“Yes, if you will not consent to retract that infamous calumny.”
“Wait a moment—no threats, if you please, M. Fernand Mondego, Vicomte de Morcerf; I never allow them from my enemies, and therefore shall not put up with them from my friends. You insist on my contradicting the article relating to General Fernand, an article with which, I assure you on my word of honor, I had nothing whatever to do?”
“Yes, I insist on it,” said Albert, whose mind was beginning to get bewildered with the excitement of his feelings.
“And if I refuse to retract, you wish to fight, do you?” said Beauchamp in a calm tone.
“Yes,” replied Albert, raising his voice.
“Well,” said Beauchamp, “here is my answer, my dear sir. The article was not inserted by me—I was not even aware of it; but you have, by the step you have taken, called my attention to the paragraph in question, and it will remain until it shall be either contradicted or confirmed by some one who has a right to do so.”
“Sir,” said Albert, rising, “I will do myself the honor of sending my seconds to you, and you will be kind enough to arrange with them the place of meeting and the weapons.”
“Certainly, my dear sir.”
“And this evening, if you please, or tomorrow at the latest, we will meet.”
“No, no, I will be on the ground at the proper time; but in my opinion (and I have a right to dictate the preliminaries, as it is I who have received the provocation)—in my opinion the time ought not to be yet. I know you to be well skilled in the management of the sword, while I am only moderately so; I know, too, that you are a good marksman—there we are about equal. I know that a duel between us two would be a serious affair, because you are brave, and I am brave also. I do not therefore wish either to kill you, or to be killed myself without a cause. Now, I am going to put a question to you, and one very much to the purpose too. Do you insist on this retractation so far as to kill me if I do not make it, although I have repeated more than once, and affirmed on my honor, that I was ignorant of the thing with which you charge me, and although I still declare that it is impossible for any one but you to recognize the Count of Morcerf under the name of Fernand?”
“I maintain my original resolution.”
“Very well, my dear sir; then I consent to cut throats with you. But I require three weeks’ preparation; at the end of that time I shall come and say to you, ‘The assertion is false, and I retract it,’ or ‘The assertion is true,’ when I shall immediately draw the sword from its sheath, or the pistols from the case, whichever you please.”
“Three weeks!” cried Albert; “they will pass as slowly as three centuries when I am all the time suffering dishonor.”
“Had you continued to remain on amicable terms with me, I should have said, ‘Patience, my friend;’ but you have constituted yourself my enemy, therefore I say, ‘What does that signify to me, sir?’“
“Well, let it be three weeks then,” said Morcerf; “but remember, at the expiration of that time no delay or subterfuge will justify you in”—
“M. Albert de Morcerf,” said Beauchamp, rising in his turn, “I cannot throw you out of window for three weeks—that is to say, for twenty-four days to come—nor have you any right to split my skull open till that time has elapsed. To-day is the 29th of August; the 21st of September will, therefore, be the conclusion of the term agreed on, and till that time arrives—and it is the advice of a gentleman which I am about to give you—till then we will refrain from growling and barking like two dogs chained within sight of each other.” When he had concluded his speech, Beauchamp bowed coldly to Albert, turned his back upon him, and went to the pressroom.
Albert vented his anger on a pile of newspapers, which he sent flying all over the office by switching them violently with his stick; after which ebullition he departed—not, however, without walking several times to the door of the pressroom, as if he had half a mind to enter. While Albert was lashing the front of his carriage in the same manner that he had the newspapers which were the innocent agents of his discomfiture, as he was crossing the barrier he perceived Morrel, who was walking with a quick step and a bright eye. He was passing the Chinese Baths, and appeared to have come from the direction of the Porte Saint-Martin, and to be going towards the Madeleine. “Ah,” said Morcerf, “there goes a happy man!” And it so happened Albert was not mistaken in his opinion.
Chapter 14. The Lemonade.
Morrel was, in fact, very happy. M. Noirtier had just sent for him, and he was in such haste to know the reason of his doing so that he had not stopped to take a cab, placing infinitely more dependence on his own two legs than on the four legs of a cab-horse. He had therefore set off at a furious rate from the Rue Meslay, and was hastening with rapid strides in the direction of the Faubourg Saint-Honore. Morrel advanced with a firm, manly tread, and poor Barrois followed him as he best might. Morrel was only thirty-one, Barrois was sixty years of age; Morrel was deeply in love, and Barrois was dying with heat and exertion. These two men, thus opposed in age and interests, resembled two parts of a triangle, presenting the extremes of separation, yet nevertheless possessing their point of union. This point of union was Noirtier, and it was he who had just sent for Morrel, with the request that the latter would lose no time in coming to him—a command which Morrel obeyed to the letter, to the great discomfiture of Barrois. On arriving at the house, Morrel was not even out of breath, for love lends wings to our desires; but Barrois, who had long forgotten what it was to love, was sorely fatigued by the expedition he had been constrained to use.
The old servant introduced Morrel by a private entrance, closed the door of the study, and soon the rustling of a dress announced the arrival of Valentine. She looked marvelously beautiful in her deep mourning dress, and Morrel experienced such intense delight in gazing upon her that he felt as if he could almost have dispensed with the conversation of her grandfather as Barrois moved off to inform Nortier of his arrival.
Valentine seized him in a great embrace as if the time they spent apart had been a long and torturous ordeal.
‘We haven’t much time, my love,” she whispered before kissing him.
Her affection was not lost to him and he grasped her around the waist, pulling her into his body, as he accepted her kiss.
“Quickly,” she said, pulling him into an adjacent empty bedroom.
“It will take a few moments for my grandfather to arrive. I have missed you so, in word and in body. Please, show me how you missed me as well.”
“With pleasure, my love.”
He led her to the bed and lifted her easily up onto the edge.
“It is my turn to bestow the honor on you that you afforded me when last we met.”
Her eyes shown bright in the shadowy room and he quickly removed the layer of undergarments separating her personal flesh from his mouth.
Valentine lay back and allowed Maximilian to perform his task. In only moments she was gasping and gripping the bedclothes.
He began by biting and licking her inner thigh gently, which she found to be an interesting sensation. Progressing, he kissed the top of her sex and then parted her legs and delved into her curls with his fingers. Once his lips touched her she knew he found that hidden pearl, that secret place, that held so much pleasure. She arched off the bed slightly as he dipped his tongue between her folds to flick that pearl.
Valentine could never have imagined this type of pleasure. There were many things in her life that drove her to distraction but nothing at all like the feel of Maximilian’s mouth on her heated skin. She would never recover from such a pleasure, both a beautiful act and a curse to ensnare her everlasting servitude. Just one more pass of his tongue and then he began to lick her in earnest, fast and with long flat strokes of his tongue from her opening to her pearl and back.
Maximilian could not believe his good fortune. His betrothed, his friend, his lover lay languidly accepting the pleasure he could bestow on her. He would have liked hours, nay
, days, to show her exactly the joy he could bring her trapped, bare, and nude with him in his own bedchamber, but for now, with their situations so precarious, this was enough.
“Maximilian, please, I can’t hold on much longer,” Valentine whispered fiercely as she gripped the bedding tightly.
He lifted his head from his ministrations and smiled up at her.
“You aren’t supposed to last longer, let yourself go my love, I will catch you.”
“No,” she said, loud in the echoing chamber.
She sat up and pulled him up to her.
“I will not go another day without knowing you. We are in a bed, in my home, and I will have my betrothed, now.”
This forceful side of his beloved surprised Maximilian but the thought of entering her body was enough to spur him into movement.
“My love, are you certain, we can’t go back.”
“Maximilian, if you truly love me you will stop asking me that and just make love to me.”
“I regret to tell you as this is your first time it will not be a wholly pleasant experience but I feel confident by the end you will gain your pleasure.”
“Make haste, grandfather will be wanting to fetch me any moment.”
Maximilian quickly released his hard and swollen erection from his pants as he climbed into place between her legs.
His pants were pushed to his knees and her skirts lay in a tangle around her hips, her lower body bare to him. Again, he would have liked something different for them but he would take this small moment and revel in it as he waited for their nuptials.
He slowly guided his manhood to her opening and she clutched his shirt in a hard grip, which helped bolster him to continue. Slowly, he entered her and she gasped as he pushed all the way inside breaching her maidenhood.
A single tear tracked down the side of her face.
“My love, I have hurt you, I will stop,” Maximilian said, moving to release her.
“No, please, I’m not in pain, I am crying because I love you, more than my next breath, and this, making love, feels wondrous,”
He watched her face carefully inspecting it for signs of subterfuge; she would do such a thing to ensure his pleasure.
Seeing none, he moved back and then forward carefully and gently, causing Valentine’s eyes to shudder in the interim.
He settled into a rhythm applying deep strokes in and out so as to minimize her discomfort. It took only minutes for her to clutch his shirt anew and wrap her legs around his hips.
“Lady?”
“My love, don’t stop, I’m close,”
Spurred by her words he increased his pace and thrust into her at a deeper angle so the base of him rubbed her pearl.
“Yes,” she said, almost shouting.
Maximilian quickly covered her mouth with his hand, increasing the pace again.
He could feel his own orgasm coming forward but he could never allow that, not until they married.
In seconds he felt her inner walls contract around him, pulling him in deeper. He thrust harder, allowing her orgasm to finish before pulling out quickly and spilling his seed just above her sex.
They stayed in that position for a few moments, both in the clutches of the languid infusion of adrenaline and post-orgasmic joy. Finally, Maximilian cleaned her with his handkerchief and then himself before adjusting her clothing and then his own.
Once they entered the adjoining passageway and then the seating room again, they released each other with a small kiss and Valentine sat across the chamber. Neither young lover would forget this day, this moment. The time they took their own fate in hand and decided for themselves once and for all they belonged to one another and no one else.
The easy chair of the old man was heard rolling along the floor, and he soon made his appearance in the room. Noirtier acknowledged by a look of extreme kindness and benevolence the thanks which Morrel lavished on him for his timely intervention on behalf of Valentine and himself—an intervention which had saved them from despair. Morrel then cast on the invalid an interrogative look as to the new favor, which he designed to bestow on him. Valentine was sitting at a little distance from them, timidly awaiting the moment when she should be obliged to speak. Noirtier fixed his eyes on her. “Am I to say what you told me?” asked Valentine. Noirtier made a sign that she was to do so.
“Monsieur Morrel,” said Valentine to the young man, who was regarding her with the most intense interest, “my grandfather, M. Noirtier, had a thousand things to say, which he told me three days ago; and now, he has sent for you, that I may repeat them to you. I will repeat them, then; and since he has chosen me as his interpreter, I will be faithful to the trust, and will not alter a word of his intentions.”
“Oh, I am listening with the greatest impatience,” replied the young man; “speak, I beg of you.” Valentine cast down her eyes; this was a good omen for Morrel, for he knew that nothing but happiness could have the power of thus overcoming Valentine. “My grandfather intends leaving this house,” said she, “and Barrois is looking out suitable apartments for him in another.”
“But you, Mademoiselle de Villefort,—you, who are necessary to M. Noirtier’s happiness”—
“I?” interrupted Valentine; “I shall not leave my grandfather,—that is an understood thing between us. My apartment will be close to his. Now, M. de Villefort must either give his consent to this plan or his refusal; in the first case, I shall leave directly, and in the second, I shall wait till I am of age, which will be in about ten months. Then I shall be free, I shall have an independent fortune, and”—
“And what?” demanded Morrel.
“And with my grandfather’s consent I shall fulfill the promise which I have made you.” Valentine pronounced these last few words in such a low tone that nothing but Morrel’s intense interest in what she was saying could have enabled him to hear them. “Have I not explained your wishes, grandpapa?” said Valentine, addressing Noirtier. “Yes,” looked the old man.—“Once under my grandfather’s roof, M. Morrel can visit me in the presence of my good and worthy protector, if we still feel that the union we contemplated will be likely to insure our future comfort and happiness; in that case I shall expect M. Morrel to come and claim me at my own hands. But, alas, I have heard it said that hearts inflamed by obstacles to their desire grew cold in time of security; I trust we shall never find it so in our experience!”
“Oh,” cried Morrel, almost tempted to throw himself on his knees before Noirtier and Valentine, and to adore them as two superior beings, “what have I ever done in my life to merit such unbounded happiness?”
“Until that time,” continued the young girl in a calm and self-possessed tone of voice, “we will conform to circumstances, and be guided by the wishes of our friends, so long as those wishes do not tend finally to separate us; in a word, and I repeat it, because it expresses all I wish to convey,—we will wait.”
“And I swear to make all the sacrifices which this word imposes, sir,” said Morrel, “not only with resignation, but with cheerfulness.”
“Therefore,” continued Valentine, looking playfully at Maximilian, “no more inconsiderate actions—no more rash projects; for you surely would not wish to compromise one who from this day regards herself as destined, honorably and happily, to bear your name?”
Morrel looked obedience to her commands. Noirtier regarded the lovers with a look of ineffable tenderness, while Barrois, who had remained in the room in the character of a man privileged to know everything that passed, smiled on the youthful couple as he wiped the perspiration from his bald forehead. “How hot you look, my good Barrois,” said Valentine.
“Ah, I have been running very fast, mademoiselle, but I must do M. Morrel the justice to say that he ran still faster.” Noirtier directed their attention to a waiter, on which was placed a decanter containing lemonade and a glass. The decanter was nearly full, with the exception of a little, which had been already drunk by M. Noirtier.
“Come, Barroi
s,” said the young girl, “take some of this lemonade; I see you are coveting a good draught of it.”
“The fact is, mademoiselle,” said Barrois, “I am dying with thirst, and since you are so kind as to offer it me, I cannot say I should at all object to drinking your health in a glass of it.”
“Take some, then, and come back immediately.” Barrois took away the waiter, and hardly was he outside the door, which in his haste he forgot to shut, than they saw him throw back his head and empty to the very dregs the glass which Valentine had filled. Valentine and Morrel were exchanging their adieux in the presence of Noirtier when a ring was heard at the doorbell. It was the signal of a visit. Valentine looked at her watch.
“It is past noon,” said she, “and to-day is Saturday; I dare say it is the doctor, grandpapa.” Noirtier looked his conviction that she was right in her supposition. “He will come in here, and M. Morrel had better go,—do you not think so, grandpapa?”
“Yes,” signed the old man.
“Barrois,” cried Valentine, “Barrois!”
“I am coming, mademoiselle,” replied he. “Barrois will open the door for you,” said Valentine, addressing Morrel. “And now remember one thing, Monsieur Officer, that my grandfather commands you not to take any rash or ill-advised step which would be likely to compromise our happiness.”
“I promised him to wait,” replied Morrel; “and I will wait.”
At this moment Barrois entered. “Who rang?” asked Valentine.
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