In proportion as Rosas considered the matter, he grew more angry with
himself, and in the very midst of the crowd, he was seized with a
violent attack of frenzy, such as at times suddenly determined him to
seek absolute solitude. He was eager to escape.
In order to avoid Madame Marsy, who was perhaps seeking him, he slipped
through the groups of people and reached the door without being seen,
leaving without formal salutation, as the English do.
He was in the hall, putting on his overcoat, while a servant turned up
its otter-fur collar, when he heard Guy say:
"You are going, my dear duke? Shall we bear each other company?"
The idea was not distasteful to Rosas. Involuntarily, perhaps, he
thought that a conversation with Lissac was, in some way, a _chat_ with
Marianne. These two beings were coupled in his recollections and
preoccupations; besides, he really liked Guy. The Parisian was the
complement of the Castilian. They had so many reminiscences in common:
fêtes, suppers, sorrows, Parisian sadnesses, girls who sobbed to the
measure of a waltz. Then they had not seen each other for so long.
Rosas experienced a certain degree of pleasure in finding himself once
more on the boulevard with Guy. It made him feel young again. Every
whiff of smoke that ascended from his cigar in the fresh air, seemed to
breathe so many exhalations of youth. They had formerly ground out so
many paradoxes as they strolled thus arm in arm, taking their recreation
through Paris.
In a very little time, and after the exchange of a few words, they had
bridged the long gap of years, of travel and separation. They expressed
so much in so few words. Rosas, as if invincibly attracted by the name
of Marianne, was the first to pronounce it, while Guy listened with an
impassive air to the duke's interrogations.
In this way they went toward the boulevard, along which the rows of
gas-jets flamed like some grand illumination.
"Paris!" said Rosas, "has a singular effect on one. It resumes its
dominion over one at once on seeing it again, and it seems as if one had
never left it. I have hardly unpacked my trunks, and here I am again
transformed into a Parisian."
"Paris is like absinthe!" said Guy. "As soon as one uncorks the bottle,
one commences to drink it again."
"Absinthe! there you are indeed, you Frenchmen, who everlastingly
calumniate your country. What an idea, comparing Paris with absinthe!"
"A Parisian's idea, _parbleu!_ You have not been here two days and you
are already intoxicated with _Parisine_, you said so yourself. The
hasheesh of the boulevard."
"Perhaps it is not _Parisine_ only that has, in fact, affected my
brain," said Rosas.
"No doubt, it is also the _Parisienne_. Madame Marsy is very pretty."
"Charming," said Rosas coldly.
"Less charming than Mademoiselle Kayser!"
Guy sent a whiff of smoke from his cigar floating on the night breeze,
while awaiting the duke's reply; but José pursued his way beside his
friend, without uttering a word, as if he were suddenly absorbed, and
Lissac, who had allowed the conversation to lapse, sought to reopen it:
"Then," he said suddenly,--dropping the name of Mademoiselle
Kayser:--"You will be in Paris for some time, Rosas?"
"I do not in the least know."
"You will not, I hope, set out again for the East?"
"Oh! you know what a strange fellow I am. It won't do to challenge me
to!"
Lissac laughed.
"I don't challenge you at all, I only ask you not to leave the
fortifications hereafter. We shall gain everything. You are not a
Spaniard, you are a born Parisian, as I have already told you a hundred
times. If I were in your place, I would set myself up here and stick to
Paris. Since it is the best place in the world, why look for another?"
"My dear Guy," interrupted the duke, who had not listened, "will you
promise to answer me, with all frankness, a delicate, an absurd
question, if you will, one of those questions that is not generally put,
but which I am going to ask you, nevertheless, without preface,
point-blank?"
"To it and to any others that you put me, my dear duke, I will answer as
an honest man and a friend should."
"Have you been much in love with Mademoiselle Kayser?"
"Very much."
"And has she loved you--a little?"
"Not at all."
"That is not what she has just told me."
"Ah!" said Lissac, as he threw away his cigar. "You spoke of me, then?"
"She told me that she believed she loved you sincerely."
"That is just what I had the pleasure of telling you."
"And--Marianne?--"
"Marianne?" repeated Lissac, who perfectly understood the question from
De Rosas's hesitation.
"My dear friend, when a man feels sufficiently anxious, or sufficiently
weak, or sufficiently smitten, whichever you please, to stake his life
on the throw of the dice, he is permitted to put one of those misplaced
questions to which I have just referred. Well! you can tell me what,
perhaps, none other than I would dare to ask you: Have you been
Marianne's lover?"
Before replying, Guy took the arm of the duke in a friendly way, and,
leaning upon it, felt that it trembled nervously. Then, touching his
hand by chance, he observed that Rosas was in a burning fever.
"My dear fellow, it is the everlasting question of honor between men and
of duty to a woman that you put before me. Had I been Marianne's lover,
I should be bound to tell you that Marianne had never been my mistress.
These falsehoods are necessary. No; I have not been Marianne's lover,
but I advise you, if you do not wish to be perfectly miserable, not to
seek to become so. You are one of those men who throw their hearts open
as wide as a gateway. She is a calculating creature, who pursues, madly
enough I admit, without consistency or constancy in her ideas, any plan
that she may have in view. She might be flattered to have you as a
suitor, as I was, or as a lover, as I have been assured others were. I
do not affirm this, remember; but she will never be moved by your
affection. She is a pure Parisian, and is incapable of loving you as
you deserve, but you could not deceive her, as they say she has been."
"Deceived?" asked Rosas, in a tone of pity that struck Lissac.
"Deceived! yes! deceit is the complementary school of love."
"Then--if I loved Marianne?" asked Rosas.
"I would advise you to tell it to her at first, and prove it afterward,
and finally to catalogue it in that album whose ashes are sprinkled at
the bottom of the marriage gifts."
"You speak of Mademoiselle Kayser as you would speak of a courtesan,"
said the duke, in a choking voice.
"Ah! I give you my word," said Lissac, "that I should speak very
differently of Mademoiselle Alice Aubry, or of Mademoiselle Cora
Touchard. I would say to you quite frankly: They are pretty creatures;
there is no danger."
"And Marianne, on the contrary, is dangerous."
"Oh! perfectly, for you."
"And why is she not dangerous for you?"
"Why, simply, my dear duke, because I am satisfied to love her as you
have hitherto done and because I had, as I told you, the good fortune
not to be her lover."
"But you brought her to Madame Marsy's this evening?"
"Oh! her uncle accompanied us, but I was there."
"You offer your arm then to a woman whom, as you have just told me, you
consider dangerous?"
"Not for Sabine!--and then, that is a drop of the absinthe, a little of
the hasheesh of which I spoke to you. One sees only concessions in
Paris, and even when one is dead, one needs a further concession, but in
perpetuity. One only becomes one's self"--and Guy's jesting tone became
serious,--"when a worthy fellow like you puts one a question that seems
terribly like asking advice. Then one answers him, as I have just
answered you, and cries out to him: 'Beware!'"
"I thank you," said Rosas, suddenly stopping short on the pavement. "You
treat me like a true friend."
"And if I seem to you to be too severe," added Lissac, smiling, "charge
that to the account of bitterness. A man that has loved a woman is never
altogether just toward her. If he has ceased to love her, he slights
her, if he still loves her, he slanders her. I have perhaps, traduced
Marianne, but I have not slighted you, that is certain. Now, take
advantage of this gossip. But when?"
"I don't know," replied the duke. "I will write you. I shall perhaps
leave Paris!"
"What is that?"
"Just what I say."
"The deuce!" said Lissac. "Do you know that if you were to fly from the
danger in question, I should be very uneasy? It would be very serious."
"That would not be a flight. At the most, a caprice," the duke replied.
They separated, less pleased with each other than they were at the
commencement of their interview. Lissac felt that in some fashion or
other, he had wounded Rosas even in adopting the flippant tone of the
lounger, without any malice, and the Spaniard with his somewhat morose
nature, retired within himself, almost gloomy, and reproached Guy for
the first time for smiling or jesting on so serious a matter.
Discontented with himself, he entered his house. His servant was waiting
for him. He brought him a blue envelope on a card-tray.
"A telegram for monsieur le duc."
Rosas tore it open in a mechanical way. It was from one of his London
friends, Lord Lindsay, who having learned of Rosas's return, sent him a
pressing invitation. If he did not hasten to Paris to welcome him, it
was simply because grave political affairs demanded his presence in
London.
The duke, while taking off his gloves, looked at the crumpled despatch
lying under the lamp. He was, like most travellers, superstitious.
Perhaps this despatch had arrived in the nick of time to prevent him
from committing some act of folly.
But what folly?
He still felt Marianne's kiss on his lips, burning like ice.
To-morrow,--in a few hours,--his first thought, his only thought would
be to find that woman again, to experience that voluptuous impression,
that dream that had penetrated his heart. A danger, Lissac had said. The
feline eyes of Marianne had a dangerous ardor; but it was their charm,
their strength and their adorable seductiveness, that filtered like a
flame through her long, fair lashes.
He closed his eyes to picture Mademoiselle Kayser, to inhale the
atmosphere, to enjoy something of the perfume surrounding her.
A danger!
Guy was perhaps right. The best love is that which is never gathered,
which remains immature, like a blossom in spring that never becomes a
fruit. Lord Lindsay's despatch arrived seasonably. It was a chance or a
warning.
In any case, what would Rosas risk by passing a few days in London, and
losing the burning of that kiss? The sea-breezes would perhaps efface
it.
"I am certainly feverish," the duke thought. "It was assuredly necessary
to speak to Lissac. It was also necessary to speak to her," he added, in
a dissatisfied, anxious, almost angry tone.
A danger!
Lissac had acted imprudently in uttering that word, which addressed to
such a man as Rosas, had something alluring about it. What irritated the
duke was Guy's reply, asserting that he had not been Marianne's lover,
but that Marianne had had other lovers. Others? What did Lissac know of
this? A species of jealous frenzy was blended with the feverish desire
that Marianne's kiss had injected into Rosas's veins. He would have
liked to know the truth, to see Marianne again, to urge Guy to further
confidences. And, then, he felt that he would rather not have come, not
have seen her again, not have gone to Sabine's.
"Well, so be it! Lord Lindsay is right, I will go."
The following morning, Guy de Lissac found in his mail a brief note,
sealed with the arms of the duke, with the motto: _Hasta la muerte_.
José wrote to him as he was leaving Paris:
"You are perhaps right. I am a little intoxicated with
_Parisine_. I am going to London to visit a friend and if I
ever recount my voyages there, it will only be to the
serious-minded members of the Geographical Society. There, at
least, there is no 'danger.' With many thanks and until we meet
again.
"Your friend,
"J. DE R----"
"Plague on it," said Lissac, who read the letter three times, "but our
dear duke is badly bitten! _Ohimé!_ Marianne Kayser has had a firm and
sure tooth this time!--We shall see!--" he added, as he broke the seal
of another letter, containing a request for a loan on the part of
someone richer than himself.