"You judged, I suppose, from the appearance of the book?" I said.
"Not at all. I judged from my own experience, at the time when I was Medical Officer at the prison here. An educated criminal is almost invariably an inveterate egotist. We are all interesting to ourselves--but the more vile we are, the more intensely we are absorbed in ourselves. The very people who have, logically speaking, the most indisputable interest in concealing their crimes, are also the very people who, almost without exception, yield to the temptation of looking at themselves in the pages of a Diary."
"I don"t doubt your experience, doctor. But your results puzzle me."
"Think a little, Mr. David, and you will not find the riddle so very hard to read. The better we are, the more unselfishly we are interested in others. The worse we are, the more inveterately our interest is concentrated on ourselves. Look at your aunt as an example of what I say.
This morning there were some letters waiting for her, on the subject of those reforms in the treatment of mad people, which she is as resolute as ever to promote--in this country as well as in England. It was with the greatest difficulty that I prevailed on her not to answer those letters just yet: in other words, not to excite her brain and nervous system, after such an ordeal as she has just pa.s.sed through. Do you think a wicked woman--with letters relating merely to the interests of other people waiting for her--would have stood in any need of my interference?
Not she! The wicked woman would have thought only of herself, and would have been far too much interested in her own recovery to run the risk of a relapse. Open that book of Madame Fontaine"s at any of the later entries. You will find the miserable woman self-betrayed in every page."
It was true! Every record of Madame Fontaine"s most secret moments, presented in this narrative, was first found in her Diary.
As an example:--Her Diary records, in the fullest detail, the infernal ingenuity of the stratagem by which she usurped her t.i.tle to Mr. Keller"s confidence, as the preserver of his life. "I have only to give him the Alexander"s Wine," she writes, "to make sure, by means of the antidote, of curing the illness which I have myself produced. After that, Minna"s mother becomes Mr. Keller"s guardian angel, and Minna"s marriage is a certainty."
On a later page, she is similarly self described--in Mrs. Wagner"s case--as acting from an exactly opposite motive, in choosing the Looking-Gla.s.s Drops. "They not only kill soonest, and most surely defy detection," she proceeds, "but I have it on the authority of the label, that my husband has tried to find the antidote to these Drops, and has tried in vain. If my heart fails me, when the deed is done, there can be no reprieve for the woman whose tongue I must silence for ever--or, after all I have sacrificed, my child"s future is ruined."
There is little doubt that she intended to destroy these compromising pages, on her return to Mr. Keller"s house--and that she would have carried out her intention, but for those first symptoms of the poison, which showed themselves in the wandering of her mind, and the helpless trembling of her hands.
The final entry in the Diary has an interest of its own, which I think justifies the presentation of it in this place. It shows the purifying influence of the maternal instinct in a wicked nature, surviving to the last. Even Madame Fontaine"s nature preserved, in this way, a softer side. On the memorable occasion of her meeting with Mr. Keller in the hall, she had acted as imprudently as if she had been the most foolish woman living, in her eagerness to plead Minna"s cause with the man on whom Minna"s marriage depended. She had shrunk from poisoning harmless Jack, even for her own protection. She would not even seduce Minna into telling a lie, when a lie would have served them both at the most critical moment of their lives.
Are such redeeming features unnatural in an otherwise wicked woman? Think of your own "inconsistencies." Read these last words of a sinner--and thank G.o.d that you were not tempted as she was:
"... Sent Minna out of my room, and hurt my sensitive girl cruelly. I am afraid of her! This last crime seems to separate me from that pure creature--all the more, because it has been committed in her dearest interests, and for her sweet sake. Every time she looks at me, I am afraid she may see what I have done for her, in my face. Oh, how I long to take her in my arms, and devour her with kisses! I daren"t do it--I daren"t do it."
Lord, have mercy on her--miserable sinner!
IX
The night is getting on; and the lamp I am writing by grows dim.
My mind wanders away from Frankfort, and from all that once happened there. The picture now in my memory presents an English scene.
I am at the house of business in London. Two friends are waiting for me.
One of them is Fritz. The other is the most popular person in the neighborhood; a happy, harmless creature, known to everyone by the undignified nickname of Jack Straw. Thanks to my aunt"s influence, and to the change of scene, no return of the relapse at Frankfort has shown itself. We are easy about the future of our little friend.
As to the past, we have made no romantic discoveries, relating to the earlier years of Jack"s life. Who were his parents; whether they died or whether they deserted him; how he lived, and what he suffered, before he drifted into the service of the chemistry-professor at Wurzburg--these, and other questions like them, remain unanswered. Jack himself feels no sort of interest in our inquiries. He either will not or cannot rouse his feeble memory to help us. "What does it matter now?" he says. "I began to live when Mistress first came to see me. I don"t remember, and won"t remember, anything before that."
So the memoirs of Jack remain unwritten, for want of materials--like the memoirs of many another foundling, in real life.
While I am speaking of Jack, I am keeping my two friends waiting in the reception-room. I dress myself in my best clothes and join them. Fritz is silent and nervous; unreasonably impatient for the arrival of the carriage at the door. Jack promenades the room, with a superb nosegay in the b.u.t.ton-hole of a glorious blue coat. He has a watch; he carries a cane; he wears white gloves, and tight nankeen pantaloons. He struts out before us, when the carriage comes at last. "I don"t deny that Fritz is a figure in the festival," he says, when we drive away; "but I positively a.s.sert that the thing is not complete without Me. If my dress fails in any respect to do me justice, for Heaven"s sake mention it, one of you, before we pa.s.s the tailor"s door!" I answer Jack, by telling him that he is in all respects perfect. And Jack answers me, "David, you have your faults; but your taste is invariably correct. Give me a little more room; I can"t face Mistress with crumpled coat-tails."
We reach a little village in the neighborhood of London, and stop at the gate of the old church.
We walk up to the altar-rails, and wait there. All the women in the place are waiting also. They merely glance at Fritz and at me--their whole attention is concentrated on Jack. They take him for the bridegroom. Jack discovers it; and is better pleased with himself than ever.
The organist plays a wedding-march. The bride, simply and unpretendingly dressed, just fluttered enough to make her eyes irresistible, and her complexion lovely, enters the church, leaning on Mr. Keller"s arm.
Our good partner looks younger than usual. At his own earnest request, the business in Frankfort has been sold; the head-partner first stipulating for the employment of a given number of reputable young women in the office. Removed from a.s.sociations which are inexpressibly repellent to him, Mr. Keller is building a house, near Mrs. Wagner"s pretty cottage, on the hill above the village. Here he proposes to pa.s.s the rest of his days peacefully, with his two married children.
On their way to the altar, Mr. Keller and Minna are followed by Doctor Dormann (taking his annual holiday, this year, in England). The doctor gives his arm to the woman of all women whom Jack worships and loves. My kind and dear aunt--with the old bright charm in her face; the firm friend of all friendless creatures--why does my calmness desert me, when I try to draw my little portrait of her; Minna"s second mother, standing by Minna"s side, on the greatest day of her life?
I can"t even see the paper. Nearly fifty years have pa.s.sed, since that wedding-day. Oh, my coevals, who have outlived your dearest friends, like me, _you_ know what is the matter with my eyes! I must take out my handkerchief, and put down my pen--and leave some of you younger ones to finish the story of the marriage for yourself.