“I should believe that you, of all men, François, would be most worshipful of the Comte!”
François dropped his hands, and now the eyes turned upon Arsène blazed with a blue and fervent light.
“Believe me, Monsieur, that is true! Who can know Monsieur le Comte without adoring him, without an impulse to adoration such as one would feel in the presence of a saint?” He paused, then added with a sad smile: “But saints do not always understand men.”
“You speak of an experiment in humanity!” said Arsène, with growing impatience. “I am interested in this experiment. Surely, you, François, cannot dissent from it? My memories of you speak in contradiction.”
“It is hard to explain,” replied François, in a low and uncertain voice.
He pressed his hands again to his eyes, and began to speak as if to himself:
“This is so new and strange a thing, in France, and perhaps in the world. After so many centuries of an avowed Christianity, it is still so new and strange! Mercy, justice, tenderness, love, compassion and generosity: all these things have we heard from our priests. Yet, except in far instances, they have not appeared. They have appeared here. You have discerned the health and the content of these peasants, and their apparent love for Monsieur le Comte? You have seen their habitations, their fields, their comfort? You have seen freedom in their voices and their manners, dignity in their attitudes? You have seen all these things, Monsieur, and have understood that they have been wrought by Monsieur le Comte?”
“I have seen,” said Arsène, with even more impatience.
François dropped his hands and stared at Arsène with mournful steadfastness.
“Then perhaps Monsieur can explain why so many of these formerly miserable peasants love Monsieur le Comte yet so few respect him? And so few honor his words?”
Arsène was aghast.
“I cannot believe this!” Rage rose in his volatile spirit. “I cannot believe this, François!” He sprang to his feet, fiery indignation consuming him. “But, if you have perceived this, why have you not spoken of it to Monsieur le Comte?”
François did not rise. He said, quietly: “I have done so.”
“And he replies?”
“That I am mistaken, or he laughs, and asks: ‘Who am I, a creature of the same flesh and earth as these, to demand a slavish respect? It is enough for me that they are content, and happy, and fear no hunger or pain.’”
“Ah, he would say that!” exclaimed Arsène, moved, but still enraged.
“I have said to Monsieur le Comte, who has pardoned my insolence, that reforms such as these must come slowly, or spontaneously, like a conflagration, over all the world. Small revolutions are dangerous, grotesque, out of joint. But Monsieur le Comte asked me in return: ‘A man must begin somewhere, and he must begin in his own garden.’”
“That is sensible!” said Arsène. But his eyes sharpened eagerly upon François.
The old man shook his head, slowly. “Too much freedom, suddenly, is like too much wine on an unaccustomed stomach. It deranges; it confuses; it enflames; it finally destroys. God moves slowly. Yet men persist in moving with rapid ardor, as if they wished to hasten the ages and compress the whole world in the hollow of their hands. Such is Monsieur le Comte.”
He flung out his hands in simple despair. “I do not know! I, too, am confused. I only know that there are many among the peasants, who owe their lives and their peace to Monsieur le Comte, who neither respect, admire, nor love him. I have heard murmurs of ridicule from them—”
“But why?” cried Arsène, in bewilderment.
François shook his head again. “I do not know, Monsieur. I have lived many years, but I still do not comprehend humanity. Once, when I was younger, I believed I had this comprehension. That was my insolence. But this I have discovered common clay respects the master. If he is a harsh and cruel master, respect is darkened with hatred and memories of suffering. If he is a kind master, then he is regarded with contempt. Who can explain the dark deviousness of the evil human heart? Who can explain why a man kisses the hand that flays him, and bites the hand that succors him?”
He paused, and continued in sinking tones: “Once the Abbé Mourion said to me: ‘Believe it, François, that evil is more powerful than good, that it is a distinct entity, pure and unsullied, like a devouring flame, that the hearts of men are steeped in natural wickedness.’ I laughed, then, believing this to be the cant of priests. But now I know it is no cant. It is a reality, like a holocaust, like a storm, like a tidal wave.”
Strangely sickened at all this, Arséne ran his hands with a gesture of distraction through his hair. His eyes implored the old man.
“You do not know what you are saying to me, François! You do not know what poison you are instilling in my heart, what confusion you have placed there, what wretchedness! What is a man to believe? What must he strive to do?”
François pondered on this, while his long brown face grew more despondent.
“There is a belief, Monsieur, that kindness and gentleness indicate weakness of temperament, and timidity. The human beast, so lately civilized, bears in itself all the ferocity and the temperament of its primitive beasthood. It still cannot believe that kindness and gentleness are the strength of the noble and steadfast heart, and not the softness of the coward.” He hesitated, pleaded for understanding and forgiveness with his eyes: “I have suggested to Monsieur le Comte that reserve and dignity in a master do not prohibit kindness and mercy, compassion and justice. But he only laughs at me gently. He goes among his people with brotherly freedom and simplicity, implying to them in every word and gesture, that they are his equals and, in some instances, probably better than himself. There is the fatality, I truly believe. If nothing else, his own great heart is superior to the hearts of the mean and the humble. He cannot condescend, and condescension, mixed with benevolence, is the only wise procedure for a man who would reform the world.” He continued after another hesitation: “Always, there must be dignity in the ways of the superior man, and the knowledge that a confessed equality is the first step to anarchy.”
“You believe that Monsieur le Comte is too Christlike, François?”
François lifted his eyes and looked sternly at the young man.
“I do not wish to see him crucified, Monsieur.”
There was a profound silence in the cottage, while Arsène, his brows drawn together, bit his lip and pondered confusedly on the old man’s words. He heard him speak again:
“The man who has always gently despised mankind is often consistently merciful, in contradiction to the man who has idealized it and is later disillusioned. Hell has no greater hatred, then, than his.”
“You believe, my friend, that Monsieur le Comte will some day hate those who have been succored by him?” asked Arsène, incredulously.
François shook his head. “No, there will never be any hatred in that lofty heart. But he may be destroyed.”
“That is fantastic!”
François was silent. Then, again, he flung out his hands.
“Monsieur! I do not know! Who can know?” He added, after a moment: “When one strains after a star, one can never hope to reach it. The best one can do is to chart one’s course by it. I may be foully wrong. Monsieur le Comte may be right. In my insolence, I have said too much. Without faith, a man is nothing. My faith is weak and confused. The faith of Monsieur le Comte is as lofty as heaven.”
He bowed his head, and murmured: “It may take many centuries before men realize that those who love and raise them are neither fools nor cowards, nor deserving of a contemptuous martyrdom.”
Arsène pondered all this in the gravest disquiet, feeling that the high and precarious ground he had lately attained was being rocked in earthquakes.
François, seeing this, exclaimed: “Monsieur! Even if one is not convinced of the value of humanity, that does not free him from the necessity for compassion and justice. In truth, the obligation is greater.”
T
hey heard the thudding of cattle entering the stables, and their somber sustained lowing. Through the small opened windows Arsène saw that Cecile and Paul were shepherding the beasts with dexterity. The strange heavy pulsing of his body began again. He saw the girl once more, slender and strong in her blue petticoat over which her black peasant skirt was drawn high and knotted behind. He saw her wooden clogs, her tight black bodice, and the folded white of her kerchief and the snowy stiffness of the cap that hid her shining light brown hair. Her bare arms were nut brown and strong as they wielded the stave. She walked swiftly and with vigor. Arsène saw that her face as no longer pale and pinched. It had become carved and full of noble strength, shining with a steadfast and serene peace. As the declining sunlight struck them, her eyes glittered blue and vivacious, full of reserved laughter. He saw the white nape of her young neck, across which fluttered a ribbon of her bright hair, blowing in the early evening breeze.
He could hardly believe this vigorous young peasant woman was the pale girl in her shift who had kissed him one dank midnight by the light of a guttering taper. As she drove in the last of the cattle, he saw her glance, laughing, over her shoulder at Paul, who was having difficulty with an obstinate calf. The glance was tender and indulgent. Paul, having succeeded in his task, came to her and took her hand, laughing gayly.
Arsène perceived the expression of the young Comte’s face, tender and concentrated, for all its laughter. Now a shyness had come over the girl, and a blush, like a shadow, ran over her cheeks and brow. But she did not withdraw her hand.
All at once, a veritable dark fury swept over Arsène, accompanied by a sensation of intense sickness and desolation. He had seen what there was to be seen in Paul’s gentle eyes, in the expression of his smiling lips. The two stood there in the blue shadow of the stables, the roof above them red in the last sunlight, the heaving bodies of the cattle behind them, the wind blowing the girl’s skirt and that one gleaming lock of hair. Beyond the stables lay the green countryside and the violet hills and the fervid sky.
It is not possible! thought Arsène, biting his lip. And then he added to himself, tasting gall and vitriol on his tongue: Is he contemplating replacing Madame duPres with this buxom peasant girl?
It was quite customary for a lord to take whom he might choose from among the comely wenches on his estates. Arsène was not guiltless of this himself, to fill an idle summer hour during the ennui of a country excursion. Even to himself, at this moment, therefore, he could not understand the black and furious pain that assailed his heart, the smoking tides of hatred that boiled up from his soul. He found something obscene and fatuous in Paul’s frank and innocent smiles, in the girl’s blushes and laughter. The hand that pressed weightily on the stone window ledge trembled. It seemed that his breath came with painful gasps. He is no better than another! he said to himself.
Lost in the paroxysms of his obscure hatred and rage, he was not aware that the two were now entering the cottage, and when he heard the girl’s voice close at hand he started as though awakened from some dark and smothering nightmare. She was standing near him, regarding him gravely and soberly, though the laughter still gleamed in her blue eyes. Meeting his glance, bemused and opaque, she curtsied to the stone floor, then rose with dignity and awaited what he might say. And now the laughter had gone.
“Well, Mademoiselle, it seems that we meet again,” he stammered, lamely. Now he saw nothing else but those blue eyes fixed so gravely and quietly upon his. Was it only the dimness in this cottage that appeared to drain the girl’s cheeks of color, make sharper her nostrils and paler and more severe her firm lips? Was it only the uncertain light that impelled her brow to appear like cold marble, the outlines of her head and throat to be cut cleanly out of rigid stone?
He did not know that both François and Paul, caught in some nameless fascination and warning apprehension, were staring at him and Cecile as at some astonishing spectacle which perplexed and vaguely alarmed them.
Arsène’s senses whirled in confusion and chaos; the aching pain in his heart extended so that it seemed to him that all the universe throbbed with it. Now he understood the bottomless depression that had frequently seized him lately, to which he had refused to give a name, the sense of futility and weariness that had assailed him in the most light and frivolous hour.
“You are happy here, Mademoiselle?” he asked, faintly, drawing a pace nearer to her.
“I am very happy, thanks to Monsieur, and to God,” she replied, quietly. Now her straight glance seemed to be accusing him coldly and with obscure scorn.
The soft ringing of the Angelus blew gently over the shining fields and the gilded hills, and the little windows were frames enclosing a scene of bright and supernal peace. The radiant mist that enfolded the distant forest crept over the whole countryside. There was a murmur of dove wings, and a flash of light as they fluttered over the red roofs of the stables.
In his sudden effort to escape her eyes, Arsène turned to Paul. The young Comte was very pale, and his expression was like one who has been struck fully in the face, by a murderous fist. He was leaning against the back of a settle, and one of his hands hung heavily over it. In his new sharpness of vision, there was something poignant and eloquent in the heavy hanging of that hand to Arsène. It was more expressive than a thousand words, a thousand cries. That gentle and compassionate hand, which had never struck a rude blow or dealt harshly with a single soul! All at once Arsène was flooded with renewed love for his friend, and a great suffering.
I shall go, he thought, and aroused himself from the numbness that weighted him down. What was this humble peasant maiden to him, who was to be married the next day to the daughter of the illustrious house of de Tremblant? Clarisse’s bewitching face rose before him. And then that face seemed to him to be as brittle as a painted and jeweled mask of plaster, and he was sickened by his revulsion from it.
He was aware of the sweet scent that came from Cecile to him, the scent of pasture and field and sun. Again, his senses were assailed by an emotion of profound loss and desolation, and his lips became cold as ice.
“I must go at once,” he faltered, in the profound silence that engulfed the cottage. He attempted to smile. “Tomorrow is my wedding day.”
“Monsieur is to be felicitated, then?” said the girl, in her clear strong voice. The blueness of her eyes appeared to enlarge and blaze, but her face was calm and composed.
“I thank you, Mademoiselle,” he said. The girl was silent.
He forced himself to turn to François. “I thank you for your hospitality, François,” he said, striving for a note of grand patronage. “It is a great pleasure to me to see your improved situation, for I have not forgotten that I owe you much gratitude.”
François did not answer. The classic Roman head was imbued with some mysterious and haughty dignity, some sad and indignant melancholy.
The girl curtsied again, and this time did not rise. Her head fell on her breast. She remained on the floor in an attitude of frozen stillness, her hands fallen to her sides.
Arsène found himself alone with Paul under the darkening skies and the celestial peace of the country. He walked rapidly to the spot where they had tethered their horses. They did not speak. Arsène mounted his horse, but Paul did not do so, as yet. He stood at his friend’s side and gazed up at him with bottomless pain and sadness.
“It is not possible to withdraw from this wedding, with honor?” he asked.
“It is not possible,” replied Arsène, in a stifled voice. Later, he wondered why he had not been amazed at Paul’s words.
Paul mounted his horse in silence. They proceeded towards the château. Arsène refused Paul’s urgent invitation to enter for a last refreshment. His one desire now, was to be alone with his desolation and suffering. He would have begone instantly, but became aware that for some time Paul had been mutely extending his hand to him. Pain was alive and glowing in the young Comte’s eyes.
Arsène took that hand. Suddenly, he fel
t such a rush of emotion and torment that he could hardly restrain himself from weeping. He rode away, furiously, and Paul watched him until he had disappeared in a copse of darkening trees.
Arsène continued his headlong flight for some moments, then, his heart thundering so that he could hardly breathe, he drew in his horse in the thick purple shadow of a tree. He dismounted, flung the reins over the neck of his panting horse. He let himself fall prone on the thick wet grass, dimly aware of the somber evening chorus of frogs in a distant pond. The horse wandered away a few paces to graze. The light steadily decreased, and now fireflies pierced the thickening gloom with points of shifting brilliance. The wind blew steadily from some far hay-field, and its breath was sweet and pure. Again, the bells were ringing softly in the church steeple, their voices shaking the perfumed air. The fragile curve of the moon rose with silent and stately movement from the west, which fumed faintly with gold and crimson light The calm and fulfilled dark peace of the night spread itself over all the world like soundless water tinted mauve and blue. The trunks of the trees about the reclining young man became black, and motionless, like clusters of giant spectators.
He heard the shrilling of awakened crickets, mingling with the deepening melody of the frogs. The grass was warm and fresh against his aching cheek.
He did not think. He only endured. But as his heart pressed against the earth he felt that the poisoned pain of it seeped healingly away into the boundless heart of the mother of all things. He felt strength rising in him, and a strange numbed comfort.
“Peace!” whispered the trees, bending their heads in the evening wind. “Peace!” sang the crickets, and the frogs.
It was not for some time until he became aware that he was hearing hushed and cautious voices deeper in the forest. It was a woman’s voice, low and tinkling, and a man’s, heavier, sonorous and reflective. Lovers, he thought, and once more the pang divided him.
Now he heard their words, and at the clearer sound of the woman’s voice, he lifted his head alertly, for it was familiar. Its tone was impatient and pettish.
The Arm and the Darkness Page 40
