at the close of day, she could no longer go to the ruined summer-house
without a certain sense of discomfort. Her unknown friend was faithful
to the daily tryst which they had made with their dreams; and, though
Gilberte herself never failed to keep it, she felt as though she had
done him some wrong. With her eyes fixed on the distant mountains
melting into the deep blue of the heavens, she let herself drift into
vague reveries, far, very far away from the homely valley where her
first friend patiently waited for her thoughts to return to him. It was
at such times, when the darkness overtook her amidst this delightful
torpor, that she seemed to be coming back from a long journey. She was
almost angry with herself. But why? She could not have said.
One day, at five o’clock, as she was going down to her garden, she
received a note from Mme. de la Vaudraye.
“MY DEAR GILBERTE,
“Guillaume and I are going for a stroll in the Forest of Andaine.
It is such a fine evening: do come with us.”
Should she go? To do so meant a break in sweet custom that had lent such
charm to the most oppressive hours of her life, meant throwing over the
constant friendship of the bad days.
She wavered and, wavering, went up to her room, put on her things, went
out and knocked at the La Vaudrayes’ door.
Whatever regrets may have lingered in her conscientious mind were very
soon dispelled by the pleasure which the walk gave her from the start.
Spring was trying her hand, at the tips of the branches, with tiny
pale-green leaves and, along the roadsides and ditches, with those
charming early flowers which are so dear to us: anemones, periwinkles,
primroses, wild hyacinths, lilies of the valley.... Arched lanes sped
into the depths of the woods. Sweet scents, songs and colours played and
mingled in all the gladness of new-born nature.
They walked without speaking. Sometimes, Guillaume and Gilberte would
point out to each other, with a glance, a corner of the landscape, or
the outline of a tree, or the glint of a ray of sunshine, both wishing
the other to share their delight and admiration.
They sat down on the edge of a pool whose waters slumbered amidst a
circle of old pines that joined their arms around them as though to
dance a moveless measure. It was one of those abodes of silence that
open only in the hearts of old forests. Those who are brought there by
chance and who grasp the fitness of things are themselves silent.
Mme. de la Vaudraye exclaimed:
“On the first fine Sunday, we must make up a party and come here. It is
a lovely spot for a picnic. What do you say?”
They did not reply. She continued:
“Every one will bring his own provisions. Of course, Mme. Charmeron will
make her famous spiced beef and Mlle. du Bocage her prune-tart. And, at
dessert, everybody must come out with a set of verses!”
Guillaume hurled a pebble violently into the mirror of the water.
“What’s the matter with you?” asked Mme. de la Vaudraye.
He sprang up and confronted her, angrily, impatiently, with tense
wrists. But, as he was about to speak, he met Gilberte’s eyes, sad and
full of entreaty. He seemed quite dazed, his lips trembled and suddenly
he took Mme. de la Vaudraye in his arms and began to kiss her with all
his might, with all his fervent soul. And he blurted out:
“It’s quite right ... you’re my mother ... you’re my mother ... you’re
entitled to say what you please.... What you say is right.... It’s my
business to understand.... Oh, mother, if you only knew ...!”
VII
GILBERTE’S TWO FRIENDS
Gilberte did not go to the summer-house again. A feeling of delicacy
kept her away. Nevertheless, each day, at the accustomed hour, something
like a light cloud passed over her mind; and she was not far from
accusing herself of ingratitude.
What was but a vague remorse towards a friend whom she had never known
took a more definite shape, in another sense, with regard to him whom
she now saw almost daily. She would so much have liked to offer him a
brand-new friendship and to feel the excitement of it for the first
time! True, there was no struggle between two sentiments, since one was
so far-off and vague, the other so vivid and distinct. And yet....
There are childish conflicts which would not even ripple the most
scrupulous soul, but which form the mighty storms of peaceful and
innocent consciences such as Gilberte’s.
But all this took place deep down within herself, unconsciously, so to
speak, and could not diminish her magical delight in living. For magic
it was, something that approached a miracle, when she compared the gloom
of the past with the dazzling life of the present. Whence did she derive
the joy with which she thrilled at her awakening; the enthusiasm that
swept her at the sight of a flower, of a landscape, of any spectacle a
hundred times witnessed and never fully seen; that exaltation of
thought, those sudden blushes, that inexplicable torpor of her whole
being and, at the same time, that unchangeable serenity which doubled
the uncertainty of her life with strength, faith, patience and
certainty?
There was no allusion to the incident in the Forest of Andaine. But,
from that time onward, Mme. de la Vaudraye looked upon her son in a
different fashion; and, in the same way, in her conduct towards
Gilberte, there was something that had hitherto been lacking: a touch of
respect.
Guillaume said to Gilberte:
“You are a regular fairy, no, more than a fairy, for you exercise your
power without knowing or trying. To do good, to disarm hatred, to heal
wounds, to make others want to be indulgent and kind, you have no need
even to wish. You have only to be as you are; and everything around you
grows nobler and better.”
She listened and smiled. From him she accepted praise without blushing.
He could have praised her beauty and enumerated all her charms without
causing her to lower her eyes. He could not wound her maidenly modesty.
One morning, following upon a day when Gilberte had not been to Mme. de
la Vaudraye’s, Adèle came back from the town all out of breath:
“Oh, ma’am, here’s a nice to do! Yesterday, at Mme. de la Vaudraye’s
evening, young M. Simare....”
“I thought he was away,” said Gilberte, interrupting her.
“He is back; and, last evening, he and M. Guillaume, during the duet
from _Mireille_, had some words in a corner ... they were heard
quarrelling.... It seems that the elder M. Simare told a story that
wasn’t quite proper and M. Guillaume went for the son about it.”
“Oh, it’s all my fault!” said Gilberte to herself, feeling certain that
Guillaume had taken the first opportunity to bring about a rupture.
And she asked:
“Is that all?”
“Yes. Mme. Duval saw two officers ringing at the Simares’ house just now
and she says that M. Guillaume has ordered the landau from the hotel
for presently ... but that has nothing to do with it.”
Though she did not foresee the possible consequences of an altercation
between the two young men, Gilberte was convinced that no interference
on her part would settle things, as it had done with M. le Hourteulx and
M. Beaufrelant. Guillaume would not consent to have M. Simare admitted
to the house again. The father would side with his son. Mme. de la
Vaudraye would be furious at losing two of her regular visitors. In
short, it meant a whole series of bothers and quarrels, of which
Gilberte would have been the real cause.
She was very low-spirited at lunch. A presentiment of danger depressed
her, but she could not have said of what sort it was nor whom it
threatened.
Her suffering must have been genuine to induce her to rise suddenly, go
out and turn her steps towards the La Vaudrayes’ house. But what she
was doing must also have seemed to her very useless and very serious to
make her stop suddenly, with frightened hesitation. How was she to act?
Whom was she to influence? What events was she to avert?
The church was near and she went in. But she was unable to pray; and her
anxiety became all the more painful inasmuch as she did not know its
reason. Then, rather than return to the Logis, where inactivity would
have been intolerable, she went along the high-road to the bottom of the
valley, followed the Varenne for a short distance and then climbed up
towards the Haute-Chapelle.
At three o’clock, feeling a little tired, she made for the shade on the
skirt of a little wood and sat down. She had hardly left the road when
the hotel landau passed and turned down the forest-lane. Was Guillaume
in it?
A sound of harness-bells, the crack of a whip told her that another
carriage was on its way. A break came dashing along, carrying Simare and
a couple of officers, and disappeared down the same lane.
For a second, Gilberte stood breathless at a horrible thought. She would
not, no, she would not have it! Then, suddenly, she began to run at full
speed. A cross-roads brought her to a stop forthwith. Which of the three
roads should she take?
She chose the one on the right, but, after running fifty yards, went
back to the middle one and then to the one on the left. After that, she
roamed at random, beating the copses, hunting on the grass for the marks
of carriage-wheels, flinging herself among the ferns, listening and
looking with all her nerves on edge....
A shot ... and a second, at almost the same moment ... close by....
She gave a scream and fell to the ground.
A few minutes passed. As though in a dream, she saw, through the
branches, the two carriages driving by. Then voices sounded:
“I assure you, doctor, I am not mistaken. It was a woman screaming.”
She had not the strength to raise her eyelids or speak; but she felt
that two men were coming towards her. One of them bent over her and took
her hand:
“It’s nothing. She has only fainted.”
“In that case, doctor, don’t wait,” said the other voice. “I will see
her home.”
The mist in which she was struggling lifted slowly. She perceived the
smell of the earth on which she lay. She made an effort to throw off the
feeling of sleep that numbed her and she opened her eyes. Guillaume was
standing before her.
“You, you?” she whispered. “Oh, how glad I am! And M. Simare?”
“He’s not hurt either.”
“That’s a good thing.”
There was a pause; and then she asked:
“Why did you do it? It was not right.”
“I lost my head, when he spoke to me last night, and I yielded to an
irresistible impulse of hatred. I did not know what I was doing.”
“But your mother?”
“I have managed to hide the truth from her so far. One of my seconds
said that he would tell her.”
“Go to her, run as fast as you can.... She will be so anxious until she
sees you.... Go at once....”
“No.”
He was so firm that she despaired of persuading him. And yet she wanted
him to go. Then she looked at him and smiled:
“To please me,” she said.
“Very well,” he said, “but you must come too.”
She at once summoned her pluck and rose to her feet; and, when she
expressed her wish to get back without delay he led her through the
short cuts where there was hardly room to walk side by side. But their
pace slackened at once; and they stopped three times to rest on the
road. Gilberte no longer displayed any hurry. What did they say? Nothing
but insignificant words, which they did not remember afterwards.
Nevertheless, when uttering them, they felt that they had never been
interested in weightier matters. What importance could suddenly have
attached, in the course of a walk, to the sight of two initials
interlaced on the bark of a tree, or to the flight of a bird, or to a
stone rolling down a slope! Whereas, to them, these were so many
astounding incidents that deserved a stop and the interchange of a few
ecstatic words.
A contest between some insect and a squad of five ants that were trying
to drag it away kept them for quite a long time. Who would be the
victor? Gilberte took pity on the insect and saved it when it was on the
point of falling in the fray. Guillaume exclaimed, in accents of
profound conviction:
“You are the most generous-hearted creature I have ever met.”
Guillaume compared the moss at the foot of an oak to velvet; and
Gilberte became aware that all the poetry in the world was summed up in
her companion.
Having exhausted their original reflexions, their brilliant remarks and
their mutual admiration, they were silent until they emerged from the
wood. A lane of apple-trees led them past furze and rocks. At the foot
of the slope ran the Varenne. After they had taken a turn, Gilberte
cried:
“Look, that might be my garden, on the other side.... Why, so it is!...
There’s the Logis.... Where are we?”
She walked on. They came to a cluster of small fir-trees. When they had
passed them, they were just opposite the ruined summer-house, with only
the width of the valley in between.
Gilberte gave a start. That spur of the hill, that circle of red rocks
surrounding it, that cluster of firs: was this not the spot where the
unknown stranger, for months ...?
A flood of contradictory feelings welled up within her: feelings of
gratitude towards the invisible friend, feelings of confusion towards
the actual friend, memories of the dear past and visions of the present.
How she wished that she had not come to this place with Guillaume! She
felt inclined to exclaim:
“Go away! Go away!”
But, on turning her head, she was stupefied at the sight of his pallor
and the change in his face:
“What’s the matter? Why don’t you say something? Speak to me!”
She broke off. A sudden thought struck her, an improbable, but madly
delightful idea. She fixed her eyes on his, looked down into his very
soul; and the truth appeared to her so clearly that, leaning against the
side of the rock, she gasped:
“It was you all the time!... It was you!...”
Not for a moment did the shadow of a fear that she was mistaken, cross
her. Holding her head between her hands and closing her eyes, she took
refuge in her happiness as in an inaccessible dwelling from which not
even he could have driven her.
He was speaking now, kneeling before her; and it seemed to Gilberte as
though two voices were joined in that one voice of entreaty, as though
the unknown friend were joining his prayer to Guillaume’s, blending his
image with Guillaume’s, mingling with him and beseeching her with the
same hands, adoring her with the same heart:
“Gilberte, it was the day on which you arrived at Domfront, You were in
the public gardens, near the ruins, and I saw you raise your
mourning-veil. Since that day, my life has been wrapped up in yours.
When you went over the Logis with my mother, I was there, hiding behind
a curtain. You stopped close by me, I was able to take you in my eyes,
to lock you in my breast like a treasure; I heard your voice, I breathed
your fragrance and I lived on that memory for weeks, seeking you,
calling you, hovering round the Logis, hoping for a chance meeting. Oh,
the delight of it when I saw you from here, one afternoon, and when you
came back next day and every day, every day! I was not sure, but it
appeared to me that you saw me ... and then ... that it was just a
little because of me that you came back.”
“I saw you, yes, I saw you,” said Gilberte, without removing her clasped
hands from her face.
He asked:
“Are you crying?”
“I am so happy!”
“Happy?”
“Yes, happy because it was you.”
“Gilberte,” he begged, “I would give worlds to see your tears.”
She showed her dear face all wet with tears, all smiling with tears. He
whispered:
“I love you.”
She seemed surprised and repeated, gravely:
“You love me ... you love me....”
He watched her anxiously. But the bright features lit up anew and she
said to Guillaume, gaily and blithely, as though she had made the most
wonderful and unexpected of discoveries:
“But, you know, Guillaume, I love you too.”
She had the look of a delighted child. She could have clapped her hands,
so great was the enchantment of that magnificent vision of love, so
sweet was it to know that she loved and was loved.
She leant over to him prettily:
“Then you are the one I was loving all the time and it is you that I
love, Guillaume?”
“Gilberte ... please....”
“What do you want? Tell me what you want, Guillaume.”
“Your eyes, Gilberte, to kiss your innocent eyes, your eyes which are
like the eyes of a little girl.”
Closing the lids, she offered her eyes, as though it were a quite
natural thing. He took her in his arms and drew her to him. But a shiver
passed through her at once. She made an instinctive movement of
resistance and moaned:
“No ... no ... oh, please don’t!...”
She was not laughing now. A blush covered her cheeks and forehead. She
no longer dared look at him; and Guillaume’s eyes almost hurt her. This
time, it was the real, perturbing, mysterious revelation of love. Shaken
with emotion, she faltered:
“Go away ... please go away....”
He kissed the hem of her skirt, picked some leaves, some blades of grass
that Gilberte’s feet had trodden and went away.
VIII
THE APPOITMENT
“GILBERTE:
“I must not see you again. When you read these lines, I shall have
left Domfront. You are rich and I am poor: you need look for no
other explanation of my departure and of my conduct in the past. I
loved you from the first; and from the first I swore that I would
shun you and for ever conceal the feeling with which you inspire
me.
“Do you now understand why I behaved so coldly to you from the
beginning, though my heart throbbed at the mere sound of your
voice; why I was so hard to my mother, whose plans were obvious to
all and drove me to exasperation: I was afraid lest you should
think that I was privy to them; why I kept in the background,
hiding among those rocks, looking at you from a distance as at a
goal which I knew was, and wished it to be, inaccessible?
“But you came to me, Gilberte: that is all my excuse. You came to
me out of kindness to my mother, perhaps also prompted by that
instinct which makes us conscious of love where it lies deepest.
What could I do against your fascination? I did not even struggle.
I closed my eyes to all that was not you, you and your beauty and
your smile and your charming grace and the colour of your hair and
the freshness of your cheeks and the rhythm of your footsteps; and,
with not a further thought of my oath or the inevitable
consequences of my weakness, I accepted the infinite joy that came
to me. Oh, Gilberte, those few weeks!... But there was something
which I had never imagined in my boldest dreams: you loved me, you
also loved me.
“You love me, which means that happiness is within my reach
to-morrow, the next day, every day. It is there, I have but to
take it; a word from me and you are my wife. For I know you, my
beloved: the gift of your heart is the gift of your entire life.
“And so I must go, if I would not be overcome by temptation....
“Oh, Gilberte, you do not know what I am feeling and suffering, you
who do not know what you are, you who are all that is most human
and most divine, most noble and most simple, a miracle of harmony,
attractiveness and light. But you know nothing of yourself and will
never know anything. One could tell you and your mirror could teach
you all the perfections of your face and form; and yet you would
not know them. Were you a child of ten, wearing the white frock of
your first communion, I should proclaim my admiration with the same
frankness and with no greater fear of hurting your modesty. The
whole world might be at your feet, chanting your praises; and you
would be none the less humble. That is the marvel of your
ingenuous nature. All is merged in your purity, as in a great,
limpid sea in which every impurity would vanish. It is impossible
to think of you without evoking images of whiteness, of
transparency, of crystal water. By what mystery has it come that
the trials of life, the realities of marriage have not soiled the
freshness of your innocent eyes?
“And so I shall never see your eyes again: your eyes of the dawn,
your eyes fresh as the dew, your kind, ignorant, gentle eyes, so
fond, so gay, so sad....”
She lowered her head, overcome with emotion. Mme. de la Vaudraye, who
had brought her this letter from her son and who waited for her to
finish reading it, said, rather aggressively:
“I should be glad of a word of explanation, Gilberte. Yesterday, my son
fights a duel without any adequate cause. To-day, he leaves me, without
giving me any reason. Have these two incidents anything to do with you?
You must admit their seriousness to a mother.”
Gilberte handed her the letter. Mme. de la Vaudraye read it and shrugged
her shoulders:
“Are you so very rich?”
The girl gave her another letter, received that morning, in which the
Dieppe solicitor furnished her with her quarterly statement. Mme. de la
Vaudraye started:
“Impossible! Oh, my child, you must never let Guillaume know!”
“How can I? He has gone away!”
“And you sit there and say that so quietly! Doesn’t his going distress
you? Don’t you love him?”
“Yes, I love him.”
“Then write to him.”
“Write to him?”
“Yes, tell him to come back ... tell him that his position makes no
difference to you....”
She spoke with a certain embarrassment: and this made Gilberte feel
awkward. However, she said:
“I can’t write. Guillaume alone can solve the question that lies between
him and his conscience.”
Mme. de la Vaudraye gave an impatient gesture and cried:
“You can’t write! What a ridiculous scruple! Is it any worse to write to
a young man than to go walking about the country with him, as I hear you
did yesterday? What! My son fights a duel because of you, he leaves me
because of you; and, when I, his mother, ask you ...! Well, what’s the
matter? What are you looking at me like that for?”
A chair suddenly pushed aside, an overturned flower-vase bore evidence
to Mme. de la Vaudraye’s burst of irritation. She flew out again:
“Oh, yes, it’s all very well, but one can’t stand that eternal
gentleness of yours! Here am I, telling you how wrong you are, and you
listen in such a queer way that I end by putting myself in the wrong.
One always feels with you as though one were in front of an indulgent
judge, who graciously forgives one’s faults. And yet it’s you who are at
fault!”
“Why, of course!” said Gilberte, all confusion.
“Then why do I look like a prisoner being judged?”
“Oh, but you don’t!”
“Yes, I do. It’s all very well for you to bend your head and all very
well for me to rave and yell: any one would think that I was to blame
and that you were making allowances. You must admit, it is enough to
make one lose all patience.”
Presumably, Mme. de la Vaudraye was afraid of growing still more
impatient, for she went away without another word.
Gilberte called on her, next day, and kissed her affectionately. There
was not a word said about their difference of the day before.
They saw each other every day. According to the weather, they walked in
the town or walked about the neighbourhood, leaning on each other’s arm
and heedless of any but themselves. But they invariably returned at the
same hour.
“Ah, it’s five o’clock: here are the ladies coming back!” people said.
This regularity was due to Gilberte. As soon as she was free, she went
to the ruined summer-house and sat there until dinnertime.
“But why this hurry?” asked Mme. de la Vaudraye. “You never give me a
minute over.”
“And what about my daily appointment?” said Gilberte, laughing.
“Your appointment?”
“Why, yes, with your son: what would he think of me if I were not
punctual?”
In the course of a longer excursion than usual, Mme. de la Vaudraye,
who was fond of turning the conversation on her past greatness, pointed
out the limits of the property once possessed by her ancestors. They
extended along both banks of the Varenne, as far as the spot where it
joined the Andainette.
“To say nothing of what we owned on the forest side: the Revolution
robbed us of that. Why, on the death of my father, the whole of the
valley still belonged to us! My marriage-portion included everything
down to the Bas-Moulin. And you should have seen the Logis in those
days! Such furniture! Such works of art!”
Gilberte, to humour her, asked:
“And how did you lose it?”