“Oh! if I marry him, he will be so happy!”
“Happy? — He does not love you. Besides, you have no great fortune to give him. Your mother detests you; you made her a fierce reply which rankles, and which will be your ruin. When she told you yesterday that obedience was the only way to repair your errors, and reminded you of the need for marrying, mentioning Amedee — ’If you are so fond of him, marry him yourself, mother!’ — Did you, or did you not, fling these words in her teeth?”
“Yes,” said Rosalie.
“Well, I know her,” Monsieur de Grancey went on. “In a few months she will be Comtesse de Soulas! She will be sure to have children; she will give Monsieur de Soulas forty thousand francs a year; she will benefit him in other ways, and reduce your share of her fortune as much as possible. You will be poor as long as she lives, and she is but eight-and-thirty! Your whole estate will be the land of les Rouxey, and the small share left to you after your father’s legal debts are settled, if, indeed, your mother should consent to forego her claims on les Rouxey. From the point of view of material advantages, you have done badly for yourself; from the point of view of feeling, I imagine you have wrecked your life. Instead of going to your mother — ” Rosalie shook her head fiercely.
“To your mother,” the priest went on, “and to religion, where you would, at the first impulse of your heart, have found enlightenment, counsel, and guidance, you chose to act in your own way, knowing nothing of life, and listening only to passion!”
These words of wisdom terrified Mademoiselle de Watteville.
“And what ought I to do now?” she asked after a pause.
“To repair your wrong-doing, you must ascertain its extent,” said the Abbe.
“Well, I will write to the only man who can know anything of Albert’s fate, Monsieur Leopold Hannequin, a notary in Paris, his friend since childhood.”
“Write no more, unless to do honor to truth,” said the Vicar-General. “Place the real and the false letters in my hands, confess everything in detail as though I were the keeper of your conscience, asking me how you may expiate your sins, and doing as I bid you. I shall see — for, above all things, restore this unfortunate man to his innocence in the eyes of the woman he had made his divinity on earth. Though he has lost his happiness, Albert must still hope for justification.”
Rosalie promised to obey the Abbe, hoping that the steps he might take would perhaps end in bringing Albert back to her.
Not long after Mademoiselle de Watteville’s confession a clerk came to Besancon from Monsieur Leopold Hannequin, armed with a power of attorney from Albert; he called first on Monsieur Girardet, begging his assistance in selling the house belonging to Monsieur Savaron. The attorney undertook to do this out of friendship for Albert. The clerk from Paris sold the furniture, and with the proceeds could repay some money owed by Savaron to Girardet, who on the occasion of his inexplicable departure had lent him five thousand francs while undertaking to collect his assets. When Girardet asked what had become of the handsome and noble pleader, to whom he had been so much attached, the clerk replied that no one knew but his master, and that the notary had seemed greatly distressed by the contents of the last letter he had received from Monsieur Albert de Savarus.
On hearing this, the Vicar-General wrote to Leopold. This was the worthy notary’s reply: —
“To Monsieur l’Abbe de Grancey,
Vicar-General of the Diocese of Besancon.
“PARIS.
“Alas, monsieur, it is in nobody’s power to restore Albert to the
life of the world; he has renounced it. He is a novice in the
monastery of the Grand Chartreuse near Grenoble. You know, better
than I who have but just learned it, that on the threshold of that
cloister everything dies. Albert, foreseeing that I should go to
him, placed the General of the Order between my utmost efforts and
himself. I know his noble soul well enough to be sure that he is
the victim of some odious plot unknown to us; but everything is at
an end. The Duchesse d’Argaiolo, now Duchesse de Rhetore, seems to
me to have carried severity to an extreme. At Belgirate, which she
had left when Albert flew thither, she had left instructions
leading him to believe that she was living in London. From London
Albert went in search of her to Naples, and from Naples to Rome,
where she was now engaged to the Duc de Rhetore. When Albert
succeeded in seeing Madame d’Argaiolo, at Florence, it was at the
ceremony of her marriage.
“Our poor friend swooned in the church, and even when he was in
danger of death he could never obtain any explanation from this
woman, who must have had I know not what in her heart. For seven
months Albert had traveled in pursuit of a cruel creature who
thought it sport to escape him; he knew not where or how to catch
her.
“I saw him on his way through Paris; and if you had seen him, as I
did, you would have felt that not a word might be spoken about the
Duchess, at the risk of bringing on an attack which might have
wrecked his reason. If he had known what his crime was, he might
have found means to justify himself; but being falsely accused of
being married! — what could he do? Albert is dead, quite dead to
the world. He longed for rest; let us hope that the deep silence
and prayer into which he has thrown himself may give him happiness
in another guise. You, monsieur, who have known him, must greatly
pity him; and pity his friends also.
“Yours, etc.”
As soon as he received this letter the good Vicar-General wrote to the General of the Carthusian order, and this was the letter he received from Albert Savarus: —
“Brother Albert to Monsieur l’Abbe de Grancey,
Vicar-General of the Diocese of Besancon.
“LA GRANDE CHARTREUSE.
“I recognized your tender soul, dear and well-beloved
Vicar-General, and your still youthful heart, in all that the
Reverend Father General of our Order has just told me. You have
understood the only wish that lurks in the depths of my heart so far
as the things of the world are concerned — to get justice done to my
feelings by her who has treated me so badly! But before leaving me
at liberty to avail myself of your offer, the General wanted to
know that my vocation was sincere; he was so kind as to tell me
his idea, on finding that I was determined to preserve absolute
silence on this point. If I had yielded to the temptation to
rehabilitate the man of the world, the friar would have been
rejected by this monastery. Grace has certainly done her work,
but, though short, the struggle was not the less keen or the less
painful. Is not this enough to show you that I could never return
to the world?
“Hence my forgiveness, which you ask for the author of so much
woe, is entire and without a thought of vindictiveness. I will
pray to God to forgive that young lady as I forgive her, and as I
shall beseech Him to give Madame de Rhetore a life of happiness.
Ah! whether it be death, or the obstinate hand of a young girl
madly bent on being loved, or one of the blows ascribed to chance,
must we not all obey God? Sorrow in some souls makes a vast void
through which the Divine Voice rings. I learned too late the
bearings of this life on that which awaits us; all in me is worn
out; I could not serve in the ranks of the Church Militant, and I
lay the remains of an almost extinct life at the foot of the<
br />
altar.
“This is the last time I shall ever write. You alone, who loved
me, and whom I loved so well, could make me break the law of
oblivion I imposed on myself when I entered these headquarters of
Saint Bruno, but you are always especially named in the prayers of
“BROTHER ALBERT.
“November 1836.”
“Everything is for the best perhaps,” thought the Abbe de Grancey.
When he showed this letter to Rosalie, who, with a pious impulse, kissed the lines which contained her forgiveness, he said to her:
“Well, now that he is lost to you, will you not be reconciled to your mother and marry the Comte de Soulas?”
“Only if Albert should order it,” said she.
“But you see it is impossible to consult him. The General of the Order would not allow it.”
“If I were to go to see him?”
“No Carthusian sees any visitor. Besides, no woman but the Queen of France may enter a Carthusian monastery,” said the Abbe. “So you have no longer any excuse for not marrying young Monsieur de Soulas.”
“I do not wish to destroy my mother’s happiness,” retorted Rosalie.
“Satan!” exclaimed the Vicar-General.
Towards the end of that winter the worthy Abbe de Grancey died. This good friend no longer stood between Madame de Watteville and her daughter, to soften the impact of those two iron wills.
The event he had foretold took place. In the month of August 1837 Madame de Watteville was married to Monsieur de Soulas in Paris, whither she went by Rosalie’s advice, the girl making a show of kindness and sweetness to her mother. Madame de Watteville believed in this affection on the part of her daughter, who simply desired to go to Paris to give herself the luxury of a bitter revenge; she thought of nothing but avenging Savarus by torturing her rival.
Mademoiselle de Watteville had been declared legally of age; she was, in fact, not far from one-and-twenty. Her mother, to settle with her finally, had resigned her claims on les Rouxey, and the daughter had signed a release for all the inheritance of the Baron de Watteville. Rosalie encouraged her mother to marry the Comte de Soulas and settle all her own fortune on him.
“Let us each be perfectly free,” she said.
Madame de Soulas, who had been uneasy as to her daughter’s intentions, was touched by this liberality, and made her a present of six thousand francs a year in the funds as conscience money. As the Comtesse de Soulas had an income of forty-eight thousand francs from her own lands, and was quite incapable of alienating them in order to diminish Rosalie’s share, Mademoiselle de Watteville was still a fortune to marry, of eighteen hundred thousand francs; les Rouxey, with the Baron’s additions, and certain improvements, might yield twenty thousand francs a year, besides the value of the house, rents, and preserves. So Rosalie and her mother, who soon adopted the Paris style and fashions, easily obtained introductions to the best society. The golden key — eighteen hundred thousand francs — embroidered on Mademoiselle de Watteville’s stomacher, did more for the Comtesse de Soulas than her pretensions a la de Rupt, her inappropriate pride, or even her rather distant great connections.
In the month of February 1838 Rosalie, who was eagerly courted by many young men, achieved the purpose which had brought her to Paris. This was to meet the Duchesse de Rhetore, to see this wonderful woman, and to overwhelm her with perennial remorse. Rosalie gave herself up to the most bewildering elegance and vanities in order to face the Duchess on an equal footing.
They first met at a ball given annually after 1830 for the benefit of the pensioners on the old Civil List. A young man, prompted by Rosalie, pointed her out to the Duchess, saying:
“There is a very remarkable young person, a strong-minded young lady too! She drove a clever man into a monastery — the Grand Chartreuse — a man of immense capabilities, Albert de Savarus, whose career she wrecked. She is Mademoiselle de Watteville, the famous Besancon heiress — — ”
The Duchess turned pale. Rosalie’s eyes met hers with one of those flashes which, between woman and woman, are more fatal than the pistol shots of a duel. Francesca Soderini, who had suspected that Albert might be innocent, hastily quitted the ballroom, leaving the speaker at his wits’ end to guess what terrible blow he had inflicted on the beautiful Duchesse de Rhetore.
“If you want to hear more about Albert, come to the Opera ball on Tuesday with a marigold in your hand.”
This anonymous note, sent by Rosalie to the Duchess, brought the unhappy Italian to the ball, where Mademoiselle de Watteville placed in her hand all Albert’s letters, with that written to Leopold Hannequin by the Vicar-General, and the notary’s reply, and even that in which she had written her confession to the Abbe de Grancey.
“I do not choose to be the only sufferer,” she said to her rival, “for one has been as ruthless as the other.”
After enjoying the dismay stamped on the Duchess’ beautiful face, Rosalie went away; she went out no more, and returned to Besancon with her mother.
Mademoiselle de Watteville, who lived alone on her estate of les Rouxey, riding, hunting, refusing two or three offers a year, going to Besancon four or five times in the course of the winter, and busying herself with improving her land, was regarded as a very eccentric personage. She was one of the celebrities of the Eastern provinces.
Madame de Soulas has two children, a boy and a girl, and she has grown younger; but Monsieur de Soulas has aged a good deal.
“My fortune has cost me dear,” said he to young Chavoncourt. “Really to know a bigot it is unfortunately necessary to marry her!”
Mademoiselle de Watteville behaves in the most extraordinary manner. “She has vagaries,” people say. Every year she goes to gaze at the walls of the Grande Chartreuse. Perhaps she dreams of imitating her grand-uncle by forcing the walls of the monastery to find a husband, as Watteville broke through those of his monastery to recover his liberty.
She left Besancon in 1841, intending, it was said, to get married; but the real reason of this expedition is still unknown, for she returned home in a state which forbids her ever appearing in society again. By one of those chances of which the Abbe de Grancey had spoken, she happened to be on the Loire in a steamboat of which the boiler burst. Mademoiselle de Watteville was so severely injured that she lost her right arm and her left leg; her face is marked with fearful scars, which have bereft her of her beauty; her health, cruelly upset, leaves her few days free from suffering. In short, she now never leaves the Chartreuse of les Rouxey, where she leads a life wholly devoted to religious practices.
PARIS, May 1842.
VENDETTA
Translated by Katharine Prescott Wormeley
La Vendetta was first published in 1830 by Mame et Delaunay-Vallée. It is believed by many that Balzac was inspired to write La Vendetta by Prosper Merimée’s novel Mateo Falcone, which was serialised by the Revue de Paris in 1829 and also deals with the subject of Corsican vengeance and family honour.
The novella concerns the tragic fate of Ginevra Piombo, the daughter of proud Corsican immigrants, who has the misfortune of falling in love with another Corsican, Luigi Porta. When it becomes known that Luigi is the sole survivor of a massacre in which the rest of his family were the victims of a vendetta with Ginevra’s family, Ginevra’s father Bartolomeo is determined to complete the act of vengeance by having him killed.
Prosper Mérimée (1803-1870) was a French dramatist, historian, archaeologist, and short story writer. He wrote the novella Carmen, which became the basis of Bizet’s famous opera, and he was a likely source of inspiration to Balzac.
CONTENTS
CHAPTER I. PROLOGUE
CHAPTER II. THE STUDIO
CHAPTER III. LABEDOYERE’S FRIEND
CHAPTER IV. LOVE
CHAPTER V. MARRIAGE
CHAPTER VI. RETRIBUTION
DEDICATION
To Puttinati, Milanese Sculptor.
CH
APTER I. PROLOGUE
In the year 1800, toward the close of October, a foreigner, accompanied by a woman and a little girl, was standing for a long time in front of the palace of the Tuileries, near the ruins of a house recently pulled down, at the point where in our day the wing begins which was intended to unite the chateau of Catherine de Medici with the Louvre of the Valois.
The man stood there with folded arms and a bowed head, which he sometimes raised to look alternately at the consular palace and at his wife, who was sitting near him on a stone. Though the woman seemed wholly occupied with the little girl of nine or ten years of age, whose long black hair she amused herself by handling, she lost not a single glance of those her companion cast on her. Some sentiment other than love united these two beings, and inspired with mutual anxiety their movements and their thoughts. Misery is, perhaps, the most powerful of all ties.
The stranger had one of those broad, serious heads, covered with thick hair, which we see so frequently in the pictures of the Caracci. The jet black of the hair was streaked with white. Though noble and proud, his features had a hardness which spoiled them. In spite of his evident strength, and his straight, erect figure, he looked to be over sixty years of age. His dilapidated clothes were those of a foreign country. Though the faded and once beautiful face of the wife betrayed the deepest sadness, she forced herself to smile, assuming a calm countenance whenever her husband looked at her.
The little girl was standing, though signs of weariness were on the youthful face, which was tanned by the sun. She had an Italian cast of countenance and bearing, large black eyes beneath their well arched brows, a native nobleness, and candid grace. More than one of those who passed them felt strongly moved by the mere aspect of this group, who made no effort to conceal a despair which seemed as deep as the expression of it was simple. But the flow of this fugitive sympathy, characteristic of Parisians, was dried immediately; for as soon as the stranger saw himself the object of attention, he looked at his observer with so savage an air that the boldest lounger hurried his step as though he had trod upon a serpent.
Works of Honore De Balzac Page 103