The Cross of Berny Part 12

EDGAR DE MEILHAN _to the_ PRINCE DE MONBERT, Saint Dominique Street, Paris.

RICHEPORT, June 3d, 18--

It seems, my dear Roger, that we are engaged in a game of interrupted addresses. For my Louise Guerin, like your Irene de Chateaudun, has gone I know not where, leaving me to struggle, in this land of apple trees, with an incipient pa.s.sion which she has planted in my breast. Flight has this year become an epidemic among women.

The day after that famous soiree, I went to the post-office ostensibly to carry the letter containing those triumphant details, but in reality to see Louise, for any servant possessed sufficient intelligence to acquit himself of such a commission. Imagine my surprise and disappointment at finding instead of Madame Taverneau a strange face, who gruffly announced that the post-mistress had gone away for a few days with Madame Louise Guerin. The dove had flown, leaving to mark its pa.s.sage a few white feathers in its mossy nest, a faint perfume of grace in this common-place mansion!

I could have questioned Madame Taverneau's fat subst.i.tute, but I am principled against asking questions; things are explained soon enough.

Disenchantment is the key to all things. When I like a woman I carefully avoid all her acquaintance, any one who can tell me aught about her. The sound of her name p.r.o.nounced by careless lips, puts me to flight; the letters that she receives might be given me open and I should throw them, unread, into the fire. If in speaking she makes any allusion to the past events of her life, I change the conversation; I tremble when she begins a recital, lest some disillusionizing incident should escape her which would destroy the impression I had formed of her. As studiously as others hunt after secrets I avoid them; if I have ever learned anything of a woman I loved, it has always been in spite of my earnest efforts, and what I have known I have carefully endeavored to forget.

Such is my system. I said nothing to the fat woman, but entered Louise's deserted chamber.

Everything was as she had left it.

A bunch of wild flowers, used as a model, had not had time to fade; an unfinished bouquet rested on the easel, as if awaiting the last touches of the pencil. Nothing betokened a final departure. One would have said that Louise might enter at any moment. A little black mitten lay upon a chair; I picked it up--and would have pressed it to my lips, if such an action had not been deplorably rococo.

Then I threw myself into an old arm-chair, by the side of the bed--like Faust in Marguerite's room--lifting the curtains with as much precaution as if Louise reposed beneath. You are going to laugh at me, I know, dear Roger, but I a.s.sure you, I have never been able to gaze upon a young girl's bed without emotion.

That little pillow, the sole confidant of timid dreams, that narrow couch, fitted like a tomb for but one alabaster form, inspired me with tender melancholy. No anacreontic thoughts came to me, I a.s.sure you, nor any disposition to rhyme in _ette_, herbette, filette, coudrette. The love I bear to n.o.ble poesy saved me from such an exhibition of bad taste.

A crucifix, over which hung a piece of blessed box, spread its ivory arms above Louise's untroubled slumber. Such simple piety touched me. I dislike bigots, but I detest atheists.

Musing there alone it flashed upon me that Louise Guerin had never been married, in spite of her a.s.sertion. I am disposed to doubt the existence of the late Albert Guerin. A sedate and austere atmosphere surrounds Louise, suggesting the convent or the boarding-school.

I went into the garden; the sunbeams checkered the steps of the porch; the wilted iris drooped on its stem, and the acacia flowers strewed the pathway. Apropos of acacia flowers, do you know, that fried in batter, they make excellent fritters? Finding myself alone in the walks where I had strolled with her, I do not know how it happened, but I felt my heart swell, and I sighed like a young abbe of the 17th century.

I returned to the chateau, having no excuse for remaining longer, vexed, disappointed, wearied, idle--the habit of seeing Louise every day had grown upon me.

And habit is everything to poor humanity, as that graceful poet Alfred de Musset says. My feet only know the way to the post-office; what shall I do with myself while this visit lasts? I tried to read, but my attention wandered; I skipped the lines, and read the same paragraph over twice; my book having fallen down I picked it up and read it for one whole hour upside down, without knowing it--I wished to make a monosyllabic sonnet--extremely interesting occupation--and failed. My quatrains were tedious, and my tercets entirely too diffuse.

My mother begins to be uneasy at my dullness; she has asked twice if I were sick--I have fallen off already a quarter of a pound; for nothing is more enraging than to be deserted at the most critical period of one's infatuation! Ixion of Normandy, my Juno is a screen-painter, I open my arms and clasp only a cloud! My position, similar to yours, cannot, however, be compared with it--mine only relates to a trifling flirtation, a thwarted fancy, while yours is a serious pa.s.sion for a woman of your own rank who has accepted your hand, and therefore has no right to trifle with you,--she must be found, if only for vengeance!

Remorse consumes me because of my sentimental stupidity by moonlight.

Had I profited by the night, the solitude and the occasion, Louise had not left me; she saw clearly that I loved her, and was not displeased at the discovery. Women are strange mixtures of timidity and rashness.

Perhaps she has gone to join her lover, some saw-bones, some counting-house Lovelace, while I languish here in vain, like Celadon or Lygdamis of cooing memory.

This is not at all probable, however, for Madame Taverneau would not compromise her respectability so far as to act as chaperon to the loves of Louise Guerin. After all, what is it to me? I am very good to trouble myself about the freaks of a prudish screen-painter! She will return, because the hired piano has not been sent back to Rouen, and not a soul in the house knows a note of music but Louise, who plays quadrilles and waltzes with considerable taste, an accomplishment she owes to her mistress of painting, who had seen better days and possessed some skill.

Do not be too much flattered by this letter of grievances, for I only wanted an excuse to go to the post-office to see if Louise has returned--suppose she has not! the thought drives the blood back to my heart.

Isn't it singular that I should fall desperately in love with this simple shepherdess--I who have resisted the sea-green glances and smiles of the sirens that dwell in the Parisian ocean? Have I escaped from the Marquise's Israelite turbans only to become a slave to a straw bonnet? I have pa.s.sed safe and sound through the most dangerous defiles to be worsted in open country; I could swim in the whirlpool, and now drown in a fish-pond; every celebrated beauty, every renowned coquette finds me on my guard. I am as circ.u.mspect as a cat walking over a table covered with gla.s.s and china. It is hard to make me pose, as they say in a certain set; but when the adversary is not to be feared, I allow him so many advantages that in the end he subdues me.

I was not sufficiently on my guard with Louise at first.

I said to myself: "She is only a grisette"--and left the door of my heart open--love entered in, and I fear I shall have some trouble in driving him out.

Excuse, dear Roger, this nonsense, but I must write you something. After all, my pa.s.sion is worth as much as yours. Love is the same whether inspired by an empress or a rope-dancer, and I am just as unhappy at Louise's disappearance as you are at Irene's.

EDGAR DE MEILHAN

XI.

ROGER DE MONBERT _to_ MONSIEUR DE MEILHAN, Pont de l'Arche (Eure).

PARIS, June 3d 18--.

She is in Paris!

Before knowing it I felt it. The atmosphere was filled with a voice, a melody, a brightness, a perfume that murmured: Irene is here!

Paris appears to me once more populated; the crowd is no longer a desert in my eyes; this great dead city has recovered its spirit of life; the sun once more smiles upon me; the earth bounds under my feet; the soft summer air fans my burning brow, and whispers into my ear that one adored name--Irene!

Chance has a treasure-house of atrocious combinations. Chance! The cunning demon! He calls himself Chance so as to better deceive us. With an infernal skilfulness he feigns not to watch us in the decisive moments of our lives, and at the same time leads us like blind fools into the very path he has marked out for us.

You know the two brothers Ernest and George de S. were planted by their family in the field of diplomacy: they study Eastern languages and affect Eastern manners. Well, yesterday we met in the Bois de Boulogne, they in a calash, and I on horseback--I am trying riding as a moral hygiene--as the carriage dashed by they called out to me an invitation to dinner; I replied, "Yes," without stopping my horse. Idleness and indolence made me say "Yes," when I should have said, "No;" but _Yes_ is so much easier to p.r.o.nounce than _No_, especially on horseback. _No_ necessitates a discussion; _Yes_ ends the matter, and economizes words and time.

I was rather glad I had met these young sprigs of diplomacy. They are good antidotes for low spirits, for they are always in a hilarious state and enjoy their youth in idle pleasure, knowing they are destined to grow old in the soporific dulness of an Eastern court.

I thought we three would be alone at dinner; alas! there were five of us.

Two female artistes who revelled in their precocious emanc.i.p.ation; two divinities worshipped in the temple of the grand sculptors of modern Athens; the Scylla and Charybdis of Paris.

I am in the habit of bowing with the same apparent respect to every woman in the universe. I have bowed to the ebony women of Senegal; to the moon-colored women of the Southern Archipelago; to the snow-white women of Behring's Strait, and to the bronze women of Lah.o.r.e and Ceylon.

Now it was impossible for me to withdraw from the presence of two fair women whose portraits are the admiration of all connoisseurs who visit the Louvre. Besides, I have a theory: the less respectable a woman is, the more respect we should show her, and thus endeavor to bring her back to virtue.

I remained and tried to add my fifth share of antique gayety to the feast. We were Praxiteles, Phidias and Scopas; we had inaugurated the modest Venus and her sister in their temples, and we drank to our model G.o.ddesses in wines from the Ionian Archipelago.

That evening, you may remember, Antigone was played at the Odeon in the Faubourg Saint-Germain.

I have another theory: in any action, foolish or wise, either carry it through bravely when once undertaken, or refrain from undertaking it. I had not the wisdom to refrain, therefore I was compelled to imitate the folly of my friends; at dessert I even abused the invitation, and too often sought to drown sorrow in the ruby cup.

We started for the Odeon. Our entrance at the theatre caused quite an excitement. The ladies, cavalierly suspended on the arms of the two future Eastern amba.s.sadors, sailed in with a conscious air of epicurean grace and dazzling beauty. The cla.s.sic ushers obsequiously threw open the doors, and led us to our box. I brought up the procession, looking as insolent and proud as I did the day I entered the ruined paG.o.da of Bangalore to carry off the statue of Sita.

The first act was being played, and the Athenian school preserved a religious silence in front of the proscenium. The noise we made by drawing back the curtain of our box, slamming the door and loudly laughing, drowned for an instant the touching strains of the tragic choir, and centred upon us the angry looks of the audience.

With what cool impertinence did our divinities lean over the seats and display their round white arms, that have so often been copied in Parian marble by our most celebrated sculptors! Our three intellectual faces, wreathed in the silly smiles of intoxication, hovered over the silken curls of our G.o.ddesses, thus giving the whole theatre a full view of our happiness!

Occasionally a glimmer of reason would cross my confused brain, and I would soliloquize: Why am I disgracing myself in this way before all these people? What possesses me to act in concert with these drunken fools and bold women? I must rush out and apologize to the first person I meet!

It was impossible for me to follow my good impulse--some unseen hand held me back--some mysterious influence kept me chained to the spot. We are influenced by magic, although magicians no longer exist!

Between the acts, our two Greek statues criticised the audience in loud tones, and their remarks, seasoned with attic salt, afforded a peculiar supplement to the choir of Antigone.