CHAPTER XIX

THE "POSTE RESTANTE."

A week had passed since the interview of Madame de Hansfeld and M. de Morville at the Opera.

M. de Morville, overcome by fresh melancholy, had not quitted his mother, who had again relapsed, and was suffering very acutely. He recollected, with a mixture of joy and bitterness, his conversation with Madame de Hansfeld: the cry that had escaped the princess had given him a faint hope of being loved by her, but this rendered the struggle which he had to maintain against duty still more painful.

By a fatality which all men obey, his love increased in proportion to the insurmountable obstacles which separated him from Paula.

For the very reason that he accomplished a painful sacrifice in flying her presence, he consoled himself by nursing this fatal passion deep in his heart's core: sometimes, he sought to revive his ancient love for Lady Melford, and attempted to rekindle the cold ashes of his former affection,--but in vain.

In vain, too, did he ask himself, by what insensible operation he had so suddenly obliterated the deep sentiment which so lately occupied his whole heart--in vain did he ask himself the cause of his love for Madame de Hansfeld. "No doubt she was remarkably beautiful--but as to her heart, her mind, he knew nothing of them. In his sole conversation with the princess, she had been disdainful--ironical--cold."

In this scrutiny into the causes of his passion, M. de Morville forgot the most essential--his letters to Madame de Hansfeld, when he had detected, by a singular intuition of love, nearly all those emotions which had so strongly agitated her. If it be true that we often love from the sacrifices we have made for the object beloved, certain gifted souls love in consequence of the elevation of the feelings with which they are inspired. Thus De Morville owed to his love for Madame de Hansfeld inspirations of the noblest kind.

If it be objected that young, handsome, sensible, sensitive, and surrounded by temptations, M. de Morville must have been another Scipio, to devote himself to an impossible love, after having remained so long faithful to the memory of a beloved woman, we reply that if these instances of phenomenal constancy are sometimes met with, it is particularly amongst young, handsome, sensible, sensitive men, surrounded by temptations. They have had success enough not to be faithless from false shame or to add from vanity one unit more to the amount of their successes in affairs of the heart.

Then the very facility of the triumphs to which they might pretend keeps them from seeking them. In truth, without being absolutely satiated with pleasures, their first excitement having long abated, they become chary of the more sensitive enjoyments, and feel happy in consecrating to them the greater portion of their existence.

They do not require a prosperous love in order thus to exercise their more delicate faculties, but find a soft and saddened charm in the incessant regrets, which arise from a beloved remembrance,--in the tender anguish of a hapless love. In fact they comprehend the ineffable pleasure of melancholy, the refinements of pure and elevated passions.

Men less finely endued, less accustomed to success, are faithful or _disinterested_ in love, from sheer necessity.

Persons like De Morville are so, if we may be allowed the expression, from luxury.

It is because it depends on themselves alone to have, that they find a kind of noble abstinence in not having. And then, indeed (we desire at all risks to excuse the constancy and resignation of our hero), certain dainty tastes know how from time to time to refresh, revivify the sensitiveness of their taste by a discreet abstinence. Having said thus much, and having (at least we hope so) exculpated De Morville from the ridicule inherent in the position of a faithful or unhappy lover, we will give our readers some additional information.

About eight days after his interview with Madame de Hansfeld, De Morville received by post the following letter in an unknown hand:--

"The step now taken with you is strange and foolish; you may perceive in it a reproach, a jest, or a caprice; you may reply to it by silence, by satire, or by disdain; you will not be reproached: there are a thousand reasons, why this step, notwithstanding it is as serious, as solemn as any thing can be in this world, may seem to you ridiculous or unworthy of your attention, still a whole existence is staked, in the hope (almost insane) that the instinct of your heart will reveal to you all that is sincere and serious in the question now asked,--_Is your heart free?_

"It is known that a cherished remembrance filled it for nearly two years; but we are not now referring to the past, we are addressing your well-known honour and frankness. Can you respond to a deep-felt love long cherished in silence and in mystery; a passionate love that you alone can inspire and justify?

"Reply--will you have this love?

"Many men would be proud to share it--this is not said from pride--for this love is cast at your feet with as much humility as fear. If you are free, if you can consecrate, or rather you will allow a whole life to be consecrated to you, say one word, and to-morrow you shall know who wrote this letter.

"Such is the confidence reposed in you, that you will be blindly believed. Nothing could be more easy for you than to deceive a heart entirely occupied with you; you might scorn this love with impunity and treat it as a plaything with the premeditation to break it speedily; you might lightly, carelessly give a mortal blow to a heart too deeply enamoured. This is said because you are known to be good and generous--because it is not too much to rely on your heart and candour for a frank reply. Be that reply what it may, it will be received with gratitude. Your sincerity will at least assuage the bitterness of rejection. This unpropitious love will return to the mystery and obscurity whence it should never have emerged. Although it be not shared, it will be none the less fervent and eternal: you may be insensible to it, but you cannot prevent its existence.

"P.S. Reply '_poste-restante_,' to Paris to Madame Derval."

Whether he was in a train of romantic and melancholy ideas, whether he believed in the sincerity of this letter, or whether, in fact, resolved on refusing the _offer of this heart_, he thus avoided the ridicule of being the dupe of some "fool-born jest," M. de Morville, replied seriously to this proposition, and wrote this, _poste-restante_, to the address of Madame Derval.

"I would a thousand times prefer being the victim of a jest to risking a frivolous reply to the expression of a sentiment for which a right-minded man should always shew himself grateful. If there is one thing I pretend to it is frankness, and I have never committed a base or mean action, I have never considered as vain and trifling the engagements of two hearts which are exchanged--engagements in which a woman almost always places her whole happiness in the honour, her future at the mercy, of a man,--engagements in which the woman risks all, the man nothing. I will therefore reply, _No, my heart is not free; I love, and love without hope._

"Shall I be understood, when I say that in thus replying, I believe I fully appreciate the sentiment which is expressed towards me, and by which I am as much touched as honoured?

"Admitting the reality of the sentiment which is expressed, I am absolved from any presumption by this well-known truth, _To be loved does not prove that we deserve to be loved._ But as for myself I have always thought that those who loved deserved always as much respect as admiration.

"LEON DE MORVILLE."

The next day De Morville received this reply by post:--

"Your noble and generous heart has been justly appreciated--your letter has caused tears to flow, but they fell without bitterness. Your excessive delicacy would, had it been possible, have increased the blind passion with which you have inspired me. Blind passion!--ah!--no--no, never was a love more deeply reflected, more meditated, more rational--for you are capable and worthy of responding to all the exactions of a love the most pure, the most elevated.

"No, the passion you inspire is not blind; but it honours and becomes one like a virtue. Now there is a last favour to ask of you; you will not grant it if it be inopportunely asked, but if, on the other hand, you do concede it, you will easily comprehend how great a consolation it will be to the heart that is filled with your image. To be allowed to write to you from time to time would be much desired, not to speak to you of a love which will never again raise its voice, but to make you hear sometimes the accents of a friendly voice, '_your heart is not free, and you love without hope._'

"This confidence may have cost you something, it may impose duties because it may presage griefs. Those who have suffered ought to repair to those who suffer; and if your love continues unhappy, perhaps in the midst of your sorrows you would hail with gratitude the consolation of a tender and devoted heart, which, better than any other, may compassionate your sorrow.

"Should you be happy, you will be generous, and you will find some kind and gentle words for the unknown friend, whose own griefs will be forgotten in the knowledge of your sufferings or happiness. You are so frank that you do not suspect the frankness of others. The end of this correspondence is not to lay a snare for your affection, or to profit by a moment's anger to offer again to you a heart you have rejected: you will believe this because you know that there are souls worthy of your own: you will believe this because whatever may happen, you will never learn who has written to you.

"Finally, you will see in this resolution neither offended pride nor bitterness. The elevation of feeling which dictates this letter places it out of the pale of such wretched passions. Destiny has willed that this offer of a devoted heart should be made to you too soon or too late. Still that heart is no less yours, that is to say, is still worthy of you.

"Reply '_poste-restante_' to the same address."

The calm and dignity of this fresh letter struck De Morville, and he was touched by it in spite of the preoccupation of his mind for the love of Madame de Hansfeld. He replied with his usual sincerity:--

"I accept with gratitude the offer you make me--my heart is indeed sad: I have never had a confidant, but I should greatly like to give utterance to my feelings, not to recount agreeable or painful facts, and confidants disturb persons, but not sentiments. I may, therefore, find a great charm, a vast comfort in breathing forth my sorrows or my hopes, or in having myself pitied if I suffer, or congratulated if I am happy, by the mysterious and generous friend I have acquired.

"LEON DE MORVILLE."

This last billet written and despatched to its address, De Morville, absorbed by his increasing passion for Madame de Hansfeld, thought but seldom of his mysterious correspondent:--the unknown person (whose name the reader has doubtless guessed) being unwilling by any indiscreet haste to abuse the permission that M. de Morville had given.