The Marchioness slept little. Her impatience for the morrow almost
stifled her. Want of sleep took away her spirits. She viewed everything
on its dark side, and expected to find the whole a delusion; but when
Caroline brought in her correspondence, there was a letter from the
Duchess that transported her with joy. "My friend," said Madame de
Dunières, "here is a change of scene like those at the opera. It is the
case of your eldest son that demands attention. I talked with Diana when
she awoke this morning. I did not asperse the Duke, but my religion
obliged me not to hide from her any of the truth. She replied that I had
said all this before, in speaking of the Marquis, that I had nothing to
tell her which she had not already considered, and that on mature
reflection, she had become equally interested in the two brothers, whose
friendship was such a beautiful thing, and that, in thinking over the
position of the Duke, she had found it more meritorious to have borne
the burden of gratitude nobly than to have rendered a service exacted by
duty." She added that, "Since I had counselled her to bestow happiness
and wealth on some worthy man, she felt herself drawn toward him who
pleased her best. In fine, the irresistible graces of your
good-for-nothing son have done the rest. And then I must not be mistaken
about Diana. She judges that the title of Duchess will suit her queenly
figure best: she is inclined to be fond of society; and when, not long
ago, some one, I know not who, told her that the Marquis did not like it
at all, I saw she was uneasy, though I did not know the reason. Now she
has confessed all. She has said to me that as a brother the Marquis
would be all she could desire, but that as a husband the Duke would show
her the gayest life. In short, my dear, she seems so determined that I
have only to serve you all I can in this unforeseen contingency as I
should have done in the other case.
"I will bring my daughter to you to-morrow morning, and as Diana will be
with us, you can see her without appearing to suspect anything; but you
will succeed in charming her completely, I am very sure."
While the Marchioness and the Duke were giving themselves up to their
happiness, Caroline was left a little more alone; for the son and the
mother held long conversations every day in which her presence was
naturally undesired, and during which she practised music or wrote her
own letters in the drawing-room, always deserted until five o'clock.
There she disturbed no one, and held herself in readiness to answer the
least summons of the Marchioness.
One day the Marquis came in with a book, and seating himself at the same
table where she was writing, with an air strangely calm and resolved,
asked her permission to work in this room, where it was easier to
breathe than in his little chamber. "That is, on condition," said he,
"that I don't drive you away, for I see quite clearly that you have
avoided me for some days past; don't deny it!" added he, seeing she was
about to reply. "You have reasons for this which I respect, but which
are not well grounded. In speaking of myself as I ventured to do at the
Jardin des Plantes I startled the delicacy of your conscience. You
thought I was going to make you my confidante in some personal project
likely to disturb the peace of my family, and you were unwilling to
become even a passive accomplice in my rebellion."
"Exactly so," replied Caroline, "you have divined my feeling perfectly."
"Now let my words become as if they had never been said," continued
Urbain, calmly and with a firmness that commanded, respect; "I will not
tell you to forget them, but do not dwell on them in any way, I beg, and
never fear my bringing your attachment for my mother into collision with
the generous friendship you have deigned to accord me."
Caroline felt constrained to yield to the power of this frankness. She
did not comprehend all that was passing through the mind of the Marquis,
all that was suppressed behind his words. She thought she must have been
mistaken, that she had felt too much alarm at a fancy he had already
conquered. In her own mind she accepted her friend's promise as a formal
reparation for having caused her a moment of troubled thought, and
thenceforth she found anew the full charm and security of friendship.
They saw each other, then, every day, and even sometimes for long hours
together, in the drawing-room, almost under the eyes of the Marchioness,
who rejoiced to see that Caroline continued to aid the Marquis in his
labors. In fact, she assisted him now only with her memory: having
arranged his documents in the country, he wrote his third and last
volume with admirable swiftness and readiness. Caroline's presence gave
him enthusiasm and inspiration. By her side, he no longer suffered from
doubt or weariness. She had become so indispensable to him that he
confessed his lack of interest in anything when alone. He was pleased to
have her talk to him even in the midst of his work. Far from disturbing
him this dearly loved voice preserved the harmony of his thought and the
elevation of his style. He challenged her to disturb him, he begged her
to read music at the piano, without fear of causing him the least
annoyance. On the contrary, all that made him sensible of her presence
fell on his soul like a pleasant warmth; for she was to him, not another
person moving about near him, but his own mind which he could see and
feel alive before him.
Her respect for his work, over which she was enthusiastic, bound
Caroline to a certain respect for him personally. She made it a sacred
duty, as it were, not, in any way, to disturb the balance needful to a
mind so finely organized. She refused to think of herself any longer.
She no longer asked herself whether she was not running some risk on her
own score, or whether, at a given time, she would be strong enough to
give up this intimacy which was becoming the groundwork of her own life.
The matrimonial alliance between the Duke d'Aléria and Mlle de
Xaintrailles progressed with encouraging rapidity. The beautiful Diana
was seriously in love and would not hear a word against Gaëtan. The
Duchess de Dunières, having herself made a love-match with a veteran
lady-killer, who had reformed on the strength of it and now rendered her
perfectly happy, took the part of her god-daughter, and pleaded her
cause so well that her guardians and the legal advisers of the family
had to give way before the known will of the heiress.
The latter told her betrothed, even before he had expressed any wish to
this effect, that she intended to pay off his indebtedness to the
Marquis, and the Marquis had to accept the promise of a reparation which
this high-minded young girl made one condition of the marriage. All the
Marquis could obtain was that they should not restore to him the share
in his mother's property which he had resigned when Madame de Villemer
had been obliged to pay the debts of her eldest son for the first time.
According to the Marquis, his mother had a right to dispose of her own
fortune during her lifetime; and he regarded himself as entirely
indemnified since the Marchioness was to live henceforth at the Hôtel
de Xaintrailles and in the castles of her daughter-in-law, far more
splendid than the little manor of Séval and much nearer Paris, thus
living no longer at his expense.
In these family arrangements all parties showed the most exquisite
delicacy and the most honorable generosity. Caroline directed the
attention of the Marquis to this fact in order to make him insist, in
his book, upon certain just reservations in favor of families where the
true idea of nobility still served as the basis of real virtues.
In fact, here each one did his duty: Mlle de Xaintrailles would have no
marriage-contract which, in protecting her fortune from her husband's
lavish expenditures, should contain any clauses likely to wound his
pride; while the Duke, on the other hand, insisted that the right of
dowry should bind the wings of his magnificent improvidence. So it was
specified with considerable flourish in the document that this
stipulation was introduced at the request of the future bridegroom, and
in compliance with his express wishes.
Everything being thus settled, the Marchioness found herself a sharer in
a most generous style of living; and although she had declared herself
satisfied with a simple promise and willing to rely on the discretion of
her children, a very handsome income had been secured to her by the same
contract in which the future bride had done so many other liberal and
considerate things; the Marquis, on his side, became repossessed of
capital enough to represent an ample competence. It is needless to state
that he took the recovery of this fortune as calmly as he had borne the
loss of it.
While the outfit of the bride was preparing, the Duke busied himself
about his presents for her, the funds for their purchase having been
forced upon his acceptance by his brother, as a wedding gift. What an
affair it was for the Duke to choose diamonds and laces and cashmeres!
He understood the lofty science of the toilet better than the most
accomplished woman. He hardly found time to eat, passing his days in
waiting upon his betrothed, consulting jewellers, merchants, and
embroiderers, and telling his mother, who was equally excited over it
all, the thousand incidents and even the surprising dramas connected
with his marvellous acquisitions. Into the midst of all this heavy fire,
in which Caroline and Urbain took only a modest share, Madame d'Arglade
glided, as if in her own despite.
A great event had overturned Léonie's way of life and all her plans. At
the beginning of the winter, her husband, twenty years her senior and
for some time past an invalid, had succumbed to a chronic disease,
leaving his affairs complicated enough; though she came out of her
embarrassments in triumphant style, thanks to a lucky stroke at the
Bourse, for she had gambled in stocks a long time without the knowledge
of M. d'Arglade, and had at last laid hands on a fortunate number in the
great lottery. So she found herself a widow, still young and handsome,
and richer than she had ever been before, all which did not hinder her
shedding so many and such big tears that people said of her with
admiration, "This poor little woman was really attached to her duty, in
spite of her frivolous ways! Certainly M. d'Arglade was not a husband to
go distracted over, but she has such a warm heart that she is
inconsolable." And thus she was pitied, and many took pains to amuse
her: the Marchioness, seriously interested, insisted that she should
come and pass her solitary afternoons with her. Nothing was more proper;
it was not going into company, for the Marchioness received no visitors
until four or five o'clock; it was not even going out, for Léonie could
come in a cab without much of a toilet, and as if incognito. Léonie
allowed herself to be consoled and amused by watching the preparations
for the wedding, and sometimes the Duke would succeed in making her
laugh outright; which did very well, because, passing from one kind of
nervous excitement to another, she would immediately begin to sob,
hiding her face in her handkerchief and saying, "How cruel you are to
make me laugh! It does me so much harm."
Through all her despair, Léonie was contriving to win the intimate
confidence of the Marchioness so as insensibly to supplant Caroline, who
did not perceive this, and was a thousand leagues from suspecting her
designs. Now Léonie's main project was this:--
As she saw the health of her disagreeable husband becoming impaired and
her own private purse filling out round, Madame d'Arglade asked herself
what kind of a successor she should give him, and, as she had not yet
been confidentially informed of the marriage already arranged with Mlle
de Xaintrailles, she had resolved to confer the right to the vacant
living upon the Duke d'Aléria. She thought him "ineligible," on the
conditions of fortune united to youth and rank, and said to herself, not
without logic and plausibility, that the widow of a respectable and
wealthy gentleman, without children, was the best match to which a
penniless prodigal, reduced to going on foot and reckoning up accounts
with his body-servant, could possibly aspire. Léonie then had no doubt
of her success, and while busying herself with much skill in the
investment of her capital she said to herself in supreme calm, "Now all
is finished, I have plenty of money, I will speculate no more, I will
intrigue no more. My ambition, satiated in this direction, must change
its object. I must efface the birth-mark of plebeianism, which still
incommodes me in society. I must have a title. That of Duchess is well
worth the trouble of some thought!"
She had indeed thought of it in time, but M. d'Arglade died too late.
She had scarcely laid aside her first mourning crapes, when, on her
earliest visit to the Marchioness, she learned that she must think of it
no longer.
Léonie then turned her batteries on the Marquis de Villemer. This was
less brilliant and more difficult, but still it was satisfactory as a
title, and, from her point of view, not impossible. The Marchioness was
extremely anxious about her son's bachelor state, the prospect of which
as a permanency seemed to have new charms for him in his negligence. She
opened her heart to Madame d'Arglade. "He really frightens me," said
she, "with his tranquil air. I fear he may have some prejudice--I know
not what--against marriage, perhaps against women in general. He is more
than timid, he is unsociable, and yet he is charming when you succeed in
winning him into familiarity. He needs to meet some woman who will fall
in love with him herself first, and then have courage enough to make him
love her in return."
Léonie profited by these revelations. "Ah! yes," replied she, giddily,
"he needs a wife of higher position than mine, one who is not the widow
of the best of men; but somebody who would still have my age, my wealth,
and my disposition."
"Your disposition is too impulsive for a man so reserved, my darling."
"And that is why a person of my character would save him. You know about
extremes. If I could love any one, which now, alas! is totally
impossible, I should certainly fancy a man who is serious and cold. Dear
me! Alas! was not that the temperament of my poor husband? Well, his
gravity tempered my vivacity, and my liveliness let sunshine into his
melancholy. That was his way of putting it, and how often he would
mention it! He had never been in love before he met me, and he also had
precisely this distaste for marriage. The first time he saw me, he was a
little afraid of my frivolity; but all at once he saw that I was
necessary to his life, because this apparent thoughtlessness, which you
know does n't hinder one from having a good heart, passed into his soul
like a light, like a balm. These were his very words, poor dear man!
There! stop! let us not talk about people who marry. It makes me feel
too keenly that I am alone forever!"
Léonie found means to touch upon the subject so often and under so many
different forms, with so much tact under an air of innocence, with so
many civilities clothed in apparent indifference, that the idea entered
the mind of the Marchioness almost without her being conscious of it,
and when Madame d'Arglade saw she was not disposed to reject it
absolutely in the proper time and place, she began a direct attack on M.
de Villemer with the same cunning, the same charming heedlessness, the
same silence of conjugal despair, the same frank insinuations, bringing
about the whole and carrying it on before the eyes of Caroline, about
whom she did not trouble herself at all.
But the chatter of Madame d'Arglade was disagreeable to the Marquis;
and, if she had never found this out, it was only because she had never
provoked him into taking any notice of her whatever. Far from being the
inexperienced savage he was supposed to be, he had a very fine tact with
regard to women; so, at the first assault which Léonie made, he
understood her designs, perceived all her intrigues, and made her feel
this so thoroughly that she was wounded to the very heart.
From that time she opened her eyes, and, in a thousand delicate
indications detected the boundless love Mlle de Saint-Geneix had
inspired in the Marquis. She rejoiced over this greatly: she thought it
was in her power to revenge herself, and she waited for the right
moment.
The marriage of the Duke was appointed for one of the first days of
January; but there were so many outcries in certain rigid drawing-rooms
of the Faubourg Saint-Germain against the readiness with which the
Duchess de Dunières had welcomed the suit of this great sinner, that
she determined to avoid the reproach of undue precipitation by delaying
the happiness of the young pair for three months, and introducing her
god-daughter into society. This postponement did not alarm the Duke, but
vexed the Marchioness exceedingly, for she was eager to open a really
grand drawing-room, on her own responsibility, with a charming
daughter-in-law, who would attract young faces around her. Madame
d'Arglade, under pretext of business, became less assiduous in her
visits, and Caroline resumed her duties.
She was much less impatient than the Marchioness to live at the Hôtel
de Xaintrailles and to change her habits. The Marquis had not decided to
accept an apartment at his brother's, and did not explain his own
personal plans. Caroline was alarmed at this, and yet she saw, in his
indifference to being under the same roof with her, one proof of the
calm regard she had exacted from him; but she had now reached that stage
of affection when logic is often found at fault in the depths of the
heart. She silently enjoyed her last happy days, and when spring came,
for the first time in her life, she regretted winter.
Mlle de Xaintrailles had taken Mlle de Saint-Geneix into high favor, and
even into a close friendship; while, on the contrary, she felt a decided
dislike for Madame d'Arglade, whom she met occasionally of a morning at
the house of her future mother-in-law, where she herself made no formal
visits, but only came with Madame and Mlle de Dunières at hours when
none but intimate friends were received. Léonie pretended not to see
this slight haughtiness in the beautiful Diana. She thought she had a
hold on her happiness also, and that she could revenge herself upon her
and upon Caroline at one and the same time.
She was not invited to the wedding festivities; her mourning, of course,
preventing her appearance there. However, from regard to the
Marchioness, toward whom Diana showed herself really perfect, a few
brief words of regret, as to this deprivation, were said to her. That
was all. Caroline, on the other hand, was chosen as a bridesmaid, and
loaded with gifts, by the future Duchess d'Aléria.
At last the great day arrived, and for the first time, after many years
of sorrow and misery, Mlle de Saint-Geneix, dressed in elegant taste,
and even with a certain richness, through the gifts of the bride,
appeared in all the splendor of her beauty and grace. She created a
lively sensation, and every one inquired where this delightful unknown
could have come from. Diana replied, "She is a friend of mine, a very
superior person who is under the care of my mother-in-law, and whom I am
delighted to see established so near me."
The Marquis danced with the bride and also with Mlle de Dunières, in
order that he might afterwards dance with Mlle de Saint-Geneix. Caroline
was so astonished at this that she could not help saying to him in a low
voice, and with a smile, "How is this? After having stood by each other
through the establishment of allodial rule and the enfranchisement of
the lower classes, now we are going to dance a contra-dance!"
"Yes," he replied, quickly, "and this will go much better, for I shall
feel your hand in mine."
It was the first time the Marquis had openly shown Caroline an emotion
in which the senses had any part. Now she was sensible of his trembling
hand and his eager eyes. She was frightened; but reminded herself that
he had seemed to be in love with her once before and had triumphed over
the ill-advised thought. With a man so pure and of such high morality
ought she to feel afraid, even if he did forget himself for an instant!
And besides, had she not herself experienced this vague intoxication of
love even when her will was strong enough to subdue it at once! She
could not help being aware of her own extraordinary beauty, for every
eye told her of it. She eclipsed the bride herself in her diamonds, with
her seventeen years, and her fine smile of fond triumph. The dowagers
said to the Duchess de Dunières, "That poor orphan you have there is
too pretty: it is disquieting!" The sons of the Duchess herself, young
men of dignity and great promise, looked at Mlle de Saint-Geneix in a
way that justified the apprehensions of these experienced matrons. The
Duke, touched by seeing that his generous wife had not thought of
harboring the slightest jealous suspicion, and also appreciating
Caroline's considerate attitude toward him, showed her especial
attention. The Marchioness, not to spoil this delightful day, made a
point of treating her more maternally than ever, and of dispelling every
shadow of servitude. In short, she was in one of those moments of life,
when, in spite of fortune's caprices, the power which intelligence,
honor, and beauty naturally exert seem to reclaim its rights and to
reconquer its place in the world.
But if Caroline read her triumph on all faces, it was especially in the
eyes of M. de Villemer that she could assure herself of it. She also
noticed how this mysterious man had altered since that first day when he
had appeared so timid, so self-absorbed, as if obstinately bent on
remaining in obscurity. He was now as elegant in his manners as his
elder brother, with more true grace and real distinction; for the Duke,
in spite of his great knowledge of demeanor, had a little of that
bearing, a shade too fine and slightly theatrical, which is
characteristic of the Spanish race. The Marquis was of the French type
in all its unaffected ease, in all its amiable kindliness, in that
particular charm which does not impress but wins. He danced, that is, he
walked through the contra-dance more simply than any one else; but the
purity of his life had imparted to his motions, his countenance, his
whole being, a perfume, as one might say, of extraordinary youth. He
seemed, this evening, to be ten years younger than his brother, and a
certain indescribable glow of hope gave his face the brightness of a
beautiful life just commencing.