A PRESENT FROM THE DUKE
Instead of a honeymoon at Boury, the old Breton castle on the cliffs
over the sounding seas, where the salt spray upon the crumbling towers,
the Duke and Duchess of Belgarde had a racketing time at the Château
de Belgarde. This was a great palace of a place in the neighborhood
of Versailles. There was incessant dancing, dining, and merry-making
for three whole weeks, and the meek, silent little bride grew so tired
she could scarcely stand upon her pretty feet. Madame de Valençay was
much in evidence, and was easily the loveliest of all the lovely women
at the Château de Belgarde. A vague uneasiness came into the heart of
the little duchess whenever she looked upon this beautiful blue-eyed
creature always radiantly dressed. Trimousette, however, still believed
that she could soon make her duke fall as deeply in love with herself
as she was irretrievably in love with him. He was certainly kind to
her, so thought Trimousette with deep delight in her innocent heart.
She did not observe that the duke’s kindness to her was exactly like
his kindness to his faithful hound, Diane, who had broken both her
forelegs in his service, and though unable to hunt, limped about
after him with the desperate devotion of that most sentimental of all
creatures except a woman--a dog. The duke did, indeed, show a sort of
protective instinct toward his silent, shy, black-eyed young wife, and
she noticed that Madame de Valençay was more civil to her when the
duke was by than when he was not. But it must be admitted that the
Duchess of Belgarde was shamefully bullied in her own house from the
day of her marriage by Madame de Valençay. Trimousette bore it with
the quiet, wordless courage which enabled her to bear many things in
silence, and she continued to mistake her husband’s casual good will
for the beginnings of love in its infancy. One day, less than a month
after her marriage, came the awakening. The duchess saw a jeweler from
Paris at the door of the duke’s room. The duke was holding in his hand
a blue, heart-shaped locket with diamonds in it.
“I will take this,” he said, “for one hundred louis.”
He did not see his duchess who was passing a little to the back of
him. A palpitating joy shot through Trimousette’s heart. What were all
the jewels and laces and furs and silks in her marriage presents from
the duke compared to that charming little jeweled heart, which he was
choosing for her! The duke thrust the trinket in his breast, dismissed
the man, and then turning, for the first time saw his duchess walking
along the broad, bright corridor, flooded with the glow of the summer
morning. As he was going the same way, he walked after Trimousette, and
like a gentleman he uttered some little phrase of compliment. In all
honesty, he preferred her as his wife a million times more than Madame
de Valençay, whom he could have married, if only he had agreed to have
the present incumbent put out of the way. A submissive person was what
the duke particularly desired for a wife, and he had got one.
The little duchess’s heart beat so with joy when her husband joined
her that she was almost suffocated, and could only say “Yes” and “No”
when the duke talked to her. He was obliged to admit, however, after a
few minutes of this, as they passed through the long, sunlit corridor
out upon the gay terrace, that his bride had not much conversational
power. And standing on the terrace, surrounded by gentlemen, was Madame
de Valençay, entertaining them all with the most amusing badinage, and
every word sparkled. She seemed to embody the very spirit of the rosy
morn with her shining eyes, her ringing voice, her gown of a jocund
yellow.
Nevertheless, for Trimousette this trifling attention of the duke
toward her filled her soul with rapture. There was a great ball that
night at the château, and she dressed herself for it with gayety of
heart in a very unbecoming gown selected for her by her fierce old
grandmother. Her innocent, hidden hope and pleasure lasted until she
entered the ballroom to receive her guests. There, amid the jewels
sparkling upon Madame de Valençay’s breast, lay the little blue
enameled heart.
Something as near resentment as Trimousette could feel stirred within
her, and her dark eyes grew sombre. She had a sudden illumination.
Never more would she mistake the duke’s careless kindness for the
beginnings of love. But with the illumination of her mind rose up
that latent, still, wordless courage which enabled her to bear almost
unbearable things without one sign of pain. She was but a girl of
seventeen, this injured wife, this insulted duchess; she knew nothing
of retaliation, she only knew how to suffer silently and with dignity.
No one, not even her brother Victor, should know of the cruel affront
put upon her in the first month of her marriage. She forced herself to
talk and even to smile, and Victor, who was afraid that Trimousette
would never look or speak or walk or act as a great duchess should,
began to have some hopes of her.
[Illustration]