Macumer has just wakened me, darling, with your husband's letter. First
and foremost--Yes. We shall be going to Chantepleurs about the end of
April. To me it will be a piling up of pleasure to travel, to see
you, and to be the godmother of your first child. I must, please, have
Macumer for godfather. To take part in a ceremony of the Church with
another as my partner would be hateful to me. Ah! if you could see the
look he gave me as I said this, you would know what store this sweetest
of lovers sets on his wife!
"I am the more bent on our visiting La Crampade together, Felipe," I
went on, "because I might have a child there. I too, you know, would be
a mother!... And yet, can you fancy me torn in two between you and
the infant? To begin with, if I saw any creature--were it even my
own son--taking my place in your heart, I couldn't answer for the
consequences. Medea may have been right after all. The Greeks had some
good notions!"
And he laughed.
So, my sweetheart, you have the fruit without the flowers; I the flowers
without the fruit. The contrast in our lives still holds good. Between
the two of us we have surely enough philosophy to find the moral of it
some day. Bah! only ten months married! Too soon, you will admit, to
give up hope.
We are leading a gay, yet far from empty life, as is the way with happy
people. The days are never long enough for us. Society, seeing me in
the trappings of a married woman, pronounces the Baronne de Macumer
much prettier than Louise de Chaulieu: a happy love is a most becoming
cosmetic. When Felipe and I drive along the Champs-Elysees in the
bright sunshine of a crisp January day, beneath the trees, frosted with
clusters of white stars, and face all Paris on the spot where last year
we met with a gulf between us, the contrast calls up a thousand fancies.
Suppose, after all, your last letter should be right in its forecast,
and we are too presumptuous!
If I am ignorant of a mother's joys, you shall tell me about them; I
will learn by sympathy. But my imagination can picture nothing to equal
the rapture of love. You will laugh at my extravagance; but, I assure
you, that a dozen times in as many months the longing has seized me to
die at thirty, while life was still untarnished, amidst the roses of
love, in the embrace of passion. To bid farewell to the feast at its
brightest, before disappointment has come, having lived in this sunshine
and celestial air, and well-nigh spent myself in love, not a leaf
dropped from my crown, not an illusion perished in my heart, what a
dream is there! Think what it would be to bear about a young heart in an
aged body, to see only cold, dumb faces around me, where even strangers
used to smile; to be a worthy matron! Can Hell have a worse torture?
On this very subject, in fact, Felipe and I have had our first quarrel.
I contended that he ought to have sufficient moral strength to kill me
in my sleep when I have reached thirty, so that I might pass from one
dream to another. The wretch declined. I threatened to leave him alone
in the world, and, poor child, he turned white as a sheet. My dear,
this distinguished statesman is neither more nor less than a baby. It is
incredible what youth and simplicity he contrived to hide away. Now that
I allow myself to think aloud with him, as I do with you, and have no
secrets from him, we are always giving each other surprises.
Dear Renee, Felipe and Louise, the pair of lovers, want to send a
present to the young mother. We would like to get something that would
give you pleasure, and we don't share the popular taste for surprises;
so tell me quite frankly, please, what you would like. It ought to be
something which would recall us to you in a pleasant way, something
which you will use every day, and which won't wear out with use. The
meal which with us is most cheerful and friendly is lunch, and therefore
the idea occurred to me of a special luncheon service, ornamented with
figures of babies. If you approve of this, let me know at once; for it
will have to be ordered immediately if we are to bring it. Paris artists
are gentlemen of far too much importance to be hurried. This will be my
offering to Lucina.
Farewell, dear nursing mother. May all a mother's delights be yours! I
await with impatience your first letter, which will tell me all about
it, I hope. Some of the details in your husband's letter went to my
heart. Poor Renee, a mother has a heavy price to pay. I will tell my
godson how dearly he must love you. No end of love, my sweet one.