother. + +Helene gave her mother an eloquent glance and lowered her eyes. + +Since the first attempt made by the General and his wife to contest +by word or action the intruder's strange presumption to the right of +staying in their midst, from their first experience of the power of +those glittering eyes, a mysterious torpor had crept over them, and +their benumbed faculties struggled in vain with the preternatural +influence. The air seemed to have suddenly grown so heavy, that they +could scarcely breathe; yet, while they could not find the reason of +this feeling of oppression, a voice within told them that this magnetic +presence was the real cause of their helplessness. In this moral agony, +it flashed across the General that he must make every effort to overcome +this influence on his daughter's reeling brain; he caught her by the +waist and drew her into the embrasure of a window, as far as possible +from the murderer. + +"Darling," he murmured, "if some wild love has been suddenly born in +your heart, I cannot believe that you have not the strength of soul to +quell the mad impulse; your innocent life, your pure and dutiful soul, +has given me too many proofs of your character. There must be something +behind all this. Well, this heart of mine is full of indulgence, you can +tell everything to me; even if it breaks, dear child, I can be silent +about my grief, and keep your confession a secret. What is it? Are you +jealous of our love for your brothers or your little sister? Is it some +love trouble? Are you unhappy here at home? Tell me about it, tell me +the reasons that urge you to leave your home, to rob it of its greatest +charm, to leave your mother and brothers and your little sister?" + +"I am in love with no one, father, and jealous of no one, not even of +your friend the diplomatist, M. de Vandenesse." + +The Marquise turned pale; her daughter saw this, and stopped short. + +"Sooner or later I must live under some man's protection, must I not?" + +"That is true." + +"Do we ever know," she went on, "the human being to whom we link our +destinies? Now, I believe in this man." + +"Oh, child," said the General, raising his voice, "you have no idea of +all the misery that lies in store for you." + +"I am thinking of _his_." + +"What a life!" groaned the father. + +"A woman's life," the girl murmured. + +"You have a great knowledge of life!" exclaimed the Marquise, finding +speech at last. + +"Madame, my answers are shaped by the questions; but if you desire it, I +will speak more clearly." + +"Speak out, my child... I am a mother." + +Mother and daughter looked each other in the face, and the Marquise said +no more. At last she said: + +"Helene, if you have any reproaches to make, I would rather bear them +than see you go away with a man from whom the whole world shrinks in +horror." + +"Then you see yourself, madame, that but for me he would be quite +alone." + +"That will do, madame," the General cried; "we have but one daughter +left to us now," and he looked at Moina, who slept on. "As for you," he +added, turning to Helene, "I will put you in a convent." + +"So be it, father," she said, in calm despair, "I shall die there. You +are answerable to God alone for my life and for _his_ soul." + +A deep sullen silence fell after these words. The on-lookers during +this strange scene, so utterly at variance with all the sentiments of +ordinary life, shunned each other's eyes. + +Suddenly the Marquis happened to glance at his pistols. He caught up one +of them, cocked the weapon, and pointed it at the intruder. At the click +of firearms the other turned his piercing gaze full upon the General; +the soldier's arm slackened indescribably and fell heavily to his side. +The pistol dropped to the floor. + +"Girl, you are free," said he, exhausted by this ghastly struggle. "Kiss +your mother, if she will let you kiss her. For my own part, I wish never +to see nor to hear of you again." + +"Helene," the mother began, "only think of the wretched life before +you." + +A sort of rattling sound came from the intruder's deep chest, all eyes +were turned to him. Disdain was plainly visible in his face. + +The General rose to his feet. "My hospitality has cost me dear," he +cried. "Before you came you had taken an old man's life; now your are +dealing a deadly blow at a whole family. Whatever happens, there must be +unhappiness in this house." + +"And if your daughter is happy?" asked the other, gazing steadily at the +General. + +The father made a superhuman effort for self-control. "If she is happy +with you," he said, "she is not worth regretting." + +Helene knelt timidly before her father. + +"Father, I love and revere you," she said, "whether you lavish all the +treasures of your kindness upon me, or make me feel to the full the +rigor of disgrace.... But I entreat that your last words of farewell +shall not be words of anger." + +The General could not trust himself to look at her. The stranger came +nearer; there was something half-diabolical, half-divine in the smile +that he gave Helene. + +"Angel of pity, you that do not shrink in horror from a murderer, come, +since you persist in your resolution of intrusting your life to me." + +"Inconceivable!" cried her father. + +The Marquise then looked strangely at her daughter, opened her arms, and +Helene fled to her in tears. + +"Farewell," she said, "farewell, mother!" The stranger trembled as +Helene, undaunted, made sign to him that she was ready. She kissed her +father's hand; and, as if performing a duty, gave a hasty kiss to Moina +and little Abel, then she vanished with the murderer. + +"Which way are they going?" exclaimed the General, listening to the +footsteps of the two fugitives.--"Madame," he turned to his wife, "I +think I must be dreaming; there is some mystery behind all this, I do +not understand it; you must know what it means." + +The Marquise shivered. + +"For some time past your daughter has grown extraordinarily romantic and +strangely high-flown in her ideas. In spite of the pains I have taken to +combat these tendencies in her character--" + +"This will not do----" began the General, but fancying that he heard +footsteps in the garden, he broke off to fling open the window. + +"Helene!" he shouted. + +His voice was lost in the darkness like a vain prophecy. The utterance +of that name, to which there should never be answer any more, acted +like a counterspell; it broke the charm and set him free from the evil +enchantment which lay upon him. It was as if some spirit passed over +his face. He now saw clearly what had taken place, and cursed his +incomprehensible weakness. A shiver of heat rushed from his heart to +his head and feet; he became himself once more, terrible, thirsting for +revenge. He raised a dreadful cry. + +"Help!" he thundered, "help!" + +He rushed to the bell-pull, pulled till the bells rang with a strange +clamor of din, pulled till the cord gave way. The whole house was roused +with a start. Still shouting, he flung open the windows that looked upon +the street, called for the police, caught up his pistols, and fired them +off to hurry the mounted patrols, the newly-aroused servants, and the +neighbors. The dogs barked at the sound of their master's voice; the +horses neighed and stamped in their stalls. The quiet night was suddenly +filled with hideous uproar. The General on the staircase, in pursuit +of his daughter, saw the scared faces of the servants flocking from all +parts of the house. + +"My daughter!" he shouted. "Helene has been carried off. Search +the garden. Keep a lookout on the road! Open the gates for the +gendarmerie!--Murder! Help!" + +With the strength of fury he snapped the chain and let loose the great +house-dog. + +"Helene!" he cried, "Helene!" + +The dog sprang out like a lion, barking furiously, and dashed into the +garden, leaving the General far behind. A troop of horses came along the +road at a gallop, and he flew to open the gates himself. + +"Corporal!" he shouted, "cut off the retreat of M. de Mauny's murderer. +They have gone through my garden. Quick! Put a cordon of men to watch +the ways by the Butte de Picardie.--I will beat up the grounds, parks, +and houses.--The rest of you keep a lookout along the road," he ordered +the servants, "form a chain between the barrier and Versailles. Forward, +every man of you!" + +He caught up the rifle which his man had brought out, and dashed into +the garden. + +"Find them!" he called to the dog. + +An ominous baying came in answer from the distance, and he plunged in +the direction from which the growl seemed to come. + +It was seven o'clock in the morning; all the search made by gendarmes, +servants, and neighbors had been fruitless, and the dog had not come +back. The General entered the salon, empty now for him though the other +three children were there; he was worn out with fatigue, and looked old +already with that night's work. + +"You have been very cold to your daughter," he said, turning his eyes +on his wife.--"And now this is all that is left to us of her," he added, +indicating the embroidery frame, and the flower just begun. "Only just +now she was there, and now she is lost... lost!" + +Tears followed; he hid his face in his hands, and for a few minutes he +said no more; he could not bear the sight of the room, which so short +a time ago had made a setting to a picture of the sweetest family +happiness. The winter dawn was struggling with the dying lamplight; the +tapers burned down to their paper-wreaths and flared out; everything was +all in keeping with the father's despair. + +"This must be destroyed," he said after a pause, pointing to the +tambour-frame. "I shall never bear to see anything again that reminds us +of _her_!" + +The terrible Christmas night when the Marquis and his wife lost their +oldest daughter, powerless to oppose the mysterious influence exercised +by the man who involuntarily, as it were, stole Helene from them, was +like a warning sent by Fate. The Marquis was ruined by the failure of +his stock-broker; he borrowed money on his wife's property, and lost +it in the endeavor to retrieve his fortunes. Driven to desperate +expedients, he left France. Six years went by. His family seldom had +news of him; but a few days before Spain recognized the independence of +the American Republics, he wrote that he was coming home. + +So, one fine morning, it happened that several French merchants were on +board a Spanish brig that lay a few leagues out from Bordeaux, impatient +to reach their native land again, with wealth acquired by long years of +toil and perilous adventures in Venezuela and Mexico. + +One of the passengers, a man who looked aged by trouble rather than +by years, was leaning against the bulwark netting, apparently quite +unaffected by the sight to be seen from the upper deck. The bright +day, the sense that the voyage was safely over, had brought all the +passengers above to greet their land. The larger number of them insisted +that they could see, far off in the distance, the houses and lighthouses +on the coast of Gascony and the Tower of Cardouan, melting into the +fantastic erections of white cloud along the horizon. But for the silver +fringe that played about their bows, and the long furrow swiftly effaced +in their wake, they might have been perfectly still in mid-ocean, so +calm was the sea. The sky was magically clear, the dark blue of the +vault above paled by imperceptible gradations, until it blended with +the bluish water, a gleaming line that sparkled like stars marking the +dividing line of sea. The sunlight caught myriads of facets over the +wide surface of the ocean, in such a sort that the vast plains of salt +water looked perhaps more full of light than the fields of sky. + +The brig had set all her canvas. The snowy sails, swelled by the +strangely soft wind, the labyrinth of cordage, and the yellow flags +flying at the masthead, all stood out sharp and uncompromisingly clear +against the vivid background of space, sky, and sea; there was nothing +to alter the color but the shadow cast by the great cloudlike sails. + +A glorious day, a fair wind, and the fatherland in sight, a sea like a +mill-pond, the melancholy sound of the ripples, a fair, solitary vessel, +gliding across the surface of the water like a woman stealing out to +a tryst--it was a picture full of harmony. That mere speck full of +movement was a starting-point whence the soul of man could descry the +immutable vast of space. Solitude and bustling life, silence and sound, +were all brought together in strange abrupt contrast; you could not +tell where life, or sound, or silence, and nothingness lay, and no human +voice broke the divine spell. + +The Spanish captain, the crew, and the French passengers sat or stood, +in a mood of devout ecstasy, in which many memories blended. There was +idleness in the air. The beaming faces told of complete forgetfulness +of past hardships, the men were rocked on the fair vessel as in a golden +dream. Yet, from time to time the elderly passenger, leaning over the +bulwark nettings, looked with something like uneasiness at the horizon. +Distrust of the ways of Fate could be read in his whole face; he seemed +to fear that he should not reach the coast of France in time. This +was the Marquis. Fortune had not been deaf to his despairing cry and +struggles. After five years of endeavor and painful toil, he was a +wealthy man once more. In his impatience to reach his home again and to +bring the good news to his family, he had followed the example set by +some French merchants in Havana, and embarked with them on a Spanish +vessel with a cargo for Bordeaux. And now, grown tired of evil +forebodings, his fancy was tracing out for him the most delicious +pictures of past happiness. In that far-off brown line of land he seemed +to see his wife and children. He sat in his place by the fireside; they +were crowding about him; he felt their caresses. Moina had grown to be +a young girl; she was beautiful, and tall, and striking. The fancied +picture had grown almost real, when the tears filled his eyes, and, to +hide his emotion, he turned his face towards the sea-line, opposite the +hazy streak that meant land. + +"There she is again.... She is following us!" he said. + +"What?" cried the Spanish captain. + +"There is a vessel," muttered the General. + +"I saw her yesterday," answered Captain Gomez. He looked at his +interlocutor as if to ask what he thought; then he added in the +General's ear, "She has been chasing us all along." + +"Then why she has not come up with us, I do not know," said the General, +"for she is a faster sailor than your damned _Saint-Ferdinand_." + +"She will have damaged herself, sprung a leak--" + +"She is gaining on us!" the General broke in. + +"She is a Columbian privateer," the captain said in his ear, "and we are +still six leagues from land, and the wind is dropping." + +"She is not _going_ ahead, she is flying, as if she knew that in two +hours' time her prey would escape her. What audacity!" + +"Audacity!" cried the captain. "Oh! she is not called the _Othello_ for +nothing. Not so long back she sank a Spanish frigate that carried thirty +guns! This is the one thing I was afraid of, for I had a notion that she +was cruising about somewhere off the Antilles.--Aha!" he added after a +pause, as he watched the sails of his own vessel, "the wind is rising; +we are making way. Get through we must, for 'the Parisian' will show us +no mercy." + +"She is making way too!" returned the General. + +The _Othello_ was scarce three leagues away by this time; and although +the conversation between the Marquis and Captain Gomez had taken place +apart, passengers and crew, attracted by the sudden appearance of a +sail, came to that side of the vessel. With scarcely an exception, +however, they took the privateer for a merchantman, and watched her +course with interest, till all at once a sailor shouted with some energy +of language: + +"By Saint-James, it is all up with us! Yonder is the Parisian captain!" + +At that terrible name dismay, and a panic impossible to describe, spread +through the brig. The Spanish captain's orders put energy into the +crew for a while; and in his resolute determination to make land at all +costs, he set all the studding sails, and crowded on every stitch +of canvas on board. But all this was not the work of a moment; and +naturally the men did not work together with that wonderful unanimity +so fascinating to watch on board a man-of-war. The _Othello_ meanwhile, +thanks to the trimming of her sails, flew over the water like a swallow; +but she was making, to all appearance, so little headway, that the +unlucky Frenchmen began to entertain sweet delusive hopes. At last, +after unheard-of efforts, the _Saint-Ferdinand_ sprang forward, Gomez +himself directing the shifting of the sheets with voice and gesture, +when all at once the man at the tiller, steering at random (purposely, +no doubt), swung the vessel round. The wind striking athwart the beam, +the sails shivered so unexpectedly that the brig heeled to one side, the +booms were carried away, and the vessel was completely out of hand. +The captain's face grew whiter than his sails with unutterable rage. He +sprang upon the man at the tiller, drove his dagger at him in such blind +fury, that he missed him, and hurled the weapon overboard. Gomez took +the helm himself, and strove to right the gallant vessel. Tears of +despair rose to his eyes, for it is harder to lose the result of our +carefully-laid plans through treachery than to face imminent death. +But the more the captain swore, the less the men worked, and it was +he himself who fired the alarm-gun, hoping to be heard on shore. The +privateer, now gaining hopelessly upon them, replied with a cannon-shot, +which struck the water ten fathoms away from the _Saint-Ferdinand_. + +"Thunder of heaven!" cried the General, "that was a close shave! They +must have guns made on purpose." + +"Oh! when that one yonder speaks, look you, you have to hold your +tongue," said a sailor. "The Parisian would not be afraid to meet an +English man-of-war." + +"It is all over with us," the captain cried in desperation; he had +pointed his telescope landwards, and saw not a sign from the shore. "We +are further from the coast than I thought." + +"Why do you despair?" asked the General. "All your passengers are +Frenchmen; they have chartered your vessel. The privateer is a Parisian, +you say? Well and good, run up the white flag, and--" + +"And he would run us down," retorted the captain. "He can be anything he +likes when he has a mind to seize on a rich booty!" + +"Oh! if he is a pirate--" + +"Pirate!" said the ferocious looking sailor. "Oh! he always has the law +on his side, or he knows how to be on the same side as the law." + +"Very well," said the General, raising his eyes, "let us make up our +minds to it," and his remaining fortitude was still sufficient to keep +back the tears. + +The words were hardly out of his mouth before a second cannon-shot, +better aimed, came crashing through the hull of the _Saint-Ferdinand_. + +"Heave to!" cried the captain gloomily. + +The sailor who had commended the Parisian's law-abiding proclivities +showed himself a clever hand at working a ship after this desperate +order was given. The crew waited for half an hour in an agony of +suspense and the deepest dismay. The _Saint-Ferdinand_ had four millions +of piastres on board, the whole fortunes of the five passengers, and the +General's eleven hundred thousand francs. At length the _Othello_ lay +not ten gunshots away, so that those on the _Saint-Ferdinand_ could look +into the muzzles of her loaded guns. The vessel seemed to be borne along +by a breeze sent by the Devil himself, but the eyes of an expert would +have discovered the secret of her speed at once. You had but to look +for a moment at the rake of her stern, her long, narrow keel, her tall +masts, to see the cut of her sails, the wonderful lightness of her +rigging, and the ease and perfect seamanship with which her crew trimmed +her sails to the wind. Everything about her gave the impression of the +security of power in this delicately curved inanimate creature, swift +and intelligent as a greyhound or some bird of prey. The privateer +crew stood silent, ready in case of resistance to shatter the wretched +merchantman, which, luckily for her, remained motionless, like a +schoolboy caught in flagrant delict by a master. + +"We have guns on board!" cried the General, clutching the Spanish +captain's hand. But the courage in Gomez's eyes was the courage of +despair. + +"Have we men?" he said. + +The Marquis looked round at the crew of the _Saint-Ferdinand_, and a +cold chill ran through him. There stood the four merchants, pale and +quaking for fear, while the crew gathered about some of their own number +who appeared to be arranging to go over in a body to the enemy. They +watched the _Othello_ with greed and curiosity in their faces. The +captain, the Marquis, and the mate exchanged glances; they were the only +three who had a thought for any but themselves. + +"Ah! Captain Gomez, when I left my home and country, my heart was half +dead with the bitterness of parting, and now must I bid it good-bye once +more when I am bringing back happiness and ease for my children?" + +The General turned his head away towards the sea, with tears of rage in +his eyes--and saw the steersman swimming out to the privateer. + +"This time it will be good-bye for good," said the captain by way +of answer, and the dazed look in the Frenchman's eyes startled the +Spaniard. + +By this time the two vessels were almost alongside, and at the first +sight of the enemy's crew the General saw that Gomez's gloomy prophecy +was only too true. The three men at each gun might have been bronze +statues, standing like athletes, with their rugged features, their bare +sinewy arms, men whom Death himself had scarcely thrown off their feet. + +The rest of the crew, well armed, active, light, and vigorous, also +stood motionless. Toil had hardened, and the sun had deeply tanned, +those energetic faces; their eyes glittered like sparks of fire with +infernal glee and clear-sighted courage. Perfect silence on the upper +deck, now black with men, bore abundant testimony to the rigorous +discipline and strong will which held these fiends incarnate in check. + +The captain of the _Othello_ stood with folded arms at the foot of the +main mast; he carried no weapons, but an axe lay on the deck beside him. +His face was hidden by the shadow of a broad felt hat. The men looked +like dogs crouching before their master. Gunners, soldiers, and ship's +crew turned their eyes first on his face, and then on the merchant +vessel. + +The two brigs came up alongside, and the shock of contact roused the +privateer captain from his musings; he spoke a word in the ear of the +lieutenant who stood beside him. + +"Grappling-irons!" shouted the latter, and the _Othello_ grappled +the _Saint-Ferdinand_ with miraculous quickness. The captain of the +privateer gave his orders in a low voice to the lieutenant, who repeated +them; the men, told off in succession for each duty, went on the upper +deck of the _Saint-Ferdinand_, like seminarists going to mass. They +bound crew and passengers hand and foot and seized the booty. In the +twinkling of an eye, provisions and barrels full of piastres were +transferred to the _Othello_; the General thought that he must be +dreaming when he himself, likewise bound, was flung down on a bale of +goods as if he had been part of the cargo. + +A brief conference took place between the captain of the privateer and +his lieutenant and a sailor, who seemed to be the mate of the +vessel; then the mate gave a whistle, and the men jumped on board +the _Saint-Ferdinand_, and completely dismantled her with the nimble +dexterity of a soldier who strips a dead comrade of a coveted overcoat +and shoes. + +"It is all over with us," said the Spanish captain coolly. He had eyed +the three chiefs during their confabulation, and saw that the sailors +were proceeding to pull his vessel to pieces. + +"Why so?" asked the General. + +"What would you have them do with us?" returned the Spaniard. "They +have just come to the conclusion that they will scarcely sell the +_Saint-Ferdinand_ in any French or Spanish port, so they are going to +sink her to be rid of her. As for us, do you suppose that they will put +themselves to the expense of feeding us, when they don't know what port +they are to put into?" + +The words were scarcely out of the captain's mouth before a hideous +outcry went up, followed by a dull splashing sound, as several bodies +were thrown overboard. He turned, the four merchants were no longer to +be seen, but eight ferocious-looking gunners were still standing with +their arms raised above their heads. He shuddered. + +"What did I tell you?" the Spanish captain asked coolly. + +The Marquis rose to his feet with a spring. The surface of the sea was +quite smooth again; he could not so much as see the place where his +unhappy fellow-passengers had disappeared. By this time they were +sinking down, bound hand and foot, below the waves, if, indeed, the fish +had not devoured them already. + +Only a few paces away, the treacherous steersman and the sailor who had +boasted of the Parisian's power were fraternizing with the crew of the +_Othello_, and pointing out those among their own number, who, in their +opinion, were worthy to join the crew of the privateer. Then the boys +tied the rest together by the feet in spite of frightful oaths. It +was soon over; the eight gunners seized the doomed men and flung them +overboard without more ado, watching the different ways in which the +drowning victims met their death, their contortions, their last agony, +with a sort of malignant curiosity, but with no sign of amusement, +surprise, or pity. For them it was an ordinary event to which seemingly +they were quite accustomed. The older men looked instead with grim, set +smiles at the casks of piastres about the main mast. + +The General and Captain Gomez, left seated on a bale of goods, consulted +each other with well-nigh hopeless looks; they were, in a sense, the +sole survivors of the _Saint-Ferdinand_, for the seven men pointed out +by the spies were transformed amid rejoicings into Peruvians. + +"What atrocious villains!" the General cried. Loyal and generous +indignation silenced prudence and pain on his own account. + +"They do it because they must," Gomez answered coolly. "If you came +across one of those fellows, you would run him through the body, would +you not?" + +The lieutenant now came up to the Spaniard. + +"Captain," said he, "the Parisian has heard of you. He says that you +are the only man who really knows the passages of the Antilles and the +Brazilian coast. Will you--" + +The captain cut him short with a scornful exclamation. + +"I shall die like a sailor," he said, "and a loyal Spaniard and a +Christian. Do you hear?" + +"Heave him overboard!" shouted the lieutenant, and a couple of gunners +seized on Gomez. + +"You cowards!" roared the General, seizing hold of the men. + +"Don't get too excited, old boy," said the lieutenant. "If your red +ribbon has made some impression upon our captain, I myself do not care +a rap for it.--You and I will have our little bit of talk together +directly." + +A smothered sound, with no accompanying cry, told the General that the +gallant captain had died "like a sailor," as he had said. + +"My money or death!" cried the Marquis, in a fit of rage terrible to +see. + +"Ah! now you talk sensibly!" sneered the lieutenant. "That is the way to +get something out of us----" + +Two of the men came up at a sign and hastened to bind the Frenchmen's +feet, but with unlooked-for boldness he snatched the lieutenant's +cutlass and laid about him like a cavalry officer who knows his +business. + +"Brigands that you are! You shall not chuck one of Napoleon's troopers +over a ship's side like an oyster!" + +At the sound of pistol shots fired point blank at the Frenchman, +"the Parisian" looked round from his occupation of superintending the +transfer of the rigging from the _Saint-Ferdinand_. He came up behind +the brave General, seized him, dragged him to the side, and was about +to fling him over with no more concern than if the man had been a broken +spar. They were at the very edge when the General looked into the tawny +eyes of the man who had stolen his daughter. The recognition was mutual. + +The captain of the privateer, his arm still upraised, suddenly swung it +in the contrary direction as if his victim was but a feather weight, and +set him down at the foot of the main mast. A murmur rose on the upper +deck, but the captain glanced round, and there was a sudden silence. + +"This is Helene's father," said the captain in a clear, firm voice. "Woe +to any one who meddles with him!" + +A hurrah of joy went up at the words, a shout rising to the sky like a +prayer of the church; a cry like the first high notes of the _Te Deum_. +The lads swung aloft in the rigging, the men below flung up their caps, +the gunners pounded away on the deck, there was a general thrill of +excitement, an outburst of oaths, yells, and shrill cries in voluble +chorus. The men cheered like fanatics, the General's misgivings +deepened, and he grew uneasy; it seemed to him that there was some +horrible mystery in such wild transports. + +"My daughter!" he cried, as soon as he could speak. "Where is my +daughter?" + +For all answer, the captain of the privateer gave him a searching +glance, one of those glances which throw the bravest man into a +confusion which no theory can explain. The General was mute, not a +little to the satisfaction of the crew; it pleased them to see their +leader exercise the strange power which he possessed over all with whom +he came in contact. Then the captain led the way down a staircase and +flung open the door of a cabin. + +"There she is," he said, and disappeared, leaving the General in a +stupor of bewilderment at the scene before his eyes. + +Helene cried out at the sight of him, and sprang up from the sofa on +which she was lying when the door flew open. So changed was she that +none but a father's eyes could have recognized her. The sun of the +tropics had brought warmer tones into the once pale face, and something +of Oriental charm with that wonderful coloring; there was a certain +grandeur about her, a majestic firmness, a profound sentiment which +impresses itself upon the coarsest nature. Her long, thick hair, falling +in large curls about her queenly throat, gave an added idea of power +to the proud face. The consciousness of that power shone out from every +movement, every line of Helene's form. The rose-tinted nostrils were +dilated slightly with the joy of triumph; the serene happiness of her +life had left its plain tokens in the full development of her beauty. A +certain indefinable virginal grace met in her with the pride of a woman +who is loved. This was a slave and a queen, a queen who would fain obey +that she might reign. + +Her dress was magnificent and elegant in its richness; India muslin was +the sole material, but her sofa and cushions were of cashmere. A Persian +carpet covered the floor in the large cabin, and her four children +playing at her feet were building castles of gems and pearl necklaces +and jewels of price. The air was full of the scent of rare flowers in +Sevres porcelain vases painted by Madame Jacotot; tiny South American +birds, like living rubies, sapphires, and gold, hovered among the +Mexican jessamines and camellias. A pianoforte had been fitted into the +room, and here and there on the paneled walls, covered with red silk, +hung small pictures by great painters--a _Sunset_ by Hippolyte Schinner +beside a Terburg, one of Raphael's Madonnas scarcely yielded in charm to +a sketch by Gericault, while a Gerard Dow eclipsed the painters of the +Empire. On a lacquered table stood a golden plate full of delicious +fruit. Indeed, Helene might have been the sovereign lady of some great +country, and this cabin of hers a boudoir in which her crowned lover +had brought together all earth's treasure to please his consort. The +children gazed with bright, keen eyes at their grandfather. Accustomed +as they were to a life of battle, storm, and tumult, they recalled the +Roman children in David's _Brutus_, watching the fighting and bloodshed +with curious interest. + +"What! is it possible?" cried Helene, catching her father's arm as if to +assure herself that this was no vision. + +"Helene!" + +"Father!" + +They fell into each other's arms, and the old man's embrace was not so +close and warm as Helene's. + +"Were you on board that vessel?" + +"Yes," he answered sadly, and looking at the little ones, who gathered +about him and gazed with wide open eyes. + +"I was about to perish, but--" + +"But for my husband," she broke in. "I see how it was." + +"Ah!" cried the General, "why must I find you again like this, Helene? +After all the many tears that I have shed, must I still groan for your +fate?" + +"And why?" she asked, smiling. "Why should you be sorry to learn that I +am the happiest woman under the sun?" + +"_Happy_?" he cried with a start of surprise. + +"Yes, happy, my kind father," and she caught his hands in hers and +covered them with kisses, and pressed them to her throbbing heart. Her +caresses, and a something in the carriage of her head, were interpreted +yet more plainly by the joy sparkling in her eyes. + +"And how is this?" he asked, wondering at his daughter's life, forgetful +now of everything but the bright glowing face before him. + +"Listen, father; I have for lover, husband, servant, and master one +whose soul is as great as the boundless sea, as infinite in his kindness +as heaven, a god on earth! Never during these seven years has a chance +look, or word, or gesture jarred in the divine harmony of his talk, +his love, his caresses. His eyes have never met mine without a gleam of +happiness in them; there has always been a bright smile on his lips for +me. On deck, his voice rises above the thunder of storms and the +tumult of battle; but here below it is soft and melodious as Rossini's +music--for he has Rossini's music sent for me. I have everything that +woman's caprice can imagine. My wishes are more than fulfilled. In +short, I am a queen on the seas; I am obeyed here as perhaps a queen may +be obeyed.--Ah!" she cried, interrupting herself, "_happy_ did I say? +Happiness is no word to express such bliss as mine. All the happiness +that should have fallen to all the women in the world has been my share. +Knowing one's own great love and self-devotion, to find in _his_ +heart an infinite love in which a woman's soul is lost, and lost for +ever--tell me, is this happiness? I have lived through a thousand lives +even now. Here, I am alone; here, I command. No other woman has set foot +on this noble vessel, and Victor is never more than a few paces distant +from me,--he cannot wander further from me than from stern to prow," she +added, with a shade of mischief in her manner. "Seven years! A love +that outlasts seven years of continual joy, that endures all the tests +brought by all the moments that make up seven years--is this love? Oh, +no, no! it is something better than all that I know of life... human +language fails to express the bliss of heaven." + +A sudden torrent of tears fell from her burning eyes. The four little +ones raised a piteous cry at this, and flocked like chickens about their +mother. The oldest boy struck the General with a threatening look. + +"Abel, darling," said Helene, "I am crying for joy." + +Helene took him on her knee, and the child fondled her, putting his arms +about her queenly neck, as a lion's whelp might play with the lioness. + +"Do you never weary of your life?" asked the General, bewildered by his +daughter's enthusiastic language. + +"Yes," she said, "sometimes, when we are on land, yet even then I have +never parted from my husband." + +"But you need to be fond of music and balls and fetes." + +"His voice is music for me; and for fetes, I devise new toilettes for +him to see. When he likes my dress, it is as if all the world admired +me. Simply for that reason I keep the diamonds and jewels, the precious +things, the flowers and masterpieces of art that he heaps upon me, +saying, 'Helene, as you live out of the world, I will have the world +come to you.' But for that I would fling them all overboard." + +"But there are others on board, wild, reckless men whose passions--" + +"I understand, father," she said smiling. "Do not fear for me. Never +was empress encompassed with more observance than I. The men are very +superstitious; they look upon me as a sort of tutelary genius, the luck +of the vessel. But _he_ is their god; they worship him. Once, and +once only, one of the crew showed disrespect, mere words," she added, +laughing; "but before Victor knew of it, the others flung the offender +overboard, although I forgave him. They love me as their good angel; I +nurse them when they are ill; several times I have been so fortunate as +to save a life, by constant care such as a woman can give. Poor fellows, +they are giants, but they are children at the same time." + +"And when there is fighting overhead?" + +"I am used to it now; I quaked for fear during the first engagement, +but never since.--I am used to such peril, and--I am your daughter," she +said; "I love it." + +"But how if he should fall?" + +"I should die with him." + +"And your children?" + +"They are children of the sea and of danger; they share the life of +their parents. We have but one life, and we do not flinch from it. We +have but one life, our names are written on the same page of the book of +Fate, one skiff bears us and our fortunes, and we know it." + +"Do you so love him that he is more to you than all beside?" + +"All beside?" echoed she. "Let us leave that mystery alone. Yet stay! +there is this dear little one--well, this too is _he_," and straining +Abel to her in a tight clasp, she set eager kisses on his cheeks and +hair. + +"But I can never forget that he has just drowned nine men!" exclaimed +the General. + +"There was no help for it, doubtless," she said, "for he is generous and +humane. He sheds as little blood as may be, and only in the interests of +the little world which he defends, and the sacred cause for which he is +fighting. Talk to him about anything that seems to you to be wrong, and +he will convince you, you will see." + +"There was that crime of his," muttered the General to himself. + +"But how if that crime was a virtue?" she asked, with cold dignity. "How +if man's justice had failed to avenge a great wrong?" + +"But a private revenge!" exclaimed her father. + +"But what is hell," she cried, "but a revenge through all eternity for +the wrong done in a little day?" + +"Ah! you are lost! He has bewitched and perverted you. You are talking +wildly." + +"Stay with us one day, father, and if you will but listen to him, and +see him, you will love him." + +"Helene, France lies only a few leagues away," he said gravely. + +Helene trembled; then she went to the porthole and pointed to the +savannas of green water spreading far and wide. + +"There lies my country," she said, tapping the carpet with her foot. + +"But are you not coming with me to see your mother and your sister and +brothers?" + +"Oh! yes," she cried, with tears in her voice, "if _he_ is willing, if +he will come with me." + +"So," the General said sternly, "you have neither country nor kin now, +Helene?" + +"I am his wife," she answered proudly, and there was something very +noble in her tone. "This is the first happiness in seven years that has +not come to me through him," she said--then, as she caught her father's +hand and kissed it--"and this is the first word of reproach that I have +heard." + +"And your conscience?" + +"My conscience; he is my conscience!" she cried, trembling from head to +foot. "Here he is! Even in the thick of a fight I can tell his footstep +among all the others on deck," she cried. + +A sudden crimson flushed her cheeks and glowed in her features, her eyes +lighted up, her complexion changed to velvet whiteness, there was joy +and love in every fibre, in the blue veins, in the unconscious trembling +of her whole frame. That quiver of the sensitive plant softened the +General. + +It was as she had said. The captain came in, sat down in an easy-chair, +took up his oldest boy, and began to play with him. There was a moment's +silence, for the General's deep musing had grown vague and dreamy, and +the daintily furnished cabin and the playing children seemed like a nest +of halcyons, floating on the waves, between sky and sea, safe in the +protection of this man who steered his way amid the perils of war and +tempest, as other heads of household guide those in their care among +the hazards of common life. He gazed admiringly at Helene--a dreamlike +vision of some sea goddess, gracious in her loveliness, rich in +happiness; all the treasures about her grown poor in comparison with +the wealth of her nature, paling before the brightness of her eyes, the +indefinable romance expressed in her and her surroundings. + +The strangeness of the situation took the General by surprise; the ideas +of ordinary life were thrown into confusion by this lofty passion and +reasoning. Chill and narrow social conventions faded away before this +picture. All these things the old soldier felt, and saw no less how +impossible it was that his daughter should give up so wide a life, a +life so variously rich, filled to the full with such passionate love. +And Helene had tasted danger without shrinking; how could she return to +the pretty stage, the superficial circumscribed life of society? + +It was the captain who broke the silence at last. + +"Am I in the way?" he asked, looking at his wife. + +"No," said the General, answering for her. "Helene has told me all. I +see that she is lost to us--" + +"No," the captain put in quickly; "in a few years' time the statute of +limitations will allow me to go back to France. When the conscience +is clear, and a man has broken the law in obedience to----" he stopped +short, as if scorning to justify himself. + +"How can you commit new murders, such as I have seen with my own eyes, +without remorse?" + +"We had no provisions," the privateer captain retorted calmly. + +"But if you had set the men ashore--" + +"They would have given the alarm and sent a man-of-war after us, and we +should never have seen Chili again." + +"Before France would have given warning to the Spanish admiralty--" +began the General. + +"But France might take it amiss that a man, with a warrant still out +against him, should seize a brig chartered by Bordeaux merchants. And +for that matter, have you never fired a shot or so too many in battle?" + +The General shrank under the other's eyes. He said no more, and his +daughter looked at him half sadly, half triumphant. + +"General," the privateer continued, in a deep voice, "I have made it +a rule to abstract nothing from booty. But even so, my share will be +beyond a doubt far larger than your fortune. Permit me to return it to +you in another form--" + +He drew a pile of banknotes from the piano, and without counting the +packets handed a million of francs to the Marquis. + +"You can understand," he said, "that I cannot spend my time in watching +vessels pass by to Bordeaux. So unless the dangers of this Bohemian +life of ours have some attraction for you, unless you care to see South +America and the nights of the tropics, and a bit of fighting now and +again for the pleasure of helping to win a triumph for a young nation, +or for the name of Simon Bolivar, we must part. The long boat manned +with a trustworthy crew is ready for you. And now let us hope that our +third meeting will be completely happy." + +"Victor," said Helene in a dissatisfied tone, "I should like to see a +little more of my father." + +"Ten minutes more or less may bring up a French frigate. However, so be +it, we shall have a little fun. The men find things dull." + +"Oh, father, go!" cried Helene, "and take these keepsakes from me to my +sister and brothers and--mother," she added. She caught up a handful of +jewels and precious stones, folded them in an Indian shawl, and timidly +held it out. + +"But what shall I say to them from you?" asked he. Her hesitation on the +word "mother" seemed to have struck him. + +"Oh! can you doubt me? I pray for their happiness every day." + +"Helene," he began, as he watched her closely, "how if we should not +meet again? Shall I never know why you left us?" + +"That secret is not mine," she answered gravely. "Even if I had the +right to tell it, perhaps I should not. For ten years I was more +miserable than words can say--" + +She broke off, and gave her father the presents for her family. The +General had acquired tolerably easy views as to booty in the course of +a soldier's career, so he took Helene's gifts and comforted himself with +the reflection that the Parisian captain was sure to wage war against +the Spaniards as an honorable man, under the influence of Helene's pure +and high-minded nature. His passion for courage carried all before it. +It was ridiculous, he thought, to be squeamish in the matter; so he +shook hands cordially with his captor, and kissed Helene, his only +daughter, with a soldier's expansiveness; letting fall a tear on the +face with the proud, strong look that once he had loved to see. "The +Parisian," deeply moved, brought the children for his blessing. The +parting was over, the last good-bye was a long farewell look, with +something of tender regret on either side. + + + +A strange sight to seaward met the General's eyes. The _Saint-Ferdinand_ +was blazing like a huge bonfire. The men told off to sink the Spanish +brig had found a cargo of rum on board; and as the _Othello_ was already +amply supplied, had lighted a floating bowl of punch on the high seas, +by way of a joke; a pleasantry pardonable enough in sailors, who hail +any chance excitement as a relief from the apparent monotony of life +at sea. As the General went over the side into the long-boat of the +_Saint-Ferdinand_, manned by six vigorous rowers, he could not help +looking at the burning vessel, as well as at the daughter who stood by +her husband's side on the stern of the _Othello_. He saw Helene's white +dress flutter like one more sail in the breeze; he saw the tall, noble +figure against a background of sea, queenly still even in the presence +of Ocean; and so many memories crowded up in his mind, that, with a +soldier's recklessness of life, he forgot that he was being borne over +the grave of the brave Gomez. + +A vast column of smoke rising spread like a brown cloud, pierced here +and there by fantastic shafts of sunlight. It was a second sky, a murky +dome reflecting the glow of the fire as if the under surface had been +burnished; but above it soared the unchanging blue of the firmament, a +thousand times fairer for the short-lived contrast. The strange hues +of the smoke cloud, black and red, tawny and pale by turns, blurred +and blending into each other, shrouded the burning vessel as it flared, +crackled and groaned; the hissing tongues of flame licked up the +rigging, and flashed across the hull, like a rumor of riot flashing +along the streets of a city. The burning rum sent up blue flitting +lights. Some sea god might have been stirring the furious liquor as +a student stirs the joyous flames of punch in an orgy. But in the +overpowering sunlight, jealous of the insolent blaze, the colors were +scarcely visible, and the smoke was but a film fluttering like a thin +scarf in the noonday torrent of light and heat. + +The _Othello_ made the most of the little wind she could gain to fly +on her new course. Swaying first to one side, then to the other, like a +stag beetle on the wing, the fair vessel beat to windward on her zigzag +flight to the south. Sometimes she was hidden from sight by the straight +column of smoke that flung fantastic shadows across the water, then +gracefully she shot out clear of it, and Helene, catching sight of her +father, waved her handkerchief for yet one more farewell greeting. + +A few more minutes, and the _Saint-Ferdinand_ went down with a bubbling +turmoil, at once effaced by the ocean. Nothing of all that had been +was left but a smoke cloud hanging in the breeze. The _Othello_ was far +away, the long-boat had almost reached land, the cloud came between +the frail skiff and the brig, and it was through a break in the swaying +smoke that the General caught the last glimpse of Helene. A prophetic +vision! Her dress and her white handkerchief stood out against the murky +background. Then the brig was not even visible between the green water +and the blue sky, and Helene was nothing but an imperceptible speck, a +faint graceful line, an angel in heaven, a mental image, a memory. + +The Marquis had retrieved his fortunes, when he died, worn out with +toil. A few months after his death, in 1833, the Marquise was obliged to +take Moina to a watering-place in the Pyrenees, for the capricious child +had a wish to see the beautiful mountain scenery. They left the baths, +and the following tragical incident occurred on their way home. + +"Dear me, mother," said Moina, "it was very foolish of us not to stay +among the mountains a few days longer. It was much nicer there. Did +you hear that horrid child moaning all night, and that wretched woman, +gabbling away in patois no doubt, for I could not understand a single +word she said. What kind of people can they have put in the next room to +ours? This is one of the horridest nights I have ever spent in my life." + +"I heard nothing," said the Marquise, "but I will see the landlady, +darling, and engage the next room, and then we shall have the whole +suite of rooms to ourselves, and there will be no more noise. How do you +feel this morning? Are you tired?" + +As she spoke, the Marquise rose and went to Moina's bedside. + +"Let us see," she said, feeling for the girl's hand. + +"Oh! let me alone, mother," said Moina; "your fingers are cold." + +She turned her head round on the pillow as she spoke, pettishly, but +with such engaging grace, that a mother could scarcely have taken it +amiss. Just then a wailing cry echoed through the next room, a faint +prolonged cry, that must surely have gone to the heart of any woman who +heard it. + +"Why, if you heard _that_ all night long, why did you not wake me? We +should have--" + +A deeper moan than any that had gone before it interrupted the Marquise. + +"Some one is dying there," she cried, and hurried out of the room. + +"Send Pauline to me!" called Moina. "I shall get up and dress." + +The Marquise hastened downstairs, and found the landlady in the +courtyard with a little group about her, apparently much interested in +something that she was telling them. + +"Madame, you have put some one in the next room who seems to be very ill +indeed--" + +"Oh! don't talk to me about it!" cried the mistress of the house. "I +have just sent some one for the mayor. Just imagine it; it is a woman, +a poor unfortunate creature that came here last night on foot. She comes +from Spain; she has no passport and no money; she was carrying her baby +on her back, and the child was dying. I could not refuse to take her +in. I went up to see her this morning myself; for when she turned up +yesterday, it made me feel dreadfully bad to look at her. Poor soul! +she and the child were lying in bed, and both of them at death's door. +'Madame,' says she, pulling a gold ring off her finger, 'this is all +that I have left; take it in payment, it will be enough; I shall not +stay here long. Poor little one! we shall die together soon!' she said, +looking at the child. I took her ring, and I asked her who she was, but +she never would tell me her name.... I have just sent for the doctor and +M. le Maire." + +"Why, you must do all that can be done for her," cried the Marquise. +"Good heavens! perhaps it is not too late! I will pay for everything +that is necessary----" + +"Ah! my lady, she looks to me uncommonly proud, and I don't know that +she would allow it." + +"I will go to see her at once." + +The Marquise went up forthwith to the stranger's room, without thinking +of the shock that the sight of her widow's weeds might give to a woman +who was said to be dying. At the sight of that dying woman the Marquise +turned pale. In spite of the changes wrought by fearful suffering in +Helene's beautiful face, she recognized her eldest daughter. + +But Helene, when she saw a woman dressed in black, sat upright in bed +with a shriek of horror. Then she sank back; she knew her mother. + +"My daughter," said Mme. d'Aiglemont, "what is to be done? Pauline!... +Moina!..." + +"Nothing now for me," said Helene faintly. "I had hoped to see my father +once more, but your mourning--" she broke off, clutched her child to her +heart as if to give it warmth, and kissed its forehead. Then she turned +her eyes on her mother, and the Marquise met the old reproach in them, +tempered with forgiveness, it is true, but still reproach. She saw it, +and would not see it. She forgot that Helene was the child conceived +amid tears and despair, the child of duty, the cause of one of the +greatest sorrows in her life. She stole to her eldest daughter's side, +remembering nothing but that Helene was her firstborn, the child who had +taught her to know the joys of motherhood. The mother's eyes were full +of tears. "Helene, my child!..." she cried, with her arms about her +daughter. + +Helene was silent. Her own babe had just drawn its last breath on her +breast. + +Moina came into the room with Pauline, her maid, and the landlady and +the doctor. The Marquise was holding her daughter's ice-cold hand in +both of hers, and gazing at her in despair; but the widowed woman, who +had escaped shipwreck with but one of all her fair band of children, +spoke in a voice that was dreadful to hear. "All this is your work," she +said. "If you had but been for me all that--" + +"Moina, go! Go out of the room, all of you!" cried Mme. d'Aiglemont, her +shrill tones drowning Helene's voice.--"For pity's sake," she continued, +"let us not begin these miserable quarrels again now----" + +"I will be silent," Helene answered with a preternatural effort. "I am a +mother; I know that Moina ought not... Where is my child?" + +Moina came back, impelled by curiosity. + +"Sister," said the spoiled child, "the doctor--" + +"It is all of no use," said Helene. "Oh! why did I not die as a girl of +sixteen when I meant to take my own life? There is no happiness outside +the laws. Moina... you..." + +Her head sank till her face lay against the face of the little one; in +her agony she strained her babe to her breast, and died. + +"Your sister, Moina," said Mme. d'Aiglemont, bursting into tears when +she reached her room, "your sister meant no doubt to tell you that a +girl will never find happiness in a romantic life, in living as nobody +else does, and, above all things, far away from her mother." + + + + +VI. THE OLD AGE OF A GUILTY MOTHER + +It was one of the earliest June days of the year 1844. A lady of fifty +or thereabouts, for she looked older than her actual age, was pacing up +and down one of the sunny paths in the garden of a great mansion in +the Rue Plument in Paris. It was noon. The lady took two or three turns +along the gently winding garden walk, careful never to lose sight of a +certain row of windows, to which she seemed to give her whole attention; +then she sat down on a bench, a piece of elegant semi-rusticity made of +branches with the bark left on the wood. From the place where she sat +she could look through the garden railings along the inner boulevards to +the wonderful dome of the Invalides rising above the crests of a +forest of elm-trees, and see the less striking view of her own grounds +terminating in the gray stone front of one of the finest hotels in the +Faubourg Saint-Germain. + +Silence lay over the neighboring gardens, and the boulevards stretching +away to the Invalides. Day scarcely begins at noon in that aristocratic +quarter, and masters and servants are all alike asleep, or just +awakening, unless some young lady takes it into her head to go for an +early ride, or a gray-headed diplomatist rises betimes to redraft a +protocol. + +The elderly lady stirring abroad at that hour was the Marquise +d'Aiglemont, the mother of Mme. de Saint-Hereen, to whom the great house +belonged. The Marquise had made over the mansion and almost her whole +fortune to her daughter, reserving only an annuity for herself. + +The Comtesse Moina de Saint-Hereen was Mme. d'Aiglemont's youngest +child. The Marquise had made every sacrifice to marry her daughter to +the eldest son of one of the greatest houses of France; and this was +only what might have been expected, for the lady had lost her sons, +first one and then the other. Gustave, Marquis d'Aiglemont, had died of +the cholera; Abel, the second, had fallen in Algeria. Gustave had left +a widow and children, but the dowager's affection for her sons had +been only moderately warm, and for the next generation it was decidedly +tepid. She was always civil to her daughter-in-law, but her feeling +towards the young Marquise was the distinctly conventional affection +which good taste and good manners require us to feel for our relatives. +The fortunes of her dead children having been settled, she could devote +her savings and her own property to her darling Moina. + +Moina, beautiful and fascinating from childhood, was Mme. d'Aiglemont's +favorite; loved beyond all the others with an instinctive or involuntary +love, a fatal drawing of the heart, which sometimes seems inexplicable, +sometimes, and to a close observer, only too easy to explain. Her +darling's pretty face, the sound of Moina's voice, her ways, her manner, +her looks and gestures, roused all the deepest emotions that can stir +a mother's heart with trouble, rapture, or delight. The springs of the +Marquise's life, of yesterday, to-morrow, and to-day, lay in that young +heart. Moina, with better fortune, had survived four older children. +As a matter of fact, Mme. d'Aiglemont had lost her eldest daughter, a +charming girl, in a most unfortunate manner, said gossip, nobody knew +exactly what became of her; and then she lost a little boy of five by a +dreadful accident. + +The child of her affections had, however, been spared to her, and +doubtless the Marquise saw the will of Heaven in that fact; for those +who had died, she kept but very shadowy recollections in some far-off +corner of her heart; her memories of her dead children were like the +headstones on a battlefield, you can scarcely see them for the flowers +that have sprung up about them since. Of course, if the world had +chosen, it might have said some hard truths about the Marquise, might +have taken her to task for shallowness and an overweening preference for +one child at the expense of the rest; but the world of Paris is swept +along by the full flood of new events, new ideas, and new fashions, and +it was inevitable the Mme. d'Aiglemont should be in some sort allowed +to drop out of sight. So nobody thought of blaming her for coldness +or neglect which concerned no one, whereas her quick, apprehensive +tenderness for Moina was found highly interesting by not a few who +respected it as a sort of superstition. Besides, the Marquise scarcely +went into society at all; and the few families who knew her thought of +her as a kindly, gentle, indulgent woman, wholly devoted to her family. +What but a curiosity, keen indeed, would seek to pry beneath the surface +with which the world is quite satisfied? And what would we not pardon +to old people, if only they will efface themselves like shadows, and +consent to be regarded as memories and nothing more! + +Indeed, Mme. d'Aiglemont became a kind of example complacently held up +by the younger generation to fathers of families, and frequently cited +to mothers-in-law. She had made over her property to Moina in her own +lifetime; the young Countess' happiness was enough for her, she only +lived in her daughter. If some cautious old person or morose uncle here +and there condemned the course with--"Perhaps Mme. d'Aiglemont may be +sorry some day that she gave up her fortune to her daughter; she may +be sure of Moina, but how can she be equally sure of her +son-in-law?"--these prophets were cried down on all sides, and from all +sides a chorus of praise went up for Moina. + +"It ought to be said, in justice to Mme. de Saint-Hereen, that her +mother cannot feel the slightest difference," remarked a young married +woman. "Mme. d'Aiglemont is admirably well housed. She has a carriage at +her disposal, and can go everywhere just as she used to do--" + +"Except to the Italiens," remarked a low voice. (This was an elderly +parasite, one of those persons who show their independence--as they +think--by riddling their friends with epigrams.) "Except to the +Italiens. And if the dowager cares for anything on this earth but her +daughter--it is music. Such a good performer she was in her time! But +the Countess' box is always full of young butterflies, and the Countess' +mother would be in the way; the young lady is talked about already as a +great flirt. So the poor mother never goes to the Italiens." + +"Mme. de Saint-Hereen has delightful 'At Homes' for her mother," said a +rosebud. "All Paris goes to her salon. + +"And no one pays any attention to the Marquise," returned the parasite. + +"The fact is that Mme. d'Aiglemont is never alone," remarked a coxcomb, +siding with the young women. + +"In the morning," the old observer continued in a discreet voice, "in +the morning dear Moina is asleep. At four o'clock dear Moina drives +in the Bois. In the evening dear Moina goes to a ball or to the +Bouffes.--Still, it is certainly true that Mme. d'Aiglemont has the +privilege of seeing her dear daughter while she dresses, and again at +dinner, if dear Moina happens to dine with her mother. Not a week ago, +sir," continued the elderly person, laying his hand on the arm of the +shy tutor, a new arrival in the house, "not a week ago, I saw the poor +mother, solitary and sad, by her own fireside.--'What is the matter?' I +asked. The Marquise looked up smiling, but I am quite sure that she had +been crying.--'I was thinking that it is a strange thing that I should +be left alone when I have had five children,' she said, 'but that is +our destiny! And besides, I am happy when I know that Moina is enjoying +herself.'--She could say that to me, for I knew her husband when he was +alive. A poor stick he was, and uncommonly lucky to have such a wife; it +was certainly owing to her that he was made a peer of France, and had a +place at Court under Charles X." + +Yet such mistaken ideas get about in social gossip, and such mischief +is done by it, that the historian of manners is bound to exercise his +discretion, and weigh the assertions so recklessly made. After all, who +is to say that either mother or daughter was right or wrong? There is +but One who can read and judge their hearts! And how often does He wreak +His vengeance in the family circle, using throughout all time children +as His instruments against their mothers, and fathers against their +sons, raising up peoples against kings, and princes against peoples, +sowing strife and division everywhere? And in the world of ideas, are +not opinions and feelings expelled by new feelings and opinions, much +as withered leaves are thrust forth by the young leaf-buds in the +spring?--all in obedience to the immutable Scheme; all to some end which +God alone knows. Yet, surely, all things proceed to Him, or rather, to +Him all things return. + +Such thoughts of religion, the natural thoughts of age, floated up +now and again on the current of Mme. d'Aiglemont's thoughts; they were +always dimly present in her mind, but sometimes they shone out clearly, +sometimes they were carried under, like flowers tossed on the vexed +surface of a stormy sea. + +She sat on a garden-seat, tired with walking, exhausted with much +thinking--with the long thoughts in which a whole lifetime rises up +before the mind, and is spread out like a scroll before the eyes of +those who feel that Death is near. + +If a poet had chanced to pass along the boulevard, he would have found +an interesting picture in the face of this woman, grown old before her +time. As she sat under the dotted shadow of the acacia, the shadow the +acacia casts at noon, a thousand thoughts were written for all the world +to see on her features, pale and cold even in the hot, bright sunlight. +There was something sadder than the sense of waning life in that +expressive face, some trouble that went deeper than the weariness of +experience. It was a face of a type that fixes you in a moment among a +host of characterless faces that fail to draw a second glance, a face +to set you thinking. Among a thousand pictures in a gallery, you are +strongly impressed by the sublime anguish on the face of some Madonna +of Murillo's; by some _Beatrice Cenci_ in which Guido's art portrays the +most touching innocence against a background of horror and crime; by the +awe and majesty that should encircle a king, caught once and for ever +by Velasquez in the sombre face of a Philip II., and so is it with some +living human faces; they are tyrannous pictures which speak to you, +submit you to searching scrutiny, and give response to your inmost +thoughts, nay, there are faces that set forth a whole drama, and Mme. +d'Aiglemont's stony face was one of these awful tragedies, one of such +faces as Dante Alighieri saw by thousands in his vision. + +For the little season that a woman's beauty is in flower it serves her +admirably well in the dissimulation to which her natural weakness and +our social laws condemn her. A young face and rich color, and eyes that +glow with light, a gracious maze of such subtle, manifold lines and +curves, flawless and perfectly traced, is a screen that hides everything +that stirs the woman within. A flush tells nothing, it only heightens +the coloring so brilliant already; all the fires that burn within +can add little light to the flame of life in eyes which only seem the +brighter for the flash of a passing pain. Nothing is so discreet as a +young face, for nothing is less mobile; it has the serenity, the surface +smoothness, and the freshness of a lake. There is not character in +women's faces before the age of thirty. The painter discovers nothing +there but pink and white, and the smile and expression that repeat the +same thought in the same way--a thought of youth and love that goes no +further than youth and love. But the face of an old woman has expressed +all that lay in her nature; passion has carved lines on her features; +love and wifehood and motherhood, and extremes of joy and anguish, +having wrung them, and left their traces in a thousand wrinkles, all +of which speak a language of their own; then it is that a woman's face +becomes sublime in its horror, beautiful in its melancholy, grand in its +calm. If it is permissible to carry the strange metaphor still further, +it might be said that in the dried-up lake you can see the traces of +all the torrents that once poured into it and made it what it is. An old +face is nothing to the frivolous world; the frivolous world is shocked +by the sight of the destruction of such comeliness as it can understand; +a commonplace artist sees nothing there. An old face is the province of +the poets among poets of those who can recognize that something which +is called Beauty, apart from all the conventions underlying so many +superstitions in art and taste. + + + +Though Mme. d'Aiglemont wore a fashionable bonnet, it was easy to see +that her once black hair had been bleached by cruel sorrows; yet her +good taste and the gracious acquired instincts of a woman of fashion +could be seen in the way she wore it, divided into two _bandeaux_, +following the outlines of a forehead that still retained some traces of +former dazzling beauty, worn and lined though it was. The contours +of her face, the regularity of her features, gave some idea, faint in +truth, of that beauty of which surely she had once been proud; but those +traces spoke still more plainly of the anguish which had laid it waste, +of sharp pain that had withered the temples, and made those hollows in +her cheeks, and empurpled the eyelids, and robbed them of their lashes, +and the eyes of their charm. She was in every way so noiseless; she +moved with a slow, self-contained gravity that showed itself in her +whole bearing, and struck a certain awe into others. Her diffident +manner had changed to positive shyness, due apparently to a habit now of +some years' growth, of effacing herself in her daughter's presence. She +spoke very seldom, and in the low tones used by those who perforce must +live within themselves a life of reflection and concentration. This +demeanor led others to regard her with an indefinable feeling which was +neither awe nor compassion, but a mysterious blending of the many ideas +awakened in us by compassion and awe. Finally, there was something in +her wrinkles, in the lines of her face, in the look of pain in those +wan eyes of hers, that bore eloquent testimony to tears that never had +fallen, tears that had been absorbed by her heart. Unhappy creatures, +accustomed to raise their eyes to heaven, in mute appeal against the +bitterness of their lot, would have seen at once from her eyes that she +was broken in to the cruel discipline of ceaseless prayer, would have +discerned the almost imperceptible symptoms of the secret bruises which +destroy all the flowers of the soul, even the sentiment of motherhood. + +Painters have colors for these portraits, but words, and the mental +images called up by words, fail to reproduce such impressions +faithfully; there are mysterious signs and tokens in the tones of the +coloring and in the look of human faces, which the mind only seizes +through the sense of sight; and the poet is fain to record the tale +of the events which wrought the havoc to make their terrible ravages +understood. + +The face spoke of cold and steady storm, an inward conflict between a +mother's long-suffering and the limitations of our nature, for our human +affections are bounded by our humanity, and the infinite has no place +in finite creatures. Sorrow endured in silence had at last produced an +indefinable morbid something in this woman. Doubtless mental anguish had +reacted on the physical frame, and some disease, perhaps an aneurism, +was undermining Julie's life. Deep-seated grief lies to all appearance +very quietly in the depths where it is conceived, yet, so still and +apparently dormant as it is, it ceaselessly corrodes the soul, like the +terrible acid which eats away crystal. + +Two tears made their way down the Marquise's cheeks; she rose to her +feet as if some thought more poignant than any that preceded it had cut +her to the quick. She had doubtless come to a conclusion as to Moina's +future; and now, foreseeing clearly all the troubles in store for her +child, the sorrows of her own unhappy life had begun to weigh once +more upon her. The key of her position must be sought in her daughter's +situation. + +The Comte de Saint-Hereen had been away for nearly six months on a +political mission. The Countess, whether from sheer giddiness, or in +obedience to the countless instincts of woman's coquetry, or to essay +its power--with all the vanity of a frivolous fine lady, all the +capricious waywardness of a child--was amusing herself, during her +husband's absence, by playing with the passion of a clever but heartless +man, distracted (so he said) with love, the love that combines readily +with every petty social ambition of a self-conceited coxcomb. Mme. +d'Aiglemont, whose long experience had given her a knowledge of life, +and taught her to judge of men and to dread the world, watched the +course of this flirtation, and saw that it could only end in one way, +if her daughter should fall into the hands of an utterly unscrupulous +intriguer. How could it be other than a terrible thought for her that +her daughter listened willingly to this _roue_? Her darling stood on the +brink of a precipice, she felt horribly sure of it, yet dared not hold +her back. She was afraid of the Countess. She knew too that Moina would +not listen to her wise warnings; she knew that she had no influence +over that nature--iron for her, silken-soft for all others. Her mother's +tenderness might have led her to sympathize with the troubles of a +passion called forth by the nobler qualities of a lover, but this was +no passion--it was coquetry, and the Marquise despised Alfred de +Vandenesse, knowing that he had entered upon this flirtation with Moina +as if it were a game of chess. + +But if Alfred de Vandenesse made her shudder with disgust, she was +obliged--unhappy mother!--to conceal the strongest reason for her +loathing in the deepest recesses of her heart. She was on terms of +intimate friendship with the Marquis de Vandenesse, the young man's +father; and this friendship, a respectable one in the eyes of the world, +excused the son's constant presence in the house, he professing an old +attachment, dating from childhood, for Mme. de Saint-Hereen. More than +this, in vain did Mme. d'Aiglemont nerve herself to come between Moina +and Alfred de Vandenesse with a terrible word, knowing beforehand that +she should not succeed; knowing that the strong reason which ought to +separate them would carry no weight; that she should humiliate herself +vainly in her daughter's eyes. Alfred was too corrupt; Moina too clever +to believe the revelation; the young Countess would turn it off and +treat it as a piece of maternal strategy. Mme. d'Aiglemont had built +her prison walls with her own hands; she had immured herself only to +see Moina's happiness ruined thence before she died; she was to look on +helplessly at the ruin of the young life which had been her pride and +joy and comfort, a life a thousand times dearer to her than her +own. What words can describe anguish so hideous beyond belief, such +unfathomed depths of pain? + +She waited for Moina to rise, with the impatience and sickening dread +of a doomed man, who longs to have done with life, and turns cold at the +thought of the headsman. She had braced herself for a last effort, but +perhaps the prospect of the certain failure of the attempt was less +dreadful to her than the fear of receiving yet again one of those +thrusts that went to her very heart--before that fear her courage ebbed +away. Her mother's love had come to this. To love her child, to be +afraid of her, to shrink from the thought of the stab, yet to go +forward. So great is a mother's affection in a loving nature, that +before it can fade away into indifference the mother herself must die +or find support in some great power without her, in religion or another +love. Since the Marquise rose that morning, her fatal memory had called +up before her some of those things, so slight to all appearance, that +make landmarks in a life. Sometimes, indeed, a whole tragedy grows out +of a single gesture; the tone in which a few words were spoken rends a +whole life in two; a glance into indifferent eyes is the deathblow of +the gladdest love; and, unhappily, such gestures and such words were +only too familiar to Mme. d'Aiglemont--she had met so many glances that +wound the soul. No, there was nothing in those memories to bid her hope. +On the contrary, everything went to show that Alfred had destroyed her +hold on her daughter's heart, that the thought of her was now associated +with duty--not with gladness. In ways innumerable, in things that were +mere trifles in themselves, the Countess' detestable conduct rose +up before her mother; and the Marquise, it may be, looked on Moina's +undutifulness as a punishment, and found excuses for her daughter in the +will of Heaven, that so she still might adore the hand that smote her. + +All these things passed through her memory that morning, and each +recollection wounded her afresh so sorely, that with a very little +additional pain her brimming cup of bitterness must have overflowed. A +cold look might kill her. + +The little details of domestic life are difficult to paint; but one or +two perhaps will suffice to give an idea of the rest. + +The Marquise d'Aiglemont, for instance, had grown rather deaf, but she +could never induce Moina to raise her voice for her. Once, with the +naivete of suffering, she had begged Moina to repeat some remark which +she had failed to catch, and Moina obeyed, but with so bad a grace, the +Mme. d'Aiglemont had never permitted herself to make her modest request +again. Ever since that day when Moina was talking or retailing a +piece of news, her mother was careful to come near to listen; but this +infirmity of deafness appeared to put the Countess out of patience, +and she would grumble thoughtlessly about it. This instance is one +from among very many that must have gone to the mother's heart; and yet +nearly all of them might have escaped a close observer, they consisted +in faint shades of manner invisible to any but a woman's eyes. Take +another example. Mme. d'Aiglemont happened to say one day that the +Princesse de Cadignan had called upon her. "Did she come to see _you_!" +Moina exclaimed. That was all, but the Countess' voice and manner +expressed surprise and well-bred contempt in semitones. Any heart, +still young and sensitive, might well have applauded the philanthropy of +savage tribes who kill off their old people when they grow too feeble +to cling to a strongly shaken bough. Mme. d'Aiglemont rose smiling, and +went away to weep alone. + +Well-bred people, and women especially, only betray their feelings +by imperceptible touches; but those who can look back over their own +experience on such bruises as this mother's heart received, know also +how the heart-strings vibrate to these light touches. Overcome by her +memories, Mme. d'Aiglemont recollected one of those microscopically +small things, so stinging and so painful was it that never till this +moment had she felt all the heartless contempt that lurked beneath +smiles. + +At the sound of shutters thrown back at her daughter's windows, she +dried her tears, and hastened up the pathway by the railings. As she +went, it struck her that the gardener had been unusually careful to rake +the sand along the walk which had been neglected for some little time. +As she stood under her daughter's windows, the shutters were hastily +closed. + +"Moina, is it you?" she asked. + +No answer. + +The Marquise went on into the house. + +"Mme. la Comtesse is in the little drawing-room," said the maid, when +the Marquise asked whether Mme. de Saint-Hereen had finished dressing. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont hurried to the little drawing-room; her heart was too +full, her brain too busy to notice matters so slight; but there on the +sofa sat the Countess in her loose morning-gown, her hair in disorder +under the cap tossed carelessly on he head, her feet thrust into +slippers. The key of her bedroom hung at her girdle. Her face, aglow +with color, bore traces of almost stormy thought. + +"What makes people come in!" she cried, crossly. "Oh! it is you, +mother," she interrupted herself, with a preoccupied look. + +"Yes, child; it is your mother----" + +Something in her tone turned those words into an outpouring of the +heart, the cry of some deep inward feeling, only to be described by the +word "holy." So thoroughly in truth had she rehabilitated the sacred +character of a mother, that her daughter was impressed, and turned +towards her, with something of awe, uneasiness, and remorse in her +manner. The room was the furthest of a suite, and safe from indiscreet +intrusion, for no one could enter it without giving warning of approach +through the previous apartments. The Marquise closed the door. + +"It is my duty, my child, to warn you in one of the most serious crises +in the lives of us women; you have perhaps reached it unconsciously, and +I am come to speak to you as a friend rather than as a mother. When you +married, you acquired freedom of action; you are only accountable to +your husband now; but I asserted my authority so little (perhaps I was +wrong), that I think I have a right to expect you to listen to me, for +once at least, in a critical position when you must need counsel. Bear +in mind, Moina that you are married to a man of high ability, a man of +whom you may well be proud, a man who--" + +"I know what you are going to say, mother!" Moina broke in pettishly. "I +am to be lectured about Alfred--" + +"Moina," the Marquise said gravely, as she struggled with her tears, +"you would not guess at once if you did not feel--" + +"What?" asked Moina, almost haughtily. "Why, really, mother--" + +Mme. d'Aiglemont summoned up all her strength. "Moina," she said, "you +must attend carefully to this that I ought to tell you--" + +"I am attending," returned the Countess, folding her arms, and affecting +insolent submission. "Permit me, mother, to ring for Pauline," she added +with incredible self-possession; "I will send her away first." + +She rang the bell. + +"My dear child, Pauline cannot possibly hear--" + +"Mamma," interrupted the Countess, with a gravity which must have struck +her mother as something unusual, "I must--" + +She stopped short, for the woman was in the room. + +"Pauline, go _yourself_ to Baudran's, and ask why my hat has not yet +been sent." + +Then the Countess reseated herself and scrutinized her mother. The +Marquise, with a swelling heart and dry eyes, in painful agitation, +which none but a mother can fully understand, began to open Moina's eyes +to the risk that she was running. But either the Countess felt hurt +and indignant at her mother's suspicions of a son of the Marquis de +Vandenesse, or she was seized with a sudden fit of inexplicable levity +caused by the inexperience of youth. She took advantage of a pause. + +"Mamma, I thought you were only jealous of _the father_--" she said, +with a forced laugh. + +Mme. d'Aiglemont shut her eyes and bent her head at the words, with a +very faint, almost inaudible sigh. She looked up and out into space, +as if she felt the common overmastering impulse to appeal to God at the +great crises of our lives; then she looked at her daughter, and her eyes +were full of awful majesty and the expression of profound sorrow. + +"My child," she said, and her voice was hardly recognizable, "you have +been less merciful to your mother than he against whom she sinned; less +merciful than perhaps God Himself will be!" + +Mme. d'Aiglemont rose; at the door she turned; but she saw nothing but +surprise in her daughter's face. She went out. Scarcely had she reached +the garden when her strength failed her. There was a violent pain at her +heart, and she sank down on a bench. As her eyes wandered over the path, +she saw fresh marks on the path, a man's footprints were distinctly +recognizable. It was too late, then, beyond a doubt. Now she began to +understand the reason for that order given to Pauline, and with these +torturing thoughts came a revelation more hateful than any that had +gone before it. She drew her own inferences--the son of the Marquis +de Vandenesse had destroyed all feeling of respect for her in her +daughter's mind. The physical pain grew worse; by degrees she lost +consciousness, and sat like one asleep upon the garden-seat. + +The Countess de Saint-Hereen, left to herself, thought that her mother +had given her a somewhat shrewd home-thrust, but a kiss and a few +attentions that evening would make all right again. + +A shrill cry came from the garden. She leaned carelessly out, as +Pauline, not yet departed on her errand, called out for help, holding +the Marquise in her arms. + +"Do not frighten my daughter!" those were the last words the mother +uttered. + +Moina saw them carry in a pale and lifeless form that struggled for +breath, and arms moving restlessly as in protest or effort to speak; and +overcome by the sight, Moina followed in silence, and helped to undress +her mother and lay her on her bed. The burden of her fault was greater +than she could bear. In that supreme hour she learned to know her +mother--too late, she could make no reparation now. She would have them +leave her alone with her mother; and when there was no one else in the +room, when she felt that the hand which had always been so tender for +her was now grown cold to her touch, she broke out into weeping. Her +tears aroused the Marquise; she could still look at her darling +Moina; and at the sound of sobbing, that seemed as if it must rend the +delicate, disheveled breast, could smile back at her daughter. That +smile taught the unnatural child that forgiveness is always to be found +in the great deep of a mother's heart. + + + +Servants on horseback had been dispatched at once for the physician and +surgeon and for Mme. d'Aiglemont's grandchildren. Mme. d'Aiglemont the +younger and her little sons arrived with the medical men, a sufficiently +impressive, silent, and anxious little group, which the servants of the +house came to join. The young Marquise, hearing no sound, tapped gently +at the door. That signal, doubtless, roused Moina from her grief, for +she flung open the doors and stood before them. No words could have +spoken more plainly than that disheveled figure looking out with haggard +eyes upon the assembled family. Before that living picture of Remorse +the rest were dumb. It was easy to see that the Marquise's feet were +stretched out stark and stiff with the agony of death; and Moina, +leaning against the door-frame, looking into their faces, spoke in a +hollow voice: + +"I have lost my mother!" + + +PARIS, 1828-1844. + + + + +ADDENDUM + +The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy. + + Aiglemont, General, Marquis Victor d' + At the Sign of the Cat and Racket + The Firm of Nucingen + + Bonaparte, Napoleon + The Vendetta + The Gondreville Mystery + Colonel Chabert + Domestic Peace + The Seamy Side of History + + Camps, Madame Octave de (nee Cadignan) + Madame Firmiani + The Government Clerks + A Daughter of Eve + The Member for Arcis + + Chatillonest, De + Modeste Mignon + + Crottat, Alexandre + Cesar Birotteau + Colonel Chabert + A Start in Life + Cousin Pons + + Desroches (son) + A Bachelor's Establishment + Colonel Chabert + A Start in Life + The Commission in Lunacy + The Government Clerks + A Distinguished Provincial at Paris + Scenes from a Courtesan's Life + The Firm of Nucingen + A Man of Business + The Middle Classes + + Duroc, Gerard-Christophe-Michel + The Gondreville Mystery + + Ronquerolles, Marquis de + The Imaginary Mistress + The Peasantry + Ursule Mirouet + Another Study of Woman + The Thirteen + The Member for Arcis + + Saint-Hereen, Comtesse Moina de + A Daughter of Eve + The Member for Arcis + + Serizy, Comtesse de + A Start in Life + The Thirteen + Ursule Mirouet + Scenes from a Courtesan's Life + Another Study of Woman + The Imaginary Mistress + + Vandenesse, Marquis Charles de + A Start in Life + A Daughter of Eve + + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of A Woman of Thirty, by Honore de Balzac + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK A WOMAN OF THIRTY *** + +***** This file should be named 1950.txt or 1950.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/1/9/5/1950/ + +Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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