very perfectly. She had substituted three letters of her own writing
for three of Albert’s, and the rough copies which she showed to the old
priest made him shudder--the genius of evil was revealed in them to such
perfection. Rosalie, writing in Albert’s name, had prepared the Duchess
for a change in the Frenchman’s feelings, falsely representing him as
faithless, and she had answered the news of the Duc d’Argaiolo’s death
by announcing the marriage ere long of Albert and Mademoiselle de
Watteville. The two letters, intended to cross on the road, had, in
fact, done so. The infernal cleverness with which the letters were
written so much astonished the Vicar-General that he read them a second
time. Francesca, stabbed to the heart by a girl who wanted to kill love
in her rival, had answered the last in these four words: “You are free.
Farewell.”
“Purely moral crimes, which give no hold to human justice, are the most
atrocious and detestable,” said the Abbe severely. “God often punishes
them on earth; herein lies the reason of the terrible catastrophes which
to us seem inexplicable. Of all secret crimes buried in the mystery of
private life, the most disgraceful is that of breaking the seal of a
letter, or of reading it surreptitiously. Every one, whoever it may be,
and urged by whatever reason, who is guilty of such an act has stained
his honor beyond retrieving.
“Do you not feel all that is touching, that is heavenly in the story of
the youthful page, falsely accused, and carrying the letter containing
the order for his execution, who sets out without a thought of ill, and
whom Providence protects and saves--miraculously, we say! But do you
know wherein the miracle lies? Virtue has a glory as potent as that of
innocent childhood.
“I say these things not meaning to admonish you,” said the old priest,
with deep grief. “I, alas! am not your spiritual director; you are not
kneeling at the feet of God; I am your friend, appalled by dread of what
your punishment may be. What has become of that unhappy Albert? Has
he, perhaps, killed himself? There was tremendous passion under his
assumption of calm. I understand now that old Prince Soderini, the
father of the Duchess d’Argaiolo, came here to take back his daughter’s
letters and portraits. This was the thunderbolt that fell on Albert’s
head, and he went off, no doubt, to try to justify himself. But how is
it that in fourteen months he has given us no news of himself?”
“Oh! if I marry him, he will be so happy!”
“Happy?--He does not love you. Besides, you have no great fortune to
give him. Your mother detests you; you made her a fierce reply which
rankles, and which will be your ruin. When she told you yesterday that
obedience was the only way to repair your errors, and reminded you of
the need for marrying, mentioning Amedee--‘If you are so fond of him,
marry him yourself, mother!’--Did you, or did you not, fling these words
in her teeth?”
“Yes,” said Rosalie.
“Well, I know her,” Monsieur de Grancey went on. “In a few months she
will be Comtesse de Soulas! She will be sure to have children; she will
give Monsieur de Soulas forty thousand francs a year; she will benefit
him in other ways, and reduce your share of her fortune as much
as possible. You will be poor as long as she lives, and she is but
eight-and-thirty! Your whole estate will be the land of les Rouxey, and
the small share left to you after your father’s legal debts are settled,
if, indeed, your mother should consent to forego her claims on les
Rouxey. From the point of view of material advantages, you have done
badly for yourself; from the point of view of feeling, I imagine you
have wrecked your life. Instead of going to your mother--” Rosalie shook
her head fiercely.
“To your mother,” the priest went on, “and to religion, where you would,
at the first impulse of your heart, have found enlightenment, counsel,
and guidance, you chose to act in your own way, knowing nothing of life,
and listening only to passion!”
These words of wisdom terrified Mademoiselle de Watteville.
“And what ought I to do now?” she asked after a pause.
“To repair your wrong-doing, you must ascertain its extent,” said the
Abbe.
“Well, I will write to the only man who can know anything of Albert’s
fate, Monsieur Leopold Hannequin, a notary in Paris, his friend since
childhood.”
“Write no more, unless to do honor to truth,” said the Vicar-General.
“Place the real and the false letters in my hands, confess everything in
detail as though I were the keeper of your conscience, asking me how you
may expiate your sins, and doing as I bid you. I shall see--for, above
all things, restore this unfortunate man to his innocence in the eyes
of the woman he had made his divinity on earth. Though he has lost his
happiness, Albert must still hope for justification.”
Rosalie promised to obey the Abbe, hoping that the steps he might take
would perhaps end in bringing Albert back to her.
Not long after Mademoiselle de Watteville’s confession a clerk came to
Besancon from Monsieur Leopold Hannequin, armed with a power of
attorney from Albert; he called first on Monsieur Girardet, begging
his assistance in selling the house belonging to Monsieur Savaron. The
attorney undertook to do this out of friendship for Albert. The clerk
from Paris sold the furniture, and with the proceeds could repay
some money owed by Savaron to Girardet, who on the occasion of
his inexplicable departure had lent him five thousand francs while
undertaking to collect his assets. When Girardet asked what had become
of the handsome and noble pleader, to whom he had been so much attached,
the clerk replied that no one knew but his master, and that the notary
had seemed greatly distressed by the contents of the last letter he had
received from Monsieur Albert de Savarus.
On hearing this, the Vicar-General wrote to Leopold. This was the worthy
notary’s reply:--
“To Monsieur l’Abbe de Grancey,
Vicar-General of the Diocese of Besancon.
“PARIS.
“Alas, monsieur, it is in nobody’s power to restore Albert to the
life of the world; he has renounced it. He is a novice in the
monastery of the Grand Chartreuse near Grenoble. You know, better
than I who have but just learned it, that on the threshold of that
cloister everything dies. Albert, foreseeing that I should go to
him, placed the General of the Order between my utmost efforts and
himself. I know his noble soul well enough to be sure that he is
the victim of some odious plot unknown to us; but everything is at
an end. The Duchesse d’Argaiolo, now Duchesse de Rhetore, seems to
me to have carried severity to an extreme. At Belgirate, which she
had left when Albert flew thither, she had left instructions
leading him to believe that she was living in London. From London
Albert went in search of her to Naples, and from Naples to Rome,
where she was now engaged to the Duc de Rhetore. When Albert
succeeded in seeing Madame d’Argaiolo, at Florence, it was at the
ceremony of her marriage.
“Our poor friend swooned in the church, and even when he was in
danger of death he could never obtain any explanation from this
woman, who must have had I know not what in her heart. For seven
months Albert had traveled in pursuit of a cruel creature who
thought it sport to escape him; he knew not where or how to catch
her.
“I saw him on his way through Paris; and if you had seen him, as I
did, you would have felt that not a word might be spoken about the
Duchess, at the risk of bringing on an attack which might have
wrecked his reason. If he had known what his crime was, he might
have found means to justify himself; but being falsely accused of
being married!--what could he do? Albert is dead, quite dead to
the world. He longed for rest; let us hope that the deep silence
and prayer into which he has thrown himself may give him happiness
in another guise. You, monsieur, who have known him, must greatly
pity him; and pity his friends also.
“Yours, etc.”
As soon as he received this letter the good Vicar-General wrote to the
General of the Carthusian order, and this was the letter he received
from Albert Savarus:--
“Brother Albert to Monsieur l’Abbe de Grancey,
Vicar-General of the Diocese of Besancon.
“LA GRANDE CHARTREUSE.
“I recognized your tender soul, dear and well-beloved
Vicar-General, and your still youthful heart, in all that the
Reverend Father General of our Order has just told me. You have
understood the only wish that lurks in the depths of my heart so far
as the things of the world are concerned--to get justice done to my
feelings by her who has treated me so badly! But before leaving me
at liberty to avail myself of your offer, the General wanted to
know that my vocation was sincere; he was so kind as to tell me
his idea, on finding that I was determined to preserve absolute
silence on this point. If I had yielded to the temptation to
rehabilitate the man of the world, the friar would have been
rejected by this monastery. Grace has certainly done her work,
but, though short, the struggle was not the less keen or the less
painful. Is not this enough to show you that I could never return
to the world?
“Hence my forgiveness, which you ask for the author of so much
woe, is entire and without a thought of vindictiveness. I will
pray to God to forgive that young lady as I forgive her, and as I
shall beseech Him to give Madame de Rhetore a life of happiness.
Ah! whether it be death, or the obstinate hand of a young girl
madly bent on being loved, or one of the blows ascribed to chance,
must we not all obey God? Sorrow in some souls makes a vast void
through which the Divine Voice rings. I learned too late the
bearings of this life on that which awaits us; all in me is worn
out; I could not serve in the ranks of the Church Militant, and I
lay the remains of an almost extinct life at the foot of the
altar.
“This is the last time I shall ever write. You alone, who loved
me, and whom I loved so well, could make me break the law of
oblivion I imposed on myself when I entered these headquarters of
Saint Bruno, but you are always especially named in the prayers of
“BROTHER ALBERT.
“November 1836.”
“Everything is for the best perhaps,” thought the Abbe de Grancey.
When he showed this letter to Rosalie, who, with a pious impulse, kissed
the lines which contained her forgiveness, he said to her:
“Well, now that he is lost to you, will you not be reconciled to your
mother and marry the Comte de Soulas?”
“Only if Albert should order it,” said she.
“But you see it is impossible to consult him. The General of the Order
would not allow it.”
“If I were to go to see him?”
“No Carthusian sees any visitor. Besides, no woman but the Queen of
France may enter a Carthusian monastery,” said the Abbe. “So you have no
longer any excuse for not marrying young Monsieur de Soulas.”
“I do not wish to destroy my mother’s happiness,” retorted Rosalie.
“Satan!” exclaimed the Vicar-General.
Towards the end of that winter the worthy Abbe de Grancey died. This
good friend no longer stood between Madame de Watteville and her
daughter, to soften the impact of those two iron wills.
The event he had foretold took place. In the month of August 1837 Madame
de Watteville was married to Monsieur de Soulas in Paris, whither
she went by Rosalie’s advice, the girl making a show of kindness and
sweetness to her mother. Madame de Watteville believed in this affection
on the part of her daughter, who simply desired to go to Paris to give
herself the luxury of a bitter revenge; she thought of nothing but
avenging Savarus by torturing her rival.
Mademoiselle de Watteville had been declared legally of age; she was,
in fact, not far from one-and-twenty. Her mother, to settle with her
finally, had resigned her claims on les Rouxey, and the daughter had
signed a release for all the inheritance of the Baron de Watteville.
Rosalie encouraged her mother to marry the Comte de Soulas and settle
all her own fortune on him.
“Let us each be perfectly free,” she said.
Madame de Soulas, who had been uneasy as to her daughter’s intentions,
was touched by this liberality, and made her a present of six thousand
francs a year in the funds as conscience money. As the Comtesse de
Soulas had an income of forty-eight thousand francs from her own
lands, and was quite incapable of alienating them in order to diminish
Rosalie’s share, Mademoiselle de Watteville was still a fortune to
marry, of eighteen hundred thousand francs; les Rouxey, with the Baron’s
additions, and certain improvements, might yield twenty thousand francs
a year, besides the value of the house, rents, and preserves. So Rosalie
and her mother, who soon adopted the Paris style and fashions, easily
obtained introductions to the best society. The golden key--eighteen
hundred thousand francs--embroidered on Mademoiselle de Watteville’s
stomacher, did more for the Comtesse de Soulas than her pretensions _a
la_ de Rupt, her inappropriate pride, or even her rather distant great
connections.
In the month of February 1838 Rosalie, who was eagerly courted by many
young men, achieved the purpose which had brought her to Paris. This
was to meet the Duchesse de Rhetore, to see this wonderful woman, and
to overwhelm her with perennial remorse. Rosalie gave herself up to the
most bewildering elegance and vanities in order to face the Duchess on
an equal footing.
They first met at a ball given annually after 1830 for the benefit of
the pensioners on the old Civil List. A young man, prompted by Rosalie,
pointed her out to the Duchess, saying:
“There is a very remarkable young person, a strong-minded young lady
too! She drove a clever man into a monastery--the Grand Chartreuse--a
man of immense capabilities, Albert de Savarus, whose career she
wrecked. She is Mademoiselle de Watteville, the famous Besancon
heiress----”
The Duchess turned pale. Rosalie’s eyes met hers with one of those
flashes which, between woman and woman, are more fatal than the pistol
shots of a duel. Francesca Soderini, who had suspected that Albert might
be innocent, hastily quitted the ballroom, leaving the speaker at his
wits’ end to guess what terrible blow he had inflicted on the beautiful
Duchesse de Rhetore.
“If you want to hear more about Albert, come to the Opera ball on
Tuesday with a marigold in your hand.”
This anonymous note, sent by Rosalie to the Duchess, brought the unhappy
Italian to the ball, where Mademoiselle de Watteville placed in her
hand all Albert’s letters, with that written to Leopold Hannequin by the
Vicar-General, and the notary’s reply, and even that in which she had
written her confession to the Abbe de Grancey.
“I do not choose to be the only sufferer,” she said to her rival, “for
one has been as ruthless as the other.”
After enjoying the dismay stamped on the Duchess’ beautiful face,
Rosalie went away; she went out no more, and returned to Besancon with
her mother.
* * * * *
Mademoiselle de Watteville, who lived alone on her estate of les Rouxey,
riding, hunting, refusing two or three offers a year, going to Besancon
four or five times in the course of the winter, and busying herself with
improving her land, was regarded as a very eccentric personage. She was
one of the celebrities of the Eastern provinces.
Madame de Soulas has two children, a boy and a girl, and she has grown
younger; but Monsieur de Soulas has aged a good deal.
“My fortune has cost me dear,” said he to young Chavoncourt. “Really to
know a bigot it is unfortunately necessary to marry her!”
Mademoiselle de Watteville behaves in the most extraordinary manner.
“She has vagaries,” people say. Every year she goes to gaze at the
walls of the Grande Chartreuse. Perhaps she dreams of imitating her
grand-uncle by forcing the walls of the monastery to find a husband, as
Watteville broke through those of his monastery to recover his liberty.
She left Besancon in 1841, intending, it was said, to get married; but
the real reason of this expedition is still unknown, for she returned
home in a state which forbids her ever appearing in society again.
By one of those chances of which the Abbe de Grancey had spoken, she
happened to be on the Loire in a steamboat of which the boiler burst.
Mademoiselle de Watteville was so severely injured that she lost her
right arm and her left leg; her face is marked with fearful scars, which
have bereft her of her beauty; her health, cruelly upset, leaves her few
days free from suffering. In short, she now never leaves the Chartreuse
of les Rouxey, where she leads a life wholly devoted to religious
practices.
PARIS, May 1842.
ADDENDUM
The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.
Beauseant, Vicomtesse de
Father Goriot
The Deserted Woman
Genovese
Massimilla Doni
Hannequin, Leopold
Beatrix
Cousin Betty
Cousin Pons
Jeanrenaud
The Commission in Lunacy
Nueil, Gaston de
The Deserted Woman
Rhetore, Duc Alphonse de
A Bachelor’s Establishment
A Distinguished Provincial at Paris
Scenes from a Courtesan’s Life
Letters of Two Brides
The Member for Arcis
Savaron de Savarus
The Quest of the Absolute
Savarus, Albert Savaron de
The Quest of the Absolute
Schinner, Hippolyte
The Purse
A Bachelor’s Establishment
Pierre Grassou
A Start in Life
The Government Clerks
Modeste Mignon
The Imaginary Mistress
The Unconscious Humorists
Tinti, Clarina
Massimilla Doni