x.x.xV. THE SAME TO THE SAME Ma.r.s.eILLES, July.

I am ashamed to think how my sudden flight will have taken you by surprise. But since I am above all honest, and since I love you not one bit the less, I shall tell you the truth in four words: I am horribly jealous!

Felipe's eyes were too often on you. You used to have little talks together at the foot of your rock, which were a torture to me; and I was fast becoming irritable and unlike myself. Your truly Spanish beauty could not fail to recall to him his native land, and along with it Marie Heredia, and I can be jealous of the past too. Your magnificent black hair, your lovely dark eyes, your brow, where the peaceful joy of motherhood stands out radiant against the shadows which tell of past suffering, the freshness of your southern skin, far fairer than that of a blonde like me, the splendid lines of your figure, the b.r.e.a.s.t.s, on which my G.o.dson hangs, peeping through the lace like some luscious fruit,--all this stabbed me in the eyes and in the heart. In vain did I stick cornflowers in my curls, in vain set off with cherry-colored ribbons the tameness of my pale locks, everything looked washed out when Renee appeared--a Renee so unlike the one I expected to find in your oasis.

Then Felipe made too much of the child, whom I found myself beginning to hate. Yes, I confess it, that exuberance of life which fills your house, making it gay with shouts and laughter--I wanted it for myself. I read a regret in Mac.u.mer's eyes, and, unknown to him, I cried over it two whole nights. I was miserable in your house. You are too beautiful as a woman, too triumphant as a mother, for me to endure your company.

Ah! you complained of your lot. Hypocrite! What would you have?

L'Estorade is most presentable; he talks well; he has fine eyes; and his black hair, dashed with white, is very becoming; his southern manners, too, have something attractive about them. As far as I can make out, he will, sooner or later, be elected deputy for the Bouches-du-Rhone; in the Chamber he is sure to come to the front, for you can always count on me to promote your interests. The sufferings of his exile have given him that calm and dignified air which goes half-way, in my opinion, to make a politician. For the whole art of politics, dear, seems to me to consist in looking serious. At this rate, Mac.u.mer, as I told him, ought certainly to have a high position in the state.

And so, having completely satisfied myself of your happiness, I fly off contented to my dear Chantepleurs, where Felipe must really achieve his aspirations. I have made up my mind not to receive you there without a fine baby at my breast to match yours.

Oh! I know very well I deserve all the epithets you can hurl at me. I am a fool, a wretch, an idiot. Alas! that is just what jealousy means. I am not vexed with you, but I was miserable, and you will forgive me for escaping from my misery. Two days more, and I should have made an exhibition of myself; yes, there would have been an outbreak of vulgarity.

But in spite of the rage gnawing at my heart, I am glad to have come, glad to have seen you in the pride of your beautiful motherhood, my friend still, as I remain yours in all the absorption of my love. Why, even here at Ma.r.s.eilles, only a step from your door, I begin to feel proud of you and of the splendid mother that you will make.

How well you judged your vocation! You seem to me born for the part of mother rather than of lover, exactly as the reverse is true of me. There are women capable of neither, hard-favored or silly women. A good mother and a pa.s.sionately loving wife have this in common, that they both need intelligence and discretion ever at hand, and an unfailing command of every womanly art and grace. Oh! I watched you well; need I add, sly puss, that I admired you too! Your children will be happy, but not spoilt, with your tenderness lapping them round and the clear light of your reason playing softly on them.

Tell Louis the truth about my going away, but find some decent excuse for your father-in-law, who seems to act as steward for the establishment; and be careful to do the same for your family--a true Provencal version of the Harlowe family. Felipe does not know why I left, and he will never know. If he asks, I shall contrive to find some colorable pretext, probably that you were jealous of me! Forgive me this little conventional fib.

Good-bye. I write in haste, as I want you to get this at lunch-time; and the postilion, who has undertaken to convey it to you, is here, refreshing himself while he waits.

Many kisses to my dear little G.o.dson. Be sure you come to Chantepleurs in October. I shall be alone there all the time that Mac.u.mer is away in Sardinia, where he is designing great improvements in his estate. At least that is his plan for the moment, and his pet vanity consists in having a plan. Then he feels that he has a will of his own, and this makes him very uneasy when he unfolds it to me. Good-bye!

x.x.xVI. THE VICOMTESSE DE L'ESTORADE TO THE BARONNE DE MAc.u.mER

Dear,--no words can express the astonishment of all our party when, at luncheon, we were told that you had both gone, and, above all, when the postilion who took you to Ma.r.s.eilles handed me your mad letter. Why, naughty child, it was of your happiness, and nothing else, that made the theme of those talks below the rock, on the "Louise" seat, and you had not the faintest justification for objecting to them. _Ingrata!_ My sentence on you is that you return here at my first summons. In that horrid letter, scribbled on the inn paper, you did not tell me what would be your next stopping place; so I must address this to Chantepleurs.

Listen to me, dear sister of my heart. Know first, that my mind is set on your happiness. Your husband, dear Louise, commands respect, not only by his natural gravity and dignified expression, but also because he somehow impresses one with the splendid power revealed in his piquant plainness and in the fire of his velvet eyes; and you will understand that it was some little time before I could meet him on those easy terms which are almost necessary for intimate conversation. Further, this man has been Prime Minister, and he idolizes you; whence it follows that he must be a profound dissembler. To fish up secrets, therefore, from the rocky caverns of this diplomatic soul is a work demanding a skilful hand no less than a ready brain. Nevertheless, I succeeded at last, without rousing my victim's suspicions, in discovering many things of which you, my pet, have no conception.

You know that, between us two, my part is rather that of reason, yours of imagination: I personify sober duty, you reckless love. It has pleased fate to continue in our lives this contrast in character which was imperceptible to all except ourselves. I am a simple country vicountess, very ambitious, and making it her task to lead her family on the road to prosperity. On the other hand, Mac.u.mer, late Duc de Soria, has a name in the world, and you, a d.u.c.h.ess by right, reign in Paris, where reigning is no easy matter even for kings. You have a considerable fortune, which will be doubled if Mac.u.mer carries out his projects for developing his great estates in Sardinia, the resources of which are matter of common talk at Ma.r.s.eilles. Deny, if you can, that if either has the right to be jealous, it is not you. But, thank G.o.d, we have both hearts generous enough to place our friendship beyond reach of such vulgar pettiness.

I know you, dear; I know that, ere now, you are ashamed of having fled.

But don't suppose that your flight will save you from a single word of discourse which I had prepared for your benefit to-day beneath the rock.

Read carefully then, I beg of you, what I say, for it concerns you even more closely than Mac.u.mer, though he also enters largely into my sermon.

Firstly, my dear, you do not love him. Before two years are over, you will be sick of adoration. You will never look on Felipe as a husband; to you he will always be the lover whom you can play with, for that is how all women treat their lovers. You do not look up to him, or reverence, or worship him as a woman should the G.o.d of her idolatry. You see, I have made a study of love, my sweet, and more than once have I taken soundings in the depth of my own heart. Now, as the result of a careful diagnosis of your case, I can say with confidence, this is not love.

Yes, dear Queen of Paris, you cannot escape the destiny of all queens.

The day will come when you long to be treated as a light-o'-love, to be mastered and swept off your feet by a strong man, one who will not prostrate himself in adoration before you, but will seize your arm roughly in a fit of jealousy. Mac.u.mer loves you too fondly ever to be able either to resist you or find fault with you. A single glance from you, a single coaxing word, would melt his sternest resolution. Sooner or later, you will learn to scorn this excessive devotion. He spoils you, alas! just as I used to spoil you at the convent, for you are a most bewitching woman, and there is no escaping your siren-like charms.

Worse than all, you are candid, and it often happens that our happiness depends on certain social hypocrisies to which you will never stoop. For instance, society will not tolerate a frank display of the wife's power over her husband. The convention is that a man must no more show himself the lover of his wife, however pa.s.sionately he adores her, than a married woman may play the part of a mistress. This rule you both disregard.

In the first place, my child, from what you have yourself told me, it is clear that the one unpardonable sin in society is to be happy. If happiness exists, no one must know of it. But this is a small point.

What seems to me important is that the perfect equality which reigns between lovers ought never to appear in the case of husband and wife, under pain of undermining the whole fabric of society and entailing terrible disasters. If it is painful to see a man whom nature has made a nonent.i.ty, how much worse is the spectacle of a man of parts brought to that position? Before very long you will have reduced Mac.u.mer to the mere shadow of a man. He will cease to have a will and character of his own, and become mere clay in your hands. You will have so completely moulded him to your likeness, that your household will consist of only one person instead of two, and that one necessarily imperfect. You will regret it bitterly; but when at last you deign to open your eyes, the evil will be past cure. Do what we will, women do not, and never will, possess the qualities which are characteristic of men, and these qualities are absolutely indispensable to family life. Already Mac.u.mer, blinded though he is, has a dim foreshadowing of this future; he feels himself less a man through his love. His visit to Sardinia is a proof to me that he hopes by this temporary separation to succeed in recovering his old self.

You never scruple to use the power which his love has placed in your hand. Your position of vantage may be read in a gesture, a look, a tone.

Oh! darling, how truly are you the mad wanton your mother called you!

You do not question, I fancy, that I am greatly Louis' superior. Well, I would ask you, have you ever heard me contradict him? Am I not always, in the presence of others, the wife who respects in him the authority of the family? Hypocrisy! you will say. Well, listen to me. It is true that if I want to give him any advice which I think may be of use to him, I wait for the quiet and seclusion of our bedroom to explain what I think and wish; but, I a.s.sure you, sweetheart, that even there I never arrogate to myself the place of mentor. If I did not remain in private the same submissive wife that I appear to others, he would lose confidence in himself. Dear, the good we do to others is spoilt unless we efface ourselves so completely that those we help have no sense of inferiority. There is a wonderful sweetness in these hidden sacrifices, and what a triumph for me in your unsuspecting praises of Louis! There can be no doubt also that the happiness, the comfort, the hope of the last two years have restored what misfortune, hardship, solitude, and despondency has robbed him of.

This, then, is the sum-total of my observations. At the present moment you love in Felipe, not your husband, but yourself. There is truth in your father's words; concealed by the spring-flowers of your pa.s.sion lies all the great lady's selfishness. Ah! my child, how I must love you to speak such bitter truths!

Let me tell you, if you will promise never to breathe a word of this to the Baron, the end of our talk. We had been singing your praises in every key, for he soon discovered that I loved you like a fondly-cherished sister, and having insensibly brought him to a confidential mood, I ventured to say:

"Louise has never yet had to struggle with life. She has been the spoilt child of fortune, and she might yet have to pay for this were you not there to act the part of father as well as lover."

"Ah! but is it possible?..." He broke off abruptly, like a man who sees himself on the edge of a precipice. But the exclamation was enough for me. No doubt, if you had stayed, he would have spoken more freely later.

My sweet, think of the day awaiting you when your husband's strength will be exhausted, when pleasure will have turned to satiety, and he sees himself, I will not say degraded, but shorn of his proper dignity before you. The stings of conscience will then waken a sort of remorse in him, all the more painful for you, because you will feel yourself responsible, and you will end by despising the man whom you have not accustomed yourself to respect. Remember, too, that scorn with a woman is only the earliest phase of hatred. You are too n.o.ble and generous, I know, ever to forget the sacrifices which Felipe has made for you; but what further sacrifices will be left for him to make when he has, so to speak, served up himself at the first banquet? Woe to the man, as to the woman, who has left no desire unsatisfied! All is over then. To our shame or our glory--the point is too nice for me to decide--it is of love alone that women are insatiable.

Oh! Louise, change yet, while there is still time. If you would only adopt the same course with Mac.u.mer that I have done with l'Estorade, you might rouse the sleeping lion in your husband, who is made of the stuff of heroes. One might almost say that you grudge him his greatness.

Would you feel no pride in using your power for other ends than your own gratification, in awakening the genius of a gifted man, as I in raising to a higher level one of merely common parts?

Had you remained with us, I should still have written this letter, for in talking you might have cut me short or got the better of me with your sharp tongue. But I know that you will read this thoughtfully and weigh my warnings. Dear heart, you have everything in life to make you happy, do not spoil your chances; return to Paris, I entreat you, as soon as Mac.u.mer comes back. The engrossing claims of society, of which I complained, are necessary for both of you; otherwise you would spend your life in mutual self-absorption. A married woman ought not to be too lavish of herself. The mother of a family, who never gives her household an opportunity of missing her, runs the risk of palling on them. If I have several children, as I trust for my own sake I may, I a.s.sure you I shall make a point of reserving to myself certain hours which shall be held sacred; even to one's children one's presence should not be a matter of daily bread.

Farewell, my dear jealous soul! Do you know that many women would be highly flattered at having roused this pa.s.sing pang in you? Alas! I can only mourn, for what is not mother in me is your dear friend. A thousand loves. Make what excuse you will for leaving; if you are not sure of Mac.u.mer, I am of Louis.

x.x.xVII. THE BARONNE DE MAc.u.mER TO THE VICOMTESSE DE L'ESTORADE Genoa.

My beloved beauty,--I was bitten with the fancy to see something of Italy, and I am delighted at having carried off Mac.u.mer, whose plans in regard to Sardinia are postponed.

This country is simple ravishing. The churches--above all, the chapels--have a seductive, bewitching air, which must make every female Protestant yearn after Catholicism. Mac.u.mer has been received with acclamation, and they are all delighted to have made an Italian of so distinguished a man. Felipe could have the Sardinian emba.s.sy at Paris if I cared about it, for I am made much of at court.

If you write, address your letters to Florence. I have not time now to go into any details, but I will tell you the story of our travels whenever you come to Paris. We only remain here a week, and then go on to Florence, taking Leghorn on the way. We shall stay a month in Tuscany and a month at Naples, so as to reach Rome in November. Thence we return home by Venice, where we shall spend the first fortnight of December, and arrive in Paris, _via_ Milan and Turin, for January.

Our journey is a perfect honeymoon; the sight of new places gives fresh life to our pa.s.sion. Mac.u.mer did not know Italy at all, and we have begun with that splendid Cornice road, which might be the work of fairy architects.

Good-bye, darling. Don't be angry if I don't write. It is impossible to get a minute to oneself in traveling; my whole time is taken up with seeing, admiring, and realizing my impressions. But not a word to you of these till memory has given them their proper atmosphere.

x.x.xVIII. THE VICOMTESSE DE L'ESTORADE TO THE BARONNE DE MAc.u.mER September.

My dear,--There is lying for you at Chantepleurs a full reply to the letter you wrote me from Ma.r.s.eilles. This honeymoon journey, so far from diminishing the fears I there expressed, makes me beg of you to get my letter sent on from Nivernais.

The Government, it is said, are resolved on dissolution. This is unlucky for the Crown, since the last session of this loyal Parliament would have been devoted to the pa.s.sing of laws, essential to the consolidation of its power; and it is not less so for us, as Louis will not be forty till the end of 1827. Fortunately, however, my father has agreed to stand, and he will resign his seat when the right moment arrives.

Your G.o.dson has found out how to walk without his G.o.dmother's help. He is altogether delicious, and begins to make the prettiest little signs to me, which bring home to one that here is really a thinking being, not a mere animal or sucking machine. His smiles are full of meaning. I have been so successful in my profession of nurse that I shall wean Armand in December. A year at the breast is quite enough; children who are suckled longer are said to grow stupid, and I am all for popular sayings.

You must make a tremendous sensation in Italy, my fair one with the golden locks. A thousand loves.