by George Sand
“Athénaïs has a piano! this young man a musician ! What extraordinary story are you telling me ?”
“It is perfectly true, madame,” interposed the marchioness. “You are never willing to understand that everybody in France receives some education to-day! Those people are rich; they have bought talents for their children. It is as it should be, it’s the fashion; there’s nothing to be said. The fellow sings very well, on my word ! I listened to him from the hall with much pleasure. Well, what’s the matter ? Do you think that Valentine was in any danger with him when I was within two steps ?”
“Oh ! madame,” said the countess, “ you have a way of interpreting my thoughts——”
“Why, that is because you have such strange thoughts! Here you are all in a fright because you found your daughter at the piano with a man ! Can a man do any harm when he is busy singing ? You talk as if I had committed a crime in leaving them alone an instant, as if—Great heaven ! you didn’t look at the fellow, did you ? He’s ugly enough to frighten one !”
“Madame,” rejoined the countess, with great contempt, “ it is very easy to see why you put this construction on my displeasure. As it is impossible for us to agree on certain matters, I address myself to my daughter. I need not tell you, Valentine, that I do not entertain the coarse thoughts which she attributes to me. I know you well enough, my child, to know that a man of that sort is not a man to you, and that it is not in his power to compromise you. But I detest any breach of propriety, and I consider that you are far too heedless in that respect. Remember that in society nothing is worse than absurd situations. You are naturally too good-humored, too condescending to your inferiors. Remember that they will not be grateful to you for it, that they will always abuse your good nature, and that those whom you treat best will be the most ungrateful. Trust your mother’s experience, and watch yourself more closely. I have already had occasion several times to reprove you for lack of dignity. You will realize the inconvenience of it at some time. Those creatures do not understand how far it is permissible for them to go, and that they must stop at a fixed point. That little Athénaïs is disgustingly familiar in her manner toward you. I put up with it because, after all, she is a woman. But I should not be very much flattered to have her fiancé come and accost you with a free-and-easy air in a public place. He is a very ill-bred young man, as all the young men of his class are, and absolutely lacking in tact. Monsieur de Lansac, who is sometimes inclined to play the liberal a little too much, gave him far too much credit the other day when he spoke of him as a bright fellow. Another man would have left the dance, but he kissed you most cavalierly, my child. I don’t blame you for it,” added the countess, seeing that Valentine blushed until she lost countenance. “I know that you suffered sufficiently because of that impertinent performance, and I remind you of it only to prove to you how carefully you must keep the lower classes at a distance.”
During this discourse the marchioness sat in a corner shrugging her shoulders. Valentine, crushed under the weight of her mother’s logic, replied in a faltering voice:
“It was only because of the piano, mamma, that I thought—I didn’t think of the impropriety——”
“If we go about it in the right way,” said the countess, disarmed by her submission, “there may not be any harm in having him come here. Did you suggest it to him ?”
“I was going to do it, when——”
“In that case we must call him back.”
The countess rang, and asked for Bénédict, but she was told that he was already far up the hill.
“This will never do,” she said, when the servant had left the room ; “ not on any account must he be allowed to think that he was admitted here on account of his fine voice. I propose that he shall return in a subordinate capacity, and I will undertake to receive him on that footing. Give me my writing-case. I will explain to him what we want of him,”
“Do at least express yourself courteously,” said the marchioness, in whose mind fear took the place of reason.
“I know what is customary, madame,” retorted the countess.
She hastily wrote a few lines and handed them to Valentine.
“Read this,” she said, “ and send it to the farm.”
Valentine glanced at the note. It was in these words:
“Monsieur Bénédict, will you kindly tune my daughter’s piano ? I shall be obliged to you.
“I have the honor to salute you.
“F. COMTESSE DE RAIMBAULT.”
Valentine took the sealing-wax in her hand and pretended to seal it, but she kept it open and left the room. Should she send that arrogant reprimand ? must Bénédict be paid in that way for his devotion ? must she treat as a menial the man on whose brow she had not feared to imprint a sisterly kiss ? Her heart triumphed over her prudence. She took a pencil from her pocket, and, standing between the double doors of the empty reception room, added these words at the foot of her mother’s note:
“Forgive me, forgive me, monsieur! I will explain this request. Come! do not refuse to come! In Louise’s name, forgive me!”
Then she sealed the missive and gave it to a servant.
XI
She was unable to open Louise’s letter until night. It was a long paraphrase of the few words they had had an opportunity to exchange freely in their interview at the farm. That letter, throbbing with joy and hope, was the outpouring of a typical romantic woman’s affection, an effusive affection, true sister to love, and overflowing with adorable childish extravagance and platonic outbursts.
It ended with these words:
“I have discovered by chance that your mother is going to pay a visit in the neighborhood to-morrow. She will not go until toward evening because of the heat. Try to avoid going with her, and as soon as it is dark join me at the end of the large field, by the little copse of Vavray. The moon doesn’t rise till midnight, and that spot is always deserted.”
The next afternoon about six o’clock the countess left the château, urging Valentine to go to bed, and the marchioness to see to it that she took a very hot foot-bath. But the old woman, saying that she had brought up seven children, and that she knew very well what to do for a sick-headache, very soon forgot everything but herself. Faithful to her old-fashioned indolent habits, she took a bath herself in her granddaughter’s place, and summoned her companion to read her one of Crébillon’s novels. Valentine made her escape as soon as the shadows began to creep down the hill. She put on a dark dress, in order to be less noticeable in the gathering darkness, and, with no other head covering than her lovely fair hair, which blew about about in the warm evening breeze, she walked rapidly across the field.
The field in question was half a league in length; it was intersected by several wide streams bridged by trunks of trees. Valentine came near falling several times in the darkness. Sometimes her dress caught on invisible thorns, sometimes her foot sank in the treacherous mud of the stream. Her light step roused myriads of buzzing moths ; the chirping cricket became mute as she drew near, and now and then an owl asleep in the trunk of an old tree flew up and startled her by grazing her cheek with its soft, flexible wing.
It was the first time that Valentine had ever voluntarily ventured away from her own roof alone, at night. Although her intense excitement lent her strength, fear took possession of her at times, and gave her wings to skim over the grass and across the brooks.
At the appointed place she found her sister impatiently awaiting her. After a thousand loving caresses, they sat down on the bank of a ditch and began to talk.
“Tell me all about your life since I lost you,” said Valentine.
Louise told the story of her wanderings, her sorrows, her loneliness, her destitution. She was barely sixteen years old when she went into exile in Germany with an old kinswoman of her family, with a paltry allowance too small to make her independent. As that old woman tyrannized over her, she fled to Italy, where, by hard work and economy, she succeeded in existing. At last, having
attained her majority, she came into possession of her patrimony, a very modst sum, for the bulk of the family fortune came from the countess ; even the estate of Raimbault, having been redeemed by her, was her own property, and the general’s aged mother was indebted for a comfortable existence solely to her daughter-in-law’s excellent behavior. That was why she was careful not to offend her, and so had entirely abandoned Louise, in order not to be cast into indigence.
Small as was the sum which the unfortunate young woman received, it was wealth to her, and was sufficient to gratify certain desires which she had been able to hold in check. Some circumstance, which she did not explain to her sister, having led her to return to Paris, she had been there ten months when she learned of Valentine’s impending marriage. Consumed by the longing to see her sister and her native province, she had written to the old nurse, Madame Lhéry, and that kind-hearted, loving soul, who had never ceased to correspond with her from time to time, lost no time in inviting her to come secretly and pass a few weeks at the farm. Louise eagerly accepted, fearing that Valentine’s marriage would soon erect a more insurmountable barrier than ever between them.
“God forbid !” said Valentine ; “on the contrary, it will be the signal for our reunion. But look you, Louise, in all that you have told me, you have not referred to a matter which is most interesting to me. You have not told me whether——”
And Valentine, confused at the thought of uttering a single word relating to her sister’s terrible wrong-doing, which she would gladly have given all her blood to efface, felt that her tongue was paralyzed and her face bathed in burning perspiration.
Louise understood, and, despite the heart-rending remorse of her whole life, no reproach had ever driven such a keen-edged sword into her breast as that confusion and that silence. She let her head fall on her hands, and, being easily embittered after a life of unhappiness, it seemed to her that Valentine alone had wounded her more deeply than all the rest of the world. But she soon returned to her senses, and said to herself that Valentine was suffering from excessive delicacy ; she realized what it must have cost that chaste and modest girl to invite her fuller confidence, or even to dare to wish for it.
“Well, Valentine!” she said, putting an arm about her young sister’s neck.
Valentine threw herself upon her breast, and they both burst into tears.
Then Valentine wiped her eyes, and succeeded by a supreme effort in laying aside the rigidity of the young virgin and rising to the rôle of the generous and stouthearted friend.
“Tell me,” she cried, “ in all this there is a little being whose blessed influence must have made itself feltthrough-out your whole life ; one whom I do not know, whose name I do not know, but whom it has sometimes seemed to me that I love with all the force of my blood and all the fervor of my affection for you.”
“And you want me to speak to you of him, my brave sister! I thought that I should never dare to remind you of his existence. But your greatness of heart surpasses my wildest hopes. My son is alive, he has never left me; I have brought him up myself. I did not try to conceal my error by sending him away from me or denying him my name. He has gone with me everywhere—everywhere his presence has revealed my misfortune and my repentance. And will you believe it, Valentine ? I have reached the point where I glory in proclaiming that I am his mother, and in all just hearts I have received absolution in acknowledgment of my courage.”
“Even if I were not your sister and your daughter as well, I would be among those just hearts,” said Valentine. “But where is he ?”
“My Valentin is at school in Paris. I left Italy to take him there, and it was to see you that I parted from him a month ago. My son is a beautiful boy, Valentine. He has a loving heart; he knows you ; he longs most ardently to embrace her whose name he bears. And he resembles you. He is fair-haired and placid like you; at fourteen he is almost your height. Tell me, when you are married, would you like me to bring him to see you ?”
Valentine replied by a shower of kisses.
Two hours passed away rapidly, not in recalling the past alone, but in laying plans for the future as well. Valentine went about it with all the confidence of her age; Louise was less hopeful, but she did not say so. Suddenly a black form appeared against the dark blue sky above the ditch. Valentine trembled and uttered a cry of alarm. Louise placed her hand on hers and said :
“Don’t be afraid, it’s a friend; it’s Bénédict.”
Valentine was annoyed at first at his presence at the rendezvous. It seemed that all the acts of her life tended to bring that young man and herself together against her will. But she was forced to acknowledge to herself that his presence might be useful to two women in that out-of-the-way spot, and that his escort would be especially agreeable to Louise, who was more than a league from her lodging. Nor could she help noticing the respectful delicacy of feeling which led him to keep out of sight during their interview. A man must surely be very self-sacrificing to mount guard thus for two hours. All things considered, it would be ungrateful to welcome him coldly. She explained her mother’s note, took all the blame upon herself, and begged him not to come to the château without a large supply of patience and philosophy. Bénédict laughingly swore that nothing would disturb him; and, after escorting her to the other side of the field with Louise, he returned with the latter to the farm.
The next day he appeared at the château. By a freak of chance, of which Bénédict was not disposed to complain, it was the countess’s turn to have a sick-headache; but hers was not feigned, it compelled her to keep her bed. So that things turned out better than Bénédict had hoped. When he learned that the countess would not rise during the day, he began by taking the piano apart and removing all the keys; then he found that he must put leathers on all the hammers; a number of rusted strings had to be renewed; in short, he made work for himself for a whole day, for Valentine was there, handing him the scissors, helping him to unroll the wire from the reel, striking the keynote for him, and paying more attention to her piano than she had done in her whole life before. Bénédict, for his part, was much less skilful at the work than Valentine had declared. He broke more than one string by tightening it; more than once he turned one peg instead of another, and often put a whole octave out of tune in order to tune a single note. Meanwhile the old marchioness went in and out, coughed and dozed, and paid no attention to them except to put them even more at their ease. It was a most delightful day to Bénédict. Valentine was so sweet, her gayety was so artless, so genuine, her courtesy so engaging, that it was impossible not to breathe easily in her company. And then it happened, I know not how, that after an hour or two all formal courtesy was banished from their conversation. A childlike and merry sort of good-fellowship sprang up between them. They joked each other on their mutual awkwardness, their hands met on the keyboard, and, as merriment banished emotion, they disputed like old friends. At last, about five o’clock, the piano being in tune, Valentine invented a pretext for detaining Bénédict. A touch of hypocrisy made its appearance opportunely in that girlish heart, and knowing that her mother would grant any favor to a deferential exterior, she stole into her bedroom.
“Mamma,” she said, “Monsieur Bénédict has passed six hours at my piano, and he hasn’t finished; but we are going to sit down to dinner. It seemed to me impossible to send the young man to the servants’ quarters, for you never send his uncle there, but have wine served to him on your own table. What shall I do ? I dared not ask him to dine with us until I had found out from you whether it would be proper.”
A similar request, in more direct terms, would have been met with sharp disapprobation. But the countess was always better satisfied to obtain submission to her principles than passive obedience to her wishes. That preference is characteristic of that form of vanity which seeks to impose respect and love of its domination.
“I think it would be perfectly proper,” she replied. “As he complied with my request without hesitation and with a good grace,
it is no more than fair to show him some consideration. Go, my child, and invite him yourself in my name.”
Valentine returned triumphantly to the salon, delighted to be able to do something agreeable in her mother’s name; and she ascribed to her all the honor of,: the invitation. Bénédict was amazed, and hesitated about accepting. Valentine overstepped her orders somewhat by insisting. As they all three went toward the dining-room, the marchioness whispered to Valentine :
“Was this act of courtesy really an idea of your mother’s ? It makes me anxious about her health. Can it be that she is seriously ill ?”
Valentine did not allow herself to smile at that bitter jest. Being the depositary of the lamentations and enmities of those two women in turn she was like a rock beaten by two opposite currents.
The repast was short but cheerful. Then they went into the garden for their coffee. The marchioness was always in good humor after eating. In her day many young women, whose frivolity was tolerated by reason of their charms, and perhaps, also, of the entertainment which their improprieties afforded amid the tedium of a dull and blase society, used to boast of their bad form : the naughty look was very becoming to certain faces. Madame de Provence was the centre of a female coterie who tossed off champagne to admiration. A century earlier, Madame, sister-in-law to Louis XIV., an honest, solemn German who cared for nothing but sausages with garlic and beer soup, admired the faculty which the ladies of the French court, especially Madame le Duchesse de Berri, possessed of drinking great quantities without showing it, and of carrying wine of Constance and Hungarian maraschino with marvellous success.
The marchioness was very lively at dessert. She told stories with the ease and naturalness characteristic of those who have lived much in society, in whom those qualities take the place of wit. Bénédict listened to her in amazement. She spoke a language which he supposed to be entirely unknown in her class and to her sex. She used words which did not offend the ear, she said them in such a simple and unaffected way. She told her stories too with an extraordinary clearness of memory, and displayed admirable presence of mind in sparing Valentine’s ear the obscene passages. At times Bénédict looked up at her in dismay, and the poor child’s placid expression showed him so plainly that she had not understood, that he wondered if he had heard aright himself, if his imagination had not carried him beyond the real meaning of the words. In fact, he was confounded, bewildered at the combination of such familiarity with the usages of society and such moral demoralization, of such contempt for principle and such respect for social conventions. The society which the marchioness depicted was to him like a dream in which he refused to believe.