A FIRST MEETING
What young man full of abounding but restrained life and emotion would
not have had the glorious idea of going to Croisic to see Madame de
Rochefide land, and examine her incognito? Calyste greatly surprised
his father and mother by going off in the morning without waiting for
the mid-day breakfast. Heaven knows with what agility the young
Breton's feet sped along. Some unknown vigor seemed lent to him; he
walked on air, gliding along by the walls of Les Touches that he might
not be seen from the house. The adorable boy was ashamed of his ardor,
and afraid of being laughed at; Felicite and Vignon were so
perspicacious! besides, in such cases young fellows fancy that their
foreheads are transparent.
He reached the shore, strengthened by a stone embankment, at the foot
of which is a house where travellers can take shelter in storms of
wind or rain. It is not always possible to cross the little arm of the
sea which separates the landing-place of Guerande from Croisic; the
weather may be bad, or the boats not ready; and during this time of
waiting, it is necessary to put not only the passengers but their
horses, donkeys, baggages, and merchandise under cover.
Calyste presently saw two boats coming over from Croisic, laden with
baggage,--trunks, packages, bags, and chests,--the shape and
appearance of which proved to a native of these parts that such
extraordinary articles must belong to travellers of distinction. In
one of the boats was a young woman in a straw bonnet with a green
veil, accompanied by a man. This boat was the first to arrive. Calyste
trembled until on closer view he saw they were a maid and a
man-servant.
"Are you going over to Croisic, Monsieur Calyste?" said one of the
boatmen; to whom he replied with a shake of the head, annoyed at being
called by his name.
He was captivated by the sight of a chest covered with tarred cloth on
which were painted the words, MME. LA MARQUISE DE ROCHEFIDE. The name
shone before him like a talisman; he fancied there was something
fateful in it. He knew in some mysterious way, which he could not
doubt, that he should love that woman. Why? In the burning desert of
his new and infinite desires, still vague and without an object, his
fancy fastened with all its strength on the first woman that presented
herself. Beatrix necessarily inherited the love which Camille had
rejected.
Calyste watched the landing of the luggage, casting from time to time
a glance at Croisic, from which he hoped to see another boat put out
to cross to the little promontory, and show him Beatrix, already to
his eyes what Beatrice was to Dante, a marble statue on which to hang
his garlands and his flowers. He stood with arms folded, lost in
meditation. Here is a fact worthy of remark, which, nevertheless, has
never been remarked: we often subject ourselves to sentiments by our
own volition,--deliberately bind ourselves, and create our own fate;
chance has not as much to do with it as we believe.
"I don't see any horses," said the maid, sitting on a trunk.
"And I don't see any road," said the footman.
"Horses have been here, though," replied the woman, pointing to the
proofs of their presence. "Monsieur," she said, addressing Calyste,
"is this really the way to Guerande?"
"Yes," he replied, "are you expecting some one to meet you?"
"We were told that they would fetch us from Les Touches. If they don't
come," she added to the footman, "I don't know how Madame la marquise
will manage to dress for dinner. You had better go and find
Mademoiselle des Touches. Oh! what a land of savages!"
Calyste had a vague idea of having blundered.
"Is your mistress going to Les Touches?" he inquired.
"She is there; Mademoiselle came for her this morning at seven
o'clock. Ah! here come the horses."
Calyste started toward Guerande with the lightness and agility of a
chamois, doubling like a hare that he might not return upon his tracks
or meet any of the servants of Les Touches. He did, however, meet two
of them on the narrow causeway of the marsh along which he went.
"Shall I go in, or shall I not?" he thought when the pines of Les
Touches came in sight. He was afraid; and continued his way rather
sulkily to Guerande, where he finished his excursion on the mall and
continued his reflections.
"She has no idea of my agitation," he said to himself.
His capricious thoughts were so many grapnels which fastened his heart
to the marquise. He had known none of these mysterious terrors and
joys in his intercourse with Camille. Such vague emotions rise like
poems in the untutored soul. Warmed by the first fires of imagination,
souls like his have been known to pass through all phases of
preparation and to reach in silence and solitude the very heights of
love, without having met the object of so many efforts.
Presently Calyste saw, coming toward him, the Chevalier du Halga and
Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoel, who were walking together on the mall. He
heard them say his name, and he slipped aside out of sight, but not
out of hearing. The chevalier and the old maid, believing themselves
alone, were talking aloud.
"If Charlotte de Kergarouet comes," said the chevalier, "keep her four
or five months. How can you expect her to coquette with Calyste? She
is never here long enough to undertake it. Whereas, if they see each
other every day, those two children will fall in love, and you can
marry them next winter. If you say two words about it to Charlotte
she'll say four to Calyste, and a girl of sixteen can certainly carry
off the prize from a woman of forty."
Here the old people turned to retrace their steps and Calyste heard no
more. But remembering what his mother had told him, he saw
Mademoiselle de Pen-Hoel's intention, and, in the mood in which he
then was, nothing could have been more fatal. The mere idea of a girl
thus imposed upon him sent him with greater ardor into his imaginary
love. He had never had a fancy for Charlotte de Kergarouet, and he now
felt repugnance at the very thought of her. Calyste was quite
unaffected by questions of fortune; from infancy he had accustomed his
life to the poverty and the restricted means of his father's house. A
young man brought up as he had been, and now partially emancipated,
was likely to consider sentiments only, and all his sentiments, all
his thought now belonged to the marquise. In presence of the portrait
which Camille had drawn for him of her friend, what was that little
Charlotte? the companion of his childhood, whom he thought of as a
sister.
He did not go home till five in the afternoon. As he entered the hall
his mother gave him, with a rather sad smile, the following letter
from Mademoiselle des Touches:--
My dear Calyste,--The beautiful marquise has come; we count on you
to help us celebrate her arrival. Claude, always sarcastic,
declares that you will play Bice and that she will be Dante. It is
for our honor as Bretons, and yours as a du Guenic to welcome a
Casteran. Come soon.
Your friend, Camille Maupin.
Come as you are, without ceremony; otherwise you will put us to
the blush.
Calyste gave the letter to his mother and departed.
"Who are the Casterans?" said Fanny to the baron.
"An old Norman family, allied to William the Conqueror," he replied.
"They bear on a shield tierce fessed azure, gules and sable, a horse
rearing argent, shod with gold. That beautiful creature for whom the
Gars was killed at Fougeres in 1800 was the daughter of a Casteran who
made herself a nun, and became an abbess after the Duc de Verneuil
deserted her."
"And the Rochefides?"
"I don't know that name. I should have to see the blazon," he replied.
The baroness was somewhat reassured on hearing that the Marquise de
Rochefide was born of a noble family, but she felt that her son was
now exposed to new seductions.
Calyste as he walked along felt all sorts of violent and yet soft
inward movements; his throat was tight, his heart swelled, his brain
was full, a fever possessed him. He tried to walk slowly, but some
superior power hurried him. This impetuosity of the several senses
excited by vague expectation is known to all young men. A subtle fire
flames within their breasts and darts outwardly about them, like the
rays of a nimbus around the heads of divine personages in works of
religious art; through it they see all Nature glorious, and woman
radiant. Are they not then like those haloed saints, full of faith,
hope, ardor, purity?
The young Breton found the company assembled in the little salon of
Camille's suite of rooms. It was then about six o'clock; the sun, in
setting, cast through the windows its ruddy light chequered by the
trees; the air was still; twilight, beloved of women, was spreading
through the room.
"Here comes the future deputy of Brittany," said Camille Maupin,
smiling, as Calyste raised the tapestry portiere,--"punctual as a
king."
"You recognized his step just now," said Claude to Felicite in a low
voice.
Calyste bowed low to the marquise, who returned the salutation with an
inclination of her head; he did not look at her; but he took the hand
Claude Vignon held out to him and pressed it.
"This is the celebrated man of whom we have talked so much, Gennaro
Conti," said Camille, not replying to Claude Vignon's remark.
She presented to Calyste a man of medium height, thin and slender,
with chestnut hair, eyes that were almost red, and a white skin,
freckled here and there, whose head was so precisely the well-known
head of Lord Byron (though rather better carried on his shoulders)
that description is superfluous. Conti was rather proud of this
resemblance.
"I am fortunate," he said, "to meet Monsieur du Guenic during the one
day that I spend at Les Touches."
"It was for me to say that to you," replied Calyste, with a certain
ease.
"He is handsome as an angel," said the marquise in an under tone to
Felicite.
Standing between the sofa and the two ladies, Calyste heard the words
confusedly. He seated himself in an arm-chair and looked furtively
toward the marquise. In the soft half-light he saw, reclining on a
divan, as if a sculptor had placed it there, a white and serpentine
shape which thrilled him. Without being aware of it, Felicite had done
her friend a service; the marquise was much superior to the
unflattered portrait Camille had drawn of her the night before. Was it
to do honor to the guest that Beatrix had wound into her hair those
tufts of blue-bells that gave value to the pale tints of her creped
curls, so arranged as to fall around her face and play upon the
cheeks? The circle of her eyes, which showed fatigue, was of the
purest mother-of-pearl, her skin was as dazzling as the eyes, and
beneath its whiteness, delicate as the satiny lining of an egg, life
abounded in the beautiful blue veins. The delicacy of the features was
extreme; the forehead seemed diaphanous. The head, so sweet and
fragrant, admirably joined to a long neck of exquisite moulding, lent
itself to many and most diverse expressions. The waist, which could be
spanned by the hands, had a charming willowy ease; the bare shoulders
sparkled in the twilight like a white camellia. The throat, visible to
the eye though covered with a transparent fichu, allowed the graceful
outlines of the bosom to be seen with charming roguishness. A gown of
white muslin, strewn with blue flowers, made with very large sleeves,
a pointed body and no belt, shoes with strings crossed on the instep
over Scotch thread stockings, showed a charming knowledge of the art
of dress. Ear-rings of silver filagree, miracles of Genoese jewelry,
destined no doubt to become the fashion, were in perfect harmony with
the delightful flow of the soft curls starred with blue-bells.
Calyste's eager eye took in these beauties at a glance, and carved
them on his soul. The fair Beatrix and the dark Felicite might have
sat for those contrasting portraits in "keepsakes" which English
designers and engravers seek so persistently. Here were the force and
the feebleness of womanhood in full development, a perfect antithesis.
These two women could never be rivals; each had her own empire. Here
was the delicate campanula, or the lily, beside the scarlet poppy; a
turquoise near a ruby. In a moment, as it were,--at first sight, as
the saying is,--Calyste was seized with a love which crowned the
secret work of his hopes, his fears, his uncertainties. Mademoiselle
des Touches had awakened his nature; Beatrix inflamed both his heart
and thoughts. The young Breton suddenly felt within him a power to
conquer all things, and yield to nothing that stood in his way. He
looked at Conti with an envious, gloomy, savage rivalry he had never
felt for Claude Vignon. He employed all his strength to control
himself; but the inward tempest went down as soon as the eyes of
Beatrix turned to him, and her soft voice sounded in his ear. Dinner
was announced.
"Calyste, give your arm to the marquise," said Mademoiselle des
Touches, taking Conti with her right hand, and Claude Vignon with her
left, and drawing back to let the marquise pass.
The descent of that ancient staircase was to Calyste like the moment
of going into battle for the first time. His heart failed him, he had
nothing to say; a slight sweat pearled upon his forehead and wet his
back; his arm trembled so much that as they reached the lowest step
the marquise said to him: "Is anything the matter?"
"Oh!" he replied, in a muffled tone, "I have never seen any woman so
beautiful as you, except my mother, and I am not master of my
emotions."
"But you have Camille Maupin before your eyes."
"Ah! what a difference!" said Calyste, ingenuously.
"Calyste," whispered Felicite, who was just behind him, "did I not
tell you that you would forget me as if I had never existed? Sit
there," she said aloud, "beside the marquise, on her right, and you,
Claude, on her left. As for you, Gennaro, I retain you by me; we will
keep a mutual eye on their coquetries."
The peculiar accept which Camille gave to the last word struck Claude
Vignon's ear, and he cast that sly but half-abstracted look upon
Camille which always denoted in him the closest observation. He never
ceased to examine Mademoiselle des Touches throughout the dinner.
"Coquetries!" replied the marquis, taking off her gloves, and showing
her beautiful hands; "the opportunity is good, with a poet," and she
motioned to Claude, "on one side, and poesy the other."
At these words Conti turned and gave Calyste a look that was full of
flattery.
By artificial light, Beatrix seemed more beautiful than before. The
white gleam of the candles laid a satiny lustre on her forehead,
lighted the spangles of her eyes, and ran through her swaying curls,
touching them here and there into gold. She threw back the thin gauze
scarf she was wearing and disclosed her neck. Calyste then saw its
beautiful nape, white as milk, and hollowed near the head, until its
lines were lost toward the shoulders with soft and flowing symmetry.
This neck, so dissimilar to that of Camille, was the sign of a totally
different character in Beatrix.
Calyste found much trouble in pretending to eat; nervous motions
within him deprived him of appetite. Like other young men, his nature
was in the throes and convulsions which precede love, and carve it
indelibly on the soul. At his age, the ardor of the heart, restrained
by moral ardor, leads to an inward conflict, which explains the long
and respectful hesitations, the tender debatings, the absence of all
calculation, characteristic of young men whose hearts and lives are
pure. Studying, though furtively, so as not to attract the notice of
Conti, the various details which made the marquise so purely
beautiful, Calyste became, before long, oppressed by a sense of her
majesty; he felt himself dwarfed by the hauteur of certain of her
glances, by the imposing expression of a face that was wholly
aristocratic, by a sort of pride which women know how to express in
slight motions, turns of the head, and slow gestures, effects less
plastic and less studied than we think. The false situation in which
Beatrix had placed herself compelled her to watch her own behavior,
and to keep herself imposing without being ridiculously so. Women of
the great world know how to succeed in this, which proves a fatal reef
to vulgar women.
The expression of Felicite's eyes made Beatrix aware of the inward
adoration she inspired in the youth beside her, and also that it would
be most unworthy on her part to encourage it. She therefore took
occasion now and then to give him a few repressive glances, which fell
upon his heart like an avalanche of snow. The unfortunate young fellow
turned on Felicite a look in which she could read the tears he was
suppressing by superhuman efforts. She asked him in a friendly tone
why he was eating nothing. The question piqued him, and he began to
force himself to eat and to take part in the conversation.
But whatever he did, Madame de Rochefide paid little attention to him.
Mademoiselle des Touches having started the topic of her journey to
Italy she related, very wittily, many of its incidents, which made
Claude Vignon, Conti, and Felicite laugh.
"Ah!" thought Calyste, "how far such a woman is from me! Will she ever
deign to notice me?"
Mademoiselle des Touches was struck with the expression she now saw on
Calyste's face, and tried to console him with a look of sympathy.
Claude Vignon intercepted that look. From that moment the great critic
expanded into gaiety that overflowed in sarcasm. He maintained to
Beatrix that love existed only by desire; that most women deceived
themselves in loving; that they loved for reasons unknown to men and
to themselves; that they wanted to deceive themselves, and that the
best among them were artful.
"Keep to books, and don't criticise our lives," said Camille, glancing
at him imperiously.
The dinner ceased to be gay. Claude Vignon's sarcasm had made the two
women pensive. Calyste was conscious of pain in the midst of the
happiness he found in looking at Beatrix. Conti looked into the eyes
of the marquise to guess her thoughts. When dinner was over
Mademoiselle des Touches took Calyste's arm, gave the other two men to
the marquise, and let them pass before her, that she might be alone
with the young Breton for a moment.
"My dear Calyste," she said, "you are acting in a manner that
embarrasses the marquise; she may be delighted with your admiration,
but she cannot accept it. Pray control yourself."
"She was hard to me, she will never care for me," said Calyste, "and
if she does not I shall die."
"Die! you! My dear Calyste, you are a child. Would you have died for
me?"
"You have made yourself my friend," he answered.
After the talk that follows coffee, Vignon asked Conti to sing
something. Mademoiselle des Touches sat down to the piano. Together
she and Gennaro sang the /Dunque il mio bene tu mia sarai/, the last
duet of Zingarelli's "Romeo e Giulietta," one of the most pathetic
pages of modern music. The passage /Di tanti palpiti/ expresses love
in all its grandeur. Calyste, sitting in the same arm-chair in which
Felicite had told him the history of the marquise, listened in rapt
devotion. Beatrix and Vignon were on either side of the piano. Conti's
sublime voice knew well how to blend with that of Felicite. Both had
often sung this piece; they knew its resources, and they put their
whole marvellous gift into bringing them out. The music was at this
moment what its creator intended, a poem of divine melancholy, the
farewell of two swans to life. When it was over, all present were
under the influence of feelings such as cannot express themselves by
vulgar applause.
"Ah! music is the first of arts!" exclaimed the marquise.
"Camille thinks youth and beauty the first of poesies," said Claude
Vignon.
Mademoiselle des Touches looked at Claude with vague uneasiness.
Beatrix, not seeing Calyste, turned her head as if to know what effect
the music had produced upon him, less by way of interest in him than
for the gratification of Conti; she saw a white face bathed in tears.
At the sight, and as if some sudden pain had seized her, she turned
back quickly and looked at Gennaro. Not only had Music arisen before
the eyes of Calyste, touching him with her divine wand until he stood
in presence of Creation from which she rent the veil, but he was
dumfounded by Conti's genius. In spite of what Camille had told him of
the musician's character, he now believed in the beauty of the soul,
in the heart that expressed such love. How could he, Calyste, rival
such as an artist? What woman could ever cease to adore such genius?
That voice entered the soul like another soul. The poor lad was
overwhelmed by poesy, and his own despair. He felt himself of no
account. This ingenuous admission of his nothingness could be read
upon his face mingled with his admiration. He did not observe the
gesture with which Beatrix, attracted to Calyste by the contagion of a
true feeling, called Felicite's attention to him.
"Oh! the adorable heart!" cried Camille. "Conti, you will never obtain
applause of one-half the value of that child's homage. Let us sing this
trio. Beatrix, my dear, come."
When the marquise, Camille, and Conti had arranged themselves at the
piano, Calyste rose softly, without attracting their attention, and
flung himself on one of the sofas in the bedroom, the door of which
stood open, where he sat with his head in his hands, plunged in
meditation.