by Henry James
CHAPTER XIX
Newman possessed a remarkable talent for sitting still when it wasnecessary, and he had an opportunity to use it on his journey toSwitzerland. The successive hours of the night brought him no sleep, buthe sat motionless in his corner of the railway-carriage, with his eyesclosed, and the most observant of his fellow-travelers might have enviedhim his apparent slumber. Toward morning slumber really came, as aneffect of mental rather than of physical fatigue. He slept for a coupleof hours, and at last, waking, found his eyes resting upon one of thesnow-powdered peaks of the Jura, behind which the sky was just reddeningwith the dawn. But he saw neither the cold mountain nor the warm sky;his consciousness began to throb again, on the very instant, with asense of his wrong. He got out of the train half an hour before itreached Geneva, in the cold morning twilight, at the station indicatedin Valentin’s telegram. A drowsy station-master was on the platformwith a lantern, and the hood of his overcoat over his head, and near himstood a gentleman who advanced to meet Newman. This personage was a manof forty, with a tall lean figure, a sallow face, a dark eye, a neatmoustache, and a pair of fresh gloves. He took off his hat, looking verygrave, and pronounced Newman’s name. Our hero assented and said, “Youare M. de Bellegarde’s friend?”
“I unite with you in claiming that sad honor,” said the gentleman.“I had placed myself at M. de Bellegarde’s service in this melancholyaffair, together with M. de Grosjoyaux, who is now at his bedside. M. deGrosjoyaux, I believe, has had the honor of meeting you in Paris, but ashe is a better nurse than I he remained with our poor friend. Bellegardehas been eagerly expecting you.”
“And how is Bellegarde?” said Newman. “He was badly hit?”
“The doctor has condemned him; we brought a surgeon with us. But hewill die in the best sentiments. I sent last evening for the curé of thenearest French village, who spent an hour with him. The curé was quitesatisfied.”
“Heaven forgive us!” groaned Newman. “I would rather the doctor weresatisfied! And can he see me--shall he know me?”
“When I left him, half an hour ago, he had fallen asleep after afeverish, wakeful night. But we shall see.” And Newman’s companionproceeded to lead the way out of the station to the village, explainingas he went that the little party was lodged in the humblest of Swissinns, where, however, they had succeeded in making M. de Bellegarde muchmore comfortable than could at first have been expected. “We are oldcompanions in arms,” said Valentin’s second; “it is not the first timethat one of us has helped the other to lie easily. It is a very nastywound, and the nastiest thing about it is that Bellegarde’s adversarywas not shot. He put his bullet where he could. It took it into its headto walk straight into Bellegarde’s left side, just below the heart.”
As they picked their way in the gray, deceptive dawn, between themanure-heaps of the village street, Newman’s new acquaintance narratedthe particulars of the duel. The conditions of the meeting had been thatif the first exchange of shots should fail to satisfy one of the twogentlemen, a second should take place. Valentin’s first bullet had doneexactly what Newman’s companion was convinced he had intended it to do;it had grazed the arm of M. Stanislas Kapp, just scratching the flesh.M. Kapp’s own projectile, meanwhile, had passed at ten good inches fromthe person of Valentin. The representatives of M. Stanislas had demandedanother shot, which was granted. Valentin had then fired aside and theyoung Alsatian had done effective execution. “I saw, when we met himon the ground,” said Newman’s informant, “that he was not going to be_commode_. It is a kind of bovine temperament.” Valentin had immediatelybeen installed at the inn, and M. Stanislas and his friends hadwithdrawn to regions unknown. The police authorities of the canton hadwaited upon the party at the inn, had been extremely majestic, and haddrawn up a long _procès-verbal_; but it was probable that they wouldwink at so very gentlemanly a bit of bloodshed. Newman asked whether amessage had not been sent to Valentin’s family, and learned that up toa late hour on the preceding evening Valentin had opposed it. He hadrefused to believe his wound was dangerous. But after his interview withthe curé he had consented, and a telegram had been dispatched to hismother. “But the marquise had better hurry!” said Newman’s conductor.
“Well, it’s an abominable affair!” said Newman. “That’s all I haveto say!” To say this, at least, in a tone of infinite disgust was anirresistible need.
“Ah, you don’t approve?” questioned his conductor, with curiousurbanity.
“Approve?” cried Newman. “I wish that when I had him there, night beforelast, I had locked him up in my _cabinet de toilette!_”
Valentin’s late second opened his eyes, and shook his head up and downtwo or three times, gravely, with a little flute-like whistle. But theyhad reached the inn, and a stout maid-servant in a night-cap was at thedoor with a lantern, to take Newman’s traveling-bag from the porter whotrudged behind him. Valentin was lodged on the ground-floor at the backof the house, and Newman’s companion went along a stone-faced passageand softly opened a door. Then he beckoned to Newman, who advancedand looked into the room, which was lighted by a single shaded candle.Beside the fire sat M. de Grosjoyaux asleep in his dressing-gown--alittle plump, fair man whom Newman had seen several times in Valentin’scompany. On the bed lay Valentin, pale and still, with his eyesclosed--a figure very shocking to Newman, who had seen it hitherto awaketo its fingertips. M. de Grosjoyaux’s colleague pointed to an open doorbeyond, and whispered that the doctor was within, keeping guard. Solong as Valentin slept, or seemed to sleep, of course Newman could notapproach him; so our hero withdrew for the present, committinghimself to the care of the half-waked _bonne_. She took him to a roomabove-stairs, and introduced him to a bed on which a magnified bolster,in yellow calico, figured as a counterpane. Newman lay down, and, inspite of his counterpane, slept for three or four hours. When he awoke,the morning was advanced and the sun was filling his window, and heheard, outside of it, the clucking of hens. While he was dressing therecame to his door a messenger from M. de Grosjoyaux and his companionproposing that he should breakfast with them. Presently he wentdownstairs to the little stone-paved dining-room, where themaid-servant, who had taken off her night-cap, was serving the repast.M. de Grosjoyaux was there, surprisingly fresh for a gentleman who hadbeen playing sick-nurse half the night, rubbing his hands and watchingthe breakfast table attentively. Newman renewed acquaintance with him,and learned that Valentin was still sleeping; the surgeon, who had hada fairly tranquil night, was at present sitting with him. Before M. deGrosjoyaux’s associate reappeared, Newman learned that his name was M.Ledoux, and that Bellegarde’s acquaintance with him dated from the dayswhen they served together in the Pontifical Zouaves. M. Ledoux was thenephew of a distinguished Ultramontane bishop. At last the bishop’snephew came in with a toilet in which an ingenious attempt at harmonywith the peculiar situation was visible, and with a gravity tempered bya decent deference to the best breakfast that the Croix Helvétiquehad ever set forth. Valentin’s servant, who was allowed only in scantymeasure the honor of watching with his master, had been lending a lightParisian hand in the kitchen. The two Frenchmen did their best to provethat if circumstances might overshadow, they could not really obscure,the national talent for conversation, and M. Ledoux delivered a neatlittle eulogy on poor Bellegarde, whom he pronounced the most charmingEnglishman he had ever known.
“Do you call him an Englishman?” Newman asked.
M. Ledoux smiled a moment and then made an epigram. _“C’est plus qu’unAnglais--c’est un Anglomane!”_ Newman said soberly that he had nevernoticed it; and M. de Grosjoyaux remarked that it was really too soonto deliver a funeral oration upon poor Bellegarde. “Evidently,” said M.Ledoux. “But I couldn’t help observing this morning to Mr. Newman thatwhen a man has taken such excellent measures for his salvation as ourdear friend did last evening, it seems almost a pity he should put it inperil again by returning to the world.” M. Ledoux was a great Catholic,and Newman thought him a queer mixture. His countenance,
by daylight,had a sort of amiably saturnine cast; he had a very large thin nose,and looked like a Spanish picture. He appeared to think dueling a veryperfect arrangement, provided, if one should get hit, one could promptlysee the priest. He seemed to take a great satisfaction in Valentin’sinterview with the curé, and yet his conversation did not at allindicate a sanctimonious habit of mind. M. Ledoux had evidently a highsense of the becoming, and was prepared to be urbane and tasteful on allpoints. He was always furnished with a smile (which pushed his moustacheup under his nose) and an explanation. _Savoir-vivre_--knowing how tolive--was his specialty, in which he included knowing how to die; but,as Newman reflected, with a good deal of dumb irritation, he seemeddisposed to delegate to others the application of his learning on thislatter point. M. de Grosjoyaux was of quite another complexion, andappeared to regard his friend’s theological unction as the sign of aninaccessibly superior mind. He was evidently doing his utmost, with akind of jovial tenderness, to make life agreeable to Valentin to thelast, and help him as little as possible to miss the Boulevard desItaliens; but what chiefly occupied his mind was the mystery of abungling brewer’s son making so neat a shot. He himself could snuff acandle, etc., and yet he confessed that he could not have done betterthan this. He hastened to add that on the present occasion he would havemade a point of not doing so well. It was not an occasion for that sortof murderous work, _que diable!_ He would have picked out some quietfleshy spot and just tapped it with a harmless ball. M. Stanislas Kapphad been deplorably heavy-handed; but really, when the world had come tothat pass that one granted a meeting to a brewer’s son!... This was M.de Grosjoyaux’s nearest approach to a generalization. He kept lookingthrough the window, over the shoulder of M. Ledoux, at a slender treewhich stood at the end of a lane, opposite to the inn, and seemed to bemeasuring its distance from his extended arm and secretly wishing that,since the subject had been introduced, propriety did not forbid a littlespeculative pistol-practice.
Newman was in no humor to enjoy good company. He could neither eat nortalk; his soul was sore with grief and anger, and the weight of hisdouble sorrow was intolerable. He sat with his eyes fixed upon hisplate, counting the minutes, wishing at one moment that Valentin wouldsee him and leave him free to go in quest of Madame de Cintré and hislost happiness, and mentally calling himself a vile brute the next, forthe impatient egotism of the wish. He was very poor company, himself,and even his acute preoccupation and his general lack of the habit ofpondering the impression he produced did not prevent him from reflectingthat his companions must be puzzled to see how poor Bellegarde came totake such a fancy to this taciturn Yankee that he must needs have him athis death-bed. After breakfast he strolled forth alone into the villageand looked at the fountain, the geese, the open barn doors, the brown,bent old women, showing their hugely darned stocking-heels at the endsof their slowly-clicking sabots, and the beautiful view of snowyAlps and purple Jura at either end of the little street. The day wasbrilliant; early spring was in the air and in the sunshine, and thewinter’s damp was trickling out of the cottage eaves. It was birthand brightness for all nature, even for chirping chickens and waddlinggoslings, and it was to be death and burial for poor, foolish, generous,delightful Bellegarde. Newman walked as far as the village church, andwent into the small graveyard beside it, where he sat down and looked atthe awkward tablets which were planted around. They were all sordid andhideous, and Newman could feel nothing but the hardness and coldnessof death. He got up and came back to the inn, where he found M. Ledouxhaving coffee and a cigarette at a little green table which he hadcaused to be carried into the small garden. Newman, learning that thedoctor was still sitting with Valentin, asked M. Ledoux if he might notbe allowed to relieve him; he had a great desire to be useful to hispoor friend. This was easily arranged; the doctor was very glad to goto bed. He was a youthful and rather jaunty practitioner, but he had aclever face, and the ribbon of the Legion of Honor in his buttonhole;Newman listened attentively to the instructions he gave him beforeretiring, and took mechanically from his hand a small volume which thesurgeon recommended as a help to wakefulness, and which turned out to bean old copy of “Les Liaisons Dangereuses.”
Valentin was still lying with his eyes closed, and there was no visiblechange in his condition. Newman sat down near him, and for a long timenarrowly watched him. Then his eyes wandered away with his thoughts uponhis own situation, and rested upon the chain of the Alps, disclosed bythe drawing of the scant white cotton curtain of the window, throughwhich the sunshine passed and lay in squares upon the red-tiled floor.He tried to interweave his reflections with hope, but he only halfsucceeded. What had happened to him seemed to have, in its violence andaudacity, the force of a real calamity--the strength and insolence ofDestiny herself. It was unnatural and monstrous, and he had no armsagainst it. At last a sound struck upon the stillness, and he heardValentin’s voice.
“It can’t be about _me_ you are pulling that long face!” He found, whenhe turned, that Valentin was lying in the same position but his eyeswere open, and he was even trying to smile. It was with a very slenderstrength that he returned the pressure of Newman’s hand. “I have beenwatching you for a quarter of an hour,” Valentin went on “you have beenlooking as black as thunder. You are greatly disgusted with me, I see.Well, of course! So am I!”
“Oh, I shall not scold you,” said Newman. “I feel too badly. And how areyou getting on?”
“Oh, I’m getting off! They have quite settled that; haven’t they?”
“That’s for you to settle; you can get well if you try,” said Newman,with resolute cheerfulness.
“My dear fellow, how can I try? Trying is violent exercise, and thatsort of thing isn’t in order for a man with a hole in his side as big asyour hat, that begins to bleed if he moves a hair’s-breadth. I knew youwould come,” he continued; “I knew I should wake up and find you here;so I’m not surprised. But last night I was very impatient. I didn’t seehow I could keep still until you came. It was a matter of keeping still,just like this; as still as a mummy in his case. You talk about trying;I tried that! Well, here I am yet--these twenty hours. It seems liketwenty days.” Bellegarde talked slowly and feebly, but distinctlyenough. It was visible, however, that he was in extreme pain, and atlast he closed his eyes. Newman begged him to remain silent and sparehimself; the doctor had left urgent orders. “Oh,” said Valentin, “let useat and drink, for to-morrow--to-morrow”--and he paused again. “No, notto-morrow, perhaps, but to-day. I can’t eat and drink, but I can talk.What’s to be gained, at this pass, by renun--renunciation? I mustn’t usesuch big words. I was always a chatterer; Lord, how I have talked in myday!”
“That’s a reason for keeping quiet now,” said Newman. “We know how wellyou talk, you know.”
But Valentin, without heeding him, went on in the same weak, dyingdrawl. “I wanted to see you because you have seen my sister. Does sheknow--will she come?”
Newman was embarrassed. “Yes, by this time she must know.”
“Didn’t you tell her?” Valentin asked. And then, in a moment, “Didn’tyou bring me any message from her?” His eyes rested upon Newman’s with acertain soft keenness.
“I didn’t see her after I got your telegram,” said Newman. “I wrote toher.”
“And she sent you no answer?”
Newman was obliged to reply that Madame de Cintré had left Paris. “Shewent yesterday to Fleurières.”
“Yesterday--to Fleurières? Why did she go to Fleurières? What day isthis? What day was yesterday? Ah, then I shan’t see her,” said Valentinsadly. “Fleurières is too far!” And then he closed his eyes again.Newman sat silent, summoning pious invention to his aid, but he wasrelieved at finding that Valentin was apparently too weak to reasonor to be curious. Bellegarde, however, presently went on. “And mymother--and my brother--will they come? Are they at Fleurières?”
“They were in Paris, but I didn’t see them, either,” Newman answered.“If they received your telegram in time, they
will have started thismorning. Otherwise they will be obliged to wait for the night-express,and they will arrive at the same hour as I did.”
“They won’t thank me--they won’t thank me,” Valentin murmured. “Theywill pass an atrocious night, and Urbain doesn’t like the earlymorning air. I don’t remember ever in my life to have seen him beforenoon--before breakfast. No one ever saw him. We don’t know how he isthen. Perhaps he’s different. Who knows? Posterity, perhaps, willknow. That’s the time he works, in his _cabinet_, at the history of thePrincesses. But I had to send for them--hadn’t I? And then I want tosee my mother sit there where you sit, and say good-bye to her. Perhaps,after all, I don’t know her, and she will have some surprise for me.Don’t think you know her yet, yourself; perhaps she may surprise _you_.But if I can’t see Claire, I don’t care for anything. I have beenthinking of it--and in my dreams, too. Why did she go to Fleurièresto-day? She never told me. What has happened? Ah, she ought to haveguessed I was here--this way. It is the first time in her life she everdisappointed me. Poor Claire!”
“You know we are not man and wife quite yet,--your sister and I,” saidNewman. “She doesn’t yet account to me for all her actions.” And, aftera fashion, he smiled.
Valentin looked at him a moment. “Have you quarreled?”
“Never, never, never!” Newman exclaimed.
“How happily you say that!” said Valentin. “You are going to behappy--_va!_” In answer to this stroke of irony, none the less powerfulfor being so unconscious, all poor Newman could do was to give ahelpless and transparent stare. Valentin continued to fix him with hisown rather over-bright gaze, and presently he said, “But something _is_the matter with you. I watched you just now; you haven’t a bridegroom’sface.”
“My dear fellow,” said Newman, “how can I show _you_ a bridegroom’sface? If you think I enjoy seeing you lie there and not being able tohelp you”--
“Why, you are just the man to be cheerful; don’t forfeit your rights!I’m a proof of your wisdom. When was a man ever gloomy when he couldsay, ‘I told you so?’ You told me so, you know. You did what you couldabout it. You said some very good things; I have thought them over. But,my dear friend, I was right, all the same. This is the regular way.”
“I didn’t do what I ought,” said Newman. “I ought to have done somethingelse.”
“For instance?”
“Oh, something or other. I ought to have treated you as a small boy.”
“Well, I’m a very small boy, now,” said Valentin. “I’m rather less thanan infant. An infant is helpless, but it’s generally voted promising.I’m not promising, eh? Society can’t lose a less valuable member.”
Newman was strongly moved. He got up and turned his back upon his friendand walked away to the window, where he stood looking out, but onlyvaguely seeing. “No, I don’t like the look of your back,” Valentincontinued. “I have always been an observer of backs; yours is quite outof sorts.”
Newman returned to his bedside and begged him to be quiet. “Be quiet andget well,” he said. “That’s what you must do. Get well and help me.”
“I told you you were in trouble! How can I help you?” Valentin asked.
“I’ll let you know when you are better. You were always curious; thereis something to get well for!” Newman answered, with resolute animation.
Valentin closed his eyes and lay a long time without speaking. He seemedeven to have fallen asleep. But at the end of half an hour he began totalk again. “I am rather sorry about that place in the bank. Who knowsbut that I might have become another Rothschild? But I wasn’t meant fora banker; bankers are not so easy to kill. Don’t you think I havebeen very easy to kill? It’s not like a serious man. It’s really verymortifying. It’s like telling your hostess you must go, when you countupon her begging you to stay, and then finding she does no such thing.‘Really--so soon? You’ve only just come!’ Life doesn’t make me any suchpolite little speech.”
Newman for some time said nothing, but at last he broke out. “It’s a badcase--it’s a bad case--it’s the worst case I ever met. I don’t wantto say anything unpleasant, but I can’t help it. I’ve seen men dyingbefore--and I’ve seen men shot. But it always seemed more natural; theywere not so clever as you. Damnation--damnation! You might have donesomething better than this. It’s about the meanest winding-up of a man’saffairs that I can imagine!”
Valentin feebly waved his hand to and fro. “Don’t insist--don’t insist!It is mean--decidedly mean. For you see at the bottom--down at thebottom, in a little place as small as the end of a wine funnel--I agreewith you!”
A few moments after this the doctor put his head through the half-openeddoor and, perceiving that Valentin was awake, came in and felt hispulse. He shook his head and declared that he had talked too much--tentimes too much. “Nonsense!” said Valentin; “a man sentenced to death cannever talk too much. Have you never read an account of an execution ina newspaper? Don’t they always set a lot of people at theprisoner--lawyers, reporters, priests--to make him talk? But it’s notMr. Newman’s fault; he sits there as mum as a death’s-head.”
The doctor observed that it was time his patient’s wound should bedressed again; MM. de Grosjoyaux and Ledoux, who had already witnessedthis delicate operation, taking Newman’s place as assistants. Newmanwithdrew and learned from his fellow-watchers that they had received atelegram from Urbain de Bellegarde to the effect that their message hadbeen delivered in the Rue de l’Université too late to allow him totake the morning train, but that he would start with his mother in theevening. Newman wandered away into the village again, and walked aboutrestlessly for two or three hours. The day seemed terribly long. At duskhe came back and dined with the doctor and M. Ledoux. The dressing ofValentin’s wound had been a very critical operation the doctor didn’treally see how he was to endure a repetition of it. He then declaredthat he must beg of Mr. Newman to deny himself for the present thesatisfaction of sitting with M. de Bellegarde; more than anyone else,apparently, he had the flattering but inconvenient privilege of excitinghim. M. Ledoux, at this, swallowed a glass of wine in silence; he musthave been wondering what the deuce Bellegarde found so exciting in theAmerican.
Newman, after dinner, went up to his room, where he sat for a long timestaring at his lighted candle, and thinking that Valentin was dyingdownstairs. Late, when the candle had burnt low, there came a soft rapat his door. The doctor stood there with a candlestick and a shrug.
“He must amuse himself still!” said Valentin’s medical adviser. “Heinsists upon seeing you, and I am afraid you must come. I think at thisrate, that he will hardly outlast the night.”
Newman went back to Valentin’s room, which he found lighted by a taperon the hearth. Valentin begged him to light a candle. “I want to seeyour face,” he said. “They say you excite me,” he went on, as Newmancomplied with this request, “and I confess I do feel excited. But itisn’t you--it’s my own thoughts. I have been thinking--thinking. Sitdown there and let me look at you again.” Newman seated himself, foldedhis arms, and bent a heavy gaze upon his friend. He seemed to be playinga part, mechanically, in a lugubrious comedy. Valentin looked at him forsome time. “Yes, this morning I was right; you have something on yourmind heavier than Valentin de Bellegarde. Come, I’m a dying man and it’sindecent to deceive me. Something happened after I left Paris. It wasnot for nothing that my sister started off at this season of the yearfor Fleurières. Why was it? It sticks in my crop. I have been thinkingit over, and if you don’t tell me I shall guess.”
“I had better not tell you,” said Newman. “It won’t do you any good.”
“If you think it will do me any good not to tell me, you are very muchmistaken. There is trouble about your marriage.”
“Yes,” said Newman. “There is trouble about my marriage.”
“Good!” And Valentin was silent again. “They have stopped it.”
“They have stopped it,” said Newman. Now that he had spoken out, hefound a satisfac
tion in it which deepened as he went on. “Your motherand brother have broken faith. They have decided that it can’t takeplace. They have decided that I am not good enough, after all. They havetaken back their word. Since you insist, there it is!”
Valentin gave a sort of groan, lifted his hands a moment, and then letthem drop.
“I am sorry not to have anything better to tell you about them,” Newmanpursued. “But it’s not my fault. I was, indeed, very unhappy when yourtelegram reached me; I was quite upside down. You may imagine whether Ifeel any better now.”
Valentin moaned gaspingly, as if his wound were throbbing. “Brokenfaith, broken faith!” he murmured. “And my sister--my sister?”
“Your sister is very unhappy; she has consented to give me up. I don’tknow why. I don’t know what they have done to her; it must be somethingpretty bad. In justice to her you ought to know it. They have madeher suffer. I haven’t seen her alone, but only before them! We had aninterview yesterday morning. They came out flat, in so many words. Theytold me to go about my business. It seems to me a very bad case. I’mangry, I’m sore, I’m sick.”
Valentin lay there staring, with his eyes more brilliantly lighted, hislips soundlessly parted, and a flush of color in his pale face. Newmanhad never before uttered so many words in the plaintive key, but now,in speaking to Valentin in the poor fellow’s extremity, he had a feelingthat he was making his complaint somewhere within the presence of thepower that men pray to in trouble; he felt his outgush of resentment asa sort of spiritual privilege.
“And Claire,”--said Bellegarde,--“Claire? She has given you up?”
“I don’t really believe it,” said Newman.
“No. Don’t believe it, don’t believe it. She is gaining time; excuseher.”
“I pity her!” said Newman.
“Poor Claire!” murmured Valentin. “But they--but they”--and he pausedagain. “You saw them; they dismissed you, face to face?”
“Face to face. They were very explicit.”
“What did they say?”
“They said they couldn’t stand a commercial person.”
Valentin put out his hand and laid it upon Newman’s arm. “And abouttheir promise--their engagement with you?”
“They made a distinction. They said it was to hold good only untilMadame de Cintré accepted me.”
Valentin lay staring a while, and his flush died away. “Don’t tell meany more,” he said at last. “I’m ashamed.”
“You? You are the soul of honor,” said Newman simply.
Valentin groaned and turned away his head. For some time nothing morewas said. Then Valentin turned back again and found a certain force topress Newman’s arm. “It’s very bad--very bad. When my people--whenmy race--come to that, it is time for me to withdraw. I believe inmy sister; she will explain. Excuse her. If she can’t--if she can’t,forgive her. She has suffered. But for the others it is very bad--verybad. You take it very hard? No, it’s a shame to make you say so.” Heclosed his eyes and again there was a silence. Newman felt almost awed;he had evoked a more solemn spirit than he expected. Presently Valentinlooked at him again, removing his hand from his arm. “I apologize,” he said. “Do you understand? Here on my death-bed. I apologize formy family. For my mother. For my brother. For the ancient house ofBellegarde. _Voilà!_” he added softly.
Newman for an answer took his hand and pressed it with a world ofkindness. Valentin remained quiet, and at the end of half an hour thedoctor softly came in. Behind him, through the half-open door, Newmansaw the two questioning faces of MM. de Grosjoyaux and Ledoux. Thedoctor laid his hand on Valentin’s wrist and sat looking at him. He gaveno sign and the two gentlemen came in, M. Ledoux having first beckonedto someone outside. This was M. le Curé, who carried in his hand anobject unknown to Newman, and covered with a white napkin. M. le Curéwas short, round, and red: he advanced, pulling off his little black capto Newman, and deposited his burden on the table; and then he sat downin the best armchair, with his hands folded across his person. The othergentlemen had exchanged glances which expressed unanimity as to thetimeliness of their presence. But for a long time Valentin neither spokenor moved. It was Newman’s belief, afterwards, that M. le Curé went tosleep. At last abruptly, Valentin pronounced Newman’s name. His friendwent to him, and he said in French, “You are not alone. I want to speakto you alone.” Newman looked at the doctor, and the doctor looked atthe curé, who looked back at him; and then the doctor and the curé,together, gave a shrug. “Alone--for five minutes,” Valentin repeated.“Please leave us.”
The curé took up his burden again and led the way out, followed byhis companions. Newman closed the door behind them and came back toValentin’s bedside. Bellegarde had watched all this intently.
“It’s very bad, it’s very bad,” he said, after Newman had seated himselfclose to him. “The more I think of it the worse it is.”
“Oh, don’t think of it,” said Newman.
But Valentin went on, without heeding him. “Even if they should comeround again, the shame--the baseness--is there.”
“Oh, they won’t come round!” said Newman.
“Well, you can make them.”
“Make them?”
“I can tell you something--a great secret--an immense secret. You canuse it against them--frighten them, force them.”
“A secret!” Newman repeated. The idea of letting Valentin, on hisdeath-bed, confide him an “immense secret” shocked him, for themoment, and made him draw back. It seemed an illicit way of arriving atinformation, and even had a vague analogy with listening at a keyhole.Then, suddenly, the thought of “forcing” Madame de Bellegarde and herson became attractive, and Newman bent his head closer to Valentin’slips. For some time, however, the dying man said nothing more. He onlylay and looked at his friend with his kindled, expanded, troubled eye,and Newman began to believe that he had spoken in delirium. But at lasthe said,--
“There was something done--something done at Fleurières. It was foulplay. My father--something happened to him. I don’t know; I have beenashamed--afraid to know. But I know there is something. My motherknows--Urbain knows.”
“Something happened to your father?” said Newman, urgently.
Valentin looked at him, still more wide-eyed. “He didn’t get well.”
“Get well of what?”
But the immense effort which Valentin had made, first to decide to utterthese words and then to bring them out, appeared to have taken his laststrength. He lapsed again into silence, and Newman sat watching him. “Doyou understand?” he began again, presently. “At Fleurières. You can findout. Mrs. Bread knows. Tell her I begged you to ask her. Then tellthem that, and see. It may help you. If not, tell everyone. It will--itwill”--here Valentin’s voice sank to the feeblest murmur--“it willavenge you!”
The words died away in a long, soft groan. Newman stood up, deeplyimpressed, not knowing what to say; his heart was beating violently.“Thank you,” he said at last. “I am much obliged.” But Valentin seemednot to hear him, he remained silent, and his silence continued. At lastNewman went and opened the door. M. le Curé re-entered, bearing hissacred vessel and followed by the three gentlemen and by Valentin’sservant. It was almost processional.