I have seen her, mylord! She has called me her friend--her dear friend.
I am happier than ever I was in my life.
Yet when I approached M. de Wolmar's house at Clarens, I was in a state
of frantic nervousness. Could I bear to see my old love in the
possession of another? Would I not be driven to despair? As the carriage
neared Clarens, I wished that it would break down. When I dismounted I
awaited Julie in mortal anxiety. She came running and calling out to me,
she seized me in her arms. All my terrors were banished, I knew no
feeling but joy.
M. de Wolmar, meanwhile, was standing beside us. She turned to him, and
introduced me to him as her old friend. "If new friends have less ardour
than old ones," he said to me as he embraced me, "they will be old
friends in their turn, and will yield nothing to others." My heart was
exhausted, I received his embraces passively.
When we reached the drawing-room she disappeared for a moment, and
returned--not alone. She brought her two children with her, darling
little boys, who bore on their countenances the charm and the
fascination of their mother. A thousand thoughts rushed into my mind, I
could not speak; I took them in my arms, and welcomed their innocent
caresses.
The children withdrew, and M. de Wolmar was called away. I was alone
with Julie. I was conscious of a painful restraint; she was seemingly at
ease, and I became gradually reassured. We talked of my travels, and of
her married life; there was no mention of our old relations.
I came to realise how Julie was changed, and yet the same. She is a
matron, the happy mother of children, the happy mistress of a prosperous
household. Her old love is not extinguished; but it is subdued by
domestic peace and by her unalterable virtue--let me add, by the trust
and kindness of her elderly husband, whose unemotional goodness has been
just what was needed to soothe her passion and sorrow. I am her old and
dear friend; I can never be more. And, believe me, I am content.
Occasionally, pangs of regret tear at my heart, but they do not last
long; my passion is cured, and I can never experience another.
How can I describe to you the peace and felicity that reign in this
household? M. de Wolmar is, above all things, a man of system; the life
of the establishment moves with ordered regularity from the year's
beginning to its end. But the system is not mechanical; it is founded on
wide experience of men, and governed by philosophy. In the home life of
Julie and her husband and children luxury is never permitted; even the
table delicacies are simple products of the country. But, without
luxury, there is perfect comfort and perfect confidence. I have never
known a community so thoroughly happy, and it is a deep joy to me to be
admitted as a cherished member of it.
One day M. de Wolmar drew Julie and myself aside, and where do you think
he took us? To a plantation near the house, which Julie had never
entered since her marriage. It was there that she had first kissed me.
She was unwilling to enter the place, but he drew her along with him,
and bade us be seated. Then he began:
"Julie, I knew the secret of your love before you revealed it to me. I
knew it before I married you. I may have been in the wrong to marry you,
knowing that your heart was elsewhere; but I loved you, and I believed I
could make you happy. Have I succeeded?"
"My dear husband," said Julie, in tears, "you know you have succeeded."
"One thing only," he went on, "was necessary to prove to you that your
old passion was powerless against your virtue, and that was the presence
of your old lover. I trusted you; I believed, from my knowledge of you,
that I could trust him. I invited him here, and since then I have been
quietly watching. My high anticipations of him are justified. And as for
you, Julie, the haunting fears that your virtue would fail before the
test inflicted by the return of your lover have, once and for all, been
put to rest. Past wounds are healed. Monsieur," he added, turning to me,
"you have proved yourself worthy of our fullest confidence and our
warmest friendship."
What could I answer? I could but embrace him in silence.
Madame d'Orbe, now a widow, is about to come here to take permanent
charge of the household, leaving Julie to devote herself to the training
of the children.
Hasten to join us, mylord; your coming is anxiously awaited. For my own
part, I shall not be content until you have looked with your own eyes
upon the peaceful delights of our life at Clarens.