THE BEAUTIFUL SPANIARD
§1
In the Rue Villedot, which is in the Louvre quarter of Paris, there is a
house, stone built and five-storied, with grey shutters to all the
windows and balconies of wrought-iron--a house exactly similar to
hundreds and thousands of others in every quarter of Paris. During the
day the small wicket in the huge porte-cochère is usually kept open; it
allows a peep into a short dark passage, and beyond it to the lodge of
the concierge. Beyond this again there is a courtyard, into which, from
every one of its four sides, five rows of windows, all adorned with grey
shutters, blink down like so many colourless eyes. The inevitable
wrought-iron balconies extend along three sides of the quadrangle on
every one of the five floors, and on the balustrade of these, pieces of
carpet in various stages of decay are usually to be seen hanging out to
air. From shutter to shutter clothes lines are stretched and support
fantastic arrays of family linen that flap lazily in the sultry,
vitiated air which alone finds its way down the shaft of the quadrangle.
On the left of the entrance passage and opposite the lodge of the
concierge there is a tall glass door, and beyond it the vestibule and
primary staircase, which gives access to the principal apartments--those
that look out upon the street and are altogether more luxurious and more
airy than those which give upon the courtyard. To the latter, two back
stairways give access. They are at the far corners of the courtyard;
both are pitch dark and reek of stuffiness and evil smells. The
apartments which they serve, especially those on the lower floors, are
dependent for light and air on what modicum of these gifts of heaven
comes down the shaft into the quadrangle.
After dark, of course, porte-cochère and wicket are both closed, and if
a belated lodger or visitor desires to enter the house, he must ring the
bell and the concierge in his lodge will pull a communicating cord that
will unlatch the wicket. It is up to the belated visitor or lodger to
close the wicket after him, and he is bound by law to give his name,
together with the number of the apartment to which he is going, in to
the concierge as he goes past the lodge. The concierge, on the other
hand, will take a look at him so that he may identify him should trouble
or police inquiry arise.
On this night of April, somewhere near midnight, there was a ring at the
outer door. Citizen Leblanc, the concierge, roused from his first sleep,
pulled the communicating cord. A young man, hatless and in torn coat and
muddy hoots and breeches, slipped in through the wicket and hurried past
the lodge, giving only one name, but that in a clear voice, as he
passed:
"Citoyenne Cabarrus."
The concierge turned over in his bed and grunted, half asleep. His duty
clearly was to run after the visitor, who had failed to give his own
name; but to begin with, the worthy concierge was very tired; and then
the name which the belated caller had given was one requiring special
consideration.
The citoyenne Cabarrus was young and well favoured, and even in these
troublous days, youth and beauty demanded certain privileges which no
patriotic concierge could refuse to grant. Moreover, the aforesaid lady
had visitors at all hours of the day and late into the night--visitors
for the most part with whom it was not well to interfere. Citizen
Tallien, the popular Representative in the Convention, was, as every one
knew, her ardent adorer. 'Twas said by all and sundry that since the
days when he met the fair Cabarrus in Bordeaux and she exercised such a
mellowing influence upon his bloodthirsty patriotism, he had no thought
save to win her regard.
But he was not the only one who came to the dreary old apartment in the
Rue Villedot, with a view to worshipping at the Queen of Beauty's
shrine. Citizen Leblanc had seen many a great Representative of the
People pass by his lodge since the beautiful Theresia came to dwell
here. And if he became very confidential and his interlocutor very
insistent, he would throw out a hint that the greatest man in France
to-day was a not infrequent visitor in the house.
Obviously, therefore, it was best not to pry too closely into secrets,
the keeping of which might prove uncomfortable for one's peace of mind.
And citizen Leblanc, tossing restlessly in his sleep, dreamed of the
fair Cabarrus and wished himself in the place of those who were
privileged to pay their court to her.
§2
And so the belated visitor was able to make his way across the courtyard
and up the dark back stairs unmolested. But even this reassuring fact
failed to give him confidence. He hurried on with the swift and stealthy
footstep which had become habitual to him, glancing over his shoulder
from time to time, wide-eyed and with ears alert, and heart quivering
with apprehension.
Up the dark and narrow staircase he hurried, dizzy and sick, his head
reeling in the dank atmosphere, his shaking hands seeking the support of
the walls as he climbed wearily up to the third-floor. Here he almost
measured his length upon the landing, tottered up again and came down
sprawling on his knees against one of the doors--the one which had the
number 22 painted upon it. For the moment it seemed as if he would once
more fall into a swoon. Terror and relief were playing havoc with his
whirling brain. He had not sufficient strength to stretch out an arm in
order to ring the bell, but only beat feebly against the panel of the
door with his moist palm.
A moment later the door was opened, and the unfortunate fell forward
into the vestibule at the feet of a tall apparition clad in white and
holding a small table lamp above her head. The apparition gave a little
scream which was entirely human and wholly feminine, hastily put down
the lamp on a small consol close by, and by retreating forcefully
farther into the vestibule, dragged the half-animate form of the young
man along too; for he was now clinging to a handful of white skirt with
the strength of despair.
"I am lost, Theresia!" he moaned pitiably. "Hide me, for God's sake
I . . . only for to-night!"
Theresia Cabarrus was frowning now, looked more perplexed than kindly,
and certainly made no attempt to raise the crouching figure from the
ground. Anon she called loudly: "Pepita!" and whilst waiting for an
answer to this call, she remained quite still, and the frown of
puzzlement on her face yielded to one of fear. The young man, obviously
only half conscious, continued to moan and to implore.
"Silence, you fool!" she said peremptorily. "The door is still open. Any
one on the stairs could hear you. Pepita!" she called again, more
harshly this time.
The next moment an old woman came from somewhere out of the darkness,
threw up her hands at sight of that grovelling figure on the floor, and
would no doubt have broken out in loud lament but that her young
mistress ordered her at once to close the door.
"Then help the citoyen Moncrif to a sofa in my room," the beautiful
Theresia went on peremptorily. "Give him a restorative and see above all
to it that he hold his tongue!"
With a quick imperious jerk she freed herself from the convulsive grasp
of the young man, and walking quickly across the small vestibule, she
went through a door at the end of it that had been left ajar, leaving
the unfortunate Moncrif to the ministrations of Pepita.
§3
Theresia Cabarrus, who had obtained a divorce from her husband, the
Marquis de Fontenay (by virtue of a decree of the former Legislative
Assembly, which allowed--nay, encouraged--the dissolution of a marriage
with an émigré who refused to return to France), Theresia Cabarrus was,
in this year 1794, in her twenty-fourth year, and perhaps in the zenith
of her beauty and in the plenitude of that power which had subjugated so
many men. In what that power consisted the historian has vainly tried to
guess; for it was not her beauty only that brought so many to her feet.
In the small oval face, the pointed chin, the full, sensuous lips, so
typically Spanish, we look in vain for traces of that beauty which we
are told surpassed that of other women of her time; whilst in the dark,
velvety eyes, more tender than spiritual, and in the narrow arched
brows, we fail to find an expression of that esprit which had moulded
Tallien to her will and even brought Robespierre out of the shell of his
asceticism--a willing victim to her wiles.
But who would be bold enough to analyse that subtle quality,
acknowledged by all, possessed by a very few, which is vaguely denoted
by the word "charm"? Theresia Cabarrus must have possessed it to a
marvellous degree--that, and an utter callousness for the feelings of
her victims, which would leave her mind cool and keen to pursue her own
ends, whilst theirs was thrown into that maze of jealousy and of passion
wherein prudence flies to the winds and the fever of self-immolation
gets into the blood.
At this moment, in the sparsely furnished room of her dingy apartment,
she looked like an angry goddess. Her figure, which undeniably was
superb, was drawn to its full height, its splendid proportions
accentuated by the clinging folds of her modish gown—a marvel of
artistic scantiness, which only half concealed the perfectly modelled
bust, and left the rounded thigh, in its skin-tight, flesh-coloured
undergarment, unblushingly exposed. Her blue-black hair was dressed in
the new fashion, copied from ancient Greece and snooded by a glittering
antique fillet; and her small bare feet were encased in satin sandals.
Truly a lovely woman, but for that air of cold displeasure coupled with
fear, which marred the harmony of the dainty, child-like features.
After awhile Pepita came back.
"Well?" queried Theresia impatiently.
"Poor M. Bertrand is very ill," the old Spanish woman replied with
unconcealed sympathy. "He has fever, the poor cabbage. Bed is the only
place for him. . . ."
"He cannot stay here, as thou well knowest, Pepita," the imperious
beauty retorted drily. "Thy head and mine are in danger every moment
that he spends under this roof."
"But thou couldst not turn a sick man out into the streets in the middle
of the night."
"Why not?" Theresia riposted coldly. "It is a beautiful and balmy night.
Why not?" she reiterated fretfully.
"Because he would die on thy doorstep," was old Pepita's muttered reply.
Theresia shrugged her shoulders.
"He dies if he goes," she said slowly, "and we die if he stays. Tell him
to go, Pepita, ere citizen Tallien comes."
A shudder went through the old woman's spare frame. "It's late," she
protested. "Citizen Tallien will not come to-night."
"Not only he," Theresia rejoined coldly, "but--but--the other---- Thou
knowest well, Pepita--those two arranged to meet here in my lodgings
to-night."
"But not at this hour!"
"After the sitting of the Convention."
"It is nearly midnight. They'll not come," the old woman persisted
obstinately.
"They arranged to meet here, to talk over certain matters which interest
their party," citoyenne Cabarrus went on, equally firmly. "They'll not
fail. So tell citizen Moncrif to go, Pepita. He endangers my life by
staying here."
"Then do the dirty work thyself," the old woman muttered sullenly. "I'll
not be a party to cold-blooded murder."
"Well, since citizen Moncrif's life is more valuable to thee than
mine----" Theresia began, but got no farther. The words died on her
lips.
Bertrand Moncrif, very pale, still looking scared and wild, had quietly
entered the room.
"You wish me to go, Theresia," he said simply. "You did not think surely
that I would do anything that might endanger your safety. My God!" he
added with passionate vehemence, "Do you not know that I would at any
time lay down my life for yours?"
Theresia shrugged her statuesque shoulders.
"Of course, of course, Bertrand," she said a little impatiently, though
obviously trying to be kind. "But I do entreat you not to go into
heroics at this hour, and not to put on tragic airs. You must see that
for yourself as well as for me it would be fatal if you were found here,
and----"
"And I am going, Theresia," he broke in seriously. "I ought never to
have come. I was a fool, as usual!" he added with bitterness. "But after
that awful fracas I was dazed and hardly knew what I was doing."
The frown of vexation reappeared upon the woman's fair, smooth brow.
"The fracas?" she asked quickly. "What fracas?"
"In the Rue St. Honoré. I thought you knew."
"No. I know nothing," she retorted, and her voice now was trenchant and
hard. "What happened?"
"They were deifying that brute Robespierre----"
"Silence!" she broke in harshly. "Name no names."
"They were deifying a bloodthirsty tyrant, and I----"
"And you rose from your seat," she broke in again, and this time with a
laugh that was cruel in its biting irony; "and lashed yourself into a
fury of eloquent vituperation. Oh, I know! I know!" she went on
excitedly. "You and your Fatalists, or whatever you call yourselves! And
that rage for martyrdom! . . . Senseless, stupid and selfish! Oh, my
God! _how_ selfish! And then you came here to drag me down with you into
an abyss of misery, along with you to the guillotine . . . to . . ."
It seemed as if she were choking, and her small white hands, with a
gruesome and pathetic gesture, went up to her neck, smoothed it and
fondled it, as if to shield it from that awful fate.
Bertrand tried to pacify her. It was he who was the more calm of the two
now. It seemed as if her danger had brought him back to full
consciousness. He forgot his own danger, the threat of death which lay
in wait for him, probably on the very threshold of this house. He was a
marked man now; martyrdom had ceased to be a dream; it had become a grim
reality. But of this he did not think. Theresia was in danger,
compromised by his own callous selfishness. His mind was full of her;
and Régine, the true and loyal friend, the beloved of past happier
years, had no place in his thoughts beside the exquisite enchantress,
whose very nearness was paradise.
"I am going," he said earnestly. "Theresia, my beloved, try to forgive
me. I was a fool--a criminal fool! But lately--since I thought that
you--you did not really care; that all my hopes of future happiness were
naught but senseless dreams; since then I seem to have lost my head--I
don't know _what_ I am doing! . . . And so----"
He got no farther. Ashamed of his own weakness, he was too proud to let
her see that she made him suffer. For the moment, he only bent the knee
and kissed the hem of her diaphanous gown. He looked so handsome then,
despite his bedraggled, woebegone appearance, so young, so ardent, that
Theresia's egotistical heart was touched, as it had always been when the
incense of his perfect love rose to her sophisticated nostrils. She put
out her hand and brushed with a gentle, almost maternal, gesture the
matted brown hair from his brow.
"Dear Bertrand," she murmured vaguely. "What a foolish boy to think that
I do not care!"
Already he had been brought back to his senses. The imminence of her
danger lent him the courage which he had been lacking, and
unhesitatingly now he jumped to his feet and turned to go. But she,
quick in the transition of her moods, had already seized him by the arm.
"No, no!" she murmured in a hoarse whisper. "Don't go just yet . . . not
before Pepita has seen if the stairs are clear."
Her small hand held him as in a vice, whilst Pepita, obedient and
silent, was shuffling across the vestibule in order to execute her
mistress's commands. But, even so, Bertrand struggled to get away. An
epitome of their whole life, this struggle between them!--he trying to
free himself from those insidious bonds that held him one moment and
loosed him the next; that numbed him to all that he was wont to hold
sacred and dear--his love for Régine, his loyalty, his honour. An
epitome of her character and his: he, weak and yielding, ever a ready
martyr, thirsting for self-immolation; and she, just a bundle of
feminine caprice, swayed by sentiment one moment and by considerations
of ambition or of personal safety the next.
"You must wait, Bertrand," she urged insistently. "Citizen Tallien may
be on the stairs--he or--or the other. If they saw you! . . . My God!"
"They would conclude that you had turned me out of doors," he riposted
simply. "Which would, in effect, be the truth. I entreat you to let me
go!" he added earnestly. "'Twere better they met me on the stairs than
here."
The old woman's footsteps were heard hurrying back. Bertrand struggled
to free himself--did in truth succeed; and Theresia smothered a
desperate cry of warning as he strode rapidly through the door and
across the vestibule, only to be met here by Pepita, who pushed him with
all her might incontinently back.
Theresia held her tiny handkerchief to her mouth to deaden the scream
that forced itself to her lips. She had followed Bertrand out of the
salon, and now stood in the doorway, a living statue of fear.
"Citizen Tallien," Pepita had murmured hurriedly. "He is on the landing.
Come this way."
She dragged Bertrand by the arm, not waiting for orders from her
mistress this time, along a narrow dark passage, which at its extreme
end gave access to a tiny kitchen. Into this she pushed him and locked
the door upon him.
"Name of a name!" she muttered as she shuffled back to the vestibule.
"If they should find him here!"
Citoyenne Cabarrus had not moved. Her eyes, dilated with terror, mutely
questioned the old woman as the latter made ready to admit the visitor.
Pepita gave reply as best she could, by silent gestures, indicating the
passage and the action of turning a key in the lock. Her wrinkled old
lips hardly stirred, and then only in order to murmur quickly and with a
sudden assumption of authority:
"Self-possession, my cabbage, or you'll endanger yourself and us all!"
Theresia pulled herself together. Obviously, the old woman's warning was
not to be ignored, nor had it been given a moment too soon. Outside, the
visitor had renewed his impatient rat-tat against the door. The eyes of
mistress and maid met for one brief second. Theresia was rapidly
regaining her presence of mind; whereupon Pepita smoothed out her apron,
readjusted her cap, and went to open the door, whilst Theresia said in a
firm voice, loudly enough for the new visitor to hear:
"One of my guests, at last! Open quickly, Pepita!"