THE BENEFIT OF CHANGE OF SCENE
One day Mariolle had gone to her house. He was awaiting her, for she
had not come in, although she had sent him a telegram to tell him
that she wanted to see him that morning. Whenever he was alone in
this drawing-room which it gave him such pleasure to enter and where
everything was so charming to him, he nevertheless was conscious
of an oppression of the heart, a slight feeling of affright and
breathlessness that would not allow him to remain seated as long as she
was not there. He walked about the room in joyful expectation, dashed
by the fear that some unforeseen obstacle might intervene to detain her
and cause their interview to go over until next day. His heart gave a
hopeful bound when he heard a carriage draw up before the street door,
and when the bell of the apartment rang he ceased to doubt.
She came in with her hat on, a thing which she was not accustomed to
do, wearing a busy and satisfied look. "I have some news for you," she
said.
"What is it, Madame?"
She looked at him and laughed. "Well! I am going to the country for a
while."
Her words produced in him a quick, sharp shock of sorrow that was
reflected upon his face. "Oh! and you tell me that as if you were glad
of it!"
"Yes. Sit down and I will tell you all about it. I don't know whether
you are aware that M. Valsaci, my poor mother's brother, the engineer
and bridge-builder, has a country-place at Avranches where he spends a
portion of his time with his wife and children, for his business lies
mostly in that neighborhood. We pay them a visit every summer. This
year I said that I did not care to go, but he was greatly disappointed
and made quite a time over it with papa. Speaking of scenes, I will
tell you confidentially that papa is jealous of you and makes scenes
with me, too; he says that I am entangling myself with you. You will
have to come to see me less frequently. But don't let that trouble you;
I will arrange matters. So papa gave me a scolding and made me promise
to go to Avranches for a visit of ten days, perhaps twelve. We are to
start Tuesday morning. What have you got to say about it?"
"I say that it breaks my heart."
"Is that all?"
"What more can I say? There is no way of preventing you from going."
"And nothing presents itself to you?"
"Why, no; I can't say that there does. And you?"
"I have an idea; it is this: Avranches is quite near Mont Saint-Michel.
Have you ever been at Mont Saint-Michel?"
"No, Madame."
"Well, something will tell you next Friday that you want to go and
see this wonder. You will leave the train at Avranches; on Friday
evening at sunset, if you please, you will take a walk in the public
garden that overlooks the bay. We will happen to meet there. Papa
will grumble, but I don't care for that. I will make up a party to
go and see the abbey next day, including all the family. You must be
enthusiastic over it, and very charming, as you can be when you choose;
be attentive to my aunt and gain her over, and invite us all to dine
at the inn where we alight. We will sleep there, and will have all the
next day to be together. You will return by way of Saint Malo, and a
week later I shall be back in Paris. Isn't that an ingenious scheme? Am
I not nice?"
With an outburst of grateful feeling, he murmured: "You are dearer to
me than all the world."
"Hush!" said she.
They looked each other for a moment in the face. She smiled, conveying
to him in that smile--very sincere and earnest it was, almost
tender--all her gratitude, her thanks for his love, and her sympathy as
well. He gazed upon her with eyes that seemed to devour her. He had an
insane desire to throw himself down and grovel at her feet, to kiss the
hem of her robe, to cry aloud and make her see what he knew not how to
tell in words, what existed in all his form from head to feet, in every
fiber of his body as well as in his heart, paining him inexpressibly
because he could not display it--his love, his terrible and delicious
love.
There was no need of words, however; she understood him, as the
marksman instinctively feels that his ball has penetrated the
bull's-eye of the target. Nothing any longer subsisted within this man,
nothing, nothing but her image. He was hers more than she herself was
her own. She was satisfied, and she thought he was charming.
She said to him, in high good-humor: "Then _that_ is settled; the
excursion is agreed on."
He answered in a voice that trembled with emotion: "Why, yes, Madame,
it is agreed on."
There was another interval of silence. "I cannot let you stay any
longer to-day," she said without further apology. "I only ran in to
tell you what I have told you, since I am to start day after to-morrow.
All my time will be occupied to-morrow, and I have still half-a-dozen
things to attend to before dinner-time."
He arose at once, deeply troubled, for the sole desire of his heart was
to be with her always; and having kissed her hands, went his way, sore
at heart, but hopeful nevertheless.
The four intervening days were horribly long ones to him. He got
through them somehow in Paris without seeing a soul, preferring silence
to conversation, and solitude to the company of friends.
On Friday morning, therefore, he boarded the eight-o'clock express.
The anticipation of the journey had made him feverish, and he had not
slept a wink. The darkness of his room and its silence, broken only by
the occasional rattling of some belated cab that served to remind him
of his longing to be off, had weighed upon him all night long like a
prison.
At the earliest ray of light that showed itself between his drawn
curtains, the gray, sad light of early morning, he jumped from his bed,
opened the window, and looked at the sky. He had been haunted by the
fear that the weather might be unfavorable. It was clear. There was a
light floating mist, presaging a warm day. He dressed more quickly than
was needful, and in his consuming impatience to get out of doors and
at last begin his journey he was ready two hours too soon, and nothing
would do but his valet must go out and get a cab lest they should all
be gone from the stand. As the vehicle jolted over the stones, its
movements were so many shocks of happiness to him, but when he reached
the Mont Parnasse station and found that he had fifty minutes to wait
before the departure of the train, his spirits fell again.
There was a compartment disengaged; he took it so that he might be
alone and give free course to his reveries. When at last he felt
himself moving, hurrying along toward her, soothed by the gentle and
rapid motion of the train, his eagerness, instead of being appeased,
was still further excited, and he felt a desire, the unreasoning desire
of a child, to push with all his strength against the partition in
front of him, so as to accelerate their speed. For a long time, until
midday, he remained in this condition of waiting expectancy, but when
they were past Argentan his eyes were gradually attracted to the window
by the fresh verdure of the Norman landscape.
The train was passing through a wide, undulating region, intersected
by valleys, where the peasant holdings, mostly in grass and
apple-orchards, were shut in by great trees, the thick-leaved tops of
which seemed to glow in the sunlight. It was late in July, that lusty
season when this land, an abundant nurse, gives generously of its sap
and life. In all the inclosures, separated from each other by these
leafy walls, great light-colored oxen, cows whose flanks were striped
with undefined figures of odd design, huge, red, wide-fronted bulls
of proud and quarrelsome aspect, with their hanging dewlaps of hairy
flesh, standing by the fences or lying down among the pasturage that
stuffed their paunches, succeeded each other, until there seemed to be
no end to them in this fresh, fertile land, the soil of which appeared
to exude cider and fat sirloins. In every direction little streams were
gliding in and out among the poplars, partially concealed by a thin
screen of willows; brooks glittered for an instant among the herbage,
disappearing only to show themselves again farther on, bathing all the
scene in their vivifying coolness. Mariolle was charmed at the sight,
and almost forgot his love for a moment in his rapid flight through
this far-reaching park of apple-trees and flocks and herds.
When he had changed cars at Folligny station, however, he was again
seized with an impatient longing to be at his destination, and during
the last forty minutes he took out his watch twenty times. His head
was constantly turned toward the window of the car, and at last,
situated upon a hill of moderate height, he beheld the city where she
was waiting for his coming. The train had been delayed, and now only
an hour separated him from the moment when he was to come upon her, by
chance, on the public promenade.
He was the only passenger that climbed into the hotel omnibus, which
the horses began to drag up the steep road of Avranches with slow and
reluctant steps. The houses crowning the heights gave to the place from
a distance the appearance of a fortification. Seen close at hand it
was an ancient and pretty Norman city, with small dwellings of regular
and almost similar appearance built closely adjoining one another,
giving an aspect of ancient pride and modern comfort, a feudal yet
peasant-like air.
As soon as Mariolle had secured a room and thrown his valise into it,
he inquired for the street that led to the Botanical Garden and started
off in the direction indicated with rapid strides, although he was
ahead of time. But he was in hopes that perhaps she also would be on
hand early. When he reached the iron railings, he saw at a glance that
the place was empty or nearly so. Only three old men were walking about
in it, _bourgeois_ to the manner born, who probably were in the habit
of coming there daily to cheer their leisure by conversation, and a
family of English children, lean-legged boys and girls, were playing
about a fair-haired governess whose wandering looks showed that her
thoughts were far away.
Mariolle walked straight ahead with beating heart, looking
scrutinizingly up and down the intersecting paths. He came to a great
alley of dark green elms which cut the garden in two portions crosswise
and stretched away in its center, a dense vault of foliage; he passed
through this, and all at once, coming to a terrace that commanded a
view of the horizon, his thoughts suddenly ceased to dwell upon her
whose influence had brought him hither.
From the foot of the elevation upon which he was standing spread an
illimitable sandy plain that stretched away in the distance and blended
with sea and sky. Through it rolled a stream, and beneath the azure,
aflame with sunlight, pools of water dotted it with luminous sheets
that seemed like orifices opening upon another sky beneath. In the
midst of this yellow desert, still wet and glistening with the receding
tide, at twelve or fifteen kilometers from the shore rose a pointed
rock of monumental profile, like some fantastic pyramid, surmounted
by a cathedral. Its only neighbor in these immense wastes was a low,
round backed reef that the tide had left uncovered, squatting among
the shifting ooze: the reef of Tombelaine. Farther still away, other
submerged rocks showed their brown heads above the bluish line of the
waves, and the eye, continuing to follow the horizon to the right,
finally rested upon the vast green expanse of the Norman country lying
beside this sandy waste, so densely covered with trees that it had
the aspect of a limitless forest. It was all Nature offering herself
to his vision at a single glance, in a single spot, in all her might
and grandeur, in all her grace and freshness, and the eye turned from
those woodland glimpses to the stern apparition of the granite mount,
the hermit of the sands, rearing its strange Gothic form upon the
far-reaching strand.
The strange pleasure which in other days had often made Mariolle
thrill, in the presence of the surprises that unknown lands preserve to
delight the eyes of travelers, now took such sudden possession of him
that he remained motionless, his feelings softened and deeply moved,
oblivious of his tortured heart. At the sound of a striking bell,
however, he turned, suddenly repossessed by the eager hope that they
were about to meet. The garden was still almost untenanted. The English
children had gone; the three old men alone kept up their monotonous
promenade. He came down and began to walk about like them.
Immediately--in a moment--she would be there. He would see her at the
end of one of those roads that centered in this wondrous terrace. He
would recognize her form, her step, then her face and her smile; he
would soon be listening to her voice. What happiness! What delight! He
felt that she was near him, somewhere, invisible as yet, but thinking
of him, knowing that she was soon to see him again.
With difficulty he restrained himself from uttering a little cry. For
there, down below, a blue sunshade, just the dome of a sunshade, was
visible, gliding along beneath a clump of trees. It must be she; there
could be no doubt of it. A little boy came in sight, driving a hoop
before him; then two ladies,--he recognized her,--then two men: her
father and another gentleman. She was all in blue, like the heavens in
springtime. Yes, indeed! he recognized her, while as yet he could not
distinguish her features; but he did not dare to go toward her, feeling
that he would blush and stammer, that he would be unable to account for
this chance meeting beneath M. de Pradon's suspicious glances.
He went forward to meet them, however, keeping his field-glass to his
eye, apparently quite intent on scanning the horizon. She it was who
addressed him first, not even taking the trouble to affect astonishment.
"Good day, M. Mariolle," she said. "Isn't it splendid?"
He was struck speechless by this reception, and knew not what tone to
adopt in reply. Finally he stammered: "Ah, it is you, Madame; how glad
I am to meet you! I wanted to see something of this delightful country."
She smiled as she replied: "And you selected the very time when I
chanced to be here. That was extremely kind of you." Then she proceeded
to make the necessary introductions. "This is M. Mariolle, one of my
dearest friends; my aunt, Mme. Valsaci; my uncle, who builds bridges."
When salutations had been exchanged. M. de Pradon and the young man
shook hands rather stiffly and the walk was continued.
She had made room for him between herself and her aunt, casting upon
him a very rapid glance, one of those glances which seem to indicate a
weakening determination.
"How do you like the country?" she asked.
"I think that I have never beheld anything more beautiful," he replied.
"Ah! if you had passed some days here, as I have just been doing, you
would feel how it penetrates one. The impression that it leaves is
beyond the power of expression. The advance and retreat of the sea
upon the sands, that grand movement that is going on unceasingly, that
twice a day floods all that you behold before you, and so swiftly that
a horse galloping at top speed would scarce have time to escape before
it--this wondrous spectacle that Heaven gratuitously displays before
us, I declare to you that it makes me forgetful of myself. I no longer
know myself. Am I not speaking the truth, aunt?"
Mme. Valsaci, an old, gray-haired woman, a lady of distinction in her
province and the respected wife of an eminent engineer, a supercilious
functionary who could not divest himself of the arrogance of the
school, confessed that she had never seen her niece in such a state
of enthusiasm. Then she added reflectively: "It is not surprising,
however, when, like her, one has never seen any but theatrical scenery."
"But I go to Dieppe and Trouville almost every year."
The old lady began to laugh. "People only go to Dieppe and Trouville to
see their friends. The sea is only there to serve as a cloak for their
rendezvous." It was very simply said, perhaps without any concealed
meaning.
People were streaming along toward the terrace, which seemed to draw
them to it with an irresistible attraction. They came from every
quarter of the garden, in spite of themselves, like round bodies
rolling down a slope. The sinking sun seemed to be drawing a golden
tissue of finest texture, transparent and ethereally light, behind the
lofty silhouette of the abbey, which was growing darker and darker,
like a gigantic shrine relieved against a veil of brightness. Mariolle,
however, had eyes for nothing but the adored blond form walking at
his side, wrapped in its cloud of blue. Never had he beheld her so
seductive. She seemed to him to have changed, without his being able to
specify in what the change consisted; she was bright with a brightness
he had never seen before, which shone in her eyes and upon her flesh,
her hair, and seemed to have penetrated her soul as well, a brightness
emanating from this country, this sky, this sunlight, this verdure.
Never had he known or loved her thus.
He walked at her side and could find no word to say to her. The rustle
of her dress, the occasional touch of her arm, the meeting, so mutely
eloquent, of their glances, completely overcame him. He felt as if
they had annihilated his personality as a man--felt himself suddenly
obliterated by contact with this woman, absorbed by her to such an
extent as to be nothing; nothing but desire, nothing but appeal,
nothing but adoration. She had consumed his being, as one burns a
letter.
She saw it all very clearly, understood the full extent of her victory,
and thrilled and deeply moved, feeling life throb within her, too, more
keenly among these odors of the country and the sea, full of sunlight
and of sap, she said to him: "I am so glad to see you!" Close upon
this, she asked: "How long do you remain here?"
He replied: "Two days, if to-day counts for a day." Then, turning to
the aunt: "Would Mme. Valsaci do me the honor to come and spend the
day to-morrow at Mont Saint-Michel with her husband?"
Mme. de Burne made answer for her relative: "I will not allow her to
refuse, since we have been so fortunate as to meet you here."
The engineer's wife replied: "Yes, Monsieur, I accept very gladly, upon
the condition that you come and dine with me this evening."
He bowed in assent. All at once there arose within him a feeling of
delirious delight, such a joy as seizes you when news is brought that
the desire of your life is attained. What had come to him? What new
occurrence was there in his life? Nothing; and yet he felt himself
carried away by the intoxication of an indefinable presentiment.
They walked upon the terrace for a long time, waiting for the sun to
set, so as to witness until the very end the spectacle of the black
and battlemented mount drawn in outline upon a horizon of flame. Their
conversation now was upon ordinary topics, such as might be discussed
in presence of a stranger, and from time to time Mme. de Burne and
Mariolle glanced at each other. Then they all returned to the villa,
which stood just outside Avranches in a fine garden, overlooking the
bay.
Wishing to be prudent, and a little disturbed, moreover, by M. de
Pradon's cold and almost hostile attitude toward him, Mariolle withdrew
at an early hour. When he took Mme. de Burne's hand to raise it to his
lips, she said to him twice in succession, with a peculiar accent:
"Till to-morrow! Till to-morrow!"
As soon as he was gone M. and Mme. Valsaci, who had long since
habituated themselves to country ways, proposed that they should go to
bed.
"Go," said Mme. de Burne. "I am going to take a walk in the garden."
"So am I," her father added.
She wrapped herself in a shawl and went out, and they began to walk
side by side upon the white-sanded alleys which the full moon,
streaming over lawn and shrubbery, illuminated as if they had been
little winding rivers of silver.
After a silence that had lasted for quite a while, M. de Pradon said in
a low voice: "My dear child, you will do me the justice to admit that I
have never troubled you with my counsels?"
She felt what was coming, and was prepared to meet his attack. "Pardon
me, papa," she said, "but you did give me one, at least."
"I did?"
"Yes, yes."
"A counsel relating to your way of life?"
"Yes; and a very bad one it was, too. And so, if you give me any more,
I have made up my mind not to follow them."
"What was the advice that I gave you?"
"You advised me to marry M. de Burne. That goes to show that you are
lacking in judgment, in clearness of insight, in acquaintance with
mankind in general and with your daughter in particular."
"Yes I made a mistake on that occasion; but I am sure that I am right
in the very paternal advice that I feel called upon to give you at the
present juncture."
"Let me hear what it is. I will accept as much of it as the
circumstances call for."
"You are on the point of entangling yourself."
She laughed with a laugh that was rather too hearty, and completing the
expression of his idea, said: "With M. Mariolle, doubtless?"
"With M. Mariolle."
"You forget," she rejoined, "the entanglements that I have already had
with M. de Maltry, with M. Massival, with M. Gaston de Lamarthe, and a
dozen others, of all of whom you have been jealous; for I never fall in
with a man who is nice and willing to show a little devotion for me but
all my flock flies into a rage, and you first of all, you whom nature
has assigned to me as my noble father and general manager."
"No, no, that is not it," he replied with warmth; "you have never
compromised your liberty with anyone. On the contrary you show a great
deal of tact in your relations with your friends."
"My dear papa, I am no longer a child, and I promise you not to involve
myself with M. Mariolle any more than I have done with the rest of
them; you need have no fears. I admit, however, that it was at my
invitation that he came here. I think that he is delightful, just as
intelligent as his predecessors and less egotistical; and you thought
so too, up to the time when you imagined that you had discovered that
I was showing some small preference for him. Oh, you are not so sharp
as you think you are! I know you, and I could say a great deal more
on this head if I chose. As M. Mariolle was agreeable to me, then, I
thought it would be very nice to make a pleasant excursion in his
company, quite by chance, of course. It is a piece of stupidity to
deprive ourselves of everything that can amuse us when there is no
danger attending it. And I incur no danger of involving myself, since
you are here."
She laughed openly as she finished, knowing well that every one of her
words had told, that she had tied his tongue by the adroit imputation
of a jealousy of Mariolle that she had suspected, that she had
instinctively scented in him for a long time past, and she rejoiced
over this discovery with a secret, audacious, unutterable coquetry. He
maintained an embarrassed and irritated silence, feeling that she had
divined some inexplicable spite underlying his paternal solicitude, the
origin of which he himself did not care to investigate.
"There is no cause for alarm," she added. "It is quite natural to make
an excursion to Mont Saint-Michel at this time of the year in company
with you, my father, my uncle and aunt, and a friend. Besides no one
will know it; and even if they do, what can they say against it? When
we are back in Paris I will reduce this friend to the ranks again, to
keep company with the others."
"Very well," he replied. "Let it be as if I had said nothing."
They took a few steps more; then M. de Pradon asked:
"Shall we return to the house? I am tired; I am going to bed."
"No; the night is so fine. I am going to walk awhile yet."
He murmured meaningly: "Do not go far away. One never knows what people
may be around."
"Oh, I will be right here under the windows."
"Good night, then, my dear child."
He gave her a hasty kiss upon the forehead and went in. She took a
seat a little way off upon a rustic bench that was set in the ground
at the foot of a great oak. The night was warm, filled with odors from
the fields and exhalations from the sea and misty light, for beneath
the full moon shining brightly in the cloudless sky a fog had come up
and covered the waters of the bay. Onward it slowly crept, like white
smoke-wreaths, hiding from sight the beach that would soon be covered
by the incoming tide.
Michèle de Burne, her hands clasped over her knees and her dreamy eyes
gazing into space, sought to look into her heart through a mist that
was as impenetrable and pale as that which lay upon the sands. How many
times before this, seated before her mirror in her dressing-room at
Paris, had she questioned herself:
"What do I love? What do I desire? What do I hope for? What am I?"
Apart from the pleasure of being beautiful, and the imperious necessity
which she felt of pleasing, which really afforded her much delight, she
had never been conscious of any appeal to her heart beyond some passing
fancy that she had quickly put her foot upon. She was not ignorant of
herself, for she had devoted too much of her time and attention to
watching and studying her face and all her person not to have been
observant of her feelings as well. Up to the present time she had
contented herself with a vague interest in that which is the subject of
emotion in others, but was powerless to impassion her, or capable at
best of affording her a momentary distraction.
And yet, whenever she had felt a little warmer liking for anyone
arising within her, whenever a rival had tried to take away from her a
man whom she valued, and by arousing her feminine instincts had caused
an innocuous fever of attachment to simmer gently in her veins, she had
discovered that these false starts of love had caused her an emotion
that was much deeper than the mere gratification of success. But it
never lasted. Why? Perhaps because she was too clear-sighted; because
she allowed herself to become wearied, disgusted. Everything that at
first had pleased her in a man, everything that had animated, moved,
and attracted her, soon appeared in her eyes commonplace and divested
of its charm. They all resembled one another too closely, without ever
being exactly similar, and none of them had yet presented himself to
her endowed with the nature and the merits that were required to hold
her liking sufficiently long to guide her heart into the path of love.
Why was this so? Was it their fault or was it hers? Were they wanting
in the qualities which she was looking for, or was it she who was
deficient in the attribute that makes one loved? Is love the result of
meeting with a person whom one believes to have been created expressly
for himself, or is it simply the result of having been born with the
faculty of loving? At times it seemed to her that everyone's heart
must be provided with arms, like the body, loving, outstretching arms
to attract, embrace, and enfold, and that her heart had only eyes and
nothing more.
Men, superior men, were often known to become madly infatuated
with women who were unworthy of them, women without intelligence,
without character, often without beauty. Why was this? Wherein lay
the mystery? Was such a crisis in the existence of two beings not
to be attributed solely to a providential meeting, but to a kind of
seed that everyone carries about within him, and that puts forth its
buds when least expected? She had been intrusted with confidences,
she had surprised secrets, she had even beheld with her own eyes the
swift transfiguration that results from the breaking forth of this
intoxication of the feelings, and she had reflected deeply upon it.
In society, in the unintermitting whirl of visiting and amusement,
in all the small tomfooleries of fashionable existence by which the
wealthy beguile their idle hours, a feeling of envious, jealous, and
almost incredulous astonishment had sometimes been excited in her
at the sight of men and women in whom some extraordinary change had
incontestably taken place. The change might not be conspicuously
manifest, but her watchful instinct felt it and divined it as the
hound holds the scent of his game. Their faces, their smiles, their
eyes especially would betray something that was beyond expression in
words, an ecstasy, a delicious, serene delight, a joy of the soul made
manifest in the body, illuming look and flesh.
Without being able to account for it she was displeased with them for
this. Lovers had always been disagreeable objects to her, and she
imagined that the deep and secret feeling of irritation inspired in her
by the sight of people whose hearts were swayed by passion was simply
disdain. She believed that she could recognize them with a readiness
and an accuracy that were exceptional, and it was a fact that she
had often divined and unraveled _liaisons_ before society had even
suspected their existence.
When she reflected upon all this, upon the fond folly that may be
induced in woman by the contact of some neighboring existence, his
aspect, his speech, his thought, the inexpressible something in the
loved being that robs the heart of tranquillity, she decided that
she was incapable of it. And yet, weary of everything, oppressed by
ineffable yearnings, tormented by a haunting longing after change and
some unknown state, feelings which were, perhaps, only the undeveloped
movements of an undefined groping after affection, how often had she
desired, with a secret shame that had its origin in her pride, to meet
with a man, who, for a time, were it only for a few months, might by
his sorceries raise her to an abnormally excited condition of mind and
body--for it seemed to her that life must assume strange and attractive
forms of ecstasy and delight during these emotional periods. Not
only had she desired such an encounter, but she had even sought it a
little--only a very little, however--with an indolent activity that
never devoted itself for any length of time to one pursuit.
In all her inchoate attachments for the men called "superior," who
had dazzled her for a few weeks, the short-lived effervescence of
her heart had always died away in irremediable disappointment. She
looked for too much from their dispositions, their characters, their
delicacy, their renown, their merits. In the case of everyone of them
she had been compelled to open her eyes to the fact that the defects of
great men are often more prominent than their merits; that talent is a
special gift, like a good digestion or good eyesight, an isolated gift
to be exercised, and unconnected with the aggregate of personal charm
that makes one's relations cordial and attractive.
Since she had known Mariolle, however, she was otherwise attached to
him. But did she love him, did she love him with the love of woman for
man? Without fame or prestige, he had conquered her affections by his
devotedness, his tenderness, his intelligence, by all the real and
unassuming attractions of his personality. He had conquered, for he
was constantly present in her thoughts; unremittingly she longed for
his society; in all the world there was no one more agreeable, more
sympathetic, more indispensable to her. Could this be love?
She was not conscious of carrying in her soul that divine flame that
everyone speaks of, but for the first time she was conscious of the
existence there of a sincere wish to be something more to this man than
merely a charming friend. Did she love him? Does love demand that a
man appear endowed with exceptional attractions, that he be different
from all the world and tower above it in the aureole that the heart
places about its elect, or does it suffice that he find favor in your
eyes, that he please you to that extent that you scarce know how to do
without him? In the latter event she loved him, or at any rate she was
very near loving him. After having pondered deeply on the matter with
concentrated attention, she at length answered herself: "Yes, I love
him, but I am lacking in warmth; that is the defect of my nature."
Still, she had felt some warmth a little while before when she saw him
coming toward her upon the terrace in the garden of Avranches. For
the first time she had felt that inexpressible something that bears
us, impels us, hurries us toward some one; she had experienced great
pleasure in walking at his side, in having him near her, burning with
love for her, as they watched the sun sinking behind the shadow of Mont
Saint-Michel, like a vision in a legend. Was not love itself a kind
of legend of the soul, in which some believe through instinct, and in
which others sometimes also come to believe through stress of pondering
over it? Would she end by believing in it? She had felt a strange,
half-formed desire to recline her head upon the shoulder of this man,
to be nearer to him, to seek that closer union that is never found, to
give him what one offers vainly and always retains: the close intimacy
with one's inner self.
Yes, she had experienced a feeling of warmth toward him, and she still
felt it there at the bottom of her heart, at that very moment. Perhaps
it would change to passion should she give way to it. She opposed too
much resistance to men's powers of attraction; she reasoned on them,
combated them too much. How sweet it would be to walk with him on an
evening like this along the river-bank beneath the willows, and allow
him to taste her lips from time to time in recompense of all the love
he had given her!
A window in the villa was flung open. She turned her head. It was her
father, who was doubtless looking to see if she were there. She called
to him: "You are not asleep yet?"
He replied: "If you don't come in you will take cold."
She arose thereupon and went toward the house. When she was in her room
she raised her curtains for another look at the mist over the bay,
which was becoming whiter and whiter in the moonlight, and it seemed to
her that the vapors in her heart were also clearing under the influence
of her dawning tenderness.
For all that she slept soundly, and her maid had to awake her in the
morning, for they were to make an early start, so as to have breakfast
at the Mount.
A roomy wagonette drew up before the door. When she heard the rolling
of the wheels upon the sand she went to her window and looked out,
and the first thing that her eyes encountered was the face of André
Mariolle who was looking for her. Her heart began to beat a little more
rapidly. She was astonished and dejected as she reflected upon the
strange and novel impression produced by this muscle, which palpitates
and hurries the blood through the veins merely at the sight of some
one. Again she asked herself, as she had done the previous night before
going to sleep: "Can it be that I am about to love him?" Then when
she was seated face to face with him her instinct told her how deeply
he was smitten, how he was suffering with his love, and she felt as
if she could open her arms to him and put up her mouth. They only
exchanged a look, however, but it made him turn pale with delight.
The carriage rolled away. It was a bright summer morning; the air was
filled with the melody of birds and everything seemed permeated by the
spirit of youth. They descended the hill, crossed the river, and drove
along a narrow, rough, stony road that set the travelers bumping upon
their seats. Mme. de Burne began to banter her uncle upon the condition
of this road; that was enough to break the ice, and the brightness that
pervaded the air seemed to be infused into the spirit of them all.
As they emerged from a little hamlet the bay suddenly presented itself
again before them, not yellow as they had seen it the evening before,
but sparkling with clear water which covered everything, sands,
salt-meadows, and, as the coachman said, even the very road itself a
little way further on. Then, for the space of an hour they allowed the
horses to proceed at a walk, so as to give this inundation time to
return to the deep.
The belts of elms and oaks that inclosed the farms among which they
were now passing momentarily hid from their vision the profile of the
abbey standing high upon its rock, now entirely surrounded by the sea;
then all at once it was visible again between two farmyards, nearer,
more huge, more astounding than ever. The sun cast ruddy tones upon the
old crenelated granite church, perched on its rocky pedestal. Michèle
de Burne and André Mariolle contemplated it, both mingling with the
newborn or acutely sensitive disturbances of their hearts the poetry
of the vision that greeted their eyes upon this rosy July morning.
The talk went on with easy friendliness. Mme. Valsaci told tragic tales
of the coast, nocturnal dramas of the yielding sands devouring human
life. M. Valsaci took up arms for the dike, so much abused by artists,
and extolled it for the uninterrupted communication that it afforded
with the Mount and for the reclaimed sand-hills, available at first for
pasturage and afterward for cultivation.
Suddenly the wagonette came to a halt; the sea had invaded the road. It
did not amount to much, only a film of water upon the stony way, but
they knew that there might be sink-holes beneath, openings from which
they might never emerge, so they had to wait. "It will go down very
quickly," M. Valsaci declared, and he pointed with his finger to the
road from which the thin sheet of water was already receding, seemingly
absorbed by the earth or drawn away to some distant place by a powerful
and mysterious force.
They got down from the carriage for a nearer look at this strange,
swift, silent flight of the sea, and followed it step by step. Now
spots of green began to appear among the submerged vegetation, lightly
stirred by the waves here and there, and these spots broadened, rounded
themselves out and became islands. Quickly these islands assumed the
appearance of continents, separated from each other by miniature
oceans, and finally over the whole expanse of the bay it was a headlong
flight of the waters retreating to their distant abode. It resembled
nothing so much as a long silvery veil withdrawn from the surface
of the earth, a great, torn, slashed veil, full of rents, which left
exposed the wide meadows of short grass as it was pulled aside, but did
not yet disclose the yellow sands that lay beyond.
They had climbed into the carriage again, and everyone was standing in
order to obtain a better view. The road in front of them was drying and
the horses were sent forward, but still at a walk, and as the rough
places sometimes caused them to lose their equilibrium, André Mariolle
suddenly felt Michèle de Burne's shoulder resting against his. At first
he attributed this contact to the movement of the vehicle, but she did
not stir from her position, and at every jolt of the wheels a trembling
started from the spot where she had placed herself and shook all his
frame and laid waste his heart. He did not venture to look at the young
woman, paralyzed as he was by this unhoped-for familiarity, and with
a confusion in his brain such as arises from drunkenness, he said to
himself: "Is this real? Can it be possible? Can it be that we are both
losing our senses?"
The horses began to trot and they had to resume their seats. Then
Mariolle felt some sudden, mysterious, imperious necessity of showing
himself attentive to M. de Pradon, and he began to devote himself to
him with flattering courtesy. Almost as sensible to compliments as his
daughter, the father allowed himself to be won over and soon his face
was all smiles.
At last they had reached the causeway and were advancing rapidly toward
the Mount, which reared its head among the sands at the point where the
long, straight road ended. Pontorson river washed its left-hand slope,
while, to the right, the pastures covered with short grass, which the
coachman wrongly called "samphire," had given way to sand-hills that
were still trickling with the water of the sea. The lofty monument now
assumed more imposing dimensions upon the blue heavens, against which,
very clear and distinct now in every slightest detail, its summit stood
out in bold relief, with all its towers and belfries, bristling with
grimacing gargoyles, heads of monstrous beings with which the faith and
the terrors of our ancestors crowned their Gothic sanctuaries.
It was nearly one o'clock when they reached the inn, where breakfast
had been ordered. The hostess had delayed the meal for prudential
reasons; it was not ready. It was late, therefore, when they sat down
at table and everyone was very hungry. Soon, however, the champagne
restored their spirits. Everyone was in good humor, and there were
two hearts that felt that they were on the verge of great happiness.
At dessert, when the cheering effect of the wine that they had drunk
and the pleasures of conversation had developed in their frames the
feeling of well-being and contentment that sometimes warms us after a
good meal, and inclines us to take a rosy view of everything, Mariolle
suggested: "What do you say to staying over here until to-morrow? It
would be so nice to look upon this scene by moonlight, and so pleasant
to dine here together this evening!"
Mme. de Burne gave her assent at once, and the two men also concurred.
Mme. Valsaci alone hesitated, on account of the little boy that she had
left at home, but her husband reassured her and reminded her that she
had frequently remained away before; he at once sat down and dispatched
a telegram to the governess. André Mariolle had flattered him by giving
his approval to the causeway, expressing his judgment that it detracted
far less than was generally reported from the picturesque effect of the
Mount, thereby making himself _persona grata_ to the engineer.
Upon rising from table they went to visit the monument, taking the
road of the ramparts. The city, a collection of old houses dating back
to the Middle Ages and rising in tiers one above the other upon the
enormous mass of granite that is crowned by the abbey, is separated
from the sands by a lofty crenelated wall. This wall winds about the
city in its ascent with many a twist and turn, with abrupt angles and
elbows and platforms and watchtowers, all forming so many surprises
for the eye, which, at every turn, rests upon some new expanse of the
far-reaching horizon. They were silent, for whether they had seen this
marvelous edifice before or not, they were equally impressed by it,
and the substantial breakfast that they had eaten, moreover, had made
them short-winded. There it rose above them in the sky, a wondrous
tangle of granite ornamentation, spires, belfries, arches thrown from
one tower to another, a huge, light, fairy-like lace-work in stone,
embroidered upon the azure of the heavens, from which the fantastic
and bestial-faced array of gargoyles seemed to be preparing to detach
themselves and wing their flight away. Upon the northern flank of the
Mount, between the abbey and the sea, a wild and almost perpendicular
descent that is called the Forest, because it is covered with ancient
trees, began where the houses ended and formed a speck of dark green
coloring upon the limitless expanse of yellow sands. Mme. de Burne and
Mariolle, who headed the little procession, stopped to enjoy the view.
She leaned upon his arm, her senses steeped in a rapture such as she
had never known before. With light steps she pursued her upward way,
willing to keep on climbing forever in his company toward this fabric
of a vision, or indeed toward any other end. She would have been glad
that the steep way should never have an ending, for almost for the
first time in her life she knew what it was to experience a plenitude
of satisfaction.
"Heavens! how beautiful it is!" she murmured.
Looking upon her, he answered: "I can think only of you."
She continued, with a smile: "I am not inclined to be very poetical,
as a general thing, but this seems to me so beautiful that I am really
moved."
He stammered: "I--I love you to distraction."
He was conscious of a slight pressure of her arm, and they resumed the
ascent.
They found a keeper awaiting them at the door of the abbey, and they
entered by that superb staircase, between two massive towers, which
leads to the Hall of the Guards. Then they went from hall to hall, from
court to court, from dungeon to dungeon, listening, wondering, charmed
with everything, admiring everything, the crypt, with its huge pillars,
so beautiful in their massiveness, which sustains upon its sturdy
arches all the weight of the choir of the church above, and all of the
_Wonder_, an awe-inspiring edifice of three stories of Gothic monuments
rising one above the other, the most extraordinary masterpiece of the
monastic and military architecture of the Middle Ages.
Then they came to the cloisters. Their surprise was so great that they
involuntarily came to a halt at sight of this square court inclosing
the lightest, most graceful, most charming of colonnades to be seen in
any cloisters in the world. For the entire length of the four galleries
the slender shafts in double rows, surmounted by exquisite capitals,
sustain a continuous garland of flowers and Gothic ornamentation of
infinite variety and constantly changing design, the elegant and
unaffected fancies of the simple-minded old artists who thus worked out
their dreams in stone beneath the hammer.
Michèle de Burne and André Mariolle walked completely around the
inclosure, very slowly, arm in arm, while the others, somewhat
fatigued, stood near the door and admired from a distance.
"Heavens! what pleasure this affords me!" she said, coming to a stop.
"For my part, I neither know where I am nor what my eyes behold. I am
conscious that you are at my side, and that is all."
Then smiling, she looked him in the face and murmured: "André!"
He saw that she was yielding. No further word was spoken, and they
resumed their walk. The inspection of the edifice was continued, but
they hardly had eyes to see anything.
Nevertheless their attention was attracted for the space of a moment
by the airy bridge, seemingly of lace, inclosed within an arch thrown
across space between two belfries, as if to afford a way to scale the
clouds, and their amazement was still greater when they came to the
"Madman's Path," a dizzy track, devoid of parapet, that encircles the
farthest tower nearly at its summit.
"May we go up there?" she asked.
"It is forbidden," the guide replied.
She showed him a twenty-franc piece. All the members of the party,
giddy at sight of the yawning gulf and the immensity of surrounding
space, tried to dissuade her from the imprudent freak.
She asked Mariolle: "Will you go?"
He laughed: "I have been in more dangerous places than that." And
paying no further attention to the others, they set out.
He went first along the narrow cornice that overhung the gulf, and she
followed him, gliding along close to the wall with eyes downcast that
she might not see the yawning void beneath, terrified now and almost
ready to sink with fear, clinging to the hand that he held out to her;
but she felt that he was strong, that there was no sign of weakening
there, that he was sure of head and foot; and enraptured for all her
fears, she said to herself: "Truly, this is a man." They were alone in
space, at the height where the sea-birds soar; they were contemplating
the same horizon that the white-winged creatures are ceaselessly
scouring in their flight as they explore it with their little yellow
eyes.
Mariolle felt that she was trembling; he asked: "Do you feel dizzy?"
"A little," she replied in a low voice; "but in your company I fear
nothing."
At this he drew near and sustained her by putting his arm about
her, and this simple assistance inspired her with such courage that
she ventured to raise her head and take a look at the distance. He
was almost carrying her and she offered no resistance, enjoying the
protection of those strong arms which thus enabled her to traverse the
heavens, and she was grateful to him with a romantic, womanly gratitude
that he did not mar their sea-gull flight by kisses.
When they had rejoined the others of the party, who were awaiting them
with the greatest anxiety, M. de Pradon angrily said to his daughter:
"_Dieu!_ what a silly thing to do!"
She replied with conviction: "No, it was not, papa, since it was
successfully accomplished. Nothing that succeeds is ever stupid."
He merely gave a shrug of the shoulders, and they descended the
stairs. At the porter's lodge there was another stoppage to purchase
photographs, and when they reached the inn it was nearly dinner-time.
The hostess recommended a short walk upon the sands, so as to obtain a
view of the Mount toward the open sea, in which direction, she said,
it presented its most imposing aspect. Although they were all much
fatigued, the band started out again and made the tour of the ramparts,
picking their way among the treacherous downs, solid to the eye but
yielding to the step, where the foot that was placed upon the pretty
yellow carpet that was stretched beneath it and seemed solid would
suddenly sink up to the calf in the deceitful golden ooze.
Seen from this point the abbey, all at once losing the cathedral-like
appearance with which it astounded the beholder on the mainland,
assumed, as if in menace of old Ocean, the martial appearance of a
feudal manor, with its huge battlemented wall picturesquely pierced
with loop-holes and supported by gigantic buttresses that sank their
Cyclopean stone foundations in the bosom of the fantastic mountain.
Mme. de Burne and André Mariolle, however, were not heedless of all
that. They were thinking only of themselves, caught in the meshes of
the net that they had set for each other, shut up within the walls of
that prison to which no sound comes from the outer world, where the eye
beholds only one being.
When they found themselves again seated before their well-filled
plates, however, beneath the cheerful light of the lamps, they seemed
to awake, and discovered that they were hungry, just like other mortals.
They remained a long time at table, and when the dinner was ended
the moonlight was quite forgotten in the pleasure of conversation.
There was no one, moreover, who had any desire to go out, and no one
suggested it. The broad moon might shed her waves of poetic light down
upon the little thin sheet of rising tide that was already creeping up
the sands with the noise of a trickling stream, scarcely perceptible
to the ear, but sinister and alarming; she might light up the ramparts
that crept in spirals up the flanks of the Mount and illumine the
romantic shadows of all the belfries of the old abbey, standing in
its wondrous setting of a boundless bay, in the bosom of which were
quiveringly reflected the lights that crawled along the downs--no one
cared to see more.
It was not yet ten o'clock when Mme. Valsaci, overcome with sleep,
spoke of going to bed, and her proposition was received without a
dissenting voice. Bidding one another a cordial good night, each
withdrew to his chamber.
André Mariolle knew well that he would not sleep; he therefore lighted
his two candles and placed them on the mantelpiece, threw open his
window, and looked out into the night.
All the strength of his body was giving way beneath the torture of an
unavailing hope. He knew that she was there, close at hand, that there
were only two doors between them, and yet it was almost as impossible
to go to her as it would be to dam the tide that was coming in and
submerging all the land. There was a cry in his throat that strove to
liberate itself, and in his nerves such an unquenchable and futile
torment of expectation that he asked himself what he was to do, unable
as he was longer to endure the solitude of this evening of sterile
happiness.
Gradually all the sounds had died away in the inn and in the single
little winding street of the town. Mariolle still remained leaning upon
his window-sill, conscious only that time was passing, contemplating
the silvery sheet of the still rising tide and rejecting the idea of
going to bed as if he had felt the undefined presentiment of some
approaching, providential good fortune.
All at once it seemed to him that a hand was fumbling with the
fastening of his door. He turned with a start: the door slowly opened
and a woman entered the room, her head veiled in a cloud of white lace
and her form enveloped in one of those great dressing-gowns that seem
made of silk, cashmere, and snow. She closed the door carefully behind
her; then, as if she had not seen him where he stood motionless--as if
smitten with joy--in the bright square of moonlight of the window, she
went straight to the mantelpiece and blew out the two candles.