Part 8

"The doctors assure me that they can save him,--that the disease is not yet deep-seated. They have prescribed a _régime_ from which they expect very good results. Every afternoon Georges must take a sea-bath, or, rather, he must dip himself for a second in the sea. Then his whole body must be rubbed vigorously with a hair-glove, to stimulate the circulation; then he must be obliged to drink a glass of old port; and then he must lie stretched for at least an hour in a very warm bed. That is what I want of you in the first place, my child. But understand me well; what I specially want is youth, grace, gaiety, life. In my house it is these things that are most lacking. I have two very devoted servants, but they are old and sad, and possessed of manias. Georges cannot endure them. And I myself, with my old white head and my perpetual wearing of mourning,--I feel that I am an affliction to him. And, what is worse still, I feel also that I often am unable to hide from him my apprehensions. Oh! I know that this, perhaps, is not exactly the _role_ for a young girl like you, beside so young a boy as Georges; for he is only nineteen! The world undoubtedly will find something to say about it. But I care not for the world; I care only for my sick grandchild, and I have confidence in you. You are a good woman, I suppose?"

"Oh! yes, Madame," I cried, certain in advance of being the sort of saint of whom this disconsolate grandmother was in search, for the salvation of her child.

"And he, the poor little one, my God! In his condition! In his condition, you see, he needs, more than sea-baths perhaps, the continual companionship of a pretty face, a fresh young laugh, something to drive from his mind the idea of death, some one to give him confidence in life. Will you undertake it?"

"I accept, Madame," I answered, moved to the depths of my being. "And Madame may be sure that I will take good care of M. Georges."

It was agreed that I should enter upon my duties that very evening, and that we should start on the next day but one for Houlgate, where the lady in mourning had rented a beautiful villa near the beach.

The grandmother had not lied. M. Georges was a charming, an adorable child. His beardless face had the loveliness of that of a beautiful woman; womanly also were his indolent movements, and his long, white, supple hands, through which could be seen the network of his veins. But what ardent eyes! Pupils consumed by a dull fire, beneath eyelids ringed with blue, and seemingly burned by the flaming gaze! What an intense focus of thought, of passion, of sensibility, of intelligence, of inner life! And to what an extent already had the red flowers of death invaded his cheeks! It seemed as if it were not of disease, as if it were not of death, that he was dying, but of an excess of life, of the fever of life that was in him, gnawing at his organs and withering his flesh. Oh! how pretty and how painful a spectacle! When his grandmother took me to him, he was stretched on a long chair, and holding in his long white hands an odorless rose. He received me, not as a servant, but almost as a friend whom he expected. And from the first moment I became attached to him with all the strength of my soul.

Our establishment at Houlgate was effected without incident, as our journey had been also. Everything was ready, when we arrived. We had only to take possession of the villa,--a roomy, elegant villa, full of life and gaiety, and separated from the beach by a broad terrace covered with wicker-chairs and tents of many colors. A stone stairway, cut in the embankment, led to the sea, and against its lower steps sounded the music of the waves when the tide was coming in. M. Georges's room, on the ground floor, commanded an admirable view of the sea from large bay-windows. My own room--not the room of a servant, but that of a master--was opposite M. Georges's, across a passage-way, and was hung with light cretonne. From its windows one looked out into a little garden, where were growing some sorry-looking spindle-trees and some sorrier-looking rose-bushes. To express in words my joy, my pride, my emotion, and the pure and new elevation of mind that I felt at being thus treated and petted, admitted, like a lady, to comfort, to luxury, and to a share in that thing so vainly coveted which is called the family; to explain how, by a simple wave of the wand of that miraculous fairy, kindness, there came instantly an end to the recollection of my past humiliations and a conception of all the duties laid upon me by the dignity that belongs to a human being, and at last vouchsafed to me,--is quite beyond me. But I can say at least that I really perceived the magic of the transfiguration. Not only did the mirror testify that I had suddenly become more beautiful, but my heart assured me that I was really better. I discovered within me sources, sources, sources,--inexhaustible sources, ever-flowing sources, of devotion, of sacrifice, of heroism; and I had but one thought,--to save, by intelligent care, by watchful fidelity, and by marvellous skill,--to save M. Georges from death.

With a robust faith in my power of cure, I said in positive tones to the poor grandmother, who was in a state of perpetual despair, and often spent her days in weeping in the adjoining room:

"Do not weep, Madame. We will save him. I swear to you that we will save him."

And, in fact, at the end of a fortnight's time, M. Georges was much improved. A great change in his condition had taken place. The fits of coughing had diminished in number and intensity; his sleep and appetite were becoming more regular. He no longer had, in the night, those copious and terrible sweats that left him gasping and exhausted in the morning. His strength was so far recovered that we could take long drives and short walks, without serious fatigue. It was a sort of resurrection. As the weather was very fine, and the air very warm, but tempered by the sea-breeze, on days when we did not leave the premises we spent most of the time on the terrace, in the shelter of the tents, awaiting the bathing hour,--the hour of "the little dip in the sea," as M. Georges gaily called it. For he was gay, always gay; never did he speak of his illness, never of death. I really believe that in all those days he never once uttered the terrible word death. On the other hand, he was much amused by my chatter, provoking it if necessary; and I, confiding in his eyes, reassured by his heart, won by his indulgence and his grace, told him everything that came into my mind,--farces, follies, and songs. My little childhood, my little desires, my little misfortunes, and my dreams, and my rebellions, and my various experiences with ludicrous or infamous masters,--I told him all, without much masking of the truth, for, young though he was, and separated from the world, and shut up as he had always been, he nevertheless, by a sort of prescience, by a marvelous divination which the sick possess, understood life thoroughly. A real friendship, that his nature surely facilitated, and that his solitude caused him to desire, and, above all, that the intimate and constant care with which I delighted his poor moribund flesh brought about, so to speak, automatically, sprang up between us. I was happy to a degree that I cannot picture, and my mind gained in refinement by incessant contact with his.

M. Georges adored poetry. For entire hours, on the terrace, to the music of the waves, or else at night in his room, he asked me to read him the poems of Victor Hugo, of Baudelaire, of Verlaine, of Mæterlinck. Often he closed his eyes, and lay motionless, with his hands folded on his breast, and I, thinking that he was asleep, stopped reading; but he smiled, and said:

"Go on, little one; I am not asleep. I can listen better so. I hear your voice better. And your voice is charming."

Sometimes it was he who interrupted me. After concentrating his thoughts, he slowly recited, with a prolongation of the rhythms, the lines that had excited in him the greatest enthusiasm, and he tried--oh! how I loved him for that!--to make me understand them, to make me feel their beauty. One day he said to me,--and I have kept these words as a relic:

"The sublimity of poetry, you see, lies in the fact that it does not take an educated person to understand it and to love it. On the contrary. The educated do not understand it, and generally they despise it, because they have too much pride. To love poetry it is enough to have a soul,--a little soul, naked, like a flower. Poets speak to the souls of the simple, of the sad, of the sick. And that is why they are eternal. Do you know that, when one has sensibility, one is always something of a poet? And you yourself, little Célestine, have often said to me things that are as beautiful as poetry."

"Oh! Monsieur Georges, you are making fun of me."

"Not in the least. And you are unaware that you have said these beautiful things. And that is the delightful part of it."

For me those were unique hours; whatever destiny may bring me, they will sing in my heart as long as I may live. I felt that indescribably sweet sensation of becoming a new being, of witnessing, so to speak, from minute to minute, the revelation of something unknown in me, and which yet was I. And to-day, in spite of worse falls, thoroughly reconquered as I am by all that is bad and embittered in me, if I have kept this passionate fondness for reading, and sometimes that impulse toward things superior to my social environment and to myself; if, trying to regain confidence in the spontaneity of my nature, I have dared--I who am so ignorant--to write this diary,--it is to M. Georges that I owe it.

Oh! yes, I was happy,--happy especially at seeing the pretty patient gradually reborn, his flesh swelling out and his face blooming again, through the flow of a new sap; happy at the joy, and the hopes, and the certainties, that the rapidity of this resurrection gave to the entire house, of which I was now the queen and the fairy. They attributed to me, they attributed to the intelligence of my care, to the vigilance of my devotion, and, more still perhaps, to my constant gaiety, to my youth so full of charm, to my surprising influence over Georges, this incomparable miracle. And the poor grandmother thanked me, overwhelmed me with gratitude and blessings, and also with presents, like a nurse to whom has been confided a baby almost dead, and who, with her pure and healthy milk, reconstructs his organs, brings back his smile, and restores him to life.

Sometimes, forgetful of her station, she took my hands, caressed them, kissed them, and, with tears of joy, said to me:

"I knew very well ... I ... when I saw you ... I knew very well!"

And already projects were being formed,--journeys to the land of sunshine, fields full of roses!

"You shall never leave us; never more, my child."

Her enthusiasm often embarrassed me, but I finally came to believe that I deserved it. If, as many others would have done in my place, I had chosen to abuse her generosity ... Oh, misfortune!

And what was to happen happened.

On the day of which I speak, the weather had been very warm, very heavy, and very threatening. Across the sky, above the leaden and perfectly flat sea, rolled stifling clouds, thick red clouds, through which the storm could not break. M. Georges had not gone out, even to the terrace, and we had remained in his room. More nervous than usual, a nervousness due undoubtedly to the electricity in the atmosphere, he had even refused to let me read poetry to him.

"That would tire me," he said. "And, besides, I feel that you would read very badly to-day."

He had gone into the _salon_, where he had tried to play a little on the piano. The piano having plagued him, he had at once come back into the room, where he had sought to divert himself for a moment by drawing, as it seemed to me, some feminine profiles. But he had not been slow in abandoning paper and pencil, fuming with some impatience:

"I cannot; I am not in the mood. My hand trembles. I don't know what is the matter with me. And you,--there is something the matter with you, too. You are restless."

Finally he had stretched himself on his long chair, near the large bay-window, through which one could see a vast expanse of water. Fishing-boats in the distance, fleeing from the ever-threatening storm, were re-entering the port of Trouville. With a distracted look he followed their manoeuvres and their grey sails.

As M. Georges had said, I was restless; I could not keep still; I was continually moving about, to find something with which to occupy his mind. Of course I found nothing, and my agitation did not have a quieting influence on his.

"Why do you move about so? Why do you enervate yourself? Stay beside me."

I had asked him:

"Would you not like to be on one of those little boats yonder? I would."

"Oh! do not talk for the sake of talking. Why say useless things? Stay beside me."

Scarcely had I taken my seat beside him, when, the sight of the sea becoming utterly unendurable to him, he asked me to lower the blind.

"This bad light exasperates me; this sea is horrible. I do not wish to look at it. Everything is horrible to-day. I do not wish to see anything; I wish to see you only."

I had gently chided him.

"Oh! Monsieur Georges, you are not good. You are not behaving well. If your grandmother were to come in and see you in this condition, you would make her cry again."

Having raised himself a little on the cushions:

"In the first place, why do you call me 'Monsieur Georges'? You know that I do not like it."

"But I cannot call you 'Monsieur Gaston'!"

"Call me 'Georges' for short, naughty girl."

"Oh! I could not; I could never do that!"

Then he had sighed:

"Is it not curious? Are you, then, still a poor little slave?"

Then he had lapsed into silence. And the rest of the day passed off, half in enervation, half in silence, which was also an enervation, and more painful.

In the evening, after dinner, the storm at last broke out. The wind began to blow violently, the waves to beat against the embankment with a heavy sullen sound. M. Georges would not go to bed. He felt that it would be impossible for him to sleep, and in a bed sleepless nights are so long! He on his long chair, I sitting near a little table on which, veiled by a shade, was burning a lamp that shed a soft, pink light about us, we said nothing. Although his eyes were more brilliant than usual, M. Georges seemed calmer, and the pink reflection from the lamp heightened his color, and outlined more clearly in the light the features of his delicate and charming face. I was engaged in sewing.

Suddenly he said to me:

"Leave your work for a little while, Célestine, and sit beside me."

I always obeyed his desires, his caprices. At times he manifested an effusive and enthusiastic friendship, which I attributed to gratitude. This time I obeyed as usual.

"Nearer, still nearer," he exclaimed.

Then:

"Now give me your hand."

Without the slightest mistrust I allowed him to take my hand, which he caressed.

"How pretty your hand is! And how pretty your eyes are! And how pretty you are, altogether, altogether, altogether!"

He had often spoken to me of my kindness, but never had he told me that I was pretty; at least, he had never told me so with such an air. Surprised and, in reality, charmed by these words, which he uttered in a grave and somewhat gasping voice, I instinctively drew back.

"No, no, do not go away; stay near me, close to me. You cannot know how much good it does me to have you near me, how it warms me. See, I am no longer nervous, agitated; I am no longer sick; I am content, happy, very happy."

And, having chastely placed his arm about my waist, he obliged me to sit down beside him on the long chair. And he asked:

"Are you uncomfortable so?"

I was not reassured. In his eyes burned a fire more ardent than ever. His voice trembled more--with that trembling which I know,--oh! yes, how I know it!--that trembling which is given to the voice of all men by the violent desire of love. I was very much moved, and I was very cowardly; my head was whirling a little. But, firmly resolved to defend myself against him, and especially to energetically defend him against himself, I answered in a childish way:

"Yes, Monsieur Georges, I am very uncomfortable; let me get up."

His arm did not leave my waist.

"No, no, I beg of you, be nice."

And in a tone the coaxing gentleness of which I cannot describe, he added:

"You are very timid. What are you afraid of, then?"

At the same time he approached his face to mine, and I felt his warm breath with its insipid odor,--something like an incense of death.

My heart seized with an inexpressible anguish, I cried:

"Monsieur Georges! Oh! Monsieur Georges, let me go. You will make yourself sick. I beg of you! Let me go."

I did not dare to struggle, because of his weakness, out of respect for the fragility of his members. I simply tried--and how carefully!--to put away his hand, which, awkward, timid, trembling, was trying to unhook my waist. And I repeated:

"Let me go! You are behaving very badly, Monsieur Georges. Let me go!"

His effort to hold me against him had tired him. His embrace soon weakened. For a few seconds he breathed with greater difficulty, and then a dry cough shook his chest.

"You see, Monsieur Georges," I said to him, with all the gentleness of a maternal reproach, "you are wilfully making yourself sick. You will listen to nothing. And all will have to be begun over again. Great progress we shall make in this way! Be good, I beg of you! And, if you were very nice, do you know what you would do? You would go to bed directly."

He withdrew his hand, stretched out on the long chair, and, as I replaced beneath his head the cushions that had slipped down, he sadly sighed:

"After all, you are right; I ask your pardon."

"You have not to ask my pardon, Monsieur Georges; you have to be quiet."

"Yes, yes," he exclaimed, his eyes fixed on the spot in the ceiling where the lamp made a circle of moving light. "I was a little mad ... to have dreamed for a moment that you could love me,--me who have never had love,--me who have never had anything but suffering. Why should you love me? It would cure me to love you. Since you have been here beside me, and since the beginning of my desire for you; since you have been here with your youth, and your freshness, and your eyes, and your hands,--your little silky hands, whose attentions are the gentlest of caresses; since the time I began to dream of you alone,--I have felt boiling within me, in my soul and in my body, new vigor, a wholly unknown life. That is to say, I did feel that,--for now ... In short, what do you expect? I was mad! And you, you are right."

I was greatly embarrassed. I knew not what to say; I knew not what to do. Powerful and opposite feelings pulled me in all directions. An impulse rushed me toward him, a sacred duty held me back. And in a silly fashion, because I was not sincere, because I could not be sincere in a struggle where these desires and this duty combatted with equal force, I stammered:

"Monsieur Georges, be good. Do not think of these ugly things. It makes you sick. Come, Monsieur Georges, be very nice."

But he repeated:

"Why should you love me? Truly, you are right in not loving me. You think me ill. You fear to poison your mouth with the poisons of mine; you are afraid of contracting my disease--the disease of which I am dying, am I not?--from one of my kisses. You are right."

The cruel injustice of these words struck me to the heart.

"Do not say that, Monsieur Georges," I cried, wildly; "what you say is horrible and wicked. And you really give me too much pain, too much pain."

I seized his hands; they were moist and burning. I bent over him; his breath had the raucous ardor of a forge.

"It is horrible, horrible!"

He continued:

"A kiss from you,---why! that meant my resurrection, my complete restoration to life. Oh! you have believed seriously in your baths, in your port wine, in your hair-glove. Poor little one! It is in your love that I have bathed, it is the wine of your love that I have drunk, it is the revulsion of your life that has set a new blood flowing beneath my skin. It is because I have so hoped and longed and waited for your kiss that I have begun to live again, to be strong,--for I am strong now. But I am not angry with you for refusing me; you are right in refusing. I understand; I understand. You are a timid little soul, without courage; a little bird that sings on one branch, and then on another, and flies away at the slightest noise ... frroutt!"

"These are frightful things which you are saying, Monsieur Georges."

He still went on, while I wrung my hands:

"Why are they frightful? No, indeed, they are not frightful; they are true. You think me sick. You think that one is sick when one has love. You do not know that love is life,--eternal life. Yes, yes, I understand, since your kiss, which is life for me, might, you fancy, be death for you. Let us say no more about it."

I could not listen further. Was it pity? Was it the bleeding reproach and bitter challenge that these atrocious and sacrilegious words conveyed? Was it simply the impulsive and savage love that suddenly took possession of me? I do not know. Perhaps it was all of these together. What I know is that I allowed myself to fall, like a mass, on the long chair, and that, lifting in my hands the child's adorable head, I wildly cried:

"There, naughty boy, see how afraid I am of you! See, then, how afraid I am of you!"

I glued my lips to his lips, I pressed my teeth against his, with such quivering fury that my tongue seemed to penetrate the deepest sores of his chest, to lick them, to drink from them, to draw out of them all the poisoned blood and all the mortal pus. His arms opened, and closed again about me, in an embrace.

And what was to happen happened.

Well, no. The more I think about it, the surer I am that what threw me into Georges's arms, what fastened my lips to his, was, first and only, an imperative, spontaneous movement of protest against the base sentiments that Georges--through strategy, perhaps--attributed to my refusal. It was, above all, an act of fervent, disinterested, and very pure piety, which meant to say:

"No, I do not think that you are sick; no, you are not sick. And the proof is that I do not hesitate to mingle my breath with yours, to breathe it, to drink it in, to impregnate my lungs with it, to saturate with it all my flesh. And, even though you were really sick, even though your disease were contagious and fatal to any one approaching it, I do not wish you to entertain concerning me this monstrous idea that I am afraid of contracting it, of suffering from it, and of dying from it."

Nor had I foreseen and calculated the inevitable result of this kiss, and that I would not have the strength, once in my friend's arms, once my lips on his, to tear myself from this embrace and put away this kiss. But there it is, you see! When a man holds me in his arms, my skin at once begins to burn, and my head to turn and turn. I become drunk; I become mad; I become savage. I have no other will than that of my desire. I see only him; I think only of him; and I suffer myself to be led by him, docile and terrible, even to crime!

Oh! that first kiss of M. Georges, his awkward and delicious caresses, the passionate artlessness of all his movements, and the wondering expression of his eyes in presence of the mystery, at last unveiled, of woman and of love! But, the intoxication passed, when I saw the poor and fragile child, panting, almost swooning in my arms, I felt a frightful remorse,--at least the terrifying sensation that I had just committed a murder.