"Alas! this terrible shame which kills you, my poor Cephyse, because you have a heart, would have been averted, had I seen Mdlle. de Cardoville, or had she but answered the letter which I asked leave to write to her at the porter"s lodge. But her silence proves to me that she is justly hurt at my abrupt departure from her house. I can understand it; she believes me guilty of the blackest ingrat.i.tude--for she must have been greatly offended not to have deigned to answer me--and therefore I had not the courage to write a second time. It would have been useless, I am sure; for, good and just as she is, her refusals are inexorable when she believes them deserved. And besides, for what good? It was too late; you had resolved to die!"
"Oh, yes, quite resolved: for my infamy was gnawing at my heart. Jacques had died in my arms despising me; and I loved him--mark me, sister,"
added Cephyse, with pa.s.sionate enthusiasm, "I loved him as we love only once in life!"
"Let our fate be accomplished, then!" said Mother Bunch with a pensive air.
"But you have never told me, sister, the cause of your departure from Mdlle. de Cardoville"s," resumed Cephyse, after a moment"s silence.
"It will be the only secret that I shall take with me, dear Cephyse,"
said the other, casting down her eyes. And she thought, with bitter joy, that she would soon be delivered from the fear which had poisoned the last days of her sad life--the fear of meeting Agricola, informed of the fatal and ridiculous love she felt for him.
For, it must be said, this fatal and despairing love was one of the causes of the suicide of the unfortunate creature. Since the disappearance of her journal, she believed that the blacksmith knew the melancholy secret contained in its sad pages. She doubted not the generosity and good heart of Agricola; but she had such doubts of herself, she was so ashamed of this pa.s.sion, however pure and n.o.ble, that, even in the extremity to which Cephyse and herself were reduced--wanting work, wanting bread--no power on earth could have induced her to meet Agricola, in an attempt to ask him for a.s.sistance.
Doubtless, she would have taken another view of the subject if her mind had not been obscured by that sort of dizziness to which the firmest characters are exposed when their misfortunes surpa.s.s all bounds.
Misery, hunger, the influence, almost contagious in such a moment, of the suicidal ideas of Cephyse, and weariness of a life so long devoted to pain and mortification, gave the last blow to the sewing-girl"s reason. After long struggling against the fatal design of her sister, the poor, dejected, broken-hearted creature finished by determining to share Cephyse"s fate, and seek in death the end of so many evils.
"Of what are you thinking, sister?" said Cephyse, astonished at the long silence. The other replied, trembling: "I think of that which made me leave Mdlle. de Cardoville so abruptly, and appear so ungrateful in her eyes. May the fatality which drove me from her house have made no other victims! may my devoted service, however obscure and powerless, never be missed by her, who extended her n.o.ble hand to the poor sempstress, and deigned to call me sister! May she be happy--oh, ever happy!" said Mother Bunch, clasping her hands with the ardor of a sincere invocation.
"That is n.o.ble, sister--such a wish in such a moment!" said Cephyse.
"Oh," said her sister, with energy, "I loved, I admired that marvel of genius, and heart, and ideal beauty--I viewed her with pious respect--for never was the power of the Divinity revealed in a more adorable and purer creation. At least one of my last thoughts will have been of her."
"Yes, you will have loved and respected your generous patroness to the last."
"To the last!" said the poor girl, after a moment"s silence. "It is true--you are right--it will soon be the last!--in a few moments, all will be finished. See how calmly we can talk of that which frightens so many others!"
"Sister, we are calm because we are resolved."
"Quite resolved, Cephyse," said the hunchback, casting once more a deep and penetrating glance upon her sister.
"Oh, yes, if you are only as determined as I am."
"Be satisfied; if I put off from day to day the final moment," answered the sempstress, "it was because I wished to give you time to reflect. As for me--"
She did not finish, but she shook her head with an air of the utmost despondency.
"Well, sister, let us kiss each other," said Cephyse; "and, courage!"
The hunchback rose, and threw herself into her sister"s arms. They held one another fast in a long embrace. There followed a few seconds of deep and solemn silence, only interrupted by the sobs of the sisters, for now they had begun to weep.
"Oh, heaven! to love each other so, and to part forever!" said Cephyse.
"It is a cruel fate."
"To part?" cried Mother Bunch, and her pale, mild countenance, bathed in tears, was suddenly illumined with a ray of divine hope; "to part, sister? oh, no! What makes me so calm is the deep and certain expectation, which I feel here at my heart, of that better world where a better life awaits us. G.o.d, so great, so merciful, so prodigal of good, cannot destine His creatures to be forever miserable. Selfish men may pervert His benevolent designs, and reduce their brethren to a state of suffering and despair. Let us pity the wicked and leave them! Come up on high, sister; men are nothing there, where G.o.d is all. We shall do well there. Let us depart, for it is late."
So saying, she pointed to the ruddy beams of the setting sun, which began to shine upon the window.
Carried away by the religious enthusiasm of her sister, whose countenance, transfigured, as it were, by the hope of an approaching deliverance, gleamed brightly in the reflected sunset, Cephyse took her hands, and, looking at her with deep emotion, exclaimed, "Oh, sister!
how beautiful you look now!"
"Then my beauty comes rather late in the day," said Mother Bunch, with a sad smile.
"No, sister; for you appear so happy, that the last scruples I had upon your account are quite gone."
"Then let us make haste," said the hunchback, as she pointed to the chafing-dish.
"Be satisfied, sister--it will not be long," said Cephyse. And she took the chafing-dish full of charcoal, which she had placed in a corner of the garret, and brought it out into the middle of the room.
"Do you know how to manage it?" asked the sewing-girl approaching.
"Oh! it is very simple," answered Cephyse; "we have only to close the door and window, and light the charcoal."
"Yes, sister; but I think I have heard that every opening must be well stopped, so as to admit no current of air."
"You are right, and the door shuts so badly."
"And look at the holes in the roof."
"What is to be done, sister?"
"I will tell you," said Mother Bunch. "The straw of our mattress, well twisted, will answer every purpose."
"Certainly," replied Cephyse. "We will keep a little to light our fire, and with the rest we will stop up all the crevices in the roof, and make filling for our doors and windows."
Then, smiling with that bitter irony, so frequent, we repeat, in the most gloomy moments, Cephyse added, "I say, sister, weather-boards at our doors and windows, to prevent the air from getting in--what a luxury! we are as delicate as rich people."
"At such a time, we may as well try to make ourselves a little comfortable," said Mother Bunch, trying to jest like the Baccha.n.a.l Queen.
And with incredible coolness, the two began to twist the straw into lengths of braid, small enough to be stuffed into the cracks of the door, and also constructed large plugs, destined to stop up the crevices in the roof. While this mournful occupation lasted, there was no departure from the calm and sad resignation of the two unfortunate creatures.
CHAPTER x.x.xII. SUICIDE.
Cephyse and her sister continued with calmness the preparations for their death.
Alas! how many poor young girls, like these sisters, have been, and still will be, fatally driven to seek in suicide a refuge from despair, from infamy, or from a too miserable existence! And upon society will rest the terrible responsibility of these sad deaths, so long as thousands of human creatures, unable to live upon the mockery of wages granted to their labor, have to choose between these three gulfs of shame and woe; a life of enervating toil and mortal privations, causes of premature death; prost.i.tution, which kills also, but slowly--by contempt, brutality, and uncleanness; suicide--which kills at once.
In a few minutes, the two sisters had constructed, with the straw of their couch, the calkings necessary to intercept the air, and to render suffocation more expeditious and certain.
The hunchback said to her sister, "You are the taller, Cephyse, and must look to the ceiling; I will take care of the window and door."
"Be satisfied, sister; I shall have finished before you," answered Cephyse.
And the two began carefully to stop up every crevice through which a current of air could penetrate into the ruined garret. Thanks to her tall stature, Cephyse was able to reach the holes in the roof, and to close them up entirely. When they had finished this sad work, the sisters again approached, and looked at each other in silence.
The fatal moment drew near; their faces, though still calm, seemed slightly agitated by that strange excitement which always accompanies a double suicide.