The Frontier/Part 1/Chapter 7
CHAPTER VII
EVE TRIUMPHANT
"There!" she said, after a few minutes. "The storm is over."
She raised her beautiful face, now lit with a smile:
"No black on my eye-lashes, you see," she added, gaily. "No rouge on my lips.... Take note, please.... Nothing that comes off!"
This versatility of mood, the despair, which he had felt to be real, followed by a light-heartedness which he felt to be equally sincere; all this bewildered Philippe.
She began to laugh:
"Philippe! Philippe! You look as though you did not understand much about women ... and even less about girls!"
She rose and went to the next room, which was her bedroom, as he saw by the white curtains and the arrangement of the furniture; and she returned with an album, in which she showed him, on the first page, the photograph of a child, crying:
"Look, Philippe. I haven't changed. At two years old, just as now, I used to have great big sorrows and eyes that flowed like taps."
He turned the pages of the album. There were portraits of Suzanne at all ages: Suzanne as a child, Suzanne as a little girl, Suzanne as a young girl; and each was more bewitching than the last.
At the bottom of one page, he read:
"Suzanne, twenty."
"Lord, how pretty you were!" he muttered, dazed by that image of beauty and gladness.
And he looked at Suzanne, in spite of himself.
"I have grown older," she said. "Three long years...."
He shrugged his shoulders without replying, for, on the contrary, he thought her lovelier still; and he turned the pages. Two loose photographs slipped to the floor. She put out her hand to take them, but did not complete the movement.
"May I?" asked Philippe.
"Yes, certainly."
He was much astonished when he examined one of the portraits:
"This," he said, "makes you look older than you are.... How funny! And why that old-fashioned dress? ... That quaint way of doing your hair.... It's you ... and yet it's not you.... Who is it?"
"Mamma," she said.
He was surprised, knowing Jorancé's persistent rancour, that he should have given his daughter the portrait of a mother whom she had been taught to believe long dead. And he remembered the riotous adventures of the divorced wife, now the beautiful Mme. de Glaris, who was celebrated in the chronicles of fast society for her dresses and her jewellery and whose photographs were displayed in the shop-windows of the Rue de Rivoli for the admiration of the passers-by.
"Yes," he said, awkwardly and not quite knowing what he was saying, "yes, you are like her.... And is this also ...?"
He suppressed a movement of astonishment. This time, he clearly recognized Suzanne's mother, or rather the Mme. de Glaris of the Rue de Rivoli, bare-shouldered, decked in her pearls and diamonds, shameless and magnificent.
Suzanne, who kept her eyes raised to his face, did not speak; and they remained opposite each other, motionless and silent.
"Does she know the truth?" Philippe asked himself. "No ... no ... it's not possible.... She must have bought this photograph, because of the likeness to herself which she saw in it, and she does not suspect anything...."
But he was not satisfied with his surmise and he dared not question the girl, for fear of touching upon one of those mysterious griefs which become more acute when once they are no longer secret.
She put the two portraits back in the album and locked the clasp with a little key. Then, after a long pause, laying her hand on Philippe's arm, she said to him, in words that corresponded strangely with the thoughts that troubled him:
"Do not be angry with me, dear, and, above all, do not judge me too severely. There is a Suzanne in me whom I do not know well ... and who often frightens me.... She is capricious, jealous, wrong-headed, capable of anything ... yes, of anything.... The real Suzanne is good and sensible: 'You're my daughter to-day,' papa used to say to me, when I was a little girl. And he said it in such a happy tone! But, the next day, I was his daughter no longer; and, struggle and fight as hard as I might, I could not become so again.... Things prevented me; and I used to cry because papa seemed to hate me.... And I wanted to be good.... And I still want to and I always do.... But there is nothing in the world so hard ... because the other ... the other one does not want to.... And besides ..."
"What?"
She waited a moment, as though hesitating, and continued:
"And, besides, what she wants, what the other Suzanne wants does not appear to me so very unreasonable. It is an immense longing to love somebody, but to love madly, boundlessly, to love too well.... Then it seems to me that life has no other object ... and all the rest bores me.... You know, Philippe, even when I was ever so small, that word love used to upset me. And, later ... and now, at certain times, I feel my brain going and all my soul seeking, waiting...."
She hid her face again, as though seized with a sudden feeling of bashfulness, and Philippe saw, between her fingers, her crimson forehead and cheeks.
His pity swelled within him. Through those desultory confidences, he saw Suzanne as she was, ignorant, ill-informed about herself and about the realities of life, troubled with desires which she took for unsatisfied feelings, torn by the implacable duel between contrary instincts and possessing nothing to counteract her woman's nature but a wayward and melancholy virtue.
How good it would be to save her! He went up to her and, very gently, said:
"You must get married, Suzanne."
She shook her head:
"There have been young men here who seemed to like me, but they always went away after a few days. One would almost think that they were afraid of me ... or that they had heard things ... against me.... Besides ... I didn't care for them.... It was not they ... that I was waiting for.... It was somebody else.... And he did not come."
He understood the irreparable words which she was about to utter and he ardently hoped that she would not utter them.
Suzanne guessed his wish and was silent. But the avowal was so clear, even when unexpressed, that Philippe read all its passion in the long silence that followed. And Suzanne experienced a great joy, as though the indissoluble bond of words were linking them together. She added:
"It was a little your fault, Philippe, and you felt it, in a way, at dinner. Yes, a little your fault.... In Paris, I lived a dangerous life beside you.... Just think, we were always together, always by ourselves, we two; and, for days at a time, I had the right to think that there was no one in the world but you and I. It was for me that you talked, it was to make me worthy of yourself that you explained things to me which I did not know, that you took me to see the beautiful sights in the churches, in the old towns.... And I, I was amazed. At what I was learning? Oh, no, Philippe, but at the new world that suddenly opened up to me. I did not listen to your words, but I listened to the sound of your voice. My eyes saw only your eyes. It was your admiration that I admired; your love for the beautiful was what I loved. All that you taught me to know ... and to love, Philippe, was ... yourself."
Notwithstanding his inward rebellion, the words entered into Philippe's being like a caress; and he too almost forgot himself in the pleasure of listening to the sound of a soft voice and looking into eyes that are dear to one.
He said, simply:
"And Marthe?"
She did not answer; and he felt that, like many women, she was indifferent to considerations of that sort. To them, love is a reason that excuses everything.
Then, seeking to create a diversion, he repeated:
"You must get married, Suzanne, you must. That is where your safety lies."
"Oh, I know!" she said, wringing her hands in despair. "I know ... only ..."
"Only what?"
"I haven't the strength to."
"You must find the strength."
"I can't.... I ought to have it given me. I ought to have ... oh, nothing very much, perhaps ... a little gladness ... a glad memory ... the thought that my life will not have been entirely wasted.... The thought that I too shall have had my spell of love.... But that short spell I ask for ... I beg for it, I pray for it."
He blurted out:
"You will find it in marriage, Suzanne."
"No, no," she said, more bitterly, "only the man I love can give it to me.... I want, once at least, to feel a pair of arms around me, nothing but that, I assure you ... to lay my head on your shoulder and to remain like that, for an instant."
She was so near to Philippe that the muslin of her bodice touched his clothes and he breathed the scent of her hair. He felt a mad temptation to take her in his arms. And it would have been a very small thing, as she had said: one of those moments of happiness which one plucks like a flower and remembers.
She looked at him, not sadly now, nor resigned, but smiling, archly, with all the ingenious charm of the woman who is trying to conquer.
He turned pale and murmured:
"Suzanne, I am your friend. Be my friend, simply, and let your imagination ..."
"You're afraid," she said.
He tried to jest:
"Afraid! Goodness gracious me, of what?"
"Afraid of the one little affectionate action which I ask of you, the action of a brother kissing his sister. That's what you shrink from, Philippe."
"I shrink from it because it is wrong and wicked," he declared, firmly. "That is the only reason."
"No, Philippe, there is another reason."
"Which is that?"
"You love me."
"I! I love you?... I!"
"Yes, you, Philippe, you love me. And I defy you to look me in the face, to look me straight in the eyes and deny it."
And, without giving him time to recover, she continued, bending over him eagerly:
"You were in love with me, before I fell in love with you. It was your love that created mine. Don't protest, you have no right to do so now, for you know.... And I, I knew it from the first day. Oh, believe me, a woman is never mistaken.... Your eyes, when they looked at me, had a new look in them ... there, the look of just now. You have never looked like that at any woman, Philippe; not even at Marthe, ... no ... not even at her.... You never loved her, her nor the others. I was the first. Love was a thing unknown to you and you do not understand it yet ... and you sit there in front of me, nonplussed and dumbfoundered, because the truth appears to you and because you love me, Philippe, because you love me, my dear Philippe...."
She clung to him, in an upheaval of hope and certainty, and he seemed not to resist.
"You were afraid, Philippe. That is why you made up your mind not to see me again.... That is why you spoke so harshly to me just now.... You were afraid, because you love me.... Do you understand now?... Oh, Philippe, I should not have acted with you as I have done, if you did not love me.... I should never have had the presumption!... But I knew.... I knew ... and you don't deny it, do you?... Oh, how I suffered! My jealousy of Marthe!... To-day again, when she kissed you.... And the thought of going away without as much as saying good-bye to you!... And the thought of that marriage!... What a torture!... But it's over now, is it not? I shall suffer no more ... because you love me."
She spoke these last words with a sort of timorous hesitation and without taking her eyes from Philippe's face, as though expecting him to give an answer that would calm the sudden anguish with which she was torn.
He was silent. His eyes were dull, his forehead creased with wrinkles. He seemed to be reflecting and did not appear to reck that Suzanne was there so close to him, her arms clinging to his arms.
She whispered:
"Philippe.... Philippe...."
Had he heard? He remained impassive. Then, little by little, Suzanne released her embrace. Her hands fell to her sides. She gazed with infinite distress upon the man she loved and, suddenly, sank into a heap, weeping:
"Oh, I am mad!... I am mad! Why did I speak?"
It was a horrible ordeal for her, after the hope that had excited her, and this time it was real tears that flowed down her cheeks. The sound of the sobs roused Philippe from his dream. He listened to it sadly and then began to pace the room. Moved though he was, what was passing within him troubled him even more. He loved Suzanne!
It did not for a second occur to him to deny the truth. From the first sentences that Suzanne had spoken and without his having to seek for further proofs, he had admitted his love even as one admits the presence of a thing that one sees and touches. And that was why Suzanne, at the mere sight of Philippe's attitude, had suddenly realized the imprudence which she had committed in speaking: Philippe, once warned, was escaping her. He was one of those men who become conscious of their duty at the very moment when they perceive their fault.
"Philippe!" she said, once more. "Philippe!"
As he did not reply, she took his hand again and whispered:
"You love me, though ... you love me.... Well, then, if you love me ..."
The tears did not disfigure her exquisite face. On the contrary, grief decked her with a new, graver and more touching beauty. And she ended, ingenuously enough:
"Then, if you love me, why do you repel me? Surely, when one loves, one does not repel the thing one loves.... And you love me...."
The pretty mouth was all entreaty. Philippe observed its voluptuous action. It was as though the two lips delighted in uttering words of love and as though they could pronounce no others.
He turned away his eyes to escape the fascination and, controlling himself, mastering his voice so that she might not perceive its tremor, he said:
"It is just because I love you, Suzanne, that I am repulsing you ... because I love you too well...."
The phrase implied a breach which she felt to be irreparable. She did not attempt to protest. It was finished. And she knew this so thoroughly that, a moment later, when Philippe opened the door and prepared to go away, she did not even raise her head.
He did not go, however, for fear of offending her. He sat down. There was only a little table between them. But how far he was from her! And how it must surprise her that all her feminine wiles, her coquetry, the allurement of her lips were powerless to subjugate the will of that man who loved her!
The belfry-clock struck ten. When Morestal and Jorancé arrived, Suzanne and Philippe had not exchanged a single word.
⁂
"Ready to start, Philippe?" cried Morestal. "Have you said good-bye to Suzanne?"
She replied:
"Yes, we have said good-bye."
"Well, then it's my turn," he said, kissing her. "Jorancé, it's settled that you're coming with us."
"As far as the Butte-aux-Loups."
"If you go as far as the Butte," said Suzanne to her father, "you may just as well go on to the Old Mill and come back by the high-road."
"That's true. But are you staying behind, Suzanne?"
She decided to see them out of Saint-Élophe. She quickly wrapped a silk scarf round her head:
"Here I am," she said.
The four of them walked off, along the sleeping streets of the little town, and Morestal at once began to comment on his interview with Captain Daspry. A very intelligent man, the captain, who had not failed to see the importance of the Old Mill as a block-house, to use his expression. But, from another point of view, he had given something of a shock to Morestal's opinions on the attitude which a French officer should maintain towards his inferiors.
"Just imagine, Philippe: he refuses to punish the soldiers I told him about ... you know, the pillagers whom Saboureux complained of.... Well, he refuses to punish them ... even the leader of the band, one Duvauchel, a lover of every country but his own, who glories in his ideas, they say. Can you understand it? The rascal escapes with a fine of ten francs, an apology, a promise not to do it again and a lecture from his captain! And Mossieu Daspry pretends that, with kindness and patience, he succeeds in turning Duvauchel and fellows of his kidney into his best soldiers! What humbug! As though there were any way of taming those beggars, short of discipline! A pack of good-for-nothing scoundrels, who would fly across the frontier the moment the first shot was fired!"
Philippe had instinctively slackened his pace. Suzanne was walking beside him; and, every now and then, by the light of an electric lamp, he saw the golden halo of her hair and the delicate profile draped in the silk scarf.
He felt full of gentleness for her, now that he no longer feared her, and he was tempted to speak kind words to her, as to a little sister of whom one is very fond. But the silence was sweeter still and he did not wish to break its charm.
They passed the last houses. The street ran into a white country-road, lined with tall poplars. And they heard scraps of Morestal's conversation:
"Oh, yes! Captain Daspry! Leniency, friendly relations between superiors and inferiors, the barracks looked upon as a school of brotherhood, with the officers for instructors! That's all very well; but do you know what a system of that sort leads to? An army of deserters and renegades...."
Suzanne said, in a low voice:
"May I have your arm, Philippe?"
He at once slipped his arm through hers, happy at the thought of pleasing her. And he felt, besides, a great relief at seeing that she leant against him with the confidence of a friend. They were going to part and nothing would tarnish the pure memory of that day. It was a comforting impression, which nevertheless caused him a certain sadness. Duty fulfilled always leaves a taste of bitterness behind. The intoxication of sacrifice no longer stimulates you; and you begin to understand what you have refused.
In the warm night, amid all the perfumes that stirred in the breeze, Suzanne's own scent was wafted up to him. He inhaled it long and greedily and reflected that no scent had ever excited him before:
"Good-bye," he said, within himself. "Good-bye, little girl; good-bye to what was my love."
And, during those last minutes, as though he were granting a crowning grace to his impossible longings and his forbidden dreams, he yielded to the delights of that love which had blossomed so mysteriously in the unknown regions of his soul.
"Good-bye," Suzanne now said. "Good-bye, Philippe."
"Are you going?"
"Yes, or else my father would come back with me; and I want nobody ... nobody...."
Jorancé and old Morestal had stopped near a bench, at a place where two paths met, the wider of which, the one on the left, climbed up towards the frontier. The spot was known as the Carrefour du Grand Chêne, or Great Oak Crossways.
Morestal kissed the girl again:
"Good-bye, for the present, Suzanne. And don't forget that I'm coming to your wedding."
He pressed the spring of his repeater:
"I say, Philippe, it's a quarter past ten.... True, there's no hurry.... Your mother and Marthe must be asleep by now. No matter, let's get on...."
"Look here, father, if you don't mind, I would rather take the direct road.... The path by the Butte-aux-Loups is longer; and I am feeling rather tired."
In reality, like Suzanne, Philippe wanted to go home alone, so that nothing might disturb the melancholy charm of his dream. Old Morestal's long speeches terrified him.
"As you please, my boy," cried the old man. "But mind you don't put up the bolt or the chain on the hall-door."
Jorancé impressed the same injunctions on Suzanne and the two walked away.
"Good-bye, Philippe," said the girl, once again.
He had already entered the path on the right.
"Good-bye, Suzanne," he said.
"Give me your hand, Philippe."
For his hand to reach Suzanne's, he had to turn two or three steps back. He hesitated. But she had come towards him and, very gently, drew him to the foot of the path:
"Philippe, we must not part like this.... It is too sad! Let us go back together to Saint-Élophe ... as far as the house.... Please do...."
"No," he said, curtly.
"Oh!" she moaned. "I asked so that I might be with you a little longer.... It is so sad! But you are right. Let us part."
He said, in a kinder tone:
"Suzanne.... Suzanne...."
Bending her head a little, she put out her forehead to him:
"Kiss me, Philippe."
He stooped, intending to kiss the curls of her hair. But she gave a swift movement and flung her arms round his neck.
He felt that he was lost and made a despairing effort. Suzanne's lips were close to his, offering themselves.
"Oh, Suzanne ... Suzanne, my darling ..." he whispered, abandoning all resistance and pressing the girl to his breast....