Luxury-Gluttony Part 25

"Certainly, Frederick the Great, Prince Eugene, were not great in manner--"

"Alas! monseigneur, it is even so, and I, on the contrary, am different from these great men; unfortunately, I have too much manner."

"What do you mean, madame?"

"Ah, my G.o.d, yes! I am like the coward who makes everybody tremble by his stern appearance, and who is really more afraid than the most cowardly of the cowards he intimidates. In a word, I inspire that which I do not feel; picture to yourself, monseigneur, the poor icicle carrying around him flame and conflagration. And I would have the presumption to call myself a phenomenon if I did not recollect that the beautiful fruits of my country, so bright-coloured, so delicate, so fragrant, awaken in me a furious appet.i.te, without sharing the least in the world the fine appet.i.te they give, or ever feeling the slightest desire to be crunched. It is so with me, monseigneur, it seems that as innocently as the fruits of my country I excite, in some respects, the hunger of an ogre, I who am of a cen.o.bitic frugality. So now I have concluded to be no longer astonished at the influence I exercise involuntarily, but as, after all, this action is powerful, inasmuch as it excites the most violent pa.s.sions of men, I try to elicit the best that is possible from my victims, either for themselves or for the good of others, and that, I swear without coquetry, deception, or promises, if one says to me, 'I am pa.s.sionately in love with you,' I answer, 'Well, cherish your pa.s.sion, perhaps its fire will melt my ice, perhaps the lava will hide itself in me under the snow. Fan your flame, then, let it burn until it wins me; I ask nothing better, for I am as free as the air, and I am twenty-two years old.'"

As she uttered these words, Madeleine raised her head, lifted her veil, and gazed intently at the archduke.

The marquise spoke truly, for her pa.s.sion for her blond archangel, of whom she had talked to Sophie Dutertre, had never had anything terrestrial in it.

The prince believed Madeleine; first, because truth almost always carries conviction with it, then, because he felt happy in putting faith in the words of the young woman. He blushed less in acknowledging to himself the profound and sudden impression produced on him by this singular creature, when he realised that, after all, she had been worthy of guarding the sacred fire of Vesta; so, the imprudent man, his eyes fixed on the eyes of Madeleine, contemplating them with pa.s.sionate eagerness, drank at leisure the enchanted love-potion.

Madeleine resumed, smiling:

"At this moment, monseigneur, you are asking yourself, I am sure, a question which I often ask myself."

"What is that, pray?"

"You are asking yourself (to speak like an old-time romance), 'Who is he who will make me share his pa.s.sion?' Ah, well, I, too, am very anxious to penetrate the future on this subject."

"That future, nevertheless, depends on you."

"No, monseigneur, to draw music from the lyre, some one must make it vibrate."

"And who will that happy mortal be?"

"My G.o.d! who knows? Perhaps you, monseigneur."

"I!" cried the prince, charmed, transported. "I!"

"I say perhaps."

"Oh, what must I do?"

"Please me."

"And how shall I do that?"

"Listen, monseigneur."

"I pray you, do not call me monseigneur; it is too ceremonious."

"Oh, oh, monseigneur; it is a great favour for a prince to be treated with familiarity; he must deserve it. You ask me how you may please me.

I will give you not an example, but a fact. The poet, Moser-Hartmann, whose apostasy you say I caused, addressed to me the most singular remark in the world. One day he met me at the house of a mutual friend, looked at me a long time, and then said, with an air of angry alarm: 'Madame, for the peace of spirituality, you ought to be buried alive!'

And he went out, but next day he came to see me, madly in love, a victim, he told me, to a sudden pa.s.sion,--as sudden and novel as it was uncontrollable. 'Let your pa.s.sion burn,' I said to him, 'but hear the advice of a friend; the pa.s.sion devours you, let it flow in your verse.

Become a great poet, and perhaps your glory will intoxicate me.'"

"And did the inebriation ever come to you?" said the prince.

"No, but glory has come to my lover to console him, and a poet can be consoled for the loss of everything by glory. Ah, well, monseigneur, have I used my influence well or ill?"

Suddenly the archduke started.

A keen suspicion pierced his heart. Dissimulating this painful doubt, he said to Madeleine, with a forced smile:

"But, madame, your adventure with the cardinal legate did not have so happy an end for him. What is left to console him?"

"There rests with him the consciousness of having delivered a country that abhorred him from his presence," replied Madeleine, gaily. "Is there nothing in that, monseigneur?"

"Come now, between us, what interest had you in making this unhappy man the victim of a terrible scandal?"

"How! What interest, monseigneur? What but the interest of unmasking an infamous hypocrite, of chasing him out of a city that he oppressed,--in short, to cover him with contempt and shame. 'I believe in your pa.s.sion,' said I to him, 'and perhaps I may share it if you will mask as a Hungarian hussar, and come with me to the ball of the Rialto, my dear cardinal; it is an extravagant, foolish caprice on my part, no doubt, but that is my condition, and, besides, who will recognise you under the mask?' This horrible priest had his head turned; he accepted, and I destroyed him."

"And you will destroy me, madame, as you did the cardinal legate," cried the archduke, rising and making a supreme effort to break the charm whose irresistible power he already felt. "I see the snare; I have enemies; you wish by your perfidious seductions, to drag me into some dangerous proceeding, and afterwards to hand me over to the contempt and ridicule that my weakness would deserve. But, bless G.o.d! he has opened my eyes in time. I recognise with horror that infernal fascination which took from me the use of my reason, and which was not love even,--no, I yielded to the grossest, most degrading pa.s.sion which can lower man to the level of a brute, to that pa.s.sion which, to my shame and to yours, I desire to stigmatise aloud as l.u.s.t, madame!"

Madeleine shrugged her shoulders and began to laugh derisively, then rising from her seat and walking up to the prince, who had stepped back to the chimney, she took him gently by the hand, and led him back to a chair near her own, without his having the strength to resist this peaceable violence.

"Do me the favour to listen to me, monseigneur," said Madeleine. "I have only a few more words to say to you, and then you will not see the Marquise de Miranda again in your life."

CHAPTER XVI.

When Madeleine had seated the prince near her, she said to him:

"Listen, monseigneur, I will be frank, so frank that I defy you not to believe me. I came here with the hope of turning your head."

"So," cried the prince, astonished, "you confess it!"

"Entirely. That end attained, I wished to use my influence over you, to obtain, as I told you, monseigneur, at the beginning of our interview, two things, one considered almost impossible, the other as altogether impossible."

"You are right, madame, to defy me not to believe you," replied the prince, with a constrained smile. "I believe you."

"The two deeds that I wished to obtain from you were great, n.o.ble, and generous; they would have made you esteemed and respected. That is very far, I think, from wishing to abuse my influence over you to excite you to evil or indignity, as you suppose."

"Well, madame, come to the point; what is it?"

"First, an act of clemency, or rather of justice, which would rally around you a mult.i.tude of hearts in Lombardy,--the free and full pardon of Colonel Pernetti."

The prince jumped up from his chair, and exclaimed:

"Never, madame, never!"

"The free and full pardon of Colonel Pernetti, one of the most honoured men in all Italy," pursued Madeleine, without noticing the interruption of the prince. "The reasonable pride of this n.o.ble-hearted man will prevent his asking you for the slightest alleviation of his woes, but come generously to his relief, and his grat.i.tude will a.s.sure you of his devotion."