“How she would have loved!”
In truth, her tones, her looks gave to her words a priceless value.
Monsieur Martener corresponded with Doctor Bianchon, and did nothing of
importance without his advice. He hoped in the first place to regular
the functions of nature and to draw away the abscess in the head through
the ear. The more Pierrette suffered, the more he hoped. He gained some
slight success at times, and that was a great triumph. For several days
Pierrette’s appetite returned and enabled her to take nourishing food
for which her illness had given her a repugnance; the color of her skin
changed; but the condition of her head was terrible. Monsieur Martener
entreated the great physician his adviser to come down. Bianchon came,
stayed two days, and resolved to undertake an operation. To spare the
feelings of poor Martener he went to Paris and brought back with him the
celebrated Desplein. Thus the operation was performed by the greatest
surgeon of ancient or modern times; but that terrible diviner said to
Martener as he departed with Bianchon, his best-loved pupil:--
“Nothing but a miracle can save her. As Horace told you, caries of the
bone has begun. At her age the bones are so tender.”
The operation was performed at the beginning of March, 1828. During
all that month, distressed by Pierrette’s horrible sufferings, Monsieur
Martener made several journeys to Paris; there he consulted Desplein and
Bianchon, and even went so far as to propose to them an operation of the
nature of lithotrity, which consists in passing into the head a hollow
instrument by the help of which an heroic remedy can be applied to
the diseased bone, to arrest the progress of the caries. Even the bold
Desplein dared not attempt that high-handed surgical measure, which
despair alone had suggested to Martener. When he returned home from
Paris he seemed to his friends morose and gloomy. He was forced to
announce on that fatal evening to the Auffrays and Madame Lorrain and to
the two priests and Brigaut that science could do no more for Pierrette,
whose recovery was now in God’s hands only. The consternation among them
was terrible. The grandmother made a vow, and requested the priests to
say a mass every morning at daybreak before Pierrette rose,--a mass at
which she and Brigaut might be present.
The trial came on. While the victim lay dying, Vinet was calumniating
her in court. The judge approved and accepted the report of the Family
Council, and Vinet instantly appealed. The newly appointed _procureur
du roi_ made a requisition which necessitated fresh evidence. Rogron and
his sister were forced to give bail to avoid going to prison. The order
for fresh evidence included that of Pierrette herself. When Monsieur
Desfondrilles came to the Auffrays’ to receive it, Pierrette was dying,
her confessor was at her bedside about to administer extreme unction.
At that moment she entreated all present to forgive her cousins as
she herself forgave them, saying with her simple good sense that the
judgment of these things belonged to God alone.
“Grandmother,” she said, “leave all you have to Brigaut” (Brigaut burst
into tears); “and,” continued Pierrette, “give a thousand francs to that
kind Adele who warmed my bed. If Adele had remained with my cousins I
should not now be dying.”
It was at three o’clock on the Tuesday of Easter week, on a beautiful,
bright day, that the angel ceased to suffer. Her heroic grandmother
wished to watch all that night with the priests, and to sew with her
stiff old fingers her darling’s shroud. Towards evening Brigaut left the
Auffray’s house and went to Frappier’s.
“I need not ask you, my poor boy, for news,” said the cabinet-maker.
“Pere Frappier, yes, it is ended for her--but not for me.”
He cast a look upon the different woods piled up around the shop,--a
look of painful meaning.
“I understand you, Brigaut,” said his worthy master. “Take all you
want.” And he showed him the oaken planks of two-inch thickness.
“Don’t help me, Monsieur Frappier,” said the Breton, “I wish to do it
alone.”
He passed the night in planing and fitting Pierrette’s coffin, and more
than once his plane took off at a single pass a ribbon of wood which was
wet with tears. The good man Frappier smoked his pipe and watched him
silently, saying only, when the four pieces were joined together,--
“Make the cover to slide; her poor grandmother will not hear the nails.”
At daybreak Brigaut went out to fetch the lead to line the coffin. By
a strange chance, the sheets of lead cost just the sum he had given
Pierrette for her journey from Nantes to Provins. The brave Breton, who
was able to resist the awful pain of himself making the coffin of his
dear one and lining with his memories those burial planks, could not
bear up against this strange reminder. His strength gave way; he was not
able to lift the lead, and the plumber, seeing this, came with him, and
offered to accompany him to the house and solder the last sheet when the
body had been laid in the coffin.
The Breton burned the plane and all the tools he had used. Then he
settled his accounts with Frappier and bade him farewell. The heroism
with which the poor lad personally performed, like the grandmother, the
last offices for Pierrette made him a sharer in the awful scene which
crowned the tyranny of the Rogrons.
Brigaut and the plumber reached the house of Monsieur Auffray just in
time to decide by their own main force an infamous and shocking judicial
question. The room where the dead girl lay was full of people, and
presented to the eyes of the two men a singular sight. The Rogron
emissaries were standing beside the body of their victim, to torture her
even after death. The corpse of the child, solemn in its beauty, lay on
the cot-bed of her grandmother. Pierrette’s eyes were closed, the brown
hair smoothed upon her brow, the body swathed in a coarse cotton sheet.
Before the bed, on her knees, her hair in disorder, her hands stretched
out, her face on fire, the old Lorrain was crying out, “No, no, it shall
not be done!”
At the foot of the bed stood Monsieur Auffray and the two priests. The
tapers were still burning.
Opposite to the grandmother was the surgeon of the hospital, with an
assistant, and near him stood Doctor Neraud and Vinet. The surgeon wore
his dissecting apron; the assistant had opened a case of instruments and
was handing him a knife.
This scene was interrupted by the noise of the coffin which Brigaut
and the plumber set down upon the floor. Then Brigaut, advancing, was
horrified at the sight of Madame Lorrain, who was now weeping.
“What is the matter?” he asked, standing beside her and grasping the
chisel convulsively in his hand.
“This,” said the old woman, “_this_, Brigaut: they want to open the body
of my child and cut into her head, and stab her heart after her death as
they did when she was living.”
“Who?” said Brigaut, in a voice that might have deafened the men of law.
“The Rogrons.”
“In the sacred name of God!--”
“Stop, Brigaut,” said Monsieur Auffray, seeing the lad brandish his
chisel.
“Monsieur Auffray,” said Brigaut, as white as his dead companion, “I
hear you because you are Monsieur Auffray, but at this moment I will not
listen to--”
“The law!” said Auffray.
“Is there law? is there justice?” cried the Breton. “Justice, this is
it!” and he advanced to the lawyer and the doctors, threatening them
with his chisel.
“My friend,” said the curate, “the law has been invoked by the lawyer of
Monsieur Rogron, who is under the weight of a serious accusation; and
it is impossible for us to refuse him the means of justification. The
lawyer of Monsieur Rogron claims that if the poor child died of an
abscess in her head her former guardian cannot be blamed, for it is
proved that Pierrette concealed the effects of the blow which she gave
to herself--”
“Enough!” said Brigaut.
“My client--” began Vinet.
“Your client,” cried the Breton, “shall go to hell and I to the
scaffold; for if one of you dares to touch her whom your client has
killed, I will kill him if my weapon does its duty.”
“This is interference with the law,” said Vinet. “I shall instantly
inform the court.”
The five men left the room.
“Oh, my son!” cried the old woman, rising from her knees and falling on
Brigaut’s neck, “let us bury her quick,--they will come back.”
“If we solder the lead,” said the plumber, “they may not dare to open
it.”
Monsieur Auffray hastened to his brother-in-law, Monsieur Lesourd, to
try and settle the matter. Vinet was not unwilling. Pierrette being dead
the suit about the guardianship fell, of course, to the ground. All the
astute lawyer wanted was the effect produced by his request.
At midday Monsieur Desfondrilles made his report on the case, and the
court rendered a decision that there was no ground for further action.
Rogron dared not go to Pierrette’s funeral, at which the whole town
was present. Vinet wished to force him there, but the miserable man was
afraid of exciting universal horror.
Brigaut left Provins after watching the filling up of the grave where
Pierrette lay, and went on foot to Paris. He wrote a petition to the
Dauphiness asking, in the name of his father, that he might enter the
Royal guard, to which he was at once admitted. When the expedition to
Algiers was undertaken he wrote to her again, to obtain employment in
it. He was then a sergeant; Marshal Bourmont gave him an appointment as
sub-lieutenant in a line regiment. The major’s son behaved like a man
who wished to die. Death has, however, respected Jacques Brigaut up
to the present time; although he has distinguished himself in all the
recent expeditions he has never yet been wounded. He is now major in a
regiment of infantry. No officer is more taciturn or more trustworthy.
Outside of his duty he is almost mute; he walks alone and lives
mechanically. Every one divines and respects a hidden sorrow. He
possesses forty-six thousand francs, which old Madame Lorrain, who died
in Paris in 1829, bequeathed to him.
At the elections of 1830 Vinet was made a deputy. The services he
rendered the new government have now earned him the position of
_procureur-general_. His influence is such that he will always remain a
deputy. Rogron is receiver-general in the same town where Vinet fulfils
his legal functions; and by one of those curious tricks of chance which
do so often occur, Monsieur Tiphaine is president of the Royal court in
the same town,--for the worthy man gave in his adhesion to the dynasty
of July without the slightest hesitation. The ex-beautiful Madame
Tiphaine lives on excellent terms with the beautiful Madame Rogron.
Vinet is hand in glove with Madame Tiphaine.
As to the imbecile Rogron, he makes such remarks as, “Louis-Philippe
will never be really king till he is able to make nobles.”
The speech is evidently not his own. His health is failing, which
allows Madame Rogron to hope she may soon marry the General Marquis de
Montriveau, peer of France, who commands the department, and is paying
her attentions. Vinet is in his element, seeking victims; he never
believes in the innocence of an accused person. This thoroughbred
prosecutor is held to be one of the most amiable men on the circuit;
and he is no less liked in Paris and in the Chamber; at court he is a
charming courtier.
According to a certain promise made by Vinet, General Baron Gouraud,
that noble relic of our glorious armies, married a Mademoiselle Matifat,
twenty-five years old, daughter of a druggist in the rue des Lombards,
whose dowry was a hundred thousand francs. He commands (as Vinet
prophesied) a department in the neighborhood of Paris. He was named
peer of France for his conduct in the riots which occurred during the
ministry of Casimir Perier. Baron Gouraud was one of the generals
who took the church of Saint-Merry, delighted to rap those rascally
civilians who had vexed him for years over the knuckles; for which
service he was rewarded with the grand cordon of the Legion of honor.
None of the personages connected with Pierrette’s death ever felt
the slightest remorse about it. Monsieur Desfondrilles is still
archaeological, but, in order to compass his own election, the
_procureur general_ Vinet took pains to have him appointed president of
the Provins court. Sylvie has a little circle, and manages her brother’s
property; she lends her own money at high interest, and does not spend
more than twelve hundred francs a year.
From time to time, when some former son or daughter of Provins returns
from Paris to settle down, you may hear them ask, as they leave
Mademoiselle Rogron’s house, “Wasn’t there a painful story against the
Rogrons,--something about a ward?”
“Mere prejudice,” replies Monsieur Desfondrilles. “Certain persons tried
to make us believe falsehoods. Out of kindness of heart the Rogrons took
in a girl named Pierrette, quite pretty but with no money. Just as she
was growing up she had an intrigue with a young man, and stood at her
window barefooted talking to him. The lovers passed notes to each other
by a string. She took cold in this way and died, having no constitution.
The Rogrons behaved admirably. They made no claim on certain property
which was to come to her,--they gave it all up to the grandmother. The
moral of it was, my good friend, that the devil punishes those who try
to benefit others.”
“Ah! that is quite another story from the one old Frappier told me.”
“Frappier consults his wine-cellar more than he does his memory,”
remarked another of Mademoiselle Rogron’s visitors.
“But that old priest, Monsieur Habert says--”
“Oh, he! don’t you know why?”
“No.”
“He wanted to marry his sister to Monsieur Rogron, the
receiver-general.”
* * * * *
Two men think of Pierrette daily: Doctor Martener and Major Brigaut;
they alone know the hideous truth.
To give that truth its true proportions we must transport the scene to
the Rome of the middle ages, where a sublime young girl, Beatrice Cenci,
was brought to the scaffold by motives and intrigues that were almost
identical with those which laid our Pierrette in her grave. Beatrice
Cenci had but one defender,--an artist, a painter. In our day history,
and living men, on the faith of Guido Reni’s portrait, condemn the Pope,
and know that Beatrice was a most tender victim of infamous passions and
base feuds.
We must all agree that legality would be a fine thing for social
scoundrelism IF THERE WERE NO GOD.