THE MARRIAGE PROPOSAL
At sight of the horrible machine, which stood before her house,
Mademoiselle de Brumpt ordered all the windows in the front closed.
When Comte de Brumpt, leaving the prison without guards and on his own
parole, arrived within sight of his own house, he found it shut like a
sepulchre, with the scaffold before it. He asked himself what it meant
and whether he dared go forward. But this hesitation did not last long;
neither scaffold nor tomb could hold him back. He walked straight to the
door and knocked in his accustomed manner--two blows in quick
succession, and a third after a long interval.
Clotilde had retired with Madame Gerard, her companion, to a room in the
back of the house overlooking the garden. She was lying among the
sofa-cushions and weeping, so ominous did Schneider's answer to her
petition seem to her. When she heard the first two strokes of the
knocker she uttered a cry, at the third she sprang to her feet.
"My God!" she cried.
Madame Gerard turned pale.
"If your father were not a prisoner," she said, "I would swear that was
his knock."
Clotilde darted toward the stairs.
"That is his step," she murmured.
She heard a voice below, asking: "Clotilde, where are you?"
"My father! my father!" cried the young girl, rushing down the stairs.
The count was waiting for her below, and received her in his arms. "My
daughter! my daughter!" he murmured, "what does this mean?"
"I don't know myself."
"But what is the meaning of this scaffold before the house, and why are
all the windows closed?"
"Schneider had the scaffold put up there, and I ordered all the windows
closed; I shut them that I might not have to see you die."
"But it was Schneider who opened the door of my prison for me, and let
me go on my own recognizance, at the same time inviting himself to
dinner to-morrow."
"My father," said Clotilde, "perhaps I did wrong, but you must blame my
love for you. When you were arrested I hastened to Strasbourg and asked
for your release."
"Of Schneider?"
"Of Schneider."
"Poor child! And at what price did he grant it?"
"Papa, the price is yet to be agreed upon between us. Doubtless, he will
tell us the conditions to-morrow."
"We will wait for them."
Clotilde took her prayer-book and went to a little church so humble that
it had not been thought necessary to deprive the Lord of it. She prayed
there until evening.
The guillotine remained standing all night.
The next day at noon, Schneider presented himself at the Comte de
Brumpt's house.
In spite of the advanced season of the year the house was filled with
flowers. It would have seemed like a gala day, had not Clotilde's
mourning contradicted the impression, as the snow in the street
contradicted the spring within.
The count and his daughter receiyed Schneider. He had not taken the name
of Euloge for nothing. At the end of ten minutes Clotilde asked herself
if this could be the man who had received her so brutally at Strasbourg.
The count, reassured, left the room to attend to some arrangements.
Schneider offered his arm to the young girl, and led her to the window,
which he opened.
The guillotine stood opposite, gayly decked with flowers and ribbons.
"Take your choice," he said, "between a scaffold and the altar."
"What do you mean?" asked Clotilde, trembling.
"To-morrow you must either be my wife or the count must die."
Clotilde blanched to the color of the white cambric handkerchief which
she held in her hand.
"My father would prefer to die," she replied.
"And therefore I leave it to you to acquaint him with my request."
"You are right," said Clotilde, "that would be the only way."
Schneider closed the window and led Mademoiselle de Brumpt back to her
chair.
Clotilde drew a flask of salts from her pocket and held it to her nose.
By a supreme effort of the will, her face regained its usual calm
expression, although it was very sad, and the roses which had seemed to
fade from her cheeks forever, bloomed there anew. She had evidently made
up her mind.
The count returned. He was followed by a servant, who announced dinner.
A magnificent repast was served, messengers having been sent in the
night to Strasbourg to bring back the finest game and the rarest fish
that the market afforded.
The count, somewhat reassured, did the honors of his table to the
commissioner of the Republic, with all the delicacy of the old nobility.
They drank in turn the best wines of the Rhine, of Germany, and of
Hungary. The pale betrothed alone ate little, and from time to time
moistened her lips with a glass of water.
But at the end of the dinner she held out her glass to the count who,
much astonished, filled it with Tokay wine. Then she rose, and lifting
her glass, said: "To Euloge Schneider, the generous man to whom I owe my
father's life; happy and proud will be the woman whom he chooses for his
wife."
"Beautiful Clotilde," cried Schneider in delight, "have you not guessed
that that woman is yourself, and do I need to tell you that I love you?"
Clotilde gently touched her glass to his, and then went and knelt before
her father, who was overwhelmed with astonishment.
"Father," she said, "I beg you to give me for husband the kind man to
whom I owe your life, and I call Heaven to witness that I will not rise
until you have granted me that favor."
The count looked alternately at Schneider, whose face shone with joy,
and at Clotilde, whose brow reflected the light of martyrdom. He
understood that something was taking place so grand and sublime that he
had no right to oppose it.
"My daughter," he said, "you are mistress of your hand and fortune; do
as you will, for whatever you do will be well done."
Clotilde rose and held out her hand to Schneider. The latter seized it
eagerly, while Clotilde, with uplifted face, seemed to be seeking God,
and wondering that such infamies could take place beneath his holy gaze.
But when Schneider raised his head from her hand, her face had regained
the serenity that it had lost for a moment in that silent appeal to the
Almighty. Then, as Schneider begged her to name the day that should set
a seal to his happiness, she pressed his hand and said with a smile:
"Listen, Schneider; I beg of your tenderness one of those favors which a
man cannot refuse to his betrothed. Some pride mingles with my
happiness. It is not in Plobsheim, a poor village of Alsace, that the
first of our citizens should give his name to the woman whom he loves
and whom he has chosen. I desire that the people should recognize me for
Schneider's wife and not for his concubine. In every town you have been
accompanied by a mistress, and the mistake might easily be made. It is
only fifteen miles to Strasbourg. I must make some preparations for my
trousseau, for I wish it to be worthy of the bridegroom. To-morrow, at
any hour you like, we will go alone, or accompanied, before the
citizens, the generals, and the representatives."[1]
[1] I have not changed one word of this request, which I have copied
from Charles Nodier's "Souvenirs de la Révolution."
"I am willing," cried Schneider; "I will agree to anything that you
like, on one condition."
"What is it?"
"It is that we start to-day instead of to-morrow."
"Impossible," said Clotilde, growing pale. "It is now half-past one and
the gates of the city close at three."
"Then they shall be closed at four!" And summoning two of his hussars,
lest an accident befall one or the other on the road, he said: "Ride at
full speed to Strasbourg, and tell them not to shut the Kehl gate until
four o'clock. You will remain at the gate and see that my orders are
executed."
"All must be as you wish," said Clotilde, laying her hand in
Schneider's. "Certainly, papa, I have every prospect of being a happy
bride."