GREY DAWN
Strange that it should all have happened in the grey dawn of a cold
winter’s morning. Nicolette, when she came home afterwards and thought
it all out, marvelled whether the grey sky, the muffled cadence of the
trees, the mysterious pallidity of the woods were a portent of the
future. And yet if it had to be done all over again, she would not have
acted differently, and minute by minute, hour by hour, it seemed as if
destiny had guided her—or God’s hand, perhaps! Oh, surely it was God’s
hand.
She rose early because she had passed a restless, miserable night, also
her head ached and she longed for fresh air. It was still dark, but
Margaï was astir, and a bright fire was blazing in the kitchen when
Nicolette came down. She was not hungry, but to please Margaï she drank
some warm milk and ate the home-made bread, and when the cold morning
light first peeped in through the open window, she set out for a walk.
She went down the terraced gradients into the valley, and turned to
wander up the river bank, keeping her shawl closely wrapped around her
shoulders, as it was very cold. The Lèze, swelled by the early winter’s
rains, tossed and tumbled in its bed with fretful turbulence. The snow
lay deep in untidy little heaps in all sorts of unexpected nooks and
crannies, but the smooth surfaces of the boulders were shiny with dewy
frost and the blades of the rough grass were heavy with moisture.
The air was very still, and slowly the silvery dawn crept up behind the
canopy of clouds, and transformed it into a neutral tinted veil that
hung loosely over the irregular heights of Luberon and concealed the
light that lay beyond. One by one the terraced slopes emerged from the
pall of night, and the moist blades of grass turned to strings of tiny
diamonds. A pallid argent hue lay over mountain and valley, and every
leaf of every tree became a looking-glass that mirrored the colourless
opalescence of the sky.
When Nicolette started out for this early morning walk she had no
thought of meeting Bertrand. Indeed she had no thought of anything
beyond a desire to be alone, and to still the restlessness which had
kept her awake all night. Anon she reached the pool and the great
boulder that marked the boundary of Paul et Virginie’s island, and she
came to a halt beside the carob tree on the spot hallowed by all the
cherished memories of the past.
And suddenly she saw Bertrand.
He too had wandered along the valley by the bank of the stream, and
Nicolette felt that it was her intense longing for him that had brought
him hither to this land of yore.
How it all came about she could not have told you. Bertrand looked as if
he had not slept: his eyes were ringed with purple, he was hatless, and
his hair clung dishevelled and moist against his forehead. Nicolette led
the way to the old olive tree, and there they stood together for awhile,
and she made him tell her all about himself. At first it seemed as if it
hurt him to speak at all, but gradually his reserve appeared to fall
away from him: he talked more and more freely! he spoke of his love for
Rixende, how it had sprung into being at first sight of her: he spoke of
the growth of his love through days of ardour and nights of longing,
when, blind to all save the beauty of her, he would have laid down his
life to hold her in his arms. He also spoke of that awful day of
humiliation and of misery when he dragged himself on his knees at her
feet like an abject beggar imploring one crumb of pity, and saw his love
spurned, his ideal shattered, and his father’s shame flung into his face
like a soiled rag.
What he had been unable to say to his mother he appeared to speak of
with real relief to Nicolette. He seemed like a man groaning under a
heavy load, who is gradually being eased of his burden. He owned that
for hours after that terrible day he had been a prey to black despair:
it was only the thought of his father’s disgrace and of his mother’s
grief that kept him from the contemplation of suicide. But his career
was ended: soon those harpies, who were counting on his wealthy marriage
to exact their pound of flesh from him, would fall on him like a cloud
of locusts, and to the sorrow in his heart would be added the dishonour
of his name. His happiness had fled on the wings of disappointment and
disillusion.
“The Rixende whom I loved,” he said, “never existed. She was just a
creation of my own brain, born of a dream. The woman who jeered at me
because I loved her and had nothing to offer her but my love, was a
stranger whom I had never known.”
Was it at that precise moment that the thought took shape in her mind,
or had it always been there? Always? When she used to run after him and
thrust her baby hand into his palm? Or when she gazed up-stream,
pretending that the Lèze was the limitless ocean, on which never a ship
appeared to take her and Tan-tan away from their island of bliss? All
the dreams of her girlhood came floating, like pale, ghostlike visions,
before Nicolette’s mind; dreams when she wandered hand in hand with
Tan-tan up the valley and the birds around her sang a chorus: “He loves
thee, passionately!” Dreams when he was gay and happy, and they would
laugh together and sing till the mountain peaks gave echo to their joy!
Dreams when, wearied or sad, he would pillow his head on her breast, and
allow her to stroke his hair, and to whisper soft words of comfort, or
sing to him his favourite songs.
Those dream visions had long since receded into forgetfulness, dispelled
by the masterful hand of a beautiful woman with gentian-blue eyes and a
heart of stone. Was this the hour to recall them from never-never land?
to let them float once more before her mind? and was this the hour to
lend an ear to the sweet insidious voice that whispered: “Why not?” even
on this cold winter’s morning, when a pall of grey monotone lay over
earth and sky, when the winter wind soughed drearily through the trees,
and every bird-song was stilled?
Is there a close time for love? Perhaps. But there is none for that
sweet and gentle pity which is the handmaid of the compelling Master of
the Universe. The sky might be grey, the flowers dead and the birds
still, but Nicolette’s heart whispered to her that Tan-tan was in pain;
he had been hurt in his love, in his pride, in that which he held dearer
than everything in life: the honour of his name. And she, Nicolette, had
it in her power to shield him, his honour and his pride, whilst in her
heart there was such an infinity of love, that the wounds which he had
endured would be healed by its magical power.
How it came about she knew not. He had spoken and he was tired: shame
and sorrow had brought tears to his eyes. Then all of a sudden she put
out her arms and drew his head down upon her breast. Like a mother
crooning over her sick baby, she soothed and comforted him: and words of
love poured out from her heart as nectar from an hallowed vessel, and in
her eyes there glowed a light of such perfect love and such sublime
surrender, that he, dazed at first, not understanding, could but listen
in silence, and let this marvellous ray of hope slowly filtrate through
the darkness of his despair.
“Nicolette,” he cried the moment he could realise what it was she was
saying, “do you really love me enough to——”
But she quickly put her hand over his mouth.
“Ask me no question, Tan-tan,” she said. “I have always loved you,
neither more nor less—just loved you always—and now that you are in
trouble and really need me, how can you ask if I love you enough?”
“Your father will never permit it, Nicolette,” he said soberly after a
while.
“He will permit it,” she rejoined simply, “because now I should die if
anything were to part us.”
“If only I could be worthy of your love, little one,” he murmured
ruefully.
“Hush, my dear,” she whispered in reply. “In love no one is either
worthy or unworthy. If you love me, then you have given me such a
priceless treasure that I should not even envy the angels up in heaven.”
“If I love you, sweetheart!” he sighed, and a sharp pang of remorse shot
through his heart.
But she was content even with this semblance of love. Never of late, in
her happiest dreams, had she thought it possible that she and Tan-tan
would ever really belong to one another. Oh! she had no illusions as to
the present: the image of that blue-eyed little fiend had not been
wholly eradicated from his heart, but so long as she had him she would
love him so much, so much, that in time he would forget everything save
her who made him happy.
They talked for awhile of the future: she would not see that in his
heart he was ashamed—ashamed of her generosity and of his own weakness
for accepting it. But she had found the right words, and he had been in
such black despair that this glorious future which she held out before
him was like a vision of paradise, and he was young and human, and did
not turn his back on his own happiness. Then, as time was getting on,
they remembered that there was a world besides themselves: a world to
which they would now have to return and which they would have to face.
It was no use restarting a game of “Let’s pretend!” on their desert
island. A ship had come in sight on the limitless ocean, and they must
make ready to go back.
Hand in hand they wandered down the valley. It was just like one of
those pictures of which Nicolette had dreamed. She and Tan-tan alone
together, the Lèze murmuring at their feet, the soughing of the trees
making sweet melody as they walked. Way up in the sky a thin shaft of
brilliant light had rent the opalescent veil and tinged the heights of
Luberon with gold. The warm sun of Provence would have its way. It tore
at that drab grey veil, tore and tore, until the rent grew wider and the
firmament over which he reigned was translucent and blue. The leaves on
the trees mirrored the azure of the sky, the mountain stream gurgled and
whispered with a sound like human laughter, and from a leafy grove of
winter oak a pair of pigeons rose and flew away over the valley, and
disappeared in the nebulous ether beyond.