The Line of Love; Dizain des Mariages Part 17

"But," Matthiette dissented, "ours is no ordinary case!"

"Surely not," Sieur Raymond readily agreed; "for there was never an ordinary case in all the history of the universe. Oh, but I, too, have known this madness; I, too, have perceived how infinitely my own skirmishes with the blind bow-G.o.d differed in every respect from all that has been or will ever be. It is an infallible sign of this frenzy.

Surely, I have said, the world will not willingly forget the vision of Chloris in her wedding garments, or the wonder of her last clinging kiss.

Or, say Phyllis comes to-morrow: will an uninventive sun dare to rise in the old, hackneyed fashion on such a day of days? Perish the thought!

There will probably be six suns, and, I dare say, a meteor or two."

"I perceive, sir," Raoul said here, "that after all you have not forgotten the young Raymond of whom I spoke."

"That was a long while ago," snapped Sieur Raymond. "I know a deal more of the world nowadays; and a level-headed world would be somewhat surprised at such occurrences, and suggest that for the future Phyllis remain at home. For whether you--or I--or any one--be in love or no is to our fellow creatures an affair of astonishingly trivial import. Not since Noe that great admiral, repeopled the world by begetting three sons upon Dame Noria has there been a love-business worthy of consideration; nor, if you come to that, not since sagacious Solomon went a-wenching has a wise man wasted his wisdom on a lover. So love one another, my children, by all means: but do you, Matthiette, make ready to depart into Normandy as a true and faithful wife to Monsieur de Puysange; and do you, Raoul de Prison, remain at Arnaye, and attend to my falcons more carefully than you have done of late,--or, by the cross of Saint Lo! I will clap the wench in a convent and hang the lad as high as Haman!"

Whereon Sieur Raymond smiled pleasantly, and drained his wine-cup as one considering the discussion ended.

Raoul sat silent for a moment. Then he rose. "Monsieur d'Arnaye, you know me to be a gentleman of unblemished descent, and as such ent.i.tled to a hearing. I forbid you before all-seeing Heaven to wed your niece to a man she does not love! And I have the honor to request of you her hand in marriage."

"Which offer I decline," said Sieur Raymond, grinning placidly,--"with every imaginable civility. Niece," he continued, "here is a gentleman who offers you a heartful of love, six months of insanity, and forty years of boredom in a leaky, wind-swept chateau. He has dreamed dreams concerning you: allow me to present to you the reality."

With some ceremony Sieur Raymond now grasped Matthiette's hand and led her mirror-ward. "Permit me to present the wife of Monsieur de Puysange.

Could he have made a worthier choice? Ah, happy lord, that shall so soon embrace such perfect loveliness! For, frankly, my niece, is not that golden hair of a shade that will set off a coronet extraordinarily well?

Are those wondrous eyes not fashioned to surfeit themselves upon the homage and respect accorded the wife of a great lord? Ouais, the thing is indisputable: and, therefore, I must differ from Monsieur de Frison here, who would condemn this perfection to bloom and bud unnoticed in a paltry country town."

There was an interval, during which Matthiette gazed sadly into the mirror. "And Arnaye--?" said she.

"Undoubtedly," said Sieur Raymond,--"Arnaye must perish unless Puysange prove her friend. Therefore, my niece conquers her natural aversion to a young and wealthy husband, and a life of comfort and flattery and gayety; relinquishes you, Raoul; and, like a feminine Mettius Curtius, sacrifices herself to her country's welfare. Pierre may sleep undisturbed; and the pigs will have a new sty. My faith, it is quite affecting! And so," Sieur Raymond summed it up, "you two young fools may bid adieu, once for all, while I contemplate this tapestry." He strolled to the end of the room and turned his back. "Admirable!" said he; "really now, that leopard is astonishingly lifelike!"

Raoul came toward Matthiette. "Dear love," said he, "you have chosen wisely, and I bow to your decision. Farewell, Matthiette,--O indomitable heart! O brave perfect woman that I have loved! Now at the last of all, I praise you for your charity to me, Love's mendicant,--ah, believe me, Matthiette, that atones for aught which follows now. Come what may, I shall always remember that once in old days you loved me, and, remembering this, I shall always thank G.o.d with a contented heart." He bowed over her unresponsive hand. "Matthiette," he whispered, "be happy!

For I desire that very heartily, and I beseech of our Sovereign Lady--not caring to hide at all how my voice shakes, nor how the loveliness of you, seen now for the last time, is making blind my eyes--that you may never know unhappiness. You have chosen wisely, Matthiette; yet, ah, my dear, do not forget me utterly, but keep always a little place in your heart for your boy lover!"

Sieur Raymond concluded his inspection of the tapestry, and turned with a premonitory cough. "Thus ends the comedy," said he, shrugging, "with much fine, harmless talking about 'always,' while the world triumphs.

Invariably the world triumphs, my children. Eheu, we are as G.o.d made us, we men and women that c.u.mber His stately earth!" He drew his arm through Raoul's. "Farewell, niece," said Sieur Raymond, smiling; "I rejoice that you are cured of your malady. Now in respect to gerfalcons--" said he.

The arras fell behind them.

3. _Obdurate Love_

Matthiette sat brooding in her room, as the night wore on. She was pitifully frightened, numb. There was in the room, she dimly noted, a heavy silence that sobs had no power to shatter. Dimly, too, she seemed aware of a mult.i.tude of wide, incurious eyes which watched her from every corner, where panels snapped at times with sharp echoes. The night was well-nigh done when she arose.

"After all," she said, wearily, "it is my manifest duty." Matthiette crept to the mirror and studied it.

"Madame de Puysange," said she, without any intonation; then threw her arms above her head, with a hard gesture of despair. "I love him!" she cried, in a frightened voice.

Matthiette went to a great chest and fumbled among its contents. She drew out a dagger in a leather case, and unsheathed it. The light shone evilly scintillant upon the blade. She laughed, and hid it in the bosom of her gown, and fastened a cloak about her with impatient fingers. Then Matthiette crept down the winding stair that led to the gardens, and unlocked the door at the foot of it.

A sudden rush of night swept toward her, big with the secrecy of dawn.

The sky, washed clean of stars, sprawled above,--a leaden, monotonous blank. Many trees whispered thickly over the chaos of earth; to the left, in an increasing dove-colored luminousness, a field of growing maize bristled like the chin of an unshaven t.i.tan.

Matthiette entered an expectant world. Once in the tree-chequered gardens, it was as though she crept through the aisles of an unlit cathedral already garnished for its sacred pageant. Matthiette heard the querulous birds call sleepily above; the margin of night was thick with their petulant complaints; behind her was the monstrous shadow of the Chateau d'Arnaye, and past that was a sullen red, the red of contused flesh, to herald dawn. Infinity waited a-tiptoe, tense for the coming miracle, and against this vast repression, her grief dwindled into irrelevancy: the leaves whispered comfort; each tree-bole hid chuckling fauns. Matthiette laughed. Content had flooded the universe all through and through now that yonder, unseen as yet, the scarlet-faced sun was toiling up the rim of the world, and matters, it somehow seemed, could not turn out so very ill, in the end.

Matthiette came to a hut, from whose open window a faded golden glow spread out into obscurity like a tawdry fan. From without she peered into the hut and saw Raoul. A lamp flickered upon the table. His shadow twitched and wavered about the plastered walls,--a portentous ma.s.s of head upon a hemisphere of shoulders,--as Raoul bent over a chest, sorting the contents, singing softly to himself, while Matthiette leaned upon the sill without, and the gardens of Arnaye took form and stirred in the heart of a chill, steady, sapphire-like radiance.

Sang Raoul:

_"Lord, I have worshipped thee ever,-- Through all these years I have served thee, forsaking never Light Love that veers As a child between laughter and tears.

Hast thou no more to afford,-- Naught save laughter and tears,-- Love, my lord?

"I have borne thy heaviest burden, Nor served thee amiss: Now thou hast given a guerdon; Lo, it was this-- A sigh, a shudder, a kiss.

Hast thou no more to accord!

I would have more than this, Love, my lord.

"I am wearied of love that is pastime And gifts that it brings; I entreat of thee, lord, at this last time

"Ineffable things.

Nay, have proud long-dead kings Stricken no subtler chord, Whereof the memory clings, Love, my lord?

"But for a little we live; Show me thine innermost h.o.a.rd!

Hast thou no more to give, Love, my lord?"_

4. _Raymond Psychopompos_

Matthiette went to the hut's door: her hands fell irresolutely upon the rough surface of it and lay still for a moment. Then with the noise of a hoa.r.s.e groan the door swung inward, and the light guttered in a swirl of keen morning air, casting convulsive shadows upon her lifted countenance, and was extinguished. She held out her arms in a gesture that was half maternal. "Raoul!" she murmured.

He turned. A sudden bird plunged through the twilight without, with a glad cry that pierced like a knife through the stillness which had fallen in the little room. Raoul de Frison faced her, with clenched hands, silent. For that instant she saw him transfigured.

But his silence frightened her. There came a piteous catch in her voice.

"Fair friend, have you not bidden me--_be happy?_"

He sighed. "Mademoiselle," he said, dully, "I may not avail myself of your tenderness of heart; that you have come to comfort me in my sorrow is a deed at which, I think, G.o.d's holy Angels must rejoice: but I cannot avail myself of it."

"Raoul, Raoul," she said, "do you think that I have come in--pity!"

"Matthiette," he returned, "your uncle spoke the truth. I have dreamed dreams concerning you,--dreams of a foolish, golden-hearted girl, who would yield--yield gladly--all that the world may give, to be one flesh and soul with me. But I have wakened, dear, to the braver reality,--that valorous woman, strong enough to conquer even her own heart that her people may be freed from their peril."

"Blind! blind!" she cried.

Raoul smiled down upon her. "Mademoiselle," said he, "I do not doubt that you love me."

She went wearily toward the window. "I am not very wise," Matthiette said, looking out upon the gardens, "and it appears that G.o.d has given me an exceedingly tangled matter to unravel. Yet if I decide it wrongly I think the Eternal Father will understand it is because I am not very wise."

Matthiette for a moment was silent. Then with averted face she spoke again. "My uncle commands me, with many astute saws and pithy sayings, to wed Monsieur de Puysange. I have not skill to combat him. Many times he has proven it my duty, but he is quick in argument and proves what he will; and I do not think it is my duty. It appears to me a matter wherein man's wisdom is at variance with G.o.d's will as manifested to us through the holy Evangelists. a.s.suredly, if I do not wed Monsieur de Puysange there may be war here in our Arnaye, and G.o.d has forbidden war; but I may not insure peace in Arnaye without prost.i.tuting my body to a man I do not love, and that, too, G.o.d has forbidden. I speak somewhat grossly for a maid, but you love me, I think, and will understand. And I, also, love you, Monsieur de Frison. Yet--ah, I am pitiably weak! Love tugs at my heart-strings, bidding me cling to you, and forget these other matters; but I cannot do that, either. I desire very heartily the comfort and splendor and adulation which you cannot give me. I am pitiably weak, Raoul! I cannot come to you with an undivided heart,--but my heart, such as it is, I have given you, and to-day I deliver my honor into your hands and my life's happiness, to preserve or to destroy. Mother of Christ, grant that I have chosen rightly, for I have chosen now, past retreat! I have chosen you, Raoul, and that love which you elect to give me, and of which I must endeavor to be worthy."

Matthiette turned from the window. Now, her bright audacity gone, her ardors chilled, you saw how like a grave, straightforward boy she was, how illimitably tender, how inefficient. "It may be that I have decided wrongly in this tangled matter," she said now. "And yet I think that G.o.d, Who loves us infinitely, cannot be greatly vexed at anything His children do for love of one another."

He came toward her. "I bid you go," he said. "Matthiette, it is my duty to bid you go, and it is your duty to obey."

She smiled wistfully through unshed tears. "Man's wisdom!" said Matthiette. "I think that it is not my duty. And so I disobey you, dear,--this once, and no more hereafter."

"And yet last night--" Raoul began.