The Indiscretion of the Duchess/Chapter 18
CHAPTER XVIII.
A Strange Good Humor
OR a moment Marie Delhasse stood looking at me; then she uttered a low cry, full of relief, of security, of joy; and coming to me stretched out her hands, saying:
“You are here then, after all!”
Charmed to see how she greeted me, I had not the heart to tell her that her peril was not past; nor did she give me the opportunity, for went on directly:
“And you are wounded? But not badly, not badly, Mr. Aycon?”
“Who told you I was wounded?”
“Why, the duke. He said that you had been shot by a thief, and were very badly hurt; and—and” She stopped, blushing.
(“Where is he?” I remembered the words; my forecast of their meaning had been true.)
“And did what he told you,” I asked softly, “make you leave the convent and come to find me?”
“Yes,” she answered, taking courage and meeting my eyes. “And then you were not here, and I thought it was a trap.”
“You were right; it was a trap. I came to find you at the convent, but you were gone: only by the chance of meeting with a friend who saw the duke’s carriage standing here have I found you.”
“You were seeking for me?”
“Yes, I was seeking for you.”
I spoke slowly, as though hours were open for our talk; but suddenly I remembered that at any moment the old witch might return. And I had much to say before she came.
“Marie” I began eagerly, never thinking that the name she had come to bear in my thoughts could be new and strange from my lips. But the moment I had uttered it I perceived what I had done, for she drew back further, gazing at me with inquiring eyes, and her breath seemed arrested. Then, answering the question in her eyes, I said simply:
“For what else am I here, Marie?” and I caught her hand in my left hand.
She stood motionless, still silently asking what I would. And I kissed her hand. And again the low cry, lower still—half a cry and half a sigh—came from her, and she drew timidly nearer to me; and I drew her yet nearer, whispering, in a broken word or two, that I loved her.
But she, still dazed, looked up at me, whispering, “When, when?”
And I could not tell her when I had come to love her, for I did not know then—nor can I recollect now; nor have I any opinion about it, save that it speaks ill for me that it was not when first I set my eyes upon her. But she doubted, remembering that I had seemed fancy-struck with the little duchess, and cold, maybe stern, to her; and because, I think, she knew that I had seen her tempted. And to silence her doubts, I kissed her lips. She did not return my kiss, but stood with wondering eyes. Then in an instant a change came over her face. I felt her press my hand, and for an instant or two her lips moved, but I heard no words, nor do I think that the unheard words were for my ear; and I bowed my head.
Yet time pressed. Again I collected my thoughts from this sweet reverie—wherein what gave me not least joy was the perfect trust she showed in me, for that is perhaps the one thing in this world that a man may be proud to win—and said to her:
“Marie, you must listen. I have something to tell you.”
“Oh, you’ll take me away from them?” she cried, clutching my hand in both of hers.
“I can’t now,” I answered. “You must be brave. Listen: if I try to take you away now, it may be that I should be killed and you left defenseless. But this evening you can be safe, whatever befalls me.”
“Why, what should befall you?” she asked, with a swift movement that brought her closer to me.
I had to tell her the truth, or my plan for her salvation would not be carried out.
“To-night I fight the duke. Hush! hush! Yes, I must fight with the duke—yes, wounded arm, my darling, notwithstanding. We shall leave here about five and go down to the bay toward the Mount, and there on the sands we shall fight. And—listen now—you must follow us, about half an hour after we have gone.”
“But they will not let me go.”
“Go you must. Marie, here is a pistol. Take it; and if anyone stops you, use it. But I think none will; for the duke will be with me, and I do not think Bontet will interfere.”
“But my mother?”
“You are as strong as she.”
“Yes, yes, I’ll come. You’ll be on the sands; I’ll come!” The help she had found in me made her brave now.
“You will get there as we are fighting or soon after. Do not look for me or for the duke, but look for two gentlemen whom you do not know, they will be there—French officers—and to their honor you must trust.”
“But why not to you?”
“If I am alive and well, I shall not fail you; but if I come not, go to them and demand their protection from the duke, telling them how he has snared you here. And they will not suffer him to carry you off against your will. Do you see? Do you understand?”
“Yes, I see. But must you fight?”
“Yes, dear, I must fight. The duke will not trouble you again, I think, before the evening; and if you remember what I have told you, all will be well.”
So I tried to comfort her, believing as I did that no two French gentlemen would desire or dare to refuse her their protection against the duke. But she was clinging to me now, in great distress that I must fight—and indeed I had rather have fought at another time myself—and in fresh terror of her mother’s anger, seeing that I should not be there to bear it for her.
“For,” she said, “we have had a terrible quarrel just before you came. I told her that unless I saw you within an hour nothing but force should keep me here, and that if they kept me here by force, I would find means to kill myself; and that I would not see nor speak to the duke unless he brought me to you, according to his promise; and that if he sent his necklace again—for he sent it here half an hour ago—I would not send it back as I did then, but would fling it out of the window yonder into the cattle pond, where he could go and fetch it out himself.”
And my dearest Marie, finding increased courage from reciting her courageous speech, and from my friendly hearing of it, raised her voice, and her eyes flashed, so that she looked yet more beautiful; and again did I forget inexorable time. But it struck me that there was small wonder that Mme. Delhasse’s temper had not been of the best nor calculated to endure patiently such a vexatious encounter as befell her when she ran against me on the landing outside her door.
Yet Marie’s courage failed again; and I told her that before we fought I would tell my second of her state, so that if she came not and I were wounded (of worse I did not speak), he would come to the inn and bring her to me. And this comforted her more, so that she grew calmer, and, passing from our present difficulties, she gave herself to persuading me (nor would the poor girl believe that I needed no persuading) that in no case would she have yielded to the duke, and that her mother had left her in wrath born of an utter despair that Marie’s will in the matter could ever be broken down.
“For I told her,” Marie repeated, “that I would sooner die!”
She paused, and raising her eyes to mine, said to me (and here I think courage was not lacking in her):
“Yes, although once I had hesitated, now I had rather die. For when I hesitated, God sent you to my door, that in love I might find salvation.”
Well, I do not know that a man does well to describe all that passes at times like this. There are things rather meet to be left dwelling in his own heart, sweetening all his life, and causing him to marvel that sinners have such joys conceded to them this side of Heaven; so that in their recollection he may find, mingling with his delight, an occasion for humility such as it little harms any of us to light on now and then.
Enough then—for the telling of it; but enough in the passing of it there was not nor could be. Yet at last, because needs must when the devil—or a son—aye, or an elderly daughter of his—drives, I found myself outside the door of Mme. Delhasse’s room. With the turning of the lock Marie whispered a last word to me, and full of hope I turned to descend the stairs. For I had upon me the feeling which, oftener perhaps than we think, gave to the righteous cause a victory against odds when ordeal of battle held sway. Now, such a feeling is, I take it, of small use in a court of law.
But Fortune lost no time in checking my presumption by an accident which at first gave me great concern. For, even as I turned away from the door of the room, there was Mme. Delhasse coming up the stairs. I was fairly caught, there was no doubt about it; and for Marie’s sake I was deeply grieved, for I feared that my discovery would mean another stormy scene for her. Nevertheless, to make the best of it, I assumed a jaunty air as I said to Mlle. Delhasse:
“The duke will be witness that you were not in your room, madame. You will not be compromised.”
I fully expected that an outburst of anger would follow on this pleasantry of mine—which was, I confess, rather in the taste best suited to Mme. Delhasse than in the best as judged by an abstract standard—but to my surprise the old creature did nothing worse than bestow on me a sour grin. Apparently, if I were well-pleased with the last half-hour, she had found time pass no less pleasantly. All traces of her exasperation and ill humor had gone, and she looked as pleased and contented as though she had been an exemplary mother, rewarded (as such deserve to be) by complete love and peace in her family circle.
“You’ve been slinking in behind my back, have you?” she asked, but still with a grin.
“It would have been rude to force an entrance to your face,” I observed.
“And I suppose you’ve been making love to the girl?”
“At the proper time, madame,” said I, with much courtesy, “I shall no doubt ask you for an interview with regard to that matter. I shall omit no respect that you deserve.”
As I spoke, I stood on one side to let her pass. I cannot make up my mind whether her recent fury or her present good humor repelled me more.
“You’d have a fine fool for a wife,” said she, with a jerk of her thumb toward the room where the daughter was.
“I should be compensated by a very clever mother-in-law,” said I.
The old woman paused for an instant at the top of the stairs, and looked me up and down.
“Aye,” said she, “you men think yourselves mighty clever, but a woman gets the better of you all now and then.”
I was utterly puzzled by her evident exultation. The duke could not have consented to accept her society in place of her daughter’s; but I risked the impropriety and hazarded the suggestion to Mme. Delhasse. Her face curled in cunning wrinkles. She seemed to be about to speak, but then she shut her lips with a snap, and suspicion betrayed itself again in her eyes. She had a secret—a fresh secret—I could have sworn, and in her triumph she had come near to saying something that might have cast light on it.
“By the way,” I said, “your daughter did not expect my coming.” It was perhaps a vain hope, but I thought that I might save Marie from a tirade.
The old woman shrugged her shoulders, and observed carelessly:
“The fool may do what she likes;” and with this she knocked at the door.
I did not wait to see it opened—to confess the truth, I felt not sure of my temper were I forced to see her and Marie together—but went downstairs and into my own room. There I sat down in a chair by the window close to a small table, for I meant to write a letter or two to friends at home, in case the duke’s left hand should prove more skillful than mine when we met that evening. But, finding that I could hardly write with my right hand and couldn’t write at all with the other, I contented myself with scrawling laboriously a short note to Gustave de Berensac, which I put in my pocket, having indorsed on it a direction for its delivery in case I should meet with an accident. Then I lay back in my chair, regretting, I recollect, that, as my luggage was left at Avranches, I had not a clean shirt to fight in; and then, becoming drowsy, I began to stare idly along the road in front of the window, rehearsing the events of the last few days in my mind, but coming back to Marie Delhasse.
So an hour passed away. Then I rose and stretched myself, and gave a glance out of the window to see if we were likely to have a fine evening for our sport, for clouds had been gathering up all day. And when I had made up my mind that the rain would hold off long enough for our purpose, I looked down at the road again, and there I saw two figures which I knew. From the direction of Pontorson came Jacques Bontet the inn-keeper, slouching along and smoking a thin black cigar.
“Ah! he has been to deliver the note to our friends the officers,” said I to myself.
And then I looked at the other familiar figure, which was that of Mme. Delhasse. She wore the bonnet and cloak which had been lying on the bed in her room at the time of my intrusion. She was just leaving the premises of the inn strolling, nay dawdling, along. She met Bontet and stopped for a moment in conversation with him. Then she pursued her leisurely walk in the direction of Pontorson, and I watched her till she was about three hundred yards off. But her form had no charms, and, growing tired of the prospect, I turned away remarking to myself:
“I suppose the old lady wants just a little stroll before dinner.”
Nor did I see any reason to be dissatisfied with either of my inferences—at the moment. So I disturbed myself no more, but rang the bell and ordered some coffee and a little glass of the least bad brandy in the inn. For it could not be long before I was presented with the Duke of Saint-Maclou’s compliments and an intimation that he would be glad to have my company on a walk in the cool of the evening.