Listen to me and heed me!
If this contract
Thou holdst me to, abide thou the result!
Answer to heaven for what I suffer! act!
Prepare thyself for such calamity
To fall on me, and those whose evil
Have linked them with me, as no past mishap,
However rare and marvellously Sad,
Can parallel.
Knowles—The Hunchback.
At the moment that Paul went into the study, the marchioness appeared at the door of the drawing-room, followed by the notary, and the several persons who had been invited to be present at the signing of the contract. Notwithstanding the nature of the meeting, the marchioness had not considered it proper to lay aside, even for one evening, her mourning garments, and dressed in complete black, as she had been always during twenty years, she came into the room a few moments before the marquis. None of the persons present, not even his son, had seen the marquis for many years. Such attention was in those days paid to ancient forms, that the marchioness would not allow the marriage contract of her daughter to be signed, without the head of the family, although deprived of reason, being present; at the ceremony. However little accustomed Lectoure was to feel intimidated, the marchioness produced upon him the effect which she did on every one that approached her, and on seeing her enter the room with so grave and dignified an aspect, he bowed to her with a feeling of profound respect.
“I am grateful to you, gentlemen,” said the marchioness, bowing to the persons who accompanied her, “for the honor you have been pleased to confer upon me, by being present at the betrothal of Mademoiselle Marguerite d’Auray, with the Baron de Lectoure. I, in consequence, was desirous that the marquis, although suffering from illness, should also be present at this meeting, to thank you at least by his presence, if he cannot do so verbally. You are all aware of his unfortunate malady, and you will, therefore, not be astonished, should some disjointed words—”
“Yes, madam,” said Lectoure, interrupting her, “we know the misfortune which has befallen him, and we admire the devoted wife, who for twenty years has borne half the weight of this sad visitation.”
“You see, madam,” said Emanuel, addressing in his turn, and kissing the hand of his mother, “all the world bows down in admiration of your conjugal piety.”
“Where is Marguerite?” murmured the marchioness, in a hair whisper.
“She was here not a moment ago,” said Emanuel. “Let her know that we are all assembled,” rejoined the marchioness, in the same tone.
A servant then announced “the Marquis d’Auray.” All present drew to one side, so as to leave free passage from the door, and all eyes were directed to the spot at which this new personage was to appear. It was not long before their curiosity was satisfied; the marquis came in almost immediately, supported by two servants.
He was an old man, whose countenance, notwithstanding that the traces of suffering had deeply furrowed it, still retained that noble and dignified appearance which had rendered him one of the most distinguished men of the court of Louis XV. His large, hollow, and feverish eyes, glanced around the assembly with a strange expression of astonishment. He was dressed in his costume of Steward of the Household, wore the order of the Holy Ghost suspended from his neck, and that of St. Louis, at his button hole. He advanced slowly, and without uttering a word. The two servants led him forward amid the most profound silence, to an arm-chair, in which he seated himself, and the servants left the room. The marchioness then placed herself at his right hand. The notary opened the portfolio, drew from it the marriage contract and read it aloud. The marquis and the marchioness made over the sum of five hundred thousand francs to Lectoure, and gave a like sum to Marguerite, as her dowry.
During the whole of the time occupied by the reading of the contract, the marchioness, notwithstanding her great self command, had betrayed some symptoms of uneasiness. But just at the moment when the notary had placed the contract open on the table, Emanuel returned and approached his mother.
“And Marguerite?” said the marchioness.
“She will be here instantly.”
“Madam,” murmured Marguerite, half opening the door, and clasping her hands.
The marchioness pretended not to hear her, and pointed with her finger at the pen.
“Baron, it is you who are first to sign.”
Lectoure immediately approached the table and signed the contract.
“Madam!” cried Marguerite, in a tone of supplication, and advancing one step toward her mother.
“Pass the pen to your betrothed, Baron,” said the marchioness.
The Baron walked round the table, and drew near to Marguerite.
“Madam!” again cried the latter, with an accent so melancholy, that it struck to the heart of every person present, and even the marquis himself raised his head.
“Sign!” said the marchioness, pointing to the marriage contract.
“Oh! my father! my father!” exclaimed Marguerite throwing herself at the feet of the marquis.
“What does this mean?” said the marchioness, leaning upon the arm of the marquis’ chair, and bending over him, “are you mad, mademoiselle?”
“My father! oh! my father!” again cried Marguerite, throwing her arms around him, “my father, have pity, save your daughter!”
“Marguerite!” murmured the marchioness, in a threatening accent.
“Madam!” replied Marguerite, “I cannot address myself to you—permit me, then, to implore my father’s pity; unless,” she added, pointing to the notary with a firm and determined gesture, “you would prefer my invoking the protection of the law.”
“Come, come,” said the marchioness, rising, and in a tone of bitter irony, “this is a family scene, and which, although highly interesting to near relations, must be sufficiently tedious to strangers. Gentlemen, you will find refreshments in the adjoining rooms. My son, conduct these gentlemen, and do the honors. Baron, I must beg your pardon for a short time.” Emanuel and Lectoure bowed in silence and withdrew, followed by all the company. The marchioness remained motionless until the last of them had withdrawn, and then she closed all the doors leading into the room, when, returning to the marquis, whom Marguerite still held clasped in her arms.
“And now,” said she, “that there is no one present excepting those who have the right to lay their commands upon you, sign that paper, mademoiselle, or leave the room.”
“For pity’s sake, madam, for pity’s sake, do not compel me to commit so infamous an act!”
“Have you not heard me?” said the marchioness, giving to her voice an imperative tone, which she thought impossible to be resisted, “or must I repeat my words? ‘Sign, or leave the room.’”
“Oh! my father!” cried Marguerite, “mercy! mercy! No, it shall not be said, that after having been banished from my father’s presence for ten years, I was torn from his arms the first time I again beheld him—and that, before he had recognized me, before he has embraced me. Oh! father! father!—it is I, it is your daughter!”
“What is that voice that is imploring me?” murmured the marquis. “Who is this child who calls me father?”
“That voice,” said the marchioness, seizing the arm of her daughter, “is a voice that is raised against the rights of nature. That child is a rebellious daughter.”
“My father!” cried Marguerite imploringly, “look at me. Oh! my father, save me I defend me! I am Marguerite.”
“Marguerite? Marguerite?” stammered the marquis, “I had formerly a child of that name.”
“It is I! it is I!” rejoined Marguerite: “I am your child—I am your daughter.”
“There are no children but those who obey. Obey! and you will then have the right to call yourself our daughter,” rejoined the marchioness.
“To you, my father, yes,—to you I am ready to obey. But you do not command this sacrifice! you do not wish that I should be unhappy—unhappy even to despair—unhappy even to death.”
“Come! come!” said the marquis holding her in his turn, and pressing her to his heart. “Oh! this is a delicious and unknown feeling to me. And now—wait! wait!” He pressed his hand to his forehead. “It seems to me that I recollect.”
“Sir!” cried the marchioness, “tell her that she ought to obey; that the malediction of God awaits rebellious children. Tell her that, rather than to encourage her in her impiety!”
The marquis slowly raised his head, and fixed his piercing eyes upon his wife, and then slowly pronounced the following words: “Take care! madam, take care. Have I not told you that I begin to remember!” and then again bending down his head to that of Marguerite, so that his grey hairs mingled with the dark tresses, of his daughter—“Speak—speak!” said he, “what is it that disturbs you, my child—tell me all.”
“Oh! I am most unhappy!”
“Everybody, then, is unhappy here,” exclaimed the marquis, “whether their hair be grey or black—an old man or a child.. Oh! and I also—I am unhappy—be assured.
“Sir, go up stairs into your room again: you must,” said the marchioness.
“Yes, that I may again be face to face with you; shut up like a prisoner! That may be very well, when I am mad.”
“Yes, yes, my father, you are right. My mother has devoted herself to you long enough; it is now time that your daughter should perform that duty. Take me with you, father. I will not leave you day or night. You will only have to make a sign, to utter a word, and I will serve you on my knees.”
“Oh! you would not have the strength to do it.”
“Yes, yes, my father, I will—as truly as I am your daughter.”
The marchioness wrung her hands with impatience.
“If you are my daughter, how is it that I have not seen you for ten years?”
“Because I was told that you would not see me, my father; because they told me that you did not love me.”
“You were told that I would not see you—not see that angel face!” said he, taking her head between his hands, and looking at her with intense auction; “they told you that—they told you that a poor condemned soul did not wish for heaven! Who was it, then, that told you a father would not see his child? Who has dared to say, child, your father loves you not?”
“I!——” said the marchioness, again endeavoring to take Marguerite from her father’s arms.
“You!” exclaimed the marquis, interrupting her: “it was you? To you then, has been confided the fatal mission of deceiving me in all my affections. All my griefs, then, must find their source in you? You wish, then, now to break the father’s heart, as twenty years ago, you did that of the husband.”
“You are delirious, sir,” said the marchioness, loosing the arm of her daughter; and going to the right of the marquis, she whispered—“be silent!”
“No, madam, no, I am not now delirious,” replied the marquis, “No! no! Say rather, say that,—and it will be the truth,—say that I am now between an angel who would recall me to reason, and a demon who wishes me again to become insane. No! No! I am not mad. Do you wish that I should prove it to you?” He rose, supporting himself on the arms of his chair. “Must I speak to you of letters, of adultery, of a duel?”
“I say,” said the marchioness, grasping his arm, “I tell you that you are more forsaken by heaven than ever, when you utter such things, without reflecting as to whose ears are listening. Cast down your eyes, sir—look who is standing yonder, and then dare assert that you are not mad!”
“You are right;” said the marquis, falling back in his chair. “Your mother is right,” continued he, addressing Marguerite—“I am mad, and you must not believe what I say, but what she says. Your mother is devotedness, virtue itself, and therefore, she has not sleepless nights, nor remorse, nor madness. What does your mother wish?”
“My misery, father; my everlasting misery.”
“And how can I prevent this misery?” said the unhappy old man, with a most heart-rending anguish; “how can I, a poor, insane old man, prevent it? who thinks he always sees the blood issuing from a wound—who thinks he constantly hears a voice proceeding from a tomb!”
“Oh you can do all; say but one word and I am saved! They wish me to marry—”
The marquis listlessly reclined his head on the back of his chair.
“Listen to me! they wish to marry me to a man whom I do not love—do you understand me?—to a wretch!—and you have been brought here—placed in that arm-chair, before the table—you, you my father! to sign this infamous contract—this contract which I now hand to you.”
“Without consulting me,” said the marquis, taking the contract; “without asking me whether I will, or I will not! Do they believe me dead? And if they think me dead, do they fear me less than they would a spectre? This marriage would cause your misery, you say?”
“My eternal misery!” exclaimed Marguerite. “The marriage, then, shall not take place.”
“I have pledged your word and mine,” said the marchioness, and with the more energy, that she felt her influence over her husband about to escape her.
“This marriage, I tell you, shall not take place!” replied the marquis, in a tone louder than that of his wife. “It is too dreadful a thing,” continued he, in a gloomy sepulchral tone, “to be permitted. A marriage in which a wife loves not her husband—why, it causes madness! As to myself, the marchioness has always loved me, and loved me faithfully—that which drove me mad—oh! that was a different matter.”
A flash of diabolical joy shot from the eyes of the marchioness, for she at once saw from the violence of the expressions used by her husband, and the terror depicted on his features, that his insanity was about to return.
“This contract,” said the marquis, and he raised it in his hands as if about to tear it.
The marchioness eagerly caught his hand. Marguerite appeared to be hanging by a thread between heaven and hell.
“That which drives me mad!” reiterated the marquis, “is a tomb which widely opens, a spectre that issues from the earth, it is a phantom that speaks to me, and says—”
“Your life is in my hands!” murmured the marchioness in his ear, repeating the last words of the dying Morlaix: “I could take it.”
“Do you hear that?” cried the marquis, rising, and as if about to rush from the room.
“My father! oh! my father! recall your senses; there is no tomb, there is no spectre, there is no phantom; those words were uttered by the marchioness.”
“But I wish you to live,” continued the latter, concluding the sentence she had begun, “to forgive me as I forgive you.”
“Pardon, Morlaix, pardon!” cried the marquis, falling back in his arm-chair, his hair standing on end with terror, and the perspiration streaming from his forehead.
“Oh! father! father!”
“You see that your father is altogether deranged,” said the marchioness, triumphantly; “say no more to him.”
“Oh!” cried Marguerite, “God will, I trust perform a miracle! My love, my caresses, my tears, will restore him to reason.”
“Make the attempt,” replied the marchioness, coldly, abandoning to her care the marquis, who was powerless, speechless, and almost without consciousness.
“Oh! my poor father!” exclaimed Marguerite, in a tone of agony.
The marquis remained perfectly impassible.
“Sir!” said the marchioness, in an imperative manner.
“Eh! eh!” cried the marquis, shuddering.
“Save me! oh! save me, father!” cried Marguerite, wringing her hands, and throwing herself back in despair.
“Take this pen and sign,” said the marchioness, “you must—it is my will.”
“Now, I am lost indeed!” cried Marguerite, overwhelmed with terror, and feeling that she had no longer strength to continue the struggle.
But at the moment that the marquis, overpowered, had written the first letters of his name; when the marchioness was congratulating herself on the victory she had obtained, and Marguerite was about to leave the room in despair, an unexpected incident suddenly changed the scene. The door of the study opened, and Paul, who had been anxiously watching, though invisibly, the whole of this terrible conflict, issued from it.
“Madam,” said he, “one word before this contract is signed!”
“Who is it calls me!” said the marchioness, endeavoring to distinguish in the distance that separated them, the person who had thus spoken, and who stood in a dark corner of the room.
“I know that voice!” exclaimed the marquis, shuddering, as if seared by a red-hot iron.
Paul advanced three paces, and the light from the lustre hanging in the centre of the room fell full upon him.
“Is it a spectre?” cried the marchioness, in her turn, struck with the resemblance of the youth who stood before her to her former lover.
“I know that face!” cried the marquis, believing that he saw the man whom he had killed.
“My God! my God! protect me,” stammered Marguerite, raising her eyes and hands to heaven.
“Morlaix! Morlaix!” said the marquis, rising and advancing toward Paul, “Morlaix!—pardon! mercy!” and he fell at full length upon the floor.
“My father!” cried Marguerite, rushing to his assistance.
At that moment a servant entered the room, with terror in his looks, and addressing the marchioness said—
“Madam, Achard has sent to request that the priest and the doctor of the castle, may instantly be ordered to attend him—he is dying.”
“Tell him,” replied the marchioness, pointing to her husband, whom Marguerite was vainly endeavoring to restore to consciousness, “that they are both obliged to remain here to attend upon the marquis.”
And this our life, exempt from public haunt,
Finds tongues in trees, books in the running brooks,
Sermons in stones, and good in every thing.
Shakespeare.
As has been seen by the end of the preceding chapter, God, by one of those extraordinary combinations, which short-sighted man almost always attributes to chance, had summoned to his presence, and almost at the same moment, the souls of the noble Marquis d’Auray, and the poor low-born Achard. We have seen that the former, struck by the sight of Paul, the living portrait of his father, as if by a thunderbolt, fell at the feet of the young man, who was himself terrified at the effect his appearance had produced.
As to Achard, the circumstances which had hastened his death, although differing in their nature, and from very opposite feelings, had arisen from the same fatal causes, and had been brought about by the same individual. The sight of Paul had created direful emotions in the breasts both of the marquis and Achard. On the former from excess of terror, on the latter from excess of joy.
During the day which had preceded the intended signing of the contract, Achard had felt himself more feeble than usual. Notwithstanding this, he had not neglected in the evening to crawl to his master’s grave, there to put up his accustomed prayer. Thence he had observed with a devotion more profound than ever, that ever new and splendid spectacle, the sun sinking into the ocean. He had followed the decline of its enpurpled light, and as though the vast torch of the world had drawn his soul toward it, he had felt his strength extinguished with its last rays; so that when the servant from the castle came in the evening at the accustomed hour to receive his orders, not finding him in his house, had sought for him without the park, and as it was well known that he generally walked in that direction, found him lying extended at the foot of the great oak tree, upon the grave of his master, and deprived of consciousness. Thus did he remain constant to the last in that religious devotedness he had vowed to his master’s tomb, and which had been the exclusive feeling of the last years of his life.
The servant took him in his arms, and carried him into his house; and then, terrified at the unexpected accident, had hastened to the marchioness to inform her that Achard required the attendance of a physician and a priest, which message was delivered to her by the servant then in waiting, to which the marchioness refused to accede, under the pretext that they were required as urgently by the marquis as the old servant, and that superiority of rank, powerful, even when at the point of death, gave her husband the right of first employing.
But the intelligence which had been announced to the marchioness at the moment of that dreadful agony, into which their varying interests and varying passions had thrown the actors in this family drama, of which we have become the historian, this intelligence, we say, was heard by Paul. Conceiving that the signature of the contract had now become impossible from the state of the marquis, he had only allowed himself time to whisper to Marguerite, that should she need his assistance, she would find him at Achard’s cottage, and then he rushed into the park, and winding his way amid its serpentine walks and thickets, with the skill of a sear man, who reads his path in the starry firmament, he soon reached the house, entered it panting from his rapid course, and found Achard just as he was recovering from his fainting fit, and clasped him in his arms. The delight of again seeing him renewed the strength of the old man, who now felt certain of having a friendly hand to close his eyes.
“Oh! it is you—it is you!” exclaimed the old man.
“I did not hope to see you again.”
“And could you possibly believe that I should have been apprized of the state in which you were, and that I would not instantly fly to your assistance?”
“But I knew not where to find you—where I could send to tell you that I wished once more to see you before I died.”
“I was at the castle, father, where I learned that you were dangerously ill, and I hastened hither.”
“And how was it that you were at the castle?” said the old man, with amazement.
Paul related to him all that had occurred.
“Eternal Providence!” cried the old man, when Paul had concluded his recital, “how hidden and inevitable are thy decrees. Thou, who, after twenty years, hast conducted this youth to the cradle of his infancy, and hast killed the assassin of the father, by the mere aspect of the son!”
“Yes, yes, thus it happens,” replied Paul, “and it is Providence, also, who conducts me to you, that I might save you. For I heard them refuse to send you the physician and the priest.”
“According to common justice,” rejoined Achard, “they might have made a fair division. The marquis, who fears death, might have retained the physician, while to me who am tired of life, they might have sent the priest.”
“I can go on horseback,” said Paul, “and in less than an hour—”
“In an hour it would be too late,” said the dying man, in an enfeebled voice, “a priest! a priest only—I ask but for a priest.”
“Father,” replied Paul, “in his sacred functions, I know I cannot supply his place; but we can speak of God, of his greatness and his goodness.”
“Yes, but let us first finish with the things of this earth, that we may then be able to turn our thoughts wholly to those of heaven. You say that, like myself, the marquis is dying.”
“I left him at the last agony.”
“You know, that immediately after his death, the papers which are deposited in that closet, and which prove your birth, are yours by right.”
“I know it.”
“If I die before the marquis, to whom can I confide them?” The old man sat up and pointed to a key hanging at the head of his bed. “You will take that key, you will open the closet—in it you will find a casket. You are a man of honor. Swear to me that you will not open that casket until the marquis shall be dead.”
“I swear it,” said Paul solemnly, and extending his hand towards the crucifix hanging at the head of the bed.
“‘Tis well,” replied Achard; “now I shall die in peace.”
“You may do so, for the son holds your hand in this world, and the father stretches out his towards you from heaven!”
“Do you believe, my child, that he will be satisfied with my fidelity?”
“No king was ever so faithfully obeyed during life, as he has been since his death.”
“Yes,” murmured the old man, in a gloomy tone, “I was but too exact in following his orders. I ought not to have suffered the duel to have taken place; I ought to have refused attending it as a witness. Hear me, Paul; it is this that I wished to have said to a priest, for it is the only thing that weighs upon my conscience: listen: there have been moments of doubt, during which, I have regarded this solitary duel as an assassination. In that case, Paul, oh! in that case, I have not only been a witness, but an accomplice!”
“Oh! my second father,” replied Paul, “I know not whether the laws of earth are always in accordance with the laws of heaven, and whether honor as it is considered by man, would be a virtue in the eyes of the Lord; I know not whether our holy church, an enemy to bloodshed, permits that the injured should attempt with his own hands, to avenge the wrongs inflicted upon him by attacking his injurer, and if in that case, the judgment of heaven directs the pistol ball or the sword’s point. These are questions not to be decided by reasoning, but by conscience. Well, then, my conscience tells me, that situated as you were, I should have done precisely as you did. Should conscience in this case mislead me, it also misled you, and in this view of the matter, I have a greater right than a priest, to absolve you; and in my name, and in that of my father, I pardon you.”
“Thanks! thanks!” cried the old man, pressing the hands of Paul; “thanks, for these words, pour consolation into the soul of a dying man. Remorse is a dreadful thing! remorse would lead one to believe that there exists no God. For without a judge there can be no judgment.”
“Listen to me,” said Paul, in that poetic and solemn accent, which was peculiar to him: “I also have often doubted in the existence of a God: isolated and lost in the wide world, without family, and without a single friend, I sought for support in the Lord, and I asked of every thing that encircled me, some proof of his existence. Often have I arrested my steps at the foot of one of these crosses, erected by the road side, and with my eyes fixed upon the Saviour, I demanded, and with tears, to be assured of his existence, and divine mission; I prayed that his eyes would deign to look upon me: that one drop of blood might fall from his wound, or that a sigh might issue from his lips. The crucifix remained motionless, and I arose, my heart being overcome with despair, saying—‘did I but know where I could find my father’s tomb, I would question him as Hamlet did the ghost, and he would perhaps answer me!’”
“Poor child!”
“Then would I enter a church,” continued Paul, “one of those churches of the north, gloomy, religious, Christian! And I would feel myself borne down with sorrow; but sorrow is not faith! I approached the altar; I threw myself upon my knees before the tabernacle, in which God dwells; I bowed my head till it touched the marble of the steps; and when I had thus remained prostrated for hours and lost in doubt, I raised my head, hoping that the God I was seeking would at length manifest his presence to me by a ray of his glory, or by some dazzling proof of his power. But the church remained gloomy, as the cross had remained motionless. And I would then rush from its porches with insensate haste, crying, ‘Lord! Lord! didst thou exist, thou would reveal thyself to man. It is thy will, then, that men should doubt, since thou canst reveal thyself to them, but dost not.’”
“Beware of what you are saying, Paul,” cried the old man: “beware that the doubt thy heart contains do not attaint mine! Thou hast time left to thee to believe, whereas, I—I am about to die.”
“Wait, father, wait!” continued Paul, with softened voice, and placid features. “I have not told you all. It was then, that I said to myself, ‘the crucifix by the road side, the churches of the cities are but the work of man. Let us seek God, in God’s own works.’ From that moment, my father, began that wandering life, which will remain an eternal mystery, known only to the heavens, the ocean, and myself—it led me into the solitary wilds of America, for I thought the newer a world was, the more freshly would it retain the impress of God’s hand. I did not deceive myself. There, often in those virgin forests, into which I was perhaps the first who had ever penetrated; with no shelter, but the heavens, no couch, but the earth, absorbed by one sole thought, I have listened to the thousand noises of a world about to sleep, and nature when awakening. For a long time, did I still remain without comprehending that unknown tongue, formed by the mingling of the murmur of rivers, the vapor of the lakes, the rustling of the forest, and the perfume of flowers. Finally, the veil which had obscured my eyes, and the weight which had oppressed my heart, was little by little removed; and from that time, I began to believe that these noises of evening, and of approaching day, were but one universal hymn, by which created things expressed their gratitude to the Creator.”
“Almighty God!” cried the dying man, clasping his hands, and raising his eyes to heaven, with an expression of holy faith, “I cried to you from the bottomless pit, and you heard me in my distress; oh! my God I I thank thee.”
“Then,” continued Paul, with still increasing enthusiasm, “then, I sought upon the ocean, that full conviction which earth had refused to me. The earth is but a span—the ocean is immensity! The ocean is, after God himself, the grandest, the most powerful object in the universe. I have heard the ocean roar like a chafed lion, and then at the voice of its master, become tranquil as a submissive dog; I have seen it rise like a Titan, to scale the heavens; and then beneath the whip of the tempest, moan like a weeping infant. I have seen it dashing its waves to meet the lightning, and endeavoring to quench the thunder with its foam; and then become smooth as a mirror, and reflect even the smallest star in the heavens. Upon the land, I had become convinced of God’s existence, upon the ocean, I recognised his power. In the solitary wilds, as Moses, I had heard the voice of the Lord, but during the tempest, I saw him, as did Ezekiel, riding upon the wings of the storm. Thenceforward, my father, thenceforward, all doubt was driven from my mind, and from the evening on which I witnessed the first hurricane, I believed, and prayed.”
“I believe in God, the Father Almighty, maker of Heaven and Earth,” said the dying man, with ardent faith; and he continued thus the symbol of the apostles to the last word.
Paul listened to him in silence, with his eyes raised to heaven, and when he had concluded, said—
“It is not thus, that a priest would have spoken to you, my father, for I have spoken to you as a seaman, and with a voice more accustomed to pronounce words of death than consolation. Forgive me, father, forgive me for it.”
“You have made me pray, and believe as you do,” said the old man; “tell me, then, what more could a priest have done? What you have said is plain and grand—let me reflect on what you have said.”
“Listen!” said Paul, shuddering, “What is it?”
“Did you not hear?”
“No.”
“I thought that a voice of some one in distress called to me—there again—do you not hear it?—now, again!—It is the voice of Marguerite.”
“Go to her instantly,” replied the old man; “I need to be alone.”
Paul rushed into the adjoining room, and as he entered it he heard his name again repeated, and close to the door of the cottage. Then, running to the door he anxiously opened it, and found Marguerite upon the threshold, her strength having failed her, and she had fallen upon her knees.
“Save me! save me!” she cried, with an expression of profound terror, on perceiving Paul, and clasped his knees.
Mercy from him!
And how can I expect it?
By what right
Can I demand he should withhold his claim,
The proofs once in his power?—Anonymous.
Paul ran to Marguerite, and caught her in his arms; she was pale and icy cold. He carried her into the first room, placed her in an arm chair, returned to the door which had remained open, and closed it, and then hastened back.
“What is it that so terrifies you? who is pursuing you? and how does it happen that you come here at this unusual hour?”
“Oh!” exclaimed Marguerite, “at any hour, whether by day or night, I should have flown as long as the earth would have borne me! I should have flown till I had found some heart in which I could have poured forth my sorrows, an arm capable of defending me. Paul! Paul! my father is dead?”
“Poor child!” said Paul, pressing Marguerite to his heart, “who flies from one house of death to fall into another; who leaves death in the castle, to find it in the cottage.”
“Yes, yes!” cried Marguerite rising, still trembling with terror, and convulsively pressing Paul’s arm. “Death is yonder, and I find death here! but yonder it is attended with despair and fear, while here it is met with tranquillity and hope. Oh! Paul! Paul! had you but seen that which I have seen!”
“Tell me all that happened.”
“You saw the terrible effect produced by your appearance, and the mere sound of your voice?”
“Yes, I saw that.”
“They carried him still fainting and speechless into his own room.”
“It was to your mother that I spoke,” said Paul, “and he heard me; I could not foresee it would so much have terrified him.”
“You full well know all that had passed, for you must have heard from the room in which you were concealed, every word we uttered. My father, my poor father, had recognized me, and I, seeing him thus, could, not repress my uneasiness: notwithstanding the risk I ran of irritating my mother, I went up to his room—the door was locked; I knocked softly at it. He had recovered his senses, for I heard a faint voice asking ‘who was there?’”
“And your mother?” said Paul eagerly.
“My mother,” replied Marguerite, “was no longer there, and she had locked him in as she would have done to a child; but when he had recognized my voice, when I had told him that it was his daughter Marguerite who wished to see him, he told me that I could get into the room by going down stairs again, and that in the study I should find a private staircase which led to it. A minute afterwards, I was kneeling by his bedside, and he gave me his blessing. Yes, Paul, I received his blessing before he died, his paternal benediction, which I trust will bring down the blessing of God upon my head.”
“Yes,” said Paul, “God will pardon you; you may now feel tranquil. Weep for your father, Marguerite, but weep no longer for yourself, for you are saved.”
“You have heard nothing yet, Paul!” exclaimed Marguerite. “Hear me still.”
“Proceed!”
“At the very moment when I was kneeling, kissing the hand of my father, and thanking him for the relief he had afforded my afflicted mind, I heard my mothers footstep on the staircase. I recognized her voice, and my father also recognized it, for he again embraced me, and made a sign to me to leave him. I obeyed him, but such was my terror and confusion, that I mistook the door, and instead of the staircase by which I had ascended, I found myself in a small cabinet which had no issue. I felt all around its walls, but could find no door. I was compelled to remain there. I then heard my mother, accompanied by the priest, entering my father’s room—I restrained my breathing, fearing that she should hear me. I saw then through the glass window of the door, and I assure you, Paul, that she was paler than my father who was about to die.”
“Gracious heaven!” murmured Paul.
“The priest seated himself by the bed-side,” continued Marguerite, so terrified that she pressed still closer against Paul; “my mother remained standing at the foot of the bed—I was there, just opposite to them, compelled to remain a witness of that mournful spectacle, without the means of retreat!—a daughter, obliged to hear the dying confession of her father!—was it not horrible? I fell upon my knees, closing my eyes that I might not see—praying that I might not hear—and yet in spite of myself—and this I swear to you, Paul—I saw and I heard—Oh! what I then heard, can never be obliterated from my memory—I saw my father, whose recollections seemed to inspire him with a feverish strength, sit up in his bed, the paleness of death imprinted on his face. I heard him—I heard him pronounce the words, a duel—adultery—assassination!—and at each word he uttered, I saw my mother turn pale—and paler even than before—and I heard her raise her voice so that it might drown the voice of the dying man, saying to the priest: ‘believe him not—believe him not, reverend father; what he says is false—or rather, he is mad, he knows not what he says—believe him not!’ Oh! Paul, it was a dreadful spectacle, an impious sacrilege; a cold perspiration stood upon my forehead, and I fainted.”
“Justice of Heaven!” cried Paul. “I know not how long I remained without consciousness. When I recovered my senses, the room was as silent as the tomb. My mother and the priest had disappeared, and two wax lights were burning near my father. I opened the door of the cabinet, and cast my eyes on the bed; it appeared to me that I could distinguish beneath the sheet which completely covered it, the stiffened form of a corpse. I divined that all was over! I remained motionless, divided between the funereal awe which such a sight inspired, and the pious desire of raising the covering to kiss once more before he should be inclosed in his coffin, the venerable forehead of my dear father. Fear, however, overcame every other feeling—an ice-like mortal, and invincible terror drove me from the room. I flew down the staircase, I know not how, but I believe without touching a single step,—I fled across the rooms and through the corridors, till the freshness of the air convinced me that I had left the castle. I fled, completely unconscious of whither my steps were leading me, until I remembered you had told me I should find you here. A secret instinct—tell me what it was—for I cannot myself comprehend it, had led me in this direction. It appeared to me that I was pursued by shadows, horrid phantoms. At the corner of one of the avenues I thought—(had I then lost my senses?)—I thought I saw my mother, dressed all in black, and walking as noiselessly as a sceptre. Oh! then, then! terror lent me wings—I at first fled without knowing whither; after this my strength failed me, and it was then you heard my cries. I dragged myself along a few more paces, and fell motionless at this door; had you not opened it, I should have expired upon the spot, for I was so much terrified, that it appeared to me,”—then suddenly pausing, Marguerite trembled, and whispered to Paul, “Silence! do you not hear?”
“Yes,” replied Paul, instantly extinguishing the lamp, “yes, yes—footsteps—I hear them also.”
“Look! look!” cried Marguerite, concealing herself behind the curtain of the window, and throwing them around Paul at the same moment—“look! I was not mistaken—it was my mother.”
The door had been opened, and the marchioness, pale as a spectre, entered the room slowly, closed the door after her, and locked it, and then without observing Paul and Marguerite, went into the second room where Achard was lying. She then walked up to his bed, as she had only a short time before to that of the marquis, only that she was not now accompanied by a priest.
“Who is there?” said Achard, drawing back one of the curtains of his bed.
“It is I,” replied the marchioness, drawing back the other curtain.
“You, madam,” cried the old man with terror; “for what purpose have you come to the bedside of a dying man?”
“I have come to make a proposal to him.”
“One that will lose his soul! is it not?”
“To save it, on the contrary. There is only one thing in this world, Achard, of which you stand in need,” rejoined the marchioness, bending down over the bed of the dying man, “and that is a priest.”
“You refused to allow the one who is attached to the castle to attend me.”
“In five minutes, if you wish it, he shall be here.”
“Let him be sent then,” said the old man, “and believe me there is not a moment to be lost. He must come quickly.”
“But if I give you the peace of heaven, you will give me in exchange peace on earth.”
“What can I do for you?” murmured the dying man, closing his eyes, that he might not see a woman whose looks chilled him.
“You stand in need of a priest, that you may die in peace,” said the marchioness, “you know the gift I require, in order to exist in tranquillity.”
“You would close heaven to me by a perjury.”
“I would open it to you by a pardon.”
“That pardon I have already received.”
“And from whom?—”
“From him who, perhaps, had alone the right to grant it to me.”
“Has Morlaix then descended from heaven?” asked the marchioness, in a tone in which there was almost as much terror as irony.
“No, madam,” replied he, “but have you forgotten that he left a son upon this earth?”
“Then you have also seen him,” exclaimed the marchioness.
“Yes,” replied Achard.
“And you have told him all——”
“All!”
“And the papers which prove his birth?” asked the marchioness, with trembling anxiety.
“The marquis was not dead—the papers are still there.”
“Achard!” cried the marchioness, falling upon her knees, by the bedside. “Achard! you will take pity on me?”
“You, on your knees, before me, madam?”
“Yes, old man,” replied the marchioness, in a supplicating tone, “yes, I am on my knees before you—and I beg, I implore you, for you hold in your hands the honor of one of the most ancient families in France—my past, my future life! Those papers are my heart, my soul—they are more than this—they are my name—the name of my forefathers—of my children—and you well know all that I have suffered to preserve that name unsullied. Do you believe that I had not a heart as other women have? the feelings of a lover, of a wife, and of a mother? Well! I have overcome them all, one by one, and the struggle has been long. I am twenty years younger than you are, old man, I am still in the prime of life, and you are on the verge of the grave. Look, then, upon these hairs; they are even whiter than your own.”
“What says she?” whispered Marguerite, who had softly crept to the door, and could see all that was passing in the inner room. “Gracious heaven!”
“Listen, listen, dear child,” said Paul, “it is the Lord who permits that all shall be thus revealed.”
“Yes, yes,” murmured Achard, who was becoming weaker every moment. “Yes, you doubted the goodness of the Lord, you had forgotten that he had forgiven the adulterous woman—”
“Yes, but when she met with Christ, men were about to cast stones at her—men, who for twenty generations have been accustomed to revere our name, to honor our family—did they but learn, that which, thank heaven! has heretofore been hidden from them—would hear it uttered with shame and with contempt. I have so much suffered, that God will pardon me—but man! men are so implacable, that they will not pardon—moreover, am I alone exposed to their insults—on either side, the cross I bear, have I not a child?—and is not the other that we speak of, the first-born? In the eyes of the law, is he not the son of the Marquis d’Auray? do you forget that he is the first-born, the head of the family? Do you not know, that in order to possess himself of the title, the estates, the fortune of the family of Auray, he has only to invoke the law? and then what would remain to Emanuel? The cross of the order of Malta—and to Marguerite?—a convent.”
“Oh! yes, yes,” whispered Marguerite, and stretching out her arms, toward the marchioness, “yes, a convent, in which I would pray for you, my mother.”
“Silence! silence!” whispered Paul.
“Oh! you know him not,” said Achard, whose voice was scarcely audible.
“No! but I know human nature,” replied the marchioness, “he may recover a name, he! who has no name—a fortune, he! who has no fortune. And do you believe he would renounce that fortune and that name.”
“Should you ask it of him, he would.”
“And by what right could I demand it?” said the marchioness; “by what right could I ask him to spare me, to spare Emanuel, to spare Marguerite? He would say, ‘I do not know you, madam—I have never seen you—you are my mother, and that is all I know.’”
“In his name,” stammered Achard, whose tongue death was beginning to benumb, “in his name, madam, I engage, I swear—oh! my God! my God!”
The marchioness arose, observing attentively by the old man’s features, the approach of death.
“You engage, you swear!” she said, “is he here to ratify this engagement—you engage! you swear! and on your word, you would, that I should stake the years I have yet to live, against the moments which yet remain between you and death! I have entreated, I have implored, and again, I entreat and implore you to give up those papers to me.”
“Those papers now are his.”
“I must have them! I repeat, I must have them,” continued the marchioness, gaining strength, as the dying man became more feeble.
“My God! my God! have mercy upon me!” murmured Achard.
“No one can now come,” rejoined the marchioness “you told me that you wore the key of that closet always about you——”
“Would you wrest it from the hands of a dying man?”
“No,” replied the marchioness, “I will wait.”
“Let me die in peace,” exclaimed Achard tearing the crucifix from the head of his bed, and raising it between, himself and the marchioness, he cried: “leave me! leave me; in the name of Jesus Christ!”
The marchioness fell upon her knees, bowing her head to the ground. The old man, for a moment, remained in the same awful attitude; then, by degrees, his strength forsook him, and he fell back on his bed, crossed his arms, and pressed the image of the Saviour to his breast.
The marchioness seized the lower part of the two curtains, and without raising her head, she crossed them in such a manner as to conceal the last struggles of the dying man.
“Horror! horror!” murmured Marguerite.
“Let us kneel, and pray,” said Paul.
A moment of solemn and dreadful silence then ensued, which was only interrupted by the last gasps of the dying man; these gasps became fainter by degrees, and then ceased altogether. All was over; the old man was dead.
The marchioness slowly raised her head, listened with intense anxiety for some minutes, and then, without opening the curtains, passed her hand between them, and after some effort, withdrew her hand again—she had obtained the key. She then silently arose, and with her face still turned toward the bed, walked to the closet. But at the moment she was about to unlock it, Paul, who was observing all her movements, rushed into the room, and seizing her by the arm, said—?
“Give me that key, my mother! for the marquis is dead, and those papers now belong to me.”
“Justice of heaven!” exclaimed the marchioness, starting back with terror, and falling into a chair, “justice of heaven! it is my son!”
“Merciful heaven!” murmured Marguerite, throwing herself upon her knees in the outer room: “merciful heaven! he is my brother!”
Paul opened the closet, and took the casket which contained the papers.
Thou canst save me,
Thou ought’st! thou must!
I tell thee at his feet
I’ll fall a corse, ere mount his bridal bed!
Go choose betwixt my rescue and my grave.
Knowles.—The hunchbach
Notwithstanding the dreadful nature of the events which had occurred during that fatal night, Paul had not forgotten the mortal defiance which had been exchanged between himself and Lectoure. As that young gentleman would probably not know where to find him, he thought it only decorous to save Lectoure the trouble of seeking for him, and about seven in the morning, Lieutenant Walter presented himself at the castle, being charged on behalf of Paul to arrange the terms of the combat. He found Emanuel in Lectoure’s apartment. The latter, on perceiving the officer, withdrew, and went down into the park, that the two young men might more freely discuss the matter. Walter had received from his commander directions to accede to every thing that might be proposed. The preliminary terms were, therefore, very speedily arranged; and it was agreed between them, that the meeting should take place in the afternoon, at four o’clock. The place of rendezvous the sea-side, near the fisherman’s hut, which was about half-way between Port Louis and Auray castle. As to the weapons, they were to bring their pistols and their swords; it would be decided on the spot which they were to use, it being clearly understood that Lectoure, having been the party insulted, should have the right to make his choice.
As to the marchioness, although in the first instance petrified by the unexpected appearance of Paul, she soon recovered all her natural firmness, and drawing her veil over her face, she withdrew from the chamber, and walked across the outer room which had remained in darkness. She did not, therefore, perceive Marguerite, who was kneeling in one corner of it, mute from astonishment and terror. She after that crossed the park, entered the castle, and repaired to the room in which the scene of the contract had taken place. There, by the dying light of the wax tapers, with both her elbows resting on the table, her head supported on her hands, her eyes riveted to the paper to which Lectoure had already affixed his name, and the marquis had signed the half of his, she passed the remainder of the night reflecting upon a new determination. Thus she awaited the coming day without even thinking of taking the least repose, so powerfully did her soul of adamant support the body in which it was enclosed. This resolution was to get Emanuel and Marguerite away from the castle as speedily as possible, for it was from her children, most especially, that she desired to conceal that which was about to take place between Paul and herself.
Marguerite, who had been thus most unexpectedly present at the death-bed of the marquis and of Achard, through which she had so providentially discovered her mother’s secret, rushed into Paul’s arms immediately after her mother’s departure from the cottage, exclaiming:
“Oh! now you are really my brother.”
Her tears choked further utterance, and it was some minutes before Paul could tranquillize her agitated spirit, torn by so many and such conflicting emotions. Paul then fearing that the marchioness might enquire for her daughter, on her arrival at the castle, urged Marguerite to hasten thither; and seeing she was still trembling at the recollection of the many horrors she had witnessed, led her out of the cottage, of which he locked the door, and accompanied her to within a few paces of the castle. During this walk, Marguerite had in a certain degree, recovered her composure. Paul stood gazing at her till he saw that she had safely entered the court yard, and then returned to watch and pray beside the body of his father’s faithful servant.
At seven o’clock, the marchioness hearing the noise occasioned by Lieutenant Walter’s arrival at the castle, reached a bell which was standing on the table and rang it. A servant presented himself at the door in the grand livery he had worn the previous evening—it was easy to perceive that he also had not been in bed.
“Inform Mademoiselle d’Auray, that her mother is waiting for her in the drawing room,” said the marchioness.
The servant obeyed, and the marchioness resumed, gloomy and motionless, her previous attitude. In a few minutes afterward, she heard a slight noise behind her, and turned round. It was Marguerite. The young girl, with more respect, perhaps, than she had ever before evinced, held out her hand toward her mother, that she might give her her hand to kiss. But the marchioness remained motionless, as if she had not understood the intention of her daughter. Marguerite let fall her hand, and silently awaited her mother’s pleasure. She also wore the same dress as the night before. Sleep had hovered over the whole world, but had forgotten the inhabitants of Auray castle.
“Come nearer,” said the marchioness.
Marguerite advanced one step.
“Why is it that you are thus pale and trembling,” continued the marchioness.
“Madam,” murmured Marguerite.
“Speak,” said the marchioness.
“The death of my father—so sudden—so unexpected,” stammered Marguerite; “indeed I have suffered so much this night.”
“Yes, yes,” rejoined the marchioness, in a hollow tone, but fixing on her daughter looks which were not altogether void of affection: “yes, the young tree bends before the wind, and is stripped of its leaves. The old oak alone withstands every tempest. I, also, have suffered, Marguerite, and suffered much. I have passed a dreadful night, and yet you see me calm and firm.”
“God has endowed you with a soul, my mother, firm and austere; but you should not expect the same strength and firmness in the souls of others. You would destroy them.”
“And therefore is it,” replied the marchioness, letting her hand fall upon the table, “that all I ask of you is obedience. The marquis is dead, Marguerite, and Emanuel is now the head of the family. You must immediately set out for Bennes with Emanuel.”
“I!” exclaimed Marguerite, “I set out for Bennes! and for what purpose?”
“Because the chapel of the castle is too narrow to contain at the same moment the wedding party of the daughter, and the funeral procession of the father.”
“My mother!” replied Marguerite with an indescribable accent of anguish, “it would seem to me to be more pious to place a longer interval between two ceremonies of so opposite a nature.”
“True piety,” rejoined the marchioness, “should lead us to fulfil the last wishes of the dead. Cast your eyes upon this contract, and see the first letters of your father’s name.”
“Oh! madam!” cried Marguerite, “allow me to ask you whether my father, when he traced these letters, which death prevented him from finishing, was in possession of his faculties, and did he write them of his own free will?”
“Of that, I am ignorant, mademoiselle,” replied the marchioness, with that imperative and icy tone, which until this time had subjected all that approached her.
“I am ignorant of that, but this I know, that the influence which made him thus act, he fully understood; and I know, also, that parents, as long as they exist, should, in the eyes of their children, have the authority of God. Now, God has ordained me to effect things terrible in themselves, and I have obeyed. Do as I have done, mademoiselle, obey!”
“Madam,” said Marguerite, who had remained standing, but who now seemed motionless, with somewhat of that determined tone, which in her mother was so terrible, and in which she had inherited from her; “madam! it is only three days ago, that with tearful eyes, I threw myself first at the feet of Emanuel, then at the feet of the man whom you would compel me to receive as my husband, and then at my father’s. Neither of them would or could listen to me, for grasping ambition, or reckless madness hardened their hearts, and drowned my voice. At length, I am now at your feet, my mother, you are the last whom I can supplicate, but also, you are best capable of understanding me, Listen, then, attentively, to what I am about to say. Had I only to sacrifice my own happiness to your will, I would make that sacrifice: my love! I would sacrifice that also; but I must also sacrifice my son.—You are a mother, and I also, madam.”
“A mother!—a mother!” cried the marchioness.
“Yes! a mother, but by a dreadful fault——”
“Be that as it may, madam, still I am a mother, and the feelings of a mother need not be sanctified, in order to be holy. Well, then, madam, tell me—for you should better comprehend these things than I—tell me if those who have given us birth, have received from heaven a voice which speaks to our hearts—have not those to whom we have given birth a voice as powerful, and when these two voices are opposed to each other, to which ought we to obey?”
“You will never hear the voice of your child.” said the marchioness; “for you will never again see him.”
“I shall never again see my son!” exclaimed Marguerite, “and who, madam, can assert that positively?”
“He will himself be ignorant as to whose son he is.”
“And should he some day discover it?” replied Marguerite; whose respect as a daughter was giving way before her mother’s harshness; “if he should then come to me and demand an account of his birth—and this may happen, madam,”—she took up the pen—“and, with such an alternative awaiting me, tell me, ought I to sign this contract?”
“Sign it,” said the marchioness.
“But,” observed Marguerite, placing her trembling and convulsed fingers upon the contract, “should my husband some day discover the existence of this child; should he demand an explanation from my lover, of the wrong committed against his name and honor? If in a desperate duel, alone and without seconds—a duel in which it is agreed that one must fall, he should kill that lover, and then, tormented by his conscience, pursued by a voice from the tomb, my husband should at length become deprived of reason—”
“Be silent!” cried the marchioness, her features quivering with terror, but still doubting whether it was chance, or some unheard of discovery which dictated the words her daughter had employed: “be silent!”
“You would have me, then,” continued Marguerite, who had now said too much to pause, “you would have me, then, in order to preserve my name, and that of my other children, pure and unsullied, that I should immure myself with a man deprived of reason! you would have me banish from my sight, and from his, every living being, and that I should render my heart iron, that I may no longer feel—that my eyes should never shed a tear! You would have me, then, clothe myself in mourning as a widow, before my husband’s death? You would have my hair turn white, twenty years before the accustomed time?”
“Be silent! say not another word!” cried the marchioness, in a tone which proved that menaces were giving way to fear: “be silent!”
“You would have me, then,” continued Marguerite, carried away by the bitterness of her grief; “you would have me, then, in order that the dreadful secret might die with those who have the keeping of it, that I should banish from their death-beds, both priest and physician—you would, in fine, that I should wander from one death-bed to another, that I might close, not the eyes, but the mouths of the dying.”
“Be silent! in the name of heaven! be silent!” again cried the marchioness, wringing her hands.
“Well, then,” continued Marguerite, “tell me again, my mother, to sign this paper, and all this will happen, and the malediction of the Lord will be accomplished, and the faults of the fathers shall be visited upon the children, even to the third and fourth generations.”
“Ah! my God! my God!” exclaimed the marchioness, bursting into tears, “am I not sufficiently humbled—am I not sufficiently punished?”
“Pardon! pardon! madam,” cried Marguerite, recalled to filial feeling by the first tears she had ever seen her mother shed; “I implore you to forgive me.”
“Yes, pardon! ask for forgiveness, unnatural daughter,” said the marchioness, advancing toward Marguerite, “you who have wrenched the scourge from the hands of eternal vengeance, and have yourself applied the lash even on your mother’s forehead.”
“Mercy! mercy!” reiterated Marguerite; “pardon me, my mother. I knew not what I said. You had deprived me of reason—-I was mad!”
“Oh! my God! my God,” said the marchioness, raising both her hands above her daughter’s head, “Thou hast heard the words which have issued from my daughter’s lips. It would be too much to hope that thy mercy will forget them; but at the moment thou shalt punish her, remember that I have not cursed her!”
She then moved toward the door; her daughter endeavored to retain her, but the marchioness turned toward her with an expression of countenance so fearful, that without needing to lay a command upon her, Marguerite dropped the skirt of her mother’s dress, and remained with arms outstretched towards her, mute and palpitating, until the marchioness had disappeared. And when she no longer saw her, she threw herself upon the ground with so piercing a shriek, that it might have been deemed that the heart which had so much suffered, had at length broken.
Be angry as
You will, it shall have scope;
Ah, Cassius, you are yoked with a lamb
That carries anger, as the flint bears fire—
Who, much enforced, shows a hasty spark,
And straight is cold again.
And from henceforth
When you are over earnest with your brother,
He’ll think your mother chides, and leave you so.
—Shakespeare
Our readers will perhaps have been surprised, that after the violent manner in which Paul had insulted Lectoure the day before, a meeting had not been appointed for the following morning; but Lieutenant Walter, who had been commissioned to regulate the conditions of the duel, together with Count d’Auray, had received from his commander directions to make every concession, saving on one point, and this was, that Paul would not meet Lectoure until the afternoon.
The reason for this was, that the young captain felt, that until the time arrived when he should have wound up this strange drama, in which, having in the first instance mingled only as a stranger, he at last found himself in the position of the head of the family, his life belonged not to himself, and that he had not the right to risk it. Moreover, as we have seen, the delay he had fixed was not a long one; and Lectoure, who was ignorant of the reason which could have induced his adversary to require it, had acceded to it without much difficulty.
Paul had therefore determined not to lose a moment, and therefore, as soon as the hour arrived at which he could, with propriety, present himself to the marchioness, he bent his steps towards the castle.
The events of the previous evening, and of that day also, had occasioned so much confusion in the stately residence, that he entered it without meeting a single servant to announce him. He nevertheless traversed the apartments, following the direction he had before twice taken, and on going into the drawing-room, found Marguerite lying fainting on the floor.
On seeing the contract lying on the table, and his sister deprived of consciousness, Paul readily imagined that a dreadful scene must have taken place between the marchioness and her daughter. He ran to Marguerite, raised her in his arms, and opened one of the windows to give her air. The state in which Marguerite then was, proceeded more from a complete prostration of strength, than an actual fainting fit; and therefore, as soon as she felt that assistance was being rendered her, and with a kindness, which left no doubt as to the feelings of the person who had thus endeavored to relieve her, she opened her eyes, and recognized her brother, that living Providence, whom God had sent to sustain her every time she felt she was about to succumb.
Marguerite related to Paul, that her mother had endeavored to compel her to sign the contract, in order to get her to leave the castle with her brother, and that having been overcome by her grief, and carried away by the dreadful situation in which she was placed, she had allowed her mother to perceive that she knew all.
Paul comprehended at once the feelings which must have rent the heart of the marchioness, who, after twenty years of silence, isolation and anguish, saw, without being able to divine the manner in which it had been brought about, that in one moment her secret had been revealed to one of the two persons, from whom she was most anxious to conceal it. Therefore, compassionating the sufferings of his mother, he resolved to terminate them as speedily as he could, by hastening on the interview he had come to seek, and which would at once enlighten her as to the intentions of that son, whose existence she was so unwilling to acknowledge, Marguerite, on her side, wished to obtain her mother’s forgiveness; she, therefore, undertook to inform the marchioness that the young captain waited her orders.
Paul, therefore, remained alone, leaning against the high chimney-piece, above which was carved the escutcheon of his family, and began to lose himself in the thoughts, which the successive and hurried events of the last few hours gave rise to, and which had rendered him the sovereign arbiter of all that house, when one of the side doors suddenly opened, and Emanuel appeared with a case of pistols in his hand. On hearing the door open, Paul turned his eyes toward them, and immediately perceiving the young man, bowed to him with that sweet and fraternal expression, which reflected in his features the serenity of his soul.
Emanuel, on the contrary, although he returned the salutation, as politeness required, allowed those hostile feelings which the presence of the man whom he regarded as his personal and determined enemy had awakened to flush his features, and they instantly assumed a look of fierce defiance.
“I was on the point of setting out to seek for you, sir,” said Emanuel, placing the pistols upon the table, and remaining at some distance from Paul; “and that, however, without precisely knowing where to find you; for, like the evil genii of our popular traditions, you appear to have the gift of being every where, and nowhere. But a servant informed me that he had seen you enter the castle, and I thank you for having saved me the trouble I was about to take, in thus anticipating my desire.”
“I am happy,” replied Paul, “that my desire in this instance, although probably emanating from a totally different cause, has so harmoniously chimed in with yours. Well, then, I am here—what do you ask of me?”
“Cannot you divine even that, sir?” replied Emanuel, with increasing agitation. “In that case—and you will allow me to express my astonishment that it should be so—you are but ill-informed as to the duties of a gentleman and an officer, and this is a fresh insult that you put upon me.”
“Believe me, Emanuel,” rejoined Paul, in a calm tone—
“I yesterday called myself the count; to-day I call myself the Marquis d’Auray,” said Emanuel, interrupting him with a gesture of haughtiness and contempt; “and I beg, sir, that you will not forget it.”
An almost imperceptible smile passed over the lips of Paul.
“I was saying, then,” continued Emanuel, “that you but imperfectly comprehend the feelings of a gentleman, if you believed that I would permit another to take up, on my behalf, a quarrel which you came here to seek. Yes, sir, for it is you who have thrown yourself across my path, and not I who have sought you.”
“His lordship, the Marquis d’Auray,” said Paul, smiling, “forgets his visit on board the Indienne.”
“A truce to your cavils, sir, and let us at once proceed to facts. Yesterday, I know not from what strange and inexplicable feeling, when I proposed to you that, which I will not say every gentleman, every officer, but simply, any man of courage would instantly, and without hesitation, have acceded to, you refused, sir, and evading my provocation, you went, as it were, behind my back to seek an adversary, who, although not precisely a stranger to the quarrel, yet good taste should have dictated that he ought not to have been drawn into it.”
“Believe me, that in this, sir,” replied Paul, with the calmness and the same candor of manner which had accompanied all he said; I was compelled to yield to the exigency of the case, which did not leave me the choice of an adversary. You had proposed a duel, which I could not accept, you being my adversary, but which was perfectly indifferent to me with any other person. I am too much habituated to encounters of this description, and to encounters of a far more murderous and mortal nature, to consider an event of this kind, but as one of the usual accidents of my adventurous life. You will, however, please to remember that it was not I who sought this duel; you, yesterday, proposed it to me; but, as I could not, I again repeat it, appear as your antagonist, I selected M. de Lectoure, as I would have done M. de Nozay or M. la Jarry, because he happened to be there, within my reach—and because, if it were absolutely necessary that I should kill some one, I preferred killing an useless and insolent fop, rather than a good and honest country gentleman, who would consider himself dishonored, did he but dream that he had entered into a bargain of so vile and despicable a nature as that which the Baron de Lectoure has, in reality, proposed to you.”
“‘Tis well, sir,” said Emanuel, jeeringly; “continue to constitute yourself as the redresser of wrongs, to dub yourself the knight-errant of oppressed princesses, and to shield yourself under the buckler of your mysterious replies! As long as this antiquated quixotism does not come in collision with my views, my interests, and my engagements, I will fully permit it to wander over the whole earth, and ocean also, even from pole to pole, and I shall merely smile at it as it passes by me; but whenever this madness breaks out against me, as yours has done, sir; whenever, in the intimate concerns of a family of which I am the head, I meet a stranger, who orders as a master where I alone have the right to raise my voice, I shall present myself before him, as I now do before you, should I have the happiness to meet him alone as I do you, and then feeling assured, that no one will come to interrupt us before I had obtained the necessary explanation, I would say to him: ‘You have, if not insulted me, at all events wounded my feelings, sir, by coming to my house, and injuring me in my in-terests, and my family affections. It is then with me, and not with another, that you ought to fight, and you shall fight with me.’”
“You are mistaken, Emanuel,” replied Paul; “I will not fight, at all events, with you; the thing is impossible.”
“Oh! sir, the time of enigmas is gone by,” cried Emanuel, impatiently; “we live in the midst of a world, in which at every moment we elbow a reality. Let us, therefore, leave the poetical and the mysterious, to the authors of romances and tragedies. Your presence in this castle has been marked by circumstances too fatal to render it necessary to add that which is not, to that which is. Lusignan returned, notwithstanding the order which condemned him to transportation; my sister, who, for the first time, has shown herself rebellious against the orders of her mother; my father, killed by your mere presence: these are the disasters by which you have been accompanied, which have heralded you from another hemisphere, and have formed your funereal escort: for all this, you have to account to me; therefore, speak, sir; speak as a man should to a man, in the broad daylight, face to face, and not as a phantom gliding in the darkness, which escapes under the cloud of night, letting fall some few solemn and prophetic words, as if from the other world. Such things are well calculated to terrify nurses and children! Speak, sir, speak! Look at me, you will see that I am calm. If you have anything to reveal to me I will listen to you.”
“The secret which you ask of me is not my own,” replied Paul, whose perfect calmness strongly contrasted with the feverish excitement of Emanuel; “believe what I have said, and do not insist farther. Farewell!”
After pronouncing these words, Paul moved toward the door.
“Oh!” cried Emanuel, rushing between him and the door, to prevent his passage; “you shall not leave me thus, sir! I have you now, we are alone in this room, without fear of any interruption, into which, it was not I that enticed you, but you have come here of your own free will. Therefore, hearken to that which I am about to say. The person you have insulted is myself! the person to whom you owe satisfaction is myself!
“The person with whom you have to fight is——”
“You are mad, sir,” tranquilly replied Paul; “I have already told you it is impossible. Therefore, allow me to withdraw.”
“Take care, sir,” cried Emanuel, stretching out his hand to the box, and taking out the pistols; “take care, sir. After having done every thing in my power to compel you to act as a gentleman, I may treat you as a brigand.—You are here in a house, in which you are a total stranger; you have entered it, I know not how, nor for what purpose; if you have not come into it to despoil us of our gold and jewels, you have entered it to steal the obedience of a daughter to her mother, and to cancel the sacred promise given by a friend to a friend. In one case or the other, you are a violator, whom I have met at the moment that his hands were about to seize a treasure; that treasure, is honor, the most precious of all riches! Come, sir, believe me, you will do better to accept this weapon”—Emanuel endeavored to thrust one of the pistols into Paul’s hand—“and defend yourself.”
“You may kill me, sir,” replied Paul, again placing his elbow on the chimney-piece, as if he were continuing an ordinary conversation; “although I do not believe that God would permit so great a crime: but you shall not force me to fight with you. I have before told you so, and I repeat it.”
“Take the pistol, sir!” cried Emanuel, “take it, sir, I tell you! you believe that the threat I am making is but a vain menace; undeceive yourself! for three days have you fatigued my patience! for three days have you filled my soul with gall and hatred! for three days have I familiarised my mind with the idea of ridding myself of you; whether it be by a duel or by murder! Do not imagine, that the dread of punishment withholds my hand; this castle is isolated, mute, and deaf. The sea is there; and before you could be even laid in the tomb, I should be in England. Therefore, sir, for the last time, I say to you, take this pistol and defend yourself.” Paul, without uttering a word, gently put the pistol aside.
“Well then!” cried Emanuel, exasperated to the highest degree, by the sangfroid of his adversary; “as you will not defend yourself like a man, die like a dog!” And so saying, he raised the muzzle of the pistol to the level of the captain’s breast.
At that moment a dreadful shriek was heard; it was Marguerite, who had returned from her mother, and who had, at a glance, comprehended all that had happened. She rushed upon Emanuel, and at that instant he fired the pistol, but the direction of the ball having been changed by the young girl’s striking up his arm, it passed two or three inches above Paul’s head, and shattered the glass above the chimney-piece.
“My brother!” cried Marguerite, with one bound, springing to were Paul stood, and throwing her arms around him: “my brother, are you not wounded?”
“Your brother!” exclaimed Emanuel, letting fall the pistol which was still smoking; “your brother!”
“Well, Emanuel!” said Paul, with the same calmness which he had evinced during the whole of this painful scene; “do you now comprehend why it was I could not fight with you?”
At that moment, the marchioness appeared at the door, pale as a spectre, for she had heard the report of the pistol; then looking around her with an expression of infinite terror, and seeing that no one was wounded, she silently raised her eyes to heaven, as if to ask if its anger was at length appeased. She remained thus for some time in an attitude of mental thanksgiving. When she again cast down her eyes, Emanuel and Marguerite were on their knees before her, each holding one of her hands, and covering it with tears and kisses.
“I thank you, my children,” said the marchioness, after a short silence; “and now leave me with this young man.”
Marguerite and Emanuel bowed with an expression of the most profound respect, and obeyed the command of their mother.
Oh! my mother!
You do not know the heart that you have pierced!
I—I—thy son—thine Arthur—I avenge?
Never on thee.
Live happy—love my brother—
Forget that I was born.
Here, here—these proofs—
These—these!
Oh! see you where the words are blistered
With my hot tears?
I wept—it was for joy—
I did not think of lands, of name, of birthright—
I did but think these arms should clasp a’ mother.
Bulwer.—The Sea Captain.
The marchioness closed the door as soon as they had withdrawn, advanced into the middle of the room, and went without looking at Paul, and leaning upon the arm-chair in which the marquis had the night before been seated to sign the contract. There she remained standing, with her eyes cast upon the ground. Paul for a moment experienced the desire to throw himself upon his knees before her, but there was upon the features of the marchioness such an expression of severity, that he repressed the yearnings of his heart, and stood motionless awaiting her commands. After a few moments of ice-like silence, the marchioness addressed him. “You desired to see me, sir, and I have come to know your will—you wished to speak to me—I am listening.”
These words were uttered without the marchioness making the least movement—her lips trembled, rather than opened—it seemed a marble statue that was speaking.
“Yes, madam,” replied Paul, in a tone of intense feeling, “yes, yes, I desired to speak with you; it is long since first this desire was cherished in my heart, and it has never left me. Recollections of infancy preyed upon the mind of the grown man. I remembered a woman who would formerly glide to my cradle, and in my youthful dreams, I thought her the guardian angel of my infancy. Since that time, still so fresh in my memory, although so distant, more than once, believe me, I have awakened with a start, imagining that I had felt upon my forehead the impression of a maternal kiss: and then seeing that there was no one near me, I would call that person, hoping she would, perhaps, return. It is now twenty years since first I thus had called, and this is the first time she has replied to me. Can it have been as I have often fearfully imagined, that you would have trembled at again beholding me? Can it be true, as I at this moment fear, that you have naught to say to me?”
“And had I feared your return,” said the marchioness, in a hollow tone, “should I have been to blame? You appeared before me only yesterday, sir, and now the mystery which ought to have been concealed to all but God and myself, is known to both my children.”
“Is it my fault that God has been pleased to reveal the secret to them? Was it I that conducted Marguerite, despairing and in tears, to the bedside of her dying father, whose protection she had gone to ask, and whose confession she was compelled to hear? Was it I that led her to Achard, and was it not you, madam, that followed her thither? As to Emanuel, the report you heard, and that shattered glass, attest, that I would have preferred death rather than to have saved my life at the expense of your secret. No, no, believe me, madam, I am the instrument, and not the hand; the effect, and not the cause. No, madam, it is God who has brought about all this, that you might see at your feet, as you have just now seen them, your two children whom you have so long banished from your arms!”
“But there is a third,” said the marchioness, in a voice in which emotion began to evince itself, “and I know not what I have to expect from him.”
“Let me accomplish a last duty, madam, and that once fulfilled, he will on his knees await your orders.”
“And of what nature is this duty?”
“It is to restore his brother to the rank to which he is entitled, his sister to that happiness which she has lost—to his mother that tranquillity of mind, which she has so long sought in vain.”
“And yet, thanks to you,” replied the marchioness, “M. de Maurepas refused to M. de Lectoure the regiment he had solicited for my son.”
“Because,” replied Paul, taking the commission from his pocket and laying it on the table, “because the king had already granted it to me, for the brother of Marguerite.”
The marchioness cast her eyes upon the commission, and saw that it was made out in the name of Emanuel d’Auray.
“And yet you would give the hand of Marguerite to a man without name, without fortune—and what is more, to a man who is banished.”
“You are mistaken, madam; I would give Marguerite to the man she loves. I would give Marguerite not to the banished Lusignan, but to the Baron Anatole de Lusignan, his majesty’s governor of the Island of Gaudaloupe—there is his commission also.” The marchioness looked at the parchment, and saw that in this instance, as in the former one, Paul had uttered but the truth.
“Yes, I acknowledge it,” she replied, “these will satisfy the ambition of Emanuel, and confer happiness on Marguerite.”
“And at the same time, secures your tranquillity madam; for Emanuel will join his regiment, and Marguerite will follow her husband. You will then remain here alone, as you have, alas! so frequently desired.”
The marchioness sighed.
“Is not this all you desire, or have I deceived myself,” continued Paul.
“But,” said the marchioness, “how can I recall the promise given to the Baron de Lectoure?”
“The marquis is dead, madam,” replied Paul; “is not the death of a husband and a father a sufficient cause for the adjournment of a marriage?”
The marchioness, without replying, seated herself in the arm-chair, took a pen and paper, wrote a few lines, folded the letter, and putting on the address the name of the Baron de Lectoure, she rang the bell for the servant. After waiting a few moments, during which time, both Paul and herself remained silent, a servant came into the room.
“In two hours from this time, you will deliver this to the Baron de Lectoure,” said the Marchioness. The servant took the letter and withdrew.
“And now,” continued the marchioness, looking at Paul, “now sir, that you have done justice to the innocent, it remains to you to pardon the guilty. You have papers which prove your birth, you are the elder—at all events, in the eyes of the law. The fortunes of Emanuel and Marguerite are yours by right. What do you require in exchange for these papers?”
Paul took them from his pocket, and showing them to the marchioness, said, “Here are the documents, look at them—they are the letters you wrote to my poor father—look here, they are moistened by my tears, for I read them last night, while watching by Achard’s corpse.” Then approaching the fire-place, he held them over the flaming wood, saying, “permit me even but once to call you mother! call me but once your son, and——”
“Can it be possible!” exclaimed the marchioness, rising.
“You speak of name, of fortune,” continued Paul, with an expression of profound melancholy; “what need have I of them. I have by my own sword gained a rank which few men of my age have ever attained—I have acquired a name which is pronounced with blessings by one nation, andi with terror by another. I could, did it so please me, amass a fortune, worthy of being bequeathed to a king. What, then, are your name your fortune, and your rank, to me, if you have nothing else to offer me—if you do not give me that which I have incessantly, and in every position of my life most yearned for—that which I have not the power to create—which God had granted to me, but which misfortune wrested from me—that which you alone can restore to me—a mother!”
“My son!” exclaimed the marchioness, overcome at length, by his tears, and supplicating accent, “my son! my son! my son!”
“Ah!” exclaimed Paul, letting the papers fall into the flames, which speedily consumed them, “ah! that missed appellation has at length escaped your lips—that tender name so long desired, and which I have so unceasingly prayed to hear addressed to me. Merciful heaven! I thank thee.”
The marchioness had fallen back into her chair, and Paul had thrown himself upon his knees, his head leaning upon her bosom. At length the marchioness gently raised him.
“Look at me!” she said; “for twenty years, this is the first tear that has ever escaped my eyelids, give me your hand!”—she placed it upon her heart—“for twenty years this is the first feeling of happiness with which my heart has palpitated. Come to my arms! For twenty years this is the first caress I have either given or received. These twenty years have doubtless been my expiation, since God now pardons me, for he has restored to me the power of weeping, of feeling joy, and has permitted me to embrace my son. Thanks to G-od! and thanks to thee, my son!”
“My mother!” cried Paul, “my beloved mother!”
“And I trembled at the thoughts of seeing you again—I trembled when I did see you—I knew not—I could not have imagined that such feelings still existed in my heart. Oh! I bless thee! I bless thee!”
At that moment, the tolling of the chapel bell was heard: the marchioness shuddered. The funeral hour had arrived. The bodies of the noble Marquis d’Auray and that of the poor man Achard, were about to be returned to earth at the same moment.
“This hour must be consecrated to prayer,” said the marchioness: “I must now leave you.”
“I must sail to-morrow, my mother,” said Paul; “shall I not once more see you?”
“Oh! yes, yes,” replied the marchioness, “we must meet again.”
“Well, then, my mother, this evening I shall be at the park gate. There is a spot which is sacred to me, and to which I must pay a last visit. I shall expect to meet you there. It is on that spot, my mother, that we should say farewell.”
“I will be there,” said the marchioness.
“Here, my mother, here,” said Paul, “take these commissions: the one for Emanuel, and the other for the husband of Marguerite. Let the happiness of your children be conferred by yourself. Believe me, mother, you have bestowed more on me than I on them.”
The marchioness retired to shut herself up in her oratory. Paul left the castle, and proceeded toward the hut of the fisherman.
Hark! she has bless’d her son—I bid ye witness,
Ye listening heavens—thou circumambient air;
The ocean sighs it back—and with the murmur
Bustle the happy leaves.
All nature breathes
Aloud—-aloft—to the Great Parent’s ear,
The blessing of the mother on her child.
ON approaching the fisherman’s hut, the place appointed with Lectoure, Paul perceived Lusignan and Walter, who were waiting for him.
Precisely at the hour agreed, Lectoure appeared on horseback; he had been obliged to find his way as he best could, for he had no guide, and his own servant was as much a stranger as himself in that part of the country. On seeing him at a distance the young men came out of the hut. The baron instantly put his horse into a gallop, to hasten to them. When within a few paces of them he alighted from his horse, and threw the rein to his servant.
“I trust you will pardon me, gentlemen,” said he, “that I should have approached you thus alone, like a forsaken orphan; but the hour selected by that gentleman,” he added, raising his hat to Paul, who returned the salutation, “was precisely that fixed upon for the funeral obsequies of the marquis; I have therefore left Emanuel to fulfil the duties of a son, and have come here without a second, trusting that I had to deal with an adversary generous enough to procure some friend of his own to aid me in this dilemma.”
“We are entirely at your service, baron,” replied Paul; “here are two friends of mine. select which you please, and he who shall be honored by your choice, will instantly become yours.”
“I have no preference, I swear to you,” said Lectoure; “please to designate which of these two gentlemen you may desire should reader me this service.”
“Walter,” said Paul, “be so good as to officiate as second to the baron.”
The lieutenant assented; the two adversaries again bowed to each other.
“And now, sir,” continued Paul, “permit me, before our respective seconds, to address a few words to you, not of apology, but explanation.”
“At your own pleasure, sir, replied Lectoure.
“When I uttered the words which have been the cause of your coming hither, the events which have since occurred at the castle were hidden in the womb of time, and these events might have entailed the misery of a whole family. You, sir, had on your side Madame d’Auray, Emanuel, and the Marquis—Marguerite had but me alone. Every chance was, therefore, in your favor. It was for this reason that I addressed myself directly to you, for had I fallen by your hand from circumstances which must for ever remain hidden to you, Marguerite could not have married you. If I had killed you, the case would have been still more simplified, and requires no commentary.
“This exordium is really most logical, sir,” replied the baron, smiling, and tapping his boots with his riding-whip; “let us proceed, if you please, to the main body of the discourse.” |
“Now,” continued Paul, bowing in sign of acquiescence, “every circumstance has changed; the marquis is dead, Emanuel has received his commission, the marchioness renounces your alliance, honorable as it may be, and Marguerite marries the Baron Anatole de Lusignan, who, for that reason, I did not name your second.”
“Ah! ah!” exclaimed Lectoure, “then that is the true meaning of the note which a servant delivered to me at the moment I was about to leave the castle. I had the simplicity to imagine that it was merely an adjournment. It appears that it was a dismissal in due form. ‘Tis well, sir, and now to the peroration.”
“It will be as simple and frank as the explanation, sir. I did not know you—I had no desire to know you; chance threw us in presence of each other, and with opposing interests—hence our collision. Then, as I have before told you, mistrusting fate, I wished in some measure to make sure of a result. But now affairs have become so altered that either my death or yours would be altogether useless, and would merely add bloodshed to the winding up of this drama; and tell me candidly, sir, do you thank it would be worth while to risk our lives to so little purpose?”
“I might, perhaps, agree with you in opinion, sir, had I not performed so long a journey,” replied Lectoure: “Not having the honor to espouse Mademoiselle Marguerite d’Auray, I should desire, at least, to have the honor of crossing swords with you. It shall not be said that I have travelled all the way from Paris into Brittany for nothing. I am at your orders, sir,” continued Lectoure, drawing his sword, and with it saluting his adversary.
“At your good pleasure, sir,” replied Paul, and replying to the salutation in the same manner.
The two young men then advanced towards each other—their swords crossed—at the third parry Lectoure’s sword was twisted from his hand, and flew to a distance of twenty yards.
“Before taking sword in hand,” said Paul, “I had offered an explanation, and now, sir, I trust you will be pleased to accept my apology.”
“And this time I will accept it, sir,” said Lectoure, in the same careless and easy manner, as if nothing particular had occurred. “Pick up my sword, Dick.”
His servant ran to fetch it, handed it to his master, who very tranquilly put it into the scabbard.
“Now,” continued he, “if either of you, gentlemen, have any orders for Paris, I am about to return there, and from this spot.”
“Tell the king, sir,” replied Paul, bowing, and in his turn sheathing his sword, “that I feel happy that the sword he gave me to be employed against the English, has remained unstained by the blood of one of my own countrymen.”
And then the two young men again bowed to each other. Lectoure remounted his horse, and at about a hundred paces from the sea shore, got into the high road leading to Vannes, and galloped off; while his servant went to the castle to get his travelling carriage, with which Lectoure had ordered him to rejoin him speedily.
“And now, Mr. Walter,” said Paul, “you must send the long-boat to the nearest creek to Auray castle, and have every thing in readiness to set sail tonight.”
The lieutenant immediately set out for Port Louis, and Paul and Lusignan returned into the fisherman’s hut.
During this time Emanuel and Marguerite had fulfilled the mournful duty to which they had been summoned by the chapel bell. The body of the marquis had been deposited in the emblazoned tomb of his ancestors, and Achard’s in the humble cemetery outside the chapel, and then the brother and sister repaired to their mother’s apartment. The marchioness delivered to Emanuel the commission which he so anxiously coveted, and gave to Marguerite her unexpected consent to her marriage with Lusignan. She then handed to Marguerite the king’s sign manual appointing Lusignan governor of Guadaloupe. And then, in order that the emotions which they experienced should not be renewed, and which were the more poignant, because they were concealed within their own breasts, for neither of them made any allusion to past events, the mother and the children embraced each other for the last time, each feeling the innate conviction that they should never meet again.
The remainder of the day was occupied in the necessary preparations for departure. Toward the evening the marchioness left the castle, to meet Paul at the place which he had appointed. When passing through the court-yard she perceived a carriage, with horses already attached to it, standing on one side of it, and the young midshipman, Arthur, with four sailors, on the other. Her heart was oppressed by the sight of this two-fold preparation. She, however, passed on, and went into the park, without giving way to her emotions, so much had her long-continued restraint upon natural feelings given her the power of self-command.
However, when she had reached a small clearing, from which she could see Achard’s house, she paused, for her knees trembled beneath her, and she was obliged to lean for support against a tree, while she pressed her hand to her breast to restrain the violent beatings of her heart. For there are souls which present danger, however imminent, cannot cause to quail, but which tremble at the remembrance of perils past; and the marchioness recalled to mind the agonizing fears and emotions to which she had been for twenty years a prey, and during which time she had daily visited that house, now closed never again to be opened. She, however, soon overcame this weakness, and reached the park gate.
There she again paused. Above all the trees rose the summit of a gigantic oak, whose wide spreading branches could be discerned from many places in the park. Often had the eyes of the marchioness remained riveted for hours upon its verdant dome: but never had she dared to seek repose beneath its shade. It was there, however, that she had promised to meet Paul, and there Paul was awaiting her. At length she made a last effort, and entered the forest.
From a distance she perceived a man kneeling upon the ground in the attitude of prayer. She slowly approached him, and kneeling down by his side, prayed also. When the prayer was concluded, they both rose, and without uttering a word, the marchioness placed her arm around Paul’s neck, and leaned her head upon his shoulder. After some moments’ silence, they heard the noise of the wheels of a carriage at a distance. The marchioness shuddered, and made a sign to Paul to listen; it was Emanuel setting out to join his regiment. Shortly afterwards Paul pointed in a direction opposite to that in which they had heard the noise, and showed the marchioness a boat gliding rapidly and silently upon the surface of the ocean; it was Marguerite going on board the frigate.
The marchioness listened to the noise of the receding wheels as long as she could hear it, and followed with anxious eyes the movements of the boat, as long as she could distinguish it; then she turned toward Paul, and raising her eyes to heaven, for she felt that the moment was approaching, when he, whom she was leaning upon, would, in his turn, leave her, she exclaimed—
“May God bless, as I now bless, the duteous son, who was the last to leave his mother.”
Saying these words, she threw her arms around his neck, pressed him convulsively to her heart, and kissed him; then gazing at him intently, she seemed to be scanning every outline of his face, and then, again, rapturously embraced him.
“Yes,” she cried, “in every feature he is the living resemblance of my poor lost Morlaix,” then for some moments she seemed to be absorbed in thought; at last after a seemingly violent struggle, she continued, “Paul, you have refused to accept any portion of that fortune to which you are legally entitled, although you know the wealth of the Auray family is unbounded—and that the fortune which I inherit in my own right, from the family of Sablé, is very large.” Paul shook his head. “Well, then, there is one thing that you must receive from your mother, as her parting gift. It is twenty years since I have dared to look upon it, and yet I have clung to its possession—it is your father’s portrait, presented to me when I was authorized to receive it—when, by the assent of both our families, he was to have become my husband—take it, my dear son, for although it tears my heart to part with it, yet I feel that I shall be more tranquil when it is in your possession—to no one but yourself would I have given it. You will sometimes look upon it, and you will think of your mother, who must now remain for ever isolated from the world. But it is better that it should be so—henceforward all my moments shall be spent in making my peace with Heaven.”
While saying these words, she had drawn from her pocket a case, which she put into Paul’s hands, and which he had eagerly opened, and gazed with intense interest at the features of his father. The miniature was richly set in diamonds of great value.
Then summoning all her fortitude, the marchioness for the last time kissed her son, who was kneeling before her, and tearing herself from his arms, she returned alone to the castle.
The next morning the inhabitants of Port Louis vainly sought the frigate they had seen only the evening before, and which for fifteen days had remained at anchor in the outer roads of Lorient. As on the former occasion, she had disappeared without their being able to comprehend the cause of her arrival, or the motive of her so sudden departure.