For some days his world spoke only of the death of Platon Napraxine in
the full vigour of his manhood. Men regretted him honestly, and many
women mourned for him as sincerely, if with less disinterestedness. His
body was taken to Zaraizoff, and there consigned to rest amidst the
dust of his ancestors with all the pomp and splendour of a funeral,
barbaric and gorgeous, like every other ceremony of his country. His
mother and his little sons were there; his wife was absent. She had
withdrawn herself to a secluded château in the Lake of Geneva, which
had been the property of her father, and no one had access to her.
What did she feel? No one could know; scarcely could she have told,
herself, so entangled and so conflicting were the emotions by which
she was swayed. Two sentiments alone were distinct to her amidst the
uncertainty of her thoughts; the one was regret that her last words
had been to him words impatient and unkind; the other an intense rage
against herself that by one involuntary question she had betrayed
herself to Prince Ezarhédine. It had been the solitary moment in all
her life in which anxiety had conquered her composure, and her perfect
self-control had failed her.
After the day which brought the dead body of Napraxine to his house,
and bore him up that beautiful staircase, where his heavy tread and
his unlovely presence had so often seemed so unwelcome and so out of
place, she had seen no one save those great ecclesiastics and high
functionaries who were perforce admitted to her presence. Cards,
dispatches, and letters were piled a foot deep in her ante-chamber, but
she took no heed of any; her secretary had one formal reply with which
he was instructed to receive one and all. Of the thousands who knew her
throughout Europe, Othmar alone sent no word and made no sign.
She understood his silence.
She made no affectation of a woe she could not feel or be expected to
feel; all the world had known how profound had been her indifference
for her husband, and how often intolerant had been her dislike of him.
But all that good taste and good breeding could dictate in respect
to his memory she did; and she withdrew herself absolutely from the
sights and sounds of the world in accordance with the severe usages of
his country and with the tragic fate to which he had succumbed. For
once her serenity had received a shock which, momentarily at least,
affected and dispelled it; for once her languid observation of the ways
of life and of death had been quickened to a dual feeling of mingled
rejoicing and remorse. The sense of her own liberty was lovely to
her, slight as had been the pressure of the bonds she wore; but her
recognition of Platon Napraxine's character had never been so just or
so warm as now when his living presence, his physical personality were
no longer there to offend her taste and fret her patience. All the
dispositions of his testament, all the entire trust they showed in her,
all the immense possessions he bequeathed to her, touched her with that
consciousness of magnanimity and generosity in this despised nature
which had at times visited her during his lifetime, but had always been
repulsed. Had it been possible for him to have returned to earth, he
would have been as intolerable to her as before; but dead,--knowing
that never more would he importune or trouble her with his unwelcome
tenderness,--she remembered him with contrition and almost with
remorse. The consciousness that never had she given him even one kind
word in return for all his royal gifts and loyal worship hurt her
sense of honour; when she remembered that the only praise she had ever
accorded to him had only been part of a scene of dissimulation with
which she had lulled his just suspicions, all the courage and candour
which were natural to her rose up in her conscience and accused her of
ingratitude and of treachery. Nor did she shrink from the _meâ culpâ_
which her self-reproach exacted. She had never been a coward before her
own conscience if her egoism had often made her sleep serenely, deaf to
its voice. She did not disguise to herself that she had been neither
merciful nor just to the dead man, neither worthy of his unquestioning
confidence nor of his unmeasured devotion. She remembered many a time
when a kind word would have cost her nothing and would have been so
much to him. But, then, if she had spoken it, he would not have
understood; he would have presumed on it; he would have imagined that
it gave him every privilege; he had always been so stupid; he had never
been able to understand _à demi-mot_--there had been no choice but to
use the whip and chain to this poor blundering, fawning, loving hound,
who would not otherwise comprehend how intolerable were his offered
caresses.
Now the 'big dog' was dead and could never more offend.
Perhaps she had been harsh, she thought--sometimes.
In the solitude of the slow-coming chilly spring of the Canton de Vaud,
Nadine Napraxine was left alone with her own thoughts. She remained
in the strictest seclusion, willing to concede so much to the usages
of her nation and the tragedy of his death. The isolation seemed very
strange to her, accustomed as she was to have the most brilliant
of societies, the most solicitous of courtiers, the most witty of
associates, for ever about her. Her life had been always _dans le
mouvement_, always seeking, if not always finding, distraction, always
filled with the voices and the laughter of the world. In this complete
solitude, where only her household were near her and there was no other
sound than the fall of water, the burr of bees, the rush of a distant
avalanche falling down the mountain side, or the lilt of a boatman's
song echoing from the lake, it seemed to her as if it were she--or all
the world--who was dead.
It had been suggested to her that she should have her children there,
but she had rejected the idea instantly.
'Now that I am free,' she thought, 'for heaven's sake, let me forget
the hours of my captivity if I can.'
They were well cared for; they should always be well cared for; she
would never allow their interests to be neglected or their fortunes to
be imperilled; but the sons of Platon Napraxine could never be more
to her than the issue of a union she had loathed, the living records
of a time of intense humiliation and disgust. Her retirement was
not nominal; no guests passed her gates except those members of her
husband's family and of her own whom it was impossible to refuse to
see. Even they could not tell whether she rejoiced or grieved. She was
serene and impassible; she never said a syllable which could let any
light in upon her own emotions; when she spoke, if it were not with her
usual malice, it was with all her usual skill at phrases which revealed
her intelligence and hid her heart. She omitted none of the observances
which Russian etiquette required from one in her position, and at the
long religious services in honour of the dead she was careful to render
the respect of her presence, though they meant no more to her than the
buzzing of the bees in the laburnum and acacia flowers.
The tedious days passed monotonous and alike.
For the first time in her life she submitted to ennui without revolt;
and if in the dewy silent evenings of the early summer she went down
to the steps which overlooked the lake, and leaned there, and drew
in the breath of the mountain air with a new invigorating sense of
freedom from a burden which had for ever galled her, though she had
borne it so lightly, no one was offended by that exhilaration, for no
one was witness of it; even as no one, either, ever knew how in such
evening musings as these an angry cloud would come upon her face and an
impatient regret stir at her heart as she thought--why had not Othmar
had patience?
She remembered him with a restless and unwilling tenderness.
The knowledge of how his name had escaped her to Ezarhédine was
constantly present to her mind, and the recollection fretted and
irritated her with all the mortification of a strong pride indignant at
its own self-betrayal. Ezarhédine would, no doubt, relate the story of
her momentary weakness to her friends and his. She had no belief in the
discretion of men; they had their views and principles of honour, no
doubt, but she had never known these remain superior to the impulses of
their indiscretion or their inquisitiveness; they were always talkative
as gossips round a market fountain, curious as children before a case
of unpacked toys.