A Chair on the Boulevard Part 37

Of course, the medical men explained that he was susceptible to any abnormal physical or mental condition of mine, not to the vagaries of my bicycle. "As an example, madame, if the elder of two twins were killed in a railway accident, it would be no reason for thinking that an accident must befall a train by which the younger travelled. What sympathy can there be between locomotives? But if the elder were to die by his own hand, there is a strong probability that the younger would commit suicide also."

However, I have not died by my own hand, so Gregoire has had nothing to reproach me for on that score. As to other grounds--well, there is much to be said on both sides!

To speak truly, that beautiful devotion for which twins are so celebrated in drama and romance has never existed between my brother and myself. Nor was this my fault. I was of a highly sensitive disposition, and from my earliest years it was impressed upon me that Gregoire regarded me in the light of a grievance, I could not help having illnesses, yet he would upbraid me for taking them. Then, too, he was always our mother's favourite, and instead of there being caresses and condolence for me when I was indisposed, there was nothing but grief for the indisposition that I was about to cause Gregoire.

This wounded me.

Again at college. I shall not pretend that I was a bookworm, or that I shared Gregoire's ambitions; on the contrary, the world beyond the walls looked such a jolly place to me that the mere sight of a cla.s.sroom would sometimes fill me with abhorrence. But, mon Dieu! if other fellows were wild occasionally, they accepted the penalties, and the affair was finished; on me rested a responsibility--my wildness was communicated to Gregoire. Scarcely had I resigned myself to dull routine again when Gregoire, the industrious, would find himself unable to study a page, and commit freaks for which he rebuked me most sternly. I swear that my chief remembrance of my college days is Gregoire addressing pompous homilies to me, in this fashion, when he was in disgrace with the authorities:

"I ask you to remember, Silvestre, that you have not only your own welfare to consider--you have mine! I am here to qualify myself for an earnest career. Be good enough not to put obstacles in my path. Your levity impels me to distractions which I condemn even while I yield to them. I perceive a weakness in your nature that fills me with misgivings for my future; if you do not learn to resist temptation, to what errors may I not be driven later on--to what outbreaks of frivolity will you not condemn me when we are men?"

Well, it is no part of my confession to whitewash myself his misgivings were realised! So far as I had any serious aspirations at all, I aspired to be a painter, and, after combating my family's objections, I entered an art school in Paris. Gregoire, on the other hand, was destined for the law. During the next few years we met infrequently, but that my brother continued to be affected by any unusual conditions of my body and mind I knew by his letters, which seldom failed to contain expostulations and entreaties. If he could have had his way, indeed, I believe he would have shut me in a monastery.

Upon my word, I was not without consideration for him, but what would you have? I think some sympathy was due to me also. Regard the situation with my eyes! I was young, popular, an artist; my life was no more frivolous than the lives of others of my set; yet, in lieu of being free, like them, to call the tune and dance the measure, I was burdened with a heavier responsibility than weighs upon the shoulders of any paterfamilias. Let me but drink a bottle too much, and Gregoire, the grave, would subsequently manifest all the symptoms of intoxication. Let me but lose my head about a petticoat, and Gregoire, the righteous, would soon be running after a girl instead of attending to his work. I had a conscience--thoughts of the trouble that I was brewing for Gregoire would come between me and the petticoat and rob it of its charms; his abominable susceptibility to my caprices marred half my pleasures for me. Once when I sat distrait, bowed by such reflections, a woman exclaimed, "What's the matter with you? One would think you had a family!" "Well," I said, "I have a twin!" And I went away. She was a pretty woman, too!

Do you suppose that Maitre Lapalme--he was Maitre Lapalme by then, this egregious Gregoire--do you suppose that he wrote to bless me for my sacrifice? Not at all! Of my heroisms he knew nothing--he was conscious only of my lapses. To read his letters one would have imagined that I was a reprobate, a creature without honour or remorse. I quote from one of them--it is a specimen of them all. Can you blame me if I had no love for this correspondent?

MY BROTHER,

THE CIRc.u.mSTANCES OF OUR BIRTH:--

Your attention is directed to my preceding communications on this subject. I desire to protest against the revelry from which you recovered either on the 15th or 16th inst. On the afternoon of the latter date, while engaged in a conference of the first magnitude, I was seized with an overwhelming desire to dance a quadrille at a public ball. I found it impossible to concentrate my attention on the case concerning which I was consulted; I could no longer express myself with lucidity. Outwardly sedate, reliable, I sat at my desk dizzied by such visions as pursued St. Anthony to his cell. No sooner was I free than I fled from Vernon, dined in Paris, bought a false beard, and plunged wildly into the vortex of a dancing-hall. Scoundrel! This is past pardon! My sensibilities revolt, and my prudence shudders. Who shall say but that one night I may be recognised? Who can foretell to what blackmail you may expose me? I, Maitre Lapalme, forbid your profligacies, which devolve upon me; I forbid--etc.

Such admissions my brother sent to me in a disguised hand, and unsigned; perhaps he feared that his blackmailer might prove to be myself! Typewriting was not yet general in France.

Our mother still lived at Vernon, where she contemplated her favourite son's success with the profoundest pride. Occasionally I spent a few days with her; sometimes even more, for she always pressed me to remain. I think she pressed me to remain, not from any pleasure in my society, but because she knew that while I was at home I could commit no actions that would corrupt Gregoire. One summer, when I visited her, I met mademoiselle Leuillet.

Mademoiselle Leuillet was the daughter of a widower, a neighbour. I remembered that when our servant first announced her, I thought, "What a nuisance; how bored I am going to be!" And then she came in, and in an instant I was spellbound.

I am tempted to describe Berthe Leuillet to you as she entered our salon that afternoon in a white frock, with a basket of roses in her little hands, but I know very well that no description of a girl ever painted her to anybody yet. Suffice it that she was beautiful as an angel, that her voice was like the music of the spheres--more than all, that one felt all the time, "How good she is, how good, how good!"

I suppose the impression that she made upon me was plainly to be seen, for when she had gone, my mother remarked, "You did not say much. Are you always so silent in girls' company?" "No," I answered; "I do not often meet such girls."

But afterwards I often met Berthe Leuillet.

Never since I was a boy had I stayed at Vernon for so long as now; never had I repented so bitterly as now the error of my ways. I loved, and it seemed to me sometimes that my attachment was reciprocated, yet my position forbade me to go to monsieur Leuillet and ask boldly for his daughter's hand. While I had remained obscure, painters of my acquaintance, whose talent was no more remarkable than my own, had raised themselves from bohemia into prosperity. I abused myself, I acknowledged that I was an idler, a good-for-nothing, I declared that the punishment that had overtaken me was no more than I deserved. And then--well, then I owned to Berthe that I loved her!

Deliberately, of course, I should not have done this before seeking her father's permission, but it happened in the hour of our "good-bye", and I was suffering too deeply to subdue the impulse. I owned that I loved her--and when I left for Paris we were secretly engaged.

Mon Dieu! Now I worked indeed! To win this girl for my own, to show myself worthy of her innocent faith, supplied me with the most powerful incentive in life. In the quarter they regarded me first with ridicule, then with wonder, and, finally, with respect. For my enthusiasm did not fade. "He has turned over a new leaf," they said, "he means to be famous!" It was understood. No more excursions for Silvestre, no more junketings and recklessness! In the morning as soon as the sky was light I was at my easel; in the evening I studied, I sketched, I wrote to Berthe, and re-read her letters. I was another man--my ideal of happiness was now a wife and home.

For a year I lived this new life. I progressed. Men--men whose approval was a cachet--began to speak of me as one with a future. In the Salon a picture of mine made something of a stir. How I rejoiced, how grateful and sanguine I was! All Paris sang "Berthe" to me; the criticisms in the papers, the felicitations of my friends, the praise of the public, all meant Berthe--Berthe with her arms about me, Berthe on my breast.

I said that it was not too soon for me to speak now; I had proved my mettle, and, though I foresaw that her father would ask more before he gave his consent, I was, at least, justified in avowing myself. I telegraphed to my mother to expect me; I packed my portmanteau with trembling hands, and threw myself into a cab. On the way to the station, I noticed the window of a florist; I bade the driver stop, and ran in to bear off some lilies for Berthe. The shop was so full of wonderful flowers that, once among them, I found some difficulty in making my choice. Hence I missed the train--and returned to my studio, incensed by the delay. A letter for me had just been delivered. It told me that on the previous morning Berthe had married my brother.

I could have welcomed a pistol-shot--my world rocked. Berthe lost, false, Gregoire's wife, I reiterated it, I said it over and over, I was stricken by it--and yet I could not realise that actually it had happened. It seemed too treacherous, too horrible to be true.

Oh, I made certain of it later, believe me!--I was no hero of a "great serial," to accept such intelligence without proof. I a.s.sured myself of her perfidy, and burnt her love-letters one by one; tore her photographs into shreds--strove also to tear her image from my heart.

Ah, that mocked me, that I could not tear! A year before I should have rushed to the cafes for forgetfulness, but now, as the shock subsided, I turned feverishly to work. I told myself that she had wrecked my peace, my faith in women, that I hated and despised her; but I swore that she should not have the triumph of wrecking my career, too. I said that my art still remained to me--that I would find oblivion in my art.

Brave words! But one does not recover from such blows so easily.

For months I persisted, denying myself the smallest respite, clinging to a resolution which proved vainer daily. Were art to be mastered by dogged endeavour, I should have conquered; but alas! though I could compel myself to paint, I could not compel myself to paint well. It was the perception of this fact that shattered me at last. I had fought temptation for half a year, worked with my teeth clenched, worked against nature, worked while my pulses beat and clamoured for the draughts of dissipation, which promised a speedier release. I had wooed art, not as art's lover, but as a tortured soul may turn to one woman in the desperate hope of subduing his pa.s.sion for another--and art would yield nothing to a suitor who approached like that; I recognised that my work had been wasted, that the struggle had been useless--I broke down!

I need say little of the months that followed--it would be a record of degradations, and remorse; alternately, I fell, and was ashamed. There were days when I never left the house, when I was repulsive to myself; I shuddered at the horrors that I had committed. No saint has loved virtue better than I did during those long, sick days of self-disgust; no man was ever more sure of defying such hideous temptations if they recurred. As my la.s.situde pa.s.sed, I would take up my brushes and feel confident for an hour, or for a week. And then temptation would creep on me once more--humming in my ears, and tingling in my veins. And temptation had lost its loathsomeness now--it looked again attractive.

It was a siren, it dizzied my conscience, and stupefied my common sense. Back to the mire!

One afternoon when I returned to my rooms, from which I had been absent since the previous day, I heard from the concierge that a visitor awaited me. I climbed the stairs without antic.i.p.ation. My thoughts were sluggish, my limbs leaden, my eyes heavy and bloodshot. Twilight had gathered, and as I entered I discerned merely the figure of a woman.

Then she advanced--and all h.e.l.l seemed to leap flaring to my heart. My visitor was Berthe.

I think nearly a minute must have pa.s.sed while we looked speechlessly in each other's face--hers convulsed by entreaty, mine dark with hate.

"Have you no word for me?" she whispered.

"Permit me to offer my congratulations on your marriage, madame," I said; "I have had no earlier opportunity."

"Forgive me," she gasped. "I have come to beseech your forgiveness! Can you not forget the wrong I did you?"

"Do I look as if I had forgotten?"

"I was inconstant, cruel, I cannot excuse myself. But, O Silvestre, in the name of the love you once bore me, have pity on us! Reform, abjure your evil courses! Do not, I implore you, condemn my husband to this abyss of depravity, do not wreck my married life!" Now I understood what had procured me the honour of a visit from this woman, and I triumphed devilishly that I was the elder twin.

"Madame," I answered, "I think that I owe you no explanations, but I shall say this: the evil courses that you deplore were adopted, not vindictively, but in the effort to numb the agony that you had made me suffer. You but reap as you have sown."

"Reform!" she sobbed. She sank on her knees before me. "Silvestre, in mercy to us, reform!"

"I will never reform," I said inflexibly. "I will grow more abandoned day by day--my past faults shall shine as merits compared with the atrocities that are to come. False girl, monster of selfishness, you are dragging me to the gutter, and your only grief is that _he_ must share my shame! You have blackened my soul, and you have no regret but that my iniquities must react on _him!_ By the shock that stunned him in the first flush of your honeymoon, you know what I experienced when I received the news of your deceit; by the anguish of repentance that overtakes him after each of his orgies, which revolt you, you know that I was capable of being a n.o.bler man. The degradation that you behold is your own work. You have made me bad, and you must bear the consequences--you cannot make me good now to save your husband!"

Humbled and despairing, she left me.

I repeat that it is no part of my confession to palliate my guilt. The sight of her had served merely to inflame my resentment--and it was at this stage that I began deliberately to contemplate revenge.

But not the one that I had threatened. Ah, no! I bethought myself of a vengeance more complete than that. What, after all, were these escapades of his that were followed by contrition, that saw him again and again a penitent at her feet? There should be no more of such trifles; she should be tortured with the torture that she had dealt to me--I would make him _adore another woman_ with all his heart and brain!

It was difficult, for first I must adore, and tire of another woman myself--as my own pa.s.sion faded, his would be born. I swore, however, that I would compa.s.s it, that I would worship some woman for a year-- two years, as long as possible. He would be at peace in the meantime, but the longer my enslavement lasted, the longer Berthe would suffer when her punishment began.

For some weeks now I worked again, to provide myself with money. I bought new clothes and made myself presentable. When my appearance accorded better with my plan, I paraded Paris, seeking the woman to adore.

You may think Paris is full of adorable women? Well, so contrary is human nature, that never had I felt such indifference towards the s.e.x as during that tedious quest--never had a pair of brilliant eyes, or a well-turned neck appealed to me so little. After a month, my search seemed hopeless; I had viewed women by the thousand, but not one with whom I could persuade myself that I might fall violently in love.

How true it is that only the unforeseen comes to pa.s.s! There was a model, one Louise, whose fortune was her back, and who had long bored me by an evident tenderness. One day, this Louise, usually so constrained in my presence, appeared in high spirits, and mentioned that she was going to be married.

The change in her demeanour interested me; for the first time, I perceived that the attractions of Louise were not limited to her back.

A little piqued, I invited her to dine with me. If she had said "yes,"

doubtless that would have been the end of my interest; but she refused.

Before I parted from her, I made an appointment for her to sit to me the next morning.

"So you are going to be married, Louise?" I said carelessly, as I set the palette.