Valentine (26 page)

“When she learned of your madness and your crime, Bénédict, Valentine, who undoubtedly was tenderly attached to you, fell suddenly ill. A gleam of hope might save her, perhaps, but she doesn't know that you are alive and that you may be restored to us.”

“Then let her never know it!” cried Bénédict; “ and as the harm is done—as the blow is dealt—let her die with me !”

As he spoke, he tore the bandage from his wound, and would have reopened it, but for Louise, who struggled manfully with him, and fell to the floor exhausted by her exertions and crushed with grief, after saving him from himself.

At another time he seemed to emerge from a profound torpor, and said to Louise, grasping her hand convulsively :

“Why are you here ? Your sister is dying, and you are taking care of me !”

Carried away by a wave of passion and excitement, Louise, forgetting everything, exclaimed:

“And what if I love you even more dearly than I love Valentine ?

In that case you are cursed,” replied Bénédict, pushing her away with a wild look in his eye, “ for you prefer chaos to light, the devil to the archangel! You are a miserable fool! Leave this house ! Am I not unhappy enough, that you must come and tear my heart with your unhappiness ?”

Louise, utterly overwhelmed, hid her face in the curtains and wrapped them about her head to stifle her sobs. Bénédict, too, began to weep, and his tears soothed him.

A moment later he called her back.

“I believe I spoke harshly to you just now,” he said ; “you must forgive something to the delirium of fever.”

Louise replied by simply kissing the hand he held out to her. Bénédict needed all of the little mental force he had recovered to endure without an angry outbreak that manifestation of love and submission. Let him explain it who can. Louise's presence, instead of being a comfort to him, was positively disagreeable; her attentions irritated him. Gratitude contended in his heart with impatience and displeasure. To receive from Louise all those services, all those tokens of devotion, was like a rebuke—a bitter reproach of his love for another. The more disastrous that love proved to be to him, the more he was offended by the efforts which were made to dissuade him from it. He clung to it as one clings to a desperate undertaking, from a feeling of pride. Moreover, even if his heart had been large enough, in his good fortune, to feel any interest in Louise or any compassion for her, it had ceased to be so in his despair. He found his own misfortunes heavy enough to bear, and this sort of appeal to his generosity which Louise ventured to make seemed to him the most selfish and ill-timed of
demands. Such injustice was inexcusable, perhaps, and yet is a man's strength always proportioned to his suffering ? That is a comforting promise of the Gospel; but who is to hold the scales—who shall be the judge ? Does God account to us ? Does he vouchsafe to measure the cup after we have drained it ?

The countess had been absent two days when Bénédict had his most alarming paroxysm of fever. He had to be strapped to his bed. A most cruel tyranny is the tyranny of friendship. It often forces upon us an existence worse than death, and employs arbitrary force to bind us to the pillory of life.

At last Louise, having asked to be left alone with him, pacified him by repeating patiently, and again and again, the name of Valentine.

“Well,” said Bénédict, suddenly, struggling violently to rise, and apparently much surprised, “where is she ?”

“Like you, Bénédict, she is at the door of the tomb,” she replied. “Do you wish to embitter her last moments by dying like a madman ?”

“She is going to die !” he said with a ghastly smile. “Ah ! God is good ! We shall be united then !”

“And suppose she should live ?” said Louise; “suppose she should order you to live ; suppose that she would give you her friendship again as the price of your obedience ?”

“Her friendship!” said Bénédict, with a contemptuous laugh; “ what should I do with it ? You have mine, haven't you ? What do you get out of it ?”

“Oh! you are very cruel, Bénédict!” cried Louise sorrowfully; “but what would I not do to save you? Tell me, then, suppose Valentine loves you, suppose I have seen her, and heard in her delirium confessions which you would never have dared to hope for ?”

“I have received her confession myself!” replied Bénédict, with the apparent calmness with which he often concealed his most violent excitement. “I know that Valentine loves me as I longed to be loved. Now, will you make sport of me ?”

“God forbid!” replied the stupefied Louise.

Louise had stolen into Valentine's room during the previous night. It had been an easy matter for her to send word to and win over the nurse, who was devoted to her, and had rejoiced to see her at her sister's bedside. They had succeeded then in making the unfortunate creature understand for the first time that Bénédict was not dead. At first she had manifested her joy by frantically kissing those two to whom she was so dear; then she had relapsed into a state of complete prostration, and, at the approach of dawn, Louise had been obliged to retire without obtaining a glance or a word from her.

The next day she learned that Valentine was better, and she passed the whole night in attendance on Bénédict, who was worse ; but on the following night, having learned that Valentine had had a relapse, she left Bénédict at the height of his paroxysm and went to her sister. Dividing her time and attention between her two patients, the melancholy but courageous Louise forgot herself.

She found the doctor with Valentine. She was quiet, and was sleeping when her sister entered the room. She took the doctor aside, deeming it her duty to open her heart to him, and to entrust to his sense of delicacy the secrets of the two lovers, so that he might be in a position to try some more efficacious moral treatment.

“You have done exceedingly well,” the physician told her, “to entrust this story to me, but there was no need of it; I should have guessed it even if you had not
informed me. I fully understand your scruples in the delicate situation in which you are placed by social prejudices and customs; but I, who am deeply interested in obtaining physical results, will undertake to soothe these two excited hearts, and to cure one by the other.”

At that moment, Valentine opened her eyes and recognized her sister. After kissing her, she asked under her breath for news of Bénédict Thereupon the doctor interposed :

“Madame,” he said, “I am the one to tell you about him, for I have been attending him, and have had the good fortune to keep him alive thus far. The friend concerning whom you are anxious, and who is entitled to the friendly interest of every noble and generous heart like yours, is now out of danger physically. But his mind is very far from making so rapid a recovery, and you alone can effect its cure.”

“O
mon Dieu!”
said the pale-cheeked Valentine, clasping her hands and gazing into the physician's face with the sad and searching gaze characteristic of the sick.

“Yes, madame,” he continued, “a command from your lips, an encouraging, strengthening word alone can close that wound. It would have been healed before this but for the patient's ghastly persistence in tearing off the bandages as soon as the healing begins. Our young friend is a prey to profound discouragement, and I have no secrets powerful enough to cure mental pain. I need your assistance; will you give it to me ?”

As he spoke, the kind-hearted old country doctor, an obscure practitioner, who had staunched the flow of blood and tears many a time in his life, took Valentine's hand with an affectionate gentleness which was not without a touch of old-fashioned gallantry, and gravely kissed it after counting the pulse.

Valentine, who was too weak to understand what she heard, looked at him with ingenuous surprise and a sad smile.

“Well, my dear child,” said the old man, “will you be my assistant, and come with me and complete his cure ?”

Valentine made no other reply than an artlessly eager gesture.

“To-morrow ?” he added.

“Oh I instantly I” she replied in a feeble but penetrating voice.

“Instantly, my poor child ?” said the doctor, with a smile. “Why, look at these candles ! It's two o'clock in the morning; but, if you will promise to be good and sleep soundly, and not have another attack of fever between now and morning, we will go for a drive in Vavray wood during the forenoon. There's a little cottage in that neighborhood to which you will carry hope and life.”

Valentine pressed the old doctor's hand, allowed herself to be dosed with childlike docility, put her arms around Louise's neck, and fell asleep peacefully on her breast.

“Can you think of such a thing, Monsieur Faure ?” said Louise when she saw that she was dozing. “How do you suppose she will have strength to go out, when she was at death's door only a few hours ago ?”

“She will have strength enough, depend upon it,” replied Monsieur Faure. “These nervous attacks weaken the body only while the paroxysms last. This one is so evidently due to mental causes that a favorable change in her ideas should lead to a similar change in the disease. Several times since she was first taken sick, I have seen Madame de Lansac pass from an alarming state of
prostration to an exhibition of superabundant strength to which I would have liked to give something to feed upon. There are symptoms of the same sort in Bénédict's case; these two people are necessary to each other.”

“Oh ! Monsieur Faure !” said Louise, “ aren't we on the point of doing something very imprudent ?”

“I don't think so. The passions which are dangerous to the existence of individuals as well as of societies are the passions which are irritated and inflamed. Have not I been young ? Have not I been so madly in love that I lost my wits ? Am I not cured ? Haven't I grown old ? Time and experience do everything, I tell you. Let these poor children get well; after they have recovered strength to live, they will find strength to part. But take my advice, and let us hasten the paroxysm of passion. Without our help it may burst out in more alarming fashion; by giving it the sanction of our presence, we shall allay it somewhat.”

“Oh ! I would make any sacrifice for him or for her!” said Louise; “ but what will people say about us, Monsieur Faure ? What a blameworthy part we are going to play !”

“If your conscience doesn't reproach you for it, what have you to fear from what men say ? Haven't they done you all the harm they could do ? Do you owe them much gratitude for such indulgence and charity as you have found in the world ?”

The old man's shrewd and affectionate smile made Louise blush. She undertook to keep Bénédict's house clear of indiscreet witnesses; and, on the following morning, Valentine, Monsieur Faure and the nurse, having driven for an hour or more in the Vavray wood, alighted at a dark and lonely spot, where they told the driver to wait for them. Valentine, leaning on her nurse's arm,
turned into one of the winding paths which go down into the ravine, while Monsieur Faure went ahead to make sure that there was no one in the way at Bénédict's house. Louise had sent everybody away on various pretexts ; she was alone with her sleeping patient. The doctor had forbidden her to tell him of their visit, fearing that the suspense would be painful to him and increase his nervous irritation.

When Valentine approached the door of the cottage, she began to tremble convulsively, but Monsieur Faure went to her and said:

“Come, madame, this is the time to have courage and give some to those who lack it; remember that my patient's life is in your hands.”

Valentine instantly repressed her emotion with that strength of soul which should destroy all the arguments of materialism, and entered the dismal, dimly-lighted room where the wounded man lay between his four green serge curtains.

Louise would have led her sister to Bénédict's bedside, but Monsieur Faure took her hand.

“We are in the way here, my dear inquisitive young lady,” he said; “let us go to admire the vegetables in the garden. And do you, Catherine,” he said to the nurse, “install yourself on this bench, in the doorway; and if anyone appears on the path, clap your hands to notify us.”

He led away Louise, who suffered beyond words during that interview. We cannot assert that an involuntary but stinging jealousy did not count for much in the bitterness of her position and in the reproaches which she heaped upon herself.

At the slight noise made by the curtain rings sliding on the rusty pole, Bénédict partly rose, half-awake, and whispered Valentine's name. He had just seen her in his dreams, but, when he saw her standing before him in the flesh, he uttered a cry of joy, which Louise heard in the garden, and which pierced her breast.

“Valentine,” he said, “was it your ghost that just now called me ? I am ready to follow you.”

Valentine sank on a chair.

“I have come to command you to live,” she replied, “or to beg you to kill me with you.”

“I should prefer that,” said Bénédict.

“O my friend,” said Valentine, “suicide is a wicked act; but for that, we should be together in the tomb. But God forbids it. He would curse us. He would punish us by an everlasting separation. Let us accept life, whatever it may bring. Have you not a thought in your heart to give you courage ?”

“What thought, Valentine ? Tell me.”

“Is not my friendship——”

“Your friendship? It is much more than I deserve, madame ; so that I do not feel worthy to respond to it, and I will not. Ah! Valentine, you ought to sleep all the time, for the purest woman becomes a hypocrite when she wakes. Your friendship!”

“Oh! you are selfish; you care nothing for my remorse !”

“I respect it, madame ; that is why I wish to die. Why
did you come here ? You must throw aside all religion, all scruples, and come to me and say : ‘ Live, and I will love you ; ‘ or else stay at home, forget me and let me die. Have I asked you for anything ? have I tried to embitter your life ? have I made a plaything of your happiness—of your principles ? have I so much as implored your pity? Look you, Valentine, this compassion for me which you display, this humane sentiment which brings you here, this friendship which you offer me—they are all meaningless words, which would have deceived me a month ago when I was a child and when a glance from you kept me alive for a whole day. Now, I have lived too much, I have learned too much about the passions, to be blind. I will not carry on a fruitless, insane struggle against my fate any longer. You ought to resist me, I know ; that you will do it, I have no doubt. You will toss me now and then a word of encouragement and compassion, to help me suffer, and even that you will reproach yourself for as a crime, and you will have to have absolution from a priest before you can forgive yourself for it. Your life will be made wretched, ruined by me; your heart, which has always been serene and untroubled, will be henceforth storm-tossed like mine ! God forbid ! And I, despite these sacrifices, which seem so great to you, I shall be the most miserable of men. No, no, Valentine, let us not deceive ourselves. I must die. Being the woman that you are, you cannot love me without remorse and a tormented conscience ; I do not desire a happiness which would cost you so dear. Far from blaming you, I love you so fervently and so passionately because of your very virtue and your strength of character. So remain as you are ; do not descend to a lower level to be with me. Live and deserve heaven hereafter. For myself, my heart is in hell, and I propose
to go thither. Adieu, Valentine; you came to bid me adieu, and I thank you.”