"And Mademoiselle de Gramont has the unparalleled audacity to send her silver here for my use? Do you mean to tell me that this salver and what it contains are from her?"
Robert could not answer.
"Great heaven! that I should endure this! That Madeleine de Gramont should have the insolence to _force_ her _bounty_ by stealth upon me, and that I should not have suspected her at once! Remove that salver out of my sight, and if you ever dare"--
Mrs. Lawkins had now partially recovered her self-possession, and interrupted the countess politely but very firmly,--
"Madame, you will do M. de Gramont great injury. Do you not see that you are exciting him by this violence?"
"_Who_ are you that you dare dictate to me? Leave this house instantly!
Were you sent here by Mademoiselle de Gramont to inst.i.tute an _espionage_ over me and my family? Go and tell your mistress that neither she nor anything that belongs to her shall ever again defile my dwelling! I shall watch better in future! I will not be snared by her low arts, her contemptible impostures!"
Mrs. Lawkins, though she was a mild woman, loved Madeleine too well to hear her mentioned disrespectfully without being roused to indignation; affection for her mistress overcame her awe of the countess, and she replied with feeling,--
"She is the n.o.blest lady that ever walked the earth to bless it! and her only art is the practise of goodness! Those who are turning upon her and reviling her ought to be on their knees before her this blessed moment!
Didn"t she nurse that poor gentleman night and day, as though he had been her own father? Did she not bear all the slights put upon her by those who are not half as good as she?--yes, that are not worthy to wipe the dust from her holy feet, for all their pride? Didn"t it almost break her heart when they forced the poor sick gentleman out of her house, to cage him in this cold, dreary place, where his own mother takes about as much care and notice of him as though he were a _Hindoo_ or a _Hottentot_!" (Mrs. Lawkins was not strong in comparisons.) "And don"t he mourn the night through for Mademoiselle Madeleine, crying out for her to come to him, as, I warrant, he never did for his mother? And isn"t that mother murdering him at this very moment?"
"Leave the house! Leave the house!" cried the countess, in a voice that had lost all its commanding dignity, through rage. "Leave the house, I say! Do you dare to stand in my presence after such insolence?"
"Yes, madame I dare!" replied Mrs. Lawkins, coolly. "I am not afraid of a marble figure, even though it has a tongue; and there"s not more soul in you than in a piece of marble; there"s nothing but stone where your heart should be; but even stone will break with a hard enough blow, and perhaps you will get such a one before you die."
"Go! I say, go!" vociferated the countess, pointing to the door. "Am I to be obeyed?"
"No, madame!" replied Mrs. Lawkins, undaunted. "Not until I receive the orders of M. Maurice de Gramont. He placed me here, and here I shall stay until I have his leave to resign my duties."
Count Tristan had caught his attendant"s hand when he conceived the idea that she was to be sent away from him, and when she refused to leave him, he pressed it approvingly.
"I am mistress here!" said the countess, with something of her former grandeur of bearing. "M. Maurice de Gramont has no authority to engage or discharge domestics, or to give any orders that are not mine. I will have none of Mademoiselle de Gramont"s spies placed about my person! Go and tell her so, and say that after this last outrage, I will never see her face again. Would that I might never hear her name! She has been my curse,--my misery; she shall never cross my path more!"
The count rose up as if sudden strength were miraculously infused into his limbs; he raised both his arms toward heaven, and wailed out, "O Lord G.o.d, bless her! bless her! Madeleine! Good angel! Madeleine!"
The next moment he fell forward senseless and rolled to the ground.
The countess was stupefied;--she could not speak, or stoop, or stir.
The alarmed house-keeper knelt beside him. Robert hastily set down the salver and lent his a.s.sistance. They lifted the count and laid him upon the sofa. The instant Mrs. Lawkins saw his face, and the foam issuing from his lips, she exclaimed,--
"It is another fit! It is his second stroke! Lord have mercy upon him!
and upon _you_," she continued, turning to the countess, solemnly; "for, if he dies, so sure as there is a heaven above us, you have killed your own son!"
The countess" look of horror softened the kindly house-keeper, in spite of her just wrath, and she added, "He may recover,--he has great strength. Robert, run quickly for Dr. Bayard."
Then she unfastened the patient"s cravat and dashed cold water upon his head, and chafed his hands, while his mother, slowly awakening from her state of stupefaction, drew near, and bent over him. But not a finger did she raise to minister to him; she would not have known what to do, so little were her hands accustomed to ministration,--so seldom had they been stretched out to perform the slightest service for any one, even her own son.
We left Madeleine chasing away all heaviness from the soul of Maurice by her sweet singing. She was still at the piano, and he still hanging over her, when Robert burst into the room. He was a man almost stolid in his quietude, and his hurried entrance, and agitated manner, were sufficient to terrify Maurice and Madeleine before he spoke.
"Mademoiselle, it was my fault! Oh, if I had been more careful to obey your orders it would never have happened!"
His contrition was so deep that he could not proceed.
"Has Madame de Gramont discovered who sent the salver?" asked Madeleine, with an air of vexation.
"That"s not the worst, Mademoiselle. The countess has found out how Mrs.
Lawkins came there. She overheard us talking about the milk-jug I missed. Madame de Gramont was very violent; she said such things of you, Mademoiselle, that Mrs. Lawkins, who loves you like her own, couldn"t stand it, and gave her a bit of her mind, and M. de Gramont was roused up also; he wouldn"t hear you spoken against; he took on so it caused him another attack; down he dropped like dead!"
"My father,--he has been seized again, and"--Maurice did not finish his sentence, but caught up his hat.
"I"ve been for the doctor, sir," said Robert; "he"s there by this time."
Maurice was out of the room, and hurrying toward the street door; Madeleine sprang after him.
"Maurice! Maurice! Stay one moment! Oh, if I could be near your father,--if I could see him! My imprudence has been the cause of this last stroke; yet I feel that he would gladly have me near him."
"He would indeed, my best Madeleine; but, my grandmother, alas! I have no hope of moving her."
"If her son were dying," persisted Madeleine, "her heart might be softened. If he asked for me, she might let me come to him; it would soothe _him_ perhaps, and how it would comfort _me_! I shall be at the hotel nearly as soon as you are. I will wait in my carriage until you come to me and tell me how he is. Perhaps I _may_ be permitted to enter if he asks for me. Do not forget that I am there."
Did Maurice ever forget her, for a single moment?
As soon as Madeleine"s carriage could be brought to the door she followed her cousin.
It was perhaps surprising that she was moved with so much sympathy for one whom she not only had good reason to dislike, but toward whom she had formerly experienced an unconquerable repugnance; but, with spirits chastened and purified, as hers had been, a tenderness is always kindled toward those whom they are permitted to _serve_. The very office of ministration (the office of angels), softens the heart, and subst.i.tutes pity for loathing, the strong inclination to regenerate for the spirit of condemnation. While Madeleine was daily ministering to the count, she found herself becoming attached to him, and, with little effort of volition, she blotted the past from her own memory.
The action of Count Tristan"s mind had been peculiar; when the discovery of his dishonorable manoeuvring caused him a shock which planted the first seeds of his present malady,--when he had fallen into the depths of despair,--it was Madeleine"s hand that raised him up, that saved him from disgrace, and saved his son from being the innocent partic.i.p.ator of that shame. For the first time in his life a strong sense of grat.i.tude was awakened in his breast. Again, it was through Madeleine that the votes of so much importance to him, and which he had believed unattainable, were procured; she stood before him for the second time in the light of a benefactress. He had been seized with apoplexy while conversing with her; when reason was dimly restored, his mind went back to his last conscious thought, and _that_ had been of her,--hence his immediate recognition of her alone. Her patient, gentle, tender care had impressed him with reverence; he was magnetized by her sphere of unselfishness, forgiveness and goodness, and some of the hardnesses of his own nature were melted away.
Count Tristan had practised deception until he had nearly lost all belief in the truth and purity of others,--had apparently grown insensible to all holy influences. Yet the daily contemplation of a character which bore witness to the existence of the most heavenly attributes silently undermined his cold scepticism, and tacitly contradicted and disproved his creed that duplicity and selfishness were universal characteristics of mankind,--a creed usually adopted by him who sees his fellow-men in the mirror which reflects his own image.
Madeleine had discovered some small, not yet tightly closed avenue to Count Tristan"s soul. Her toiling, pardoning, helping, holy spirit had done more to lift him out of the bondage of his evil pa.s.sions than could have been affected by any other human agency.
CHAPTER XLVII.
INFLEXIBILITY.
"Oh, you have come at last!" exclaimed the countess, with acrimony, as Maurice opened the door of his father"s chamber. Then, pointing to the count, who still lay in a state of unconsciousness, she added, "Do you see what calamities you leave me alone to bear?--you who are the only stay I have left?"
By the aid of Mrs. Lawkins and the servants of the hotel, the count had been removed to his room. When Maurice entered, Mrs. Lawkins was standing on one side of the bed, Dr. Bayard on the other. The countess was pacing up and down the small chamber like a caged lioness.
Her grandson did not reply to her taunt, but addressed the doctor in a tone too low for her to hear. His answer was a dubious movement of the head which augured ill.
Bertha, who chanced to be in her own chamber, writing to her dyspeptic uncle, had only that moment become aware of what had happened. She stole into the count"s room, pale with terror, crept up to Maurice, and clung to his arm as she asked, in a frightened tone,--
"Will he die, Maurice? Is it as bad as that?"
"I cannot tell; I have great fears. But see, he is opening his eyes; he looks better."
The senses of the count were returning; the fit had been of brief duration, and hardly as violent as the one with which he had before been attacked. In a short time it was apparent that he was aware of what was pa.s.sing around him.