"No, signor. A slight apoplexy."
She spoke without any intermission of the cares she was giving the
infant.
"Julia, give me the linen."
And, while swathing the infant, she added:
"There is nothing to fear on his account. God bless him!"
Her expert hands took hold of the little soft head as if to mould it.
The infant's wails increased in strength. He cried louder and louder, as
if to prove that he was really alive, as if to provoke me and exasperate
me.
"He is living, he is living. But the mother?"
Abruptly I re-entered the other room, beside myself.
"Tullio!"
It was Juliana's voice, as feeble as that of a dying woman.
*XXXII.*
The patient was now lying on her bed in the alcove. It was broad
daylight.
I was seated at her bedside. I looked at her silently, sorrowfully.
She was not asleep, but extreme weakness prevented all movement, removed
all expression of life, made her seem inanimate. I made an instinctive
movement to touch her, because I thought she had become cold as ice.
But I was restrained by the fear of disturbing her. More than once
during my continuous contemplation, beneath the shock of some sudden
fear, I made a movement to rise and fetch the doctor. As I meditated I
rolled between my fingers a little tuft of cotton which I carefully
picked apart, and, from time to time, impelled by an invincible
restlessness, I placed it with infinite precautions near Juliana's lips.
The waving of the threads showed me the strength of her respiration.
She was stretched on her back, and a low pillow supported her head. In
the frame formed by her chestnut hair, which was loosely caught up, the
lines of her face seemed more refined than usual; showed more perfectly
the waxy tones. Her night-dress was fastened at the neck and tight at
her wrists, and her hands lay flat on the cover, so white that they were
only distinguished from the linen by the azure of their veins. A
supernatural goodness emanated from this poor creature, so pallid and
motionless--a goodness that penetrated all my being, that filled my
heart. And one would have thought that she was still repeating: "What
have you done to me?" Her colorless mouth, with its depressed angles,
revealing a mortal lassitude; that arid mouth, twisted by so many
convulsions, martyrized by so many cries, seemed constantly repeating:
"What have you done to me?"
I examined the emaciation of her body, that scarcely formed a relief on
the surface of the bed. Since the event had taken place, since finally
the _other life_ had been separated from her life forever, I no longer
felt rise in me the least instinctive movement of repulsion, not the
least sudden shade of anger, nothing that could affect my tenderness and
pity. I no longer felt, on seeing her, anything but an effusion of
immense tenderness and pity for the best and most unfortunate of human
creatures. All my soul now hung on those poor lips which, from one
moment to another, might render up their last sigh. As I looked at her
pale face I thought with profound sincerity: "How happy I should be
could I transfuse half of my own blood into her veins!"
I heard the light ticking of a clock placed on the night-table; I felt
that fugitive time was slipping by, and I thought: "He is alive!" The
flight of time caused me singular anxiety, very different from that
which I had felt on other occasions--indefinable.
I thought: "He lives, and has a tenacious hold on life. At the time of
his birth he was not breathing. When I saw him he still had the signs
of asphyxia all over his body. If the care of the midwife had not saved
him he would be now nothing but a little, livid cadaver, a harmless,
negligible, and perhaps forgettable thing. I should only have Juliana's
cure to think of, and I would not leave this room again. I would be the
most assiduous and most gentle of nurses. I would succeed in realizing
the transfusion of life, in accomplishing the miracle by the power of
love. It would be impossible for her not to get well. She would
resuscitate gradually, be regenerated with new blood. She would appear
a new creature, freed from all impurity. We would both feel purified,
worthy of each other, after so long and so painful an expiation. The
illness, the convalescence would relegate the sad memories to an
indefinite distance. And I would try to efface from her soul even the
shadow of remembrance; I would try to procure for her perfect oblivion
in love. After this great trial, every other human love would seem
frivolous by comparison with ours." I exalted myself in the almost
mystic splendor of this dream of the future, whilst, beneath my fixed
gaze, Juliana's visage took on a sort of immateriality, an expression of
supernatural goodness; as if she were already removed from the world; as
if the presence of death had left behind in her being only a pure,
spiritual essence. The mute question no longer struck me like a wound,
no longer seemed terrifying to me: "What have you done to me?" I
replied: "Have you not become, through my instrumentality, _the sister
of Pain_? Has not suffering elevated your soul to a vertiginous height,
from which it has been given you to see the world in an extraordinary
light? Do you not owe to me the revelation of the supreme truth? What
matters our errors, our falls, our sins, if we have succeeded in tearing
the veil from our eyes, if we have succeeded in setting at liberty what
there is lowest in our miserable substance? We will obtain the highest
joy to which the elect of earth can aspire--the consciousness of a
re-birth."
I became exalted. The alcove was silent, the darkness full of mystery.
Juliana's face acquired for me a superhuman aspect, and there was a
solemnity in my contemplation, for I felt in the air the presence of
invisible death. All my soul was suspended on those pallid lips, which,
from one moment to another, might render their last breath. And those
lips were contracted, emitted a groan. The painful contraction changed
the lines of the face, persisted for several moments. The wrinkles in
the forehead deepened, the skin of the eyelids trembled lightly, a white
line appeared between the lashes.
I bent over the invalid. She opened her eyes, and immediately closed
them. She did not appear to see me; her eyes showed no sign of
recognition. One would have thought she was blind. Had an anemic
amaurosis supervened? Had she been suddenly struck by blindness?
I heard some one enter the room. God grant it is the doctor. I left
the alcove, and saw the doctor, my mother, and the midwife, who had
entered quietly. Cristina followed them.
"Is she quiet?" inquired the doctor in a low voice.
"She's moaning. Who knows what she is still suffering?"
"Has she spoken?"
"No."
"She must not be disturbed in the least; remember that."
"Just now she opened her eyes for a moment. She did not seem to see
anything."
The doctor entered the alcove, after having made a sign for us to remain
where we were. My mother said to me:
"Come. It is time to renew the compresses. Come quickly. Let us go
and see little Raymond. Federico is downstairs."
She took my hand. I let myself be led.
"He has fallen asleep," she continued. "He sleeps quietly. The
wet-nurse will arrive this evening."
However sad and anxious she was when speaking of Juliana, she had a
smile in her eyes when speaking of the infant. Her entire face was lit
up by tenderness.
By the doctor's orders, a room distant from that occupied by the invalid
had been selected for Raymond--a large, airy room, containing a thousand
souvenirs of our childhood. Directly I entered I saw Federico, Maria,
and Natalia grouped around the cradle and attentively contemplating the
little sleeper. Federico turned and asked:
"How is Juliana?"
"Bad."
"Isn't she resting?"
"She is suffering."
In spite of myself, I answered almost harshly. A sort of aridity had
suddenly invaded my soul. My only sensation was an indomitable aversion
against the intruder, an impatience of the torture which people
inflicted on me without knowing it. In spite of my efforts, I could not
feint. Thus, we were all around the cradle--I, my mother, Federico,
Maria, and Natalia--contemplating Raymond's slumber.
He was bound in the swaddling-clothes, and his head was covered with a
cap trimmed with laces and ribbons. His face appeared less swollen, but
still red, and the cheeks shone like the skin of a wound recently
healed. A little saliva rolled from the corners of the closed mouth;
the eyelids, without lashes, puffed up at the edges, covered the
projecting eyeballs; the root of the nose, yet formless, was marked by a
bruise.
"Whom does he resemble?" said my mother. "I cannot find any
resemblance."
"He is too young," said Federico. "We must wait a few days."
Two or three times my mother looked at me and then looked at the infant,
as if to compare the faces.
"No," she said. "I think he resembles Juliana most."
"At present," I interrupted, "he resembles no one. He is horrible."
"Horrible? How can you say so? He is perfectly beautiful. Look at
that mass of hair."
With her fingers she gently raised the cap, disclosing the still soft
skull, on which were seen several brown hairs.
"Let me touch them, grandmamma," begged Maria, stretching out her hand
toward her brother's head.
"No, no. Do you wish to wake him?"
The skull had the appearance of wax somewhat softened by heat, and it
seemed as if the slightest touch would leave a mark on it. My mother
covered it again, and then bent over to kiss the forehead with infinite
gentleness.
"Me, too, grandmother!" begged Maria.
"Yes, but gently."
The cradle was too high.
"Lift me," said Maria to Federico.
Federico raised her up in his arms, and I saw the beautiful rosy mouth
of my daughter get ready to kiss before she succeeded in touching the
forehead. I saw her long locks play on the whiteness of the clothes.
Federico looked at me. But I did not smile.
"Me, too! Me, too!"
Natalia now clung to the edge of the cradle.
"Gently!"
Federico raised her too. And again I saw the long locks play on the
whiteness of the bed linen, in the movement she made in bending over.
This spectacle had petrified me, and my look certainly expressed my
emotion. These kisses from lips so dear to me had not removed from the
intruder his repugnant aspect; they had, on the contrary, rendered him
more odious to me. I felt it would be impossible for me to touch that
strange flesh, to make any gesture resembling paternal love. My mother
observed me with uneasiness.
"You do not kiss him?" she asked.
"No, mother, no. He has done too much harm to Juliana. I cannot forgive
him...."
I recoiled with an instinctive movement, a movement of manifest disgust.
My mother remained for a moment stupefied, speechless.
"What are you saying, Tullio? Is it this poor baby's fault? Be just!"
Assuredly my mother had remarked the sincerity of my aversion. I could
not succeed in restraining myself. All my nerves rebelled.
"Impossible now! Impossible! Let me be, mother. It will pass."
My tone was resolute. I trembled all over. There was a lump in my
throat; the muscles of my face contracted. After so many hours of
violent tension my entire being required relaxation. I believe that a
great burst of sobs would have done me good, but the lump in my throat
was too firm.
"You grieve me greatly, Tullio," said my mother.
"So you exact that I kiss him?" I burst out, beside myself.
And I approached the cradle, bent over the infant and kissed him.
The child awoke. He began to wail, feebly at first, then with
increasing fury. I observed that the skin of his face took on a more
reddish tint and wrinkled beneath the effort, while his whitish tongue
trembled in his wide-open mouth. Although I was at the height of
exasperation, I recognized the error committed. I felt the gaze of
Federico, Maria, and Natalia fixed upon me.
"Forgive me, mother," I stammered. "I no longer know what I am doing; I
am not in my right senses. Forgive me."
She had taken the infant from the cradle, and held it in her arms,
without succeeding in quieting it. The wails went through me,
overwhelmed me.
"Let us go out, Federico."