DOMESTIC PEACE
By Honore De Balzac
Translated By Ellen Marriage and Clara Bell
Dedicated to my dear niece Valentine Surville.
DOMESTIC PEACE
The incident recorded in this sketch took place towards the end of the
month of November, 1809, the moment when Napoleon’s fugitive empire
attained the apogee of its splendor. The trumpet-blasts of Wagram were
still sounding an echo in the heart of the Austrian monarchy. Peace was
being signed between France and the Coalition. Kings and princes came to
perform their orbits, like stars, round Napoleon, who gave himself the
pleasure of dragging all Europe in his train--a magnificent
experiment in the power he afterwards displayed at Dresden. Never, as
contemporaries tell us, did Paris see entertainments more superb than
those which preceded and followed the sovereign’s marriage with an
Austrian archduchess. Never, in the most splendid days of the Monarchy,
had so many crowned heads thronged the shores of the Seine, never
had the French aristocracy been so rich or so splendid. The diamonds
lavishly scattered over the women’s dresses, and the gold and silver
embroidery on the uniforms contrasted so strongly with the penury of the
Republic, that the wealth of the globe seemed to be rolling through the
drawing-rooms of Paris. Intoxication seemed to have turned the brains
of this Empire of a day. All the military, not excepting their chief,
reveled like parvenus in the treasure conquered for them by a million
men with worsted epaulettes, whose demands were satisfied by a few yards
of red ribbon.
At this time most women affected that lightness of conduct and facility
of morals which distinguished the reign of Louis XV. Whether it were in
imitation of the tone of the fallen monarchy, or because certain members
of the Imperial family had set the example--as certain malcontents of
the Faubourg Saint-Germain chose to say--it is certain that men and
women alike flung themselves into a life of pleasure with an intrepidity
which seemed to forbode the end of the world. But there was at that
time another cause for such license. The infatuation of women for the
military became a frenzy, and was too consonant to the Emperor’s views
for him to try to check it. The frequent calls to arms, which gave every
treaty concluded between Napoleon and the rest of Europe the character
of an armistice, left every passion open to a termination as sudden as
the decisions of the Commander-in-chief of all these busbys, pelisses,
and aiguillettes, which so fascinated the fair sex. Hearts were as
nomadic as the regiments. Between the first and fifth bulletins from the
_Grand Armee_ a woman might be in succession mistress, wife, mother, and
widow.
Was it the prospect of early widowhood, the hope of a jointure, or
that of bearing a name promised to history, which made the soldiers so
attractive? Were women drawn to them by the certainty that the secret
of their passions would be buried on the field of battle? or may we find
the reason of this gentle fanaticism in the noble charm that courage has
for a woman? Perhaps all these reasons, which the future historian
of the manners of the Empire will no doubt amuse himself by weighing,
counted for something in their facile readiness to abandon themselves
to love intrigues. Be that as it may, it must here be confessed that at
that time laurels hid many errors, women showed an ardent preference for
the brave adventurers, whom they regarded as the true fount of honor,
wealth, or pleasure; and in the eyes of young girls, an epaulette--the
hieroglyphic of a future--signified happiness and liberty.
One feature, and a characteristic one, of this unique period in our
history was an unbridled mania for everything glittering. Never were
fireworks so much in vogue, never were diamonds so highly prized. The
men, as greedy as the women of these translucent pebbles, displayed them
no less lavishly. Possibly the necessity for carrying plunder in the
most portable form made gems the fashion in the army. A man was not
ridiculous then, as he would be now, if his shirt-frill or his fingers
blazed with large diamonds. Murat, an Oriental by nature, set the
example of preposterous luxury to modern soldiers.
The Comte de Gondreville, formerly known as Citizen Malin, whose
elevation had made him famous, having become a Lucullus of the
Conservative Senate, which “conserved” nothing, had postponed an
entertainment in honor of the peace only that he might the better pay
his court to Napoleon by his efforts to eclipse those flatterers who had
been before-hand with him. The ambassadors from all the Powers
friendly with France, with an eye to favors to come, the most important
personages of the Empire, and even a few princes, were at this hour
assembled in the wealthy senator’s drawing-rooms. Dancing flagged; every
one was watching for the Emperor, whose presence the Count had promised
his guests. And Napoleon would have kept his word but for the scene
which had broken out that very evening between him and Josephine--the
scene which portended the impending divorce of the august pair. The
report of this incident, at the time kept very secret, but recorded by
history, did not reach the ears of the courtiers, and had no effect on
the gaiety of Comte de Gondreville’s party beyond keeping Napoleon away.
The prettiest women in Paris, eager to be at the Count’s on the strength
of mere hearsay, at this moment were a besieging force of luxury,
coquettishness, elegance, and beauty. The financial world, proud of its
riches, challenged the splendor of the generals and high officials of
the Empire, so recently gorged with orders, titles, and honors. These
grand balls were always an opportunity seized upon by wealthy families
for introducing their heiresses to Napoleon’s Praetorian Guard, in the
foolish hope of exchanging their splendid fortunes for uncertain favors.
The women who believed themselves strong enough in their beauty alone
came to test their power. There, as elsewhere, amusement was but a
blind. Calm and smiling faces and placid brows covered sordid interests,
expressions of friendship were a lie, and more than one man was less
distrustful of his enemies than of his friends.
These remarks are necessary to explain the incidents of the little
imbroglio which is the subject of this study, and the picture, softened
as it is, of the tone then dominant in Paris drawing-rooms.
“Turn your eyes a little towards the pedestal supporting that
candelabrum--do you see a young lady with her hair drawn back _a la
Chinoise_!--There, in the corner to the left; she has bluebells in the
knot of chestnut curls which fall in clusters on her head. Do not you
see her? She is so pale you might fancy she was ill, delicate-looking,
and very small; there--now she is turning her head this way; her
almond-shaped blue eyes, so delightfully soft, look as if they were made
expressly for tears. Look, look! She is bending forward to see Madame
de Vaudremont below the crowd of heads in constant motion; the high
head-dresses prevent her having a clear view.”
“I see her now, my dear fellow. You had only to say that she had the
whitest skin of all the women here; I should have known whom you meant.
I had noticed her before; she has the loveliest complexion I ever
admired. From hence I defy you to see against her throat the pearls
between the sapphires of her necklace. But she is a prude or a coquette,
for the tucker of her bodice scarcely lets one suspect the beauty of her
bust. What shoulders! what lily-whiteness!”
“Who is she?” asked the first speaker.
“Ah! that I do not know.”
“Aristocrat!--Do you want to keep them all to yourself, Montcornet?”
“You of all men to banter me!” replied Montcornet, with a smile. “Do you
think you have a right to insult a poor general like me because, being
a happy rival of Soulanges, you cannot even turn on your heel without
alarming Madame de Vaudremont? Or is it because I came only a month ago
into the Promised Land? How insolent you can be, you men in office,
who sit glued to your chairs while we are dodging shot and shell! Come,
Monsieur le Maitre des Requetes, allow us to glean in the field of which
you can only have precarious possession from the moment when we evacuate
it. The deuce is in it! We have a right to live! My good friend, if you
knew the German women, you would, I believe, do me a good turn with the
Parisian you love best.”
“Well, General, since you have vouchsafed to turn your attention to that
lady, whom I never saw till now, have the charity to tell me if you have
seen her dance.”
“Why, my dear Martial, where have you dropped from? If you are ever sent
with an embassy, I have small hopes of your success. Do not you see a
triple rank of the most undaunted coquettes of Paris between her and the
swarm of dancing men that buzz under the chandelier? And was it not only
by the help of your eyeglass that you were able to discover her at all
in the corner by that pillar, where she seems buried in the gloom, in
spite of the candles blazing above her head? Between her and us there is
such a sparkle of diamonds and glances, so many floating plumes, such a
flutter of lace, of flowers and curls, that it would be a real miracle
if any dancer could detect her among those stars. Why, Martial, how is
it that you have not understood her to be the wife of some sous-prefet
from Lippe or Dyle, who has come to try to get her husband promoted?”
“Oh, he will be!” exclaimed the Master of Appeals quickly.
“I doubt it,” replied the Colonel of Cuirassiers, laughing. “She seems
as raw in intrigue as you are in diplomacy. I dare bet, Martial, that
you do not know how she got into that place.”
The lawyer looked at the Colonel of Cuirassiers with an expression as
much of contempt as of curiosity.
“Well,” proceeded Montcornet, “she arrived, I have no doubt, punctually
at nine, the first of the company perhaps, and probably she greatly
embarrassed the Comtesse de Gondreville, who cannot put two ideas
together. Repulsed by the mistress of the house, routed from chair to
chair by each newcomer, and driven into the darkness of this little
corner, she allowed herself to be walled in, the victim of the jealousy
of the other ladies, who would gladly have buried that dangerous beauty.
She had, of course, no friend to encourage her to maintain the place she
first held in the front rank; then each of those treacherous fair ones
would have enjoined on the men of her circle on no account to take out
our poor friend, under pain of the severest punishment. That, my dear
fellow, is the way in which those sweet faces, in appearance so tender
and so artless, would have formed a coalition against the stranger, and
that without a word beyond the question, ‘Tell me, dear, do you know
that little woman in blue?’--Look here, Martial, if you care to run the
gauntlet of more flattering glances and inviting questions than you will
ever again meet in the whole of your life, just try to get through the
triple rampart which defends that Queen of Dyle, or Lippe, or Charente.
You will see whether the dullest woman of them all will not be equal
to inventing some wile that would hinder the most determined man from
bringing the plaintive stranger to the light. Does it not strike you
that she looks like an elegy?”
“Do you think so, Montcornet? Then she must be a married woman?”
“Why not a widow?”
“She would be less passive,” said the lawyer, laughing.
“She is perhaps the widow of a man who is gambling,” replied the
handsome Colonel.
“To be sure; since the peace there are so many widows of that class!”
said Martial. “But my dear Montcornet, we are a couple of simpletons.
That face is still too ingenuous, there is too much youth and
freshness on the brow and temples for her to be married. What splendid
flesh-tints! Nothing has sunk in the modeling of the nose. Lips, chin,
everything in her face is as fresh as a white rosebud, though the
expression is veiled, as it were, by the clouds of sadness. Who can it
be that makes that young creature weep?”
“Women cry for so little,” said the Colonel.
“I do not know,” replied Martial; “but she does not cry because she is
left there without a partner; her grief is not of to-day. It is evident
that she has beautified herself for this evening with intention. I would
wager that she is in love already.”
“Bah! She is perhaps the daughter of some German princeling; no one
talks to her,” said Montcornet.
“Dear! how unhappy a poor child may be!” Martial went on. “Can there be
anything more graceful and refined than our little stranger? Well, not
one of those furies who stand round her, and who believe that they can
feel, will say a word to her. If she would but speak, we should see if
she has fine teeth.
“Bless me, you boil over like milk at the least increase of
temperature!” cried the Colonel, a little nettled at so soon finding a
rival in his friend.
“What!” exclaimed the lawyer, without heeding the Colonel’s question.
“Can nobody here tell us the name of this exotic flower?”
“Some lady companion!” said Montcornet.
“What next? A companion! wearing sapphires fit for a queen, and a dress
of Malines lace? Tell that to the marines, General. You, too, would not
shine in diplomacy if, in the course of your conjectures, you jump in a
breath from a German princess to a lady companion.”
Montcornet stopped a man by taking his arm--a fat little man, whose
iron-gray hair and clever eyes were to be seen at the lintel of every
doorway, and who mingled unceremoniously with the various groups which
welcomed him respectfully.
“Gondreville, my friend,” said Montcornet, “who is that quite charming
little woman sitting out there under that huge candelabrum?”
“The candelabrum? Ravrio’s work; Isabey made the design.”
“Oh, I recognized your lavishness and taste; but the lady?”
“Ah! I do not know. Some friend of my wife’s, no doubt.”
“Or your mistress, you old rascal.”
“No, on my honor. The Comtesse de Gondreville is the only person capable
of inviting people whom no one knows.”
In spite of this very acrimonious comment, the fat little man’s lips did
not lose the smile which the Colonel’s suggestion had brought to them.
Montcornet returned to the lawyer, who had rejoined a neighboring group,
intent on asking, but in vain, for information as to the fair unknown.
He grasped Martial’s arm, and said in his ear:
“My dear Martial, mind what you are about. Madame de Vaudremont has been
watching you for some minutes with ominous attentiveness; she is a woman
who can guess by the mere movement of your lips what you say to me;
our eyes have already told her too much; she has perceived and followed
their direction, and I suspect that at this moment she is thinking even
more than we are of the little blue lady.”
“That is too old a trick in warfare, my dear Montcornet! However, what
do I care? Like the Emperor, when I have made a conquest, I keep it.”
“Martial, your fatuity cries out for a lesson. What! you, a civilian,
and so lucky as to be the husband-designate of Madame de Vaudremont, a
widow of two-and-twenty, burdened with four thousand napoleons a year--a
woman who slips such a diamond as this on your finger,” he added, taking
the lawyer’s left hand, which the young man complacently allowed; “and,
to crown all, you affect the Lovelace, just as if you were a colonel and
obliged to keep up the reputation of the military in home quarters! Fie,
fie! Only think of all you may lose.”
“At any rate, I shall not lose my liberty,” replied Martial, with a
forced laugh.
He cast a passionate glance at Madame de Vaudremont, who responded only
by a smile of some uneasiness, for she had seen the Colonel examining
the lawyer’s ring.
“Listen to me, Martial. If you flutter round my young stranger, I shall
set to work to win Madame de Vaudremont.”
“You have my full permission, my dear Cuirassier, but you will not
gain this much,” and the young Maitre des Requetes put his polished
thumb-nail under an upper tooth with a little mocking click.
“Remember that I am unmarried,” said the Colonel; “that my sword is my
whole fortune; and that such a challenge is setting Tantalus down to a
banquet which he will devour.”
“Prrr.”
This defiant roll of consonants was the only reply to the Colonel’s
declaration, as Martial looked him from head to foot before turning
away.
The fashion of the time required men to wear at a ball white kerseymere
breeches and silk stockings. This pretty costume showed to great
advantage the perfection of Montcornet’s fine shape. He was
five-and-thirty, and attracted attention by his stalwart height,
insisted on for the Cuirassiers of the Imperial Guard whose handsome
uniform enhanced the dignity of his figure, still youthful in spite
of the stoutness occasioned by living on horseback. A black moustache
emphasized the frank expression of a thoroughly soldierly countenance,
with a broad, high forehead, an aquiline nose, and bright red lips.
Montcornet’s manner, stamped with a certain superiority due to the habit
of command, might please a woman sensible enough not to aim at making a
slave of her husband. The Colonel smiled as he looked at the lawyer, one
of his favorite college friends, whose small figure made it necessary
for Montcornet to look down a little as he answered his raillery with a
friendly glance.
Baron Martial de la Roche-Hugon was a young Provencal patronized by
Napoleon; his fate might probably be some splendid embassy. He had
won the Emperor by his Italian suppleness and a genius for intrigue, a
drawing-room eloquence, and a knowledge of manners, which are so good a
substitute for the higher qualities of a sterling man. Through young
and eager, his face had already acquired the rigid brilliancy of tinned
iron, one of the indispensable characteristics of diplomatists, which
allows them to conceal their emotions and disguise their feelings,
unless, indeed, this impassibility indicates an absence of all emotion
and the death of every feeling. The heart of a diplomate may be regarded
as an insoluble problem, for the three most illustrious ambassadors of
the time have been distinguished by perdurable hatreds and most romantic
attachments.
Martial, however, was one of those men who are capable of reckoning on
the future in the midst of their intensest enjoyment; he had already
learned to judge the world, and hid his ambition under the fatuity of a
lady-killer, cloaking his talent under the commonplace of mediocrity
as soon as he observed the rapid advancement of those men who gave the
master little umbrage.
The two friends now had to part with a cordial grasp of hands. The
introductory tune, warning the ladies to form in squares for a fresh
quadrille, cleared the men away from the space they had filled while
talking in the middle of the large room. This hurried dialogue had taken
place during the usual interval between two dances, in front of the
fireplace of the great drawing-room of Gondreville’s mansion. The
questions and answers of this very ordinary ballroom gossip had been
almost whispered by each of the speakers into his neighbor’s ear. At the
same time, the chandeliers and the flambeaux on the chimney-shelf shed
such a flood of light on the two friends that their faces, strongly
illuminated, failed, in spite of their diplomatic discretion, to conceal
the faint expression of their feelings either from the keen-sighted
countess or the artless stranger. This espionage of people’s thoughts is
perhaps to idle persons one of the pleasures they find in society, while
numbers of disappointed numskulls are bored there without daring to own
it.
Fully to appreciate the interest of this conversation, it is necessary
to relate an incident which would presently serve as an invisible bond,
drawing together the actors in this little drama, who were at present
scattered through the rooms.
At about eleven o’clock, just as the dancers were returning to their
seats, the company had observed the entrance of the handsomest woman in
Paris, the queen of fashion, the only person wanting to the brilliant
assembly. She made it a rule never to appear till the moment when a
party had reached that pitch of excited movement which does not allow
the women to preserve much longer the freshness of their faces or of
their dress. This brief hour is, as it were, the springtime of a ball.
An hour after, when pleasure falls flat and fatigue is encroaching,
everything is spoilt. Madame de Vaudremont never committed the blunder
of remaining at a party to be seen with drooping flowers, hair out
of curl, tumbled frills, and a face like every other that sleep is
courting--not always without success. She took good care not to let her
beauty be seen drowsy, as her rivals did; she was so clever as to
keep up her reputation for smartness by always leaving a ballroom in
brilliant order, as she had entered it. Women whispered to each other
with a feeling of envy that she planned and wore as many different
dresses as the parties she went to in one evening.
On the present occasion Madame de Vaudremont was not destined to be free
to leave when she would the ballroom she had entered in triumph. Pausing
for a moment on the threshold, she shot swift but observant glances on
the women present, hastily scrutinizing their dresses to assure herself
that her own eclipsed them all.
The illustrious beauty presented herself to the admiration of the crowd
at the same moment with one of the bravest colonels of the Guards’
Artillery and the Emperor’s favorite, the Comte de Soulanges. The
transient and fortuitous association of these two had about it a certain
air of mystery. On hearing the names announced of Monsieur de Soulanges
and the Comtesse de Vaudremont, a few women sitting by the wall rose,
and men, hurrying in from the side-rooms, pressed forward to the
principal doorway. One of the jesters who are always to be found in any
large assembly said, as the Countess and her escort came in, that “women
had quite as much curiosity about seeing a man who was faithful to his
passion as men had in studying a woman who was difficult to enthrall.”
Though the Comte de Soulanges, a young man of about two-and-thirty, was
endowed with the nervous temperament which in a man gives rise to fine
qualities, his slender build and pale complexion were not at first sight
attractive; his black eyes betrayed great vivacity, but he was taciturn
in company, and there was nothing in his appearance to reveal the gift
for oratory which subsequently distinguished him, on the Right, in the
legislative assembly under the Restoration.
The Comtesse de Vaudremont, a tall woman, rather fat, with a skin of
dazzling whiteness, a small head that she carried well, and the immense
advantage of inspiring love by the graciousness of her manner, was one
of those beings who keep all the promise of their beauty.
The pair, who for a few minutes were the centre of general observation,
did not for long give curiosity an opportunity of exercising itself
about them. The Colonel and the Countess seemed perfectly to understand
that accident had placed them in an awkward position. Martial, as they
came forward, had hastened to join the group of men by the fireplace,
that he might watch Madame de Vaudremont with the jealous anxiety of
the first flame of passion, from behind the heads which formed a sort of
rampart; a secret voice seemed to warn him that the success on which he
prided himself might perhaps be precarious. But the coldly polite smile
with which the Countess thanked Monsieur de Soulanges, and her little
bow of dismissal as she sat down by Madame de Gondreville, relaxed the
muscles of his face which jealousy had made rigid. Seeing Soulanges,
however, still standing quite near the sofa on which Madame de
Vaudremont was seated, not apparently having understood the glance
by which the lady had conveyed to him that they were both playing a
ridiculous part, the volcanic Provencal again knit the black brows that
overshadowed his blue eyes, smoothed his chestnut curls to keep himself
in countenance, and without betraying the agitation which made his heart
beat, watched the faces of the Countess and of M. de Soulanges while
still chatting with his neighbors. He then took the hand of Colonel
Montcornet, who had just renewed their old acquaintance, but he listened
to him without hearing him; his mind was elsewhere.
Soulanges was gazing calmly at the women, sitting four ranks deep all
round the immense ballroom, admiring this dado of diamonds, rubies,
masses of gold and shining hair, of which the lustre almost outshone the
blaze of waxlights, the cutglass of the chandeliers, and the gilding.
His rival’s stolid indifference put the lawyer out of countenance. Quite
incapable of controlling his secret transports of impatience, Martial
went towards Madame de Vaudremont with a bow. On seeing the Provencal,
Soulanges gave him a covert glance, and impertinently turned away his
head. Solemn silence now reigned in the room, where curiosity was at
the highest pitch. All these eager faces wore the strangest mixed
expressions; every one apprehended one of those outbreaks which men of
breeding carefully avoid. Suddenly the Count’s pale face turned as red
as the scarlet facings of his coat, and he fixed his gaze on the floor
that the cause of his agitation might not be guessed. On catching sight
of the unknown lady humbly seated by the pedestal of the candelabrum,
he moved away with a melancholy air, passing in front of the lawyer, and
took refuge in one of the cardrooms. Martial and all the company thought
that Soulanges had publicly surrendered the post, out of fear of the
ridicule which invariably attaches to a discarded lover. The lawyer
proudly raised his head and looked at the strange lady; then, as he took
his seat at his ease near Madame de Vaudremont, he listened to her so
inattentively that he did not catch these words spoken behind her fan:
“Martial, you will oblige me this evening by not wearing that ring that
you snatched from me. I have my reasons, and will explain them to you
in a moment when we go away. You must give me your arm to go to the
Princess de Wagram’s.”
“Why did you come in with the Colonel?” asked the Baron.
“I met him in the hall,” she replied. “But leave me now; everybody is
looking at us.”
Martial returned to the Colonel of Cuirassiers. Then it was that the
little blue lady had become the object of the curiosity which agitated
in such various ways the Colonel, Soulanges, Martial, and Madame de
Vaudremont.
When the friends parted, after the challenge which closed their
conversation, the Baron flew to Madame de Vaudremont, and led her to
a place in the most brilliant quadrille. Favored by the sort of
intoxication which dancing always produces in a woman, and by the
turmoil of a ball, where men appear in all the trickery of dress,
which adds no less to their attractions than it does to those of women,
Martial thought he might yield with impunity to the charm that attracted
his gaze to the fair stranger. Though he succeeded in hiding his first
glances towards the lady in blue from the anxious activity of the
Countess’ eyes, he was ere long caught in the fact; and though he
managed to excuse himself once for his absence of mind, he could not
justify the unseemly silence with which he presently heard the most
insinuating question which a woman can put to a man:
“Do you like me very much this evening?”
And the more dreamy he became, the more the Countess pressed and teased
him.
While Martial was dancing, the Colonel moved from group to group,
seeking information about the unknown lady. After exhausting the
good-humor even of the most indifferent, he had resolved to take
advantage of a moment when the Comtesse de Gondreville seemed to be at
liberty, to ask her the name of the mysterious lady, when he perceived a
little space left clear between the pedestal of the candelabrum and the
two sofas, which ended in that corner. The dance had left several of the
chairs vacant, which formed rows of fortifications held by mothers or
women of middle age; and the Colonel seized the opportunity to make his
way through this palisade hung with shawls and wraps. He began by making
himself agreeable to the dowagers, and so from one to another, and from
compliment to compliment, he at last reached the empty space next the
stranger. At the risk of catching on to the gryphons and chimaeras of
the huge candelabrum, he stood there, braving the glare and dropping of
the wax candles, to Martial’s extreme annoyance.
The Colonel, far too tactful to speak suddenly to the little blue lady
on his right, began by saying to a plain woman who was seated on the
left:
“This is a splendid ball, madame! What luxury! What life! On my word,
every woman here is pretty! You are not dancing--because you do not care
for it, no doubt.”
This vapid conversation was solely intended to induce his right-hand
neighbor to speak; but she, silent and absent-minded, paid not the
least attention. The officer had in store a number of phrases which he
intended should lead up to: “And you, madame?”--a question from which he
hoped great things. But he was strangely surprised to see tears in the
strange lady’s eyes, which seemed wholly absorbed in gazing on Madame de
Vaudremont.
“You are married, no doubt, madame?” he asked her at length, in
hesitating tones.
“Yes, monsieur,” replied the lady.
“And your husband is here, of course?”
“Yes, monsieur.”
“And why, madame, do you remain in this spot? Is it to attract
attention?”
The mournful lady smiled sadly.
“Allow me the honor, madame, of being your partner in the next
quadrille, and I will take care not to bring you back here. I see a
vacant settee near the fire; come and take it. When so many people
are ready to ascend the throne, and Royalty is the mania of the day, I
cannot imagine that you will refuse the title of Queen of the Ball which
your beauty may claim.”
“I do not intend to dance, monsieur.”
The curt tone of the lady’s replies was so discouraging that the Colonel
found himself compelled to raise the siege. Martial, who guessed what
the officer’s last request had been, and the refusal he had met with,
began to smile, and stroked his chin, making the diamond sparkle which
he wore on his finger.
“What are you laughing at?” said the Comtesse de Vaudremont.
“At the failure of the poor Colonel, who has just put his foot in
it----”
“I begged you to take your ring off,” said the Countess, interrupting
him.
“I did not hear you.”
“If you can hear nothing this evening, at any rate you see everything,
Monsieur le Baron,” said Madame de Vaudremont, with an air of vexation.
“That young man is displaying a very fine diamond,” the stranger
remarked to the Colonel.
“Splendid,” he replied. “The man is the Baron Martial de la Roche-Hugon,
one of my most intimate friends.”
“I have to thank you for telling me his name,” she went on; “he seems an
agreeable man.”
“Yes, but he is rather fickle.”
“He seems to be on the best terms with the Comtesse de Vaudremont?” said
the lady, with an inquiring look at the Colonel.
“On the very best.”
The unknown turned pale.
“Hallo!” thought the soldier, “she is in love with that lucky devil
Martial.”
“I fancied that Madame de Vaudremont had long been devoted to M. de
Soulanges,” said the lady, recovering a little from the suppressed grief
which had clouded the fairness of her face.
“For a week past the Countess has been faithless,” replied the Colonel.
“But you must have seen poor Soulanges when he came in; he is till
trying to disbelieve in his disaster.”
“Yes, I saw him,” said the lady. Then she added, “Thank you very much,
monsieur,” in a tone which signified a dismissal.
At this moment the quadrille was coming to an end. Montcornet had only
time to withdraw, saying to himself by way of consolation, “She is
married.”
“Well, valiant Cuirassier,” exclaimed the Baron, drawing the Colonel
aside into a window-bay to breathe the fresh air from the garden, “how
are you getting on?”
“She is a married woman, my dear fellow.”
“What does that matter?”
“Oh, deuce take it! I am a decent sort of man,” replied the Colonel. “I
have no idea of paying my addresses to a woman I cannot marry. Besides,
Martial, she expressly told me that she did not intend to dance.”
“Colonel, I will bet a hundred napoleons to your gray horse that she
will dance with me this evening.”
“Done!” said the Colonel, putting his hand in the coxcomb’s. “Meanwhile
I am going to look for Soulanges; he perhaps knows the lady, as she
seems interested in him.”
“You have lost, my good fellow,” cried Martial, laughing. “My eyes
have met hers, and I know what they mean. My dear friend, you owe me no
grudge for dancing with her after she has refused you?”
“No, no. Those who laugh last, laugh longest. But I am an honest gambler
and a generous enemy, Martial, and I warn you, she is fond of diamonds.”
With these words the friends parted; General Montcornet made his way
to the cardroom, where he saw the Comte de Soulanges sitting at a
_bouillotte_ table. Though there was no friendship between the two
soldiers, beyond the superficial comradeship arising from the perils
of war and the duties of the service, the Colonel of Cuirassiers was
painfully struck by seeing the Colonel of Artillery, whom he knew to
be a prudent man, playing at a game which might bring him to ruin. The
heaps of gold and notes piled on the fateful cards showed the frenzy of
play. A circle of silent men stood round the players at the table. Now
and then a few words were spoken--_pass, play, I stop, a thousand Louis,
taken_--but, looking at the five motionless men, it seemed as though
they talked only with their eyes. As the Colonel, alarmed by Soulanges’
pallor, went up to him, the Count was winning. Field-Marshal the Duc
d’Isemberg, Keller, and a famous banker rose from the table completely
cleaned out of considerable sums. Soulanges looked gloomier than ever as
he swept up a quantity of gold and notes; he did not even count it; his
lips curled with bitter scorn, he seemed to defy fortune rather than be
grateful for her favors.
“Courage,” said the Colonel. “Courage, Soulanges!” Then, believing he
would do him a service by dragging him from play, he added: “Come with
me. I have some good news for you, but on one condition.”
“What is that?” asked Soulanges.
“That you will answer a question I will ask you.”
The Comte de Soulanges rose abruptly, placing his winnings with reckless
indifference in his handkerchief, which he had been twisting with
convulsive nervousness, and his expression was so savage that none of
the players took exception to his walking off with their money. Indeed,
every face seemed to dilate with relief when his morose and crabbed
countenance was no longer to be seen under the circle of light which a
shaded lamp casts on a gaming-table.
“Those fiends of soldiers are always as thick as thieves at a fair!”
said a diplomate who had been looking on, as he took Soulanges’ place.
One single pallid and fatigued face turned to the newcomer, and said
with a glance that flashed and died out like the sparkle of a diamond:
“When we say military men, we do not mean civil, Monsieur le Ministre.”
“My dear fellow,” said Montcornet to Soulanges, leading him into a
corner, “the Emperor spoke warmly in your praise this morning, and your
promotion to be field-marshal is a certainty.”
“The Master does not love the Artillery.”
“No, but he adores the nobility, and you are an aristocrat. The Master
said,” added Montcornet, “that the men who had married in Paris during
the campaign were not therefore to be considered in disgrace. Well
then?”
The Comte de Soulanges looked as if he understood nothing of this
speech.
“And now I hope,” the Colonel went on, “that you will tell me if
you know a charming little woman who is sitting under a huge
candelabrum----”
At these words the Count’s face lighted up; he violently seized the
Colonel’s hand: “My dear General,” said he, in a perceptibly altered
voice, “if any man but you had asked me such a question, I would have
cracked his skull with this mass of gold. Leave me, I entreat you.
I feel more like blowing out my brains this evening, I assure you,
than----I hate everything I see. And, in fact, I am going. This gaiety,
this music, these stupid faces, all laughing, are killing me!”
“My poor friend!” replied Montcornet gently, and giving the Count’s hand
a friendly pressure, “you are too vehement. What would you say if I told
you that Martial is thinking so little of Madame de Vaudremont that he
is quite smitten with that little lady?”
“If he says a word to her,” cried Soulanges, stammering with rage, “I
will thrash him as flat as his own portfolio, even if the coxcomb were
in the Emperor’s lap!”
And he sank quite overcome on an easy-chair to which Montcornet had led
him. The colonel slowly went away, for he perceived that Soulanges
was in a state of fury far too violent for the pleasantries or the
attentions of superficial friendship to soothe him.
When Montcornet returned to the ballroom, Madame de Vaudremont was the
first person on whom his eyes fell, and he observed on her face, usually
so calm, some symptoms of ill-disguised agitation. A chair was vacant
near hers, and the Colonel seated himself.
“I dare wager something has vexed you?” said he.
“A mere trifle, General. I want to be gone, for I have promised to go to
a ball at the Grand Duchess of Berg’s, and I must look in first at the
Princesse de Wagram’s. Monsieur de la Roche-Hugon, who knows this, is
amusing himself by flirting with the dowagers.”
“That is not the whole secret of your disturbance, and I will bet a
hundred louis that you will remain here the whole evening.”
“Impertinent man!”
“Then I have hit the truth?”
“Well, tell me, what am I thinking of?” said the Countess, tapping the
Colonel’s fingers with her fan. “I might even reward you if you guess
rightly.”
“I will not accept the challenge; I have too much the advantage of you.”
“You are presumptuous.”
“You are afraid of seeing Martial at the feet----”
“Of whom?” cried the Countess, affecting surprise.
“Of that candelabrum,” replied the Colonel, glancing at the fair
stranger, and then looking at the Countess with embarrassing scrutiny.
“You have guessed it,” replied the coquette, hiding her face behind her
fan, which she began to play with. “Old Madame de Lansac, who is, you
know, as malicious as an old monkey,” she went on, after a pause, “has
just told me that Monsieur de la Roche-Hugon is running into danger by
flirting with that stranger, who sits here this evening like a skeleton
at a feast. I would rather see a death’s head than that face, so cruelly
beautiful, and as pale as a ghost. She is my evil genius.--Madame de
Lansac,” she added, after a flash and gesture of annoyance, “who only
goes to a ball to watch everything while pretending to sleep, has made
me miserably anxious. Martial shall pay dearly for playing me such a
trick. Urge him, meanwhile, since he is your friend, not to make me so
unhappy.”
“I have just been with a man who promises to blow his brains out, and
nothing less, if he speaks to that little lady. And he is a man, madame,
to keep his word. But then I know Martial; such threats are to him
an encouragement. And, besides, we have wagered----” Here the Colonel
lowered his voice.
“Can it be true?” said the Countess.
“On my word of honor.”
“Thank you, my dear Colonel,” replied Madame de Vaudremont, with a
glance full of invitation.
“Will you do me the honor of dancing with me?”
“Yes; but the next quadrille. During this one I want to find out what
will come of this little intrigue, and to ascertain who the little blue
lady may be; she looks intelligent.”
The Colonel, understanding that Madame de Vaudremont wished to be alone,
retired, well content to have begun his attack so well.
At most entertainments women are to be met who are there, like Madame de
Lansac, as old sailors gather on the seashore to watch younger mariners
struggling with the tempest. At this moment Madame de Lansac, who seemed
to be interested in the personages of this drama, could easily guess
the agitation which the Countess was going through. The lady might fan
herself gracefully, smile on the young men who bowed to her, and bring
into play all the arts by which a woman hides her emotion,--the Dowager,
one of the most clear-sighted and mischief-loving duchesses bequeathed
by the eighteenth century to the nineteenth, could read her heart and
mind through it all.
The old lady seemed to detect the slightest movement that revealed the
impressions of the soul. The imperceptible frown that furrowed that
calm, pure forehead, the faintest quiver of the cheeks, the curve of the
eyebrows, the least curl of the lips, whose living coral could conceal
nothing from her,--all these were to the Duchess like the print of a
book. From the depths of her large arm-chair, completely filled by
the flow of her dress, the coquette of the past, while talking to a
diplomate who had sought her out to hear the anecdotes she told so
cleverly, was admiring herself in the younger coquette; she felt kindly
to her, seeing how bravely she disguised her annoyance and grief of
heart. Madame de Vaudremont, in fact, felt as much sorrow as she feigned
cheerfulness; she had believed that she had found in Martial a man of
talent on whose support she could count for adorning her life with all
the enchantment of power; and at this moment she perceived her mistake,
as injurious to her reputation as to her good opinion of herself. In
her, as in other women of that time, the suddenness of their passions
increased their vehemence. Souls which love much and love often, suffer
no less than those which burn themselves out in one affection. Her
liking for Martial was but of yesterday, it is true, but the least
experienced surgeon knows that the pain caused by the amputation of a
healthy limb is more acute than the removal of a diseased one. There was
a future before Madame de Vaudremont’s passion for Martial, while her
previous love had been hopeless, and poisoned by Soulanges’ remorse.
The old Duchess, who was watching for an opportunity of speaking to the
Countess, hastened to dismiss her Ambassador; for in comparison with a
lover’s quarrel every interest pales, even with an old woman. To engage
battle, Madame de Lansac shot at the younger lady a sardonic glance
which made the Countess fear lest her fate was in the dowager’s hands.
There are looks between woman and woman which are like the torches
brought on at the climax of a tragedy. No one who had not known
that Duchess could appreciate the terror which the expression of her
countenance inspired in the Countess.
Madame de Lansac was tall, and her features led people to say, “That
must have been a handsome woman!” She coated her cheeks so thickly with
rouge that the wrinkles were scarcely visible; but her eyes, far from
gaining a factitious brilliancy from this strong carmine, looked all
the more dim. She wore a vast quantity of diamonds, and dressed with
sufficient taste not to make herself ridiculous. Her sharp nose promised
epigram. A well-fitted set of teeth preserved a smile of such irony as
recalled that of Voltaire. At the same time, the exquisite politeness of
her manners so effectually softened the mischievous twist in her mind,
that it was impossible to accuse her of spitefulness.
The old woman’s eyes lighted up, and a triumphant glance, seconded by a
smile, which said, “I promised you as much!” shot across the room,
and brought a blush of hope to the pale cheeks of the young creature
languishing under the great chandelier. The alliance between Madame
de Lansac and the stranger could not escape the practised eye of the
Comtesse de Vaudremont, who scented a mystery, and was determined to
penetrate it.
At this instant the Baron de la Roche-Hugon, after questioning all the
dowagers without success as to the blue lady’s name, applied in
despair to the Comtesse de Gondreville, from whom he reached only this
unsatisfactory reply, “A lady whom the ‘ancient’ Duchesse de Lansac
introduced to me.”
Turning by chance towards the armchair occupied by the old lady, the
lawyer intercepted the glance of intelligence she sent to the stranger;
and although he had for some time been on bad terms with her, he
determined to speak to her. The “ancient” Duchess, seeing the jaunty
Baron prowling round her chair, smiled with sardonic irony, and looked
at Madame de Vaudremont with an expression that made Montcornet laugh.
“If the old witch affects to be friendly,” thought the Baron, “she is
certainly going to play me some spiteful trick.--Madame,” he said, “you
have, I am told, undertaken the charge of a very precious treasure.”
“Do you take me for a dragon?” said the old lady. “But of whom are you
speaking?” she added, with a sweetness which revived Martial’s hopes.
“Of that little lady, unknown to all, whom the jealousy of all these
coquettes has imprisoned in that corner. You, no doubt, know her
family?”
“Yes,” said the Duchess. “But what concern have you with a provincial
heiress, married some time since, a woman of good birth, whom you none
of you know, you men; she goes nowhere.”
“Why does not she dance, she is such a pretty creature?--May we conclude
a treaty of peace? If you will vouchsafe to tell me all I want to
know, I promise you that a petition for the restitution of the woods of
Navarreins by the Commissioners of Crown Lands shall be strongly urged
on the Emperor.”
The younger branch of the house of Navarreins bears quarterly with the
arms of Navarreins those of Lansac, namely, azure, and argent party per
pale raguly, between six spear-heads in pale, and the old lady’s liaison
with Louis XV. had earned her husband the title of duke by royal patent.
Now, as the Navarreins had not yet resettled in France, it was sheer
trickery that the young lawyer thus proposed to the old lady by
suggesting to her that she should petition for an estate belonging to
the elder branch of the family.
“Monsieur,” said the old woman with deceptive gravity, “bring the
Comtesse de Vaudremont across to me. I promise you that I will reveal
to her the mystery of the interesting unknown. You see, every man in
the room has reached as great a curiosity as your own. All eyes are
involuntarily turned towards the corner where my protegee has so
modestly placed herself; she is reaping all the homage the women wished
to deprive her of. Happy the man she chooses for her partner!” She
interrupted herself, fixing her eyes on Madame de Vaudremont with one of
those looks which plainly say, “We are talking of you.”--Then she added,
“I imagine you would rather learn the stranger’s name from the lips of
your handsome Countess than from mine.”
There was such marked defiance in the Duchess’ attitude that Madame de
Vaudremont rose, came up to her, and took the chair Martial placed for
her; then without noticing him she said, “I can guess, madame, that you
are talking of me; but I admit my want of perspicacity; I do not know
whether it is for good or evil.”
Madame de Lansac pressed the young woman’s pretty hand in her own dry
and wrinkled fingers, and answered in a low, compassionate tone, “Poor
child!”
The women looked at each other. Madame de Vaudremont understood that
Martial was in the way, and dismissed him, saying with an imperious
expression, “Leave us.”
The Baron, ill-pleased at seeing the Countess under the spell of the
dangerous sibyl who had drawn her to her side gave one of those looks
which a man can give--potent over a blinded heart, but simply ridiculous
in the eyes of a woman who is beginning to criticise the man who has
attracted her.
“Do you think you can play the Emperor?” said Madame de Vaudremont,
turning three-quarters of her face to fix an ironical sidelong gaze on
the lawyer.
Martial was too much a man of the world, and had too much wit and
acumen, to risk breaking with a woman who was in favor at Court, and
whom the Emperor wished to see married. He counted, too, on the jealousy
he intended to provoke in her as the surest means of discovering the
secret of her coolness, and withdrew all the more willingly, because at
this moment a new quadrille was putting everybody in motion.