WHAT ANDREA WANTED OF GILBERT.
At eight precisely next day, Gilbert knocked at the house-door of the
Countess of Charny.
On hearing of her request made to Pitou, he had asked him for full
particulars of the occurrence, and he had pondered over them.
As he went out in the morning, he sent for Pitou to go to the college
where his son and Andrea's, Sebastian, was being educated, and bring
him to Coq-Heron Street. He was to wait at the door there for the
physician to come out.
No doubt the old janitor had been informed of the doctor's visit, for
he showed him at once into the sitting-room.
Andrea was waiting, clad in full mourning. It was clear that she had
neither slept nor wept all the night through; her face was pale and her
eyes dry. Never had the lines of her countenance, always indicative of
willfulness carried to the degree of stubbornness, been more firmly
fixed.
It was hard to tell what resolution that loving heart had settled on,
but it was plain that it had come to one. This was comprehended by
Gilbert at a first glance, as he was a skilled observer and a reasoning
physician.
He bowed and waited.
"I asked you to come because I want a favor done, and it must be put to
one who can not refuse it me."
"You are right, madame; not, perhaps, in what you are about to ask, but
in what you have done; for you have the right to claim of me anything,
even to my life."
She smiled bitterly.
"Your life, sir, is one of those so precious to mankind that I should
be the first to pray God to prolong it and make it happy, far from
wishing it abridged. But acknowledge that yours is placed under happy
influences, as there are others seemingly doomed beneath a fatal star."
Gilbert was silent.
"Mine, for instance," went on Andrea; "what do you say about mine? Let
me recall it briefly," she said, as Gilbert lowered his eyes. "I was
born poor. My father was a ruined spendthrift before I was born. My
childhood was sad and lonesome. You knew what my father was, as you
were born on his estate and grew up in our house, and you can measure
the little affection he had for me.
"Two persons, one of whom was bound to be a stranger to me, while the
other was unknown, exercised a fatal and mysterious sway over me, in
which my will went for naught. One disposed of my soul, the other of my
body. I became a mother without ceasing to be a virgin. By this horrid
event I nearly lost the love of the only being who ever loved me--my
brother Philip.
"I took refuge in the idea of motherhood, and that my babe would love
me; but it was snatched from me within an hour of its birth. I was
therefore a wife without a husband, a mother without a child.
"A queen's friendship consoled me.
"One day chance sent me in a public vehicle with the queen and a
handsome young gallant, whom fatality caused me to love, though I had
never loved a soul.
"He fell in love with the queen. I became the confidante in this amour.
As I believe you have loved without return, Doctor Gilbert, you can
understand what I suffered. Yet this was not enough. It happened on a
day that the queen came to me to say: 'Andrea, save my life; more than
life--my honor!' It was necessary that I should become the bride of the
man I had loved three years without becoming his wife. I agreed. Five
years I dwelt beside that man, flame within, but ice without; a statue
with a burning heart. Doctor, as a doctor, can you understand what my
heart went through?
"One day--day of unspeakable bliss--my self-sacrifice, silence, and
devotion touched that man. For six years I loved him without letting
him suspect it by a look, when he came all of a quiver to throw himself
at my feet and cry: 'I know all, and I love you!'
"Willing to recompense me, God, in giving me my husband, restored me my
child. A year flew by like a day--nay, an hour, a minute. This year is
all I call my life.
"Four days ago the lightning fell at my feet. The count's honor bid him
go to Paris, to die there. I did not make any remark, did not shed a
tear; I went with him. Hardly had we arrived before he parted from me.
Last night I found him, slain. There he rests, in the next room.
"Do you think I am too ambitious to crave to lie in the same grave? Do
you believe you can refuse the request I make to you?
"Doctor Gilbert, you are a learned physician and a skillful chemist.
You have been guilty of great wrongs to me, and you have much to
expiate as regards me. Well, give me a swift sure poison, and I shall
not merely forgive you all, but die with a heart full of gratitude to
you."
"Madame," replied Gilbert, "as you say, your life has been one long,
dolorous trial, and for it all glory be yours, since you have borne it
nobly and saintly, like a martyr."
She gave an impatient toss of the head, as if she wanted a direct
answer.
"Now you say to your torturer: 'You made my life a misery; give me
a sweet death.' You have the right to do this, and there is reason
in your adding: 'You must do it, for you have no right to refuse me
anything,' Do you still want the poison?"
"I entreat you to be friend enough to give it me."
"Is life so heavy to you that it is impossible for you to support it?"
"Death is the sweetest boon man can give me; the greatest blessing God
may grant me."
"In ten minutes you shall have your wish, madame," responded Gilbert,
bowing and taking a step toward the door.
"Ah!" said the lady, holding out her hand to him, "you do me more
kindness in an instant than you did harm in all your life. God bless
you, Gilbert!"
He hurried out. At the door he found Pitou and Sebastian, waiting in a
hack.
"Sebastian," he said to the youth, drawing a small vial attached to a
gold chain from inside his clothes at his breast, "take this flask of
liquor to the Countess of Charny."
"How long am I to stay with her?"
"As long as you like."
"Where am I to find you?"
"I shall be waiting here."
Taking the small bottle, the young man went in-doors. In a quarter of
an hour he came forth. Gilbert cast on him a rapid glance. He brought
back the tiny flask untouched.
"What did she say?" asked Gilbert.
"'Not from your hand, my child!'"
"What did she do then?"
"She fell a-weeping."
"She is saved," said Gilbert. "Come, my boy," and he embraced him more
tenderly than ever before. In clasping him to his heart, he heard the
crackling of paper.
"What is that?" he asked, with a nervous laugh of joy. "Do you by
chance carry your compositions in your breast-pocket?"
"There, I had forgotten," said the youth, taking a parchment from his
pocket. "The countess gave it me, and says it is to be deposited in the
proper registry."
The doctor examined the paper. It was a document which empowered, in
default of heirs male, to the titles of Philip de Taverney, Knight of
Redcastle, Sebastian Emile Gilbert, son of Andrea Taverney, Countess
of Charny, to wear that title honorarily until the king should make it
good to him by favor of his mother's service to the Crown, and perhaps
award him the estates to maintain the dignity.
"Keep it," said Gilbert, with a melancholy smile; "as well date it
from the Greek kalends! The king, I fear, will nevermore dispose of
more than six-feet-by-three of landed property in his once kingdom of
France."
Gilbert could jest, for he believed Andrea saved.
He had reckoned without Marat. A week after, he learned that the
scoundrel had denounced the favorite of the queen, and that the widowed
Countess of Charny had been arrested and lodged in the old Abbey Prison.