Chapter XIX: The Portrait

Emile did not return to Boisguilbault for several days. His sorrow was deep-seated. At first he was annoyed and angry at the marquis's distressing and incomprehensible caprice. But soon, after reflecting upon that strange episode, he conceived an immense pity for that diseased mind, which, amid ideas so lucid and instincts so affectionate, nourished a deplorable sort of mania, paroxysms of hatred or resentment closely akin to mental alienation.

That was the only explanation that the young man could conceive of the violent effect produced on his venerable friend by the adored name of Gilberte. He was so dismayed by the discovery, that he no longer felt the courage to pursue so hopeless an undertaking and determined to inform Mademoiselle frankly of his failure.

He bent his steps toward the ruins one evening, depressed by his discomfiture, and for the first time he was sad on his arrival. But love is a magician who overturns all our anticipations by unexpected favors or cruelties.

Gilberte was alone. To be sure, Janille was not far away; but as she left the house to find one of her goats, and as Gilberte did not know in what direction she had gone, so that they could not go to meet her, they had a plausible excuse for indulging in a tête-à-tête. Gilberte also seemed a little sad. She would have been sorely embarrassed to say why, or how it happened that, after passing five minutes with Emile, she entirely forgot that she had had any gloomy thoughts prior to his arrival.

They had dined at Châteaubrun long before: according to a custom of many years' standing, they ate at the same hours as the peasants, that is to say, in the morning, at noon, and after the day's work--a perfectly logical arrangement for those who do not turn night into day.

The sun was sinking when Emile arrived: it was the hour when all things are lovely--grave and smiling at once. Emile fancied that he had never before appreciated Gilberte's beauty, he was so impressed by it at that moment; as if it were the first time, as if he had not been living for six weeks in an ecstasy of contemplation.

No matter; he persuaded himself that he had hitherto noticed only the half of her hair and only the hundredth part of the charms contained in her smile, of her grace of movement, of the inestimable treasures of her glance.

He had some important things to say to her, he remembered nothing. He could think of nothing but looking at her and listening to her. All that she said was so striking, so novel to him! How redolent she was of the richness of nature, how she made him realize the perfection of its most trivial details! If she showed him a flower, he discovered shades of coloring therein whose delicacy or beauty he had never before appreciated; if she spoke in terms of admiration of the sky, he discovered that he had never seen the sky so lovely. The landscape at which she gazed assumed a magical aspect and he could think of nothing to say, except:

"Oh! yes, how lovely it is! Oh! you are right. Of course, of course, what you see and what you say is so true!"

There is a delicious stupidity in the mind of a lover: everything means _I love you_! and it would be a vain task to seek any other meaning to their monotonous agreement on all subjects. Still, although she was even less experienced than Emile, Gilberte, being a woman, understood a little more clearly what she herself felt, whereas Emile loved, as we breathe, without reflecting that a problem or a prodigy is connected with every minute of our lives.

Gilberte questioned herself more and was more overcome with astonishment. She speedily made an effort to change the form of their conversation, in which, by dint of saying nothing at all, they said far too much.

She mentioned Monsieur de Boisguilbault, and Emile was compelled to say that he had no hope. All his disappointment reawoke at that admission and he bitterly lamented the destiny that deprived him of his sole opportunity to make himself useful to Monsieur de Châteaubrun and to gratify Gilberte.

"Oh! have no fear on that score," said the girl innocently, "I shall be none the less under obligation to you; for thanks to your zeal and courage my mind is at rest on the main point. Let me tell you what worried me most. In view of the marquis's haughty obstinacy and my father's generous humility, an intolerable suspicion had found its way into my mind. I fancied that my dear father might have inflicted some grave injury upon him--unintentionally, I am sure,--and I was anxious to discover the secret so that I could take upon myself to repair it. Oh! I would have done it at the cost of my life! But now----"

"But now! well, now," said Monsieur Antoine, suddenly appearing around a clump of wild shrubs, and smiling with his usual expression of frank trustfulness, "what the deuce are you telling in such a serious tone, and what is it that you would repair at the cost of your life, my dear love? I see, Emile, that she has taken you for her confessor, and that she is accusing herself of killing a fly with too much temper. What is it? Come, speak out; for your embarrassed air makes me long to laugh. Can it be by any chance that you have secrets from your old father?"

"Oh! no, father! I never will have a secret from you!" cried Gilberte, throwing an arm around Antoine's neck and laying her pink cheek against his copper-colored one. "And then you listen at keyholes in the open air, so you are going to be compelled to hear what is under consideration. If you find any reason to blame us, remember that you have forfeited the right to do it by taking me by surprise and criticising my words. Listen, Monsieur Emile, I am going to tell him everything, for it is much better that he should know it. My dear father, you are unhappy over Monsieur de Boisguilbault's unjust resentment against you on account of a mere trifle."

"Ah! _diantre_! do you propose to talk about that? What's the use? You know well that it's a painful subject to me!" said Monsieur Antoine, his good-humored face suddenly becoming clouded.

"You must talk about it, as it is for the last time," said Gilberte. "What I am going to say will pain you, and yet I am sure that it will take a great weight off your heart. Come, come, dear father, don't turn your head away, and don't put on that careworn expression that makes your Gilberte feel so pained. I know very well that you don't want me to mention the marquis's name before you; you say that it's none of my affair and that I can do nothing to bring you together. But it is too bad to treat me as a little girl, and I am quite old enough to know a little something of your sorrows so that I can help you to find consolation for them. Very good; I was making inquiries of Monsieur Cardonnet,--who sees Monsieur de Boisguilbault frequently, and to whom he has given his confidence on many important matters,--as to that gentleman's frame of mind toward us. I was saying to him that to relieve you from the regret which you still feel for having unintentionally wounded him, I would give my life--wasn't that what I was saying?"

"And then?" queried Monsieur de Châteaubrun, putting his daughter's pretty hand to his lips with a preoccupied air.

"And then," she continued, "Monsieur Emile had already told me what I wanted to know, namely, that Monsieur de Boisguilbault still nourishes an intense resentment, but that we need think no more about it, because it is founded upon nothing at all, and you have, thank God! nothing with which to reproach yourself! Indeed, I was sure of it, dearest father; I simply dreaded one of your fits of absent-mindedness. But now you can set your mind at rest, although you will be distressed, I am sure, at your old friend's deplorable condition. Monsieur de Boisguilbault really is what he is said to be, and you must recognize it as everybody else does--the poor man is mad."

"Mad!" cried Monsieur Antoine, terror-stricken and grief-stricken at once, "really mad? Have you heard him talk wildly, Emile? Does he suffer much? does he complain? has he been pronounced mad by the doctors? Oh! that is horrible news to me!"

And honest Antoine, sinking upon a bench, tried in vain to repress his sobs. His robust breast swelled as if it would burst.

"_O mon Dieu_! see how he loves him still!" cried Gilberte, throwing herself on her knees at her father's feet and covering him with kisses. "Oh! forgive me, forgive me, father dear! I spoke too hastily! I have pained you! Come and help me to console him, Emile."

Emile started when Gilberte, in her excitement, forgot for the first time to call him _monsieur_. It seemed that she looked upon him as a brother, and, in an outburst of emotion, he too knelt beside poor Antoine, who seemed to be threatened with an apoplectic stroke, he was so red and so oppressed.

"Never fear," said Emile, "matters have not reached that point and never will, I trust. Monsieur de Boisguilbault is not ill; he has the full enjoyment of all his faculties. His monomania, if we may so describe his professed repulsion for your family, is not a new disease; only, finding that strange freak in a man so tranquil and tolerant in all other respects, I believed for a long while that there must be some serious reasons for it, and I am forced to admit now that there are none; that it is a streak of temporary madness, which he will forget if it is not stirred up again, and that you are not the sole object of it, since other persons, of whom he has never had any reason to complain, and whom he does not know at all, inspire the same unhealthy feeling of horror and repulsion."

"Explain yourself," said Monsieur Antoine, beginning to breathe once more; "who are these other persons?"

"Why, Jean, for one," replied Emile. "You know very well that he has no reason to dread his presence as he does, and that excellent man is entirely at sea as to any possible cause of ill-will the marquis can have toward him."

"He has no reason to reproach him, nor anyone else; but I know very well what he imagines. Go on! if Jean is the only other one, the marquis is not mad in the least degree, he is simply unjust or mistaken as to our friend the carpenter. But it is as impossible to convince him of his mistake as to close the wound that is bleeding in his heart. Poor Boisguilbault! Ah! Gilberte, I would gladly sacrifice my life to enable him to forget the past. Let us say no more about it."

"One word more," said Gilberte, "for that word will enlighten you, father. Jean Jappeloup is not the only one whom the marquis detests so bitterly; he has the same feeling against me, whom he has hardly seen, who have never spoken to him, and of whom he most assuredly can have no reason to complain. Upon mentioning my name, with the purpose of calming him, Monsieur Cardonnet, who will tell you so himself, found that his anger sprang up afresh, and he slammed the door, shouting, as if he had heard the name of a mortal enemy:

"'Woe to you if you ever mention that _demoiselle_ to me!'"

Monsieur de Châteaubrun hung his head and sat for some moments without speaking. Several times he wiped the perspiration from his broad brow with his coarse blue and white handkerchief. Then he took Gilberte's hand and Emile's in his, unconsciously placing them so that they touched, so engrossed was he by every other subject except the possibility of their love.

"My children," he said, "you thought that you were doing me good, and you have added to my grief. I thank you none the less for your kind intentions, but I wish you both to give me your word not to refer to this subject again with me, nor with each other, nor in Janille's presence or Jean's, nor you, Emile, with Monsieur de Boisguilbault. Never, never--do you understand?" he added, in the most solemn and impressive tone of which he was capable. Then, addressing Emile more particularly, and pressing his hand against Gilberte's with less consciousness than before of his acts:

"My dear Monsieur Emile," he said, with emotion, "you have been led by your friendship for me to do a very imprudent thing. Remember that the first time you went to Boisguilbault I said to you: 'Do not mention my name in that house, if you do not wish to injure my friend Jean!' And now you have injured me myself by forgetting my injunction. All that I can tell you is that Monsieur de Boisguilbault is no more insane than any of us three, and that, if he is unjust to Jean or my daughter, who are both innocent of my wrong-doing, it is because one naturally includes an enemy's friends and kindred in the hatred which he inspires. Monsieur de Boisguilbault would be very cruel not to forgive me if he could read my heart; but his suffering is too great to allow him to do it. Respect his grief, therefore, Emile, and do not call a man insane whose misfortunes deserve the consolation of your friendship and all the consideration of which you are capable. Come! promise me that you will not conspire together for my repose any more, for whatever you do will really be conspiring against it."

Emile and Gilberte promised, trembling with excitement; whereupon Antoine said to them: "That is well, my children; there are incurable diseases and griefs that one must learn to submit to in silence. Now let us go to see if Janille has found her goat. I have in my basket some apricots I have been picking for you two; for I saw Emile coming up the path, and I was determined to regale him with the first ripe fruit from my old trees."

After divers efforts, Antoine recovered his cheerful humor--with greater ease than Gilberte and Emile. The latter dared make no further comments or investigations; for whatever concerned Gilberte was sacred to him, and Antoine's earnest injunction to give no more thought to the matter was sufficient inducement for him to try and put it out of his mind. But there were many other subjects of anxiety in his heart, and love had taken such deep root there that he fell into fits of abstraction more complete than Monsieur Antoine's.

When he found himself on the road to Gargilesse, at the point where the road to Boisguilbault branches off, his horse, which was equally attached to both places, turned toward Boisguilbault. Emile did not notice it at first, and, when he did notice it, he said to himself that Providence willed it so; that he had left the melancholy old man, whom he had promised to love as his father, all alone for three days; and that, at the risk of being coldly received, he must go at once and obtain his pardon.

The gates of the park were not closed for the night when he arrived at the foot of the hill. He entered and rode in the direction of the chalet, expecting that, even if he did not find the marquis there, he would surely arrive as soon as it was dark.

Having hitched _Corbeau_ to the balcony rail of the ground floor, he knocked softly at the door of the Swiss chalet, and, as a little breeze had sprung up with the sunset, it seemed to him that he could hear sounds inside and the marquis's feeble voice bidding him come in. But it was a pure illusion, for when he had opened the door he noticed that the interior was empty.

However, Monsieur de Boisguilbault might be in the invisible room to which he was accustomed to retire at night. Emile coughed and stamped on the floor to give notice of his presence, determined to go away without seeing him, rather than pass through the door that was closed to everybody without exception.

As no sound replied to the noise he made, he concluded that the marquis was still at the château, and he was about to walk in that direction when a gust of wind blew a window violently open, also a door at the end of the room. He turned toward the door, expecting to see Monsieur de Boisguilbault, but no one appeared, and Emile found himself looking into a small study, the disorderly arrangement of which was as noticeable as the scrupulous neatness of the apartments at the château.

He would have considered it an impertinence on his part to enter the room or even to scrutinize from a distance the cheap, common furniture and the mass of old books and papers which he saw confusedly at the first glance. But there was one thing that arrested his attention in spite of himself--a life-size portrait of a woman, hung at the farther end of that den, directly opposite him, so that it was impossible for him not to see it, to say nothing of the fact that it would have been difficult not to gaze at so fine a painting and so charming a face.

_Nothing could be more refined and charming than that youthful face; doubtless it was Madame de Boisguilbault, and our hero forgot himself altogether as he gazed with deep interest at the features of that woman, whose life and death must have had so vast an influence on the destiny of the recluse._]

The lady was dressed in the style of the Empire; but a sky-blue shawl richly embroidered and draped over her shoulders, concealed the apparent deformity produced by the fashionable short waist of that period. The arrangement of her hair, in so-called natural curls, was most becoming, and the hair itself was of a magnificent golden hue.

Nothing could be more refined and charming than that youthful face; doubtless it was Madame de Boisguilbault, and our hero forgot himself altogether as he gazed with deep interest at the features of that woman, whose life and death must have had so vast an influence on the destiny of the recluse.

But it rarely happens that a portrait gives us a just idea of the original; indeed, in the majority of cases one may say that nothing resembles the person so little as his image.

Emile had thought of the marchioness as a pale, melancholy creature; he saw a fashionable beauty, with a proud, sweet smile, with a noble and triumphant bearing. Was she like that before or after her marriage? Or was hers a nature entirely different from what he had supposed?

One thing of which he was certain was that he had before him a most fascinating face, and, as it was impossible for him to look upon the image of youth and beauty without thinking instantly of Gilberte, he began to compare the two types, in which it seemed to him that he discovered points of resemblance. The light was rapidly failing, and, as Emile dared not take a step toward the mysterious study, the outlines of the portrait soon became very indistinct. The white flesh and golden hair, standing forth from the shadow, produced so powerful an illusion upon him, that he thought that he had a portrait of Gilberte before him, and when he could no longer see aught but a sort of mist filled with dancing sparks, he had to make a strong effort of his will to remember that in his first impression, the only reliable one under such circumstances, there had been no thought of a resemblance between Madame de Boisguilbault's face and Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun's.

He left the chalet, and, meeting no one in the park, went on to the château.

The same silence and solitude reigned in the courtyard. He mounted the stairs in the turret, but did not as usual meet Martin coming to announce him in that ceremonious tone from which he never departed, even with the only habitué of the house.

At last he reached the salon, which was always very dark, the blinds being closed night and day; and, seized with a vague alarm, as if death had entered that house in which there was so little life at the best, he ran through the other rooms and at last found Monsieur de Boisguilbault lying on a bed. He was as pale and motionless as a corpse. The last rays of daylight cast a vague and melancholy reflection into the room, and old Martin, whose deafness prevented him from hearing Emile's approach, had every appearance of a statue as he sat at his master's pillow.

Emile darted to the bed and seized the marquis's hand. It was burning; and as the two old men awoke, one from the troubled sleep of fever, the other from the drowsiness of fatigue or inaction, the young man soon satisfied himself that the marquis's indisposition was in itself of little consequence. However, the ravages which two days of illness had wrought in that feeble, worn out frame were most disquieting for the future.

"Ah! you have done well to come!" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, pressing Emile's hand feebly; "ennui would soon have consumed me if you had abandoned me!"

And Martin, who had not heard his master's words, but seemed to receive his thoughts on the rebound, repeated in a louder voice than he supposed:

"Ah! Monsieur Emile, you did well to come! Monsieur le marquis was suffering terribly from ennui because you didn't come."

Thereupon he told him that monsieur le marquis had been taken with the fever as he was about to go to the park two nights before, and had tranquilly made up his mind that he was going to die. He had insisted on going to bed in that very room, although he was not accustomed to sleep there, and he had given him instructions as if he never expected to get up again. He had a very restless night and the next morning he said to him:

"I feel much better; this will not amount to anything; but I feel as tired as if I had made a long journey and I need to rest a little. Perfect silence, Martin; little light, little nursing and no doctor; those are my orders. Don't be alarmed about me."

"And as I couldn't help being frightened," continued the old retainer, "monsieur le marquis said to me:

"'Never fear, my dear fellow, my time hasn't come yet.'"

"Is monsieur le marquis subject to such attacks?" Emile inquired; "are they serious? do they last long?"

But he had forgotten that Martin could hear nobody but his master, and, at a signal from the latter, he had already left the room.

"I allowed the poor old deaf fellow to have his say," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, "for it would have been of no use to try to interrupt him. But don't take me for a coward from his story. I am not afraid of death, Emile; I used to long for it; now I await it calmly. I have been conscious of its approach for a long time; but it comes slowly, and I shall die as I have lived, without haste. I am subject to intermittent fevers which take away my appetite and my sleep, but which no one ever discovers because they leave me enough strength for the little I have to do. I do not believe in medicine; thus far it has found no means of curing disease without attacking the vital principle. In whatever form it assumes, it is empiricism, and I prefer bending under God's hand to leaping and capering under the hand of a man. This time I was harder hit than usual; I felt weaker mentally, and I will confess without shame, Emile, that I realized that I could no longer live alone. Old men are like children for falling in love with a new pleasure; but when it comes to losing it, they are not easily consoled like children. They become old men again and die. Don't be embarrassed by what I say: it is the fever that makes me so talkative. When I am cured, I shall not say it, I shall not even think it; but I shall always feel it as an instinct beneath my apathy. Do not feel that you are chained henceforth to my sad old age. It is of little importance whether I live a year more or less, or whether a friendly hand closes the eyes of him who has lived alone. But I thank you for coming again. Let us talk no more of me, but of you. What have you been doing during these sad days?"

"I have been sad myself because I have passed them away from you," Emile replied.

"Is it possible! Such is life, such is man. To make oneself suffer by making others suffer! That is a convincing proof of the brotherhood of souls."

Emile passed two hours with the marquis, and found him more confidential and more affectionate than he had ever been. He felt that his attachment to him became stronger, and he determined that he would cause him no more suffering. And when, upon taking his leave, he expressed some anxiety because he had allowed him to talk so earnestly, the marquis replied:

"Never fear. Come again to-morrow and you will find me on my feet. That is not the kind of thing that tires one; it is the absence of opportunities for pouring out one's heart that dries up and kills."