Conscience Part 53

If she dared not frankly ask him this question: Why must we go out? any more than the others: Why is it proper that I should go to ma.s.s to be seen? Why should I wear gowns that ruin us? Why do you accept decorations that are valueless in your eyes? Why do you seek the society of men who have no merit but what they derive from their official position or from their fortune? Why do we take upon ourselves social duties that weary both of us, instead of remaining together in a tender and intelligent intimacy that is sweet to us both? she could not ask herself.

They all appertained to this order of ideas, that she, without doubt, found explained them: disposition of character; the exactions of an ambition in haste to realize its desires; susceptibility or overshadowing pride; but there were others founded on observation or memory, having no connection with those, or so it seemed to her.

She began to know her husband the day following their marriage, having believed that he was always such as he revealed himself to her; but this was not the case, and the man she had loved was so unlike the man whose wife she had become, that it might almost be thought there were two.

To tell the truth, it was not marriage that made the change in his temper that distressed her; but it was not less characteristic by that, that it dated back to a period anterior to this marriage.

She remembered the commencement with a clearness that left no place for doubt or hesitation; it was at the time when pursued by creditors he entered into relations with Caffie. For the first time he, always so strong that she believed him above weakness, had had a moment of discouragement on announcing that he would probably be obliged to leave Paris; but this depression had neither the anger nor weakness that he had since shown. It was the natural sadness of a man who saw his future destroyed, nothing more. The only surprise that she then felt was caused by the idea of strangling Caffie and taking enough money from his safe to clear himself from debt, and also because he said--as a consequence of this act--speaking of the remorse of an intelligent man, that his conscience would not reproach him, since for him conscience did not exist. But this was evidently a simple philosophical theory, not a trait of character; a jest or an argument for the sake of discussion.

Relieved from his creditors with the money won at Monaco, he returned to his usual calm, working harder than ever, pa.s.sing his 'concours', and when it seemed excusable that he might be nervous, violent, unjust, he remained the man that he had been ever since she knew him. Then, all at once, a short time before Florlentin went to the a.s.sizes, occurred these strange explosions of temper, spasms of anger, and restlessness that she could not explain, manifesting themselves exactly at the time when, by Madame Dammauville's intervention, she hoped Florentin would be saved.

She had not forgotten the furious anger, that was inexplicable and unjustifiable, with which he refused her request to see Madame Dammauville. He had thrust her away, wishing to break with her, and until she was a witness of this scene she never imagined that any one could put such violence into exasperation. Then to this scene succeeded another, totally opposed, which had not less impressed her, when, at their little dinner by the fire, he showed such profound desolation on telling her to keep the memory of this evening when she should judge him, and announcing to her, in a prophetic sort of way, that the hour would come when she would know him whom she loved.

And now this hour, the thought of which she had thrown far from her, had sounded; she sought to combine the elements of this judgment which then appeared criminal to her, and now forced itself upon her, whatever she might do to repel it.

How many times this memory returned to her! It could almost be said that it had never left her, sweet and sad at the same time, less sweet and more sad, according as new subjects for uneasiness were added to the others, in deepening the mysterious and troublous impression that it left with her.

To judge him! Why did he wish that she should judge him? And on what?

And yet with him it was not an insignificant word, but the evidence of a particular state of conscience, which many times since a.s.serted itself.

Was it not, in effect, to this order of ideas that the cry belonged that escaped him in the night when, waking suddenly, he asked with emotion, with fright: "What have I said?" And also to the same appertained the anger that carried him away when, 'a propos' of their religious marriage, she spoke of confession: "Why do you think that I should be afraid to go to confession?"

How could he imagine that she could admit the idea of fear in connection with him? The idea never occurred to her mind until this moment; and if now the memory of her astonishment came to her, it was because of other little things added to those of the past that evoked it.

How numerous and significant they were, these things: his constant uneasiness on seeing himself watched by her; his invitation when he thought she was going to question him; his access of pa.s.sion when, through heedlessness or forgetfulness, or simply by chance, she asked him a question on certain subjects, and immediately the tenderness that followed, so sudden that they appeared rather planned in view of a determined end than natural or spontaneous.

It was a long time before she admitted the calculation under the sweet words that made her so happy; but in the end it was well that she should open her eyes to the evidence, and see that they were with him the consequences of the same and constant preoccupation, that of not committing himself.

It was only one step from this to ask him what he did not wish to yield up.

Yet, as short as it was, she resisted for a long time the curiosity that possessed her. It was her duty as a loving and devoted wife not to seek beyond what he showed her, and this duty was in perfect accord with the dispositions of her love; but the power of things seen carried her beyond will and reason. She could not apply her mind to search for that which agonized her, and she could not close her eyes and ears to what she saw and heard.

And what struck them were the same observations, turning always in the same circle, applied to the same subjects and persons:

Caffie's name irritated him; Madame Dammauville's angered him; Florentin's made him positively unhappy.

As for the two former, she might have prevented the p.r.o.nunciation of them when she saw the effect they infallibly produced on him.

But she could not prevent the utterance of Florentin's name, even had she wished it. How could she tell her mother never to speak the name of him who was constantly in their thoughts?

In spite of Saniel's efforts and solicitations, supported by Nougarede's, Florentin had embarked for New Caledonia, whence he wrote as often as he could. His letters related all his sufferings in the terrible galleys, where he was confined during the voyage, and since his arrival they were a series of long complaints, continued from one to the other, like a story without end, turning always on the same subject, his physical sufferings, his humiliation, his discouragement, and his disgust in the midst of the unfortunates whose companion he was.

The arrival of these letters filled the mother and sister with anguish that lasted for several days; and this anguish, that neither of them could dissimulate, angered Saniel.

"What would you do if he were dead?" he asked Phillis.

"Would it not be better for him?"

"But he will return."

"In what condition?"

"Are we the masters of fate?"

"We weep, we do not complain."

But he complained of the weeping faces that surrounded him, the tears they concealed from him, the sighs they stifled. Ordinarily he was tender and affectionate to his mother-in-law, with attention and deference which in some ways seemed affected, as if he were so by will rather than by natural sentiment; but at these times he forgot this tenderness, and treated her with hardness so unjust, that more than once Madame Cormier spoke of it to her daughter.

"How can your husband, who is so good to me, be so merciless regarding Florentin? One would say that our sadness produces on him the effect of a reproach that we would address to him."

One day when things had gone farther than usual, she had the courage to speak to him plainly: "Forgive me for burdening you with the weariness of our disgrace," she said to him. "When I complain of everything, of men and things, you should remember that you are the exception, you who have done everything to save him."

But these few words which she believed would calm the irritation of her son-in-law, had on the contrary exasperated him; he left her, furious.

"I do not understand your husband at all," she said to her daughter.

"Will you not explain to me what the matter is with him?"

How could she give her mother the explanation that she could not give herself? Having reached an unfathomable abyss, she dared not even lean over to look into its depths; and instead of going on in the path where she was pledged in spite of herself, she made every effort to return, or at least to stop.

What good would it do to find out why he was so peculiar, and what it was that he took so much pains to conceal? This could only be idle curiosity on her part, for which she would be punished sooner or later.

Turning these thoughts over continually in her mind she lost her gayety, her power to resist blows of fate, such as the small trials of life, which formerly made her courageous; her vigorous elasticity sunk under the heavy weight with which it was charged, and her smiling eyes now more often expressed anxiety than happiness and confidence.

In spite of her watchfulness over herself she was not able to hide the change from Saniel, for it manifested itself in everything--in her face formerly so open, but which now bore the imprint of a secret sadness; in her concentrated manner, in her silence and abstraction.

What was the matter with her? He questioned her, and she replied with the prudence that she used in all her conversation with him. He examined her medically, but found nothing to indicate a sickly condition which would justify the change in her.

If she did not wish to answer his questions, and he had the proof that she did not wish to; if, on the other hand, she was not ill, and he was convinced that she was not--there must be something serious the matter to make the woman whom but lately he read so easily become an enigma that made him uneasy.

And this thing--if it were that whose crushing weight he himself carried on his bent shoulders? She divined, she understood, if not all, at least a part of the truth.

What an extraordinary situation was hers, and one which might truly destroy her reason.

Nothing to fear from others, everything from himself. Justice, law, the world--on all sides he was let alone; nothing was asked of him; that which was owed was paid; but he by a sickly aberration was going to awake the dead who slept in their tomb, from which no one thought of taking them, and to make spectres of them which he alone saw and heard.

And he believed himself strong. Fool that he was, and still more foolish to have taken such a charge when by the exercise of his will he did not place himself in a condition to carry it! To will! But he had not learned how to will.

CHAPTER XLII. THE POWER OF HYPNOTISM

The relative calm that Saniel had felt since his marriage he owed to Phillis; to the strength, the confidence, the peace that he drew from her. Phillis without strength, without confidence, without interior peace, such as she was now, could not give him what she no longer had herself, and he returned to the distracted condition that preceded his marriage, and felt the same anguish, the same agitation, the same madness. The beautiful relations, worldly consideration, success, decorations, honors, were good for others; but for his happiness he required the tranquillity and serenity of his wife, and her good moral health which pa.s.sed into him when she slept on his shoulder. In that case there were no sudden awakenings, no sleeplessness; at the sound of her gentle respiration he was rea.s.sured, and the spectres remained in their tomb.

But now that this respiration was agitated, and he no longer felt in her this tranquillity and serenity, he was no longer calm; she was weak and uneasy, and she communicated her fever to him, not her sleep.

"You do not sleep. Why do you not sleep?"

"And you?"