CHAPTER XII

CRUEL TO BE KIND

When René Vincy had got as far as the Museum gates without finding Suzanne a crowd of contradictory ideas burst so suddenly upon him that he was lifted, metaphorically speaking, off his feet. Suzanne had not been mistaken in her calculations, the double blow she had dealt the young poet paralysing all his powers of analysis and reflection. Had she simply told him that she loved him he would probably have opened his eyes and perceived the striking contrast between the angelic attitude assumed by Suzanne and the bluntness of this declaration. He would have had to acknowledge that the angel's wings were very loosely attached if they could be so easily laid aside. But instead of committing the mistake of laying them aside the angel had spread her bright pinions out wide and disappeared. 'She loves me, and will never forgive me for having dragged that confession from her,' said René to himself.

He fully believed that she had gone away resolved never to see him again, and all his thoughts became concentrated upon that idea. How could he hope to shake the resolution of a creature so sincere that she had been unable to conceal her feelings, so saint-like that she had immediately regarded her involuntary confession as a crime? And René again saw her before him with terror written on her face and tears starting from her eyes. Lost in these thoughts, he walked straight before him, unable to bear the sight of a human being, even were it Emilie, his dear confidante. Hailing a cab, he told the driver to take him to Saint-Cloud. This was the first name that rose to his lips, because Suzanne had described to him two _fêtes_ at which she had been present in the palace when quite a girl. On getting out of the cab he felt a savage delight in plunging into the denuded wood. A pale February sun lit up the bleak wintry landscape and the dry leaves cracked under his tread as he strode along. Now and then, through a network of blackened trunks and naked branches, he could see the dreary ruins of the old palace and the blue waters of the little lake upon which, in bygone days, Madame Moraines had seen the unhappy Prince, since killed at the Cape.

The impressions produced by his surroundings and by these memories of a tragic past did not distract the poet's thoughts from the one idea that hypnotised him, as it were--by what means he could conquer the will of this woman whom he loved, who loved him in return, and whom he was determined to see again at all costs. What was to be done? Call at her house and demand admittance? Inflict his presence upon her by frequenting the houses she visited? Waylay her at street corners and at theatres? No--he felt that he could not do anything that might furnish Suzanne with a single reason for loving him less. It was to her that he looked for everything, even for the right of beholding her. The memory of the ideals he had cherished in the first years of his manhood and the purer years of his youth inspired him with serious thoughts of doing absolutely nothing to approach her, of obeying her as Dante would have obeyed Beatrice, Petrarch his Laura, Cino da Pistoia his Sylvia--those noble poets of the ages of chivalry who gave voice to the lofty conceptions of an imaginative and holy love full of ideal devotion. He had so often dipped with delight into the _Vita Nuova_ and devoured the sonnets these dreamers wrote their lady-loves. But how could such literature, of almost ascetic purity, hold its own against the poison of sensuous passion which, unknown to him, Suzanne's beauty and surroundings had instilled into his blood? Obey her! No--that he could not do. Fresh ideas welled up within him, and he sought to calm his overwrought nerves by exercise, the only palliative for the terrible mental agonies he was suffering.

Night fell--a wintry night preceded by a short, dismal twilight. Worn out by the excess of emotion, René at last decided to adopt the only course that could be put into immediate execution--that of writing to Suzanne. On reaching the village of Saint-Cloud he entered a _café_, and there, on a beer-stained blotting-pad, with a spluttering pen, disgusted with the paper he used and the place he was in, disturbed by the noise of billiard balls and blinded by the smoke of the players' pipes, he wrote, under the insolent gaze of a dirty waiter, first one letter, then another, and finally a third. How horrified he would have been had Suzanne seen him sitting there! But, on the other hand, he felt that he could not wait until he got home to tell her what he had to say, and in the following terms, that would have greatly surprised Baron Desforges had he read them and been told that they were addressed to his Suzette of the Rue du Mont-Thabor, he gave vent to his excessive grief:

'I have written you several letters, madame, and torn them up, and I am not sure that I shall send you this one, so great is my fear of displeasing you by the crude expression of sentiments which I am sure would not displease you if you really knew them. Alas! we cannot bare our hearts, and will you believe me when I tell you that the feelings which prompt me to write this letter have nothing in them that would offend the most sensitive and pure-minded woman--not even yourself, madame? But you know so little of me, and the feeling which, with the divine sincerity of a soul that abhors concealment, you have permitted me to see, has been such a surprise that, by the time I am writing these lines, it has probably been already banished and effaced from your heart for ever. If that be so, do not answer this letter--do not even read it. I shall know what to make of your silence, and will bow to your decision. I shall suffer cruelly, but my gratitude to you will be eternal for having procured me the absolute and unalloyed delight of seeing the Ideal of all my youthful dreams in the flesh. For such happiness I can never be sufficiently grateful, even were I to die of grief through having met you only to lose you. You crossed my path, and by your existence alone you have proved that my ideal was no myth. However hard my lot may one day be, this dear, divine memory will be to me a talisman, a magic charm.

'But, unworthy as I am, should the feeling that I read in your eyes this morning--how beautiful they were at that moment, and how I shall always remember them!--should, I say, that feeling conquer your virtuous indignation, should that sympathy with which you reproached yourself still live in your heart, should you remain, in spite of yourself, the woman who wept when she heard me confess my love and adoration--then I conjure you, madame, to wrest some pity from that sympathy. Before confirming the sentence to which I am quite ready to submit--that terrible sentence never to see you more--let me ask you to put me to one single proof. My request is so humble, and so subservient to your will. Hear it, I beg. If I have guessed rightly from the all too short and fleeting conversations we have had, your life, though apparently so complete, is devoid of many things. Have you never felt the need of having near you a friend to whom you could confide your troubles, a friend who would never speak to you again as he once dared to do, but who would be content to breathe the same air as yourself, and to share your joys and sorrows--a friend on whom you could rely, whom you could take or leave at your sweet will--in a word, a thing of your own, whose very thoughts would be yours? Such a friend, with no desire beyond that of serving you, regretting only that he has not always done so, and entertaining no criminal hopes whatever, is what I dreamt of becoming before that interview in which my feelings were stronger than my will. And I feel that I love you sufficiently to realise that dream even now. Nay, do not shake your head. I am sincere in my entreaties, sincere in my determination never to utter a word which will make you repent your forbearance if you decide to put me to this proof. Will it not be time enough to banish me from your presence when you think me in danger of breaking the promise I now make?

'My God! how empty my phrases seem! I tremble at the thought that you will read these lines, and that is why I can scarcely write them. What will your answer be? Will you call me back to that shrine in the Rue Murillo where you have already been so kind and so full of indulgence that the memory of the minutes spent there falls like balm upon my aching heart? That poor heart beats only for you in obedient and humble admiration. Say--oh! say that you forgive me. Say that you will let me see you once more. Say that you will let us try to be friends. You would say all this, I know, if you could read what is in my heart. And even if you do not speak those blessed words, there shall be no murmuring, no reproaches, nothing but eternal gratitude--gratitude as deep in martyrdom as it would have been in ecstasy. I have learnt to-day how sweet it is to suffer through those one loves!'

It was six o'clock when René posted this letter. He gazed after it as it disappeared in the box, and no sooner had it left his hand than he began to regret having sent it, the anguish of suspense respecting the result being greater than his sufferings of the afternoon. In his disturbed state of mind he had entirely forgotten his daily habits and the fact that he had never stayed from home a whole day without giving some previous explanation. He sat down to dinner in the first restaurant he came across, without a thought of his people at home, and completely absorbed in speculations as to what Suzanne would do after reading his effusion. The first thing that awoke him from his state of semi-somnambulism was the exclamation of Françoise when, having reached home on foot about half-past nine, he opened the door and found himself face to face with the big, clumsy maid, who nearly dropped the lamp with fright.

'Oh! sir,' she cried; 'if you only knew how uneasy you've made Madame Fresneau--it's sent her into fits.'

As Emilie ran out into the passage to meet him René said, 'You don't mean to say that you've been upset by my not coming home? I couldn't help it,' he added in an undertone as he kissed her; 'it was on _her_ account.'

Emilie, who had really spent a most wretched evening, looked at her brother. She saw that he too had been greatly agitated, and that his eyes were burning feverishly; she had not the courage to reproach him with selfishness in paying no regard to her own unreasonable susceptibilities--though he knew them so well--and replied in a whisper, as she pointed to the half-open door of the dining-room: 'The Offarels are here.'

These simple words sufficed to give a sudden turn to René's feelings. His fever of suspense was dispelled by a more pressing fear. During the sweetest moments of his walk through the Louvre that morning the memory of Rosalie had been able to give him pain--even when he was with Suzanne! And now he was obliged to unexpectedly face--not a vision--but the girl herself, to meet those eyes which he had avoided in such cowardly fashion for days past, to gaze upon that pallor which he himself had caused. A sense of his treachery once more came over him, but this time it was more painful and acute than ever. He had spoken words of love to another woman before breaking off his engagement with her whom he justly regarded as his betrothed.

He entered the dining-room as if he were walking to the scaffold, and had no sooner come under the full light of the lamp than he saw by the look in Rosalie's eyes that she read his heart like an open book. She was seated between Fresneau and Madame Offarel, working as usual, her feet resting on the supports of an empty chair upon which she had placed her ball of wool and her father's hat; this, as René knew well enough, was only an innocent ruse to get him to sit near her when he came home. She and her mother were knitting some long mittens for old Offarel, who had now got hold of an idea that he was going to have gout in his wrists. Her fanciful parent was there, too, drinking, in spite of his imaginary ills, a glass of good strong grog and playing piquet with the professor. It was Emilie who had proposed the game in order to discourage general conversation, and so be able to give herself up to thoughts of her absent brother, whilst Angélique Offarel had been helping her to unravel some skeins of silk. A soft light illumined this quiet, peaceful scene, symbolical, in the poet's eyes, of all that had so long constituted his happiness, and which he had now given up for ever. Fortunately for him the professor immediately made his loud voice heard, and so put an end to his further reflections.

'Young man,' cried Fresneau, 'you can boast of having a sister who thinks something of you, I can tell you! She was actually proposing to sit up all night! "Something must have happened to him. He would have sent a wire." For two pins she would have sent me off to the Morgue. It was no use my suggesting that some one had kept you to dinner. Come, Offarel, it's your deal.'

'I had to go into the country,' replied René, 'and I lost the train.'

'How badly he tells them!' thought Emilie, admiring her brother as much for his unskilfulness, which in this case was a sign of honesty, as she would have admired him for Machiavelian cleverness.

'You look rather pale,' observed Madame Offarel aggressively, 'aren't you well?'

'Shall I make room for you here, Monsieur René?' asked Rosalie, with a timid smile; 'I'll take away papa's hat.'

'Give it to me,' said old Offarel, perceiving a place for it on the sideboard; 'it will be safer here. It's my Number One, and mamma would scold me if any harm came to it.'

'It's been Number One for such a long time,' cried Angélique, with a laugh. 'Look here, papa, here's a real Number One,' she added, holding up René's hat under the lamp-light and comparing its glossy nap with the shabby silk and old-fashioned shape of her father's headgear, much to the latter's disadvantage.

'But nothing is too good for Monsieur René now,' observed Madame Offarel with her usual acrimony, venting the rest of her displeasure upon Angélique, whose action had annoyed her. 'You'll be lucky if your husband is always as well dressed as your father.'

René was seated by Rosalie's side, and let the epigram of the terrible _bourgeoise_ pass unnoticed, taking no part either in the rest of the conversation, which Emilie wisely led round to cookery topics. Madame Offarel was almost as keen on this subject as she was on that of her feline pets. Not content with having recipes of her own for all kinds of dishes, such as _coulis d'écrevisses_, her triumph, and _canard sauce Offarel_, as she had proudly named it, she also kept a list of addresses where specialities might be obtained. Treating Paris like Robinson Crusoe treated his island, she would, from time to time, start out on a foraging expedition to the most remote quarters of the capital, going to some particular shop for her coffee and to another for her _pâtes d'Italie._ She knew the exact date on which a certain man received his consignment of Bologna sausages, and when another got his Spanish olives in.

The slightest incidents of these excursions were magnified by her into events. Sometimes she would go on foot, and then her comments on the improvements she had noticed, on the increase in the traffic, and on the superiority of the air in the Rue de Bagneux were inexhaustible. At other times she would go by omnibus, and then her fellow-passengers formed the subject of her remarks. She had met a very nice woman who was very fat, or a young man who was very impertinent; the conductor had recognised her and said good morning; the 'bus had nearly been upset three times; an old gentleman--'decorated'--had had some trouble in alighting. 'I really thought he would fall, poor, dear old man!'

The insignificant and superfluous details upon which it pleased the poor woman's simple mind to dilate generally amused René, for the _bourgeoise_ sometimes hit upon some curious figures of speech in her flow of words. She would say, for instance, when speaking of a fellow-passenger who was paying attentions to a cook laden with provisions, 'Some people like their pockets greasy,' or of two persons quarrelling, 'They fought like Darnajats'--a mysterious expression which she had always refused to translate.

But that evening there was too pronounced a contrast between the state of romantic excitement into which his interview with Suzanne had thrown the poet and the meanness of the surroundings in which he had been born. He did not stop to think that similar contrasts are to be found in every form of life, and that the substrata of the fashionable world are composed of mean rivalries, of disgusting attempts to keep up illusory appearances, and of compromises of conscience compared with which the narrow-mindedness of the middle classes is a proof of the most delightful simplicity.

He looked at Rosalie, and the resemblance between the girl and her mother struck him most forcibly. She was pretty, for all that. Her oval face, pale with evident grief, had an ivory tint as she bent down over her knitting in the lamp-light, and when she raised her eyes to his the sincerity of the passion that animated her shone forth from beneath her long lashes. But why were her eyes of precisely the same shade of colour as her mother's? Why, with twenty-four years between them, had they the same shape of brow, the same cut of the chin, and the same lines of the mouth? But how unjust to blame this innocent child for that resemblance, for that pallor, for that grief, and even for the silence in which she wrapped herself! Alas! that it should be so, but when we have wronged a woman it is easy enough to find an inexhaustible source of unjust complaints against her.

Rosalie had unwittingly committed the crime of adding remorse to the feelings brought into play by René's fresh passion. She represented that past which we never forgive if it becomes an obstacle between us and our future. False as most women are in matters of love, their perfidy can never sufficiently punish the secret selfishness of the majority of men. If René had had the sorry courage of his friend Claude Larcher, and looked himself straight in the face, he would have had to confess that the real cause of his irritation lay in the fact that he had deceived Rosalie. But he was a poet, and one who was an adept at throwing a veil over the ugly parts of his soul.

He therefore compelled himself to think of Suzanne, and of the noble love which had sprung up and was burning within him; for the first time he succeeded in forming a resolve to break definitely with Rosalie, saying to himself, 'I will be worthy of _her!_' _She_ was the lying wanton who, with her luxurious surroundings, her rare science of dress, her incomparable power of aping sentiment, and her seductive, soul-troubling beauty, had such immense advantages over sweet, simple-hearted Rosalie. Her beauty once more rose up before René's enslaved imagination just as old Offarel was giving the signal for departure by rising and saying to Fresneau, 'I've won fourteen _sous_ from you--ha! ha! that'll keep me in cigars for a week. Come,' he added, turning to his wife, 'are you ladies ready?'

'Since we are all here,' replied Madame Offarel, emphasising the word 'all' by darting a look at René. 'When are you coming to dinner? Would Saturday suit you? That's M. Fresneau's best day, I believe?' The professor replying in the affirmative, she now addressed herself to the poet direct, 'Will that suit you, René? You'll be more comfortable at our place, I can assure you, than amongst all those grand people on whom your friend Larcher goes sponging.'

'But, Madame----' exclaimed the poet.

'Oh--that's enough!' cried the old lady; 'I always remember what my dear mother used to say: a crust of bread at home is better than a stuffed turkey at another's table.'

Although this epigram of Rosalie's mother was simply nonsense when applied to the unhappy Claude, whose acute dyspepsia seldom permitted him to drink even a glass of wine, it wounded René as deeply as if it had been thoroughly deserved. This was because he saw in it yet another sign of deep and ever-increasing hostility between his old associations and the new life for which since that morning he so eagerly and ardently longed. These people had a right to him--a fuller right than Madame Offarel knew, for was he not bound to Rosalie by a secret understanding? A fresh fit of irritation against this poor child came over him, and he said to himself more firmly than before, 'I shall break it off.'

Having arrived at that decision, he went to bed, but could not sleep. The current of his ideas had changed. He was now thinking of his letter. It must have reached Suzanne by this, and a series of unforeseen dangers spread itself out before his imagination. Suppose her husband were to intercept the letter? A thrill ran through him as he thought of the misery his imprudence might bring down upon this poor woman, in the power of a tyrant whose brutality he could well imagine. And then, even if the letter reached Suzanne safely, what if it displeased her? And he was sure that such would be the case. He tried to remember the words he had written. 'How can I have been such a fool as to write like that?' he asked himself, and hoped that the letter might miscarry. He knew that such things happened sometimes when people wished the contrary. Why should it not happen now that he expressly desired it? He grew quite ashamed of his childishness, and attributing it to the nervous excitement of the evening, began once more to curse Madame Offarel's mean-spirited remarks. His irritability against the mother paralysed all pity for the daughter. He passed the night in this fashion, tossed between two kinds of tortures, until he fell into that deep morning sleep which is more tiring than refreshing; on awaking, the first thought that occurred to him was his desire, stronger than ever, to break off his engagement.

What means could he employ? A very simple expedient presented itself to his mind at once--ask the girl to make an appointment. It was so easy, too! How many times had she not let him know when Madame Offarel would be out, so that he could come to the Rue Bagneux sure of finding her alone with Angélique; and how considerate the latter had always been in leaving the two lovers together and in peace! This was undoubtedly the most loyal means to adopt. But the poet could not even bear to think of such an interview.

In such crises we are sometimes assailed by a contemptible form of pity that consists in unwillingness to look upon the sufferings we have caused. We do not mind inflicting torture upon the woman we cast off, but we do not care to see her tears. It was only natural that René should try to spare himself this insufferable pain by writing--the resource of the weak in every kind of rupture. Paper can stand a good deal, people say. He got out of bed and commenced to write--but the words would not flow easily, and he was obliged to stop. Meanwhile the hour for the postman's first call was drawing near. Although it was perfect madness to expect Suzanne's reply by that delivery, the lover's heart beat faster when Emilie entered the room with his letters and the newspaper, as was her wont when she knew he was awake. How happy would he have been had one of the three envelopes she brought him borne that long, elegant hand which, though seen but once, he would have recognised amongst a hundred others! No--these were only business letters, which he tossed aside so petulantly that his sister stared at him in surprise.

'Are you in trouble, René?' she asked, and as she put the question there was a look of such intense devotion and love in her eyes that she appeared to her brother like a guardian angel come to save him from the troubles of that cruel night. Why should he not charge Emilie with the utterance of those words he dared not formulate himself, and which he could not manage to put into writing? He had no sooner conceived this plan of getting over the difficulty than he hastened to carry it out with the impetuosity common to all weak minds, and with tears in his eyes he began to disclose the unfortunate plight he was in with regard to Rosalie.

He told his sister exactly how the whole matter stood. Whilst his mind was in that state of excitement frequently caused by confessions, fresh ideas originated within him and strengthened the resolve he had made. They were, however, such as ought to have occurred to him at the time he was entering into those relations which he now regarded as guilty ones. When the intimacy had first sprung up between them--a purely innocent but clandestine affair--he had not told himself that strict morality forbids any secret engagement of this kind, and that to accustom a girl to elude the watchfulness of her parents is a most reprehensible proceeding. He had not told himself then that a man of honour has no right to declare his love until he has satisfied himself as to its stability, and that, although the ardour of passion excuses many weaknesses, a mere desire for obtaining fresh emotions makes such weakness sinful. These reproaches and many more were now in his mind and on his lips, and as he looked in Emilie's face he plainly saw what pain his conduct had caused his confiding sister. In a narrow home circle such dissimulation is productive of much grief to those who have been its victims. But though Madame Fresneau felt as though she had been imposed upon, she vented all her anger upon the girl, and upon her alone, exclaiming, after her brother had told her what he wanted her to do, 'I never would have believed her so deceitful.'

'Don't blame her,' said René shamefacedly. If their relations had remained hidden, whose fault was it? He therefore added: 'I am the guilty one.'

'You!' cried Emilie, folding him in her arms. 'No, no; you are too good, too loving. But I will do what you wish, and I promise you I'll be as gentle as possible. It was the best thing you could have done to come to me. We women know how to smooth things down. And then, you know, it is only right that you should put an end to such a false position. The sooner it's over the better, so I shall go to the Rue Bagneux this very afternoon. If I can't see her alone I will ask her to meet me somewhere.'

In spite of the confidence she had expressed in her own tact, Emilie became so impressed with the difficulties of her mission that, during lunch, she wore a look of anxiety that made her husband feel uneasy and awakened in René feelings of remorse. In employing a third person to tell Rosalie the truth was he not acting in a particularly cruel manner and adding unnecessary humiliation to unavoidable pain? When his sister came to him ready dressed, just before starting on her errand, he was on the point of stopping her. There was still time--but he let her go. He heard the door close. Emilie was in the street--now she was in the Rue d'Assas--now in the Rue du Cherche-Midi.

But such thoughts as these were soon dispelled by the fever of anxiety with which he awaited the arrival of the next post. Suzanne must have had his letter that morning. If she had replied at once the answer would come by the next delivery. This idea, and the approach of the moment in which its correctness would be tested, at once cut short his pity for the girl he had cast off. Complex as are the subtle workings of the heart, love simplifies them wondrously. René was tortured by the suspense felt by all lovers, from the simple soldier who expects an ill-spelt letter from his sweetheart to the royal prince carrying on a sentimental correspondence with the brightest and most heartless Court beauty. The man wishes to go on with his usual occupations, but his mind is on the alert, counting the minutes and unable to endure the torment of waiting. He looks at the clock, and imagines all kinds of possibilities. If he dared he would go twenty times an hour to the person from whom he gets his letters, and ask whether there is nothing for him. Such is the agony of waiting, with all its intense anxiety, its mad conjectures, the burning fever of its illusions and disenchantments. Every other feeling of the soul is burnt up and, consumed in this fire of impatience. When Emilie came back, after having been gone an hour and a half, René seemed to have entirely forgotten on what errand he had sent her, but there was such a look of pain on his sister's face that it quite startled him.

'Well?' he ejaculated, in a tone of suspense.

'It is all over,' she replied, almost in a whisper. 'Oh, René, how I misjudged her!'

'What did she say?'

'Not a word of reproach. She only wept--but, oh, how bitterly! Her love for you is greater than I thought. Her mother had gone out with Angélique--how cruel it sounds!--to order the things for Saturday's dinner. I, for one, am not going to that dinner. When Rosalie opened the door, she turned so pale that I thought she was going to faint. She guessed everything before I said a word. She is like I am with you--it is a kind of second sight. She took me into her room. It is full of you--of your portraits, of trifles that remind her of places you've been to together, and of cuts from the illustrated papers about your play. I began to deliver your message as gently as I could, but I give you my word I was quite as upset as she was. She said, "It is so good of him to have asked you to come. You at least will not think me foolish in loving him as I do." And then she went on, "I have been expecting it for some time. It seemed too good to be true. Ask him to let me keep his letters." Oh, my God! I can't tell you any more about it now. I am so afraid for you, my dear René; I am so afraid that her grief may bring you ill luck.'