Valentine (16 page)

“Give me some,
Madame la fermière!”

Although they drank native wine at the farm, Monsieur Lhéry had some excellent champagne in reserve for great occasions ; but no one indulged in it. The mental intoxication was strong enough. Those healthy young people had no need to excite their nerves and lash their blood. After dinner they played hide-and-seek in the fields. Even Monsieur and Madame Lhéry, relieved at last from the cares of the day, took part in the game. A pretty maid-servant at the farm and the tenant-farmer's children were also admitted. Soon the fields rang with joyous shouts and laughter. It was the last blow to Bénédict's reason. To pursue Valentine, slacken his pace to let her gain on him and force her to go astray in the bushes, then to pounce upon her unexpectedly, laugh at her shrieks and her ruses, to overtake her at last and not dare to touch her, but to see her heaving bosom, her rosy cheeks and her moist eyes, was too much for one day.

Athénaïs, noticing these frequent absences of Bénédict and Valentine, and wishing to make him run after her, proposed that the pursuer should be blindfolded.
She cunningly tied the handkerchief over Bénédict's eyes, thinking that he could no longer select his victim ; but little did Bénédict care for the bandage ! The instinct of love, that powerful, magic spell which enables the lover to recognize the air through which his mistress has passed, guided him as unerringly as his eyes. He always caught Valentine, and was even happier than in the other game, for he could take her in his arms, and, pretending not to recognize her, keep her there a long time. Games of that sort are the most dangerous things in the world.

At last night came, and Valentine spoke of returning home. Bénédict was beside her, and could not conceal his disappointment.

“Already !” he cried in a loud, rough tone, which carried conviction of the true state of affairs to Valentine's heart.

“Already!” she replied, “the day has seemed very short to me.”

She kissed her sister, but she was not thinking of Louise when she made that remark.

The carriage was made ready. Bénédict promised himself a few more moments of happiness, but the young women seated themselves in a way to disappoint expectations. Louise sat on the back seat in order not to be seen in the neighborhood of the château. Her sister sat beside her. Athénaïs took her place on the front seat beside her cousin ; he was so angry that he did not speak to her during the whole drive.

At the park gate, Valentine asked him to stop because of Louise, who was afraid of being seen in spite of the darkness. Bénédict leaped to the ground in order to help her to alight. All was dark and silent about that sumptuous abode, which Bénédict would have been glad to see sink
into the earth. Valentine kissed her sister and Athénaïs, gave her hand to Bénédict, who ventured to kiss it this time, and hurried away across the park. Through the gate, Bénédict watched the fluttering of her white dress for a few moments as it receded through the trees: he would have forgotten the whole earth had not Athénaïs called him from the carriage and said sharply:

“Well, are you going to leave us to pass the night here ?”

At the farm, no one slept during the night which followed that day. Athénaïs complained of feeling ill when they returned; her mother was very anxious, and consented to go to bed only at Louise's earnest entreaty. The latter agreed to pass the night with her young friend, and Bénédict retired to his own room where, torn as he was between joy and remorse, he was unable to obtain an instant's sleep.

As a result of the fatigue caused by a hysterical attack, Athénaïs slept soundly; but soon the troubles which had tormented her during the day entered into her dreams, and she began to weep bitterly. Louise, who was dozing in a chair, woke with a start when she heard her sobbing, and, leaning over affectionately, asked her the cause of her tears. Obtaining no reply, she saw that she was asleep, and hastened to rouse her from that painful state. Louise was the most compassionate creature on earth ; she had suffered so much on her own
account, that she could sympathize with all the troubles of another. She put forth all the gentleness and kindliness at her command to comfort the girl, but she only threw her arms about her neck, crying :

“Why do you also try to deceive me ? Why do you try to prolong an error which must come to an end sooner or later ? My cousin doesn't love me ; he never will love me, and you know it very well ! Come, confess that he has told you so.”

Louise was sorely embarrassed to reply. After Bénédict's
never
—a word of which she had no means of estimating the real meaning—she dared not guarantee the future to her young friend, for fear of becoming a party to a deception. On the other hand, she would have been glad to find some excuse for consoling her, for her grief caused her sincere pain. So she strove to prove to her that, even if her cousin had no love for her, it certainly was not probable that he loved any other woman, and she did her utmost to encourage the hope that she would eventually triumph over his coldness ; but Athénaïs would listen to nothing.

“No, no, my dear young lady,” she replied, abruptly wiping away her tears, “I must make the best of it. I shall die of grief, perhaps, but I will do my best to cure myself. It is too humiliating to see one's self despised thus. I have plenty of other suitors ! If Bénédict thinks he is the only man in the world who's courting me, he's mistaken. I know some others who won't think me so unworthy to be sought after. He will see ! he will see that I'll have my revenge, that I won't be long unprovided, that I'll marry Georges Simonneau or Pierre Blutty, or else Blaise Moret. To be sure I can't endure 'em. Oh ! yes, I know well enough that I shall hate the man who marries me instead of Bénédict I But it
will be his fault; and if I go to the bad, he will be responsible for it before God !”

“All this won't happen, my dear child,” replied Louise ; “ you won't find among your numerous adorers a man who can be compared to Bénédict for intellect and refinement and talent, just as he, for his part, will never find a woman who excels you in beauty and attachment to him.”

“Oh ! stop there, my dear Mademoiselle Louise, stop. I am not blind, nor you either. It's easy enough to see when one has eyes, and Monsieur Bénédict doesn't take much pains to avoid ours. Nothing could be clearer to me than his actions to-day. Ah ! if she wasn't your sister, how I'd hate her !”

“Hate Valentine ! your playmate from childhood, who loves you so dearly and is so far from imagining such a thing as you suspect! Valentine, who is so affectionate and kind-hearted, but so reserved because of her modesty ! Ah ! how she would suffer, Athénaïs, if she could guess what is going on in your heart!”

“Ah ! you are right!” said the girl, weeping afresh ; “ I am very unjust, very impertinent to accuse her of such a thing ! I know very well that if such a thought should occur to her, she would shudder with anger. But that is what drives me to despair on Bénédict's account; that is what makes me frantic with his madness: to see him make himself miserable to no purpose. What does he hope for, pray ? What insane freak draws him on to his destruction ? Why must he fall in love with the woman who can never be anything to him, while there is one right at his hand who would bring him youth, love and wealth ? O Bénédict! Bénédict! what sort of man are you ? Yes, and what sort of woman am I, that I cannot make him love me ? You have all deceived me ;
you told me that I was pretty, that I had talent, that I was lovable and attractive. You deceived me ; you see well enough that I am not attractive !”

Athénaïs ran her hands through her black hair as if she would tear it out ; but her glance fell upon the lemonwood dressing table beside her bed, and the mirror contradicted her so flatly that she became somewhat reconciled to herself.

“You are very childish!” said Louise. “How can you believe that Bénédict is already in love with my sister, whom he has seen only three times ?”

“Only three times ! Oh ! only three times !”

“Call it four or five, what does it matter ? Surely, if he loves her, it must be very recent, for only yesterday he told me that Valentine was the loveliest, the most estimable of women——”

“You see, the loveliest, the most estimable——”

“Wait a moment. He said that she was worthy of the homage of the whole world, and that her husband would be the most fortunate of men. ‘And yet,‘ he added, ‘I think that I could live near her for ten years without falling in love with her, her frank trustfulness inspires so much respect, her pure and serene expression diffuses such tranquillity all about her !'”

“He said that yesterday ?”

“I swear it by my affection for you.”

“Oh, yes! but that was yesterday! to-day it is all changed !”

“Do you think, pray, that Valentine has lost the charm that made her so imposing ?”

“Perhaps she has acquired other charms ; who knows ? love comes so swiftly ! Why, it is hardly a month since I began to love my cousin. I didn't love him before that. I hadn't seen him since he left school, and I was so young
then ! And I remember him as being so tall and awkward and embarrassed by his arms, which were too long for his sleeves ! But when I found him so elegant and attractive, carrying himself so well and knowing so many things, and with that glance of his, just a little stern, which is so becoming to him, and makes one always a little afraid of him—why, I loved him from that minute, and all at once; between night and morning my heart was taken by surprise. What was to prevent Valentine from taking his to-day in the same way ? She is very beautiful, Valentine is; she always has the knack of saying just what's in Bénédict's mind. It seems to me that she divines what he wants to hear her say, and I do just the opposite. Where does she get that knack ? Oh ! it's not because he's disposed to admire what she says. And, then, even if it were just a fancy, begun this morning and ended to-night, suppose he should come to me to-morrow and hold out his hand and say: ‘ Let's make up ;' I see well enough that I haven't really won him and that I never shall win him. Just think what a happy life I should lead, married to him, if I should have to be always weeping with rage or burning up with jealousy ! No, no, it will be much better to invent some excuse and give it up.”

“Well, my dear girl,” said Louise, “as you can't put this suspicion out of your mind, we must find out the truth. To-morrow I will speak to Bénédict; I will question him frankly concerning his intentions, and, whatever the truth may be, you shall be informed. Do you feel that you have the courage to bear it ?”

“Yes,” Athénaïs replied, kissing her; “I prefer to know my fate rather than live in such torments.”

“Make up your mind then to try to rest,” said Louise, “and don't let your emotion be perceptible
tomorrow. As you do not think that you can count on your cousin's attachment, your womanly dignity demands that you put a good face on the matter.”

“Yes, you are right,” said the girl, burying her face in the bedclothes. “I will follow your advice. I feel stronger already since you take my side.”

This resolution having tranquillized her to some extent, she fell asleep, and Louise, whose heart was much more violently disturbed, waited open-eyed until the first rays of dawn appeared on the horizon. Then she heard Bénédict, who also had been unable to sleep, softly open his door and go downstairs. She followed him without waking anybody, and together, having greeted each other with more than customary gravity, they turned into one of the garden paths, where the dew lay heavily.

Louise was sorely embarrassed at the thought of broaching so delicate a subject, but Bénédict, breaking the silence first, said in a firm tone :

“My friend, I know what you are going to talk about. Our oak partitions are not so thick, there is not so much noise around this house at night, and my sleep was not so sound that I lost a single word of your conversation with my cousin. So that the confession which I proposed to make to you would be absolutely useless now, as you are as well informed as myself of the state of my heart.”

Louise halted and looked him in the face to see if he
were not joking, but his expression was so perfectly calm that she was dumbfounded.

“I know that you have a way of jesting with a marvellously sober face,” she said, “ but I beg you to talk seriously with me. This is not a question of feelings with which you have a right to trifle.”

“God forbid! “said Bénédict, vehemently; “it is a question of the most important and most sacred sentiment of my life; Athénaïs told you, and I swear upon my honor it is true, that I love Valentine with all the strength of my heart.”

Louise clasped her hands with an expression of dire dismay, and, raising them to heaven, cried:

“What utter madness!”

“Why so ?” retorted Bénédict, with that steady gaze whose authoritative expression was so hard to resist.

“Why so ?” echoed Louise. “You ask me that question ! Why, Bénédict, are you under the influence of a dream, or am I fully awake ? You love my sister, you say; what in God's name do you hope from her ?”

“What do I hope? This,” he replied:” I hope to love her all my life.”

“And perhaps you think that she will allow it?”

“Who knows? Perhaps!”

“But surely you know that she is rich—that she is of high birth——”

“She is, like yourself, the daughter of the Comte de Raimbault, and I have presumed to love you ! Was it because I was the son of the peasant Lhéry, pray, that you repulsed me ?”

“No, certainly not,” replied Louise, turning as pale as death; “ but Valentine is not twenty years old, and, even assuming that she had none of the prejudices of birth——”

“She hasn't,” Bénédict interrupted.