CHAPTER VI.
THE OLD BONAPARTIST'S STORY.
'When I was young like you,' began the captain, 'I had my illusions. Icame of a royalist family which had suffered much by the Revolution, andhad stood up for the cause of the king as long as La Vend?e was able tokeep a square league of ground to itself or a square inch of its flagflying. But we had to give way; we could not conquer impossibilities:Fortune always sides with the big battalions, as the Man used to say.The domain passed from the hands of the Chauvins, and I, the heir of thehouse, was obliged to take service with those who had helped to uprootthe family tree. I had no other alternative; my parents were dead; I,the only scion of the ancient stock left, owed my life to the care of mynurse, a brave peasant woman, who was married to a burly grenadier ofthe Republic. They were kind in their way to the young aristocrat, andthey loved France. Poor C?line, to-day I could drop a tear over yourquiet grass-covered grave down in Burgundy: and Tricot, too, he was athorough soldier. He died on the retreat from Moscow the same day thatSchramm--you know Schramm, who is president of an army commission herenow--was made brigadier-general.
'Did you ever hear the story of his promotion?
'He was a colonel when we made that fatal invasion, and in one of thebloody fights on our retrograde march, fell, pierced by a bullet. Theblood bubbled in hot gouts from his wound, but the tears came fasterfrom his eyes. The Man saw him.
'"What, weeping!" he said. "Why do you cry?"
'"Because I'm going to die only a colonel," said Schramm.
'"We'll settle that," said Napoleon, and made him a brigadier-general onthe spot. Schramm has not died since.
'But to return to myself. I showed a mathematical taste, and early wassent, at the expense of the commune in which C?line lived, to thePolytechnic School. They did not keep us long over our course in thosetimes, and I was shortly appointed to a corps on active service. It wasthere I learned to love the Man who was then leading France to a highereminence on the path of glory than she had ever reached. He was the idolof the army. I had my ambition, and I often recollected with a thrillof pride and hope that he, too, was a mathematician, and commenced hiscareer as a subaltern of artillery. But, as I told you, I was onlysub-lieutenant at Mont St. Jean, and that day finished the soldier'schances for that era in France--put a quencher on his aspirations. Toone passion succeeds another. Our life is a series of agitations, comingchangeful in aspect but regular in period as the tides of thesea--sometimes smooth and glistening under a bright sun, sometimesrestless, sullen, heaving under the strong breath of the storm. Toglory, in my breast, followed love. I had met the daughter of anotherVend?an family in Paris, where she supported herself by giving lessonsin music. Her mother received me (she had known my mother), andencouraged my little attentions to Caroline with her smiles. Alas; had Ibeen rich, at that time, what happiness might not have been mine, whatsorrows might not have been spared to her and me!'
Here the aged officer stopped and busied himself with his handkerchiefabout the region of the eyes.
'But, sir, an officer with us who has to live on his pay cannot affordhimself the luxury of a wife. Caroline had no dowry, and I had noposition. If we had espoused each other she would have had to do withouta _trousseau_, and I certainly would not have been able to present herwith a _corbeille_. We loved each other, and we parted--not withoutsome sighing, and many wishes for our meeting again under happiercircumstances. I was very fond of my cigar, and Caroline's motherdetested smoking. It was a mania with her. She had an unaccountable,almost diseased, aversion to the habit. One evening, Caroline, out ofplay, induced me to light a cigar in the chamber while she was lookingout of the window. I can never forget the fierce, pallid face with whichher mother turned on me and ordered me to leave the room on the instant.It was only by a plentiful sprinkling of tears from Caroline that herheart was softened to accept my excuses.
'"It is his first fault, and I tempted him," said Caroline; "will younot give him absolution, mamma?"
After a while the mother relented, but said she would not admit me tothe same position in her esteem again, unless I consented to accept thepenance she would impose on me. The penance was never to smoke again. Ipromised. This was when the wreck of our army was being re-formed atParis, under Louis XVIII., and the allies who had violated our capitalwere beginning to get confident on the news which each ship conveyedfrom St. Helena of the hastening end of the Man whom Sir Lowe was doingto death. There was no chance of promotion for us if he did not comeback; for the soldiers who loved Him, his death would indeed be thesetting of the sun of Austerlitz. I had long given up the expectation ofthat marshal's b?ton which every conscript fancies he carries in hisknapsack; but still I had the conviction that some chance of distinctionwould present itself, even under the pacific Restoration, that mightlead me to a rank sufficient to maintain my beloved Caroline in comfortas my wife. My regiment was ordered to Metz. The night I parted from herI confided to her ear the idea that was before my mind, and she lookedsuch a cheerful, hope-inspiring look from her large liquid eyes intomine as would have put fire into a breast of stone. It was the purelustre of a fresh innocent love, and as earnest that I accepted it assacred, I gave her my first and last kiss of holy affection. Her motherreminded me at the door of the promise I had made about smoking, andgave me a letter of introduction to a cousin of hers who was an officerin the garrison to which we were ordered. This cousin, as I learned froma comrade who knew him, was of a haughty, overbearing temper, and I wasin no hurry to hand him my credentials. About a week after my arrival Iwas strolling about the fortification in the cool breezy twilight of asultry day, thinking of my future and of my Caroline, and looking up tothe stars in the mood of the poet, to whom the lover is so like. I triedto shape out, in the light clouds that were flitting across the heavensin white flakes, some clue to my fortune. There that pale star, which isso small and distant to-night, but will go on steadily increasing inbrightness and size until it attains its zenith, is the star of mydestiny. At the instant I gazed on it a wanton scud shut it out fromview; I tried to laugh, but I couldn't help feeling as if it were apresentiment of coming gloom. Then I turned towards a bank of cloudrising fantastically on the edge of the far blue horizon, and in fancypictured to myself that a pair of jagged peaks projecting from itssurface were the epaulettes of a general which awaited me; and, stilllooking, until my eyes had almost got as visionary as my mind, I framedout of a loose irregular mass of fleecy vapour the beamy figure of awoman, whom I had persuaded my senses into identifying as the genius ofglory.
'"It is our Napoleon who comes back to France," said I; "the soldierwill have his meat to carve again."
'At the moment a tall figure passed, and recalled me from my dreaming. Iwalked on, but somehow I was melancholic. I couldn't shake off theimpression which that star, blotted out of sight as I looked, had madeon my mind. I put my hand in the pocket of my uniform and involuntarilytook something out of it. It was my cigar-case. Involuntarily still, Iopened it--there was one cigar left. I was depressed in spirits,thinking sadly--and smoking, you know, kills thought.
'The bribe was strong. I forgot my promise to Caroline's mother, orencouraged myself to look upon it as a mere puerile engagement to humoura woman's whim, and lit the cigar. Scarcely did the red fire take at itsend, and the first puff of smoke escape from my lips, when it was pulledout of my mouth and cast on the ground, and a tall man stood frowningbefore me, as well as I could distinguish in the dim light. My handimmediately flew to my sword-hilt, and I put myself in an attitude ofdefence.
'"How dare you smoke here? don't you know the magazine is beside you?"said the stranger, in a harsh voice.
'"I did not know it," I answered; "nor will I allow any fellow to makethe fact known to me in that brutal manner."
'"Fellow!" and the stranger laughed; "_ma foi_, that's amusing; and thecockchafer has his hand on his butter-blade. Is your honour wounded, mygallant sir?"
'"Your body will be wounded shortly if you don't endeavour to civi
lizeyour tongue," I answered, enraged.
'"I positively think," said he, coolly twirling his moustaches, "thatthe Gascon would fight. Does your fancy run on being impaled like afrog? If so, follow me, Sir Braggart," and he moved off.
'I followed, wrath boiling in every vein. He stopped when he came to anangle in the works, totally secure from observation from any side. Themoon burst out in full splendour; he cast a look upward, made a jestingremark on the politeness of the higher powers in lighting folk tokingdom come; and, throwing off his cloak, I discovered him to be astaff-officer of rank by the uniform underneath.
'"Has your courage failed yet?" he tauntingly asked, as he dexterouslydetached his sword from the scabbard.
'I was too vexed to speak. I said nothing, but fixed myself in the bestposition I knew to receive his expected attack.
'"Ha! Is that it?" he exclaimed, "think of your _ma?tre d'armes_, andrecommend your soul to God, if you believe in Him."
'At the last word he sprang forward, made a feint at my left leg, butcarried his weapon round in a circle in the one swing, and was bringingit down on my sword-arm. But I knew the trick of old, and instead ofattempting to parry the feint, I turned my body aside to the left, andheld my weapon extended with a quick lunge to the front. He ran instraight upon it with a force that made it shiver. His sword fell fromhis grasp; his hands were thrown up over his head; he fell back, gaveone convulsive shake of the limbs, and his life's blood gushed over thelips on which the taunts that brought him to his fate were yettrembling.
'I do not know how I found my way to my quarters on that dreadful night.The next thing I recollect was rising in the morning exhausted as ifafter the delirium of a fever, and descending feebly to my breakfast atthe caf? opposite. A knot of officers were eagerly conversing outsidethe door.
'"Chauvin," said a comrade of mine from amongst them, "have youpresented that letter yet?"
'I shook my head.
'"You may spare yourself the trouble; your friend was found at daybreakin a corner of the ramparts, dead as a burst shell, run through theright lung."
'I shuddered and felt as if my spine were turned to ice. Feigning urgentprivate business, I sought leave of absence, and flew to Paris toacquaint the mother of her whom I looked upon as my _fianc?e_ with thedreadful secret. She heard me, never changed colour, said she believedme; his conduct was in keeping with his character, which washead-strong; she did not blame me for killing him--it was done inself-defence; but, added she in the end, this would not have happened ifyou had kept your promise not to smoke. "The man who cannot keep hisword shall be no suitor for my daughter's hand--never again approach meor mine----"
'"But Caroline whom I love," I cried.
'"Whom _you_ love," she said, in a cutting voice--"there, there, takeyour mistress to your breast," and she cast an old cigar-case at my feetas she shut the door in my face.
'I never saw Caroline again. I returned to my regiment, said nothingabout the fatal duel--nay, even wore mourning for my adversary, who wasnot very much regretted. He left after him one pretty boy, a love-child;I was not able to adopt him myself, but I watched over him and got himadmitted into the regiment as _enfant de troupe_--a brave, truthful, buthot-headed, passionate boy. He died a soldier's death at the taking ofthe Smala of Abd-el-Kader, under Lamorici?re. His daughter has hiscandour and generosity, without his ebullitions of temper. She'ssomewhat giddy, perhaps, but very good-natured. Don't you think so?'
'How should I know, captain?' said O'Hara, who had been a patientlistener to this moving story.
'Ah, me! How an old man's brain wanders! Do you know,' he continued,after a little hesitation, 'I feel the better for having opened my bosomto you, my young friend, and I don't care for making half-confidences. Imay trust your discretion, I think,' and he smiled amiably. 'Berthe, mySong-bird, the sunbeam in my house, is the daughter of the boy, thegrand-daughter of him I had the misfortune to slay at Metz. No, not toslay,' he added quickly, correcting himself, 'I did not slay him; herushed on his own death.'
'Did Caroline's mother ever divulge the secret of your confession?'inquired O'Hara.
'Never, oh no! She was one of the old nobility, the mirror of honour.She would not look upon any casualty in an affair of the kind other thanas a matter of ordinary course, even of professional necessity, in thelife of a soldier.'
'And you never saw Caroline? Did she learn anything about it, do youthink?'
Captain Chauvin sighed.
'Sometimes I think she did, but I am sure she forgave me if she heardall as it happened. She was too good in herself to think evil of anyone.Ah! my dear sir, she was a woman. The sex, the sex! we, soldiers and menof feeling, ought to have no commerce with it, but be let walk our waysstraightly.'
O'Hara was fiddling with a certain parcel which he had stolen from hisbosom.
'She married a rich politician, one of the damn---- pardon me, my dearsir, one of the bourgeoisie class, and as Louis Philippe was king, thebourgeoisie was everything, and Caroline's husband was a favourite and agreat man. I think she married him out of duty to her mother, to saveher declining days from poverty. When Louis Philippe was sent to theright-about, the mean bourgeois politician went to the right-about too,and his fortune with him. Poor Caroline had died in giving birth todaughters, twins. Luckily, their nurse, one of the people, had a heart;she kept a wine-shop at Choisy-le-Roi, and she took care of the two poororphans: yes, they were orphans, for that shabby Orleans rascal, whoskirted, was never a real living man, nor his master either. Damn----pardon me, sir, but Louis Philippe was no king--he was a grocer, sir, agrocer.'
'At best he was a usurper, but a singularly mild one,' remarked O'Hara.
'We shall not talk of him, sir,' said the captain; 'but now let mecomplete an old man's confidences. I adopted one of those twins, she wasso like her mother in manner; she is my housekeeper. If Berthe is mySong-bird, it is Caroline who keeps the nest tidy.'
'That superb brunette!'
'Ah! you think her superb,' cried the aged officer, pleased.'Superb--that's right; she is the born image of her mother.'
'And the other,' pursued O'Hara eagerly, a dark suspicion taking hold ofhis imagination.
A shade passed over the old man's face. 'Ah! I know nothing of her. Shewas her father's daughter, not her mother's. She preferred the noisywine-shop to my quiet home, and three years ago she disappeared fromour sight altogether. But the night waxes late. I must be going. So youhaven't seen your friend since?'
'No, and I have anxiously desired to see him, to clear off someobligations I am under to him.'
'Well, again good-night. I pray you don't be such a stranger as he; butsometimes call up to Victor Chauvin's humble quarters. It gladdens hisspirit to converse with youth.'
O'Hara gave assurance that he would esteem it a happiness and an honourto visit one with whom he had so many kindred sympathies.
'It grows late' said the officer, 'and my pair of pretty birds will beanxiously looking out for me if I delay. Good-night, my child,good-night.'
And as O'Hara escorted Captain Chauvin to the door, Pat accompaniedthem, but only with a valedictory bark. The truth is he was too wellfed, and he was not used to it. With dogs, as with men, high feedingbegets indolence, and the indolent are not over-polite.
Mated from the Morgue: A Tale of the Second Empire Page 6
