Developments
For eight days, Christiane wholly occupied herself with preparations
for this _fête_. The curé, indeed, was able to find no one among his
female parishioners except the Oriol girls who could be deemed worthy
of collecting along with the Marquis de Ravenel's daughter; and, happy
at having the opportunity of making himself prominent, he took all
the necessary steps, organized everything, regulated everything, and
himself invited the young girls, as if the idea had originated with him.
The inhabitants were in a state of excitement, and the gloomy bathers,
finding a new topic of conversation, entertained one another at the
_table d'hôte_ with various estimates as to the possible receipts from
the two portions of the _fête_, the sacred and the profane.
The day opened finely. It was admirable summer weather, warm and clear,
with bright sunshine in the open plain and a grateful shade under the
village trees. The mass was fixed for nine o'clock--a quick mass with
Church music. Christiane, who had arrived before the office, in order
to inspect the ornamentation of the church with garlands of flowers
that had been sent from Royat and Clermont-Ferrand, consented to walk
behind it. The curé, Abbé Litre, followed her accompanied by the Oriol
girls, and he introduced them to her. Christiane immediately invited
the young girls to luncheon. They accepted her invitation with blushes
and respectful bows.
The faithful were now making their appearance. Christiane and her girls
sat down on three chairs of honor reserved for them at the side of the
choir, facing three other chairs, which were occupied by young lads
dressed in their Sunday clothes, sons of the mayor, of the deputy, and
of a municipal councilor, selected to accompany the lady-collectors and
to flatter the local authorities. Everything passed off well.
The office was short. The collection realized one hundred and ten
francs, which, added to Andermatt's five hundred francs, the Marquis's
fifty francs, and a hundred francs contributed by Paul Bretigny, made a
total of seven hundred and sixty, an amount never before reached in the
parish of Enval. Then, after the conclusion of the ceremony, the Oriol
girls were brought to the hotel. They appeared to be a little abashed,
without any display of awkwardness, however, and scarcely uttered one
word, through modesty rather than through timidity. They sat down to
luncheon at the _table d'hôte_, and pleased the meal of all the men.
The elder the more serious of the pair, the younger the more sprightly,
the elder better bred, in the common-place acceptation of the word, the
younger more pleasant, they yet resembled one another as closely as two
sisters possibly could.
As soon as the meal was finished, they repaired to the Casino for the
lottery-drawing at the _tombola_, which was fixed for two o'clock.
The park, already invaded by the mixed crowd of bathers and peasants,
presented the aspect of an outlandish _fête_.
Under their Chinese _kiosque_ the musicians were executing a rural
symphony, a work composed by Saint Landri himself. Paul, who
accompanied Christiane, suddenly drew up:
"Look here!" said he, "that's pretty! He has some talent, that chap!
With an orchestra, he could produce a fine effect."
Then he asked: "Are you fond of music, Madame?"
"Exceedingly."
"As for me, it overwhelms me. When I am listening to a work that I
like, it seems to me first that the opening notes detach my skin from
my flesh, melt it, dissolve it, cause it to disappear, and leave me
like one flayed alive, under the combined attacks of the instruments.
And in fact it is on my nerves that the orchestra is playing, on my
nerves stripped bare, vibrating, trembling at every note. I hear it,
the music, not merely with my ears, but with all the sensibility of
my body quivering from head to foot. Nothing gives me such exquisite
pleasure, or rather such exquisite happiness."
She smiled, and then said: "Your sensibilities are keen."
"By Jove, they are! What is the good of living if one has not keen
sensibilities? I do not envy those people who wear over their hearts a
tortoise's shell or a hippopotamus's hide. Those alone are happy who
feel their sensations acutely, who receive them like shocks, and savor
them like dainty morsels. For it is necessary to reason out all our
emotions, joyous and sad, to be satiated with them, to be intoxicated
with them to the most intense degree of bliss or the most extreme pitch
of suffering."
She raised her eyes to look up at his face, with that sense of
astonishment which she had experienced during the past eight days at
all the things that he said. Indeed, during these eight days, this new
friend--for, despite her repugnance toward him, on first acquaintance,
he had in this short interval become her friend--was every moment
shaking the tranquillity of her soul, and disturbing it as a pool of
water is disturbed by flinging stones into it. And he flung stones, big
stones, into this soul which had calmly slumbered until now.
Christiane's father, like all fathers, had always treated her as a
little girl, to whom one ought not to say anything of a serious nature;
her brother made her laugh rather than reflect; her husband did not
consider it right for a man to speak of anything whatever to his wife
outside the interests of their common life; and so she had hitherto
lived perfectly contented, her mind steeped in a sweet torpor.
This newcomer opened her intellect with ideas which fell upon it like
strokes of a hatchet. Moreover, he was one of those men who please
women, all women, by his very nature, by the vibrating acuteness of his
emotions. He knew how to talk to them, to tell them everything, and he
made them understand everything. Incapable of continuous effort but
extremely intelligent, always loving or hating passionately, speaking
of everything with the ingenious ardor of a man fanatically convinced,
variable as he was enthusiastic, he possessed to an excessive degree
the true feminine temperament, the credulity, the charm, the mobility,
the nervous sensibility of a woman, with the superior intellect,
active, comprehensive, and penetrating, of a man.
Gontran came up to them in a hurry. "Come back," said he, "and give a
look at the Honorat family."
They returned, and saw Doctor Honorat, accompanied by a fat, old woman
in a blue dress, whose head looked like a nursery-garden, for every
variety of plants and flowers were gathered together on her head.
Christiane asked in astonishment: "This is his wife, then? But she is
fifteen years older than her husband."
"Yes, she is sixty-five--an old midwife whom he fell in love with
between two confinements. This, however, is one of those households in
which they are nagging at one another from morning till night."
They made their way toward the Casino, attracted by the exclamations
of the crowd. On a large table, in front of the establishment, were
displayed the lots of the _tombola_, which were drawn by Petrus
Martel, assisted by Mademoiselle Odelin of the Odéon, a very small
brunette, who also announced the numbers, with mountebank's tricks,
which greatly diverted the spectators. The Marquis, accompanied by the
Oriol girls and Andermatt, reappeared, and asked: "Are we to remain
here? It is very noisy."
They accordingly resolved to take a walk halfway up the hill on the
road from Enval to La Roche-Pradière. In order to reach it, they first
ascended, one behind the other, a narrow path through vine-trees.
Christiane walked on in front with a light and rapid step. Since her
arrival in this neighborhood, she felt as if she existed in a new sort
of way, with an active sense of enjoyment and of vitality which she
had never known before. Perhaps, the baths, by improving her health,
and so ridding her of that slight disturbance of the vital organs
which annoyed and saddened her without any apparent cause, disposed
her to perceive and to relish everything more thoroughly. Perhaps she
simply felt herself animated, lashed by the presence and by the ardor
of spirit of that unknown youth who had taught her how to understand.
She drew a long, deep breath, as she thought of all he had said to her
about the perfumes that were scattered through the atmosphere. "It is
true," she mused, "that he has shown me how to feel the air." And she
found again all the odors, especially that of the vine, so light, so
delicate, so fleeting.
She gained the level road, and they formed themselves into groups.
Andermatt and Louise Oriol, the elder girl, started first side by
side, chatting about the produce of lands in Auvergne. She knew, this
Auvergnat, true daughter of her sire, endowed with the hereditary
instinct, all the correct and practical details of agriculture, and she
spoke about them in her grave tone, in the ladylike fashion, and with
the careful pronunciation which they had taught her at the convent.
While listening to her, he cast a side glance at her, every now and
then, and thought this little girl quite charming with her gravity
of manner and her mind so full already of practical knowledge. He
occasionally repeated with some surprise: "What! is the land in the
Limagne worth so much as thirty thousand francs for each hectare?"[1]
"Yes, Monsieur, when it is planted with beautiful apple-trees, which
supply dessert apples. It is our country which furnishes nearly all the
fruit used in Paris."
Then, they turned back in order to make a more careful estimate of the
Limagne, for from the road they were pursuing they could see, as far as
their eyes could reach, the vast plain always covered with a light haze
of blue vapor.
Christiane and Paul also halted in front of this immense veiled
tract of country, so agreeable to the eye that they would have liked
to remain there incessantly gazing at it. The road was bordered by
enormous walnut-trees, the dense shade of which made the skin feel a
refreshing sensation of coolness. It no longer ascended, but took a
winding course halfway up on the slope of the hillside adorned lower
down with a tapestry of vines, and then with short green herbage as
far as the crest, which at this point looked rather steep.
Paul murmured: "Is it not lovely? Tell me, is it not lovely? And why
does this landscape move me? Yes, why? It diffuses a charm so profound,
so wide, that it penetrates to my very heart. It seems, as you gaze at
this plain, that thought opens its wings, does it not? And it flies
away, it soars, it passes on, it goes off there below, farther and
farther, toward all the countries seen in dreams which we shall never
see. Yes, see here, this is worthy of admiration because it is much
more like a thing we dream of than a thing that we have seen."
She listened to him without saying anything, waiting, expectant,
gathering up each of his words; and she felt herself affected without
too well knowing how to explain her emotions. She caught glimpses,
indeed, of other countries, blue countries, rose-hued countries,
countries unlikely and marvelous, countries undiscoverable though ever
sought for, which make us look upon all others as commonplace.
He went on: "Yes, it is lovely, because it is lovely. Other horizons
are more striking but less harmonious. Ah! Madame, beauty, harmonious
beauty! There is nothing but that in the world. Nothing exists but
beauty. But how few understand it! The line of a body, of a statue,
or of a mountain, the color of a painting or of that plain, the
inexpressible something of the 'Joconde,' a phrase that bites you to
the soul, that--nothing more--which makes an artist a creator just like
God, which, therefore, distinguishes him among men. Wait! I am going to
recite for you two stanzas of Baudelaire."
And he declaimed:
"Whether you come from heaven or hell I do
not care,
O Beauty, monster of splendor and terror,
yet sweet at the core,
As long as your eye, your smile, your feet
lay the infinite bare,
Unveiling a world of love that I never have
known before!
"From Satan or God, what matter, whether
angel or siren you be,
What matter if you can give, enchanting,
velvet-eyed fay,
Rhythm, perfume, and light, and be
queen of the earth for me,
And make all things less hideous, and
the sad moments fly away."
Christiane now was gazing at him, struck with wonder by his
lyricism, questioning him with her eyes, not comprehending well what
extraordinary meaning might be embodied in this poetry. He divined
her thoughts, and was irritated at not having communicated his own
enthusiasm to her, for he had recited those verses very effectively,
and he resumed, with a shade of disdain:
"I am a fool to wish to force you to relish a poet of such subtle
inspiration. A day will come, I hope, when you will feel those things
just as I do. Women, endowed rather with intuition than comprehension,
do not seize the secret and veiled purposes of art in the same way as
if a sympathetic appeal had first been made to their minds."
And, with a bow, he added: "I will strive, Madame, to make this
sympathetic appeal."
She did not think him impertinent, but fantastic; and moreover she did
not seek any longer to understand, suddenly struck by a circumstance
which she had not previously noticed: he was very elegant, though he
was a little too tall and too strongly-built, with a gait so virile
that one could not immediately perceive the studied refinement of
his attire. And then his head had a certain brutishness about it, an
incompleteness, which gave to his entire person a somewhat heavy aspect
at first glance. But when one had got accustomed to his features, one
found in them some charm, a charm powerful and fierce, which at moments
became very pleasant according to the inflections of his voice, which
always seemed veiled.
Christiane said to herself, as she observed for the first time what
attention he had paid to his external appearance from head to foot:
"Decidedly this is a man whose qualities must be discovered one by one."
But here Gontran came rushing toward them. He exclaimed: "Sister, I
say, Christiane, wait!" And when he had overtaken them, he said to
them, still laughing: "Oh! just come and listen to the younger Oriol
girl! She is as droll as anything--she has wonderful wit. Papa has
succeeded in putting her at her ease, and she has been telling us the
most comical things in the world. Wait for them."
And they awaited the Marquis, who presently appeared with the younger
of the two girls, Charlotte Oriol. She was relating with a childlike,
knowing liveliness some village tales, accounts of rustic simplicity
and roguery. And she imitated them with their slow movements, their
grave remarks, their "fouchtras," their innumerable "bougrres,"
mimicking, in a fashion that made her pretty, sprightly face look
charming, all the changes of their physiognomies. Her bright eyes
sparkled; her rather large mouth was opened wide, displaying her white
teeth; her nose, a little tip-tilted, gave her a humorous look; and she
was fresh, with a flower's freshness that might make lips quiver with
desire.
The Marquis, having spent nearly his entire life on his estate, in the
family château where Christiane and Gontran had been brought up in the
midst of rough, big Norman farmers who were occasionally invited to
dine there, in accordance with custom, and whose children, companions
of theirs from the period of their first communion, had been on terms
of familiarity with them, knew how to talk to this little girl, already
three-fourths a woman of the world, with a friendly candor which
awakened at once in her a gay and self-confident assurance.
Andermatt and Louise returned after having walked as far as the
village, which they did not care to enter. And they all sat down at
the foot of a tree, on the grassy edge of a ditch. There they remained
for a long time pleasantly chatting about everything and nothing in a
torpor of languid ease. Now and then, a wagon would roll past, always
drawn by the two cows whose heads were bent and twisted by the yoke,
and always driven by a peasant with a shrunken frame and a big black
hat on his head, guiding the animals with the end of his thin switch in
the swaying style of the conductor of an orchestra.
The man would take off his hat, bowing to the Oriol girls, and they
would reply with a familiar, "Good day," flung out by their fresh young
voices.
Then, as the hour was growing late, they went back. As they drew near
the park, Charlotte Oriol exclaimed: "Oh! the boree! the boree!" In
fact, the boree was being danced to an old air well known in Auvergne.
There they were, male and female peasants stepping out, hopping, making
courtesies,--turning and bowing to each other,--the women taking hold
of their petticoats and lifting them up with two fingers of each hand,
the men swinging their arms or holding them akimbo. The pleasant
monotonous air was also dancing in the fresh evening wind; it was
always the same refrain played in a very high note by the violin, and
taken up in concert by the other instruments, giving a more rattling
pace to the dance. And it was not unpleasant, this simple rustic music,
lively and artless, keeping time as it did with this shambling country
minuet.
The bathers, too, made an attempt to dance. Petrus Martel went skipping
in front of little Odelin, who affected the style of a _danseuse_
walking through a ballet, and the comic Lapalme mimicked a fantastic
step round the attendant at the Casino, who seemed agitated by
recollections of Bullier.
But suddenly Gontran saw Doctor Honorat dancing away with all his heart
and all his limbs, and executing the classical boree like a true-blue
native of Auvergne.
The orchestra became silent. All stopped. The doctor came over and
bowed to the Marquis. He was wiping his forehead and puffing.
"'Tis good," said he, "to be young sometimes."
Gontran laid his hand on the doctor's shoulder, and smiling with a
mischievous air: "You never told me you were married."
The physician stopped wiping his face, and gravely responded: "Yes, I
am, and marred."
"What do you say?"
"I say, married and marred. Never commit that folly, young man."
"Why?"
"Why! See here! I have been married now for twenty years, and haven't
got used to it yet. Every evening, when I reach home, I say to myself,
'Hold hard! this old woman is still in my house! So then she'll never
go away?'" Everyone began to laugh, so serious and convinced was his
tone.
But the bells of the hotel were ringing for dinner. The _fête_ was
over. Louise and Charlotte were accompanied back to their father's
house; and when their new friends had left them, they commenced talking
about them. Everyone thought them charming, Andermatt alone preferred
the elder girl.
The Marquis said: "How pliant the feminine nature is! The mere vicinity
of the paternal gold, of which they do not even know the use, has made
ladies of these country girls."
Christiane, having asked Paul Bretigny: "And you, which of them do you
prefer?" he murmured:
"Oh! I? I have not even looked at them. It is not they whom I prefer."
He had spoken in a very low voice; and she made no reply.
[Footnote 1: A hectare is about two acres and a half.]