THE shock of my awakening was so violent, the downfall of my air-castles
so sudden and complete, that I think for awhile I had little sense of
what was going on. Yvon came to my door and knocked, and then called;
but I made no answer, and he went away, thinking, I suppose, that I had
forgotten him, and gone to bed. I sat on the side of my bed, where I had
thrown myself, great part of that night; and there was no thought of
sleep in me. My folly loomed large before me; I sat and looked it in the
face. And sometimes, for a few moments, it would not seem altogether
folly. I felt my youth and strength in every limb of me, and I thought,
what could not love do that was as strong as mine? for now I knew that
all these quiet weeks it had been growing to full stature, and that
neither gratitude nor friendship had any considerable part in my
feeling, but here was the one woman in the world for me. And would it be
so hard, I asked, to take her away from all this, and make a home for
her in my own good country, where she should be free and happy as a
bird, with no hateful watchers about her path? And would she not love
the newness, and the greatness and beauty of it all, and the homely
friends whom her brother so truly loved? Could I not say to her, "Come!"
and would she not come with me?
Ah! would she not? And with that there fell from my eyes as it were
scales,--even like the Apostle Paul, with reverence be it said,--and I
saw the thing in its true light. My heart said she would come; had not
her eyes answered mine last night? Was there not for her, too, an
awakening? And if she came,--what then?
I saw her, the delicate lady, in my father's house; not a guest, as Yvon
had been, but a dweller, the wife and daughter of the house, the wife of
a poor man. I remembered all the work that my mother Marie had done so
joyfully, so easily, because she was a working-woman, and these were the
things she had known all her life. This form of grace that filled my
eyes now was no lighter nor more graceful than hers; but the difference!
My mother's little brown hands could do any work that they had strength
for, and make it a woman's work in the doing, because she was pure woman
in herself; but these white fingers that had caught mine last
night,--what could they do? What ought they to do, save work delicately
with the needle, and make cordials and sweets (for in this my young lady
excelled), and beyond these matters, to play the harp and guitar, and
tend her roses, and adorn her own lovely person?
"But," cried the other voice in me, "I am young and strong, and I can
work! I can study the violin, I can become a musician, can earn my
bread and hers, so that there will be no need of the farm. It would be a
few years of study, a few years of waiting,--and she is so young!"
Ah, yes! she was so young! and then that voice died away, and knew that
it had no more to say. What--what was this, to think of urging a young
girl, still almost a child, to give up the station of life in which she
had lived happy and joyous, and go away with a stranger, far from her
own home and her own people, to share a struggling life, with no certain
assurance of anything, save love alone? What was this but a baseness, of
which no honest man could be capable? If,--if even I had read her glance
aright,--last night,--or was it a year ago? Still, it was but a thing of
a moment, the light springing up of a tiny fire of good will, that would
die out in a few days after I was gone, for want of fuel; even if it
were not snatched out strongly by other hands, as I had put out those
climbing flames last night. How her startled eyes sought mine! How the
colour flashed into her face when I spoke. No! no! Of that I must not
think, if my manhood was to stay in me!
This other, then, who was coming,--this man would turn her thoughts. She
would yield, as is the custom for young maidens in France, with no
thought that it might be otherwise. He was no longer young,--he had
already been once married,--I looked up at this moment, I do not know
by what chance, and my eyes fell on a long glass, what they call a
cheval-glass in France, my dear, showing the whole figure. I think no
harm, seeing this was so long ago, in saying that I appeared to
advantage in such a view, being well-made, and perhaps not without other
good points. This will seem strangely trifling to you, my child, who see
nothing but the soul of man or woman; but I have always loved a good
figure, and never felt shame to thank God for giving me one. My clothes
were good, having been bought in Paris as we came through. I have never
made any claim to pass for a gentleman, Melody, but yet I think I made a
fair enough show of one, that night at least. And being so constituted,
I sat staring at my image in the mirror, and wondering like a fool if
the other man were as good-looking. This would be like a slight crust of
contentment,--sad enough at that,--forming for a moment over the black
depth of sorrow that was my heart; and next moment the pain would stab
through it again, till I could have cried out but for the shame of it;
and so the night wore by, and the morning found me still there. I had
learned little, save the one thing that was all the world,--that I could
not commit a baseness.
It was strange to me, coming down to breakfast, to find Yvon unchanged,
his own gay self simply. I was grown suddenly so old, he seemed no more
than a child to me, with his bits of song that yesterday I had joined in
with a light heart, and his plans for another day of pleasure, like
yesterday and all the days. Looking at him, I could have laughed, had
there been any laughter in me, at the thought of his aunt that I had
come over with a view to bettering myself at his expense. It seemed a
thing of so little moment; I had half a mind to tell him, but held my
peace, wishing her really no evil, since what she had done had been
through love and care for her own. There might be such men as she had
thought me; I have since found that there are indeed.
Yvon was full of plans; we were to ride this afternoon, to such and such
a place; it was the finest view in the country, there was nothing to
approach it. Pierre should drive over and meet us there, with peaches,
and cream, and cakes, and we would sup, we three together, and come home
by moonlight. It would be the very thing! if I really could hold the
bridle? it was the very thing to remove the recollection of last night
from his sister's mind, impressionable, as youth always is. (He said
this, Melody, with an air of seventy years, and wisdom ineffable, that
was comical enough.) "From my own mind," he cried, "never shall the
impression be effaced. Thy heroism, my Jacques, shall be inscribed in
the annals of our houses. To save the life of a Demoiselle de Ste.
Valerie is claim sufficient for undying remembrance; to save the life of
my sister, my Valerie,--and you her saviour, the friend of my
heart,--the combination is perfect; it is ideal. I shall compose a poem,
Jacques; I have already begun it. '_Ciel d'argent_--' you shall hear it
when it has progressed a little farther; at present it is in embryo
merely."
He sent for his sister, that they might arrange their plans before she
passed to her lessons, which were strictly kept up. She came, and my
heart spoke loud, telling me that all my vigil had brought to me was
true, and that I must begone. There was a new softness in her sweet
eyes, a tone in her voice,--oh, it was always kind,--but now a
tenderness that I must not hear. She would see my hands; could not
believe that I was not seriously wounded; vowed that her aunt was a
magician; "though I prayed long, long, last night, monsieur, that the
wounds might heal quickly. They are really--no! look, Yvon! look! these
terrible blisters! but, they are frightful, M. D'Arthenay. You--surely
you should not have left your room, in this condition?"
Not only this, I assured her, but I was so entirely well that I hoped to
ride with them this afternoon, if the matter could be arranged. She
listened with delight while Yvon detailed his plan; presently her face
fell a little.
"Walk back!" she said. "Yes, Yvon, what could be more delightful? but
when I tell you that the sole is sprung from my walking-shoe, and it
must go to the village to be mended! How can I get it back in time?"
A thought came to me. "If mademoiselle would let me see the shoe?" I
said. "Perhaps I can arrange it for her." Yvon frowned and pshawed; he
did not like any mention of my shoemaking; this was from no unworthy
feeling, but because he thought the trade unsuited to me. I, however,
repeated my request, and, greatly wondering, the young lady sent a
servant for the shoe. I took it in my hand with pleasure; it was not
only beautiful, but well made. "Here is an easy matter!" I said,
smiling. "Will mademoiselle see how they mend shoes in my country?" A
hammer was soon found, and sitting down on a low bench, I tapped away,
and soon had the pretty thing in order again. Mademoiselle Valerie cried
out upon my cleverness. "But, you can then do anything you choose,
monsieur?" she said. "To play the violin, to save a life, to mend a
shoe,--do they teach all these things in your country? and to what
wonderful school did you go?"
I said, to none more wonderful than a village school; and that this I
had indeed learned well, but on the cobbler's bench. "Surely Yvon has
told you, mademoiselle, of our good shoemaker, and how he taught me his
trade, that I might practise it at times when there is no fiddling
needed?" I spoke cheerfully, but let it be seen that I was not in jest.
A little pale, she looked from one of us to the other, not
understanding.
"All nonsense, Valerie!" cried Yvon, forcing a laugh. "Jacques learned
shoemaking, as he would learn anything, for the sake of knowledge. He
may even have practised it here and there, among his neighbours; why
not? I have often wished I could set a stitch, in time of need, as he
has done to-day. But to remain at this trade,--it is stuff that he
talks; he does not know his own nature, his own descent, when he permits
himself to think of such a thing. Fie, M. D'Arthenay!"
"No more of that!" I said. "The play is over, _mon cher_! M. D'Arthenay
is a figure of your kind, romantic heart, Yvon. Plain Jacques De
Arthenay, farmer's son, fiddler, and cobbler, stands from this moment on
his own feet, not those of his grandfather four times back."
I did not look at my young lady, not daring to see the trouble that I
knew was in her sweet face; but I looked full at Yvon, and was glad
rather than sorry at his black look. I could have quarrelled with him or
any man who had brought me to this pass. But just then, before there
could be any more speech, came the sour-faced maid with an urgent
message from Mme. de Lalange, that both the young lady and the marquis
should attend her in her own room without delay.
Left alone, I found myself considering the roses on the terrace, and
wondering could I take away a slip of one, and keep it alive till I
reached home. In the back of my head I knew what was going on up-stairs
in the grim lady's room; but I had no mind to lose hold on myself, and
presently I went for my fiddle, which was kept in the parlour hard by,
and practised scales, a thing I always did when out of Yvon's company,
being what he could not abear. To practise scales is a fine thing,
Melody, to steady the mind and give it balance; you never knew, my
child, why I made you sing your scales so often, that night when your
aunt Rejoice was like to die, and all the house in such distress. Your
aunt Vesta thought me mad, but I was never in better wits.
So I was quiet, when after a long time Yvon came down to me. When I saw
that he knew all, I laid my violin away, agitation being bad for the
strings,--or so I have always thought. He was in a flame of anger, and
fairly stammered in his speech. What had his aunt said to me, he
demanded, the night before? How had she treated me, his friend? She
was--many things which you know nothing about, Melody, my dear; the very
least of them was cat, and serpent, and traitress. But I took a cool
tone.
"Is it true, Yvon," I asked, "about the gentleman who comes to-morrow?
You have already known about it? It is true?"
"True!" cried Yvon, his passion breaking out. "Yes, it is true! What,
then? Because my sister is to marry, some day,--she is but just out of
her pinafores, I tell you,--because some day she is to marry, and the
estates are to join, is that a reason that my friend is to be insulted,
my pleasure broken up, my summer destroyed? I insist upon knowing what
that cat said to you, Jacques!"
"She told me what you acknowledge," I said. "That I can be insulted I
deny, unless there be ground for what is said. Mme. de Lalange did what
she considered to be her duty; and--and I have spent a month of great
happiness with you, marquis, and it is a time that will always be the
brightest of my life."
But at this Yvon flung himself on my neck--it is not a thing practised
among men in this country, but in him it seemed nowise strange, my blood
being partly like his own--and wept and stormed. He loved me, I am glad
to believe, truly; yet after all the most part was to him, that his
party of pleasure was spoiled, and his plans broken up. And then I
remembered how we had talked together that day in the old grist-mill,
and how he had said that when trouble came, we should spread our wings
and fly away from it. And Ham's words came back to me, too, till I could
almost hear him speak, and see the grave, wise look of him. "Take good
stuff, and grind it in the Lord's mill, and you've got the best this
world can give." And I found that Ham's philosophy was the one that
held.
There was no more question of the gay party that afternoon. Mlle. de
Ste. Valerie did not dine with us, word coming down that her head ached,
and she would not go out. Yvon and I went to walk, and I led the way to
my tower (so I may call it this once), thinking I would like to see it
once more. All these three months and more (counting from the day I
first met Yvon de Ste. Valerie at the priest's house), I had played a
second in the duet, and that right cheerfully. Though my own age, the
marquis was older in many ways from his knowledge of society and its
ways, and his gay, masterful manner; and I, the country lad, had been
too happy only to follow his lead, and go about open-eyed, seeing all he
would show, and loving him with honest admiration and pride in him. But
it was curious to see how from this moment we changed; and now it was I
who led, and was the master. The master in my own house, I thought for a
moment, as we sat on the shelf under the great round window, and looked
out over the lands that had once belonged to my people. Here once more
the dream came upon me, and I had a wild vision of myself coming back
after years, rich and famous, and buying back the old tower, building
the castle, and holding that sweet princess by my side. The poet
Coleridge, my dear, in describing a man whose wits are crazed, makes use
of this remarkable expression:
"How there looked him in the face
An angel beautiful and bright,
And how he knew it was a fiend,
That miserable knight."
This knowledge was also mercifully mine. And I was helped, too, by a
thing slight enough, and yet curious. Being in distress of mind, I
sought some use of my hands, as is the case with most women and some
men. I fell to pulling off the dead leaves of ivy from the wall; and so,
running my hand along the inside of the window, felt beneath it a
carving on the stone. I lifted the leaves, which here were not so thick
as in most places, and saw a shield carved with arms, and on it the
motto I knew well: "_D'Arthenay, tenez foi!_"
I told my friend that I must be gone that night; that I knew his aunt
desired it, and was entirely in her right, it being most unfitting that
a stranger should be present on such an occasion as this. Doubtless
other friends would be coming, too, and my room would be wanted.
Here he broke out in a storm, and vowed no one should have my room, and
I should not stir a foot for a hundred of them. And here had she kept
him in the dark, as if he were a babe, instead of the head of the house.
It was an affront never to be forgiven. If the vicomte had not been the
friend of his father, he would break off the match, and forbid him the
house. As it was, he was powerless, tied hand and foot.
I interrupted him, thinking such talk idle; and begged to know what
manner of man this was who was coming. Was he--was he the man he should
be?
He was a gallant gentleman, Yvon confessed; there was no fault to find
with him, save that he was old enough to be the girl's father. But that
was all one! If he were twenty viscounts, he should not turn out his,
Yvon's friend, the only man he ever cared to call his brother,--and so
on and so on, till I cut him short. For now I saw no way, Melody, but to
tell him how it was with me; and this I did in as few words as might
be, and begged him to let me go quietly, and say no more. For once, I
think, the lad was put to such depth of sorrow as was in him. He had
never guessed, never thought of this; his sister was a child to him, and
must be so, he supposed, to all. How could he tell? Why had he brought
me here, to suffer? He was a criminal! What could he do? And then there
struck him a thought, and he glanced up sharply at me, and I saw not the
face of my friend, but one cold and questioning. Had I spoken to his
sister? Did she--
I cut him short at the word. Of that, I said, he could judge better than
I, having been in my company daily for three months. He fell on my neck
again, and implored my pardon; and said, I think, that twenty viscounts
were less noble than I. I cared little for my nobility; all I asked was
to get away, and hide my wound among my own friendly people.
And so it was arranged that I was to go that night; and we walked back
to the chateau, speaking little, but our hearts full of true affection,
and--save for that one sting of a moment--trust in each other.