At night, after this final interview with Lebeau, Graham took leave for
good of his lodgings in Montmartre, and returned to his apartment in the
Rue d'Anjou. He spent several hours of the next morning in answering
numerous letters accumulated during his absence. Late in the afternoon
he had an interview with M. Renard, who, as at that season of the year he
was not over-busied with other affairs, engaged to obtain leave to place
his services at Graham's command during the time requisite for inquiries
at Aix, and to be in readiness to start the next day. Graham then went
forth to pay one or two farewell visits; and these over, bent his way
through the Champs Elysees towards Isaura's villa, when he suddenly
encountered Rochebriant on horseback. The Marquis courteously
dismounted, committing his horse to the care of the groom, and linking
his arm in Graham's, expressed his pleasure at seeing him again; then,
with some visible hesitation and embarrassment, he turned the
conversation towards the political aspects of France.
"There was," he said, "much in certain words of yours, when we last
walked together in this very path, that sank deeply into my mind at the
time, and over which I have of late still more earnestly reflected. You
spoke of the duties a Frenchman owed to France, and the 'impolicy' of
remaining aloof from all public employment on the part of those attached
to the Legitimist cause."
"True; it cannot be the policy of any party to forget that between the
irrevocable past and the uncertain future there intervenes the action of
the present time."
"Should you, as an impartial bystander, consider it dishonourable in me
if I entered the military service under the ruling sovereign?"
"Certainly not, if your country needed you."
"And it may, may it not? I hear vague rumours of coming war in almost
every salon I frequent. There has been gunpowder in the atmosphere we
breathe ever since the battle of Sadowa. What think you of German
arrogance and ambition? Will they suffer the swords of France to rust in
their scabbards?"
"My dear Marquis, I should incline to put the question otherwise. Will
the jealous _amour propre_ of France permit the swords of Germany to
remain sheathed? But in either case, no politician can see without grave
apprehension two nations so warlike, close to each other, divided by a
borderland that one covets and the other will not yield, each armed to
the teeth,--the one resolved to brook no rival, the other equally
determined to resist all aggression. And therefore, as you say, war is
in the atmosphere; and we may also hear, in the clouds that give no sign
of dispersion, the growl of the gathering thunder. War may come any day;
and if France be not at once the victor--"
"France not at once the victor?" interrupted Alain, passionately; "and
against a Prussian! Permit me to say no Frenchman can believe that."
"Let no man despise a foe," said Graham, smiling half sadly. "However, I
must not incur the danger of wounding your national susceptibilities. To
return to the point you raise. If France needed the aid of her best and
bravest, a true descendant of Henri Quatre ought to blush for his ancient
noblesse were a Rochebriant to say, 'But I don't like the colour of the
flag.'"
"Thank you," said Alain, simply; "that is enough." There was a pause,
the young men walking on slowly, arm in arm. And then there flashed
across Graham's mind the recollection of talk on another subject in that
very path. Here he had spoken to Alain in deprecation of any possible
alliance with Isaura Cicogna, the destined actress and public; singer.
His cheek flushed; his heart smote him. What! had he spoken slightingly
of her--of her? What if she became his own wife? What! had he himself
failed in the respect which he would demand as her right from the
loftiest of his high-born kindred? What, too, would this man, of fairer
youth than himself, think of that disparaging counsel, when be heard that
the monitor had won the prize from which he had warned another? Would it
not seem that he had but spoken in the mean cunning dictated by the fear
of a worthier rival? Stung by these thoughts, he arrested his steps,
and, looking the Marquis full in the face, said, "You remind me of one
subject in our talk many weeks since; it is my duty to remind you of
another. At that time you, and, speaking frankly, I myself, acknowledged
the charm in the face of a young Italian lady. I told you then that, on
learning she was intended for the stage, the charm for me had vanished.
I said bluntly that it should vanish perhaps still more utterly for a
noble of your illustrious name; you remember?"
"Yes," answered Alain, hesitatingly, and with a look of surprise.
"I wish now to retract all I said thereon. Mademoiselle Cicogna is not
bent on the profession for which she was educated. She would willingly
renounce all idea of entering it. The only counterweight which, viewed
whether by my reason or my prejudices, could be placed in the opposite
scale to that of the excellences which might make any man proud to win
her, is withdrawn. I have become acquainted with her since the date of
our conversation. Hers is a mind which harmonizes with the loveliness of
her face. In one word, Marquis, I should deem myself honoured, as well
as blest, by such a bride. It was due to her that I should say this; it
was due also to you, in case you should retain the impression I sought in
ignorance to efface. And I am bound, as a gentleman, to obey this
twofold duty, even though in so doing I bring upon myself the affliction
of a candidate for the hand to which I would fain myself aspire,--a
candidate with pretensions in every way far superior to my own."
An older or a more cynical man than Alain de Rochebriant might well have
found something suspicious in a confession thus singularly volunteered;
but the Marquis was himself so loyal that he had no doubt of the loyalty
of Graham.
"I reply to you," he said, "with a frankness which finds an example in
your own. The first fair face which attracted my fancy since my arrival
at Paris was that of the Italian demoiselle of whom you speak in terms of
such respect. I do think if I had then been thrown into her society, and
found her to be such as you no doubt truthfully describe, that fancy
might have become a very grave emotion. I was then so poor, so
friendless, so despondent! Your words of warning impressed me at the
time, but less durably than you might suppose; for that very night as I
sat in my solitary attic I said to myself, 'Why should I shrink, with an
obsolete old-world prejudice, from what my forefathers would have termed
a mesalliance? What is the value of my birthright now? None,--worse
than none. It excludes me from all careers; my name is but a load that
weighs me down. Why should I make that name a curse as well as a burden?
Nothing is left to me but that which is permitted to all men,--wedded and
holy love. Could I win to my heart the smile of a woman who brings me
that dower, the home of my fathers would lose its gloom.' And therefore,
if at that time I had become familiarly acquainted with her who had thus
attracted my eye and engaged my thoughts, she might have become my
destiny; but now!"
"But now?"
"Things have changed. I am no longer poor, friendless, solitary. I have
entered the world of my equals as a Rochebriant; I have made myself
responsible for the dignity of my name. I could not give that name to
one, however peerless in herself, of whom the world would say, 'But for
her marriage she would have been a singer on the stage!' I will own
more: the fancy I conceived for the first fair face, other fair faces
have dispelled. At this moment, however, I have no thought of marriage;
and having known the anguish of struggle, the privations of poverty, I
would ask no woman to share the hazard of my return to them. You might
present me, then, safely to this beautiful Italian,--certain, indeed,
that I should be her admirer; equally certain that I could not become
your rival."
There was something in this speech that jarred upon Graham's sensitive
pride; but on the whole, he felt relieved, both in honour and in heart.
After a few more words, the two young men shook hands and parted. Alain
remounted his horse. The day was now declining. Graham hailed a vacant
fiacre, and directed the driver to Isaura's villa.