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diff --git a/.gitattributes b/.gitattributes new file mode 100644 index 0000000..6833f05 --- /dev/null +++ b/.gitattributes @@ -0,0 +1,3 @@ +* text=auto +*.txt text +*.md text diff --git a/7813-0.txt b/7813-0.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..3cb6a98 --- /dev/null +++ b/7813-0.txt @@ -0,0 +1,3339 @@ +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Madame de Mauves, by Henry James + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Madame de Mauves + +Author: Henry James + +Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7813] +Posting Date: July 27, 2009 +Last Updated: September 18, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + + + + +Produced by Eve Sobol + + + + + +MADAME DE MAUVES + + +Byhenry James + + + + +I + +The view from the terrace at Saint-Germain-en-Laye is immense and +famous. Paris lies spread before you in dusky vastness, domed and +fortified, glittering here and there through her light vapours and +girdled with her silver Seine. Behind you is a park of stately symmetry, +and behind that a forest where you may lounge through turfy avenues and +light-chequered glades and quite forget that you are within half an +hour of the boulevards. One afternoon, however, in mid-spring, some five +years ago, a young man seated on the terrace had preferred to keep this +in mind. His eyes were fixed in idle wistfulness on the mighty human +hive before him. He was fond of rural things, and he had come to +Saint-Germain a week before to meet the spring halfway; but though he +could boast of a six months’ acquaintance with the great city he never +looked at it from his present vantage without a sense of curiosity still +unappeased. There were moments when it seemed to him that not to be +there just then was to miss some thrilling chapter of experience. And +yet his winter’s experience had been rather fruitless and he had closed +the book almost with a yawn. Though not in the least a cynic he was what +one may call a disappointed observer, and he never chose the right-hand +road without beginning to suspect after an hour’s wayfaring that the +left would have been the better. He now had a dozen minds to go to Paris +for the evening, to dine at the Cafe Brebant and repair afterwards to +the Gymnase and listen to the latest exposition of the duties of the +injured husband. He would probably have risen to execute this project if +he had not noticed a little girl who, wandering along the terrace, +had suddenly stopped short and begun to gaze at him with round-eyed +frankness. For a moment he was simply amused, the child’s face denoting +such helpless wonderment; the next he was agreeably surprised. “Why this +is my friend Maggie,” he said; “I see you’ve not forgotten me.” + +Maggie, after a short parley, was induced to seal her remembrance with +a kiss. Invited then to explain her appearance at Saint-Germain, she +embarked on a recital in which the general, according to the infantine +method, was so fatally sacrificed to the particular that Longmore looked +about him for a superior source of information. He found it in Maggie’s +mamma, who was seated with another lady at the opposite end of the +terrace; so, taking the child by the hand, he led her back to her +companions. + +Maggie’s mamma was a young American lady, as you would immediately have +perceived, with a pretty and friendly face and a great elegance of fresh +finery. She greeted Longmore with amazement and joy, mentioning his name +to her friend and bidding him bring a chair and sit with them. The other +lady, in whom, though she was equally young and perhaps even prettier, +muslins and laces and feathers were less of a feature, remained silent, +stroking the hair of the little girl, whom she had drawn against her +knee. She had never heard of Longmore, but she now took in that her +companion had crossed the ocean with him, had met him afterwards in +travelling and--having left her husband in Wall Street--was indebted +to him for sundry services. Maggie’s mamma turned from time to time and +smiled at this lady with an air of invitation; the latter smiled back +and continued gracefully to say nothing. For ten minutes, meanwhile, +Longmore felt a revival of interest in his old acquaintance; then (as +mild riddles are more amusing than mere commonplaces) it gave way to +curiosity about her friend. His eyes wandered; her volubility shook a +sort of sweetness out of the friend’s silence. + +The stranger was perhaps not obviously a beauty nor obviously an +American, but essentially both for the really seeing eye. She was slight +and fair and, though naturally pale, was delicately flushed just now, +as by the effect of late agitation. What chiefly struck Longmore in her +face was the union of a pair of beautifully gentle, almost languid grey +eyes with a mouth that was all expression and intention. Her forehead +was a trifle more expansive than belongs to classic types, and her thick +brown hair dressed out of the fashion, just then even more ugly than +usual. Her throat and bust were slender, but all the more in harmony +with certain rapid charming movements of the head, which she had a +way of throwing back every now and then with an air of attention and a +sidelong glance from her dove-like eyes. She seemed at once alert +and indifferent, contemplative and restless, and Longmore very soon +discovered that if she was not a brilliant beauty she was at least a +most attaching one. This very impression made him magnanimous. He was +certain he had interrupted a confidential conversation, and judged it +discreet to withdraw, having first learned from Maggie’s mamma--Mrs. +Draper--that she was to take the six o’clock train back to Paris. He +promised to meet her at the station. + +He kept his appointment, and Mrs. Draper arrived betimes, accompanied +by her friend. The latter, however, made her farewells at the door and +drove away again, giving Longmore time only to raise his hat. “Who +is she?” he asked with visible ardour as he brought the traveller her +tickets. + +“Come and see me to-morrow at the Hotel de l’Empire,” she answered, +“and I’ll tell you all about her.” The force of this offer in making +him punctual at the Hotel de l’Empire Longmore doubtless never exactly +measured; and it was perhaps well he was vague, for he found his friend, +who was on the point of leaving Paris, so distracted by procrastinating +milliners and perjured lingeres that coherence had quite deserted her. +“You must find Saint-Germain dreadfully dull,” she nevertheless had the +presence of mind to say as he was going. “Why won’t you come with me to +London?” + +“Introduce me to Madame de Mauves,” he answered, “and Saint-Germain will +quite satisfy me.” All he had learned was the lady’s name and residence. + +“Ah she, poor woman, won’t make your affair a carnival. She’s very +unhappy,” said Mrs. Draper. + +Longmore’s further enquiries were arrested by the arrival of a young +lady with a bandbox; but he went away with the promise of a note of +introduction, to be immediately dispatched to him at Saint-Germain. + +He then waited a week, but the note never came, and he felt how little +it was for Mrs. Draper to complain of engagements unperformed. He +lounged on the terrace and walked in the forest, studied suburban street +life and made a languid attempt to investigate the records of the court +of the exiled Stuarts; but he spent most of his time in wondering where +Madame de Mauves lived and whether she ever walked on the terrace. +Sometimes, he was at last able to recognise; for one afternoon toward +dusk he made her out from a distance, arrested there alone and leaning +against the low wall. In his momentary hesitation to approach her there +was almost a shade of trepidation, but his curiosity was not chilled by +such a measure of the effect of a quarter of an hour’s acquaintance. She +at once recovered their connexion, on his drawing near, and showed +it with the frankness of a person unprovided with a great choice of +contacts. Her dress, her expression, were the same as before; her charm +came out like that of fine music on a second hearing. She soon made +conversation easy by asking him for news of Mrs. Draper. Longmore told +her that he was daily expecting news and after a pause mentioned the +promised note of introduction. + +“It seems less necessary now,” he said--“for me at least. But for you--I +should have liked you to know the good things our friend would probably +have been able to say about me.” + +“If it arrives at last,” she answered, “you must come and see me and +bring it. If it doesn’t you must come without it.” + +Then, as she continued to linger through the thickening twilight, she +explained that she was waiting for her husband, who was to arrive in the +train from Paris and who often passed along the terrace on his way home. +Longmore well remembered that Mrs. Draper had spoken of uneasy things +in her life, and he found it natural to guess that this same husband was +the source of them. Edified by his six months in Paris, “What else is +possible,” he put it, “for a sweet American girl who marries an unholy +foreigner?” + +But this quiet dependence on her lord’s return rather shook his +shrewdness, and it received a further check from the free confidence +with which she turned to greet an approaching figure. Longmore +distinguished in the fading light a stoutish gentleman, on the fair side +of forty, in a high grey hat, whose countenance, obscure as yet against +the quarter from which it came, mainly presented to view the large +outward twist of its moustache. M. de Mauves saluted his wife with +punctilious gallantry and, having bowed to Longmore, asked her several +questions in French. Before taking his offered arm to walk to their +carriage, which was in waiting at the gate of the terrace, she +introduced our hero as a friend of Mrs. Draper and also a fellow +countryman, whom she hoped they might have the pleasure of seeing, as +she said, chez eux. M. de Mauves responded briefly, but civilly, in fair +English, and led his wife away. + +Longmore watched him as he went, renewing the curl of his main facial +feature--watched him with an irritation devoid of any mentionable +ground. His one pretext for gnashing his teeth would have been in his +apprehension that this gentleman’s worst English might prove a matter to +shame his own best French. For reasons involved apparently in the very +structure of his being Longmore found a colloquial use of that idiom +as insecure as the back of a restive horse, and was obliged to take his +exercise, as he was aware, with more tension than grace. He reflected +meanwhile with comfort that Madame de Mauves and he had a common tongue, +and his anxiety yielded to his relief at finding on his table that +evening a letter from Mrs. Draper. It enclosed a short formal missive to +Madame de Mauves, but the epistle itself was copious and confidential. +She had deferred writing till she reached London, where for a week, of +course, she had found other amusements. + +“I think it’s the sight of so many women here who don’t look at all like +her that has reminded me by the law of contraries of my charming friend +at Saint-Germain and my promise to introduce you to her,” she wrote. +“I believe I spoke to you of her rather blighted state, and I wondered +afterwards whether I hadn’t been guilty of a breach of confidence. But +you would certainly have arrived at guesses of your own, and, besides, +she has never told me her secrets. The only one she ever pretended to +was that she’s the happiest creature in the world, after assuring me +of which, poor thing, she went off into tears; so that I prayed to be +delivered from such happiness. It’s the miserable story of an American +girl born neither to submit basely nor to rebel crookedly marrying a +shining sinful Frenchman who believes a woman must do one or the other +of those things. The lightest of US have a ballast that they can’t +imagine, and the poorest a moral imagination that they don’t require. +She was romantic and perverse--she thought the world she had been +brought up in too vulgar or at least too prosaic. To have a decent +home-life isn’t perhaps the greatest of adventures; but I think she +wishes nowadays she hadn’t gone in quite so desperately for thrills. M. +de Mauves cared of course for nothing but her money, which he’s spending +royally on his menus plaisirs. I hope you appreciate the compliment +I pay you when I recommend you to go and cheer up a lady domestically +dejected. Believe me, I’ve given no other man a proof of this esteem; so +if you were to take me in an inferior sense I would never speak to you +again. Prove to this fine sore creature that our manners may have all +the grace without wanting to make such selfish terms for it. She avoids +society and lives quite alone, seeing no one but a horrible French +sister-in-law. Do let me hear that you’ve made her patience a little +less absent-minded. Make her WANT to forget; make her like you.” + +This ingenious appeal left the young man uneasy. He found himself in +presence of more complications than had been in his reckoning. To call +on Madame de Mauves with his present knowledge struck him as akin to +fishing in troubled waters. He was of modest composition, and yet he +asked himself whether an appearance of attentions from any gallant +gentleman mightn’t give another twist to her tangle. A flattering sense +of unwonted opportunity, however--of such a possible value constituted +for him as he had never before been invited to rise to--made him with +the lapse of time more confident, possibly more reckless. It was too +inspiring not to act upon the idea of kindling a truer light in his fair +countrywoman’s slow smile, and at least he hoped to persuade her that +even a raw representative of the social order she had not done justice +to was not necessarily a mere fortuitous collocation of atoms. He +immediately called on her. + + + + +II + +She had been placed for her education, fourteen years before, in a +Parisian convent, by a widowed mammma who was fonder of Homburg and +Nice than of letting out tucks in the frocks of a vigorously growing +daughter. Here, besides various elegant accomplishments--the art of +wearing a train, of composing a bouquet, of presenting a cup of tea--she +acquired a certain turn of the imagination which might have passed for +a sign of precocious worldliness. She dreamed of marrying a man of +hierarchical “rank”--not for the pleasure of hearing herself called +Madame la Vicomtesse, for which it seemed to her she should never +greatly care, but because she had a romantic belief that the enjoyment +of inherited and transmitted consideration, consideration attached to +the fact of birth, would be the direct guarantee of an ideal delicacy +of feeling. She supposed it would be found that the state of being noble +does actually enforce the famous obligation. Romances are rarely worked +out in such transcendent good faith, and Euphemia’s excuse was the prime +purity of her moral vision. She was essentially incorruptible, and she +took this pernicious conceit to her bosom very much as if it had been a +dogma revealed by a white-winged angel. Even after experience had given +her a hundred rude hints she found it easier to believe in fables, +when they had a certain nobleness of meaning, than in well-attested but +sordid facts. She believed that a gentleman with a long pedigree must +be of necessity a very fine fellow, and enjoyment of a chance to +carry further a family chronicle begun ever so far back must be, as +a consciousness, a source of the most beautiful impulses. It wasn’t +therefore only that noblesse oblige, she thought, as regards yourself, +but that it ensures as nothing else does in respect to your wife. She +had never, at the start, spoken to a nobleman in her life, and these +convictions were but a matter of extravagant theory. They were the +fruit, in part, of the perusal of various Ultramontane works of +fiction--the only ones admitted to the convent library--in which the +hero was always a Legitimist vicomte who fought duels by the dozen but +went twice a month to confession; and in part of the strong social scent +of the gossip of her companions, many of them filles de haut lieu who, +in the convent-garden, after Sundays at home, depicted their brothers +and cousins as Prince Charmings and young Paladins. Euphemia listened +and said nothing; she shrouded her visions of matrimony under a coronet +in the silence that mostly surrounds all ecstatic faith. She was not +of that type of young lady who is easily induced to declare that her +husband must be six feet high and a little near-sighted, part his hair +in the middle and have amber lights in his beard. To her companions her +flights of fancy seemed short, rather, and poor and untutored; and +even the fact that she was a sprig of the transatlantic democracy never +sufficiently explained her apathy on social questions. She had a mental +image of that son of the Crusaders who was to suffer her to adore him, +but like many an artist who has produced a masterpiece of idealisation +she shrank from exposing it to public criticism. It was the portrait of +a gentleman rather ugly than handsome and rather poor than rich. But his +ugliness was to be nobly expressive and his poverty delicately proud. +She had a fortune of her own which, at the proper time, after fixing on +her in eloquent silence those fine eyes that were to soften the feudal +severity of his visage, he was to accept with a world of stifled +protestations. One condition alone she was to make--that he should have +“race” in a state as documented as it was possible to have it. On this +she would stake her happiness; and it was so to happen that several +accidents conspired to give convincing colour to this artless +philosophy. + +Inclined to long pauses and slow approaches herself, Euphemia was +a great sitter at the feet of breathless volubility, and there were +moments when she fairly hung upon the lips of Mademoiselle Marie de +Mauves. Her intimacy with this chosen schoolmate was founded on the +perception--all her own--that their differences were just the right +ones. Mademoiselle de Mauves was very positive, very shrewd, +very ironical, very French--everything that Euphemia felt herself +unpardonable for not being. During her Sundays en ville she had examined +the world and judged it, and she imparted her impressions to our +attentive heroine with an agreeable mixture of enthusiasm and +scepticism. She was moreover a handsome and well-grown person, on whom +Euphemia’s ribbons and trinkets had a trick of looking better than on +their slender proprietress. She had finally the supreme merit of being +a rigorous example of the virtue of exalted birth, having, as she did, +ancestors honourably mentioned by Joinville and Commines, and a stately +grandmother with a hooked nose who came up with her after the holidays +from a veritable castel in Auvergne. It seemed to our own young woman +that these attributes made her friend more at home in the world than if +she had been the daughter of even the most prosperous grocer. A certain +aristocratic impudence Mademoiselle de Mauves abundantly possessed, +and her raids among her friend’s finery were quite in the spirit of her +baronial ancestors in the twelfth century--a spirit regarded by +Euphemia but as a large way of understanding friendship, a freedom from +conformities without style, and one that would sooner or later express +itself in acts of surprising magnanimity. There doubtless prevailed +in the breast of Mademoiselle de Mauves herself a dimmer vision of the +large securities that Euphemia envied her. She was to become later in +life so accomplished a schemer that her sense of having further heights +to scale might well have waked up early. The especially fine appearance +made by our heroine’s ribbons and trinkets as her friend wore them +ministered to pleasure on both sides, and the spell was not of a nature +to be menaced by the young American’s general gentleness. The concluding +motive of Marie’s writing to her grandmamma to invite Euphemia for a +three weeks’ holiday to the castel in Auvergne involved, however, the +subtlest considerations. Mademoiselle de Mauves indeed, at this time +seventeen years of age and capable of views as wide as her wants, was as +proper a figure as could possibly have been found for the foreground +of a scene artfully designed; and Euphemia, whose years were of like +number, asked herself if a right harmony with such a place mightn’t +come by humble prayer. It is a proof of the sincerity of the latter’s +aspirations that the castel was not a shock to her faith. It was neither +a cheerful nor a luxurious abode, but it was as full of wonders as a +box of old heirlooms or objects “willed.” It had battered towers and +an empty moat, a rusty drawbridge and a court paved with crooked +grass-grown slabs over which the antique coach-wheels of the lady with +the hooked nose seemed to awaken the echoes of the seventeenth century. +Euphemia was not frightened out of her dream; she had the pleasure of +seeing all the easier passages translated into truth, as the learner +of a language begins with the common words. She had a taste for old +servants, old anecdotes, old furniture, faded household colours and +sweetly stale odours--musty treasures in which the Chateau de Mauves +abounded. She made a dozen sketches in water-colours after her +conventual pattern; but sentimentally, as one may say, she was for ever +sketching with a freer hand. + +Old Madame de Mauves had nothing severe but her nose, and she seemed to +Euphemia--what indeed she had every claim to pass for--the very image +and pattern of an “historical character.” Belonging to a great order of +things, she patronised the young stranger who was ready to sit all day +at her feet and listen to anecdotes of the bon temps and quotations from +the family chronicles. Madame de Mauves was a very honest old woman; she +uttered her thoughts with ancient plainness. One day after pushing back +Euphemia’s shining locks and blinking with some tenderness from behind +an immense face-a-main that acted as for the relegation of the girl +herself to the glass case of a museum, she declared with an energetic +shake of the head that she didn’t know what to make of such a little +person. And in answer to the little person’s evident wonder, “I should +like to advise you,” she said, “but you seem to me so all of a piece +that I’m afraid that if I advise you I shall spoil you. It’s easy to see +you’re not one of us. I don’t know whether you’re better, but you +seem to me to have been wound up by some key that isn’t kept by your +governess or your confessor or even your mother, but that you wear by +a fine black ribbon round your own neck. Little persons in my day--when +they were stupid they were very docile, but when they were clever they +were very sly! You’re clever enough, I imagine, and yet if I guessed all +your secrets at this moment is there one I should have to frown at? I +can tell you a wickeder one than any you’ve discovered for yourself. If +you wish to live at ease in the doux pays de France don’t trouble too +much about the key of your conscience or even about your conscience +itself--I mean your own particular one. You’ll fancy it saying things it +won’t help your case to hear. They’ll make you sad, and when you’re sad +you’ll grow plain, and when you’re plain you’ll grow bitter, and when +you’re bitter you’ll be peu aimable. I was brought up to think that a +woman’s first duty is to be infinitely so, and the happiest women I’ve +known have been in fact those who performed this duty faithfully. As +you’re not a Catholic I suppose you can’t be a devote; and if you don’t +take life as a fifty years’ mass the only way to take it’s as a game of +skill. Listen to this. Not to lose at the game of life you must--I don’t +say cheat, but not be too sure your neighbour won’t, and not be shocked +out of your self-possession if he does. Don’t lose, my dear--I beseech +you don’t lose. Be neither suspicious nor credulous, and if you find +your neighbour peeping don’t cry out; only very politely wait your own +chance. I’ve had my revenge more than once in my day, but I really think +the sweetest I could take, en somme, against the past I’ve known, would +be to have your blest innocence profit by my experience.” + +This was rather bewildering advice, but Euphemia understood it too +little to be either edified or frightened. She sat listening to it very +much as she would have listened to the speeches of an old lady in a +comedy whose diction should strikingly correspond to the form of her +high-backed armchair and the fashion of her coif. Her indifference was +doubly dangerous, for Madame de Mauves spoke at the instance of coming +events, and her words were the result of a worry of scruples--scruples +in the light of which Euphemia was on the one hand too tender a victim +to be sacrificed to an ambition and the prosperity of her own house on +the other too precious a heritage to be sacrificed to an hesitation. The +prosperity in question had suffered repeated and grievous breaches and +the menaced institution been overmuch pervaded by that cold comfort in +which people are obliged to balance dinner-table allusions to feudal +ancestors against the absence of side-dishes; a state of things the +sorrier as the family was now mainly represented by a gentleman whose +appetite was large and who justly maintained that its historic glories +hadn’t been established by underfed heroes. + +Three days after Euphemia’s arrival Richard de Mauves, coming down from +Paris to pay his respects to his grandmother, treated our heroine to her +first encounter with a gentilhomme in the flesh. On appearing he kissed +his grandmother’s hand with a smile which caused her to draw it away +with dignity, and set Euphemia, who was standing by, to ask herself +what could have happened between them. Her unanswered wonder was but the +beginning of a long chain of puzzlements, but the reader is free to know +that the smile of M. de Mauves was a reply to a postscript affixed by +the old lady to a letter addressed to him by her granddaughter as +soon as the girl had been admitted to justify the latter’s promises. +Mademoiselle de Mauves brought her letter to her grandmother for +approval, but obtained no more than was expressed in a frigid nod. The +old lady watched her with this coldness while she proceeded to seal the +letter, then suddenly bade her open it again and bring her a pen. + +“Your sister’s flatteries are all nonsense,” she wrote; “the young +lady’s far too good for you, mauvais sujet beyond redemption. If you’ve +a particle of conscience you’ll not come and disturb the repose of an +angel of innocence.” + +The other relative of the subject of this warning, who had read these +lines, made up a little face as she freshly indited the address; but she +laid down her pen with a confident nod which might have denoted that by +her judgement her brother was appealed to on the ground of a principle +that didn’t exist in him. And “if you meant what you said,” the young +man on his side observed to his grandmother on his first private +opportunity, “it would have been simpler not to have sent the letter.” + +Put out of humour perhaps by this gross impugnment of her sincerity, the +head of the family kept her room on pretexts during a greater part of +Euphemia’s stay, so that the latter’s angelic innocence was left all to +her grandson’s mercy. It suffered no worse mischance, however, than to +be prompted to intenser communion with itself. Richard de Mauves was the +hero of the young girl’s romance made real, and so completely accordant +with this creature of her imagination that she felt afraid of him almost +as she would have been of a figure in a framed picture who should have +stepped down from the wall. He was now thirty-three--young enough to +suggest possibilities of ardent activity and old enough to have formed +opinions that a simple woman might deem it an intellectual privilege to +listen to. He was perhaps a trifle handsomer than Euphemia’s rather grim +Quixotic ideal, but a very few days reconciled her to his good looks as +effectually they would have reconciled her to a characterised want of +them. He was quiet, grave, eminently distinguished. He spoke little, +but his remarks, without being sententious, had a nobleness of tone that +caused them to re-echo in the young girl’s ears at the end of the day. +He paid her very little direct attention, but his chance words--when he +only asked her if she objected to his cigarette--were accompanied by a +smile of extraordinary kindness. + +It happened that shortly after his arrival, riding an unruly horse which +Euphemia had with shy admiration watched him mount in the castle-yard, +he was thrown with a violence which, without disparaging his skill, made +him for a fortnight an interesting invalid lounging in the library +with a bandaged knee. To beguile his confinement the accomplished young +stranger was repeatedly induced to sing for him, which she did with a +small natural tremor that might have passed for the finish of vocal +art. He never overwhelmed her with compliments, but he listened with +unfailing attention, remembered all her melodies and would sit humming +them to himself. While his imprisonment lasted indeed he passed hours in +her company, making her feel not unlike some unfriended artist who has +suddenly gained the opportunity to devote a fortnight to the study of a +great model. Euphemia studied with noiseless diligence what she supposed +to be the “character” of M. de Mauves, and the more she looked the +more fine lights and shades she seemed to behold in this masterpiece of +nature. M. de Mauves’s character indeed, whether from a sense of being +so generously and intensely taken for granted, or for reasons which bid +graceful defiance to analysis, had never been so much on show, even to +the very casual critic lodged, as might be said, in an out-of-the-way +corner of it; it seemed really to reflect the purity of Euphemia’s pious +opinion. There had been nothing especially to admire in the state of +mind in which he left Paris--a settled resolve to marry a young person +whose charms might or might not justify his sister’s account of them, +but who was mistress, at the worst, of a couple of hundred thousand +francs a year. He had not counted out sentiment--if she pleased him so +much the better; but he had left a meagre margin for it and would hardly +have admitted that so excellent a match could be improved by it. He was +a robust and serene sceptic, and it was a singular fate for a man who +believed in nothing to be so tenderly believed in. What his original +faith had been he could hardly have told you, for as he came back to his +childhood’s home to mend his fortunes by pretending to fall in love he +was a thoroughly perverse creature and overlaid with more corruptions +than a summer day’s questioning of his conscience would have put to +flight. Ten years’ pursuit of pleasure, which a bureau full of unpaid +bills was all he had to show for, had pretty well stifled the natural +lad whose violent will and generous temper might have been shaped by +a different pressure to some such showing as would have justified a +romantic faith. So should he have exhaled the natural fragrance of a +late-blooming flower of hereditary honour. His violence indeed had been +subdued and he had learned to be irreproachably polite; but he had lost +the fineness of his generosity, and his politeness, which in the long +run society paid for, was hardly more than a form of luxurious egotism, +like his fondness for ciphered pocket-handkerchiefs, lavender gloves +and other fopperies by which shopkeepers remained out of pocket. In +after-years he was terribly polite to his wife. He had formed himself, +as the phrase was, and the form prescribed to him by the society into +which his birth and his tastes had introduced him was marked by some +peculiar features. That which mainly concerns us is its classification +of the fairer half of humanity as objects not essentially different--say +from those very lavender gloves that are soiled in an evening and +thrown away. To do M. de Mauves justice, he had in the course of time +encountered in the feminine character such plentiful evidence of its +pliant softness and fine adjustability that idealism naturally seemed to +him a losing game. + +Euphemia, as he lay on his sofa, struck him as by no means +contradictory; she simply reminded him that very young women are +generally innocent and that this is on the whole the most potent source +of their attraction. Her innocence moved him to perfect consideration, +and it seemed to him that if he shortly became her husband it would +be exposed to a danger the less. Old Madame de Mauves, who flattered +herself that in this whole matter she was very laudably rigid, might +almost have taken a lesson from the delicacy he practised. For two or +three weeks her grandson was well-nigh a blushing boy again. He watched +from behind the Figaro, he admired and desired and held his tongue. He +found himself not in the least moved to a flirtation; he had no wish +to trouble the waters he proposed to transfuse into the golden cup of +matrimony. Sometimes a word, a look, a gesture of Euphemia’s gave him +the oddest sense of being, or of seeming at least, almost bashful; +for she had a way of not dropping her eyes according to the mysterious +virginal mechanism, of not fluttering out of the room when she found him +there alone, of treating him rather as a glorious than as a pernicious +influence--a radiant frankness of demeanour in fine, despite an +infinite natural reserve, which it seemed at once graceless not to be +complimentary about and indelicate not to take for granted. In this way +had been wrought in the young man’s mind a vague unwonted resonance of +soft impressions, as we may call it, which resembled the happy stir of +the change from dreaming pleasantly to waking happily. His imagination +was touched; he was very fond of music and he now seemed to give easy +ear to some of the sweetest he had ever heard. In spite of the bore of +being laid up with a lame knee he was in better humour than he had known +for months; he lay smoking cigarettes and listening to the nightingales +with the satisfied smile of one of his country neighbours whose big +ox should have taken the prize at a fair. Every now and then, with an +impatient suspicion of the resemblance, he declared himself pitifully +bete; but he was under a charm that braved even the supreme penalty of +seeming ridiculous. One morning he had half an hour’s tete-a-tete with +his grandmother’s confessor, a soft-voiced old Abbe whom, for reasons of +her own, Madame de Mauves had suddenly summoned and had left waiting in +the drawing-room while she rearranged her curls. His reverence, going +up to the old lady, assured her that M. le Comte was in a most edifying +state of mind and the likeliest subject for the operation of grace. This +was a theological interpretation of the count’s unusual equanimity. +He had always lazily wondered what priests were good for, and he now +remembered, with a sense of especial obligation to the Abbe, that they +were excellent for marrying people. + +A day or two after this he left off his bandages and tried to walk. He +made his way into the garden and hobbled successfully along one of the +alleys, but in the midst of his progress was pulled up by a spasm of +pain which forced him to stop and call for help. In an instant Euphemia +came tripping along the path and offered him her arm with the frankest +solicitude. + +“Not to the house,” he said, taking it; “further on, to the bosquet.” + This choice was prompted by her having immediately confessed that she +had seen him leave the house, had feared an accident and had followed +him on tiptoe. + +“Why didn’t you join me?” he had asked, giving her a look in which +admiration was no longer disguised and yet felt itself half at the +mercy of her replying that a jeune fille shouldn’t be seen following a +gentleman. But it drew a breath which filled its lungs for a long time +afterwards when she replied simply that if she had overtaken him he +might have accepted her arm out of politeness, whereas she wished to +have the pleasure of seeing him walk alone. + +The bosquet was covered with an odorous tangle of blossoming creepers, +and a nightingale overhead was shaking out love-notes with a profusion +that made the Count feel his own conduct the last word of propriety. +“I’ve always heard that in America, when a man wishes to marry a +young girl, he offers himself simply face to face and without +ceremony--without parents and uncles and aunts and cousins sitting round +in a circle.” + +“Why I believe so,” said Euphemia, staring and too surprised to be +alarmed. + +“Very well then--suppose our arbour here to be your great sensible +country. I offer you my hand a l’Americaine. It will make me intensely +happy to feel you accept it.” + +Whether Euphemia’s acceptance was in the American manner is more than +I can say; I incline to think that for fluttering grateful trustful +softly-amazed young hearts there is only one manner all over the world. + +That evening, in the massive turret chamber it was her happiness to +inhabit, she wrote a dutiful letter to her mamma, and had just sealed it +when she was sent for by Madame de Mauves. She found this ancient lady +seated in her boudoir in a lavender satin gown and with her candles all +lighted as for the keeping of some fete. “Are you very happy?” the old +woman demanded, making Euphemia sit down before her. + +“I’m almost afraid to say so, lest I should wake myself up.” + +“May you never wake up, belle enfant,” Madame de Mauves grandly +returned. “This is the first marriage ever made in our family in this +way--by a Comte de Mauves proposing to a young girl in an arbour like +Jeannot and Jeannette. It has not been our way of doing things, and +people may say it wants frankness. My grandson tells me he regards +it--for the conditions--as the perfection of good taste. Very well. I’m +a very old woman, and if your differences should ever be as marked as +your agreements I shouldn’t care to see them. But I should be sorry +to die and think you were going to be unhappy. You can’t be, my dear, +beyond a certain point; because, though in this world the Lord sometimes +makes light of our expectations he never altogether ignores our deserts. +But you’re very young and innocent and easy to dazzle. There never was a +man in the world--among the saints themselves--as good as you believe my +grandson. But he’s a galant homme and a gentleman, and I’ve been talking +to him to-night. To you I want to say this--that you’re to forget the +worldly rubbish I talked the other day about the happiness of +frivolous women. It’s not the kind of happiness that would suit you, ma +toute-belle. Whatever befalls you, promise me this: to be, to remain, +your own sincere little self only, charming in your own serious little +way. The Comtesse de Mauves will be none the worse for it. Your brave +little self, understand, in spite of everything--bad precepts and bad +examples, bad fortune and even bad usage. Be persistently and patiently +just what the good God has made you, and even one of us--and one of +those who is most what we ARE--will do you justice!” + +Euphemia remembered this speech in after-years, and more than once, +wearily closing her eyes, she seemed to see the old woman sitting +upright in her faded finery and smiling grimly like one of the Fates +who sees the wheel of fortune turning up her favourite event. But at the +moment it had for her simply the proper gravity of the occasion: this +was the way, she supposed, in which lucky young girls were addressed on +their engagement by wise old women of quality. + +At her convent, to which she immediately returned, she found a letter +from her mother which disconcerted her far more than the remarks of +Madame de Mauves. Who were these people, Mrs. Cleve demanded, who had +presumed to talk to her daughter of marriage without asking her leave? +Questionable gentlefolk plainly; the best French people never did such +things. Euphemia would return straightway to her convent, shut herself +up and await her own arrival. It took Mrs. Cleve three weeks to +travel from Nice to Paris, and during this time the young girl had +no communication with her lover beyond accepting a bouquet of violets +marked with his initials and left by a female friend. “I’ve not brought +you up with such devoted care,” she declared to her daughter at their +first interview, “to marry a presumptuous and penniless Frenchman. I +shall take you straight home and you’ll please forget M. de Mauves.” + +Mrs. Cleve received that evening at her hotel a visit from this +personage which softened her wrath but failed to modify her decision. He +had very good manners, but she was sure he had horrible morals; and the +lady, who had been a good-natured censor on her own account, felt a deep +and real need to sacrifice her daughter to propriety. She belonged to +that large class of Americans who make light of their native land +in familiar discourse but are startled back into a sense of having +blasphemed when they find Europeans taking them at their word. “I know +the type, my dear,” she said to her daughter with a competent nod. “He +won’t beat you. Sometimes you’ll wish he would.” + +Euphemia remained solemnly silent, for the only answer she felt capable +of making was that her mother’s mind was too small a measure of things +and her lover’s type an historic, a social masterpiece that it took some +mystic illumination to appreciate. A person who confounded him with the +common throng of her watering-place acquaintance was not a person to +argue with. It struck the girl she had simply no cause to plead; her +cause was in the Lord’s hands and in those of M. de Mauves. + +This agent of Providence had been irritated and mortified by Mrs. +Cleve’s opposition, and hardly knew how to handle an adversary who +failed to perceive that a member of his family gave of necessity more +than he received. But he had obtained information on his return to Paris +which exalted the uses of humility. Euphemia’s fortune, wonderful to +say, was greater than its fame, and in view of such a prize, even a +member of his family could afford to take a snubbing. + +The young man’s tact, his deference, his urbane insistence, won a +concession from Mrs. Cleve. The engagement was to be put off and her +daughter was to return home, be brought out and receive the homage she +was entitled to and which might well take a form representing peril to +the suit of this first headlong aspirant. They were to exchange neither +letters nor mementoes nor messages; but if at the end of two years +Euphemia had refused offers enough to attest the permanence of her +attachment he should receive an invitation to address her again. This +decision was promulgated in the presence of the parties interested. +The Count bore himself gallantly, looking at his young friend as if he +expected some tender protestation. But she only looked at him silently +in return, neither weeping nor smiling nor putting out her hand. On this +they separated, and as M. de Mauves walked away he declared to himself +that in spite of the confounded two years he was one of the luckiest +of men--to have a fiancee who to several millions of francs added such +strangely beautiful eyes. + +How many offers Euphemia refused but scantily concerns us--and how the +young man wore his two years away. He found he required pastimes, and +as pastimes were expensive he added heavily to the list of debts to be +cancelled by Euphemia’s fortune. Sometimes, in the thick of what he +had once called pleasure with a keener conviction than now, he put to +himself the case of their failing him after all; and then he remembered +that last mute assurance of her pale face and drew a long breath of +such confidence as he felt in nothing else in the world save his own +punctuality in an affair of honour. + +At last, one morning, he took the express to Havre with a letter of Mrs. +Cleve’s in his pocket, and ten days later made his bow to mother and +daughter in New York. His stay was brief, and he was apparently unable +to bring himself to view what Euphemia’s uncle, Mr. Butterworth, who +gave her away at the altar, called our great experiment of democratic +self-government, in a serious light. He smiled at everything and seemed +to regard the New World as a colossal plaisanterie. It is true that a +perpetual smile was the most natural expression of countenance for a man +about to marry Euphemia Cleve. + + + + +III + +Longmore’s first visit seemed to open to him so large a range of quiet +pleasure that he very soon paid a second, and at the end of a fortnight +had spent uncounted hours in the little drawing-room which Madame de +Mauves rarely quitted except to drive or walk in the forest. She +lived in an old-fashioned pavilion, between a high-walled court and an +excessively artificial garden, beyond whose enclosure you saw a long +line of tree-tops. Longmore liked the garden and in the mild afternoons +used to move his chair through the open window to the smooth terrace +which overlooked it while his hostess sat just within. Presently she +would come out and wander through the narrow alleys and beside the +thin-spouting fountain, and at last introduce him to a private gate +in the high wall, the opening to a lane which led to the forest. +Hitherwards she more than once strolled with him, bareheaded and meaning +to go but twenty rods, but always going good-naturedly further and often +stretching it to the freedom of a promenade. They found many things to +talk about, and to the pleasure of feeling the hours slip along +like some silver stream Longmore was able to add the satisfaction of +suspecting that he was a “resource” for Madame de Mauves. He had made +her acquaintance with the sense, not wholly inspiring, that she was a +woman with a painful twist in her life and that seeking her acquaintance +would be like visiting at a house where there was an invalid who could +bear no noise. But he very soon recognised that her grievance, if +grievance it was, was not aggressive; that it was not fond of attitudes +and ceremonies, and that her most earnest wish was to remember it as +little as possible. He felt that even if Mrs. Draper hadn’t told him +she was unhappy he would have guessed it, and yet that he couldn’t +have pointed to his proof. The evidence was chiefly negative--she never +alluded to her husband. Beyond this it seemed to him simply that her +whole being was pitched in a lower key than harmonious Nature had +designed; she was like a powerful singer who had lost her high notes. +She never drooped nor sighed nor looked unutterable things; she dealt +no sarcastic digs at her fate; she had in short none of the conscious +graces of the woman wronged. Only Longmore was sure that her gentle +gaiety was but the milder or sharper flush of a settled ache, and that +she but tried to interest herself in his thoughts in order to escape +from her own. If she had wished to irritate his curiosity and lead him +to take her confidence by storm nothing could have served her purpose +better than this studied discretion. He measured the rare magnanimity +of self-effacement so deliberate, he felt how few women were capable of +exchanging a luxurious woe for a thankless effort. Madame de Mauves, +he himself felt, wasn’t sweeping the horizon for a compensation or a +consoler; she had suffered a personal deception that had disgusted her +with persons. She wasn’t planning to get the worth of her trouble back +in some other way; for the present she was proposing to live with +it peaceably, reputably and without scandal--turning the key on it +occasionally as you would on a companion liable to attacks of insanity. +Longmore was a man of fine senses and of a speculative spirit, +leading-strings that had never been slipped. He began to regard his +hostess as a figure haunted by a shadow which was somehow her intenser +and more authentic self. This lurking duality in her put on for him an +extraordinary charm. Her delicate beauty acquired to his eye the serious +cast of certain blank-browed Greek statues; and sometimes when his +imagination, more than his ear, detected a vague tremor in the tone in +which she attempted to make a friendly question seem to have behind it +none of the hollow resonance of absent-mindedness, his marvelling eyes +gave her an answer more eloquent, though much less to the point, than +the one she demanded. + +She supplied him indeed with much to wonder about, so that he fitted, in +his ignorance, a dozen high-flown theories to her apparent history. She +had married for love and staked her whole soul on it; of that he was +convinced. She hadn’t changed her allegiance to be near Paris and her +base of supplies of millinery; he was sure she had seen her perpetrated +mistake in a light of which her present life, with its conveniences for +shopping and its moral aridity, was the absolute negation. But by what +extraordinary process of the heart--through what mysterious intermission +of that moral instinct which may keep pace with the heart even when this +organ is making unprecedented time--had she fixed her affections on an +insolently frivolous Frenchman? Longmore needed no telling; he knew that +M. de Mauves was both cynical and shallow; these things were stamped +on his eyes, his nose, his mouth, his voice, his gesture, his step. Of +Frenchwomen themselves, when all was said, our young man, full of nursed +discriminations, went in no small fear; they all seemed to belong to the +type of a certain fine lady to whom he had ventured to present a letter +of introduction and whom, directly after his first visit to her, he had +set down in his note-book as “metallic.” Why should Madame de Mauves +have chosen a Frenchwoman’s lot--she whose nature had an atmospheric +envelope absent even from the brightest metals? He asked her one day +frankly if it had cost her nothing to transplant herself--if she weren’t +oppressed with a sense of irreconcileable difference from “all these +people.” She replied nothing at first, till he feared she might think +it her duty to resent a question that made light of all her husband’s +importances. He almost wished she would; it would seem a proof that +her policy of silence had a limit. “I almost grew up here,” she said +at last, “and it was here for me those visions of the future took +shape that we all have when we begin to think or to dream beyond mere +playtime. As matters stand one may be very American and yet arrange it +with one’s conscience to live in Europe. My imagination perhaps--I had +a little when I was younger--helped me to think I should find happiness +here. And after all, for a woman, what does it signify? This isn’t +America, no--this element, but it’s quite as little France. France is +out there beyond the garden, France is in the town and the forest; but +here, close about me, in my room and”--she paused a moment--“in my mind, +it’s a nameless, and doubtless not at all remarkable, little country of +my own. It’s not her country,” she added, “that makes a woman happy or +unhappy.” + +Madame Clairin, Euphemia’s sister-in-law, might meanwhile have been +supposed to have undertaken the graceful task of making Longmore ashamed +of his uncivil jottings about her sex and nation. Mademoiselle de +Mauves, bringing example to the confirmation of precept, had made +a remunerative match and sacrificed her name to the millions of a +prosperous and aspiring wholesale druggist--a gentleman liberal enough +to regard his fortune as a moderate price for being towed into circles +unpervaded by pharmaceutic odours. His system possibly was sound, but +his own application of it to be deplored. M. Clairin’s head was turned +by his good luck. Having secured an aristocratic wife he adopted an +aristocratic vice and began to gamble at the Bourse. In an evil hour he +lost heavily, and then staked heavily to recover himself. But he was +to learn that the law of compensation works with no such pleasing +simplicity, and he rolled to the dark bottom of his folly. There he felt +everything go--his wits, his courage, his probity, everything that had +made him what his fatuous marriage had so promptly unmade. He walked up +the Rue Vivienne with his hands in his empty pockets and stood half an +hour staring confusedly up and down the brave boulevard. People brushed +against him and half a dozen carriages almost ran over him, until at +last a policeman, who had been watching him for some time, took him by +the arm and led him gently away. He looked at the man’s cocked hat and +sword with tears in his eyes; he hoped for some practical application +of the wrath of heaven, something that would express violently his +dead-weight of self-abhorrence. The sergent de ville, however, only +stationed him in the embrasure of a door, out of harm’s way, and walked +off to supervise a financial contest between an old lady and a cabman. +Poor M. Clairin had only been married a year, but he had had time to +measure the great spirit of true children of the anciens preux. When +night had fallen he repaired to the house of a friend and asked for +a night’s lodging; and as his friend, who was simply his old head +book-keeper and lived in a small way, was put to some trouble to +accommodate him, “You must pardon me,” the poor man said, “but I can’t +go home. I’m afraid of my wife!” Toward morning he blew his brains out. +His widow turned the remnants of his property to better account than +could have been expected and wore the very handsomest mourning. It was +for this latter reason perhaps that she was obliged to retrench at other +points and accept a temporary home under her brother’s roof. + +Fortune had played Madame Clairin a terrible trick, but had found an +adversary and not a victim. Though quite without beauty she had always +had what is called the grand air, and her air from this time forth was +grander than ever. As she trailed about in her sable furbelows, tossing +back her well-dressed head and holding up her vigilant long-handled +eyeglass, she seemed to be sweeping the whole field of society and +asking herself where she should pluck her revenge. Suddenly she espied +it, ready made to her hand, in poor Longmore’s wealth and amiability. +American dollars and American complaisance had made her brother’s +fortune; why shouldn’t they make hers? She overestimated the wealth and +misinterpreted the amiability; for she was sure a man could neither be +so contented without being rich nor so “backward” without being weak. +Longmore met her advances with a formal politeness that covered a +good deal of unflattering discomposure. She made him feel deeply +uncomfortable; and though he was at a loss to conceive how he could be +an object of interest to a sharp Parisienne he had an indefinable sense +of being enclosed in a magnetic circle, of having become the victim of +an incantation. If Madame Clairin could have fathomed his Puritanic soul +she would have laid by her wand and her book and dismissed him for an +impossible subject. She gave him a moral chill, and he never named her +to himself save as that dreadful woman--that awful woman. He did justice +to her grand air, but for his pleasure he preferred the small air of +Madame de Mauves; and he never made her his bow, after standing frigidly +passive for five minutes to one of her gracious overtures to intimacy, +without feeling a peculiar desire to ramble away into the forest, fling +himself down on the warm grass and, staring up at the blue sky, forget +that there were any women in nature who didn’t please like the swaying +tree-tops. One day, on his arrival at the house, she met him in the +court with the news that her sister-in-law was shut up with a +headache and that his visit must be for HER. He followed her into the +drawing-room with the best grace at his command, and sat twirling his +hat for half an hour. Suddenly he understood her; her caressing cadences +were so almost explicit an invitation to solicit the charming honour +of her hand. He blushed to the roots of his hair and jumped up with +uncontrollable alacrity; then, dropping a glance at Madame Clairin, +who sat watching him with hard eyes over the thin edge of her smile, +perceived on her brow a flash of unforgiving wrath. It was not pleasing +in itself, but his eyes lingered a moment, for it seemed to show off her +character. What he saw in the picture frightened him and he felt himself +murmur “Poor Madame de Mauves!” His departure was abrupt, and this time +he really went into the forest and lay down on the grass. + +After which he admired his young countrywoman more than ever; her +intrinsic clearness shone out to him even through the darker shade cast +over it. At the end of a month he received a letter from a friend with +whom he had arranged a tour through the Low Countries, reminding him +of his promise to keep their tryst at Brussels. It was only after his +answer was posted that he fully measured the zeal with which he had +declared that the journey must either be deferred or abandoned--since he +couldn’t possibly leave Saint-Germain. He took a walk in the forest +and asked himself if this were indeed portentously true. Such a truth +somehow made it surely his duty to march straight home and put together +his effects. Poor Webster, who, he knew, had counted ardently on this +excursion, was the best of men; six weeks ago he would have gone through +anything to join poor Webster. It had never been in his books to throw +overboard a friend whom he had loved ten years for a married woman whom +he had six weeks--well, admired. It was certainly beyond question that +he hung on at Saint-Germain because this admirable married woman was +there; but in the midst of so much admiration what had become of his +fine old power to conclude? This was the conduct of a man not judging +but drifting, and he had pretended never to drift. If she were as +unhappy as he believed the active sympathy of such a man would help her +very little more than his indifference; if she were less so she needed +no help and could dispense with his professions. He was sure moreover +that if she knew he was staying on her account she would be extremely +annoyed. This very feeling indeed had much to do with making it hard +to go; her displeasure would be the flush on the snow of the high cold +stoicism that touched him to the heart. At moments withal he assured +himself that staying to watch her--and what else did it come to?--was +simply impertinent; it was gross to keep tugging at the cover of a book +so intentionally closed. Then inclination answered that some day her +self-support would fail, and he had a vision of this exquisite creature +calling vainly for help. He would just be her friend to any length, and +it was unworthy of either to think about consequences. He was a friend, +however, who nursed a brooding regret for his not having known her +five years earlier, as well as a particular objection to those who had +smartly anticipated him. It seemed one of fortune’s most mocking strokes +that she should be surrounded by persons whose only merit was that they +threw every side of her, as she turned in her pain, into radiant relief. + +Our young man’s growing irritation made it more and more difficult for +him to see any other merit than this in Richard de Mauves. And yet, +disinterestedly, it would have been hard to give a name to the pitiless +perversity lighted by such a conclusion, and there were times when +Longmore was almost persuaded against his finer judgement that he was +really the most considerate of husbands and that it was not a man’s +fault if his wife’s love of life had pitched itself once for all in +the minor key. The Count’s manners were perfect, his discretion +irreproachable, and he seemed never to address his companion but, +sentimentally speaking, hat in hand. His tone to Longmore--as the latter +was perfectly aware--was that of a man of the world to a man not quite +of the world; but what it lacked in true frankness it made up in easy +form. “I can’t thank you enough for having overcome my wife’s shyness,” + he more than once declared. “If we left her to do as she pleased she +would--in her youth and her beauty--bury herself all absurdly alive. +Come often, and bring your good friends and compatriots--some of them +are so amusing. She’ll have nothing to do with mine, but perhaps you’ll +be able to offer her better son affaire.” + +M. de Mauves made these speeches with a bright assurance very amazing to +our hero, who had an innocent belief that a man’s head may point out +to him the shortcomings of his heart and make him ashamed of them. +He couldn’t fancy him formed both to neglect his wife and to take the +derisive view of her minding it. Longmore had at any rate an exasperated +sense that this nobleman thought rather the less of their interesting +friend on account of that very same fine difference of nature which +so deeply stirred his own sympathies. He was rarely present during the +sessions of the American visitor, and he made a daily journey to Paris, +where he had de gros soucis d’affaires as he once mentioned--with an +all-embracing flourish and not in the least in the tone of apology. When +he appeared it was late in the evening and with an imperturbable air +of being on the best of terms with every one and every thing which was +peculiarly annoying if you happened to have a tacit quarrel with him. +If he was an honest man he was an honest man somehow spoiled for +confidence. Something he had, however, that his critic vaguely envied, +something in his address, splendidly positive, a manner rounded +and polished by the habit of conversation and the friction of full +experience, an urbanity exercised for his own sake, not for his +neighbour’s, which seemed the fruit of one of those strong temperaments +that rule the inward scene better than the best conscience. The Count +had plainly no sense for morals, and poor Longmore, who had the finest, +would have been glad to borrow his recipe for appearing then so to range +the whole scale of the senses. What was it that enabled him, short of +being a monster with visibly cloven feet and exhaling brimstone, to +misprize so cruelly a nature like his wife’s and to walk about the world +with such a handsome invincible grin? It was the essential grossness of +his imagination, which had nevertheless helped him to such a store of +neat speeches. He could be highly polite and could doubtless be damnably +impertinent, but the life of the spirit was a world as closed to him as +the world of great music to a man without an ear. It was ten to one +he didn’t in the least understand how his wife felt; he and his smooth +sister had doubtless agreed to regard their relative as a Puritanical +little person, of meagre aspirations and few talents, content with +looking at Paris from the terrace and, as a special treat, having a +countryman very much like herself to regale her with innocent echoes +of their native wit. M. de Mauves was tired of his companion; he +liked women who could, frankly, amuse him better. She was too dim, too +delicate, too modest; she had too few arts, too little coquetry, +too much charity. Lighting a cigar some day while he summed up his +situation, her husband had probably decided she was incurably stupid. +It was the same taste, in essence, our young man moralised, as the taste +for M. Gerome and M. Baudry in painting and for M. Gustave Flaubert and +M. Charles Baudelaire in literature. The Count was a pagan and his wife +a Christian, and between them an impassable gulf. He was by race and +instinct a grand seigneur. Longmore had often heard of that historic +type, and was properly grateful for an opportunity to examine it +closely. It had its elegance of outline, but depended on spiritual +sources so remote from those of which he felt the living gush in his own +soul that he found himself gazing at it, in irreconcileable antipathy, +through a dim historic mist. “I’m a modern bourgeois,” he said, “and +not perhaps so good a judge of how far a pretty woman’s tongue may go at +supper before the mirrors properly crack to hear. But I’ve not met +one of the rarest of women without recognising her, without making +my reflexion that, charm for charm, such a maniere d’etre is more +‘fetching’ even than the worst of Theresa’s songs sung by a dissipated +duchess. Wit for wit, I think mine carries me further.” It was easy +indeed to perceive that, as became a grand seigneur, M. de Mauves had a +stock of social principles. He wouldn’t especially have desired perhaps +that his wife should compete in amateur operettas with the duchesses in +question, for the most part of comparatively recent origin; but he held +that a gentleman may take his amusement where he finds it, that he +is quite at liberty not to find it at home, and that even an adoptive +daughter of his house who should hang her head and have red eyes and +allow herself to make any other response to officious condolence than +that her husband’s amusements were his own affair, would have forfeited +every claim to having her finger-tips bowed over and kissed. And yet in +spite of this definite faith Longmore figured him much inconvenienced +by the Countess’s avoidance of betrayals. Did it dimly occur to him that +the principle of this reserve was self-control and not self-effacement? +She was a model to all the inferior matrons of his line, past and to +come, and an occasional “scene” from her at a manageable hour would +have had something reassuring--would have attested her stupidity rather +better than this mere polish of her patience. + +Longmore would have given much to be able to guess how this latter +secret worked, and he tried more than once, though timidly and awkwardly +enough, to make out the game she was playing. She struck him as having +long resisted the force of cruel evidence, and, as though succumbing to +it at last, having denied herself on simple grounds of generosity the +right to complain. Her faith might have perished, but the sense of her +own old deep perversity remained. He believed her thus quite capable +of reproaching herself with having expected too much and of trying to +persuade herself out of her bitterness by saying that her hopes had been +vanities and follies and that what was before her was simply Life. “I +hate tragedy,” she once said to him; “I’m a dreadful coward about having +to suffer or to bleed. I’ve always tried to believe that--without +base concessions--such extremities may always somehow be dodged or +indefinitely postponed. I should be willing to buy myself off, from +having ever to be OVERWHELMED, by giving up--well, any amusement you +like.” She lived evidently in nervous apprehension of being fatally +convinced--of seeing to the end of her deception. Longmore, when he +thought of this, felt the force of his desire to offer her something of +which she could be as sure as of the sun in heaven. + + + + +IV + +His friend Webster meanwhile lost no time in accusing him of the basest +infidelity and in asking him what he found at suburban Saint-Germain to +prefer to Van Eyck and Memling, Rubens and Rembrandt. A day or two after +the receipt of this friend’s letter he took a walk with Madame de Mauves +in the forest. They sat down on a fallen log and she began to arrange +into a bouquet the anemones and violets she had gathered. “I’ve a word +here,” he said at last, “from a friend whom I some time ago promised to +join in Brussels. The time has come--it has passed. It finds me terribly +unwilling to leave Saint-Germain.” + +She looked up with the immediate interest she always showed in +his affairs, but with no hint of a disposition to make a personal +application of his words. “Saint-Germain is pleasant enough, but are you +doing yourself justice? Shan’t you regret in future days that instead +of travelling and seeing cities and monuments and museums and improving +your mind you simply sat here--for instance--on a log and pulled my +flowers to pieces?” + +“What I shall regret in future days,” he answered after some hesitation, +“is that I should have sat here--sat here so much--and never have shown +what’s the matter with me. I’m fond of museums and monuments and of +improving my mind, and I’m particularly fond of my friend Webster. But I +can’t bring myself to leave Saint-Germain without asking you a question. +You must forgive me if it’s indiscreet and be assured that curiosity +was never more respectful. Are you really as unhappy as I imagine you to +be?” + +She had evidently not expected his appeal, and, making her change +colour, it took her unprepared. “If I strike you as unhappy,” she none +the less simply said, “I’ve been a poorer friend to you than I wished to +be.” + +“I, perhaps, have been a better friend of yours than you’ve supposed,” + he returned. “I’ve admired your reserve, your courage, your studied +gaiety. But I’ve felt the existence of something beneath them that was +more YOU--more you as I wished to know you--than they were; some trouble +in you that I’ve permitted myself to hate and resent.” + +She listened all gravely, but without an air of offence, and he felt +that while he had been timorously calculating the last consequences of +friendship she had quietly enough accepted them. “You surprise me,” she +said slowly, and her flush still lingered. “But to refuse to answer +you would confirm some impression in you even now much too strong. Any +‘trouble’--if you mean any unhappiness--that one can sit comfortably +talking about is an unhappiness with distinct limitations. If I were +examined before a board of commissioners for testing the felicity of +mankind I’m sure I should be pronounced a very fortunate woman.” There +was something that deeply touched him in her tone, and this quality +pierced further as she continued. “But let me add, with all gratitude +for your sympathy, that it’s my own affair altogether. It needn’t +disturb you, my dear sir,” she wound up with a certain quaintness of +gaiety, “for I’ve often found myself in your company contented enough +and diverted enough.” + +“Well, you’re a wonderful woman,” the young man declared, “and I admire +you as I’ve never admired any one. You’re wiser than anything I, for +one, can say to you; and what I ask of you is not to let me advise +or console you, but simply thank you for letting me know you.” He had +intended no such outburst as this, but his voice rang loud and he felt +an unfamiliar joy as he uttered it. + +She shook her head with some impatience. “Let us be friends--as I +supposed we were going to be--without protestations and fine words. +To have you paying compliments to my wisdom--that would be real +wretchedness. I can dispense with your admiration better than the +Flemish painters can--better than Van Eyck and Rubens, in spite of +all their worshippers. Go join your friend--see everything, enjoy +everything, learn everything, and write me an excellent letter, brimming +over with your impressions. I’m extremely fond of the Dutch painters,” + she added with the faintest quaver in the world, an impressible break of +voice that Longmore had noticed once or twice before and had interpreted +as the sudden weariness, the controlled convulsion, of a spirit +self-condemned to play a part. + +“I don’t believe you care a button for the Dutch painters,” he said with +a laugh. “But I shall certainly write you a letter.” + +She rose and turned homeward, thoughtfully rearranging her flowers +as she walked. Little was said; Longmore was asking himself with an +agitation of his own in the unspoken words whether all this meant +simply that he was in love. He looked at the rooks wheeling against the +golden-hued sky, between the tree-tops, but not at his companion, whose +personal presence seemed lost in the felicity she had created. Madame de +Mauves was silent and grave--she felt she had almost grossly failed and +she was proportionately disappointed. An emotional friendship she had +not desired; her scheme had been to pass with her visitor as a placid +creature with a good deal of leisure which she was disposed to devote to +profitable conversation of an impersonal sort. She liked him extremely, +she felt in him the living force of something to which, when she made up +her girlish mind that a needy nobleman was the ripest fruit of time, +she had done too scant justice. They went through the little gate in the +garden-wall and approached the house. On the terrace Madame Clairin was +entertaining a friend--a little elderly gentleman with a white moustache +and an order in his buttonhole. Madame de Mauves chose to pass round +the house into the court; whereupon her sister-in-law, greeting Longmore +with an authoritative nod, lifted her eye-glass and stared at them as +they went by. Longmore heard the little old gentleman uttering some +old-fashioned epigram about “la vieille galanterie francaise”--then by +a sudden impulse he looked at Madame de Mauves and wondered what she was +doing in such a world. She stopped before the house, not asking him to +come in. “I hope you will act on my advice and waste no more time at +Saint-Germain.” + +For an instant there rose to his lips some faded compliment about his +time not being wasted, but it expired before the simple sincerity of +her look. She stood there as gently serious as the angel of +disinterestedness, and it seemed to him he should insult her by treating +her words as a bait for flattery. “I shall start in a day or two,” he +answered, “but I won’t promise you not to come back.” + +“I hope not,” she said simply. “I expect to be here a long time.” + +“I shall come and say good-bye,” he returned--which she appeared to +accept with a smile as she went in. + +He stood a moment, then walked slowly homeward by the terrace. It seemed +to him that to leave her thus, for a gain on which she herself insisted, +was to know her better and admire her more. But he was aware of a vague +ferment of feeling which her evasion of his question half an hour before +had done more to deepen than to allay. In the midst of it suddenly, on +the great terrace of the Chateau, he encountered M. de Mauves, planted +there against the parapet and finishing a cigar. The Count, who, he +thought he made out, had an air of peculiar affability, offered him his +white plump hand. Longmore stopped; he felt a sharp, a sore desire to +cry out to him that he had the most precious wife in the world, that +he ought to be ashamed of himself not to know it, and that for all his +grand assurance he had never looked down into the depths of her eyes. +Richard de Mauves, we have seen, considered he had; but there was +doubtless now something in this young woman’s eyes that had not been +there five years before. The two men conversed formally enough, and +M. de Mauves threw off a light bright remark or two about his visit to +America. His tone was not soothing to Longmore’s excited sensibilities. +He seemed to have found the country a gigantic joke, and his blandness +went but so far as to allow that jokes on that scale are indeed +inexhaustible. Longmore was not by habit an aggressive apologist for the +seat of his origin, but the Count’s easy diagnosis confirmed his worst +estimate of French superficiality. He had understood nothing, felt +nothing, learned nothing, and his critic, glancing askance at his +aristocratic profile, declared that if the chief merit of a long +pedigree was to leave one so fatuously stupid he thanked goodness the +Longmores had emerged from obscurity in the present century and in the +person of an enterprising timber-merchant. M. de Mauves dwelt of course +on that prime oddity of the American order--the liberty allowed the +fairer half of the unmarried young, and confessed to some personal study +of the “occasions” it offered to the speculative visitor; a line of +research in which, during a fortnight’s stay, he had clearly spent his +most agreeable hours. “I’m bound to admit,” he said, “that in every case +I was disarmed by the extreme candour of the young lady, and that they +took care of themselves to better purpose than I have seen some mammas +in France take care of them.” Longmore greeted this handsome concession +with the grimmest of smiles and damned his impertinent patronage. + +Mentioning, however, at last that he was about to leave Saint-Germain, +he was surprised, without exactly being flattered, by his interlocutor’s +quickened attention. “I’m so very sorry; I hoped we had you for the +whole summer.” Longmore murmured something civil and wondered why M. +de Mauves should care whether he stayed or went. “You’ve been a real +resource to Madame de Mauves,” the Count added; “I assure you I’ve +mentally blessed your visits.” + +“They were a great pleasure to me,” Longmore said gravely. “Some day I +expect to come back.” + +“Pray do”--and the Count made a great and friendly point of it. “You see +the confidence I have in you.” Longmore said nothing and M. de Mauves +puffed his cigar reflectively and watched the smoke. “Madame de Mauves,” + he said at last, “is a rather singular person.” And then while our young +man shifted his position and wondered whether he was going to “explain” + Madame de Mauves, “Being, as you are, her fellow countryman,” this +lady’s husband pursued, “I don’t mind speaking frankly. She’s a little +overstrained; the most charming woman in the world, as you see, but +a little volontaire and morbid. Now you see she has taken this +extraordinary fancy for solitude. I can’t get her to go anywhere, to see +any one. When my friends present themselves she’s perfectly polite, but +it cures them of coming again. She doesn’t do herself justice, and I +expect every day to hear two or three of them say to me, ‘Your wife’s +jolie a croquer: what a pity she hasn’t a little esprit.’ You must +have found out that she has really a great deal. But, to tell the whole +truth, what she needs is to forget herself. She sits alone for hours +poring over her English books and looking at life through that terrible +brown fog they seem to me--don’t they?--to fling over the world. I +doubt if your English authors,” the Count went on with a serenity which +Longmore afterwards characterised as sublime, “are very sound reading +for young married women. I don’t pretend to know much about them; but I +remember that not long after our marriage Madame de Mauves undertook to +read me one day some passages from a certain Wordsworth--a poet highly +esteemed, it appears, chez vous. It was as if she had taken me by the +nape of the neck and held my head for half an hour over a basin of soupe +aux choux: I felt as if we ought to ventilate the drawing-room before +any one called. But I suppose you know him--ce genie-la. Every nation +has its own ideals of every kind, but when I remember some of OUR +charming writers! I think at all events my wife never forgave me and +that it was a real shock to her to find she had married a man who had +very much the same taste in literature as in cookery. But you’re a man +of general culture, a man of the world,” said M. de Mauves, turning to +Longmore but looking hard at the seal of his watchguard. “You can talk +about everything, and I’m sure you like Alfred de Musset as well as +Monsieur Wordsworth. Talk to her about everything you can, Alfred de +Musset included. Bah! I forgot you’re going. Come back then as soon as +possible and report on your travels. If my wife too would make a little +voyage it would do her great good. It would enlarge her horizon”--and +M. de Mauves made a series of short nervous jerks with his stick in the +air--“it would wake up her imagination. She’s too much of one piece, +you know--it would show her how much one may bend without breaking.” He +paused a moment and gave two or three vigorous puffs. Then turning +to his companion again with eyebrows expressively raised: “I hope you +admire my candour. I beg you to believe I wouldn’t say such things to +one of US!” + +Evening was at hand and the lingering light seemed to charge the air +with faintly golden motes. Longmore stood gazing at these luminous +particles; he could almost have fancied them a swarm of humming insects, +the chorus of a refrain: “She has a great deal of esprit--she has +a great deal of esprit.” “Yes,--she has a great deal,” he said +mechanically, turning to the Count. M. de Mauves glanced at him sharply, +as if to ask what the deuce he was talking about. “She has a great deal +of intelligence,” said Longmore quietly, “a great deal of beauty, a +great many virtues.” + +M. de Mauves busied himself for a moment in lighting another cigar, +and when he had finished, with a return of his confidential smile, +“I suspect you of thinking that I don’t do my wife justice.” he made +answer. “Take care--take care, young man; that’s a dangerous assumption. +In general a man always does his wife justice. More than justice,” the +Count laughed--“that we keep for the wives of other men!” + +Longmore afterwards remembered in favour of his friend’s fine manner +that he had not measured at this moment the dusky abyss over which +it hovered. Hut a deepening subterranean echo, loudest at the last, +lingered on his spiritual ear. For the present his keenest sensation was +a desire to get away and cry aloud that M. de Mauves was no better than +a pompous dunce. He bade him an abrupt good-night, which was to serve +also, he said, as good-bye. + +“Decidedly then you go?” It was spoken almost with the note of +irritation. + +“Decidedly.” + +“But of course you’ll come and take leave--?” His manner implied that +the omission would be uncivil, but there seemed to Longmore himself +something so ludicrous in his taking a lesson in consideration from M. +de Mauves that he put the appeal by with a laugh. The Count frowned as +if it were a new and unpleasant sensation for him to be left at a loss. +“Ah you people have your facons!” he murmured as Longmore turned away, +not foreseeing that he should learn still more about his facons before +he had done with him. + +Longmore sat down to dinner at his hotel with his usual good intentions, +but in the act of lifting his first glass of wine to his lips he +suddenly fell to musing and set down the liquor untasted. This mood +lasted long, and when he emerged from it his fish was cold; but that +mattered little, for his appetite was gone. That evening he packed his +trunk with an indignant energy. This was so effective that the operation +was accomplished before bedtime, and as he was not in the least sleepy +he devoted the interval to writing two letters, one of them a short note +to Madame de Mauves, which he entrusted to a servant for delivery the +next morning. He had found it best, he said, to leave Saint-Germain +immediately, but he expected to return to Paris early in the autumn. The +other letter was the result of his having remembered a day or two before +that he had not yet complied with Mrs. Draper’s injunction to give her +an account of his impression of her friend. The present occasion seemed +propitious, and he wrote half a dozen pages. His tone, however, +was grave, and Mrs. Draper, on reading him over, was slightly +disappointed--she would have preferred he should have “raved” a little +more. But what chiefly concerns us is the concluding passage. + +“The only time she ever spoke to me of her marriage,” he wrote, “she +intimated that it had been a perfect love-match. With all abatements, I +suppose, this is what most marriages take themselves to be; but it would +mean in her case, I think, more than in that of most women, for her love +was an absolute idealisation. She believed her husband to be a hero of +rose-coloured romance, and he turns out to be not even a hero of very +sad-coloured reality. For some time now she has been sounding her +mistake, but I don’t believe she has yet touched the bottom. She strikes +me as a person who’s begging off from full knowledge--who has patched up +a peace with some painful truth and is trying a while the experiment of +living with closed eyes. In the dark she tries to see again the gilding +on her idol. Illusion of course is illusion, and one must always pay for +it; but there’s something truly tragical in seeing an earthly penalty +levied on such divine folly as this. As for M. de Mauves he’s a shallow +Frenchman to his fingers’ ends, and I confess I should dislike him for +this if he were a much better man. He can’t forgive his wife for having +married him too extravagantly and loved him too well; since he feels, I +suppose, in some uncorrupted corner of his being that as she originally +saw him so he ought to have been. It disagrees with him somewhere that +a little American bourgeoise should have fancied him a finer fellow +than he is or than he at all wants to be. He hasn’t a glimmering of real +acquaintance with his wife; he can’t understand the stream of passion +flowing so clear and still. To tell the truth I hardly understand it +myself, but when I see the sight I find I greatly admire it. The Count +at any rate would have enjoyed the comfort of believing his wife as bad +a case as himself, and you’ll hardly believe me when I assure you he +goes about intimating to gentlemen whom he thinks it may concern that +it would be a convenience to him they should make love to Madame de +Mauves.” + + + + +V + +On reaching Paris Longmore straightaway purchased a Murray’s “Belgium” + to help himself to believe that he would start on the morrow for +Brussels; but when the morrow came it occurred to him that he ought by +way of preparation to acquaint himself more intimately with the Flemish +painters in the Louvre. This took a whole morning, but it did little +to hasten his departure. He had abruptly left Saint-Germain because +it seemed to him that respect for Madame de Mauves required he should +bequeath her husband no reason to suppose he had, as it were, taken a +low hint; but now that he had deferred to that scruple he found himself +thinking more and more ardently of his friend. It was a poor expression +of ardour to be lingering irresolutely on the forsaken boulevard, but +he detested the idea of leaving Saint-Germain five hundred miles behind +him. He felt very foolish, nevertheless, and wandered about nervously, +promising himself to take the next train. A dozen trains started, +however, and he was still in Paris. This inward ache was more than he +had bargained for, and as he looked at the shop-windows he wondered if +it represented a “passion.” He had never been fond of the word and had +grown up with much mistrust of what it stood for. He had hoped that +when he should fall “really” in love he should do it with an excellent +conscience, with plenty of confidence and joy, doubtless, but no strange +soreness, no pangs nor regrets. Here was a sentiment concocted of pity +and anger as well as of admiration, and bristling with scruples and +doubts and fears. He had come abroad to enjoy the Flemish painters and +all others, but what fair-tressed saint of Van Eyck or Memling was so +interesting a figure as the lonely lady of Saint-Germain? His restless +steps carried him at last out of the long villa-bordered avenue which +leads to the Bois de Boulogne. + +Summer had fairly begun and the drive beside the lake was empty, but +there were various loungers on the benches and chairs, and the great +cafe had an air of animation. Longmore’s walk had given him an appetite, +and he went into the establishment and demanded a dinner, remarking for +the hundredth time, as he admired the smart little tables disposed in +the open air, how much better (than anywhere else) they ordered this +matter in France. “Will monsieur dine in the garden or in the salon?” + the waiter blandly asked. Longmore chose the garden and, observing that +a great cluster of June roses was trained over the wall of the house, +placed himself at a table near by, where the best of dinners was served +him on the whitest of linen and in the most shining of porcelain. It so +happened that his table was near a window and that as he sat he could +look into a corner of the salon. So it was that his attention rested +on a lady seated just within the window, which was open, face to face +apparently with a companion who was concealed by the curtain. She was a +very pretty woman, and Longmore looked at her as often as was consistent +with good manners. After a while he even began to wonder who she was and +finally to suspect that she was one of those ladies whom it is no breach +of good manners to look at as often as you like. Our young man too, if +he had been so disposed, would have been the more free to give her all +his attention that her own was fixed upon the person facing her. She was +what the French call a belle brune, and though Longmore, who had rather +a conservative taste in such matters, was but half-charmed by her bold +outlines and even braver complexion, he couldn’t help admiring her +expression of basking contentment. + +She was evidently very happy, and her happiness gave her an air of +innocence. The talk of her friend, whoever he was, abundantly suited +her humour, for she sat listening to him with a broad idle smile and +interrupting him fitfully, while she crunched her bonbons, with a +murmured response, presumably as broad, which appeared to have the +effect of launching him again. She drank a great deal of champagne and +ate an immense number of strawberries, and was plainly altogether a +person with an impartial relish for strawberries, champagne and what she +doubtless would have called betises. + +They had half-finished dinner when Longmore sat down, and he was still +in his place when they rose. She had hung her bonnet on a nail above her +chair, and her companion passed round the table to take it down for her. +As he did so she bent her head to look at a wine-stain on her dress, and +in the movement exposed the greater part of the back of a very handsome +neck. The gentleman observed it, and observed also, apparently, that the +room beyond them was empty; that he stood within eyeshot of Longmore he +failed to observe. He stooped suddenly and imprinted a gallant kiss on +the fair expanse. In the author of this tribute Longmore then recognised +Richard de Mauves. The lady to whom it had been rendered put on her +bonnet, using his flushed smile as a mirror, and in a moment they passed +through the garden on their way to their carriage. Then for the first +time M. de Mauves became aware of his wife’s young friend. He measured +with a rapid glance this spectator’s relation to the open window and +checked himself in the impulse to stop and speak to him. He contented +himself with bowing all imperturbably as he opened the gate for his +companion. + +That evening Longmore made a railway journey, but not to Brussels. He +had effectually ceased to care for Brussels; all he cared for in the +world now was Madame de Mauves. The air of his mind had had a sudden +clearing-up; pity and anger were still throbbing there, but they had +space to range at their pleasure, for doubts and scruples had abruptly +departed. It was little, he felt, that he could interpose between her +resignation and the indignity of her position; but that little, if it +involved the sacrifice of everything that bound him to the tranquil +past, he could offer her with a rapture which at last made stiff +resistance a terribly inferior substitute for faith. Nothing in his +tranquil past had given such a zest to consciousness as this happy sense +of choosing to go straight back to Saint-Germain. How to justify his +return, how to explain his ardour, troubled him little. He wasn’t even +sure he wished to be understood; he wished only to show how little by +any fault of his Madame de Mauves was alone so with the harshness of +fate. He was conscious of no distinct desire to “make love” to her; if +he could have uttered the essence of his longing he would have said that +he wished her to remember that in a world coloured grey to her vision +by the sense of her mistake there was one vividly honest man. She might +certainly have remembered it, however, without his coming back to remind +her; and it is not to be denied that as he waited for the morrow he +longed immensely for the sound of her voice. + +He waited the next day till his usual hour of calling--the late +afternoon; but he learned at the door that the mistress of the house was +not at home. The servant offered the information that she was walking +a little way in the forest. Longmore went through the garden and out +of the small door into the lane, and, after half an hour’s vain +exploration, saw her coming toward him at the end of a green by-path. As +he appeared she stopped a moment, as if to turn aside; then recognising +him she slowly advanced and had presently taken the hand he held out. + +“Nothing has happened,” she said with her beautiful eyes on him. “You’re +not ill?” + +“Nothing except that when I got to Paris I found how fond I had grown of +Saint-Germain.” + +She neither smiled nor looked flattered; it seemed indeed to Longmore +that she took his reappearance with no pleasure. But he was uncertain, +for he immediately noted that in his absence the whole character of her +face had changed. It showed him something momentous had happened. It was +no longer self-contained melancholy that he read in her eyes, but grief +and agitation which had lately struggled with the passionate love of +peace ruling her before all things else, and forced her to know that +deep experience is never peaceful. She was pale and had evidently been +shedding tears. He felt his heart beat hard--he seemed now to touch +her secret. She continued to look at him with a clouded brow, as if his +return had surrounded her with complications too great to be disguised +by a colourless welcome. For some moments, as he turned and walked +beside her, neither spoke; then abruptly, “Tell me truly, Mr. Longmore,” + she said, “why you’ve come back.” He inclined himself to her, almost +pulling up again, with an air that startled her into a certainty of what +she had feared. “Because I’ve learned the real answer to the question I +asked you the other day. You’re not happy--you’re too good to be happy +on the terms offered you. Madame de Mauves,” he went on with a gesture +which protested against a gesture of her own, “I can’t be happy, you +know, when you’re as little so as I make you out. I don’t care for +anything so long as I only feel helpless and sore about you. I found +during those dreary days in Paris that the thing in life I most care for +is this daily privilege of seeing you. I know it’s very brutal to tell +you I admire you; it’s an insult to you to treat you as if you had +complained to me or appealed to me. But such a friendship as I waked up +to there”--and he tossed his head toward the distant city--“is a potent +force, I assure you. When forces are stupidly stifled they explode. +However,” he went on, “if you had told me every trouble in your heart it +would have mattered little; I couldn’t say more than I--that if that +in life from which you’ve hoped most has given you least, this devoted +respect of mine will refuse no service and betray no trust.” + +She had begun to make marks in the earth with the point of her parasol, +but she stopped and listened to him in perfect immobility--immobility +save for the appearance by the time he had stopped speaking of a flush +in her guarded clearness. Such as it was it told Longmore she was moved, +and his first perceiving it was the happiest moment of his life. She +raised her eyes at last, and they uttered a plea for non-insistence that +unspeakably touched him. + +“Thank you--thank you!” she said calmly enough; but the next moment +her own emotion baffled this pretence, a convulsion shook her for ten +seconds and she burst into tears. Her tears vanished as quickly as +they came, but they did Longmore a world of good. He had always felt +indefinably afraid of her; her being had somehow seemed fed by a deeper +faith and a stronger will than his own; but her half-dozen smothered +sobs showed him the bottom of her heart and convinced him she was weak +enough to be grateful. “Excuse me,” she said; “I’m too nervous to listen +to you. I believe I could have dealt with an enemy to-day, but I can’t +bear up under a friend.” + +“You’re killing yourself with stoicism--that’s what is the matter with +you!” he cried. “Listen to a friend for his own sake if not for yours. +I’ve never presumed to offer you an atom of compassion, and you can’t +accuse yourself of an abuse of charity.” + +She looked about her as under the constraint of this appeal, but it +promised him a reluctant attention. Noting, however, by the wayside the +fallen log on which they had rested a few evenings before, she went and +sat down on it with a resigned grace while the young man, silent before +her and watching her, took from her the mute assurance that if she was +charitable now he must at least be very wise. + +“Something came to my knowledge yesterday,” he said as he sat down +beside her, “which gave me an intense impression of your loneliness. +You’re truth itself, and there’s no truth about you. You believe in +purity and duty and dignity, and you live in a world in which they’re +daily belied. I ask myself with vain rage how you ever came into such a +world, and why the perversity of fate never let me know you before.” + +She waited a little; she looked down, straight before her. “I like my +‘world’ no better than you do, and it was not for its own sake I came +into it. But what particular group of people is worth pinning one’s +faith upon? I confess it sometimes seems to me men and women are very +poor creatures. I suppose I’m too romantic and always was. I’ve an +unfortunate taste for poetic fitness. Life’s hard prose, and one must +learn to read prose contentedly. I believe I once supposed all the +prose to be in America, which was very foolish. What I thought, what I +believed, what I expected, when I was an ignorant girl fatally addicted +to falling in love with my own theories, is more than I can begin +to tell you now. Sometimes when I remember certain impulses, certain +illusions of those days they take away my breath, and I wonder that my +false point of view hasn’t led me into troubles greater than any I’ve +now to lament. I had a conviction which you’d probably smile at if +I were to attempt to express it to you. It was a singular form for +passionate faith to take, but it had all of the sweetness and the ardour +of passionate faith. It led me to take a great step, and it lies +behind me now, far off, a vague deceptive form melting in the light of +experience. It has faded, but it hasn’t vanished. Some feelings, I’m +sure, die only with ourselves; some illusions are as much the condition +of our life as our heart-beats. They say that life itself is an +illusion--that this world is a shadow of which the reality is yet +to come. Life is all of a piece then and there’s no shame in being +miserably human. As for my loneliness, it doesn’t greatly matter; it is +the fault in part of my obstinacy. There have been times when I’ve been +frantically distressed and, to tell you the truth, wretchedly homesick, +because my maid--a jewel of a maid--lied to me with every second breath. +There have been moments when I’ve wished I was the daughter of a poor +New England minister--living in a little white house under a couple of +elms and doing all the housework.” + +She had begun to speak slowly, with reserve and effort; but she went on +quickly and as if talk were at last a relief. “My marriage introduced me +to people and things which seemed to me at first very strange and then +very horrible, and then, to tell the truth, of very little importance. +At first I expended a great deal of sorrow and dismay and pity on it +all; but there soon came a time when I began to wonder if it were worth +one’s tears. If I could tell you the eternal friendships I’ve seen +broken, the inconsolable woes consoled, the jealousies and vanities +scrambling to outdo each other, you’d agree with me that tempers +like yours and mine can understand neither such troubles nor such +compensations. A year ago, while I was in the country, a friend of mine +was in despair at the infidelity of her husband; she wrote me a most +dolorous letter, and on my return to Paris I went immediately to see +her. A week had elapsed, and as I had seen stranger things I thought +she might have recovered her spirits. Not at all; she was still in +despair--but at what? At the conduct, the abandoned, shameless conduct +of--well of a lady I’ll call Madame de T. You’ll imagine of course that +Madame de T. was the lady whom my friend’s husband preferred to his +wife. Far from it; he had never seen her. Who then was Madame de T.? +Madame de T. was cruelly devoted to M. de V. And who was M. de V.? M. +de V. was--well, in two words again, my friend was cultivating two +jealousies at once. I hardly know what I said to her; something at any +rate that she found unpardonable, for she quite gave me up. Shortly +afterwards my husband proposed we should cease to live in Paris, and I +gladly assented, for I believe I had taken a turn of spirits that made +me a detestable companion. I should have preferred to go quite into the +country, into Auvergne, where my husband has a house. But to him Paris +in some degree is necessary, and Saint-Germain has been a conscious +compromise.” + +“A conscious compromise!” Longmore expressively repeated. “That’s your +whole life.” + +“It’s the life of many people,” she made prompt answer--“of most people +of quiet tastes, and it’s certainly better than acute distress. One’s +at a loss theoretically to defend compromises; but if I found a poor +creature who had managed to arrive at one I should think myself not +urgently called to expose its weak side.” But she had no sooner uttered +these words than she laughed all amicably, as if to mitigate their too +personal application. + +“Heaven forbid one should do that unless one has something better to +offer,” Longmore returned. “And yet I’m haunted by the dream of a life +in which you should have found no compromises, for they’re a perversion +of natures that tend only to goodness and rectitude. As I see it you +should have found happiness serene, profound, complete; a femme de +chambre not a jewel perhaps, but warranted to tell but one fib a day; a +society possibly rather provincial, but--in spite of your poor opinion +of mankind--a good deal of solid virtue; jealousies and vanities very +tame, and no particular iniquities and adulteries. A husband,” he added +after a moment--“a husband of your own faith and race and spiritual +substance, who would have loved you well.” + +She rose to her feet, shaking her head. “You’re very kind to go to the +expense of such dazzling visions for me. Visions are vain things; we +must make the best of the reality we happen to be in for.” + +“And yet,” said Longmore, provoked by what seemed the very wantonness of +her patience, “the reality YOU ‘happen to be in for’ has, if I’m not in +error, very recently taken a shape that keenly tests your philosophy.” + +She seemed on the point of replying that his sympathy was too zealous; +but a couple of impatient tears in his eyes proved it founded on a +devotion of which she mightn’t make light. “Ah philosophy?” she echoed. +“I HAVE none. Thank heaven,” she cried with vehemence, “I have none! +I believe, Mr. Longmore,” she added in a moment, “that I’ve nothing on +earth but a conscience--it’s a good time to tell you so--nothing but a +dogged obstinate clinging conscience. Does that prove me to be indeed of +your faith and race, and have you one yourself for which you can say as +much? I don’t speak in vanity, for I believe that if my conscience may +prevent me from doing anything very base it will effectually prevent me +also from doing anything very fine.” + +“I’m delighted to hear it,” her friend returned with high +emphasis--“that proves we’re made for each other. It’s very certain I +too shall never cut a great romantic figure. And yet I’ve fancied that +in my case the unaccommodating organ we speak of might be blinded and +gagged a while, in a really good cause, if not turned out of doors. +In yours,” he went on with the same appealing irony, “is it absolutely +beyond being ‘squared’?” + +But she made no concession to his tone. “Don’t laugh at your +conscience,” she answered gravely; “that’s the only blasphemy I know.” + +She had hardly spoken when she turned suddenly at an unexpected sound, +and at the same moment he heard a footstep in an adjacent by-path which +crossed their own at a short distance from where they stood. + +“It’s M. de Mauves,” she said at once; with which she moved slowly +forward. Longmore, wondering how she knew without seeing, had overtaken +her by the time her husband came into view. A solitary walk in the +forest was a pastime to which M. de Mauves was not addicted, but he +seemed on this occasion to have resorted to it with some equanimity. He +was smoking a fragrant cigar and had thrust his thumb into the armhole +of his waistcoat with the air of a man thinking at his ease. He stopped +short with surprise on seeing his wife and her companion, and his +surprise had for Longmore even the pitch of impertinence. He glanced +rapidly from one to the other, fixed the young man’s own look sharply a +single instant and then lifted his hat with formal politeness. + +“I was not aware,” he said, turning to Madame de Mauves, “that I might +congratulate you on the return of monsieur.” + +“You should at once have known it,” she immediately answered, “if I had +expected such a pleasure.” + +She had turned very pale, and Longmore felt this to be a first meeting +after some commotion. “My return was unexpected to myself,” he said to +her husband. “I came back last night.” + +M. de Mauves seemed to express such satisfaction as could consort with +a limited interest. “It’s needless for me to make you welcome. Madame +de Mauves knows the duties of hospitality.” And with another bow he +continued his walk. + +She pursued her homeward course with her friend, neither of them +pretending much not to consent to appear silent. The Count’s few moments +with them had both chilled Longmore and angered him, casting a shadow +across a prospect which had somehow, just before, begun to open and +almost to brighten. He watched his companion narrowly as they went, and +wondered what she had last had to suffer. Her husband’s presence +had checked her disposition to talk, though nothing betrayed she had +recognised his making a point at her expense. Yet if matters were none +the less plainly at a crisis between them he could but wonder vainly +what it was on her part that prevented some practical protest or some +rupture. What did she suspect?--how much did she know? To what was she +resigned?--how much had she forgiven? How, above all, did she reconcile +with knowledge, or with suspicion, that intense consideration she had +just now all but assured him she entertained? “She has loved him once,” + Longmore said with a sinking of the heart, “and with her to love once is +to commit herself for ever. Her clever husband thinks her too prim. What +would a stupid poet call it?” He relapsed with aching impotence into the +sense of her being somehow beyond him, unattainable, immeasurable by his +own fretful logic. Suddenly he gave three passionate switches in the air +with his cane which made Madame de Mauves look round. She could hardly +have guessed their signifying that where ambition was so vain the next +best thing to it was the very ardour of hopelessness. + +She found in her drawing-room the little elderly Frenchman, M. de +Chalumeau, whom Longmore had observed a few days before on the terrace. +On this occasion too Madame Clairin was entertaining him, but as her +sister-in-law came in she surrendered her post and addressed herself to +our hero. Longmore, at thirty, was still an ingenuous youth, and +there was something in this lady’s large assured attack that fairly +intimidated him. He was doubtless not as reassured as he ought to have +been at finding he had not absolutely forfeited her favour by his want +of resource during their last interview, and a suspicion of her being +prepared to approach him on another line completed his distress. + +“So you’ve returned from Brussels by way of the forest?” she archly +asked. + +“I’ve not been to Brussels. I returned yesterday from Paris by the only +way--by the train.” + +Madame Clairin was infinitely struck. “I’ve never known a person at all +to be so fond of Saint-Germain. They generally declare it’s horribly +dull.” + +“That’s not very polite to you,” said Longmore, vexed at his lack of +superior form and determined not to be abashed. + +“Ah what have I to do with it?” Madame Clairin brightly wailed. “I’m the +dullest thing here. They’ve not had, other gentlemen, your success with +my sister-in-law.” + +“It would have been very easy to have it. Madame de Mauves is kindness +itself.” + +She swung open her great fan. “To her own countrymen!” + +Longmore remained silent; he hated the tone of this conversation. + +The speaker looked at him a little and then took in their hostess, to +whom M. de Chalumeau was serving up another epigram, which the charming +creature received with a droop of the head and eyes that strayed through +the window. “Don’t pretend to tell me,” Madame Clairin suddenly exhaled, +“that you’re not in love with that pretty woman.” + +“Allons donc!” cried Longmore in the most inspired French he had ever +uttered. He rose the next minute and took a hasty farewell. + + + + +VI + +He allowed several days to pass without going back; it was of a sublime +suitability to appear to regard his friend’s frankness during their +last interview as a general invitation. The sacrifice cost him a great +effort, for hopeless passions are exactly not the most patient; and he +had moreover a constant fear that if, as he believed, deep within the +circle round which he could only hover, the hour of supreme explanations +had come, the magic of her magnanimity might convert M. de Mauves. +Vicious men, it was abundantly recorded, had been so converted as to be +acceptable to God, and the something divine in this lady’s composition +would sanctify any means she should choose to employ. Her means, he kept +repeating, were no business of his, and the essence of his admiration +ought to be to allow her to do as she liked; but he felt as if he should +turn away into a world out of which most of the joy had departed if she +should like, after all, to see nothing more in his interest in her than +might be repaid by mere current social coin. + +When at last he went back he found to his vexation that he was to run +the gauntlet of Madame Clairin’s officious hospitality. It was one of +the first mornings of perfect summer, and the drawing-room, through the +open windows, was flooded with such a confusion of odours and bird-notes +as might warrant the hope that Madame de Mauves would renew with him +for an hour or two the exploration of the forest. Her sister-in-law, +however, whose hair was not yet dressed, emerged like a brassy discord +in a maze of melody. At the same moment the servant returned with his +mistress’s regrets; she begged to be excused, she was indisposed and +unable to see Mr. Longmore. The young man knew just how disappointed +he looked and just what Madame Clairin thought of it, and this +consciousness determined in him an attitude of almost aggressive +frigidity. This was apparently what she desired. She wished to throw him +off his balance and, if she was not mistaken, knew exactly how. + +“Put down your hat, Mr. Longmore,” she said, “and be polite for once. +You were not at all polite the other day when I asked you that friendly +question about the state of your heart.” + +“I HAVE no heart--to talk about,” he returned with as little grace. + +“As well say you’ve none at all. I advise you to cultivate a little +eloquence; you may have use for it. That was not an idle question of +mine; I don’t ask idle questions. For a couple of months now that you’ve +been coming and going among us it seems to me you’ve had very few to +answer of any sort.” + +“I’ve certainly been very well treated,” he still dryly allowed. + +His companion waited ever so little to bring out: “Have you never felt +disposed to ask any?” + +Her look, her tone, were so charged with insidious meanings as to +make him feel that even to understand her would savour of dishonest +complicity. “What is it you have to tell me?” he cried with a flushed +frown. + +Her own colour rose at the question. It’s rather hard, when you come +bearing yourself very much as the sibyl when she came to the Roman king, +to be treated as something worse than a vulgar gossip. “I might tell +you, monsieur,” she returned, “that you’ve as bad a ton as any young man +I ever met. Where have you lived--what are your ideas? A stupid one of +my own--possibly!--has been to call your attention to a fact that it +takes some delicacy to touch upon. You’ve noticed, I suppose, that my +sister-in-law isn’t the happiest woman in the world.” + +“Oh!”--Longmore made short work of it. + +She seemed to measure his intelligence a little uncertainly. “You’ve +formed, I suppose,” she nevertheless continued, “your conception of the +grounds of her discontent?” + +“It hasn’t required much forming. The grounds--or at least a specimen or +two of them--have simply stared me in the face.” + +Madame Clairin considered a moment with her eyes on him. “Yes--ces +choses-la se voient. My brother, in a single word, has the deplorable +habit of falling in love with other women. I don’t judge him; I don’t +judge my sister-in-law. I only permit myself to say that in her position +I would have managed otherwise. I’d either have kept my husband’s +affection or I’d have frankly done without it. But my sister’s an odd +compound; I don’t profess to understand her. Therefore it is, in a +measure, that I appeal to you, her fellow countryman. Of course you’ll +be surprised at my way of looking at the matter, and I admit that it’s +a way in use only among people whose history--that of a race--has +cultivated in them the sense for high political solutions.” She paused +and Longmore wondered where the history of her race was going to lead +her. But she clearly saw her course. “There has never been a galant +homme among us, I fear, who has not given his wife, even when she was +very charming, the right to be jealous. We know our history for ages +back, and the fact’s established. It’s not a very edifying one if you +like, but it’s something to have scandals with pedigrees--if you can’t +have them with attenuations. Our men have been Frenchmen of France, and +their wives--I may say it--have been of no meaner blood. You may see +all their portraits at our poor charming old house--every one of them an +‘injured’ beauty, but not one of them hanging her head. Not one of them +ever had the bad taste to be jealous, and yet not one in a dozen ever +consented to an indiscretion--allowed herself, I mean, to be talked +about. Voila comme elles ont su s’arranger. How they did it--go and look +at the dusky faded canvases and pastels and ask. They were dear brave +women of wit. When they had a headache they put on a little rouge and +came to supper as usual, and when they had a heart-ache they touched up +that quarter with just such another brush. These are great traditions +and charming precedents, I hold, and it doesn’t seem to me fair that a +little American bourgeoise should come in and pretend to alter them--all +to hang her modern photograph and her obstinate little air penche in the +gallery of our shrewd great-grandmothers. She should fall into line, she +should keep up the tone. When she married my brother I don’t suppose she +took him for a member of a societe de bonnes oeuvres. I don’t say we’re +right; who IS right? But we are as history has made us, and if any one’s +to change it had better be our charming, but not accommodating, friend.” + Again Madame Clairin paused, again she opened and closed her great +modern fan, which clattered like the screen of a shop-window. “Let her +keep up the tone!” she prodigiously repeated. + +Longmore felt himself gape, but he gasped an “Ah!” to cover it. Madame +Clairin’s dip into the family annals had apparently imparted an +honest zeal to her indignation. “For a long time,” she continued, “my +belle-soeur has been taking the attitude of an injured woman, affecting +a disgust with the world and shutting herself up to read free-thinking +books. I’ve never permitted myself, you may believe, the least +observation on her conduct, but I can’t accept it as the last word +either of taste or of tact. When a woman with her prettiness lets her +husband stray away she deserves no small part of her fate. I don’t wish +you to agree with me--on the contrary; but I call such a woman a pure +noodle. She must have bored him to death. What has passed between them +for many months needn’t concern us; what provocation my sister has +had--monstrous, if you wish--what ennui my brother has suffered. It’s +enough that a week ago, just after you had ostensibly gone to Brussels, +something happened to produce an explosion. She found a letter in his +pocket, a photograph, a trinket, que sais-je? At any rate there was a +grand scene. I didn’t listen at the keyhole, and I don’t know what was +said; but I’ve reason to believe that my poor brother was hauled over +the coals as I fancy none of his ancestors have ever been--even by angry +ladies who weren’t their wives.” + +Longmore had leaned forward in silent attention with his elbows on his +knees, and now, impulsively, he dropped his face into his hands. “Ah +poor poor woman!” + +“Voila!” said Madame Clairin. “You pity her.” + +“Pity her?” cried Longmore, looking up with ardent eyes and forgetting +the spirit of the story to which he had been treated in the miserable +facts. “Don’t you?” + +“A little. But I’m not acting sentimentally--I’m acting scientifically. +We’ve always been capable of ideas. I want to arrange things; to see +my brother free to do as he chooses; to see his wife contented. Do you +understand me?” + +“Very well, I think,” the young man said. “You’re the most immoral +person I’ve lately had the privilege of conversing with.” + +Madame Clairin took it calmly. “Possibly. When was ever a great +peacemaker not immoral?” + +“Ah no,” Longmore protested. “You’re too superficial to be a great +peacemaker. You don’t begin to know anything about Madame de Mauves.” + +She inclined her head to one side while her fine eyes kept her +visitor in view; she mused a moment and then smiled as with a certain +compassionate patience. “It’s not in my interest to contradict you.” + +“It would be in your interest to learn, madam” he resolutely returned, +“what honest men most admire in a woman--and to recognise it when you +see it.” + +She was wonderful--she waited a moment. “So you ARE in love!” she then +effectively brought out. + +For a moment he thought of getting up, but he decided to stay. “I wonder +if you’d understand me,” he said at last, “if I were to tell you that +I have for Madame de Mauves the most devoted and most respectful +friendship?” + +“You underrate my intelligence. But in that case you ought to exert your +influence to put an end to these painful domestic scenes.” + +“Do you imagine she talks to me about her domestic scenes?” Longmore +cried. + +His companion stared. “Then your friendship isn’t returned?” And as he +but ambiguously threw up his hands, “Now, at least,” she added, “she’ll +have something to tell you. I happen to know the upshot of my brother’s +last interview with his wife.” Longmore rose to his feet as a protest +against the indelicacy of the position into which he had been drawn; but +all that made him tender made him curious, and she caught in his averted +eyes an expression that prompted her to strike her blow. “My brother’s +absurdly entangled with a certain person in Paris; of course he ought +not to be, but he wouldn’t be my brother if he weren’t. It was this +irregular passion that dictated his words. ‘Listen to me, madam,’ +he cried at last; ‘let us live like people who understand life! It’s +unpleasant to be forced to say such things outright, but you’ve a way +of bringing one down to the rudiments. I’m faithless, I’m heartless, +I’m brutal, I’m everything horrible--it’s understood. Take your revenge, +console yourself: you’re too charming a woman to have anything to +complain of. Here’s a handsome young man sighing himself into a +consumption for you. Listen to your poor compatriot and you’ll find that +virtue’s none the less becoming for being good-natured. You’ll see +that it’s not after all such a doleful world and that there’s even an +advantage in having the most impudent of husbands.”’ Madame Clairin +paused; Longmore had turned very pale. “You may believe it,” she +amazingly pursued; “the speech took place in my presence; things were +done in order. And now, monsieur”--this with a wondrous strained grimace +which he was too troubled at the moment to appreciate, but which he +remembered later with a kind of awe--“we count on you!” + +“Her husband said this to her face to face, as you say it to me now?” he +asked after a silence. + +“Word for word and with the most perfect politeness.” + +“And Madame de Mauves--what did she say?” + +Madame Clairin smiled again. “To such a speech as that a woman +says--nothing. She had been sitting with a piece of needlework, and I +think she hadn’t seen Richard since their quarrel the day before. He +came in with the gravity of an ambassador, and I’m sure that when he +made his demande en mariage his manner wasn’t more respectful. He only +wanted white gloves!” said Longmore’s friend. “My belle-soeur sat silent +a few moments, drawing her stitches, and then without a word, without a +glance, walked out of the room. It was just what she SHOULD have done!” + +“Yes,” the young man repeated, “it was just what she should have done.” + +“And I, left alone with my brother, do you know what I said?” + +Longmore shook his head. + +“Mauvals sujet!” he suggested. + +“‘You’ve done me the honour,’ I said, ‘to take this step in my presence. +I don’t pretend to qualify it. You know what you’re about, and it’s your +own affair. But you may confide in my discretion.’ Do you think he has +had reason to complain of it?” She received no answer; her visitor had +slowly averted himself; he passed his gloves mechanically round the +band of his hat. “I hope,” she cried, “you’re not going to start for +Brussels!” + +Plainly he was much disturbed, and Madame Clairin might congratulate +herself on the success of her plea for old-fashioned manners. And yet +there was something that left her more puzzled than satisfied in the +colourless tone with which he answered, “No, I shall remain here for +the present.” The processes of his mind were unsociably private, and she +could have fancied for a moment that he was linked with their difficult +friend in some monstrous conspiracy of asceticism. + +“Come this evening,” she nevertheless bravely resumed. “The rest will +take care of itself. Meanwhile I shall take the liberty of telling my +sister-in-law that I’ve repeated--in short, that I’ve put you au fait” + +He had a start but he controlled himself, speaking quietly enough. “Tell +her what you please. Nothing you can tell her will affect her conduct.” + +“Voyons! Do you mean to tell me that a woman young, pretty, sentimental, +neglected, wronged if you will--? I see you don’t believe it. Believe +simply in your own opportunity!” she went on. “But for heaven’s sake, if +it is to lead anywhere, don’t come back with that visage de croquemort. +You look as if you were going to bury your heart--not to offer it to a +pretty woman. You’re much better when you smile--you’re very nice then. +Come, do yourself justice.” + +He remained a moment face to face with her, but his expression didn’t +change. “I shall do myself justice,” he however after an instant made +answer; and abruptly, with a bow, he took his departure. + + + + +VII + +He felt, when he found himself unobserved and outside, that he must +plunge into violent action, walk fast and far and defer the opportunity +for thought. He strode away into the forest, swinging his cane, throwing +back his head, casting his eyes into verdurous vistas and following the +road without a purpose. He felt immensely excited, but could have given +no straight name to his agitation. It was a joy as all increase of +freedom is joyous; something seemed to have been cleared out of his path +and his destiny to have rounded a cape and brought him into sight of an +open sea. But it was a pain in the degree in which his freedom somehow +resolved itself into the need of despising all mankind with a single +exception; and the fact that Madame de Mauves inhabited a planet +contaminated by the presence of the baser multitude kept elation from +seeming a pledge of ideal bliss. + +There she was, at any rate, and circumstances now forced them to be +intimate. She had ceased to have what men call a secret for him, and +this fact itself brought with it a sort of rapture. He had no prevision +that he should “profit,” in the vulgar sense, by the extraordinary +position into which they had been thrown; it might be but a cruel trick +of destiny to make hope a harsher mockery and renunciation a keener +suffering. But above all this rose the conviction that she could do +nothing that wouldn’t quicken his attachment. It was this conviction +that gross accident--all odious in itself--would force the beauty of her +character into more perfect relief for him that made him stride along +as if he were celebrating a spiritual feast. He rambled at hazard for a +couple of hours, finding at last that he had left the forest behind him +and had wandered into an unfamiliar region. It was a perfectly rural +scene, and the still summer day gave it a charm for which its meagre +elements but half accounted. + +He thought he had never seen anything so characteristically French; +all the French novels seemed to have described it, all the French +landscapists to have painted it. The fields and trees were of a cool +metallic green; the grass looked as if it might stain his trousers and +the foliage his hands. The clear light had a mild greyness, the sheen +of silver, not of gold, was in the work-a-day sun. A great red-roofed +high-stacked farmhouse, with whitewashed walls and a straggling yard, +surveyed the highroad, on one side, from behind a transparent curtain of +poplars. A narrow stream half-choked with emerald rushes and edged with +grey aspens occupied the opposite quarter. The meadows rolled and +sloped away gently to the low horizon, which was barely concealed by the +continuous line of clipped and marshalled trees. The prospect was not +rich, but had a frank homeliness that touched the young man’s fancy. +It was full of light atmosphere and diffused clearness, and if it was +prosaic it was somehow sociable. + +Longmore was disposed to walk further, and he advanced along the road +beneath the poplars. In twenty minutes he came to a village which +straggled away to the right, among orchards and potagers. On the left, +at a stone’s throw from the road, stood a little pink-faced inn which +reminded him that he had not breakfasted, having left home with a +prevision of hospitality from Madame de Mauves. In the inn he found a +brick-tiled parlour and a hostess in sabots and a white cap, whom, over +the omelette she speedily served him--borrowing licence from the bottle +of sound red wine that accompanied it--he assured she was a true artist. +To reward his compliment she invited him to smoke his cigar in her +little garden behind the house. + +Here he found a tonnelle and a view of tinted crops stretching down to +the stream. The tonnelle was rather close, and he preferred to lounge on +a bench against the pink wall, in the sun, which was not too hot. Here, +as he rested and gazed and mused, he fell into a train of thought which, +in an indefinable fashion, was a soft influence from the scene about +him. His heart, which had been beating fast for the past three hours, +gradually checked its pulses and left him looking at life with rather a +more level gaze. The friendly tavern sounds coming out through the open +windows, the sunny stillness of the yellowing grain which covered +so much vigorous natural life, conveyed no strained nor high-pitched +message, had little to say about renunciation--nothing at all about +spiritual zeal. They communicated the sense of plain ripe nature, +expressed the unperverted reality of things, declared that the common +lot isn’t brilliantly amusing and that the part of wisdom is to grasp +frankly at experience lest you miss it altogether. What reason there was +for his beginning to wonder after this whether a deeply-wounded heart +might be soothed and healed by such a scene, it would be difficult to +explain; certain it was that as he sat there he dreamt, awake, of an +unhappy woman who strolled by the slow-flowing stream before him and who +pulled down the fruit-laden boughs in the orchards. He mused and mused, +and at last found himself quite angry that he couldn’t somehow think +worse of Madame de Mauves--or at any rate think otherwise. He could +fairly claim that in the romantic way he asked very little of life--made +modest demands on passion: why then should his only passion be born +to ill fortune? Why should his first--his last--glimpse of positive +happiness be so indissolubly linked with renunciation? + +It is perhaps because, like many spirits of the same stock, he had +in his composition a lurking principle of sacrifice, sacrifice for +sacrifice’s sake, to the authority of which he had ever paid due +deference, that he now felt all the vehemence of rebellion. To renounce, +to renounce again, to renounce for ever, was this all that youth and +longing and ardour were meant for? Was experience to be muffled and +mutilated like an indecent picture? Was a man to sit and deliberately +condemn his future to be the blank memory of a regret rather than the +long possession of a treasure? Sacrifice? The word was a trap for minds +muddled by fear, an ignoble refuge of weakness. To insist now seemed not +to dare, but simply to BE, to live on possible terms. + +His hostess came out to hang a moist cloth on the hedge, and, though her +guest was sitting quietly enough, she might have imagined in his kindled +eyes a flattering testimony to the quality of her wine. As she turned +back into the house she was met by a young man of whom Longmore took +note in spite of his high distraction. He was evidently a member of that +jovial fraternity of artists whose very shabbiness has an affinity with +the unestablished and unexpected in life--the element often gazed at +with a certain wistfulness out of the curtained windows even of the +highest respectability. Longmore was struck first with his looking like +a very clever man and then with his looking like a contented one. The +combination, as it was expressed in his face, might have arrested the +attention of a less exasperated reasoner. He had a slouched hat and a +yellow beard, a light easel under one arm, and an unfinished sketch in +oils under the other. He stopped and stood talking for some moments to +the landlady, while something pleasant played in his face. They were +discussing the possibilities of dinner; the hostess enumerated some +very savoury ones, and he nodded briskly, assenting to everything. It +couldn’t be, Longmore thought, that he found such ideal ease in the +prospect of lamb-chops and spinach and a croute aux fruits. When the +dinner had been ordered he turned up his sketch, and the good woman fell +to admiring and comparing, to picking up, off by the stream-side, the +objects represented. + +Was it his work, Longmore wondered, that made him so happy? Was a +strong talent the best thing in the world? The landlady went back to +her kitchen, and the young painter stood, as if he were waiting for +something, beside the gate which opened upon the path across the fields. +Longmore sat brooding and asking himself if it weren’t probably better +to cultivate the arts than to cultivate the passions. Before he had +answered the question the painter had grown tired of waiting. He had +picked up a pebble, tossed it lightly into an upper window and called +familiarly “Claudine!” Claudine appeared; Longmore heard her at the +window, bidding the young man cultivate patience. “But I’m losing +my light,” he said; “I must have my shadows in the same place as +yesterday.” + +“Go without me then,” Claudine answered; “I’ll join you in ten minutes.” + Her voice was fresh and young; it represented almost aggressively to +Longmore that she was as pleased as her companion. + +“Don’t forget the Chenier,” cried the young man, who, turning away, +passed out of the gate and followed the path across the fields until +he disappeared among the trees by the side of the stream. Who might +Claudine be? Longmore vaguely wondered; and was she as pretty as her +voice? Before long he had a chance to satisfy himself; she came out of +the house with her hat and parasol, prepared to follow her companion. +She had on a pink muslin dress and a little white hat, and she was as +pretty as suffices almost any Frenchwoman to be pleasing. She had a +clear brown skin and a bright dark eye and a step that made walking as +light a matter as being blown--and this even though she happened to be +at the moment not a little over-weighted. Her hands were encumbered with +various articles involved in her pursuit of her friend. In one arm she +held her parasol and a large roll of needlework, and in the other a +shawl and a heavy white umbrella, such as painters use for sketching. +Meanwhile she was trying to thrust into her pocket a paper-covered +volume which Longmore saw to be the poems of Andre Chenier, and in the +effort dropping the large umbrella and marking this with a half-smiled +exclamation of disgust. Longmore stepped forward and picked up the +umbrella, and as she, protesting her gratitude, put out her hand to take +it, he recognised her as too obliging to the young man who had preceded +her. + +“You’ve too much to carry,” he said; “you must let me help you.” + +“You’re very good, monsieur,” she answered. “My husband always +forgets something. He can do nothing without his umbrella. He is d’une +etourderie--” + +“You must allow me to carry the umbrella,” Longmore risked; “there’s too +much of it for a lady.” + +She assented, after many compliments to his politeness; and he walked +by her side into the meadow. She went lightly and rapidly, picking her +steps and glancing forward to catch a glimpse of her husband. She +was graceful, she was charming, she had an air of decision and yet of +accommodation, and it seemed to our friend that a young artist would +work none the worse for having her seated at his side reading Chenier’s +iambics. They were newly married, he supposed, and evidently their path +of life had none of the mocking crookedness of some others. They asked +little; but what need to ask more than such quiet summer days by a shady +stream, with a comrade all amiability, to say nothing of art and books +and a wide unmenaced horizon? To spend such a morning, to stroll back to +dinner in the red-tiled parlour of the inn, to ramble away again as the +sun got low--all this was a vision of delight which floated before him +only to torture him with a sense of the impossible. All Frenchwomen were +not coquettes, he noted as he kept pace with his companion. She uttered +a word now and then for politeness’ sake, but she never looked at him +and seemed not in the least to care that he was a well-favoured and +well-dressed young man. She cared for nothing but the young artist in +the shabby coat and the slouched hat, and for discovering where he had +set up his easel. + +This was soon done. He was encamped under the trees, close to the +stream, and, in the diffused green shade of the little wood, couldn’t +have felt immediate need of his umbrella. He received a free rebuke, +however, for forgetting it, and was informed of what he owed to +Longmore’s complaisance. He was duly grateful; he thanked our hero +warmly and offered him a seat on the grass. But Longmore felt himself +a marplot and lingered only long enough to glance at the young man’s +sketch and to see in it an easy rendering of the silvery stream and the +vivid green rushes. The young wife had spread her shawl on the grass +at the base of a tree and meant to seat herself when he had left them, +meant to murmur Chenier’s verses to the music of the gurgling river. +Longmore looked a while from one of these lucky persons to the other, +barely stifled a sigh, bade them good-morning and took his departure. He +knew neither where to go nor what to do; he seemed afloat on the sea of +ineffectual longing. He strolled slowly back to the inn, where, in +the doorway, he met the landlady returning from the butcher’s with the +lambchops for the dinner of her lodgers. + +“Monsieur has made the acquaintance of the dame of our young painter,” + she said with a free smile--a smile too free for malicious meanings. +“Monsieur has perhaps seen the young man’s picture. It appears that he’s +d’une jolie force.” + +“His picture’s very charming,” said Longmore, “but his dame is more +charming still.” + +“She’s a very nice little woman; but I pity her all the more.” + +“I don’t see why she’s to be pitied,” Longmore pleaded. “They seem a +very happy couple.” + +The landlady gave a knowing nod. “Don’t trust to it, monsieur! Those +artists--ca na pas de principes! From one day to another he can plant +her there! I know them, allez. I’ve had them here very often; one year +with one, another year with another.” + +Longmore was at first puzzled. Then, “You mean she’s not his wife?” he +asked. + +She took it responsibly. “What shall I tell you? They’re not des hommes +serieux, those gentlemen! They don’t engage for eternity. It’s none +of my business, and I’ve no wish to speak ill of madame. She’s +gentille--but gentille, and she loves her jeune homme to distraction.” + +“Who then is so distinguished a young woman?” asked Longmore. “What do +you know about her?” + +“Nothing for certain; but it’s my belief that she’s better than he. I’ve +even gone so far as to believe that she’s a lady--a vraie dame--and that +she has given up a great many things for him. I do the best I can for +them, but I don’t believe she has had all her life to put up with a +dinner of two courses.” And she turned over her lamb-chops tenderly, as +to say that though a good cook could imagine better things, yet if you +could have but one course lamb-chops had much in their favour. “I shall +do them with breadcrumbs. Voila les femmes, monsieur!” + +Longmore turned away with the feeling that women were indeed a +measureless mystery, and that it was hard to say in which of their forms +of perversity there was most merit. He walked back to Saint-Germain more +slowly than he had come, with less philosophic resignation to any event +and more of the urgent egotism of the passion pronounced by philosophers +the supremely selfish one. Now and then the episode of the happy young +painter and the charming woman who had given up a great many things for +him rose vividly in his mind and seemed to mock his moral unrest like +some obtrusive vision of unattainable bliss. + +The landlady’s gossip had cast no shadow on its brightness; her voice +seemed that of the vulgar chorus of the uninitiated, which stands always +ready with its gross prose rendering of the inspired passages of human +action. Was it possible a man could take THAT from a woman--take all +that lent lightness to that other woman’s footstep and grace to her +surrender and not give her the absolute certainty of a devotion as +unalterable as the process of the sun? Was it possible that so clear +a harmony had the seeds of trouble, that the charm of so perfect union +could be broken by anything but death? Longmore felt an immense desire +to cry out a thousand times “No!” for it seemed to him at last that +he was somehow only a graver equivalent of the young lover and that +rustling Claudine was a lighter sketch of Madame de Mauves. The heat of +the sun, as he walked along, became oppressive, and when he re-entered +the forest he turned aside into the deepest shade he could find and +stretched himself on the mossy ground at the foot of a great beech. He +lay for a while staring up into the verdurous dusk overhead and trying +mentally to see his friend at Saint-Germain hurry toward some quiet +stream-side where HE waited, as he had seen that trusting creature hurry +an hour before. It would be hard to say how well he succeeded; but the +effort soothed rather than excited him, and as he had had a good deal +both of moral and physical fatigue he sank at last into a quiet sleep. +While he slept moreover he had a strange and vivid dream. He seemed +to be in a wood, very much like the one on which his eyes had lately +closed; but the wood was divided by the murmuring stream he had left an +hour before. He was walking up and down, he thought, restlessly and in +intense expectation of some momentous event. Suddenly, at a distance, +through the trees, he saw a gleam of a woman’s dress, on which he +hastened to meet her. As he advanced he recognised her, but he saw at +the same time that she was on the other bank of the river. She seemed at +first not to notice him, but when they had come to opposite places she +stopped and looked at him very gravely and pityingly. She made him no +sign that he must cross the stream, but he wished unutterably to stand +by her side. He knew the water was deep, and it seemed to him he knew +how he should have to breast it and how he feared that when he rose to +the surface she would have disappeared. Nevertheless he was going to +plunge when a boat turned into the current from above and came swiftly +toward them, guided by an oarsman who was sitting so that they couldn’t +see his face. He brought the boat to the bank where Longmore stood; +the latter stepped in, and with a few strokes they touched the opposite +shore. Longmore got out and, though he was sure he had crossed the +stream, Madame de Mauves was not there. He turned with a kind of agony +and saw that now she was on the other bank--the one he had left. She +gave him a grave silent glance and walked away up the stream. The boat +and the boatman resumed their course, but after going a short distance +they stopped and the boatman turned back and looked at the still divided +couple. Then Longmore recognised him--just as he had recognised him a +few days before at the restaurant in the Bois de Boulogne. + + + + +VIII + +He must have slept some time after he ceased dreaming for he had no +immediate memory of this vision. It came back to him later, after he +had roused himself and had walked nearly home. No great arrangement was +needed to make it seem a striking allegory, and it haunted and oppressed +him for the rest of the day. He took refuge, however, in his quickened +conviction that the only sound policy in life is to grasp unsparingly +at happiness; and it seemed no more than one of the vigorous measures +dictated by such a policy to return that evening to Madame de Mauves. +And yet when he had decided to do so and had carefully dressed himself +he felt an irresistible nervous tremor which made it easier to linger +at his open window, wondering with a strange mixture of dread and desire +whether Madame Clairin had repeated to her sister-in-law what she had +said to him. His presence now might be simply a gratuitous annoyance, +and yet his absence might seem to imply that it was in the power of +circumstances to make them ashamed to meet each other’s eyes. He sat +a long time with his head in his hands, lost in a painful confusion of +hopes and ambiguities. He felt at moments as if he could throttle Madame +Clairin, and yet couldn’t help asking himself if it weren’t possible she +had done him a service. It was late when he left the hotel, and as he +entered the gate of the other house his heart beat so fast that he was +sure his voice would show it. + +The servant ushered him into the drawing-room, which was empty and with +the lamp burning low. But the long windows were open and their light +curtains swaying in a soft warm wind, so that Longmore immediately +stepped out upon the terrace. There he found Madame de Mauves alone, +slowly pacing its length. She was dressed in white, very simply, and her +hair was arranged not as she usually wore it, but in a single loose coil +and as if she were unprepared for company. She stopped when she saw her +friend, showed some surprise, uttered an exclamation and stood waiting +for him to speak. He tried, with his eyes on her, to say something, +but found no words. He knew it was awkward, it was offensive, to stand +gazing at her; but he couldn’t say what was suitable and mightn’t say +what he wished. Her face was indistinct in the dim light, but he felt +her eyes fixed on him and wondered what they expressed. Did they warn +him, did they plead, or did they confess to a sense of provocation? For +an instant his head swam; he was sure it would make all things clear to +stride forward and fold her in his arms. But a moment later he was still +dumb there before her; he hadn’t moved; he knew she had spoken, but he +hadn’t understood. + +“You were here this morning,” she continued; and now, slowly, the +meaning of her words came to him. “I had a bad headache and had to shut +myself up.” She spoke with her usual voice. + +Longmore mastered his agitation and answered her without betraying +himself. “I hope you’re better now.” + +“Yes, thank you, I’m better--much better.” + +He waited again and she moved away to a chair and seated herself. After +a pause he followed her and leaned closer to her, against the balustrade +of the terrace. “I hoped you might have been able to come out for the +morning into the forest. I went alone; it was a lovely day, and I took a +long walk.” + +“It was a lovely day,” she said absently, and sat with her eyes lowered, +slowly opening and closing her fan. Longmore, as he watched her, felt +more and more assured her sister-in-law had seen her since her interview +with him; that her attitude toward him was changed. It was this same +something that hampered the desire with which he had come, or at least +converted all his imagined freedom of speech about it to a final hush of +wonder. No, certainly, he couldn’t clasp her to his arms now, any more +than some antique worshipper could have clasped the marble statue in his +temple. But Longmore’s statue spoke at last with a full human voice and +even with a shade of human hesitation. She looked up, and it seemed to +him her eyes shone through the dusk. + +“I’m very glad you came this evening--and I’ve a particular reason +for being glad. I half-expected you, and yet I thought it possible you +mightn’t come.” + +“As the case has been present to me,” Longmore answered, “it was +impossible I shouldn’t come. I’ve spent every minute of the day in +thinking of you.” + +She made no immediate reply, but continued to open and close her fan +thoughtfully. At last, “I’ve something important to say to you,” she +resumed with decision. “I want you to know to a certainty that I’ve +a very high opinion of you.” Longmore gave an uneasy shift to his +position. To what was she coming? But he said nothing, and she went on: +“I take a great interest in you. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t +say it. I feel a great friendship for you.” He began to laugh, all +awkwardly--he hardly knew why, unless because this seemed the very irony +of detachment. But she went on in her way: “You know, I suppose, that a +great disappointment always implies a great confidence--a great hope.” + +“I’ve certainly hoped,” he said, “hoped strongly; but doubtless never +rationally enough to have a right to bemoan my disappointment.” + +There was something troubled in her face that seemed all the while to +burn clearer. “You do yourself injustice. I’ve such confidence in your +fairness of mind that I should be greatly disappointed if I were to find +it wanting.” + +“I really almost believe you’re amusing yourself at my expense,” the +young man cried. “My fairness of mind? Of all the question-begging +terms!” he laughed. “The only thing for one’s mind to be fair to is the +thing one FEELS!” + +She rose to her feet and looked at him hard. His eyes by this time were +accustomed to the imperfect light, and he could see that if she was +urgent she was yet beseechingly kind. She shook her head impatiently and +came near enough to lay her fan on his arm with a strong pressure. “If +that were so it would be a weary world. I know enough, however, of your +probable attitude. You needn’t try to express it. It’s enough that your +sincerity gives me the right to ask a favour of you--to make an intense, +a solemn request.” + +“Make it; I listen.” + +“DON’T DISAPPOINT ME. If you don’t understand me now you will to-morrow +or very soon. When I said just now that I had a high opinion of you, +you see I meant it very seriously,” she explained. “It wasn’t a vain +compliment. I believe there’s no appeal one may make to your generosity +that can remain long unanswered. If this were to happen--if I were to +find you selfish where I thought you generous, narrow where I thought +you large”--and she spoke slowly, her voice lingering with all emphasis +on each of these words--“vulgar where I thought you rare, I should think +worse of human nature. I should take it, I assure you, very hard indeed. +I should say to myself in the dull days of the future: ‘There was ONE +man who might have done so and so, and he too failed.’ But this shan’t +be. You’ve made too good an impression on me not to make the very best. +If you wish to please me for ever there’s a way.” + +She was standing close to him, with her dress touching him, her +eyes fixed on his. As she went on her tone became, to his sense, +extraordinary, and she offered the odd spectacle of a beautiful woman +preaching reason with the most communicative and irresistible passion. +Longmore was dazzled, but mystified and bewildered. The intention of +her words was all remonstrance, refusal, dismissal, but her presence +and effect there, so close, so urgent, so personal, a distracting +contradiction of it. She had never been so lovely. In her white dress, +with her pale face and deeply-lighted brow, she seemed the very spirit +of the summer night. When she had ceased speaking she drew a long +breath; he felt it on his cheek, and it stirred in his whole being +a sudden perverse imagination. Were not her words, in their high +impossible rigour, a mere challenge to his sincerity, a mere precaution +of her pride, meant to throw into relief her almost ghostly beauty, and +wasn’t this the only truth, the only law, the only thing to take account +of? + +He closed his eyes and felt her watch him not without pain and +perplexity herself. He looked at her again, met her own eyes and saw +them fill with strange tears. Then this last sophistry of his great +desire for her knew itself touched as a bubble is pricked; it died away +with a stifled murmur, and her beauty, more and more radiant in the +darkness, rose before him as a symbol of something vague which was yet +more beautiful than itself. “I may understand you to-morrow,” he said, +“but I don’t understand you now.” + +“And yet I took counsel with myself to-day and asked myself how I had +best speak to you. On one side I might have refused to see you at all.” + Longmore made a violent movement, and she added: “In that case I should +have written to you. I might see you, I thought, and simply say to you +that there were excellent reasons why we should part, and that I begged +this visit should be your last. This I inclined to do; what made me +decide otherwise was--well, simply that I like you so. I said to myself +that I should be glad to remember in future days, not that I had, in the +horrible phrase, got rid of you, but that you had gone away out of the +fulness of your own wisdom and the excellence of your own taste.” + +“Ah wisdom and taste!” the poor young man wailed. + +“I’m prepared, if necessary,” Madame de Mauves continued after a pause, +“to fall back on my strict right. But, as I said before, I shall be +greatly disappointed if I’m obliged to do that.” + +“When I listen to your horrible and unnatural lucidity,” Longmore +answered, “I feel so angry, so merely sore and sick, that I wonder I +don’t leave you without more words.” + +“If you should go away in anger this idea of mine about our parting +would be but half-realised,” she returned with no drop in her ardour. +“No, I don’t want to think of you as feeling a great pain, I don’t want +even to think of you as making a great sacrifice. I want to think of +you--” + +“As a stupid brute who has never existed, who never CAN exist!” he broke +in. “A creature who could know you without loving you, who could leave +you without for ever missing you!” + +She turned impatiently away and walked to the other end of the terrace. +When she came back he saw that her impatience had grown sharp and almost +hard. She stood before him again, looking at him from head to foot +and without consideration now; so that as the effect of it he felt his +assurance finally quite sink. This then she took from him, withholding +in consequence something she had meant to say. She moved off afresh, +walked to the other end of the terrace and stood there with her face to +the garden. She assumed that he understood her, and slowly, slowly, half +as the fruit of this mute pressure, he let everything go but the rage of +a purpose somehow still to please her. She was giving him a chance to do +gallantly what it seemed unworthy of both of them he should do meanly. +She must have “liked” him indeed, as she said, to wish so to spare him, +to go to the trouble of conceiving an ideal of conduct for him. With +this sense of her tenderness still in her dreadful consistency, his +spirit rose with a new flight and suddenly felt itself breathe clearer +air. Her profession ceased to seem a mere bribe to his eagerness; it was +charged with eagerness itself; it was a present reward and would somehow +last. He moved rapidly toward her as with the sense of a gage that he +might sublimely yet immediately enjoy. + +They were separated by two thirds of the length of the terrace, and he +had to pass the drawing-room window. As he did so he started with an +exclamation. Madame Clairin stood framed in the opening as if, though +just arriving on the scene, she too were already aware of its interest. +Conscious, apparently, that she might be suspected of having watched +them she stepped forward with a smile and looked from one to the other. +“Such a tete-a-tete as that one owes no apology for interrupting. One +ought to come in for good manners.” + +Madame de Mauves turned to her, but answered nothing. She looked +straight at Longmore, and her eyes shone with a lustre that struck him +as divine. He was not exactly sure indeed what she meant them to say, +but it translated itself to something that would do. “Call it what you +will, what you’ve wanted to urge upon me is the thing this woman can +best conceive. What I ask of you is something she can’t begin to!” They +seemed somehow to beg him to suffer her to be triumphantly herself, +and to intimate--yet this too all decently--how little that self was +of Madame Clairin’s particular swelling measure. He felt an immense +answering desire not to do anything then that might seem probable or +prevu to this lady. He had laid his hat and stick on the parapet of the +terrace. He took them up, offered his hand to Madame de Mauves with a +simple good-night, bowed silently to Madame Clairin and found his way, +with tingling ears, out of the place. + + + + +IX + +He went home and, without lighting his candle, flung himself on his +bed. But he got no sleep till morning; he lay hour after hour tossing, +thinking, wondering; his mind had never been so active. It seemed to him +his friend had laid on him in those last moments a heavy charge and +had expressed herself almost as handsomely as if she had listened +complacently to an assurance of his love. It was neither easy nor +delightful thoroughly to understand her; but little by little her +perfect meaning sank into his mind and soothed it with a sense of +opportunity which somehow stifled his sense of loss. For, to begin with, +she meant that she could love him in no degree or contingency, in no +imaginable future. This was absolute--he knew he could no more alter +it than he could pull down one of the constellations he lay gazing at +through his open window. He wondered to what it was, in the background +of her life, she had so dedicated herself. A conception of duty +unquenchable to the end? A love that no outrage could stifle? “Great +heaven!” he groaned; “is the world so rich in the purest pearls of +passion that such tenderness as that can be wasted for ever--poured +away without a sigh into bottomless darkness?” Had she, in spite of the +detestable present, some precious memory that still kept the door of +possibility open? Was she prepared to submit to everything and yet to +believe? Was it strength, was it weakness, was it a vulgar fear, was it +conviction, conscience, constancy? + +Longmore sank back with a sigh and an oppressive feeling that it was +vain to guess at such a woman’s motives. He only felt that those of this +one were buried deep in her soul and that they must be of the noblest, +must contain nothing base. He had his hard impression that endless +constancy was all her law--a constancy that still found a foothold among +crumbling ruins. “She has loved once,” he said to himself as he rose +and wandered to his window; “and that’s for ever. Yes, yes--if she loved +again she’d be COMMON!” He stood for a long time looking out into the +starlit silence of the town and forest and thinking of what life would +have been if his constancy had met her own in earlier days. But life was +this now, and he must live. It was living, really, to stand there with +such a faith even in one’s self still flung over one by such hands. +He was not to disappoint her, he was to justify a conception it had +beguiled her weariness to form. His imagination embraced it; he threw +back his head and seemed to be looking for his friend’s conception +among the blinking mocking stars. But it came to him rather on the mild +night-wind wandering in over the house-tops which covered the rest of +so many heavy human hearts. What she asked he seemed to feel her ask not +for her own sake--she feared nothing, she needed nothing--but for that +of his own happiness and his own character. He must assent to destiny. +Why else was he young and strong, intelligent and resolute? He mustn’t +give it to her to reproach him with thinking she had had a moment’s +attention for his love, give it to her to plead, to argue, to break off +in bitterness. He must see everything from above, her indifference and +his own ardour; he must prove his strength, must do the handsome thing, +must decide that the handsome thing was to submit to the inevitable, to +be supremely delicate, to spare her all pain, to stifle his passion, +to ask no compensation, to depart without waiting and to try to believe +that wisdom is its own reward. All this, neither more nor less, it was +a matter of beautiful friendship with him for her to expect of him. And +what should he himself gain by it? He should have pleased her! Well, +he flung himself on his bed again, fell asleep at last and slept till +morning. + +Before noon next day he had made up his mind to leave Saint-Germain at +once. It seemed easiest to go without seeing her, and yet if he might +ask for a grain of “compensation” this would be five minutes face to +face with her. He passed a restless day. Wherever he went he saw her +stand before him in the dusky halo of evening, saw her look at him with +an air of still negation more intoxicating than the most passionate +self-surrender. He must certainly go, and yet it was hideously hard. He +compromised and went to Paris to spend the rest of the day. He strolled +along the boulevard and paused sightlessly before the shops, sat a while +in the Tuileries gardens and looked at the shabby unfortunates for whom +this only was nature and summer; but simply felt afresh, as a result +of it all, the dusty dreary lonely world to which Madame de Mauves had +consigned him. + +In a sombre mood he made his way back to the centre of motion and sat +down at a table before a cafe door, on the great plain of hot asphalt. +Night arrived, the lamps were lighted, the tables near him found +occupants, and Paris began to wear that evening grimace of hers that +seems to tell, in the flare of plate glass and of theatre-doors, the +muffled rumble of swift-rolling carriages, how this is no world for +you unless you have your pockets lined and your delicacies perverted. +Longmore, however, had neither scruples nor desires; he looked at +the great preoccupied place for the first time with an easy sense +of repaying its indifference. Before long a carriage drove up to the +pavement directly in front of him and remained standing for several +minutes without sign from its occupant. It was one of those neat plain +coupes, drawn by a single powerful horse, in which the flaneur figures +a pale handsome woman buried among silk cushions and yawning as she sees +the gas-lamps glittering in the gutters. At last the door opened and out +stepped Richard de Mauves. He stopped and leaned on the window for some +time, talking in an excited manner to a person within. At last he gave a +nod and the carriage rolled away. He stood swinging his cane and looking +up and down the boulevard, with the air of a man fumbling, as one +might say, the loose change of time. He turned toward the cafe and was +apparently, for want of anything better worth his attention, about to +seat himself at one of the tables when he noticed Longmore. He wavered +an instant and then, without a shade of difference in his careless gait, +advanced to the accompaniment of a thin recognition. It was the first +time they had met since their encounter in the forest after Longmore’s +false start for Brussels. Madame Clairin’s revelations, as he might have +regarded them, had not made the Count especially present to his mind; he +had had another call to meet than the call of disgust. But now, as M. de +Mauves came toward him he felt abhorrence well up. He made out, however, +for the first time, a cloud on this nobleman’s superior clearness, and a +delight at finding the shoe somewhere at last pinching HIM, mingled with +the resolve to be blank and unaccommodating, enabled him to meet the +occasion with due promptness. + +M. de Mauves sat down, and the two men looked at each other across the +table, exchanging formal remarks that did little to lend grace to their +encounter. Longmore had no reason to suppose the Count knew of his +sister’s various interventions. He was sure M. de Mauves cared very +little about his opinions, and yet he had a sense of something grim in +his own New York face which would have made him change colour if keener +suspicion had helped it to be read there. M. de Mauves didn’t change +colour, but he looked at his wife’s so oddly, so more than naturally +(wouldn’t it be?) detached friend with an intentness that betrayed at +once an irritating memory of the episode in the Bois de Boulogne and +such vigilant curiosity as was natural to a gentleman who had entrusted +his “honour” to another gentleman’s magnanimity--or to his artlessness. + +It might appear that these virtues shone out of our young man less +engagingly or reassuringly than a few days before; the shadow at any +rate fell darker across the brow of his critic, who turned away and +frowned while lighting a cigar. The person in the coupe, he accordingly +judged, whether or no the same person as the heroine of the episode of +the Bois de Boulogne, was not a source of unalloyed delight. Longmore +had dark blue eyes of admirable clarity, settled truth-telling eyes +which had in his childhood always made his harshest taskmasters smile at +his notion of a subterfuge. An observer watching the two men and knowing +something of their relations would certainly have said that what he had +at last both to recognise and to miss in those eyes must not a little +have puzzled and tormented M. de Mauves. They took possession of him, +they laid him out, they measured him in that state of flatness, they +triumphed over him, they treated him as no pair of eyes had perhaps ever +treated any member of his family before. The Count’s scheme had been to +provide for a positive state of ease on the part of no one save himself, +but here was Longmore already, if appearances perhaps not appreciable to +the vulgar meant anything, primed as for some prospect of pleasure more +than Parisian. Was this candid young barbarian but a faux bonhomme after +all? He had never really quite satisfied his occasional host, but was he +now, for a climax, to leave him almost gaping? + +M. de Mauves, as if hating to seem preoccupied, took up the evening +paper to help himself to seem indifferent. As he glanced over it he +threw off some perfunctory allusion to the crisis--the political--which +enabled Longmore to reply with perfect veracity that, with other things +to think about, he had had no attention to spare for it. And yet our +hero was in truth far from secure against rueful reflexion. The Count’s +ruffled state was a comfort so far as it pointed to the possibility +that the lady in the coupe might be proving too many for him; but it +ministered to no vindictive sweetness for Longmore so far as it should +perhaps represent rising jealousy. It passed through his mind that +jealousy is a passion with a double face and that on one of its sides it +may sometimes almost look generous. It glimmered upon him odiously M. de +Mauves might grow ashamed of his political compact with his wife, and +he felt how far more tolerable it would be in future to think of him as +always impertinent than to think of him as occasionally contrite. +The two men pretended meanwhile for half an hour to outsit each other +conveniently; and the end--at that rate--might have been distant had not +the tension in some degree yielded to the arrival of a friend of M. de +Mauves--a tall pale consumptive-looking dandy who filled the air with +the odour of heliotrope. He looked up and down the boulevard wearily, +examined the Count’s garments in some detail, then appeared to refer +restlessly to his own, and at last announced resignedly that the Duchess +was in town. M. de Mauves must come with him to call; she had abused him +dreadfully a couple of evenings before--a sure sign she wanted to see +him. “I depend on you,” said with an infantine drawl this specimen of +an order Longmore felt he had never had occasion so intimately to +appreciate, “to put her en train.” + +M. de Mauves resisted, he protested that he was d’une humeur +massacrante; but at last he allowed himself to be drawn to his feet +and stood looking awkwardly--awkwardly for M. de Mauves--at Longmore. +“You’ll excuse me,” he appeared to find some difficulty in saying; “you +too probably have occupation for the evening?” + +“None but to catch my train.” And our friend looked at his watch. + +“Ah you go back to Saint-Germain?” + +“In half an hour.” + +M. de Mauves seemed on the point of disengaging himself from his +companion’s arm, which was locked in his own; but on the latter’s +uttering some persuasive murmur he lifted his hat stiffly and turned +away. + +Longmore the next day wandered off to the terrace to try and beguile +the restlessness with which he waited for the evening; he wished to see +Madame de Mauves for the last time at the hour of long shadows and +pale reflected amber lights, as he had almost always seen her. Destiny, +however, took no account of this humble plea for poetic justice; it +was appointed him to meet her seated by the great walk under a tree and +alone. The hour made the place almost empty; the day was warm, but as +he took his place beside her a light breeze stirred the leafy edges of +their broad circle of shadow. She looked at him almost with no pretence +of not having believed herself already rid of him, and he at once told +her that he should leave Saint-Germain that evening, but must first bid +her farewell. Her face lighted a moment, he fancied, as he spoke; but +she said nothing, only turning it off to far Paris which lay twinkling +and flashing through hot exhalations. “I’ve a request to make of you,” + he added. “That you think of me as a man who has felt much and claimed +little.” + +She drew a long breath which almost suggested pain. “I can’t think of +you as unhappy. That’s impossible. You’ve a life to lead, you’ve duties, +talents, inspirations, interests. I shall hear of your career. And +then,” she pursued after a pause, though as if it had before this quite +been settled between them, “one can’t be unhappy through having a better +opinion of a friend instead of a worse.” + +For a moment he failed to understand her. “Do you mean that there can be +varying degrees in my opinion of you?” + +She rose and pushed away her chair. “I mean,” she said quickly, “that +it’s better to have done nothing in bitterness--nothing in passion.” And +she began to walk. + +Longmore followed her without answering at first. But he took off his +hat and with his pocket-handkerchief wiped his forehead. “Where shall +you go? what shall you do?” he simply asked at last. + +“Do? I shall do as I’ve always done--except perhaps that I shall go for +a while to my husband’s old home.” + +“I shall go to MY old one. I’ve done with Europe for the present,” the +young man added. + +She glanced at him as he walked beside her, after he had spoken these +words, and then bent her eyes for a long time on the ground. But +suddenly, as if aware of her going too far she stopped and put out her +hand. “Good-bye. May you have all the happiness you deserve!” + +He took her hand with his eyes on her, but something was at work in +him that made it impossible to deal in the easy way with her touch. +Something of infinite value was floating past him, and he had taken an +oath, with which any such case interfered, not to raise a finger to stop +it. It was borne by the strong current of the world’s great life and not +of his own small one. Madame de Mauves disengaged herself, gathered in +her long scarf and smiled at him almost as you would do at a child +you should wish to encourage. Several moments later he was still there +watching her leave him and leave him. When she was out of sight he shook +himself, walked at once back to his hotel and, without waiting for the +evening train, paid his bill and departed. + +Later in the day M. de Mauves came into his wife’s drawing-room, where +she sat waiting to be summoned to dinner. He had dressed as he usually +didn’t dress for dining at home. He walked up and down for some moments +in silence, then rang the bell for a servant and went out into the hall +to meet him. He ordered the carriage to take him to the station, paused +a moment with his hand on the knob of the door, dismissed the +servant angrily as the latter lingered observing him, re-entered the +drawing-room, resumed his restless walk and at last stopped abruptly +before his wife, who had taken up a book. “May I ask the favour,” he +said with evident effort, in spite of a forced smile as of allusion to +a large past exercise of the very best taste, “of having a question +answered?” + +“It’s a favour I never refused,” she replied. + +“Very true. Do you expect this evening a visit from Mr. Longmore?” + +“Mr. Longmore,” said his wife, “has left Saint-Germain.” M. de Mauves +waited, but his smile expired. “Mr. Longmore,” his wife continued, “has +gone to America.” + +M. de Mauves took it--a rare thing for him--with confessed, if +momentary, intellectual indigence. But he raised, as it were, the wind. +“Has anything happened?” he asked, “Had he a sudden call?” But his +question received no answer. At the same moment the servant threw open +the door and announced dinner; Madame Clairin rustled in, rubbing her +white hands, Madame de Mauves passed silently into the dining-room, +but he remained outside--outside of more things, clearly, than his mere +salle-a-manger. Before long he went forth to the terrace and continued +his uneasy walk. At the end of a quarter of an hour the servant came to +let him know that his carriage was at the door. “Send it away,” he said +without hesitation. “I shan’t use it.” When the ladies had half-finished +dinner he returned and joined them, with a formal apology to his wife +for his inconsequence. + +The dishes were brought back, but he hardly tasted them; he drank on +the other hand more wine than usual. There was little talk, scarcely a +convivial sound save the occasional expressive appreciative “M-m-m!” of +Madame Clairin over the succulence of some dish. Twice this lady saw +her brother’s eyes, fixed on her own over his wineglass, put to her a +question she knew she should have to irritate him later on by not being +able to answer. She replied, for the present at least, by an elevation +of the eyebrows that resembled even to her own humour the vain raising +of an umbrella in anticipation of a storm. M. de Mauves was left alone +to finish his wine; he sat over it for more than an hour and let the +darkness gather about him. At last the servant came in with a letter and +lighted a candle. The letter was a telegram, which M. de Mauves, when +he had read it, burnt at the candle. After five minutes’ meditation +he wrote a message on the back of a visiting-card and gave it to the +servant to carry to the office. The man knew quite as much as his master +suspected about the lady to whom the telegram was addressed; but its +contents puzzled him; they consisted of the single word “Impossible.” As +the evening passed without her brother’s reappearing in the drawing-room +Madame Clairin came to him where he sat by his solitary candle. He +took no notice of her presence for some time, but this affected her +as unexpected indulgence. At last, however, he spoke with a particular +harshness. “Ce jeune mufle has gone home at an hour’s notice. What the +devil does it mean?” + +Madame Clairin now felt thankful for her umbrella. “It means that I’ve a +sister-in-law whom I’ve not the honour to understand.” + +He said nothing more and silently allowed her, after a little, to +depart. It had been her duty to provide him with an explanation, and he +was disgusted with her blankness; but she was--if there was no more to +come--getting off easily. When she had gone he went into the garden and +walked up and down with his cigar. He saw his wife seated alone on the +terrace, but remained below, wandering, turning, pausing, lingering. +He remained a long time. It grew late and Madame de Mauves disappeared. +Toward midnight he dropped upon a bench, tired, with a long vague +exhalation of unrest. It was sinking into his spirit that he too didn’t +understand Madame Clairin’s sister-in-law. + +Longmore was obliged to wait a week in London for a ship. It was very +hot, and he went out one day to Richmond. In the garden of the hotel at +which he dined he met his friend Mrs. Draper, who was staying there. +She made eager enquiry about Madame de Mauves; but Longmore at first, +as they sat looking out at the famous view of the Thames, parried her +questions and confined himself to other topics. At last she said she was +afraid he had something to conceal; whereupon, after a pause, he asked +her if she remembered recommending him, in the letter she had addressed +him at Saint-Germain, to draw the sadness from her friend’s smile. “The +last I saw of her was her smile,” he said--“when I bade her good-bye.” + +“I remember urging you to ‘console’ her,” Mrs. Draper returned, “and I +wondered afterwards whether--model of discretion as you are--I hadn’t +cut you out work for which you wouldn’t thank me.” + +“She has her consolation in herself,” the young man said; “she needs +none that any one else can offer her. That’s for troubles for which--be +it more, be it less--our own folly has to answer. Madame de Mauves +hasn’t a grain of folly left.” + +“Ah don’t say that!”--Mrs. Draper knowingly protested. “Just a little +folly’s often very graceful.” + +Longmore rose to go--she somehow annoyed him. “Don’t talk of grace,” he +said, “till you’ve measured her reason!” + +For two years after his return to America he heard nothing of Madame de +Mauves. That he thought of her intently, constantly, I need hardly say; +most people wondered why such a clever young man shouldn’t “devote” + himself to something; but to himself he seemed absorbingly occupied. He +never wrote to her; he believed she wouldn’t have “liked” it. At last he +heard that Mrs. Draper had come home and he immediately called on her. +“Of course,” she said after the first greetings, “you’re dying for news +of Madame de Mauves. Prepare yourself for something strange. I heard +from her two or three times during the year after your seeing her. She +left Saint-Germain and went to live in the country on some old property +of her husband’s. She wrote me very kind little notes, but I felt +somehow that--in spite of what you said about ‘consolation’--they were +the notes of a wretched woman. The only advice I could have given her +was to leave her scamp of a husband and come back to her own land and +her own people. But this I didn’t feel free to do, and yet it made me +so miserable not to be able to help her that I preferred to let our +correspondence die a natural death. I had no news of her for a year. +Last summer, however, I met at Vichy a clever young Frenchman whom +I accidentally learned to be a friend of that charming sister of the +Count’s, Madame Clairin. I lost no time in asking him what he knew +about Madame de Mauves--a countrywoman of mine and an old friend. ‘I +congratulate you on the friendship of such a person,’ he answered. +‘That’s the terrible little woman who killed her husband.’ You may +imagine I promptly asked for an explanation, and he told me--from his +point of view--what he called the whole story. M. de Mauves had fait +quelques folies which his wife had taken absurdly to heart. He had +repented and asked her forgiveness, which she had inexorably refused. +She was very pretty, and severity must have suited her style; for, +whether or no her husband had been in love with her before, he fell +madly in love with her now. He was the proudest man in France, but he +had begged her on his knees to be re-admitted to favour. All in vain! +She was stone, she was ice, she was outraged virtue. People noticed a +great change in him; he gave up society, ceased to care for anything, +looked shockingly. One fine day they discovered he had blown out his +brains. My friend had the story of course from Madame Clairin.” + +Longmore was strongly moved, and his first impulse after he had +recovered his composure was to return immediately to Europe. But several +years have passed, and he still lingers at home. The truth is that, +in the midst of all the ardent tenderness of his memory of Madame de +Mauves, he has become conscious of a singular feeling--a feeling of +wonder, of uncertainty, of awe. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Madame de Mauves, by Henry James + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + +***** This file should be named 7813-0.txt or 7813-0.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/7/8/1/7813/ + +Produced by Eve Sobol + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + http://www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. diff --git a/7813-0.zip b/7813-0.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..0126d3f --- /dev/null +++ b/7813-0.zip diff --git a/7813-h.zip b/7813-h.zip Binary files differnew file mode 100644 index 0000000..c238dee --- /dev/null +++ b/7813-h.zip diff --git a/7813-h/7813-h.htm b/7813-h/7813-h.htm new file mode 100644 index 0000000..102a46c --- /dev/null +++ b/7813-h/7813-h.htm @@ -0,0 +1,3677 @@ +<?xml version="1.0" encoding="utf-8"?> + +<!DOCTYPE html + PUBLIC "-//W3C//DTD XHTML 1.0 Strict//EN" + "http://www.w3.org/TR/xhtml1/DTD/xhtml1-strict.dtd" > + +<html xmlns="http://www.w3.org/1999/xhtml" lang="en"> + <head> + <title> + Madame de Mauves, by Enry James + </title> + <style type="text/css" xml:space="preserve"> + + body { margin:5%; background:#faebd0; text-align:justify} + P { text-indent: 1em; margin-top: .25em; margin-bottom: .25em; } + H1,H2,H3,H4,H5,H6 { text-align: center; margin-left: 15%; margin-right: 15%; } + hr { width: 50%; text-align: center;} + .foot { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; text-indent: -3em; font-size: 90%; } + blockquote {font-size: 97%; font-style: italic; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%;} + .mynote {background-color: #DDE; color: #000; padding: .5em; margin-left: 10%; margin-right: 10%; font-family: sans-serif; font-size: 95%;} + .toc { margin-left: 10%; margin-bottom: .75em;} + .toc2 { margin-left: 20%;} + div.fig { display:block; margin:0 auto; text-align:center; } + div.middle { margin-left: 20%; margin-right: 20%; text-align: justify; } + .figleft {float: left; margin-left: 0%; margin-right: 1%;} + .figright {float: right; margin-right: 0%; margin-left: 1%;} + .pagenum {display:inline; font-size: 70%; font-style:normal; + margin: 0; padding: 0; position: absolute; right: 1%; + text-align: right;} + pre { font-style: italic; font-size: 90%; margin-left: 10%;} + +</style> + </head> + <body> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + +The Project Gutenberg EBook of Madame de Mauves, by Henry James + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Madame de Mauves + +Author: Henry James + +Release Date: July 27, 2009 [EBook #7813] +Last Updated: September 18, 2016 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: UTF-8 + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + + + + +Produced by Eve Sobol, and David Widger + + + + + + +</pre> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h1> + MADAME DE MAUVES + </h1> + <p> + <br /><br /> + </p> + <h2> + Byhenry James + </h2> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <h2> + Contents + </h2> + <table summary="" style="margin-right: auto; margin-left: auto"> + <tr> + <td> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0001"> I </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0002"> II </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0003"> III </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0004"> IV </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0005"> V </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0006"> VI </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0007"> VII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0008"> VIII </a> + </p> + <p class="toc"> + <a href="#link2H_4_0009"> IX </a> + </p> + </td> + </tr> + </table> + <p> + <br /> <br /> + </p> + <hr /> + <p> + <br /> <br /> <a name="link2H_4_0001" id="link2H_4_0001"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <h2> + I + </h2> + <p> + The view from the terrace at Saint-Germain-en-Laye is immense and famous. + Paris lies spread before you in dusky vastness, domed and fortified, + glittering here and there through her light vapours and girdled with her + silver Seine. Behind you is a park of stately symmetry, and behind that a + forest where you may lounge through turfy avenues and light-chequered + glades and quite forget that you are within half an hour of the + boulevards. One afternoon, however, in mid-spring, some five years ago, a + young man seated on the terrace had preferred to keep this in mind. His + eyes were fixed in idle wistfulness on the mighty human hive before him. + He was fond of rural things, and he had come to Saint-Germain a week + before to meet the spring halfway; but though he could boast of a six + months’ acquaintance with the great city he never looked at it from his + present vantage without a sense of curiosity still unappeased. There were + moments when it seemed to him that not to be there just then was to miss + some thrilling chapter of experience. And yet his winter’s experience had + been rather fruitless and he had closed the book almost with a yawn. + Though not in the least a cynic he was what one may call a disappointed + observer, and he never chose the right-hand road without beginning to + suspect after an hour’s wayfaring that the left would have been the + better. He now had a dozen minds to go to Paris for the evening, to dine + at the Cafe Brebant and repair afterwards to the Gymnase and listen to the + latest exposition of the duties of the injured husband. He would probably + have risen to execute this project if he had not noticed a little girl + who, wandering along the terrace, had suddenly stopped short and begun to + gaze at him with round-eyed frankness. For a moment he was simply amused, + the child’s face denoting such helpless wonderment; the next he was + agreeably surprised. “Why this is my friend Maggie,” he said; “I see + you’ve not forgotten me.” + </p> + <p> + Maggie, after a short parley, was induced to seal her remembrance with a + kiss. Invited then to explain her appearance at Saint-Germain, she + embarked on a recital in which the general, according to the infantine + method, was so fatally sacrificed to the particular that Longmore looked + about him for a superior source of information. He found it in Maggie’s + mamma, who was seated with another lady at the opposite end of the + terrace; so, taking the child by the hand, he led her back to her + companions. + </p> + <p> + Maggie’s mamma was a young American lady, as you would immediately have + perceived, with a pretty and friendly face and a great elegance of fresh + finery. She greeted Longmore with amazement and joy, mentioning his name + to her friend and bidding him bring a chair and sit with them. The other + lady, in whom, though she was equally young and perhaps even prettier, + muslins and laces and feathers were less of a feature, remained silent, + stroking the hair of the little girl, whom she had drawn against her knee. + She had never heard of Longmore, but she now took in that her companion + had crossed the ocean with him, had met him afterwards in travelling and—having + left her husband in Wall Street—was indebted to him for sundry + services. Maggie’s mamma turned from time to time and smiled at this lady + with an air of invitation; the latter smiled back and continued gracefully + to say nothing. For ten minutes, meanwhile, Longmore felt a revival of + interest in his old acquaintance; then (as mild riddles are more amusing + than mere commonplaces) it gave way to curiosity about her friend. His + eyes wandered; her volubility shook a sort of sweetness out of the + friend’s silence. + </p> + <p> + The stranger was perhaps not obviously a beauty nor obviously an American, + but essentially both for the really seeing eye. She was slight and fair + and, though naturally pale, was delicately flushed just now, as by the + effect of late agitation. What chiefly struck Longmore in her face was the + union of a pair of beautifully gentle, almost languid grey eyes with a + mouth that was all expression and intention. Her forehead was a trifle + more expansive than belongs to classic types, and her thick brown hair + dressed out of the fashion, just then even more ugly than usual. Her + throat and bust were slender, but all the more in harmony with certain + rapid charming movements of the head, which she had a way of throwing back + every now and then with an air of attention and a sidelong glance from her + dove-like eyes. She seemed at once alert and indifferent, contemplative + and restless, and Longmore very soon discovered that if she was not a + brilliant beauty she was at least a most attaching one. This very + impression made him magnanimous. He was certain he had interrupted a + confidential conversation, and judged it discreet to withdraw, having + first learned from Maggie’s mamma—Mrs. Draper—that she was to + take the six o’clock train back to Paris. He promised to meet her at the + station. + </p> + <p> + He kept his appointment, and Mrs. Draper arrived betimes, accompanied by + her friend. The latter, however, made her farewells at the door and drove + away again, giving Longmore time only to raise his hat. “Who is she?” he + asked with visible ardour as he brought the traveller her tickets. + </p> + <p> + “Come and see me to-morrow at the Hotel de l’Empire,” she answered, “and + I’ll tell you all about her.” The force of this offer in making him + punctual at the Hotel de l’Empire Longmore doubtless never exactly + measured; and it was perhaps well he was vague, for he found his friend, + who was on the point of leaving Paris, so distracted by procrastinating + milliners and perjured lingeres that coherence had quite deserted her. + “You must find Saint-Germain dreadfully dull,” she nevertheless had the + presence of mind to say as he was going. “Why won’t you come with me to + London?” + </p> + <p> + “Introduce me to Madame de Mauves,” he answered, “and Saint-Germain will + quite satisfy me.” All he had learned was the lady’s name and residence. + </p> + <p> + “Ah she, poor woman, won’t make your affair a carnival. She’s very + unhappy,” said Mrs. Draper. + </p> + <p> + Longmore’s further enquiries were arrested by the arrival of a young lady + with a bandbox; but he went away with the promise of a note of + introduction, to be immediately dispatched to him at Saint-Germain. + </p> + <p> + He then waited a week, but the note never came, and he felt how little it + was for Mrs. Draper to complain of engagements unperformed. He lounged on + the terrace and walked in the forest, studied suburban street life and + made a languid attempt to investigate the records of the court of the + exiled Stuarts; but he spent most of his time in wondering where Madame de + Mauves lived and whether she ever walked on the terrace. Sometimes, he was + at last able to recognise; for one afternoon toward dusk he made her out + from a distance, arrested there alone and leaning against the low wall. In + his momentary hesitation to approach her there was almost a shade of + trepidation, but his curiosity was not chilled by such a measure of the + effect of a quarter of an hour’s acquaintance. She at once recovered their + connexion, on his drawing near, and showed it with the frankness of a + person unprovided with a great choice of contacts. Her dress, her + expression, were the same as before; her charm came out like that of fine + music on a second hearing. She soon made conversation easy by asking him + for news of Mrs. Draper. Longmore told her that he was daily expecting + news and after a pause mentioned the promised note of introduction. + </p> + <p> + “It seems less necessary now,” he said—“for me at least. But for you—I + should have liked you to know the good things our friend would probably + have been able to say about me.” + </p> + <p> + “If it arrives at last,” she answered, “you must come and see me and bring + it. If it doesn’t you must come without it.” + </p> + <p> + Then, as she continued to linger through the thickening twilight, she + explained that she was waiting for her husband, who was to arrive in the + train from Paris and who often passed along the terrace on his way home. + Longmore well remembered that Mrs. Draper had spoken of uneasy things in + her life, and he found it natural to guess that this same husband was the + source of them. Edified by his six months in Paris, “What else is + possible,” he put it, “for a sweet American girl who marries an unholy + foreigner?” + </p> + <p> + But this quiet dependence on her lord’s return rather shook his + shrewdness, and it received a further check from the free confidence with + which she turned to greet an approaching figure. Longmore distinguished in + the fading light a stoutish gentleman, on the fair side of forty, in a + high grey hat, whose countenance, obscure as yet against the quarter from + which it came, mainly presented to view the large outward twist of its + moustache. M. de Mauves saluted his wife with punctilious gallantry and, + having bowed to Longmore, asked her several questions in French. Before + taking his offered arm to walk to their carriage, which was in waiting at + the gate of the terrace, she introduced our hero as a friend of Mrs. + Draper and also a fellow countryman, whom she hoped they might have the + pleasure of seeing, as she said, chez eux. M. de Mauves responded briefly, + but civilly, in fair English, and led his wife away. + </p> + <p> + Longmore watched him as he went, renewing the curl of his main facial + feature—watched him with an irritation devoid of any mentionable + ground. His one pretext for gnashing his teeth would have been in his + apprehension that this gentleman’s worst English might prove a matter to + shame his own best French. For reasons involved apparently in the very + structure of his being Longmore found a colloquial use of that idiom as + insecure as the back of a restive horse, and was obliged to take his + exercise, as he was aware, with more tension than grace. He reflected + meanwhile with comfort that Madame de Mauves and he had a common tongue, + and his anxiety yielded to his relief at finding on his table that evening + a letter from Mrs. Draper. It enclosed a short formal missive to Madame de + Mauves, but the epistle itself was copious and confidential. She had + deferred writing till she reached London, where for a week, of course, she + had found other amusements. + </p> + <p> + “I think it’s the sight of so many women here who don’t look at all like + her that has reminded me by the law of contraries of my charming friend at + Saint-Germain and my promise to introduce you to her,” she wrote. “I + believe I spoke to you of her rather blighted state, and I wondered + afterwards whether I hadn’t been guilty of a breach of confidence. But you + would certainly have arrived at guesses of your own, and, besides, she has + never told me her secrets. The only one she ever pretended to was that + she’s the happiest creature in the world, after assuring me of which, poor + thing, she went off into tears; so that I prayed to be delivered from such + happiness. It’s the miserable story of an American girl born neither to + submit basely nor to rebel crookedly marrying a shining sinful Frenchman + who believes a woman must do one or the other of those things. The + lightest of US have a ballast that they can’t imagine, and the poorest a + moral imagination that they don’t require. She was romantic and perverse—she + thought the world she had been brought up in too vulgar or at least too + prosaic. To have a decent home-life isn’t perhaps the greatest of + adventures; but I think she wishes nowadays she hadn’t gone in quite so + desperately for thrills. M. de Mauves cared of course for nothing but her + money, which he’s spending royally on his menus plaisirs. I hope you + appreciate the compliment I pay you when I recommend you to go and cheer + up a lady domestically dejected. Believe me, I’ve given no other man a + proof of this esteem; so if you were to take me in an inferior sense I + would never speak to you again. Prove to this fine sore creature that our + manners may have all the grace without wanting to make such selfish terms + for it. She avoids society and lives quite alone, seeing no one but a + horrible French sister-in-law. Do let me hear that you’ve made her + patience a little less absent-minded. Make her WANT to forget; make her + like you.” + </p> + <p> + This ingenious appeal left the young man uneasy. He found himself in + presence of more complications than had been in his reckoning. To call on + Madame de Mauves with his present knowledge struck him as akin to fishing + in troubled waters. He was of modest composition, and yet he asked himself + whether an appearance of attentions from any gallant gentleman mightn’t + give another twist to her tangle. A flattering sense of unwonted + opportunity, however—of such a possible value constituted for him as + he had never before been invited to rise to—made him with the lapse + of time more confident, possibly more reckless. It was too inspiring not + to act upon the idea of kindling a truer light in his fair countrywoman’s + slow smile, and at least he hoped to persuade her that even a raw + representative of the social order she had not done justice to was not + necessarily a mere fortuitous collocation of atoms. He immediately called + on her. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0002" id="link2H_4_0002"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + II + </h2> + <p> + She had been placed for her education, fourteen years before, in a + Parisian convent, by a widowed mammma who was fonder of Homburg and Nice + than of letting out tucks in the frocks of a vigorously growing daughter. + Here, besides various elegant accomplishments—the art of wearing a + train, of composing a bouquet, of presenting a cup of tea—she + acquired a certain turn of the imagination which might have passed for a + sign of precocious worldliness. She dreamed of marrying a man of + hierarchical “rank”—not for the pleasure of hearing herself called + Madame la Vicomtesse, for which it seemed to her she should never greatly + care, but because she had a romantic belief that the enjoyment of + inherited and transmitted consideration, consideration attached to the + fact of birth, would be the direct guarantee of an ideal delicacy of + feeling. She supposed it would be found that the state of being noble does + actually enforce the famous obligation. Romances are rarely worked out in + such transcendent good faith, and Euphemia’s excuse was the prime purity + of her moral vision. She was essentially incorruptible, and she took this + pernicious conceit to her bosom very much as if it had been a dogma + revealed by a white-winged angel. Even after experience had given her a + hundred rude hints she found it easier to believe in fables, when they had + a certain nobleness of meaning, than in well-attested but sordid facts. + She believed that a gentleman with a long pedigree must be of necessity a + very fine fellow, and enjoyment of a chance to carry further a family + chronicle begun ever so far back must be, as a consciousness, a source of + the most beautiful impulses. It wasn’t therefore only that noblesse + oblige, she thought, as regards yourself, but that it ensures as nothing + else does in respect to your wife. She had never, at the start, spoken to + a nobleman in her life, and these convictions were but a matter of + extravagant theory. They were the fruit, in part, of the perusal of + various Ultramontane works of fiction—the only ones admitted to the + convent library—in which the hero was always a Legitimist vicomte + who fought duels by the dozen but went twice a month to confession; and in + part of the strong social scent of the gossip of her companions, many of + them filles de haut lieu who, in the convent-garden, after Sundays at + home, depicted their brothers and cousins as Prince Charmings and young + Paladins. Euphemia listened and said nothing; she shrouded her visions of + matrimony under a coronet in the silence that mostly surrounds all + ecstatic faith. She was not of that type of young lady who is easily + induced to declare that her husband must be six feet high and a little + near-sighted, part his hair in the middle and have amber lights in his + beard. To her companions her flights of fancy seemed short, rather, and + poor and untutored; and even the fact that she was a sprig of the + transatlantic democracy never sufficiently explained her apathy on social + questions. She had a mental image of that son of the Crusaders who was to + suffer her to adore him, but like many an artist who has produced a + masterpiece of idealisation she shrank from exposing it to public + criticism. It was the portrait of a gentleman rather ugly than handsome + and rather poor than rich. But his ugliness was to be nobly expressive and + his poverty delicately proud. She had a fortune of her own which, at the + proper time, after fixing on her in eloquent silence those fine eyes that + were to soften the feudal severity of his visage, he was to accept with a + world of stifled protestations. One condition alone she was to make—that + he should have “race” in a state as documented as it was possible to have + it. On this she would stake her happiness; and it was so to happen that + several accidents conspired to give convincing colour to this artless + philosophy. + </p> + <p> + Inclined to long pauses and slow approaches herself, Euphemia was a great + sitter at the feet of breathless volubility, and there were moments when + she fairly hung upon the lips of Mademoiselle Marie de Mauves. Her + intimacy with this chosen schoolmate was founded on the perception—all + her own—that their differences were just the right ones. + Mademoiselle de Mauves was very positive, very shrewd, very ironical, very + French—everything that Euphemia felt herself unpardonable for not + being. During her Sundays en ville she had examined the world and judged + it, and she imparted her impressions to our attentive heroine with an + agreeable mixture of enthusiasm and scepticism. She was moreover a + handsome and well-grown person, on whom Euphemia’s ribbons and trinkets + had a trick of looking better than on their slender proprietress. She had + finally the supreme merit of being a rigorous example of the virtue of + exalted birth, having, as she did, ancestors honourably mentioned by + Joinville and Commines, and a stately grandmother with a hooked nose who + came up with her after the holidays from a veritable castel in Auvergne. + It seemed to our own young woman that these attributes made her friend + more at home in the world than if she had been the daughter of even the + most prosperous grocer. A certain aristocratic impudence Mademoiselle de + Mauves abundantly possessed, and her raids among her friend’s finery were + quite in the spirit of her baronial ancestors in the twelfth century—a + spirit regarded by Euphemia but as a large way of understanding + friendship, a freedom from conformities without style, and one that would + sooner or later express itself in acts of surprising magnanimity. There + doubtless prevailed in the breast of Mademoiselle de Mauves herself a + dimmer vision of the large securities that Euphemia envied her. She was to + become later in life so accomplished a schemer that her sense of having + further heights to scale might well have waked up early. The especially + fine appearance made by our heroine’s ribbons and trinkets as her friend + wore them ministered to pleasure on both sides, and the spell was not of a + nature to be menaced by the young American’s general gentleness. The + concluding motive of Marie’s writing to her grandmamma to invite Euphemia + for a three weeks’ holiday to the castel in Auvergne involved, however, + the subtlest considerations. Mademoiselle de Mauves indeed, at this time + seventeen years of age and capable of views as wide as her wants, was as + proper a figure as could possibly have been found for the foreground of a + scene artfully designed; and Euphemia, whose years were of like number, + asked herself if a right harmony with such a place mightn’t come by humble + prayer. It is a proof of the sincerity of the latter’s aspirations that + the castel was not a shock to her faith. It was neither a cheerful nor a + luxurious abode, but it was as full of wonders as a box of old heirlooms + or objects “willed.” It had battered towers and an empty moat, a rusty + drawbridge and a court paved with crooked grass-grown slabs over which the + antique coach-wheels of the lady with the hooked nose seemed to awaken the + echoes of the seventeenth century. Euphemia was not frightened out of her + dream; she had the pleasure of seeing all the easier passages translated + into truth, as the learner of a language begins with the common words. She + had a taste for old servants, old anecdotes, old furniture, faded + household colours and sweetly stale odours—musty treasures in which + the Chateau de Mauves abounded. She made a dozen sketches in water-colours + after her conventual pattern; but sentimentally, as one may say, she was + for ever sketching with a freer hand. + </p> + <p> + Old Madame de Mauves had nothing severe but her nose, and she seemed to + Euphemia—what indeed she had every claim to pass for—the very + image and pattern of an “historical character.” Belonging to a great order + of things, she patronised the young stranger who was ready to sit all day + at her feet and listen to anecdotes of the bon temps and quotations from + the family chronicles. Madame de Mauves was a very honest old woman; she + uttered her thoughts with ancient plainness. One day after pushing back + Euphemia’s shining locks and blinking with some tenderness from behind an + immense face-a-main that acted as for the relegation of the girl herself + to the glass case of a museum, she declared with an energetic shake of the + head that she didn’t know what to make of such a little person. And in + answer to the little person’s evident wonder, “I should like to advise + you,” she said, “but you seem to me so all of a piece that I’m afraid that + if I advise you I shall spoil you. It’s easy to see you’re not one of us. + I don’t know whether you’re better, but you seem to me to have been wound + up by some key that isn’t kept by your governess or your confessor or even + your mother, but that you wear by a fine black ribbon round your own neck. + Little persons in my day—when they were stupid they were very + docile, but when they were clever they were very sly! You’re clever + enough, I imagine, and yet if I guessed all your secrets at this moment is + there one I should have to frown at? I can tell you a wickeder one than + any you’ve discovered for yourself. If you wish to live at ease in the + doux pays de France don’t trouble too much about the key of your + conscience or even about your conscience itself—I mean your own + particular one. You’ll fancy it saying things it won’t help your case to + hear. They’ll make you sad, and when you’re sad you’ll grow plain, and + when you’re plain you’ll grow bitter, and when you’re bitter you’ll be peu + aimable. I was brought up to think that a woman’s first duty is to be + infinitely so, and the happiest women I’ve known have been in fact those + who performed this duty faithfully. As you’re not a Catholic I suppose you + can’t be a devote; and if you don’t take life as a fifty years’ mass the + only way to take it’s as a game of skill. Listen to this. Not to lose at + the game of life you must—I don’t say cheat, but not be too sure + your neighbour won’t, and not be shocked out of your self-possession if he + does. Don’t lose, my dear—I beseech you don’t lose. Be neither + suspicious nor credulous, and if you find your neighbour peeping don’t cry + out; only very politely wait your own chance. I’ve had my revenge more + than once in my day, but I really think the sweetest I could take, en + somme, against the past I’ve known, would be to have your blest innocence + profit by my experience.” + </p> + <p> + This was rather bewildering advice, but Euphemia understood it too little + to be either edified or frightened. She sat listening to it very much as + she would have listened to the speeches of an old lady in a comedy whose + diction should strikingly correspond to the form of her high-backed + armchair and the fashion of her coif. Her indifference was doubly + dangerous, for Madame de Mauves spoke at the instance of coming events, + and her words were the result of a worry of scruples—scruples in the + light of which Euphemia was on the one hand too tender a victim to be + sacrificed to an ambition and the prosperity of her own house on the other + too precious a heritage to be sacrificed to an hesitation. The prosperity + in question had suffered repeated and grievous breaches and the menaced + institution been overmuch pervaded by that cold comfort in which people + are obliged to balance dinner-table allusions to feudal ancestors against + the absence of side-dishes; a state of things the sorrier as the family + was now mainly represented by a gentleman whose appetite was large and who + justly maintained that its historic glories hadn’t been established by + underfed heroes. + </p> + <p> + Three days after Euphemia’s arrival Richard de Mauves, coming down from + Paris to pay his respects to his grandmother, treated our heroine to her + first encounter with a gentilhomme in the flesh. On appearing he kissed + his grandmother’s hand with a smile which caused her to draw it away with + dignity, and set Euphemia, who was standing by, to ask herself what could + have happened between them. Her unanswered wonder was but the beginning of + a long chain of puzzlements, but the reader is free to know that the smile + of M. de Mauves was a reply to a postscript affixed by the old lady to a + letter addressed to him by her granddaughter as soon as the girl had been + admitted to justify the latter’s promises. Mademoiselle de Mauves brought + her letter to her grandmother for approval, but obtained no more than was + expressed in a frigid nod. The old lady watched her with this coldness + while she proceeded to seal the letter, then suddenly bade her open it + again and bring her a pen. + </p> + <p> + “Your sister’s flatteries are all nonsense,” she wrote; “the young lady’s + far too good for you, mauvais sujet beyond redemption. If you’ve a + particle of conscience you’ll not come and disturb the repose of an angel + of innocence.” + </p> + <p> + The other relative of the subject of this warning, who had read these + lines, made up a little face as she freshly indited the address; but she + laid down her pen with a confident nod which might have denoted that by + her judgement her brother was appealed to on the ground of a principle + that didn’t exist in him. And “if you meant what you said,” the young man + on his side observed to his grandmother on his first private opportunity, + “it would have been simpler not to have sent the letter.” + </p> + <p> + Put out of humour perhaps by this gross impugnment of her sincerity, the + head of the family kept her room on pretexts during a greater part of + Euphemia’s stay, so that the latter’s angelic innocence was left all to + her grandson’s mercy. It suffered no worse mischance, however, than to be + prompted to intenser communion with itself. Richard de Mauves was the hero + of the young girl’s romance made real, and so completely accordant with + this creature of her imagination that she felt afraid of him almost as she + would have been of a figure in a framed picture who should have stepped + down from the wall. He was now thirty-three—young enough to suggest + possibilities of ardent activity and old enough to have formed opinions + that a simple woman might deem it an intellectual privilege to listen to. + He was perhaps a trifle handsomer than Euphemia’s rather grim Quixotic + ideal, but a very few days reconciled her to his good looks as effectually + they would have reconciled her to a characterised want of them. He was + quiet, grave, eminently distinguished. He spoke little, but his remarks, + without being sententious, had a nobleness of tone that caused them to + re-echo in the young girl’s ears at the end of the day. He paid her very + little direct attention, but his chance words—when he only asked her + if she objected to his cigarette—were accompanied by a smile of + extraordinary kindness. + </p> + <p> + It happened that shortly after his arrival, riding an unruly horse which + Euphemia had with shy admiration watched him mount in the castle-yard, he + was thrown with a violence which, without disparaging his skill, made him + for a fortnight an interesting invalid lounging in the library with a + bandaged knee. To beguile his confinement the accomplished young stranger + was repeatedly induced to sing for him, which she did with a small natural + tremor that might have passed for the finish of vocal art. He never + overwhelmed her with compliments, but he listened with unfailing + attention, remembered all her melodies and would sit humming them to + himself. While his imprisonment lasted indeed he passed hours in her + company, making her feel not unlike some unfriended artist who has + suddenly gained the opportunity to devote a fortnight to the study of a + great model. Euphemia studied with noiseless diligence what she supposed + to be the “character” of M. de Mauves, and the more she looked the more + fine lights and shades she seemed to behold in this masterpiece of nature. + M. de Mauves’s character indeed, whether from a sense of being so + generously and intensely taken for granted, or for reasons which bid + graceful defiance to analysis, had never been so much on show, even to the + very casual critic lodged, as might be said, in an out-of-the-way corner + of it; it seemed really to reflect the purity of Euphemia’s pious opinion. + There had been nothing especially to admire in the state of mind in which + he left Paris—a settled resolve to marry a young person whose charms + might or might not justify his sister’s account of them, but who was + mistress, at the worst, of a couple of hundred thousand francs a year. He + had not counted out sentiment—if she pleased him so much the better; + but he had left a meagre margin for it and would hardly have admitted that + so excellent a match could be improved by it. He was a robust and serene + sceptic, and it was a singular fate for a man who believed in nothing to + be so tenderly believed in. What his original faith had been he could + hardly have told you, for as he came back to his childhood’s home to mend + his fortunes by pretending to fall in love he was a thoroughly perverse + creature and overlaid with more corruptions than a summer day’s + questioning of his conscience would have put to flight. Ten years’ pursuit + of pleasure, which a bureau full of unpaid bills was all he had to show + for, had pretty well stifled the natural lad whose violent will and + generous temper might have been shaped by a different pressure to some + such showing as would have justified a romantic faith. So should he have + exhaled the natural fragrance of a late-blooming flower of hereditary + honour. His violence indeed had been subdued and he had learned to be + irreproachably polite; but he had lost the fineness of his generosity, and + his politeness, which in the long run society paid for, was hardly more + than a form of luxurious egotism, like his fondness for ciphered + pocket-handkerchiefs, lavender gloves and other fopperies by which + shopkeepers remained out of pocket. In after-years he was terribly polite + to his wife. He had formed himself, as the phrase was, and the form + prescribed to him by the society into which his birth and his tastes had + introduced him was marked by some peculiar features. That which mainly + concerns us is its classification of the fairer half of humanity as + objects not essentially different—say from those very lavender + gloves that are soiled in an evening and thrown away. To do M. de Mauves + justice, he had in the course of time encountered in the feminine + character such plentiful evidence of its pliant softness and fine + adjustability that idealism naturally seemed to him a losing game. + </p> + <p> + Euphemia, as he lay on his sofa, struck him as by no means contradictory; + she simply reminded him that very young women are generally innocent and + that this is on the whole the most potent source of their attraction. Her + innocence moved him to perfect consideration, and it seemed to him that if + he shortly became her husband it would be exposed to a danger the less. + Old Madame de Mauves, who flattered herself that in this whole matter she + was very laudably rigid, might almost have taken a lesson from the + delicacy he practised. For two or three weeks her grandson was well-nigh a + blushing boy again. He watched from behind the Figaro, he admired and + desired and held his tongue. He found himself not in the least moved to a + flirtation; he had no wish to trouble the waters he proposed to transfuse + into the golden cup of matrimony. Sometimes a word, a look, a gesture of + Euphemia’s gave him the oddest sense of being, or of seeming at least, + almost bashful; for she had a way of not dropping her eyes according to + the mysterious virginal mechanism, of not fluttering out of the room when + she found him there alone, of treating him rather as a glorious than as a + pernicious influence—a radiant frankness of demeanour in fine, + despite an infinite natural reserve, which it seemed at once graceless not + to be complimentary about and indelicate not to take for granted. In this + way had been wrought in the young man’s mind a vague unwonted resonance of + soft impressions, as we may call it, which resembled the happy stir of the + change from dreaming pleasantly to waking happily. His imagination was + touched; he was very fond of music and he now seemed to give easy ear to + some of the sweetest he had ever heard. In spite of the bore of being laid + up with a lame knee he was in better humour than he had known for months; + he lay smoking cigarettes and listening to the nightingales with the + satisfied smile of one of his country neighbours whose big ox should have + taken the prize at a fair. Every now and then, with an impatient suspicion + of the resemblance, he declared himself pitifully bete; but he was under a + charm that braved even the supreme penalty of seeming ridiculous. One + morning he had half an hour’s tete-a-tete with his grandmother’s + confessor, a soft-voiced old Abbe whom, for reasons of her own, Madame de + Mauves had suddenly summoned and had left waiting in the drawing-room + while she rearranged her curls. His reverence, going up to the old lady, + assured her that M. le Comte was in a most edifying state of mind and the + likeliest subject for the operation of grace. This was a theological + interpretation of the count’s unusual equanimity. He had always lazily + wondered what priests were good for, and he now remembered, with a sense + of especial obligation to the Abbe, that they were excellent for marrying + people. + </p> + <p> + A day or two after this he left off his bandages and tried to walk. He + made his way into the garden and hobbled successfully along one of the + alleys, but in the midst of his progress was pulled up by a spasm of pain + which forced him to stop and call for help. In an instant Euphemia came + tripping along the path and offered him her arm with the frankest + solicitude. + </p> + <p> + “Not to the house,” he said, taking it; “further on, to the bosquet.” This + choice was prompted by her having immediately confessed that she had seen + him leave the house, had feared an accident and had followed him on + tiptoe. + </p> + <p> + “Why didn’t you join me?” he had asked, giving her a look in which + admiration was no longer disguised and yet felt itself half at the mercy + of her replying that a jeune fille shouldn’t be seen following a + gentleman. But it drew a breath which filled its lungs for a long time + afterwards when she replied simply that if she had overtaken him he might + have accepted her arm out of politeness, whereas she wished to have the + pleasure of seeing him walk alone. + </p> + <p> + The bosquet was covered with an odorous tangle of blossoming creepers, and + a nightingale overhead was shaking out love-notes with a profusion that + made the Count feel his own conduct the last word of propriety. “I’ve + always heard that in America, when a man wishes to marry a young girl, he + offers himself simply face to face and without ceremony—without + parents and uncles and aunts and cousins sitting round in a circle.” + </p> + <p> + “Why I believe so,” said Euphemia, staring and too surprised to be + alarmed. + </p> + <p> + “Very well then—suppose our arbour here to be your great sensible + country. I offer you my hand a l’Americaine. It will make me intensely + happy to feel you accept it.” + </p> + <p> + Whether Euphemia’s acceptance was in the American manner is more than I + can say; I incline to think that for fluttering grateful trustful + softly-amazed young hearts there is only one manner all over the world. + </p> + <p> + That evening, in the massive turret chamber it was her happiness to + inhabit, she wrote a dutiful letter to her mamma, and had just sealed it + when she was sent for by Madame de Mauves. She found this ancient lady + seated in her boudoir in a lavender satin gown and with her candles all + lighted as for the keeping of some fete. “Are you very happy?” the old + woman demanded, making Euphemia sit down before her. + </p> + <p> + “I’m almost afraid to say so, lest I should wake myself up.” + </p> + <p> + “May you never wake up, belle enfant,” Madame de Mauves grandly returned. + “This is the first marriage ever made in our family in this way—by a + Comte de Mauves proposing to a young girl in an arbour like Jeannot and + Jeannette. It has not been our way of doing things, and people may say it + wants frankness. My grandson tells me he regards it—for the + conditions—as the perfection of good taste. Very well. I’m a very + old woman, and if your differences should ever be as marked as your + agreements I shouldn’t care to see them. But I should be sorry to die and + think you were going to be unhappy. You can’t be, my dear, beyond a + certain point; because, though in this world the Lord sometimes makes + light of our expectations he never altogether ignores our deserts. But + you’re very young and innocent and easy to dazzle. There never was a man + in the world—among the saints themselves—as good as you + believe my grandson. But he’s a galant homme and a gentleman, and I’ve + been talking to him to-night. To you I want to say this—that you’re + to forget the worldly rubbish I talked the other day about the happiness + of frivolous women. It’s not the kind of happiness that would suit you, ma + toute-belle. Whatever befalls you, promise me this: to be, to remain, your + own sincere little self only, charming in your own serious little way. The + Comtesse de Mauves will be none the worse for it. Your brave little self, + understand, in spite of everything—bad precepts and bad examples, + bad fortune and even bad usage. Be persistently and patiently just what + the good God has made you, and even one of us—and one of those who + is most what we ARE—will do you justice!” + </p> + <p> + Euphemia remembered this speech in after-years, and more than once, + wearily closing her eyes, she seemed to see the old woman sitting upright + in her faded finery and smiling grimly like one of the Fates who sees the + wheel of fortune turning up her favourite event. But at the moment it had + for her simply the proper gravity of the occasion: this was the way, she + supposed, in which lucky young girls were addressed on their engagement by + wise old women of quality. + </p> + <p> + At her convent, to which she immediately returned, she found a letter from + her mother which disconcerted her far more than the remarks of Madame de + Mauves. Who were these people, Mrs. Cleve demanded, who had presumed to + talk to her daughter of marriage without asking her leave? Questionable + gentlefolk plainly; the best French people never did such things. Euphemia + would return straightway to her convent, shut herself up and await her own + arrival. It took Mrs. Cleve three weeks to travel from Nice to Paris, and + during this time the young girl had no communication with her lover beyond + accepting a bouquet of violets marked with his initials and left by a + female friend. “I’ve not brought you up with such devoted care,” she + declared to her daughter at their first interview, “to marry a + presumptuous and penniless Frenchman. I shall take you straight home and + you’ll please forget M. de Mauves.” + </p> + <p> + Mrs. Cleve received that evening at her hotel a visit from this personage + which softened her wrath but failed to modify her decision. He had very + good manners, but she was sure he had horrible morals; and the lady, who + had been a good-natured censor on her own account, felt a deep and real + need to sacrifice her daughter to propriety. She belonged to that large + class of Americans who make light of their native land in familiar + discourse but are startled back into a sense of having blasphemed when + they find Europeans taking them at their word. “I know the type, my dear,” + she said to her daughter with a competent nod. “He won’t beat you. + Sometimes you’ll wish he would.” + </p> + <p> + Euphemia remained solemnly silent, for the only answer she felt capable of + making was that her mother’s mind was too small a measure of things and + her lover’s type an historic, a social masterpiece that it took some + mystic illumination to appreciate. A person who confounded him with the + common throng of her watering-place acquaintance was not a person to argue + with. It struck the girl she had simply no cause to plead; her cause was + in the Lord’s hands and in those of M. de Mauves. + </p> + <p> + This agent of Providence had been irritated and mortified by Mrs. Cleve’s + opposition, and hardly knew how to handle an adversary who failed to + perceive that a member of his family gave of necessity more than he + received. But he had obtained information on his return to Paris which + exalted the uses of humility. Euphemia’s fortune, wonderful to say, was + greater than its fame, and in view of such a prize, even a member of his + family could afford to take a snubbing. + </p> + <p> + The young man’s tact, his deference, his urbane insistence, won a + concession from Mrs. Cleve. The engagement was to be put off and her + daughter was to return home, be brought out and receive the homage she was + entitled to and which might well take a form representing peril to the + suit of this first headlong aspirant. They were to exchange neither + letters nor mementoes nor messages; but if at the end of two years + Euphemia had refused offers enough to attest the permanence of her + attachment he should receive an invitation to address her again. This + decision was promulgated in the presence of the parties interested. The + Count bore himself gallantly, looking at his young friend as if he + expected some tender protestation. But she only looked at him silently in + return, neither weeping nor smiling nor putting out her hand. On this they + separated, and as M. de Mauves walked away he declared to himself that in + spite of the confounded two years he was one of the luckiest of men—to + have a fiancee who to several millions of francs added such strangely + beautiful eyes. + </p> + <p> + How many offers Euphemia refused but scantily concerns us—and how + the young man wore his two years away. He found he required pastimes, and + as pastimes were expensive he added heavily to the list of debts to be + cancelled by Euphemia’s fortune. Sometimes, in the thick of what he had + once called pleasure with a keener conviction than now, he put to himself + the case of their failing him after all; and then he remembered that last + mute assurance of her pale face and drew a long breath of such confidence + as he felt in nothing else in the world save his own punctuality in an + affair of honour. + </p> + <p> + At last, one morning, he took the express to Havre with a letter of Mrs. + Cleve’s in his pocket, and ten days later made his bow to mother and + daughter in New York. His stay was brief, and he was apparently unable to + bring himself to view what Euphemia’s uncle, Mr. Butterworth, who gave her + away at the altar, called our great experiment of democratic + self-government, in a serious light. He smiled at everything and seemed to + regard the New World as a colossal plaisanterie. It is true that a + perpetual smile was the most natural expression of countenance for a man + about to marry Euphemia Cleve. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0003" id="link2H_4_0003"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + III + </h2> + <p> + Longmore’s first visit seemed to open to him so large a range of quiet + pleasure that he very soon paid a second, and at the end of a fortnight + had spent uncounted hours in the little drawing-room which Madame de + Mauves rarely quitted except to drive or walk in the forest. She lived in + an old-fashioned pavilion, between a high-walled court and an excessively + artificial garden, beyond whose enclosure you saw a long line of + tree-tops. Longmore liked the garden and in the mild afternoons used to + move his chair through the open window to the smooth terrace which + overlooked it while his hostess sat just within. Presently she would come + out and wander through the narrow alleys and beside the thin-spouting + fountain, and at last introduce him to a private gate in the high wall, + the opening to a lane which led to the forest. Hitherwards she more than + once strolled with him, bareheaded and meaning to go but twenty rods, but + always going good-naturedly further and often stretching it to the freedom + of a promenade. They found many things to talk about, and to the pleasure + of feeling the hours slip along like some silver stream Longmore was able + to add the satisfaction of suspecting that he was a “resource” for Madame + de Mauves. He had made her acquaintance with the sense, not wholly + inspiring, that she was a woman with a painful twist in her life and that + seeking her acquaintance would be like visiting at a house where there was + an invalid who could bear no noise. But he very soon recognised that her + grievance, if grievance it was, was not aggressive; that it was not fond + of attitudes and ceremonies, and that her most earnest wish was to + remember it as little as possible. He felt that even if Mrs. Draper hadn’t + told him she was unhappy he would have guessed it, and yet that he + couldn’t have pointed to his proof. The evidence was chiefly negative—she + never alluded to her husband. Beyond this it seemed to him simply that her + whole being was pitched in a lower key than harmonious Nature had + designed; she was like a powerful singer who had lost her high notes. She + never drooped nor sighed nor looked unutterable things; she dealt no + sarcastic digs at her fate; she had in short none of the conscious graces + of the woman wronged. Only Longmore was sure that her gentle gaiety was + but the milder or sharper flush of a settled ache, and that she but tried + to interest herself in his thoughts in order to escape from her own. If + she had wished to irritate his curiosity and lead him to take her + confidence by storm nothing could have served her purpose better than this + studied discretion. He measured the rare magnanimity of self-effacement so + deliberate, he felt how few women were capable of exchanging a luxurious + woe for a thankless effort. Madame de Mauves, he himself felt, wasn’t + sweeping the horizon for a compensation or a consoler; she had suffered a + personal deception that had disgusted her with persons. She wasn’t + planning to get the worth of her trouble back in some other way; for the + present she was proposing to live with it peaceably, reputably and without + scandal—turning the key on it occasionally as you would on a + companion liable to attacks of insanity. Longmore was a man of fine senses + and of a speculative spirit, leading-strings that had never been slipped. + He began to regard his hostess as a figure haunted by a shadow which was + somehow her intenser and more authentic self. This lurking duality in her + put on for him an extraordinary charm. Her delicate beauty acquired to his + eye the serious cast of certain blank-browed Greek statues; and sometimes + when his imagination, more than his ear, detected a vague tremor in the + tone in which she attempted to make a friendly question seem to have + behind it none of the hollow resonance of absent-mindedness, his + marvelling eyes gave her an answer more eloquent, though much less to the + point, than the one she demanded. + </p> + <p> + She supplied him indeed with much to wonder about, so that he fitted, in + his ignorance, a dozen high-flown theories to her apparent history. She + had married for love and staked her whole soul on it; of that he was + convinced. She hadn’t changed her allegiance to be near Paris and her base + of supplies of millinery; he was sure she had seen her perpetrated mistake + in a light of which her present life, with its conveniences for shopping + and its moral aridity, was the absolute negation. But by what + extraordinary process of the heart—through what mysterious + intermission of that moral instinct which may keep pace with the heart + even when this organ is making unprecedented time—had she fixed her + affections on an insolently frivolous Frenchman? Longmore needed no + telling; he knew that M. de Mauves was both cynical and shallow; these + things were stamped on his eyes, his nose, his mouth, his voice, his + gesture, his step. Of Frenchwomen themselves, when all was said, our young + man, full of nursed discriminations, went in no small fear; they all + seemed to belong to the type of a certain fine lady to whom he had + ventured to present a letter of introduction and whom, directly after his + first visit to her, he had set down in his note-book as “metallic.” Why + should Madame de Mauves have chosen a Frenchwoman’s lot—she whose + nature had an atmospheric envelope absent even from the brightest metals? + He asked her one day frankly if it had cost her nothing to transplant + herself—if she weren’t oppressed with a sense of irreconcileable + difference from “all these people.” She replied nothing at first, till he + feared she might think it her duty to resent a question that made light of + all her husband’s importances. He almost wished she would; it would seem a + proof that her policy of silence had a limit. “I almost grew up here,” she + said at last, “and it was here for me those visions of the future took + shape that we all have when we begin to think or to dream beyond mere + playtime. As matters stand one may be very American and yet arrange it + with one’s conscience to live in Europe. My imagination perhaps—I + had a little when I was younger—helped me to think I should find + happiness here. And after all, for a woman, what does it signify? This + isn’t America, no—this element, but it’s quite as little France. + France is out there beyond the garden, France is in the town and the + forest; but here, close about me, in my room and”—she paused a + moment—“in my mind, it’s a nameless, and doubtless not at all + remarkable, little country of my own. It’s not her country,” she added, + “that makes a woman happy or unhappy.” + </p> + <p> + Madame Clairin, Euphemia’s sister-in-law, might meanwhile have been + supposed to have undertaken the graceful task of making Longmore ashamed + of his uncivil jottings about her sex and nation. Mademoiselle de Mauves, + bringing example to the confirmation of precept, had made a remunerative + match and sacrificed her name to the millions of a prosperous and aspiring + wholesale druggist—a gentleman liberal enough to regard his fortune + as a moderate price for being towed into circles unpervaded by + pharmaceutic odours. His system possibly was sound, but his own + application of it to be deplored. M. Clairin’s head was turned by his good + luck. Having secured an aristocratic wife he adopted an aristocratic vice + and began to gamble at the Bourse. In an evil hour he lost heavily, and + then staked heavily to recover himself. But he was to learn that the law + of compensation works with no such pleasing simplicity, and he rolled to + the dark bottom of his folly. There he felt everything go—his wits, + his courage, his probity, everything that had made him what his fatuous + marriage had so promptly unmade. He walked up the Rue Vivienne with his + hands in his empty pockets and stood half an hour staring confusedly up + and down the brave boulevard. People brushed against him and half a dozen + carriages almost ran over him, until at last a policeman, who had been + watching him for some time, took him by the arm and led him gently away. + He looked at the man’s cocked hat and sword with tears in his eyes; he + hoped for some practical application of the wrath of heaven, something + that would express violently his dead-weight of self-abhorrence. The + sergent de ville, however, only stationed him in the embrasure of a door, + out of harm’s way, and walked off to supervise a financial contest between + an old lady and a cabman. Poor M. Clairin had only been married a year, + but he had had time to measure the great spirit of true children of the + anciens preux. When night had fallen he repaired to the house of a friend + and asked for a night’s lodging; and as his friend, who was simply his old + head book-keeper and lived in a small way, was put to some trouble to + accommodate him, “You must pardon me,” the poor man said, “but I can’t go + home. I’m afraid of my wife!” Toward morning he blew his brains out. His + widow turned the remnants of his property to better account than could + have been expected and wore the very handsomest mourning. It was for this + latter reason perhaps that she was obliged to retrench at other points and + accept a temporary home under her brother’s roof. + </p> + <p> + Fortune had played Madame Clairin a terrible trick, but had found an + adversary and not a victim. Though quite without beauty she had always had + what is called the grand air, and her air from this time forth was grander + than ever. As she trailed about in her sable furbelows, tossing back her + well-dressed head and holding up her vigilant long-handled eyeglass, she + seemed to be sweeping the whole field of society and asking herself where + she should pluck her revenge. Suddenly she espied it, ready made to her + hand, in poor Longmore’s wealth and amiability. American dollars and + American complaisance had made her brother’s fortune; why shouldn’t they + make hers? She overestimated the wealth and misinterpreted the amiability; + for she was sure a man could neither be so contented without being rich + nor so “backward” without being weak. Longmore met her advances with a + formal politeness that covered a good deal of unflattering discomposure. + She made him feel deeply uncomfortable; and though he was at a loss to + conceive how he could be an object of interest to a sharp Parisienne he + had an indefinable sense of being enclosed in a magnetic circle, of having + become the victim of an incantation. If Madame Clairin could have fathomed + his Puritanic soul she would have laid by her wand and her book and + dismissed him for an impossible subject. She gave him a moral chill, and + he never named her to himself save as that dreadful woman—that awful + woman. He did justice to her grand air, but for his pleasure he preferred + the small air of Madame de Mauves; and he never made her his bow, after + standing frigidly passive for five minutes to one of her gracious + overtures to intimacy, without feeling a peculiar desire to ramble away + into the forest, fling himself down on the warm grass and, staring up at + the blue sky, forget that there were any women in nature who didn’t please + like the swaying tree-tops. One day, on his arrival at the house, she met + him in the court with the news that her sister-in-law was shut up with a + headache and that his visit must be for HER. He followed her into the + drawing-room with the best grace at his command, and sat twirling his hat + for half an hour. Suddenly he understood her; her caressing cadences were + so almost explicit an invitation to solicit the charming honour of her + hand. He blushed to the roots of his hair and jumped up with + uncontrollable alacrity; then, dropping a glance at Madame Clairin, who + sat watching him with hard eyes over the thin edge of her smile, perceived + on her brow a flash of unforgiving wrath. It was not pleasing in itself, + but his eyes lingered a moment, for it seemed to show off her character. + What he saw in the picture frightened him and he felt himself murmur “Poor + Madame de Mauves!” His departure was abrupt, and this time he really went + into the forest and lay down on the grass. + </p> + <p> + After which he admired his young countrywoman more than ever; her + intrinsic clearness shone out to him even through the darker shade cast + over it. At the end of a month he received a letter from a friend with + whom he had arranged a tour through the Low Countries, reminding him of + his promise to keep their tryst at Brussels. It was only after his answer + was posted that he fully measured the zeal with which he had declared that + the journey must either be deferred or abandoned—since he couldn’t + possibly leave Saint-Germain. He took a walk in the forest and asked + himself if this were indeed portentously true. Such a truth somehow made + it surely his duty to march straight home and put together his effects. + Poor Webster, who, he knew, had counted ardently on this excursion, was + the best of men; six weeks ago he would have gone through anything to join + poor Webster. It had never been in his books to throw overboard a friend + whom he had loved ten years for a married woman whom he had six weeks—well, + admired. It was certainly beyond question that he hung on at Saint-Germain + because this admirable married woman was there; but in the midst of so + much admiration what had become of his fine old power to conclude? This + was the conduct of a man not judging but drifting, and he had pretended + never to drift. If she were as unhappy as he believed the active sympathy + of such a man would help her very little more than his indifference; if + she were less so she needed no help and could dispense with his + professions. He was sure moreover that if she knew he was staying on her + account she would be extremely annoyed. This very feeling indeed had much + to do with making it hard to go; her displeasure would be the flush on the + snow of the high cold stoicism that touched him to the heart. At moments + withal he assured himself that staying to watch her—and what else + did it come to?—was simply impertinent; it was gross to keep tugging + at the cover of a book so intentionally closed. Then inclination answered + that some day her self-support would fail, and he had a vision of this + exquisite creature calling vainly for help. He would just be her friend to + any length, and it was unworthy of either to think about consequences. He + was a friend, however, who nursed a brooding regret for his not having + known her five years earlier, as well as a particular objection to those + who had smartly anticipated him. It seemed one of fortune’s most mocking + strokes that she should be surrounded by persons whose only merit was that + they threw every side of her, as she turned in her pain, into radiant + relief. + </p> + <p> + Our young man’s growing irritation made it more and more difficult for him + to see any other merit than this in Richard de Mauves. And yet, + disinterestedly, it would have been hard to give a name to the pitiless + perversity lighted by such a conclusion, and there were times when + Longmore was almost persuaded against his finer judgement that he was + really the most considerate of husbands and that it was not a man’s fault + if his wife’s love of life had pitched itself once for all in the minor + key. The Count’s manners were perfect, his discretion irreproachable, and + he seemed never to address his companion but, sentimentally speaking, hat + in hand. His tone to Longmore—as the latter was perfectly aware—was + that of a man of the world to a man not quite of the world; but what it + lacked in true frankness it made up in easy form. “I can’t thank you + enough for having overcome my wife’s shyness,” he more than once declared. + “If we left her to do as she pleased she would—in her youth and her + beauty—bury herself all absurdly alive. Come often, and bring your + good friends and compatriots—some of them are so amusing. She’ll + have nothing to do with mine, but perhaps you’ll be able to offer her + better son affaire.” + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves made these speeches with a bright assurance very amazing to + our hero, who had an innocent belief that a man’s head may point out to + him the shortcomings of his heart and make him ashamed of them. He + couldn’t fancy him formed both to neglect his wife and to take the + derisive view of her minding it. Longmore had at any rate an exasperated + sense that this nobleman thought rather the less of their interesting + friend on account of that very same fine difference of nature which so + deeply stirred his own sympathies. He was rarely present during the + sessions of the American visitor, and he made a daily journey to Paris, + where he had de gros soucis d’affaires as he once mentioned—with an + all-embracing flourish and not in the least in the tone of apology. When + he appeared it was late in the evening and with an imperturbable air of + being on the best of terms with every one and every thing which was + peculiarly annoying if you happened to have a tacit quarrel with him. If + he was an honest man he was an honest man somehow spoiled for confidence. + Something he had, however, that his critic vaguely envied, something in + his address, splendidly positive, a manner rounded and polished by the + habit of conversation and the friction of full experience, an urbanity + exercised for his own sake, not for his neighbour’s, which seemed the + fruit of one of those strong temperaments that rule the inward scene + better than the best conscience. The Count had plainly no sense for + morals, and poor Longmore, who had the finest, would have been glad to + borrow his recipe for appearing then so to range the whole scale of the + senses. What was it that enabled him, short of being a monster with + visibly cloven feet and exhaling brimstone, to misprize so cruelly a + nature like his wife’s and to walk about the world with such a handsome + invincible grin? It was the essential grossness of his imagination, which + had nevertheless helped him to such a store of neat speeches. He could be + highly polite and could doubtless be damnably impertinent, but the life of + the spirit was a world as closed to him as the world of great music to a + man without an ear. It was ten to one he didn’t in the least understand + how his wife felt; he and his smooth sister had doubtless agreed to regard + their relative as a Puritanical little person, of meagre aspirations and + few talents, content with looking at Paris from the terrace and, as a + special treat, having a countryman very much like herself to regale her + with innocent echoes of their native wit. M. de Mauves was tired of his + companion; he liked women who could, frankly, amuse him better. She was + too dim, too delicate, too modest; she had too few arts, too little + coquetry, too much charity. Lighting a cigar some day while he summed up + his situation, her husband had probably decided she was incurably stupid. + It was the same taste, in essence, our young man moralised, as the taste + for M. Gerome and M. Baudry in painting and for M. Gustave Flaubert and M. + Charles Baudelaire in literature. The Count was a pagan and his wife a + Christian, and between them an impassable gulf. He was by race and + instinct a grand seigneur. Longmore had often heard of that historic type, + and was properly grateful for an opportunity to examine it closely. It had + its elegance of outline, but depended on spiritual sources so remote from + those of which he felt the living gush in his own soul that he found + himself gazing at it, in irreconcileable antipathy, through a dim historic + mist. “I’m a modern bourgeois,” he said, “and not perhaps so good a judge + of how far a pretty woman’s tongue may go at supper before the mirrors + properly crack to hear. But I’ve not met one of the rarest of women + without recognising her, without making my reflexion that, charm for + charm, such a maniere d’etre is more ‘fetching’ even than the worst of + Theresa’s songs sung by a dissipated duchess. Wit for wit, I think mine + carries me further.” It was easy indeed to perceive that, as became a + grand seigneur, M. de Mauves had a stock of social principles. He wouldn’t + especially have desired perhaps that his wife should compete in amateur + operettas with the duchesses in question, for the most part of + comparatively recent origin; but he held that a gentleman may take his + amusement where he finds it, that he is quite at liberty not to find it at + home, and that even an adoptive daughter of his house who should hang her + head and have red eyes and allow herself to make any other response to + officious condolence than that her husband’s amusements were his own + affair, would have forfeited every claim to having her finger-tips bowed + over and kissed. And yet in spite of this definite faith Longmore figured + him much inconvenienced by the Countess’s avoidance of betrayals. Did it + dimly occur to him that the principle of this reserve was self-control and + not self-effacement? She was a model to all the inferior matrons of his + line, past and to come, and an occasional “scene” from her at a manageable + hour would have had something reassuring—would have attested her + stupidity rather better than this mere polish of her patience. + </p> + <p> + Longmore would have given much to be able to guess how this latter secret + worked, and he tried more than once, though timidly and awkwardly enough, + to make out the game she was playing. She struck him as having long + resisted the force of cruel evidence, and, as though succumbing to it at + last, having denied herself on simple grounds of generosity the right to + complain. Her faith might have perished, but the sense of her own old deep + perversity remained. He believed her thus quite capable of reproaching + herself with having expected too much and of trying to persuade herself + out of her bitterness by saying that her hopes had been vanities and + follies and that what was before her was simply Life. “I hate tragedy,” + she once said to him; “I’m a dreadful coward about having to suffer or to + bleed. I’ve always tried to believe that—without base concessions—such + extremities may always somehow be dodged or indefinitely postponed. I + should be willing to buy myself off, from having ever to be OVERWHELMED, + by giving up—well, any amusement you like.” She lived evidently in + nervous apprehension of being fatally convinced—of seeing to the end + of her deception. Longmore, when he thought of this, felt the force of his + desire to offer her something of which she could be as sure as of the sun + in heaven. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0004" id="link2H_4_0004"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IV + </h2> + <p> + His friend Webster meanwhile lost no time in accusing him of the basest + infidelity and in asking him what he found at suburban Saint-Germain to + prefer to Van Eyck and Memling, Rubens and Rembrandt. A day or two after + the receipt of this friend’s letter he took a walk with Madame de Mauves + in the forest. They sat down on a fallen log and she began to arrange into + a bouquet the anemones and violets she had gathered. “I’ve a word here,” + he said at last, “from a friend whom I some time ago promised to join in + Brussels. The time has come—it has passed. It finds me terribly + unwilling to leave Saint-Germain.” + </p> + <p> + She looked up with the immediate interest she always showed in his + affairs, but with no hint of a disposition to make a personal application + of his words. “Saint-Germain is pleasant enough, but are you doing + yourself justice? Shan’t you regret in future days that instead of + travelling and seeing cities and monuments and museums and improving your + mind you simply sat here—for instance—on a log and pulled my + flowers to pieces?” + </p> + <p> + “What I shall regret in future days,” he answered after some hesitation, + “is that I should have sat here—sat here so much—and never + have shown what’s the matter with me. I’m fond of museums and monuments + and of improving my mind, and I’m particularly fond of my friend Webster. + But I can’t bring myself to leave Saint-Germain without asking you a + question. You must forgive me if it’s indiscreet and be assured that + curiosity was never more respectful. Are you really as unhappy as I + imagine you to be?” + </p> + <p> + She had evidently not expected his appeal, and, making her change colour, + it took her unprepared. “If I strike you as unhappy,” she none the less + simply said, “I’ve been a poorer friend to you than I wished to be.” + </p> + <p> + “I, perhaps, have been a better friend of yours than you’ve supposed,” he + returned. “I’ve admired your reserve, your courage, your studied gaiety. + But I’ve felt the existence of something beneath them that was more YOU—more + you as I wished to know you—than they were; some trouble in you that + I’ve permitted myself to hate and resent.” + </p> + <p> + She listened all gravely, but without an air of offence, and he felt that + while he had been timorously calculating the last consequences of + friendship she had quietly enough accepted them. “You surprise me,” she + said slowly, and her flush still lingered. “But to refuse to answer you + would confirm some impression in you even now much too strong. Any + ‘trouble’—if you mean any unhappiness—that one can sit + comfortably talking about is an unhappiness with distinct limitations. If + I were examined before a board of commissioners for testing the felicity + of mankind I’m sure I should be pronounced a very fortunate woman.” There + was something that deeply touched him in her tone, and this quality + pierced further as she continued. “But let me add, with all gratitude for + your sympathy, that it’s my own affair altogether. It needn’t disturb you, + my dear sir,” she wound up with a certain quaintness of gaiety, “for I’ve + often found myself in your company contented enough and diverted enough.” + </p> + <p> + “Well, you’re a wonderful woman,” the young man declared, “and I admire + you as I’ve never admired any one. You’re wiser than anything I, for one, + can say to you; and what I ask of you is not to let me advise or console + you, but simply thank you for letting me know you.” He had intended no + such outburst as this, but his voice rang loud and he felt an unfamiliar + joy as he uttered it. + </p> + <p> + She shook her head with some impatience. “Let us be friends—as I + supposed we were going to be—without protestations and fine words. + To have you paying compliments to my wisdom—that would be real + wretchedness. I can dispense with your admiration better than the Flemish + painters can—better than Van Eyck and Rubens, in spite of all their + worshippers. Go join your friend—see everything, enjoy everything, + learn everything, and write me an excellent letter, brimming over with + your impressions. I’m extremely fond of the Dutch painters,” she added + with the faintest quaver in the world, an impressible break of voice that + Longmore had noticed once or twice before and had interpreted as the + sudden weariness, the controlled convulsion, of a spirit self-condemned to + play a part. + </p> + <p> + “I don’t believe you care a button for the Dutch painters,” he said with a + laugh. “But I shall certainly write you a letter.” + </p> + <p> + She rose and turned homeward, thoughtfully rearranging her flowers as she + walked. Little was said; Longmore was asking himself with an agitation of + his own in the unspoken words whether all this meant simply that he was in + love. He looked at the rooks wheeling against the golden-hued sky, between + the tree-tops, but not at his companion, whose personal presence seemed + lost in the felicity she had created. Madame de Mauves was silent and + grave—she felt she had almost grossly failed and she was + proportionately disappointed. An emotional friendship she had not desired; + her scheme had been to pass with her visitor as a placid creature with a + good deal of leisure which she was disposed to devote to profitable + conversation of an impersonal sort. She liked him extremely, she felt in + him the living force of something to which, when she made up her girlish + mind that a needy nobleman was the ripest fruit of time, she had done too + scant justice. They went through the little gate in the garden-wall and + approached the house. On the terrace Madame Clairin was entertaining a + friend—a little elderly gentleman with a white moustache and an + order in his buttonhole. Madame de Mauves chose to pass round the house + into the court; whereupon her sister-in-law, greeting Longmore with an + authoritative nod, lifted her eye-glass and stared at them as they went + by. Longmore heard the little old gentleman uttering some old-fashioned + epigram about “la vieille galanterie francaise”—then by a sudden + impulse he looked at Madame de Mauves and wondered what she was doing in + such a world. She stopped before the house, not asking him to come in. “I + hope you will act on my advice and waste no more time at Saint-Germain.” + </p> + <p> + For an instant there rose to his lips some faded compliment about his time + not being wasted, but it expired before the simple sincerity of her look. + She stood there as gently serious as the angel of disinterestedness, and + it seemed to him he should insult her by treating her words as a bait for + flattery. “I shall start in a day or two,” he answered, “but I won’t + promise you not to come back.” + </p> + <p> + “I hope not,” she said simply. “I expect to be here a long time.” + </p> + <p> + “I shall come and say good-bye,” he returned—which she appeared to + accept with a smile as she went in. + </p> + <p> + He stood a moment, then walked slowly homeward by the terrace. It seemed + to him that to leave her thus, for a gain on which she herself insisted, + was to know her better and admire her more. But he was aware of a vague + ferment of feeling which her evasion of his question half an hour before + had done more to deepen than to allay. In the midst of it suddenly, on the + great terrace of the Chateau, he encountered M. de Mauves, planted there + against the parapet and finishing a cigar. The Count, who, he thought he + made out, had an air of peculiar affability, offered him his white plump + hand. Longmore stopped; he felt a sharp, a sore desire to cry out to him + that he had the most precious wife in the world, that he ought to be + ashamed of himself not to know it, and that for all his grand assurance he + had never looked down into the depths of her eyes. Richard de Mauves, we + have seen, considered he had; but there was doubtless now something in + this young woman’s eyes that had not been there five years before. The two + men conversed formally enough, and M. de Mauves threw off a light bright + remark or two about his visit to America. His tone was not soothing to + Longmore’s excited sensibilities. He seemed to have found the country a + gigantic joke, and his blandness went but so far as to allow that jokes on + that scale are indeed inexhaustible. Longmore was not by habit an + aggressive apologist for the seat of his origin, but the Count’s easy + diagnosis confirmed his worst estimate of French superficiality. He had + understood nothing, felt nothing, learned nothing, and his critic, + glancing askance at his aristocratic profile, declared that if the chief + merit of a long pedigree was to leave one so fatuously stupid he thanked + goodness the Longmores had emerged from obscurity in the present century + and in the person of an enterprising timber-merchant. M. de Mauves dwelt + of course on that prime oddity of the American order—the liberty + allowed the fairer half of the unmarried young, and confessed to some + personal study of the “occasions” it offered to the speculative visitor; a + line of research in which, during a fortnight’s stay, he had clearly spent + his most agreeable hours. “I’m bound to admit,” he said, “that in every + case I was disarmed by the extreme candour of the young lady, and that + they took care of themselves to better purpose than I have seen some + mammas in France take care of them.” Longmore greeted this handsome + concession with the grimmest of smiles and damned his impertinent + patronage. + </p> + <p> + Mentioning, however, at last that he was about to leave Saint-Germain, he + was surprised, without exactly being flattered, by his interlocutor’s + quickened attention. “I’m so very sorry; I hoped we had you for the whole + summer.” Longmore murmured something civil and wondered why M. de Mauves + should care whether he stayed or went. “You’ve been a real resource to + Madame de Mauves,” the Count added; “I assure you I’ve mentally blessed + your visits.” + </p> + <p> + “They were a great pleasure to me,” Longmore said gravely. “Some day I + expect to come back.” + </p> + <p> + “Pray do”—and the Count made a great and friendly point of it. “You + see the confidence I have in you.” Longmore said nothing and M. de Mauves + puffed his cigar reflectively and watched the smoke. “Madame de Mauves,” + he said at last, “is a rather singular person.” And then while our young + man shifted his position and wondered whether he was going to “explain” + Madame de Mauves, “Being, as you are, her fellow countryman,” this lady’s + husband pursued, “I don’t mind speaking frankly. She’s a little + overstrained; the most charming woman in the world, as you see, but a + little volontaire and morbid. Now you see she has taken this extraordinary + fancy for solitude. I can’t get her to go anywhere, to see any one. When + my friends present themselves she’s perfectly polite, but it cures them of + coming again. She doesn’t do herself justice, and I expect every day to + hear two or three of them say to me, ‘Your wife’s jolie a croquer: what a + pity she hasn’t a little esprit.’ You must have found out that she has + really a great deal. But, to tell the whole truth, what she needs is to + forget herself. She sits alone for hours poring over her English books and + looking at life through that terrible brown fog they seem to me—don’t + they?—to fling over the world. I doubt if your English authors,” the + Count went on with a serenity which Longmore afterwards characterised as + sublime, “are very sound reading for young married women. I don’t pretend + to know much about them; but I remember that not long after our marriage + Madame de Mauves undertook to read me one day some passages from a certain + Wordsworth—a poet highly esteemed, it appears, chez vous. It was as + if she had taken me by the nape of the neck and held my head for half an + hour over a basin of soupe aux choux: I felt as if we ought to ventilate + the drawing-room before any one called. But I suppose you know him—ce + genie-la. Every nation has its own ideals of every kind, but when I + remember some of OUR charming writers! I think at all events my wife never + forgave me and that it was a real shock to her to find she had married a + man who had very much the same taste in literature as in cookery. But + you’re a man of general culture, a man of the world,” said M. de Mauves, + turning to Longmore but looking hard at the seal of his watchguard. “You + can talk about everything, and I’m sure you like Alfred de Musset as well + as Monsieur Wordsworth. Talk to her about everything you can, Alfred de + Musset included. Bah! I forgot you’re going. Come back then as soon as + possible and report on your travels. If my wife too would make a little + voyage it would do her great good. It would enlarge her horizon”—and + M. de Mauves made a series of short nervous jerks with his stick in the + air—“it would wake up her imagination. She’s too much of one piece, + you know—it would show her how much one may bend without breaking.” + He paused a moment and gave two or three vigorous puffs. Then turning to + his companion again with eyebrows expressively raised: “I hope you admire + my candour. I beg you to believe I wouldn’t say such things to one of US!” + </p> + <p> + Evening was at hand and the lingering light seemed to charge the air with + faintly golden motes. Longmore stood gazing at these luminous particles; + he could almost have fancied them a swarm of humming insects, the chorus + of a refrain: “She has a great deal of esprit—she has a great deal + of esprit.” “Yes,—she has a great deal,” he said mechanically, + turning to the Count. M. de Mauves glanced at him sharply, as if to ask + what the deuce he was talking about. “She has a great deal of + intelligence,” said Longmore quietly, “a great deal of beauty, a great + many virtues.” + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves busied himself for a moment in lighting another cigar, and + when he had finished, with a return of his confidential smile, “I suspect + you of thinking that I don’t do my wife justice.” he made answer. “Take + care—take care, young man; that’s a dangerous assumption. In general + a man always does his wife justice. More than justice,” the Count laughed—“that + we keep for the wives of other men!” + </p> + <p> + Longmore afterwards remembered in favour of his friend’s fine manner that + he had not measured at this moment the dusky abyss over which it hovered. + Hut a deepening subterranean echo, loudest at the last, lingered on his + spiritual ear. For the present his keenest sensation was a desire to get + away and cry aloud that M. de Mauves was no better than a pompous dunce. + He bade him an abrupt good-night, which was to serve also, he said, as + good-bye. + </p> + <p> + “Decidedly then you go?” It was spoken almost with the note of irritation. + </p> + <p> + “Decidedly.” + </p> + <p> + “But of course you’ll come and take leave—?” His manner implied that + the omission would be uncivil, but there seemed to Longmore himself + something so ludicrous in his taking a lesson in consideration from M. de + Mauves that he put the appeal by with a laugh. The Count frowned as if it + were a new and unpleasant sensation for him to be left at a loss. “Ah you + people have your facons!” he murmured as Longmore turned away, not + foreseeing that he should learn still more about his facons before he had + done with him. + </p> + <p> + Longmore sat down to dinner at his hotel with his usual good intentions, + but in the act of lifting his first glass of wine to his lips he suddenly + fell to musing and set down the liquor untasted. This mood lasted long, + and when he emerged from it his fish was cold; but that mattered little, + for his appetite was gone. That evening he packed his trunk with an + indignant energy. This was so effective that the operation was + accomplished before bedtime, and as he was not in the least sleepy he + devoted the interval to writing two letters, one of them a short note to + Madame de Mauves, which he entrusted to a servant for delivery the next + morning. He had found it best, he said, to leave Saint-Germain + immediately, but he expected to return to Paris early in the autumn. The + other letter was the result of his having remembered a day or two before + that he had not yet complied with Mrs. Draper’s injunction to give her an + account of his impression of her friend. The present occasion seemed + propitious, and he wrote half a dozen pages. His tone, however, was grave, + and Mrs. Draper, on reading him over, was slightly disappointed—she + would have preferred he should have “raved” a little more. But what + chiefly concerns us is the concluding passage. + </p> + <p> + “The only time she ever spoke to me of her marriage,” he wrote, “she + intimated that it had been a perfect love-match. With all abatements, I + suppose, this is what most marriages take themselves to be; but it would + mean in her case, I think, more than in that of most women, for her love + was an absolute idealisation. She believed her husband to be a hero of + rose-coloured romance, and he turns out to be not even a hero of very + sad-coloured reality. For some time now she has been sounding her mistake, + but I don’t believe she has yet touched the bottom. She strikes me as a + person who’s begging off from full knowledge—who has patched up a + peace with some painful truth and is trying a while the experiment of + living with closed eyes. In the dark she tries to see again the gilding on + her idol. Illusion of course is illusion, and one must always pay for it; + but there’s something truly tragical in seeing an earthly penalty levied + on such divine folly as this. As for M. de Mauves he’s a shallow Frenchman + to his fingers’ ends, and I confess I should dislike him for this if he + were a much better man. He can’t forgive his wife for having married him + too extravagantly and loved him too well; since he feels, I suppose, in + some uncorrupted corner of his being that as she originally saw him so he + ought to have been. It disagrees with him somewhere that a little American + bourgeoise should have fancied him a finer fellow than he is or than he at + all wants to be. He hasn’t a glimmering of real acquaintance with his + wife; he can’t understand the stream of passion flowing so clear and + still. To tell the truth I hardly understand it myself, but when I see the + sight I find I greatly admire it. The Count at any rate would have enjoyed + the comfort of believing his wife as bad a case as himself, and you’ll + hardly believe me when I assure you he goes about intimating to gentlemen + whom he thinks it may concern that it would be a convenience to him they + should make love to Madame de Mauves.” + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0005" id="link2H_4_0005"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + V + </h2> + <p> + On reaching Paris Longmore straightaway purchased a Murray’s “Belgium” to + help himself to believe that he would start on the morrow for Brussels; + but when the morrow came it occurred to him that he ought by way of + preparation to acquaint himself more intimately with the Flemish painters + in the Louvre. This took a whole morning, but it did little to hasten his + departure. He had abruptly left Saint-Germain because it seemed to him + that respect for Madame de Mauves required he should bequeath her husband + no reason to suppose he had, as it were, taken a low hint; but now that he + had deferred to that scruple he found himself thinking more and more + ardently of his friend. It was a poor expression of ardour to be lingering + irresolutely on the forsaken boulevard, but he detested the idea of + leaving Saint-Germain five hundred miles behind him. He felt very foolish, + nevertheless, and wandered about nervously, promising himself to take the + next train. A dozen trains started, however, and he was still in Paris. + This inward ache was more than he had bargained for, and as he looked at + the shop-windows he wondered if it represented a “passion.” He had never + been fond of the word and had grown up with much mistrust of what it stood + for. He had hoped that when he should fall “really” in love he should do + it with an excellent conscience, with plenty of confidence and joy, + doubtless, but no strange soreness, no pangs nor regrets. Here was a + sentiment concocted of pity and anger as well as of admiration, and + bristling with scruples and doubts and fears. He had come abroad to enjoy + the Flemish painters and all others, but what fair-tressed saint of Van + Eyck or Memling was so interesting a figure as the lonely lady of + Saint-Germain? His restless steps carried him at last out of the long + villa-bordered avenue which leads to the Bois de Boulogne. + </p> + <p> + Summer had fairly begun and the drive beside the lake was empty, but there + were various loungers on the benches and chairs, and the great cafe had an + air of animation. Longmore’s walk had given him an appetite, and he went + into the establishment and demanded a dinner, remarking for the hundredth + time, as he admired the smart little tables disposed in the open air, how + much better (than anywhere else) they ordered this matter in France. “Will + monsieur dine in the garden or in the salon?” the waiter blandly asked. + Longmore chose the garden and, observing that a great cluster of June + roses was trained over the wall of the house, placed himself at a table + near by, where the best of dinners was served him on the whitest of linen + and in the most shining of porcelain. It so happened that his table was + near a window and that as he sat he could look into a corner of the salon. + So it was that his attention rested on a lady seated just within the + window, which was open, face to face apparently with a companion who was + concealed by the curtain. She was a very pretty woman, and Longmore looked + at her as often as was consistent with good manners. After a while he even + began to wonder who she was and finally to suspect that she was one of + those ladies whom it is no breach of good manners to look at as often as + you like. Our young man too, if he had been so disposed, would have been + the more free to give her all his attention that her own was fixed upon + the person facing her. She was what the French call a belle brune, and + though Longmore, who had rather a conservative taste in such matters, was + but half-charmed by her bold outlines and even braver complexion, he + couldn’t help admiring her expression of basking contentment. + </p> + <p> + She was evidently very happy, and her happiness gave her an air of + innocence. The talk of her friend, whoever he was, abundantly suited her + humour, for she sat listening to him with a broad idle smile and + interrupting him fitfully, while she crunched her bonbons, with a murmured + response, presumably as broad, which appeared to have the effect of + launching him again. She drank a great deal of champagne and ate an + immense number of strawberries, and was plainly altogether a person with + an impartial relish for strawberries, champagne and what she doubtless + would have called betises. + </p> + <p> + They had half-finished dinner when Longmore sat down, and he was still in + his place when they rose. She had hung her bonnet on a nail above her + chair, and her companion passed round the table to take it down for her. + As he did so she bent her head to look at a wine-stain on her dress, and + in the movement exposed the greater part of the back of a very handsome + neck. The gentleman observed it, and observed also, apparently, that the + room beyond them was empty; that he stood within eyeshot of Longmore he + failed to observe. He stooped suddenly and imprinted a gallant kiss on the + fair expanse. In the author of this tribute Longmore then recognised + Richard de Mauves. The lady to whom it had been rendered put on her + bonnet, using his flushed smile as a mirror, and in a moment they passed + through the garden on their way to their carriage. Then for the first time + M. de Mauves became aware of his wife’s young friend. He measured with a + rapid glance this spectator’s relation to the open window and checked + himself in the impulse to stop and speak to him. He contented himself with + bowing all imperturbably as he opened the gate for his companion. + </p> + <p> + That evening Longmore made a railway journey, but not to Brussels. He had + effectually ceased to care for Brussels; all he cared for in the world now + was Madame de Mauves. The air of his mind had had a sudden clearing-up; + pity and anger were still throbbing there, but they had space to range at + their pleasure, for doubts and scruples had abruptly departed. It was + little, he felt, that he could interpose between her resignation and the + indignity of her position; but that little, if it involved the sacrifice + of everything that bound him to the tranquil past, he could offer her with + a rapture which at last made stiff resistance a terribly inferior + substitute for faith. Nothing in his tranquil past had given such a zest + to consciousness as this happy sense of choosing to go straight back to + Saint-Germain. How to justify his return, how to explain his ardour, + troubled him little. He wasn’t even sure he wished to be understood; he + wished only to show how little by any fault of his Madame de Mauves was + alone so with the harshness of fate. He was conscious of no distinct + desire to “make love” to her; if he could have uttered the essence of his + longing he would have said that he wished her to remember that in a world + coloured grey to her vision by the sense of her mistake there was one + vividly honest man. She might certainly have remembered it, however, + without his coming back to remind her; and it is not to be denied that as + he waited for the morrow he longed immensely for the sound of her voice. + </p> + <p> + He waited the next day till his usual hour of calling—the late + afternoon; but he learned at the door that the mistress of the house was + not at home. The servant offered the information that she was walking a + little way in the forest. Longmore went through the garden and out of the + small door into the lane, and, after half an hour’s vain exploration, saw + her coming toward him at the end of a green by-path. As he appeared she + stopped a moment, as if to turn aside; then recognising him she slowly + advanced and had presently taken the hand he held out. + </p> + <p> + “Nothing has happened,” she said with her beautiful eyes on him. “You’re + not ill?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing except that when I got to Paris I found how fond I had grown of + Saint-Germain.” + </p> + <p> + She neither smiled nor looked flattered; it seemed indeed to Longmore that + she took his reappearance with no pleasure. But he was uncertain, for he + immediately noted that in his absence the whole character of her face had + changed. It showed him something momentous had happened. It was no longer + self-contained melancholy that he read in her eyes, but grief and + agitation which had lately struggled with the passionate love of peace + ruling her before all things else, and forced her to know that deep + experience is never peaceful. She was pale and had evidently been shedding + tears. He felt his heart beat hard—he seemed now to touch her + secret. She continued to look at him with a clouded brow, as if his return + had surrounded her with complications too great to be disguised by a + colourless welcome. For some moments, as he turned and walked beside her, + neither spoke; then abruptly, “Tell me truly, Mr. Longmore,” she said, + “why you’ve come back.” He inclined himself to her, almost pulling up + again, with an air that startled her into a certainty of what she had + feared. “Because I’ve learned the real answer to the question I asked you + the other day. You’re not happy—you’re too good to be happy on the + terms offered you. Madame de Mauves,” he went on with a gesture which + protested against a gesture of her own, “I can’t be happy, you know, when + you’re as little so as I make you out. I don’t care for anything so long + as I only feel helpless and sore about you. I found during those dreary + days in Paris that the thing in life I most care for is this daily + privilege of seeing you. I know it’s very brutal to tell you I admire you; + it’s an insult to you to treat you as if you had complained to me or + appealed to me. But such a friendship as I waked up to there”—and he + tossed his head toward the distant city—“is a potent force, I assure + you. When forces are stupidly stifled they explode. However,” he went on, + “if you had told me every trouble in your heart it would have mattered + little; I couldn’t say more than I—that if that in life from which + you’ve hoped most has given you least, this devoted respect of mine will + refuse no service and betray no trust.” + </p> + <p> + She had begun to make marks in the earth with the point of her parasol, + but she stopped and listened to him in perfect immobility—immobility + save for the appearance by the time he had stopped speaking of a flush in + her guarded clearness. Such as it was it told Longmore she was moved, and + his first perceiving it was the happiest moment of his life. She raised + her eyes at last, and they uttered a plea for non-insistence that + unspeakably touched him. + </p> + <p> + “Thank you—thank you!” she said calmly enough; but the next moment + her own emotion baffled this pretence, a convulsion shook her for ten + seconds and she burst into tears. Her tears vanished as quickly as they + came, but they did Longmore a world of good. He had always felt + indefinably afraid of her; her being had somehow seemed fed by a deeper + faith and a stronger will than his own; but her half-dozen smothered sobs + showed him the bottom of her heart and convinced him she was weak enough + to be grateful. “Excuse me,” she said; “I’m too nervous to listen to you. + I believe I could have dealt with an enemy to-day, but I can’t bear up + under a friend.” + </p> + <p> + “You’re killing yourself with stoicism—that’s what is the matter + with you!” he cried. “Listen to a friend for his own sake if not for + yours. I’ve never presumed to offer you an atom of compassion, and you + can’t accuse yourself of an abuse of charity.” + </p> + <p> + She looked about her as under the constraint of this appeal, but it + promised him a reluctant attention. Noting, however, by the wayside the + fallen log on which they had rested a few evenings before, she went and + sat down on it with a resigned grace while the young man, silent before + her and watching her, took from her the mute assurance that if she was + charitable now he must at least be very wise. + </p> + <p> + “Something came to my knowledge yesterday,” he said as he sat down beside + her, “which gave me an intense impression of your loneliness. You’re truth + itself, and there’s no truth about you. You believe in purity and duty and + dignity, and you live in a world in which they’re daily belied. I ask + myself with vain rage how you ever came into such a world, and why the + perversity of fate never let me know you before.” + </p> + <p> + She waited a little; she looked down, straight before her. “I like my + ‘world’ no better than you do, and it was not for its own sake I came into + it. But what particular group of people is worth pinning one’s faith upon? + I confess it sometimes seems to me men and women are very poor creatures. + I suppose I’m too romantic and always was. I’ve an unfortunate taste for + poetic fitness. Life’s hard prose, and one must learn to read prose + contentedly. I believe I once supposed all the prose to be in America, + which was very foolish. What I thought, what I believed, what I expected, + when I was an ignorant girl fatally addicted to falling in love with my + own theories, is more than I can begin to tell you now. Sometimes when I + remember certain impulses, certain illusions of those days they take away + my breath, and I wonder that my false point of view hasn’t led me into + troubles greater than any I’ve now to lament. I had a conviction which + you’d probably smile at if I were to attempt to express it to you. It was + a singular form for passionate faith to take, but it had all of the + sweetness and the ardour of passionate faith. It led me to take a great + step, and it lies behind me now, far off, a vague deceptive form melting + in the light of experience. It has faded, but it hasn’t vanished. Some + feelings, I’m sure, die only with ourselves; some illusions are as much + the condition of our life as our heart-beats. They say that life itself is + an illusion—that this world is a shadow of which the reality is yet + to come. Life is all of a piece then and there’s no shame in being + miserably human. As for my loneliness, it doesn’t greatly matter; it is + the fault in part of my obstinacy. There have been times when I’ve been + frantically distressed and, to tell you the truth, wretchedly homesick, + because my maid—a jewel of a maid—lied to me with every second + breath. There have been moments when I’ve wished I was the daughter of a + poor New England minister—living in a little white house under a + couple of elms and doing all the housework.” + </p> + <p> + She had begun to speak slowly, with reserve and effort; but she went on + quickly and as if talk were at last a relief. “My marriage introduced me + to people and things which seemed to me at first very strange and then + very horrible, and then, to tell the truth, of very little importance. At + first I expended a great deal of sorrow and dismay and pity on it all; but + there soon came a time when I began to wonder if it were worth one’s + tears. If I could tell you the eternal friendships I’ve seen broken, the + inconsolable woes consoled, the jealousies and vanities scrambling to + outdo each other, you’d agree with me that tempers like yours and mine can + understand neither such troubles nor such compensations. A year ago, while + I was in the country, a friend of mine was in despair at the infidelity of + her husband; she wrote me a most dolorous letter, and on my return to + Paris I went immediately to see her. A week had elapsed, and as I had seen + stranger things I thought she might have recovered her spirits. Not at + all; she was still in despair—but at what? At the conduct, the + abandoned, shameless conduct of—well of a lady I’ll call Madame de + T. You’ll imagine of course that Madame de T. was the lady whom my + friend’s husband preferred to his wife. Far from it; he had never seen + her. Who then was Madame de T.? Madame de T. was cruelly devoted to M. de + V. And who was M. de V.? M. de V. was—well, in two words again, my + friend was cultivating two jealousies at once. I hardly know what I said + to her; something at any rate that she found unpardonable, for she quite + gave me up. Shortly afterwards my husband proposed we should cease to live + in Paris, and I gladly assented, for I believe I had taken a turn of + spirits that made me a detestable companion. I should have preferred to go + quite into the country, into Auvergne, where my husband has a house. But + to him Paris in some degree is necessary, and Saint-Germain has been a + conscious compromise.” + </p> + <p> + “A conscious compromise!” Longmore expressively repeated. “That’s your + whole life.” + </p> + <p> + “It’s the life of many people,” she made prompt answer—“of most + people of quiet tastes, and it’s certainly better than acute distress. + One’s at a loss theoretically to defend compromises; but if I found a poor + creature who had managed to arrive at one I should think myself not + urgently called to expose its weak side.” But she had no sooner uttered + these words than she laughed all amicably, as if to mitigate their too + personal application. + </p> + <p> + “Heaven forbid one should do that unless one has something better to + offer,” Longmore returned. “And yet I’m haunted by the dream of a life in + which you should have found no compromises, for they’re a perversion of + natures that tend only to goodness and rectitude. As I see it you should + have found happiness serene, profound, complete; a femme de chambre not a + jewel perhaps, but warranted to tell but one fib a day; a society possibly + rather provincial, but—in spite of your poor opinion of mankind—a + good deal of solid virtue; jealousies and vanities very tame, and no + particular iniquities and adulteries. A husband,” he added after a moment—“a + husband of your own faith and race and spiritual substance, who would have + loved you well.” + </p> + <p> + She rose to her feet, shaking her head. “You’re very kind to go to the + expense of such dazzling visions for me. Visions are vain things; we must + make the best of the reality we happen to be in for.” + </p> + <p> + “And yet,” said Longmore, provoked by what seemed the very wantonness of + her patience, “the reality YOU ‘happen to be in for’ has, if I’m not in + error, very recently taken a shape that keenly tests your philosophy.” + </p> + <p> + She seemed on the point of replying that his sympathy was too zealous; but + a couple of impatient tears in his eyes proved it founded on a devotion of + which she mightn’t make light. “Ah philosophy?” she echoed. “I HAVE none. + Thank heaven,” she cried with vehemence, “I have none! I believe, Mr. + Longmore,” she added in a moment, “that I’ve nothing on earth but a + conscience—it’s a good time to tell you so—nothing but a + dogged obstinate clinging conscience. Does that prove me to be indeed of + your faith and race, and have you one yourself for which you can say as + much? I don’t speak in vanity, for I believe that if my conscience may + prevent me from doing anything very base it will effectually prevent me + also from doing anything very fine.” + </p> + <p> + “I’m delighted to hear it,” her friend returned with high emphasis—“that + proves we’re made for each other. It’s very certain I too shall never cut + a great romantic figure. And yet I’ve fancied that in my case the + unaccommodating organ we speak of might be blinded and gagged a while, in + a really good cause, if not turned out of doors. In yours,” he went on + with the same appealing irony, “is it absolutely beyond being ‘squared’?” + </p> + <p> + But she made no concession to his tone. “Don’t laugh at your conscience,” + she answered gravely; “that’s the only blasphemy I know.” + </p> + <p> + She had hardly spoken when she turned suddenly at an unexpected sound, and + at the same moment he heard a footstep in an adjacent by-path which + crossed their own at a short distance from where they stood. + </p> + <p> + “It’s M. de Mauves,” she said at once; with which she moved slowly + forward. Longmore, wondering how she knew without seeing, had overtaken + her by the time her husband came into view. A solitary walk in the forest + was a pastime to which M. de Mauves was not addicted, but he seemed on + this occasion to have resorted to it with some equanimity. He was smoking + a fragrant cigar and had thrust his thumb into the armhole of his + waistcoat with the air of a man thinking at his ease. He stopped short + with surprise on seeing his wife and her companion, and his surprise had + for Longmore even the pitch of impertinence. He glanced rapidly from one + to the other, fixed the young man’s own look sharply a single instant and + then lifted his hat with formal politeness. + </p> + <p> + “I was not aware,” he said, turning to Madame de Mauves, “that I might + congratulate you on the return of monsieur.” + </p> + <p> + “You should at once have known it,” she immediately answered, “if I had + expected such a pleasure.” + </p> + <p> + She had turned very pale, and Longmore felt this to be a first meeting + after some commotion. “My return was unexpected to myself,” he said to her + husband. “I came back last night.” + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves seemed to express such satisfaction as could consort with a + limited interest. “It’s needless for me to make you welcome. Madame de + Mauves knows the duties of hospitality.” And with another bow he continued + his walk. + </p> + <p> + She pursued her homeward course with her friend, neither of them + pretending much not to consent to appear silent. The Count’s few moments + with them had both chilled Longmore and angered him, casting a shadow + across a prospect which had somehow, just before, begun to open and almost + to brighten. He watched his companion narrowly as they went, and wondered + what she had last had to suffer. Her husband’s presence had checked her + disposition to talk, though nothing betrayed she had recognised his making + a point at her expense. Yet if matters were none the less plainly at a + crisis between them he could but wonder vainly what it was on her part + that prevented some practical protest or some rupture. What did she + suspect?—how much did she know? To what was she resigned?—how + much had she forgiven? How, above all, did she reconcile with knowledge, + or with suspicion, that intense consideration she had just now all but + assured him she entertained? “She has loved him once,” Longmore said with + a sinking of the heart, “and with her to love once is to commit herself + for ever. Her clever husband thinks her too prim. What would a stupid poet + call it?” He relapsed with aching impotence into the sense of her being + somehow beyond him, unattainable, immeasurable by his own fretful logic. + Suddenly he gave three passionate switches in the air with his cane which + made Madame de Mauves look round. She could hardly have guessed their + signifying that where ambition was so vain the next best thing to it was + the very ardour of hopelessness. + </p> + <p> + She found in her drawing-room the little elderly Frenchman, M. de + Chalumeau, whom Longmore had observed a few days before on the terrace. On + this occasion too Madame Clairin was entertaining him, but as her + sister-in-law came in she surrendered her post and addressed herself to + our hero. Longmore, at thirty, was still an ingenuous youth, and there was + something in this lady’s large assured attack that fairly intimidated him. + He was doubtless not as reassured as he ought to have been at finding he + had not absolutely forfeited her favour by his want of resource during + their last interview, and a suspicion of her being prepared to approach + him on another line completed his distress. + </p> + <p> + “So you’ve returned from Brussels by way of the forest?” she archly asked. + </p> + <p> + “I’ve not been to Brussels. I returned yesterday from Paris by the only + way—by the train.” + </p> + <p> + Madame Clairin was infinitely struck. “I’ve never known a person at all to + be so fond of Saint-Germain. They generally declare it’s horribly dull.” + </p> + <p> + “That’s not very polite to you,” said Longmore, vexed at his lack of + superior form and determined not to be abashed. + </p> + <p> + “Ah what have I to do with it?” Madame Clairin brightly wailed. “I’m the + dullest thing here. They’ve not had, other gentlemen, your success with my + sister-in-law.” + </p> + <p> + “It would have been very easy to have it. Madame de Mauves is kindness + itself.” + </p> + <p> + She swung open her great fan. “To her own countrymen!” + </p> + <p> + Longmore remained silent; he hated the tone of this conversation. + </p> + <p> + The speaker looked at him a little and then took in their hostess, to whom + M. de Chalumeau was serving up another epigram, which the charming + creature received with a droop of the head and eyes that strayed through + the window. “Don’t pretend to tell me,” Madame Clairin suddenly exhaled, + “that you’re not in love with that pretty woman.” + </p> + <p> + “Allons donc!” cried Longmore in the most inspired French he had ever + uttered. He rose the next minute and took a hasty farewell. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0006" id="link2H_4_0006"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VI + </h2> + <p> + He allowed several days to pass without going back; it was of a sublime + suitability to appear to regard his friend’s frankness during their last + interview as a general invitation. The sacrifice cost him a great effort, + for hopeless passions are exactly not the most patient; and he had + moreover a constant fear that if, as he believed, deep within the circle + round which he could only hover, the hour of supreme explanations had + come, the magic of her magnanimity might convert M. de Mauves. Vicious + men, it was abundantly recorded, had been so converted as to be acceptable + to God, and the something divine in this lady’s composition would sanctify + any means she should choose to employ. Her means, he kept repeating, were + no business of his, and the essence of his admiration ought to be to allow + her to do as she liked; but he felt as if he should turn away into a world + out of which most of the joy had departed if she should like, after all, + to see nothing more in his interest in her than might be repaid by mere + current social coin. + </p> + <p> + When at last he went back he found to his vexation that he was to run the + gauntlet of Madame Clairin’s officious hospitality. It was one of the + first mornings of perfect summer, and the drawing-room, through the open + windows, was flooded with such a confusion of odours and bird-notes as + might warrant the hope that Madame de Mauves would renew with him for an + hour or two the exploration of the forest. Her sister-in-law, however, + whose hair was not yet dressed, emerged like a brassy discord in a maze of + melody. At the same moment the servant returned with his mistress’s + regrets; she begged to be excused, she was indisposed and unable to see + Mr. Longmore. The young man knew just how disappointed he looked and just + what Madame Clairin thought of it, and this consciousness determined in + him an attitude of almost aggressive frigidity. This was apparently what + she desired. She wished to throw him off his balance and, if she was not + mistaken, knew exactly how. + </p> + <p> + “Put down your hat, Mr. Longmore,” she said, “and be polite for once. You + were not at all polite the other day when I asked you that friendly + question about the state of your heart.” + </p> + <p> + “I HAVE no heart—to talk about,” he returned with as little grace. + </p> + <p> + “As well say you’ve none at all. I advise you to cultivate a little + eloquence; you may have use for it. That was not an idle question of mine; + I don’t ask idle questions. For a couple of months now that you’ve been + coming and going among us it seems to me you’ve had very few to answer of + any sort.” + </p> + <p> + “I’ve certainly been very well treated,” he still dryly allowed. + </p> + <p> + His companion waited ever so little to bring out: “Have you never felt + disposed to ask any?” + </p> + <p> + Her look, her tone, were so charged with insidious meanings as to make him + feel that even to understand her would savour of dishonest complicity. + “What is it you have to tell me?” he cried with a flushed frown. + </p> + <p> + Her own colour rose at the question. It’s rather hard, when you come + bearing yourself very much as the sibyl when she came to the Roman king, + to be treated as something worse than a vulgar gossip. “I might tell you, + monsieur,” she returned, “that you’ve as bad a ton as any young man I ever + met. Where have you lived—what are your ideas? A stupid one of my + own—possibly!—has been to call your attention to a fact that + it takes some delicacy to touch upon. You’ve noticed, I suppose, that my + sister-in-law isn’t the happiest woman in the world.” + </p> + <p> + “Oh!”—Longmore made short work of it. + </p> + <p> + She seemed to measure his intelligence a little uncertainly. “You’ve + formed, I suppose,” she nevertheless continued, “your conception of the + grounds of her discontent?” + </p> + <p> + “It hasn’t required much forming. The grounds—or at least a specimen + or two of them—have simply stared me in the face.” + </p> + <p> + Madame Clairin considered a moment with her eyes on him. “Yes—ces + choses-la se voient. My brother, in a single word, has the deplorable + habit of falling in love with other women. I don’t judge him; I don’t + judge my sister-in-law. I only permit myself to say that in her position I + would have managed otherwise. I’d either have kept my husband’s affection + or I’d have frankly done without it. But my sister’s an odd compound; I + don’t profess to understand her. Therefore it is, in a measure, that I + appeal to you, her fellow countryman. Of course you’ll be surprised at my + way of looking at the matter, and I admit that it’s a way in use only + among people whose history—that of a race—has cultivated in + them the sense for high political solutions.” She paused and Longmore + wondered where the history of her race was going to lead her. But she + clearly saw her course. “There has never been a galant homme among us, I + fear, who has not given his wife, even when she was very charming, the + right to be jealous. We know our history for ages back, and the fact’s + established. It’s not a very edifying one if you like, but it’s something + to have scandals with pedigrees—if you can’t have them with + attenuations. Our men have been Frenchmen of France, and their wives—I + may say it—have been of no meaner blood. You may see all their + portraits at our poor charming old house—every one of them an + ‘injured’ beauty, but not one of them hanging her head. Not one of them + ever had the bad taste to be jealous, and yet not one in a dozen ever + consented to an indiscretion—allowed herself, I mean, to be talked + about. Voila comme elles ont su s’arranger. How they did it—go and + look at the dusky faded canvases and pastels and ask. They were dear brave + women of wit. When they had a headache they put on a little rouge and came + to supper as usual, and when they had a heart-ache they touched up that + quarter with just such another brush. These are great traditions and + charming precedents, I hold, and it doesn’t seem to me fair that a little + American bourgeoise should come in and pretend to alter them—all to + hang her modern photograph and her obstinate little air penche in the + gallery of our shrewd great-grandmothers. She should fall into line, she + should keep up the tone. When she married my brother I don’t suppose she + took him for a member of a societe de bonnes oeuvres. I don’t say we’re + right; who IS right? But we are as history has made us, and if any one’s + to change it had better be our charming, but not accommodating, friend.” + Again Madame Clairin paused, again she opened and closed her great modern + fan, which clattered like the screen of a shop-window. “Let her keep up + the tone!” she prodigiously repeated. + </p> + <p> + Longmore felt himself gape, but he gasped an “Ah!” to cover it. Madame + Clairin’s dip into the family annals had apparently imparted an honest + zeal to her indignation. “For a long time,” she continued, “my belle-soeur + has been taking the attitude of an injured woman, affecting a disgust with + the world and shutting herself up to read free-thinking books. I’ve never + permitted myself, you may believe, the least observation on her conduct, + but I can’t accept it as the last word either of taste or of tact. When a + woman with her prettiness lets her husband stray away she deserves no + small part of her fate. I don’t wish you to agree with me—on the + contrary; but I call such a woman a pure noodle. She must have bored him + to death. What has passed between them for many months needn’t concern us; + what provocation my sister has had—monstrous, if you wish—what + ennui my brother has suffered. It’s enough that a week ago, just after you + had ostensibly gone to Brussels, something happened to produce an + explosion. She found a letter in his pocket, a photograph, a trinket, que + sais-je? At any rate there was a grand scene. I didn’t listen at the + keyhole, and I don’t know what was said; but I’ve reason to believe that + my poor brother was hauled over the coals as I fancy none of his ancestors + have ever been—even by angry ladies who weren’t their wives.” + </p> + <p> + Longmore had leaned forward in silent attention with his elbows on his + knees, and now, impulsively, he dropped his face into his hands. “Ah poor + poor woman!” + </p> + <p> + “Voila!” said Madame Clairin. “You pity her.” + </p> + <p> + “Pity her?” cried Longmore, looking up with ardent eyes and forgetting the + spirit of the story to which he had been treated in the miserable facts. + “Don’t you?” + </p> + <p> + “A little. But I’m not acting sentimentally—I’m acting + scientifically. We’ve always been capable of ideas. I want to arrange + things; to see my brother free to do as he chooses; to see his wife + contented. Do you understand me?” + </p> + <p> + “Very well, I think,” the young man said. “You’re the most immoral person + I’ve lately had the privilege of conversing with.” + </p> + <p> + Madame Clairin took it calmly. “Possibly. When was ever a great peacemaker + not immoral?” + </p> + <p> + “Ah no,” Longmore protested. “You’re too superficial to be a great + peacemaker. You don’t begin to know anything about Madame de Mauves.” + </p> + <p> + She inclined her head to one side while her fine eyes kept her visitor in + view; she mused a moment and then smiled as with a certain compassionate + patience. “It’s not in my interest to contradict you.” + </p> + <p> + “It would be in your interest to learn, madam” he resolutely returned, + “what honest men most admire in a woman—and to recognise it when you + see it.” + </p> + <p> + She was wonderful—she waited a moment. “So you ARE in love!” she + then effectively brought out. + </p> + <p> + For a moment he thought of getting up, but he decided to stay. “I wonder + if you’d understand me,” he said at last, “if I were to tell you that I + have for Madame de Mauves the most devoted and most respectful + friendship?” + </p> + <p> + “You underrate my intelligence. But in that case you ought to exert your + influence to put an end to these painful domestic scenes.” + </p> + <p> + “Do you imagine she talks to me about her domestic scenes?” Longmore + cried. + </p> + <p> + His companion stared. “Then your friendship isn’t returned?” And as he but + ambiguously threw up his hands, “Now, at least,” she added, “she’ll have + something to tell you. I happen to know the upshot of my brother’s last + interview with his wife.” Longmore rose to his feet as a protest against + the indelicacy of the position into which he had been drawn; but all that + made him tender made him curious, and she caught in his averted eyes an + expression that prompted her to strike her blow. “My brother’s absurdly + entangled with a certain person in Paris; of course he ought not to be, + but he wouldn’t be my brother if he weren’t. It was this irregular passion + that dictated his words. ‘Listen to me, madam,’ he cried at last; ‘let us + live like people who understand life! It’s unpleasant to be forced to say + such things outright, but you’ve a way of bringing one down to the + rudiments. I’m faithless, I’m heartless, I’m brutal, I’m everything + horrible—it’s understood. Take your revenge, console yourself: + you’re too charming a woman to have anything to complain of. Here’s a + handsome young man sighing himself into a consumption for you. Listen to + your poor compatriot and you’ll find that virtue’s none the less becoming + for being good-natured. You’ll see that it’s not after all such a doleful + world and that there’s even an advantage in having the most impudent of + husbands.”’ Madame Clairin paused; Longmore had turned very pale. “You may + believe it,” she amazingly pursued; “the speech took place in my presence; + things were done in order. And now, monsieur”—this with a wondrous + strained grimace which he was too troubled at the moment to appreciate, + but which he remembered later with a kind of awe—“we count on you!” + </p> + <p> + “Her husband said this to her face to face, as you say it to me now?” he + asked after a silence. + </p> + <p> + “Word for word and with the most perfect politeness.” + </p> + <p> + “And Madame de Mauves—what did she say?” + </p> + <p> + Madame Clairin smiled again. “To such a speech as that a woman says—nothing. + She had been sitting with a piece of needlework, and I think she hadn’t + seen Richard since their quarrel the day before. He came in with the + gravity of an ambassador, and I’m sure that when he made his demande en + mariage his manner wasn’t more respectful. He only wanted white gloves!” + said Longmore’s friend. “My belle-soeur sat silent a few moments, drawing + her stitches, and then without a word, without a glance, walked out of the + room. It was just what she SHOULD have done!” + </p> + <p> + “Yes,” the young man repeated, “it was just what she should have done.” + </p> + <p> + “And I, left alone with my brother, do you know what I said?” + </p> + <p> + Longmore shook his head. + </p> + <p> + “Mauvals sujet!” he suggested. + </p> + <p> + “‘You’ve done me the honour,’ I said, ‘to take this step in my presence. I + don’t pretend to qualify it. You know what you’re about, and it’s your own + affair. But you may confide in my discretion.’ Do you think he has had + reason to complain of it?” She received no answer; her visitor had slowly + averted himself; he passed his gloves mechanically round the band of his + hat. “I hope,” she cried, “you’re not going to start for Brussels!” + </p> + <p> + Plainly he was much disturbed, and Madame Clairin might congratulate + herself on the success of her plea for old-fashioned manners. And yet + there was something that left her more puzzled than satisfied in the + colourless tone with which he answered, “No, I shall remain here for the + present.” The processes of his mind were unsociably private, and she could + have fancied for a moment that he was linked with their difficult friend + in some monstrous conspiracy of asceticism. + </p> + <p> + “Come this evening,” she nevertheless bravely resumed. “The rest will take + care of itself. Meanwhile I shall take the liberty of telling my + sister-in-law that I’ve repeated—in short, that I’ve put you au + fait” + </p> + <p> + He had a start but he controlled himself, speaking quietly enough. “Tell + her what you please. Nothing you can tell her will affect her conduct.” + </p> + <p> + “Voyons! Do you mean to tell me that a woman young, pretty, sentimental, + neglected, wronged if you will—? I see you don’t believe it. Believe + simply in your own opportunity!” she went on. “But for heaven’s sake, if + it is to lead anywhere, don’t come back with that visage de croquemort. + You look as if you were going to bury your heart—not to offer it to + a pretty woman. You’re much better when you smile—you’re very nice + then. Come, do yourself justice.” + </p> + <p> + He remained a moment face to face with her, but his expression didn’t + change. “I shall do myself justice,” he however after an instant made + answer; and abruptly, with a bow, he took his departure. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0007" id="link2H_4_0007"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VII + </h2> + <p> + He felt, when he found himself unobserved and outside, that he must plunge + into violent action, walk fast and far and defer the opportunity for + thought. He strode away into the forest, swinging his cane, throwing back + his head, casting his eyes into verdurous vistas and following the road + without a purpose. He felt immensely excited, but could have given no + straight name to his agitation. It was a joy as all increase of freedom is + joyous; something seemed to have been cleared out of his path and his + destiny to have rounded a cape and brought him into sight of an open sea. + But it was a pain in the degree in which his freedom somehow resolved + itself into the need of despising all mankind with a single exception; and + the fact that Madame de Mauves inhabited a planet contaminated by the + presence of the baser multitude kept elation from seeming a pledge of + ideal bliss. + </p> + <p> + There she was, at any rate, and circumstances now forced them to be + intimate. She had ceased to have what men call a secret for him, and this + fact itself brought with it a sort of rapture. He had no prevision that he + should “profit,” in the vulgar sense, by the extraordinary position into + which they had been thrown; it might be but a cruel trick of destiny to + make hope a harsher mockery and renunciation a keener suffering. But above + all this rose the conviction that she could do nothing that wouldn’t + quicken his attachment. It was this conviction that gross accident—all + odious in itself—would force the beauty of her character into more + perfect relief for him that made him stride along as if he were + celebrating a spiritual feast. He rambled at hazard for a couple of hours, + finding at last that he had left the forest behind him and had wandered + into an unfamiliar region. It was a perfectly rural scene, and the still + summer day gave it a charm for which its meagre elements but half + accounted. + </p> + <p> + He thought he had never seen anything so characteristically French; all + the French novels seemed to have described it, all the French landscapists + to have painted it. The fields and trees were of a cool metallic green; + the grass looked as if it might stain his trousers and the foliage his + hands. The clear light had a mild greyness, the sheen of silver, not of + gold, was in the work-a-day sun. A great red-roofed high-stacked + farmhouse, with whitewashed walls and a straggling yard, surveyed the + highroad, on one side, from behind a transparent curtain of poplars. A + narrow stream half-choked with emerald rushes and edged with grey aspens + occupied the opposite quarter. The meadows rolled and sloped away gently + to the low horizon, which was barely concealed by the continuous line of + clipped and marshalled trees. The prospect was not rich, but had a frank + homeliness that touched the young man’s fancy. It was full of light + atmosphere and diffused clearness, and if it was prosaic it was somehow + sociable. + </p> + <p> + Longmore was disposed to walk further, and he advanced along the road + beneath the poplars. In twenty minutes he came to a village which + straggled away to the right, among orchards and potagers. On the left, at + a stone’s throw from the road, stood a little pink-faced inn which + reminded him that he had not breakfasted, having left home with a + prevision of hospitality from Madame de Mauves. In the inn he found a + brick-tiled parlour and a hostess in sabots and a white cap, whom, over + the omelette she speedily served him—borrowing licence from the + bottle of sound red wine that accompanied it—he assured she was a + true artist. To reward his compliment she invited him to smoke his cigar + in her little garden behind the house. + </p> + <p> + Here he found a tonnelle and a view of tinted crops stretching down to the + stream. The tonnelle was rather close, and he preferred to lounge on a + bench against the pink wall, in the sun, which was not too hot. Here, as + he rested and gazed and mused, he fell into a train of thought which, in + an indefinable fashion, was a soft influence from the scene about him. His + heart, which had been beating fast for the past three hours, gradually + checked its pulses and left him looking at life with rather a more level + gaze. The friendly tavern sounds coming out through the open windows, the + sunny stillness of the yellowing grain which covered so much vigorous + natural life, conveyed no strained nor high-pitched message, had little to + say about renunciation—nothing at all about spiritual zeal. They + communicated the sense of plain ripe nature, expressed the unperverted + reality of things, declared that the common lot isn’t brilliantly amusing + and that the part of wisdom is to grasp frankly at experience lest you + miss it altogether. What reason there was for his beginning to wonder + after this whether a deeply-wounded heart might be soothed and healed by + such a scene, it would be difficult to explain; certain it was that as he + sat there he dreamt, awake, of an unhappy woman who strolled by the + slow-flowing stream before him and who pulled down the fruit-laden boughs + in the orchards. He mused and mused, and at last found himself quite angry + that he couldn’t somehow think worse of Madame de Mauves—or at any + rate think otherwise. He could fairly claim that in the romantic way he + asked very little of life—made modest demands on passion: why then + should his only passion be born to ill fortune? Why should his first—his + last—glimpse of positive happiness be so indissolubly linked with + renunciation? + </p> + <p> + It is perhaps because, like many spirits of the same stock, he had in his + composition a lurking principle of sacrifice, sacrifice for sacrifice’s + sake, to the authority of which he had ever paid due deference, that he + now felt all the vehemence of rebellion. To renounce, to renounce again, + to renounce for ever, was this all that youth and longing and ardour were + meant for? Was experience to be muffled and mutilated like an indecent + picture? Was a man to sit and deliberately condemn his future to be the + blank memory of a regret rather than the long possession of a treasure? + Sacrifice? The word was a trap for minds muddled by fear, an ignoble + refuge of weakness. To insist now seemed not to dare, but simply to BE, to + live on possible terms. + </p> + <p> + His hostess came out to hang a moist cloth on the hedge, and, though her + guest was sitting quietly enough, she might have imagined in his kindled + eyes a flattering testimony to the quality of her wine. As she turned back + into the house she was met by a young man of whom Longmore took note in + spite of his high distraction. He was evidently a member of that jovial + fraternity of artists whose very shabbiness has an affinity with the + unestablished and unexpected in life—the element often gazed at with + a certain wistfulness out of the curtained windows even of the highest + respectability. Longmore was struck first with his looking like a very + clever man and then with his looking like a contented one. The + combination, as it was expressed in his face, might have arrested the + attention of a less exasperated reasoner. He had a slouched hat and a + yellow beard, a light easel under one arm, and an unfinished sketch in + oils under the other. He stopped and stood talking for some moments to the + landlady, while something pleasant played in his face. They were + discussing the possibilities of dinner; the hostess enumerated some very + savoury ones, and he nodded briskly, assenting to everything. It couldn’t + be, Longmore thought, that he found such ideal ease in the prospect of + lamb-chops and spinach and a croute aux fruits. When the dinner had been + ordered he turned up his sketch, and the good woman fell to admiring and + comparing, to picking up, off by the stream-side, the objects represented. + </p> + <p> + Was it his work, Longmore wondered, that made him so happy? Was a strong + talent the best thing in the world? The landlady went back to her kitchen, + and the young painter stood, as if he were waiting for something, beside + the gate which opened upon the path across the fields. Longmore sat + brooding and asking himself if it weren’t probably better to cultivate the + arts than to cultivate the passions. Before he had answered the question + the painter had grown tired of waiting. He had picked up a pebble, tossed + it lightly into an upper window and called familiarly “Claudine!” Claudine + appeared; Longmore heard her at the window, bidding the young man + cultivate patience. “But I’m losing my light,” he said; “I must have my + shadows in the same place as yesterday.” + </p> + <p> + “Go without me then,” Claudine answered; “I’ll join you in ten minutes.” + Her voice was fresh and young; it represented almost aggressively to + Longmore that she was as pleased as her companion. + </p> + <p> + “Don’t forget the Chenier,” cried the young man, who, turning away, passed + out of the gate and followed the path across the fields until he + disappeared among the trees by the side of the stream. Who might Claudine + be? Longmore vaguely wondered; and was she as pretty as her voice? Before + long he had a chance to satisfy himself; she came out of the house with + her hat and parasol, prepared to follow her companion. She had on a pink + muslin dress and a little white hat, and she was as pretty as suffices + almost any Frenchwoman to be pleasing. She had a clear brown skin and a + bright dark eye and a step that made walking as light a matter as being + blown—and this even though she happened to be at the moment not a + little over-weighted. Her hands were encumbered with various articles + involved in her pursuit of her friend. In one arm she held her parasol and + a large roll of needlework, and in the other a shawl and a heavy white + umbrella, such as painters use for sketching. Meanwhile she was trying to + thrust into her pocket a paper-covered volume which Longmore saw to be the + poems of Andre Chenier, and in the effort dropping the large umbrella and + marking this with a half-smiled exclamation of disgust. Longmore stepped + forward and picked up the umbrella, and as she, protesting her gratitude, + put out her hand to take it, he recognised her as too obliging to the + young man who had preceded her. + </p> + <p> + “You’ve too much to carry,” he said; “you must let me help you.” + </p> + <p> + “You’re very good, monsieur,” she answered. “My husband always forgets + something. He can do nothing without his umbrella. He is d’une etourderie—” + </p> + <p> + “You must allow me to carry the umbrella,” Longmore risked; “there’s too + much of it for a lady.” + </p> + <p> + She assented, after many compliments to his politeness; and he walked by + her side into the meadow. She went lightly and rapidly, picking her steps + and glancing forward to catch a glimpse of her husband. She was graceful, + she was charming, she had an air of decision and yet of accommodation, and + it seemed to our friend that a young artist would work none the worse for + having her seated at his side reading Chenier’s iambics. They were newly + married, he supposed, and evidently their path of life had none of the + mocking crookedness of some others. They asked little; but what need to + ask more than such quiet summer days by a shady stream, with a comrade all + amiability, to say nothing of art and books and a wide unmenaced horizon? + To spend such a morning, to stroll back to dinner in the red-tiled parlour + of the inn, to ramble away again as the sun got low—all this was a + vision of delight which floated before him only to torture him with a + sense of the impossible. All Frenchwomen were not coquettes, he noted as + he kept pace with his companion. She uttered a word now and then for + politeness’ sake, but she never looked at him and seemed not in the least + to care that he was a well-favoured and well-dressed young man. She cared + for nothing but the young artist in the shabby coat and the slouched hat, + and for discovering where he had set up his easel. + </p> + <p> + This was soon done. He was encamped under the trees, close to the stream, + and, in the diffused green shade of the little wood, couldn’t have felt + immediate need of his umbrella. He received a free rebuke, however, for + forgetting it, and was informed of what he owed to Longmore’s + complaisance. He was duly grateful; he thanked our hero warmly and offered + him a seat on the grass. But Longmore felt himself a marplot and lingered + only long enough to glance at the young man’s sketch and to see in it an + easy rendering of the silvery stream and the vivid green rushes. The young + wife had spread her shawl on the grass at the base of a tree and meant to + seat herself when he had left them, meant to murmur Chenier’s verses to + the music of the gurgling river. Longmore looked a while from one of these + lucky persons to the other, barely stifled a sigh, bade them good-morning + and took his departure. He knew neither where to go nor what to do; he + seemed afloat on the sea of ineffectual longing. He strolled slowly back + to the inn, where, in the doorway, he met the landlady returning from the + butcher’s with the lambchops for the dinner of her lodgers. + </p> + <p> + “Monsieur has made the acquaintance of the dame of our young painter,” she + said with a free smile—a smile too free for malicious meanings. + “Monsieur has perhaps seen the young man’s picture. It appears that he’s + d’une jolie force.” + </p> + <p> + “His picture’s very charming,” said Longmore, “but his dame is more + charming still.” + </p> + <p> + “She’s a very nice little woman; but I pity her all the more.” + </p> + <p> + “I don’t see why she’s to be pitied,” Longmore pleaded. “They seem a very + happy couple.” + </p> + <p> + The landlady gave a knowing nod. “Don’t trust to it, monsieur! Those + artists—ca na pas de principes! From one day to another he can plant + her there! I know them, allez. I’ve had them here very often; one year + with one, another year with another.” + </p> + <p> + Longmore was at first puzzled. Then, “You mean she’s not his wife?” he + asked. + </p> + <p> + She took it responsibly. “What shall I tell you? They’re not des hommes + serieux, those gentlemen! They don’t engage for eternity. It’s none of my + business, and I’ve no wish to speak ill of madame. She’s gentille—but + gentille, and she loves her jeune homme to distraction.” + </p> + <p> + “Who then is so distinguished a young woman?” asked Longmore. “What do you + know about her?” + </p> + <p> + “Nothing for certain; but it’s my belief that she’s better than he. I’ve + even gone so far as to believe that she’s a lady—a vraie dame—and + that she has given up a great many things for him. I do the best I can for + them, but I don’t believe she has had all her life to put up with a dinner + of two courses.” And she turned over her lamb-chops tenderly, as to say + that though a good cook could imagine better things, yet if you could have + but one course lamb-chops had much in their favour. “I shall do them with + breadcrumbs. Voila les femmes, monsieur!” + </p> + <p> + Longmore turned away with the feeling that women were indeed a measureless + mystery, and that it was hard to say in which of their forms of perversity + there was most merit. He walked back to Saint-Germain more slowly than he + had come, with less philosophic resignation to any event and more of the + urgent egotism of the passion pronounced by philosophers the supremely + selfish one. Now and then the episode of the happy young painter and the + charming woman who had given up a great many things for him rose vividly + in his mind and seemed to mock his moral unrest like some obtrusive vision + of unattainable bliss. + </p> + <p> + The landlady’s gossip had cast no shadow on its brightness; her voice + seemed that of the vulgar chorus of the uninitiated, which stands always + ready with its gross prose rendering of the inspired passages of human + action. Was it possible a man could take THAT from a woman—take all + that lent lightness to that other woman’s footstep and grace to her + surrender and not give her the absolute certainty of a devotion as + unalterable as the process of the sun? Was it possible that so clear a + harmony had the seeds of trouble, that the charm of so perfect union could + be broken by anything but death? Longmore felt an immense desire to cry + out a thousand times “No!” for it seemed to him at last that he was + somehow only a graver equivalent of the young lover and that rustling + Claudine was a lighter sketch of Madame de Mauves. The heat of the sun, as + he walked along, became oppressive, and when he re-entered the forest he + turned aside into the deepest shade he could find and stretched himself on + the mossy ground at the foot of a great beech. He lay for a while staring + up into the verdurous dusk overhead and trying mentally to see his friend + at Saint-Germain hurry toward some quiet stream-side where HE waited, as + he had seen that trusting creature hurry an hour before. It would be hard + to say how well he succeeded; but the effort soothed rather than excited + him, and as he had had a good deal both of moral and physical fatigue he + sank at last into a quiet sleep. While he slept moreover he had a strange + and vivid dream. He seemed to be in a wood, very much like the one on + which his eyes had lately closed; but the wood was divided by the + murmuring stream he had left an hour before. He was walking up and down, + he thought, restlessly and in intense expectation of some momentous event. + Suddenly, at a distance, through the trees, he saw a gleam of a woman’s + dress, on which he hastened to meet her. As he advanced he recognised her, + but he saw at the same time that she was on the other bank of the river. + She seemed at first not to notice him, but when they had come to opposite + places she stopped and looked at him very gravely and pityingly. She made + him no sign that he must cross the stream, but he wished unutterably to + stand by her side. He knew the water was deep, and it seemed to him he + knew how he should have to breast it and how he feared that when he rose + to the surface she would have disappeared. Nevertheless he was going to + plunge when a boat turned into the current from above and came swiftly + toward them, guided by an oarsman who was sitting so that they couldn’t + see his face. He brought the boat to the bank where Longmore stood; the + latter stepped in, and with a few strokes they touched the opposite shore. + Longmore got out and, though he was sure he had crossed the stream, Madame + de Mauves was not there. He turned with a kind of agony and saw that now + she was on the other bank—the one he had left. She gave him a grave + silent glance and walked away up the stream. The boat and the boatman + resumed their course, but after going a short distance they stopped and + the boatman turned back and looked at the still divided couple. Then + Longmore recognised him—just as he had recognised him a few days + before at the restaurant in the Bois de Boulogne. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0008" id="link2H_4_0008"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + VIII + </h2> + <p> + He must have slept some time after he ceased dreaming for he had no + immediate memory of this vision. It came back to him later, after he had + roused himself and had walked nearly home. No great arrangement was needed + to make it seem a striking allegory, and it haunted and oppressed him for + the rest of the day. He took refuge, however, in his quickened conviction + that the only sound policy in life is to grasp unsparingly at happiness; + and it seemed no more than one of the vigorous measures dictated by such a + policy to return that evening to Madame de Mauves. And yet when he had + decided to do so and had carefully dressed himself he felt an irresistible + nervous tremor which made it easier to linger at his open window, + wondering with a strange mixture of dread and desire whether Madame + Clairin had repeated to her sister-in-law what she had said to him. His + presence now might be simply a gratuitous annoyance, and yet his absence + might seem to imply that it was in the power of circumstances to make them + ashamed to meet each other’s eyes. He sat a long time with his head in his + hands, lost in a painful confusion of hopes and ambiguities. He felt at + moments as if he could throttle Madame Clairin, and yet couldn’t help + asking himself if it weren’t possible she had done him a service. It was + late when he left the hotel, and as he entered the gate of the other house + his heart beat so fast that he was sure his voice would show it. + </p> + <p> + The servant ushered him into the drawing-room, which was empty and with + the lamp burning low. But the long windows were open and their light + curtains swaying in a soft warm wind, so that Longmore immediately stepped + out upon the terrace. There he found Madame de Mauves alone, slowly pacing + its length. She was dressed in white, very simply, and her hair was + arranged not as she usually wore it, but in a single loose coil and as if + she were unprepared for company. She stopped when she saw her friend, + showed some surprise, uttered an exclamation and stood waiting for him to + speak. He tried, with his eyes on her, to say something, but found no + words. He knew it was awkward, it was offensive, to stand gazing at her; + but he couldn’t say what was suitable and mightn’t say what he wished. Her + face was indistinct in the dim light, but he felt her eyes fixed on him + and wondered what they expressed. Did they warn him, did they plead, or + did they confess to a sense of provocation? For an instant his head swam; + he was sure it would make all things clear to stride forward and fold her + in his arms. But a moment later he was still dumb there before her; he + hadn’t moved; he knew she had spoken, but he hadn’t understood. + </p> + <p> + “You were here this morning,” she continued; and now, slowly, the meaning + of her words came to him. “I had a bad headache and had to shut myself + up.” She spoke with her usual voice. + </p> + <p> + Longmore mastered his agitation and answered her without betraying + himself. “I hope you’re better now.” + </p> + <p> + “Yes, thank you, I’m better—much better.” + </p> + <p> + He waited again and she moved away to a chair and seated herself. After a + pause he followed her and leaned closer to her, against the balustrade of + the terrace. “I hoped you might have been able to come out for the morning + into the forest. I went alone; it was a lovely day, and I took a long + walk.” + </p> + <p> + “It was a lovely day,” she said absently, and sat with her eyes lowered, + slowly opening and closing her fan. Longmore, as he watched her, felt more + and more assured her sister-in-law had seen her since her interview with + him; that her attitude toward him was changed. It was this same something + that hampered the desire with which he had come, or at least converted all + his imagined freedom of speech about it to a final hush of wonder. No, + certainly, he couldn’t clasp her to his arms now, any more than some + antique worshipper could have clasped the marble statue in his temple. But + Longmore’s statue spoke at last with a full human voice and even with a + shade of human hesitation. She looked up, and it seemed to him her eyes + shone through the dusk. + </p> + <p> + “I’m very glad you came this evening—and I’ve a particular reason + for being glad. I half-expected you, and yet I thought it possible you + mightn’t come.” + </p> + <p> + “As the case has been present to me,” Longmore answered, “it was + impossible I shouldn’t come. I’ve spent every minute of the day in + thinking of you.” + </p> + <p> + She made no immediate reply, but continued to open and close her fan + thoughtfully. At last, “I’ve something important to say to you,” she + resumed with decision. “I want you to know to a certainty that I’ve a very + high opinion of you.” Longmore gave an uneasy shift to his position. To + what was she coming? But he said nothing, and she went on: “I take a great + interest in you. There’s no reason why I shouldn’t say it. I feel a great + friendship for you.” He began to laugh, all awkwardly—he hardly knew + why, unless because this seemed the very irony of detachment. But she went + on in her way: “You know, I suppose, that a great disappointment always + implies a great confidence—a great hope.” + </p> + <p> + “I’ve certainly hoped,” he said, “hoped strongly; but doubtless never + rationally enough to have a right to bemoan my disappointment.” + </p> + <p> + There was something troubled in her face that seemed all the while to burn + clearer. “You do yourself injustice. I’ve such confidence in your fairness + of mind that I should be greatly disappointed if I were to find it + wanting.” + </p> + <p> + “I really almost believe you’re amusing yourself at my expense,” the young + man cried. “My fairness of mind? Of all the question-begging terms!” he + laughed. “The only thing for one’s mind to be fair to is the thing one + FEELS!” + </p> + <p> + She rose to her feet and looked at him hard. His eyes by this time were + accustomed to the imperfect light, and he could see that if she was urgent + she was yet beseechingly kind. She shook her head impatiently and came + near enough to lay her fan on his arm with a strong pressure. “If that + were so it would be a weary world. I know enough, however, of your + probable attitude. You needn’t try to express it. It’s enough that your + sincerity gives me the right to ask a favour of you—to make an + intense, a solemn request.” + </p> + <p> + “Make it; I listen.” + </p> + <p> + “DON’T DISAPPOINT ME. If you don’t understand me now you will to-morrow or + very soon. When I said just now that I had a high opinion of you, you see + I meant it very seriously,” she explained. “It wasn’t a vain compliment. I + believe there’s no appeal one may make to your generosity that can remain + long unanswered. If this were to happen—if I were to find you + selfish where I thought you generous, narrow where I thought you large”—and + she spoke slowly, her voice lingering with all emphasis on each of these + words—“vulgar where I thought you rare, I should think worse of + human nature. I should take it, I assure you, very hard indeed. I should + say to myself in the dull days of the future: ‘There was ONE man who might + have done so and so, and he too failed.’ But this shan’t be. You’ve made + too good an impression on me not to make the very best. If you wish to + please me for ever there’s a way.” + </p> + <p> + She was standing close to him, with her dress touching him, her eyes fixed + on his. As she went on her tone became, to his sense, extraordinary, and + she offered the odd spectacle of a beautiful woman preaching reason with + the most communicative and irresistible passion. Longmore was dazzled, but + mystified and bewildered. The intention of her words was all remonstrance, + refusal, dismissal, but her presence and effect there, so close, so + urgent, so personal, a distracting contradiction of it. She had never been + so lovely. In her white dress, with her pale face and deeply-lighted brow, + she seemed the very spirit of the summer night. When she had ceased + speaking she drew a long breath; he felt it on his cheek, and it stirred + in his whole being a sudden perverse imagination. Were not her words, in + their high impossible rigour, a mere challenge to his sincerity, a mere + precaution of her pride, meant to throw into relief her almost ghostly + beauty, and wasn’t this the only truth, the only law, the only thing to + take account of? + </p> + <p> + He closed his eyes and felt her watch him not without pain and perplexity + herself. He looked at her again, met her own eyes and saw them fill with + strange tears. Then this last sophistry of his great desire for her knew + itself touched as a bubble is pricked; it died away with a stifled murmur, + and her beauty, more and more radiant in the darkness, rose before him as + a symbol of something vague which was yet more beautiful than itself. “I + may understand you to-morrow,” he said, “but I don’t understand you now.” + </p> + <p> + “And yet I took counsel with myself to-day and asked myself how I had best + speak to you. On one side I might have refused to see you at all.” + Longmore made a violent movement, and she added: “In that case I should + have written to you. I might see you, I thought, and simply say to you + that there were excellent reasons why we should part, and that I begged + this visit should be your last. This I inclined to do; what made me decide + otherwise was—well, simply that I like you so. I said to myself that + I should be glad to remember in future days, not that I had, in the + horrible phrase, got rid of you, but that you had gone away out of the + fulness of your own wisdom and the excellence of your own taste.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah wisdom and taste!” the poor young man wailed. + </p> + <p> + “I’m prepared, if necessary,” Madame de Mauves continued after a pause, + “to fall back on my strict right. But, as I said before, I shall be + greatly disappointed if I’m obliged to do that.” + </p> + <p> + “When I listen to your horrible and unnatural lucidity,” Longmore + answered, “I feel so angry, so merely sore and sick, that I wonder I don’t + leave you without more words.” + </p> + <p> + “If you should go away in anger this idea of mine about our parting would + be but half-realised,” she returned with no drop in her ardour. “No, I + don’t want to think of you as feeling a great pain, I don’t want even to + think of you as making a great sacrifice. I want to think of you—” + </p> + <p> + “As a stupid brute who has never existed, who never CAN exist!” he broke + in. “A creature who could know you without loving you, who could leave you + without for ever missing you!” + </p> + <p> + She turned impatiently away and walked to the other end of the terrace. + When she came back he saw that her impatience had grown sharp and almost + hard. She stood before him again, looking at him from head to foot and + without consideration now; so that as the effect of it he felt his + assurance finally quite sink. This then she took from him, withholding in + consequence something she had meant to say. She moved off afresh, walked + to the other end of the terrace and stood there with her face to the + garden. She assumed that he understood her, and slowly, slowly, half as + the fruit of this mute pressure, he let everything go but the rage of a + purpose somehow still to please her. She was giving him a chance to do + gallantly what it seemed unworthy of both of them he should do meanly. She + must have “liked” him indeed, as she said, to wish so to spare him, to go + to the trouble of conceiving an ideal of conduct for him. With this sense + of her tenderness still in her dreadful consistency, his spirit rose with + a new flight and suddenly felt itself breathe clearer air. Her profession + ceased to seem a mere bribe to his eagerness; it was charged with + eagerness itself; it was a present reward and would somehow last. He moved + rapidly toward her as with the sense of a gage that he might sublimely yet + immediately enjoy. + </p> + <p> + They were separated by two thirds of the length of the terrace, and he had + to pass the drawing-room window. As he did so he started with an + exclamation. Madame Clairin stood framed in the opening as if, though just + arriving on the scene, she too were already aware of its interest. + Conscious, apparently, that she might be suspected of having watched them + she stepped forward with a smile and looked from one to the other. “Such a + tete-a-tete as that one owes no apology for interrupting. One ought to + come in for good manners.” + </p> + <p> + Madame de Mauves turned to her, but answered nothing. She looked straight + at Longmore, and her eyes shone with a lustre that struck him as divine. + He was not exactly sure indeed what she meant them to say, but it + translated itself to something that would do. “Call it what you will, what + you’ve wanted to urge upon me is the thing this woman can best conceive. + What I ask of you is something she can’t begin to!” They seemed somehow to + beg him to suffer her to be triumphantly herself, and to intimate—yet + this too all decently—how little that self was of Madame Clairin’s + particular swelling measure. He felt an immense answering desire not to do + anything then that might seem probable or prevu to this lady. He had laid + his hat and stick on the parapet of the terrace. He took them up, offered + his hand to Madame de Mauves with a simple good-night, bowed silently to + Madame Clairin and found his way, with tingling ears, out of the place. + </p> + <p> + <a name="link2H_4_0009" id="link2H_4_0009"> + <!-- H2 anchor --> </a> + </p> + <div style="height: 4em;"> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </div> + <h2> + IX + </h2> + <p> + He went home and, without lighting his candle, flung himself on his bed. + But he got no sleep till morning; he lay hour after hour tossing, + thinking, wondering; his mind had never been so active. It seemed to him + his friend had laid on him in those last moments a heavy charge and had + expressed herself almost as handsomely as if she had listened complacently + to an assurance of his love. It was neither easy nor delightful thoroughly + to understand her; but little by little her perfect meaning sank into his + mind and soothed it with a sense of opportunity which somehow stifled his + sense of loss. For, to begin with, she meant that she could love him in no + degree or contingency, in no imaginable future. This was absolute—he + knew he could no more alter it than he could pull down one of the + constellations he lay gazing at through his open window. He wondered to + what it was, in the background of her life, she had so dedicated herself. + A conception of duty unquenchable to the end? A love that no outrage could + stifle? “Great heaven!” he groaned; “is the world so rich in the purest + pearls of passion that such tenderness as that can be wasted for ever—poured + away without a sigh into bottomless darkness?” Had she, in spite of the + detestable present, some precious memory that still kept the door of + possibility open? Was she prepared to submit to everything and yet to + believe? Was it strength, was it weakness, was it a vulgar fear, was it + conviction, conscience, constancy? + </p> + <p> + Longmore sank back with a sigh and an oppressive feeling that it was vain + to guess at such a woman’s motives. He only felt that those of this one + were buried deep in her soul and that they must be of the noblest, must + contain nothing base. He had his hard impression that endless constancy + was all her law—a constancy that still found a foothold among + crumbling ruins. “She has loved once,” he said to himself as he rose and + wandered to his window; “and that’s for ever. Yes, yes—if she loved + again she’d be COMMON!” He stood for a long time looking out into the + starlit silence of the town and forest and thinking of what life would + have been if his constancy had met her own in earlier days. But life was + this now, and he must live. It was living, really, to stand there with + such a faith even in one’s self still flung over one by such hands. He was + not to disappoint her, he was to justify a conception it had beguiled her + weariness to form. His imagination embraced it; he threw back his head and + seemed to be looking for his friend’s conception among the blinking + mocking stars. But it came to him rather on the mild night-wind wandering + in over the house-tops which covered the rest of so many heavy human + hearts. What she asked he seemed to feel her ask not for her own sake—she + feared nothing, she needed nothing—but for that of his own happiness + and his own character. He must assent to destiny. Why else was he young + and strong, intelligent and resolute? He mustn’t give it to her to + reproach him with thinking she had had a moment’s attention for his love, + give it to her to plead, to argue, to break off in bitterness. He must see + everything from above, her indifference and his own ardour; he must prove + his strength, must do the handsome thing, must decide that the handsome + thing was to submit to the inevitable, to be supremely delicate, to spare + her all pain, to stifle his passion, to ask no compensation, to depart + without waiting and to try to believe that wisdom is its own reward. All + this, neither more nor less, it was a matter of beautiful friendship with + him for her to expect of him. And what should he himself gain by it? He + should have pleased her! Well, he flung himself on his bed again, fell + asleep at last and slept till morning. + </p> + <p> + Before noon next day he had made up his mind to leave Saint-Germain at + once. It seemed easiest to go without seeing her, and yet if he might ask + for a grain of “compensation” this would be five minutes face to face with + her. He passed a restless day. Wherever he went he saw her stand before + him in the dusky halo of evening, saw her look at him with an air of still + negation more intoxicating than the most passionate self-surrender. He + must certainly go, and yet it was hideously hard. He compromised and went + to Paris to spend the rest of the day. He strolled along the boulevard and + paused sightlessly before the shops, sat a while in the Tuileries gardens + and looked at the shabby unfortunates for whom this only was nature and + summer; but simply felt afresh, as a result of it all, the dusty dreary + lonely world to which Madame de Mauves had consigned him. + </p> + <p> + In a sombre mood he made his way back to the centre of motion and sat down + at a table before a cafe door, on the great plain of hot asphalt. Night + arrived, the lamps were lighted, the tables near him found occupants, and + Paris began to wear that evening grimace of hers that seems to tell, in + the flare of plate glass and of theatre-doors, the muffled rumble of + swift-rolling carriages, how this is no world for you unless you have your + pockets lined and your delicacies perverted. Longmore, however, had + neither scruples nor desires; he looked at the great preoccupied place for + the first time with an easy sense of repaying its indifference. Before + long a carriage drove up to the pavement directly in front of him and + remained standing for several minutes without sign from its occupant. It + was one of those neat plain coupes, drawn by a single powerful horse, in + which the flaneur figures a pale handsome woman buried among silk cushions + and yawning as she sees the gas-lamps glittering in the gutters. At last + the door opened and out stepped Richard de Mauves. He stopped and leaned + on the window for some time, talking in an excited manner to a person + within. At last he gave a nod and the carriage rolled away. He stood + swinging his cane and looking up and down the boulevard, with the air of a + man fumbling, as one might say, the loose change of time. He turned toward + the cafe and was apparently, for want of anything better worth his + attention, about to seat himself at one of the tables when he noticed + Longmore. He wavered an instant and then, without a shade of difference in + his careless gait, advanced to the accompaniment of a thin recognition. It + was the first time they had met since their encounter in the forest after + Longmore’s false start for Brussels. Madame Clairin’s revelations, as he + might have regarded them, had not made the Count especially present to his + mind; he had had another call to meet than the call of disgust. But now, + as M. de Mauves came toward him he felt abhorrence well up. He made out, + however, for the first time, a cloud on this nobleman’s superior + clearness, and a delight at finding the shoe somewhere at last pinching + HIM, mingled with the resolve to be blank and unaccommodating, enabled him + to meet the occasion with due promptness. + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves sat down, and the two men looked at each other across the + table, exchanging formal remarks that did little to lend grace to their + encounter. Longmore had no reason to suppose the Count knew of his + sister’s various interventions. He was sure M. de Mauves cared very little + about his opinions, and yet he had a sense of something grim in his own + New York face which would have made him change colour if keener suspicion + had helped it to be read there. M. de Mauves didn’t change colour, but he + looked at his wife’s so oddly, so more than naturally (wouldn’t it be?) + detached friend with an intentness that betrayed at once an irritating + memory of the episode in the Bois de Boulogne and such vigilant curiosity + as was natural to a gentleman who had entrusted his “honour” to another + gentleman’s magnanimity—or to his artlessness. + </p> + <p> + It might appear that these virtues shone out of our young man less + engagingly or reassuringly than a few days before; the shadow at any rate + fell darker across the brow of his critic, who turned away and frowned + while lighting a cigar. The person in the coupe, he accordingly judged, + whether or no the same person as the heroine of the episode of the Bois de + Boulogne, was not a source of unalloyed delight. Longmore had dark blue + eyes of admirable clarity, settled truth-telling eyes which had in his + childhood always made his harshest taskmasters smile at his notion of a + subterfuge. An observer watching the two men and knowing something of + their relations would certainly have said that what he had at last both to + recognise and to miss in those eyes must not a little have puzzled and + tormented M. de Mauves. They took possession of him, they laid him out, + they measured him in that state of flatness, they triumphed over him, they + treated him as no pair of eyes had perhaps ever treated any member of his + family before. The Count’s scheme had been to provide for a positive state + of ease on the part of no one save himself, but here was Longmore already, + if appearances perhaps not appreciable to the vulgar meant anything, + primed as for some prospect of pleasure more than Parisian. Was this + candid young barbarian but a faux bonhomme after all? He had never really + quite satisfied his occasional host, but was he now, for a climax, to + leave him almost gaping? + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves, as if hating to seem preoccupied, took up the evening paper + to help himself to seem indifferent. As he glanced over it he threw off + some perfunctory allusion to the crisis—the political—which + enabled Longmore to reply with perfect veracity that, with other things to + think about, he had had no attention to spare for it. And yet our hero was + in truth far from secure against rueful reflexion. The Count’s ruffled + state was a comfort so far as it pointed to the possibility that the lady + in the coupe might be proving too many for him; but it ministered to no + vindictive sweetness for Longmore so far as it should perhaps represent + rising jealousy. It passed through his mind that jealousy is a passion + with a double face and that on one of its sides it may sometimes almost + look generous. It glimmered upon him odiously M. de Mauves might grow + ashamed of his political compact with his wife, and he felt how far more + tolerable it would be in future to think of him as always impertinent than + to think of him as occasionally contrite. The two men pretended meanwhile + for half an hour to outsit each other conveniently; and the end—at + that rate—might have been distant had not the tension in some degree + yielded to the arrival of a friend of M. de Mauves—a tall pale + consumptive-looking dandy who filled the air with the odour of heliotrope. + He looked up and down the boulevard wearily, examined the Count’s garments + in some detail, then appeared to refer restlessly to his own, and at last + announced resignedly that the Duchess was in town. M. de Mauves must come + with him to call; she had abused him dreadfully a couple of evenings + before—a sure sign she wanted to see him. “I depend on you,” said + with an infantine drawl this specimen of an order Longmore felt he had + never had occasion so intimately to appreciate, “to put her en train.” + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves resisted, he protested that he was d’une humeur massacrante; + but at last he allowed himself to be drawn to his feet and stood looking + awkwardly—awkwardly for M. de Mauves—at Longmore. “You’ll + excuse me,” he appeared to find some difficulty in saying; “you too + probably have occupation for the evening?” + </p> + <p> + “None but to catch my train.” And our friend looked at his watch. + </p> + <p> + “Ah you go back to Saint-Germain?” + </p> + <p> + “In half an hour.” + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves seemed on the point of disengaging himself from his + companion’s arm, which was locked in his own; but on the latter’s uttering + some persuasive murmur he lifted his hat stiffly and turned away. + </p> + <p> + Longmore the next day wandered off to the terrace to try and beguile the + restlessness with which he waited for the evening; he wished to see Madame + de Mauves for the last time at the hour of long shadows and pale reflected + amber lights, as he had almost always seen her. Destiny, however, took no + account of this humble plea for poetic justice; it was appointed him to + meet her seated by the great walk under a tree and alone. The hour made + the place almost empty; the day was warm, but as he took his place beside + her a light breeze stirred the leafy edges of their broad circle of + shadow. She looked at him almost with no pretence of not having believed + herself already rid of him, and he at once told her that he should leave + Saint-Germain that evening, but must first bid her farewell. Her face + lighted a moment, he fancied, as he spoke; but she said nothing, only + turning it off to far Paris which lay twinkling and flashing through hot + exhalations. “I’ve a request to make of you,” he added. “That you think of + me as a man who has felt much and claimed little.” + </p> + <p> + She drew a long breath which almost suggested pain. “I can’t think of you + as unhappy. That’s impossible. You’ve a life to lead, you’ve duties, + talents, inspirations, interests. I shall hear of your career. And then,” + she pursued after a pause, though as if it had before this quite been + settled between them, “one can’t be unhappy through having a better + opinion of a friend instead of a worse.” + </p> + <p> + For a moment he failed to understand her. “Do you mean that there can be + varying degrees in my opinion of you?” + </p> + <p> + She rose and pushed away her chair. “I mean,” she said quickly, “that it’s + better to have done nothing in bitterness—nothing in passion.” And + she began to walk. + </p> + <p> + Longmore followed her without answering at first. But he took off his hat + and with his pocket-handkerchief wiped his forehead. “Where shall you go? + what shall you do?” he simply asked at last. + </p> + <p> + “Do? I shall do as I’ve always done—except perhaps that I shall go + for a while to my husband’s old home.” + </p> + <p> + “I shall go to MY old one. I’ve done with Europe for the present,” the + young man added. + </p> + <p> + She glanced at him as he walked beside her, after he had spoken these + words, and then bent her eyes for a long time on the ground. But suddenly, + as if aware of her going too far she stopped and put out her hand. + “Good-bye. May you have all the happiness you deserve!” + </p> + <p> + He took her hand with his eyes on her, but something was at work in him + that made it impossible to deal in the easy way with her touch. Something + of infinite value was floating past him, and he had taken an oath, with + which any such case interfered, not to raise a finger to stop it. It was + borne by the strong current of the world’s great life and not of his own + small one. Madame de Mauves disengaged herself, gathered in her long scarf + and smiled at him almost as you would do at a child you should wish to + encourage. Several moments later he was still there watching her leave him + and leave him. When she was out of sight he shook himself, walked at once + back to his hotel and, without waiting for the evening train, paid his + bill and departed. + </p> + <p> + Later in the day M. de Mauves came into his wife’s drawing-room, where she + sat waiting to be summoned to dinner. He had dressed as he usually didn’t + dress for dining at home. He walked up and down for some moments in + silence, then rang the bell for a servant and went out into the hall to + meet him. He ordered the carriage to take him to the station, paused a + moment with his hand on the knob of the door, dismissed the servant + angrily as the latter lingered observing him, re-entered the drawing-room, + resumed his restless walk and at last stopped abruptly before his wife, + who had taken up a book. “May I ask the favour,” he said with evident + effort, in spite of a forced smile as of allusion to a large past exercise + of the very best taste, “of having a question answered?” + </p> + <p> + “It’s a favour I never refused,” she replied. + </p> + <p> + “Very true. Do you expect this evening a visit from Mr. Longmore?” + </p> + <p> + “Mr. Longmore,” said his wife, “has left Saint-Germain.” M. de Mauves + waited, but his smile expired. “Mr. Longmore,” his wife continued, “has + gone to America.” + </p> + <p> + M. de Mauves took it—a rare thing for him—with confessed, if + momentary, intellectual indigence. But he raised, as it were, the wind. + “Has anything happened?” he asked, “Had he a sudden call?” But his + question received no answer. At the same moment the servant threw open the + door and announced dinner; Madame Clairin rustled in, rubbing her white + hands, Madame de Mauves passed silently into the dining-room, but he + remained outside—outside of more things, clearly, than his mere + salle-a-manger. Before long he went forth to the terrace and continued his + uneasy walk. At the end of a quarter of an hour the servant came to let + him know that his carriage was at the door. “Send it away,” he said + without hesitation. “I shan’t use it.” When the ladies had half-finished + dinner he returned and joined them, with a formal apology to his wife for + his inconsequence. + </p> + <p> + The dishes were brought back, but he hardly tasted them; he drank on the + other hand more wine than usual. There was little talk, scarcely a + convivial sound save the occasional expressive appreciative “M-m-m!” of + Madame Clairin over the succulence of some dish. Twice this lady saw her + brother’s eyes, fixed on her own over his wineglass, put to her a question + she knew she should have to irritate him later on by not being able to + answer. She replied, for the present at least, by an elevation of the + eyebrows that resembled even to her own humour the vain raising of an + umbrella in anticipation of a storm. M. de Mauves was left alone to finish + his wine; he sat over it for more than an hour and let the darkness gather + about him. At last the servant came in with a letter and lighted a candle. + The letter was a telegram, which M. de Mauves, when he had read it, burnt + at the candle. After five minutes’ meditation he wrote a message on the + back of a visiting-card and gave it to the servant to carry to the office. + The man knew quite as much as his master suspected about the lady to whom + the telegram was addressed; but its contents puzzled him; they consisted + of the single word “Impossible.” As the evening passed without her + brother’s reappearing in the drawing-room Madame Clairin came to him where + he sat by his solitary candle. He took no notice of her presence for some + time, but this affected her as unexpected indulgence. At last, however, he + spoke with a particular harshness. “Ce jeune mufle has gone home at an + hour’s notice. What the devil does it mean?” + </p> + <p> + Madame Clairin now felt thankful for her umbrella. “It means that I’ve a + sister-in-law whom I’ve not the honour to understand.” + </p> + <p> + He said nothing more and silently allowed her, after a little, to depart. + It had been her duty to provide him with an explanation, and he was + disgusted with her blankness; but she was—if there was no more to + come—getting off easily. When she had gone he went into the garden + and walked up and down with his cigar. He saw his wife seated alone on the + terrace, but remained below, wandering, turning, pausing, lingering. He + remained a long time. It grew late and Madame de Mauves disappeared. + Toward midnight he dropped upon a bench, tired, with a long vague + exhalation of unrest. It was sinking into his spirit that he too didn’t + understand Madame Clairin’s sister-in-law. + </p> + <p> + Longmore was obliged to wait a week in London for a ship. It was very hot, + and he went out one day to Richmond. In the garden of the hotel at which + he dined he met his friend Mrs. Draper, who was staying there. She made + eager enquiry about Madame de Mauves; but Longmore at first, as they sat + looking out at the famous view of the Thames, parried her questions and + confined himself to other topics. At last she said she was afraid he had + something to conceal; whereupon, after a pause, he asked her if she + remembered recommending him, in the letter she had addressed him at + Saint-Germain, to draw the sadness from her friend’s smile. “The last I + saw of her was her smile,” he said—“when I bade her good-bye.” + </p> + <p> + “I remember urging you to ‘console’ her,” Mrs. Draper returned, “and I + wondered afterwards whether—model of discretion as you are—I + hadn’t cut you out work for which you wouldn’t thank me.” + </p> + <p> + “She has her consolation in herself,” the young man said; “she needs none + that any one else can offer her. That’s for troubles for which—be it + more, be it less—our own folly has to answer. Madame de Mauves + hasn’t a grain of folly left.” + </p> + <p> + “Ah don’t say that!”—Mrs. Draper knowingly protested. “Just a little + folly’s often very graceful.” + </p> + <p> + Longmore rose to go—she somehow annoyed him. “Don’t talk of grace,” + he said, “till you’ve measured her reason!” + </p> + <p> + For two years after his return to America he heard nothing of Madame de + Mauves. That he thought of her intently, constantly, I need hardly say; + most people wondered why such a clever young man shouldn’t “devote” + himself to something; but to himself he seemed absorbingly occupied. He + never wrote to her; he believed she wouldn’t have “liked” it. At last he + heard that Mrs. Draper had come home and he immediately called on her. “Of + course,” she said after the first greetings, “you’re dying for news of + Madame de Mauves. Prepare yourself for something strange. I heard from her + two or three times during the year after your seeing her. She left + Saint-Germain and went to live in the country on some old property of her + husband’s. She wrote me very kind little notes, but I felt somehow that—in + spite of what you said about ‘consolation’—they were the notes of a + wretched woman. The only advice I could have given her was to leave her + scamp of a husband and come back to her own land and her own people. But + this I didn’t feel free to do, and yet it made me so miserable not to be + able to help her that I preferred to let our correspondence die a natural + death. I had no news of her for a year. Last summer, however, I met at + Vichy a clever young Frenchman whom I accidentally learned to be a friend + of that charming sister of the Count’s, Madame Clairin. I lost no time in + asking him what he knew about Madame de Mauves—a countrywoman of + mine and an old friend. ‘I congratulate you on the friendship of such a + person,’ he answered. ‘That’s the terrible little woman who killed her + husband.’ You may imagine I promptly asked for an explanation, and he told + me—from his point of view—what he called the whole story. M. + de Mauves had fait quelques folies which his wife had taken absurdly to + heart. He had repented and asked her forgiveness, which she had inexorably + refused. She was very pretty, and severity must have suited her style; + for, whether or no her husband had been in love with her before, he fell + madly in love with her now. He was the proudest man in France, but he had + begged her on his knees to be re-admitted to favour. All in vain! She was + stone, she was ice, she was outraged virtue. People noticed a great change + in him; he gave up society, ceased to care for anything, looked + shockingly. One fine day they discovered he had blown out his brains. My + friend had the story of course from Madame Clairin.” + </p> + <p> + Longmore was strongly moved, and his first impulse after he had recovered + his composure was to return immediately to Europe. But several years have + passed, and he still lingers at home. The truth is that, in the midst of + all the ardent tenderness of his memory of Madame de Mauves, he has become + conscious of a singular feeling—a feeling of wonder, of uncertainty, + of awe. + </p> + <p> + <br /><br /><br /><br /> + </p> +<pre xml:space="preserve"> + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Madame de Mauves, by Henry James + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + +***** This file should be named 7813-h.htm or 7813-h.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/7/8/1/7813/ + +Produced by Eve Sobol, and David Widger + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + +Title: Madame de Mauves + +Author: Henry James + +Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7813] +Posting Date: July 27, 2009 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + + + + +Produced by Eve Sobol + + + + + +MADAME DE MAUVES + + +Byhenry James + + + + +I + +The view from the terrace at Saint-Germain-en-Laye is immense and +famous. Paris lies spread before you in dusky vastness, domed and +fortified, glittering here and there through her light vapours and +girdled with her silver Seine. Behind you is a park of stately symmetry, +and behind that a forest where you may lounge through turfy avenues and +light-chequered glades and quite forget that you are within half an +hour of the boulevards. One afternoon, however, in mid-spring, some five +years ago, a young man seated on the terrace had preferred to keep this +in mind. His eyes were fixed in idle wistfulness on the mighty human +hive before him. He was fond of rural things, and he had come to +Saint-Germain a week before to meet the spring halfway; but though he +could boast of a six months' acquaintance with the great city he never +looked at it from his present vantage without a sense of curiosity still +unappeased. There were moments when it seemed to him that not to be +there just then was to miss some thrilling chapter of experience. And +yet his winter's experience had been rather fruitless and he had closed +the book almost with a yawn. Though not in the least a cynic he was what +one may call a disappointed observer, and he never chose the right-hand +road without beginning to suspect after an hour's wayfaring that the +left would have been the better. He now had a dozen minds to go to Paris +for the evening, to dine at the Cafe Brebant and repair afterwards to +the Gymnase and listen to the latest exposition of the duties of the +injured husband. He would probably have risen to execute this project if +he had not noticed a little girl who, wandering along the terrace, +had suddenly stopped short and begun to gaze at him with round-eyed +frankness. For a moment he was simply amused, the child's face denoting +such helpless wonderment; the next he was agreeably surprised. "Why this +is my friend Maggie," he said; "I see you've not forgotten me." + +Maggie, after a short parley, was induced to seal her remembrance with +a kiss. Invited then to explain her appearance at Saint-Germain, she +embarked on a recital in which the general, according to the infantine +method, was so fatally sacrificed to the particular that Longmore looked +about him for a superior source of information. He found it in Maggie's +mamma, who was seated with another lady at the opposite end of the +terrace; so, taking the child by the hand, he led her back to her +companions. + +Maggie's mamma was a young American lady, as you would immediately have +perceived, with a pretty and friendly face and a great elegance of fresh +finery. She greeted Longmore with amazement and joy, mentioning his name +to her friend and bidding him bring a chair and sit with them. The other +lady, in whom, though she was equally young and perhaps even prettier, +muslins and laces and feathers were less of a feature, remained silent, +stroking the hair of the little girl, whom she had drawn against her +knee. She had never heard of Longmore, but she now took in that her +companion had crossed the ocean with him, had met him afterwards in +travelling and--having left her husband in Wall Street--was indebted +to him for sundry services. Maggie's mamma turned from time to time and +smiled at this lady with an air of invitation; the latter smiled back +and continued gracefully to say nothing. For ten minutes, meanwhile, +Longmore felt a revival of interest in his old acquaintance; then (as +mild riddles are more amusing than mere commonplaces) it gave way to +curiosity about her friend. His eyes wandered; her volubility shook a +sort of sweetness out of the friend's silence. + +The stranger was perhaps not obviously a beauty nor obviously an +American, but essentially both for the really seeing eye. She was slight +and fair and, though naturally pale, was delicately flushed just now, +as by the effect of late agitation. What chiefly struck Longmore in her +face was the union of a pair of beautifully gentle, almost languid grey +eyes with a mouth that was all expression and intention. Her forehead +was a trifle more expansive than belongs to classic types, and her thick +brown hair dressed out of the fashion, just then even more ugly than +usual. Her throat and bust were slender, but all the more in harmony +with certain rapid charming movements of the head, which she had a +way of throwing back every now and then with an air of attention and a +sidelong glance from her dove-like eyes. She seemed at once alert +and indifferent, contemplative and restless, and Longmore very soon +discovered that if she was not a brilliant beauty she was at least a +most attaching one. This very impression made him magnanimous. He was +certain he had interrupted a confidential conversation, and judged it +discreet to withdraw, having first learned from Maggie's mamma--Mrs. +Draper--that she was to take the six o'clock train back to Paris. He +promised to meet her at the station. + +He kept his appointment, and Mrs. Draper arrived betimes, accompanied +by her friend. The latter, however, made her farewells at the door and +drove away again, giving Longmore time only to raise his hat. "Who +is she?" he asked with visible ardour as he brought the traveller her +tickets. + +"Come and see me to-morrow at the Hotel de l'Empire," she answered, +"and I'll tell you all about her." The force of this offer in making +him punctual at the Hotel de l'Empire Longmore doubtless never exactly +measured; and it was perhaps well he was vague, for he found his friend, +who was on the point of leaving Paris, so distracted by procrastinating +milliners and perjured lingeres that coherence had quite deserted her. +"You must find Saint-Germain dreadfully dull," she nevertheless had the +presence of mind to say as he was going. "Why won't you come with me to +London?" + +"Introduce me to Madame de Mauves," he answered, "and Saint-Germain will +quite satisfy me." All he had learned was the lady's name and residence. + +"Ah she, poor woman, won't make your affair a carnival. She's very +unhappy," said Mrs. Draper. + +Longmore's further enquiries were arrested by the arrival of a young +lady with a bandbox; but he went away with the promise of a note of +introduction, to be immediately dispatched to him at Saint-Germain. + +He then waited a week, but the note never came, and he felt how little +it was for Mrs. Draper to complain of engagements unperformed. He +lounged on the terrace and walked in the forest, studied suburban street +life and made a languid attempt to investigate the records of the court +of the exiled Stuarts; but he spent most of his time in wondering where +Madame de Mauves lived and whether she ever walked on the terrace. +Sometimes, he was at last able to recognise; for one afternoon toward +dusk he made her out from a distance, arrested there alone and leaning +against the low wall. In his momentary hesitation to approach her there +was almost a shade of trepidation, but his curiosity was not chilled by +such a measure of the effect of a quarter of an hour's acquaintance. She +at once recovered their connexion, on his drawing near, and showed +it with the frankness of a person unprovided with a great choice of +contacts. Her dress, her expression, were the same as before; her charm +came out like that of fine music on a second hearing. She soon made +conversation easy by asking him for news of Mrs. Draper. Longmore told +her that he was daily expecting news and after a pause mentioned the +promised note of introduction. + +"It seems less necessary now," he said--"for me at least. But for you--I +should have liked you to know the good things our friend would probably +have been able to say about me." + +"If it arrives at last," she answered, "you must come and see me and +bring it. If it doesn't you must come without it." + +Then, as she continued to linger through the thickening twilight, she +explained that she was waiting for her husband, who was to arrive in the +train from Paris and who often passed along the terrace on his way home. +Longmore well remembered that Mrs. Draper had spoken of uneasy things +in her life, and he found it natural to guess that this same husband was +the source of them. Edified by his six months in Paris, "What else is +possible," he put it, "for a sweet American girl who marries an unholy +foreigner?" + +But this quiet dependence on her lord's return rather shook his +shrewdness, and it received a further check from the free confidence +with which she turned to greet an approaching figure. Longmore +distinguished in the fading light a stoutish gentleman, on the fair side +of forty, in a high grey hat, whose countenance, obscure as yet against +the quarter from which it came, mainly presented to view the large +outward twist of its moustache. M. de Mauves saluted his wife with +punctilious gallantry and, having bowed to Longmore, asked her several +questions in French. Before taking his offered arm to walk to their +carriage, which was in waiting at the gate of the terrace, she +introduced our hero as a friend of Mrs. Draper and also a fellow +countryman, whom she hoped they might have the pleasure of seeing, as +she said, chez eux. M. de Mauves responded briefly, but civilly, in fair +English, and led his wife away. + +Longmore watched him as he went, renewing the curl of his main facial +feature--watched him with an irritation devoid of any mentionable +ground. His one pretext for gnashing his teeth would have been in his +apprehension that this gentleman's worst English might prove a matter to +shame his own best French. For reasons involved apparently in the very +structure of his being Longmore found a colloquial use of that idiom +as insecure as the back of a restive horse, and was obliged to take his +exercise, as he was aware, with more tension than grace. He reflected +meanwhile with comfort that Madame de Mauves and he had a common tongue, +and his anxiety yielded to his relief at finding on his table that +evening a letter from Mrs. Draper. It enclosed a short formal missive to +Madame de Mauves, but the epistle itself was copious and confidential. +She had deferred writing till she reached London, where for a week, of +course, she had found other amusements. + +"I think it's the sight of so many women here who don't look at all like +her that has reminded me by the law of contraries of my charming friend +at Saint-Germain and my promise to introduce you to her," she wrote. +"I believe I spoke to you of her rather blighted state, and I wondered +afterwards whether I hadn't been guilty of a breach of confidence. But +you would certainly have arrived at guesses of your own, and, besides, +she has never told me her secrets. The only one she ever pretended to +was that she's the happiest creature in the world, after assuring me +of which, poor thing, she went off into tears; so that I prayed to be +delivered from such happiness. It's the miserable story of an American +girl born neither to submit basely nor to rebel crookedly marrying a +shining sinful Frenchman who believes a woman must do one or the other +of those things. The lightest of US have a ballast that they can't +imagine, and the poorest a moral imagination that they don't require. +She was romantic and perverse--she thought the world she had been +brought up in too vulgar or at least too prosaic. To have a decent +home-life isn't perhaps the greatest of adventures; but I think she +wishes nowadays she hadn't gone in quite so desperately for thrills. M. +de Mauves cared of course for nothing but her money, which he's spending +royally on his menus plaisirs. I hope you appreciate the compliment +I pay you when I recommend you to go and cheer up a lady domestically +dejected. Believe me, I've given no other man a proof of this esteem; so +if you were to take me in an inferior sense I would never speak to you +again. Prove to this fine sore creature that our manners may have all +the grace without wanting to make such selfish terms for it. She avoids +society and lives quite alone, seeing no one but a horrible French +sister-in-law. Do let me hear that you've made her patience a little +less absent-minded. Make her WANT to forget; make her like you." + +This ingenious appeal left the young man uneasy. He found himself in +presence of more complications than had been in his reckoning. To call +on Madame de Mauves with his present knowledge struck him as akin to +fishing in troubled waters. He was of modest composition, and yet he +asked himself whether an appearance of attentions from any gallant +gentleman mightn't give another twist to her tangle. A flattering sense +of unwonted opportunity, however--of such a possible value constituted +for him as he had never before been invited to rise to--made him with +the lapse of time more confident, possibly more reckless. It was too +inspiring not to act upon the idea of kindling a truer light in his fair +countrywoman's slow smile, and at least he hoped to persuade her that +even a raw representative of the social order she had not done justice +to was not necessarily a mere fortuitous collocation of atoms. He +immediately called on her. + + + + +II + +She had been placed for her education, fourteen years before, in a +Parisian convent, by a widowed mammma who was fonder of Homburg and +Nice than of letting out tucks in the frocks of a vigorously growing +daughter. Here, besides various elegant accomplishments--the art of +wearing a train, of composing a bouquet, of presenting a cup of tea--she +acquired a certain turn of the imagination which might have passed for +a sign of precocious worldliness. She dreamed of marrying a man of +hierarchical "rank"--not for the pleasure of hearing herself called +Madame la Vicomtesse, for which it seemed to her she should never +greatly care, but because she had a romantic belief that the enjoyment +of inherited and transmitted consideration, consideration attached to +the fact of birth, would be the direct guarantee of an ideal delicacy +of feeling. She supposed it would be found that the state of being noble +does actually enforce the famous obligation. Romances are rarely worked +out in such transcendent good faith, and Euphemia's excuse was the prime +purity of her moral vision. She was essentially incorruptible, and she +took this pernicious conceit to her bosom very much as if it had been a +dogma revealed by a white-winged angel. Even after experience had given +her a hundred rude hints she found it easier to believe in fables, +when they had a certain nobleness of meaning, than in well-attested but +sordid facts. She believed that a gentleman with a long pedigree must +be of necessity a very fine fellow, and enjoyment of a chance to +carry further a family chronicle begun ever so far back must be, as +a consciousness, a source of the most beautiful impulses. It wasn't +therefore only that noblesse oblige, she thought, as regards yourself, +but that it ensures as nothing else does in respect to your wife. She +had never, at the start, spoken to a nobleman in her life, and these +convictions were but a matter of extravagant theory. They were the +fruit, in part, of the perusal of various Ultramontane works of +fiction--the only ones admitted to the convent library--in which the +hero was always a Legitimist vicomte who fought duels by the dozen but +went twice a month to confession; and in part of the strong social scent +of the gossip of her companions, many of them filles de haut lieu who, +in the convent-garden, after Sundays at home, depicted their brothers +and cousins as Prince Charmings and young Paladins. Euphemia listened +and said nothing; she shrouded her visions of matrimony under a coronet +in the silence that mostly surrounds all ecstatic faith. She was not +of that type of young lady who is easily induced to declare that her +husband must be six feet high and a little near-sighted, part his hair +in the middle and have amber lights in his beard. To her companions her +flights of fancy seemed short, rather, and poor and untutored; and +even the fact that she was a sprig of the transatlantic democracy never +sufficiently explained her apathy on social questions. She had a mental +image of that son of the Crusaders who was to suffer her to adore him, +but like many an artist who has produced a masterpiece of idealisation +she shrank from exposing it to public criticism. It was the portrait of +a gentleman rather ugly than handsome and rather poor than rich. But his +ugliness was to be nobly expressive and his poverty delicately proud. +She had a fortune of her own which, at the proper time, after fixing on +her in eloquent silence those fine eyes that were to soften the feudal +severity of his visage, he was to accept with a world of stifled +protestations. One condition alone she was to make--that he should have +"race" in a state as documented as it was possible to have it. On this +she would stake her happiness; and it was so to happen that several +accidents conspired to give convincing colour to this artless +philosophy. + +Inclined to long pauses and slow approaches herself, Euphemia was +a great sitter at the feet of breathless volubility, and there were +moments when she fairly hung upon the lips of Mademoiselle Marie de +Mauves. Her intimacy with this chosen schoolmate was founded on the +perception--all her own--that their differences were just the right +ones. Mademoiselle de Mauves was very positive, very shrewd, +very ironical, very French--everything that Euphemia felt herself +unpardonable for not being. During her Sundays en ville she had examined +the world and judged it, and she imparted her impressions to our +attentive heroine with an agreeable mixture of enthusiasm and +scepticism. She was moreover a handsome and well-grown person, on whom +Euphemia's ribbons and trinkets had a trick of looking better than on +their slender proprietress. She had finally the supreme merit of being +a rigorous example of the virtue of exalted birth, having, as she did, +ancestors honourably mentioned by Joinville and Commines, and a stately +grandmother with a hooked nose who came up with her after the holidays +from a veritable castel in Auvergne. It seemed to our own young woman +that these attributes made her friend more at home in the world than if +she had been the daughter of even the most prosperous grocer. A certain +aristocratic impudence Mademoiselle de Mauves abundantly possessed, +and her raids among her friend's finery were quite in the spirit of her +baronial ancestors in the twelfth century--a spirit regarded by +Euphemia but as a large way of understanding friendship, a freedom from +conformities without style, and one that would sooner or later express +itself in acts of surprising magnanimity. There doubtless prevailed +in the breast of Mademoiselle de Mauves herself a dimmer vision of the +large securities that Euphemia envied her. She was to become later in +life so accomplished a schemer that her sense of having further heights +to scale might well have waked up early. The especially fine appearance +made by our heroine's ribbons and trinkets as her friend wore them +ministered to pleasure on both sides, and the spell was not of a nature +to be menaced by the young American's general gentleness. The concluding +motive of Marie's writing to her grandmamma to invite Euphemia for a +three weeks' holiday to the castel in Auvergne involved, however, the +subtlest considerations. Mademoiselle de Mauves indeed, at this time +seventeen years of age and capable of views as wide as her wants, was as +proper a figure as could possibly have been found for the foreground +of a scene artfully designed; and Euphemia, whose years were of like +number, asked herself if a right harmony with such a place mightn't +come by humble prayer. It is a proof of the sincerity of the latter's +aspirations that the castel was not a shock to her faith. It was neither +a cheerful nor a luxurious abode, but it was as full of wonders as a +box of old heirlooms or objects "willed." It had battered towers and +an empty moat, a rusty drawbridge and a court paved with crooked +grass-grown slabs over which the antique coach-wheels of the lady with +the hooked nose seemed to awaken the echoes of the seventeenth century. +Euphemia was not frightened out of her dream; she had the pleasure of +seeing all the easier passages translated into truth, as the learner +of a language begins with the common words. She had a taste for old +servants, old anecdotes, old furniture, faded household colours and +sweetly stale odours--musty treasures in which the Chateau de Mauves +abounded. She made a dozen sketches in water-colours after her +conventual pattern; but sentimentally, as one may say, she was for ever +sketching with a freer hand. + +Old Madame de Mauves had nothing severe but her nose, and she seemed to +Euphemia--what indeed she had every claim to pass for--the very image +and pattern of an "historical character." Belonging to a great order of +things, she patronised the young stranger who was ready to sit all day +at her feet and listen to anecdotes of the bon temps and quotations from +the family chronicles. Madame de Mauves was a very honest old woman; she +uttered her thoughts with ancient plainness. One day after pushing back +Euphemia's shining locks and blinking with some tenderness from behind +an immense face-a-main that acted as for the relegation of the girl +herself to the glass case of a museum, she declared with an energetic +shake of the head that she didn't know what to make of such a little +person. And in answer to the little person's evident wonder, "I should +like to advise you," she said, "but you seem to me so all of a piece +that I'm afraid that if I advise you I shall spoil you. It's easy to see +you're not one of us. I don't know whether you're better, but you +seem to me to have been wound up by some key that isn't kept by your +governess or your confessor or even your mother, but that you wear by +a fine black ribbon round your own neck. Little persons in my day--when +they were stupid they were very docile, but when they were clever they +were very sly! You're clever enough, I imagine, and yet if I guessed all +your secrets at this moment is there one I should have to frown at? I +can tell you a wickeder one than any you've discovered for yourself. If +you wish to live at ease in the doux pays de France don't trouble too +much about the key of your conscience or even about your conscience +itself--I mean your own particular one. You'll fancy it saying things it +won't help your case to hear. They'll make you sad, and when you're sad +you'll grow plain, and when you're plain you'll grow bitter, and when +you're bitter you'll be peu aimable. I was brought up to think that a +woman's first duty is to be infinitely so, and the happiest women I've +known have been in fact those who performed this duty faithfully. As +you're not a Catholic I suppose you can't be a devote; and if you don't +take life as a fifty years' mass the only way to take it's as a game of +skill. Listen to this. Not to lose at the game of life you must--I don't +say cheat, but not be too sure your neighbour won't, and not be shocked +out of your self-possession if he does. Don't lose, my dear--I beseech +you don't lose. Be neither suspicious nor credulous, and if you find +your neighbour peeping don't cry out; only very politely wait your own +chance. I've had my revenge more than once in my day, but I really think +the sweetest I could take, en somme, against the past I've known, would +be to have your blest innocence profit by my experience." + +This was rather bewildering advice, but Euphemia understood it too +little to be either edified or frightened. She sat listening to it very +much as she would have listened to the speeches of an old lady in a +comedy whose diction should strikingly correspond to the form of her +high-backed armchair and the fashion of her coif. Her indifference was +doubly dangerous, for Madame de Mauves spoke at the instance of coming +events, and her words were the result of a worry of scruples--scruples +in the light of which Euphemia was on the one hand too tender a victim +to be sacrificed to an ambition and the prosperity of her own house on +the other too precious a heritage to be sacrificed to an hesitation. The +prosperity in question had suffered repeated and grievous breaches and +the menaced institution been overmuch pervaded by that cold comfort in +which people are obliged to balance dinner-table allusions to feudal +ancestors against the absence of side-dishes; a state of things the +sorrier as the family was now mainly represented by a gentleman whose +appetite was large and who justly maintained that its historic glories +hadn't been established by underfed heroes. + +Three days after Euphemia's arrival Richard de Mauves, coming down from +Paris to pay his respects to his grandmother, treated our heroine to her +first encounter with a gentilhomme in the flesh. On appearing he kissed +his grandmother's hand with a smile which caused her to draw it away +with dignity, and set Euphemia, who was standing by, to ask herself +what could have happened between them. Her unanswered wonder was but the +beginning of a long chain of puzzlements, but the reader is free to know +that the smile of M. de Mauves was a reply to a postscript affixed by +the old lady to a letter addressed to him by her granddaughter as +soon as the girl had been admitted to justify the latter's promises. +Mademoiselle de Mauves brought her letter to her grandmother for +approval, but obtained no more than was expressed in a frigid nod. The +old lady watched her with this coldness while she proceeded to seal the +letter, then suddenly bade her open it again and bring her a pen. + +"Your sister's flatteries are all nonsense," she wrote; "the young +lady's far too good for you, mauvais sujet beyond redemption. If you've +a particle of conscience you'll not come and disturb the repose of an +angel of innocence." + +The other relative of the subject of this warning, who had read these +lines, made up a little face as she freshly indited the address; but she +laid down her pen with a confident nod which might have denoted that by +her judgement her brother was appealed to on the ground of a principle +that didn't exist in him. And "if you meant what you said," the young +man on his side observed to his grandmother on his first private +opportunity, "it would have been simpler not to have sent the letter." + +Put out of humour perhaps by this gross impugnment of her sincerity, the +head of the family kept her room on pretexts during a greater part of +Euphemia's stay, so that the latter's angelic innocence was left all to +her grandson's mercy. It suffered no worse mischance, however, than to +be prompted to intenser communion with itself. Richard de Mauves was the +hero of the young girl's romance made real, and so completely accordant +with this creature of her imagination that she felt afraid of him almost +as she would have been of a figure in a framed picture who should have +stepped down from the wall. He was now thirty-three--young enough to +suggest possibilities of ardent activity and old enough to have formed +opinions that a simple woman might deem it an intellectual privilege to +listen to. He was perhaps a trifle handsomer than Euphemia's rather grim +Quixotic ideal, but a very few days reconciled her to his good looks as +effectually they would have reconciled her to a characterised want of +them. He was quiet, grave, eminently distinguished. He spoke little, +but his remarks, without being sententious, had a nobleness of tone that +caused them to re-echo in the young girl's ears at the end of the day. +He paid her very little direct attention, but his chance words--when he +only asked her if she objected to his cigarette--were accompanied by a +smile of extraordinary kindness. + +It happened that shortly after his arrival, riding an unruly horse which +Euphemia had with shy admiration watched him mount in the castle-yard, +he was thrown with a violence which, without disparaging his skill, made +him for a fortnight an interesting invalid lounging in the library +with a bandaged knee. To beguile his confinement the accomplished young +stranger was repeatedly induced to sing for him, which she did with a +small natural tremor that might have passed for the finish of vocal +art. He never overwhelmed her with compliments, but he listened with +unfailing attention, remembered all her melodies and would sit humming +them to himself. While his imprisonment lasted indeed he passed hours in +her company, making her feel not unlike some unfriended artist who has +suddenly gained the opportunity to devote a fortnight to the study of a +great model. Euphemia studied with noiseless diligence what she supposed +to be the "character" of M. de Mauves, and the more she looked the +more fine lights and shades she seemed to behold in this masterpiece of +nature. M. de Mauves's character indeed, whether from a sense of being +so generously and intensely taken for granted, or for reasons which bid +graceful defiance to analysis, had never been so much on show, even to +the very casual critic lodged, as might be said, in an out-of-the-way +corner of it; it seemed really to reflect the purity of Euphemia's pious +opinion. There had been nothing especially to admire in the state of +mind in which he left Paris--a settled resolve to marry a young person +whose charms might or might not justify his sister's account of them, +but who was mistress, at the worst, of a couple of hundred thousand +francs a year. He had not counted out sentiment--if she pleased him so +much the better; but he had left a meagre margin for it and would hardly +have admitted that so excellent a match could be improved by it. He was +a robust and serene sceptic, and it was a singular fate for a man who +believed in nothing to be so tenderly believed in. What his original +faith had been he could hardly have told you, for as he came back to his +childhood's home to mend his fortunes by pretending to fall in love he +was a thoroughly perverse creature and overlaid with more corruptions +than a summer day's questioning of his conscience would have put to +flight. Ten years' pursuit of pleasure, which a bureau full of unpaid +bills was all he had to show for, had pretty well stifled the natural +lad whose violent will and generous temper might have been shaped by +a different pressure to some such showing as would have justified a +romantic faith. So should he have exhaled the natural fragrance of a +late-blooming flower of hereditary honour. His violence indeed had been +subdued and he had learned to be irreproachably polite; but he had lost +the fineness of his generosity, and his politeness, which in the long +run society paid for, was hardly more than a form of luxurious egotism, +like his fondness for ciphered pocket-handkerchiefs, lavender gloves +and other fopperies by which shopkeepers remained out of pocket. In +after-years he was terribly polite to his wife. He had formed himself, +as the phrase was, and the form prescribed to him by the society into +which his birth and his tastes had introduced him was marked by some +peculiar features. That which mainly concerns us is its classification +of the fairer half of humanity as objects not essentially different--say +from those very lavender gloves that are soiled in an evening and +thrown away. To do M. de Mauves justice, he had in the course of time +encountered in the feminine character such plentiful evidence of its +pliant softness and fine adjustability that idealism naturally seemed to +him a losing game. + +Euphemia, as he lay on his sofa, struck him as by no means +contradictory; she simply reminded him that very young women are +generally innocent and that this is on the whole the most potent source +of their attraction. Her innocence moved him to perfect consideration, +and it seemed to him that if he shortly became her husband it would +be exposed to a danger the less. Old Madame de Mauves, who flattered +herself that in this whole matter she was very laudably rigid, might +almost have taken a lesson from the delicacy he practised. For two or +three weeks her grandson was well-nigh a blushing boy again. He watched +from behind the Figaro, he admired and desired and held his tongue. He +found himself not in the least moved to a flirtation; he had no wish +to trouble the waters he proposed to transfuse into the golden cup of +matrimony. Sometimes a word, a look, a gesture of Euphemia's gave him +the oddest sense of being, or of seeming at least, almost bashful; +for she had a way of not dropping her eyes according to the mysterious +virginal mechanism, of not fluttering out of the room when she found him +there alone, of treating him rather as a glorious than as a pernicious +influence--a radiant frankness of demeanour in fine, despite an +infinite natural reserve, which it seemed at once graceless not to be +complimentary about and indelicate not to take for granted. In this way +had been wrought in the young man's mind a vague unwonted resonance of +soft impressions, as we may call it, which resembled the happy stir of +the change from dreaming pleasantly to waking happily. His imagination +was touched; he was very fond of music and he now seemed to give easy +ear to some of the sweetest he had ever heard. In spite of the bore of +being laid up with a lame knee he was in better humour than he had known +for months; he lay smoking cigarettes and listening to the nightingales +with the satisfied smile of one of his country neighbours whose big +ox should have taken the prize at a fair. Every now and then, with an +impatient suspicion of the resemblance, he declared himself pitifully +bete; but he was under a charm that braved even the supreme penalty of +seeming ridiculous. One morning he had half an hour's tete-a-tete with +his grandmother's confessor, a soft-voiced old Abbe whom, for reasons of +her own, Madame de Mauves had suddenly summoned and had left waiting in +the drawing-room while she rearranged her curls. His reverence, going +up to the old lady, assured her that M. le Comte was in a most edifying +state of mind and the likeliest subject for the operation of grace. This +was a theological interpretation of the count's unusual equanimity. +He had always lazily wondered what priests were good for, and he now +remembered, with a sense of especial obligation to the Abbe, that they +were excellent for marrying people. + +A day or two after this he left off his bandages and tried to walk. He +made his way into the garden and hobbled successfully along one of the +alleys, but in the midst of his progress was pulled up by a spasm of +pain which forced him to stop and call for help. In an instant Euphemia +came tripping along the path and offered him her arm with the frankest +solicitude. + +"Not to the house," he said, taking it; "further on, to the bosquet." +This choice was prompted by her having immediately confessed that she +had seen him leave the house, had feared an accident and had followed +him on tiptoe. + +"Why didn't you join me?" he had asked, giving her a look in which +admiration was no longer disguised and yet felt itself half at the +mercy of her replying that a jeune fille shouldn't be seen following a +gentleman. But it drew a breath which filled its lungs for a long time +afterwards when she replied simply that if she had overtaken him he +might have accepted her arm out of politeness, whereas she wished to +have the pleasure of seeing him walk alone. + +The bosquet was covered with an odorous tangle of blossoming creepers, +and a nightingale overhead was shaking out love-notes with a profusion +that made the Count feel his own conduct the last word of propriety. +"I've always heard that in America, when a man wishes to marry a +young girl, he offers himself simply face to face and without +ceremony--without parents and uncles and aunts and cousins sitting round +in a circle." + +"Why I believe so," said Euphemia, staring and too surprised to be +alarmed. + +"Very well then--suppose our arbour here to be your great sensible +country. I offer you my hand a l'Americaine. It will make me intensely +happy to feel you accept it." + +Whether Euphemia's acceptance was in the American manner is more than +I can say; I incline to think that for fluttering grateful trustful +softly-amazed young hearts there is only one manner all over the world. + +That evening, in the massive turret chamber it was her happiness to +inhabit, she wrote a dutiful letter to her mamma, and had just sealed it +when she was sent for by Madame de Mauves. She found this ancient lady +seated in her boudoir in a lavender satin gown and with her candles all +lighted as for the keeping of some fete. "Are you very happy?" the old +woman demanded, making Euphemia sit down before her. + +"I'm almost afraid to say so, lest I should wake myself up." + +"May you never wake up, belle enfant," Madame de Mauves grandly +returned. "This is the first marriage ever made in our family in this +way--by a Comte de Mauves proposing to a young girl in an arbour like +Jeannot and Jeannette. It has not been our way of doing things, and +people may say it wants frankness. My grandson tells me he regards +it--for the conditions--as the perfection of good taste. Very well. I'm +a very old woman, and if your differences should ever be as marked as +your agreements I shouldn't care to see them. But I should be sorry +to die and think you were going to be unhappy. You can't be, my dear, +beyond a certain point; because, though in this world the Lord sometimes +makes light of our expectations he never altogether ignores our deserts. +But you're very young and innocent and easy to dazzle. There never was a +man in the world--among the saints themselves--as good as you believe my +grandson. But he's a galant homme and a gentleman, and I've been talking +to him to-night. To you I want to say this--that you're to forget the +worldly rubbish I talked the other day about the happiness of +frivolous women. It's not the kind of happiness that would suit you, ma +toute-belle. Whatever befalls you, promise me this: to be, to remain, +your own sincere little self only, charming in your own serious little +way. The Comtesse de Mauves will be none the worse for it. Your brave +little self, understand, in spite of everything--bad precepts and bad +examples, bad fortune and even bad usage. Be persistently and patiently +just what the good God has made you, and even one of us--and one of +those who is most what we ARE--will do you justice!" + +Euphemia remembered this speech in after-years, and more than once, +wearily closing her eyes, she seemed to see the old woman sitting +upright in her faded finery and smiling grimly like one of the Fates +who sees the wheel of fortune turning up her favourite event. But at the +moment it had for her simply the proper gravity of the occasion: this +was the way, she supposed, in which lucky young girls were addressed on +their engagement by wise old women of quality. + +At her convent, to which she immediately returned, she found a letter +from her mother which disconcerted her far more than the remarks of +Madame de Mauves. Who were these people, Mrs. Cleve demanded, who had +presumed to talk to her daughter of marriage without asking her leave? +Questionable gentlefolk plainly; the best French people never did such +things. Euphemia would return straightway to her convent, shut herself +up and await her own arrival. It took Mrs. Cleve three weeks to +travel from Nice to Paris, and during this time the young girl had +no communication with her lover beyond accepting a bouquet of violets +marked with his initials and left by a female friend. "I've not brought +you up with such devoted care," she declared to her daughter at their +first interview, "to marry a presumptuous and penniless Frenchman. I +shall take you straight home and you'll please forget M. de Mauves." + +Mrs. Cleve received that evening at her hotel a visit from this +personage which softened her wrath but failed to modify her decision. He +had very good manners, but she was sure he had horrible morals; and the +lady, who had been a good-natured censor on her own account, felt a deep +and real need to sacrifice her daughter to propriety. She belonged to +that large class of Americans who make light of their native land +in familiar discourse but are startled back into a sense of having +blasphemed when they find Europeans taking them at their word. "I know +the type, my dear," she said to her daughter with a competent nod. "He +won't beat you. Sometimes you'll wish he would." + +Euphemia remained solemnly silent, for the only answer she felt capable +of making was that her mother's mind was too small a measure of things +and her lover's type an historic, a social masterpiece that it took some +mystic illumination to appreciate. A person who confounded him with the +common throng of her watering-place acquaintance was not a person to +argue with. It struck the girl she had simply no cause to plead; her +cause was in the Lord's hands and in those of M. de Mauves. + +This agent of Providence had been irritated and mortified by Mrs. +Cleve's opposition, and hardly knew how to handle an adversary who +failed to perceive that a member of his family gave of necessity more +than he received. But he had obtained information on his return to Paris +which exalted the uses of humility. Euphemia's fortune, wonderful to +say, was greater than its fame, and in view of such a prize, even a +member of his family could afford to take a snubbing. + +The young man's tact, his deference, his urbane insistence, won a +concession from Mrs. Cleve. The engagement was to be put off and her +daughter was to return home, be brought out and receive the homage she +was entitled to and which might well take a form representing peril to +the suit of this first headlong aspirant. They were to exchange neither +letters nor mementoes nor messages; but if at the end of two years +Euphemia had refused offers enough to attest the permanence of her +attachment he should receive an invitation to address her again. This +decision was promulgated in the presence of the parties interested. +The Count bore himself gallantly, looking at his young friend as if he +expected some tender protestation. But she only looked at him silently +in return, neither weeping nor smiling nor putting out her hand. On this +they separated, and as M. de Mauves walked away he declared to himself +that in spite of the confounded two years he was one of the luckiest +of men--to have a fiancee who to several millions of francs added such +strangely beautiful eyes. + +How many offers Euphemia refused but scantily concerns us--and how the +young man wore his two years away. He found he required pastimes, and +as pastimes were expensive he added heavily to the list of debts to be +cancelled by Euphemia's fortune. Sometimes, in the thick of what he +had once called pleasure with a keener conviction than now, he put to +himself the case of their failing him after all; and then he remembered +that last mute assurance of her pale face and drew a long breath of +such confidence as he felt in nothing else in the world save his own +punctuality in an affair of honour. + +At last, one morning, he took the express to Havre with a letter of Mrs. +Cleve's in his pocket, and ten days later made his bow to mother and +daughter in New York. His stay was brief, and he was apparently unable +to bring himself to view what Euphemia's uncle, Mr. Butterworth, who +gave her away at the altar, called our great experiment of democratic +self-government, in a serious light. He smiled at everything and seemed +to regard the New World as a colossal plaisanterie. It is true that a +perpetual smile was the most natural expression of countenance for a man +about to marry Euphemia Cleve. + + + + +III + +Longmore's first visit seemed to open to him so large a range of quiet +pleasure that he very soon paid a second, and at the end of a fortnight +had spent uncounted hours in the little drawing-room which Madame de +Mauves rarely quitted except to drive or walk in the forest. She +lived in an old-fashioned pavilion, between a high-walled court and an +excessively artificial garden, beyond whose enclosure you saw a long +line of tree-tops. Longmore liked the garden and in the mild afternoons +used to move his chair through the open window to the smooth terrace +which overlooked it while his hostess sat just within. Presently she +would come out and wander through the narrow alleys and beside the +thin-spouting fountain, and at last introduce him to a private gate +in the high wall, the opening to a lane which led to the forest. +Hitherwards she more than once strolled with him, bareheaded and meaning +to go but twenty rods, but always going good-naturedly further and often +stretching it to the freedom of a promenade. They found many things to +talk about, and to the pleasure of feeling the hours slip along +like some silver stream Longmore was able to add the satisfaction of +suspecting that he was a "resource" for Madame de Mauves. He had made +her acquaintance with the sense, not wholly inspiring, that she was a +woman with a painful twist in her life and that seeking her acquaintance +would be like visiting at a house where there was an invalid who could +bear no noise. But he very soon recognised that her grievance, if +grievance it was, was not aggressive; that it was not fond of attitudes +and ceremonies, and that her most earnest wish was to remember it as +little as possible. He felt that even if Mrs. Draper hadn't told him +she was unhappy he would have guessed it, and yet that he couldn't +have pointed to his proof. The evidence was chiefly negative--she never +alluded to her husband. Beyond this it seemed to him simply that her +whole being was pitched in a lower key than harmonious Nature had +designed; she was like a powerful singer who had lost her high notes. +She never drooped nor sighed nor looked unutterable things; she dealt +no sarcastic digs at her fate; she had in short none of the conscious +graces of the woman wronged. Only Longmore was sure that her gentle +gaiety was but the milder or sharper flush of a settled ache, and that +she but tried to interest herself in his thoughts in order to escape +from her own. If she had wished to irritate his curiosity and lead him +to take her confidence by storm nothing could have served her purpose +better than this studied discretion. He measured the rare magnanimity +of self-effacement so deliberate, he felt how few women were capable of +exchanging a luxurious woe for a thankless effort. Madame de Mauves, +he himself felt, wasn't sweeping the horizon for a compensation or a +consoler; she had suffered a personal deception that had disgusted her +with persons. She wasn't planning to get the worth of her trouble back +in some other way; for the present she was proposing to live with +it peaceably, reputably and without scandal--turning the key on it +occasionally as you would on a companion liable to attacks of insanity. +Longmore was a man of fine senses and of a speculative spirit, +leading-strings that had never been slipped. He began to regard his +hostess as a figure haunted by a shadow which was somehow her intenser +and more authentic self. This lurking duality in her put on for him an +extraordinary charm. Her delicate beauty acquired to his eye the serious +cast of certain blank-browed Greek statues; and sometimes when his +imagination, more than his ear, detected a vague tremor in the tone in +which she attempted to make a friendly question seem to have behind it +none of the hollow resonance of absent-mindedness, his marvelling eyes +gave her an answer more eloquent, though much less to the point, than +the one she demanded. + +She supplied him indeed with much to wonder about, so that he fitted, in +his ignorance, a dozen high-flown theories to her apparent history. She +had married for love and staked her whole soul on it; of that he was +convinced. She hadn't changed her allegiance to be near Paris and her +base of supplies of millinery; he was sure she had seen her perpetrated +mistake in a light of which her present life, with its conveniences for +shopping and its moral aridity, was the absolute negation. But by what +extraordinary process of the heart--through what mysterious intermission +of that moral instinct which may keep pace with the heart even when this +organ is making unprecedented time--had she fixed her affections on an +insolently frivolous Frenchman? Longmore needed no telling; he knew that +M. de Mauves was both cynical and shallow; these things were stamped +on his eyes, his nose, his mouth, his voice, his gesture, his step. Of +Frenchwomen themselves, when all was said, our young man, full of nursed +discriminations, went in no small fear; they all seemed to belong to the +type of a certain fine lady to whom he had ventured to present a letter +of introduction and whom, directly after his first visit to her, he had +set down in his note-book as "metallic." Why should Madame de Mauves +have chosen a Frenchwoman's lot--she whose nature had an atmospheric +envelope absent even from the brightest metals? He asked her one day +frankly if it had cost her nothing to transplant herself--if she weren't +oppressed with a sense of irreconcileable difference from "all these +people." She replied nothing at first, till he feared she might think +it her duty to resent a question that made light of all her husband's +importances. He almost wished she would; it would seem a proof that +her policy of silence had a limit. "I almost grew up here," she said +at last, "and it was here for me those visions of the future took +shape that we all have when we begin to think or to dream beyond mere +playtime. As matters stand one may be very American and yet arrange it +with one's conscience to live in Europe. My imagination perhaps--I had +a little when I was younger--helped me to think I should find happiness +here. And after all, for a woman, what does it signify? This isn't +America, no--this element, but it's quite as little France. France is +out there beyond the garden, France is in the town and the forest; but +here, close about me, in my room and"--she paused a moment--"in my mind, +it's a nameless, and doubtless not at all remarkable, little country of +my own. It's not her country," she added, "that makes a woman happy or +unhappy." + +Madame Clairin, Euphemia's sister-in-law, might meanwhile have been +supposed to have undertaken the graceful task of making Longmore ashamed +of his uncivil jottings about her sex and nation. Mademoiselle de +Mauves, bringing example to the confirmation of precept, had made +a remunerative match and sacrificed her name to the millions of a +prosperous and aspiring wholesale druggist--a gentleman liberal enough +to regard his fortune as a moderate price for being towed into circles +unpervaded by pharmaceutic odours. His system possibly was sound, but +his own application of it to be deplored. M. Clairin's head was turned +by his good luck. Having secured an aristocratic wife he adopted an +aristocratic vice and began to gamble at the Bourse. In an evil hour he +lost heavily, and then staked heavily to recover himself. But he was +to learn that the law of compensation works with no such pleasing +simplicity, and he rolled to the dark bottom of his folly. There he felt +everything go--his wits, his courage, his probity, everything that had +made him what his fatuous marriage had so promptly unmade. He walked up +the Rue Vivienne with his hands in his empty pockets and stood half an +hour staring confusedly up and down the brave boulevard. People brushed +against him and half a dozen carriages almost ran over him, until at +last a policeman, who had been watching him for some time, took him by +the arm and led him gently away. He looked at the man's cocked hat and +sword with tears in his eyes; he hoped for some practical application +of the wrath of heaven, something that would express violently his +dead-weight of self-abhorrence. The sergent de ville, however, only +stationed him in the embrasure of a door, out of harm's way, and walked +off to supervise a financial contest between an old lady and a cabman. +Poor M. Clairin had only been married a year, but he had had time to +measure the great spirit of true children of the anciens preux. When +night had fallen he repaired to the house of a friend and asked for +a night's lodging; and as his friend, who was simply his old head +book-keeper and lived in a small way, was put to some trouble to +accommodate him, "You must pardon me," the poor man said, "but I can't +go home. I'm afraid of my wife!" Toward morning he blew his brains out. +His widow turned the remnants of his property to better account than +could have been expected and wore the very handsomest mourning. It was +for this latter reason perhaps that she was obliged to retrench at other +points and accept a temporary home under her brother's roof. + +Fortune had played Madame Clairin a terrible trick, but had found an +adversary and not a victim. Though quite without beauty she had always +had what is called the grand air, and her air from this time forth was +grander than ever. As she trailed about in her sable furbelows, tossing +back her well-dressed head and holding up her vigilant long-handled +eyeglass, she seemed to be sweeping the whole field of society and +asking herself where she should pluck her revenge. Suddenly she espied +it, ready made to her hand, in poor Longmore's wealth and amiability. +American dollars and American complaisance had made her brother's +fortune; why shouldn't they make hers? She overestimated the wealth and +misinterpreted the amiability; for she was sure a man could neither be +so contented without being rich nor so "backward" without being weak. +Longmore met her advances with a formal politeness that covered a +good deal of unflattering discomposure. She made him feel deeply +uncomfortable; and though he was at a loss to conceive how he could be +an object of interest to a sharp Parisienne he had an indefinable sense +of being enclosed in a magnetic circle, of having become the victim of +an incantation. If Madame Clairin could have fathomed his Puritanic soul +she would have laid by her wand and her book and dismissed him for an +impossible subject. She gave him a moral chill, and he never named her +to himself save as that dreadful woman--that awful woman. He did justice +to her grand air, but for his pleasure he preferred the small air of +Madame de Mauves; and he never made her his bow, after standing frigidly +passive for five minutes to one of her gracious overtures to intimacy, +without feeling a peculiar desire to ramble away into the forest, fling +himself down on the warm grass and, staring up at the blue sky, forget +that there were any women in nature who didn't please like the swaying +tree-tops. One day, on his arrival at the house, she met him in the +court with the news that her sister-in-law was shut up with a +headache and that his visit must be for HER. He followed her into the +drawing-room with the best grace at his command, and sat twirling his +hat for half an hour. Suddenly he understood her; her caressing cadences +were so almost explicit an invitation to solicit the charming honour +of her hand. He blushed to the roots of his hair and jumped up with +uncontrollable alacrity; then, dropping a glance at Madame Clairin, +who sat watching him with hard eyes over the thin edge of her smile, +perceived on her brow a flash of unforgiving wrath. It was not pleasing +in itself, but his eyes lingered a moment, for it seemed to show off her +character. What he saw in the picture frightened him and he felt himself +murmur "Poor Madame de Mauves!" His departure was abrupt, and this time +he really went into the forest and lay down on the grass. + +After which he admired his young countrywoman more than ever; her +intrinsic clearness shone out to him even through the darker shade cast +over it. At the end of a month he received a letter from a friend with +whom he had arranged a tour through the Low Countries, reminding him +of his promise to keep their tryst at Brussels. It was only after his +answer was posted that he fully measured the zeal with which he had +declared that the journey must either be deferred or abandoned--since he +couldn't possibly leave Saint-Germain. He took a walk in the forest +and asked himself if this were indeed portentously true. Such a truth +somehow made it surely his duty to march straight home and put together +his effects. Poor Webster, who, he knew, had counted ardently on this +excursion, was the best of men; six weeks ago he would have gone through +anything to join poor Webster. It had never been in his books to throw +overboard a friend whom he had loved ten years for a married woman whom +he had six weeks--well, admired. It was certainly beyond question that +he hung on at Saint-Germain because this admirable married woman was +there; but in the midst of so much admiration what had become of his +fine old power to conclude? This was the conduct of a man not judging +but drifting, and he had pretended never to drift. If she were as +unhappy as he believed the active sympathy of such a man would help her +very little more than his indifference; if she were less so she needed +no help and could dispense with his professions. He was sure moreover +that if she knew he was staying on her account she would be extremely +annoyed. This very feeling indeed had much to do with making it hard +to go; her displeasure would be the flush on the snow of the high cold +stoicism that touched him to the heart. At moments withal he assured +himself that staying to watch her--and what else did it come to?--was +simply impertinent; it was gross to keep tugging at the cover of a book +so intentionally closed. Then inclination answered that some day her +self-support would fail, and he had a vision of this exquisite creature +calling vainly for help. He would just be her friend to any length, and +it was unworthy of either to think about consequences. He was a friend, +however, who nursed a brooding regret for his not having known her +five years earlier, as well as a particular objection to those who had +smartly anticipated him. It seemed one of fortune's most mocking strokes +that she should be surrounded by persons whose only merit was that they +threw every side of her, as she turned in her pain, into radiant relief. + +Our young man's growing irritation made it more and more difficult for +him to see any other merit than this in Richard de Mauves. And yet, +disinterestedly, it would have been hard to give a name to the pitiless +perversity lighted by such a conclusion, and there were times when +Longmore was almost persuaded against his finer judgement that he was +really the most considerate of husbands and that it was not a man's +fault if his wife's love of life had pitched itself once for all in +the minor key. The Count's manners were perfect, his discretion +irreproachable, and he seemed never to address his companion but, +sentimentally speaking, hat in hand. His tone to Longmore--as the latter +was perfectly aware--was that of a man of the world to a man not quite +of the world; but what it lacked in true frankness it made up in easy +form. "I can't thank you enough for having overcome my wife's shyness," +he more than once declared. "If we left her to do as she pleased she +would--in her youth and her beauty--bury herself all absurdly alive. +Come often, and bring your good friends and compatriots--some of them +are so amusing. She'll have nothing to do with mine, but perhaps you'll +be able to offer her better son affaire." + +M. de Mauves made these speeches with a bright assurance very amazing to +our hero, who had an innocent belief that a man's head may point out +to him the shortcomings of his heart and make him ashamed of them. +He couldn't fancy him formed both to neglect his wife and to take the +derisive view of her minding it. Longmore had at any rate an exasperated +sense that this nobleman thought rather the less of their interesting +friend on account of that very same fine difference of nature which +so deeply stirred his own sympathies. He was rarely present during the +sessions of the American visitor, and he made a daily journey to Paris, +where he had de gros soucis d'affaires as he once mentioned--with an +all-embracing flourish and not in the least in the tone of apology. When +he appeared it was late in the evening and with an imperturbable air +of being on the best of terms with every one and every thing which was +peculiarly annoying if you happened to have a tacit quarrel with him. +If he was an honest man he was an honest man somehow spoiled for +confidence. Something he had, however, that his critic vaguely envied, +something in his address, splendidly positive, a manner rounded +and polished by the habit of conversation and the friction of full +experience, an urbanity exercised for his own sake, not for his +neighbour's, which seemed the fruit of one of those strong temperaments +that rule the inward scene better than the best conscience. The Count +had plainly no sense for morals, and poor Longmore, who had the finest, +would have been glad to borrow his recipe for appearing then so to range +the whole scale of the senses. What was it that enabled him, short of +being a monster with visibly cloven feet and exhaling brimstone, to +misprize so cruelly a nature like his wife's and to walk about the world +with such a handsome invincible grin? It was the essential grossness of +his imagination, which had nevertheless helped him to such a store of +neat speeches. He could be highly polite and could doubtless be damnably +impertinent, but the life of the spirit was a world as closed to him as +the world of great music to a man without an ear. It was ten to one +he didn't in the least understand how his wife felt; he and his smooth +sister had doubtless agreed to regard their relative as a Puritanical +little person, of meagre aspirations and few talents, content with +looking at Paris from the terrace and, as a special treat, having a +countryman very much like herself to regale her with innocent echoes +of their native wit. M. de Mauves was tired of his companion; he +liked women who could, frankly, amuse him better. She was too dim, too +delicate, too modest; she had too few arts, too little coquetry, +too much charity. Lighting a cigar some day while he summed up his +situation, her husband had probably decided she was incurably stupid. +It was the same taste, in essence, our young man moralised, as the taste +for M. Gerome and M. Baudry in painting and for M. Gustave Flaubert and +M. Charles Baudelaire in literature. The Count was a pagan and his wife +a Christian, and between them an impassable gulf. He was by race and +instinct a grand seigneur. Longmore had often heard of that historic +type, and was properly grateful for an opportunity to examine it +closely. It had its elegance of outline, but depended on spiritual +sources so remote from those of which he felt the living gush in his own +soul that he found himself gazing at it, in irreconcileable antipathy, +through a dim historic mist. "I'm a modern bourgeois," he said, "and +not perhaps so good a judge of how far a pretty woman's tongue may go at +supper before the mirrors properly crack to hear. But I've not met +one of the rarest of women without recognising her, without making +my reflexion that, charm for charm, such a maniere d'etre is more +'fetching' even than the worst of Theresa's songs sung by a dissipated +duchess. Wit for wit, I think mine carries me further." It was easy +indeed to perceive that, as became a grand seigneur, M. de Mauves had a +stock of social principles. He wouldn't especially have desired perhaps +that his wife should compete in amateur operettas with the duchesses in +question, for the most part of comparatively recent origin; but he held +that a gentleman may take his amusement where he finds it, that he +is quite at liberty not to find it at home, and that even an adoptive +daughter of his house who should hang her head and have red eyes and +allow herself to make any other response to officious condolence than +that her husband's amusements were his own affair, would have forfeited +every claim to having her finger-tips bowed over and kissed. And yet in +spite of this definite faith Longmore figured him much inconvenienced +by the Countess's avoidance of betrayals. Did it dimly occur to him that +the principle of this reserve was self-control and not self-effacement? +She was a model to all the inferior matrons of his line, past and to +come, and an occasional "scene" from her at a manageable hour would +have had something reassuring--would have attested her stupidity rather +better than this mere polish of her patience. + +Longmore would have given much to be able to guess how this latter +secret worked, and he tried more than once, though timidly and awkwardly +enough, to make out the game she was playing. She struck him as having +long resisted the force of cruel evidence, and, as though succumbing to +it at last, having denied herself on simple grounds of generosity the +right to complain. Her faith might have perished, but the sense of her +own old deep perversity remained. He believed her thus quite capable +of reproaching herself with having expected too much and of trying to +persuade herself out of her bitterness by saying that her hopes had been +vanities and follies and that what was before her was simply Life. "I +hate tragedy," she once said to him; "I'm a dreadful coward about having +to suffer or to bleed. I've always tried to believe that--without +base concessions--such extremities may always somehow be dodged or +indefinitely postponed. I should be willing to buy myself off, from +having ever to be OVERWHELMED, by giving up--well, any amusement you +like." She lived evidently in nervous apprehension of being fatally +convinced--of seeing to the end of her deception. Longmore, when he +thought of this, felt the force of his desire to offer her something of +which she could be as sure as of the sun in heaven. + + + + +IV + +His friend Webster meanwhile lost no time in accusing him of the basest +infidelity and in asking him what he found at suburban Saint-Germain to +prefer to Van Eyck and Memling, Rubens and Rembrandt. A day or two after +the receipt of this friend's letter he took a walk with Madame de Mauves +in the forest. They sat down on a fallen log and she began to arrange +into a bouquet the anemones and violets she had gathered. "I've a word +here," he said at last, "from a friend whom I some time ago promised to +join in Brussels. The time has come--it has passed. It finds me terribly +unwilling to leave Saint-Germain." + +She looked up with the immediate interest she always showed in +his affairs, but with no hint of a disposition to make a personal +application of his words. "Saint-Germain is pleasant enough, but are you +doing yourself justice? Shan't you regret in future days that instead +of travelling and seeing cities and monuments and museums and improving +your mind you simply sat here--for instance--on a log and pulled my +flowers to pieces?" + +"What I shall regret in future days," he answered after some hesitation, +"is that I should have sat here--sat here so much--and never have shown +what's the matter with me. I'm fond of museums and monuments and of +improving my mind, and I'm particularly fond of my friend Webster. But I +can't bring myself to leave Saint-Germain without asking you a question. +You must forgive me if it's indiscreet and be assured that curiosity +was never more respectful. Are you really as unhappy as I imagine you to +be?" + +She had evidently not expected his appeal, and, making her change +colour, it took her unprepared. "If I strike you as unhappy," she none +the less simply said, "I've been a poorer friend to you than I wished to +be." + +"I, perhaps, have been a better friend of yours than you've supposed," +he returned. "I've admired your reserve, your courage, your studied +gaiety. But I've felt the existence of something beneath them that was +more YOU--more you as I wished to know you--than they were; some trouble +in you that I've permitted myself to hate and resent." + +She listened all gravely, but without an air of offence, and he felt +that while he had been timorously calculating the last consequences of +friendship she had quietly enough accepted them. "You surprise me," she +said slowly, and her flush still lingered. "But to refuse to answer +you would confirm some impression in you even now much too strong. Any +'trouble'--if you mean any unhappiness--that one can sit comfortably +talking about is an unhappiness with distinct limitations. If I were +examined before a board of commissioners for testing the felicity of +mankind I'm sure I should be pronounced a very fortunate woman." There +was something that deeply touched him in her tone, and this quality +pierced further as she continued. "But let me add, with all gratitude +for your sympathy, that it's my own affair altogether. It needn't +disturb you, my dear sir," she wound up with a certain quaintness of +gaiety, "for I've often found myself in your company contented enough +and diverted enough." + +"Well, you're a wonderful woman," the young man declared, "and I admire +you as I've never admired any one. You're wiser than anything I, for +one, can say to you; and what I ask of you is not to let me advise +or console you, but simply thank you for letting me know you." He had +intended no such outburst as this, but his voice rang loud and he felt +an unfamiliar joy as he uttered it. + +She shook her head with some impatience. "Let us be friends--as I +supposed we were going to be--without protestations and fine words. +To have you paying compliments to my wisdom--that would be real +wretchedness. I can dispense with your admiration better than the +Flemish painters can--better than Van Eyck and Rubens, in spite of +all their worshippers. Go join your friend--see everything, enjoy +everything, learn everything, and write me an excellent letter, brimming +over with your impressions. I'm extremely fond of the Dutch painters," +she added with the faintest quaver in the world, an impressible break of +voice that Longmore had noticed once or twice before and had interpreted +as the sudden weariness, the controlled convulsion, of a spirit +self-condemned to play a part. + +"I don't believe you care a button for the Dutch painters," he said with +a laugh. "But I shall certainly write you a letter." + +She rose and turned homeward, thoughtfully rearranging her flowers +as she walked. Little was said; Longmore was asking himself with an +agitation of his own in the unspoken words whether all this meant +simply that he was in love. He looked at the rooks wheeling against the +golden-hued sky, between the tree-tops, but not at his companion, whose +personal presence seemed lost in the felicity she had created. Madame de +Mauves was silent and grave--she felt she had almost grossly failed and +she was proportionately disappointed. An emotional friendship she had +not desired; her scheme had been to pass with her visitor as a placid +creature with a good deal of leisure which she was disposed to devote to +profitable conversation of an impersonal sort. She liked him extremely, +she felt in him the living force of something to which, when she made up +her girlish mind that a needy nobleman was the ripest fruit of time, +she had done too scant justice. They went through the little gate in the +garden-wall and approached the house. On the terrace Madame Clairin was +entertaining a friend--a little elderly gentleman with a white moustache +and an order in his buttonhole. Madame de Mauves chose to pass round +the house into the court; whereupon her sister-in-law, greeting Longmore +with an authoritative nod, lifted her eye-glass and stared at them as +they went by. Longmore heard the little old gentleman uttering some +old-fashioned epigram about "la vieille galanterie francaise"--then by +a sudden impulse he looked at Madame de Mauves and wondered what she was +doing in such a world. She stopped before the house, not asking him to +come in. "I hope you will act on my advice and waste no more time at +Saint-Germain." + +For an instant there rose to his lips some faded compliment about his +time not being wasted, but it expired before the simple sincerity of +her look. She stood there as gently serious as the angel of +disinterestedness, and it seemed to him he should insult her by treating +her words as a bait for flattery. "I shall start in a day or two," he +answered, "but I won't promise you not to come back." + +"I hope not," she said simply. "I expect to be here a long time." + +"I shall come and say good-bye," he returned--which she appeared to +accept with a smile as she went in. + +He stood a moment, then walked slowly homeward by the terrace. It seemed +to him that to leave her thus, for a gain on which she herself insisted, +was to know her better and admire her more. But he was aware of a vague +ferment of feeling which her evasion of his question half an hour before +had done more to deepen than to allay. In the midst of it suddenly, on +the great terrace of the Chateau, he encountered M. de Mauves, planted +there against the parapet and finishing a cigar. The Count, who, he +thought he made out, had an air of peculiar affability, offered him his +white plump hand. Longmore stopped; he felt a sharp, a sore desire to +cry out to him that he had the most precious wife in the world, that +he ought to be ashamed of himself not to know it, and that for all his +grand assurance he had never looked down into the depths of her eyes. +Richard de Mauves, we have seen, considered he had; but there was +doubtless now something in this young woman's eyes that had not been +there five years before. The two men conversed formally enough, and +M. de Mauves threw off a light bright remark or two about his visit to +America. His tone was not soothing to Longmore's excited sensibilities. +He seemed to have found the country a gigantic joke, and his blandness +went but so far as to allow that jokes on that scale are indeed +inexhaustible. Longmore was not by habit an aggressive apologist for the +seat of his origin, but the Count's easy diagnosis confirmed his worst +estimate of French superficiality. He had understood nothing, felt +nothing, learned nothing, and his critic, glancing askance at his +aristocratic profile, declared that if the chief merit of a long +pedigree was to leave one so fatuously stupid he thanked goodness the +Longmores had emerged from obscurity in the present century and in the +person of an enterprising timber-merchant. M. de Mauves dwelt of course +on that prime oddity of the American order--the liberty allowed the +fairer half of the unmarried young, and confessed to some personal study +of the "occasions" it offered to the speculative visitor; a line of +research in which, during a fortnight's stay, he had clearly spent his +most agreeable hours. "I'm bound to admit," he said, "that in every case +I was disarmed by the extreme candour of the young lady, and that they +took care of themselves to better purpose than I have seen some mammas +in France take care of them." Longmore greeted this handsome concession +with the grimmest of smiles and damned his impertinent patronage. + +Mentioning, however, at last that he was about to leave Saint-Germain, +he was surprised, without exactly being flattered, by his interlocutor's +quickened attention. "I'm so very sorry; I hoped we had you for the +whole summer." Longmore murmured something civil and wondered why M. +de Mauves should care whether he stayed or went. "You've been a real +resource to Madame de Mauves," the Count added; "I assure you I've +mentally blessed your visits." + +"They were a great pleasure to me," Longmore said gravely. "Some day I +expect to come back." + +"Pray do"--and the Count made a great and friendly point of it. "You see +the confidence I have in you." Longmore said nothing and M. de Mauves +puffed his cigar reflectively and watched the smoke. "Madame de Mauves," +he said at last, "is a rather singular person." And then while our young +man shifted his position and wondered whether he was going to "explain" +Madame de Mauves, "Being, as you are, her fellow countryman," this +lady's husband pursued, "I don't mind speaking frankly. She's a little +overstrained; the most charming woman in the world, as you see, but +a little volontaire and morbid. Now you see she has taken this +extraordinary fancy for solitude. I can't get her to go anywhere, to see +any one. When my friends present themselves she's perfectly polite, but +it cures them of coming again. She doesn't do herself justice, and I +expect every day to hear two or three of them say to me, 'Your wife's +jolie a croquer: what a pity she hasn't a little esprit.' You must +have found out that she has really a great deal. But, to tell the whole +truth, what she needs is to forget herself. She sits alone for hours +poring over her English books and looking at life through that terrible +brown fog they seem to me--don't they?--to fling over the world. I +doubt if your English authors," the Count went on with a serenity which +Longmore afterwards characterised as sublime, "are very sound reading +for young married women. I don't pretend to know much about them; but I +remember that not long after our marriage Madame de Mauves undertook to +read me one day some passages from a certain Wordsworth--a poet highly +esteemed, it appears, chez vous. It was as if she had taken me by the +nape of the neck and held my head for half an hour over a basin of soupe +aux choux: I felt as if we ought to ventilate the drawing-room before +any one called. But I suppose you know him--ce genie-la. Every nation +has its own ideals of every kind, but when I remember some of OUR +charming writers! I think at all events my wife never forgave me and +that it was a real shock to her to find she had married a man who had +very much the same taste in literature as in cookery. But you're a man +of general culture, a man of the world," said M. de Mauves, turning to +Longmore but looking hard at the seal of his watchguard. "You can talk +about everything, and I'm sure you like Alfred de Musset as well as +Monsieur Wordsworth. Talk to her about everything you can, Alfred de +Musset included. Bah! I forgot you're going. Come back then as soon as +possible and report on your travels. If my wife too would make a little +voyage it would do her great good. It would enlarge her horizon"--and +M. de Mauves made a series of short nervous jerks with his stick in the +air--"it would wake up her imagination. She's too much of one piece, +you know--it would show her how much one may bend without breaking." He +paused a moment and gave two or three vigorous puffs. Then turning +to his companion again with eyebrows expressively raised: "I hope you +admire my candour. I beg you to believe I wouldn't say such things to +one of US!" + +Evening was at hand and the lingering light seemed to charge the air +with faintly golden motes. Longmore stood gazing at these luminous +particles; he could almost have fancied them a swarm of humming insects, +the chorus of a refrain: "She has a great deal of esprit--she has +a great deal of esprit." "Yes,--she has a great deal," he said +mechanically, turning to the Count. M. de Mauves glanced at him sharply, +as if to ask what the deuce he was talking about. "She has a great deal +of intelligence," said Longmore quietly, "a great deal of beauty, a +great many virtues." + +M. de Mauves busied himself for a moment in lighting another cigar, +and when he had finished, with a return of his confidential smile, +"I suspect you of thinking that I don't do my wife justice." he made +answer. "Take care--take care, young man; that's a dangerous assumption. +In general a man always does his wife justice. More than justice," the +Count laughed--"that we keep for the wives of other men!" + +Longmore afterwards remembered in favour of his friend's fine manner +that he had not measured at this moment the dusky abyss over which +it hovered. Hut a deepening subterranean echo, loudest at the last, +lingered on his spiritual ear. For the present his keenest sensation was +a desire to get away and cry aloud that M. de Mauves was no better than +a pompous dunce. He bade him an abrupt good-night, which was to serve +also, he said, as good-bye. + +"Decidedly then you go?" It was spoken almost with the note of +irritation. + +"Decidedly." + +"But of course you'll come and take leave--?" His manner implied that +the omission would be uncivil, but there seemed to Longmore himself +something so ludicrous in his taking a lesson in consideration from M. +de Mauves that he put the appeal by with a laugh. The Count frowned as +if it were a new and unpleasant sensation for him to be left at a loss. +"Ah you people have your facons!" he murmured as Longmore turned away, +not foreseeing that he should learn still more about his facons before +he had done with him. + +Longmore sat down to dinner at his hotel with his usual good intentions, +but in the act of lifting his first glass of wine to his lips he +suddenly fell to musing and set down the liquor untasted. This mood +lasted long, and when he emerged from it his fish was cold; but that +mattered little, for his appetite was gone. That evening he packed his +trunk with an indignant energy. This was so effective that the operation +was accomplished before bedtime, and as he was not in the least sleepy +he devoted the interval to writing two letters, one of them a short note +to Madame de Mauves, which he entrusted to a servant for delivery the +next morning. He had found it best, he said, to leave Saint-Germain +immediately, but he expected to return to Paris early in the autumn. The +other letter was the result of his having remembered a day or two before +that he had not yet complied with Mrs. Draper's injunction to give her +an account of his impression of her friend. The present occasion seemed +propitious, and he wrote half a dozen pages. His tone, however, +was grave, and Mrs. Draper, on reading him over, was slightly +disappointed--she would have preferred he should have "raved" a little +more. But what chiefly concerns us is the concluding passage. + +"The only time she ever spoke to me of her marriage," he wrote, "she +intimated that it had been a perfect love-match. With all abatements, I +suppose, this is what most marriages take themselves to be; but it would +mean in her case, I think, more than in that of most women, for her love +was an absolute idealisation. She believed her husband to be a hero of +rose-coloured romance, and he turns out to be not even a hero of very +sad-coloured reality. For some time now she has been sounding her +mistake, but I don't believe she has yet touched the bottom. She strikes +me as a person who's begging off from full knowledge--who has patched up +a peace with some painful truth and is trying a while the experiment of +living with closed eyes. In the dark she tries to see again the gilding +on her idol. Illusion of course is illusion, and one must always pay for +it; but there's something truly tragical in seeing an earthly penalty +levied on such divine folly as this. As for M. de Mauves he's a shallow +Frenchman to his fingers' ends, and I confess I should dislike him for +this if he were a much better man. He can't forgive his wife for having +married him too extravagantly and loved him too well; since he feels, I +suppose, in some uncorrupted corner of his being that as she originally +saw him so he ought to have been. It disagrees with him somewhere that +a little American bourgeoise should have fancied him a finer fellow +than he is or than he at all wants to be. He hasn't a glimmering of real +acquaintance with his wife; he can't understand the stream of passion +flowing so clear and still. To tell the truth I hardly understand it +myself, but when I see the sight I find I greatly admire it. The Count +at any rate would have enjoyed the comfort of believing his wife as bad +a case as himself, and you'll hardly believe me when I assure you he +goes about intimating to gentlemen whom he thinks it may concern that +it would be a convenience to him they should make love to Madame de +Mauves." + + + + +V + +On reaching Paris Longmore straightaway purchased a Murray's "Belgium" +to help himself to believe that he would start on the morrow for +Brussels; but when the morrow came it occurred to him that he ought by +way of preparation to acquaint himself more intimately with the Flemish +painters in the Louvre. This took a whole morning, but it did little +to hasten his departure. He had abruptly left Saint-Germain because +it seemed to him that respect for Madame de Mauves required he should +bequeath her husband no reason to suppose he had, as it were, taken a +low hint; but now that he had deferred to that scruple he found himself +thinking more and more ardently of his friend. It was a poor expression +of ardour to be lingering irresolutely on the forsaken boulevard, but +he detested the idea of leaving Saint-Germain five hundred miles behind +him. He felt very foolish, nevertheless, and wandered about nervously, +promising himself to take the next train. A dozen trains started, +however, and he was still in Paris. This inward ache was more than he +had bargained for, and as he looked at the shop-windows he wondered if +it represented a "passion." He had never been fond of the word and had +grown up with much mistrust of what it stood for. He had hoped that +when he should fall "really" in love he should do it with an excellent +conscience, with plenty of confidence and joy, doubtless, but no strange +soreness, no pangs nor regrets. Here was a sentiment concocted of pity +and anger as well as of admiration, and bristling with scruples and +doubts and fears. He had come abroad to enjoy the Flemish painters and +all others, but what fair-tressed saint of Van Eyck or Memling was so +interesting a figure as the lonely lady of Saint-Germain? His restless +steps carried him at last out of the long villa-bordered avenue which +leads to the Bois de Boulogne. + +Summer had fairly begun and the drive beside the lake was empty, but +there were various loungers on the benches and chairs, and the great +cafe had an air of animation. Longmore's walk had given him an appetite, +and he went into the establishment and demanded a dinner, remarking for +the hundredth time, as he admired the smart little tables disposed in +the open air, how much better (than anywhere else) they ordered this +matter in France. "Will monsieur dine in the garden or in the salon?" +the waiter blandly asked. Longmore chose the garden and, observing that +a great cluster of June roses was trained over the wall of the house, +placed himself at a table near by, where the best of dinners was served +him on the whitest of linen and in the most shining of porcelain. It so +happened that his table was near a window and that as he sat he could +look into a corner of the salon. So it was that his attention rested +on a lady seated just within the window, which was open, face to face +apparently with a companion who was concealed by the curtain. She was a +very pretty woman, and Longmore looked at her as often as was consistent +with good manners. After a while he even began to wonder who she was and +finally to suspect that she was one of those ladies whom it is no breach +of good manners to look at as often as you like. Our young man too, if +he had been so disposed, would have been the more free to give her all +his attention that her own was fixed upon the person facing her. She was +what the French call a belle brune, and though Longmore, who had rather +a conservative taste in such matters, was but half-charmed by her bold +outlines and even braver complexion, he couldn't help admiring her +expression of basking contentment. + +She was evidently very happy, and her happiness gave her an air of +innocence. The talk of her friend, whoever he was, abundantly suited +her humour, for she sat listening to him with a broad idle smile and +interrupting him fitfully, while she crunched her bonbons, with a +murmured response, presumably as broad, which appeared to have the +effect of launching him again. She drank a great deal of champagne and +ate an immense number of strawberries, and was plainly altogether a +person with an impartial relish for strawberries, champagne and what she +doubtless would have called betises. + +They had half-finished dinner when Longmore sat down, and he was still +in his place when they rose. She had hung her bonnet on a nail above her +chair, and her companion passed round the table to take it down for her. +As he did so she bent her head to look at a wine-stain on her dress, and +in the movement exposed the greater part of the back of a very handsome +neck. The gentleman observed it, and observed also, apparently, that the +room beyond them was empty; that he stood within eyeshot of Longmore he +failed to observe. He stooped suddenly and imprinted a gallant kiss on +the fair expanse. In the author of this tribute Longmore then recognised +Richard de Mauves. The lady to whom it had been rendered put on her +bonnet, using his flushed smile as a mirror, and in a moment they passed +through the garden on their way to their carriage. Then for the first +time M. de Mauves became aware of his wife's young friend. He measured +with a rapid glance this spectator's relation to the open window and +checked himself in the impulse to stop and speak to him. He contented +himself with bowing all imperturbably as he opened the gate for his +companion. + +That evening Longmore made a railway journey, but not to Brussels. He +had effectually ceased to care for Brussels; all he cared for in the +world now was Madame de Mauves. The air of his mind had had a sudden +clearing-up; pity and anger were still throbbing there, but they had +space to range at their pleasure, for doubts and scruples had abruptly +departed. It was little, he felt, that he could interpose between her +resignation and the indignity of her position; but that little, if it +involved the sacrifice of everything that bound him to the tranquil +past, he could offer her with a rapture which at last made stiff +resistance a terribly inferior substitute for faith. Nothing in his +tranquil past had given such a zest to consciousness as this happy sense +of choosing to go straight back to Saint-Germain. How to justify his +return, how to explain his ardour, troubled him little. He wasn't even +sure he wished to be understood; he wished only to show how little by +any fault of his Madame de Mauves was alone so with the harshness of +fate. He was conscious of no distinct desire to "make love" to her; if +he could have uttered the essence of his longing he would have said that +he wished her to remember that in a world coloured grey to her vision +by the sense of her mistake there was one vividly honest man. She might +certainly have remembered it, however, without his coming back to remind +her; and it is not to be denied that as he waited for the morrow he +longed immensely for the sound of her voice. + +He waited the next day till his usual hour of calling--the late +afternoon; but he learned at the door that the mistress of the house was +not at home. The servant offered the information that she was walking +a little way in the forest. Longmore went through the garden and out +of the small door into the lane, and, after half an hour's vain +exploration, saw her coming toward him at the end of a green by-path. As +he appeared she stopped a moment, as if to turn aside; then recognising +him she slowly advanced and had presently taken the hand he held out. + +"Nothing has happened," she said with her beautiful eyes on him. "You're +not ill?" + +"Nothing except that when I got to Paris I found how fond I had grown of +Saint-Germain." + +She neither smiled nor looked flattered; it seemed indeed to Longmore +that she took his reappearance with no pleasure. But he was uncertain, +for he immediately noted that in his absence the whole character of her +face had changed. It showed him something momentous had happened. It was +no longer self-contained melancholy that he read in her eyes, but grief +and agitation which had lately struggled with the passionate love of +peace ruling her before all things else, and forced her to know that +deep experience is never peaceful. She was pale and had evidently been +shedding tears. He felt his heart beat hard--he seemed now to touch +her secret. She continued to look at him with a clouded brow, as if his +return had surrounded her with complications too great to be disguised +by a colourless welcome. For some moments, as he turned and walked +beside her, neither spoke; then abruptly, "Tell me truly, Mr. Longmore," +she said, "why you've come back." He inclined himself to her, almost +pulling up again, with an air that startled her into a certainty of what +she had feared. "Because I've learned the real answer to the question I +asked you the other day. You're not happy--you're too good to be happy +on the terms offered you. Madame de Mauves," he went on with a gesture +which protested against a gesture of her own, "I can't be happy, you +know, when you're as little so as I make you out. I don't care for +anything so long as I only feel helpless and sore about you. I found +during those dreary days in Paris that the thing in life I most care for +is this daily privilege of seeing you. I know it's very brutal to tell +you I admire you; it's an insult to you to treat you as if you had +complained to me or appealed to me. But such a friendship as I waked up +to there"--and he tossed his head toward the distant city--"is a potent +force, I assure you. When forces are stupidly stifled they explode. +However," he went on, "if you had told me every trouble in your heart it +would have mattered little; I couldn't say more than I--that if that +in life from which you've hoped most has given you least, this devoted +respect of mine will refuse no service and betray no trust." + +She had begun to make marks in the earth with the point of her parasol, +but she stopped and listened to him in perfect immobility--immobility +save for the appearance by the time he had stopped speaking of a flush +in her guarded clearness. Such as it was it told Longmore she was moved, +and his first perceiving it was the happiest moment of his life. She +raised her eyes at last, and they uttered a plea for non-insistence that +unspeakably touched him. + +"Thank you--thank you!" she said calmly enough; but the next moment +her own emotion baffled this pretence, a convulsion shook her for ten +seconds and she burst into tears. Her tears vanished as quickly as +they came, but they did Longmore a world of good. He had always felt +indefinably afraid of her; her being had somehow seemed fed by a deeper +faith and a stronger will than his own; but her half-dozen smothered +sobs showed him the bottom of her heart and convinced him she was weak +enough to be grateful. "Excuse me," she said; "I'm too nervous to listen +to you. I believe I could have dealt with an enemy to-day, but I can't +bear up under a friend." + +"You're killing yourself with stoicism--that's what is the matter with +you!" he cried. "Listen to a friend for his own sake if not for yours. +I've never presumed to offer you an atom of compassion, and you can't +accuse yourself of an abuse of charity." + +She looked about her as under the constraint of this appeal, but it +promised him a reluctant attention. Noting, however, by the wayside the +fallen log on which they had rested a few evenings before, she went and +sat down on it with a resigned grace while the young man, silent before +her and watching her, took from her the mute assurance that if she was +charitable now he must at least be very wise. + +"Something came to my knowledge yesterday," he said as he sat down +beside her, "which gave me an intense impression of your loneliness. +You're truth itself, and there's no truth about you. You believe in +purity and duty and dignity, and you live in a world in which they're +daily belied. I ask myself with vain rage how you ever came into such a +world, and why the perversity of fate never let me know you before." + +She waited a little; she looked down, straight before her. "I like my +'world' no better than you do, and it was not for its own sake I came +into it. But what particular group of people is worth pinning one's +faith upon? I confess it sometimes seems to me men and women are very +poor creatures. I suppose I'm too romantic and always was. I've an +unfortunate taste for poetic fitness. Life's hard prose, and one must +learn to read prose contentedly. I believe I once supposed all the +prose to be in America, which was very foolish. What I thought, what I +believed, what I expected, when I was an ignorant girl fatally addicted +to falling in love with my own theories, is more than I can begin +to tell you now. Sometimes when I remember certain impulses, certain +illusions of those days they take away my breath, and I wonder that my +false point of view hasn't led me into troubles greater than any I've +now to lament. I had a conviction which you'd probably smile at if +I were to attempt to express it to you. It was a singular form for +passionate faith to take, but it had all of the sweetness and the ardour +of passionate faith. It led me to take a great step, and it lies +behind me now, far off, a vague deceptive form melting in the light of +experience. It has faded, but it hasn't vanished. Some feelings, I'm +sure, die only with ourselves; some illusions are as much the condition +of our life as our heart-beats. They say that life itself is an +illusion--that this world is a shadow of which the reality is yet +to come. Life is all of a piece then and there's no shame in being +miserably human. As for my loneliness, it doesn't greatly matter; it is +the fault in part of my obstinacy. There have been times when I've been +frantically distressed and, to tell you the truth, wretchedly homesick, +because my maid--a jewel of a maid--lied to me with every second breath. +There have been moments when I've wished I was the daughter of a poor +New England minister--living in a little white house under a couple of +elms and doing all the housework." + +She had begun to speak slowly, with reserve and effort; but she went on +quickly and as if talk were at last a relief. "My marriage introduced me +to people and things which seemed to me at first very strange and then +very horrible, and then, to tell the truth, of very little importance. +At first I expended a great deal of sorrow and dismay and pity on it +all; but there soon came a time when I began to wonder if it were worth +one's tears. If I could tell you the eternal friendships I've seen +broken, the inconsolable woes consoled, the jealousies and vanities +scrambling to outdo each other, you'd agree with me that tempers +like yours and mine can understand neither such troubles nor such +compensations. A year ago, while I was in the country, a friend of mine +was in despair at the infidelity of her husband; she wrote me a most +dolorous letter, and on my return to Paris I went immediately to see +her. A week had elapsed, and as I had seen stranger things I thought +she might have recovered her spirits. Not at all; she was still in +despair--but at what? At the conduct, the abandoned, shameless conduct +of--well of a lady I'll call Madame de T. You'll imagine of course that +Madame de T. was the lady whom my friend's husband preferred to his +wife. Far from it; he had never seen her. Who then was Madame de T.? +Madame de T. was cruelly devoted to M. de V. And who was M. de V.? M. +de V. was--well, in two words again, my friend was cultivating two +jealousies at once. I hardly know what I said to her; something at any +rate that she found unpardonable, for she quite gave me up. Shortly +afterwards my husband proposed we should cease to live in Paris, and I +gladly assented, for I believe I had taken a turn of spirits that made +me a detestable companion. I should have preferred to go quite into the +country, into Auvergne, where my husband has a house. But to him Paris +in some degree is necessary, and Saint-Germain has been a conscious +compromise." + +"A conscious compromise!" Longmore expressively repeated. "That's your +whole life." + +"It's the life of many people," she made prompt answer--"of most people +of quiet tastes, and it's certainly better than acute distress. One's +at a loss theoretically to defend compromises; but if I found a poor +creature who had managed to arrive at one I should think myself not +urgently called to expose its weak side." But she had no sooner uttered +these words than she laughed all amicably, as if to mitigate their too +personal application. + +"Heaven forbid one should do that unless one has something better to +offer," Longmore returned. "And yet I'm haunted by the dream of a life +in which you should have found no compromises, for they're a perversion +of natures that tend only to goodness and rectitude. As I see it you +should have found happiness serene, profound, complete; a femme de +chambre not a jewel perhaps, but warranted to tell but one fib a day; a +society possibly rather provincial, but--in spite of your poor opinion +of mankind--a good deal of solid virtue; jealousies and vanities very +tame, and no particular iniquities and adulteries. A husband," he added +after a moment--"a husband of your own faith and race and spiritual +substance, who would have loved you well." + +She rose to her feet, shaking her head. "You're very kind to go to the +expense of such dazzling visions for me. Visions are vain things; we +must make the best of the reality we happen to be in for." + +"And yet," said Longmore, provoked by what seemed the very wantonness of +her patience, "the reality YOU 'happen to be in for' has, if I'm not in +error, very recently taken a shape that keenly tests your philosophy." + +She seemed on the point of replying that his sympathy was too zealous; +but a couple of impatient tears in his eyes proved it founded on a +devotion of which she mightn't make light. "Ah philosophy?" she echoed. +"I HAVE none. Thank heaven," she cried with vehemence, "I have none! +I believe, Mr. Longmore," she added in a moment, "that I've nothing on +earth but a conscience--it's a good time to tell you so--nothing but a +dogged obstinate clinging conscience. Does that prove me to be indeed of +your faith and race, and have you one yourself for which you can say as +much? I don't speak in vanity, for I believe that if my conscience may +prevent me from doing anything very base it will effectually prevent me +also from doing anything very fine." + +"I'm delighted to hear it," her friend returned with high +emphasis--"that proves we're made for each other. It's very certain I +too shall never cut a great romantic figure. And yet I've fancied that +in my case the unaccommodating organ we speak of might be blinded and +gagged a while, in a really good cause, if not turned out of doors. +In yours," he went on with the same appealing irony, "is it absolutely +beyond being 'squared'?" + +But she made no concession to his tone. "Don't laugh at your +conscience," she answered gravely; "that's the only blasphemy I know." + +She had hardly spoken when she turned suddenly at an unexpected sound, +and at the same moment he heard a footstep in an adjacent by-path which +crossed their own at a short distance from where they stood. + +"It's M. de Mauves," she said at once; with which she moved slowly +forward. Longmore, wondering how she knew without seeing, had overtaken +her by the time her husband came into view. A solitary walk in the +forest was a pastime to which M. de Mauves was not addicted, but he +seemed on this occasion to have resorted to it with some equanimity. He +was smoking a fragrant cigar and had thrust his thumb into the armhole +of his waistcoat with the air of a man thinking at his ease. He stopped +short with surprise on seeing his wife and her companion, and his +surprise had for Longmore even the pitch of impertinence. He glanced +rapidly from one to the other, fixed the young man's own look sharply a +single instant and then lifted his hat with formal politeness. + +"I was not aware," he said, turning to Madame de Mauves, "that I might +congratulate you on the return of monsieur." + +"You should at once have known it," she immediately answered, "if I had +expected such a pleasure." + +She had turned very pale, and Longmore felt this to be a first meeting +after some commotion. "My return was unexpected to myself," he said to +her husband. "I came back last night." + +M. de Mauves seemed to express such satisfaction as could consort with +a limited interest. "It's needless for me to make you welcome. Madame +de Mauves knows the duties of hospitality." And with another bow he +continued his walk. + +She pursued her homeward course with her friend, neither of them +pretending much not to consent to appear silent. The Count's few moments +with them had both chilled Longmore and angered him, casting a shadow +across a prospect which had somehow, just before, begun to open and +almost to brighten. He watched his companion narrowly as they went, and +wondered what she had last had to suffer. Her husband's presence +had checked her disposition to talk, though nothing betrayed she had +recognised his making a point at her expense. Yet if matters were none +the less plainly at a crisis between them he could but wonder vainly +what it was on her part that prevented some practical protest or some +rupture. What did she suspect?--how much did she know? To what was she +resigned?--how much had she forgiven? How, above all, did she reconcile +with knowledge, or with suspicion, that intense consideration she had +just now all but assured him she entertained? "She has loved him once," +Longmore said with a sinking of the heart, "and with her to love once is +to commit herself for ever. Her clever husband thinks her too prim. What +would a stupid poet call it?" He relapsed with aching impotence into the +sense of her being somehow beyond him, unattainable, immeasurable by his +own fretful logic. Suddenly he gave three passionate switches in the air +with his cane which made Madame de Mauves look round. She could hardly +have guessed their signifying that where ambition was so vain the next +best thing to it was the very ardour of hopelessness. + +She found in her drawing-room the little elderly Frenchman, M. de +Chalumeau, whom Longmore had observed a few days before on the terrace. +On this occasion too Madame Clairin was entertaining him, but as her +sister-in-law came in she surrendered her post and addressed herself to +our hero. Longmore, at thirty, was still an ingenuous youth, and +there was something in this lady's large assured attack that fairly +intimidated him. He was doubtless not as reassured as he ought to have +been at finding he had not absolutely forfeited her favour by his want +of resource during their last interview, and a suspicion of her being +prepared to approach him on another line completed his distress. + +"So you've returned from Brussels by way of the forest?" she archly +asked. + +"I've not been to Brussels. I returned yesterday from Paris by the only +way--by the train." + +Madame Clairin was infinitely struck. "I've never known a person at all +to be so fond of Saint-Germain. They generally declare it's horribly +dull." + +"That's not very polite to you," said Longmore, vexed at his lack of +superior form and determined not to be abashed. + +"Ah what have I to do with it?" Madame Clairin brightly wailed. "I'm the +dullest thing here. They've not had, other gentlemen, your success with +my sister-in-law." + +"It would have been very easy to have it. Madame de Mauves is kindness +itself." + +She swung open her great fan. "To her own countrymen!" + +Longmore remained silent; he hated the tone of this conversation. + +The speaker looked at him a little and then took in their hostess, to +whom M. de Chalumeau was serving up another epigram, which the charming +creature received with a droop of the head and eyes that strayed through +the window. "Don't pretend to tell me," Madame Clairin suddenly exhaled, +"that you're not in love with that pretty woman." + +"Allons donc!" cried Longmore in the most inspired French he had ever +uttered. He rose the next minute and took a hasty farewell. + + + + +VI + +He allowed several days to pass without going back; it was of a sublime +suitability to appear to regard his friend's frankness during their +last interview as a general invitation. The sacrifice cost him a great +effort, for hopeless passions are exactly not the most patient; and he +had moreover a constant fear that if, as he believed, deep within the +circle round which he could only hover, the hour of supreme explanations +had come, the magic of her magnanimity might convert M. de Mauves. +Vicious men, it was abundantly recorded, had been so converted as to be +acceptable to God, and the something divine in this lady's composition +would sanctify any means she should choose to employ. Her means, he kept +repeating, were no business of his, and the essence of his admiration +ought to be to allow her to do as she liked; but he felt as if he should +turn away into a world out of which most of the joy had departed if she +should like, after all, to see nothing more in his interest in her than +might be repaid by mere current social coin. + +When at last he went back he found to his vexation that he was to run +the gauntlet of Madame Clairin's officious hospitality. It was one of +the first mornings of perfect summer, and the drawing-room, through the +open windows, was flooded with such a confusion of odours and bird-notes +as might warrant the hope that Madame de Mauves would renew with him +for an hour or two the exploration of the forest. Her sister-in-law, +however, whose hair was not yet dressed, emerged like a brassy discord +in a maze of melody. At the same moment the servant returned with his +mistress's regrets; she begged to be excused, she was indisposed and +unable to see Mr. Longmore. The young man knew just how disappointed +he looked and just what Madame Clairin thought of it, and this +consciousness determined in him an attitude of almost aggressive +frigidity. This was apparently what she desired. She wished to throw him +off his balance and, if she was not mistaken, knew exactly how. + +"Put down your hat, Mr. Longmore," she said, "and be polite for once. +You were not at all polite the other day when I asked you that friendly +question about the state of your heart." + +"I HAVE no heart--to talk about," he returned with as little grace. + +"As well say you've none at all. I advise you to cultivate a little +eloquence; you may have use for it. That was not an idle question of +mine; I don't ask idle questions. For a couple of months now that you've +been coming and going among us it seems to me you've had very few to +answer of any sort." + +"I've certainly been very well treated," he still dryly allowed. + +His companion waited ever so little to bring out: "Have you never felt +disposed to ask any?" + +Her look, her tone, were so charged with insidious meanings as to +make him feel that even to understand her would savour of dishonest +complicity. "What is it you have to tell me?" he cried with a flushed +frown. + +Her own colour rose at the question. It's rather hard, when you come +bearing yourself very much as the sibyl when she came to the Roman king, +to be treated as something worse than a vulgar gossip. "I might tell +you, monsieur," she returned, "that you've as bad a ton as any young man +I ever met. Where have you lived--what are your ideas? A stupid one of +my own--possibly!--has been to call your attention to a fact that it +takes some delicacy to touch upon. You've noticed, I suppose, that my +sister-in-law isn't the happiest woman in the world." + +"Oh!"--Longmore made short work of it. + +She seemed to measure his intelligence a little uncertainly. "You've +formed, I suppose," she nevertheless continued, "your conception of the +grounds of her discontent?" + +"It hasn't required much forming. The grounds--or at least a specimen or +two of them--have simply stared me in the face." + +Madame Clairin considered a moment with her eyes on him. "Yes--ces +choses-la se voient. My brother, in a single word, has the deplorable +habit of falling in love with other women. I don't judge him; I don't +judge my sister-in-law. I only permit myself to say that in her position +I would have managed otherwise. I'd either have kept my husband's +affection or I'd have frankly done without it. But my sister's an odd +compound; I don't profess to understand her. Therefore it is, in a +measure, that I appeal to you, her fellow countryman. Of course you'll +be surprised at my way of looking at the matter, and I admit that it's +a way in use only among people whose history--that of a race--has +cultivated in them the sense for high political solutions." She paused +and Longmore wondered where the history of her race was going to lead +her. But she clearly saw her course. "There has never been a galant +homme among us, I fear, who has not given his wife, even when she was +very charming, the right to be jealous. We know our history for ages +back, and the fact's established. It's not a very edifying one if you +like, but it's something to have scandals with pedigrees--if you can't +have them with attenuations. Our men have been Frenchmen of France, and +their wives--I may say it--have been of no meaner blood. You may see +all their portraits at our poor charming old house--every one of them an +'injured' beauty, but not one of them hanging her head. Not one of them +ever had the bad taste to be jealous, and yet not one in a dozen ever +consented to an indiscretion--allowed herself, I mean, to be talked +about. Voila comme elles ont su s'arranger. How they did it--go and look +at the dusky faded canvases and pastels and ask. They were dear brave +women of wit. When they had a headache they put on a little rouge and +came to supper as usual, and when they had a heart-ache they touched up +that quarter with just such another brush. These are great traditions +and charming precedents, I hold, and it doesn't seem to me fair that a +little American bourgeoise should come in and pretend to alter them--all +to hang her modern photograph and her obstinate little air penche in the +gallery of our shrewd great-grandmothers. She should fall into line, she +should keep up the tone. When she married my brother I don't suppose she +took him for a member of a societe de bonnes oeuvres. I don't say we're +right; who IS right? But we are as history has made us, and if any one's +to change it had better be our charming, but not accommodating, friend." +Again Madame Clairin paused, again she opened and closed her great +modern fan, which clattered like the screen of a shop-window. "Let her +keep up the tone!" she prodigiously repeated. + +Longmore felt himself gape, but he gasped an "Ah!" to cover it. Madame +Clairin's dip into the family annals had apparently imparted an +honest zeal to her indignation. "For a long time," she continued, "my +belle-soeur has been taking the attitude of an injured woman, affecting +a disgust with the world and shutting herself up to read free-thinking +books. I've never permitted myself, you may believe, the least +observation on her conduct, but I can't accept it as the last word +either of taste or of tact. When a woman with her prettiness lets her +husband stray away she deserves no small part of her fate. I don't wish +you to agree with me--on the contrary; but I call such a woman a pure +noodle. She must have bored him to death. What has passed between them +for many months needn't concern us; what provocation my sister has +had--monstrous, if you wish--what ennui my brother has suffered. It's +enough that a week ago, just after you had ostensibly gone to Brussels, +something happened to produce an explosion. She found a letter in his +pocket, a photograph, a trinket, que sais-je? At any rate there was a +grand scene. I didn't listen at the keyhole, and I don't know what was +said; but I've reason to believe that my poor brother was hauled over +the coals as I fancy none of his ancestors have ever been--even by angry +ladies who weren't their wives." + +Longmore had leaned forward in silent attention with his elbows on his +knees, and now, impulsively, he dropped his face into his hands. "Ah +poor poor woman!" + +"Voila!" said Madame Clairin. "You pity her." + +"Pity her?" cried Longmore, looking up with ardent eyes and forgetting +the spirit of the story to which he had been treated in the miserable +facts. "Don't you?" + +"A little. But I'm not acting sentimentally--I'm acting scientifically. +We've always been capable of ideas. I want to arrange things; to see +my brother free to do as he chooses; to see his wife contented. Do you +understand me?" + +"Very well, I think," the young man said. "You're the most immoral +person I've lately had the privilege of conversing with." + +Madame Clairin took it calmly. "Possibly. When was ever a great +peacemaker not immoral?" + +"Ah no," Longmore protested. "You're too superficial to be a great +peacemaker. You don't begin to know anything about Madame de Mauves." + +She inclined her head to one side while her fine eyes kept her +visitor in view; she mused a moment and then smiled as with a certain +compassionate patience. "It's not in my interest to contradict you." + +"It would be in your interest to learn, madam" he resolutely returned, +"what honest men most admire in a woman--and to recognise it when you +see it." + +She was wonderful--she waited a moment. "So you ARE in love!" she then +effectively brought out. + +For a moment he thought of getting up, but he decided to stay. "I wonder +if you'd understand me," he said at last, "if I were to tell you that +I have for Madame de Mauves the most devoted and most respectful +friendship?" + +"You underrate my intelligence. But in that case you ought to exert your +influence to put an end to these painful domestic scenes." + +"Do you imagine she talks to me about her domestic scenes?" Longmore +cried. + +His companion stared. "Then your friendship isn't returned?" And as he +but ambiguously threw up his hands, "Now, at least," she added, "she'll +have something to tell you. I happen to know the upshot of my brother's +last interview with his wife." Longmore rose to his feet as a protest +against the indelicacy of the position into which he had been drawn; but +all that made him tender made him curious, and she caught in his averted +eyes an expression that prompted her to strike her blow. "My brother's +absurdly entangled with a certain person in Paris; of course he ought +not to be, but he wouldn't be my brother if he weren't. It was this +irregular passion that dictated his words. 'Listen to me, madam,' +he cried at last; 'let us live like people who understand life! It's +unpleasant to be forced to say such things outright, but you've a way +of bringing one down to the rudiments. I'm faithless, I'm heartless, +I'm brutal, I'm everything horrible--it's understood. Take your revenge, +console yourself: you're too charming a woman to have anything to +complain of. Here's a handsome young man sighing himself into a +consumption for you. Listen to your poor compatriot and you'll find that +virtue's none the less becoming for being good-natured. You'll see +that it's not after all such a doleful world and that there's even an +advantage in having the most impudent of husbands."' Madame Clairin +paused; Longmore had turned very pale. "You may believe it," she +amazingly pursued; "the speech took place in my presence; things were +done in order. And now, monsieur"--this with a wondrous strained grimace +which he was too troubled at the moment to appreciate, but which he +remembered later with a kind of awe--"we count on you!" + +"Her husband said this to her face to face, as you say it to me now?" he +asked after a silence. + +"Word for word and with the most perfect politeness." + +"And Madame de Mauves--what did she say?" + +Madame Clairin smiled again. "To such a speech as that a woman +says--nothing. She had been sitting with a piece of needlework, and I +think she hadn't seen Richard since their quarrel the day before. He +came in with the gravity of an ambassador, and I'm sure that when he +made his demande en mariage his manner wasn't more respectful. He only +wanted white gloves!" said Longmore's friend. "My belle-soeur sat silent +a few moments, drawing her stitches, and then without a word, without a +glance, walked out of the room. It was just what she SHOULD have done!" + +"Yes," the young man repeated, "it was just what she should have done." + +"And I, left alone with my brother, do you know what I said?" + +Longmore shook his head. + +"Mauvals sujet!" he suggested. + +"'You've done me the honour,' I said, 'to take this step in my presence. +I don't pretend to qualify it. You know what you're about, and it's your +own affair. But you may confide in my discretion.' Do you think he has +had reason to complain of it?" She received no answer; her visitor had +slowly averted himself; he passed his gloves mechanically round the +band of his hat. "I hope," she cried, "you're not going to start for +Brussels!" + +Plainly he was much disturbed, and Madame Clairin might congratulate +herself on the success of her plea for old-fashioned manners. And yet +there was something that left her more puzzled than satisfied in the +colourless tone with which he answered, "No, I shall remain here for +the present." The processes of his mind were unsociably private, and she +could have fancied for a moment that he was linked with their difficult +friend in some monstrous conspiracy of asceticism. + +"Come this evening," she nevertheless bravely resumed. "The rest will +take care of itself. Meanwhile I shall take the liberty of telling my +sister-in-law that I've repeated--in short, that I've put you au fait" + +He had a start but he controlled himself, speaking quietly enough. "Tell +her what you please. Nothing you can tell her will affect her conduct." + +"Voyons! Do you mean to tell me that a woman young, pretty, sentimental, +neglected, wronged if you will--? I see you don't believe it. Believe +simply in your own opportunity!" she went on. "But for heaven's sake, if +it is to lead anywhere, don't come back with that visage de croquemort. +You look as if you were going to bury your heart--not to offer it to a +pretty woman. You're much better when you smile--you're very nice then. +Come, do yourself justice." + +He remained a moment face to face with her, but his expression didn't +change. "I shall do myself justice," he however after an instant made +answer; and abruptly, with a bow, he took his departure. + + + + +VII + +He felt, when he found himself unobserved and outside, that he must +plunge into violent action, walk fast and far and defer the opportunity +for thought. He strode away into the forest, swinging his cane, throwing +back his head, casting his eyes into verdurous vistas and following the +road without a purpose. He felt immensely excited, but could have given +no straight name to his agitation. It was a joy as all increase of +freedom is joyous; something seemed to have been cleared out of his path +and his destiny to have rounded a cape and brought him into sight of an +open sea. But it was a pain in the degree in which his freedom somehow +resolved itself into the need of despising all mankind with a single +exception; and the fact that Madame de Mauves inhabited a planet +contaminated by the presence of the baser multitude kept elation from +seeming a pledge of ideal bliss. + +There she was, at any rate, and circumstances now forced them to be +intimate. She had ceased to have what men call a secret for him, and +this fact itself brought with it a sort of rapture. He had no prevision +that he should "profit," in the vulgar sense, by the extraordinary +position into which they had been thrown; it might be but a cruel trick +of destiny to make hope a harsher mockery and renunciation a keener +suffering. But above all this rose the conviction that she could do +nothing that wouldn't quicken his attachment. It was this conviction +that gross accident--all odious in itself--would force the beauty of her +character into more perfect relief for him that made him stride along +as if he were celebrating a spiritual feast. He rambled at hazard for a +couple of hours, finding at last that he had left the forest behind him +and had wandered into an unfamiliar region. It was a perfectly rural +scene, and the still summer day gave it a charm for which its meagre +elements but half accounted. + +He thought he had never seen anything so characteristically French; +all the French novels seemed to have described it, all the French +landscapists to have painted it. The fields and trees were of a cool +metallic green; the grass looked as if it might stain his trousers and +the foliage his hands. The clear light had a mild greyness, the sheen +of silver, not of gold, was in the work-a-day sun. A great red-roofed +high-stacked farmhouse, with whitewashed walls and a straggling yard, +surveyed the highroad, on one side, from behind a transparent curtain of +poplars. A narrow stream half-choked with emerald rushes and edged with +grey aspens occupied the opposite quarter. The meadows rolled and +sloped away gently to the low horizon, which was barely concealed by the +continuous line of clipped and marshalled trees. The prospect was not +rich, but had a frank homeliness that touched the young man's fancy. +It was full of light atmosphere and diffused clearness, and if it was +prosaic it was somehow sociable. + +Longmore was disposed to walk further, and he advanced along the road +beneath the poplars. In twenty minutes he came to a village which +straggled away to the right, among orchards and potagers. On the left, +at a stone's throw from the road, stood a little pink-faced inn which +reminded him that he had not breakfasted, having left home with a +prevision of hospitality from Madame de Mauves. In the inn he found a +brick-tiled parlour and a hostess in sabots and a white cap, whom, over +the omelette she speedily served him--borrowing licence from the bottle +of sound red wine that accompanied it--he assured she was a true artist. +To reward his compliment she invited him to smoke his cigar in her +little garden behind the house. + +Here he found a tonnelle and a view of tinted crops stretching down to +the stream. The tonnelle was rather close, and he preferred to lounge on +a bench against the pink wall, in the sun, which was not too hot. Here, +as he rested and gazed and mused, he fell into a train of thought which, +in an indefinable fashion, was a soft influence from the scene about +him. His heart, which had been beating fast for the past three hours, +gradually checked its pulses and left him looking at life with rather a +more level gaze. The friendly tavern sounds coming out through the open +windows, the sunny stillness of the yellowing grain which covered +so much vigorous natural life, conveyed no strained nor high-pitched +message, had little to say about renunciation--nothing at all about +spiritual zeal. They communicated the sense of plain ripe nature, +expressed the unperverted reality of things, declared that the common +lot isn't brilliantly amusing and that the part of wisdom is to grasp +frankly at experience lest you miss it altogether. What reason there was +for his beginning to wonder after this whether a deeply-wounded heart +might be soothed and healed by such a scene, it would be difficult to +explain; certain it was that as he sat there he dreamt, awake, of an +unhappy woman who strolled by the slow-flowing stream before him and who +pulled down the fruit-laden boughs in the orchards. He mused and mused, +and at last found himself quite angry that he couldn't somehow think +worse of Madame de Mauves--or at any rate think otherwise. He could +fairly claim that in the romantic way he asked very little of life--made +modest demands on passion: why then should his only passion be born +to ill fortune? Why should his first--his last--glimpse of positive +happiness be so indissolubly linked with renunciation? + +It is perhaps because, like many spirits of the same stock, he had +in his composition a lurking principle of sacrifice, sacrifice for +sacrifice's sake, to the authority of which he had ever paid due +deference, that he now felt all the vehemence of rebellion. To renounce, +to renounce again, to renounce for ever, was this all that youth and +longing and ardour were meant for? Was experience to be muffled and +mutilated like an indecent picture? Was a man to sit and deliberately +condemn his future to be the blank memory of a regret rather than the +long possession of a treasure? Sacrifice? The word was a trap for minds +muddled by fear, an ignoble refuge of weakness. To insist now seemed not +to dare, but simply to BE, to live on possible terms. + +His hostess came out to hang a moist cloth on the hedge, and, though her +guest was sitting quietly enough, she might have imagined in his kindled +eyes a flattering testimony to the quality of her wine. As she turned +back into the house she was met by a young man of whom Longmore took +note in spite of his high distraction. He was evidently a member of that +jovial fraternity of artists whose very shabbiness has an affinity with +the unestablished and unexpected in life--the element often gazed at +with a certain wistfulness out of the curtained windows even of the +highest respectability. Longmore was struck first with his looking like +a very clever man and then with his looking like a contented one. The +combination, as it was expressed in his face, might have arrested the +attention of a less exasperated reasoner. He had a slouched hat and a +yellow beard, a light easel under one arm, and an unfinished sketch in +oils under the other. He stopped and stood talking for some moments to +the landlady, while something pleasant played in his face. They were +discussing the possibilities of dinner; the hostess enumerated some +very savoury ones, and he nodded briskly, assenting to everything. It +couldn't be, Longmore thought, that he found such ideal ease in the +prospect of lamb-chops and spinach and a croute aux fruits. When the +dinner had been ordered he turned up his sketch, and the good woman fell +to admiring and comparing, to picking up, off by the stream-side, the +objects represented. + +Was it his work, Longmore wondered, that made him so happy? Was a +strong talent the best thing in the world? The landlady went back to +her kitchen, and the young painter stood, as if he were waiting for +something, beside the gate which opened upon the path across the fields. +Longmore sat brooding and asking himself if it weren't probably better +to cultivate the arts than to cultivate the passions. Before he had +answered the question the painter had grown tired of waiting. He had +picked up a pebble, tossed it lightly into an upper window and called +familiarly "Claudine!" Claudine appeared; Longmore heard her at the +window, bidding the young man cultivate patience. "But I'm losing +my light," he said; "I must have my shadows in the same place as +yesterday." + +"Go without me then," Claudine answered; "I'll join you in ten minutes." +Her voice was fresh and young; it represented almost aggressively to +Longmore that she was as pleased as her companion. + +"Don't forget the Chenier," cried the young man, who, turning away, +passed out of the gate and followed the path across the fields until +he disappeared among the trees by the side of the stream. Who might +Claudine be? Longmore vaguely wondered; and was she as pretty as her +voice? Before long he had a chance to satisfy himself; she came out of +the house with her hat and parasol, prepared to follow her companion. +She had on a pink muslin dress and a little white hat, and she was as +pretty as suffices almost any Frenchwoman to be pleasing. She had a +clear brown skin and a bright dark eye and a step that made walking as +light a matter as being blown--and this even though she happened to be +at the moment not a little over-weighted. Her hands were encumbered with +various articles involved in her pursuit of her friend. In one arm she +held her parasol and a large roll of needlework, and in the other a +shawl and a heavy white umbrella, such as painters use for sketching. +Meanwhile she was trying to thrust into her pocket a paper-covered +volume which Longmore saw to be the poems of Andre Chenier, and in the +effort dropping the large umbrella and marking this with a half-smiled +exclamation of disgust. Longmore stepped forward and picked up the +umbrella, and as she, protesting her gratitude, put out her hand to take +it, he recognised her as too obliging to the young man who had preceded +her. + +"You've too much to carry," he said; "you must let me help you." + +"You're very good, monsieur," she answered. "My husband always +forgets something. He can do nothing without his umbrella. He is d'une +etourderie--" + +"You must allow me to carry the umbrella," Longmore risked; "there's too +much of it for a lady." + +She assented, after many compliments to his politeness; and he walked +by her side into the meadow. She went lightly and rapidly, picking her +steps and glancing forward to catch a glimpse of her husband. She +was graceful, she was charming, she had an air of decision and yet of +accommodation, and it seemed to our friend that a young artist would +work none the worse for having her seated at his side reading Chenier's +iambics. They were newly married, he supposed, and evidently their path +of life had none of the mocking crookedness of some others. They asked +little; but what need to ask more than such quiet summer days by a shady +stream, with a comrade all amiability, to say nothing of art and books +and a wide unmenaced horizon? To spend such a morning, to stroll back to +dinner in the red-tiled parlour of the inn, to ramble away again as the +sun got low--all this was a vision of delight which floated before him +only to torture him with a sense of the impossible. All Frenchwomen were +not coquettes, he noted as he kept pace with his companion. She uttered +a word now and then for politeness' sake, but she never looked at him +and seemed not in the least to care that he was a well-favoured and +well-dressed young man. She cared for nothing but the young artist in +the shabby coat and the slouched hat, and for discovering where he had +set up his easel. + +This was soon done. He was encamped under the trees, close to the +stream, and, in the diffused green shade of the little wood, couldn't +have felt immediate need of his umbrella. He received a free rebuke, +however, for forgetting it, and was informed of what he owed to +Longmore's complaisance. He was duly grateful; he thanked our hero +warmly and offered him a seat on the grass. But Longmore felt himself +a marplot and lingered only long enough to glance at the young man's +sketch and to see in it an easy rendering of the silvery stream and the +vivid green rushes. The young wife had spread her shawl on the grass +at the base of a tree and meant to seat herself when he had left them, +meant to murmur Chenier's verses to the music of the gurgling river. +Longmore looked a while from one of these lucky persons to the other, +barely stifled a sigh, bade them good-morning and took his departure. He +knew neither where to go nor what to do; he seemed afloat on the sea of +ineffectual longing. He strolled slowly back to the inn, where, in +the doorway, he met the landlady returning from the butcher's with the +lambchops for the dinner of her lodgers. + +"Monsieur has made the acquaintance of the dame of our young painter," +she said with a free smile--a smile too free for malicious meanings. +"Monsieur has perhaps seen the young man's picture. It appears that he's +d'une jolie force." + +"His picture's very charming," said Longmore, "but his dame is more +charming still." + +"She's a very nice little woman; but I pity her all the more." + +"I don't see why she's to be pitied," Longmore pleaded. "They seem a +very happy couple." + +The landlady gave a knowing nod. "Don't trust to it, monsieur! Those +artists--ca na pas de principes! From one day to another he can plant +her there! I know them, allez. I've had them here very often; one year +with one, another year with another." + +Longmore was at first puzzled. Then, "You mean she's not his wife?" he +asked. + +She took it responsibly. "What shall I tell you? They're not des hommes +serieux, those gentlemen! They don't engage for eternity. It's none +of my business, and I've no wish to speak ill of madame. She's +gentille--but gentille, and she loves her jeune homme to distraction." + +"Who then is so distinguished a young woman?" asked Longmore. "What do +you know about her?" + +"Nothing for certain; but it's my belief that she's better than he. I've +even gone so far as to believe that she's a lady--a vraie dame--and that +she has given up a great many things for him. I do the best I can for +them, but I don't believe she has had all her life to put up with a +dinner of two courses." And she turned over her lamb-chops tenderly, as +to say that though a good cook could imagine better things, yet if you +could have but one course lamb-chops had much in their favour. "I shall +do them with breadcrumbs. Voila les femmes, monsieur!" + +Longmore turned away with the feeling that women were indeed a +measureless mystery, and that it was hard to say in which of their forms +of perversity there was most merit. He walked back to Saint-Germain more +slowly than he had come, with less philosophic resignation to any event +and more of the urgent egotism of the passion pronounced by philosophers +the supremely selfish one. Now and then the episode of the happy young +painter and the charming woman who had given up a great many things for +him rose vividly in his mind and seemed to mock his moral unrest like +some obtrusive vision of unattainable bliss. + +The landlady's gossip had cast no shadow on its brightness; her voice +seemed that of the vulgar chorus of the uninitiated, which stands always +ready with its gross prose rendering of the inspired passages of human +action. Was it possible a man could take THAT from a woman--take all +that lent lightness to that other woman's footstep and grace to her +surrender and not give her the absolute certainty of a devotion as +unalterable as the process of the sun? Was it possible that so clear +a harmony had the seeds of trouble, that the charm of so perfect union +could be broken by anything but death? Longmore felt an immense desire +to cry out a thousand times "No!" for it seemed to him at last that +he was somehow only a graver equivalent of the young lover and that +rustling Claudine was a lighter sketch of Madame de Mauves. The heat of +the sun, as he walked along, became oppressive, and when he re-entered +the forest he turned aside into the deepest shade he could find and +stretched himself on the mossy ground at the foot of a great beech. He +lay for a while staring up into the verdurous dusk overhead and trying +mentally to see his friend at Saint-Germain hurry toward some quiet +stream-side where HE waited, as he had seen that trusting creature hurry +an hour before. It would be hard to say how well he succeeded; but the +effort soothed rather than excited him, and as he had had a good deal +both of moral and physical fatigue he sank at last into a quiet sleep. +While he slept moreover he had a strange and vivid dream. He seemed +to be in a wood, very much like the one on which his eyes had lately +closed; but the wood was divided by the murmuring stream he had left an +hour before. He was walking up and down, he thought, restlessly and in +intense expectation of some momentous event. Suddenly, at a distance, +through the trees, he saw a gleam of a woman's dress, on which he +hastened to meet her. As he advanced he recognised her, but he saw at +the same time that she was on the other bank of the river. She seemed at +first not to notice him, but when they had come to opposite places she +stopped and looked at him very gravely and pityingly. She made him no +sign that he must cross the stream, but he wished unutterably to stand +by her side. He knew the water was deep, and it seemed to him he knew +how he should have to breast it and how he feared that when he rose to +the surface she would have disappeared. Nevertheless he was going to +plunge when a boat turned into the current from above and came swiftly +toward them, guided by an oarsman who was sitting so that they couldn't +see his face. He brought the boat to the bank where Longmore stood; +the latter stepped in, and with a few strokes they touched the opposite +shore. Longmore got out and, though he was sure he had crossed the +stream, Madame de Mauves was not there. He turned with a kind of agony +and saw that now she was on the other bank--the one he had left. She +gave him a grave silent glance and walked away up the stream. The boat +and the boatman resumed their course, but after going a short distance +they stopped and the boatman turned back and looked at the still divided +couple. Then Longmore recognised him--just as he had recognised him a +few days before at the restaurant in the Bois de Boulogne. + + + + +VIII + +He must have slept some time after he ceased dreaming for he had no +immediate memory of this vision. It came back to him later, after he +had roused himself and had walked nearly home. No great arrangement was +needed to make it seem a striking allegory, and it haunted and oppressed +him for the rest of the day. He took refuge, however, in his quickened +conviction that the only sound policy in life is to grasp unsparingly +at happiness; and it seemed no more than one of the vigorous measures +dictated by such a policy to return that evening to Madame de Mauves. +And yet when he had decided to do so and had carefully dressed himself +he felt an irresistible nervous tremor which made it easier to linger +at his open window, wondering with a strange mixture of dread and desire +whether Madame Clairin had repeated to her sister-in-law what she had +said to him. His presence now might be simply a gratuitous annoyance, +and yet his absence might seem to imply that it was in the power of +circumstances to make them ashamed to meet each other's eyes. He sat +a long time with his head in his hands, lost in a painful confusion of +hopes and ambiguities. He felt at moments as if he could throttle Madame +Clairin, and yet couldn't help asking himself if it weren't possible she +had done him a service. It was late when he left the hotel, and as he +entered the gate of the other house his heart beat so fast that he was +sure his voice would show it. + +The servant ushered him into the drawing-room, which was empty and with +the lamp burning low. But the long windows were open and their light +curtains swaying in a soft warm wind, so that Longmore immediately +stepped out upon the terrace. There he found Madame de Mauves alone, +slowly pacing its length. She was dressed in white, very simply, and her +hair was arranged not as she usually wore it, but in a single loose coil +and as if she were unprepared for company. She stopped when she saw her +friend, showed some surprise, uttered an exclamation and stood waiting +for him to speak. He tried, with his eyes on her, to say something, +but found no words. He knew it was awkward, it was offensive, to stand +gazing at her; but he couldn't say what was suitable and mightn't say +what he wished. Her face was indistinct in the dim light, but he felt +her eyes fixed on him and wondered what they expressed. Did they warn +him, did they plead, or did they confess to a sense of provocation? For +an instant his head swam; he was sure it would make all things clear to +stride forward and fold her in his arms. But a moment later he was still +dumb there before her; he hadn't moved; he knew she had spoken, but he +hadn't understood. + +"You were here this morning," she continued; and now, slowly, the +meaning of her words came to him. "I had a bad headache and had to shut +myself up." She spoke with her usual voice. + +Longmore mastered his agitation and answered her without betraying +himself. "I hope you're better now." + +"Yes, thank you, I'm better--much better." + +He waited again and she moved away to a chair and seated herself. After +a pause he followed her and leaned closer to her, against the balustrade +of the terrace. "I hoped you might have been able to come out for the +morning into the forest. I went alone; it was a lovely day, and I took a +long walk." + +"It was a lovely day," she said absently, and sat with her eyes lowered, +slowly opening and closing her fan. Longmore, as he watched her, felt +more and more assured her sister-in-law had seen her since her interview +with him; that her attitude toward him was changed. It was this same +something that hampered the desire with which he had come, or at least +converted all his imagined freedom of speech about it to a final hush of +wonder. No, certainly, he couldn't clasp her to his arms now, any more +than some antique worshipper could have clasped the marble statue in his +temple. But Longmore's statue spoke at last with a full human voice and +even with a shade of human hesitation. She looked up, and it seemed to +him her eyes shone through the dusk. + +"I'm very glad you came this evening--and I've a particular reason +for being glad. I half-expected you, and yet I thought it possible you +mightn't come." + +"As the case has been present to me," Longmore answered, "it was +impossible I shouldn't come. I've spent every minute of the day in +thinking of you." + +She made no immediate reply, but continued to open and close her fan +thoughtfully. At last, "I've something important to say to you," she +resumed with decision. "I want you to know to a certainty that I've +a very high opinion of you." Longmore gave an uneasy shift to his +position. To what was she coming? But he said nothing, and she went on: +"I take a great interest in you. There's no reason why I shouldn't +say it. I feel a great friendship for you." He began to laugh, all +awkwardly--he hardly knew why, unless because this seemed the very irony +of detachment. But she went on in her way: "You know, I suppose, that a +great disappointment always implies a great confidence--a great hope." + +"I've certainly hoped," he said, "hoped strongly; but doubtless never +rationally enough to have a right to bemoan my disappointment." + +There was something troubled in her face that seemed all the while to +burn clearer. "You do yourself injustice. I've such confidence in your +fairness of mind that I should be greatly disappointed if I were to find +it wanting." + +"I really almost believe you're amusing yourself at my expense," the +young man cried. "My fairness of mind? Of all the question-begging +terms!" he laughed. "The only thing for one's mind to be fair to is the +thing one FEELS!" + +She rose to her feet and looked at him hard. His eyes by this time were +accustomed to the imperfect light, and he could see that if she was +urgent she was yet beseechingly kind. She shook her head impatiently and +came near enough to lay her fan on his arm with a strong pressure. "If +that were so it would be a weary world. I know enough, however, of your +probable attitude. You needn't try to express it. It's enough that your +sincerity gives me the right to ask a favour of you--to make an intense, +a solemn request." + +"Make it; I listen." + +"DON'T DISAPPOINT ME. If you don't understand me now you will to-morrow +or very soon. When I said just now that I had a high opinion of you, +you see I meant it very seriously," she explained. "It wasn't a vain +compliment. I believe there's no appeal one may make to your generosity +that can remain long unanswered. If this were to happen--if I were to +find you selfish where I thought you generous, narrow where I thought +you large"--and she spoke slowly, her voice lingering with all emphasis +on each of these words--"vulgar where I thought you rare, I should think +worse of human nature. I should take it, I assure you, very hard indeed. +I should say to myself in the dull days of the future: 'There was ONE +man who might have done so and so, and he too failed.' But this shan't +be. You've made too good an impression on me not to make the very best. +If you wish to please me for ever there's a way." + +She was standing close to him, with her dress touching him, her +eyes fixed on his. As she went on her tone became, to his sense, +extraordinary, and she offered the odd spectacle of a beautiful woman +preaching reason with the most communicative and irresistible passion. +Longmore was dazzled, but mystified and bewildered. The intention of +her words was all remonstrance, refusal, dismissal, but her presence +and effect there, so close, so urgent, so personal, a distracting +contradiction of it. She had never been so lovely. In her white dress, +with her pale face and deeply-lighted brow, she seemed the very spirit +of the summer night. When she had ceased speaking she drew a long +breath; he felt it on his cheek, and it stirred in his whole being +a sudden perverse imagination. Were not her words, in their high +impossible rigour, a mere challenge to his sincerity, a mere precaution +of her pride, meant to throw into relief her almost ghostly beauty, and +wasn't this the only truth, the only law, the only thing to take account +of? + +He closed his eyes and felt her watch him not without pain and +perplexity herself. He looked at her again, met her own eyes and saw +them fill with strange tears. Then this last sophistry of his great +desire for her knew itself touched as a bubble is pricked; it died away +with a stifled murmur, and her beauty, more and more radiant in the +darkness, rose before him as a symbol of something vague which was yet +more beautiful than itself. "I may understand you to-morrow," he said, +"but I don't understand you now." + +"And yet I took counsel with myself to-day and asked myself how I had +best speak to you. On one side I might have refused to see you at all." +Longmore made a violent movement, and she added: "In that case I should +have written to you. I might see you, I thought, and simply say to you +that there were excellent reasons why we should part, and that I begged +this visit should be your last. This I inclined to do; what made me +decide otherwise was--well, simply that I like you so. I said to myself +that I should be glad to remember in future days, not that I had, in the +horrible phrase, got rid of you, but that you had gone away out of the +fulness of your own wisdom and the excellence of your own taste." + +"Ah wisdom and taste!" the poor young man wailed. + +"I'm prepared, if necessary," Madame de Mauves continued after a pause, +"to fall back on my strict right. But, as I said before, I shall be +greatly disappointed if I'm obliged to do that." + +"When I listen to your horrible and unnatural lucidity," Longmore +answered, "I feel so angry, so merely sore and sick, that I wonder I +don't leave you without more words." + +"If you should go away in anger this idea of mine about our parting +would be but half-realised," she returned with no drop in her ardour. +"No, I don't want to think of you as feeling a great pain, I don't want +even to think of you as making a great sacrifice. I want to think of +you--" + +"As a stupid brute who has never existed, who never CAN exist!" he broke +in. "A creature who could know you without loving you, who could leave +you without for ever missing you!" + +She turned impatiently away and walked to the other end of the terrace. +When she came back he saw that her impatience had grown sharp and almost +hard. She stood before him again, looking at him from head to foot +and without consideration now; so that as the effect of it he felt his +assurance finally quite sink. This then she took from him, withholding +in consequence something she had meant to say. She moved off afresh, +walked to the other end of the terrace and stood there with her face to +the garden. She assumed that he understood her, and slowly, slowly, half +as the fruit of this mute pressure, he let everything go but the rage of +a purpose somehow still to please her. She was giving him a chance to do +gallantly what it seemed unworthy of both of them he should do meanly. +She must have "liked" him indeed, as she said, to wish so to spare him, +to go to the trouble of conceiving an ideal of conduct for him. With +this sense of her tenderness still in her dreadful consistency, his +spirit rose with a new flight and suddenly felt itself breathe clearer +air. Her profession ceased to seem a mere bribe to his eagerness; it was +charged with eagerness itself; it was a present reward and would somehow +last. He moved rapidly toward her as with the sense of a gage that he +might sublimely yet immediately enjoy. + +They were separated by two thirds of the length of the terrace, and he +had to pass the drawing-room window. As he did so he started with an +exclamation. Madame Clairin stood framed in the opening as if, though +just arriving on the scene, she too were already aware of its interest. +Conscious, apparently, that she might be suspected of having watched +them she stepped forward with a smile and looked from one to the other. +"Such a tete-a-tete as that one owes no apology for interrupting. One +ought to come in for good manners." + +Madame de Mauves turned to her, but answered nothing. She looked +straight at Longmore, and her eyes shone with a lustre that struck him +as divine. He was not exactly sure indeed what she meant them to say, +but it translated itself to something that would do. "Call it what you +will, what you've wanted to urge upon me is the thing this woman can +best conceive. What I ask of you is something she can't begin to!" They +seemed somehow to beg him to suffer her to be triumphantly herself, +and to intimate--yet this too all decently--how little that self was +of Madame Clairin's particular swelling measure. He felt an immense +answering desire not to do anything then that might seem probable or +prevu to this lady. He had laid his hat and stick on the parapet of the +terrace. He took them up, offered his hand to Madame de Mauves with a +simple good-night, bowed silently to Madame Clairin and found his way, +with tingling ears, out of the place. + + + + +IX + +He went home and, without lighting his candle, flung himself on his +bed. But he got no sleep till morning; he lay hour after hour tossing, +thinking, wondering; his mind had never been so active. It seemed to him +his friend had laid on him in those last moments a heavy charge and +had expressed herself almost as handsomely as if she had listened +complacently to an assurance of his love. It was neither easy nor +delightful thoroughly to understand her; but little by little her +perfect meaning sank into his mind and soothed it with a sense of +opportunity which somehow stifled his sense of loss. For, to begin with, +she meant that she could love him in no degree or contingency, in no +imaginable future. This was absolute--he knew he could no more alter +it than he could pull down one of the constellations he lay gazing at +through his open window. He wondered to what it was, in the background +of her life, she had so dedicated herself. A conception of duty +unquenchable to the end? A love that no outrage could stifle? "Great +heaven!" he groaned; "is the world so rich in the purest pearls of +passion that such tenderness as that can be wasted for ever--poured +away without a sigh into bottomless darkness?" Had she, in spite of the +detestable present, some precious memory that still kept the door of +possibility open? Was she prepared to submit to everything and yet to +believe? Was it strength, was it weakness, was it a vulgar fear, was it +conviction, conscience, constancy? + +Longmore sank back with a sigh and an oppressive feeling that it was +vain to guess at such a woman's motives. He only felt that those of this +one were buried deep in her soul and that they must be of the noblest, +must contain nothing base. He had his hard impression that endless +constancy was all her law--a constancy that still found a foothold among +crumbling ruins. "She has loved once," he said to himself as he rose +and wandered to his window; "and that's for ever. Yes, yes--if she loved +again she'd be COMMON!" He stood for a long time looking out into the +starlit silence of the town and forest and thinking of what life would +have been if his constancy had met her own in earlier days. But life was +this now, and he must live. It was living, really, to stand there with +such a faith even in one's self still flung over one by such hands. +He was not to disappoint her, he was to justify a conception it had +beguiled her weariness to form. His imagination embraced it; he threw +back his head and seemed to be looking for his friend's conception +among the blinking mocking stars. But it came to him rather on the mild +night-wind wandering in over the house-tops which covered the rest of +so many heavy human hearts. What she asked he seemed to feel her ask not +for her own sake--she feared nothing, she needed nothing--but for that +of his own happiness and his own character. He must assent to destiny. +Why else was he young and strong, intelligent and resolute? He mustn't +give it to her to reproach him with thinking she had had a moment's +attention for his love, give it to her to plead, to argue, to break off +in bitterness. He must see everything from above, her indifference and +his own ardour; he must prove his strength, must do the handsome thing, +must decide that the handsome thing was to submit to the inevitable, to +be supremely delicate, to spare her all pain, to stifle his passion, +to ask no compensation, to depart without waiting and to try to believe +that wisdom is its own reward. All this, neither more nor less, it was +a matter of beautiful friendship with him for her to expect of him. And +what should he himself gain by it? He should have pleased her! Well, +he flung himself on his bed again, fell asleep at last and slept till +morning. + +Before noon next day he had made up his mind to leave Saint-Germain at +once. It seemed easiest to go without seeing her, and yet if he might +ask for a grain of "compensation" this would be five minutes face to +face with her. He passed a restless day. Wherever he went he saw her +stand before him in the dusky halo of evening, saw her look at him with +an air of still negation more intoxicating than the most passionate +self-surrender. He must certainly go, and yet it was hideously hard. He +compromised and went to Paris to spend the rest of the day. He strolled +along the boulevard and paused sightlessly before the shops, sat a while +in the Tuileries gardens and looked at the shabby unfortunates for whom +this only was nature and summer; but simply felt afresh, as a result +of it all, the dusty dreary lonely world to which Madame de Mauves had +consigned him. + +In a sombre mood he made his way back to the centre of motion and sat +down at a table before a cafe door, on the great plain of hot asphalt. +Night arrived, the lamps were lighted, the tables near him found +occupants, and Paris began to wear that evening grimace of hers that +seems to tell, in the flare of plate glass and of theatre-doors, the +muffled rumble of swift-rolling carriages, how this is no world for +you unless you have your pockets lined and your delicacies perverted. +Longmore, however, had neither scruples nor desires; he looked at +the great preoccupied place for the first time with an easy sense +of repaying its indifference. Before long a carriage drove up to the +pavement directly in front of him and remained standing for several +minutes without sign from its occupant. It was one of those neat plain +coupes, drawn by a single powerful horse, in which the flaneur figures +a pale handsome woman buried among silk cushions and yawning as she sees +the gas-lamps glittering in the gutters. At last the door opened and out +stepped Richard de Mauves. He stopped and leaned on the window for some +time, talking in an excited manner to a person within. At last he gave a +nod and the carriage rolled away. He stood swinging his cane and looking +up and down the boulevard, with the air of a man fumbling, as one +might say, the loose change of time. He turned toward the cafe and was +apparently, for want of anything better worth his attention, about to +seat himself at one of the tables when he noticed Longmore. He wavered +an instant and then, without a shade of difference in his careless gait, +advanced to the accompaniment of a thin recognition. It was the first +time they had met since their encounter in the forest after Longmore's +false start for Brussels. Madame Clairin's revelations, as he might have +regarded them, had not made the Count especially present to his mind; he +had had another call to meet than the call of disgust. But now, as M. de +Mauves came toward him he felt abhorrence well up. He made out, however, +for the first time, a cloud on this nobleman's superior clearness, and a +delight at finding the shoe somewhere at last pinching HIM, mingled with +the resolve to be blank and unaccommodating, enabled him to meet the +occasion with due promptness. + +M. de Mauves sat down, and the two men looked at each other across the +table, exchanging formal remarks that did little to lend grace to their +encounter. Longmore had no reason to suppose the Count knew of his +sister's various interventions. He was sure M. de Mauves cared very +little about his opinions, and yet he had a sense of something grim in +his own New York face which would have made him change colour if keener +suspicion had helped it to be read there. M. de Mauves didn't change +colour, but he looked at his wife's so oddly, so more than naturally +(wouldn't it be?) detached friend with an intentness that betrayed at +once an irritating memory of the episode in the Bois de Boulogne and +such vigilant curiosity as was natural to a gentleman who had entrusted +his "honour" to another gentleman's magnanimity--or to his artlessness. + +It might appear that these virtues shone out of our young man less +engagingly or reassuringly than a few days before; the shadow at any +rate fell darker across the brow of his critic, who turned away and +frowned while lighting a cigar. The person in the coupe, he accordingly +judged, whether or no the same person as the heroine of the episode of +the Bois de Boulogne, was not a source of unalloyed delight. Longmore +had dark blue eyes of admirable clarity, settled truth-telling eyes +which had in his childhood always made his harshest taskmasters smile at +his notion of a subterfuge. An observer watching the two men and knowing +something of their relations would certainly have said that what he had +at last both to recognise and to miss in those eyes must not a little +have puzzled and tormented M. de Mauves. They took possession of him, +they laid him out, they measured him in that state of flatness, they +triumphed over him, they treated him as no pair of eyes had perhaps ever +treated any member of his family before. The Count's scheme had been to +provide for a positive state of ease on the part of no one save himself, +but here was Longmore already, if appearances perhaps not appreciable to +the vulgar meant anything, primed as for some prospect of pleasure more +than Parisian. Was this candid young barbarian but a faux bonhomme after +all? He had never really quite satisfied his occasional host, but was he +now, for a climax, to leave him almost gaping? + +M. de Mauves, as if hating to seem preoccupied, took up the evening +paper to help himself to seem indifferent. As he glanced over it he +threw off some perfunctory allusion to the crisis--the political--which +enabled Longmore to reply with perfect veracity that, with other things +to think about, he had had no attention to spare for it. And yet our +hero was in truth far from secure against rueful reflexion. The Count's +ruffled state was a comfort so far as it pointed to the possibility +that the lady in the coupe might be proving too many for him; but it +ministered to no vindictive sweetness for Longmore so far as it should +perhaps represent rising jealousy. It passed through his mind that +jealousy is a passion with a double face and that on one of its sides it +may sometimes almost look generous. It glimmered upon him odiously M. de +Mauves might grow ashamed of his political compact with his wife, and +he felt how far more tolerable it would be in future to think of him as +always impertinent than to think of him as occasionally contrite. +The two men pretended meanwhile for half an hour to outsit each other +conveniently; and the end--at that rate--might have been distant had not +the tension in some degree yielded to the arrival of a friend of M. de +Mauves--a tall pale consumptive-looking dandy who filled the air with +the odour of heliotrope. He looked up and down the boulevard wearily, +examined the Count's garments in some detail, then appeared to refer +restlessly to his own, and at last announced resignedly that the Duchess +was in town. M. de Mauves must come with him to call; she had abused him +dreadfully a couple of evenings before--a sure sign she wanted to see +him. "I depend on you," said with an infantine drawl this specimen of +an order Longmore felt he had never had occasion so intimately to +appreciate, "to put her en train." + +M. de Mauves resisted, he protested that he was d'une humeur +massacrante; but at last he allowed himself to be drawn to his feet +and stood looking awkwardly--awkwardly for M. de Mauves--at Longmore. +"You'll excuse me," he appeared to find some difficulty in saying; "you +too probably have occupation for the evening?" + +"None but to catch my train." And our friend looked at his watch. + +"Ah you go back to Saint-Germain?" + +"In half an hour." + +M. de Mauves seemed on the point of disengaging himself from his +companion's arm, which was locked in his own; but on the latter's +uttering some persuasive murmur he lifted his hat stiffly and turned +away. + +Longmore the next day wandered off to the terrace to try and beguile +the restlessness with which he waited for the evening; he wished to see +Madame de Mauves for the last time at the hour of long shadows and +pale reflected amber lights, as he had almost always seen her. Destiny, +however, took no account of this humble plea for poetic justice; it +was appointed him to meet her seated by the great walk under a tree and +alone. The hour made the place almost empty; the day was warm, but as +he took his place beside her a light breeze stirred the leafy edges of +their broad circle of shadow. She looked at him almost with no pretence +of not having believed herself already rid of him, and he at once told +her that he should leave Saint-Germain that evening, but must first bid +her farewell. Her face lighted a moment, he fancied, as he spoke; but +she said nothing, only turning it off to far Paris which lay twinkling +and flashing through hot exhalations. "I've a request to make of you," +he added. "That you think of me as a man who has felt much and claimed +little." + +She drew a long breath which almost suggested pain. "I can't think of +you as unhappy. That's impossible. You've a life to lead, you've duties, +talents, inspirations, interests. I shall hear of your career. And +then," she pursued after a pause, though as if it had before this quite +been settled between them, "one can't be unhappy through having a better +opinion of a friend instead of a worse." + +For a moment he failed to understand her. "Do you mean that there can be +varying degrees in my opinion of you?" + +She rose and pushed away her chair. "I mean," she said quickly, "that +it's better to have done nothing in bitterness--nothing in passion." And +she began to walk. + +Longmore followed her without answering at first. But he took off his +hat and with his pocket-handkerchief wiped his forehead. "Where shall +you go? what shall you do?" he simply asked at last. + +"Do? I shall do as I've always done--except perhaps that I shall go for +a while to my husband's old home." + +"I shall go to MY old one. I've done with Europe for the present," the +young man added. + +She glanced at him as he walked beside her, after he had spoken these +words, and then bent her eyes for a long time on the ground. But +suddenly, as if aware of her going too far she stopped and put out her +hand. "Good-bye. May you have all the happiness you deserve!" + +He took her hand with his eyes on her, but something was at work in +him that made it impossible to deal in the easy way with her touch. +Something of infinite value was floating past him, and he had taken an +oath, with which any such case interfered, not to raise a finger to stop +it. It was borne by the strong current of the world's great life and not +of his own small one. Madame de Mauves disengaged herself, gathered in +her long scarf and smiled at him almost as you would do at a child +you should wish to encourage. Several moments later he was still there +watching her leave him and leave him. When she was out of sight he shook +himself, walked at once back to his hotel and, without waiting for the +evening train, paid his bill and departed. + +Later in the day M. de Mauves came into his wife's drawing-room, where +she sat waiting to be summoned to dinner. He had dressed as he usually +didn't dress for dining at home. He walked up and down for some moments +in silence, then rang the bell for a servant and went out into the hall +to meet him. He ordered the carriage to take him to the station, paused +a moment with his hand on the knob of the door, dismissed the +servant angrily as the latter lingered observing him, re-entered the +drawing-room, resumed his restless walk and at last stopped abruptly +before his wife, who had taken up a book. "May I ask the favour," he +said with evident effort, in spite of a forced smile as of allusion to +a large past exercise of the very best taste, "of having a question +answered?" + +"It's a favour I never refused," she replied. + +"Very true. Do you expect this evening a visit from Mr. Longmore?" + +"Mr. Longmore," said his wife, "has left Saint-Germain." M. de Mauves +waited, but his smile expired. "Mr. Longmore," his wife continued, "has +gone to America." + +M. de Mauves took it--a rare thing for him--with confessed, if +momentary, intellectual indigence. But he raised, as it were, the wind. +"Has anything happened?" he asked, "Had he a sudden call?" But his +question received no answer. At the same moment the servant threw open +the door and announced dinner; Madame Clairin rustled in, rubbing her +white hands, Madame de Mauves passed silently into the dining-room, +but he remained outside--outside of more things, clearly, than his mere +salle-a-manger. Before long he went forth to the terrace and continued +his uneasy walk. At the end of a quarter of an hour the servant came to +let him know that his carriage was at the door. "Send it away," he said +without hesitation. "I shan't use it." When the ladies had half-finished +dinner he returned and joined them, with a formal apology to his wife +for his inconsequence. + +The dishes were brought back, but he hardly tasted them; he drank on +the other hand more wine than usual. There was little talk, scarcely a +convivial sound save the occasional expressive appreciative "M-m-m!" of +Madame Clairin over the succulence of some dish. Twice this lady saw +her brother's eyes, fixed on her own over his wineglass, put to her a +question she knew she should have to irritate him later on by not being +able to answer. She replied, for the present at least, by an elevation +of the eyebrows that resembled even to her own humour the vain raising +of an umbrella in anticipation of a storm. M. de Mauves was left alone +to finish his wine; he sat over it for more than an hour and let the +darkness gather about him. At last the servant came in with a letter and +lighted a candle. The letter was a telegram, which M. de Mauves, when +he had read it, burnt at the candle. After five minutes' meditation +he wrote a message on the back of a visiting-card and gave it to the +servant to carry to the office. The man knew quite as much as his master +suspected about the lady to whom the telegram was addressed; but its +contents puzzled him; they consisted of the single word "Impossible." As +the evening passed without her brother's reappearing in the drawing-room +Madame Clairin came to him where he sat by his solitary candle. He +took no notice of her presence for some time, but this affected her +as unexpected indulgence. At last, however, he spoke with a particular +harshness. "Ce jeune mufle has gone home at an hour's notice. What the +devil does it mean?" + +Madame Clairin now felt thankful for her umbrella. "It means that I've a +sister-in-law whom I've not the honour to understand." + +He said nothing more and silently allowed her, after a little, to +depart. It had been her duty to provide him with an explanation, and he +was disgusted with her blankness; but she was--if there was no more to +come--getting off easily. When she had gone he went into the garden and +walked up and down with his cigar. He saw his wife seated alone on the +terrace, but remained below, wandering, turning, pausing, lingering. +He remained a long time. It grew late and Madame de Mauves disappeared. +Toward midnight he dropped upon a bench, tired, with a long vague +exhalation of unrest. It was sinking into his spirit that he too didn't +understand Madame Clairin's sister-in-law. + +Longmore was obliged to wait a week in London for a ship. It was very +hot, and he went out one day to Richmond. In the garden of the hotel at +which he dined he met his friend Mrs. Draper, who was staying there. +She made eager enquiry about Madame de Mauves; but Longmore at first, +as they sat looking out at the famous view of the Thames, parried her +questions and confined himself to other topics. At last she said she was +afraid he had something to conceal; whereupon, after a pause, he asked +her if she remembered recommending him, in the letter she had addressed +him at Saint-Germain, to draw the sadness from her friend's smile. "The +last I saw of her was her smile," he said--"when I bade her good-bye." + +"I remember urging you to 'console' her," Mrs. Draper returned, "and I +wondered afterwards whether--model of discretion as you are--I hadn't +cut you out work for which you wouldn't thank me." + +"She has her consolation in herself," the young man said; "she needs +none that any one else can offer her. That's for troubles for which--be +it more, be it less--our own folly has to answer. Madame de Mauves +hasn't a grain of folly left." + +"Ah don't say that!"--Mrs. Draper knowingly protested. "Just a little +folly's often very graceful." + +Longmore rose to go--she somehow annoyed him. "Don't talk of grace," he +said, "till you've measured her reason!" + +For two years after his return to America he heard nothing of Madame de +Mauves. That he thought of her intently, constantly, I need hardly say; +most people wondered why such a clever young man shouldn't "devote" +himself to something; but to himself he seemed absorbingly occupied. He +never wrote to her; he believed she wouldn't have "liked" it. At last he +heard that Mrs. Draper had come home and he immediately called on her. +"Of course," she said after the first greetings, "you're dying for news +of Madame de Mauves. Prepare yourself for something strange. I heard +from her two or three times during the year after your seeing her. She +left Saint-Germain and went to live in the country on some old property +of her husband's. She wrote me very kind little notes, but I felt +somehow that--in spite of what you said about 'consolation'--they were +the notes of a wretched woman. The only advice I could have given her +was to leave her scamp of a husband and come back to her own land and +her own people. But this I didn't feel free to do, and yet it made me +so miserable not to be able to help her that I preferred to let our +correspondence die a natural death. I had no news of her for a year. +Last summer, however, I met at Vichy a clever young Frenchman whom +I accidentally learned to be a friend of that charming sister of the +Count's, Madame Clairin. I lost no time in asking him what he knew +about Madame de Mauves--a countrywoman of mine and an old friend. 'I +congratulate you on the friendship of such a person,' he answered. +'That's the terrible little woman who killed her husband.' You may +imagine I promptly asked for an explanation, and he told me--from his +point of view--what he called the whole story. M. de Mauves had fait +quelques folies which his wife had taken absurdly to heart. He had +repented and asked her forgiveness, which she had inexorably refused. +She was very pretty, and severity must have suited her style; for, +whether or no her husband had been in love with her before, he fell +madly in love with her now. He was the proudest man in France, but he +had begged her on his knees to be re-admitted to favour. All in vain! +She was stone, she was ice, she was outraged virtue. People noticed a +great change in him; he gave up society, ceased to care for anything, +looked shockingly. One fine day they discovered he had blown out his +brains. My friend had the story of course from Madame Clairin." + +Longmore was strongly moved, and his first impulse after he had +recovered his composure was to return immediately to Europe. But several +years have passed, and he still lingers at home. The truth is that, +in the midst of all the ardent tenderness of his memory of Madame de +Mauves, he has become conscious of a singular feeling--a feeling of +wonder, of uncertainty, of awe. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Madame de Mauves, by Henry James + +*** END OF THIS PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + +***** This file should be named 7813.txt or 7813.zip ***** +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: + http://www.gutenberg.org/7/8/1/7813/ + +Produced by Eve Sobol + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. 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Do not change or edit the +header without written permission. + +Please read the "legal small print," and other information about the +eBook and Project Gutenberg at the bottom of this file. Included is +important information about your specific rights and restrictions in +how the file may be used. You can also find out about how to make a +donation to Project Gutenberg, and how to get involved. + + +**Welcome To The World of Free Plain Vanilla Electronic Texts** + +**eBooks Readable By Both Humans and By Computers, Since 1971** + +*****These eBooks Were Prepared By Thousands of Volunteers!***** + + +Title: Madame de Mauves + +Author: Henry James + +Release Date: April, 2005 [EBook #7813] +[Yes, we are more than one year ahead of schedule] +[This file was first posted on May 19, 2003] + +Edition: 10 + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ASCII + +*** START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + + + + +Produced by Eve Sobol + + + + +MADAME DE MAUVES + +HENRY JAMES + + + +I + +The view from the terrace at Saint-Germain-en-Laye is immense and +famous. Paris lies spread before you in dusky vastness, domed and +fortified, glittering here and there through her light vapours and +girdled with her silver Seine. Behind you is a park of stately symmetry, +and behind that a forest where you may lounge through turfy avenues and +light-chequered glades and quite forget that you are within half an hour +of the boulevards. One afternoon, however, in mid-spring, some five +years ago, a young man seated on the terrace had preferred to keep this +in mind. His eyes were fixed in idle wistfulness on the mighty human +hive before him. He was fond of rural things, and he had come to Saint- +Germain a week before to meet the spring halfway; but though he could +boast of a six months' acquaintance with the great city he never looked +at it from his present vantage without a sense of curiosity still +unappeased. There were moments when it seemed to him that not to be +there just then was to miss some thrilling chapter of experience. And +yet his winter's experience had been rather fruitless and he had closed +the book almost with a yawn. Though not in the least a cynic he was what +one may call a disappointed observer, and he never chose the right-hand +road without beginning to suspect after an hour's wayfaring that the +left would have been the better. He now had a dozen minds to go to Paris +for the evening, to dine at the Cafe Brebant and repair afterwards to +the Gymnase and listen to the latest exposition of the duties of the +injured husband. He would probably have risen to execute this project if +he had not noticed a little girl who, wandering along the terrace, had +suddenly stopped short and begun to gaze at him with round-eyed +frankness. For a moment he was simply amused, the child's face denoting +such helpless wonderment; the next he was agreeably surprised. "Why this +is my friend Maggie," he said; "I see you've not forgotten me." + +Maggie, after a short parley, was induced to seal her remembrance with a +kiss. Invited then to explain her appearance at Saint-Germain, she +embarked on a recital in which the general, according to the infantine +method, was so fatally sacrificed to the particular that Longmore looked +about him for a superior source of information. He found it in Maggie's +mamma, who was seated with another lady at the opposite end of the +terrace; so, taking the child by the hand, he led her back to her +companions. + +Maggie's mamma was a young American lady, as you would immediately have +perceived, with a pretty and friendly face and a great elegance of fresh +finery. She greeted Longmore with amazement and joy, mentioning his name +to her friend and bidding him bring a chair and sit with them. The other +lady, in whom, though she was equally young and perhaps even prettier, +muslins and laces and feathers were less of a feature, remained silent, +stroking the hair of the little girl, whom she had drawn against her +knee. She had never heard of Longmore, but she now took in that her +companion had crossed the ocean with him, had met him afterwards in +travelling and--having left her husband in Wall Street--was indebted to +him for sundry services. Maggie's mamma turned from time to time and +smiled at this lady with an air of invitation; the latter smiled back +and continued gracefully to say nothing. For ten minutes, meanwhile, +Longmore felt a revival of interest in his old acquaintance; then (as +mild riddles are more amusing than mere commonplaces) it gave way to +curiosity about her friend. His eyes wandered; her volubility shook a +sort of sweetness out of the friend's silence. + +The stranger was perhaps not obviously a beauty nor obviously an +American, but essentially both for the really seeing eye. She was slight +and fair and, though naturally pale, was delicately flushed just now, as +by the effect of late agitation. What chiefly struck Longmore in her +face was the union of a pair of beautifully gentle, almost languid grey +eyes with a mouth that was all expression and intention. Her forehead +was a trifle more expansive than belongs to classic types, and her thick +brown hair dressed out of the fashion, just then even more ugly than +usual. Her throat and bust were slender, but all the more in harmony +with certain rapid charming movements of the head, which she had a way +of throwing back every now and then with an air of attention and a +sidelong glance from her dove-like eyes. She seemed at once alert and +indifferent, contemplative and restless, and Longmore very soon +discovered that if she was not a brilliant beauty she was at least a +most attaching one. This very impression made him magnanimous. He was +certain he had interrupted a confidential conversation, and judged it +discreet to withdraw, having first learned from Maggie's mamma--Mrs. +Draper--that she was to take the six o'clock train back to Paris. He +promised to meet her at the station. + +He kept his appointment, and Mrs. Draper arrived betimes, accompanied by +her friend. The latter, however, made her farewells at the door and +drove away again, giving Longmore time only to raise his hat. "Who is +she?" he asked with visible ardour as he brought the traveller her +tickets. + +"Come and see me to-morrow at the Hotel de l'Empire," she answered, "and +I'll tell you all about her." The force of this offer in making him +punctual at the Hotel de l'Empire Longmore doubtless never exactly +measured; and it was perhaps well he was vague, for he found his friend, +who was on the point of leaving Paris, so distracted by procrastinating +milliners and perjured lingeres that coherence had quite deserted her. +"You must find Saint-Germain dreadfully dull," she nevertheless had the +presence of mind to say as he was going. "Why won't you come with me to +London?" + +"Introduce me to Madame de Mauves," he answered, "and Saint-Germain will +quite satisfy me." All he had learned was the lady's name and residence. + +"Ah she, poor woman, won't make your affair a carnival. She's very +unhappy," said Mrs. Draper. + +Longmore's further enquiries were arrested by the arrival of a young +lady with a bandbox; but he went away with the promise of a note of +introduction, to be immediately dispatched to him at Saint-Germain. + +He then waited a week, but the note never came, and he felt how little +it was for Mrs. Draper to complain of engagements unperformed. He +lounged on the terrace and walked in the forest, studied suburban street +life and made a languid attempt to investigate the records of the court +of the exiled Stuarts; but he spent most of his time in wondering where +Madame de Mauves lived and whether she ever walked on the terrace. +Sometimes, he was at last able to recognise; for one afternoon toward +dusk he made her out from a distance, arrested there alone and leaning +against the low wall. In his momentary hesitation to approach her there +was almost a shade of trepidation, but his curiosity was not chilled by +such a measure of the effect of a quarter of an hour's acquaintance. She +at once recovered their connexion, on his drawing near, and showed it +with the frankness of a person unprovided with a great choice of +contacts. Her dress, her expression, were the same as before; her charm +came out like that of fine music on a second hearing. She soon made +conversation easy by asking him for news of Mrs. Draper. Longmore told +her that he was daily expecting news and after a pause mentioned the +promised note of introduction. + +"It seems less necessary now," he said--"for me at least. But for you--I +should have liked you to know the good things our friend would probably +have been able to say about me." + +"If it arrives at last," she answered, "you must come and see me and +bring it. If it doesn't you must come without it." + +Then, as she continued to linger through the thickening twilight, she +explained that she was waiting for her husband, who was to arrive in the +train from Paris and who often passed along the terrace on his way home. +Longmore well remembered that Mrs. Draper had spoken of uneasy things in +her life, and he found it natural to guess that this same husband was +the source of them. Edified by his six months in Paris, "What else is +possible," he put it, "for a sweet American girl who marries an unholy +foreigner?" + +But this quiet dependence on her lord's return rather shook his +shrewdness, and it received a further check from the free confidence +with which she turned to greet an approaching figure. Longmore +distinguished in the fading light a stoutish gentleman, on the fair side +of forty, in a high grey hat, whose countenance, obscure as yet against +the quarter from which it came, mainly presented to view the large +outward twist of its moustache. M. de Mauves saluted his wife with +punctilious gallantry and, having bowed to Longmore, asked her several +questions in French. Before taking his offered arm to walk to their +carriage, which was in waiting at the gate of the terrace, she +introduced our hero as a friend of Mrs. Draper and also a fellow +countryman, whom she hoped they might have the pleasure of seeing, as +she said, chez eux. M. de Mauves responded briefly, but civilly, in fair +English, and led his wife away. + +Longmore watched him as he went, renewing the curl of his main facial +feature--watched him with an irritation devoid of any mentionable +ground. His one pretext for gnashing his teeth would have been in his +apprehension that this gentleman's worst English might prove a matter to +shame his own best French. For reasons involved apparently in the very +structure of his being Longmore found a colloquial use of that idiom as +insecure as the back of a restive horse, and was obliged to take his +exercise, as he was aware, with more tension than grace. He reflected +meanwhile with comfort that Madame de Mauves and he had a common tongue, +and his anxiety yielded to his relief at finding on his table that +evening a letter from Mrs. Draper. It enclosed a short formal missive to +Madame de Mauves, but the epistle itself was copious and confidential. +She had deferred writing till she reached London, where for a week, of +course, she had found other amusements. + +"I think it's the sight of so many women here who don't look at all like +her that has reminded me by the law of contraries of my charming friend +at Saint-Germain and my promise to introduce you to her," she wrote. "I +believe I spoke to you of her rather blighted state, and I wondered +afterwards whether I hadn't been guilty of a breach of confidence. But +you would certainly have arrived at guesses of your own, and, besides, +she has never told me her secrets. The only one she ever pretended to +was that she's the happiest creature in the world, after assuring me of +which, poor thing, she went off into tears; so that I prayed to be +delivered from such happiness. It's the miserable story of an American +girl born neither to submit basely nor to rebel crookedly marrying a +shining sinful Frenchman who believes a woman must do one or the other +of those things. The lightest of US have a ballast that they can't +imagine, and the poorest a moral imagination that they don't require. +She was romantic and perverse--she thought the world she had been +brought up in too vulgar or at least too prosaic. To have a decent home- +life isn't perhaps the greatest of adventures; but I think she wishes +nowadays she hadn't gone in quite so desperately for thrills. M. de +Mauves cared of course for nothing but her money, which he's spending +royally on his menus plaisirs. I hope you appreciate the compliment I +pay you when I recommend you to go and cheer up a lady domestically +dejected. Believe me, I've given no other man a proof of this esteem; so +if you were to take me in an inferior sense I would never speak to you +again. Prove to this fine sore creature that our manners may have all +the grace without wanting to make such selfish terms for it. She avoids +society and lives quite alone, seeing no one but a horrible French +sister-in-law. Do let me hear that you've made her patience a little +less absent-minded. Make her WANT to forget; make her like you." + +This ingenious appeal left the young man uneasy. He found himself in +presence of more complications than had been in his reckoning. To call +on Madame de Mauves with his present knowledge struck him as akin to +fishing in troubled waters. He was of modest composition, and yet he +asked himself whether an appearance of attentions from any gallant +gentleman mightn't give another twist to her tangle. A flattering sense +of unwonted opportunity, however--of such a possible value constituted +for him as he had never before been invited to rise to--made him with +the lapse of time more confident, possibly more reckless. It was too +inspiring not to act upon the idea of kindling a truer light in his fair +countrywoman's slow smile, and at least he hoped to persuade her that +even a raw representative of the social order she had not done justice +to was not necessarily a mere fortuitous collocation of atoms. He +immediately called on her. + + + +II + +She had been placed for her education, fourteen years before, in a +Parisian convent, by a widowed mammma who was fonder of Homburg and Nice +than of letting out tucks in the frocks of a vigorously growing +daughter. Here, besides various elegant accomplishments--the art of +wearing a train, of composing a bouquet, of presenting a cup of tea--she +acquired a certain turn of the imagination which might have passed for a +sign of precocious worldliness. She dreamed of marrying a man of +hierarchical "rank"--not for the pleasure of hearing herself called +Madame la Vicomtesse, for which it seemed to her she should never +greatly care, but because she had a romantic belief that the enjoyment +of inherited and transmitted consideration, consideration attached to +the fact of birth, would be the direct guarantee of an ideal delicacy of +feeling. She supposed it would be found that the state of being noble +does actually enforce the famous obligation. Romances are rarely worked +out in such transcendent good faith, and Euphemia's excuse was the prime +purity of her moral vision. She was essentially incorruptible, and she +took this pernicious conceit to her bosom very much as if it had been a +dogma revealed by a white-winged angel. Even after experience had given +her a hundred rude hints she found it easier to believe in fables, when +they had a certain nobleness of meaning, than in well-attested but +sordid facts. She believed that a gentleman with a long pedigree must be +of necessity a very fine fellow, and enjoyment of a chance to carry +further a family chronicle begun ever so far back must be, as a +consciousness, a source of the most beautiful impulses. It wasn't +therefore only that noblesse oblige, she thought, as regards yourself, +but that it ensures as nothing else does in respect to your wife. She +had never, at the start, spoken to a nobleman in her life, and these +convictions were but a matter of extravagant theory. They were the +fruit, in part, of the perusal of various Ultramontane works of fiction +--the only ones admitted to the convent library--in which the hero was +always a Legitimist vicomte who fought duels by the dozen but went twice +a month to confession; and in part of the strong social scent of the +gossip of her companions, many of them filles de haut lieu who, in the +convent-garden, after Sundays at home, depicted their brothers and +cousins as Prince Charmings and young Paladins. Euphemia listened and +said nothing; she shrouded her visions of matrimony under a coronet in +the silence that mostly surrounds all ecstatic faith. She was not of +that type of young lady who is easily induced to declare that her +husband must be six feet high and a little near-sighted, part his hair +in the middle and have amber lights in his beard. To her companions her +flights of fancy seemed short, rather, and poor and untutored; and even +the fact that she was a sprig of the transatlantic democracy never +sufficiently explained her apathy on social questions. She had a mental +image of that son of the Crusaders who was to suffer her to adore him, +but like many an artist who has produced a masterpiece of idealisation +she shrank from exposing it to public criticism. It was the portrait of +a gentleman rather ugly than handsome and rather poor than rich. But his +ugliness was to be nobly expressive and his poverty delicately proud. +She had a fortune of her own which, at the proper time, after fixing on +her in eloquent silence those fine eyes that were to soften the feudal +severity of his visage, he was to accept with a world of stifled +protestations. One condition alone she was to make--that he should have +"race" in a state as documented as it was possible to have it. On this +she would stake her happiness; and it was so to happen that several +accidents conspired to give convincing colour to this artless +philosophy. + +Inclined to long pauses and slow approaches herself, Euphemia was a +great sitter at the feet of breathless volubility, and there were +moments when she fairly hung upon the lips of Mademoiselle Marie de +Mauves. Her intimacy with this chosen schoolmate was founded on the +perception--all her own--that their differences were just the right +ones. Mademoiselle de Mauves was very positive, very shrewd, very +ironical, very French--everything that Euphemia felt herself +unpardonable for not being. During her Sundays en ville she had examined +the world and judged it, and she imparted her impressions to our +attentive heroine with an agreeable mixture of enthusiasm and +scepticism. She was moreover a handsome and well-grown person, on whom +Euphemia's ribbons and trinkets had a trick of looking better than on +their slender proprietress. She had finally the supreme merit of being a +rigorous example of the virtue of exalted birth, having, as she did, +ancestors honourably mentioned by Joinville and Commines, and a stately +grandmother with a hooked nose who came up with her after the holidays +from a veritable castel in Auvergne. It seemed to our own young woman +that these attributes made her friend more at home in the world than if +she had been the daughter of even the most prosperous grocer. A certain +aristocratic impudence Mademoiselle de Mauves abundantly possessed, and +her raids among her friend's finery were quite in the spirit of her +baronial ancestors in the twelfth century--a spirit regarded by Euphemia +but as a large way of understanding friendship, a freedom from +conformities without style, and one that would sooner or later express +itself in acts of surprising magnanimity. There doubtless prevailed in +the breast of Mademoiselle de Mauves herself a dimmer vision of the +large securities that Euphemia envied her. She was to become later in +life so accomplished a schemer that her sense of having further heights +to scale might well have waked up early. The especially fine appearance +made by our heroine's ribbons and trinkets as her friend wore them +ministered to pleasure on both sides, and the spell was not of a nature +to be menaced by the young American's general gentleness. The concluding +motive of Marie's writing to her grandmamma to invite Euphemia for a +three weeks' holiday to the castel in Auvergne involved, however, the +subtlest considerations. Mademoiselle de Mauves indeed, at this time +seventeen years of age and capable of views as wide as her wants, was as +proper a figure as could possibly have been found for the foreground of +a scene artfully designed; and Euphemia, whose years were of like +number, asked herself if a right harmony with such a place mightn't come +by humble prayer. It is a proof of the sincerity of the latter's +aspirations that the castel was not a shock to her faith. It was neither +a cheerful nor a luxurious abode, but it was as full of wonders as a box +of old heirlooms or objects "willed." It had battered towers and an +empty moat, a rusty drawbridge and a court paved with crooked grass- +grown slabs over which the antique coach-wheels of the lady with the +hooked nose seemed to awaken the echoes of the seventeenth century. +Euphemia was not frightened out of her dream; she had the pleasure of +seeing all the easier passages translated into truth, as the learner of +a language begins with the common words. She had a taste for old +servants, old anecdotes, old furniture, faded household colours and +sweetly stale odours--musty treasures in which the Chateau de Mauves +abounded. She made a dozen sketches in water-colours after her +conventual pattern; but sentimentally, as one may say, she was for ever +sketching with a freer hand. + +Old Madame de Mauves had nothing severe but her nose, and she seemed to +Euphemia--what indeed she had every claim to pass for--the very image +and pattern of an "historical character." Belonging to a great order of +things, she patronised the young stranger who was ready to sit all day +at her feet and listen to anecdotes of the bon temps and quotations from +the family chronicles. Madame de Mauves was a very honest old woman; she +uttered her thoughts with ancient plainness. One day after pushing back +Euphemia's shining locks and blinking with some tenderness from behind +an immense face-a-main that acted as for the relegation of the girl +herself to the glass case of a museum, she declared with an energetic +shake of the head that she didn't know what to make of such a little +person. And in answer to the little person's evident wonder, "I should +like to advise you," she said, "but you seem to me so all of a piece +that I'm afraid that if I advise you I shall spoil you. It's easy to see +you're not one of us. I don't know whether you're better, but you seem +to me to have been wound up by some key that isn't kept by your +governess or your confessor or even your mother, but that you wear by a +fine black ribbon round your own neck. Little persons in my day--when +they were stupid they were very docile, but when they were clever they +were very sly! You're clever enough, I imagine, and yet if I guessed all +your secrets at this moment is there one I should have to frown at? I +can tell you a wickeder one than any you've discovered for yourself. If +you wish to live at ease in the doux pays de France don't trouble too +much about the key of your conscience or even about your conscience +itself--I mean your own particular one. You'll fancy it saying things it +won't help your case to hear. They'll make you sad, and when you're sad +you'll grow plain, and when you're plain you'll grow bitter, and when +you're bitter you'll be peu aimable. I was brought up to think that a +woman's first duty is to be infinitely so, and the happiest women I've +known have been in fact those who performed this duty faithfully. As +you're not a Catholic I suppose you can't be a devote; and if you don't +take life as a fifty years' mass the only way to take it's as a game of +skill. Listen to this. Not to lose at the game of life you must--I don't +say cheat, but not be too sure your neighbour won't, and not be shocked +out of your self-possession if he does. Don't lose, my dear--I beseech +you don't lose. Be neither suspicious nor credulous, and if you find +your neighbour peeping don't cry out; only very politely wait your own +chance. I've had my revenge more than once in my day, but I really think +the sweetest I could take, en somme, against the past I've known, would +be to have your blest innocence profit by my experience." + +This was rather bewildering advice, but Euphemia understood it too +little to be either edified or frightened. She sat listening to it very +much as she would have listened to the speeches of an old lady in a +comedy whose diction should strikingly correspond to the form of her +high-backed armchair and the fashion of her coif. Her indifference was +doubly dangerous, for Madame de Mauves spoke at the instance of coming +events, and her words were the result of a worry of scruples--scruples +in the light of which Euphemia was on the one hand too tender a victim +to be sacrificed to an ambition and the prosperity of her own house on +the other too precious a heritage to be sacrificed to an hesitation. The +prosperity in question had suffered repeated and grievous breaches and +the menaced institution been overmuch pervaded by that cold comfort in +which people are obliged to balance dinner-table allusions to feudal +ancestors against the absence of side-dishes; a state of things the +sorrier as the family was now mainly represented by a gentleman whose +appetite was large and who justly maintained that its historic glories +hadn't been established by underfed heroes. + +Three days after Euphemia's arrival Richard de Mauves, coming down from +Paris to pay his respects to his grandmother, treated our heroine to her +first encounter with a gentilhomme in the flesh. On appearing he kissed +his grandmother's hand with a smile which caused her to draw it away +with dignity, and set Euphemia, who was standing by, to ask herself what +could have happened between them. Her unanswered wonder was but the +beginning of a long chain of puzzlements, but the reader is free to know +that the smile of M. de Mauves was a reply to a postscript affixed by +the old lady to a letter addressed to him by her granddaughter as soon +as the girl had been admitted to justify the latter's promises. +Mademoiselle de Mauves brought her letter to her grandmother for +approval, but obtained no more than was expressed in a frigid nod. The +old lady watched her with this coldness while she proceeded to seal the +letter, then suddenly bade her open it again and bring her a pen. + +"Your sister's flatteries are all nonsense," she wrote; "the young +lady's far too good for you, mauvais sujet beyond redemption. If you've +a particle of conscience you'll not come and disturb the repose of an +angel of innocence." + +The other relative of the subject of this warning, who had read these +lines, made up a little face as she freshly indited the address; but she +laid down her pen with a confident nod which might have denoted that by +her judgement her brother was appealed to on the ground of a principle +that didn't exist in him. And "if you meant what you said," the young +man on his side observed to his grandmother on his first private +opportunity, "it would have been simpler not to have sent the letter." + +Put out of humour perhaps by this gross impugnment of her sincerity, the +head of the family kept her room on pretexts during a greater part of +Euphemia's stay, so that the latter's angelic innocence was left all to +her grandson's mercy. It suffered no worse mischance, however, than to +be prompted to intenser communion with itself. Richard de Mauves was the +hero of the young girl's romance made real, and so completely accordant +with this creature of her imagination that she felt afraid of him almost +as she would have been of a figure in a framed picture who should have +stepped down from the wall. He was now thirty-three--young enough to +suggest possibilities of ardent activity and old enough to have formed +opinions that a simple woman might deem it an intellectual privilege to +listen to. He was perhaps a trifle handsomer than Euphemia's rather grim +Quixotic ideal, but a very few days reconciled her to his good looks as +effectually they would have reconciled her to a characterised want of +them. He was quiet, grave, eminently distinguished. He spoke little, but +his remarks, without being sententious, had a nobleness of tone that +caused them to re-echo in the young girl's ears at the end of the day. +He paid her very little direct attention, but his chance words--when he +only asked her if she objected to his cigarette--were accompanied by a +smile of extraordinary kindness. + +It happened that shortly after his arrival, riding an unruly horse which +Euphemia had with shy admiration watched him mount in the castle-yard, +he was thrown with a violence which, without disparaging his skill, made +him for a fortnight an interesting invalid lounging in the library with +a bandaged knee. To beguile his confinement the accomplished young +stranger was repeatedly induced to sing for him, which she did with a +small natural tremor that might have passed for the finish of vocal art. +He never overwhelmed her with compliments, but he listened with +unfailing attention, remembered all her melodies and would sit humming +them to himself. While his imprisonment lasted indeed he passed hours in +her company, making her feel not unlike some unfriended artist who has +suddenly gained the opportunity to devote a fortnight to the study of a +great model. Euphemia studied with noiseless diligence what she supposed +to be the "character" of M. de Mauves, and the more she looked the more +fine lights and shades she seemed to behold in this masterpiece of +nature. M. de Mauves's character indeed, whether from a sense of being +so generously and intensely taken for granted, or for reasons which bid +graceful defiance to analysis, had never been so much on show, even to +the very casual critic lodged, as might be said, in an out-of-the-way +corner of it; it seemed really to reflect the purity of Euphemia's pious +opinion. There had been nothing especially to admire in the state of +mind in which he left Paris--a settled resolve to marry a young person +whose charms might or might not justify his sister's account of them, +but who was mistress, at the worst, of a couple of hundred thousand +francs a year. He had not counted out sentiment--if she pleased him so +much the better; but he had left a meagre margin for it and would hardly +have admitted that so excellent a match could be improved by it. He was +a robust and serene sceptic, and it was a singular fate for a man who +believed in nothing to be so tenderly believed in. What his original +faith had been he could hardly have told you, for as he came back to his +childhood's home to mend his fortunes by pretending to fall in love he +was a thoroughly perverse creature and overlaid with more corruptions +than a summer day's questioning of his conscience would have put to +flight. Ten years' pursuit of pleasure, which a bureau full of unpaid +bills was all he had to show for, had pretty well stifled the natural +lad whose violent will and generous temper might have been shaped by a +different pressure to some such showing as would have justified a +romantic faith. So should he have exhaled the natural fragrance of a +late-blooming flower of hereditary honour. His violence indeed had been +subdued and he had learned to be irreproachably polite; but he had lost +the fineness of his generosity, and his politeness, which in the long +run society paid for, was hardly more than a form of luxurious egotism, +like his fondness for ciphered pocket-handkerchiefs, lavender gloves and +other fopperies by which shopkeepers remained out of pocket. In after- +years he was terribly polite to his wife. He had formed himself, as the +phrase was, and the form prescribed to him by the society into which his +birth and his tastes had introduced him was marked by some peculiar +features. That which mainly concerns us is its classification of the +fairer half of humanity as objects not essentially different--say from +those very lavender gloves that are soiled in an evening and thrown +away. To do M. de Mauves justice, he had in the course of time +encountered in the feminine character such plentiful evidence of its +pliant softness and fine adjustability that idealism naturally seemed to +him a losing game. + +Euphemia, as he lay on his sofa, struck him as by no means +contradictory; she simply reminded him that very young women are +generally innocent and that this is on the whole the most potent source +of their attraction. Her innocence moved him to perfect consideration, +and it seemed to him that if he shortly became her husband it would be +exposed to a danger the less. Old Madame de Mauves, who flattered +herself that in this whole matter she was very laudably rigid, might +almost have taken a lesson from the delicacy he practised. For two or +three weeks her grandson was well-nigh a blushing boy again. He watched +from behind the Figaro, he admired and desired and held his tongue. He +found himself not in the least moved to a flirtation; he had no wish to +trouble the waters he proposed to transfuse into the golden cup of +matrimony. Sometimes a word, a look, a gesture of Euphemia's gave him +the oddest sense of being, or of seeming at least, almost bashful; for +she had a way of not dropping her eyes according to the mysterious +virginal mechanism, of not fluttering out of the room when she found him +there alone, of treating him rather as a glorious than as a pernicious +influence--a radiant frankness of demeanour in fine, despite an infinite +natural reserve, which it seemed at once graceless not to be +complimentary about and indelicate not to take for granted. In this way +had been wrought in the young man's mind a vague unwonted resonance of +soft impressions, as we may call it, which resembled the happy stir of +the change from dreaming pleasantly to waking happily. His imagination +was touched; he was very fond of music and he now seemed to give easy +ear to some of the sweetest he had ever heard. In spite of the bore of +being laid up with a lame knee he was in better humour than he had known +for months; he lay smoking cigarettes and listening to the nightingales +with the satisfied smile of one of his country neighbours whose big ox +should have taken the prize at a fair. Every now and then, with an +impatient suspicion of the resemblance, he declared himself pitifully +bete; but he was under a charm that braved even the supreme penalty of +seeming ridiculous. One morning he had half an hour's tete-a-tete with +his grandmother's confessor, a soft-voiced old Abbe whom, for reasons of +her own, Madame de Mauves had suddenly summoned and had left waiting in +the drawing-room while she rearranged her curls. His reverence, going up +to the old lady, assured her that M. le Comte was in a most edifying +state of mind and the likeliest subject for the operation of grace. This +was a theological interpretation of the count's unusual equanimity. He +had always lazily wondered what priests were good for, and he now +remembered, with a sense of especial obligation to the Abbe, that they +were excellent for marrying people. + +A day or two after this he left off his bandages and tried to walk. He +made his way into the garden and hobbled successfully along one of the +alleys, but in the midst of his progress was pulled up by a spasm of +pain which forced him to stop and call for help. In an instant Euphemia +came tripping along the path and offered him her arm with the frankest +solicitude. + +"Not to the house," he said, taking it; "further on, to the bosquet." +This choice was prompted by her having immediately confessed that she +had seen him leave the house, had feared an accident and had followed +him on tiptoe. + +"Why didn't you join me?" he had asked, giving her a look in which +admiration was no longer disguised and yet felt itself half at the mercy +of her replying that a jeune fille shouldn't be seen following a +gentleman. But it drew a breath which filled its lungs for a long time +afterwards when she replied simply that if she had overtaken him he +might have accepted her arm out of politeness, whereas she wished to +have the pleasure of seeing him walk alone. + +The bosquet was covered with an odorous tangle of blossoming creepers, +and a nightingale overhead was shaking out love-notes with a profusion +that made the Count feel his own conduct the last word of propriety. +"I've always heard that in America, when a man wishes to marry a young +girl, he offers himself simply face to face and without ceremony-- +without parents and uncles and aunts and cousins sitting round in a +circle." + +"Why I believe so," said Euphemia, staring and too surprised to be +alarmed. + +"Very well then--suppose our arbour here to be your great sensible +country. I offer you my hand a l'Americaine. It will make me intensely +happy to feel you accept it." + +Whether Euphemia's acceptance was in the American manner is more than I +can say; I incline to think that for fluttering grateful trustful +softly-amazed young hearts there is only one manner all over the world. + +That evening, in the massive turret chamber it was her happiness to +inhabit, she wrote a dutiful letter to her mamma, and had just sealed it +when she was sent for by Madame de Mauves. She found this ancient lady +seated in her boudoir in a lavender satin gown and with her candles all +lighted as for the keeping of some fete. "Are you very happy?" the old +woman demanded, making Euphemia sit down before her. + +"I'm almost afraid to say so, lest I should wake myself up." + +"May you never wake up, belle enfant," Madame de Mauves grandly +returned. "This is the first marriage ever made in our family in this +way--by a Comte de Mauves proposing to a young girl in an arbour like +Jeannot and Jeannette. It has not been our way of doing things, and +people may say it wants frankness. My grandson tells me he regards it-- +for the conditions--as the perfection of good taste. Very well. I'm a +very old woman, and if your differences should ever be as marked as your +agreements I shouldn't care to see them. But I should be sorry to die +and think you were going to be unhappy. You can't be, my dear, beyond a +certain point; because, though in this world the Lord sometimes makes +light of our expectations he never altogether ignores our deserts. But +you're very young and innocent and easy to dazzle. There never was a man +in the world--among the saints themselves--as good as you believe my +grandson. But he's a galant homme and a gentleman, and I've been talking +to him to-night. To you I want to say this--that you're to forget the +worldly rubbish I talked the other day about the happiness of frivolous +women. It's not the kind of happiness that would suit you, ma toute- +belle. Whatever befalls you, promise me this: to be, to remain, your own +sincere little self only, charming in your own serious little way. The +Comtesse de Mauves will be none the worse for it. Your brave little +self, understand, in spite of everything--bad precepts and bad examples, +bad fortune and even bad usage. Be persistently and patiently just what +the good God has made you, and even one of us--and one of those who is +most what we ARE--will do you justice!" + +Euphemia remembered this speech in after-years, and more than once, +wearily closing her eyes, she seemed to see the old woman sitting +upright in her faded finery and smiling grimly like one of the Fates who +sees the wheel of fortune turning up her favourite event. But at the +moment it had for her simply the proper gravity of the occasion: this +was the way, she supposed, in which lucky young girls were addressed on +their engagement by wise old women of quality. + +At her convent, to which she immediately returned, she found a letter +from her mother which disconcerted her far more than the remarks of +Madame de Mauves. Who were these people, Mrs. Cleve demanded, who had +presumed to talk to her daughter of marriage without asking her leave? +Questionable gentlefolk plainly; the best French people never did such +things. Euphemia would return straightway to her convent, shut herself +up and await her own arrival. It took Mrs. Cleve three weeks to travel +from Nice to Paris, and during this time the young girl had no +communication with her lover beyond accepting a bouquet of violets +marked with his initials and left by a female friend. "I've not brought +you up with such devoted care," she declared to her daughter at their +first interview, "to marry a presumptuous and penniless Frenchman. I +shall take you straight home and you'll please forget M. de Mauves." + +Mrs. Cleve received that evening at her hotel a visit from this +personage which softened her wrath but failed to modify her decision. He +had very good manners, but she was sure he had horrible morals; and the +lady, who had been a good-natured censor on her own account, felt a deep +and real need to sacrifice her daughter to propriety. She belonged to +that large class of Americans who make light of their native land in +familiar discourse but are startled back into a sense of having +blasphemed when they find Europeans taking them at their word. "I know +the type, my dear," she said to her daughter with a competent nod. "He +won't beat you. Sometimes you'll wish he would." + +Euphemia remained solemnly silent, for the only answer she felt capable +of making was that her mother's mind was too small a measure of things +and her lover's type an historic, a social masterpiece that it took some +mystic illumination to appreciate. A person who confounded him with the +common throng of her watering-place acquaintance was not a person to +argue with. It struck the girl she had simply no cause to plead; her +cause was in the Lord's hands and in those of M. de Mauves. + +This agent of Providence had been irritated and mortified by Mrs. +Cleve's opposition, and hardly knew how to handle an adversary who +failed to perceive that a member of his family gave of necessity more +than he received. But he had obtained information on his return to Paris +which exalted the uses of humility. Euphemia's fortune, wonderful to +say, was greater than its fame, and in view of such a prize, even a +member of his family could afford to take a snubbing. + +The young man's tact, his deference, his urbane insistence, won a +concession from Mrs. Cleve. The engagement was to be put off and her +daughter was to return home, be brought out and receive the homage she +was entitled to and which might well take a form representing peril to +the suit of this first headlong aspirant. They were to exchange neither +letters nor mementoes nor messages; but if at the end of two years +Euphemia had refused offers enough to attest the permanence of her +attachment he should receive an invitation to address her again. This +decision was promulgated in the presence of the parties interested. The +Count bore himself gallantly, looking at his young friend as if he +expected some tender protestation. But she only looked at him silently +in return, neither weeping nor smiling nor putting out her hand. On this +they separated, and as M. de Mauves walked away he declared to himself +that in spite of the confounded two years he was one of the luckiest of +men--to have a fiancee who to several millions of francs added such +strangely beautiful eyes. + +How many offers Euphemia refused but scantily concerns us--and how the +young man wore his two years away. He found he required pastimes, and as +pastimes were expensive he added heavily to the list of debts to be +cancelled by Euphemia's fortune. Sometimes, in the thick of what he had +once called pleasure with a keener conviction than now, he put to +himself the case of their failing him after all; and then he remembered +that last mute assurance of her pale face and drew a long breath of such +confidence as he felt in nothing else in the world save his own +punctuality in an affair of honour. + +At last, one morning, he took the express to Havre with a letter of Mrs. +Cleve's in his pocket, and ten days later made his bow to mother and +daughter in New York. His stay was brief, and he was apparently unable +to bring himself to view what Euphemia's uncle, Mr. Butterworth, who +gave her away at the altar, called our great experiment of democratic +self-government, in a serious light. He smiled at everything and seemed +to regard the New World as a colossal plaisanterie. It is true that a +perpetual smile was the most natural expression of countenance for a man +about to marry Euphemia Cleve. + + + +III + +Longmore's first visit seemed to open to him so large a range of quiet +pleasure that he very soon paid a second, and at the end of a fortnight +had spent uncounted hours in the little drawing-room which Madame de +Mauves rarely quitted except to drive or walk in the forest. She lived +in an old-fashioned pavilion, between a high-walled court and an +excessively artificial garden, beyond whose enclosure you saw a long +line of tree-tops. Longmore liked the garden and in the mild afternoons +used to move his chair through the open window to the smooth terrace +which overlooked it while his hostess sat just within. Presently she +would come out and wander through the narrow alleys and beside the thin- +spouting fountain, and at last introduce him to a private gate in the +high wall, the opening to a lane which led to the forest. Hitherwards +she more than once strolled with him, bareheaded and meaning to go but +twenty rods, but always going good-naturedly further and often +stretching it to the freedom of a promenade. They found many things to +talk about, and to the pleasure of feeling the hours slip along like +some silver stream Longmore was able to add the satisfaction of +suspecting that he was a "resource" for Madame de Mauves. He had made +her acquaintance with the sense, not wholly inspiring, that she was a +woman with a painful twist in her life and that seeking her acquaintance +would be like visiting at a house where there was an invalid who could +bear no noise. But he very soon recognised that her grievance, if +grievance it was, was not aggressive; that it was not fond of attitudes +and ceremonies, and that her most earnest wish was to remember it as +little as possible. He felt that even if Mrs. Draper hadn't told him she +was unhappy he would have guessed it, and yet that he couldn't have +pointed to his proof. The evidence was chiefly negative--she never +alluded to her husband. Beyond this it seemed to him simply that her +whole being was pitched in a lower key than harmonious Nature had +designed; she was like a powerful singer who had lost her high notes. +She never drooped nor sighed nor looked unutterable things; she dealt no +sarcastic digs at her fate; she had in short none of the conscious +graces of the woman wronged. Only Longmore was sure that her gentle +gaiety was but the milder or sharper flush of a settled ache, and that +she but tried to interest herself in his thoughts in order to escape +from her own. If she had wished to irritate his curiosity and lead him +to take her confidence by storm nothing could have served her purpose +better than this studied discretion. He measured the rare magnanimity of +self-effacement so deliberate, he felt how few women were capable of +exchanging a luxurious woe for a thankless effort. Madame de Mauves, he +himself felt, wasn't sweeping the horizon for a compensation or a +consoler; she had suffered a personal deception that had disgusted her +with persons. She wasn't planning to get the worth of her trouble back +in some other way; for the present she was proposing to live with it +peaceably, reputably and without scandal--turning the key on it +occasionally as you would on a companion liable to attacks of insanity. +Longmore was a man of fine senses and of a speculative spirit, leading- +strings that had never been slipped. He began to regard his hostess as a +figure haunted by a shadow which was somehow her intenser and more +authentic self. This lurking duality in her put on for him an +extraordinary charm. Her delicate beauty acquired to his eye the serious +cast of certain blank-browed Greek statues; and sometimes when his +imagination, more than his ear, detected a vague tremor in the tone in +which she attempted to make a friendly question seem to have behind it +none of the hollow resonance of absent-mindedness, his marvelling eyes +gave her an answer more eloquent, though much less to the point, than +the one she demanded. + +She supplied him indeed with much to wonder about, so that he fitted, in +his ignorance, a dozen high-flown theories to her apparent history. She +had married for love and staked her whole soul on it; of that he was +convinced. She hadn't changed her allegiance to be near Paris and her +base of supplies of millinery; he was sure she had seen her perpetrated +mistake in a light of which her present life, with its conveniences for +shopping and its moral aridity, was the absolute negation. But by what +extraordinary process of the heart--through what mysterious intermission +of that moral instinct which may keep pace with the heart even when this +organ is making unprecedented time--had she fixed her affections on an +insolently frivolous Frenchman? Longmore needed no telling; he knew that +M. de Mauves was both cynical and shallow; these things were stamped on +his eyes, his nose, his mouth, his voice, his gesture, his step. Of +Frenchwomen themselves, when all was said, our young man, full of nursed +discriminations, went in no small fear; they all seemed to belong to the +type of a certain fine lady to whom he had ventured to present a letter +of introduction and whom, directly after his first visit to her, he had +set down in his note-book as "metallic." Why should Madame de Mauves +have chosen a Frenchwoman's lot--she whose nature had an atmospheric +envelope absent even from the brightest metals? He asked her one day +frankly if it had cost her nothing to transplant herself--if she weren't +oppressed with a sense of irreconcileable difference from "all these +people." She replied nothing at first, till he feared she might think it +her duty to resent a question that made light of all her husband's +importances. He almost wished she would; it would seem a proof that her +policy of silence had a limit. "I almost grew up here," she said at +last, "and it was here for me those visions of the future took shape +that we all have when we begin to think or to dream beyond mere +playtime. As matters stand one may be very American and yet arrange it +with one's conscience to live in Europe. My imagination perhaps--I had a +little when I was younger--helped me to think I should find happiness +here. And after all, for a woman, what does it signify? This isn't +America, no--this element, but it's quite as little France. France is +out there beyond the garden, France is in the town and the forest; but +here, close about me, in my room and"--she paused a moment--"in my mind, +it's a nameless, and doubtless not at all remarkable, little country of +my own. It's not her country," she added, "that makes a woman happy or +unhappy." + +Madame Clairin, Euphemia's sister-in-law, might meanwhile have been +supposed to have undertaken the graceful task of making Longmore ashamed +of his uncivil jottings about her sex and nation. Mademoiselle de +Mauves, bringing example to the confirmation of precept, had made a +remunerative match and sacrificed her name to the millions of a +prosperous and aspiring wholesale druggist--a gentleman liberal enough +to regard his fortune as a moderate price for being towed into circles +unpervaded by pharmaceutic odours. His system possibly was sound, but +his own application of it to be deplored. M. Clairin's head was turned +by his good luck. Having secured an aristocratic wife he adopted an +aristocratic vice and began to gamble at the Bourse. In an evil hour he +lost heavily, and then staked heavily to recover himself. But he was to +learn that the law of compensation works with no such pleasing +simplicity, and he rolled to the dark bottom of his folly. There he felt +everything go--his wits, his courage, his probity, everything that had +made him what his fatuous marriage had so promptly unmade. He walked up +the Rue Vivienne with his hands in his empty pockets and stood half an +hour staring confusedly up and down the brave boulevard. People brushed +against him and half a dozen carriages almost ran over him, until at +last a policeman, who had been watching him for some time, took him by +the arm and led him gently away. He looked at the man's cocked hat and +sword with tears in his eyes; he hoped for some practical application of +the wrath of heaven, something that would express violently his dead- +weight of self-abhorrence. The sergent de ville, however, only stationed +him in the embrasure of a door, out of harm's way, and walked off to +supervise a financial contest between an old lady and a cabman. Poor M. +Clairin had only been married a year, but he had had time to measure the +great spirit of true children of the anciens preux. When night had +fallen he repaired to the house of a friend and asked for a night's +lodging; and as his friend, who was simply his old head book-keeper and +lived in a small way, was put to some trouble to accommodate him, "You +must pardon me," the poor man said, "but I can't go home. I'm afraid of +my wife!" Toward morning he blew his brains out. His widow turned the +remnants of his property to better account than could have been expected +and wore the very handsomest mourning. It was for this latter reason +perhaps that she was obliged to retrench at other points and accept a +temporary home under her brother's roof. + +Fortune had played Madame Clairin a terrible trick, but had found an +adversary and not a victim. Though quite without beauty she had always +had what is called the grand air, and her air from this time forth was +grander than ever. As she trailed about in her sable furbelows, tossing +back her well-dressed head and holding up her vigilant long-handled +eyeglass, she seemed to be sweeping the whole field of society and +asking herself where she should pluck her revenge. Suddenly she espied +it, ready made to her hand, in poor Longmore's wealth and amiability. +American dollars and American complaisance had made her brother's +fortune; why shouldn't they make hers? She overestimated the wealth and +misinterpreted the amiability; for she was sure a man could neither be +so contented without being rich nor so "backward" without being weak. +Longmore met her advances with a formal politeness that covered a good +deal of unflattering discomposure. She made him feel deeply +uncomfortable; and though he was at a loss to conceive how he could be +an object of interest to a sharp Parisienne he had an indefinable sense +of being enclosed in a magnetic circle, of having become the victim of +an incantation. If Madame Clairin could have fathomed his Puritanic soul +she would have laid by her wand and her book and dismissed him for an +impossible subject. She gave him a moral chill, and he never named her +to himself save as that dreadful woman--that awful woman. He did justice +to her grand air, but for his pleasure he preferred the small air of +Madame de Mauves; and he never made her his bow, after standing frigidly +passive for five minutes to one of her gracious overtures to intimacy, +without feeling a peculiar desire to ramble away into the forest, fling +himself down on the warm grass and, staring up at the blue sky, forget +that there were any women in nature who didn't please like the swaying +tree-tops. One day, on his arrival at the house, she met him in the +court with the news that her sister-in-law was shut up with a headache +and that his visit must be for HER. He followed her into the drawing- +room with the best grace at his command, and sat twirling his hat for +half an hour. Suddenly he understood her; her caressing cadences were so +almost explicit an invitation to solicit the charming honour of her +hand. He blushed to the roots of his hair and jumped up with +uncontrollable alacrity; then, dropping a glance at Madame Clairin, who +sat watching him with hard eyes over the thin edge of her smile, +perceived on her brow a flash of unforgiving wrath. It was not pleasing +in itself, but his eyes lingered a moment, for it seemed to show off her +character. What he saw in the picture frightened him and he felt himself +murmur "Poor Madame de Mauves!" His departure was abrupt, and this time +he really went into the forest and lay down on the grass. + +After which he admired his young countrywoman more than ever; her +intrinsic clearness shone out to him even through the darker shade cast +over it. At the end of a month he received a letter from a friend with +whom he had arranged a tour through the Low Countries, reminding him of +his promise to keep their tryst at Brussels. It was only after his +answer was posted that he fully measured the zeal with which he had +declared that the journey must either be deferred or abandoned--since he +couldn't possibly leave Saint-Germain. He took a walk in the forest and +asked himself if this were indeed portentously true. Such a truth +somehow made it surely his duty to march straight home and put together +his effects. Poor Webster, who, he knew, had counted ardently on this +excursion, was the best of men; six weeks ago he would have gone through +anything to join poor Webster. It had never been in his books to throw +overboard a friend whom he had loved ten years for a married woman whom +he had six weeks--well, admired. It was certainly beyond question that +he hung on at Saint-Germain because this admirable married woman was +there; but in the midst of so much admiration what had become of his +fine old power to conclude? This was the conduct of a man not judging +but drifting, and he had pretended never to drift. If she were as +unhappy as he believed the active sympathy of such a man would help her +very little more than his indifference; if she were less so she needed +no help and could dispense with his professions. He was sure moreover +that if she knew he was staying on her account she would be extremely +annoyed. This very feeling indeed had much to do with making it hard to +go; her displeasure would be the flush on the snow of the high cold +stoicism that touched him to the heart. At moments withal he assured +himself that staying to watch her--and what else did it come to?--was +simply impertinent; it was gross to keep tugging at the cover of a book +so intentionally closed. Then inclination answered that some day her +self-support would fail, and he had a vision of this exquisite creature +calling vainly for help. He would just be her friend to any length, and +it was unworthy of either to think about consequences. He was a friend, +however, who nursed a brooding regret for his not having known her five +years earlier, as well as a particular objection to those who had +smartly anticipated him. It seemed one of fortune's most mocking strokes +that she should be surrounded by persons whose only merit was that they +threw every side of her, as she turned in her pain, into radiant relief. + +Our young man's growing irritation made it more and more difficult for +him to see any other merit than this in Richard de Mauves. And yet, +disinterestedly, it would have been hard to give a name to the pitiless +perversity lighted by such a conclusion, and there were times when +Longmore was almost persuaded against his finer judgement that he was +really the most considerate of husbands and that it was not a man's +fault if his wife's love of life had pitched itself once for all in the +minor key. The Count's manners were perfect, his discretion +irreproachable, and he seemed never to address his companion but, +sentimentally speaking, hat in hand. His tone to Longmore--as the latter +was perfectly aware--was that of a man of the world to a man not quite +of the world; but what it lacked in true frankness it made up in easy +form. "I can't thank you enough for having overcome my wife's shyness," +he more than once declared. "If we left her to do as she pleased she +would--in her youth and her beauty--bury herself all absurdly alive. +Come often, and bring your good friends and compatriots--some of them +are so amusing. She'll have nothing to do with mine, but perhaps you'll +be able to offer her better son affaire." + +M. de Mauves made these speeches with a bright assurance very amazing to +our hero, who had an innocent belief that a man's head may point out to +him the shortcomings of his heart and make him ashamed of them. He +couldn't fancy him formed both to neglect his wife and to take the +derisive view of her minding it. Longmore had at any rate an exasperated +sense that this nobleman thought rather the less of their interesting +friend on account of that very same fine difference of nature which so +deeply stirred his own sympathies. He was rarely present during the +sessions of the American visitor, and he made a daily journey to Paris, +where he had de gros soucis d'affaires as he once mentioned--with an +all-embracing flourish and not in the least in the tone of apology. When +he appeared it was late in the evening and with an imperturbable air of +being on the best of terms with every one and every thing which was +peculiarly annoying if you happened to have a tacit quarrel with him. If +he was an honest man he was an honest man somehow spoiled for +confidence. Something he had, however, that his critic vaguely envied, +something in his address, splendidly positive, a manner rounded and +polished by the habit of conversation and the friction of full +experience, an urbanity exercised for his own sake, not for his +neighbour's, which seemed the fruit of one of those strong temperaments +that rule the inward scene better than the best conscience. The Count +had plainly no sense for morals, and poor Longmore, who had the finest, +would have been glad to borrow his recipe for appearing then so to range +the whole scale of the senses. What was it that enabled him, short of +being a monster with visibly cloven feet and exhaling brimstone, to +misprize so cruelly a nature like his wife's and to walk about the world +with such a handsome invincible grin? It was the essential grossness of +his imagination, which had nevertheless helped him to such a store of +neat speeches. He could be highly polite and could doubtless be damnably +impertinent, but the life of the spirit was a world as closed to him as +the world of great music to a man without an ear. It was ten to one he +didn't in the least understand how his wife felt; he and his smooth +sister had doubtless agreed to regard their relative as a Puritanical +little person, of meagre aspirations and few talents, content with +looking at Paris from the terrace and, as a special treat, having a +countryman very much like herself to regale her with innocent echoes of +their native wit. M. de Mauves was tired of his companion; he liked +women who could, frankly, amuse him better. She was too dim, too +delicate, too modest; she had too few arts, too little coquetry, too +much charity. Lighting a cigar some day while he summed up his +situation, her husband had probably decided she was incurably stupid. It +was the same taste, in essence, our young man moralised, as the taste +for M. Gerome and M. Baudry in painting and for M. Gustave Flaubert and +M. Charles Baudelaire in literature. The Count was a pagan and his wife +a Christian, and between them an impassable gulf. He was by race and +instinct a grand seigneur. Longmore had often heard of that historic +type, and was properly grateful for an opportunity to examine it +closely. It had its elegance of outline, but depended on spiritual +sources so remote from those of which he felt the living gush in his own +soul that he found himself gazing at it, in irreconcileable antipathy, +through a dim historic mist. "I'm a modern bourgeois," he said, "and not +perhaps so good a judge of how far a pretty woman's tongue may go at +supper before the mirrors properly crack to hear. But I've not met one +of the rarest of women without recognising her, without making my +reflexion that, charm for charm, such a maniere d'etre is more +'fetching' even than the worst of Theresa's songs sung by a dissipated +duchess. Wit for wit, I think mine carries me further." It was easy +indeed to perceive that, as became a grand seigneur, M. de Mauves had a +stock of social principles. He wouldn't especially have desired perhaps +that his wife should compete in amateur operettas with the duchesses in +question, for the most part of comparatively recent origin; but he held +that a gentleman may take his amusement where he finds it, that he is +quite at liberty not to find it at home, and that even an adoptive +daughter of his house who should hang her head and have red eyes and +allow herself to make any other response to officious condolence than +that her husband's amusements were his own affair, would have forfeited +every claim to having her finger-tips bowed over and kissed. And yet in +spite of this definite faith Longmore figured him much inconvenienced by +the Countess's avoidance of betrayals. Did it dimly occur to him that +the principle of this reserve was self-control and not self-effacement? +She was a model to all the inferior matrons of his line, past and to +come, and an occasional "scene" from her at a manageable hour would have +had something reassuring--would have attested her stupidity rather +better than this mere polish of her patience. + +Longmore would have given much to be able to guess how this latter +secret worked, and he tried more than once, though timidly and awkwardly +enough, to make out the game she was playing. She struck him as having +long resisted the force of cruel evidence, and, as though succumbing to +it at last, having denied herself on simple grounds of generosity the +right to complain. Her faith might have perished, but the sense of her +own old deep perversity remained. He believed her thus quite capable of +reproaching herself with having expected too much and of trying to +persuade herself out of her bitterness by saying that her hopes had been +vanities and follies and that what was before her was simply Life. "I +hate tragedy," she once said to him; "I'm a dreadful coward about having +to suffer or to bleed. I've always tried to believe that--without base +concessions--such extremities may always somehow be dodged or +indefinitely postponed. I should be willing to buy myself off, from +having ever to be OVERWHELMED, by giving up--well, any amusement you +like." She lived evidently in nervous apprehension of being fatally +convinced--of seeing to the end of her deception. Longmore, when he +thought of this, felt the force of his desire to offer her something of +which she could be as sure as of the sun in heaven. + + + +IV + +His friend Webster meanwhile lost no time in accusing him of the basest +infidelity and in asking him what he found at suburban Saint-Germain to +prefer to Van Eyck and Memling, Rubens and Rembrandt. A day or two after +the receipt of this friend's letter he took a walk with Madame de Mauves +in the forest. They sat down on a fallen log and she began to arrange +into a bouquet the anemones and violets she had gathered. "I've a word +here," he said at last, "from a friend whom I some time ago promised to +join in Brussels. The time has come--it has passed. It finds me terribly +unwilling to leave Saint-Germain." + +She looked up with the immediate interest she always showed in his +affairs, but with no hint of a disposition to make a personal +application of his words. "Saint-Germain is pleasant enough, but are you +doing yourself justice? Shan't you regret in future days that instead of +travelling and seeing cities and monuments and museums and improving +your mind you simply sat here--for instance--on a log and pulled my +flowers to pieces?" + +"What I shall regret in future days," he answered after some hesitation, +"is that I should have sat here--sat here so much--and never have shown +what's the matter with me. I'm fond of museums and monuments and of +improving my mind, and I'm particularly fond of my friend Webster. But I +can't bring myself to leave Saint-Germain without asking you a question. +You must forgive me if it's indiscreet and be assured that curiosity was +never more respectful. Are you really as unhappy as I imagine you to +be?" + +She had evidently not expected his appeal, and, making her change +colour, it took her unprepared. "If I strike you as unhappy," she none +the less simply said, "I've been a poorer friend to you than I wished to +be." + +"I, perhaps, have been a better friend of yours than you've supposed," +he returned. "I've admired your reserve, your courage, your studied +gaiety. But I've felt the existence of something beneath them that was +more YOU--more you as I wished to know you--than they were; some +trouble in you that I've permitted myself to hate and resent." + +She listened all gravely, but without an air of offence, and he felt +that while he had been timorously calculating the last consequences of +friendship she had quietly enough accepted them. "You surprise me," she +said slowly, and her flush still lingered. "But to refuse to answer you +would confirm some impression in you even now much too strong. Any +'trouble'--if you mean any unhappiness--that one can sit comfortably +talking about is an unhappiness with distinct limitations. If I were +examined before a board of commissioners for testing the felicity of +mankind I'm sure I should be pronounced a very fortunate woman." There +was something that deeply touched him in her tone, and this quality +pierced further as she continued. "But let me add, with all gratitude +for your sympathy, that it's my own affair altogether. It needn't +disturb you, my dear sir," she wound up with a certain quaintness of +gaiety, "for I've often found myself in your company contented enough +and diverted enough." + +"Well, you're a wonderful woman," the young man declared, "and I admire +you as I've never admired any one. You're wiser than anything I, for +one, can say to you; and what I ask of you is not to let me advise or +console you, but simply thank you for letting me know you." He had +intended no such outburst as this, but his voice rang loud and he felt +an unfamiliar joy as he uttered it. + +She shook her head with some impatience. "Let us be friends--as I +supposed we were going to be--without protestations and fine words. To +have you paying compliments to my wisdom--that would be real +wretchedness. I can dispense with your admiration better than the +Flemish painters can--better than Van Eyck and Rubens, in spite of all +their worshippers. Go join your friend--see everything, enjoy +everything, learn everything, and write me an excellent letter, brimming +over with your impressions. I'm extremely fond of the Dutch painters," +she added with the faintest quaver in the world, an impressible break of +voice that Longmore had noticed once or twice before and had interpreted +as the sudden weariness, the controlled convulsion, of a spirit self- +condemned to play a part. + +"I don't believe you care a button for the Dutch painters," he said with +a laugh. "But I shall certainly write you a letter." + +She rose and turned homeward, thoughtfully rearranging her flowers as +she walked. Little was said; Longmore was asking himself with an +agitation of his own in the unspoken words whether all this meant simply +that he was in love. He looked at the rooks wheeling against the golden- +hued sky, between the tree-tops, but not at his companion, whose +personal presence seemed lost in the felicity she had created. Madame de +Mauves was silent and grave--she felt she had almost grossly failed and +she was proportionately disappointed. An emotional friendship she had +not desired; her scheme had been to pass with her visitor as a placid +creature with a good deal of leisure which she was disposed to devote to +profitable conversation of an impersonal sort. She liked him extremely, +she felt in him the living force of something to which, when she made up +her girlish mind that a needy nobleman was the ripest fruit of time, she +had done too scant justice. They went through the little gate in the +garden-wall and approached the house. On the terrace Madame Clairin was +entertaining a friend--a little elderly gentleman with a white moustache +and an order in his buttonhole. Madame de Mauves chose to pass round the +house into the court; whereupon her sister-in-law, greeting Longmore +with an authoritative nod, lifted her eye-glass and stared at them as +they went by. Longmore heard the little old gentleman uttering some old- +fashioned epigram about "la vieille galanterie francaise"--then by a +sudden impulse he looked at Madame de Mauves and wondered what she was +doing in such a world. She stopped before the house, not asking him to +come in. "I hope you will act on my advice and waste no more time at +Saint-Germain." + +For an instant there rose to his lips some faded compliment about his +time not being wasted, but it expired before the simple sincerity of her +look. She stood there as gently serious as the angel of +disinterestedness, and it seemed to him he should insult her by treating +her words as a bait for flattery. "I shall start in a day or two," he +answered, "but I won't promise you not to come back." + +"I hope not," she said simply. "I expect to be here a long time." + +"I shall come and say good-bye," he returned--which she appeared to +accept with a smile as she went in. + +He stood a moment, then walked slowly homeward by the terrace. It seemed +to him that to leave her thus, for a gain on which she herself insisted, +was to know her better and admire her more. But he was aware of a vague +ferment of feeling which her evasion of his question half an hour before +had done more to deepen than to allay. In the midst of it suddenly, on +the great terrace of the Chateau, he encountered M. de Mauves, planted +there against the parapet and finishing a cigar. The Count, who, he +thought he made out, had an air of peculiar affability, offered him his +white plump hand. Longmore stopped; he felt a sharp, a sore desire to +cry out to him that he had the most precious wife in the world, that he +ought to be ashamed of himself not to know it, and that for all his +grand assurance he had never looked down into the depths of her eyes. +Richard de Mauves, we have seen, considered he had; but there was +doubtless now something in this young woman's eyes that had not been +there five years before. The two men conversed formally enough, and M. +de Mauves threw off a light bright remark or two about his visit to +America. His tone was not soothing to Longmore's excited sensibilities. +He seemed to have found the country a gigantic joke, and his blandness +went but so far as to allow that jokes on that scale are indeed +inexhaustible. Longmore was not by habit an aggressive apologist for the +seat of his origin, but the Count's easy diagnosis confirmed his worst +estimate of French superficiality. He had understood nothing, felt +nothing, learned nothing, and his critic, glancing askance at his +aristocratic profile, declared that if the chief merit of a long +pedigree was to leave one so fatuously stupid he thanked goodness the +Longmores had emerged from obscurity in the present century and in the +person of an enterprising timber-merchant. M. de Mauves dwelt of course +on that prime oddity of the American order--the liberty allowed the +fairer half of the unmarried young, and confessed to some personal study +of the "occasions" it offered to the speculative visitor; a line of +research in which, during a fortnight's stay, he had clearly spent his +most agreeable hours. "I'm bound to admit," he said, "that in every case +I was disarmed by the extreme candour of the young lady, and that they +took care of themselves to better purpose than I have seen some mammas +in France take care of them." Longmore greeted this handsome concession +with the grimmest of smiles and damned his impertinent patronage. + +Mentioning, however, at last that he was about to leave Saint-Germain, +he was surprised, without exactly being flattered, by his interlocutor's +quickened attention. "I'm so very sorry; I hoped we had you for the +whole summer." Longmore murmured something civil and wondered why M. de +Mauves should care whether he stayed or went. "You've been a real +resource to Madame de Mauves," the Count added; "I assure you I've +mentally blessed your visits." + +"They were a great pleasure to me," Longmore said gravely. "Some day I +expect to come back." + +"Pray do"--and the Count made a great and friendly point of it. "You see +the confidence I have in you." Longmore said nothing and M. de Mauves +puffed his cigar reflectively and watched the smoke. "Madame de Mauves," +he said at last, "is a rather singular person." And then while our young +man shifted his position and wondered whether he was going to "explain" +Madame de Mauves, "Being, as you are, her fellow countryman," this +lady's husband pursued, "I don't mind speaking frankly. She's a little +overstrained; the most charming woman in the world, as you see, but a +little volontaire and morbid. Now you see she has taken this +extraordinary fancy for solitude. I can't get her to go anywhere, to see +any one. When my friends present themselves she's perfectly polite, but +it cures them of coming again. She doesn't do herself justice, and I +expect every day to hear two or three of them say to me, 'Your wife's +jolie a croquer: what a pity she hasn't a little esprit.' You must have +found out that she has really a great deal. But, to tell the whole +truth, what she needs is to forget herself. She sits alone for hours +poring over her English books and looking at life through that terrible +brown fog they seem to me--don't they?--to fling over the world. I doubt +if your English authors," the Count went on with a serenity which +Longmore afterwards characterised as sublime, "are very sound reading +for young married women. I don't pretend to know much about them; but I +remember that not long after our marriage Madame de Mauves undertook to +read me one day some passages from a certain Wordsworth--a poet highly +esteemed, it appears, chez vous. It was as if she had taken me by the +nape of the neck and held my head for half an hour over a basin of soupe +aux choux: I felt as if we ought to ventilate the drawing-room before +any one called. But I suppose you know him--ce genie-la. Every nation +has its own ideals of every kind, but when I remember some of OUR +charming writers! I think at all events my wife never forgave me and +that it was a real shock to her to find she had married a man who had +very much the same taste in literature as in cookery. But you're a man +of general culture, a man of the world," said M. de Mauves, turning to +Longmore but looking hard at the seal of his watchguard. "You can talk +about everything, and I'm sure you like Alfred de Musset as well as +Monsieur Wordsworth. Talk to her about everything you can, Alfred de +Musset included. Bah! I forgot you're going. Come back then as soon as +possible and report on your travels. If my wife too would make a little +voyage it would do her great good. It would enlarge her horizon"--and M. +de Mauves made a series of short nervous jerks with his stick in the +air--"it would wake up her imagination. She's too much of one piece, you +know--it would show her how much one may bend without breaking." He +paused a moment and gave two or three vigorous puffs. Then turning to +his companion again with eyebrows expressively raised: "I hope you +admire my candour. I beg you to believe I wouldn't say such things to +one of US!" + +Evening was at hand and the lingering light seemed to charge the air +with faintly golden motes. Longmore stood gazing at these luminous +particles; he could almost have fancied them a swarm of humming insects, +the chorus of a refrain: "She has a great deal of esprit--she has a +great deal of esprit." "Yes,--she has a great deal," he said +mechanically, turning to the Count. M. de Mauves glanced at him sharply, +as if to ask what the deuce he was talking about. "She has a great deal +of intelligence," said Longmore quietly, "a great deal of beauty, a +great many virtues." + +M. de Mauves busied himself for a moment in lighting another cigar, and +when he had finished, with a return of his confidential smile, "I +suspect you of thinking that I don't do my wife justice." he made +answer. "Take care--take care, young man; that's a dangerous assumption. +In general a man always does his wife justice. More than justice," the +Count laughed--"that we keep for the wives of other men!" + +Longmore afterwards remembered in favour of his friend's fine manner +that he had not measured at this moment the dusky abyss over which it +hovered. Hut a deepening subterranean echo, loudest at the last, +lingered on his spiritual ear. For the present his keenest sensation was +a desire to get away and cry aloud that M. de Mauves was no better than +a pompous dunce. He bade him an abrupt good-night, which was to serve +also, he said, as good-bye. + +"Decidedly then you go?" It was spoken almost with the note of +irritation. + +"Decidedly." + +"But of course you'll come and take leave--?" His manner implied that +the omission would be uncivil, but there seemed to Longmore himself +something so ludicrous in his taking a lesson in consideration from M. +de Mauves that he put the appeal by with a laugh. The Count frowned as +if it were a new and unpleasant sensation for him to be left at a loss. +"Ah you people have your facons!" he murmured as Longmore turned away, +not foreseeing that he should learn still more about his facons before +he had done with him. + +Longmore sat down to dinner at his hotel with his usual good intentions, +but in the act of lifting his first glass of wine to his lips he +suddenly fell to musing and set down the liquor untasted. This mood +lasted long, and when he emerged from it his fish was cold; but that +mattered little, for his appetite was gone. That evening he packed his +trunk with an indignant energy. This was so effective that the operation +was accomplished before bedtime, and as he was not in the least sleepy +he devoted the interval to writing two letters, one of them a short note +to Madame de Mauves, which he entrusted to a servant for delivery the +next morning. He had found it best, he said, to leave Saint-Germain +immediately, but he expected to return to Paris early in the autumn. The +other letter was the result of his having remembered a day or two before +that he had not yet complied with Mrs. Draper's injunction to give her +an account of his impression of her friend. The present occasion seemed +propitious, and he wrote half a dozen pages. His tone, however, was +grave, and Mrs. Draper, on reading him over, was slightly disappointed-- +she would have preferred he should have "raved" a little more. But what +chiefly concerns us is the concluding passage. + +"The only time she ever spoke to me of her marriage," he wrote, "she +intimated that it had been a perfect love-match. With all abatements, I +suppose, this is what most marriages take themselves to be; but it would +mean in her case, I think, more than in that of most women, for her love +was an absolute idealisation. She believed her husband to be a hero of +rose-coloured romance, and he turns out to be not even a hero of very +sad-coloured reality. For some time now she has been sounding her +mistake, but I don't believe she has yet touched the bottom. She strikes +me as a person who's begging off from full knowledge--who has patched up +a peace with some painful truth and is trying a while the experiment of +living with closed eyes. In the dark she tries to see again the gilding +on her idol. Illusion of course is illusion, and one must always pay for +it; but there's something truly tragical in seeing an earthly penalty +levied on such divine folly as this. As for M. de Mauves he's a shallow +Frenchman to his fingers' ends, and I confess I should dislike him for +this if he were a much better man. He can't forgive his wife for having +married him too extravagantly and loved him too well; since he feels, I +suppose, in some uncorrupted corner of his being that as she originally +saw him so he ought to have been. It disagrees with him somewhere that a +little American bourgeoise should have fancied him a finer fellow than +he is or than he at all wants to be. He hasn't a glimmering of real +acquaintance with his wife; he can't understand the stream of passion +flowing so clear and still. To tell the truth I hardly understand it +myself, but when I see the sight I find I greatly admire it. The Count +at any rate would have enjoyed the comfort of believing his wife as bad +a case as himself, and you'll hardly believe me when I assure you he +goes about intimating to gentlemen whom he thinks it may concern that it +would be a convenience to him they should make love to Madame de +Mauves." + + + +V + +On reaching Paris Longmore straightaway purchased a Murray's "Belgium" +to help himself to believe that he would start on the morrow for +Brussels; but when the morrow came it occurred to him that he ought by +way of preparation to acquaint himself more intimately with the Flemish +painters in the Louvre. This took a whole morning, but it did little to +hasten his departure. He had abruptly left Saint-Germain because it +seemed to him that respect for Madame de Mauves required he should +bequeath her husband no reason to suppose he had, as it were, taken a +low hint; but now that he had deferred to that scruple he found himself +thinking more and more ardently of his friend. It was a poor expression +of ardour to be lingering irresolutely on the forsaken boulevard, but he +detested the idea of leaving Saint-Germain five hundred miles behind +him. He felt very foolish, nevertheless, and wandered about nervously, +promising himself to take the next train. A dozen trains started, +however, and he was still in Paris. This inward ache was more than he +had bargained for, and as he looked at the shop-windows he wondered if +it represented a "passion." He had never been fond of the word and had +grown up with much mistrust of what it stood for. He had hoped that when +he should fall "really" in love he should do it with an excellent +conscience, with plenty of confidence and joy, doubtless, but no strange +soreness, no pangs nor regrets. Here was a sentiment concocted of pity +and anger as well as of admiration, and bristling with scruples and +doubts and fears. He had come abroad to enjoy the Flemish painters and +all others, but what fair-tressed saint of Van Eyck or Memling was so +interesting a figure as the lonely lady of Saint-Germain? His restless +steps carried him at last out of the long villa-bordered avenue which +leads to the Bois de Boulogne. + +Summer had fairly begun and the drive beside the lake was empty, but +there were various loungers on the benches and chairs, and the great +cafe had an air of animation. Longmore's walk had given him an appetite, +and he went into the establishment and demanded a dinner, remarking for +the hundredth time, as he admired the smart little tables disposed in +the open air, how much better (than anywhere else) they ordered this +matter in France. "Will monsieur dine in the garden or in the salon?" +the waiter blandly asked. Longmore chose the garden and, observing that +a great cluster of June roses was trained over the wall of the house, +placed himself at a table near by, where the best of dinners was served +him on the whitest of linen and in the most shining of porcelain. It so +happened that his table was near a window and that as he sat he could +look into a corner of the salon. So it was that his attention rested on +a lady seated just within the window, which was open, face to face +apparently with a companion who was concealed by the curtain. She was a +very pretty woman, and Longmore looked at her as often as was consistent +with good manners. After a while he even began to wonder who she was and +finally to suspect that she was one of those ladies whom it is no breach +of good manners to look at as often as you like. Our young man too, if +he had been so disposed, would have been the more free to give her all +his attention that her own was fixed upon the person facing her. She was +what the French call a belle brune, and though Longmore, who had rather +a conservative taste in such matters, was but half-charmed by her bold +outlines and even braver complexion, he couldn't help admiring her +expression of basking contentment. + +She was evidently very happy, and her happiness gave her an air of +innocence. The talk of her friend, whoever he was, abundantly suited her +humour, for she sat listening to him with a broad idle smile and +interrupting him fitfully, while she crunched her bonbons, with a +murmured response, presumably as broad, which appeared to have the +effect of launching him again. She drank a great deal of champagne and +ate an immense number of strawberries, and was plainly altogether a +person with an impartial relish for strawberries, champagne and what she +doubtless would have called betises. + +They had half-finished dinner when Longmore sat down, and he was still +in his place when they rose. She had hung her bonnet on a nail above her +chair, and her companion passed round the table to take it down for her. +As he did so she bent her head to look at a wine-stain on her dress, and +in the movement exposed the greater part of the back of a very handsome +neck. The gentleman observed it, and observed also, apparently, that the +room beyond them was empty; that he stood within eyeshot of Longmore he +failed to observe. He stooped suddenly and imprinted a gallant kiss on +the fair expanse. In the author of this tribute Longmore then recognised +Richard de Mauves. The lady to whom it had been rendered put on her +bonnet, using his flushed smile as a mirror, and in a moment they passed +through the garden on their way to their carriage. Then for the first +time M. de Mauves became aware of his wife's young friend. He measured +with a rapid glance this spectator's relation to the open window and +checked himself in the impulse to stop and speak to him. He contented +himself with bowing all imperturbably as he opened the gate for his +companion. + +That evening Longmore made a railway journey, but not to Brussels. He +had effectually ceased to care for Brussels; all he cared for in the +world now was Madame de Mauves. The air of his mind had had a sudden +clearing-up; pity and anger were still throbbing there, but they had +space to range at their pleasure, for doubts and scruples had abruptly +departed. It was little, he felt, that he could interpose between her +resignation and the indignity of her position; but that little, if it +involved the sacrifice of everything that bound him to the tranquil +past, he could offer her with a rapture which at last made stiff +resistance a terribly inferior substitute for faith. Nothing in his +tranquil past had given such a zest to consciousness as this happy sense +of choosing to go straight back to Saint-Germain. How to justify his +return, how to explain his ardour, troubled him little. He wasn't even +sure he wished to be understood; he wished only to show how little by +any fault of his Madame de Mauves was alone so with the harshness of +fate. He was conscious of no distinct desire to "make love" to her; if +he could have uttered the essence of his longing he would have said that +he wished her to remember that in a world coloured grey to her vision by +the sense of her mistake there was one vividly honest man. She might +certainly have remembered it, however, without his coming back to remind +her; and it is not to be denied that as he waited for the morrow he +longed immensely for the sound of her voice. + +He waited the next day till his usual hour of calling--the late +afternoon; but he learned at the door that the mistress of the house was +not at home. The servant offered the information that she was walking a +little way in the forest. Longmore went through the garden and out of +the small door into the lane, and, after half an hour's vain +exploration, saw her coming toward him at the end of a green by-path. As +he appeared she stopped a moment, as if to turn aside; then recognising +him she slowly advanced and had presently taken the hand he held out. + +"Nothing has happened," she said with her beautiful eyes on him. "You're +not ill?" + +"Nothing except that when I got to Paris I found how fond I had grown of +Saint-Germain." + +She neither smiled nor looked flattered; it seemed indeed to Longmore +that she took his reappearance with no pleasure. But he was uncertain, +for he immediately noted that in his absence the whole character of her +face had changed. It showed him something momentous had happened. It was +no longer self-contained melancholy that he read in her eyes, but grief +and agitation which had lately struggled with the passionate love of +peace ruling her before all things else, and forced her to know that +deep experience is never peaceful. She was pale and had evidently been +shedding tears. He felt his heart beat hard--he seemed now to touch her +secret. She continued to look at him with a clouded brow, as if his +return had surrounded her with complications too great to be disguised +by a colourless welcome. For some moments, as he turned and walked +beside her, neither spoke; then abruptly, "Tell me truly, Mr. Longmore," +she said, "why you've come back." He inclined himself to her, almost +pulling up again, with an air that startled her into a certainty of what +she had feared. "Because I've learned the real answer to the question I +asked you the other day. You're not happy--you're too good to be happy +on the terms offered you. Madame de Mauves," he went on with a gesture +which protested against a gesture of her own, "I can't be happy, you +know, when you're as little so as I make you out. I don't care for +anything so long as I only feel helpless and sore about you. I found +during those dreary days in Paris that the thing in life I most care for +is this daily privilege of seeing you. I know it's very brutal to tell +you I admire you; it's an insult to you to treat you as if you had +complained to me or appealed to me. But such a friendship as I waked up +to there"--and he tossed his head toward the distant city--"is a potent +force, I assure you. When forces are stupidly stifled they explode. +However," he went on, "if you had told me every trouble in your heart it +would have mattered little; I couldn't say more than I--that if that in +life from which you've hoped most has given you least, this devoted +respect of mine will refuse no service and betray no trust." + +She had begun to make marks in the earth with the point of her parasol, +but she stopped and listened to him in perfect immobility--immobility +save for the appearance by the time he had stopped speaking of a flush +in her guarded clearness. Such as it was it told Longmore she was moved, +and his first perceiving it was the happiest moment of his life. She +raised her eyes at last, and they uttered a plea for non-insistence that +unspeakably touched him. + +"Thank you--thank you!" she said calmly enough; but the next moment her +own emotion baffled this pretence, a convulsion shook her for ten +seconds and she burst into tears. Her tears vanished as quickly as they +came, but they did Longmore a world of good. He had always felt +indefinably afraid of her; her being had somehow seemed fed by a deeper +faith and a stronger will than his own; but her half-dozen smothered +sobs showed him the bottom of her heart and convinced him she was weak +enough to be grateful. "Excuse me," she said; "I'm too nervous to listen +to you. I believe I could have dealt with an enemy to-day, but I can't +bear up under a friend." + +"You're killing yourself with stoicism--that's what is the matter with +you!" he cried. "Listen to a friend for his own sake if not for yours. +I've never presumed to offer you an atom of compassion, and you can't +accuse yourself of an abuse of charity." + +She looked about her as under the constraint of this appeal, but it +promised him a reluctant attention. Noting, however, by the wayside the +fallen log on which they had rested a few evenings before, she went and +sat down on it with a resigned grace while the young man, silent before +her and watching her, took from her the mute assurance that if she was +charitable now he must at least be very wise. + +"Something came to my knowledge yesterday," he said as he sat down +beside her, "which gave me an intense impression of your loneliness. +You're truth itself, and there's no truth about you. You believe in +purity and duty and dignity, and you live in a world in which they're +daily belied. I ask myself with vain rage how you ever came into such a +world, and why the perversity of fate never let me know you before." + +She waited a little; she looked down, straight before her. "I like my +'world' no better than you do, and it was not for its own sake I came +into it. But what particular group of people is worth pinning one's +faith upon? I confess it sometimes seems to me men and women are very +poor creatures. I suppose I'm too romantic and always was. I've an +unfortunate taste for poetic fitness. Life's hard prose, and one must +learn to read prose contentedly. I believe I once supposed all the prose +to be in America, which was very foolish. What I thought, what I +believed, what I expected, when I was an ignorant girl fatally addicted +to falling in love with my own theories, is more than I can begin to +tell you now. Sometimes when I remember certain impulses, certain +illusions of those days they take away my breath, and I wonder that my +false point of view hasn't led me into troubles greater than any I've +now to lament. I had a conviction which you'd probably smile at if I +were to attempt to express it to you. It was a singular form for +passionate faith to take, but it had all of the sweetness and the ardour +of passionate faith. It led me to take a great step, and it lies behind +me now, far off, a vague deceptive form melting in the light of +experience. It has faded, but it hasn't vanished. Some feelings, I'm +sure, die only with ourselves; some illusions are as much the condition +of our life as our heart-beats. They say that life itself is an +illusion--that this world is a shadow of which the reality is yet to +come. Life is all of a piece then and there's no shame in being +miserably human. As for my loneliness, it doesn't greatly matter; it is +the fault in part of my obstinacy. There have been times when I've been +frantically distressed and, to tell you the truth, wretchedly homesick, +because my maid--a jewel of a maid--lied to me with every second breath. +There have been moments when I've wished I was the daughter of a poor +New England minister--living in a little white house under a couple of +elms and doing all the housework." + +She had begun to speak slowly, with reserve and effort; but she went on +quickly and as if talk were at last a relief. "My marriage introduced me +to people and things which seemed to me at first very strange and then +very horrible, and then, to tell the truth, of very little importance. +At first I expended a great deal of sorrow and dismay and pity on it +all; but there soon came a time when I began to wonder if it were worth +one's tears. If I could tell you the eternal friendships I've seen +broken, the inconsolable woes consoled, the jealousies and vanities +scrambling to outdo each other, you'd agree with me that tempers like +yours and mine can understand neither such troubles nor such +compensations. A year ago, while I was in the country, a friend of mine +was in despair at the infidelity of her husband; she wrote me a most +dolorous letter, and on my return to Paris I went immediately to see +her. A week had elapsed, and as I had seen stranger things I thought she +might have recovered her spirits. Not at all; she was still in despair-- +but at what? At the conduct, the abandoned, shameless conduct of--well +of a lady I'll call Madame de T. You'll imagine of course that Madame de +T. was the lady whom my friend's husband preferred to his wife. Far from +it; he had never seen her. Who then was Madame de T.? Madame de T. was +cruelly devoted to M. de V. And who was M. de V.? M. de V. was--well, in +two words again, my friend was cultivating two jealousies at once. I +hardly know what I said to her; something at any rate that she found +unpardonable, for she quite gave me up. Shortly afterwards my husband +proposed we should cease to live in Paris, and I gladly assented, for I +believe I had taken a turn of spirits that made me a detestable +companion. I should have preferred to go quite into the country, into +Auvergne, where my husband has a house. But to him Paris in some degree +is necessary, and Saint-Germain has been a conscious compromise." + +"A conscious compromise!" Longmore expressively repeated. "That's your +whole life." + +"It's the life of many people," she made prompt answer--"of most people +of quiet tastes, and it's certainly better than acute distress. One's at +a loss theoretically to defend compromises; but if I found a poor +creature who had managed to arrive at one I should think myself not +urgently called to expose its weak side." But she had no sooner uttered +these words than she laughed all amicably, as if to mitigate their too +personal application. + +"Heaven forbid one should do that unless one has something better to +offer," Longmore returned. "And yet I'm haunted by the dream of a life +in which you should have found no compromises, for they're a perversion +of natures that tend only to goodness and rectitude. As I see it you +should have found happiness serene, profound, complete; a femme de +chambre not a jewel perhaps, but warranted to tell but one fib a day; a +society possibly rather provincial, but--in spite of your poor opinion +of mankind--a good deal of solid virtue; jealousies and vanities very +tame, and no particular iniquities and adulteries. A husband," he added +after a moment--"a husband of your own faith and race and spiritual +substance, who would have loved you well." + +She rose to her feet, shaking her head. "You're very kind to go to the +expense of such dazzling visions for me. Visions are vain things; we +must make the best of the reality we happen to be in for." + +"And yet," said Longmore, provoked by what seemed the very wantonness of +her patience, "the reality YOU 'happen to be in for' has, if I'm not in +error, very recently taken a shape that keenly tests your philosophy." + +She seemed on the point of replying that his sympathy was too zealous; +but a couple of impatient tears in his eyes proved it founded on a +devotion of which she mightn't make light. "Ah philosophy?" she echoed. +"I HAVE none. Thank heaven," she cried with vehemence, "I have none! I +believe, Mr. Longmore," she added in a moment, "that I've nothing on +earth but a conscience--it's a good time to tell you so--nothing but a +dogged obstinate clinging conscience. Does that prove me to be indeed of +your faith and race, and have you one yourself for which you can say as +much? I don't speak in vanity, for I believe that if my conscience may +prevent me from doing anything very base it will effectually prevent me +also from doing anything very fine." + +"I'm delighted to hear it," her friend returned with high emphasis-- +"that proves we're made for each other. It's very certain I too shall +never cut a great romantic figure. And yet I've fancied that in my case +the unaccommodating organ we speak of might be blinded and gagged a +while, in a really good cause, if not turned out of doors. In yours," he +went on with the same appealing irony, "is it absolutely beyond being +'squared'?" + +But she made no concession to his tone. "Don't laugh at your +conscience," she answered gravely; "that's the only blasphemy I know." + +She had hardly spoken when she turned suddenly at an unexpected sound, +and at the same moment he heard a footstep in an adjacent by-path which +crossed their own at a short distance from where they stood. + +"It's M. de Mauves," she said at once; with which she moved slowly +forward. Longmore, wondering how she knew without seeing, had overtaken +her by the time her husband came into view. A solitary walk in the +forest was a pastime to which M. de Mauves was not addicted, but he +seemed on this occasion to have resorted to it with some equanimity. He +was smoking a fragrant cigar and had thrust his thumb into the armhole +of his waistcoat with the air of a man thinking at his ease. He stopped +short with surprise on seeing his wife and her companion, and his +surprise had for Longmore even the pitch of impertinence. He glanced +rapidly from one to the other, fixed the young man's own look sharply a +single instant and then lifted his hat with formal politeness. + +"I was not aware," he said, turning to Madame de Mauves, "that I might +congratulate you on the return of monsieur." + +"You should at once have known it," she immediately answered, "if I had +expected such a pleasure." + +She had turned very pale, and Longmore felt this to be a first meeting +after some commotion. "My return was unexpected to myself," he said to +her husband. "I came back last night." + +M. de Mauves seemed to express such satisfaction as could consort with a +limited interest. "It's needless for me to make you welcome. Madame de +Mauves knows the duties of hospitality." And with another bow he +continued his walk. + +She pursued her homeward course with her friend, neither of them +pretending much not to consent to appear silent. The Count's few moments +with them had both chilled Longmore and angered him, casting a shadow +across a prospect which had somehow, just before, begun to open and +almost to brighten. He watched his companion narrowly as they went, and +wondered what she had last had to suffer. Her husband's presence had +checked her disposition to talk, though nothing betrayed she had +recognised his making a point at her expense. Yet if matters were none +the less plainly at a crisis between them he could but wonder vainly +what it was on her part that prevented some practical protest or some +rupture. What did she suspect?--how much did she know? To what was she +resigned?--how much had she forgiven? How, above all, did she reconcile +with knowledge, or with suspicion, that intense consideration she had +just now all but assured him she entertained? "She has loved him once," +Longmore said with a sinking of the heart, "and with her to love once is +to commit herself for ever. Her clever husband thinks her too prim. What +would a stupid poet call it?" He relapsed with aching impotence into the +sense of her being somehow beyond him, unattainable, immeasurable by his +own fretful logic. Suddenly he gave three passionate switches in the air +with his cane which made Madame de Mauves look round. She could hardly +have guessed their signifying that where ambition was so vain the next +best thing to it was the very ardour of hopelessness. + +She found in her drawing-room the little elderly Frenchman, M. de +Chalumeau, whom Longmore had observed a few days before on the terrace. +On this occasion too Madame Clairin was entertaining him, but as her +sister-in-law came in she surrendered her post and addressed herself to +our hero. Longmore, at thirty, was still an ingenuous youth, and there +was something in this lady's large assured attack that fairly +intimidated him. He was doubtless not as reassured as he ought to have +been at finding he had not absolutely forfeited her favour by his want +of resource during their last interview, and a suspicion of her being +prepared to approach him on another line completed his distress. + +"So you've returned from Brussels by way of the forest?" she archly +asked. + +"I've not been to Brussels. I returned yesterday from Paris by the only +way--by the train." + +Madame Clairin was infinitely struck. "I've never known a person at all +to be so fond of Saint-Germain. They generally declare it's horribly +dull." + +"That's not very polite to you," said Longmore, vexed at his lack of +superior form and determined not to be abashed. + +"Ah what have I to do with it?" Madame Clairin brightly wailed. "I'm the +dullest thing here. They've not had, other gentlemen, your success with +my sister-in-law." + +"It would have been very easy to have it. Madame de Mauves is kindness +itself." + +She swung open her great fan. "To her own countrymen!" + +Longmore remained silent; he hated the tone of this conversation. + +The speaker looked at him a little and then took in their hostess, to +whom M. de Chalumeau was serving up another epigram, which the charming +creature received with a droop of the head and eyes that strayed through +the window. "Don't pretend to tell me," Madame Clairin suddenly exhaled, +"that you're not in love with that pretty woman." + +"Allons donc!" cried Longmore in the most inspired French he had ever +uttered. He rose the next minute and took a hasty farewell. + + + +VI + +He allowed several days to pass without going back; it was of a sublime +suitability to appear to regard his friend's frankness during their last +interview as a general invitation. The sacrifice cost him a great +effort, for hopeless passions are exactly not the most patient; and he +had moreover a constant fear that if, as he believed, deep within the +circle round which he could only hover, the hour of supreme explanations +had come, the magic of her magnanimity might convert M. de Mauves. +Vicious men, it was abundantly recorded, had been so converted as to be +acceptable to God, and the something divine in this lady's composition +would sanctify any means she should choose to employ. Her means, he kept +repeating, were no business of his, and the essence of his admiration +ought to be to allow her to do as she liked; but he felt as if he should +turn away into a world out of which most of the joy had departed if she +should like, after all, to see nothing more in his interest in her than +might be repaid by mere current social coin. + +When at last he went back he found to his vexation that he was to run +the gauntlet of Madame Clairin's officious hospitality. It was one of +the first mornings of perfect summer, and the drawing-room, through the +open windows, was flooded with such a confusion of odours and bird-notes +as might warrant the hope that Madame de Mauves would renew with him for +an hour or two the exploration of the forest. Her sister-in-law, +however, whose hair was not yet dressed, emerged like a brassy discord +in a maze of melody. At the same moment the servant returned with his +mistress's regrets; she begged to be excused, she was indisposed and +unable to see Mr. Longmore. The young man knew just how disappointed he +looked and just what Madame Clairin thought of it, and this +consciousness determined in him an attitude of almost aggressive +frigidity. This was apparently what she desired. She wished to throw him +off his balance and, if she was not mistaken, knew exactly how. + +"Put down your hat, Mr. Longmore," she said, "and be polite for once. +You were not at all polite the other day when I asked you that friendly +question about the state of your heart." + +"I HAVE no heart--to talk about," he returned with as little grace. + +"As well say you've none at all. I advise you to cultivate a little +eloquence; you may have use for it. That was not an idle question of +mine; I don't ask idle questions. For a couple of months now that you've +been coming and going among us it seems to me you've had very few to +answer of any sort." + +"I've certainly been very well treated," he still dryly allowed. + +His companion waited ever so little to bring out: "Have you never felt +disposed to ask any?" + +Her look, her tone, were so charged with insidious meanings as to make +him feel that even to understand her would savour of dishonest +complicity. "What is it you have to tell me?" he cried with a flushed +frown. + +Her own colour rose at the question. It's rather hard, when you come +bearing yourself very much as the sibyl when she came to the Roman king, +to be treated as something worse than a vulgar gossip. "I might tell +you, monsieur," she returned, "that you've as bad a ton as any young man +I ever met. Where have you lived--what are your ideas? A stupid one of +my own--possibly!--has been to call your attention to a fact that it +takes some delicacy to touch upon. You've noticed, I suppose, that my +sister-in-law isn't the happiest woman in the world." + +"Oh!"--Longmore made short work of it. + +She seemed to measure his intelligence a little uncertainly. "You've +formed, I suppose," she nevertheless continued, "your conception of the +grounds of her discontent?" + +"It hasn't required much forming. The grounds--or at least a specimen or +two of them--have simply stared me in the face." + +Madame Clairin considered a moment with her eyes on him. "Yes--ces +choses-la se voient. My brother, in a single word, has the deplorable +habit of falling in love with other women. I don't judge him; I don't +judge my sister-in-law. I only permit myself to say that in her position +I would have managed otherwise. I'd either have kept my husband's +affection or I'd have frankly done without it. But my sister's an odd +compound; I don't profess to understand her. Therefore it is, in a +measure, that I appeal to you, her fellow countryman. Of course you'll +be surprised at my way of looking at the matter, and I admit that it's a +way in use only among people whose history--that of a race--has +cultivated in them the sense for high political solutions." She paused +and Longmore wondered where the history of her race was going to lead +her. But she clearly saw her course. "There has never been a galant +homme among us, I fear, who has not given his wife, even when she was +very charming, the right to be jealous. We know our history for ages +back, and the fact's established. It's not a very edifying one if you +like, but it's something to have scandals with pedigrees--if you can't +have them with attenuations. Our men have been Frenchmen of France, and +their wives--I may say it--have been of no meaner blood. You may see all +their portraits at our poor charming old house--every one of them an +'injured' beauty, but not one of them hanging her head. Not one of them +ever had the bad taste to be jealous, and yet not one in a dozen ever +consented to an indiscretion--allowed herself, I mean, to be talked +about. Voila comme elles ont su s'arranger. How they did it--go and look +at the dusky faded canvases and pastels and ask. They were dear brave +women of wit. When they had a headache they put on a little rouge and +came to supper as usual, and when they had a heart-ache they touched up +that quarter with just such another brush. These are great traditions +and charming precedents, I hold, and it doesn't seem to me fair that a +little American bourgeoise should come in and pretend to alter them--all +to hang her modern photograph and her obstinate little air penche in the +gallery of our shrewd great-grandmothers. She should fall into line, she +should keep up the tone. When she married my brother I don't suppose she +took him for a member of a societe de bonnes oeuvres. I don't say we're +right; who IS right? But we are as history has made us, and if any one's +to change it had better be our charming, but not accommodating, friend." +Again Madame Clairin paused, again she opened and closed her great +modern fan, which clattered like the screen of a shop-window. "Let her +keep up the tone!" she prodigiously repeated. + +Longmore felt himself gape, but he gasped an "Ah!" to cover it. Madame +Clairin's dip into the family annals had apparently imparted an honest +zeal to her indignation. "For a long time," she continued, "my belle- +soeur has been taking the attitude of an injured woman, affecting a +disgust with the world and shutting herself up to read free-thinking +books. I've never permitted myself, you may believe, the least +observation on her conduct, but I can't accept it as the last word +either of taste or of tact. When a woman with her prettiness lets her +husband stray away she deserves no small part of her fate. I don't wish +you to agree with me--on the contrary; but I call such a woman a pure +noodle. She must have bored him to death. What has passed between them +for many months needn't concern us; what provocation my sister has had-- +monstrous, if you wish--what ennui my brother has suffered. It's enough +that a week ago, just after you had ostensibly gone to Brussels, +something happened to produce an explosion. She found a letter in his +pocket, a photograph, a trinket, que sais-je? At any rate there was a +grand scene. I didn't listen at the keyhole, and I don't know what was +said; but I've reason to believe that my poor brother was hauled over +the coals as I fancy none of his ancestors have ever been--even by angry +ladies who weren't their wives." + +Longmore had leaned forward in silent attention with his elbows on his +knees, and now, impulsively, he dropped his face into his hands. "Ah +poor poor woman!" + +"Voila!" said Madame Clairin. "You pity her." + +"Pity her?" cried Longmore, looking up with ardent eyes and forgetting +the spirit of the story to which he had been treated in the miserable +facts. "Don't you?" + +"A little. But I'm not acting sentimentally--I'm acting scientifically. +We've always been capable of ideas. I want to arrange things; to see my +brother free to do as he chooses; to see his wife contented. Do you +understand me?" + +"Very well, I think," the young man said. "You're the most immoral +person I've lately had the privilege of conversing with." + +Madame Clairin took it calmly. "Possibly. When was ever a great +peacemaker not immoral?" + +"Ah no," Longmore protested. "You're too superficial to be a great +peacemaker. You don't begin to know anything about Madame de Mauves." + +She inclined her head to one side while her fine eyes kept her visitor +in view; she mused a moment and then smiled as with a certain +compassionate patience. "It's not in my interest to contradict you." + +"It would be in your interest to learn, madam" he resolutely returned, +"what honest men most admire in a woman--and to recognise it when you +see it." + +She was wonderful--she waited a moment. "So you ARE in love!" she then +effectively brought out. + +For a moment he thought of getting up, but he decided to stay. "I wonder +if you'd understand me," he said at last, "if I were to tell you that I +have for Madame de Mauves the most devoted and most respectful +friendship?" + +"You underrate my intelligence. But in that case you ought to exert your +influence to put an end to these painful domestic scenes." + +"Do you imagine she talks to me about her domestic scenes?" Longmore +cried. + +His companion stared. "Then your friendship isn't returned?" And as he +but ambiguously threw up his hands, "Now, at least," she added, "she'll +have something to tell you. I happen to know the upshot of my brother's +last interview with his wife." Longmore rose to his feet as a protest +against the indelicacy of the position into which he had been drawn; but +all that made him tender made him curious, and she caught in his averted +eyes an expression that prompted her to strike her blow. "My brother's +absurdly entangled with a certain person in Paris; of course he ought +not to be, but he wouldn't be my brother if he weren't. It was this +irregular passion that dictated his words. 'Listen to me, madam,' he +cried at last; 'let us live like people who understand life! It's +unpleasant to be forced to say such things outright, but you've a way of +bringing one down to the rudiments. I'm faithless, I'm heartless, I'm +brutal, I'm everything horrible--it's understood. Take your revenge, +console yourself: you're too charming a woman to have anything to +complain of. Here's a handsome young man sighing himself into a +consumption for you. Listen to your poor compatriot and you'll find that +virtue's none the less becoming for being good-natured. You'll see that +it's not after all such a doleful world and that there's even an +advantage in having the most impudent of husbands."' Madame Clairin +paused; Longmore had turned very pale. "You may believe it," she +amazingly pursued; "the speech took place in my presence; things were +done in order. And now, monsieur"--this with a wondrous strained grimace +which he was too troubled at the moment to appreciate, but which he +remembered later with a kind of awe--"we count on you!" + +"Her husband said this to her face to face, as you say it to me now?" he +asked after a silence. + +"Word for word and with the most perfect politeness." + +"And Madame de Mauves--what did she say?" + +Madame Clairin smiled again. "To such a speech as that a woman says-- +nothing. She had been sitting with a piece of needlework, and I think +she hadn't seen Richard since their quarrel the day before. He came in +with the gravity of an ambassador, and I'm sure that when he made his +demande en mariage his manner wasn't more respectful. He only wanted +white gloves!" said Longmore's friend. "My belle-soeur sat silent a few +moments, drawing her stitches, and then without a word, without a +glance, walked out of the room. It was just what she SHOULD have done!" + +"Yes," the young man repeated, "it was just what she should have done." + +"And I, left alone with my brother, do you know what I said?" + +Longmore shook his head. + +"Mauvals sujet!" he suggested. + +"'You've done me the honour,' I said, 'to take this step in my presence. +I don't pretend to qualify it. You know what you're about, and it's your +own affair. But you may confide in my discretion.' Do you think he has +had reason to complain of it?" She received no answer; her visitor had +slowly averted himself; he passed his gloves mechanically round the band +of his hat. "I hope," she cried, "you're not going to start for +Brussels!" + +Plainly he was much disturbed, and Madame Clairin might congratulate +herself on the success of her plea for old-fashioned manners. And yet +there was something that left her more puzzled than satisfied in the +colourless tone with which he answered, "No, I shall remain here for the +present." The processes of his mind were unsociably private, and she +could have fancied for a moment that he was linked with their difficult +friend in some monstrous conspiracy of asceticism. + +"Come this evening," she nevertheless bravely resumed. "The rest will +take care of itself. Meanwhile I shall take the liberty of telling my +sister-in-law that I've repeated--in short, that I've put you au fait" + +He had a start but he controlled himself, speaking quietly enough. "Tell +her what you please. Nothing you can tell her will affect her conduct." + +"Voyons! Do you mean to tell me that a woman young, pretty, sentimental, +neglected, wronged if you will--? I see you don't believe it. Believe +simply in your own opportunity!" she went on. "But for heaven's sake, if +it is to lead anywhere, don't come back with that visage de croquemort. +You look as if you were going to bury your heart--not to offer it to a +pretty woman. You're much better when you smile--you're very nice then. +Come, do yourself justice." + +He remained a moment face to face with her, but his expression didn't +change. "I shall do myself justice," he however after an instant made +answer; and abruptly, with a bow, he took his departure. + + + +VII + +He felt, when he found himself unobserved and outside, that he must +plunge into violent action, walk fast and far and defer the opportunity +for thought. He strode away into the forest, swinging his cane, throwing +back his head, casting his eyes into verdurous vistas and following the +road without a purpose. He felt immensely excited, but could have given +no straight name to his agitation. It was a joy as all increase of +freedom is joyous; something seemed to have been cleared out of his path +and his destiny to have rounded a cape and brought him into sight of an +open sea. But it was a pain in the degree in which his freedom somehow +resolved itself into the need of despising all mankind with a single +exception; and the fact that Madame de Mauves inhabited a planet +contaminated by the presence of the baser multitude kept elation from +seeming a pledge of ideal bliss. + +There she was, at any rate, and circumstances now forced them to be +intimate. She had ceased to have what men call a secret for him, and +this fact itself brought with it a sort of rapture. He had no prevision +that he should "profit," in the vulgar sense, by the extraordinary +position into which they had been thrown; it might be but a cruel trick +of destiny to make hope a harsher mockery and renunciation a keener +suffering. But above all this rose the conviction that she could do +nothing that wouldn't quicken his attachment. It was this conviction +that gross accident--all odious in itself--would force the beauty of her +character into more perfect relief for him that made him stride along as +if he were celebrating a spiritual feast. He rambled at hazard for a +couple of hours, finding at last that he had left the forest behind him +and had wandered into an unfamiliar region. It was a perfectly rural +scene, and the still summer day gave it a charm for which its meagre +elements but half accounted. + +He thought he had never seen anything so characteristically French; all +the French novels seemed to have described it, all the French +landscapists to have painted it. The fields and trees were of a cool +metallic green; the grass looked as if it might stain his trousers and +the foliage his hands. The clear light had a mild greyness, the sheen of +silver, not of gold, was in the work-a-day sun. A great red-roofed high- +stacked farmhouse, with whitewashed walls and a straggling yard, +surveyed the highroad, on one side, from behind a transparent curtain of +poplars. A narrow stream half-choked with emerald rushes and edged with +grey aspens occupied the opposite quarter. The meadows rolled and sloped +away gently to the low horizon, which was barely concealed by the +continuous line of clipped and marshalled trees. The prospect was not +rich, but had a frank homeliness that touched the young man's fancy. It +was full of light atmosphere and diffused clearness, and if it was +prosaic it was somehow sociable. + +Longmore was disposed to walk further, and he advanced along the road +beneath the poplars. In twenty minutes he came to a village which +straggled away to the right, among orchards and potagers. On the left, +at a stone's throw from the road, stood a little pink-faced inn which +reminded him that he had not breakfasted, having left home with a +prevision of hospitality from Madame de Mauves. In the inn he found a +brick-tiled parlour and a hostess in sabots and a white cap, whom, over +the omelette she speedily served him--borrowing licence from the bottle +of sound red wine that accompanied it--he assured she was a true artist. +To reward his compliment she invited him to smoke his cigar in her +little garden behind the house. + +Here he found a tonnelle and a view of tinted crops stretching down to +the stream. The tonnelle was rather close, and he preferred to lounge on +a bench against the pink wall, in the sun, which was not too hot. Here, +as he rested and gazed and mused, he fell into a train of thought which, +in an indefinable fashion, was a soft influence from the scene about +him. His heart, which had been beating fast for the past three hours, +gradually checked its pulses and left him looking at life with rather a +more level gaze. The friendly tavern sounds coming out through the open +windows, the sunny stillness of the yellowing grain which covered so +much vigorous natural life, conveyed no strained nor high-pitched +message, had little to say about renunciation--nothing at all about +spiritual zeal. They communicated the sense of plain ripe nature, +expressed the unperverted reality of things, declared that the common +lot isn't brilliantly amusing and that the part of wisdom is to grasp +frankly at experience lest you miss it altogether. What reason there was +for his beginning to wonder after this whether a deeply-wounded heart +might be soothed and healed by such a scene, it would be difficult to +explain; certain it was that as he sat there he dreamt, awake, of an +unhappy woman who strolled by the slow-flowing stream before him and who +pulled down the fruit-laden boughs in the orchards. He mused and mused, +and at last found himself quite angry that he couldn't somehow think +worse of Madame de Mauves--or at any rate think otherwise. He could +fairly claim that in the romantic way he asked very little of life--made +modest demands on passion: why then should his only passion be born to +ill fortune? Why should his first--his last--glimpse of positive +happiness be so indissolubly linked with renunciation? + +It is perhaps because, like many spirits of the same stock, he had in +his composition a lurking principle of sacrifice, sacrifice for +sacrifice's sake, to the authority of which he had ever paid due +deference, that he now felt all the vehemence of rebellion. To renounce, +to renounce again, to renounce for ever, was this all that youth and +longing and ardour were meant for? Was experience to be muffled and +mutilated like an indecent picture? Was a man to sit and deliberately +condemn his future to be the blank memory of a regret rather than the +long possession of a treasure? Sacrifice? The word was a trap for minds +muddled by fear, an ignoble refuge of weakness. To insist now seemed not +to dare, but simply to BE, to live on possible terms. + +His hostess came out to hang a moist cloth on the hedge, and, though her +guest was sitting quietly enough, she might have imagined in his kindled +eyes a flattering testimony to the quality of her wine. As she turned +back into the house she was met by a young man of whom Longmore took +note in spite of his high distraction. He was evidently a member of that +jovial fraternity of artists whose very shabbiness has an affinity with +the unestablished and unexpected in life--the element often gazed at +with a certain wistfulness out of the curtained windows even of the +highest respectability. Longmore was struck first with his looking like +a very clever man and then with his looking like a contented one. The +combination, as it was expressed in his face, might have arrested the +attention of a less exasperated reasoner. He had a slouched hat and a +yellow beard, a light easel under one arm, and an unfinished sketch in +oils under the other. He stopped and stood talking for some moments to +the landlady, while something pleasant played in his face. They were +discussing the possibilities of dinner; the hostess enumerated some very +savoury ones, and he nodded briskly, assenting to everything. It +couldn't be, Longmore thought, that he found such ideal ease in the +prospect of lamb-chops and spinach and a croute aux fruits. When the +dinner had been ordered he turned up his sketch, and the good woman fell +to admiring and comparing, to picking up, off by the stream-side, the +objects represented. + +Was it his work, Longmore wondered, that made him so happy? Was a strong +talent the best thing in the world? The landlady went back to her +kitchen, and the young painter stood, as if he were waiting for +something, beside the gate which opened upon the path across the fields. +Longmore sat brooding and asking himself if it weren't probably better +to cultivate the arts than to cultivate the passions. Before he had +answered the question the painter had grown tired of waiting. He had +picked up a pebble, tossed it lightly into an upper window and called +familiarly "Claudine!" Claudine appeared; Longmore heard her at the +window, bidding the young man cultivate patience. "But I'm losing my +light," he said; "I must have my shadows in the same place as +yesterday." + +"Go without me then," Claudine answered; "I'll join you in ten minutes." +Her voice was fresh and young; it represented almost aggressively to +Longmore that she was as pleased as her companion. + +"Don't forget the Chenier," cried the young man, who, turning away, +passed out of the gate and followed the path across the fields until he +disappeared among the trees by the side of the stream. Who might +Claudine be? Longmore vaguely wondered; and was she as pretty as her +voice? Before long he had a chance to satisfy himself; she came out of +the house with her hat and parasol, prepared to follow her companion. +She had on a pink muslin dress and a little white hat, and she was as +pretty as suffices almost any Frenchwoman to be pleasing. She had a +clear brown skin and a bright dark eye and a step that made walking as +light a matter as being blown--and this even though she happened to be +at the moment not a little over-weighted. Her hands were encumbered with +various articles involved in her pursuit of her friend. In one arm she +held her parasol and a large roll of needlework, and in the other a +shawl and a heavy white umbrella, such as painters use for sketching. +Meanwhile she was trying to thrust into her pocket a paper-covered +volume which Longmore saw to be the poems of Andre Chenier, and in the +effort dropping the large umbrella and marking this with a half-smiled +exclamation of disgust. Longmore stepped forward and picked up the +umbrella, and as she, protesting her gratitude, put out her hand to take +it, he recognised her as too obliging to the young man who had preceded +her. + +"You've too much to carry," he said; "you must let me help you." + +"You're very good, monsieur," she answered. "My husband always forgets +something. He can do nothing without his umbrella. He is d'une +etourderie--" + +"You must allow me to carry the umbrella," Longmore risked; "there's too +much of it for a lady." + +She assented, after many compliments to his politeness; and he walked +by her side into the meadow. She went lightly and rapidly, picking her +steps and glancing forward to catch a glimpse of her husband. She was +graceful, she was charming, she had an air of decision and yet of +accommodation, and it seemed to our friend that a young artist would +work none the worse for having her seated at his side reading Chenier's +iambics. They were newly married, he supposed, and evidently their path +of life had none of the mocking crookedness of some others. They asked +little; but what need to ask more than such quiet summer days by a shady +stream, with a comrade all amiability, to say nothing of art and books +and a wide unmenaced horizon? To spend such a morning, to stroll back to +dinner in the red-tiled parlour of the inn, to ramble away again as the +sun got low--all this was a vision of delight which floated before him +only to torture him with a sense of the impossible. All Frenchwomen were +not coquettes, he noted as he kept pace with his companion. She uttered +a word now and then for politeness' sake, but she never looked at him +and seemed not in the least to care that he was a well-favoured and +well-dressed young man. She cared for nothing but the young artist in +the shabby coat and the slouched hat, and for discovering where he had +set up his easel. + +This was soon done. He was encamped under the trees, close to the +stream, and, in the diffused green shade of the little wood, couldn't +have felt immediate need of his umbrella. He received a free rebuke, +however, for forgetting it, and was informed of what he owed to +Longmore's complaisance. He was duly grateful; he thanked our hero +warmly and offered him a seat on the grass. But Longmore felt himself a +marplot and lingered only long enough to glance at the young man's +sketch and to see in it an easy rendering of the silvery stream and the +vivid green rushes. The young wife had spread her shawl on the grass at +the base of a tree and meant to seat herself when he had left them, +meant to murmur Chenier's verses to the music of the gurgling river. +Longmore looked a while from one of these lucky persons to the other, +barely stifled a sigh, bade them good-morning and took his departure. He +knew neither where to go nor what to do; he seemed afloat on the sea of +ineffectual longing. He strolled slowly back to the inn, where, in the +doorway, he met the landlady returning from the butcher's with the +lambchops for the dinner of her lodgers. + +"Monsieur has made the acquaintance of the dame of our young painter," +she said with a free smile--a smile too free for malicious meanings. +"Monsieur has perhaps seen the young man's picture. It appears that he's +d'une jolie force." + +"His picture's very charming," said Longmore, "but his dame is more +charming still." + +"She's a very nice little woman; but I pity her all the more." + +"I don't see why she's to be pitied," Longmore pleaded. "They seem a +very happy couple." + +The landlady gave a knowing nod. "Don't trust to it, monsieur! Those +artists--ca na pas de principes! From one day to another he can plant +her there! I know them, allez. I've had them here very often; one year +with one, another year with another." + +Longmore was at first puzzled. Then, "You mean she's not his wife?" he +asked. + +She took it responsibly. "What shall I tell you? They're not des hommes +serieux, those gentlemen! They don't engage for eternity. It's none of +my business, and I've no wish to speak ill of madame. She's gentille-- +but gentille, and she loves her jeune homme to distraction." + +"Who then is so distinguished a young woman?" asked Longmore. "What do +you know about her?" + +"Nothing for certain; but it's my belief that she's better than he. I've +even gone so far as to believe that she's a lady--a vraie dame--and that +she has given up a great many things for him. I do the best I can for +them, but I don't believe she has had all her life to put up with a +dinner of two courses." And she turned over her lamb-chops tenderly, as +to say that though a good cook could imagine better things, yet if you +could have but one course lamb-chops had much in their favour. "I shall +do them with breadcrumbs. Voila les femmes, monsieur!" + +Longmore turned away with the feeling that women were indeed a +measureless mystery, and that it was hard to say in which of their forms +of perversity there was most merit. He walked back to Saint-Germain more +slowly than he had come, with less philosophic resignation to any event +and more of the urgent egotism of the passion pronounced by philosophers +the supremely selfish one. Now and then the episode of the happy young +painter and the charming woman who had given up a great many things for +him rose vividly in his mind and seemed to mock his moral unrest like +some obtrusive vision of unattainable bliss. + +The landlady's gossip had cast no shadow on its brightness; her voice +seemed that of the vulgar chorus of the uninitiated, which stands always +ready with its gross prose rendering of the inspired passages of human +action. Was it possible a man could take THAT from a woman--take all +that lent lightness to that other woman's footstep and grace to her +surrender and not give her the absolute certainty of a devotion as +unalterable as the process of the sun? Was it possible that so clear a +harmony had the seeds of trouble, that the charm of so perfect union +could be broken by anything but death? Longmore felt an immense desire +to cry out a thousand times "No!" for it seemed to him at last that he +was somehow only a graver equivalent of the young lover and that +rustling Claudine was a lighter sketch of Madame de Mauves. The heat of +the sun, as he walked along, became oppressive, and when he re-entered +the forest he turned aside into the deepest shade he could find and +stretched himself on the mossy ground at the foot of a great beech. He +lay for a while staring up into the verdurous dusk overhead and trying +mentally to see his friend at Saint-Germain hurry toward some quiet +stream-side where HE waited, as he had seen that trusting creature hurry +an hour before. It would be hard to say how well he succeeded; but the +effort soothed rather than excited him, and as he had had a good deal +both of moral and physical fatigue he sank at last into a quiet sleep. +While he slept moreover he had a strange and vivid dream. He seemed to +be in a wood, very much like the one on which his eyes had lately +closed; but the wood was divided by the murmuring stream he had left an +hour before. He was walking up and down, he thought, restlessly and in +intense expectation of some momentous event. Suddenly, at a distance, +through the trees, he saw a gleam of a woman's dress, on which he +hastened to meet her. As he advanced he recognised her, but he saw at +the same time that she was on the other bank of the river. She seemed at +first not to notice him, but when they had come to opposite places she +stopped and looked at him very gravely and pityingly. She made him no +sign that he must cross the stream, but he wished unutterably to stand +by her side. He knew the water was deep, and it seemed to him he knew +how he should have to breast it and how he feared that when he rose to +the surface she would have disappeared. Nevertheless he was going to +plunge when a boat turned into the current from above and came swiftly +toward them, guided by an oarsman who was sitting so that they couldn't +see his face. He brought the boat to the bank where Longmore stood; the +latter stepped in, and with a few strokes they touched the opposite +shore. Longmore got out and, though he was sure he had crossed the +stream, Madame de Mauves was not there. He turned with a kind of agony +and saw that now she was on the other bank--the one he had left. She +gave him a grave silent glance and walked away up the stream. The boat +and the boatman resumed their course, but after going a short distance +they stopped and the boatman turned back and looked at the still divided +couple. Then Longmore recognised him--just as he had recognised him a +few days before at the restaurant in the Bois de Boulogne. + + + +VIII + +He must have slept some time after he ceased dreaming for he had no +immediate memory of this vision. It came back to him later, after he had +roused himself and had walked nearly home. No great arrangement was +needed to make it seem a striking allegory, and it haunted and oppressed +him for the rest of the day. He took refuge, however, in his quickened +conviction that the only sound policy in life is to grasp unsparingly at +happiness; and it seemed no more than one of the vigorous measures +dictated by such a policy to return that evening to Madame de Mauves. +And yet when he had decided to do so and had carefully dressed himself +he felt an irresistible nervous tremor which made it easier to linger at +his open window, wondering with a strange mixture of dread and desire +whether Madame Clairin had repeated to her sister-in-law what she had +said to him. His presence now might be simply a gratuitous annoyance, +and yet his absence might seem to imply that it was in the power of +circumstances to make them ashamed to meet each other's eyes. He sat a +long time with his head in his hands, lost in a painful confusion of +hopes and ambiguities. He felt at moments as if he could throttle Madame +Clairin, and yet couldn't help asking himself if it weren't possible she +had done him a service. It was late when he left the hotel, and as he +entered the gate of the other house his heart beat so fast that he was +sure his voice would show it. + +The servant ushered him into the drawing-room, which was empty and with +the lamp burning low. But the long windows were open and their light +curtains swaying in a soft warm wind, so that Longmore immediately +stepped out upon the terrace. There he found Madame de Mauves alone, +slowly pacing its length. She was dressed in white, very simply, and her +hair was arranged not as she usually wore it, but in a single loose coil +and as if she were unprepared for company. She stopped when she saw her +friend, showed some surprise, uttered an exclamation and stood waiting +for him to speak. He tried, with his eyes on her, to say something, but +found no words. He knew it was awkward, it was offensive, to stand +gazing at her; but he couldn't say what was suitable and mightn't say +what he wished. Her face was indistinct in the dim light, but he felt +her eyes fixed on him and wondered what they expressed. Did they warn +him, did they plead, or did they confess to a sense of provocation? For +an instant his head swam; he was sure it would make all things clear to +stride forward and fold her in his arms. But a moment later he was still +dumb there before her; he hadn't moved; he knew she had spoken, but he +hadn't understood. + +"You were here this morning," she continued; and now, slowly, the +meaning of her words came to him. "I had a bad headache and had to shut +myself up." She spoke with her usual voice. + +Longmore mastered his agitation and answered her without betraying +himself. "I hope you're better now." + +"Yes, thank you, I'm better--much better." + +He waited again and she moved away to a chair and seated herself. After +a pause he followed her and leaned closer to her, against the balustrade +of the terrace. "I hoped you might have been able to come out for the +morning into the forest. I went alone; it was a lovely day, and I took a +long walk." + +"It was a lovely day," she said absently, and sat with her eyes lowered, +slowly opening and closing her fan. Longmore, as he watched her, felt +more and more assured her sister-in-law had seen her since her interview +with him; that her attitude toward him was changed. It was this same +something that hampered the desire with which he had come, or at least +converted all his imagined freedom of speech about it to a final hush of +wonder. No, certainly, he couldn't clasp her to his arms now, any more +than some antique worshipper could have clasped the marble statue in his +temple. But Longmore's statue spoke at last with a full human voice and +even with a shade of human hesitation. She looked up, and it seemed to +him her eyes shone through the dusk. + +"I'm very glad you came this evening--and I've a particular reason for +being glad. I half-expected you, and yet I thought it possible you +mightn't come." + +"As the case has been present to me," Longmore answered, "it was +impossible I shouldn't come. I've spent every minute of the day in +thinking of you." + +She made no immediate reply, but continued to open and close her fan +thoughtfully. At last, "I've something important to say to you," she +resumed with decision. "I want you to know to a certainty that I've a +very high opinion of you." Longmore gave an uneasy shift to his +position. To what was she coming? But he said nothing, and she went on: +"I take a great interest in you. There's no reason why I shouldn't say +it. I feel a great friendship for you." He began to laugh, all +awkwardly--he hardly knew why, unless because this seemed the very irony +of detachment. But she went on in her way: "You know, I suppose, that a +great disappointment always implies a great confidence--a great hope." + +"I've certainly hoped," he said, "hoped strongly; but doubtless never +rationally enough to have a right to bemoan my disappointment." + +There was something troubled in her face that seemed all the while to +burn clearer. "You do yourself injustice. I've such confidence in your +fairness of mind that I should be greatly disappointed if I were to find +it wanting." + +"I really almost believe you're amusing yourself at my expense," the +young man cried. "My fairness of mind? Of all the question-begging +terms!" he laughed. "The only thing for one's mind to be fair to is the +thing one FEELS!" + +She rose to her feet and looked at him hard. His eyes by this time were +accustomed to the imperfect light, and he could see that if she was +urgent she was yet beseechingly kind. She shook her head impatiently and +came near enough to lay her fan on his arm with a strong pressure. "If +that were so it would be a weary world. I know enough, however, of your +probable attitude. You needn't try to express it. It's enough that your +sincerity gives me the right to ask a favour of you--to make an intense, +a solemn request." + +"Make it; I listen." + +"DON'T DISAPPOINT ME. If you don't understand me now you will to-morrow +or very soon. When I said just now that I had a high opinion of you, you +see I meant it very seriously," she explained. "It wasn't a vain +compliment. I believe there's no appeal one may make to your generosity +that can remain long unanswered. If this were to happen--if I were to +find you selfish where I thought you generous, narrow where I thought +you large"--and she spoke slowly, her voice lingering with all emphasis +on each of these words--"vulgar where I thought you rare, I should think +worse of human nature. I should take it, I assure you, very hard indeed. +I should say to myself in the dull days of the future: 'There was ONE +man who might have done so and so, and he too failed.' But this shan't +be. You've made too good an impression on me not to make the very best. +If you wish to please me for ever there's a way." + +She was standing close to him, with her dress touching him, her eyes +fixed on his. As she went on her tone became, to his sense, +extraordinary, and she offered the odd spectacle of a beautiful woman +preaching reason with the most communicative and irresistible passion. +Longmore was dazzled, but mystified and bewildered. The intention of her +words was all remonstrance, refusal, dismissal, but her presence and +effect there, so close, so urgent, so personal, a distracting +contradiction of it. She had never been so lovely. In her white dress, +with her pale face and deeply-lighted brow, she seemed the very spirit +of the summer night. When she had ceased speaking she drew a long +breath; he felt it on his cheek, and it stirred in his whole being a +sudden perverse imagination. Were not her words, in their high +impossible rigour, a mere challenge to his sincerity, a mere precaution +of her pride, meant to throw into relief her almost ghostly beauty, and +wasn't this the only truth, the only law, the only thing to take account +of? + +He closed his eyes and felt her watch him not without pain and +perplexity herself. He looked at her again, met her own eyes and saw +them fill with strange tears. Then this last sophistry of his great +desire for her knew itself touched as a bubble is pricked; it died away +with a stifled murmur, and her beauty, more and more radiant in the +darkness, rose before him as a symbol of something vague which was yet +more beautiful than itself. "I may understand you to-morrow," he said, +"but I don't understand you now." + +"And yet I took counsel with myself to-day and asked myself how I had +best speak to you. On one side I might have refused to see you at all." +Longmore made a violent movement, and she added: "In that case I should +have written to you. I might see you, I thought, and simply say to you +that there were excellent reasons why we should part, and that I begged +this visit should be your last. This I inclined to do; what made me +decide otherwise was--well, simply that I like you so. I said to myself +that I should be glad to remember in future days, not that I had, in the +horrible phrase, got rid of you, but that you had gone away out of the +fulness of your own wisdom and the excellence of your own taste." + +"Ah wisdom and taste!" the poor young man wailed. + +"I'm prepared, if necessary," Madame de Mauves continued after a pause, +"to fall back on my strict right. But, as I said before, I shall be +greatly disappointed if I'm obliged to do that." + +"When I listen to your horrible and unnatural lucidity," Longmore +answered, "I feel so angry, so merely sore and sick, that I wonder I +don't leave you without more words." + +"If you should go away in anger this idea of mine about our parting +would be but half-realised," she returned with no drop in her ardour. +"No, I don't want to think of you as feeling a great pain, I don't want +even to think of you as making a great sacrifice. I want to think of +you--" + +"As a stupid brute who has never existed, who never CAN exist!" he broke +in. "A creature who could know you without loving you, who could leave +you without for ever missing you!" + +She turned impatiently away and walked to the other end of the terrace. +When she came back he saw that her impatience had grown sharp and almost +hard. She stood before him again, looking at him from head to foot and +without consideration now; so that as the effect of it he felt his +assurance finally quite sink. This then she took from him, withholding +in consequence something she had meant to say. She moved off afresh, +walked to the other end of the terrace and stood there with her face to +the garden. She assumed that he understood her, and slowly, slowly, half +as the fruit of this mute pressure, he let everything go but the rage of +a purpose somehow still to please her. She was giving him a chance to do +gallantly what it seemed unworthy of both of them he should do meanly. +She must have "liked" him indeed, as she said, to wish so to spare him, +to go to the trouble of conceiving an ideal of conduct for him. With +this sense of her tenderness still in her dreadful consistency, his +spirit rose with a new flight and suddenly felt itself breathe clearer +air. Her profession ceased to seem a mere bribe to his eagerness; it was +charged with eagerness itself; it was a present reward and would somehow +last. He moved rapidly toward her as with the sense of a gage that he +might sublimely yet immediately enjoy. + +They were separated by two thirds of the length of the terrace, and he +had to pass the drawing-room window. As he did so he started with an +exclamation. Madame Clairin stood framed in the opening as if, though +just arriving on the scene, she too were already aware of its interest. +Conscious, apparently, that she might be suspected of having watched +them she stepped forward with a smile and looked from one to the other. +"Such a tete-a-tete as that one owes no apology for interrupting. One +ought to come in for good manners." + +Madame de Mauves turned to her, but answered nothing. She looked +straight at Longmore, and her eyes shone with a lustre that struck him +as divine. He was not exactly sure indeed what she meant them to say, +but it translated itself to something that would do. "Call it what you +will, what you've wanted to urge upon me is the thing this woman can +best conceive. What I ask of you is something she can't begin to!" They +seemed somehow to beg him to suffer her to be triumphantly herself, and +to intimate--yet this too all decently--how little that self was of +Madame Clairin's particular swelling measure. He felt an immense +answering desire not to do anything then that might seem probable or +prevu to this lady. He had laid his hat and stick on the parapet of the +terrace. He took them up, offered his hand to Madame de Mauves with a +simple good-night, bowed silently to Madame Clairin and found his way, +with tingling ears, out of the place. + + + +IX + +He went home and, without lighting his candle, flung himself on his bed. +But he got no sleep till morning; he lay hour after hour tossing, +thinking, wondering; his mind had never been so active. It seemed to him +his friend had laid on him in those last moments a heavy charge and had +expressed herself almost as handsomely as if she had listened +complacently to an assurance of his love. It was neither easy nor +delightful thoroughly to understand her; but little by little her +perfect meaning sank into his mind and soothed it with a sense of +opportunity which somehow stifled his sense of loss. For, to begin with, +she meant that she could love him in no degree or contingency, in no +imaginable future. This was absolute--he knew he could no more alter it +than he could pull down one of the constellations he lay gazing at +through his open window. He wondered to what it was, in the background +of her life, she had so dedicated herself. A conception of duty +unquenchable to the end? A love that no outrage could stifle? "Great +heaven!" he groaned; "is the world so rich in the purest pearls of +passion that such tenderness as that can be wasted for ever--poured away +without a sigh into bottomless darkness?" Had she, in spite of the +detestable present, some precious memory that still kept the door of +possibility open? Was she prepared to submit to everything and yet to +believe? Was it strength, was it weakness, was it a vulgar fear, was it +conviction, conscience, constancy? + +Longmore sank back with a sigh and an oppressive feeling that it was +vain to guess at such a woman's motives. He only felt that those of this +one were buried deep in her soul and that they must be of the noblest, +must contain nothing base. He had his hard impression that endless +constancy was all her law--a constancy that still found a foothold among +crumbling ruins. "She has loved once," he said to himself as he rose and +wandered to his window; "and that's for ever. Yes, yes--if she loved +again she'd be COMMON!" He stood for a long time looking out into the +starlit silence of the town and forest and thinking of what life would +have been if his constancy had met her own in earlier days. But life was +this now, and he must live. It was living, really, to stand there with +such a faith even in one's self still flung over one by such hands. He +was not to disappoint her, he was to justify a conception it had +beguiled her weariness to form. His imagination embraced it; he threw +back his head and seemed to be looking for his friend's conception among +the blinking mocking stars. But it came to him rather on the mild night- +wind wandering in over the house-tops which covered the rest of so many +heavy human hearts. What she asked he seemed to feel her ask not for her +own sake--she feared nothing, she needed nothing--but for that of his +own happiness and his own character. He must assent to destiny. Why else +was he young and strong, intelligent and resolute? He mustn't give it to +her to reproach him with thinking she had had a moment's attention for +his love, give it to her to plead, to argue, to break off in bitterness. +He must see everything from above, her indifference and his own ardour; +he must prove his strength, must do the handsome thing, must decide that +the handsome thing was to submit to the inevitable, to be supremely +delicate, to spare her all pain, to stifle his passion, to ask no +compensation, to depart without waiting and to try to believe that +wisdom is its own reward. All this, neither more nor less, it was a +matter of beautiful friendship with him for her to expect of him. And +what should he himself gain by it? He should have pleased her! Well, he +flung himself on his bed again, fell asleep at last and slept till +morning. + +Before noon next day he had made up his mind to leave Saint-Germain at +once. It seemed easiest to go without seeing her, and yet if he might +ask for a grain of "compensation" this would be five minutes face to +face with her. He passed a restless day. Wherever he went he saw her +stand before him in the dusky halo of evening, saw her look at him with +an air of still negation more intoxicating than the most passionate +self-surrender. He must certainly go, and yet it was hideously hard. He +compromised and went to Paris to spend the rest of the day. He strolled +along the boulevard and paused sightlessly before the shops, sat a while +in the Tuileries gardens and looked at the shabby unfortunates for whom +this only was nature and summer; but simply felt afresh, as a result of +it all, the dusty dreary lonely world to which Madame de Mauves had +consigned him. + +In a sombre mood he made his way back to the centre of motion and sat +down at a table before a cafe door, on the great plain of hot asphalt. +Night arrived, the lamps were lighted, the tables near him found +occupants, and Paris began to wear that evening grimace of hers that +seems to tell, in the flare of plate glass and of theatre-doors, the +muffled rumble of swift-rolling carriages, how this is no world for you +unless you have your pockets lined and your delicacies perverted. +Longmore, however, had neither scruples nor desires; he looked at the +great preoccupied place for the first time with an easy sense of +repaying its indifference. Before long a carriage drove up to the +pavement directly in front of him and remained standing for several +minutes without sign from its occupant. It was one of those neat plain +coupes, drawn by a single powerful horse, in which the flaneur figures a +pale handsome woman buried among silk cushions and yawning as she sees +the gas-lamps glittering in the gutters. At last the door opened and out +stepped Richard de Mauves. He stopped and leaned on the window for some +time, talking in an excited manner to a person within. At last he gave a +nod and the carriage rolled away. He stood swinging his cane and looking +up and down the boulevard, with the air of a man fumbling, as one might +say, the loose change of time. He turned toward the cafe and was +apparently, for want of anything better worth his attention, about to +seat himself at one of the tables when he noticed Longmore. He wavered +an instant and then, without a shade of difference in his careless gait, +advanced to the accompaniment of a thin recognition. It was the first +time they had met since their encounter in the forest after Longmore's +false start for Brussels. Madame Clairin's revelations, as he might have +regarded them, had not made the Count especially present to his mind; he +had had another call to meet than the call of disgust. But now, as M. de +Mauves came toward him he felt abhorrence well up. He made out, however, +for the first time, a cloud on this nobleman's superior clearness, and a +delight at finding the shoe somewhere at last pinching HIM, mingled with +the resolve to be blank and unaccommodating, enabled him to meet the +occasion with due promptness. + +M. de Mauves sat down, and the two men looked at each other across the +table, exchanging formal remarks that did little to lend grace to their +encounter. Longmore had no reason to suppose the Count knew of his +sister's various interventions. He was sure M. de Mauves cared very +little about his opinions, and yet he had a sense of something grim in +his own New York face which would have made him change colour if keener +suspicion had helped it to be read there. M. de Mauves didn't change +colour, but he looked at his wife's so oddly, so more than naturally +(wouldn't it be?) detached friend with an intentness that betrayed at +once an irritating memory of the episode in the Bois de Boulogne and +such vigilant curiosity as was natural to a gentleman who had entrusted +his "honour" to another gentleman's magnanimity--or to his artlessness. + +It might appear that these virtues shone out of our young man less +engagingly or reassuringly than a few days before; the shadow at any +rate fell darker across the brow of his critic, who turned away and +frowned while lighting a cigar. The person in the coupe, he accordingly +judged, whether or no the same person as the heroine of the episode of +the Bois de Boulogne, was not a source of unalloyed delight. Longmore +had dark blue eyes of admirable clarity, settled truth-telling eyes +which had in his childhood always made his harshest taskmasters smile at +his notion of a subterfuge. An observer watching the two men and knowing +something of their relations would certainly have said that what he had +at last both to recognise and to miss in those eyes must not a little +have puzzled and tormented M. de Mauves. They took possession of him, +they laid him out, they measured him in that state of flatness, they +triumphed over him, they treated him as no pair of eyes had perhaps ever +treated any member of his family before. The Count's scheme had been to +provide for a positive state of ease on the part of no one save himself, +but here was Longmore already, if appearances perhaps not appreciable to +the vulgar meant anything, primed as for some prospect of pleasure more +than Parisian. Was this candid young barbarian but a faux bonhomme after +all? He had never really quite satisfied his occasional host, but was he +now, for a climax, to leave him almost gaping? + +M. de Mauves, as if hating to seem preoccupied, took up the evening +paper to help himself to seem indifferent. As he glanced over it he +threw off some perfunctory allusion to the crisis--the political--which +enabled Longmore to reply with perfect veracity that, with other things +to think about, he had had no attention to spare for it. And yet our +hero was in truth far from secure against rueful reflexion. The Count's +ruffled state was a comfort so far as it pointed to the possibility that +the lady in the coupe might be proving too many for him; but it +ministered to no vindictive sweetness for Longmore so far as it should +perhaps represent rising jealousy. It passed through his mind that +jealousy is a passion with a double face and that on one of its sides it +may sometimes almost look generous. It glimmered upon him odiously M. de +Mauves might grow ashamed of his political compact with his wife, and he +felt how far more tolerable it would be in future to think of him as +always impertinent than to think of him as occasionally contrite. The +two men pretended meanwhile for half an hour to outsit each other +conveniently; and the end--at that rate--might have been distant had not +the tension in some degree yielded to the arrival of a friend of M. de +Mauves--a tall pale consumptive-looking dandy who filled the air with +the odour of heliotrope. He looked up and down the boulevard wearily, +examined the Count's garments in some detail, then appeared to refer +restlessly to his own, and at last announced resignedly that the Duchess +was in town. M. de Mauves must come with him to call; she had abused him +dreadfully a couple of evenings before--a sure sign she wanted to see +him. "I depend on you," said with an infantine drawl this specimen of an +order Longmore felt he had never had occasion so intimately to +appreciate, "to put her en train." + +M. de Mauves resisted, he protested that he was d'une humeur +massacrante; but at last he allowed himself to be drawn to his feet and +stood looking awkwardly--awkwardly for M. de Mauves--at Longmore. +"You'll excuse me," he appeared to find some difficulty in saying; "you +too probably have occupation for the evening?" + +"None but to catch my train." And our friend looked at his watch. + +"Ah you go back to Saint-Germain?" + +"In half an hour." + +M. de Mauves seemed on the point of disengaging himself from his +companion's arm, which was locked in his own; but on the latter's +uttering some persuasive murmur he lifted his hat stiffly and turned +away. + +Longmore the next day wandered off to the terrace to try and beguile the +restlessness with which he waited for the evening; he wished to see +Madame de Mauves for the last time at the hour of long shadows and pale +reflected amber lights, as he had almost always seen her. Destiny, +however, took no account of this humble plea for poetic justice; it was +appointed him to meet her seated by the great walk under a tree and +alone. The hour made the place almost empty; the day was warm, but as he +took his place beside her a light breeze stirred the leafy edges of +their broad circle of shadow. She looked at him almost with no pretence +of not having believed herself already rid of him, and he at once told +her that he should leave Saint-Germain that evening, but must first bid +her farewell. Her face lighted a moment, he fancied, as he spoke; but +she said nothing, only turning it off to far Paris which lay twinkling +and flashing through hot exhalations. "I've a request to make of you," +he added. "That you think of me as a man who has felt much and claimed +little." + +She drew a long breath which almost suggested pain. "I can't think of +you as unhappy. That's impossible. You've a life to lead, you've duties, +talents, inspirations, interests. I shall hear of your career. And +then," she pursued after a pause, though as if it had before this quite +been settled between them, "one can't be unhappy through having a better +opinion of a friend instead of a worse." + +For a moment he failed to understand her. "Do you mean that there can be +varying degrees in my opinion of you?" + +She rose and pushed away her chair. "I mean," she said quickly, "that +it's better to have done nothing in bitterness--nothing in passion." And +she began to walk. + +Longmore followed her without answering at first. But he took off his +hat and with his pocket-handkerchief wiped his forehead. "Where shall +you go? what shall you do?" he simply asked at last. + +"Do? I shall do as I've always done--except perhaps that I shall go for +a while to my husband's old home." + +"I shall go to MY old one. I've done with Europe for the present," the +young man added. + +She glanced at him as he walked beside her, after he had spoken these +words, and then bent her eyes for a long time on the ground. But +suddenly, as if aware of her going too far she stopped and put out her +hand. "Good-bye. May you have all the happiness you deserve!" + +He took her hand with his eyes on her, but something was at work in him +that made it impossible to deal in the easy way with her touch. +Something of infinite value was floating past him, and he had taken an +oath, with which any such case interfered, not to raise a finger to stop +it. It was borne by the strong current of the world's great life and not +of his own small one. Madame de Mauves disengaged herself, gathered in +her long scarf and smiled at him almost as you would do at a child you +should wish to encourage. Several moments later he was still there +watching her leave him and leave him. When she was out of sight he shook +himself, walked at once back to his hotel and, without waiting for the +evening train, paid his bill and departed. + +Later in the day M. de Mauves came into his wife's drawing-room, where +she sat waiting to be summoned to dinner. He had dressed as he usually +didn't dress for dining at home. He walked up and down for some moments +in silence, then rang the bell for a servant and went out into the hall +to meet him. He ordered the carriage to take him to the station, paused +a moment with his hand on the knob of the door, dismissed the servant +angrily as the latter lingered observing him, re-entered the drawing- +room, resumed his restless walk and at last stopped abruptly before his +wife, who had taken up a book. "May I ask the favour," he said with +evident effort, in spite of a forced smile as of allusion to a large +past exercise of the very best taste, "of having a question answered?" + +"It's a favour I never refused," she replied. + +"Very true. Do you expect this evening a visit from Mr. Longmore?" + +"Mr. Longmore," said his wife, "has left Saint-Germain." M. de Mauves +waited, but his smile expired. "Mr. Longmore," his wife continued, "has +gone to America." + +M. de Mauves took it--a rare thing for him--with confessed, if +momentary, intellectual indigence. But he raised, as it were, the wind. +"Has anything happened?" he asked, "Had he a sudden call?" But his +question received no answer. At the same moment the servant threw open +the door and announced dinner; Madame Clairin rustled in, rubbing her +white hands, Madame de Mauves passed silently into the dining-room, but +he remained outside--outside of more things, clearly, than his mere +salle-a-manger. Before long he went forth to the terrace and continued +his uneasy walk. At the end of a quarter of an hour the servant came to +let him know that his carriage was at the door. "Send it away," he said +without hesitation. "I shan't use it." When the ladies had half-finished +dinner he returned and joined them, with a formal apology to his wife +for his inconsequence. + +The dishes were brought back, but he hardly tasted them; he drank on the +other hand more wine than usual. There was little talk, scarcely a +convivial sound save the occasional expressive appreciative "M-m-m!" of +Madame Clairin over the succulence of some dish. Twice this lady saw her +brother's eyes, fixed on her own over his wineglass, put to her a +question she knew she should have to irritate him later on by not being +able to answer. She replied, for the present at least, by an elevation +of the eyebrows that resembled even to her own humour the vain raising +of an umbrella in anticipation of a storm. M. de Mauves was left alone +to finish his wine; he sat over it for more than an hour and let the +darkness gather about him. At last the servant came in with a letter and +lighted a candle. The letter was a telegram, which M. de Mauves, when he +had read it, burnt at the candle. After five minutes' meditation he +wrote a message on the back of a visiting-card and gave it to the +servant to carry to the office. The man knew quite as much as his master +suspected about the lady to whom the telegram was addressed; but its +contents puzzled him; they consisted of the single word "Impossible." As +the evening passed without her brother's reappearing in the drawing-room +Madame Clairin came to him where he sat by his solitary candle. He took +no notice of her presence for some time, but this affected her as +unexpected indulgence. At last, however, he spoke with a particular +harshness. "Ce jeune mufle has gone home at an hour's notice. What the +devil does it mean?" + +Madame Clairin now felt thankful for her umbrella. "It means that I've a +sister-in-law whom I've not the honour to understand." + +He said nothing more and silently allowed her, after a little, to +depart. It had been her duty to provide him with an explanation, and he +was disgusted with her blankness; but she was--if there was no more to +come--getting off easily. When she had gone he went into the garden and +walked up and down with his cigar. He saw his wife seated alone on the +terrace, but remained below, wandering, turning, pausing, lingering. He +remained a long time. It grew late and Madame de Mauves disappeared. +Toward midnight he dropped upon a bench, tired, with a long vague +exhalation of unrest. It was sinking into his spirit that he too didn't +understand Madame Clairin's sister-in-law. + +Longmore was obliged to wait a week in London for a ship. It was very +hot, and he went out one day to Richmond. In the garden of the hotel at +which he dined he met his friend Mrs. Draper, who was staying there. She +made eager enquiry about Madame de Mauves; but Longmore at first, as +they sat looking out at the famous view of the Thames, parried her +questions and confined himself to other topics. At last she said she was +afraid he had something to conceal; whereupon, after a pause, he asked +her if she remembered recommending him, in the letter she had addressed +him at Saint-Germain, to draw the sadness from her friend's smile. "The +last I saw of her was her smile," he said--"when I bade her good-bye." + +"I remember urging you to 'console' her," Mrs. Draper returned, "and I +wondered afterwards whether--model of discretion as you are--I hadn't +cut you out work for which you wouldn't thank me." + +"She has her consolation in herself," the young man said; "she needs +none that any one else can offer her. That's for troubles for which--be +it more, be it less--our own folly has to answer. Madame de Mauves +hasn't a grain of folly left." + +"Ah don't say that!"--Mrs. Draper knowingly protested. "Just a little +folly's often very graceful." + +Longmore rose to go--she somehow annoyed him. "Don't talk of grace," he +said, "till you've measured her reason!" + +For two years after his return to America he heard nothing of Madame de +Mauves. That he thought of her intently, constantly, I need hardly say; +most people wondered why such a clever young man shouldn't "devote" +himself to something; but to himself he seemed absorbingly occupied. He +never wrote to her; he believed she wouldn't have "liked" it. At last he +heard that Mrs. Draper had come home and he immediately called on her. +"Of course," she said after the first greetings, "you're dying for news +of Madame de Mauves. Prepare yourself for something strange. I heard +from her two or three times during the year after your seeing her. She +left Saint-Germain and went to live in the country on some old property +of her husband's. She wrote me very kind little notes, but I felt +somehow that--in spite of what you said about 'consolation'--they were +the notes of a wretched woman. The only advice I could have given her +was to leave her scamp of a husband and come back to her own land and +her own people. But this I didn't feel free to do, and yet it made me so +miserable not to be able to help her that I preferred to let our +correspondence die a natural death. I had no news of her for a year. +Last summer, however, I met at Vichy a clever young Frenchman whom I +accidentally learned to be a friend of that charming sister of the +Count's, Madame Clairin. I lost no time in asking him what he knew about +Madame de Mauves--a countrywoman of mine and an old friend. 'I +congratulate you on the friendship of such a person,' he answered. +'That's the terrible little woman who killed her husband.' You may +imagine I promptly asked for an explanation, and he told me--from his +point of view--what he called the whole story. M. de Mauves had fait +quelques folies which his wife had taken absurdly to heart. He had +repented and asked her forgiveness, which she had inexorably refused. +She was very pretty, and severity must have suited her style; for, +whether or no her husband had been in love with her before, he fell +madly in love with her now. He was the proudest man in France, but he +had begged her on his knees to be re-admitted to favour. All in vain! +She was stone, she was ice, she was outraged virtue. People noticed a +great change in him; he gave up society, ceased to care for anything, +looked shockingly. One fine day they discovered he had blown out his +brains. My friend had the story of course from Madame Clairin." + +Longmore was strongly moved, and his first impulse after he had +recovered his composure was to return immediately to Europe. But several +years have passed, and he still lingers at home. The truth is that, in +the midst of all the ardent tenderness of his memory of Madame de +Mauves, he has become conscious of a singular feeling--a feeling of +wonder, of uncertainty, of awe. + + + + + +End of the Project Gutenberg EBook of Madame de Mauves, by Henry James + +*** END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK MADAME DE MAUVES *** + +This file should be named mauve10.txt or mauve10.zip +Corrected EDITIONS of our eBooks get a new NUMBER, mauve11.txt +VERSIONS based on separate sources get new LETTER, mauve10a.txt + +Produced by Eve Sobol + +Project Gutenberg eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the US +unless a copyright notice is included. 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