TALES FROM FOREIGN TONGUES. UNIFORM IN STYLE AND PRICE. I. Memories : A Story of German Love. Translated from the German of MAX MULLER, by GEO. P. UPTON. i6mo, 173 pages, gilt top. II. Graziella: A Story of Italian Love. Translated from the French of A. DE LAMARTINE, by JAMES B. RUNNION. i6mo, 235 pages, gilt top. III. Marie: A Story of Russian Love. From the Russian of ALEXANDER PUSHKIN, by MARIH H. DE ZIELINSKA. i6mo, 210 pages, gilt top. IV. Madeleine: A Story of French Love. Translated from the French of JULES SANDJBAU, by FRANCIS CHARLOT. i6mo, 244 pages, gilt top. jan. MADELEINE: A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE (CROWNED BY THE FRENCH ACADEMY.) TRANSLATED FROM THE FRENCH OF JULES SANDEAU, BY FRANCIS CHARLOT. CHICAGO: A. C. McCLURG & COMPANY 1 801. COPYRIGHT. JANSEN, McCLURG & CO. 7 A. P., 1878. 2138137 MADELEINE. CHAPTER I. T IKE most provincial villages through which * ' passes a royal route, Neuvy-les-Bois is an ugly town muddy in Winter, dusty in Summer, in all seasons without poetry and without mystery. It possesses so little impor- tance that, previous to the day when our simple narrative commences, the inhabitants had no recollection of any public carriage ever having stopped in their streets. The disdain that the postilions and conductors of the diligences had from all time affected toward Neuvy-les-Bois, will convey an idea of the poor quality of its wines. It was mid-day of a Sunday in Autumn. MADELEINE ; Grouped at the entrance of the little hamlet, under a fiery sun whose rays fell like lead upon their heads, the inhabitants waited gravely for the passage of the diligence from Paris to Limoges. This weekly event was their only diversion ; brief, it is true, but intoxicating, like all joys that are soon lost. On these occasions, at the moment when they first heard the approaching vehicle, they ranged themselves sol- emnly on each side of the road ; and when the huge machine, rolling in at the grand trot of the Limousine horses, had passed between the two rows of noses in the air, staring eyes, and wide- open mouths, and disappeared in a cloud of dust at a bend of the road, these worthy people would re-enter their houses, their hearts filled with a sweet satisfaction. On this particular Sunday, there was nothing to indicate any change from the usual course of things ; but it was written above that Neuvy-les- Bois should that day be the theater of an event upon which this modest village, profoundly A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. g discouraged by a half-century of waiting, had not dared to count. Instead of passing through the village in a flash, as was its habit, the diligence stopped short in the middle of the street, between the two living fences which had been formed as usual to await its passage. At this unexpected spectacle, all Neuvy-les-Bois remained standing in its place, without dreaming of asking whence came so rare an honor. Even the dogs, that were in the habit of running barking before the coach, inviting blows from the postilion's whip, seemed to partake of the astonishment of their masters, and held them- selves, like them, stiff and mute with stupor. Meanwhile the conductor had descended, opened the coach door, and uttered in a dry tone the word "Neuvy-les-Bois." A young girl alighted, her only baggage being a small packet which she carried in her hand. She was dressed in black, and could not have been more than fourteen or fifteen years of age. Her pale face, her eyes evidently used to tears, and her sad I0 MADELEINE : and suffering air, said more than her mourning dress. Although but a child, she seemed grave beyond her years. Before she had time to say adieu to her traveling companions, the conductor had climbed again to his seat, and the diligence whirled away. When she found herself in the road at the entrance of this miserable village, where not a soul knew her, alone in the midst of all these faces that examined her with an ex- pression of curiosity simple yet suspicious, the poor girl seated herself upon a pile of stones, and, feeling her heart give way, bowed her head between her hands and wept bitterly. The peasants continued to regard her with the same air, but without a word, and without budging from the spot. Happily, in this rustic group there were some women; and among these women was a mother, who cradled upon her breast a little new-born babe. She approached the afflicted girl, and regarded her with a hesitating pity ; for although the child seemed friendless and poor, there was A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. XI about her a natural distinction that relieved singularly the simplicity of her costume, and easily commanded deference and respect. " Poor young lady ! " said the woman at last ; " since you are traveling alone at your age, it must be that you have lost your mother." "Yes, Madame, I have lost my mother," replied the young girl, in a sweet voice, with a slight foreign accent. " Alas ! I have lost all even the little corner of the earth where I was born, and where rest the remains of those who were dearest to me. I have nothing now left under heaven," added she, dropping her head. " Dear young lady, may the good God take pity upon your pain. I can tell from your speech that you are not of our country. No doubt you have come far." "Oh, yes indeed far. I have often feared I would never arrive." "And you go ?" " Where my mother, before she died, directed me. I knew when I started that once at I2 MADELEINE: Neuvy-les-Bois I could easily find my way to Valtravers." " You are going to Valtravers ? " "Yes, Madame." " To the chateau ? " " Precisely." " You have come the longest way, Mademoi- selle. You should have stopped at the last village. However, it is nearly the same. You have only three little leagues to walk, and you can make them yet shorter by going through the woods. If you will permit, my nephew Pierrot will conduct you. But the heat is overpowering; and I dare say, my child, that you have taken no food to-day. Come to our farm and taste some milk, and then in the cool of the evening you can go on your way." "Thanks, Madame; you are good. But I need nothing. I would rather start at once. And if it would not be imposing on Pierrot " " Come here, Pierrot ! " cried the woman. At this invitation, made in a tone that A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I3 admitted of no reply, a droll little fellow detached himself from the crowd, and advanced toward the woman with the piteous manner of a dog that feels that his master calls him for a beating. Pierrot, who all day had soothed him- self with the delightful hope of playing ball on the church common after vespers, seemed little pleased at the proposition of his aunt. She, however, reiterated her command in such a tone that he deemed it prudent to resign himself. Putting in his hand the little packet of the stranger, she pushed him by the shoulders, and said: "Go through the woods; and above all, do not make the young lady walk too fast. She has neither thy feet nor thy legs." Pierrot started, with a sullen air; whilst Neuvy - les - Bois, beginning to recover from its stupor, absorbed itself in commenting upon the events of the great day. We suspect that the village of Neuvy-les-Bois had been thus named by way of paradox: MADELEINE : Neuvy, if you please; but as for woods, that was another matter. I know of nothing more fallacious and uncertain than these names of persons and of places which have a precise signification, and which are like formal engage- ments rarely fulfilling that which they promise; their failure being usually in precisely those qualities for which they are named. I have known Angeliques who were not angels, and young Blanches that were as black as little crows. And as for places, without going farther than Neuvy-les-Bois since we are there it has no trees, not even a group of poplars to shelter it from the Northern winds or the Sum- mer heats. The country is naked and flat as the sea; and for a distance of half-a-league around, you will not find even the shadow of an oak. At Fontenay-aux-Roses you will at least find a few withered rose-bushes. However, as the young girl and her guide left the dusty road and advanced through the fields, the landscape assumed an aspect more A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I $ smiling and green. After two hours' walk, they could see the forest of Valtravers undulating on the horizon. In spite of the injunction of his aunt, Pierrot walked rapidly, without care for his companion. The possibility of being able to return in time to take part in the game of ball, gave the little rascal wings. Although the young girl was quick-footed and light, she had begged him to go slower; but the abominable Pierrot was deaf to her entreaty, and pursued his way without pity. Though going post-haste, he yet could not fail to see by the lengthening shadows of the grain in the fields, that, try his best, he could not reach Valtravers and return in time for his Sunday play. At the edge of the forest, an idea sud- denly crossed the brain of this young cow-boy. " See ! " said he resolutely, placing the packet upon the ground ; " you have only to follow this wide path, and it will lead you direct to the chateau. In a quarter of an hour you will have your nose in the door." 1 6 MADELEINE: Upon this, he prepared to leave her, when a gesture detained him. Detaching from her belt a little purse, which did not appear very heavy, the young girl drew out a piece of silver, which she handed to Pierrot, at the same time thanking him for his trouble. At this trait of generosity, upon which he had not counted, Pierrot hesitated; and perhaps he would have heeded the cry of conscience, had he not at that instant caught a glimpse of the church- spire of Neuvy-les-Bois, in the distance. By some effect of mirage, which the passion for play can perhaps explain, he also saw upon the common a dozen little rascals like himself, with their bats and balls. At this sight, Pierrot could restrain himself no longer. He took the piece of silver, buried it in the depths of his pocket, and took to his legs as if the devil pursued him. Upon reaching the cool shade of the trees, the young girl experienced a grateful sense of relief, as of one going from a heated room to a A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I7 cool bath. Her first act was to thank God for having sustained and protected her in the long journey which was about to end, and to pray of Him to render hospitable the door at which she was soon to knock. Not doubting that the chateau was very near, she seated herself at the foot of an oak, and gave herself up to the enchantment of the forest. Kind and indulgent Nature ! Thou art the friend of all ages ; thou consolest the old, and even children, when thou smilest upon them, forget that they have lost their mother. Around her was harmony, freshness, and perfume. The oblique rays that the sun sent through the leaves to die at her feet, reminded her that night approached. She rose and pursued her path, expecting every instant to see walls and towers. But she soon found that the path which Pierrot had told her led direct to the chateau, ended in an avenue that crossed it at right angles. The child listened, to catch sounds from any habitation that might be near; but she heard instead 2 1 8 MADELEINE: only the profound murmurs of the forest. She climbed a little mound, and saw nothing around her but an ocean of verdure. For a long time she wandered on, alone save for the care of God; when, wishing to retrace her steps, she found it was impossible to distinguish the path by which she came. The setting sun filled the forest with shade and with mystery. The songs of the birds had ceased ; the butterflies beat the air with their silky wings ; and there had already begun the sinister concert of the frogs. It is at this hour, above all others, that solitude and sadness weigh heaviest upon the souls of the unfortunate. Tired and discouraged, and without strength to go farther, the poor child fell upon the grass, while her tears ran down afresh. She had untied the black ribbons of her straw hat ; and whilst she wept, the breezes played with her blonde hair, that was gilded by the sun's last ray. She had been for some minutes thus lost in despair, when she saw near her a beautiful A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I9 horse, whose approach she had not noticed, and which had been stopped, when a few steps from her, by its rider, who was now regarding her with the surprised air of one not accus- tomed to such meetings at such an hour and in such a place. She sprang to her feet ; then, re-assured by the frank smile of the cavalier, she said: "Monsieur, it is God who has sent you to my aid. If you belong in this country, you know already that I am a stranger. For more than two hours I have wandered in this forest, not knowing where its paths led. Will you do me the kindness to put me in my way ? " " Certainly, Mademoiselle," replied a voice almost as soft as her own ; " only, I must know where you wish to go." " To Valtravers, Monsieur." "To the chateau?" "Yes to the chateau of Valtravers." " You could have found no one to direct you better, Mademoiselle, for I am going there, and MADELEINE : if you will permit I will have the honor of guiding you." Without waiting for a reply, the cavalier sprang from his horse. He was a young man, in all the freshness of life's Spring-time; slender and elegant, with soft yet proud eyes, and above all that grace that cannot be described. His hair, lustrous as jet, curled closely about his temples. Tied negligently about his neck was a scarf of gray silk striped with blue, which did not hide but only relieved the pure ivory of the throat. A brown riding-coat fitted closely to his flexible figure, and white pantaloons fell over a boot slender and straight and arched, armed at the heel with a tinkling spur of steel. His appearance was thus at the same time simple and charming. "Is this yours, Mademoiselle?" he asked, pointing with his whip to the little packet on the grass. " Yes, Monsieur, it is all my fortune," replied the little stranger, with a sad smile. A STO.RY OF FRENCH LOVE. 21 The young man took the packet and fastened it securely to the saddle ; then, offering his arm to the girl, they proceeded in the direction of the chateau, followed by the beautiful and docile horse, which cropped on each side of the way the young buds of Autumn. " Mademoiselle, I thank the chance which brought me here ; for, lost as you were, you were likely to sleep to-night under the stars and upon the moss of the woods." "I had resigned myself to that, Monsieur;" and the young girl recounted the manner in which she had been deceived by Pierrot. " Pierrot is a rascal who deserves to have his ears cut off," said the young man. " As you are going to Valtravers, Mademoiselle, you must know the Chevalier, or at least some one at the chateau ?" " I know no one there." " Indeed ! " " Absolutely no one. But you, Monsieur, you know the Chevalier ? " 22 MADELEINE: "Certainly; we are old friends." " It is said that he is good, generous, and charitable." " Oh, very charitable," replied the young man, who thought this was perhaps some case of misfortune seeking aid ; but after a rapid survey of his companion, he gave up this idea, and decided that she could not be an ordinary seeker of charity. " Mademoiselle," he continued, gravely, "the Chevalier has the most noble heart that ever beat." " I did not doubt it," she replied, simply. " Still, at this moment it is sweet to hear it affirmed anew. And little Maurice, Monsieur; you must know him ? " "What little Maurice, Mademoiselle?" "Oh, the son of the Chevalier." "Indeed! indeed!" cried the young man, laughing; "certainly I know little Maurice." " Does he promise to become some day as good and generous as his father ? " A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 23 "Oh, he passes generally in the country for a good-enough fellow. I do not wish to say any evil of him." "I feel that I shall love him like a brother." " And I can assure you, on his part, that he will be charmed to see you. " At this instant they crossed a clearing; and behind the wall of a park whose gate opened upon the forest, there appeared a pretty castle, its windows burning with the last rays of the setting sun. CHAPTER II. ON the same evening, at the same hour, the old Chevalier de Valtravers was seated upon his door-step, in company with the Marquise de Fresnes, whose neighboring chateau could be seen in the depth of the valley, through the yet green foliage of the poplars that bordered the Vienne river. They were entertaining each other in talking of by-gone times ; for at their age life has little to illumine it beyond the dim and pale reflection of the past which is called Memory. The friendship of the Chevalier and the Marquise was of long standing. At the first stroke of the tocsin sounded by the Monarchy to its supporters, the Marquis de Fresnes had A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 25 determined that the proper thing for him to do was to make with his wife a tour of a few months along the Rhine; thus protesting against what passed in France, while giving at the same time a mark of respect and devotion to the throne of St. Louis. The Chevalier de Valtravers decided to accompany them. It is now known how these journeyings, begun as pleasure-excursions of but a few months, ended for the most part in a long and hard exile. The three companions counted so surely upon an early return, that they had taken with them enough to sustain them in a life of idleness but little more than a year. These resources exhausted, the income of their home estates diverted by the govern- ment, their diamonds and jewels and other valuables converted into money, they went quietly to Nuremberg, where they installed themselves in the simplest manner, their only study being how to exist. The Marquis and the Chevalier were firmly wedded to the old ideas of the aristocracy ; and so, as always happens, 26 MADELEINE: it was a woman who first set the example of resignation, of courage, and of energy. When the two friends asked anxiously what they should do in the new condition of things, Madame de Fresnes said simply, "We will work." She painted tolerably in pastel and miniature. She made portraits, and she gave lessons. Her beauty, her grace, and her misfortune were more marked than her talents, and soon gained for her numerous patrons. The two fine gentle- men, who began by decrying her work as lower ing one of her rank, ended by admitting that they were supported without their own efforts, and that it was the Marquise who, to use an old say- ing, "brought water to the mill." The Marquis, however, did not care to do anything ; but the Chevalier realized that to stand thus with arms folded from false pride, was to present a poor front to fortune. But what employment could he find for his faculties? to what industry could he apply his two strong arms? It oc- curred to him that he could teach French; but A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 27 the thought that he must first learn another lan- guage, upset this beautiful idea. After having studied and turned himself in all ways, the Chevalier decided in all humility that he was fit for nothing but to go and be killed in the army of Conde". For this he prepared himself, seriously, but without enthusiasm. One day, as he wandered sadly in the street, he stopped mechanically before a toy-shop, where he saw, among other little objects of wood made with a turning -lathe, some cups and balls artistically cut, and a goodly number of those humming- tops which are the delight of children and the glory of Nuremberg. It would seem that for a gentleman emigrant, completely ruined, and long past the age of cups and balls and spin- ning-tops, this spectacle had nothing that could excite the imagination or induce a transport of the brain. It happened, however, that after some minutes of silent contemplation, the Chev- alier seemed to experience something of that shock of discovery that struck Columbus when 2 8 MADELEINE : he saw rising from the bosom of the ocean the shores of a new world ; or Galileo, when he felt our little globe, stationed by ignorance for six thousand years in space, move itself and prom- enade around the sun. M. de Valtravers was born in 1760; when, thanks to the "Emile" of Rousseau, it was the fashion among the higher classes of French society to complete an education by an appren- ticeship to some trade. The example set was of the highest; for in 1780 the King of France, who was the most honest man in his kingdom, was also the best locksmith. It was then the fashion for all the great lords to know some mechanical art, and for the grand ladies to nurse their own children. In general, this state of affairs shaped itself without any pre-arrange- ment or design. One sex played at work, the other at maternity; lending themselves more to the caprice of the day than to the instincts of Nature. The noblemen never suspected, as they handled the plane and the file, that the A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 29 time was coming when the sons of the great families would be forced to become the sons of toil, and that it was more wise to act than to dream, as they must thenceforth create for themselves titles in the State. At the sight of all these playthings, before which chance or the instincts of a mysterious vocation had conducted him, M. de Valtravers remembered that he had learned in youth the art of turning in ebony and in ivory. Three months after this, he passed in Nuremberg as the Benvenuto Cellini of wood - turning. He excelled in the making of toys. His humming- tops delighted the public; but what shall we say of his nut-crackers, which, by the delicacy and finish of their details, were simply marvels of art ? His works in ivory were valued as real jewels. Fashion mixed itself in all this, and his products, like the pastels of Madame de Fresnes, were soon greatly in vogue. During the two years they spent in this old German city, every well-born face considered it a duty MADELEINE : to pose before the Marquise ; while there was not a filbert eaten in society without the inter- vention of the French emigrant. It can readily be believed that, unlike some people, our two artists did not take their suc- cess very seriously. Though holding it in public at a very high price, it furnished them material for much pleasant badinage at home. After working hard all day, they met in the evening; and then there was a scene of child- like gaiety. When the Marquise exhibited upon her easel the full-blown face of some fat Nuremberger, the Chevalier drew from his pocket half-a-dozen nut-crackers that he had turned during the day ; and they laughed like children, without perceiving that it was to work that they owed their light -heartedness to labor, that made them happier and better than they had ever been in their prosperity. The Marquis, however, still clung to his belief that to toil for his daily bread was beneath the character of a gentleman, who should respect A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 31 himself and know how to die, like a Roman senator in his cerulean chair, rather than live like common workers. He grew disdainful in manner toward his wife, and despised sove- reignly the Chevalier ; and he did not trouble himself to conceal his feelings. What exasper- ated him most was to see them constantly occupied, and in good humor ; whilst he was literally dying of that heavy and profound ennui which inaction drags after it. In respect- ing himself, however, he was still able to eat with a good appetite ; availing himself, without scruple, of the benefits of the association, and showing himself in every respect more exact- ing than when in his chateau on the banks of the Vienne. It was when they were assembled at meal-times that his bile showed itself most. Sometimes the Chevalier would then rejoin by asking: "Marquis, do me the favor to say where would we now be except for the pastels of the Marquise?" "And without the nut-crackers of our friend ? " the Marquise would add, laugh- MADELEINE: ing. But M. de Fresnes would shrug his shoulders, speak of the stain on his escutcheon, ask pardon for his wife of the manes of his ancestors and then complain bitterly that there was no Bordeaux wine upon the table. At length, when they were assured of the pros- perity of their household, Madame de Fresnes and M. de Valtravers could obey a sentiment more disinterested and .more poetic, which had insensibly developed in them. They had crossed, without suspecting it, the steps that lead from trade to art, like the ladder of Jacob, reach- ing from the earth to heaven. The Marquise attempted miniature copies of the portraits of the old masters, and succeeded so well that buyers competed for these miniatures after Hol- bein and Albert Diirer. For his part, the Cheva- lier labored earnestly at sculpture in wood. He distinguished himself, and became in this genre one of the most eminent artists beyond the Rhine. There is shown yet in the Cathedral of Nuremberg a chair, whose ornaments, though A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 33 not in irreproachable taste, includes a carving representing St. John preaching in the wilder- ness, which is one of the most beautiful in Ger- many, and would bear comparison with the carv- ings in the Church of St. Giorgio Maggiore. Outside of the enjoyments that it procures, humble and modest as they are, art has some- thing yet more sure and precious. It elevates the heart and widens the spirit; it opens to thought a wider and serener horizon. At least, this is what it did for the Marquise and the Chevalier. It broke, little by little, the circle of narrow ideas in which their birth and educa- tion had confined them. They recognized the aristocracy of labor and the royalty of intelli- gence. Like two butterflies escaped from the chrysalis, they emerged from the wrappings of caste to enter triumphantly the grand family of humanity. During this time, worn by ennui to the very marrow of his bones, the Marquis con- tinued to be consumed by impotent desires and sterile regrets ; till at last, one beautiful day, he 34 MADELEINE : rendered to God what he had of soul, and his wife and his friend wept over him like children. Some months after, in 1802, upon the invita- tion of the First Consul, they re-crossed the Rhine and returned happily into their own country, like it regenerated. They had both long comprehended and accepted the new glory of France. In again touching this heroic ground, they felt their hearts tremble, and sweet tears moistened their eyes. The best portions of their estates had been preserved by the government, and they easily obtained permis- sion to enter upon their possession. Once more established at home, their long exile seemed like a dream ; only, unlike the Epimenides, they awakened young after having gone to sleep old. Hardly was he re-established in the castle of his father, when the Chevalier hastened to bring there a chaste and beautiful girl whom he had loved in Germany, whom he married, and who died in giving birth to a son. This child grew up between his father and Madame de Fresnes, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 35 who devoted themselves to him, living philo- sophically in their retreat, doing good, occupied with their old pursuits, deaf to the noise of the world, and strangers to ambition. Of all habits, that of work is the most rare and the most imperious. The Marquise painted as she did in the old time. The Chevalier rose at day- light, and cut and hollowed and polished the wood of the pear and walnut and oak; for he had undertaken the task of renewing magnifi- cently the worm-eaten wood- work of his old chateau. Also, in memory of his old success, he turned nut-crackers, which he presented to the daughters of his tenantry. Reading, walking, and the delights of a friendship whose charm seemed never to grow old, with the edu- cation of young Maurice, absorbed the remain- der of days all too short when one works and when one loves. CHAPTER III. ONE evening, as these old companions were seated near each other, entertaining themselves in re-traversing the current of the days they had descended together, they saw, coming up the avenue of the park, the two young people whom we left at the gate. Arrived at the foot of the steps, the young girl ascended them slowly, with a grave air, although visibly affected. The Marquise and the Cheva- lier rose to receive her. She drew from her breast a letter, which she first carried reverently to her lips, and then presented it to M. de Val- travers, who contemplated, with a sentiment of benevolent curiosity, this child that he saw for the first time. The old gentleman broke 36 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 37 the seal and read. Standing with her thin arms crossed upon her breast, calm in her grief, dignified in her humility, the little stranger drooped her eyes under the gaze of Madame de Fresnes, who regarded her with interest ; while, some steps apart, the young man who had brought her joined in discreet witness of the silent scene. "MUNICH, i3th July, 18 . "About to quit this world, in face of the eternity which is immediately to open for me, it is not toward Heaven, it is toward France, that my eyes turn before closing. It is not toward God, but toward you, my brother, that I cry, and to whom I extend my suppliant hands in the name of her who was my sister and the wife of your choice. Alas ! this house, that you have known so prosperous, has been cruelly tried. Where have gone the joys of that fireside at which in other days you came to seat your- self? The tomb has taken from me all. My husband has not survived the loss of his for- tune ; and I, unhappily, in my turn, see death 38 MADELEINE : approach. I die, and I am a mother. O God ! this is to die twice. When you read these lines, my only treasure, the sole inheritance that I could leave in going my daughter will have only you upon this earth. When you hold in your hands this paper, wet with my tears, my child will be before you ; alone, come from afar, broken by grief and by fatigue, without other refuge than your roof, without other support than your heart. Oh, by the sweet tie which was dear to you, and which death has not broken; by this Germany which showed itself so hospitable to you, and which for a long time was for you your country; by my family, become yours ; by the adorable creature so soon ravished from your love, and who adjures you here through my voice, oh, do not repulse my orphan child. Receive her. Warm in your breast the dove that has fallen from her nest. And thou, whom I do not know, but whom I have loved to include so often with my daughter in the same sentiment of tenderness and solicitude son of my sister if thy mother has given thee her soul, thou wilt be good and fraternal to my beloved Madeleine. Protect and watch over her when thy father shall be no more. And A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 39 forget not, young friend, that the orphan child that Heaven sends us sometimes becomes the tutelary angel of the house that opens to her." " Come, my daughter ! come to my arms ! " cried the Chevalier, when he had finished the reading. " Be welcome, my child, under the roof of thy old uncle. Were it not for the mourning that has brought thee hither, I should say thrice happy for us all is the day of thy arrival. Marquise, it is my niece," he added, taking in his hands the fair head of the young girl. " Maurice, it is thy cousin. It is a young sister, who conies to thee from the country of thy mother." The orphan passed from the arms of her uncle to those of the Marquise. Madame de Fresnes had lost an only daughter, taken in her flower, near the age of Madeleine ; and, like all who have known such bereavements, she felt an irresistible impulse to find, even where it did not exist, striking and vivid resemblances between the child death had taken and those me^ along MADELEINE : the way. Touching illusion of love and of grief, which transforms all these fresh faces into living portraits of the adored being who is no more ! The Marquise felt herself naturally attracted toward the fair creature who appeared to her the image of her daughter; having the same eyes, the same look, the same charm, sad and grave, peculiar to the young who have suffered or who are condemned to die before their time. With this predisposition, one can judge that Madame de Fresnes, with her impulsive and ardent nature a nature whose generosity age had not changed adopted with enthusiasm the cause of the young stranger. She pressed her to her breast, called her by tender names, and covered her with kisses and caresses. Then it was the turn of the young man. " What, my cousin ! it was you ? " she cried, smiling through her tears. " You are the little Maurice ? I had fancied you could only be a child like me." Maurice embraced her cordially though it A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 4I is doubtful if he had ever thought before of the existence of his cousin. Meanwhile the Chevalier gave his orders, troubling himself to see to everything, and saying to each one of the old servants, " We have one child more." Certainly if she could that evening have seen the welcome that her daughter received at Valtravers, the mother of our heroine would have been content in Paradise. The installation of Madeleine did not change the way of things at the chateau. A simple, pious, and modest girl, already serious and reflect- ive, taking a quiet place, making but little noise, the most of the time silently bent over her needle-work, in a few days she had rendered herself agreeable to everyone by her sweetness and her goodness. Of her face and figure, we shall say but little. She was just at the age which has lost the graces of childhood and has not yet reached those of womanhood. She was not really beautiful, nor will we say that she promised to become so. Before pronouncing 4 2 MADELEINE : upon questions so delicate, it is always prudent to wait until the season of transition accom- plishes its mysterious work, in which ugliness is transfigured and the early flowers of beauty are too often withered. But just as she was, the Marquise and the Chevalier loved her with a true tenderness; and the life of the child was divided between their neighboring houses which really made but one family. So far from having been neglected, her education had been pushed so fast that she could continue it herself and finish it at need without other help. She spoke French with purity almost without accent. Like all Germans, and too many French, she thoroughly understood music; and a quality unhappily more rare she did not abuse it. The Chevalier and the Marquise were delighted to have her sing the Tyrolese songs; but these airs, which brought back so pleasantly to them the happy days of their exile and poverty, recalled cruelly to her her mother and her country, both lost without return ; and A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE 43 often the poor child's song was interrupted by her tears and sobs. As for Maurice, at the end of two or three weeks, during which he felt obliged to pay some attention to his cousin and to do the honors of the country, he scarcely perceived her presence. He was twenty years old, and had all the ardor and impetuosity of his age. He had grown in entire liberty, doubly spoiled by his father and by the Marquise, who thought no one in the world more handsome or more charming. A tutor had taught him a little Greek and Latin; while at the same time his father, whose love for wood-carving had become almost a mania, initiated him into th.at art. The old Chevalier wept with pride and joy when he saw near him his son, squaring and turning and polishing, and promising to surpass his instruc- tor; while Maurice, on his part, appeared to take pleasure in this inoffensive pastime. But one beautiful day, there came to him a misfor- tune. He asked himself the question if, after 44 MADELEINE : the Chevalier, the Marquise, and wood-carving, there was nothing else for him in the world. To this indiscreet question, addressed to him by the turbulence of his unquiet youth, the response did not wait. There are tender and poetic natures, veiled in their morning by a light mist. There are others, vivacious and energetic, whose dawn seems to burst with the fire of mid-day. With the one, the first unquiet of the awakened sense and of imagination reveals itself without noise and translates itself into dreamy sadness. With the other, there is violent and tumultuous agitation. Maurice partook of both these na- tures; at times, sad, preoccupied, dreamy; then all at once seized with ardors without end and without name ; unable to remain in-doors ; impetuous, boiling, even a little angry ; and not knowing to what wind to throw the savage energy that consumed him; but through all, affectionate toward his father, full of attentions for Madame de Fresnes, adored by everybody. A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE, 45 Having constantly in his head the wood-carvings of the old chateau, and the endless histories that he had heard for twenty years, he asked himself, in great irritation, if his life was to be forever devoted to turning wood and fashioning oak, and in listening at evening, with his feet upon the fender in the chimney-corner, to the eternal histories of the time of exile. Waiting for something better, he hunted everywhere in the region, and lamed his horses. It was at the height of this explosive period that Madeleine arrived. One can judge of how little importance, at such an hour in the des- tiny of this young man, could be the apparition of a little girl of fourteen or fifteen years, timid, reserved, silent, without too much beauty or grace. He occupied himself with her but little more than if she had never quitted Munich. He departed at daylight every morning, and did not return till night. He often passed a week at some neighboring town or chateau. If he chanced to see Madeleine at her window, 46 MADELEINE : he nodded to her carelessly. At meal-time he addressed her an occasional insignificant word. When she sang her "Tyroliennes," as this was always the occasion for the Marquise and the Chevalier to speak of Nuremberg and recall the nut-crackers of the one and the miniatures of the other, Maurice never failed to escape at the first note. One evening, however, as he stood near her, he could not help noticing the beauty and luxuriance of her hair. He re- marked upon it, lifting with a familiar hand the magnificent blonde mass that covered the head of the little German. The poor child was so unaccustomed to being an object of interest to her cousin, that she blushed and trembled ; but when she wished to thank him with a smile, Maurice, fearing some new " Tyroliennes," had already escaped. Another time, returning from the chase, he gave her a pretty pheasant that he had rescued alive from his dogs. " My cousin, then you think sometimes of me?" inquired the young girl, much affected. A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 47 But Maurice had already turned upon his heel. It was not that he saw with jealous dis- pleasure the presence of the orphan under the paternal roof. Far from that ; if he had all the hot-headedness of his age, he had also its noble and generous instincts. It had never occurred to him to dispute any place that Madeleine might one day have in the will of the Chevalier. Let us also say, in passing, that such shameful calculations rarely enter the heart at twenty years. Maurice was as ready to share with his cousin as with a sister; and if he was not more tender and attentive to her, it was simply because she had not come into the world fifteen or twenty months sooner than she did. The Marquise and the Chevalier did not at first comprehend the abrupt change in Maurice, whom they had hitherto found so simple in taste and so even in temper. They both distressed themselves, without understand- ing why. They had been young at a time 48 MADELEINE: when youth wasted itself, right and left, in little distractions and elegant frivolities ; with- out a thought of that heavy unrest and pro- found weariness which later was the martyrdom of a generation. Although reared in the re- tirement of the country, Maurice had submitted to the influence of the new ideas. Ideas are living forces, mixed with the air we breathe. The wind carries and sows them everywhere ; and do what one can to escape these invisible currents though he keep to one side or in the distance he is yet penetrated and impreg- nated, for he is always the child of his century. That which was most surprising to the Chevalier and the Marquise was not the devouring need of activity, which was naturally explained by the heated blood of youth, but the sombre melancholy in which its ardor and impetuosity seemed lost. But in fact, how could they comprehend the malady of an epoch when gaiety, exiled from the heart of twenty years, found a home under the white hairs of A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 49 age ? After discussing the question, they arrived at the conclusion that the life which Maurice had led till then was neither profitable nor amusing; and that, in spite of the incomparable charms of wood-carving, it was not surprising that a young heart was not entirely absorbed by it. That was the opinion of the Marquise : the Chevalier ended by agreeing with her. The question was, what to do. They spoke at first of a marriage ; but that remedy seemed a little too violent. Besides, the Marquise observed, with reason, that young men of rank in that generation did not marry at twenty ; and that, in another respect, unlike the old times, marriage had become less a commencement than an end. In brief, after ripe reflection, it was decided to send Maurice for two or three years to Paris, and then, at his choice, to Germany or Italy; thus to complete his education by a profound study of men and things. This programme was not much more vague than that usually traced for the sons of families in the Provinces, 4 5 o MADELEINE: before putting the bridle-rein on their necks and launching them into the life of Paris. Some time after, on an Autumn evening which was the anniversary of Madeleine's arrival, the Chevalier, his son, and the Marquise were re-united in the chateau of Valtravers. The horse that was to take Maurice to the neighboring town through which passed the mail-route, waited, saddled and bridled, at the door. It was the hour of adieu. A parting has always something sad and solemn, even when the separation is but temporary. The Chevalier seemed painfully affected. The Marquise con- cealed her depression poorly. Maurice himself appeared much agitated; and when his old father opened his arms, he threw himself into them, weeping as if he embraced him for the last time. Madame de Fresnes pressed the young man to her heart with emotion. The old house-servants, who had been present at his birth, embraced him as their child. Time passed. Maurice tore himself from A STOR Y OF FRENCH LO VE. 5 r the farewells of his friends. At the last moment, as he was about to put his foot in the stirrup, he remembered Madeleine. Surprised at her absence, he was about to send for her, when he was told that the young girl had left the chateau several hours before. Leaving some affectionate words of adieu for his cousin, he moved away at the slow walk of his horse, turning often with gestures of salutation to the kind beings who followed him with their eyes. Arrived at the gate of the park he hesitated like a young eagle on the edge of its nest before launching itself in space. He recalled the happy days that he had passed in the shade of this pretty manor, between the care of the Marquise and the tenderness of his father. He seemed to see through the trees the gracious phantom of his youth, that regarded him with sadness and tried to detain him. He seemed to hear voices that said, " Ingrate, where do you go ? " His heart swelled to bursting, and his eyes moistened with tears. But his destiny 52 MADELEINE: controlled him. He plunged into the forest that he must cross to reach the town. At the end of a rapid ride, at the very place where he had met her a year before at the same day and hour, he saw Madeleine, seated and dreaming. As before, she had not heard the sound of his gallop upon the moss. Lifting her eyes, she saw her cousin regarding her. It was the same frame and the same picture. Nothing was changed, only in place of an unde- veloped child, frail and delicate, without beauty and almost without grace, he saw a fair face, around which there had commenced to hover a bright host of the sweet dreams of youth. It was not yet the flower in bloom ; but the bud had opened its leaves. It was not the Aurora, but the misty white dawn of awaken- ing Nature, trembling under the first kiss of Morning. Maurice dismounted from his horse, and hastened to embrace his cousin and to say adieu. Again in the saddle, he pursued his A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 53 route, without knowing, alas! that he left happi- ness behind him. When he had disappeared at the bend of the avenue, Madeleine returned to the chateau. Entering the drawing-room she found the Chevalier seated by his deserted fireside. She walked sadly to the back of the chair in which the old man sat in a bent attitude, and for some minutes contemplated him in silence. " My father," she said, bending toward him her blonde head, " my father, you have still a daughter." The Chevalier smiled, and drew her softly to his heart. CHAPTER IV. ATER the departure of Maurice, Madeleine became the joy of Valtravers; enlivening with her growing graces the household which was no longer animated by his presence. Like a young Antigone, she redoubled toward her old uncle her pious and tender care. Though her heart was still sad, and her spirit more reflect- ive than is usual at her age, yet, to divert him, she forgot herself, and transformed her natural gravity into a smiling serenity. She accompanied him in all his excursions ; lingered around him in his workshop; read aloud his journals ; encouraged him in recounting the old stories of his exile ; and never failed to go into ecstacies before each piece of carving with 54 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 55 which this indefatigable artist encumbered every corner of the chateau. At the same time, she was a devoted daughter to the Marquise, who taught her painting, and whose highest pleasure was in cultivating the charms that God had given her. Thus loved and guarded by these two old people, this orphan child grew in talents and in virtue. In the three years succeeding her arrival, Madeleine had developed into a good and beautiful creature; though not of that acquired and conventional beauty which marks the hero- ines of poets and romancers. Her figure was neither large nor small, and had not the flexi- bility of the willow. A critic devoted to the plastic side of art would have found something to remodel in the oval of her face. Her hair, which had grown darker, could not truthfully be compared either with the black of ebony or the sheen of gold. Though her skin had that heavy whiteness of the camellia which defies the effects of sun and air, her eyes were more 56 MADELEINE: gray than blue. If her teeth were even and white as the pearls of a necklace, the mouth was rather large, the lips were a little heavy. Her lashes did not fall upon her cheek like the fringe of a gentian ; and the line of the nose recalled but vaguely the straight noses of royal races. Yet such a face and figure may form a pleasing whole in which imperfec- tions of detail are lost, harmonizing so well that each one appears but a new charm. I love this style of beauty, which is less correct than sympathetic, which captivates the heart more than the eyes, and which, without any- thing to dazzle or fascinate the first view, is always ready to reveal, to those who can com- prehend it, some unexpected grace, some new enchantment. Although she occupied herself closely with domestic affairs, the practical wis- dom and judgment that she brought to these duties did not preclude a certain air of dis- tinction, a cast of spirit romantic, poetic, dreamy, that she inherited at the same time A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 57 from her mother, from Germany, and from God. One can readily imagine the attachment that was formed between Madeleine, the Marquise, and the Chevalier. She was the light of their old age, the soft ray which illumined the end of their days. Mixed and blended, these three existences ran in slow and peaceful waves. But it sometimes happened that these waves, usually so pure, were troubled. The letters of Maurice were at first full of charm and poesy; fresh and perfumed like the bouquets that are gathered in the dew of the fields. It is thus that one writes at the happy age which flies so quickly. At the hour when life commences its decline, have you never found, in the depths of an old drawer, some such letters of your youth ? Have they not surprised you? In reading them, have you not seen pass across your tears the image of your beautiful past? Have you not asked yourself if it was indeed the same spring, now ready to 5 8 MADELEINE: dry up, which poured out all these treasures of enthusiasm and of faith, of grace and of virtue, of happiness and of love ? It was such letters that Maurice wrote at twenty years. The days of the letter-courier were joyful ones at Valtravers. As far as she could see the post-man, Madeleine ran to meet him, and returned triumphantly to the chateau. Ordina- rily it was she who read, in a clear voice, her cousin's letters. When as did not always happen she found in them her name, her bosom heaved, and a rosy tint, almost imper- ceptible, colored for a moment the alabaster of her face. If there was no mention of her as more often was the case she was grave and silent for the rest of the day. These letters of Maurice made all the fibres of the good Cheva- lier's heart to vibrate; for he could trace, beneath the outbursts of their passionate ten- derness, the development of an elevated spirit and of a lively intelligence. Sometimes old friends at Paris would write to congratulate him A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 59 upon his son. All seemed promising for the best; and they already began to speak of the happiness of his return. But at the end of a year, the letters of our young friend became rarer and briefer, less and less affectionate and tender. Vague in thought and constrained in expression, they betrayed a great disquiet of the senses and of the soul. The little family began by distressing itself in silence ; it soon became seriously alarmed. To the indulgent reproaches that were addressed to him, Maurice returned evasive responses. The term fixed for his stay in Paris had long since expired ; but he showed no disposition to leave, though it had been decided that he should go from there to Germany or Italy. To the Chevalier, who pressed this, Maurice at first did not reply. Then, pushed to extremes by the persistence of his father, he answered in lan- guage through which shone an impatience of control. If the Chevalier's old friends still wrote to him, it was to express their regrets at 60 MADELEINE : seeing no more the Maurice of the past. At last an explosion came in the form of some heavy drafts upon the honest manor, which was stricken with affright. These things were not accomplished in a week, nor even in a month. It had taken little less than three years to reach this point. And there were other troubles. If, by virtue of the pretexts, more or less specious, with which Maurice tried to excuse his wanderings, M. de Valtravers could have kept up any illusions as to the conduct of his son, the good souls with which the Provinces abound would not have failed to lift the illusions from him. The Chevalier was a perfect gentleman, in the most beautiful acceptation of this word, which has become so common since the thing is so rare. Accessible to all, with a charming spirit, a noble heart, a loyal character, he had yet many enemies in the country; not among his peas- antry, who loved him, but at the neighboring town, where there were some officers and some A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 61 lawyers pillars of the coffee-houses, leaders of liberalism, and vermin of the Province who had never pardoned him for having re-entered his possessions. All the town had long known the kind of life young Valtravers led at Paris; for the Province is a good mother, who never forgets her absent sons. She follows them through life with an eager eye, curious and jealous, always ready to overwhelm those who fall, in order to avenge herself for those who rise. In general, if you wish to throw despair and consternation into the haunts of men who have seen you born and grow up, arrive with your head high and by a straight path at suc- cess, honors, and fortune. If, on the contrary, it pleases you to diffuse there a sweet joy, run into all possible errors, that your virtuous fel- low-citizens may weep over your ruin. For when our fellow-citizens weep over us, it is to hide their laughter. Maurice had for some time been for the town in question a marvellous subject of 62 MADELEINE: public scandal and internal satisfaction. Trai- torously hidden under the mantle of pity, hate gives free vent to its joy. Nothing failed the poor Chevalier; neither charitable warnings nor hypocritical condolence. Anony- mous letters did the rest. The Marquise wept in secret. The Chevalier wasted himself with grief. Happiness seemed to have fled from under the roof of these old friends. Madeleine went from one to the other like an angel of consolation. She defended Maurice, and spoke constantly of his speedy return ; though she really believed in it no longer, and often hid herself to conceal her tears. It was easy to see that the Chevalier was seriously affected; for having commenced to neglect wood-carving, he presently aban- doned it entirely. He had no more taste for anything. Madeleine alone knew how to unwrinkle his forehead, and to bring to his lips a faint smile. He would sometimes say : " Poor child! before I die I need to make sure A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 63 thy destiny; for in the way he is going, it is not Maurice who will watch over thee when I am gone." "Come, come, my father," Madeleine would reply, " do not trouble yourself about that. I wish for nothing but your love. I shall have need of nothing when you are gone. I am old enough to watch over myself. I have resolution and courage, thank God! and what you have done in my Germany, you and the Marquise, I will do in your France. I will work. Why not?" The old man smiled, and tremblingly shook his head. The young girl one day wrote secretly to her cousin an admirable letter; but Maurice never replied. As for the old Chevalier, he wrote no more; and in those last days he scarcely permitted anyone to speak in his presence of his son. As he grew more and more feeble, and felt the end approaching, he decided to throw to this unhappy young man a last cry of love and of despair. The response was slow in coming. After three months of 64 MADELEINE : waiting, it arrived. It said that, absent from Paris nearly a year, traveling I know not where, in company with I know not whom, Maurice had received on his return the last counsel of his father. God be praised ! the young man awoke to better sentiments. His letter proved it. It showed the distress of a fallen soul, which, by a supreme effort, tries to uplift itself. He embraced the knees of his father; he covered with tears and kisses the hand of the Marquise ; Madeleine found herself mixed in the effusion of his repentance. He only asked a few weeks in which to break with these wretched ties, and then he would return. He would say an eternal adieu to that world in which he had wandered. Beaten by the tempest, he would enter the port of home, and quit it no more. "Paternal roof! I shall see thee again. I return to the home of my childhood. Dear companions of my young years ! I shall press you to my heart. You also, little cousin." Exalted by these lively A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 65 images, his imagination had found for an instant the grace and freshness of youth. Unhappily, when this letter arrived at the chateau, for twenty-four hours the Chevalier had been no more. He had died the evening before, at the window, to which they had rolled his chair, between the Marquise and Madeleine, who each held him by the hand. The day of the funeral, when the earth covered all that was left below of this excellent being that chance had made a gentleman and that work and poverty had made a man, the Marquise affectionately embraced Madeleine, made an orphan for the. second time. " My child," said she to her, " thy work is not accomplished. Thou hast yet to aid me to die, and to close my eyes." They threw themselves into each other's arms, and remained thus a long time. "Ah!" cried the Marquise, "since you have restored to me my daughter, it is only just that I take the place of thy mother." 66 MADELEINE ; From this day, Madeleine lived at the Chateau de Fresnes. A week before his death, the old Chevalier had put into the hands of the Marquise an autograph will, by which he had left to his niece the small farm of Coudray, of the value of eighty or a hundred thousand francs. This will was expressed in the most touching and affectionate terms. All the exquisite delicacy of the Chevalier there showed itself. When, to re-assure her as to the future, Madame de Fresnes confided to Madeleine this precious proof of the love of her uncle, by an impulse of pious gratitude, the young girl pressed it to her lips and against her heart. Then, tearing it to pieces, she put the shreds in her breast. " My daughter! what have you done ? " cried the Marquise, apparently surprised, but really delighted. " Can a heart noble as yours ask ? " replied Madeleine, smiling. " I know nothing of the life of Maurice. I am only sure that he will A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 67 have need of all his resources; and I should but poorly recognize his father's goodness if I took from the son part of his inheritance. You could not have acted otherwise, in my place." " But, my poor child, thou hast nothing. I cannot counsel thee to trust to the devotion of Maurice ; and when I am gone and I have not a long time to stay what will be- come of thee ? " "That which becomes of anyone who has courage and a good will. Am I not, thanks to your lessons, as rich as you were when you arrived in Nuremberg? The God who aided you will not abandon me ; and I will make my nest as you have made yours." * You are a brave girl ! " said the Marquise, taking between her withered white hands the head of Madeleine. Every day they expected Maurice, whom the death of his father had stricken like a thunder- bolt. But weeks and months ran by, and he did not come. They soon learned that he had 68 MADELEINE : sent a power-of-attorney to arrange the affairs of his inheritance. He had written to his cousin, offering her, without either enthusiasm or bad grace, a generous portion in the estate of his father. It was precisely this same little farm of Coudray, which, without his knowledge, the orphan had already so generously re- nounced. The young girl replied simply, that, living with Madame de Fresnes, she had need of nothing. The young man did not insist. What had become of his good resolutions? Restrained by respect, and perhaps by remorse, he dared not. look upon a tomb that, without too much rigor, he could accuse himself of having made before its time. They credited him with reserve, and did not doubt that later he would come to Valtravers with his offering of expiation. Whilst at the Chateau de Fres- nes they solaced themselves in this last hope, a few steps from there the mortgages fell like rain. Scarcely a year after the death of the old Chevalier, the news ran through the country A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 69 that the domain and chateau of Valtravers were to be offered at public sale. The Marquise and Madeleine refused to believe it, and cried out against the calumny, as they had done so many times in defending Maurice against the comments of the Province. One day, however, as they were walking together in the forest, they saw through the gate of the park at Val- travers a number of servants and peasants who looked at one another with an air of consterna- tion. Influenced partly by their presentiments, and partly by curiosity, they advanced toward the manor. "Ah! Madame la Marquise. Ah! Madem- oiselle Madeleine ! " cried the people, as they drew near. "What a terrible misfortune for us ! The thunderbolt has fallen upon our heads. It is the ruin of our lives." " What is it, my children ? What has hap- pened to you ? " asked Madame de Fresnes. " See ! see ! Madame la Marquise ! What will our good master the Chevalier think of MADELEINE : this in Heaven? " And with frightened gestures, they showed the door of the chateau, dishon- ored by immense placards that announced the sale. Doubt was no longer possible. Madeleine drooped her head, and silent tears rolled down her cheeks. Until then she had never under- stood all of the comments she had heard upon the conduct of Maurice. In her heart she had always absolved him. This time, all her noble instincts in revolt cried unpityingly that the young man was lost. The Marquise felt her forehead redden with the indignant blood of her heart that gen- erous heart that age had not yet cooled. " No, my children ! " she cried resolutely. " Whilst I live, this domain and this chateau shall not become the prey of these harpies. These villains shall not have such a pleasure. Be comforted, my friends. You shall remain upon the farms where you were born, in this home where you have grown old; nothing shall A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 7I be changed in your lives. Take my word for it, and go and console your wives and children." Without delay, she sent for her notary, and put in his hands deeds which represented the best part of her fortune, directing him to con- vert them into money and buy the entire prop- erty enumerated in the announcement of the sale. And so, one bright morning, the Marquise found herself proprietress of the domain of Valtravers. She still continued to live with Madeleine in the Chateau de Fresnes, where her daughter had died, and where she wished to die. Alas! this last blow struck fatally the beloved Marquise. For some time she had felt herself irresistibly drawn by the impatient soul of her old companion. " What would you have ? " said she to Madeleine. "For so long a time we were never separated. Without speaking of the Marquis, whom thou hast not known, I am sure that my poor Chevalier wearies himself in Paradise, not to see me. It is wicked in 7 2 MADELEINE : me to make him wait so long. That which embarrasses me is to know what I shall say to him when he asks me for news of his son." The evening of her death, awakening from a long unconsciousness, Madame de Fresnes said to Madeleine, who waited at her bedside: " I have had a strange dream. I saw Maurice in the depths of an abyss. Horrible serpents crawled and hissed at his feet. The unhappy youth exhausted himself in desperate efforts to remount to the regions of day. I wished to run to his aid, but felt my feet chained to the ground. I extended toward him my feeble hands, when suddenly I saw thee arrive from afar, calm and serene. At the side of the abyss, after having untied thy white scarf which surrounded thy throat and floated upon thy shoulders, I saw thee throw it smilingly tc Maurice, who seized it and was drawn up without effort; and by thy side he appeared radiant and transfigured. Behold my dream what thinkest thou, my daughter?" A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 73 A faint glow lit the lips of Madeleine, who remained pensive and in silence. The Marquise died the following day; or, to express it better, she went to sleep in the arms of the young girl, to whom her beautiful soul said good-night in her last smile. Some hours before her death, she had said gaily, " I have not forgotten thee in my will. Since thou hast a taste for miniature-painting, I have left thee my colors and my brushes. Try with these to find a husband." At the opening of the will, Madeleine found that Madame de Fresnes had spoken truly ; only to this little legacy the Marquise had added the domain and the chateau of Val- travers leaving still a large portion to her natural heirs, who were not in want. Thus this young girl re-entered as sovereign the house where, one Autumn evening five years before, she had arrived with her little packet in her hand. CHAPTER V. C,SS elated than one would have believed from her new position, Madeleine rever- ently re-entered the chateau where all the old servants had seen her grow from girlhood to womanhood, and where now she was loved and received like a young queen. She lived there, as in the past, modestly and quietly, solely occupied with the beings confided to her care. Her authority only revealed itself in the profusion of benefits that she shed around her. In all other respects, no one would have suspected any change in her fortune, but would have said that she was still the same little orphan who had been sheltered by the charity of her uncle. Her only command was that nothing should be changed in the manner of life 74 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 75 at the chateau ; that all the customs of the old Chevalier should be respected as absolutely as if he were not dead, and might return at any moment. For her own use, she selected the little chamber in which she had spent the last days of her childhood and the first years of her youth. Whenever the servants came to her for directions in any matter of moment, she never failed to inquire what the Chevalier would have done in like circumstances. If counsel or reproof was needed, she always began it by some such phrase as, " I believe, my children, that your good master the Chevalier would have said ." She repeated often that the best way to honor the memory of those who have loved us is to do nothing to distress them, and to ask ourselves before acting what they would have thought if they were yet here. When she spoke of Maurice, it was with the respect that might be due to a young king upon whose kingdom she administered during his minority. She was less queen than regent. 76 MADELEINE: The news of her prosperity ran through the country, and suitors were not slow to present themselves. Valtravers became a Mecca, to which journeyed the bachelors of the Province. In Summer, one could see a long file of these pilgrims marching toward the sacred place to pay their devotions. Little country squires, ruined gentlemen, younger sons, bachelors, young and old, in willow carriages, on foot, or on worn-out jades, came from all points to recite their pater-nosters at this shrine. Though serious and reflective, Madeleine had that frank and hearty gaiety which flows naturally from a pure conscience, an upright heart, and a healthy spirit. She replied to these faithful ones that it was an edifying spectacle to see a poor orphan become all at once the object of so pure a worship, of attentions so disinterested. She had heard, she said, in Germany, that France was the country of pious souls and generous hearts ; but she never before suspected that they carried so far the religious duty of caring for A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 77 the unfortunate. She confessed that though touched almost to tears, she had only one regret : that she was so content and happy in her humble condition that she did not wish to change it for the rare honor they came to offer her. Thus, one by one, these devoted and pious personages were dismissed. Madeleine had always replied in something of the same manner when the Chevalier or the Marquise had spoken to her of marrying. She had decided that she would not marry. If such was her taste, I approve it ; never having under- stood the ridicule which attaches to old maids. I esteem far more highly the woman who resigns herself to grow old in solitude than the one who consents to mismate her heart or her soul. Disincumbered of her suitors, Madeleine continued to live in her retreat, dividing her days between the care of her little empire, works of charity, and the culture of the arts that she loved. She had exhumed from her uncle's library some good old books that had 7 8 MADELEINE : done much to ripen her intelligence. In her smiling gravity, in her calm and serene beauty, at twenty -one years of age she was a living representative of good sense, of reason, of grace and poesy; like the flowers that draw up the sweets of the earth by their roots, and drink at the same time in their chalices the balmy dew of heaven. Her religion was not simply a matter of mass at Neuvy-les-Bois, but she visited often and willingly the miserable village that she had entered so poor and forlorn, and where she now had her own poor and her orphans who blessed her. Upon such visits, she rarely failed to stop for a moment at the house of the good woman who, when she first entered the place five years before, had so char- itably offered her refreshment and repose. But as for Monsieur Pierrot, she never succeeded in coming near him. Whether it was because in her presence he felt himself crushed with remorse, or feared that she would seek to reclaim the piece of silver that he had so A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 79 easily gained, the scamp put in play both his legs whenever he saw her in the distance. When the funereal tints that death leaves after it were dispelled from around Madeleine, when time had changed to smiling shadows the spectres of her grief, this young girl would have deemed herself happy in the midst of her duties but for one constant and increasing anxiety. Where was Maurice ? What was he doing? The only signs of life he had given since his father's death were the ravages in his estate caused by his growing excesses. Before taking possession of Valtravers, Made- leine, actuated by sentiments of delicacy which lofty spirits can easily comprehend and which commonplace natures never can, had written to him to explain and excuse her own fortune. This letter, which he should have carried rev- erently to his lips if he was not dead to every sentiment of virtue, had remained unanswered. But in spite of so many reasons, both in his own acts and his reputation, for discarding him 8o MADELEINE : from her heart, he remained in her dreams as she found him that Autumn evening when for the first time he opened to her this hospitable door. True, she was then merely a child ; but at this age, when boys think only of their amusements, it is impossible to know what germ has already taken root in the heart of a girl of fifteen years. In this, girls have no childhood ; and no matter how young may be the wife, there is seldom a husband who dares flatter himself that he has gathered the first perfume of her soul. God, who sees the diamond formed in the bowels of the earth and the budding pearl in the depths of the ocean, alone knew what had passed in the heart of this child since their first meeting. Madeleine had long refused to believe that Maurice had fallen as low as people assured her. For a long time she had defended him against all ; even against his father, so in- dulgent; against the Marquise, so good. At last, after having seen the days of the Chevalier A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 8 1 shortened and the home of his ancestors ex- posed to public sale, she could no longer resist the evidences of his wrong-doing. But none the less had this young man remained the secret thought, the hidden romance of her life. These sentiments had redoubled in intensity since Madeleine had returned to Valtravers, and found at every step some lively trace of this youth whom she had known so impetuous but so charming in his enthusiasm. In his apartment nothing was changed. She passed there long, long hours, sometimes sad and sometimes enchanted. In the park, she sat under the trees that he had planted. In cross- ing the court, his dogs would run to meet her. By the borders of the Vienne, she saw the horses that he had ridden, now at liberty in the grass. The forest was filled with his image. He had carved the oak that ornamented the dining- room. This was not all. There was at Valtravers a good and honest girl, who had never been away from the house, 82 MADELEINE: and who was born the same day with Maurice. They were nurslings of the same mother, which in the Province establishes always between children a close fraternity. The Chevalier gave to this foster-sister of his son a moderate education. She had the rare spirit to profit but little by it, and to remain simply what Nature had made her; neat, active, alert, attentive, speaking frankly on all occasions, and rejoicing the sight by her splendid health. She had few faults, except the boisterousness proceeding from an excess of animal spirits. She simply adored her foster-brother. She found it only natural that he had spent all his means; and she was only surprised at the surprise of others. If, in the place of selling it, he had set fire to the chateau of his father, Ursula would have declared without hesitation that it was admirably done. If he had roasted his farmers for his own amusement, she would have judged the case at most a little singular. From the first, she had conceived for Made- A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 83 leine an affection almost as strong. On hearing that the little German orphan, a cousin of Maurice, had arrived at the chateau, she had run to meet her, thrown her arms around her, and almost drowned her in her tears of welcome. She was intolerant of the servants or peasants who dared in her presence to doubt the virtues of the young Chevalier. A blow here and a kick there cost her nothing. She had a heavy fist, and the most courageous among them dared not cross her. Madeleine would talk with her for hours. What charm could there be in this ? We scarcely need to say. Ursula talked always of her young master. Seated in the embrasure of a window, one at her embroidery, the other mending, the only topic was Maurice. Ursula would tell the stories of their youth, always the same; but what the one was never tired of hearing, the other was never tired of repeating. In following these reminiscences, they always arrived insensibly at the present hour, when 84 MADELEINE: Ursula, having depicted her foster-brother as a lamb without stain, would prophesy his speedy return. The small farm of Coudray had not been sold; consequently they believed Maurice had not said a final adieu to his country. This last hope was soon broken. They heard one day that Coudray was for sale; and as a misfortune never comes alone, the same day a morG unexpected event brought trouble and confusion to the chateau. Madeleine's notary came to tell her that a nephew of Madame de Fresnes, whom they had thought dead for many years, had returned from America; that he was resolved to dispute the will of his aunt, and that hostilities were about to commence. A few evenings after, Madeleine was walking in the avenue to the park, alone and sad, thinking of her new troubles and complications. It was impossible to foresee the issue of the lawsuit; and although she naturally shrank from the publicity and annoyance of this affair, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 85 it was not care for her fortune which troubled her. Her first impulse had been to give up her inheritance without dispute ; and when, on reflection, she concluded to defend her rights, it was through respect for the memory of her benefactors. Then, let what would happen, as she had followed the path of duty, the end should not disquiet her. Besides, what was this house to her if Maurice did not return? She had always considered it his property, and it had been the dream of her life that one day the prodigal should be reinstated by her in the domain of his fathers. At the turn of the walk, Madeleine saw him before her Maurice but so pale and so changed that one would have thought it was his spectre. Alas! he was in truth only the spectre of himself. Surprised and delighted, Madeleine started to throw herself into his arms; but her emotion was chilled by the frozen attitude of this still figure. Simply remarking that the evening was chilly, he offered his cousin 86 MADELEINE : his arm to conduct her to the chateau ; and although Madeleine trembled, he walked with a firm step. He mounted without hesitation the steps to the doorway ; but when he entered the drawing-room and Madeleine said to him, " It is here that your father died," his strength appeared to falter, and he hid his face between his hands " Ah ! it is thou ? " he said to Ursula, who almost stifled him with her embraces ; then, after some commonplace com- pliments to his cousin, he told them that, about to leave France for a long voyage, he wished to see for a last time the house of his fathers, and say adieu to those whom he had loved. At the end of an hour, he retired to his chamber; Madeleine having insisted that he should seek no other shelter. When he had gone, she burst into tears, and sobbed aloud. As for Ursula, she seemed changed to stone. In coming to Valtravers, Maurice had intended passing only a few hours there, before returning to Paris to arrange the pre- A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 87 parations for his journey. At the entreaty of his cousin, he consented to remain some days. During this period, Madeleine could observe the ravages that dissipation had made, not less in his appearance than upon his heart and mind. He was sombre, stern, critical ; rarely affectionate or kind. He seemed, however, to take some interest in the affairs of his cousin. One evening, as if to ease his conscience, he carefully examined the papers in her lawsuit, and declared that in his opinion it was a matter that was decided in advance. " That concerns you, my cousin," said the young girl, smiling. " Me ? " "You know that since the death of your father the place has not changed masters." " Oh, my cousin," replied Maurice, in an indifferent tone, "your generosity is lost. I could have all the chateaus in France without being any happier." "Are you then so unhappy? asked the MADELEINE : young girl, in a voice so soft and sweet that it might have melted a heart of stone. " I, my cousin? I am the happiest of men." The following day, Madeleine learned that Maurice had gone away without saying farewell. He wrote from Paris to excuse this abrupt departure. Two months after, he wrote again. His preparations, he said, were complete. In fifteen days he should be gone. Beneath their tone of raillery, these two letters showed the unhappy condition of his mind. The last especially seemed to breathe a spirit of dis- couragement, and was full of sombre thoughts. At the first reading, Madeleine felt sad ; at the second, she was stricken with affright. During this time, the lawsuit went on. All the pious pilgrims whom Madeleine had repulsed, rejoiced over the bad turn in the affairs of the little German. Madeleine alone was undisturbed. CHAPTER VI. AS he had announced to Madeleine, Maurice *^ was indeed about to take a long journey a journey from which no one returns, and before which the most intrepid heart recoils. His preparations were completed, and it only remained for him to say an eternal adieu to this world, which he was to quit for a better at least, that is what we are assured; and it is a trust to which we are permitted to cling, without presuming too much on the goodness of God. Maurice had reached this point in his career by an insensible but sure descent. It is a history so common, and so often told by more eloquent pens than mine, that there is need to sketch here only its leading phases. go MADELEINE : See this young man, of twenty years at most! He enters life, which till now he has seen only in the enchanted dreams of the solitude in which he has grown. His childhood has run itself away in the shade of the paternal roof and in the depths of valleys. Nature has cradled him upon her bosom. God has placed around him noble and pious examples. See him as he advances, escorted by the laughing cortege which Youth draws around her. Grace sits upon his forehead. Illusion dwells in his breast. Like a flower that uncloses beneath crystal waters, the beauty of his soul shines from the depths of his eyes. He believes without effort in chaste passions, in the ten- derness that reaches beyond the tomb, in the vows that are exchanged in the purity of serene nights. He has only one ambition : love. Ah, well ! whilst we ask ourselves in what balmy airs so precious a blossom will unfold, whilst you search for the Beatrice whose hand is pure enough to gather this virginal A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 91 flower, it is already the prize of some vicious and corrupt nature. Beatrice never arrives in time ; and when at last the angel presents her- self, there is nothing left for her to glean but the harvest sown by demons. Such was Maurice's first experience in the world. Some women they are rare have received from Heaven the gift of ennobling all who approach them. Even the grief which they bring us is blessed. Others more numerous have the deadly quality of those waters which petrify all objects dropped in their depths. Unhappy oh, thrice unhappy the credulous and confident youth who is taken in these fatal charms. Maurice left there the best portion of himself; and like most feeble yet ardent natures who have touched all extremes of life, he lost his faith in humanity. There are noble souls that are strengthened and purified in the blood of their wounds. There are others that are embittered and corrupted. Maurice rushed headlong into the cynical philosophy which MADELEINE : ridicules all exalted sentiments, and affects to consider as chimeras all that does not enter into the circle of material enjoyment : a phi- losophy of the ante-chamber, in older times reserved for the valets in comedies, for the use of " Frontin " and " Gros-Rene," and which cer- tain vain spirits of our day have had the pre- sumption to make the doctrine of reason, the theory of good sense and elegance. These abortive souls have no other occupation than to strike at all that would uplift humanity ; deeming enthusiasm, poetry, heroism, love, country, and liberty, mere senseless words that serve only to amuse mediocrity. Maurice be- came one of the most fervent disciples of this mocking skepticism. Once upon this incline, he went fast. At first he persuaded himself that it was but a play; and, in effect, it was for a long time only a play. Say what he may, the cynic believes that he has still virtually within himself the very sentiments of which he professes to be divested. He fancies that A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 93 whenever the occasion comes, he will find them again ; that at the first serious call, not one will fail to answer. He rests in this belief, not perceiving that this boasting of vices, this parade of unbelief, degrades and ruins the moral sense. He discovers some fine morning that, thanks to his own raillery and ridicule, these sentiments upon which he had counted as a reserve corps have folded their tents and silently departed. Thus, commencing by being unwilling to avow openly that which at heart he believes, he finishes by becoming in reality that which he had sought only to appear. Maurice still turned his thoughts at times toward Valtravers; but too many ties held him on every side. The letters of his father irritated him, although maternal in their ten- derness. The remonstrances of the Marquise made him smile in pity, or rage like a wounded lion. It was then the fashion of youth to hold in little honor that which in older times they had the weakness to venerate in Lacedemonia. 94 MADELEINE : The Restoration was finished, and the times bordered upon that social crisis which seemed about to change the face of the world : and I know no epoch that has carried so far con- tempt for all rule and absence of all respect. Maurice was imbued with that spirit of revolt which filled the air, and toward which his natural impetuosity of character impelled him. Alas, that he was so far away from that kind being, endowed with so many graces, affection- ate, charming, good to all ; one of those poetic and fragile organizations that are like glass, smooth to the touch when whole, but cutting when it is broken. However, Maurice did nothing but walk the streets of Paris, eating his wheat in the flower, and cultivating his intelligence just enough to avoid the air of having arrived the evening before from Congo. Unlike those grand souls who, when they are deeply wounded, bury themselves in solitude, to be cured in silence or to die, he launched himself into A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 95 the whirlpool of vulgar dissipations. Idleness, and the weariness which succeeds the storms of passion, plunged him every day deeper. Strange remedies for the wounds of a soul ; to wash them in the waters of a gutter! He is to be pitied, the young man who knows not how to respect his own grief. Handsome, generous, prodigal, Maurice was not slow to make a name in the dubious world where the manners of the Regency, without its elegance and charm, have found refuge. The talk there was of duels, of horses, of debts, and of intrigues. Descending step by step, he found himself one day face - to - face with debauch. He regarded the monster without fright, and threw to him the remainder of his youth. It was in the midst of these wild disorders that the last letter of his father found him. This letter was beautiful and touching, without anger or denunciation. In reading it, Maurice felt the prick of remorse, which re-awakened all his nobler instincts. At this voice, august and 96 MADELEINE: dear, his sobs burst forth, tears came to his eyes, and a cry of love rose from that heart that had been silent so long. He would go. He would tear himself away from these accursed ties. Then he learned that his father was dead. Young and full of days, we too often forget at a distance that the years of our father are numbered. We put off from month to month the debt of tenderness ; and it is usually upon a tomb that we tearfully place our offering of tardy piety. Maurice was stricken to the earth. Under pretext of consoling him, his friends or, more accurately, his accomplices gathered around his bedside. Thus the stroke which seemed about to break these unhappy ties only fastened them more securely. Besides, what could he do at Valtravers ? After useless efforts to guide himself, he found it easier to float with the cur- rent. This current, so easy to descend, is diffi- cult to fight against. It leads to the gulf of strange fascinations, unknown to those who have A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 97 navigated only peaceful waters. Meanwhile, troublesome realities began to torment him. Embarrassments multiplied about him ; for the disorder of sentiment leads straight to all other disorders. To appease the hydra of debt, and fill the abyss that yawned at his feet, Maurice was forced to resign himself to the sale of the chateau where he was born and the domain of his fathers. In brief, he insensibly joined the group of veteran route that are seen at Paris, without patrimony, without career, and without position ; yet overshadowing with their inex- plicable fortunes those honest people whom they despise, and who, God knows, return their con- tempt. Do what we can to escape it, there comes inevitably an hour when that unpitying creditor, Destiny, knocks at our door. Whether we will or no, she regulates her accounts with us. It is said that man is the play of hazard. But for my part, I do not know a logic more close or more inflexible than that of each human life. 98 MADELEINE : All there ties and enchains itself; and for him who knows how to lay bare the premises and wait patiently the conclusion, it is certainly the most rigorous of syllogisms. Thus, what should have happened to Maurice did happen. The fatal hour surprised him, overwhelmed in a past without other issue than suicide or dis- honor. His was a soul perverted but not perverse. At the height of his excesses, it was easy to see in him the stamp of his origin, and, although singularly altered, the impress of a grand nature. In a world where ignorance struts in the midst of luxurious furniture, in the crowd of parvenues, where, as in the " Pr6- cieuses Ridicules," one sees grooms give them- selves the airs of Dukes, this young man at least had brought elegant and chivalrous man- ners, an adventurous and proud spirit. Between the two issues that presented themselves, he did not hesitate. Besides, his moral suicide was already accomplished. Nothing remained for him but to bury himself. The heavy weari- A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 99 ness that consumed him, the disgust that he felt for himself, perhaps more than all else, forced him sooner or later to this common denotement, easy to foresee in an epoch when it was not rare to meet youths of twenty years who despaired of life. His resolution once taken, too proud in his abasement to quit existence like an insolvent debtor who flies before the constable, he sold the farm of Coudray, which he had hitherto refrained from touching for the sake of Made- leine; for though he had kept in his thoughts only a half-effaced image of his cousin, he had still foreseen that she might one day fall into poverty. Reassured in this regard, since he knew that Madeleine had inherited the domain of Valtravers, he could discharge his debts with this last remaining vestige of his patrimony. Led by that vague impulse of emotion which never dies in us, he had wished to see once more before his death that corner of the earth where he was born. loo MADELEINE: The return to his native place, upon which he had perhaps counted to revive his youth, served only to show in all its sterile naked- ness the impoverishment of his being. He could scarcely recognize the familiar paths where so many times he had walked between the Marquise and the Chevalier. He saw again, but without emotion, the places that he had loved so well. When he seated himself on the steps of the house where his father had died, not a tear moistened his eyes. Just punishment of fallen souls, who, having out- raged all that is holy, come to quench their thirst at the spring of pure emotions! If this young man believed that he could regenerate himself by contact with this pure girl that we call Madeleine, he deceived him- self strangely, and prepared for himself a bitter disappointment. A Levite, gross from the wor- ship of sensual beauty, how could he compre- hend this pure soul ? In seeing her, he was not only untouched by so much grace, but after A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE, IO i studying her curiously, as he would a statue or a picture, he thought his cousin failed decidedly in character. All that he felt toward her re- duced itself to that vague sentiment of con- straint and uneasiness felt by all routs when they chance to meet with a chaste woman. Dreading the scene of adieu, he left one morn- ing, as he had come, without a word to anyone. Returning to Paris, he hastened to put his affairs in order. Before his visit to Valtravers, he had dismissed his servants and sold his equipages. The sale of Coudray had paid his last debts. He found himself now with three thousand francs. It was enough to take him to the end of his journey. Freed from care, he decided to pass in quietude the few days that remained to him on earth. If he had lived badly, he wished to die decently that is, with dignity; for he believed in nothing, and the unhappy man troubled himself no more with God than with men. The image of Madeleine did not light with even a pale 102 MADELEINE: reflection the evening on which he was to take leave of life. He did not once think of that sweet face. In his cowardly egotism, he did not call to mind the lawsuit which might seriously imperil the destiny of his cousin. The hour approached. If he waited, it was not from irresolution ; only, after the fatigues and vain agitations of life, he wished to taste for a little time the calm and the silence that precede death. He had written a letter of adieu to Madeleine. His pistols were loaded. More than once he had pressed to his fore- head their bronze lips, as if to anticipate the icy kiss of death. He touched that supreme moment which was to annihilate the past, and leave only a corpse to the comments of curiosity. CHAPTER VII. GOING out of Paris that morning, he had returned in the evening, after wandering all day in the woods of Lucienne and Celle. Never had life weighed upon him so heavily. Never had he felt so profoundly the nothing- ness of his soul, the exhaustion of his faculties. Upon his return, he opened a little casket, in which, heaped in confusion, with no more care or order than he showed in his daily life, were the letters he had received in better times, with withered flowers, faded ribbons, and tresses of hair ; in short, all the romance and poetry of his youth. When he raised the lid of the casket, although for years a stranger to emotion, he trembled at the perfume which escaped from 104 MADELEINE ; the box, like a breath of Springtime, to remind him of happier days. Among the letters that he read over before burning them, accident had placed the very one which his cousin had lately written, unknown to the Chevalier and the Marquise, and which he had left unan- swered. For the first time, he read it care- fully; smiling here and there at the naive charm that it revealed. When the fire had consumed the letters, Maurice took from the casket a medallion, which he contemplated for a long time with a gloomy air. In touching it, he had started as at the contact of a viper. It was the portrait of the first and only woman he had ever loved. The face was beautiful, but it was a beauty fatal and sensuous. Atten- tively examined, it seemed a mysterious Sphinx, offering to all comers her heart as a riddle, and ready to destroy the madmen who presented themselves to guess it. After many minutes of moody contemplation, with a sudden motion of hate and anger Maurice hurled from him A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 105 the slender and fragile ivory, which broke in pieces at his feet. Worn out by this last effort, he sank upon a divan, his face hidden in his hands. He remained thus for nearly an hour ; then, raising his head, he saw Madeleine standing near him, and looking upon him with a sad, sweet smile. He thought for an instant that it was an hallucination of his excited senses; for a moment he believed her the angel of death whom he was about to summon. But he did not dwell long on so poetic an image. "You, Madeleine? It is you? What do you wish? What do you ask? What fantasy or what need has brought you? Certainly your place is not here." " Yes, my cousin, it is I," said the young girl, who seemed neither troubled nor surprised at his words, spoken in an abrupt and almost brutal tone. "It is I or, rather, we," she added ; " for your foster-sister is in the ante- chamber. She would come with me; and per- io6 MADELEINE: haps you will not be displeased to see her good and honest face." "What has possessed you to quit your home ? Why have you come to this infamous city? You do not know that even the air you breathe is tainted, here where virtue dies of disgust, of sadness, and of weariness. You and Ursula at Paris ? Return to Valtravers, and remain in the peaceful shade of its woods." " My cousin, that is very easy for you to say," replied Madeleine, softly. "But you do not know that this lawsuit, that I should have gained, I lost in the last court. Valtravers is no longer mine. I am absolutely at the same point as when you found me in the shade of those woods to which you counsel me to return." " You have lost your lawsuit ? Valtravers does not belong to you?" cried Maurice. " Yes, my cousin. Heaven is my witness that I do not regret the loss of riches. The only painful thought is that they have not A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 107 respected the last will of our beloved Mar- quise. And one other hope that I cherished was that this chateau which had fallen to me would sometime go to you or your children." "My children will have need of nothing; and there is no question of me in the matter," replied Maurice, in a tone becoming more and more abrupt. " Why did you not accept the farm of Coudray when I offered it to you? Why did you let me sell it ? Why did you not say that the day might come when you would find yourself without resources ? The day has come, and what is to become of you ? " " Do not chide me, my cousin. You see I have not doubted your heart, since I am here to address myself to you. I have never hesi- tated an instant. I said to myself, ' My cousin is henceforth the only protector that is left to me in this world ; he knows that I have ten- derly loved his old father, and that I am worthy of his affection ; I know him ; he is generous; I will place myself under his care; io8 MADELEINE : I am sure he will not repulse me.' And so I made up my little package, as in the old time when I left Munich ; and after a last prayer beneath the roof that had been so hospitable, after a sad adieu to the house wherein I had grown to womanhood, and to all those dear places that I shall see no more, I came to you. Maurice, do you think that I could have done otherwise?" Maurice did not reply. Seated upon a divan beside Madeleine, he regarded her with an air of heavy stupor, like a man who is uncertain whether he wakes or dreams. It did not need much insight to divine what was passing in his mind. Madeleine seemed not to perceive it. She added, with a smiling dignity : " Above all, my cousin, do not fear that I will become a serious embarrassment in your life. My tastes are modest and simple. My poverty will not long burden you. I beg you only to renounce for a little while the long voy- age you have meditated. You could not leave A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 109 me alone and without protection, in the great city that you call infamous. You will not go. It is your noble father, it is the good Marquise, that pray to you by my voice. It is also my mother, who, before dying, confided me to the son of her sister. Recall the letter, the only inheritance she left me in dying. If you have forgotten here, Maurice, take it and read it." The truth is that Maurice had never read that letter. As it was the only legacy of her mother, the day after her arrival at Valtravers the orphan had begged her uncle to give it back to her; and the good Chevalier had im- mediately acceded to this filial wish. It was not surprising that the thoughtless young man had never troubled himself to verify the titles which established Madeleine's identity, nor to know how his German aunt wrote French. Naturally, these were the least of his cares. His father had said, " See thy cousin ; " and Maurice had accepted the relationship. More through embarrassment than curiosity, MADELEINE : he mechanically took the paper from the hand of the young girl, and, unfolding it, read at first with indifference. No matter what the reader thinks, no matter what he thought him- self; his was not a heart entirely hardened. Under its calloused surface there were some fibers unparalyzed, which yet vibrated to the touch of a strong emotion. He had preserved not, it is true, in all its freshness or integrity the most precious and the most fatal of the faculties that man has received from Divine anger and mercy ; that which awakens first within us, and that which dies after all others ; at the same time both a blessing and a curse, poison and antidote, infernal punishment and celestial enchantment; the superhuman force which adds to our joys and intensifies our griefs; in a word, Imagination. In reading this letter, whose characters, worn by tears and kisses, had passed first before the eyes of his father, Maurice recalled little by little all the circumstances of that Autumn evening A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. ZI1 when Madeleine first appeared to him. He saw again the shady forest ; the clearing, bathed in the light of the setting sun ; the gate of the park; and upon the doorstep which the little German slowly mounted, he saw the Chevalier and the Marquise rise to give her welcome. He was moved by these images. A slender thread of living water pierced the arid side of the rock; but in the last page, which was addressed to him alone, when he reached the lines "And thou, whom I do not know, but whom I have loved to include so often with my daughter in the same sentiment of tender- ness and solicitude son of my sister if thy mother has given thee her soul, thou wilt be good and fraternal to my beloved Madeleine" when he read these words, the rock was broken, and for an instant the spring so long captive burst out in quick and abundant waves. Whilst Maurice stifled his sobs among the cushions of the divan on which he was seated, Madeleine regarded him in silence, standing with her arms I I2 MADELEINE: crossed upon her breast, with the sad and grave air of a young mother by the cradle of a sick child. "Maurice! my friend! my brother! what is the matter?" said she, in a tender voice. He seated her near him, took her hands in his, and there, yet quivering with emotion, he recounted to her his life; all that he could recount without shocking the pure soul that listened to his words. He told of the loss of his illusions ; the dissipations into which weari- ness and grief had plunged him; his wander- ings ; his utter ruin ; his profound disgust with existence; his final resolve to end it. In this recital, Maurice seemed not so much to blame himself as to imagine that he was the poetic victim of the realities of life. He accused the world, and even Heaven ; and in the destruc- tion which he called down upon society, he spared only himself. Madeleine listened with an air of dreamy sadness and melancholy pity. When he had A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. II3 finished, she remained silent for a long time, in an attitude of reflection. " It is a strange history," said she, pleasantly, raising her eyes, whose limpid azure had not been altered for an instant by what she had heard. " Unhappily, my cousin, I have not thoroughly understood what you have said. It is too deep for the intelligence of a poor country girl, who has grown up among honest hearts that were content with little. We are unfamiliar with such extraordinary sentiments; and, not- withstanding its vicissitudes, I had believed until now that life was the best gift of our Heavenly Father. That which I have under- stood clearly is, that you have wasted your patrimony; and that, if I have nothing, you have as much. But that is not a matter for despair. Only, in my turn, I ask what are you going to do? Kill yourself? You cannot. I am not come to address myself to your for- tune. I have counted only upon your affection. Although poor, like me, you are my only rela- MADELEINE : tive and my natural protector. Be your own judge. Our mothers were sisters. Both see us and listen to us. When I arrived at your door at Valtravers, your father opened his arms, and I became his cherished daughter. I re- placed you at his fireside. I was the last solace of his old age. He died in my arms, and my hand closed his eyes. And now, alone, without resources, without other protection than yours, in a world full of dangers that I do not even know, tell me, Maurice, do you think that your life belongs only to yourself?" Crushed by the weight of duties which came like a thunderbolt upon his head, as frightened at this new obligation to live as he would have been in happier days at the necessity of dying, linked to existence like a galley-slave whose chain was loosened only to be more strongly riveted than before, Maurice replied only an outburst of despair. What could he do for his cousin? he, who could do nothing for himself. What possible succor could he A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. n 5 lend ? he who bent under the burden of his own destiny. " Go ! leave me ! " he cried ; " respect my mis- fortune ; do not insult my distress. From the shore where you stand in safety, do not call to your aid an unfortunate who is drowning. Do not ask support of a reed beaten by the winds." "Friend," said Madeleine, "let us lean upon each other, and we can resist the storm. Let us give each other a helping hand, and we can escape together the waves that threaten to engulf us. We will, by a common effort, reach that shore where you misjudge that I stand. Come, Maurice ! have courage. Instead of weeping, uplift yourself. Death is but a barren expiation. Live! be a man! We are poor; but is it for nothing that we have received from Heaven the gifts of intelligence, strength, and health ? We will do, my cousin, as in the olden times did the Marquise and the Chevalier." This prospect did not appear to charm 1 1 6 MA DELEINE : Maurice, who made a violent gesture of anger and disdain. " I am then to make nut-crackers ? " he asked, shrugging his shoulders. "And why not, cousin? Your father made them, and I imagine he was as true a gentle- man as you." Maurice rose and rapidly paced the room. He then stopped suddenly before Madeleine. " Come, Maurice ! be resolved." "Well, cousin, be satisfied," he said, in a tone surely not affectionate, scarcely polite. " I will do for you what I certainly should not have done for myself. I will live." "Thanks, dear cousin," said Madeleine, in a tender voice. "I knew that you would not repulse me. I will pray God to shed upon your head his benedictions." "Well, well, cousin. God has enough to do without disturbing himself for so little. I will live. But my conditions are, that once assured of your destiny, I am again master of mine." A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 117 "That is understood," said the young girl. " But I have my own plan of operation. We will talk of that fraternally. I do not ask more than two years to place myself comfort- ably in life." "Two years? you ask two years?" cried the young man, with an expression of anger that he did not seek to conceal. "Is that exacting too much? I will neglect nothing that may shorten this time of trial." Maurice terminated the interview by a ges- ture of heroic resignation. At this moment, Ursula, unable to wait longer, burst like a water -spout into the chamber, and threw herself upon the neck of her young master, who defended himself ill- humoredly against her too violent tenderness. Then retreating to the embrasure of a window, pale, immobile, with hands clenched, he silently regarded the two women. It had grown late, and Maurice was com- pelled to go with them to the door of the little n8 MADELEINE: hotel where they were staying. During the walk, he had to submit to the provincial ques- tionings of Ursula, and her absurd amazement. She thought the street lights were a sign of public rejoicing ; and having been all her life intimate with the saints of the calendar, she inquired naively if it was in honor of St. Babo- lein that they had illuminated the city. This childishness, which under other circumstances would have singularly diverted Maurice, served only to exasperate him. He returned by the quays, which were now deserted, looking eagerly at the glistening black water of the river that seemed to allure him. Returning to his apart- ment, he opened his box of pistols and contem- plated them with an ardent and sombre gaze. " Sleep ! " said he at last, slowly closing the lid. u Sleep, faithful friends, until the day of deliverance, when I shall come to awaken you." CHAPTER VIII. AFTER some hours of feverish slumber, * Maurice arose, ashamed of his weak- ness, furious with Madeleine, and exasperated with himself. Of what importance to him was his cousin's destiny? What did he owe to her? Of what right, by what title, had she come to impose herself upon him? Was it his fault that she had lost her lawsuit ? What ! because an aunt whom he had never known had before giving up the ghost sent into France a young girl for whose existence he had never cared, because a little German had one Autumn even- 119 120 MADELEINE : ing knocked at the door of Valtravers, was he obliged thereby to live, and resign himself to the rdle of guardian, at the moment when he was about to take refuge in the arms of death ? How long had it been the mission of young men to escort their kinswomen through life ? What more could one do for a sister ? Besides, Madeleine was not a child. She was at least twenty-two or twenty-three years old ; and at this age orphans cease to be interesting. This one had decidedly abused the advantage of being without a family. And frankly, what could he do for her? His resources were exhausted. He had nothing not even the furniture of his apartment, which represented only the amount of his rent. If he had resolved to kill himself, it was his own good pleasure; and in fact, at the point where he had arrived, any other determination would have singularly embarrassed him. Work! the word costs nothing. But when one has taken root in vice and idleness, it is not so easy to A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 121 become transplanted and acclimated in the regions of order and labor. In the midst of these irritating and confused reflections, ready to break the engagements so heedlessly contracted the evening before, his cousin, accompanied by Ursula, smilingly en- tered the chamber. Madeleine was simply but neatly attired in a muslin dress, without orna- ments, while her hair was arranged in a plain band upon each side of her forehead. Maurice, so long accustomed to women magnificently dressed, fancied that his cousin had the air of a grisette. Thus it is that one rarely loses the taste for simple things, without losing at the same time the instinct that recognizes the truly beautiful ; so intimately blended are these two sentiments. Ursula was dressed in her richest attire, in the costume of the girls of her pro- vince. Her low shoes with silver buckles, her short petticoats, extravagant head-dress that she greatly exaggerated in the effort to render herself more pleasing to her foster-brother, her 122 MADELEINE: stout and vigorous form, full bust, white teeth, and ruddy lips, revealed at the distance of a league that she was the product of Limoges. The shock of seeing her thus bedizened did not tend to restore the tranquillity of Maurice. As if she had understood her cousin's mood, Madeleine seated herself, and without giving him time to reconsider what had been decided the evening before, she explained to him how she intended to arrange their way of living. First they must find, in a quiet quarter, under one roof, two small lodgings, one for Maurice, the other for herself and Ursula, where they would install themselves simply, as suited henceforth their humble condition. Mad- eleine had saved from the shipwreck of her fortune some diamonds left her by the Mar- quise. The amount they would bring would be sufficient for their installation and for their present needs, provided she felt herself directed by a firm hand and sheltered by a faithful heart. She declared herself undisturbed about their A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 123 affairs, and said she could build a nest in keep- ing with her taste. She had, according to the proverb, " more than one string to her bow." She embroidered like a fairy, and worked in crochet little purses of silk beaded with gold, marvellously fine and delicate. She painted, on wood, birds and flowers, which, when var- nished, had the lively colors of the tropics. She could give lessons on the piano, and in singing. Above all, thanks to the teachings of Madame de Fresnes, she excelled in miniature painting. Whether from respect for the memory of the Marquise, or whether really the most available of her resources, it was this she first determined to attempt. Thus, her talents did not fail her. She had, besides these, the winged courage which plays with obstacles ; the spon- taneous energy that seems to act without effort ; the charming gaiety which laughs and sings; the unfailing aid of the will that works. It was thus decided that Madeleine should try her hand at miniatures; and she was joyous as a 124 MADELEINE : child in thinking that she would live in Paris as in other days the adorable Marquise had lived in Nuremburg. As the reader will remem- ber, that had always been her dream. We could even affirm that in this view there was in the loss of her fortune something that pleased her. As for Maurice, he would remain free to act at his own pleasure, and to follow his inclinations. Madeleine only asked that he would support and direct her first steps in the world, and in the career she had chosen. It was under- stood that at the end of two years he was to be given his independence, and become again the master of his destiny. Only until then Madeleine would have the right to lean upon him as if he were her brother as, indeed, he was to be before the public, to escape malignant comments. All this was said with such animation and intensity that Maurice found no place to put in an objection, and with such grace and good- humor that he could not prevent himself from A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 125 occasionally smiling; although whenever the young girl finished a sentence, he shook his head with the air of a man but little touched and not at all convinced. But immediately she arose and took his arm without hesitation. "Cousin, to-day our fraternity commences. Remember that your father called me his daughter; and indeed I was his daughter, well beloved. The day is beautiful, and we will profit by it to seek a shelter under some modest roof you must decide in what quarter. Besides, you must be in haste to quit this apartment, whose luxury insults your poverty. Leave it as soon as possible; and," added she, gaily, " try to leave here that gloomy and heavy air which does not suit your age, and which is not becoming to you." " Yes, my young master," said in her turn the good Ursula. " You must laugh and play, and divert yourself. You will not be twenty- nine until St. Nicaise's day. Jarni-Dieu ! it is the beautiful age. You will see what a I2 6 MADELEINE: pretty little family we will make, we three, and what care I shall take of you two. All is not lost, since there remain to you health, youth, and your foster-sister, who will make for you, as at Valtravers, brown biscuits and the pancakes that you loved so well." Meanwhile, Madeleine had led out Maurice, who allowed her to conduct him with the heartiness of a criminal about to be beheaded. At the door, he turned and saw Ursula, who prepared to follow them. " Art thou going with us ? " he asked, brusquely, surveying her from head to foot. " What ! Am I going with you ? " she cried, with profound astonishment. " My young mas- ter, do you suppose that it is to gape in the air that I have put on my best clothes ? " " Stupid girl ! " exclaimed Maurice, in a rage that he was scarcely able to conceal. " Dost thou not comprehend that thou wilt be re- garded like some curious beast in the streets where we are going ? " A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 127 "What do I care ?" replied Ursula, bridling up. " For my part, I will not be afraid to show your Parisians of what timber the girls of Val- travers are made. In seeing me they will say, 'Behold the foster-sister of Monsieur Maurice; ' and, with due respect, I dare believe that will do you honor," added she, making him a low courtesy. Resigning himself to drink the bitter cup to the last drop, Maurice replied only by a gesture of mute despair. A few moments after, they were walking in the boulevards, Madeleine on the arm of her cousin, followed closely by the full form of Ursula, her arms akimbo, defending herself from the billows of the crowd like a ship under full sail, with all its signals spread. It was one of those splendid days when Paris opens its gilded cages and liberates its prettiest birds ; one of those bright suns which bring upon the glittering pavements of the great city a popula- tion of young gallants and smiling women. To ! 2 8 MA DELEINE : the lively regret of Ursula, who had achieved already a complete success, and whose steps were marked by a veritable triumph, Maurice hastened to quit these regions where he had so many times displayed the luxuriance of his mistresses and his horses. To tell the truth, the place was no longer tenable. Without speaking of her costume, which riveted the attention of all passers, Ursula, believing her young master as well known in Paris as at Neuvy-les-Bois, addressed him from time to time in a high voice, that all might know that she was in his company. Sometimes, when the crowd was unusually compact, she held tightly to the tails of his coat, in fear of losing him or of being herself lost. Maurice occasionally turned around and launched at her a withering look, to which the brave girl replied simply by a kind smile. The unhappy young man was in torment. He had at first hoped to conceal his shame in a carriage ; but his cousin had pre- vented this by remarking that such grand man- A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 129 ners did not suit their humble fortune. The sky, she said, was clear, the pavement dry; and simple good sense told that they could not inspect apartments from a carriage. Madeleine walked lightly, without seeming either surprised or annoyed at the noise and motion around her ; apparently unconscious of the ill-humor of her companion, which he no longer troubled himself to conceal. They had now reached the river. Near the gate of the Louvre, at the moment they came out upon the quay, that which Maurice had most dreaded, happened. They stepped aside to make way for an open carriage, which advanced rapidly. He was quickly recognized by its gay occupants, who were going to the Bois. They were the very cream of that world in which he had lived. With a salutation too profound to be sincere, four or five gay heads bowed as they passed, leaving behind them a penetrating perfume of cigars and Patchouly; while the poor fellow, immovable in his steps, heard in the distance loud bursts of laughter. 130 MADELEINE : At this instant, he felt a lively longing to throw both Madeleine and Ursula in the Seine. Even if on quitting his lodgings he had been piously resolved to keep his engagements of the evening before, this promenade like that of a galley-slave with a ball at each leg would have convinced Maurice that what he had promised was beyond his power to fulfil. To spend two years in such a life was simply to take two years in which to die. At the same time he saw that unless he had lost all manhood he could not abandon these two poor creatures in Paris without either protector or guide. Perhaps he would not have recoiled before a crime; but he had a horror of cowardice. For an hour, for example, he had wished to wring the neck of Ursula; but he could not desert two helpless women placed under his protection. Pale with rage and mortification, Maurice continued his walk with Madeleine. Since she desired to retire into a modest and quiet corner of Paris, he thought the neighborhood of the A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 131 Luxembourg would realize her wish. As Mau- rice had to resign himself to pass some months near her, he knew that in this quarter the asylum of science and of serious study he would be tolerably certain of meeting none of his acquaintances. After seeking vainly in the public streets lodgings that suited at the same time the poetic instincts and the modest ambi- tion of the young German, they dined together in the neighborhood of the Observatory. This did not lighten, however, the ill-humor of Mau- rice ; for the task of climbing four or five stories, frequently repeated, had disposed him to a much less frugal repast. It should be added, that in face even of suicide Maurice had re- tained habits that were not those of an anchor- ite. He valued, above all, elegance of service ; and although disgusted with life, thought that a gentleman, the evening before blowing out his brains, should not touch different kinds of meat with the same fork. He drank with the edges of his lips, and ate with the tips of his teeth. 132 MADELEINE : Ursula simply devoured. Madeleine declared that she had never made so charming a repast in her life. As they returned, seeking right and left an attractive house, they plunged by common consent into a street whose rural aspect attracted Madeleine; crossing from the Boule- vard des Invalides to the Rue du Bac, which Madame de Stael has rendered famous. Thanks to the increase of population and the progress of industry, before five hundred years there will not remain in Paris a refuge for reverie. For to-day, all that remains of this street which so charmed Madeleine is a double row of houses, more or less new, ugly, and badly built. Then, one would have thought it a hamlet, or at least the verdant outskirts of a little city lost in the foliage. In following its paths, one met the odor of the lilac or the perfume of the lindens in flower ; above the walls, acacias, laburnums, trees of Judea, shook their odorous clusters. In the depths of parks, where the nightingale sang during the Summer A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I33 nights, one could see through the gates beauti- ful houses, before which played happy children. It was, in a word, the Rue du Babylone ; thus named perhaps because of its gardens, perhaps because in old times it had been the residence of the bishop of the antique city of Semiramis. Ursula fancied herself at Valtravers, and asked where was the Vienne. Madeleine declared that it would be happiness for her to live in this little village, lost in the bosom of Paris. The wish of the young girl was fulfilled. She found, in one of those rare houses which here and there dot the landscape, two little adjoin- ing apartments, one for Maurice, the other for herself and Ursula; under the roof, it is true, but opening upon shady grounds. My opinion is and it was that of Madeleine that it is better to have before the window a sprig of verdure than the colonnade of the Louvre. Thus terminated the day which gave Maurice a foretaste of the delights in store for him. The next day, and those which followed, were 134 MADELEINE: yet more rude and laborious. It is not all to have chosen the bush in which to build a nest; it is necessary also to bring there sticks, moss, and down. With Ursula always at his heels, Maurice was compelled to accompany Made- leine to the shops, to see and examine all, and to hear prices discussed and debated; he, who had never bargained in his life, but who rather had made it a point to pay dearer than others. Though she possessed in a high degree the sen- timents of practicality, though naturally endowed with reason as well as grace, Madeleine showed in her purchases a childlike joy that does not think of figures, and that is careless of calcula- tions. But Ursula, who imagined that the shop- people wished to cheat her as a Limousine, the unpitying Ursula constantly raised interminable objections, and defended the interests of her master with a sharp parsimony worthy of a Jew. Strong in the jaws as a servant of Moliere, she disputed with the trades-people, and treated them as rascals and sharpers. More than once, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I3S they politely showed her the door. Maurice thought he would lose his head. He wished the devil had her. But Ursula did not restrain herself; and it was only by threatening to send her back into the country, that Maurice could bring her to moderation. At the end of a week, the three companions took possession of their little domain. On the day of their removal, a hack, before which two lean jades were harnessed, stopped noisily at the door of the sumptuous hotel where Maurice yet resided. Ursula and Madeleine alighted. " Come, Maurice ! come, my brother ! " cried the young girl. " The great day has arrived. It only remains to say a last adieu to these gilded walls. You will not find them where we are going; but poverty has its luxury, and happiness does not require a magnificent home." " Poor lamb ! " said Ursula, with an expres- sion of ineffable tenderness. " We will love and cherish him, spoil and coddle him, until he believes himself yet at Valtravers. Sundays 136 MADELEINE: and holidays, when we have done our work, we will all go to promenade in the public gardens. Hold, Monsieur Maurice ! I am too happy ! It suffocates me. Jarni-Dieu ! I must embrace you ! " With these words, the good creature threw herself upon him like a panther, and in spite of his utmost efforts to tear himself from her arms, she gave him two huge kisses upon the cheeks. The hour had sounded; the hour that Maurice thought should never have arrived. He had counted upon some unforeseen accident, some insurmountable obstacle, to interpose ; and yet all went as by enchantment. The evening before, he had said to himself that something must yet happen to relieve him of this strange position. Yet nothing had come nothing but the Actual, with her sure foot and her wrist of iron. Recoil? He had no longer time. Mau- rice was not the man to waste himself in plaintive elegies or poetic adieus. He per- mitted Ursula to put his effects in the carriage; A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 137 then he took under his arm his box of pistols, carrying thus all his fortune and his last hope. At this instant, one could have seen upon the face of Madeleine a reflection of that celestial joy which must illuminate the faces of angels when they come, bringing a soul that has wandered, into the presence of God. CHAPTER IX. A POET, at the time when poets lived in garrets, would have been charmed with the lodgings of Madeleine and Maurice. Though of an exceeding simplicity, taste and elegance were shown in all the details of the furniture. The young girl's chamber was hung with a delicate pearl-gray paper, on which were strewn bouquets of violets and roses. The only ornaments were a few of the miniatures of Madame de Fresnes, which had been re- ligiously preserved among them a copy of the Madonna which Madame de Mirbel or David might not have disowned; some hang- ing-shelves with books, and a few withered 138 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 139 flowers that had been brought from Valtravers. Near the window was a table, covered with brushes, boxes of colors, and small squares of porcelain. Maurice's chamber was arranged with equal neatness and simplicity ; but nothing there indicated habits or plans of work, and one would have searched vainly for any object to which was linked a hope or a recollection. " It is not elegant," said Madeleine to him, "but the four walls where we work and love and dream are to us always those of a palace." These words were scarcely noticed by Mau- rice, who, when left alone, strode about his room like a lion newly put in his cage. It was then his anger found vent ; he struck his fore- head, and rolled upon his bed with smothered cries of rage. He asked himself by what cowardly condescension, what incredible weak- ness, he had permitted himself to be brought to this. He accused himself of imbecility, and cursed the name of his cousin. Whilst Madeleine busied herself in arranging 140 MADELEINE : the new ways of her life, Ursula was also at work. She scrubbed and cleaned and polished, and sang in a high voice the songs of her coun- try. This was the finishing stroke to Maurice, who left the house, and wandered in the city all the evening, not knowing or caring where accident might lead him. Toward midnight it began to rain. Having no other shelter than his garret in the Rue Babylone, he reluctantly sought refuge there. Ursula, who was watching for his return, was frightened at his appearance. His face was pale, his lips livid, and his sunken eyes burned with a feverish light. The kind girl, seriously alarmed, begged him to come into their apartment; but he refused angrily, and retired to his chamber. Seating himself near an open window, he remained there till morn- ing, listening to the trees groaning in the wind, and watching a sky little less sombre and gloomy than his own soul. In the morning, Ursula found him delirious with fever. For a long time they feared for his life ; but A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I41 the skill of science, and the youth which was not yet dead within him, more than the solici- tude of Madeleine and Ursula, recalled him gradually back to life. More than once he thanked them with a tearful eye; more than once his hand sought the hand of his cousin. One day, perceiving a portrait of his father, painted by the Marquise a year before his death, which Madeleine had placed upon the wall, he addressed to it, in a voice stifled with sobs, touching words of repentance and remorse. The first day he was able to leave his bed, he found upon the mantel a walnut box which he had not seen before. He raised the lid, and recognized the tools which in the olden times his father had used in wood-carving. " I thought," said Madeleine, who was seated near the window, " that you would like these instruments in your possession or at least that you would not like to leave them to the mercy of strangers." "Thanks, my sister," he replied. 142 MADELEINE : It was the first time he had called her by this name, and the young girl paled and trembled. " Only to think," said Ursula, " that it was with these that Monsieur le Chevalier earned his bread among the infidels ! Monsieur le Chevalier, a nobleman, a great lord, an aristo- crat ! and that his white hands turned toys as if he had only done that all his life ! He was not ashamed to work like one of the people. And yet he was a proud man." "He had a grand heart," said Madeleine. " And the Marquise ! " continued Ursula, who was not the girl to be easily diverted from her path. "She did not have to knock long at the door of Paradise. Think of a great lady like her one who had been at court paint- ing portraits for a lot of beer-drinkers and saur- kraut eaters! Jarni-Dieu! she was a grand woman ! " "Yes," said Madeleine, " she had indeed a beautiful soul." A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 143 " Like yours, my brave young lady," said Ursula, carrying Madeleine's fingers respect- fully to her lips. Like people who hear a fable without caring for the moral, Maurice heard, without asking himself if perchance there was in this discus- sion anything intended for him. The one delightful feature of convalescence is its pro- found forgetfulness of the future. Too feeble to look beyond the present hour, we are lost in the material sentiment of our recovery. We feel existence, and that is enough. Little by little, with returning health, we resume the burden of life. Although he was out of danger, and almost re-established in health, Madeleine and Ursula passed most of their time with Maurice. At his request, his cousin had brought her easel into his chamber, and worked there during the day and often watched far into the night, whilst Ursula dozed and knit. Maurice was at first pleased with this ; but with the progress of his 144 MADELEINE : physical cure the irritation of his spirit revived, and he began to weary of the solicitude of these two women, who would not quit his bedside. Soon Conscience began to whisper to him of duty. One night, as he appeared to be sleeping soundly, Madeleine and Ursula, working by the shaded light of the lamp, talked in a low voice. "Poor cherubin! " said Ursula, drawing out her needle. " I do not regret the money he has cost us. For him, I would pawn my bonnet and my last petticoat. The expenses of this illness have brought us to our last louis." " Do not disquiet thyself, my good Ursula. To-morrow I will finish this little box, and I am sure they will buy it at the shop where I have sold ten already. And these little purses are not badly made. Such trifles sell well in Paris. Besides, I have yet a few rings and jewels, which we will send to join my diamonds." " In company with my earrings and gold cross," added Ursula. "All that is nothing; A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I45 but, my dear young lady, you work too late. You will lose your eyesight, and, what is more precious, your health." " I am stronger than I appear," said Made- leine. " And think, Ursula, of our invalid. His convalescence may perhaps be long, and if we do not provide for him with all the care that his condition requires, we should merit reproach, for he resigned himself to live only for us." " Yes," said Ursula, turning a look of adora- tion toward the bed where her young master was sleeping. " Just at the moment he was about to blow out his brains, he deprived him- self of the pleasure out of love for us. And how proud he was to walk with us in the streets ! Once cured, he will be delighted to work for his cousin and his foster-sister. For he is an angel, Mademoiselle Madeleine! I always said he was an angel." Maurice was not sleeping. He had heard all ; and the next day he left his bed, as calm i o 146 MADELEINE : and resolute as we have before known him angry and wild. He accepted at last the task that had fallen to his lot. It would be an error to attribute this re-awak- ening of his will to emotions of tenderness and gratitude. With his health Maurice had refound also the obduracy of his soul. The devotion of these two noble women only irritated him. God has put pride in the depth of our hearts, to supplant at need virtue. Maurice was ready to assume the duties that devolved upon him, without hesitation but without enthusiasm. But what could he do? To work, is easily said; but one must first know how to work. To make toys was well enough in Nuremburg, which is the land of toys; but to attempt wood-carving in Paris there were a thousand difficulties. Besides, he had neglected the art so long as almost to fiave forgotten it. As for literary labor, he dared not think of it. At that period letters had some prestige; and the most difficult of arts had not then become the most easy of A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 147 trades. Some years later, he would not have hesitated; and thus we should now have had one great writer the more. To be born at the right time is one of the great secrets of life. Tired of the fruitless study, Maurice con- sulted his cousin. The young girl replied sweetly : " Do not trouble yourself. There is nothing pressing. You are yet weak and suffering. Regain your strength ; the rest will follow. So long as I feel myself under your care, it is enough. I am strong, and have good courage. I will work for you with joy till the time comes when happily we can work together." It is easy to imagine how such words irritated Maurice's pride. But it was thus that chance or, rather, Providence, in the character of Madeleine constrained the young man into the only path that was open to him. CHAPTER X. TN a wing of the house where Maurice and *- Madeleine resided, and facing their apart- ment, were three modest rooms, inhabited by a young artisan and his family. Pierre Marceau was a cabinet-maker, about twenty-five years of age, honest, handsome, frank, always in a good humor, quite charming in his blouse of gray cotton with its belt of varnished leather drawn around his supple and vigorous body. True, he made no verses, and had no other instruments of music than his plane and chisel. Rising with the dawn, he worked gaily from morning till night, as if convinced that labor is at once the poetry of the people and the best means by which to better their condition. Gentle and us A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 149 amiable, his wife worked diligently with her needle, while keeping her eye constantly upon two hearty urchins that frolicked about their father. From time to time Pierre would leave his bench to bend over his wife's embroidery, or to take in his arms the two little rogues; then he would return to his work with new ardor. Sometimes the young mother would hum in a soft voice a song of Be'ranger one of those immortal songs that have consoled the heart of the people. Without ceasing his work, the father would join in the refrain with a proud and energetic voice. When the day was near its close, the pretty house- wife busied herself in preparing the supper, which was enlivened by the prattling of the happy children. They often sat long around the frugal table, and the evening was prolonged in pleasant and familiar talk. Leaning his elbow upon the window-sill, Maurice frequently watched with a listless eye the movements of this industrious and happy MADELEINE: household. Not that he took any interest in them, or sought any useful instruction; it was to him simply a novel spectacle. But Made- leine, from her window, was delighted to observe the life of this humble family, and found in it a wondrous charm. Little by little, neighborly relations had come to be established between her and these people. She caressed the chil- dren when she chanced to meet them upon the stairs ; and during the illness of Maurice, Pierre Marceau had come more than once to ask news of him. One morning, having noticed that the cab- inet-maker planed and polished oak, as in the olden time Maurice had done in company with the good Chevalier, the young girl watched him attentively. Bent over his work-bench, near the open window, Marceau appeared to be absorbed in some difficulty which he tried in vain to overcome. Suddenly, with a violent gesture, he threw down his tools and struck his forehead as if in despair; then, crossing A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I5 r his arms upom his breast, he assumed an atti- tude of profound dejection and discouragement. His young wife hastened to him, and seemed trying, by caresses and sweet words, to restore his courage. Perhaps for the first time, he repulsed her rudely. The poor woman began weeping; whilst the children followed her example, and screamed at their best. At this scene, Madeleine, moved by a feeling of sym- pathy, left her chamber, and in a few moments appeared in the midst of the little family. "Alas, Mademoiselle !" said the wife, whom she questioned first, "my husband should finish to-day an order upon the success of which our future depends. Either because in accepting the work he overestimated his own skill, or because his powers have failed him, he feels now that he is not able to finish the task con- fided to him. He is distressed because of me and our little children ; and I weep because of his distress." "See, Mademoiselle!" said the young work- 152 MADELEINE: man, in his turn. " God pardon me for having dared to presume that He had put in me the stuff of an artist. I see now that I am only fit to plane planks and to turn sticks." " Talent has its hours, like fortune," replied Madeleine, softly. " Mediocrity alone is always ready, and never hesitates. But let us see, Monsieur, what is the trouble." The difficulty was one respecting a piece of wood-carving, designed to represent the figure of an archangel, and intended to ornament one of the churches of Paris. As a matter of fact, the figure was badly outlined. Although natu- rally indulgent, Madeleine was forced to admit that if the future of the young family depended upon the merit of this piece of work, there was good reason for despair. At this instant, she saw Maurice at his window; and in answer to her signal, he came loungingly toward her. " See, my brother ! " she said. " Is there no way to aid these good people in their embarrass- ment ? " A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE 153 The situation explained to him, Maurice approached the piece of work and inspected it with a disdainful air. Ranged around him, the young cabinet-maker, his wife, and Made- leine, awaited anxiously his decision. Maurice said nothing, but suddenly took off his coat, turned back his cuffs, and seizing one of the tools, resolutely attacked the block of oak, which had been so obstinate under the hand of Marceau. Madeleine was lost in admiration. Standing in mute contemplation, the young couple followed the progress of the work; whilst at the farther side of the work- table, perched curiously in their chairs, with blonde heads and cherubic faces, the two chil- dren formed natural counterparts of the figure which grew into life under the creative chisel. Whatever storms may have traversed and devastated the heart, does it, like the desert of Sahara, enclose only arid and desolate sands? One flower yet grows there, in all its freshness and in all its bloom. Though all others in its 154 MADELEINE : region be dead, in this not a petal fails in the corolla. It laughs upon the end of its stalk, which no wind can uproot. This flower immor- tal of the human heart has its name: it is Vanity. Thus, though all that makes life worthiest was dead in Maurice, he enjoyed with a secret complaisance the effect that he pro- duced upon his audience. Under the stimulus of his self-love, he had found, as by enchant- ment, that boldness and precision of the chisel which in old times had been the pride of the Chevalier. Loosened from the confining oak, already the victorious archangel shook his quivering wings. At the end of a few hours, the figure that Maurice had found in a rough outline appeared as distinct and pure as if sculptured in marble. "See!" said he, throwing down his tools and turning down his cuffs; "it was not very difficult." It is impossible to picture the joy of the little household. The two children clapped A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. I55 their hands in delight. The husband and wife, with blended sentiments of gratitude and admi- ration, praised Maurice's skill and thanked him for his kindness. Silent and smiling, Madeleine contemplated, with happy elation, what she fancied was passing in the mind of her cousin. But this elation was short - lived. Maurice interrupted their expressions of gratitude by curtly putting on his coat, inwardly cursing himself for the stupid pleasure he had felt in his task. "Ah, Monsieur! you have saved my life!" cried the young workman, joyfully. " I prefer to believe, Monsieur," replied Maurice, dryly, " that what you have said is an exaggeration of speech. Otherwise, I have rendered you a very bad service, for which it is scarcely necessary to thank me." Then, rudely pushing aside the little chil- dren, who had caught at his knees, he went out as he had come in, and retired to his chamber. Whence came this angry and unreasoning 156 MADELEINE: humor? From the heart of man, which is an abyss of cowardly infamies. Maurice was furious because he had no longer either pretext or justification for doing nothing. The artisan and his family were mortified at their inability to express their gratitude, and grieved at the abrupt departure of their bene- factor. Madeleine, cruelly stricken, turned aside to wipe away her tears. After this, as she had scarcely dared hope, Maurice had frequent interviews with Pierre Marceau. He said nothing in Madeleine's presence, but she saw from his serious and earnest air that there was impending a change in his destiny. One morning, Ursula hurried in and threw herself upon Madeleine, whom she covered with tears and kis-ses. Then, taking her by the hand, she drew her silently toward Maurice's apartment. " Make no noise," she whispered, "but look! " Madeleine held her breath, and peered A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 157 through the half-open door. What did she see? The most grateful sight possible to her. For there, bent over his table, in his blouse, Maurice was at work. CHAPTER XI. r 1 ""HE time was a propitious one for wood- -*- carving. For a long time neglected and nearly lost, this branch of art had revived again in the capricious breath of fashion. We were then in the full moyen dge. Literature made itself Gothic, to rejuvenate itself. The taste dominated poetry, as it had all the arts painting, statuary, architecture. By a natural sequence, furniture had followed the same ten- dency. Fashion commenced by pulling down a number of chateaus in the Provinces, to satisfy this Parisian mania ; then, when the chests, the dressing-tables, the pantries, the arm-chairs 158 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 159 with armorial carvings, failed of a market, when the true moyen dge was exhausted, they were forced to create one of new things. Wal- nut, oak, pear, fashioned by able hands, cleverly duped more than one connoisseur; and this innocent ruse enriched some favorite artists. Through the agency of Pierre Marceau, Maurice soon found himself charged with some important orders. He saw that he could in a little time surround himself with ease ; at least he could shelter from want the two beings confided to his care. It was poverty, but inde- pendent poverty, which owes nothing to anyone; without care in the morning, without regret in the evening; a hundred times preferable to that factitious and tormented luxury in which Maurice had lived. It is true, the young man appeared to be neither convinced of the advan- tages of his new condition, nor affected by them. He accepted his destiny, but he detested it. He worked, but cursed the work. Many times, 160 MADELEINE: during these last months, he felt his courage weaken and his will falter. Many times he abandoned himself to feelings of desperation, even in the presence of his cousin. He would throw down his tools in anger, and break under his feet the work he had commenced, as though ignorant of that simple courtesy which doubles the worth of sacrifice. That which stimulated and sustained him in the struggle he had com- menced, was pride. Above all, he wished to owe nothing to his cousin. He said to himself that the sooner he could assure the future existence of Madeleine, the sooner he would be free to finish as he pleased. The spectre of suicide still watched at his bedside; not menacingly, but as an angel of deliverance. There is a joy of which those are ignorant whose life has only cost the pain of being born ; a joy that Maurice felt more keenly, because, not having foreseen it, he had not thought to defend himself against it. I speak of the puerile joy, if you choose so to call it, that one A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 161 feels in holding in his hand the first money that he has gained by his labor. No, this joy is not puerile ; for it is nothing else than the con- sciousness of our personal value. Are not the riches created by our work the most legitimate of all riches, and those of which we are most justly proud? The heir who counts his gold is poorer in the sight of God than the workman who receives his wages. These reflections were far from Maurice's mind ; but when he saw upon his table some louis that Pierre Marceau had received for him, he examined them one by one with an expression of childish curiosity. One would have thought him a miser, or a poor wretch who handles money for the first time. By a naive impulse, worthy of the best days of his youth, he started gaily to carry his earn- ings in triumph to Madeleine. He laughed as at twenty years. Alas ! he was not at her door, before he despised his own contentment the stupid sentiment which had brought him to his cousin. Ursula was in the ante-chamber. He 11 MADELEINE: threw coldly into her lap a handful of money, and retired without a word. In the accomplishment of a serious duty, hard and painful as it may be, God has given even degraded souls an internal feeling of satisfaction. The most disagreeable calling has its hours of elevation ; and the culture of an art, modest though it be, has its moments of enthusiasm. Maurice was conscious of an unacknowledged charm in feeling himself useful and necessary. He sometimes even conceived a passion for the figure his chisel had created. The chaste images of his youth played around his table. The portrait of his father seemed to smile down upon him in encouragement. His fits of fury became less and less frequent; and before many months, when the night came Maurice would be astonished at the flight of time and at the peace he had felt. Labor brings with it its own recompense. It isolates us from the world, and also from ourselves. If we owed to it only the serenity which crowns A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 163 each day that is well spent, we should bless and love it. Unhappily, these healthy influ- ences had not time to fructify in the spirit of Maurice, who, when his day was finished, dissipated in the outer world the moral profit he had gained in retirement. Too exalted, in his opinion, to subject himself to an existence commonplace and regular, he had declared definitely that he would now live in his own manner. The truth is, he was not anxious for a permanent lease of the cuisine of Ursula; and to take his repasts Ute-a-tete with Madeline, did not tempt him. Like all weak natures, he wished to show plainly that it was by his own will that he uplifted himself. He break- fasted frugally in his chamber; in the evening, when the clock struck six, he quit his blouse, dressed himself, and left the house, often without having seen his cousin during the day. He thought that after providing for her wants, he owed her nothing. He went out calmly, his head clear, his blood cooled by 164 MADELEINE: work, silence, and solitude ; elated at leaving his garret, being lost in the crowd, and free upon the pavement. But where should he go ? He had broken violently with his past. No friend remained to him ; or, more correctly, in the world where he had wasted his youth, one has companions, but not friends. He wandered by chance ; but a fatal charm too often led him to those places where he had foundered. Pale and haggard, he wandered on, keeping in the shadow of the walls ; like a shipwrecked mariner driven upon the shore, and regarding with a jealous eye the vessels that ride upon the waves which have engulfed his fortune. He passed along, with a sombre air, in this eternal ftte of Paris which wears no mourning for its victims; where the youngest, the most beautiful, the most brilliant, disappear, leaving behind them neither regret nor vacancy not even the luminous trace left by a falling star. Upon those boulevards flooded with light, in A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. ^5 the midst of those enchantments that are the pride of Paris and the marvel of the world, in those avenues where he had so often prome- naded in his elegant idleness, Maurice thought of the Rue Babylone, of his garret and his table ; and tears of rage rolled down his cheeks. Irritable, feverish, miserable, he returned like a wild beast with a thousand wounds. Before retiring to his chamber, he rarely failed to enter the apartment of Madeleine, who, as well as Ursula, had the habit of working late. This was an impulse of neither solicitude nor polite- ness. He simply obeyed the cowardly need of venting his anger ; and avenged upon these two poor women the ills that he endured. It is the special characteristic of egotists, to wish when they suffer that all around should suffer with them. His hat upon his head, his coat buttoned to his throat, he would enter brusquely, his face haggard, and his mouth fixed in an expression of disdain. Ursula would receive him with a caress, and Madeleine with a smile; never an 1 66 MA DELEINE : indiscreet question, never a wounding word ; nothing in their welcome that did not breathe tenderness, as if he were the most amiable of brothers, the most charming of friends. Repuls- ing brutally his foster-sister, and casting a haughty glance at the picture the young Ger- man was making, he would seat himself at the extremity of the chamber, watching their work with an angry and cynical air. The calmness, the order, the harmonious grace, which reigned under this humble roof, in place of appeasing, only exasperated him. Ordinarily taciturn, he had at these times a cruel, aggressive, and implacable gaiety. Habitually silent, he became ingenious, witty, eloquent, to torture the heart of his cousin. Madeleine responded only by soft reason and unalterable goodness; but Ursula knew how she wept when he was gone. The outrage went even farther. Maurice belonged to that school of young route Love- laces of the side-scenes, Don Juans of the lower class who, because they have stupidly A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. ^ consumed their patrimony with lost creatures, believe that they know women, and glorify themselves for their contempt of them. For two or three withered and faded Bacchantes, these petty dandies speak of one -half the human race with such irreverence that one is tempted to ask of what trades are their sisters, and what breasts have nourished them ? Although he did not consider his cousin either beautiful or desirable, Maurice thought to him- self that he was playing the part of a fool. Instead of those feelings which this chaste and fair beauty left perfectly tranquil, self-love and vanity mounted to his head. Was it natural, he asked himself, that a young man not yet thirty should live fraternally under the same roof with a fair young girl ? What would his old com- panions think? What could Madeleine think herself? For, in the tenderness which she had shown him, Maurice did not hesitate to see an encouragement. However, every time he went near her with the intention of changing a !68 MADELEINE: position that seemed to him ridiculous, seized with a vague sentiment of respect that he could not explain, he retired without daring even to touch her hand. Having gone out one morning when work failed, Maurice wandered until evening under one of those burning suns which ferment the mire of swamps and the vileness of impure passions. He dined at a rude tavern *in the neighborhood of the old Theatre Italien. Seated in an obscure place, under the light of a dim lamp, he ate but little, and drank deeply of a bottle of old wine mixed with alcohol, which had never paid duty at the Custom House. Leaning upon the table, his forehead in his hands, he was plunged for a long time in a chaos of irritating thoughts. Excited by the fumes of drunkenness, his brain and his senses inflamed, he passed the remainder of the even- ing in public places, watching the movements of those infamous sirens who are emptied upon the pavement by the sewers of Parisian life. A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 169 When he entered the apartment of his cousin, he felt a savage joy at finding her alone. Made- leine was reading when Maurice entered. She closed her book, laid it on the table, and wel- comed her cousin without appearing to notice the change in his features. Maurice seated himself near her, and with an abrupt voice, whose accents suited insult better than flattery, he began such exaggerated compliments that the young girl regarded him at first with sur- prise, which ended with a hearty burst of laugh- ter. This was another spur ; this silvery laugh, this gaiety of a nymph without suspicion, pursued by a satyr and believing it only play, finished the irritation of Maurice and pushed him to the end. Stifling a cry of inward rage, he spoke of love with the transports of hate, of tenderness in a tone of wrath, in language whose obscurity was sometimes pierced by a sinister light. White, cold, immobile, like Chas- tity astonished to see at her feet offerings suited to the altar of the impure Venus, Madeleine, I 7 o MADELEINE: whilst he spoke, regarded him with an air at once so proud and so sad, that Maurice, crushed under her look, stopped short as if he had pressed in his arms an insensible marble. Still in the same attitude, Madeleine. betrayed neither anger nor indignation ; only a mixture of mater- nal pity and grieved astonishment. Maurice, unable to endure it, arose and fled in affright. After some hours of that heavy sleep that follows drunkenness, he awoke, and remember- ing what had passed, was ready to die with shame and confusion. Not that his conscience reproached him ; it was habituated to indul- gence. But he could not bear the thought of having to blush before Madeleine. The day drew to its close. Maurice was still a prey to these reflections, when his cousin entered his room. He blushed, paled, and trembled. He wished the floor would open beneath his feet, or the roof fall upon his head. With her hand extended, and a kind look, she called him her brother. For an instant he thought he had A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 171 only dreamed the scene of the evening before. Maurice was touched by the generosity of Madeleine. He saw that Virtue is not neces- sarily ridiculous or harsh, but that she can be amiable and forgiving. Madeleine said that she came to ask him to dine with her that day. He first looked at the sky, which since morning had been dark with rain. To go out in such weather to seek a meagre repast at a rude tavern, was not a pleasing prospect. On the other hand, his stomach yet suffered from the excesses of the previous evening. I have read somewhere that the days that follow orgies make anchorites. In short, Maurice, who judged himself culpable towards his cousin, was not sorry to expiate his sin at so little expense. In his turn grand and generous, he yielded to Madeleine's request. CHAPTER XII. THE table was spread in a small dining- room, beautifully papered in imitation of oak. The fire-place was surrounded by clusters of asters, dahlias, and chrysanthemums. The single window looked out upon the little park, whose trees the winds of Autumn had now stripped of their foliage. The table was narrow; and the luxury of the service would not have startled either a Quaker or a Trappist. But the shining whiteness of the cloth, which ex- haled the perfume of lavender, gave the whole a bright and pleasant air. Seating himself face-to-face with Madeleine, who did the honors of her poverty with a grace sometimes unknown A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 173 to riches, Maurice was forced to confess to him- self that it was much better than the horrid tavern where he usually dined. The dishes were not numerous or expensive ; but they were wholesome, and exquisitely prepared ; for Ursula had shown in this dinner all her skill, and the good girl had surpassed herself. Neat, smiling, quick -footed and light-handed, her sleeves turned back to the elbows, uncovering her rounded and dimpled arms, she hovered about the table, serving Maurice with the daintiest morsels, and overjoyed whenever he found something especially to his taste. Made- leine ate little, and gave all her attention to her cousin, with the proud and happy solicitude of a young housekeeper. The object of all this care could not help being a little touched by it ; and asked himself, in some humiliation, what he had done to merit it. It should be added that he was not insensible to the talent of Ursula, which he had not before suspected. Another surprise revealed itself to him at 174 MADELEINE : dessert. Ursula approached him with an enor- mous bouquet, and recited a little verse that she had learned for the occasion. But emotion choked her voice, and she ended by throwing herself upon her foster-brother, wishing him a happy birth-day, and covering him with tears and kisses. It was then Madeleine's turn. Extending her pretty hand across the table to Maurice, she addressed him some simple and affectionate words. Ursula then brought, with the pancakes and biscuit, as at Valtravers, a bottle of old wine wreathed with flowers, that they had purchased in honor of this day by a month of privation and rigorous economy. The sky was clear; the birds had finished their evening songs; the odor of fallen leaves entered at the open window; and, as he was about to disappear below the horizon, the sun sent a joyous ray across the table, lighting the glasses until they shone like precious crystals. Since Maurice had quitted the paternal A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. '75 roof, it was the first celebration of his birth- day. For ten years forgotten and lost, this anniversary awakened the best recollections of his youth. He recalled the time when it was a day of public rejoicing at Valtravers ; when, seated between the Marquise and the Chevalier, the old servants had come to offer their com- pliments and good-wishes. At these memories, his heart softened and his eyes filled with tears. Madeleine, who was observing him, rose and went to him, to take advantage of this good impulse. Leaning upon his shoulder, she bent over him her virginal head, and remained thus, like the beautiful statue in the Louvre known as Polyhymnia; or like a guardian angel watching the resurrection of the soul committed to her care. In thinking what she had been to him, and what he had been to her, Maurice's hardened soul was softened. This time his pride, instead of being irritated, bent in humiliation. Not a word disturbed the tender scene. Ursula herself was silent 176 MADELEINE: Only when the young man, by a gesture too abrupt not to be involuntary, seized Madeleine's hand and carried it to his lips, Ursula could not restrain one of her usual bursts of adoration, as if her foster-brother had just accomplished the most beautiful action in the world. The evening was finished in Madeleine's chamber, in exchanging reminiscences of Val- travers, of the Marquise, of the good Chevalier; and also of that Autumn evening when Maurice found Madeleine, a victim of the rascally Pierrot, weeping in the forest. They enter- tained themselves in recounting the scene of their arrival at the chateau, the little orphan upon the arm of the young cavalier, she not suspecting that it was the little Maurice of whom she had so often heard; the horse following after, with the bridle on his neck; the setting sun illuminating the towers of the beautiful chateau; and at last the two old companions who stood upon the doorstep to A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 177 receive the young stranger. They forgot them- selves in these recollections, which warbled in their memories like birds in an aviary. Maurice, charmed by the melody, forgot, except at rare intervals, the cynical accom- paniment of Don Juan, which grew feeble and was almost lost in the song. When about to retire, he was forced to admit to himself that life still had its good half-hours, and that poverty as well as fortune has its fetes. He regarded his tools without anger, and the portrait of his father with satisfaction. Saying to himself that they were two good girls his cousin and his foster-sister he slept in unaccustomed peace. His slumber was calm and profound. Awakened at dawn by the voice of Pierre Marceau, who saluted the day and praised God by singing and working, he sprang from bed and set himself resolutely at his work. 12 CHAPTER XIII. " I X) believe that Maurice was saved, to -*- rejoice and chant victory, to believe that it only remained for him to extend his hand and seize again youth and its vanished trea- sures, would be to expose oneself to cruel disappointments, and to misunderstand at the same time the purpose of God, who wills that expiation precedes rehabilitation, and does not permit man to regain in one day the summit of the holy mountain from which he has fallen. The ascent is hard to climb ; and I have known those stronger than Maurice to be arrested midway, pallid, bruised, despairing, when they measured with frightened eye the distance they 178 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 179 had yet to go. It is true that they had not near them an angel to sustain them and wipe the sweat from their faces ; to show the shortest and easiest way by which fallen souls can regain those celestial heights. Autumn drew near its close. November advanced, shivering in her frosty mantle. Re- covered from his prejudice against the cooking of Ursula, forced by the rigor of the weather to reconcile himself to family life, Maurice had finally resigned himself to dine regularly with his cousin. When the north-wind whistled, and the hoar-frost wrought fantastic figures on the windows, it was not unpleasant for him to think of the place waiting for him at Madeleine's table, not two steps off, in a warm and com- fortable room, where two smiling faces never failed to welcome him with eagerness. To appreciate such joys it is not necessary to be a Grandison. Maurice brought usually to these repasts the formidable appetite that he owed to work, and that rendered him indulgent to !8o MADELEINE: the plainness of the service. Ursula knew the tastes of her young master, and it was her glory to prepare the dishes that he liked. Madeleine added the grace of her spirit. Maurice, who no longer allowed himself to be easily charmed by poetic illusions, marveled at the qualities in his cousin to which he had been blind so long. Thus all went well at the table. Unhappily, the evenings dragged more heavily; not for Madeleine or Ursula, but for Maurice, who did not know how to employ them. It is to be remarked that women are always occupied; whilst men do nothing when they cease to work seriously. While they busied themselves with their needles or crochet, Maurice, with his hands in his pockets, wandered about the chamber with a wearied air. Even between the finest intellects, subjects of conversation are not inex- haustible. Men have invented cards and chess, to dispense with speech when they are together. Since the birth-day supper, Maurice had been less bitter in his manner, and had more self- A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE jgi control. More than once, with trembling lips, he had held back some reproachful sentence; and yet, do what he could to subjugate himself, exasperated by ennui, he rarely finished an evening without some bitter or wounding word escaping him. Madeleine, becoming more sure of her empire, replied with a pleasant firmness, in that charming tone which reason employs when tempered with kindness and goodness. From time to time Ursula glided in her little word. Maurice, at first irritated, would pre- serve a sullen silence ; sometimes he could not keep himself from laughing. To overcome his weariness, Madeleine occasionally begged Mau- rice to read to them ; but he refused in disdain. During his life of idleness and dissipation, he had rarely opened a book. Repulsed at first, Madeleine did not despair. One evening she handed him one of the most charming works of English literature : the " Vicar of Wakefield." In this book, Goldsmith has recounted the joys and anguish of a family. Maurice, in his pro- 1 82 MADELEINE: found ignorance, looked at the first page, and asked Madeleine if she considered him a child that was to be amused with nursery stories. Madeleine insisted ; and Maurice, to rid himself of her importunities, began the reading of this admirable narrative. In the painting of its characters, the manner in which they are intro- duced, the art with which the least circumstance conforms to the action of the story, there is so much that is natural, and so powerfully is it depicted, that it is difficult to quit the book before having finished it. Maurice, in spite of his superb disdain for what he called these nursery stories, could not resist the attraction of this domestic epic. His daily association with Madeleine had already softened his heart, and prepared it to receive and nourish these precious germs. In seeing how the most obscure destinies are proved by trial, he understood that there is a place for the most exalted virtues, for the most heroic devotion, in the humblest con- ditions of life. He finished the story at a A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. ^3 sitting, and thanked his cousin for the pleasure she had furnished him. From that day he did not need to be urged to read. Closing the books, the little group exchanged their thoughts and their sentiments. Ursula took part in the discussions; and thus the evenings were fin- ished without having to count the hours. Occasionally Pierre Marceau and his wife would come to pass the evening with Madeleine, who felt a sincere friendship for this little household. In Pierre she saw the providential instrument for the restoration of Maurice. She could not forget that but for him Maurice would have been a long time without the occasion to put himself to work. The artisan remembered the intervention of Madeleine, and the succor that Maurice had rendered at a moment when his fortune was at stake. The little family had soon understood that these young people, whom they believed to be brother and sister, were not in their proper place. Also, with a tact that education does not give, MADELEINE: they brought into the relation of neighbors a sentiment of respect and deference which took nothing from the sincerity of their affection. They came usually after their children were in bed. Sometimes, at the request of Madeleine, they brought their little ones. Maurice at first opposed this intrusion. Of the aristo- cratic blood that he had in his veins, the poor fellow had kept only the instincts of pride and idleness. One day, before Madeleine, he spoke of these poor people with contempt. She, feeling more secure of her place, answered him for the first time with severity. " You are an ingrate," said she. " Even if Marceau had not opened to you the way of life in which you have entered, you should still be proud to touch the hand of a man who has closed the eyes of his old father, and who supports his wife and children." At this merited rebuke, Maurice, who a short time before would have raved in anger, blushed and was silent. A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. ^5 One evening both families were together. The'rese the wife of the young artisan had brought her work, and the three women were seated about the lamp, working and talking in a low voice. Marceau sat a little apart. Maurice, leaning upon the table, one hand in his hair, turned with the other the leaves of a book that he had brought home, and the selection of which would have astonished Madeleine if she could have divined the poison it contained. He read it with the air of a fallen angel, triumphant in evil. The sight singularly troubled his cousin. Curious and disquieted, she begged of him to read it aloud. He obeyed with alacrity. It was one of those romances, so numerous some years ago, but which happily become rarer from day to day, which speak with disdain, almost with contempt, of such sentiments as duty and family; whilst on the other hand they exalt passion, and attribute to it a divine mission. In this romance, like so many others 1 86 MADELEINE: published at that period, the hero, after tramp- ling under his feet all the ridiculous prejudices that education gives, after posing himself in the face of society like an Ajax insulting the gods, or rather like a Solon who would regen- erate them by the example of his life, after having maintained against existing institutions a bitter struggle, finishes by losing his own courage. Despairing of things and of men, indignant towards a corrupt society that refuses to receive the mandates of his pride as the oracles of genius, to punish it he takes refuge in suicide, as the last and only asylum remain- ing here below for grand hearts and beautiful souls. But he does not wish to acknowledge himself vanquished. He tries to hide his agony and defeat by throwing to Heaven and to earth a cry of rage and defiance. All these beautiful things, which have been the admiration of a generation, were written in a high-sounding but hollow style something like the humming- tops which the old Chevalier had made at A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. i8j Nuremburg. Maurice found in this book the faithful image of thoughts that had long dwelt with him, and which, now slumbering, might re-awaken at the first imprudent breath. His eyes glowed with a sinister light. His voice assumed, little by little, a terrible and menacing accent. He had so thoroughly iden- tified himself with the hero whose imprecations he read, that he believed himself speaking in his name. The genius of evil had again seized him. Madeleine listened tremblingly; The"rese was astonished; Ursula had a jeering look; whilst Pierre Marceau had his accustomed expression of good humor. When Maurice had finished, he threw his book upon the table, and surveyed his auditors with an air of triumph and questioning curiosity. "What stuff!" said Ursula. "What silly trash ! Who is this wicked scapegrace who has taken it into his head to reform the world, and who does not even know how to govern his own life?" !88 MADELEINE: "Monsieur," said Pierre Marceau, "it is a worthless hero who can find nothing better to do than to kill himself. Men of any value have always a part to play in the drama of life; only they must be careful to choose a rdlc suited to their strength. I am only an artisan, but I value the work of my hands higher than the grand phrases of this false logic." Therese confessed candidly that she knew nothing about it. Madeleine applauded silently the words of Ursula, of Marceau, and of Therese. Astonished by the strange result of his reading, Maurice took his hat and went out. This evening was not lost to Maurice. Alone with himself, after having given scope to his anger, after having qualified as one can imagine the intelligence of Ursula, of Therese, and of Marceau, after having exhausted all the epithets which disdain could furnish, he was forced in spite of himself to recognize that they had taken in hand the cause of good sense. A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. igg Later, he returned and found Madeleine with Marceau and his wife. His spirit was soothed by their calmness and happiness. Even the children, who usually excited his impatience and ill-humor, awakened in him an unaccustomed tenderness. He took them upon his knees, covered them with caresses, and comprehended for the first time the joys of a family. Thus this young man struggled against the muddy current that pressed against him. A little sturdy effort, and he would touch the shore, where he could shake the mire from his feet and uplift his head in serene regions. But this laborious and retired existence had its diversions and its pleasures. Maurice and Madeleine sometimes went to the theatre. One night they were at the Opera when the play was "William Tell." In the days of his excesses, he had never passed an evening at the opera without profound weariness. In the midst of the frivolities of his companions, it is doubtful if he had ever understood what inspiration 190 MADELEINE : there is in music in this form of imagination so vague and yet so rich. The accents of a melodious voice had never transported him to the ideal regions of passion and reverie. Seated near Madeleine, alone in the crowd that surrounded them, and that sent him not one friendly look, he listened to this last chant of Rossini as to a new language whose meaning is revealed to him for the first time. The first measure had deliciously affected him. Aston- ished, he felt himself penetrated with sympathy and enthusiasm for this beautiful poem. The sobs of Arnold, at the moment when he learns of the death of his father, awakened within him memories of his own father, dead, without his having pressed for a last time that feeble hand. The oath of the Cantons, united for common deliverance, touched in his heart a chord that had been mute before : the love of country and of liberty. All these holy sentiments held him closely; for when one of them takes possession of our conscience, she calls her sisters by a A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 191 mysterious sign, and opens to them the door of a new domain. Maurice subjected himself to a sad and severe review. He asked himself what he had done for his country, what he had done for his family. He exchanged a few words with his cousin; but Madeleine understood from the tone of his voice that his thoughts were not upon his lips. Fearing to trouble him, she did not speak again. They returned in the starry night, recounting to each other their emotions. In listening to Madeleine, Maurice discovered new reasons for admiration that had escaped him before. Dom- inated by the profound impression created by the play, after reaching home he opened the window to contemplate the heaven whose seren- ity had descended into his heart. Then he seated himself near the young German, who, to crown worthily this poetic evening, begged him to read to her the " William Tell " of Schiller. He obeyed with joy. Scarcely had he read the 192 MADELEINE : first page, when his voice, transformed as if by enchantment, took a new accent, to which Madeleine listened with delight. As he ad- vanced in this recital of the marvellous deliver- ance of a people, he appeared to be transfigured. His forehead lightened; his look seemed ani- mated with celestial hope. The old man was effaced, and Madeleine contemplated with pride the new man that she saw before her. That evening was to be fruitful. In comprehending the extent of his duties, Maurice did not deceive himself as to his own power; for Madeleine had the art both to excite and restrain him. He did not exag- gerate the importance of the part he had to play. There are people enough, God knows, who believe they have been called to occupy the chair of state. Maurice had the good- sense not to desire to increase the number. He kept himself prudently in his place; feeling that it is not given to all to conduct public affairs, but that it is the duty of all to interest A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 193 themselves in them. From that day he followed with an ardent solicitude the march of events. His heart was no longer shut to those senti- ments of honor and of glory which before he had ridiculed. Thanks to his constant labor, Maurice now enjoyed a fair degree of prosperity. Madeleine had studied music, and sang with taste. Maurice had not forgotten this; and to thank his cousin for the care that she had lavished upon him above all, in recognition of the angelic patience with which she had borne his anger and his hardness, he made her a present of a piano. It was a grand occasion for Madeleine. This unexpected present gave new life to their little family assemblies. Pierre Marceau, with his wife and children, listened to the music with delight. Maurice also was pleased. One evening when he was alone with Madeleine, she played for him one of the most beautiful and touching of the melodies 13 194 MADELEINE : of Schubert: the "Adieu." That which I love above all else in the compositions of Schubert, is that they cannot endure medi- ocrity. Faithfully and sympathetically rendered, they inspire us to ecstacy, lulling us to delicious reverie. Sung without intelligence, but with literal exactness, they plunge us into profound weariness. They are a touchstone which rarely deceives. To charm with the melodies of Schubert, it is not enough to know music. It needs also the soul of a poet. Madeleine felt profoundly the influence of this divine genius ; and she knew how to render with simplicity all that she felt. Her voice had not great volume, but silvery sweetness. One could not hear it without emotion. She sang the " Adieu " with a melancholy so touching that Maurice was deeply moved. As he looked at her, he understood for the first time that she was beautiful. Not, as I have said, that she offered to the sculptor a type of perfection ; but her soul looked through her eyes, and her A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 195 melodious lips had a sweetness that no words could tell. Maurice had never before separated beauty from voluptuousness. He had con- founded admiration with desire. But a new sense was about to unfold its bud. He contemplated Madeleine with a devotion almost religious; like that which a pilgrim might feel, kneeling before a Madonna. CHAPTER XIV. THUS was realized the dream of the good Marquise, which came to her but a few hours before her death. By the aid of the hand which Madeleine extended to him, Maurice climbed little by little from the depths of the abyss where he had fallen, to the light of day. Already he was strengthened by the exhilar- ating influence of those higher regions that he had gained. He felt their cool breezes fanning his forehead and playing in his hair. He heard confusedly the voices of his youth, chanting the chorus of his return. His face wore the glorious impress of rehabilitation. His features, so long marred by evil passions, and withered before their time, now bore the 196 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 197 stamp of dignity that labor impresses upon the brows of men of courage and of will. His eyes, once dulled by debauch, had regained their clearness. The tones of his voice had softened. When he walked near his cousin, his step re-found the lightness of his young years. A second Spring-time bloomed for him with less of grace and freshness than the first, but fruitful in promises more sure, and already rich with treasures of the Summer. Alas! the poor child had not reached this height without effort. How many times, with bleeding feet and face bathed in sweat, he had stopped discouraged by the way! How many times, stumbling when almost at the summit, he felt himself slip back to the beginning of the ascent that he had climbed so painfully! Often, in a single hour of weakness or rebellion, he lost the fruits of months of struggling. Often, at the moment when the good seed had commenced to germinate in his heart, some dreadful storm, impossible to foresee, annihi- 198 MADELEINE; lated the hope of the harvest. But Madeleine watched always. Her angelic patience, her indefatigable solicitude, sustained and uplifted him; and her hand planted anew the growth that the tempest had uprooted. It is the punishment of those who have lived badly, that they drag after them, even in a better life, the sombre shadow of their past. There were hours in Maurice's life when, overwhelmed with despair under the burden of his faults, the spectre of his lost youth rose before him, and struck him mute with terror. With dismay the unhappy man saw slowly defile before him the gloomy cortege of his recollections : his father abandoned in his old age; the home of his ancestors sold to strangers; the destiny of Madeleine left to the hazard of accident. He suffered in silence under his self-reproach, like the Lacedemonian youth with the wolf gnawing at his side. But Madeleine was always with him, vigilantly watching every impulse of his soul. She knew, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE, 199 better even than himself, what was passing in his thoughts. In his days of weakness or of silent melancholy, she redoubled her touching tenderness. Sometimes she would go to the piano; and, like Orestes at the voice of his sister Electra, the listening Maurice felt his remorse assuaged. Tears came tears that are divine ; the celestial dew that washes away the stains of the soul. Kneeling in her chamber, the pure young girl prayed for her cousin with fervor know- ing that the creature is nothing without the Creator, and that the noblest enterprises fail unless favored by Heaven. God, who reads hearts, had already blessed her work. The Maurice whom we have known cynical, bitter, unpitying, disbelieving this Maurice existed no longer. Madeleine had made of him a new man ; and if sometimes the old man re-appeared, it was but a pale and unsubstantial phantom, that the brave girl exorcised with a gesture or a look. If the passing storm reverberated at 200 MADELEINE: intervals, it was only the sound of the distant thunder which clears the sky. Maurice had no longer moods of sadness or ill-humor that could withstand a word from his cousin. Even Ursula, who so long had only irritated him, now infected him with her gaiety. Whenever he showed signs of the old restlessness, his foster-sister brought him to his better senses with some pro- vincial sally which, instead of exasperating him, forced him to laughter. He now ate willingly of that fruit of reality which he at first turned from in disgust. The taste of this fruit, though bitter, is wholesome ; and Maurice came to love it. He learned that there is more of real greatness in the accomplishment of a duty, humble and modest though it be, than in that philosophy of lackeys which consists in decry- ing all that uplifts humanity. Like his father at Nuremburg, he had learned to respect the royalty of intellect. He loved the arts, he read and appreciated the poets. He became an attentive witness of the progress of ideas ; and A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 2 OI welcomed with eagerness, sometimes with en- thusiasm, those Utopian dreams that not long before had excited his anger and disdain. Pre- serving an implacable hatred of that envious low democracy which, pretending to be the friend of the people, is the enemy of all true excellence, detesting the charlatans who make a trade of socialism and philanthropy, he yet venerated those disinterested souls who embrace with sincere devotion the cause of labor and poverty. Child of an unbelieving century, under the influence of his good angel he felt re-awaken within him, not faith, but hope and charity. He did not yet believe; but he hoped, and he wished to believe. He agreed willingly with Madeleine, that one risks nothing in following the truths that Religion teaches. He learned also that life is sweet when it is useful ; that it is only the egotist and the weak who kill them- selves. The spectre of suicide no longer watched beside his couch. People who work from morn- ing until evening, do not think much about 2O2 MADELEINE : blowing out their brains. Those famous pistols, which had inspired such beautiful phrases, Mau- rice sold to buy flowers for his cousin upon her birth-day. CHAPTER XV. A5IDE from the days of Maurice's despon- dency, which had become more and more rare, time ran on in enchanted hours. The two years which he had pledged, with such bad grace, to his cousin, had been for some months expired. He no longer sought to reclaim his liberty. Captivated by the taste for labor, he was passionately in love with his art. Work did not fail him. By the agency of Pierre Marceau, orders came to him without his solicitation. He gained in wood-sculpture almost as much success as his father had in making nut-crackers and humming-tops; whilst Madeleine's miniatures had become numerous in the galleries of the aristocracy. The story had run through society, that the son of a noble family, and his young sister, ruined by 903 204 MADELEINE : a lawsuit, lived by the labor of their hands under a roof in the Rue Babylone. No more was needed to interest a world which watches eagerly every occasion of diversion. After their poverty, Madeleine and Maurice enjoyed their growing prosperity. They might, if they had chosen, have now quitted their Mansard and established themselves more elegantly ; at least, they could have sought two nests less highly perched. Maurice had contemplated this. Not that he desired more sumptuous apartments. He loved his little lodging, where he had learned to recognize the truth of the words of Madeleine " The walls that see us work and dream and hope are always to us the walls of a palace." But this young man, before so brusque and hard, now felt for Madeleine the solicitude of a brother. It was the grief of his life, that he was not able to restore to her the fortune that she had lost. Many times he had offered her larger and more commodious apartments, in a less retired A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 205 quarter; but she had answered : " Why change our way of life? We are happy here, and happiness has its habitudes, which it is not wise to disturb." If Maurice still urged the matter, he secretly applauded her decision. Thus they remained in their retirement, without other acquaintances than the Marceaus. As for Ursula, she regretted nothing and desired nothing. She sang continually the praises of Maurice, and repeated oftener than ever that he was "An angel an angel from Heaven an angel from the good God!" In fine weather they went on Sundays to the country. These were their only holidays. They passed the day on the hills or in the valleys, returning at night happy and joyous. Thus Maurice saw again, with his cousin, the forests of Luciennes and of Celle, where two years before he had walked and thought of suicide. Under the chestnut trees and by the side of the little lake bordered with mimosas, where before Death had appeared, Life bloomed for him anew. CHAPTER XVI. IT happened that Maurice was seized by a strange malady He felt, when with Made- leine, an inexplicable trouble. He paled and blushed beneath her look, and trembled at the sound of her voice. If by chance she came to his apartments, he received her with the awk- wardness and embarrassment of a boy. At all hours, even in his slumbers, he was conscious of an enchantment that was going on within him. What was passing? Maurice had one day a vague presentiment. Through the friendly offices of Marceau, the young artist had received an order for a grand figure in wood, representing Saint Elizabeth of Hungary, which a wealthy English baronet de- 206 A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 207 signed for the decoration of an oratory in his castle in Lancashire. Maurice had undertaken this piece the more willingly, because it was for this saint that his mother was named. But in proceeding with his work, in spite of the knowl- edge he had gained from the instructions of his father, in spite of the dexterity with which he had so long handled the chisel, he felt an unac- countable distrust of his own skill. Till then he had played with difficulties with a boldness that was almost presumption. Now he delayed and hesitated. He scarcely dared attempt the outline of the figure upon the wood. He was surprised at his own timidity; for he did not yet know that distrust of oneself may be a sign of talent. He studied all the figures that he could find in churches. None of them real- ized his idea of a queen and a saint ; none had the nobility and the chasteness that he sought. Time pressed. He ventured to sketch the drapery and the hands. His ambition to pro- duce a work that should establish his reputation 208 MADELEINE: as an artist and merit the praise of his cousin, rendered him exacting of himself. He was not content with the folds of the drapery. It seemed to him that the fabric lacked flexibility, and its outline wanted grace. The hands de- layed him for a long time; but he forced himself to give them a royal elegance. When the time came to commence the head, his hesitancy was redoubled. But he put himself resolutely at work, and immediately the chisel obeyed the impulse of a mysterious thought. The forehead rounded without effort. The eyes, modelled as if by enchantment, softly shaded, seemed to express the ecstacy of a soul in prayer. The lips, slightly opened, seemed to give passage to a balmy breath. The hair divided itself into plain bands, that framed the gracious oval of the face. After a few moments of mute contempla- tion, Maurice slowly re-touched all that seemed modelled with imperfection. At last he threw aside his tools, and retreated a few steps to A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 209 judge better of his work. At this instant, Madeleine entered ; and seeing the figure, had no trouble in recognizing there herself. She clapped her hands, and showed a childlike joy ; whilst Maurice, confused and embarrassed, blushed like a young girl. In searching for a model to guide him, he had found in his heart the image of Madeleine; and without wishing or even thinking of it, he had faithfully repro- duced the features of his cousin. From that day, his serenity was more profoundly troubled than he dared own, even to himself. This figure of Saint Elizabeth decided his destiny. Although apparently finished, it re- mained still in his work-room, because he was unwilling to let it go. From day to day he found some pretext for retaining it. There was always some point that was unfinished, some detail that needed yet his chisel. One morning, the Baronet presented himself in person. He was a young man about Maurice's own age, but appearing some years 2 1 o MA DELEINE : younger; tall and slender, fair and blue-eyed. Entering coldly, he slightly saluted Maurice, and walked directly to the statue of Saint Elizabeth, which he examined for a time in silence. "They have not deceived me," he said at last, as if speaking to himself. " It is the ideal that I have dreamed. It is the work of a great artist." Saying this, he opened a little pocket-book and took from it a handful of bank-notes, which he laid carelessly on the table. " No, Monsieur," cried Maurice. " We will keep to the price that was agreed. Take back your notes. Your generosity is entirely lost; for if you wish to put upon this figure the price at which I estimate it, your fortune is not sufficient for the purchase." At these words, Sir Edward for the first time looked upon the wood-cutter. Although Maurice was clad in a workman's blouse, his white hands, the purity of the lines of his A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 211 face, the proud attitude of this young man upon whose brow Labor had re-established the impress of his race, revealed to the Baronet that he was no ordinary workman. He com- prehended this the more easily, since he was himself possessed of faculties that lifted him high above the crowd of men of wealth. Con- fused and troubled, he did not wish to retire without asking pardon for his Britannic entrance. Seating himself upon the side of the couch which served both as bed and divan, he conversed with Maurice with a grace that is indeed rare to the sons of Albion. He spoke of Art with the taste of a man who appreciated and loved it. At first reserved and silent, Maurice was won by the exquisite simplicity of his language and his manner. In this little chamber, in the midst of blocks of oak and sticks of walnut that encumbered the floor, they conversed as if in a drawing-room. By an involuntary impulse of vanity, whilst one sought to show that he had not always lived by 212 MADELEINE: the work of his hands, and that he was not a stranger to the elegancies of life, the other was equally desirous of proving that in spite of his riches and his rank he knew the worth of labor and intelligence. In listening to Maurice, Sir Edward felt that he had met one of his peers. In listening to Sir Edward, Maurice recognized that poverty has not the sole privilege of wis- dom, but that every condition of life, from the highest to the lowest, offers fruitful instruction to those who know how to profit by it. Return- ing to the figure of the sainted queen, the Baronet said that his mother had borne the sweet name of Elizabeth during her brief life. Maurice, in his turn, said that his mother, who also died in her youth, was called by the same name. This coincidence, slight as it was, estab- lished between the two young men a bond of sympathy; and at the end of two hours, they separated as friends. The intimacy did not stop here. Rich with- out arrogance, grave without stiffness, expansive A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 213 and affectionate, Sir Edward was one of those Englishmen that one sometimes meets when one is born under a happy star. Of a generous and chivalrous nature, he possessed in a high degree the sentiment which conceals the advan- tages of birth, and which might be called the modesty of riches. Stronger in will than Mau- rice, he had crossed the stormy regions of youth without leaving there his native purity. The shipwreck of his illusions had not turned him from his way. In learning to know men, he had not felt obliged to hate or to despise them. With the experience of a sage, he had the enthusiasm of a poet, the candor and simplicity of a child. He happily combined two rare fac- ulties which seem ordinarily to exclude each other : he was as wise as those who no longer love, and he loved like those who are not yet wise. He had cultivated his mind by travel and by study. Gifted with an instinct for the beautiful in art, he honored talent and glorified genius. For many years he had passed his 214 MADELEINE: Winters in Paris, in the intimacy of artists. The world attracted him but little ; and he was more frequently seen in studios than in drawing- rooms. From this time he visited Maurice daily. He would come in the afternoon, bringing some excellent cigars; and, seating himself upon the side of the bed, he would smoke while watching Maurice at his task, occasionally giving the artist the benefit of his opinion upon the progress of his work. The intimacy grew, until Maurice insensibly arrived at half- confidences. Although prudently silent upon the excesses of his past life, he spoke with enthusiasm of his sister and of her devotion. Of a tender and poetic nature, Sir Edward did not fail to be interested in the description of their fraternal existence. But although he desired to become acquainted with this young sister, he had not yet ventured to ask Maurice to present him; and notwithstanding the artist's sincere attachment for him, he made no further A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 215 offering of courtesy than the welcome to his work-room. Alas! No one escapes his destiny. One day when Madeleine was in her cousin's work- room, the Baronet entered. Maurice had spoken to her more than once of his friend; and the young girl, rejoiced to see the new sentiment growing in the heart so long desolate, had encouraged the friendship. Thus she was under no restraint in the presence of the Baronet; and desiring to render herself agree- able to her cousin, she was cordial and amiable to his friend. Sir Edward was delighted with her, and after she had retired he said to Maurice : " You are right, Monsieur, to speak with pride of your sister. I am only surprised that you have failed to describe her grace and beauty. A purer soul I am sure was never reflected in a sweeter face. I can understand now why it will be easy for you to be a great artist. The beauty of the model assists the 216 MADELEINE: genius of the master. Fortune has been kinder to you than I suspected, since she has left you such a treasure." The speaker ran no risk of interruption. Bent over his table, Maurice fashioned a piece of wood, not appearing to hear what his com- panion said. At dinner that day, and in the evening, in Madeleine's room, the talk was all of the Baronet. By the elegant simplicity of his manner, the delicacy of his language, and the elevation of his ideas, Sir Edward had gained the sympathies of Madeleine, who warmly con- gratulated her cousin upon such an intimacy. Women who love us have a marvellous instinct by which they measure at a glance the sincerity and value of the friendships that surround us. Ursula, who had met the gentleman in the stairway, was not silent concerning his good face, and absolutely refused to believe that he was an Englishman. Pierre Marceau, who had known the Baronet a long time, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 217 recounted some incidents of his generosity that delighted Madeleine, whilst Ursula uttered cries of unbounded admiration. In this concert of praise, Maurice was not mute: though he was scarcely able to account to himself for the uneasiness that he experienced like plants which feel the approach of a storm while the sky is yet clear. After that day, the Baronet occasionally visited Madeleine in her apartments. Short and rare at first, these visits soon became longer and more frequent. Sometimes he would come in the morning, and again in the evening. Madeleine always received him with frank cordiality, not dissimulating in any way her liking for him. Maurice observed her with disquietude. There were hours when he felt an irritation toward his friend that he could not explain. It seemed to him that his cousin was less reserved to this stranger than to him. He also noticed that the Baronet no longer spoke of leaving Paris. One evening 2i8 MADELEINE: when he hazarded a question upon this point, the Baronet replied that he was not going; and Maurice believed that he saw Madeleine thank him with a smile. This disquietude, this mysterious distress, assumed a more serious and alarming character. Maurice sought solitude, and seemed to have lost his taste for work. Madeleine, hitherto so vigilant and clear-sighted, did not appear to notice any change in her cousin. One would have thought she had eyes only for Sir Edward. One morning the Baronet entered Maurice's room, more grave than usual. He seated himself upon the bed, and, without opening his mouth, commenced tracing invisible circles with the end of his cane upon the floor. He had the air of a man who has something important to say, but who does not know where to begin. Maurice waited with anxiety, as if he divined that the storm he had feared was about to burst above his head. " My friend," said the Baronet at length, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 219 with that amiable embarrassment which is so becoming to riches when addressing poverty, " I loved your sister before knowing her. You taught me to love her to associate her with you in the same sentiment of affection and respect. After meeting her, the sentiment im- mediately became love. Could it be other- wise? I make you the judge. If she were not your sister, could you see her and not adore her ? I know nothing of your family or of your history; but I have seen your daily life, and from the manner in which you have borne mis- fortune, I know you are not unworthy of wealth and rank. I believe I have shown you that I am not unworthy of poverty. We are already friends : are you willing that we should become brothers ? " Paler than death, Maurice spoke at length, in a voice of forced composure. "Sir Edward," he said, "your words honor us all. Believe me, I am deeply touched aa I should be. But Madeleine .... my siste* 220 MADELEINE: ..... doubtless she loves you. You have her consent?" "No, my friend, I do not know that I am loved by her. But I believe firmly in the force of attraction of a pure love ; and I have said to myself that perhaps by a devotion and affection without bounds, I may gain the heart I have chosen." " But, Sir Edward, does Madeleine know that you love her?" asked Maurice. " I have never spoken to her of my love," replied the Baronet. " It was my duty to come first to you and loyally ask your consent." " It is well," said Maurice, in his turn ex- tending his hand to Sir Edward. " You have entirely gained my esteem. I will tell Made- leine what you have said, and if she consents to your wish I shall be content with her happi- ness and yours." The Baronet withdrew, his heart filled with hope. If he loved Madeleine if he had not failed to be captivated by so much of candor, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 221 reason, grace, and beauty he also loved Mau- rice ; and it was a lively pleasure to this poetic spirit, this generous and tender soul, to think that he might now avenge these young people upon fortune, and restore them before the world to the position they had lost. CHAPTER XVII. E,FT alone, Maurice was lost in a chaos of confused thoughts, of sentiments so op- posed and contradictory that the most subtle analyst, the most consummate psychologist, would have been baffled by them. After con- ducting Sir Edward to the door, Maurice threw himself upon his bed, prostrated by his emo- tions. He felt a sense of suffering that he could neither define nor name. Little by little the tumult of his feelings quieted, and his per- ceptions became clearer. His face was illumim ated by a soft and gentle glow, like the first rays of the dawn. In truth, it was the dawn dawn of a newer life. He remained a long time silent; upon his lips, yet pale and trembling, A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 223 was the smile of a child but just awakened ; his bosom heaved ; tears filled his eyes ; and, like the resurrected Lazarus, he lifted his hands to Heaven. Looking into the depths of his own heart, Maurice had seen a newly-opened flower. He had breathed its perfume. This flower was Love. He loved. . . . Ah, to understand that rapture, one must himself have known it; at the close of a too -early Autumn, have felt awaken in his soul a second Spring-time, in which blooms this divine flower of Love, that he has believed forever faded. . . . Maurice's rapture was brief. It ended in an emotion of anger and despair. Like a bird mortally stricken in the empyrean, he fell heavily upon the ground of reality. He loved when the hour of love had passed. He arrived too late at the gate of Eden, through whose bars he caught a glimpse of happiness, only to bid it an eternal farewell. The violence of his nature again asserted itself; and he exhausted his strength 224 MADELEINE : in jealous imprecations upon Sir Edward, who had closed against him the door of happiness. In his frenzy, he did not spare even Madeleine. He recalled her every look and attitude in these last days. He saw her smiling at the Baronet and he felt his bosom stung by the serpents of Hell. He had not even the consolation of thinking that he might possibly deceive himself. Even if he had not observed these lovers, if he had not followed with an unquiet eye the progress of their mutual affection, the vague uneasiness that he had felt would have sufficed ; the martyrdom which he endured at this hour would have revealed to him that Madeleine loved Sir Edward. He paced his chamber for some time in silence ; then, suddenly arresting his steps, ashamed of his violence, he said to himself: "Of what, miserable wretch, dost thou complain ? Barely escaped from the mire where thou hast dragged thy youth, thou pitiest thy- self because thou art not loved ? Thou art indignant at seeing preferred to thee a noble A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE 225 heart, a virtue without stain, a conscience that has never failed? What hast thou done to merit this affection which to-day seems to thee the supreme good? In the years when this treasure was within thy reach, what effort hast thou made to prove thyself worthy of it ? Thou hast misunderstood it, disdained it, trampled it under thy feet ; and now thou art in revolt because one more worthy takes it from thee! Rest in the shadow of thy grief, and thank Heaven for having given thee the grace of knowing how to love." Never before had Maurice so bitterly la- mented the faults of his past; never had remorse for his ill-spent days so weighed upon him. For the first time, he saw his ruin in all of its extent. At the moment when his soul opened to the sentiment of love, to the hope of happiness, they had escaped his grasp. He said to himself: "If I had always followed, like Sir Edward, the inflexible line of duty, I would now be under the roof of my father, 15 22 6 MADELEINE: beside Madeleine, who perhaps would have loved me for I would then have been worthy of her love." True love is humble, resigned, and ready for sacrifice. What, Maurice asked himself, could he offer his cousin? In spite of his courage and his perseverance, in spite of the favor that his work had won supposing even this favor durable he would never be able to secure to her anything more than a wretched and stinted existence; whilst in marrying Sir Edward she would take again the rank in society that belonged to her. If she felt herself drawn toward the Baronet by even a feeble sentiment of affection, should Maurice discourage it? Was it not rather his duty to encourage her, and to sacrifice all for her happiness ? He did not hesitate. He decided upon the instant. He passed the evening, as was his wont, with his cousin. He was sad and silent; whilst she, by one of those contrasts that so A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 227 often occur in life, was unusually gay. Maurice did not invite a word or a look that could shake his resolution. Only, when about to retire, he begged her to sing the " Adieu " of Schubert, which had one night affected him so profoundly. Never had she sang so touchingly. When she had finished, Maurice took her hands in his and pressed them to his lips. In the ante-chamber he met Ursula. " You are sad, Monsieur Maurice," said she. " What is the matter ? " " Nothing, my good Ursula," he replied. "Thou knowest that my sadnesses are not serious. But embrace me; I am sure that will do me good." Ursula sprang to her foster-brother, who pressed her to his heart. The following morning, rising at daylight, Maurice went to his table, and, to make com- plete this immolation of his hopes, stifling the cry of his soul, he wrote with a firm hand this letter : 228 MADELEINE; "MADELEINE: I have kept my promise. You asked of me two years of abnegation and devotion. They have long since expired. In them, you have assumed my rdle. You have been to me more than I was to you. In leading me to understand the value of labor, the gran- deur and holiness of duty, you have almost effaced in me the traces of my wanderings. Whatever may be the future that God has reserved for me, I shall never have for you any sentiment but gratitude, any words but those of benediction. But I do not wish, I cannot accept longer, the sacrifice to which you have resigned yourself with so much courage. That would be in me a gross selfishness for which I could never pardon myself. It is no longer a question of me, but of you and your happiness. Sir Edward loves you. He is worthy of your love. He can secure to you the rank that you merit. He has for me a sincere affection, and will charge himself to acquit my debt to you. Adieu then. Be not disquieted for my destiny. In whatever place I find myself, my labor will suffice for all my needs. Do not fear that I will again fall into the profound night from which A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 229 you have rescued me. A mysterious star will guide me in the path that you have opened. If discouragements arise, if my strength fails, I have only to look into my heart, and I shall find there your image. I am going to see again the home of my father. It is a reparation that I owe his memory. I wish to present myself, pure and regenerated, in the place that beheld me debased and dishonored. I trust this pilgrimage will appease the trouble of my con- science. Then I will go with a firm step wherever God may lead me. Adieu, Madeleine. Be happy ; and then I shall bless the memory of the days we have passed together, since the memory will not then be bitter to you. Your Brother, MAURICE." He folded the letter, and traced upon the envelope the sweet name which should hence- forth fill his life. Putting the letter where it would be found, upon the chimney-piece, he saw, at this instant, Marceau and his wife, already at work, near the cradle of their chil- 230 MADELEINE : dren. He saluted them affectionately ; and after contemplating fondly for several minutes the peace and happiness of this little household, he prepared for his departure. When all was ready, he clasped his leathern belt around his blouse, put upon his back the knapsack which contained all his fortune, and took in his hand a workman's travelling staff. Then, surveying tenderly the little chamber, which he had entered hardened by selfishness, withered by idleness, aged by debauch, he left it, regener- ated by labor, rejuvenated by love, and sancti- fied by sacrifice. CHAPTER XVIII. TT 7HILE still in Paris, Maurice's sadness * * was mixed with a secret irritation. He even felt misgivings for the generous resignation that had led him to leave Madeleine. It seemed as if there was in the atmosphere of the great city a remnant of the unhappy influences of his past. But outside of Paris, where his breast swelled with the country air and he was face-to- face with Nature, his heart was softened, and he was dominated by but one sentiment his love for Madeleine. He had now a clear glimpse of the greatness and the holiness of a passion of which before he had known only the gross image. The farther he found himself from Madeleine, the more his heart bled at the 931 232 MADELEINE : separation. But there was still some sweetness in his grief. In the exile to which he resigned himself, he felt a joy keener and more profound than in the intoxication of passion. He was not loved; but he felt himself worthy of love, and the consciousness of moral value inspired a legitimate pride. He was not loved ; but he applauded himself for the sacrifices he had made for the happiness of the woman he loved, and he found in this sacrifice a joy that nothing could take away. His pilgrimage to Valtravers was not only a mark of respect for his father's memory ; he wished also to see again those places where he had known Madeleine for the first time ; to breathe the air that had been embalmed by her presence ; to walk the paths where he had heard her voice. The sentiment of the beautiful in Nature, so long dead in his heart, all the undulations of the country, the caprices of the sky, the tones of the landscape, were to Maurice a source of unexpected joy. His simple delight would have A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 233 made one believe that he saw for the first time the marvels of creation. The fatigues of this journey on foot were sweeter to him than those excursions which he had so often made in car- riages or in the saddle. The halts at evening in country inns ; the departure at dawn ; the meetings at the common table ; the chats with the little children before the door, all were to him poetic episodes, renewing and varying the interest of his pilgrimage, while perfecting him in the practice of equality. A last moral revolution crowned all the others in the soul of Maurice. Madeleine had succeeded in awakening a religious sentiment in his heart, and had often besought him to have recourse to prayer. But he had never consented to enter a church for worship. It was reserved for the influence of grief to bring him, by an insensible but sure ascent, to the beliefs and practices that he had ridiculed. He found the truth that all sincere griefs lift us to God. In passing through a village, he found himself one 234 MADELEINE : day before a little church. Moved by an irre- sistible impulse, he entered. It was one of those plain and humble churches which God prefers to a sumptuous and gilded temple. The sun shone softly in through a window. Field- flowers adorned the altar, upon whose steps some aged men and women kneeled in prayer. Maurice too sank upon his knees and prayed. He prayed to obtain pardon from his father for his wanderings, and from Heaven the happiness of Madeleine. After a solitary walk of fifteen days, he passed unrecognized through the little village of Neuvy-les-Bois. His costume served as a disguise. Besides, in this assured step, in this proud and serene look, in the calmness and dignity of this noble and manly face, how should anyone detect a likeness to the young man who had departed like an outlaw three years before? Who can tell the emotions of his heart, when an hour later, he saw at the horizon's A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 2 35 edge the forests that had sheltered his child- hood, in whose mysterious depths he had so often walked between his father and the Marquise, and where Madeleine had first appeared to him? In finding himself, full of life and love, once more in these beautiful places where three years before he had brought only the consciousness of his fall, his first impulse was to cry aloud to Nature that he was young, that he could love, that he loved. His regenerated soul was exalted in an ecstacy of holy delight. " Nature, rejoice thou ! " he cried. " It is yet thy child. Light breezes ! caress, as in the old time, my forehead. Mosses of the woods, grasses of the clearing, recognize my step ! Tremble and bend lovingly above my head, ye trees that my father planted." He walked slowly. Recollections rose before him, like skylarks in a field. In the shade of this oak he had rested, with his father. Under the silvery leaves of this sensitive tree he had forgotten himself for a day, listening to 2 3 6 MA DELEINE : the first passionate murmurs of the youth awakening within him. At the turn of an avenue, he recognized the place where that Autumn evening he had found his cousin. He recalled all the details of their meeting. He also remembered that one year later the day of his first departure he had again found Madeleine at this place. " Ah, poor wretch ! " he cried sadly. " What demon possessed thee? She was here, a celestial warning, the image of the happiness thou wert leaving behind thee. Why hast thou not taken her by the hand and returned upon thy steps?" The day faded. Overcome by his emotions, Maurice had fallen upon the grass. He arose and proceeded toward the chateau. He did not even know who inhabited it; but he was not curious to see or know the owner. He only wished to say a last adieu, and depart from the Eden from which he was forever exiled. At the gate of the park, he remained A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 237 a long time leaning against the bars ; then he mechanically opened the gate and entered. The park was deserted. The shadows of evening were beginning to fall about him. Maurice heard only the murmurs of the wind in the leaves, the calls of birds in their nests, the crushing of the sand under his feet. At the end of the avenue, which brought the chateau into view, he stopped, held his breath, and pressed his hand against his heart. . . . Could he believe his eyes? Was it not a dream a mirage an hallucination of his excited brain? The staff escaped from his hands. His knees bent under him, and he was obliged to lean against a tree. Twenty steps before him, seated upon the door-step of the chateau, lit as of old by the fires of the setting sun, whilst two children, whom Maurice knew, rolled upon the sward, were Madeleine, Sir Edward, and Pierre Mar- ceau and his wife. 2 3 8 MADELEINE : Madeleine arose and advanced smilingly to Maurice, as serene and calm as if his presence were the most natural thing in the world. " My friend," she said, " we have waited for you." Taking his arm, the young girl drew him softly toward the Baronet, The"rese, and Mar- ceau, who came to meet him. They shook hands; but all hearts were affected to silence. "Oh, my friends," at length said Maurice, in a trembling voice, "what is it that is passing? what has passed ? Have I dreamed of grief and of despair, or do I now dream of happiness ? " The faces of those about him answered only by an affectionate smile. Led by Madeleine, Maurice ascended the steps. All the old servants were waiting in the hall. " My children," said Madeleine, " see your young master, who has returned again to us." They surrounded him with expressions of A STOXY OF FRENCH LOVE. 239 respect and love, whilst Ursula unfastened with delight the buckles of his knapsack. At this moment a servant announced in a high voice that Monsieur the Chevalier was served. Fol- lowed by Sir Edward and the Marceaus, Made- leine conducted him to the dining-room, and seated him, in his workman's blouse, in the chair of his father. The repast was brief and silent. Maurice had the air of a man who is uncertain whether he wakes or sleeps, and who fears to break, by an abrupt motion or an imprudent word, the enchantment that holds him. At the end of the meal, Madeleine arose, and quitting the group, went toward the forest with her cousin, who permitted her to lead him like a child. They reached a green mound, where the young girl seated herself, and made Maurice sit beside her. It was one of those evenings that seem to double the value of happiness. Whilst one part of the sky was empurpled with the dying 240 MADELEINE : fires left by the descending sun, on the other side of the horizon the moon was rising in a lake of azure, and mounting slowly to the summits of the trees that she silvered with her pale rays. The nightingale sang with full throat in the thick foliage. The breezes of the night awakened and sounded in the depths of the forest like the distant murmurs of a cascade. " Oh, my friend," said Madeleine, in a voice sweeter than the song of the nightingale, fresher than the breezes of the night, " I have loved you from the day when I saw you here for the first time. You had need to pass, by the way of poverty, of labor, and of abnegation, to regeneration. I comprehended this, and I de- termined to share the trials that I imposed upon you. These trials are ended. Maurice, will you pardon me?" Maurice was kneeling at the foot of the mound where his cousin was seated. The fair girl bent toward him her sweet face, and under A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 241 the light of the starry heavens, their lips met in a chaste kiss. Madeleine had not lost her lawsuit. The chateau was yet hers. She had deceived Mau- rice that she might save him. . . . I do not wish to recount here what had passed day by day in the heart of the young girl whilst Mau- rice pursued the work of his rehabilitation. It is a recital which delicate souls can make for themselves ; whilst vulgar souls would not com- prehend it. As soon as they had learned of Maurice's departure from Paris, they all followed by diligence; and thus the young Chevalier found the friends of his last days in Paris, under the roof of his fathers. "They were the witnesses of our struggles and our efforts," said Madeleine. "It is just that they should be present when you receive the recompense that you have merited. That which Sir Edward loved most in me was 16 242 MADELEINE : our poverty. Our happiness will console him." A month later, Maurice and Madeleine were married, without ostentation, at Neuvy- les-Bois. The next day, Pierre Marceau, with his wife and children, left for Paris. It was in vain that Madeleine and Maurice begged them to remain at the chateau, where they would find abundant employment for their activity and intelligence. "You have re-found your place," replied Marceau. "Let me keep mine. I would only weary your felicity. I fear nothing from your pride. Labor has established between us an equality which nothing can disturb. But the world in which you live would refuse to com- prehend it ; and its astonishment would be to me a reproach which I wish to spare us both." And so the little family left them, loaded with tokens of affection. At the end of a month, Sir Edward also took his leave. A STORY OF FRENCH LOVE. 243 " Watch over your happiness," said he to Maurice, at the moment of his departure. " It is a delicate plant, which needs tender and vigilant care." My task is terminated. Happy lives have no history. Maurice was henceforth beyond danger. Work was no longer a necessity; but he was not inactive. He occupied himself in doing good, and sowed his riches about him with an open hand. Madeleine is paid with usury for her devotion ; and no cloud troubles the serenity of their mutual tenderness. No matter what Madeleine may say, Ursula persists in believing that her young mistress really lost her lawsuit, and that Maurice found in wood-carving the means to buy again the home of his ancestors. Maurice has ever for his young wife a steadfast and exalted gratitude. When he is 244 MADELEINE : impelled to bless her for their happiness, she will reply : " My friend, it is not I that you should thank. I have only pointed the way in which you should walk. It is Labor that you should bless, for it is through Labor that you have found again youth, love, and happiness." THE END. A 000 129 228