CHAPTER XXIV.
M. DE BASSOMPIERRE.
Those who live in retirement, whose lives have fallen amid theseclusion of schools or of other walled-in and guarded dwellings, areliable to be suddenly and for a long while dropped out of the memory oftheir friends, the denizens of a freer world. Unaccountably, perhaps,and close upon some space of unusually frequent intercourse--somecongeries of rather exciting little circumstances, whose natural sequelwould rather seem to be the quickening than the suspension ofcommunication--there falls a stilly pause, a wordless silence, a longblank of oblivion. Unbroken always is this blank; alike entire andunexplained. The letter, the message once frequent, are cut off; thevisit, formerly periodical, ceases to occur; the book, paper, or othertoken that indicated remembrance, comes no more.
Always there are excellent reasons for these lapses, if the hermit butknew them. Though he is stagnant in his cell, his connections withoutare whirling in the very vortex of life. That void interval whichpasses for him so slowly that the very clocks seem at a stand, and thewingless hours plod by in the likeness of tired tramps prone to rest atmilestones--that same interval, perhaps, teems with events, and pantswith hurry for his friends.
The hermit--if he be a sensible hermit--will swallow his own thoughts,and lock up his own emotions during these weeks of inward winter. Hewill know that Destiny designed him to imitate, on occasion, thedormouse, and he will be conformable: make a tidy ball of himself,creep into a hole of life's wall, and submit decently to the driftwhich blows in and soon blocks him up, preserving him in ice for theseason.
Let him say, ”It is quite right: it ought to be so, since so it is.”And, perhaps, one day his snow-sepulchre will open, spring's softnesswill return, the sun and south-wind will reach him; the budding ofhedges, and carolling of birds, and singing of liberated streams, willcall him to kindly resurrection. _Perhaps_ this may be the case,perhaps not: the frost may get into his heart and never thaw more; whenspring comes, a crow or a pie may pick out of the wall only hisdormouse-bones. Well, even in that case, all will be right: it is to besupposed he knew from the first he was mortal, and must one day go theway of all flesh, ”As well soon as syne.”
Following that eventful evening at the theatre, came for me seven weeksas bare as seven sheets of blank paper: no word was written on one ofthem; not a visit, not a token.
About the middle of that time I entertained fancies that something hadhappened to my friends at La Terrasse. The mid-blank is always abeclouded point for the solitary: his nerves ache with the strain oflong expectancy; the doubts hitherto repelled gather now to a massand--strong in accumulation--roll back upon him with a force whichsavours of vindictiveness. Night, too, becomes an unkindly time, andsleep and his nature cannot agree: strange starts and struggles harasshis couch: the sinister band of bad dreams, with horror of calamity,and sick dread of entire desertion at their head, join the leagueagainst him. Poor wretch! He does his best to bear up, but he is apoor, pallid, wasting wretch, despite that best.
Towards the last of these long seven weeks I admitted, what through theother six I had jealously excluded--the conviction that these blankswere inevitable: the result of circumstances, the fiat of fate, a partof my life's lot and--above all--a matter about whose origin noquestion must ever be asked, for whose painful sequence no murmur everuttered. Of course I did not blame myself for suffering: I thank God Ihad a truer sense of justice than to fall into any imbecileextravagance of self-accusation; and as to blaming others for silence,in my reason I well knew them blameless, and in my heart acknowledgedthem so: but it was a rough and heavy road to travel, and I longed forbetter days.
I tried different expedients to sustain and fill existence: I commencedan elaborate piece of lace-work, I studied German pretty hard, Iundertook a course of regular reading of the driest and thickest booksin the library; in all my efforts I was as orthodox as I knew how tobe. Was there error somewhere? Very likely. I only know the result wasas if I had gnawed a file to satisfy hunger, or drank brine to quenchthirst.
My hour of torment was the post-hour. Unfortunately, I knew it toowell, and tried as vainly as assiduously to cheat myself of thatknowledge; dreading the rack of expectation, and the sick collapse ofdisappointment which daily preceded and followed upon thatwell-recognised ring.
I suppose animals kept in cages, and so scantily fed as to be alwaysupon the verge of famine, await their food as I awaited a letter.Oh!--to speak truth, and drop that tone of a false calm which long tosustain, outwears nature's endurance--I underwent in those seven weeksbitter fears and pains, strange inward trials, miserable defections ofhope, intolerable encroachments of despair. This last came so near mesometimes that her breath went right through me. I used to feel it likea baleful air or sigh, penetrate deep, and make motion pause at myheart, or proceed only under unspeakable oppression. The letter--thewell-beloved letter--would not come; and it was all of sweetness inlife I had to look for.
In the very extremity of want, I had recourse again, and yet again, tothe little packet in the case--the five letters. How splendid thatmonth seemed whose skies had beheld the rising of these five stars! Itwas always at night I visited them, and not daring to ask every eveningfor a candle in the kitchen, I bought a wax taper and matches to lightit, and at the study-hour stole up to the dormitory and feasted on mycrust from the Barmecide's loaf. It did not nourish me: I pined on it,and got as thin as a shadow: otherwise I was not ill.
Reading there somewhat late one evening, and feeling that the power toread was leaving me--for the letters from incessant perusal were losingall sap and significance: my gold was withering to leaves before myeyes, and I was sorrowing over the disillusion--suddenly a quicktripping foot ran up the stairs. I knew Ginevra Fanshawe's step: shehad dined in town that afternoon; she was now returned, and would comehere to replace her shawl, &c. in the wardrobe.
Yes: in she came, dressed in bright silk, with her shawl falling fromher shoulders, and her curls, half-uncurled in the damp of night,drooping careless and heavy upon her neck. I had hardly time torecasket my treasures and lock them up when she was at my side herhumour seemed none of the best.
”It has been a stupid evening: they are stupid people,” she began.
”Who? Mrs. Cholmondeley? I thought you always found her house charming?”
”I have not been to Mrs. Cholmondeley's.”
”Indeed! Have you made new acquaintance?”
”My uncle de Bassompierre is come.”
”Your uncle de Bassompierre! Are you not glad?--I thought he was afavourite.”
”You thought wrong: the man is odious; I hate him.”
”Because he is a foreigner? or for what other reason of equal weight?”
”He is not a foreigner. The man is English enough, goodness knows; andhad an English name till three or four years ago; but his mother was aforeigner, a de Bassompierre, and some of her family are dead and haveleft him estates, a title, and this name: he is quite a great man now.”
”Do you hate him for that reason?”
”Don't I know what mamma says about him? He is not my own uncle, butmarried mamma's sister. Mamma detests him; she says he killed auntGinevra with unkindness: he looks like a bear. Such a dismal evening!”she went on. ”I'll go no more to his big hotel. Fancy me walking into aroom alone, and a great man fifty years old coming forwards, and aftera few minutes' conversation actually turning his back upon me, and thenabruptly going out of the room. Such odd ways! I daresay his consciencesmote him, for they all say at home I am the picture of aunt Ginevra.Mamma often declares the likeness is quite ridiculous.”
”Were you the only visitor?”
”The only visitor? Yes; then there was missy, my cousin: littlespoiled, pampered thing.”
”M. de Bassompierre has a daughter?”
”Yes, yes: don't tease one with questions. Oh, dear! I am so tired.”
She yawned. Throwing herself without ceremony on my bed she added, ”Itseems Mademoiselle was nearly crushed to a jelly in a hubbub at thetheatre some weeks ago.”
”Ah! indeed. And they live at a large hotel in the Rue Crecy?”
”Justement. How do _you_ know?”
”I have been there.”
”Oh, you have? Really! You go everywhere in these days. I supposeMother Bretton took you. She and Esculapius have the _entree_ of the deBassompierre apartments: it seems 'my son John' attended missy on theoccasion of her accident--Accident? Bah! All affectation! I don't thinkshe was squeezed more than she richly deserves for her airs. And nowthere is quite an intimacy struck up: I heard something about 'auldlang syne,' and what not. Oh, how stupid they all were!”
”_All!_ You said you were the only visitor.”
”Did I? You see one forgets to particularize an old woman and her boy.”
”Dr. and Mrs. Bretton were at M. de Bassompierre's this evening?”
”Ay, ay! as large as life; and missy played the hostess. What aconceited doll it is!”
Soured and listless, Miss Fanshawe was beginning to disclose the causesof her prostrate condition. There had been a retrenchment of incense, adiversion or a total withholding of homage and attention coquetry hadfailed of effect, vanity had undergone mortification. She lay fuming inthe vapours.
”Is Miss de Bassompierre quite well now?” I asked.
”As well as you or I, no doubt; but she is an affected little thing,and gave herself invalid airs to attract medical notice. And to see theold dowager making her recline on a couch, and 'my son John'prohibiting excitement, etcetera--faugh! the scene was quite sickening.”
”It would not have been so if the object of attention had been changed:if you had taken Miss de Bassompierre's place.”
”Indeed! I hate 'my son John!'”
”'My son John!'--whom do you indicate by that name? Dr. Bretton'smother never calls him so.”
”Then she ought. A clownish, bearish John he is.”
”You violate the truth in saying so; and as the whole of my patience isnow spun off the distaff, I peremptorily desire you to rise from thatbed, and vacate this room.”
”Passionate thing! Your face is the colour of a coquelicot. I wonderwhat always makes you so mighty testy a l'endroit du gros Jean? 'JohnAnderson, my Joe, John!' Oh, the distinguished name!”
Thrilling with exasperation, to which it would have been sheer folly tohave given vent--for there was no contending with that unsubstantialfeather, that mealy-winged moth--I extinguished my taper, locked mybureau, and left her, since she would not leave me. Small-beer as shewas, she had turned insufferably acid.
The morrow was Thursday and a half-holiday. Breakfast was over; I hadwithdrawn to the first classe. The dreaded hour, the post-hour, wasnearing, and I sat waiting it, much as a ghost-seer might wait hisspectre. Less than ever was a letter probable; still, strive as Iwould, I could not forget that it was possible. As the momentslessened, a restlessness and fear almost beyond the average assailedme. It was a day of winter east wind, and I had now for some timeentered into that dreary fellowship with the winds and their changes,so little known, so incomprehensible to the healthy. The north and eastowned a terrific influence, making all pain more poignant, all sorrowsadder. The south could calm, the west sometimes cheer: unless, indeed,they brought on their wings the burden of thunder-clouds, under theweight and warmth of which all energy died.
Bitter and dark as was this January day, I remember leaving the classe,and running down without bonnet to the bottom of the long garden, andthen lingering amongst the stripped shrubs, in the forlorn hope thatthe postman's ring might occur while I was out of hearing, and I mightthus be spared the thrill which some particular nerve or nerves, almostgnawed through with the unremitting tooth of a fixed idea, werebecoming wholly unfit to support. I lingered as long as I dared withoutfear of attracting attention by my absence. I muffled my head in myapron, and stopped my ears in terror of the torturing clang, sure to befollowed by such blank silence, such barren vacuum for me. At last Iventured to re-enter the first classe, where, as it was not yet nineo'clock, no pupils had been admitted. The first thing seen was a whiteobject on my black desk, a white, flat object. The post had, indeed,arrived; by me unheard. Rosine had visited my cell, and, like someangel, had left behind her a bright token of her presence. That shiningthing on the desk was indeed a letter, a real letter; I saw so much atthe distance of three yards, and as I had but one correspondent onearth, from that one it must come. He remembered me yet. How deep apulse of gratitude sent new life through my heart.
Drawing near, bending and looking on the letter, in trembling butalmost certain hope of seeing a known hand, it was my lot to find, onthe contrary, an autograph for the moment deemed unknown--a pale femalescrawl, instead of a firm, masculine character. I then thought fate was_too_ hard for me, and I said, audibly, ”This is cruel.”
But I got over that pain also. Life is still life, whatever its pangs:our eyes and ears and their use remain with us, though the prospect ofwhat pleases be wholly withdrawn, and the sound of what consoles bequite silenced.
I opened the billet: by this time I had recognised its handwriting asperfectly familiar. It was dated ”La Terrasse,” and it ran thus:--
”DEAR LUCY,--It occurs to me to inquire what you have been doing withyourself for the last month or two? Not that I suspect you would havethe least difficulty in giving an account of your proceedings. Idaresay you have been just as busy and as happy as ourselves at LaTerrasse. As to Graham, his professional connection extends daily: heis so much sought after, so much engaged, that I tell him he will growquite conceited. Like a right good mother, as I am, I do my best tokeep him down: no flattery does he get from me, as you know. And yet,Lucy, he is a fine fellow: his mother's heart dances at the sight ofhim. After being hurried here and there the whole day, and passing theordeal of fifty sorts of tempers, and combating a hundred caprices, andsometimes witnessing cruel sufferings--perhaps, occasionally, as I tellhim, inflicting them--at night he still comes home to me in suchkindly, pleasant mood, that really, I seem to live in a sort of moralantipodes, and on these January evenings my day rises when otherpeople's night sets in.
”Still he needs keeping in order, and correcting, and repressing, and Ido him that good service; but the boy is so elastic there is no suchthing as vexing him thoroughly. When I think I have at last driven himto the sullens, he turns on me with jokes for retaliation: but you knowhim and all his iniquities, and I am but an elderly simpleton to makehim the subject of this epistle.
”As for me, I have had my old Bretton agent here on a visit, and havebeen plunged overhead and ears in business matters. I do so wish toregain for Graham at least some part of what his father left him. Helaughs to scorn my anxiety on this point, bidding me look and see howhe can provide for himself and me too, and asking what the old lady canpossibly want that she has not; hinting about sky-blue turbans;accusing me of an ambition to wear diamonds, keep livery servants, havean hotel, and lead the fashion amongst the English clan in Villette.
”Talking of sky-blue turbans, I wish you had been with us the otherevening. He had come in really tired, and after I had given him histea, he threw himself into my chair with his customary presumption. Tomy great delight, he dropped asleep. (You know how he teases me aboutbeing drowsy; I, who never, by any chance, close an eye by daylight.)While he slept, I thought he looked very bonny, Lucy: fool as I am tobe so proud of him; but who can help it? Show me his peer. Look where Iwill, I see nothing like him in Villette. Well, I took it into my headto play him a trick: so I brought out the sky-blue turban, and handlingit with gingerly precaution, I managed to invest his brows with thisgrand adornment. I assure you it did not at all misbecome him; helooked quite Eastern, except that he is so fair. Nobody, however, canaccuse him of having red hair _now_--it is genuine chestnut--a dark,glossy chestnut; and when I put my large cashmere about him, there wasas fine a young bey, dey, or pacha improvised as you would wish to see.
”It was good entertainment; but only half-enjoyed, since I was alone:you should have been there.
”In due time my lord awoke: the looking-glass above the fireplace soonintimated to him his plight: as you may imagine, I now live underthreat and dread of vengeance.
”But to come to the gist of my letter. I know Thursday is ahalf-holiday in the Rue Fossette: be ready, then, by five in theafternoon, at which hour I will send the carriage to take you out to LaTerrasse. Be sure to come: you may meet some old acquaintance. Good-by,my wise, dear, grave little god-daughter.--Very truly yours,
”LOUISA BRETTON.”.
Now, a letter like that sets one to rights! I might still be sad afterreading that letter, but I was more composed; not exactly cheered,perhaps, but relieved. My friends, at least, were well and happy: noaccident had occurred to Graham; no illness had seized hismother--calamities that had so long been my dream and thought. Theirfeelings for me too were--as they had been. Yet, how strange it was tolook on Mrs. Bretton's seven weeks and contrast them with my sevenweeks! Also, how very wise it is in people placed in an exceptionalposition to hold their tongues and not rashly declare how such positiongalls them! The world can understand well enough the process ofperishing for want of food: perhaps few persons can enter into orfollow out that of going mad from solitary confinement. They see thelong-buried prisoner disinterred, a maniac or an idiot!--how his sensesleft him--how his nerves, first inflamed, underwent nameless agony, andthen sunk to palsy--is a subject too intricate for examination, tooabstract for popular comprehension. Speak of it! you might almost aswell stand up in an European market-place, and propound dark sayings inthat language and mood wherein Nebuchadnezzar, the imperialhypochondriac, communed with his baffled Chaldeans. And long, long maythe minds to whom such themes are no mystery--by whom their bearingsare sympathetically seized--be few in number, and rare of rencounter.Long may it be generally thought that physical privations alone meritcompassion, and that the rest is a figment. When the world was youngerand haler than now, moral trials were a deeper mystery still: perhapsin all the land of Israel there was but one Saul--certainly but oneDavid to soothe or comprehend him.
The keen, still cold of the morning was succeeded, later in the day, bya sharp breathing from Russian wastes: the cold zone sighed over thetemperate zone, and froze it fast. A heavy firmament, dull, and thickwith snow, sailed up from the north, and settled over expectant Europe.Towards afternoon began the descent. I feared no carriage would come,the white tempest raged so dense and wild. But trust my godmother! Oncehaving asked, she would have her guest. About six o'clock I was liftedfrom the carriage over the already blocked-up front steps of thechateau, and put in at the door of La Terrasse.
Running through the vestibule, and up-stairs to the drawing-room, thereI found Mrs. Bretton--a summer-day in her own person. Had I been twiceas cold as I was, her kind kiss and cordial clasp would have warmed me.Inured now for so long a time to rooms with bare boards, black benches,desks, and stoves, the blue saloon seemed to me gorgeous. In itsChristmas-like fire alone there was a clear and crimson splendour whichquite dazzled me.
When my godmother had held my hand for a little while, and chatted withme, and scolded me for having become thinner than when she last saw me,she professed to discover that the snow-wind had disordered my hair,and sent me up-stairs to make it neat and remove my shawl.
Repairing to my own little sea-green room, there also I found a brightfire, and candles too were lit: a tall waxlight stood on each side thegreat looking glass; but between the candles, and before the glass,appeared something dressing itself--an airy, fairy thing--small,slight, white--a winter spirit.
I declare, for one moment I thought of Graham and his spectralillusions. With distrustful eye I noted the details of this new vision.It wore white, sprinkled slightly with drops of scarlet; its girdle wasred; it had something in its hair leafy, yet shining--a little wreathwith an evergreen gloss. Spectral or not, here truly was nothingfrightful, and I advanced.
Turning quick upon me, a large eye, under long lashes, flashed over me,the intruder: the lashes were as dark as long, and they softened withtheir pencilling the orb they guarded.
”Ah! you are come!” she breathed out, in a soft, quiet voice, and shesmiled slowly, and gazed intently.
I knew her now. Having only once seen that sort of face, with that castof fine and delicate featuring, I could not but know her.
”Miss de Bassompierre,” I pronounced.
”No,” was the reply, ”not Miss de Bassompierre for _you!_” I did notinquire who then she might be, but waited voluntary information.
”You are changed, but still you are yourself,” she said, approachingnearer. ”I remember you well--your countenance, the colour of yourhair, the outline of your face....”
I had moved to the fire, and she stood opposite, and gazed into me; andas she gazed, her face became gradually more and more expressive ofthought and feeling, till at last a dimness quenched her clear vision.
”It makes me almost cry to look so far back,” said she: ”but as tobeing sorry, or sentimental, don't think it: on the contrary, I amquite pleased and glad.”
Interested, yet altogether at fault, I knew not what to say. At last Istammered, ”I think I never met you till that night, some weeks ago,when you were hurt...?”
She smiled. ”You have forgotten then that I have sat on your knee, beenlifted in your arms, even shared your pillow? You no longer rememberthe night when I came crying, like a naughty little child as I was, toyour bedside, and you took me in. You have no memory for the comfortand protection by which you soothed an acute distress? Go back toBretton. Remember Mr. Home.”
At last I saw it all. ”And you are little Polly?”
”I am Paulina Mary Home de Bassompierre.”
How time can change! Little Polly wore in her pale, small features, herfairy symmetry, her varying expression, a certain promise of interestand grace; but Paulina Mary was become beautiful--not with the beautythat strikes the eye like a rose--orbed, ruddy, and replete; not withthe plump, and pink, and flaxen attributes of her blond cousin Ginevra;but her seventeen years had brought her a refined and tender charmwhich did not lie in complexion, though hers was fair and clear; nor inoutline, though her features were sweet, and her limbs perfectlyturned; but, I think, rather in a subdued glow from the soul outward.This was not an opaque vase, of material however costly, but a lampchastely lucent, guarding from extinction, yet not hiding from worship,a flame vital and vestal. In speaking of her attractions, I would notexaggerate language; but, indeed, they seemed to me very real andengaging. What though all was on a small scale, it was the perfumewhich gave this white violet distinction, and made it superior to thebroadest camelia--the fullest dahlia that ever bloomed.
”Ah! and you remember the old time at Bretton?”
”Better,” said she, ”better, perhaps, than you. I remember it withminute distinctness: not only the time, but the days of the time, andthe hours of the days.”
”You must have forgotten some things?”
”Very little, I imagine.”
”You were then a little creature of quick feelings: you must, long erethis, have outgrown the impressions with which joy and grief, affectionand bereavement, stamped your mind ten years ago.”
”You think I have forgotten whom I liked, and in what degree I likedthem when a child?”
”The sharpness must be gone--the point, the poignancy--the deep imprintmust be softened away and effaced?”
”I have a good memory for those days.”
She looked as if she had. Her eyes were the eyes of one who canremember; one whose childhood does not fade like a dream, nor whoseyouth vanish like a sunbeam. She would not take life, loosely andincoherently, in parts, and let one season slip as she entered onanother: she would retain and add; often review from the commencement,and so grow in harmony and consistency as she grew in years. Still Icould not quite admit the conviction that _all_ the pictures which nowcrowded upon me were vivid and visible to her. Her fond attachments,her sports and contests with a well-loved playmate, the patient, truedevotion of her child's heart, her fears, her delicate reserves, herlittle trials, the last piercing pain of separation.... I retracedthese things, and shook my head incredulous. She persisted. ”The childof seven years lives yet in the girl of seventeen,” said she.
”You used to be excessively fond of Mrs. Bretton,” I remarked,intending to test her. She set me right at once.
”Not _excessively_ fond,” said she; ”I liked her: I respected her as Ishould do now: she seems to me very little altered.”
”She is not much changed,” I assented.
We were silent a few minutes. Glancing round the room she said, ”Thereare several things here that used to be at Bretton! I remember thatpincushion and that looking-glass.”
Evidently she was not deceived in her estimate of her own memory; not,at least, so far.
”You think, then, you would have known Mrs. Bretton?” I went on.
”I perfectly remembered her; the turn of her features, her olivecomplexion, and black hair, her height, her walk, her voice.”
”Dr. Bretton, of course,” I pursued, ”would be out of the question:and, indeed, as I saw your first interview with him, I am aware that heappeared to you as a stranger.”
”That first night I was puzzled,” she answered.
”How did the recognition between him and your father come about?”
”They exchanged cards. The names Graham Bretton and Home deBassompierre gave rise to questions and explanations. That was on thesecond day; but before then I was beginning to know something.”
”How--know something?”
”Why,” she said, ”how strange it is that most people seem so slow tofeel the truth--not to see, but _feel_! When Dr. Bretton had visited mea few times, and sat near and talked to me; when I had observed thelook in his eyes, the expression about his mouth, the form of his chin,the carriage of his head, and all that we _do_ observe in persons whoapproach us--how could I avoid being led by association to think ofGraham Bretton? Graham was slighter than he, and not grown so tall, andhad a smoother face, and longer and lighter hair, and spoke--not sodeeply--more like a girl; but yet _he_ is Graham, just as _I_ am littlePolly, or you are Lucy Snowe.”
I thought the same, but I wondered to find my thoughts hers: there arecertain things in which we so rarely meet with our double that it seemsa miracle when that chance befalls.
”You and Graham were once playmates.”
”And do you remember that?” she questioned in her turn.
”No doubt he will remember it also,” said I.
”I have not asked him: few things would surprise me so much as to findthat he did. I suppose his disposition is still gay and careless?”
”Was it so formerly? Did it so strike you? Do you thus remember him?”
”I scarcely remember him in any other light. Sometimes he was studious;sometimes he was merry: but whether busy with his books or disposed forplay, it was chiefly the books or game he thought of; not much heedingthose with whom he read or amused himself.”
”Yet to you he was partial.”
”Partial to me? Oh, no! he had other playmates--his school-fellows; Iwas of little consequence to him, except on Sundays: yes, he was kindon Sundays. I remember walking with him hand-in-hand to St. Mary's, andhis finding the places in my prayer-book; and how good and still he wason Sunday evenings! So mild for such a proud, lively boy; so patientwith all my blunders in reading; and so wonderfully to be depended on,for he never spent those evenings from home: I had a constant fear thathe would accept some invitation and forsake us; but he never did, norseemed ever to wish to do it. Thus, of course, it can be no more. Isuppose Sunday will now be Dr. Bretton's dining-out day....?”
”Children, come down!” here called Mrs. Bretton from below. Paulinawould still have lingered, but I inclined to descend: we went down.