Chương Chương 47 · AN OLD SWORD

. AN OLD SWORD

I now mean to be serious; it is time

Since laughter now-a-days is deemed too serious.

A jest at vice by virtues called a crime.

_Don Juan, c. xiii._

She did not appear at dinner. She came for a minute into the salon in

the evening, but did not look at Julien. He considered this behaviour

strange, "but," he thought, "I do not know their usages. She will give

me some good reason for all this." None the less he was a prey to

the most extreme curiosity; he studied the expression of Mathilde's

features; he was bound to own to himself that she looked cold and

malicious. It was evidently not the same woman who on the proceeding

night had had, or pretended to have, transports of happiness which were

too extravagant to be genuine.

The day after, and the subsequent day she showed the same coldness;

she did not look at him, she did not notice his existence. Julien was

devoured by the keenest anxiety and was a thousand leagues removed from

that feeling of triumph which had been his only emotion on the first

day. "Can it be by chance," he said to himself, "a return to virtue?"

But this was a very bourgeois word to apply to the haughty Mathilde.

"Placed in an ordinary position in life she would disbelieve in

religion," thought Julien, "she only likes it in so far as it is very

useful to the interests of her class."

But perhaps she may as a mere matter of delicacy be keenly reproaching

herself for the mistake which she has committed. Julien believed that

he was her first lover.

"But," he said to himself at other moments, "I must admit that there is

no trace of naivety, simplicity, or tenderness in her own demeanour;

I have never seen her more haughty, can she despise me? It would be

worthy of her to reproach herself simply because of my low birth, for

what she has done for me."

While Julien, full of those preconceived ideas which he had found in

books and in his memories of Verrières, was chasing the phantom of a

tender mistress, who from the minute when she has made her lover happy

no longer thinks of her own existence, Mathilde's vanity was infuriated

against him.

As for the last two months she had no longer been bored, she was not

frightened of boredom; consequently, without being able to have the

slightest suspicion of it, Julien had lost his greatest advantage.

"I have given myself a master," said mademoiselle de la Mole to

herself, a prey to the blackest sorrow. "Luckily he is honour itself,

but if I offend his vanity, he will revenge himself by making known

the nature of our relations." Mathilde had never had a lover, and

though passing through a stage of life which affords some tender

illusions even to the coldest souls, she fell a prey to the most bitter

reflections.

"He has an immense dominion over me since his reign is one of terror,

and he is capable, if I provoke him, of punishing me with an awful

penalty." This idea alone was enough to induce mademoiselle de la

Mole to insult him. Courage was the primary quality in her character.

The only thing which could give her any thrill and cure her from a

fundamental and chronically recurring ennui was the idea that she was

staking her entire existence on a single throw.

As mademoiselle de la Mole obstinately refused to look at him, Julien

on the third day in spite of her evident objection, followed her into

the billiard-room after dinner.

"Well, sir, you think you have acquired some very strong rights over

me?" she said to him with scarcely controlled anger, "since you venture

to speak to me, in spite of my very clearly manifested wish? Do you

know that no one in the world has had such effrontery?"

The dialogue of these two lovers was incomparably humourous. Without

suspecting it, they were animated by mutual sentiments of the most

vivid hate. As neither the one nor the other had a meekly patient

character, while they were both disciples of good form, they soon came

to informing each other quite clearly that they would break for ever.

"I swear eternal secrecy to you," said Julien. "I should like to add

that I would never address a single word to you, were it not that a

marked change might perhaps jeopardise your reputation." He saluted

respectfully and left.

He accomplished easily enough what he believed to be a duty; he was

very far from thinking himself much in love with mademoiselle de la

Mole. He had certainly not loved her three days before, when he had

been hidden in the big mahogany cupboard. But the moment that he found

himself estranged from her for ever his mood underwent a complete and

rapid change.

His memory tortured him by going over the least details in that night,

which had as a matter of fact left him so cold. In the very night that

followed this announcement of a final rupture, Julien almost went mad

at being obliged to own to himself that he loved mademoiselle de la

Mole.

This discovery was followed by awful struggles: all his emotions were

overwhelmed.

Two days later, instead of being haughty towards M. de Croisenois, he

could have almost burst out into tears and embraced him.

His habituation to unhappiness gave him a gleam of commonsense, he

decided to leave for Languedoc, packed his trunk and went to the post.

He felt he would faint, when on arriving at the office of the mails, he

was told that by a singular chance there was a place in the Toulouse

mail. He booked it and returned to the Hôtel de la Mole to announce his

departure to the marquis.

M. de la Mole had gone out. More dead than alive Julien went into

the library to wait for him. What was his emotion when he found

mademoiselle de la Mole there.

As she saw him come, she assumed a malicious expression which it was

impossible to mistake.

In his unhappiness and surprise Julien lost his head and was weak

enough to say to her in a tone of the most heartfelt tenderness. "So

you love me no more."

"I am horrified at having given myself to the first man who came

along," said Mathilde crying with rage against herself.

"The first man who came along," cried Julien, and he made for an old

mediæval sword which was kept in the library as a curiosity.

His grief--which he thought was at its maximum at the moment when he

had spoken to mademoiselle de la Mole--had been rendered a hundred

times more intense by the tears of shame which he saw her shedding.

He would have been the happiest of men if he had been able to kill her.

When he was on the point of drawing the sword with some difficulty from

its ancient scabbard, Mathilde, rendered happy by so novel a sensation,

advanced proudly towards him, her tears were dry.

The thought of his benefactor--the marquis de la Mole--presented

itself vividly to Julien. "Shall I kill his daughter?" he said to

himself, "how horrible." He made a movement to throw down the sword.

"She will certainly," he thought, "burst out laughing at the sight of

such a melodramatic pose:" that idea was responsible for his regaining

all his self-possession. He looked curiously at the blade of the old

sword as though he had been looking for some spot of rust, then put it

back in the scabbard and replaced it with the utmost tranquillity on

the gilt bronze nail from which it hung.

The whole manœuvre, which towards the end was very slow, lasted quite

a minute; mademoiselle de la Mole looked at him in astonishment. "So

I have been on the verge of being killed by my lover," she said to

herself.

This idea transported her into the palmiest days of the age of Charles

IX. and of Henri III.

She stood motionless before Julien, who had just replaced the sword;

she looked at him with eyes whose hatred had disappeared. It must be

owned that she was very fascinating at this moment, certainly no woman

looked less like a Parisian doll (this expression symbolised Julien's

great objection to the women of this city).

"I shall relapse into some weakness for him," thought Mathilde; "it

is quite likely that he will think himself my lord and master after a

relapse like that at the very moment that I have been talking to him so

firmly." She ran away.

"By heaven, she is pretty said Julien as he watched her run and that's

the creature who threw herself into my arms with so much passion

scarcely a week ago ... and to think that those moments will never

come back? And that it's my fault, to think of my being lacking

in appreciation at the very moment when I was doing something so

extraordinarily interesting! I must own that I was born with a very

dull and unfortunate character."

The marquis appeared; Julien hastened to announce his departure.

"Where to?" said M. de la Mole.

"For Languedoc."

"No, if you please, you are reserved for higher destinies. If you leave

it will be for the North.... In military phraseology I actually confine

you in the hotel. You will compel me to be never more than two or three

hours away. I may have need of you at any moment."

Julien bowed and retired without a word, leaving the marquis in a state

of great astonishment. He was incapable of speaking. He shut himself

up in his room. He was there free to exaggerate to himself all the

awfulness of his fate.

"So," he thought, "I cannot even get away. God knows how many days

the marquis will keep me in Paris. Great God, what will become of me,

and not a friend whom I can consult? The abbé Pirard will never let

me finish my first sentence, while the comte Altamira will propose

enlisting me in some conspiracy. And yet I am mad; I feel it, I am mad.

Who will be able to guide me, what will become of me?"