الفصل الفصل 25 · MADAME DE PLOUGASTEL

. MADAME DE PLOUGASTEL

The postilion drew rein, and the footman opened the door, letting

down the steps and proffering his arm to his mistress to assist her to

alight, since that was the wish she had expressed. Then he opened

one wing of the iron gates, and held it for her. She was a woman of

something more than forty, who once must have been very lovely, who

was very lovely still with the refining quality that age brings to some

women. Her dress and carriage alike advertised great rank.

“I take my leave here, since you have a visitor,” said Andre-Louis.

“But it is an old acquaintance of your own, Andre. You remember Mme. la

Comtesse de Plougastel?”

He looked at the approaching lady, whom Aline was now hastening forward

to meet, and because she was named to him he recognized her. He must,

he thought, had he but looked, have recognized her without prompting

anywhere at any time, and this although it was some sixteen years since

last he had seen her. The sight of her now brought it all back to him--a

treasured memory that had never permitted itself to be entirely overlaid

by subsequent events.

When he was a boy of ten, on the eve of being sent to school at Rennes,

she had come on a visit to his godfather, who was her cousin. It

happened that at the time he was taken by Rabouillet to the Manor of

Gavrillac, and there he had been presented to Mme. de Plougastel. The

great lady, in all the glory then of her youthful beauty, with her

gentle, cultured voice--so cultured that she had seemed to speak a

language almost unknown to the little Breton lad--and her majestic air of

the great world, had scared him a little at first. Very gently had she

allayed those fears of his, and by some mysterious enchantment she had

completely enslaved his regard. He recalled now the terror in which

he had gone to the embrace to which he was bidden, and the subsequent

reluctance with which he had left those soft round arms. He remembered,

too, how sweetly she had smelled and the very perfume she had used, a

perfume as of lilac--for memory is singularly tenacious in these matters.

For three days whilst she had been at Gavrillac, he had gone daily to

the manor, and so had spent hours in her company. A childless woman with

the maternal instinct strong within her, she had taken this precociously

intelligent, wide-eyed lad to her heart.

“Give him to me, Cousin Quintin,” he remembered her saying on the

last of those days to his godfather. “Let me take him back with me to

Versailles as my adopted child.”

But the Seigneur had gravely shaken his head in silent refusal, and

there had been no further question of such a thing. And then, when she

said good-bye to him--the thing came flooding back to him now--there had

been tears in her eyes.

“Think of me sometimes, Andre-Louis,” had been her last words.

He remembered how flattered he had been to have won within so short a

time the affection of this great lady. The thing had given him a sense

of importance that had endured for months thereafter, finally to fade

into oblivion.

But all was vividly remembered now upon beholding her again, after

sixteen years, profoundly changed and matured, the girl--for she had been

no more in those old days--sunk in this worldly woman with the air of

calm dignity and complete self-possession. Yet, he insisted, he must

have known her anywhere again.

Aline embraced her affectionately, and then answering the questioning

glance with faintly raised eyebrows that madame was directing towards

Aline’s companion--

“This is Andre-Louis,” she said. “You remember Andre-Louis, madame?”

Madame checked. Andre-Louis saw the surprise ripple over her face,

taking with it some of her colour, leaving her for a moment breathless.

And then the voice--the well-remembered rich, musical voice--richer and

deeper now than of yore, repeated his name:

“Andre-Louis!”

Her manner of uttering it suggested that it awakened memories, memories

perhaps of the departed youth with which it was associated. And she

paused a long moment, considering him, a little wide-eyed, what time he

bowed before her.

“But of course I remember him,” she said at last, and came towards

him, putting out her hand. He kissed it dutifully, submissively,

instinctively. “And this is what you have grown into?” She appraised

him, and he flushed with pride at the satisfaction in her tone. He

seemed to have gone back sixteen years, and to be again the little

Breton lad at Gavrillac. She turned to Aline. “How mistaken Quintin was

in his assumptions. He was pleased to see him again, was he not?”

“So pleased, madame, that he has shown me the door,” said Andre-Louis.

“Ah!” She frowned, conning him still with those dark, wistful eyes of

hers. “We must change that, Aline. He is of course very angry with

you. But it is not the way to make converts. I will plead for you,

Andre-Louis. I am a good advocate.”

He thanked her and took his leave.

“I leave my case in your hands with gratitude. My homage, madame.”

And so it happened that in spite of his godfather’s forbidding reception

of him, the fragment of a song was on his lips as his yellow chaise

whirled him back to Paris and the Rue du Hasard. That meeting with Mme.

de Plougastel had enheartened him; her promise to plead his case in

alliance with Aline gave him assurance that all would be well.

That he was justified of this was proved when on the following Thursday

towards noon his academy was invaded by M. de Kercadiou. Gilles, the

boy, brought him word of it, and breaking off at once the lesson upon

which he was engaged, he pulled off his mask, and went as he was--in a

chamois waistcoat buttoned to the chin and with his foil under his arm

to the modest salon below, where his godfather awaited him.

The florid little Lord of Gavrillac stood almost defiantly to receive

him.

“I have been over-persuaded to forgive you,” he announced aggressively,

seeming thereby to imply that he consented to this merely so as to put

an end to tiresome importunities.

Andre-Louis was not misled. He detected a pretence adopted by the

Seigneur so as to enable him to retreat in good order.

“My blessings on the persuaders, whoever they may have been. You restore

me my happiness, monsieur my godfather.”

He took the hand that was proffered and kissed it, yielding to the

impulse of the unfailing habit of his boyish days. It was an act

symbolical of his complete submission, reestablishing between himself

and his godfather the bond of protected and protector, with all the

mutual claims and duties that it carries. No mere words could more

completely have made his peace with this man who loved him.

M. de Kercadiou’s face flushed a deeper pink, his lip trembled, and

there was a huskiness in the voice that murmured “My dear boy!” Then he

recollected himself, threw back his great head and frowned. His voice

resumed its habitual shrillness. “You realize, I hope, that you have

behaved damnably... damnably, and with the utmost ingratitude?”

“Does not that depend upon the point of view?” quoth Andre-Louis, but

his tone was studiously conciliatory.

“It depends upon a fact, and not upon any point of view. Since I have

been persuaded to overlook it, I trust that at least you have some

intention of reforming.”

“I... I will abstain from politics,” said Andre-Louis, that being the

utmost he could say with truth.

“That is something, at least.” His godfather permitted himself to be

mollified, now that a concession--or a seeming concession--had been made

to his just resentment.

“A chair, monsieur.”

“No, no. I have come to carry you off to pay a visit with me. You owe

it entirely to Mme. de Plougastel that I consent to receive you again. I

desire that you come with me to thank her.”

“I have my engagements here...” began Andre-Louis, and then broke off.

“No matter! I will arrange it. A moment.” And he was turning away to

reenter the academy.

“What are your engagements? You are not by chance a fencing-instructor?”

M. de Kercadiou had observed the leather waistcoat and the foil tucked

under Andre-Louis’ arm.

“I am the master of this academy--the academy of the late Bertrand des

Amis, the most flourishing school of arms in Paris to-day.”

M. de Kercadiou’s brows went up.

“And you are master of it?”

“Maitre en fait d’Armes. I succeeded to the academy upon the death of

des Amis.”

He left M. Kercadiou to think it over, and went to make his arrangements

and effect the necessary changes in his toilet.

“So that is why you have taken to wearing a sword,” said M. de

Kercadiou, as they climbed into his waiting carriage.

“That and the need to guard one’s self in these times.”

“And do you mean to tell me that a man who lives by what is after all

an honourable profession, a profession mainly supported by the nobility,

can at the same time associate himself with these peddling attorneys and

low pamphleteers who are spreading dissension and insubordination?”

“You forget that I am a peddling attorney myself, made so by your own

wishes, monsieur.”

M. de Kercadiou grunted, and took snuff. “You say the academy

flourishes?” he asked presently.

“It does. I have two assistant instructors. I could employ a third. It

is hard work.”

“That should mean that your circumstances are affluent.”

“I have reason to be satisfied. I have far more than I need.”

“Then you’ll be able to do your share in paying off this national debt,”

growled the nobleman, well content that--as he conceived it--some of the

evil Andre-Louis had helped to sow should recoil upon him.

Then the talk veered to Mme. de Plougastel. M. de Kercadiou, Andre-Louis

gathered, but not the reason for it, disapproved most strongly of this

visit. But then Madame la Comtesse was a headstrong woman whom there was

no denying, whom all the world obeyed. M. de Plougastel was at present

absent in Germany, but would shortly be returning. It was an indiscreet

admission from which it was easy to infer that M. de Plougastel was one

of those intriguing emissaries who came and went between the Queen of

France and her brother, the Emperor of Austria.

The carriage drew up before a handsome hotel in the Faubourg

Saint-Denis, at the corner of the Rue Paradis, and they were ushered by

a sleek servant into a little boudoir, all gilt and brocade, that opened

upon a terrace above a garden that was a park in miniature. Here madame

awaited them. She rose, dismissing the young person who had been reading

to her, and came forward with both hands outheld to greet her cousin

Kercadiou.

“I almost feared you would not keep your word,” she said. “It was

unjust. But then I hardly hoped that you would succeed in bringing

him.” And her glance, gentle, and smiling welcome upon him, indicated

Andre-Louis.

The young man made answer with formal gallantry.

“The memory of you, madame, is too deeply imprinted on my heart for any

persuasions to have been necessary.”

“Ah, the courtier!” said madame, and abandoned him her hand. “We are to

have a little talk, Andre-Louis,” she informed him, with a gravity that

left him vaguely ill at ease.

They sat down, and for a while the conversation was of general matters,

chiefly concerned, however, with Andre-Louis, his occupations and his

views. And all the while madame was studying him attentively with those

gentle, wistful eyes, until again that sense of uneasiness began to

pervade him. He realized instinctively that he had been brought here for

some purpose deeper than that which had been avowed.

At last, as if the thing were concerted--and the clumsy Lord of Gavrillac

was the last man in the world to cover his tracks--his godfather rose

and, upon a pretext of desiring to survey the garden, sauntered through

the windows on to the terrace, over whose white stone balustrade the

geraniums trailed in a scarlet riot. Thence he vanished among the

foliage below.

“Now we can talk more intimately,” said madame. “Come here, and sit

beside me.” She indicated the empty half of the settee she occupied.

Andre-Louis went obediently, but a little uncomfortably. “You know,” she

said gently, placing a hand upon his arm, “that you have behaved very

ill, that your godfather’s resentment is very justly founded?”

“Madame, if I knew that, I should be the most unhappy, the most

despairing of men.” And he explained himself, as he had explained

himself on Sunday to his godfather. “What I did, I did because it was

the only means to my hand in a country in which justice was paralyzed by

Privilege to make war upon an infamous scoundrel who had killed my best

friend--a wanton, brutal act of murder, which there was no law to punish.

And as if that were not enough--forgive me if I speak with the utmost

frankness, madame--he afterwards debauched the woman I was to have

married.”

“Ah, mon Dieu!” she cried out.

“Forgive me. I know that it is horrible. You perceive, perhaps, what

I suffered, how I came to be driven. That last affair of which I

am guilty--the riot that began in the Feydau Theatre and afterwards

enveloped the whole city of Nantes--was provoked by this.”

“Who was she, this girl?”

It was like a woman, he thought, to fasten upon the unessential.

“Oh, a theatre girl, a poor fool of whom I have no regrets. La Binet was

her name. I was a player at the time in her father’s troupe. That was

after the Rennes business, when it was necessary to hide from such

justice as exists in France--the gallows’ justice for unfortunates

who are not ‘born.’ This added wrong led me to provoke a riot in the

theatre.”

“Poor boy,” she said tenderly. “Only a woman’s heart can realize what

you must have suffered; and because of that I can so readily forgive

you. But now...”

“Ah, but you don’t understand, madame. If to-day I thought that I had

none but personal grounds for having lent a hand in the holy work

of abolishing Privilege, I think I should cut my throat. My true

justification lies in the insincerity of those who intended that the

convocation of the States General should be a sham, mere dust in the

eyes of the nation.”

“Was it not, perhaps, wise to have been insincere in such a matter?”

He looked at her blankly.

“Can it ever be wise, madame, to be insincere?”

“Oh, indeed it can; believe me, who am twice your age, and know my

world.”

“I should say, madame, that nothing is wise that complicates existence;

and I know of nothing that so complicates it as insincerity. Consider a

moment the complications that have arisen out of this.”

“But surely, Andre-Louis, your views have not been so perverted that you

do not see that a governing class is a necessity in any country?”

“Why, of course. But not necessarily a hereditary one.”

“What else?”

He answered her with an epigram. “Man, madame, is the child of his own

work. Let there be no inheriting of rights but from such a parent. Thus

a nation’s best will always predominate, and such a nation will achieve

greatly.”

“But do you account birth of no importance?”

“Of none, madame--or else my own might trouble me.” From the deep flush

that stained her face, he feared that he had offended by what was almost

an indelicacy. But the reproof that he was expecting did not come.

Instead--

“And does it not?” she asked. “Never, Andre?”

“Never, madame. I am content.”

“You have never... never regretted your lack of parents’ care?”

He laughed, sweeping aside her sweet charitable concern that was so

superfluous. “On the contrary, madame, I tremble to think what they

might have made of me, and I am grateful to have had the fashioning of

myself.”

She looked at him for a moment very sadly, and then, smiling, gently

shook her head.

“You do not want self-satisfaction... Yet I could wish that you saw

things differently, Andre. It is a moment of great opportunities for

a young man of talent and spirit. I could help you; I could help you,

perhaps, to go very far if you would permit yourself to be helped after

my fashion.”

“Yes,” he thought, “help me to a halter by sending me on treasonable

missions to Austria on the Queen’s behalf, like M. de Plougastel. That

would certainly end in a high position for me.”

Aloud he answered more as politeness prompted. “I am grateful, madame.

But you will see that, holding the ideals I have expressed, I could not

serve any cause that is opposed to their realization.”

“You are misled by prejudice, Andre-Louis, by personal grievances. Will

you allow them to stand in the way of your advancement?”

“If what I call ideals were really prejudices, would it be honest of me

to run counter to them whilst holding them?”

“If I could convince you that you are mistaken! I could help you so much

to find a worthy employment for the talents you possess. In the

service of the King you would prosper quickly. Will you think of it,

Andre-Louis, and let us talk of this again?”

He answered her with formal, chill politeness.

“I fear that it would be idle, madame. Yet your interest in me is very

flattering, and I thank you. It is unfortunate for me that I am so

headstrong.”

“And now who deals in insincerity?” she asked him.

“Ah, but you see, madame, it is an insincerity that does not mislead.”

And then M. de Kercadiou came in through the window again, and announced

fussily that he must be getting back to Meudon, and that he would take

his godson with him and set him down at the Rue du Hasard.

“You must bring him again, Quintin,” the Countess said, as they took

their leave of her.

“Some day, perhaps,” said M. de Kercadiou vaguely, and swept his godson

out.

In the carriage he asked him bluntly of what madame had talked.

“She was very kind--a sweet woman,” said Andre-Louis pensively.

“Devil take you, I didn’t ask you the opinion that you presume to have

formed of her. I asked you what she said to you.”

“She strove to point out to me the error of my ways. She spoke of great

things that I might do--to which she would very kindly help me--if I were

to come to my senses. But as miracles do not happen, I gave her little

encouragement to hope.”

“I see. I see. Did she say anything else?”

He was so peremptory that Andre-Louis turned to look at him.

“What else did you expect her to say, monsieur my godfather?”

“Oh, nothing.”

“Then she fulfilled your expectations.”

“Eh? Oh, a thousand devils, why can’t you express yourself in a sensible

manner that a plain man can understand without having to think about

it?”

He sulked after that most of the way to the Rue du Hasard, or so it

seemed to Andre-Louis. At least he sat silent, gloomily thoughtful to

judge by his expression.

“You may come and see us soon again at Meudon,” he told Andre-Louis at

parting. “But please remember--no revolutionary politics in future, if we

are to remain friends.”