Led Astray and The Sphinx Part 14

In the meantime she had reached her sixteenth year. Her mother's promise had been formal. Julia was henceforth free to follow her vocation, and she was preparing for it with an impatient ardor that edified the good ladies of the convent. Madame de Lucan expressing, one morning, in the presence of her mother and her husband the anxiety that oppressed her heart during these last days of respite:

"As to me, my daughter," said the baroness, "I must confess that I am urging with all my wishes and prayers the moment which you seem to dread.

The life you have been leading since your marriage has nothing human about it; but what forms its princ.i.p.al torment, is the constant struggle which you have to sustain against that child's obstinacy. Well, when she has become a nun, there will no longer be any struggle; the situation will be clearer; and note that you will not be in reality any more separated than you are now, since the house is not a cloister; I would just as lief it were, myself; but it is not. And then, why oppose a vocation which I really look upon as providential? In the interest of the child herself, you should congratulate yourself upon the resolution she has taken; I appeal to your husband to say if that is not so. Come, let me ask you, my dear sir, what could be expected of such an organization, if she were once let loose upon the world? Why! she would be a dangerous character for society! You know what a head she has! a volcano! And pray observe, my friend, that at this present moment she is a perfect odalisk. You have not seen her for some time; you cannot imagine how she has developed. I, who enjoy the treat of seeing her twice a week, can positively a.s.sure you that she is a perfect odalisk, and besides, divinely dressed. In fact, she is so well made! you might throw a window-curtain over her with a pitch-fork, and she would look as if she were just coming out of Worth's! There, ask Pierre what he thinks about it, he who has the honor of being admitted to her good graces!"

Monsieur de Moras, who was coming in at that very moment, shared, indeed, with a very limited number of friends of the family, the privilege of accompanying Clotilde occasionally on her visits to Julia's convent.

"Well, my good Pierre," resumed the baroness, "we were speaking of Julia, and I was telling my son-in-law that it was really quite fortunate that she was willing to become a saint, because otherwise she would certainly set Paris on fire!"

"Because?" asked the count.

"Because she is beautiful as Sin!"

"Undoubtedly she is quite good-looking," said the count somewhat coldly.

The baroness having gone out on some errands with Clotilde, Monsieur de Moras remained alone with Lucan.

"It really seems to me," he said to the latter, "that our poor Julia is being very harshly treated."

"In what way?"

"Her grandmother speaks of her as of a perverse creature! And what fault do they find with her after all? Her worship of her father's memory! It is excessive, I grant; but filial piety, even when exaggerated, is not a vice, that I know of. Her sentiments are exalted; what does it matter if they are generous? Is that a reason why she should be devoted to the infernal divinities and thrust out of the way to be forgotten?"

"But you are very strange, my friend, I a.s.sure you," said Lucan. "What is the matter with you? whom do you mean to blame? You are certainly aware that Julia proposes taking the vail wholly of her own accord; that her mother is distressed about it, and that she has spared no effort to dissuade her from that step. As to myself, I have no reason whatever to be fond of her; she has caused and is still causing me much grief; but you know well enough that I have ever been ready to greet her as my daughter, if she had deigned to return to us."

"Oh! I accuse neither her mother nor yourself, of course; it is the baroness who irritates me; she is unnatural! Julia is her grandchild after all, and she rejoices--she positively rejoices--at the prospect of seeing her a nun!"

"_Ma foi_, I declare to you that I am not far from rejoicing too. The situation is too painful for Clotilde; it must be brought to an end; and as I see no other possible solution--"

"But I beg your pardon; there might be another."

"And which?"

"She might marry."

"How likely! and marry--whom, pray?"

The count approached nearer to Lucan, looked him straight in the face, and smiling with some embarra.s.sment:

"Me!" he said.

"Repeat that!" said Lucan.

"_Mon cher_," rejoined the count, "you see that I am as red as a peony; spare me. I have wished for a long time to broach that delicate question to you, but my courage has failed me; since I have found it, at last, don't deprive me of it."

"My dear friend," said Lucan, "allow me to recover a little first, for I am falling from the clouds. What! you are in love with Julia?"

"To an extraordinary degree, my friend."

"No! there is something under that; you have discovered this means of drawing us together, and you wish to sacrifice yourself for the peace of the family."

"I swear to you that I am not thinking in the least of the peace of the family; I am thinking wholly of my own, which is very much disturbed, for I love that child with an energy of feeling that I never knew before. If I don't marry her, I shall never console myself for the rest of my life."

"To that extent?" said Lucan, dumfounded.

"It is a terrible thing, _mon cher_," rejoined Monsieur de Moras. "I am absolutely in love; when she looks at me, when I touch her hand, when her dress rustles against me, I feel, as it were, a philter running through my veins. I had heard of emotions of that kind, but I had never felt them. I must confess that they delight me; but at the same time they distress me, for I cannot conceal the fact to myself that there are a thousand chances against one that my pa.s.sion will not be reciprocated, and it really seems as though my heart should wear mourning for it as long as it shall beat."

"What an adventure!" said Lucan, who had recovered all his gravity. "That is a very serious matter; very annoying."

He walked a few steps about the parlor, absorbed in thoughts that seemed of a rather somber character.

"Is Julia aware of your sentiments?" he said, suddenly.

"Most certainly not; I would not have taken the liberty of informing her of them without first speaking to you. Will you be kind enough to act as my amba.s.sador to her mother?"

"Why, yes, with pleasure," said Lucan, with a shade of hesitation that did not escape his friend.

"You think that is useless, don't you?" said the count with a forced smile.

"Useless--why so?"

"In the first place, it is very late."

"It is somewhat late, no doubt. Things have gone very far; but I have never had much confidence in the stability of Julia's ideas of her vocation. Besides, in these restless imaginations, the sincerest resolutions of to-day become readily the dislikes of the morrow."

"But you doubt that--that I should succeed in pleasing her?"

"Why should you not please her? You are more than good-looking. You are thirty-two years old; she is sixteen. You are a little richer than she is.

All that does very well."

"Well, then, why do you hesitate to serve me?"

"I do not hesitate to serve you; only I see you very much in love; you are not accustomed to it, and I fear that a condition of things so novel for you might be urging you somewhat hastily to such a grave determination as marriage. A wife is not a mistress. In short, before taking an irrevocable step I would beg of you to think well and further over it."

"My good friend," said the count, "I do not wish, and I believe quite sincerely that I cannot, do so. You know my ideas. Genuine pa.s.sions always have the best of it, and I am not quite sure that honor itself is a very effective argument against them. As to setting up reason against them, it is worse than folly. Besides, come, Lucan, what is there so unreasonable in the simple fact of marrying a person I love? I don't see that it is absolutely necessary for a man not to love his wife--Well! can I rely upon you?"

"Completely so," said Lucan, taking his hand. "I raised my objections; now I am wholly at your service. I shall speak to Clotilde in a moment. She is going to see her daughter this afternoon. Come and dine with us to-night; but summon up all your courage, for, after all, success is very uncertain."

Monsieur de Lucan found it no difficult task to gain the cause of Monsieur de Moras with Clotilde. After hearing him, not, however, without interrupting him more than once with exclamations of surprise:

"Mon Dieu!" she replied, "that would be an ideal! Not only would that marriage put an end to projects that break my heart, but it offers all the conditions of happiness that I can possibly think of for my daughter; and furthermore, the friendship that binds you to Pierre would naturally, some day, bring about a _rapprochement_ between his wife and yourself. All that would be too fortunate; but how could we hope for such a complete and sudden revolution in Julia's ideas? She will not even allow me to deliver my message to the end."

She left, palpitating with anxiety. She found Julia alone in her room, trying on before a mirror her novice's dress; the vail that was to conceal her luxuriant hair was laid upon the bed; she was simply dressed in a long, white woolen tunic, whose folds she was engaged in adjusting.

She blushed when she saw her mother come in; then with an insipient laugh:

"Cymodocea in the circus, isn't it, mother?"

Clotilde made no answer; she had joined her hands in a supplicating att.i.tude, and wept as she looked at her. Julia was moved by that mute sorrow; two tears rolled from her eyes, and she threw her arms around her mother's neck; then, taking a seat by her side: