THE PROTECTRESS.
The inspectress soon entered with Goualeuse into the little room where
Clemence was staying. The pale cheek of the young girl was still
slightly coloured in consequence of her conversation with La Louve.
"Madame la Marquise, pleased with the excellent character I have given
of you," said Madame Armand to Fleur-de-Marie, "has desired to see you,
and will, perhaps, be so good as to have you released from here before
the expiration of your time."
"I thank you, madame," replied Fleur-de-Marie, timidly, to Madame
Armand, who left her alone with the marchioness.
The latter, struck by the candid expression of her protegee's features,
and by her carriage, so full of grace and modesty, could not help
remembering that La Goualeuse had pronounced the name of Rodolph in her
sleep, and that the inspectress believed the youthful prisoner to be a
prey to deep and hidden love. Although perfectly convinced that it could
not be a question as to the Grand Duke Rodolph, Clemence acknowledged to
herself that, with regard to beauty, La Goualeuse was worthy of a
prince's love.
At the sight of her protectress, whose physiognomy, as we have said,
displayed excessive goodness, Fleur-de-Marie felt herself
sympathetically attracted towards her.
"My girl," said Clemence to her, "whilst commending the gentleness of
your disposition and the discreetness of your behaviour, Madame Armand
complains of your want of confidence in her."
Fleur-de-Marie bowed her look, but did not reply.
"The peasant's dress in which you were clad when you were apprehended,
your silence on the subject of the place where you resided before you
were brought here, prove that you conceal certain particulars from us."
"Madame--"
"I have no right to your confidence, my poor child, nor would I ask you
any question that would distress you; but, as I am assured that if I
request your discharge from prison it will be accorded to me, before I
do so I should wish to talk to you of your own plans, your resources for
the future. Once free, what do you propose to do? If, as I doubt not,
you decide on following the good path you have already entered upon,
have confidence in me, and I will put you in the way of gaining an
honest subsistence."
La Goualeuse was moved to tears at the interest which Madame d'Harville
evinced for her. After a moment's hesitation, she replied:
"You are very good, madame, to show so much benevolence towards me,--so
generous, that I ought, perhaps, to break the silence which I have
hitherto kept on the past, to which I was forced by an oath--"
"An oath?"
"Yes, madame, I have sworn to be secret to justice, and the persons
employed in this prison, as to the series of events by which I was
brought hither. Yet, madame, if you will make me a promise--"
"Of what nature?"
"To keep my secret. I may, thanks to you, madame, without breaking my
oath, comfort most worthy persons who, no doubt, are excessively uneasy
on my account."
"Rely on my discretion. I will only say what you authorise me to
disclose."
"Oh, thanks, madame! I was so fearful that my silence towards my
benefactors would appear like ingratitude!"
The gentle accents of Fleur-de-Marie, and her well-selected phrases,
struck Madame d'Harville with fresh surprise.
"I will not conceal from you," said she, "that your demeanour, your
language, all surprise me in a remarkable degree. How could you, with an
education which appears polished,--how could you--"
"Fall so low, you would say, madame?" said Goualeuse, with bitterness.
"Alas! It is but a very short time that I have received this education.
I owe this benefit to a generous protector, who, like you, madame,
without knowing me, without even having the favourable recommendation
which you have received in my favour, took pity upon me--"
"And who is this protector?"
"I do not know, madame."
"You do not know?"
"He only makes himself known, they tell me, by his inexhaustible
goodness. Thanks be to Heaven, he found me in his path!"
"And when did you first meet?"
"One night,--in the Cite, madame," said Goualeuse, lowering her eyes, "a
man was going to beat me; this unknown benefactor defended me
courageously; this was my first meeting with him."
"Then he was one of the people?"
"The first time I saw him he had the dress and language; but
afterwards--"
"Afterwards?"
"The way in which he spoke to me, the profound respect with which he was
treated by the persons to whom he confided me, all proved to me that he
had only assumed the exterior disguise of one of the men who are seen
about the Cite."
"But with what motive?"
"I do not know."
"And do you know the name of this mysterious protector?"
"Oh, yes, madame," said La Goualeuse, with excitement; "thank Heaven!
For I can incessantly bless and adore that name. My preserver is called
M. Rodolph, madame."
Clemence blushed deeply.
"And has he no other name," she asked, quickly, of Fleur-de-Marie.
"I know no other, madame. In the farm, where he sent me, he was only
known as M. Rodolph."
"And his age?"
"Still young, madame."
"And handsome?"
"Oh, yes! Handsome,--noble as his own heart."
The grateful and impassioned accent with which Fleur-de-Marie uttered
these words caused a deeply painful sensation in Madame d'Harville's
bosom. An unconquerable and inexplicable presentiment told her that it
was indeed the prince. "The remarks of the inspectress were just,"
thought Clemence. "Goualeuse loves Rodolph; that was the name which she
pronounced in her sleep. Under what strange circumstance had the prince
and this unfortunate girl met? Why did Rodolph go disguised into the
Cite?"
The marquise could not resolve these questions. She only remembered what
Sarah had wickedly and mendaciously told her as to the pretended
eccentricities of Rodolph. Was it not, in fact, strange that he should
have extricated from the dregs of society a girl of such excessive
loveliness, and evidently so intelligent and sensible?
Clemence had noble qualities, but she was a woman, and deeply loved
Rodolph, although she had resolved to bury that secret in her heart's
very core.
Without reflecting that this was unquestionably but one of those
generous actions which the prince was accustomed to do by stealth,
without considering that she was, perchance, confounding with love a
sentiment that was but excess of gratitude, without considering that,
even if this feeling were more tender, Rodolph must be ignorant of it,
the marchioness, in the first moment of bitterness and injustice, could
not help looking on Goualeuse as her rival. Her pride revolted when she
believed she was suffering, in spite of herself, with such a humiliating
rivalry; and she replied, in a tone so harsh as to contrast cruelly with
the affectionate kindness of her first words:
"And how is it, then, mademoiselle, that your protector leaves you in
prison? How comes it that you are here?"
"Oh, madame," said Fleur-de-Marie, struck at this sudden change of tone,
"have I done anything to displease you?"
"In what could you have displeased me?" asked Madame d'Harville,
haughtily.
"It appeared to me just now that you spoke to me so kindly, madame."
"Really, mademoiselle, is it necessary that I should weigh every word I
utter? Since I take an interest in you, I have, I think, a right to ask
you certain questions!"
Scarcely had Clemence uttered these words, than she regretted their
severity; first from a praiseworthy return of generosity, and then
because she thought by being harsh with her rival she might not learn
any more of what she was so anxious to know. In fact, Goualeuse's
countenance, just now so open and confiding, became suddenly alarmed.
Like the sensitive plant, which, on the first touch, curls up its leaves
and withdraws within itself, the heart of Fleur-de-Marie became
painfully contracted. Clemence replied, gently, in order that she might
not awaken her protegee's suspicions by too sudden a return to a milder
tone:
"Really I must repeat that I cannot understand why, having so much to
praise your benefactor for, you are left here a prisoner. How is it
that, after having returned with all sincerity to the paths of
rectitude, you could have been apprehended, at night, in a forbidden
place? All this, I confess to you, appears to me very extraordinary. You
speak of an oath, which has bound you to silence; but this very oath is
so strange!"
"I have spoken the truth, madame--"
"I am sure of that; it is only to see and hear you to be convinced that
you are incapable of falsehood; but what is so incomprehensible in your
situation makes me the more curious and impatient to have it cleared up;
and to this alone must you attribute the abruptness of my language just
now. I was wrong, I feel I was, for, although I have no claim to your
confidence beyond my anxious desire to be of service to you, yet you
have offered to disclose to me what you have not yet told to any person;
and I can assure you, my poor girl, that this proof of your confidence
in the interest I feel for you touches me very nearly. I promise you to
keep your secret most scrupulously, if you confide it to me, and I will
do everything in my power to effect what you may wish to have done."
Thanks to this skilful patching up (the phrase will be excused, we
trust), Madame d'Harville regained La Goualeuse's confidence, which had
been for a moment repressed. Fleur-de-Marie, in her candour, reproached
herself for having wrongly interpreted the words which had wounded her.
"Excuse me, madame," she said to Clemence; "I was, no doubt, wrong not
to tell you at once what you desired to know, but you asked me for the
name of my preserver, and, in spite of myself, I could not resist the
pleasure of speaking of him."
"Nothing could be more praiseworthy, and it proves how truly grateful
you are to him. Tell me how it was that you left the worthy people with
whom you were, no doubt, placed by M. Rodolph? Is it to this event that
the oath you were compelled to take, refers?"
"Yes, madame; but, thanks to you, I think I may still keep my word
faithfully, and, at the same time, inform my benefactors as to my
disappearance."
"Now, then, my poor girl, I am all attention to you."
"It is three months nearly since M. Rodolph placed me at a farm, which
is situated four or five leagues from Paris--"
"Did M. Rodolph take you there himself?"
"Yes, madame, and confided me to the charge of a worthy lady, as good as
she was venerable; and I loved her like my mother. She and the cure of
the village, at the request of M. Rodolph, took charge of my education."
"And M.--Rodolph,--did he often come to the farm?"
"No, madame, he only came three times during the whole time I was
there."
Clemence's heart throbbed with joy.
"And when he came to see you that made you very happy, did it not?"
"Oh, yes, madame! It was more than happiness to me; it was a feeling
mingled with gratitude, respect, adoration, and even a degree of fear."
"Of fear?"
"Between him and me, between him and others, the distance is so great!"
"But what, then, was his rank?"
"I do not know that he had any rank, madame."
"Yet you allude to the distance which exists between him and others."
"Oh, madame, what places him above all the rest of the world is the
elevation of his character, his inexhaustible generosity towards those
who suffer, the enthusiasm which he inspires in every one. The wicked,
even, cannot hear his name without trembling, and respect as much as
they dread him! But forgive me, madame, for still speaking of him. I
ought to be silent, for I seek to give you an adequate idea of him who
ought to be adored in silence. I might as well try to express by words
the goodness of Heaven!"
"This comparison--"
"Is, perhaps, sacrilegious, madame; but will it offend the good God to
compare to him one who has given me the consciousness of good and evil,
one who has snatched me from the abyss, one, in fact, to whom I owe a
new existence?"
"I do not blame you, my child; I can understand all your noble
exaggerations. But how was it that you abandoned this farm, where you
must have been so happy?"
"Alas, not voluntarily, madame!"
"Who, then, forced you away?"
"One evening, some days since," said Fleur-de-Marie, trembling even as
she spoke, "I was going towards the parsonage-house in the village, when
a wicked woman, who had used me very cruelly during my infancy, and a
man, her accomplice, who had concealed themselves in a ravine, threw
themselves upon me, and, after having gagged me, carried me off in a
hackney-coach."
"For what purpose?"
"I know not, madame. My ravishers, as I think, were acting in conformity
to orders from some powerful personages."
"What followed this?"
"Scarcely was the hackney-coach in motion, than the wicked creature, who
is called La Chouette, exclaimed, 'I have some vitriol here, and I'll
rub La Goualeuse's face, to disfigure her with it!'"
"Oh, horrible! Unhappy girl! And who has saved you from this danger?"
"The woman's confederate, a blind man called the Schoolmaster."
"And he defended you?"
"Yes, madame, this and another time also. On this occasion there was a
struggle between him and La Chouette: exerting his strength, the
Schoolmaster compelled her to throw out of window the bottle which held
the vitriol. This was the first service he rendered me, after having,
however, aided in carrying me off. The night was excessively dark. At
the end of an hour and a half the coach stopped, as I think, on the
highroad which traverses the Plain St. Denis, and here was a man on
horseback, evidently awaiting us. 'What!' said he, 'have you got her at
last?' 'Yes, we've got her,' answered La Chouette, who was furious
because she had been hindered from disfiguring me. 'If you wish to get
rid of the little baggage at once, it will be a good plan to stretch her
on the ground, and let the coach wheels pass over her skull. It will
appear as if she had been accidentally killed.'"
"You make me shudder."
"Alas, madame, La Chouette was quite capable of doing what she said!
Fortunately, the man on horseback replied that he would not have any
harm done to me, and all he wanted was to have me confined somewhere for
two months in a place whence I could neither go out nor be allowed to
write to any one. Then La Chouette proposed to take me to a man's called
Bras Rouge, who keeps a tavern in the Champs Elysees. In this tavern
there are several subterranean chambers, and one of these, La Chouette
said, would serve me for a prison. The man on horseback agreed to this
proposition; and he promised me that, after remaining two months at Bras
Rouge's, I should be properly taken care of, and not be sorry for having
quitted the farm at Bouqueval."
"What a strange mystery!"
"This man gave money to La Chouette, and promised her more when she
should bring me from Bras Rouge's, and then galloped away. Our
hackney-coach continued its way on to Paris; and a short time before we
reached the barrier the Schoolmaster said to La Chouette, 'You want to
shut Goualeuse up in one of Bras Rouge's cellars, when you know very
well that, being so close to the river's side, these cellars are always
under water in the winter! Do you wish to drown her?' 'Yes,' replied La
Chouette."
"Poor girl! What had you ever done to this horrid woman?"
"Nothing, madame; and from my very infancy she had always been so full
of hatred towards me. The Schoolmaster replied, 'I won't have Goualeuse
drowned! She sha'n't go to Bras Rouge's!' La Chouette was as astonished
as I was, madame, to hear this man defend me thus, and she flew into a
violent rage, and swore she would take me to Bras Rouge's in spite of
the Schoolmaster. 'I defy you!' said he, 'for I have got Goualeuse by
the arm, and I will not let go my hold of her; and, if you come near
her, I'll strangle you!' 'What do you mean, then, to do with her,' cried
La Chouette, 'since she must be concealed somewhere for two months, so
that no one may know where she is?' 'There's a way,' said the
Schoolmaster. 'We are going by the Champs Elysees; we will stop the
coach a little way off the guard-house, and you shall go to Bras Rouge's
tavern. It is midnight, and you will be sure to find him; bring him
here, and he shall lead La Goualeuse to the guard-house, declaring that
she is a _fille de la Cite_, whom he has found loitering about his
house. As girls are sentenced to three months' imprisonment if found in
the Champs Elysees, and as La Goualeuse is still on the police books,
she will be apprehended and sent to St. Lazare, where she will be better
taken care of and concealed than in Bras Rouge's cellar.' 'But,'
answered La Chouette, 'Goualeuse will not allow herself to be arrested
even at the _corps-de-garde_. She will declare that we have carried her
off, and give information against us; and, supposing even that she goes
to prison, she will write to her protectors, and all will be
discovered.' 'No, she will go to prison willingly,' answered the
Schoolmaster; 'and she shall take an oath not to give any information
against any person as long as she is in St. Lazare, nor afterwards,
either. This is a debt she owes me, for I prevented you from disfiguring
her, La Chouette, and saved her from being drowned at Bras Rouge's; but
if, after having sworn not to speak, she dares to do so, we will attack
the farm at Bouqueval with fire and blood!' Then, addressing me, the
Schoolmaster added,'Decide, then: take the oath I demand of you, and you
shall get off for three months in prison; if not, I abandon you to La
Chouette, who will take you to Bras Rouge's, where you will be drowned,
and we will set Bouqueval farm on fire. So, come, decide. I know, if you
take the oath, you will keep it.'"
"And you did swear?"
"Alas, yes, madame! I was so fearful they would do my protectors at the
farm an injury, and then I so much dreaded being drowned by La Chouette
in a cellar, it seemed so frightful to me; another death would have
seemed to me less horrid, and, perhaps, I should not have tried to
escape it."
"What a dreadful idea at your age!" said Madame d'Harville, looking at
La Goualeuse with surprise. "When you have left this place, and have
been restored to your benefactors, shall you not be very happy? Has not
your repentance effaced the past?"
"Can the past ever be effaced? Can the past ever be forgotten? Can
repentance kill memory, madame?" exclaimed Fleur-de-Marie, in a tone so
despairing that Clemence shuddered.
"But all faults are retrieved, unhappy girl!"
"And the remembrance of stain, madame, does not that become more and
more terrible in proportion as the soul becomes purer, in proportion as
the mind becomes more elevated? Alas, the higher we ascend, the deeper
appears the abyss which we have quitted!"
"Then you renounce all hope of restoration--of pardon?"
"On the part of others--no, madame, your kindness proves to me that
remorse will find indulgence."
"But you will be pitiless towards yourself?"
"Others, madame, may not know, pardon, or forget what I have been, but I
shall never forget it!"
"And do you sometimes desire to die?"
"Sometimes!" said Goualeuse, smiling bitterly. Then, after a moment's
silence, she added, "Sometimes,--yes, madame."
"Still you were afraid of being disfigured by that horrid woman; and so
you wish to preserve your beauty, my poor little girl. That proves that
life has still some attraction for you; so courage! Courage!"
"It is, perhaps, weakness to think of it, but if I were handsome, as you
say, madame, I should like to die handsome, pronouncing the name of my
benefactor."
Madame d'Harville's eyes filled with tears. Fleur-de-Marie had said
these last words with so much simplicity; her angelic, pale, depressed
features, her melancholy smile, were all so much in accord with her
words, that it was impossible to doubt the reality of her sad desire.
Madame d'Harville was endued with too much delicacy not to feel how
miserable, how fatal, was this thought of La Goualeuse: "I shall never
forget what I have been!"--the fixed, permanent, incessant idea which
controlled and tortured Fleur-de-Marie's life. Clemence, ashamed at
having for an instant misconstrued the ever disinterested generosity of
the prince, regretted also that she had for a moment allowed herself to
be actuated by any feeling of absurd jealousy against La Goualeuse,
who, with such pure excitement, expressed her gratitude towards her
protector. It was strange that the admiration which this poor prisoner
felt so deeply towards Rodolph perhaps increased the profound love which
Clemence must for ever conceal from him. She said, to drive away these
thoughts:
"I trust that, for the future, you will be less severe towards yourself.
But let us talk of this oath, for now I can explain your silence. You
will not denounce these wretches?"
"Although the Schoolmaster shared in my carrying off, yet he twice
defended me, and I would not be ungrateful towards him."
"Then you lent yourself to the plans of these monsters?"
"Yes, madame, I was so frightened! The Chouette went to seek for Bras
Rouge, who conducted me to the guard-house, saying he had found me
roving near his cabaret. I did not deny it, and so they took me into
custody and brought me here."
"But your friends at the farm must be in the utmost anxiety about you!"
"Alas, madame, in my great alarm, I did not reflect that my oath would
prevent me from assuring them of my safety. Now that makes me wretched!
But I think (and hope you think so, too) that, without breaking my word,
I may beg of you to write to Madame Georges at the farm of Bouqueval,
and assure her that she need have no fears for me, without informing her
where I am; for I have promised to be silent."
"My child, these precautions will be useless if, at my recommendation,
you are pardoned. To-morrow you will return to the farm without having
betrayed your oath by that; and you may consult your friends hereafter
to know how far you are bound by a promise which was extorted from you
by a threat."
"You believe then, madame, that, thanks to your kindness, I may hope to
leave here very soon?"
"You deserve my interest so much that I am sure I shall succeed, and I
have no doubt but that the day after to-morrow you may rely on going in
person to your benefactors."
"So soon! Madame, how have I deserved so much goodness on your part? How
can I ever repay your kindness?"
"By continuing to behave as you have done. I only regret that I cannot
do anything towards your future existence; that is a pleasure which your
friends have reserved for themselves."
At this moment Madame Armand entered abruptly, and with a troubled air.
"Madame la Marquise," she said, addressing Clemence with hesitation, "I
am deeply pained with a message I have to convey to you."
"What do you mean, madame?"
"The Duke de Lucenay is below, just come from your house, madame."
"La, how you frighten me! What's the matter?"
"I do not know, madame; but M. de Lucenay has, he told me, some very
distressing information to communicate to you. He learnt from the
duchess, his lady, that you were here, and has come in great haste."
"Distressing information!" said Madame d'Harville to herself; then she
suddenly shrieked out, in agonised accents, "My daughter, my daughter,
my daughter, perhaps! Oh, speak, madame!"
"I do not know, your ladyship."
"Oh, for mercy's sake--for mercy's sake, take me to M. de Lucenay!"
cried Madame d'Harville, rushing out with a bewildered air, followed by
Madame Armand.
"Poor mother! She fears for her child!" said La Goualeuse, following
Clemence with her eyes. "Oh, no, it is impossible! At the very moment
when she was so benevolent and kind to me such a blow could not strike
her! No, no; once again I say it is impossible!"