"O Love, forsake me not;
Mine were a lone dark lot
Bereft of thee."
HEMANS, /Genius singing to Love/.
I FEAR that as yet Ernest Maltravers had gained little from Experience,
except a few current coins of worldly wisdom (and not very valuable
those!) while he has lost much of that nobler wealth with which youthful
enthusiasm sets out on the journey of life. Experience is an open
giver, but a stealthy thief. There is, however, this to be said in her
favour, that we retain her gifts; and if ever we demand restitution in
earnest, 'tis ten to one but what we recover her thefts. Maltravers had
lived in lands where public opinion is neither strong in its influence,
nor rigid in its canons; and that does not make a man better. Moreover,
thrown headlong amidst the temptations that make the first ordeal of
youth, with ardent passions and intellectual superiority, he had been
led by the one into many errors, from the consequences of which the
other had delivered him; the necessity of roughing it through the
world--of resisting fraud to-day, and violence to-morrow,--had hardened
over the surface of his heart, though at bottom the springs were still
fresh and living. He had lost much of his chivalrous veneration for
women, for he had seen them less often deceived than deceiving. Again,
too, the last few years had been spent without any high aims or fixed
pursuits. Maltravers had been living on the capital of his faculties
and affections in a wasteful, speculating spirit. It is a bad thing for
a clever and ardent man not to have from the onset some paramount object
of life.
All this considered, we can scarcely wonder that Maltravers should have
fallen into an involuntary system of pursuing his own amusements and
pursuits, without much forethought of the harm or the good they were to
do to others or himself. The moment we lose forethought, we lose sight
of duty; and though it seems like a paradox, we can seldom be careless
without being selfish.
In seeking the society of Madame de Ventadour, Maltravers obeyed but the
mechanical impulse that leads the idler towards the companionship which
most pleases his leisure. He was interested and excited; and Valerie's
manners, which to-day flattered, and to-morrow piqued him, enlisted his
vanity and pride on the side of his fancy. But although Monsieur de
Ventadour, a frivolous and profligate Frenchman, seemed utterly
indifferent as to what his wife chose to do--and in the society in which
Valerie lived, almost every lady had her cavalier,--yet Maltravers would
have started with incredulity or dismay had any one accused him of a
systematic design on her affections. But he was living with the world,
and the world affected him as it almost always does every one else.
Still he had, at times, in his heart, the feeling that he was not
fulfilling his proper destiny and duties; and when he stole from the
brilliant resorts of an unworthy and heartless pleasure, he was ever and
anon haunted by his old familiar aspirations for the Beautiful, the
Virtuous, and the Great. However, hell is paved with good intentions;
and so, in the meanwhile, Ernest Maltravers surrendered himself to the
delicious presence of Valerie de Ventadour.
One evening, Maltravers, Ferrers, the French minister, a pretty Italian,
and the Princess di ------, made the whole party collected at Madame de
Ventadour's. The conversation fell upon one of the tales of scandal
relative to English persons, so common on the Continent.
"Is it true, Monsieur," said the French minister, gravely, to Lumley,
"that your countrymen are much more immoral than other people? It is
very strange, but in every town I enter, there is always some story in
which /les Anglais/ are the heroes. I hear nothing of French
scandal--nothing of Italian--/toujours les Anglais/."
"Because we are shocked at these things, and make a noise about them,
while you take them quietly. Vice is our episode--your epic."
"I suppose it is so," said the Frenchman, with affected seriousness.
"If we cheat at play, or flirt with a fair lady, we do it with decorum,
and our neighbours think it no business of theirs. But you treat every
frailty you find in your countrymen as a public concern, to be discussed
and talked over, and exclaimed against, and told to all the world."
"I like the system of scandal," said Madame de Ventadour, abruptly; "say
what you will, the policy of fear keeps many of us virtuous. Sin might
not be odious, if we did not tremble at the consequence even of
appearances."
"Hein, hein," grunted Monsieur de Ventadour, shuffling into the room.
"How are you?--how are you? Charmed to see you. Dull night--I suspect
we shall have rain. Hein, hein. Aha, Monsieur Ferrers, /comment ca
va-t-il/? Will you give me my revenge at /ecarte/? I have my
suspicions that I am in luck to-night. Hein, hein."
"/Ecarte/!--well, with pleasure," said Ferrers.
Ferrers played well.
The conversation ended in a moment. The little party gathered round the
table--all, except Valerie and Maltravers. The chairs that were vacated
left a kind of breach between them; but still they were next to each
other, and they felt embarrassed, for they felt alone.
"Do you never play?" asked Madame de Ventadour, after a pause.
"I /have/ played," said Maltravers, "and I know the temptation. I dare
not play now. I love the excitement, but I have been humbled at the
debasement: it is a moral drunkenness that is worse than the physical."
"You speak warmly."
"Because I feel keenly. I once won of a man I respected, who was poor.
His agony was a dreadful lesson to me. I went home, and was terrified
to think I had felt so much pleasure in the pain of another. I have
never played since that night."
"So young and so resolute!" said Valerie, with admiration in her voice
and eyes; "you are a strange person. Others would have been cured by
losing, you were cured by winning. It is a fine thing to have principle
at your age, Mr. Maltravers."
"I fear it was rather pride than principle," said Maltravers. "Error is
sometimes sweet; but there is no anguish like an error of which we feel
ashamed. I cannot submit to blush for myself."
"Ah!" muttered Valerie; "this is the echo of my own heart!" She rose
and went to the window. Maltravers paused a moment, and followed her.
Perhaps he half thought there was an invitation in the movement.
There lay before them the still street, with its feeble and unfrequent
lights; beyond, a few stars, struggling through an atmosphere unusually
clouded, brought the murmuring ocean partially into sight. Valerie
leaned against the wall, and the draperies of the window veiled her from
all the guests, save Maltravers; and between her and himself was a large
marble vase filled with flowers; and by that uncertain light Valerie's
brilliant cheek looked pale, and soft, and thoughtful. Maltravers never
before felt so much in love with the beautiful Frenchwoman.
"Ah, madam!" said he, softly; "there is one error, if it be so, that
never can cost me shame."
"Indeed!" said Valerie with an unaffected start, for she was not aware
he was so near her. As she spoke she began plucking (it is a common
woman's trick) the flowers from the vase between her and Ernest. That
small, delicate, almost transparent hand!--Maltravers gazed upon the
hand, then on the countenance, then on the hand again. The scene swam
before him, and, involuntarily and as by an irresistible impulse, the
next moment that hand was in his own.
"Pardon me--pardon me," said he, falteringly; "but that error is in the
feelings that I know for you."
Valerie lifted on him her large and radiant eyes, and made no answer.
Maltravers went on. "Chide me, scorn me, hate me if you will. Valerie,
I love you."
Valerie drew away her hand, and still remained silent.
"Speak to me," said Ernest, leaning forward; "one word, I implore
you--speak to me!"
He paused,--still no reply; he listened breathlessly--he heard her sob.
Yes; that proud, that wise, that lofty woman of the world, in that
moment, was as weak as the simplest girl that ever listened to a lover.
But how different the feelings that made her weak!--what soft and what
stern emotions were blent together!
"Mr. Maltravers," she said, recovering her voice, though it sounded
hollow, yet almost unnaturally firm and clear"--the die is cast, and I
have lost for ever the friend for whose happiness I cannot live, but for
whose welfare I would have died; I should have foreseen this, but I was
blind. No more--no more; see me to-morrow, and leave me now!"
"But, Valerie--"
"Ernest Maltravers," said she, laying her hand lightly on his own;
"/there is no anguish, like an error of which we feel ashamed/!"
Before he could reply to this citation from his own aphorism, Valerie
had glided away; and was already seated at the card-table, by the side
of the Italian princess.
Maltravers also joined the group. He fixed his eyes on Madame de
Ventadour, but her face was calm--not a trace of emotion was
discernible. Her voice, her smile, her charming and courtly manner, all
were as when he first beheld her.
"These women--what hypocrites they are!" muttered Maltravers to himself;
and his lip writhed into a sneer, which had of late often forced away
the serene and gracious expression of his earlier years, ere he knew
what it was to despise. But Maltravers mistook the woman he dared to
scorn.
He soon withdrew from the palazzo, and sought his hotel. There, while
yet musing in his dressing-room, he was joined by Ferrers. The time had
passed when Ferrers had exercised an influence over Maltravers; the boy
had grown up to be the equal of the man, in the exercise of that
two-edged sword--the reason. And Maltravers now felt, unalloyed, the
calm consciousness of his superior genius. He could not confide to
Ferrers what had passed between him and Valerie. Lumley was too /hard/
for a confidant in matters where the heart was at all concerned. In
fact, in high spirits, and in the midst of frivolous adventures, Ferrers
was charming. But in sadness, or in the moments of deep feeling,
Ferrers was one whom you would wish out of the way.
"You are sullen to-eight, /mon cher/," said Lumley, yawning; "I suppose
you want to go to bed--some persons are so ill-bred, so selfish, they
never think of their friends. Nobody asks me what I won at /ecarte/.
Don't be late to-morrow--I hate breakfasting alone, and I am never later
than a quarter before nine--I hate egotistical, ill-mannered people.
Good night."
With this, Ferrers sought his own room; there, as he slowly undressed,
he thus soliloquised: "I think I have put this man to all the use I can
make of him. We don't pull well together any longer; perhaps I myself
am a little tired of this sort of life. That is not right. I shall
grow ambitious by and by; but I think it a bad calculation not to make
the most of youth. At four or five-and-thirty it will be time enough to
consider what one ought to be at fifty."