The Cross of Berny Part 9

The locomotive soon devoured the distance between Mantos and Pont de l'Arche. An abominable sc.r.a.ping of iron and twisting of brakes was heard, and the train stopped. I was terribly alarmed lest the grisette and her companion should continue their route, but they got out at the station. O Roger wasn't I a happy dog? While they were employed in hunting up some parcel, the vehicle which runs between the station and Pont de l'Arche left, weighed down with trunks and travellers; so that the two women and myself were compelled, in spite of the weather, to walk to Pont de l'Arche. Large drops began to sprinkle the dust. One of those big black clouds which I mentioned opened, and long streams of rain fell from its gloomy folds like arrows from an overturned quiver.

A moss-covered shed, used to put away farming implements, odd cart-wheels, performed for us the same service as the cla.s.sic grotto which sheltered Eneas and Dido under similar circ.u.mstances. The wild branches of the hawthorn and sweet-briar added to the rusticity of our asylum.

My unknown, although visibly annoyed by this delay, resigned herself to her fate, and watched the rain falling in torrents. O Robinson Crusoe, how I envied you, at that moment, your famous goat-skin umbrella! how gracefully would I have offered its shelter to this beauty as far as Pont de l'Arche, for she was going to Pont de l'Arche, right into the lion's mouth. Time pa.s.sed. The vehicle would not return until the next train was due, that is in five or six hours; I had not told them to come for me; our situation was most melancholy.

My infanta opened daintily her little bag, took from it a roll and some bonbons, which she began to eat in the most graceful manner imaginable, but having breakfasted before leaving Mantes, I was dying of hunger; I suppose I must have looked covetously at her provisions, for she began to laugh and offered me half of her pittance, which I accepted. In the division, I don't know how it happened, but my hand touched hers--she drew it quickly away, and bestowed upon me a look of such royal disdain that I said to myself--This young girl is destined for the dramatic profession,--she plays the Marguerites and the Clytemnestras in the provinces until she possesses _embonpoint_ enough to appear at Porte Saint Martin or the Odeon. This vampire is her dresser--everything was clear.

I promised you a paragraph upon her eyes and hair; her eyes were a changeable gray, sometimes blue, sometimes green, according to the expression and the light; her chestnut locks were separated in two glossy braids, half satin, half velvet--many a great lady would have paid high for such hair.

The shower over, a wild resolution was unanimously taken to set out on foot for Pont de l'Arche, notwithstanding the mud and the puddles.

Having entered into the good graces of the infanta by speech full of wisdom and gesture carefully guarded, we set out together, the old woman following a few steps behind, and the marvellous little boot arrived at its destination without being soiled the least in the world--grisettes are perfect partridges--the house of Madame Taverneau, the post-mistress, where my incognita stopped.

You are a prince of very little penetration, dear Roger, if you have not divined that you will receive a letter from me every day, and even two, if I have to send empty envelopes or recopy the Complete Letter Writer.

To whom will I not write? No minister of state will ever have so extended a correspondence.

EDGAR DE MEILHAN.

VII.

IRENE DE CHATEAUDUN _to_ MME. LA VICOMTESSE DE BRAIMES, Hotel of the Prefecture, Gren.o.ble (Isere).

PONT DE L'ARCHE, May 29th 18--.

Valentine, this time I rebel, and question your infallibility.

It is useless for you to say to me, "You do not love him." I tell you I do love him, and intend to marry him. Nevertheless you excite my admiration in p.r.o.nouncing against me this very well-turned sentence.

"Genuine and fervid love is not so ingenuous. When you love deeply, you respect the object of your devotion and are fearful of giving offence by daring to test him.

"When you love sincerely you are not so venturesome. It is so necessary for you to trust him, that you treasure up your faith and risk it not in suspicious trifling.

"Real love is timid, it would rather err than suspect, it buries doubts instead of nursing them, and very wisely, for love cannot survive faith."

This is a magnificent period, and you should send it to Balzac; he delights in filling his novels with such very woman-like phrases.

I admit that your ideas are just and true when applied to love alone; but if this love is to end in marriage, the "test" is no longer "suspicious trifling," and one has the right to try the constancy of a character without offending the dignity of love.

Marriage, and especially a marriage of inclination, is so serious a matter, that we cannot exercise too much prudence and reasonable delay before taking the final step.

You say, "Love is timid;" well, so is Hymen. One dares not lightly utter the irrevocable promise, "Thine for life!" these words make us hesitate.

When we wish to be honorable and faithfully keep our oaths, we pause a little before we utter them.

Now I can hear you exclaim, "You are not in love; if you were, instead of being frightened by these words, they would rea.s.sure you; you would be quick to say 'Thine for life,' and you could never imagine that there existed any other man you could love."

I am aware that this gives you weapons to be used against me; I know I am foolish! but--well, I feel that there is some one somewhere that I could love more deeply!

This silly idea sometimes makes me pause and question, but it grows fainter daily, and I now confess that it is folly, childish to cherish such a fancy. In spite of your opinion, I persist in believing that I am in love with Roger. And when you know him, you will understand how natural it is for me to love him.

I would at this very moment be talking to him in Paris but for you!

Don't be astonished, for your advice prevented my returning to Paris yesterday.

Alas! I asked you for aid, and you add to my anxiety.

I left the hotel de Langeac with a joyful heart. The test will be favorable, thought I,--and when I have seen Roger in the depths of despair for a few days, seeking me everywhere, impatiently expecting me, blaming me a little and regretting me deeply, I will suddenly appear before him, happy and smiling! I will say, "Roger, you love me; I left you to think of you from afar, to question my own heart--to try the strength of your devotion; I now return without fear and with renewed confidence in myself and in you; never again shall we be separated!"

I intend to frankly confess everything to him; but you say the confession will be fatal to me. "If you intend to marry M. de Moubert, for Heaven's sake keep him in ignorance of the motive of your departure; invent an excuse--be called off to perform a duty--to nurse a sick friend; choose any story you please, rather than let him suspect you ran away to experiment upon the degree of his love."

You add, "he loves you devotedly and never will he forgive you for inflicting on him these unnecessary sufferings; a proud and deserving love never pardons suspicious and undeserved trials of its faith."

Now what can I do? Invent a falsehood? All falsehoods are stupid! Then I would have to write it, for I could not undertake to lie to his face.

With strangers and people indifferent to me, I might manage it; but to look into the face of the man who loves me, who gazes so honestly into my eyes when I speak to him, who understands every expression of my countenance, who observes and admires the blush that flushes my cheek, who is familiar with every modulation of my voice, as a musician with the tones of his instrument--

Why, it is a moral impossibility to attempt such a thing! A forced smile, a false tone, would put him on his guard at once; he becomes suspicious.

At his first question my fine castle of lies vanishes into air, and I have to fall back on the unvarnished truth.

To gratify you, Valentine, I will lie, but lie at a distance. I feel that it is necessary to put many stations and provinces between my native candor and the people I am to deceive.

Why do you scold me so much? You must see that I have not acted thoughtlessly; my conduct is strange, eccentric and mysterious to no one but Roger.

To every one else it is perfectly proper. I am supposed to be in the neighborhood of Fontainebleau, with the d.u.c.h.ess de Langeac, at her daughter's house; and as the poor girl is very sick and receives no company, I can disappear for a short time without my absence calling forth remark, or raising an excitement in the country.

I have told my cousin a part of the truth--she understands my scruples and doubts. She thinks it very natural that I should wish to consider the matter over before engaging myself for life; she knows that I am staying with an old friend, and as I have promised to return home in two weeks, she is not a bit uneasy about me.

"My child," she said when we parted, "if you decide to marry, I will go with you to Paris; if not, you shall go with us to enjoy the waters of Aix." I have discovered that Aix is a good place to learn news of our friends in Isere. You also reproach me for not having told Roger all my troubles; for having hidden from him what you flatteringly call "the most beautiful pages of my life."

O, Valentine! in this matter I am wiser than you, in spite of your matronly experience and acknowledged wisdom. Doubtless you understand better than I do, the serious affairs of life, but about the frivolities, I think I know best, and I tell you that courage in a woman is not an attraction in the eyes of these latter-day beaux.

Their weak minds, with an affected nicety, prefer a sighing, supplicating coquette, decked in pretty ribbons, surrounded by luxuries that are the price of her dignity; one who pours her sorrows into the lover's ear--yes! I say they prefer such a one to a n.o.ble woman who bravely faces misery with proud resignation, who refuses the favors of those she despises, and calm, strong, self-reliant, waters with her tears her hard-earned bread.

Believe me, men are more inclined to love women they can pity than women they must admire and respect; feminine courage in adversity is to them a disagreeable picture in an ugly frame; that is to say, a poorly dressed woman in a poorly furnished room. So you now see why, not wishing to disgust my future husband, I was careful that he should not see this ugly picture.

Ah! you speak to me of my dear ideal, and you say you love him? Ah! to him alone could I fearlessly read these beautiful pages of my life. But let us banish him from our minds; I would forget him!

Once I was very near betraying myself; my cousin and I called on a Russian lady residing in furnished apartments on Rivoli street.

M. de Monbert was there--as I took a seat near the fire, the Countess R.

handed me a screen--I at once recognised a painting of my own. It represented Paul and Virginia gardening with Domingo.

How horrible did all three look! Time and dust had curiously altered the faces of my characters; by an inexplicable phenomenon Virginia and Domingo had changed complexions; Virginia was a negress, and Domingo was enfranchised, bleached, he had cast aside the tint of slavery and was a pure Caucasian. The absurdity of the picture made me laugh, and M. de Monbert inquired the cause of my merriment. I showed him the screen, and he said "How very horrible!" and I was about to add "I painted it," when some one interrupted us, and so prevented the betrayal of my secret.

You will not have to scold me any more; I am going to take your advice and leave Pont de l'Arche to-day. Oh I how I wish I were in Paris this minute! I am dreadfully tired of this little place, it is so wearying to play poverty.

When I was really poor, the modest life I had to lead, the cruel privations I had to suffer, seemed to me to be n.o.ble and dignified.