Poor novice! He found his ethereal sylphide shrouded in a brown cashmere dressing-gown ingeniously befrilled, lying languidly stretched out upon a sofa in a dimly lighted boudoir.Mme de Langeais did not so much as rise, nothing was visible of her but her face, her hair was loose but confined by a scarf.A hand indicated a seat, a hand that seemed white as marble to Montriveau by the flickering light of a single candle at the further side of the room, and a voice as soft as the light said--"If it had been anyone else, M.le Marquis, a friend with whom Icould dispense with ceremony, or a mere acquaintance in whom Ifelt but slight interest, I should have closed my door.I am exceedingly unwell.""I will go," Armand said to himself.
"But I do not know how it is," she continued (and the simple warrior attributed the shining of her eyes to fever), "perhaps it was a presentiment of your kind visit (and no one can be more sensible of the prompt attention than I), but the vapours have left my head.""Then may I stay?"
"Oh, I should be very sorry to allow you to go.I told myself this morning that it was impossible that I should have made the slightest impression on your mind, and that in all probability you took my request for one of the commonplaces of which Parisians are lavish on every occasion.And I forgave your ingratitude in advance.An explorer from the deserts is not supposed to know how exclusive we are in our friendships in the Faubourg."The gracious, half-murmured words dropped one by one, as if they had been weighted with the gladness that apparently brought them to her lips.The Duchess meant to have the full benefit of her headache, and her speculation was fully successful.The General, poor man, was really distressed by the lady's simulated distress.
Like Crillon listening to the story of the Crucifixion, he was ready to draw his sword against the vapours.How could a man dare to speak just then to this suffering woman of the love that she inspired? Armand had already felt that it would be absurd to fire off a declaration of love point-blank at one so far above other women.With a single thought came understanding of the delicacies of feeling, of the soul's requirements.To love: what was that but to know how to plead, to beg for alms, to wait? And as for the love that he felt, must he not prove it? His tongue was mute, it was frozen by the conventions of the noble Faubourg, the majesty of a sick headache, the bashfulness of love.But no power on earth could veil his glances; the heat and the Infinite of the desert blazed in eyes calm as a panther's, beneath the lids that fell so seldom.The Duchess enjoyed the steady gaze that enveloped her in light and warmth.
"Mme la Duchesse," he answered, "I am afraid I express my gratitude for your goodness very badly.At this moment I have but one desire--I wish it were in my power to cure the pain.""Permit me to throw this off, I feel too warm now," she said, gracefully tossing aside a cushion that covered her feet.
"Madame, in Asia your feet would be worth some ten thousand sequins.
"A traveller's compliment!" smiled she.
It pleased the sprightly lady to involve a rough soldier in a labyrinth of nonsense, commonplaces, and meaningless talk, in which he manoeuvred, in military language, as Prince Charles might have done at close quarters with Napoleon.She took a mischievous amusement in reconnoitring the extent of his infatuation by the number of foolish speeches extracted from a novice whom she led step by step into a hopeless maze, meaning to leave him there in confusion.She began by laughing at him, but nevertheless it pleased her to make him forget how time went.
The length of a first visit is frequently a compliment, but Armand was innocent of any such intent.The famous explorer spent an hour in chat on all sorts of subjects, said nothing that he meant to say, and was feeling that he was only an instrument on whom this woman played, when she rose, sat upright, drew the scarf from her hair, and wrapped it about her throat, leant her elbow on the cushions, did him the honour of a complete cure, and rang for lights.The most graceful movement succeeded to complete repose.She turned to M.de Montriveau, from whom she had just extracted a confidence which seemed to interest her deeply, and said--"You wish to make game of me by trying to make me believe that you have never loved.It is a man's great pretension with us.
And we always believe it! Out of pure politeness.Do we not know what to expect from it for ourselves? Where is the man that has found but a single opportunity of losing his heart? But you love to deceive us, and we submit to be deceived, poor foolish creatures that we are; for your hypocrisy is, after all, a homage paid to the superiority of our sentiments, which are all purity."The last words were spoken with a disdainful pride that made the novice in love feel like a worthless bale flung into the deep, while the Duchess was an angel soaring back to her particular heaven.
"Confound it!" thought Armand de Montriveau, "how am I to tell this wild thing that I love her?"He had told her already a score of times; or rather, the Duchess had a score of times read his secret in his eyes; and the passion in this unmistakably great man promised her amusement, and an interest in her empty life.So she prepared with no little dexterity to raise a certain number of redoubts for him to carry by storm before he should gain an entrance into her heart.
Montriveau should overleap one difficulty after another; he should be a plaything for her caprice, just as an insect teased by children is made to jump from one finger to another, and in spite of all its pains is kept in the same place by its mischievous tormentor.And yet it gave the Duchess inexpressible happiness to see that this strong man had told her the truth.
Armand had never loved, as he had said.He was about to go, in a bad humour with himself, and still more out of humour with her;but it delighted her to see a sullenness that she could conjure away with a word, a glance, or a gesture.
