The Cross of Berny Part 1

The Cross of Berny.

by Emile de Girardin.

PREFACE TO THE AMERICAN EDITION.

Literary partnerships have often been tried, but very rarely with success in the more imaginative branches of literature. Occasionally two minds have been found to supplement each other sufficiently to produce good joint writing, as in the works of MM. Erckman-Chatrian; but when the partnership has included more than two, it has almost invariably proved a failure, even when composed of individually the brightest intellects, and where the highest hopes have been entertained. Standing almost if not quite alone, in contrast with these failures of the past, THE CROSS OF BERNY is the more remarkable; and has achieved the success not merely of being the simply harmonious joint work of four individual minds,--but of being in itself, and entirely aside from its interest as a literary curiosity, a _great book_.

A high rank, then, is claimed for it not upon its success as a literary partnership, for that at best would but excite a sort of curious interest, but upon its intrinsic merit as a work of fiction. The spirit of rivalry in which it was undertaken was perhaps not the best guarantee of harmony in the tone of the whole work, but it has certainly added materially to the wit and brilliancy of the letters, while harmony has been preserved by much tact and skill. No one of its authors could alone have written THE CROSS OF BERNY--together, each one has given us his best, and their joint effort will long live to their fame.

The shape in which it appears, as a correspondence between four characters whose names are the pseudonyms of the four authors of the book, although at first it may seem to the reader a little awkward, will upon reflection be seen to be wisely chosen, since it allows to each of the prominent characters an individuality otherwise very difficult of attainment. In this way also any differences of style which there may be, tend rather to heighten the effect, and to increase the reality of the characters.

The t.i.tle under which the original French edition appeared has been retained in the translation, although since its applicability depends upon a somewhat local allusion, the general reader may possibly fail to appreciate it.

CROSS OF BERNY.

I.

IRENE DE CHATEAUDUN _to_ MME. LA VICOMTESSE DE BRAIMES, Hotel de la Prefecture, GREn.o.bLE (Isere).

PARIS, May 16th, 18--.

You are a great prophetess, my dear Valentino. Your predictions are verified.

Thanks to my peculiar disposition, I am already in the most deplorably false position that a reasonable mind and romantic heart could ever have contrived.

With you, naturally and instinctively, I have always been sincere; indeed it would be difficult to deceive one whom I have so often seen by a single glance read the startled conscience, and lead it from the ways of insolence and shame back into the paths of rect.i.tude.

It is to you I would confide all my troubles; your counsel may save me ere it be too late.

You must not think me absurd in ascribing all my unhappiness to what is popularly regarded as "a piece of good luck."

Governed by my weakness, or rather by my fatal judgment, I have plighted my troth!... Good Heavens! is it really true that I am engaged to Prince de Monbert?

If you knew the prince you would laugh at my sadness, and at the melancholy tone in which I announce this intelligence.

Monsieur de Monbert is the most witty and agreeable man in Paris; he is n.o.ble-hearted, generous and ...in fact fascinating!... and I love him!

He alone pleases me; in his absence I weary of everything; in his presence I am satisfied and happy--the hours glide away uncounted; I have perfect faith in his good heart and sound judgment, and proudly recognise his incontestable superiority--yes, I admire, respect, and, I repeat it, love him!...

Yet, the promise I have made to dedicate my life to him, frightens me, and for a month I have had but one thought--to postpone this marriage I wished for--to fly from this man whom I have chosen!...

I question my heart, my experience, my imagination, for an answer to this inexplicable contradiction; and to interpret so many fears, find nothing but school-girl philosophy and poetic fancies, which you will excuse because you love me, and I _know_ my imaginary sufferings will at least awaken pity in your sympathetic breast.

Yes, my dear Valentine, I am more to be pitied now, than I was in the days of my distress and desolation. I, who so courageously braved the blows of adversity, feel weak and trembling under the weight of a too brilliant fortune.

This happy destiny for which I alone am responsible, alarms me more than did the bitter lot that was forced upon me one year ago.

The actual trials of poverty exhaust the field of thought and prevent us from nursing imaginary cares, for when we have undergone the torture of our own forebodings, struggled with the impetuosity and agony of a nature surrendered to itself, we are disposed to look almost with relief on tangible troubles, and to end by appreciating the cares of poverty as salutary distractions from the sickly anxieties of an unemployed mind.

Oh! believe me to be serious, and accuse me not of comic-opera philosophy, my dear Valentine! I feel none of that proud disdain for importunate fortune that we read of in novels; nor do I regret "my pretty boat," nor "my cottage by the sea;" here, in this beautiful drawing-room of the Hotel de Langeac, writing to you, I do not sigh for my gloomy garret in the Marais, where my labors day and night were most tiresome, because a mere parody of the n.o.blest arts, an undignified labor making patience and courage ridiculous, a cruel game which we play for life while cursing it.

No! I regret not this, but I do regret the indolence, the idleness of mind succeeding such trivial exertions. For then there were no resolutions to make, no characters to study, and, above all, no responsibility to bear, nothing to choose, nothing to change.

I had but to follow every morning the path marked out by necessity the evening before.

If I were able to copy or originate some hundred designs; if I possessed sufficient carmine or cobalt to color some wretched engravings--worthless, but fashionable--which I must myself deliver on the morrow; if I could succeed in finding some new patterns for embroidery and tapestry, I was content--and for recreation indulged at evenings in the sweetest, that is most absurd, reveries.

Revery then was a rest to me, now it is a labor, and a dangerous labor when too often resorted to; good thoughts then came to a.s.sist me in my misery; now, vexatious presentiments torment my happiness. Then the uncertainty of my future made me mistress of events. I could each day choose a new destiny, and new adventures. My unexpected and undeserved misfortune was so complete that I had nothing more to dread and everything to hope for, and experienced a vague feeling of grat.i.tude for the ultimate succor that I confidently expected.

I would pa.s.s long hours gazing from my window at a little light shining from the fourth-story window of a distant house. What strange conjectures I made, as I silently watched the mysterious beacon!

Sometimes, in contemplating it, I recalled the questions addressed by Childe Harold to the tomb of Cecilia Metella, asking the cold marble if she who rested there were young and beautiful, a dark-eyed, delicate-featured woman, whose destiny was that reserved by Heaven for those it loves; or was she a venerable matron who had outlived her charms, her children and her kindred?

So I also questioned this solitary light:

To what distressed soul did it lend its aid? Some anxious mother watching and praying beside her sick child, or some youthful student plunging with stern delight into the arcana of science, to wrest from the revealing spirits of the night some luminous truth?

But while the poet questioned death and the past, I questioned the living present, and more than once the distant beacon seemed to answer me. I even imagined that this busy light flickered in concert with mine, and that they brightened and faded in unison.

I could only see it through a thick foliage of trees, for a large garden planted with poplars, pines and sycamores separated the house where I had taken refuge from the tall building whence the beacon shone for me night after night.

As I could never succeed in finding the points of the compa.s.s, I was ignorant of the exact locality of the house, or even on what street it fronted, and knew nothing of its occupants. But still this light was a friend; it spoke a sympathetic language to my eyes--it said: "Courage!

you do not suffer alone; behind these trees and under those stars there is one who watches, labors, dreams." And when the night was majestic and beautiful, when the morn rose slowly in the azure sky, like a radiant host offered by the invisible hand of G.o.d to the adoration of the faithful who pray, lament and die by night; when these ever-new splendors dazzled my troubled soul; when I felt myself seized with that poignant admiration which makes solitary hearts find almost grief in joys that cannot be shared, it seemed to me that a dear voice came to calm my excitement, and exclaimed, with fervor, "Is not the night beautiful? What happiness in enjoying it together!"

When the nightingale, deceived by the silence of the deserted spot, and attracted by these dark shades, became a Parisian for a few days, rejuvenating with his vernal songs the old echoes of the city, again it seemed that the same voice whispered softly through the trembling leaves: "He sings, come listen!"

So the sad nights glided peacefully away, comforted by these foolish reveries.

Then I invoked my dear ideal, beloved shadow, protector of every honest heart, proud dream, a perfect choice, a jealous love sometimes making all other love impossible! Oh, my beautiful ideal! Must I then say farewell? Now I no longer dare to invoke thee!...

But what folly! Why am I so silly as to permit the remembrance of an ideal to haunt me like a remorse? Why do I suffer it to make me unjust towards n.o.ble and generous qualities that I should worthily appreciate?

Do not laugh at me, Valentine, when I a.s.sure you that my greatest distress is that my lover does not resemble in any respect my ideal, and I am provoked that I love him--I cannot deceive myself, the contrast is striking--judge for yourself.

You may laugh if you will, but the whole secret of my distress is the contrast between these two portraits.

My lover has handsome, intelligent blue eyes--my ideal's eyes are black, full of sadness and fire, not the soft, troubadour eye with long drooping lids--no! My ideal's glance has none of the languishing tenderness of romance, but is proud, powerful, penetrating, the look of a thinker, of a great mind yielding to the influence of love, the gaze of a hero disarmed by pa.s.sion!

My lover is tall and slender--my ideal is only a head taller than myself ... Ah! I know you are laughing at me, Valentine! Well! I sometimes laugh at myself....

My lover is frankness personified--my ideal is not a sly knave, but he is mysterious; he never utters his thoughts, but lets you divine, or rather he speaks to a responsive sentiment in your own bosom.

My lover is what men call "A good fellow," you are intimate with him in twenty-four hours.