"What kindness! what generosity! You think of everything. You are right; my mother must not know that you have saved my life at the risk of your own, and yet--"
"What your mother ought to know, my dear Frederick, what she ought to see, is that I have kept the promise that I made to her this morning, for time presses."
"What promise?"
"I promised her to cure you."
"Cure me!" and Frederick bowed his head with grief. "Cure me!"
"And this cure must be accomplished this morning."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that in an hour, upon our arrival at the farm, you must be the Frederick of former times, the glory and pride of your mother."
"M. David!"
"My child, the moments are numbered, so listen to me. This morning, at the time you disappeared, I said to you, "I know the cause of your illness.""
"You did say that to me, truly, M. David."
"Well, now, the cause is envy!"
"Oh, my G.o.d!" murmured Frederick, overwhelmed with shame, and trying to slip away from David"s embrace.
But the latter pressed Frederick all the more tenderly to his heart, and said, quickly:
"Lift up your head, my child,--there is no need for shame, envy is an excellent quality."
"Envy an excellent quality!" exclaimed Frederick, sitting up and staring at David with bewildered astonishment. "Envy!" repeated he, shuddering.
"Ah, monsieur, you do not know what it produces."
"Hatred? so much the better."
"So much the better! but hatred in its turn--"
"Gives birth to vengeance, so much the better still."
"M. David," said the young man, falling back on his straw couch with sadness, "you are laughing at me, and yet--"
"Laughing at you, poor child!" said David, in a voice full of emotion, as he drew Frederick back to him, and pressed him to his breast with affection. "I laugh at you! do not say that. To me, more than to anyone else, grief is sacred. I laugh at you. You do not know then, at first sight of you, I was filled with compa.s.sion, with tenderness, because, you see, Frederick, I had a young brother about your age--"
And David"s tears flowed, until, choked with emotion, he was obliged to keep silent.
Frederick"s tears flowed also, and he in his turn embraced David, looking at him with a heart-broken expression, as if he wished to ask pardon for making him weep.
David understood him.
"Be calm, my child; these tears, too, have their sweetness. Well, the brother I speak of, this young beloved brother, who made my joy and my love, I lost. That is why I felt for you such a quick and keen interest, that is why I wish to return you to your mother as you were in the olden time, because it is to return you to happiness."
The accent, the countenance of David, as he uttered these words, were of such a melancholy, pathetic sweetness that Frederick, more and more affected, answered, timidly:
"Forgive me, M. David, for having thought you were laughing at me, but--"
"But what I said to you seemed so strange, did it not, that you could not believe that I was speaking seriously?"
"That is true."
"So it ought to be, nevertheless my words are sincere, and I am going to prove it to you."
Frederick fixed on David a look full of pain and eager curiosity.
"Yes, my child, envy, in itself, is an excellent quality; only you, up to this time, have applied it improperly,--you have envied wickedly instead of envying well."
"Envy well! Envy an excellent quality!" repeated Frederick, as if he could not believe his ears. "Envy, frightful envy, which corrodes, which devours, which kills!"
"My poor child, the Loire came near, just now, being your tomb. Had that misfortune happened, would not your mother have cried, "Oh, the accursed river which kills,--accursed river which has swallowed up my son!""
"Alas, M. David!"
"And if these fears of inundation are realised, how many despairing hearts will cry, "Oh, accursed river! our houses are swept away, our fields submerged." Are not these maledictions just?"
"Only too just, M. David."
"Yes; and yet this river so cursed fertilises its sh.o.r.es. It is the wealth of the cities by which it flows. Thousands of boats, laden with provisions of all sorts, plough its waves; this river so cursed accomplishes truly a useful mission, that G.o.d has given to everything he has created, because to say that G.o.d has created rivers for inundation and disaster would be a blasphemy. No, no! It is man, whose ignorance, whose carelessness, whose egotism, whose greed, and whose disdain change the gifts of the Creator into plagues."
Frederick, struck with his preceptor"s words, listened to him with increasing interest.
"Just now, even," continued David, "unless heat from the fire had penetrated your benumbed limbs, you would, perhaps, have died, yet how horrible are the ravages of fire! Must we curse it and its Creator? What more shall I say to you? Shall we curse steam, which has changed the face of the earth, because it has caused so many awful disasters? No, no! G.o.d has created forces, and man, a free agent, employs those forces for good or for evil. And as G.o.d is everywhere the same in his omnipotence, it is with pa.s.sions as with elements; no one of them is bad in itself, they are levers. Man uses them for good or for evil, according to his own free will. So, my child, your troubles date from your visit to the castle of Pont Brillant, do they not?"
"Yes, M. David."
"And you felt envy, keenly and deeply, did you not, when you compared the obscurity of your name and your poor, humble life with the splendid life and ill.u.s.trious name of the young Marquis of Pont Brillant?"
"It is only too true."
"Up to that point, these sentiments were excellent."
"Excellent?"
"Excellent! You brought with you from the castle living and powerful forces; they ought, wisely directed, to have given the widest range to the development of your faculties. Unhappily, these forces have burst in your inexperienced hands, and have wounded you, poor dear child! Thus, to return to yourself, all your pure and simple enjoyments were destroyed by the constant remembrance of the splendours of the castle; then, in your grievous, unoccupied covetousness, you were forced to hate the one who possessed all that you desired; then vengeance."
"You know!" cried Frederick, in dismay.
"I know all, my child."
"Ah, M. David, pardon, I pray you," murmured Frederick, humiliated, "it was remorse for that base and horrible act that led me to think of suicide."
"I believe you, my child, and now that explains to me your unconquerable dejection since I arrived at your mother"s house. You meditated this dreadful deed?"