"One morning she was found in bed, lifeless, and already quite cold, with a cotton mask over her face.
"Her coffin was covered with flowers, the church was hung in white.
There was a large crowd at the funeral ceremony.
"Ah! well, if I had known--but you never can know--I would have married that girl, for she was infernally pretty."
"And what became of the mother?"
"Oh! she shed a lot of tears over it. She has only begun to receive visits again for the past week."
"And what explanation is given of the girl"s death?"
"Oh! "tis pretended that it was an accident caused by a new stove, the mechanism of which got out of order. As a good many such accidents have happened, the thing looks probable enough."
A Pa.s.sION
The sea was brilliant and unruffled, scarcely stirred, and on the pier the entire town of Havre watched the ships as they came on.
They could be seen at a distance, in great numbers; some of them, the steamers, with plumes of smoke; the others, the sailing vessels, drawn by almost invisible tugs, lifting towards the sky their bare masts, like leafless trees.
They hurried from every end of the horizon towards the narrow mouth of the jetty which devoured these monsters; and they groaned, they shrieked, they hissed while they spat out puffs of steam like animals panting for breath.
Two young officers were walking on the landing-stage, where a number of people were waiting, saluting or returning salutes, and sometimes stopping to chat.
Suddenly, one of them, the taller, Paul d"Henricol, pressed the arm of his comrade, Jean Renoldi, then, in a whisper, said:
"Hallo, here"s Madame Poincot; give a good look at her. I a.s.sure you that she"s making eyes at you."
She was moving along on the arm of her husband. She was a woman of about forty, very handsome still, slightly stout, but, owing to her graceful fullness of figure, as fresh as she was at twenty. Among her friends she was known as the G.o.ddess on account of her proud gait, her large black eyes, and the entire air of n.o.bility of her person. She remained irreproachable; never had the least suspicion cast a breath on her life"s purity. She was regarded as the very type of a virtuous, uncorrupted woman. So upright that no man had ever dared to think of her.
And yet for the last month Paul d"Henricol had been a.s.suring his friend Renoldi that Madame Poincot was in love with him, and he maintained that there was no doubt of it.
"Be sure I don"t deceive myself. I see it clearly. She loves you--she loves you pa.s.sionately, like a chaste woman who had never loved. Forty years is a terrible age for virtuous women when they possess senses; they become foolish, and commit utter follies. She is. .h.i.t, my dear fellow; she is falling like a wounded bird, and is ready to drop into your arms. I say--just look at her!"
The tall woman, preceded by her two daughters, aged twelve and fifteen years, suddenly turned pale, on her approach, as her eyes lighted on the officer"s face. She gave him an ardent glance, concentrating her gaze upon him, and no longer seemed to have any eyes for her children, her husband, or any other person around her. She returned the salutation of the two young men without lowering her eyes, glowing with such a flame that a doubt, at last, forced its way into Lieutenant Renoldi"s mind.
His friend said, in the same hushed voice: "I was sure of it. Did you not notice her this time? By Jove, she is a nice t.i.t-bit!"
But Jean Renoldi had no desire for a society intrigue. Caring little for love, he longed, above all, for a quiet life, and contented himself with occasional amours such as a young man can always have. All the sentimentality, the attentions, and the tenderness which a well-bred woman exacts bored him. The chain, however slight it might be, which is always formed by an adventure of this sort, filled him with fear. He said: "At the end of a month I"ll have had enough of it, and I"ll be forced to wait patiently for six months through politeness."
Then, a rupture exasperated him, with the scenes, the allusions, the clinging attachment, of the abandoned woman.
He avoided meeting Madame Poincot.
But, one evening he found himself by her side at a dinner-party, and he felt on his skin, in his eyes, and even in his heart, the burning glance of his fair neighbor. Their hands met, and almost involuntarily were pressed together in a warm clasp. Already the intrigue was almost begun.
He saw her again, always in spite of himself. He realized that he was loved. He felt himself moved by a kind of pitying vanity when he saw what a violent pa.s.sion for him swayed this woman"s breast. So he allowed himself to be adored, and merely displayed gallantry, hoping that the affair would be only sentimental.
But, one day, she made an appointment with him for the ostensible purpose of seeing him and talking freely to him. She fell, swooning, into his arms; and he had no alternative but to be her lover.
And this lasted six months. She loved him with an unbridled, panting love. Absorbed in this frenzied pa.s.sion, she no longer bestowed a thought on anything else. She surrendered herself to it utterly--her body, her soul, her reputation, her position, her happiness--all she had cast into that fire of her heart, as one casts, as a sacrifice, every precious object into a funeral pier.
He had for some time grown tired of her, and deeply regretted his easy conquest as a fascinating officer; but he was bound, held prisoner. At every moment she said to him: "I have given you everything. What more would you have?" He felt a desire to answer:
"But I have asked nothing from you, and I beg of you to take back what you gave me."
Without caring about being seen, compromised, ruined, she came to see him every evening, her pa.s.sion becoming more inflamed each time they met. She flung herself into his arms, strained him in a fierce embrace, fainted under the force of rapturous kisses which to him were now terribly wearisome.
He said in a languid tone: "Look here! be reasonable!"
She replied:
"I love you," and sank on her knees gazing at him for a long time in an att.i.tude of admiration. At length, exasperated by her persistent gaze, he tried to make her rise.
"I say! Sit down. Let us talk."
She murmured:
"No, leave me;" and remained there, her soul in a state of ecstasy.
He said to his friend d"Henricol:
"You know, "twill end by my beating her. I won"t have any more of it! It must end, and that without further delay!" Then he went on:
"What do you advise me to do?"
The other replied:
"Break it off."
And Renoldi added, shrugging his shoulders:
"You speak indifferently about the matter; you believe that it is easy to break with a woman who tortures you with attention, who annoys you with kindnesses, who persecutes you with her affection, whose only care is to please you, and whose only wrong is that she gave herself to you in spite of you."
But suddenly, one morning the news came that the regiment was about to be removed from the garrison; Renoldi began to dance with joy. He was saved! Saved without scenes, without cries! Saved! All he had to do now was to wait patiently for two months more. Saved!
In the evening she came to him more excited than she had ever been before. She had heard the dreadful news, and, without taking off her hat she caught his hands and pressed them nervously, with her eyes fixed on his, and her voice vibrating and resolute.
"You are leaving," she said; "I know it. At first, I felt heart-broken; then, I understood what I had to do. I don"t hesitate about doing it. I have come to give you the greatest proof of love that a woman can offer.
I follow you. For you I am abandoning my husband, my children, my family. I am ruining myself, but I am happy. It seems to me that I am giving myself to you over again. It is the last and the greatest sacrifice. I am yours for ever!"
He felt a cold sweat down his back, and was seized with a dull and violent rage, the anger of weakness. However, he became calm, and, in a disinterested tone, with a show of kindness, he refused to accept her sacrifice, tried to appease her, to bring her to reason, to make her see her own folly! She listened to him, staring at him with her great black eyes and with a smile of disdain on her lips, and said not a word in reply. He went on talking to her, and when, at length, he stopped, she said merely: