Produced by John Bickers, and Dagny
A SECOND HOME
By Honore De Balzac
Translated by Clara Bell
DEDICATION
To Madame la Comtesse Louise de Turheim as a token of
remembrance and affectionate respect.
A SECOND HOME
The Rue du Tourniquet-Saint-Jean, formerly one of the darkest and most
tortuous of the streets about the Hotel de Ville, zigzagged round the
little gardens of the Paris Prefecture, and ended at the Rue Martroi,
exactly at the angle of an old wall now pulled down. Here stood the
turnstile to which the street owed its name; it was not removed
till 1823, when the Municipality built a ballroom on the garden plot
adjoining the Hotel de Ville, for the fete given in honor of the Duc
d’Angouleme on his return from Spain.
The widest part of the Rue du Tourniquet was the end opening into the
Rue de la Tixeranderie, and even there it was less than six feet across.
Hence in rainy weather the gutter water was soon deep at the foot of the
old houses, sweeping down with it the dust and refuse deposited at
the corner-stones by the residents. As the dust-carts could not pass
through, the inhabitants trusted to storms to wash their always
miry alley; for how could it be clean? When the summer sun shed its
perpendicular rays on Paris like a sheet of gold, but as piercing as the
point of a sword, it lighted up the blackness of this street for a
few minutes without drying the permanent damp that rose from the
ground-floor to the first story of these dark and silent tenements.
The residents, who lighted their lamps at five o’clock in the month
of June, in winter never put them out. To this day the enterprising
wayfarer who should approach the Marais along the quays, past the end
of the Rue du Chaume, the Rues de l’Homme Arme, des Billettes, and des
Deux-Portes, all leading to the Rue du Tourniquet, might think he had
passed through cellars all the way.
Almost all the streets of old Paris, of which ancient chronicles laud
the magnificence, were like this damp and gloomy labyrinth, where the
antiquaries still find historical curiosities to admire. For instance,
on the house then forming the corner where the Rue du Tourniquet joined
the Rue de la Tixeranderie, the clamps might still be seen of two strong
iron rings fixed to the wall, the relics of the chains put up every
night by the watch to secure public safety.
This house, remarkable for its antiquity, had been constructed in a way
that bore witness to the unhealthiness of these old dwellings; for,
to preserve the ground-floor from damp, the arches of the cellars
rose about two feet above the soil, and the house was entered up three
outside steps. The door was crowned by a closed arch, of which the
keystone bore a female head and some time-eaten arabesques. Three
windows, their sills about five feet from the ground, belonged to a
small set of rooms looking out on the Rue du Tourniquet, whence they
derived their light. These windows were protected by strong iron bars,
very wide apart, and ending below in an outward curve like the bars of a
baker’s window.
If any passer-by during the day were curious enough to peep into the two
rooms forming this little dwelling, he could see nothing; for only under
the sun of July could he discern, in the second room, two beds hung with
green serge, placed side by side under the paneling of an old-fashioned
alcove; but in the afternoon, by about three o’clock, when the candles
were lighted, through the pane of the first room an old woman might be
seen sitting on a stool by the fireplace, where she nursed the fire in
a brazier, to simmer a stew, such as porters’ wives are expert in. A
few kitchen utensils, hung up against the wall, were visible in the
twilight.
At that hour an old table on trestles, but bare of linen, was laid with
pewter-spoons, and the dish concocted by the old woman. Three wretched
chairs were all the furniture of this room, which was at once the
kitchen and the dining-room. Over the chimney-piece were a piece of
looking-glass, a tinder-box, three glasses, some matches, and a large,
cracked white jug. Still, the floor, the utensils, the fireplace,
all gave a pleasant sense of the perfect cleanliness and thrift that
pervaded the dull and gloomy home.
The old woman’s pale, withered face was quite in harmony with the
darkness of the street and the mustiness of the place. As she sat there,
motionless, in her chair, it might have been thought that she was as
inseparable from the house as a snail from its brown shell; her face,
alert with a vague expression of mischief, was framed in a flat cap made
of net, which barely covered her white hair; her fine, gray eyes were as
quiet as the street, and the many wrinkles in her face might be compared
to the cracks in the walls. Whether she had been born to poverty, or
had fallen from some past splendor, she now seemed to have been long
resigned to her melancholy existence.
From sunrise till dark, excepting when she was getting a meal ready, or,
with a basket on her arm, was out purchasing provisions, the old woman
sat in the adjoining room by the further window, opposite a young girl.
At any hour of the day the passer-by could see the needlewoman seated
in an old, red velvet chair, bending over an embroidery frame, and
stitching indefatigably.
Her mother had a green pillow on her knee, and busied herself with
hand-made net; but her fingers could move the bobbin but slowly;
her sight was feeble, for on her nose there rested a pair of those
antiquated spectacles which keep their place on the nostrils by the grip
of a spring. By night these two hardworking women set a lamp between
them; and the light, concentrated by two globe-shaped bottles of water,
showed the elder the fine network made by the threads on her pillow,
and the younger the most delicate details of the pattern she was
embroidering. The outward bend of the window had allowed the girl to
rest a box of earth on the window-sill, in which grew some sweet peas,
nasturtiums, a sickly little honeysuckle, and some convolvulus that
twined its frail stems up the iron bars. These etiolated plants produced
a few pale flowers, and added a touch of indescribable sadness and
sweetness to the picture offered by this window, in which the two
figures were appropriately framed.
The most selfish soul who chanced to see this domestic scene would carry
away with him a perfect image of the life led in Paris by the working
class of women, for the embroideress evidently lived by her needle.
Many, as they passed through the turnstile, found themselves wondering
how a girl could preserve her color, living in such a cellar. A student
of lively imagination, going that way to cross to the Quartier-Latin,
would compare this obscure and vegetative life to that of the ivy that
clung to these chill walls, to that of the peasants born to labor, who
are born, toil, and die unknown to the world they have helped to feed.
A house-owner, after studying the house with the eye of a valuer, would
have said, “What will become of those two women if embroidery should go
out of fashion?” Among the men who, having some appointment at the
Hotel de Ville or the Palais de Justice, were obliged to go through
this street at fixed hours, either on their way to business or on their
return home, there may have been some charitable soul. Some widower or
Adonis of forty, brought so often into the secrets of these sad lives,
may perhaps have reckoned on the poverty of this mother and daughter,
and have hoped to become the master at no great cost of the innocent
work-woman, whose nimble and dimpled fingers, youthful figure, and
white skin--a charm due, no doubt, to living in this sunless street--had
excited his admiration. Perhaps, again, some honest clerk, with twelve
hundred francs a year, seeing every day the diligence the girl gave to
her needle, and appreciating the purity of her life, was only waiting
for improved prospects to unite one humble life with another, one form
of toil to another, and to bring at any rate a man’s arm and a calm
affection, pale-hued like the flowers in the window, to uphold this
home.
Vague hope certainly gave life to the mother’s dim, gray eyes. Every
morning, after the most frugal breakfast, she took up her pillow, though
chiefly for the look of the thing, for she would lay her spectacles on a
little mahogany worktable as old as herself, and look out of the window
from about half-past eight till ten at the regular passers in the
street; she caught their glances, remarked on their gait, their dress,
their countenance, and almost seemed to be offering her daughter, her
gossiping eyes so evidently tried to attract some magnetic sympathy by
manoeuvres worthy of the stage. It was evident that this little review
was as good as a play to her, and perhaps her single amusement.
The daughter rarely looked up. Modesty, or a painful consciousness of
poverty, seemed to keep her eyes riveted to the work-frame; and only
some exclamation of surprise from her mother moved her to show her small
features. Then a clerk in a new coat, or who unexpectedly appeared with
a woman on his arm, might catch sight of the girl’s slightly upturned
nose, her rosy mouth, and gray eyes, always bright and lively in spite
of her fatiguing toil. Her late hours had left a trace on her face by a
pale circle marked under each eye on the fresh rosiness of her cheeks.
The poor child looked as if she were made for love and cheerfulness--for
love, which had drawn two perfect arches above her eyelids, and had
given her such a mass of chestnut hair, that she might have hidden under
it as under a tent, impenetrable to the lover’s eye--for cheerfulness,
which gave quivering animation to her nostrils, which carved two
dimples in her rosy cheeks, and made her quick to forget her troubles;
cheerfulness, the blossom of hope, which gave her strength to look out
without shuddering on the barren path of life.
The girl’s hair was always carefully dressed. After the manner of
Paris needlewomen, her toilet seemed to her quite complete when she had
brushed her hair smooth and tucked up the little short curls that played
on each temple in contrast with the whiteness of her skin. The growth of
it on the back of her neck was so pretty, and the brown line, so clearly
traced, gave such a pleasing idea of her youth and charm, that the
observer, seeing her bent over her work, and unmoved by any sound,
was inclined to think of her as a coquette. Such inviting promise had
excited the interest of more than one young man, who turned round in the
vain hope of seeing that modest countenance.
“Caroline, there is a new face that passes regularly by, and not one of
the old ones to compare with it.”
These words, spoken in a low voice by her mother one August morning
in 1815, had vanquished the young needlewoman’s indifference, and she
looked out on the street; but in vain, the stranger was gone.
“Where has he flown to?” said she.
“He will come back no doubt at four; I shall see him coming, and will
touch your foot with mine. I am sure he will come back; he has been
through the street regularly for the last three days; but his hours
vary. The first day he came by at six o’clock, the day before yesterday
it was four, yesterday as early as three. I remember seeing him
occasionally some time ago. He is some clerk in the Prefet’s office who
has moved to the Marais.--Why!” she exclaimed, after glancing down the
street, “our gentleman of the brown coat has taken to wearing a wig; how
much it alters him!”
The gentleman of the brown coat was, it would seem, the individual
who commonly closed the daily procession, for the old woman put on her
spectacles and took up her work with a sigh, glancing at her daughter
with so strange a look that Lavater himself would have found it
difficult to interpret. Admiration, gratitude, a sort of hope for better
days, were mingled with pride at having such a pretty daughter.
At about four in the afternoon the old lady pushed her foot against
Caroline’s, and the girl looked up quickly enough to see the new actor,
whose regular advent would thenceforth lend variety to the scene. He
was tall and thin, and wore black, a man of about forty, with a certain
solemnity of demeanor; as his piercing hazel eye met the old woman’s
dull gaze, he made her quake, for she felt as though he had the gift of
reading hearts, or much practice in it, and his presence must surely be
as icy as the air of this dank street. Was the dull, sallow complexion
of that ominous face due to excess of work, or the result of delicate
health?
The old woman supplied twenty different answers to this question; but
Caroline, next day, discerned the lines of long mental suffering on
that brow that was so prompt to frown. The rather hollow cheeks of the
Unknown bore the stamp of the seal which sorrow sets on its victims as
if to grant them the consolation of common recognition and brotherly
union for resistance. Though the girl’s expression was at first one of
lively but innocent curiosity, it assumed a look of gentle sympathy
as the stranger receded from view, like a last relation following in a
funeral train.
The heat of the weather was so great, and the gentleman was so
absent-minded, that he had taken off his hat and forgotten to put it on
again as he went down the squalid street. Caroline could see the stern
look given to his countenance by the way the hair was brushed from his
forehead. The strong impression, devoid of charm, made on the girl by
this man’s appearance was totally unlike any sensation produced by the
other passengers who used the street; for the first time in her life
she was moved to pity for some one else than herself and her mother; she
made no reply to the absurd conjectures that supplied material for the
old woman’s provoking volubility, and drew her long needle in silence
through the web of stretched net; she only regretted not having seen
the stranger more closely, and looked forward to the morrow to form a
definite opinion of him.
It was the first time, indeed, that a man passing down the street had
ever given rise to much thought in her mind. She generally had nothing
but a smile in response to her mother’s hypotheses, for the old woman
looked on every passer-by as a possible protector for her daughter. And
if such suggestions, so crudely presented, gave rise to no evil thoughts
in Caroline’s mind, her indifference must be ascribed to the persistent
and unfortunately inevitable toil in which the energies of her sweet
youth were being spent, and which would infallibly mar the clearness
of her eyes or steal from her fresh cheeks the bloom that still colored
them.
For two months or more the “Black Gentleman”--the name they had given
him--was erratic in his movements; he did not always come down the Rue
du Tourniquet; the old woman sometimes saw him in the evening when he
had not passed in the morning, and he did not come by at such regular
hours as the clerks who served Madame Crochard instead of a clock;
moreover, excepting on the first occasion, when his look had given the
old mother a sense of alarm, his eyes had never once dwelt on the
weird picture of these two female gnomes. With the exception of two
carriage-gates and a dark ironmonger’s shop, there were in the Rue du
Tourniquet only barred windows, giving light to the staircases of the
neighboring houses; thus the stranger’s lack of curiosity was not to be
accounted for by the presence of dangerous rivals; and Madame Crochard
was greatly piqued to see her “Black Gentleman” always lost in thought,
his eyes fixed on the ground, or straight before him, as though he hoped
to read the future in the fog of the Rue du Tourniquet. However, one
morning, about the middle of September, Caroline Crochard’s roguish face
stood out so brightly against the dark background of the room, looking
so fresh among the belated flowers and faded leaves that twined round
the window-bars, the daily scene was gay with such contrasts of light
and shade, of pink and white blending with the light material on which
the pretty needlewoman was working, and with the red and brown hues of
the chairs, that the stranger gazed very attentively at the effects of
this living picture. In point of fact, the old woman, provoked by her
“Black Gentleman’s” indifference, had made such a clatter with her
bobbins that the gloomy and pensive passer-by was perhaps prompted to
look up by the unusual noise.
The stranger merely exchanged glances with Caroline, swift indeed, but
enough to effect a certain contact between their souls, and both were
aware that they would think of each other. When the stranger came by
again, at four in the afternoon, Caroline recognized the sound of his
step on the echoing pavement; they looked steadily at each other, and
with evident purpose; his eyes had an expression of kindliness which
made him smile, and Caroline colored; the old mother noted them with
satisfaction. Ever after that memorable afternoon, the Gentleman in
Black went by twice a day, with rare exceptions, which both the women
observed. They concluded from the irregularity of the hours of his
homecoming that he was not released so early, nor so precisely punctual
as a subordinate official.
All through the first three winter months, twice a day, Caroline and the
stranger thus saw each other for so long as it took him to traverse the
piece of road that lay along the length of the door and three windows
of the house. Day after day this brief interview had the hue of friendly
sympathy which at last had acquired a sort of fraternal kindness.
Caroline and the stranger seemed to understand each other from the
first; and then, by dint of scrutinizing each other’s faces, they
learned to know them well. Ere long it came to be, as it were, a visit
that the Unknown owed to Caroline; if by any chance her Gentleman in
Black went by without bestowing on her the half-smile of his expressive
lips, or the cordial glance of his brown eyes, something was missing to
her all day. She felt as an old man does to whom the daily study of a
newspaper is such an indispensable pleasure that on the day after any
great holiday he wanders about quite lost, and seeking, as much out of
vagueness as for want of patience, the sheet by which he cheats an hour
of life.
But these brief meetings had the charm of intimate friendliness, quite
as much for the stranger as for Caroline. The girl could no more hide
a vexation, a grief, or some slight ailment from the keen eye of her
appreciative friend than he could conceal anxiety from hers.
“He must have had some trouble yesterday,” was the thought that
constantly arose in the embroideress’ mind as she saw some change in the
features of the “Black Gentleman.”
“Oh, he has been working too hard!” was a reflection due to another
shade of expression which Caroline could discern.
The stranger, on his part, could guess when the girl had spent Sunday
in finishing a dress, and he felt an interest in the pattern. As
quarter-day came near he could see that her pretty face was clouded by
anxiety, and he could guess when Caroline had sat up late at work; but
above all, he noted how the gloomy thoughts that dimmed the cheerful
and delicate features of her young face gradually vanished by degrees
as their acquaintance ripened. When winter had killed the climbers and
plants of her window garden, and the window was kept closed, it was
not without a smile of gentle amusement that the stranger observed the
concentration of the light within, just at the level of Caroline’s head.
The very small fire and the frosty red of the two women’s faces betrayed
the poverty of their home; but if ever his own countenance expressed
regretful compassion, the girl proudly met it with assumed cheerfulness.
Meanwhile the feelings that had arisen in their hearts remained buried
there, no incident occurring to reveal to either of them how deep and
strong they were in the other; they had never even heard the sound of
each other’s voice. These mute friends were even on their guard against
any nearer acquaintance, as though it meant disaster. Each seemed to
fear lest it should bring on the other some grief more serious than
those they felt tempted to share. Was it shyness or friendship that
checked them? Was it a dread of meeting with selfishness, or the odious
distrust which sunders all the residents within the walls of a populous
city? Did the voice of conscience warn them of approaching danger? It
would be impossible to explain the instinct which made them as much
enemies as friends, at once indifferent and attached, drawn to each
other by impulse, and severed by circumstance. Each perhaps hoped to
preserve a cherished illusion. It might almost have been thought that
the stranger feared lest he should hear some vulgar word from those lips
as fresh and pure as a flower, and that Caroline felt herself unworthy
of the mysterious personage who was evidently possessed of power and
wealth.
As to Madame Crochard, that tender mother, almost angry at her
daughter’s persistent lack of decisiveness, now showed a sulky face to
the “Black Gentleman,” on whom she had hitherto smiled with a sort of
benevolent servility. Never before had she complained so bitterly of
being compelled, at her age, to do the cooking; never had her catarrh
and her rheumatism wrung so many groans from her; finally, she could
not, this winter, promise so many ells of net as Caroline had hitherto
been able to count on.
Under these circumstances, and towards the end of December, at the time
when bread was dearest, and that dearth of corn was beginning to be felt
which made the year 1816 so hard on the poor, the stranger observed
on the features of the girl whose name was still unknown to him, the
painful traces of a secret sorrow which his kindest smiles could not
dispel. Before long he saw in Caroline’s eyes the dimness attributed
to long hours at night. One night, towards the end of the month, the
Gentleman in Black passed down the Rue du Tourniquet at the quite
unwonted hour of one in the morning. The perfect silence allowed of his
hearing before passing the house the lachrymose voice of the old mother,
and Caroline’s even sadder tones, mingling with the swish of a shower
of sleet. He crept along as slowly as he could; and then, at the risk
of being taken up by the police, he stood still below the window to hear
the mother and daughter, while watching them through the largest of the
holes in the yellow muslin curtains, which were eaten away by wear as a
cabbage leaf is riddled by caterpillars. The inquisitive stranger saw a
sheet of paper on the table that stood between the two work-frames, and
on which stood the lamp and the globes filled with water. He at once
identified it as a writ. Madame Crochard was weeping, and Caroline’s
voice was thick, and had lost its sweet, caressing tone.
“Why be so heartbroken, mother? Monsieur Molineux will not sell us up or
turn us out before I have finished this dress; only two nights more and
I shall take it home to Madame Roguin.”
“And supposing she keeps you waiting as usual?--And will the money for
the gown pay the baker too?”
The spectator of this scene had long practice in reading faces; he
fancied he could discern that the mother’s grief was as false as the
daughter’s was genuine; he turned away, and presently came back. When he
next peeped through the hole in the curtain, Madame Crochard was in bed.
The young needlewoman, bending over her frame, was embroidering with
indefatigable diligence; on the table, with the writ lay a triangular
hunch of bread, placed there, no doubt, to sustain her in the night and
to remind her of the reward of her industry. The stranger was tremulous
with pity and sympathy; he threw his purse in through a cracked pane
so that it should fall at the girl’s feet; and then, without waiting to
enjoy her surprise, he escaped, his cheeks tingling.
Next morning the shy and melancholy stranger went past with a look of
deep preoccupation, but he could not escape Caroline’s gratitude;
she had opened her window and affected to be digging in the square
window-box buried in snow, a pretext of which the clumsy ingenuity
plainly told her benefactor that she had been resolved not to see him
only through the pane. Her eyes were full of tears as she bowed her
head, as much as to say to her benefactor, “I can only repay you from my
heart.”
But the Gentleman in Black affected not to understand the meaning of
this sincere gratitude. In the evening, as he came by, Caroline was busy
mending the window with a sheet of paper, and she smiled at him, showing
her row of pearly teeth like a promise. Thenceforth the Stranger went
another way, and was no more seen in the Rue due Tourniquet.
It was one day early in the following May that, as Caroline was giving
the roots of the honeysuckle a glass of water, one Saturday morning, she
caught sight of a narrow strip of cloudless blue between the black lines
of houses, and said to her mother:
“Mamma, we must go to-morrow for a trip to Montmorency!”
She had scarcely uttered the words, in a tone of glee, when the
Gentleman in Black came by, sadder and more dejected than ever.
Caroline’s innocent and ingratiating glance might have been taken for
an invitation. And, in fact, on the following day, when Madame Crochard,
dressed in a pelisse of claret-colored merinos, a silk bonnet, and
striped shawl of an imitation Indian pattern, came out to choose seats
in a chaise at the corner of the Rue du Faubourg Saint-Denis and the Rue
d’Enghien, there she found her Unknown standing like a man waiting for
his wife. A smile of pleasure lighted up the Stranger’s face when
his eye fell on Caroline, her neat feet shod in plum-colored prunella
gaiters, and her white dress tossed by a breeze that would have been
fatal to an ill-made woman, but which displayed her graceful form. Her
face, shaded by a rice-straw bonnet lined with pink silk, seemed to beam
with a reflection from heaven; her broad, plum-colored belt set off a
waist he could have spanned; her hair, parted in two brown bands over a
forehead as white as snow, gave her an expression of innocence which no
other feature contradicted. Enjoyment seemed to have made Caroline as
light as the straw of her hat; but when she saw the Gentleman in Black,
radiant hope suddenly eclipsed her bright dress and her beauty. The
Stranger, who appeared to be in doubt, had not perhaps made up his mind
to be the girl’s escort for the day till this revelation of the delight
she felt on seeing him. He at once hired a vehicle with a fairly good
horse, to drive to Saint-Leu-Taverny, and he offered Madame Crochard
and her daughter seats by his side. The mother accepted without ado; but
presently, when they were already on the way to Saint-Denis, she was by
way of having scruples, and made a few civil speeches as to the possible
inconvenience two women might cause their companion.
“Perhaps, monsieur, you wished to drive alone to Saint-Leu-Taverny,”
said she, with affected simplicity.
Before long she complained of the heat, and especially of her cough,
which, she said, had hindered her from closing her eyes all night; and
by the time the carriage had reached Saint-Denis, Madame Crochard seemed
to be fast asleep. Her snores, indeed, seemed, to the Gentleman in
Black, rather doubtfully genuine, and he frowned as he looked at the old
woman with a very suspicious eye.
“Oh, she is fast asleep,” said Caroline quilelessly; “she never ceased
coughing all night. She must be very tired.”
Her companion made no reply, but he looked at the girl with a smile that
seemed to say:
“Poor child, you little know your mother!”
However, in spite of his distrust, as the chaise made its way down the
long avenue of poplars leading to Eaubonne, the Stranger thought that
Madame Crochard was really asleep; perhaps he did not care to inquire
how far her slumbers were genuine or feigned. Whether it were that the
brilliant sky, the pure country air, and the heady fragrance of the
first green shoots of the poplars, the catkins of willow, and the
flowers of the blackthorn had inclined his heart to open like all the
nature around him; or that any long restraint was too oppressive while
Caroline’s sparkling eyes responded to his own, the Gentleman in Black
entered on a conversation with his young companion, as aimless as the
swaying of the branches in the wind, as devious as the flitting of the
butterflies in the azure air, as illogical as the melodious murmur of
the fields, and, like it, full of mysterious love. At that season is not
the rural country as tremulous as a bride that has donned her marriage
robe; does it not invite the coldest soul to be happy? What heart could
remain unthawed, and what lips could keep its secret, on leaving the
gloomy streets of the Marais for the first time since the previous
autumn, and entering the smiling and picturesque valley of Montmorency;
on seeing it in the morning light, its endless horizons receding from
view; and then lifting a charmed gaze to eyes which expressed no less
infinitude mingled with love?
The Stranger discovered that Caroline was sprightly rather than witty,
affectionate, but ill educated; but while her laugh was giddy, her words
promised genuine feeling. When, in response to her companion’s shrewd
questioning, the girl spoke with the heartfelt effusiveness of which the
lower classes are lavish, not guarding it with reticence like people of
the world, the Black Gentleman’s face brightened, and seemed to renew
its youth. His countenance by degrees lost the sadness that lent
sternness to his features, and little by little they gained a look of
handsome youthfulness which made Caroline proud and happy. The pretty
needlewoman guessed that her new friend had been long weaned from
tenderness and love, and no longer believed in the devotion of woman.
Finally, some unexpected sally in Caroline’s light prattle lifted the
last veil that concealed the real youth and genuine character of the
Stranger’s physiognomy; he seemed to bid farewell to the ideas that
haunted him, and showed the natural liveliness that lay beneath the
solemnity of his expression.
Their conversation had insensibly become so intimate, that by the time
when the carriage stopped at the first houses of the straggling village
of Saint-Leu, Caroline was calling the gentleman Monsieur Roger. Then
for the first time the old mother awoke.
“Caroline, she has heard everything!” said Roger suspiciously in the
girl’s ear.
Caroline’s reply was an exquisite smile of disbelief, which dissipated
the dark cloud that his fear of some plot on the old woman’s part had
brought to this suspicious mortal’s brow. Madame Crochard was amazed
at nothing, approved of everything, followed her daughter and Monsieur
Roger into the park, where the two young people had agreed to wander
through the smiling meadows and fragrant copses made famous by the taste
of Queen Hortense.
“Good heavens! how lovely!” exclaimed Caroline when standing on the
green ridge where the forest of Montmorency begins, she saw lying at her
feet the wide valley with its combes sheltering scattered villages, its
horizon of blue hills, its church towers, its meadows and fields, whence
a murmur came up, to die on her ear like the swell of the ocean. The
three wanderers made their way by the bank of an artificial stream and
came to the Swiss valley, where stands a chalet that had more than once
given shelter to Hortense and Napoleon. When Caroline had seated
herself with pious reverence on the mossy wooden bench where kings and
princesses and the Emperor had rested, Madame Crochard expressed a wish
to have a nearer view of a bridge that hung across between two rocks at
some little distance, and bent her steps towards that rural curiosity,
leaving her daughter in Monsieur Roger’s care, though telling them that
she would not go out of sight.
“What, poor child!” cried Roger, “have you never longed for wealth and
the pleasures of luxury? Have you never wished that you might wear the
beautiful dresses you embroider?”
“It would not be the truth, Monsieur Roger, if I were to tell you that
I never think how happy people must be who are rich. Oh yes! I often
fancy, especially when I am going to sleep, how glad I should be to see
my poor mother no longer compelled to go out, whatever the weather,
to buy our little provisions, at her age. I should like her to have a
servant who, every morning before she was up, would bring her up her
coffee, nicely sweetened with white sugar. And she loves reading novels,
poor dear soul! Well, and I would rather see her wearing out her eyes
over her favorite books than over twisting her bobbins from morning
till night. And again, she ought to have a little good wine. In short, I
should like to see her comfortable--she is so good.”
“Then she has shown you great kindness?”
“Oh yes,” said the girl, in a tone of conviction. Then, after a short
pause, during which the two young people stood watching Madame Crochard,
who had got to the middle of the rustic bridge, and was shaking her
finger at them, Caroline went on:
“Oh yes, she has been so good to me. What care she took of me when I was
little! She sold her last silver forks to apprentice me to the old maid
who taught me to embroider.--And my poor father! What did she not go
through to make him end his days in happiness!” The girl shivered at the
remembrance, and hid her face in her hands.--“Well! come! let us forget
past sorrows!” she added, trying to rally her high spirits. She blushed
as she saw that Roger too was moved, but she dared not look at him.
“What was your father?” he asked.
“He was an opera-dancer before the Revolution,” said she, with an air
of perfect simplicity, “and my mother sang in the chorus. My father, who
was leader of the figures on the stage, happened to be present at the
siege of the Bastille. He was recognized by some of the assailants, who
asked him whether he could not lead a real attack, since he was used to
leading such enterprises on the boards. My father was brave; he accepted
the post, led the insurgents, and was rewarded by the nomination to the
rank of captain in the army of Sambre-et-Meuse, where he distinguished
himself so far as to rise rapidly to be a colonel. But at Lutzen he was
so badly wounded that, after a year’s sufferings, he died in Paris.--The
Bourbons returned; my mother could obtain no pension, and we fell into
such abject misery that we were compelled to work for our living. For
some time past she has been ailing, poor dear, and I have never known
her so little resigned; she complains a good deal, and, indeed, I cannot
wonder, for she has known the pleasures of an easy life. For my part,
I cannot pine for delights I have never known, I have but one thing to
wish for.”
“And that is?” said Roger eagerly, as if roused from a dream.
“That women may continue to wear embroidered net dresses, so that I may
never lack work.”
The frankness of this confession interested the young man, who looked
with less hostile eyes on Madame Crochard as she slowly made her way
back to them.
“Well, children, have you had a long talk?” said she, with a
half-laughing, half-indulgent air. “When I think, Monsieur Roger, that
the ‘little Corporal’ has sat where you are sitting,” she went on after
a pause. “Poor man! how my husband worshiped him! Ah! Crochard did well
to die, for he could not have borne to think of him where _they_ have
sent him!”
Roger put his finger to his lips, and the good woman went on very
gravely, with a shake of her head:
“All right, mouth shut and tongue still! But,” added she, unhooking a
bit of her bodice, and showing a ribbon and cross tied round her neck by
a piece of black ribbon, “they shall never hinder me from wearing what
_he_ gave to my poor Crochard, and I will have it buried with me.”
On hearing this speech, which at that time was regarded as seditious,
Roger interrupted the old lady by rising suddenly, and they returned to
the village through the park walks. The young man left them for a
few minutes while he went to order a meal at the best eating-house
in Taverny; then, returning to fetch them, he led the way through the
alleys cut in the forest.
The dinner was cheerful. Roger was no longer the melancholy shade that
was wont to pass along the Rue du Tourniquet; he was not the “Black
Gentleman,” but rather a confiding young man ready to take life as it
came, like the two hard-working women who, on the morrow, might lack
bread; he seemed alive to all the joys of youth, his smile was quite
affectionate and childlike.
When, at five o’clock, this happy meal was ended with a few glasses
of champagne, Roger was the first to propose that they should join the
village ball under the chestnuts, where he and Caroline danced together.
Their hands met with sympathetic pressure, their hearts beat with the
same hopes; and under the blue sky and the slanting, rosy beams of
sunset, their eyes sparkled with fires which, to them, made the glory of
the heavens pale. How strange is the power of an idea, of a desire!
To these two nothing seemed impossible. In such magic moments, when
enjoyment sheds its reflections on the future, the soul foresees nothing
but happiness. This sweet day had created memories for these two to
which nothing could be compared in all their past existence. Would
the source prove to be more beautiful than the river, the desire more
enchanting than its gratification, the thing hoped for more delightful
than the thing possessed?
“So the day is already at an end!” On hearing this exclamation from
her unknown friend when the dance was over, Caroline looked at him
compassionately, as his face assumed once more a faint shade of sadness.
“Why should you not be as happy in Paris as you are here?” she asked.
“Is happiness to be found only at Saint-Leu? It seems to me that I can
henceforth never be unhappy anywhere.”
Roger was struck by these words, spoken with the glad unrestraint that
always carries a woman further than she intended, just as prudery often
lends her greater cruelty than she feels. For the first time since that
glance, which had, in a way, been the beginning of their friendship,
Caroline and Roger had the same idea; though they did not express it,
they felt it at the same instant, as a result of a common impression
like that of a comforting fire cheering both under the frost of winter;
then, as if frightened by each other’s silence, they made their way to
the spot where the carriage was waiting. But before getting into it,
they playfully took hands and ran together down the dark avenue in front
of Madame Crochard. When they could no longer see the white net
cap, which showed as a speck through the leaves where the old woman
was--“Caroline!” said Roger in a tremulous voice, and with a beating
heart.
The girl was startled, and drew back a few steps, understanding the
invitation this question conveyed; however, she held out her hand, which
was passionately kissed, but which she hastily withdrew, for by standing
on tiptoe she could see her mother.
Madame Crochard affected blindness, as if, with a reminiscence of her
old parts, she was only required to figure as a supernumerary.
The adventures of these two young people were not continued in the Rue
du Tourniquet. To see Roger and Caroline once more, we must leap into
the heart of modern Paris, where, in some of the newly-built houses,
there are apartments that seem made on purpose for newly-married couples
to spend their honeymoon in. There the paper and paint are as fresh as
the bride and bridegroom, and the decorations are in blossom like their
love; everything is in harmony with youthful notions and ardent wishes.
Half-way down the Rue Taitbout, in a house whose stone walls were
still white, where the columns of the hall and the doorway were as yet
spotless, and the inner walls shone with the neat painting which our
recent intimacy with English ways had brought into fashion, there was,
on the second floor, a small set of rooms fitted by the architect as
though he had known what their use would be. A simple airy ante-room,
with a stucco dado, formed an entrance into a drawing-room and
dining-room. Out of the drawing-room opened a pretty bedroom, with a
bathroom beyond. Every chimney-shelf had over it a fine mirror elegantly
framed. The doors were crowded with arabesques in good taste, and the
cornices were in the best style. Any amateur would have discerned there
the sense of distinction and decorative fitness which mark the work of
modern French architects.
For above a month Caroline had been at home in this apartment, furnished
by an upholsterer who submitted to an artist’s guidance. A short
description of the principal room will suffice to give us an idea of the
wonders it offered to Caroline’s delighted eyes when Roger installed her
there. Hangings of gray stuff trimmed with green silk adorned the walls
of her bedroom; the seats, covered with light-colored woolen sateen,
were of easy and comfortable shapes, and in the latest fashion; a chest
of drawers of some simple wood, inlaid with lines of a darker hue,
contained the treasures of the toilet; a writing-table to match served
for inditing love-letters on scented paper; the bed, with antique
draperies, could not fail to suggest thoughts of love by its soft
hangings of elegant muslin; the window-curtains, of drab silk with
green fringe, were always half drawn to subdue the light; a bronze clock
represented Love crowning Psyche; and a carpet of Gothic design on a red
ground set off the other accessories of this delightful retreat. There
was a small dressing-table in front of a long glass, and here the
needlewoman sat, out of patience with Plaisir, the famous hairdresser.
“Do you think you will have done to-day?” said she.
“Your hair is so long and so thick, madame,” replied Plaisir.
Caroline could not help smiling. The man’s flattery had no doubt revived
in her mind the memory of the passionate praises lavished by her lover
on the beauty of her hair, which he delighted in.
The hairdresser having done, a waiting-maid came and held counsel with
her as to the dress in which Roger would like best to see her. It was
the beginning of September 1816, and the weather was cold; she chose a
green _grenadine_ trimmed with chinchilla. As soon as she was dressed,
Caroline flew into the drawing-room and opened a window, out of which
she stepped on to the elegant balcony, that adorned the front of the
house; there she stood, with her arms crossed, in a charming attitude,
not to show herself to the admiration of the passers-by and see them
turn to gaze at her, but to be able to look out on the Boulevard at the
bottom of the Rue Taitbout. This side view, really very comparable to
the peephole made by actors in the drop-scene of a theatre, enabled
her to catch a glimpse of numbers of elegant carriages, and a crowd of
persons, swept past with the rapidity of _Ombres Chinoises_. Not knowing
whether Roger would arrive in a carriage or on foot, the needlewoman
from the Rue du Tourniquet looked by turns at the foot-passengers, and
at the tilburies--light cabs introduced into Paris by the English.
Expressions of refractoriness and of love passed by turns over her
youthful face when, after waiting for a quarter of an hour, neither her
keen eye nor her heart had announced the arrival of him whom she knew
to be due. What disdain, what indifference were shown in her beautiful
features for all the other creatures who were bustling like ants below
her feet. Her gray eyes, sparkling with fun, now positively flamed.
Given over to her passion, she avoided admiration with as much care
as the proudest devote to encouraging it when they drive about Paris,
certainly feeling no care as to whether her fair countenance leaning
over the balcony, or her little foot between the bars, and the picture
of her bright eyes and delicious turned-up nose would be effaced or no
from the minds of the passers-by who admired them; she saw but one
face, and had but one idea. When the spotted head of a certain bay
horse happened to cross the narrow strip between the two rows of houses,
Caroline gave a little shiver and stood on tiptoe in hope of recognizing
the white traces and the color of the tilbury. It was he!
Roger turned the corner of the street, saw the balcony, whipped the
horse, which came up at a gallop, and stopped at the bronze-green door
that he knew as well as his master did. The door of the apartment was
opened at once by the maid, who had heard her mistress’ exclamation of
delight. Roger rushed up to the drawing-room, clasped Caroline in his
arms, and embraced her with the effusive feeling natural when two beings
who love each other rarely meet. He led her, or rather they went by a
common impulse, their arms about each other, into the quiet and fragrant
bedroom; a settee stood ready for them to sit by the fire, and for a
moment they looked at each other in silence, expressing their happiness
only by their clasped hands, and communicating their thoughts in a fond
gaze.
“Yes, it is he!” she said at last. “Yes, it is you. Do you know, I have
not seen you for three long days, an age!--But what is the matter? You
are unhappy.”
“My poor Caroline--”
“There, you see! ‘poor Caroline’--”
“No, no, do not laugh, my darling; we cannot go to the Feydeau Theatre
together this evening.”
Caroline put on a little pout, but it vanished immediately.
“How absurd I am! How can I think of going to the play when I see you?
Is not the sight of you the only spectacle I care for?” she cried,
pushing her fingers through Roger’s hair.
“I am obliged to go to the Attorney-General’s. We have a knotty case in
hand. He met me in the great hall at the Palais; and as I am to plead,
he asked me to dine with him. But, my dearest, you can go to the theatre
with your mother, and I will join you if the meeting breaks up early.”
“To the theatre without you!” cried she in a tone of amazement; “enjoy
any pleasure you do not share! O my Roger! you do not deserve a
kiss,” she added, throwing her arms round his neck with an artless and
impassioned impulse.
“Caroline, I must go home and dress. The Marais is some way off, and I
still have some business to finish.”
“Take care what you are saying, monsieur,” said she, interrupting him.
“My mother says that when a man begins to talk about his business, he is
ceasing to love.”
“Caroline! Am I not here? Have I not stolen this hour from my
pitiless--”
“Hush!” said she, laying a finger on his mouth. “Don’t you see that I am
in jest.”
They had now come back to the drawing-room, and Roger’s eye fell on an
object brought home that morning by the cabinetmaker. Caroline’s old
rosewood embroidery-frame, by which she and her mother had earned their
bread when they lived in the Rue du Tourniquet-Saint-Jean, had been
refitted and polished, and a net dress, of elaborate design, was already
stretched upon it.
“Well, then, my dear, I shall do some work this evening. As I stitch, I
shall fancy myself gone back to those early days when you used to
pass by me without a word, but not without a glance; the days when
the remembrance of your look kept me awake all night. Oh my dear old
frame--the best piece of furniture in my room, though you did not give
it me!--You cannot think,” said she, seating herself on Roger’s knees;
for he, overcome by irresistible feelings, had dropped into a chair.
“Listen.--All I can earn by my work I mean to give to the poor. You have
made me rich. How I love that pretty home at Bellefeuille, less because
of what it is than because you gave it me! But tell me, Roger, I should
like to call myself Caroline de Bellefeuille--can I? You must know: is
it legal or permissible?”
As she saw a little affirmative grimace--for Roger hated the name of
Crochard--Caroline jumped for glee, and clapped her hands.
“I feel,” said she, “as if I should more especially belong to you.
Usually a woman gives up her own name and takes her husband’s--” An idea
forced itself upon her and made her blush. She took Roger’s hand and led
him to the open piano.--“Listen,” said she, “I can play my sonata now
like an angel!” and her fingers were already running over the ivory
keys, when she felt herself seized round the waist.
“Caroline, I ought to be far from hence!”
“You insist on going? Well, go,” said she, with a pretty pout, but she
smiled as she looked at the clock and exclaimed joyfully, “At any rate,
I have detained you a quarter of an hour!”
“Good-bye, Mademoiselle de Bellefeuille,” said he, with the gentle irony
of love.