The Red and the Black: A Chronicle of the Nineteenth Century

by Stendhal

  At this, everyone stood up and spoke at once. They'll send me out again, Julien thought; but even the wise chairman had forgotten about Julien's presence and his very existence.

  All eyes looked round for a man Julien recognized. It was M. de Nerval, the Prime Minister, whom he had glimpsed at the Duc de Retz's ball.

  The commotion reached a peak, as the newspapers say when talking about the National Assembly. After a good quarter of an hour things quietened down somewhat.

  Then M. de Nerval rose to his feet and, adopting the tones of an apostle:

  'I shall not make out to you', he said in a strange voice, 'that I put no store by the premiership.

  'It has been indicated to me, gentlemen, that my name doubles the Jacobins' numbers by turning a good many moderates against us. I should therefore readily step down; but the ways of the Lord are shown only to a few; and', he added, staring straight at the cardinal, 'I have a mission; heaven has said to me: "You shall lay your head on the block, or you shad restore the monarchy in France and reduce the

  -398-

  Chambers to what Parliament was under Louis XV", * and that, gentlemen, is what I shall do.'

  He finished uttering and sat down; a deep silence fell. There's a good actor, Julien thought. He again made the mistake, as he always did, of crediting people with too much intelligence. Roused by this stimulating evening's debates, and particularly by the sincerity of the discussion, at that moment M. de Nerval believed in his mission. For all his great courage, the man did not have any sense.

  Midnight struck during the silence following the fine phrase: that is what I shall do. Julien found the striking of the clock somehow imposing and funereal. He was moved.

  The discussion soon resumed with growing animation, and in particular with unbelievable openness. These people will have me poisoned, Julien thought at times. How can they say such things in front of a plebeian?

  Two o'clock struck, and they were still talking. The host had been asleep for some time; M. de La Mole was obliged to ring for more candles. M. de Nerval, the minister, had left at a quarter to two, having taken frequent advantage of a mirror beside him to study Julien's face. His departure had seemed to put everyone at their ease.

  While the candles were being renewed, 'God knows what that man is going to tell the king!' said the man in the waistcoats softly to his neighbour. 'He can make us look pretty ridiculous and ruin our future. You must admit he's got a rare degree of self-importance and even effrontery to turn up here. He used to come along before he rose to the Cabinet; but a portfolio changes everything: it swamps all a man's other interests, and he ought to have sensed this.'

  No sooner was the minister gone than the general from Bonaparte's army had shut his eyes. Now he said something about his health and his wounds, looked at his watch and left.

  'I'd lay a wager on it', said the man in the waistcoats, 'that the general is running after the minister; he's going to apologize for being here, and claim to be manipulating us.'

  When the bleary-eyed servants had finished renewing the candles:

  'Let us get down to our deliberations, gentlemen,' said the

  -399-

  chairman, 'we must stop trying to convince one another. We must think about the content of the memorandum which in forty-eight hours' time will be before the eyes of our friends across the border. We have talked about ministers. We can admit now that M. de Nerval has left us: what do we care about ministers? We shall dictate wishes to them.'

  The cardinal showed his approval with a subtle smile.

  'Nothing could be easier, it seems to me, than summing up our position,' said the young Bishop of Agde with the concentrated and forced vehemence of the most exalted fanaticism. He had kept silent up until then; his eyes, which Julien had been watching, had had a gentle and serene look in them to start with, but had begun to blue after the first hour of discussion. Now his soul was overflowing like lava from Vesuvius.

  'Between 1806 and 1814, the one thing England did wrong', he said 'was not to take direct, personal action against Napoleon. Once the man had created dukes and chamberlains, once he had restored the throne, the mission God had entrusted to him was over; he was ripe for sacrificial slaughter. The Holy Scriptures teach us in more places than one how to deal with tyrants.' (Here followed a number of quotations in Latin.)

  'Today, gentleman, what has to be sacrificed is not a man, but Paris. The whole of France copies Paris. What's the use of arming your five hundred men per département? It's a risky and never-ending enterprise. What's the use of involving France in a business that is peculiar to Paris? Paris alone with its newspapers and its salons has committed the evil: let this new Babylon perish.

  'There must be a decisive confrontation between the altar and Paris. Such a catastrophe would even be in the worldly interests of the throne. Why didn't Paris dare breathe a word under Bonaparte? The Saint-Roch cannon* has the answer to that one . . .'

  ... ... ...

  It was not until three in the morning that Julien and M. de La Mole left.

  The marquis felt embarrassed and tired. For the first time, when he addressed Julien, there was a note of entreaty in his

  -400-

  voice. He wanted Julien's word for it that he would never disclose the excesses of zeal--that was the marquis's expression--which chance had just let him witness. 'Don't mention this to our friend abroad unless he really insists on knowing what our young hotheads are like. What does it matter to them if the State is overthrown? They will be cardinals, and take refuge in Rome. But nobles like us, in our châteaux, will be massacred by the peasants.'

  The secret memorandum that the marquis drafted on the basis of Julien's twenty-six pages of minutes was not ready until a quarter to five.

  'I'm absolutely dead beat,' said the marquis, 'and it shows clearly in this memorandum, which lacks clarity towards the end; I'm more dissatisfied with it than with anything I've ever done in my whole life. Let's think now, dear fellow,' he added, 'go and get a few hours' rest; and for fear of your being abducted, I'm going to lock you into your room myself.'

  The next day the marquis took Julien to a remote château some distance from Paris. They were received by odd-looking hosts, whom Julien took to be priests. He was handed a passport which bore an assumed name, but did finally indicate the purpose of the journey which he had always pretended to be ignorant of. He took his seat in a barouche on his own.

  The marquis had no worries about Julien's memory: he had recited the secret memorandum to him several times; but he was in great fear lest Julien be waylaid.

  'Make sure you always keep up the appearance of a dandy travelling to while away the time,' he said to him warmly as he was leaving the drawing-room. 'There may have been several false brethren at our gathering yesterday.'

  The journey was swift and very dreary. No sooner was Julien out of the marquis's sight than he forgot both the secret memorandum and his mission, and all his thoughts turned to Mathilde's disdain.

  At a village several leagues beyond Metz, the postmaster came to him to say there were no horses. It was ten o'clock at night; most put out, Julien ordered some supper. He walked up and down in front of the door, and imperceptibly, without

  -401-

  letting anyone see what he was doing, he slipped into the stable courtyard. He saw no horses there.

  All the same, that man had a strange look, Julien said to himself; his vulgar eye was examining me.

  He was beginning, as you see, not to believe every word of what was said to him. He was thinking of slipping away after supper; and with a view to learning at any rate something about the region, he left his room to go and warm himself in front of the kitchen fire. Just imagine his delight at finding Signor Geronimo, the famous singer, sitting there.

  Ensconced in an armchair that he had had brought to the fireside for him, the Neapolitan was groaning out loud and talking more himself than the twenty German peasants put together who were crowding round him in open-mo
uthed astonishment.

  'These people will be the ruin of me,' he called out to Julien, 'I've promised to sing in Mainz * tomorrow. Seven sovereign princes have flocked to listen to me. But let's go and take the air,' he added with a meaningful look.

  When he was a hundred yards off down the road, and out of range of being overheard:

  'Do you know what's going on?' he asked Julien; 'this postmaster is a rogue. While I was out walking, I gave twenty sous to a little urchin who told me everything. There are more than twelve horses in a stable at the far end of the village. They want to delay some courier or other.'

  'Really?' said Julien innocently.

  It wasn't everything to have discovered the fraud: they still had to leave; but this result Geronimo and his friend failed to achieve. 'Let's wait until tomorrow,' the singer said at last, 'they're suspicious of us. Perhaps one of us is the person they've got it in for. Tomorrow morning we order a good breakfast; while they prepare it we go for a walk, we slip away, we hire horses and get to the next post.'

  'What about your luggage?' said Julien, who was thinking that perhaps Geronimo himself might have been sent to waylay him. There was nothing for it but to have supper and go to bed. Julien was still in his first deep sleep when he was woken

  -402-

  with a start by the voices of two people talking quite uninhibitedly in his room.

  He recognized the postmaster, wielding a dark lantern. The light was directed towards the trunk of the barouche, which Julien had had brought up to his room. Next to the postmaster was a man rummaging unperturbed in the open trunk. All Julien could make out were the sleeves of his coat, which were black and tight-fitting.

  It's a cassock, he said to himself, and he quietly seized hold of two small pistols he had put under his pillow.

  'Don't be afraid that he'll wake up, Father,' the postmaster was saying. 'The wine they were served was some of the one you yourself prepared.'

  'I can't find any sign of papers,' replied the priest. 'Plenty of linen, essences, creams and other frivolities; he's a young man of the world, in pursuit of his pleasures. The envoy is more likely to be the other one, who puts on an Italian accent.'

  The men moved closer to Julien to search the pockets of his travelling suit. He was very tempted to kill them as thieves. Nothing could have been less risky as far as the consequences went. He really wanted to. I would be a fool, he told himself, I'd compromise my mission. When his suit had been searched; 'He's no diplomat,' said the priest; he moved away, luckily for him.

  If he touches me in my bed, he'd better watch out! Julien said to himself; he may very well come and stab me, and I won't put up with that.

  The priest looked round. Julien had his eyes half open; imagine his astonishment: it was Father Castanède! Indeed, although the two people were trying to keep their voices down, he had fancied right from the start that he recognized one of the voices. Julien was seized with an overwhelming desire to purge the earth of one of its most dastardly scoundrels...

  But what about my mission! he said to himself.

  The priest and his acolyte went out. A quarter of an hour later, Julien pretended to wake up. He called for someone and woke the whole house.

  'I've been poisoned!' he shouted, 'I'm in horrible agony!'

  -403-

  He wanted a pretext to go to Geronimo's assistance. He found him half-asphyxiated by the laudanum that was in the wine.

  Fearing some funny business of this sort, at supper Julien had drunk some chocolate brought from Paris. He did not succeed in waking Geronimo sufficiently to persuade him to leave.

  'If you gave me the whole kingdom of Naples', said the singer, 'I still wouldn't give up the bliss of sleeping right now.'

  'But what about the seven sovereign princes!'

  'Let them wait.'

  Julien set off alone and arrived without further incident at the important dignitary's residence. He wasted a whole morning trying in vain to obtain an audience. By a stroke of good fortune, about four o'clock, the duke decided to take the air. Julien saw him going out on foot, and did not hesitate to go up to him to ask for alms. When he was a couple of paces from the important dignitary, he drew out the Marquis de La Mole's watch and displayed it ostentatiously. 'Follow me at a distance', he was told, without so much as a glance.

  A quarter of a league further on, the duke plunged into a little Café-hauss. * It was in one of the rooms of this low-class inn that Julien had the honour of reciting his four pages to the duke. When he had finished: 'Begin again and go more slowly,' he was told.

  The prince took notes. 'Make your way on foot to the next post. Abandon your belongings and your barouche here. Get to Strasburg as best you can, and on the twenty-second of this month (it was then the tenth) be here at half past twelve noon in this same Café-hauss. Don't leave it now until half an hour is up. Silence!'

  These were the only words Julien heard. They were enough to imbue him with the utmost admiration. That's the way, he thought, to conduct business; what ever would this great statesman think if he heard the impassioned talkers of three days ago?

  Julien spent two days getting to Strasburg: it did not seem to him that he had any business there. He made a great detour. If that devil of a Father Castanède recognized me, he's not a

  -404-

  man to lose track of me that easily... And what a pleasure for him to make a fool of me and scupper my mission!

  Father Castanède, chief of the Congregation's police * for the whole of the northern border, had fortunately not recognized him. And despite their zeal, the Jesuits in Strasburg did not think to put Julien under observation: with his cross fastened to his blue greatcoat, he had the air of a young soldier very taken with his personal appearance.

  -405-

  CHAPTER 24

  Strasburg

  Fascination! You have all the energy of love, all its power to endure unhappiness. Only its enchanting pleasures, its sweet delights are outside your sphere. I could not say as I watched her sleep: she is all mine, with her angelic beauty and her sweet failings! Here she is delivered into my power, just as heaven created her in its mercy to delight a man's heart.

  SCHILLER, Ode

  FORCED to spend a week in Strasburg, Julien tried to keep himself entertained by thoughts of military glory and devotion to his country. Was he in love, then? he really didn't know, but in his tortured mind he did find Mathilde absolute mistress of his happiness and of his imagination. He needed all the energy in his character to keep himself from sinking into despair. Thinking about anything that didn't have some connection with Mlle de La Mole was beyond his powers. Ambition or the simple triumphs of vanity used to take his mind off the feelings inspired in him formerly by Mme de Rênal. Mathilde had absorbed everything; he found her everywhere in the future.

  On all sides, in this future, Julien saw lack of success. This individual we saw so full of presumption, so arrogant in Verrières, had lapsed into ridiculous extremes of selfdisparagement.

  Three days previously he would have taken pleasure in killing Father Castanède, and here in Strasburg, if a child had picked a quarrel with him, he would have decided the child was in the right. Thinking back over the adversaries and enemies he had encountered in his life, he felt every time that he, Julien, had been in the wrong.

  The reason was that now he had an implacable enemy in the shape of that powerful imagination of his, which had previ-

  -406-

  ously been wholly engaged in depicting such brilliant success for him in the future.

  The unmitigated solitude of a traveller's life increased the hold of his black imagination. What a treasure a friend would have been! But, Julien said to himself, is there any heart that beats for me? And even if I had a friend, doesn't honour bid me keep eternal silence?

  He was out riding, miserably, in the countryside round Kehl; this little town on the banks of the Rhine has been immortalized by Desaix and Gouvion Saint-Cyr * . A German peasant was showing him the l
ittle streams, the paths and the islands in the Rhine made famous by the courage of those great generals. Using his left hand to guide the horse, Julien held open with his right hand the superb map which adorns the Memoirs of Marshal Saint-Cyr. A cheerful exclamation made him look up.

  It was Prince Korasov, his friend from London who some months earlier had instructed him in the first principles of high foppery. Faithful to this great art, Korasov, who had arrived in Strasburg the day before, and in Kehl an hour ago, and who had never in his life read a word on the siege of 1796, began to explain everything to Julien. The German peasant stared at him astonished, for he knew enough French to make out the gross howlers perpetrated by the prince. Julien was a thousand miles away from what the peasant was thinking, he was looking in astonishment at this handsome young man, and admiring the graceful way he rode his horse.

  Oh happy man! he said to himself. How well his breeches suit him; and what an elegant haircut! Alas! if I had been like that, perhaps when she'd loved me for three days she wouldn't have taken an aversion to me.

  When the prince had finished his siege of Kehl: 'Your expression is like a Trappist's,' he said to Julien, 'you're exceeding the guidelines on gravity I explained to you in London. Looking miserable is never in good taste; looking bored is the done thing. If you're miserable, there must be something you're wanting, something that hasn't turned out right.

  'It's showing yourself to be inferior. If you're bored, on the

  -407-

  contrary, it's what tried in vain to please you that is inferior. So you must understand, old fellow, how serious it is to confuse the two.'

  Julien flung a crown to the peasant who was listening to them open-mouthed.

  'Good,' said the prince, 'there's graciousness, and a noble disdain! Very good!' And he set his horse at a gallop. Julien followed him, filled with dumb admiration.