the castle of st. renan, like the dwellings of many of the nobles of bretagne and gascony, was a superb old pile of solid masonry towering above the huge cliffs which guard the whole of that iron coast with its gigantic masses of rude masonry. so close did it stand to the verge of these precipitous crags on its seaward face, that whenever the wind from the westward blew angrily and in earnest, the spray of the tremendous billows which rolled in from the wide atlantic, and burst in thunder at the foot of those stern ramparts, was dashed so high by the collision that it would often fall in salt, bitter rain, upon the esplanade above, and dim the diamond-paned casements with its cold mists.
for leagues on either side, as the spectator stood upon the terrace above and gazed out on the expanse of the everlasting ocean, nothing was to be seen but the salient angles or deep recesses formed by the dark, gray cliffs, unrelieved by any spot of verdure, or even by that line of silver sand at their base, which often intervenes between the rocks of an iron coast and the sea. here, however, there was no such intermediate step visible; the black face of the rocks sunk sheer and abrupt into the water, which, by its dark-green hue, indicated to the practised eye, that it was deep and scarcely fathomable to the very shore.
in places, indeed, where huge caverns opening in front to the vast ocean, which had probably hollowed them out of the earth-fast rock in the course of succeeding ages, yawned in the mimicry of gothic arches, the entering tide would rush, as it were, into the bowels of the land, roaring and groaning in those strange subterranean dungeons like some strong prisoner,250 typhon, enceladus, or ephialtes, in his immortal agony. one of these singular vaults opened right in the base of the rock on the summit of which stood the castle of st. renan, and into this the billows rushed with rapidity so tumultuous and terrible that the fishers of that stormy coast avowed that a vortex was created in the bay by their influx or return seaward, which could be perceived sensibly at a league’s distance; and that to be caught in it, unless the wind blew strong and steadily off land, was sure destruction. however that might be, it is certain that this great subterranean tunnel extended far beneath the rocks into the interior of the land, for at the distance of nearly two miles from the castle, directly eastward, in the bottom of a dark, wooded glen, which runs for many miles nearly parallel to the coast, there is a deep, rocky well, or natural cavity, of a form nearly circular, which, when the tide is up, is filled to overflowing with bitter sea-water, on which the bubbles and foam-flakes show the obstacles against which it must have striven in its landward journey. at low water, on the contrary, “the devil’s drinking-cup,” for so it is named by the superstitious peasantry of the neighborhood, presents nothing to the eye but a deep, black abyss, which the countryfolks, of course, assert to be bottomless. but, in truth, its depth is immense, as can easily be perceived, if you cast a stone into it, by the length of time during which it may be heard thundering from side to side, until the reverberated roar of its descent appears to die away, not because it has ceased, but because the sound is too distant to be conveyed to human ears.
on this side of the castle everything differs as much as it is possible to conceive from the view to the seaward, which is grim and desolate as any ocean scenery the world over. few sails are ever seen on those dangerous coasts; all vessels bound to the mouth of the garonne, or southward to the shores of spain, giving as wide a berth as possible to its frightful reefs251 and inaccessible crags, which to all their other terrors add that, from the extraordinary prevalence of the west wind on that part of the ocean, of being, during at least three parts of the year, a lee shore.
inland, however, instead of the bleak and barren surface of the ever-stormy sea, indented into long rolling ridges and dark tempestuous hollows, all was varied and smiling, and gratifying to every sense given by nature for his good to man. immediately from the brink of the cliffs the land sloped downward southwardly and to the eastward, so that it was bathed during all the day, except a few late evening hours, in the fullest radiance of the sunbeams. over this immense sloping descent the eye could range from the castle battlements for miles and miles, until the rich green champaign was lost in the blue haze of distance. and it was green and gay over the whole of that vast expanse, here with the dense and unpruned foliage of immemorial forests, well stocked with every species of game, from the gaunt wolf and the tusky boar, to the fleet roebuck and the timid hare; here with the trim and smiling verdure of rich orchards, in which nestled around their old, gray shrines the humble hamlets of the happy peasantry; and everywhere with the long intersecting curves, and sinuous irregular lines of the old hawthorn hedges, thick set with pollard trees and hedgerow timber, which make the whole country, when viewed from a height, resemble a continuous tract of intermingled glades and coppices, and which have procured for an adjoining district the well-known, and in after-days far celebrated name of the bocage.
immediately around the castle, on the edge as it were of this beautiful and almost boundless slope, there lay a large and well-kept garden in the old french style, laid out in a succession of terraces, bordered by balustrades of marble, adorned at frequent intervals by urns and statues, and rendered accessible252 each from the next below by flights of ornamented steps of regular and easy elevation; pleached bowery walks, and high clipped hedges of holly, yew, and hornbeam, were the usual decorations of such a garden, and here they abounded to an extent that would have gladdened the heart of an admirer of the tastes and habits of the olden time. in addition to these, however, there were a profusion of flowers of the choicest kinds known or cultivated in those days—roses and lilies without number, and honeysuckles, and the sweet-scented clematis, climbing in bountiful luxuriance over the numberless seats and bowers which everywhere tempted to repose.
below this beautiful garden a wide expanse of smooth, green turf, dotted here and there with majestic trees, and at rarer intervals diversified with tall groves and verdant coppices, covered the whole descent of the first hill to the dim wooded dell which has been mentioned as containing the singular cavity known throughout the country as the “devil’s drinking-cup.” this dell, which was the limit of count de st. renan’s demesnes in that direction, was divided from the park by a ragged paling many feet in height, and of considerable strength, framed of rough timber from the woods, the space within being appropriated to a singular and choice breed of deer, imported from the east by one of the former counts, who, being of an adventurous and roving disposition, had sojourned for some time in the french settlements of hindostan. beyond this dell again, which was defended on the outer side by a strong and lofty wall of brick, all overrun with luxuriant ivy, the ground rose in a small rounded knoll, or hillock of small extent, richly wooded, and crowned by the gray turrets and steep flagged roof of the old chateau d’argenson.
this building, however, was as much inferior in size and stateliness to the grand feudal fortalice of st. renan, as the little round-topped hill on which it stood, so slightly elevated253 above the face of the surrounding country as to detract nothing, at least in appearance, from its general slope to the southeastward, was lower than the great rock-bound ridge from which it overlooked the territories, all of which had in distant times obeyed the rules of its almost princely dwellers.
the sun of a lovely evening in the latter part of july had already sunk so far down in the west that only one half of its great golden disk was visible above the well-defined, dark outline of the seaward-crags, which, relieved by the glowing radiance of the whole western sky, stood out massive and solid like a huge purple wall, and seemed so close at hand that the spectator could almost persuade himself that he had but to stretch out his arm, in order to touch the great barrier, which was in truth several miles distant.
over the crest, and through the gaps of this continuous line of highland, the long level rays streamed down in the slope in one vast flood of golden glory, which was checkered only by the interminable length of shadows which were projected from every single tree, or scattered clump, from every petty elevation of the soil, down the soft glimmering declivity.
three years had elapsed since the frightful fate of the unhappy lord of kerguelen, and the various incidents, which in some sort took their origin from the nature of his crime and its consequence, affecting in the highest degree the happiness of the families of st. renan and d’argenson.
three years had elapsed—three years! that is a little space in the annals of the world, in the life of nations, nay, in the narrow records of humanity. three years of careless happiness, three years of indolent and tranquil ease, unmarked by any great event, pass over our heads unnoted, and, save in the gray hairs which they scatter, leave no memorial of their transit, more than the sunshine of a happy summer day. they are, they are gone, they are forgotten.
254 even three years of gloom and sorrow, of that deep anguish which at the time the sufferer believes to be indelible and everlasting, lag on their weary, desolate course, and when they too are over-passed, and he looks back upon their transit, which seemed so painfully protracted, and, lo! all is changed, and their flight also is now but as an ended minute.
and yet, what strange and sudden changes altering the affairs of men, changing the hearts of mortals, yea, revolutionizing their whole intellects, and overturning their very natures—more than the devastating earthquake or the destroying lava transforms the face of the everlasting earth—have not been wrought, and again well nigh forgotten within that little period.
three years had passed, i say, over the head of raoul de douarnenez—the three most marked and memorable years in the life of every young man—and from the ingenuous and promising stripling, he had now become in every respect a man, and a bold and enterprising man, moreover, who had seen much and struggled much, and suffered somewhat—without which there is no gain of his wisdom here below—in his transit, even thus far, over the billows and among the reefs and quicksands of the world.
his father had kept his promise to that loved son in all things, nor had the sieur d’argenson failed of his plighted faith. the autumn of that year, the spring of which saw kerguelen die in unutterable agony, saw raoul de douarnenez the contracted and affianced husband of the lovely and beloved melanie.
all that was wanted now to render them actually man and wife, to create between them that bond which, alone of mortal ties, man can not sunder, was the ministration of the church’s holiest rite, and that, in wise consideration of their tender years, was postponed until the termination of the third summer.
during the interval it was decided that raoul, as was the custom of the world in those days, especially among the nobility,255 and most especially among the nobility of france, should bear arms in active service, and see something of the world abroad, before settling down into the easier duties of domestic life. the family of st. renan, since the days of that ancestor who has been already mentioned as having sojourned in pondicherry, had never ceased to maintain some relations with the east indian possessions of france, and a relation of the house in no very remote degree was at this time military governor of the french east indies, which were then, previous to the unexampled growth of the british empire in the east, important, flourishing, and full of future promise.
thither, then, it was determined that raoul should go in search of adventures, if not of fortune, in the spring following the signature of his marriage contract with the young demoiselle d’argenson. and, consequently, after a winter passed in quiet domestic happiness on the noble estates, whereon the gentry of brittany were wont to reside in almost patriarchal state—a winter, every day of which the young lovers spent in company, and at every eve of which they separated more in love than they were at meeting in the morning—raoul set sail in a fine frigate, carrying several companies of the line, invested with the rank of ensign, and proud to bear the colors of his king, for the shores of the still half-fabulous oriental world.
three years had passed, and the boy had returned a man, the ensign had returned a colonel, so rapid was the promotion of the nobility of the sword in the french army, under the ancient regime; and—greatest change of all, ay, and saddest—the viscount of douarnenez had returned count de st. renan. an infectious fever, ere he had been one year absent from the land of his birth, and had cut off his noble father in the very pride and maturity of his intellectual manhood; nor had his mother lingered long behind him whom she had ever loved so256 fondly. a low, slow fever, caught from that beloved patient whom she had so affectionately nurtured, was as fatal to her, though not so suddenly, as it had proved to her good lord; and when their son returned to france full of honors achieved, and gay anticipations for the future, he found himself an orphan, the lord in lonely and unwilling state of the superb demesnes which had so long called his family their owners.
there never in the world was a kinder heart than that which beat in the breast of the young soldier, and never was a family more strictly bound together by all the kindly influences which breed love and confidence, and domestic happiness among all the members of it, than that of st. renan. there had been nothing austere or rigid in the bringing up of the gallant boy; the father, who had at one hour been the tutor and the monitor, was at the next the comrade and the playmate, and at all times the true and trusted friend, while the mother had been ever the idolized and adored protectress, and the confidante of all the innocent schemes and artless joys of boyhood.
bitter, then, was the blow stricken to the very heart of the young soldier, when the first tidings which he received, on landing in his loved france, was the intelligence that those—all those, with but one exception—whom he most tenderly and truly loved, all those to whom he looked up with affectionate trust for advice and guidance, all those on whom he relied for support in his first trials of young manhood, were cold and silent in the all-absorbing tomb.
to him there was no hot, feverish ambition prompting him to grasp joyously the absolute command of his great heritage. in his heart there was none of that fierce yet sordid avarice which finds compensation for the loss of the scarce-lamented dead in the severance of the dearest natural bonds, in the possession of wealth, or the promise of power. nor was this all, for, in truth, so well had raoul de douarnenez been brought257 up, and so completely had wisdom grown up with his growth, that when, at the age of nineteen years, he found himself endowed with the rank and revenues of one of the highest and wealthiest peers of france, and in all but mere name his own master—for the abbé de chastellar, his mother’s brother, who had been appointed his guardian by his father’s will, scarcely attempted to exercise even a nominal jurisdiction over him—he felt himself more than ever at a loss, deprived as he was, when he most needed it, of his best natural counsellor; and instead of rejoicing, was more than half inclined to lament over the almost absolute self-control with which he found himself invested.
young hearts are naturally true themselves, and prone to put trust in others; and it is rarely, except in a few dark and morose and gloomy natures, which are exceptions to the rule and standard of human nature, that man learns to be distrustful and suspicious of his kind, even after experience of fickleness and falsehood may have in some sort justified suspicions, until his head has grown gray.
and this in an eminent degree was the case with raoul de st. renan, for henceforth he must be called by the title which his altered state had conferred upon him.
his natural disposition was as trustful and unsuspicious as it was artless and ingenuous; and from his early youth all the lessons which had been taught him by his parents tended to preserve in him unblemished and unbroken that bright gem, which once shattered never can be restored, confidence in the truth, the probity, the goodness of mankind.
some ruder schooling he had met in the course of his service in the eastern world—he had already learned that men, and—harder knowledge yet to gain—women also, can feign friendship, ay, and love, where neither have the least root in the heart, for purposes the vilest, ends the most sordid. he258 had learned that bosom friends can be secret foes; that false loves can betray; and yet he was not disenchanted with humanity, he had not even dreamed of doubting, because he had fallen among worldly-minded flatterers and fickle-hearted coquettes, that absolute friendship and unchangeable love may exist, even in this evil world, stainless and incorruptible among all the changes and chances of this mortal life.
if he had been deceived, he had attributed the failure of his hopes hitherto to the right cause—the fallacy of his own judgment, and the error of his own choice; and the more he had been disappointed the more firmly had he relied on what he felt certain could not change, the affection of his parents, the love of his betrothed bride.
on the very instant of his landing he found himself shipwrecked in his first hope; and on his earliest interview with his uncle, in paris, he had the agony—the utter and appalling agony to undergo—of hearing that in the only promise which he had flattered himself was yet left to him, he was destined in all probability to undergo a deeper, deadlier disappointment.
if melanie d’argenson had been a lovely girl, the good abbé said, when she was budding out of childhood into youth, so utterly had she outstripped all the promise of her girlhood, that no words could describe, nor imagination suggest to itself the charms of the mature yet youthful woman. there was no other beauty named, when loveliness was the theme, throughout all france, than that of the young betrothed of raoul de douarnenez. and that which was so loudly and so widely bruited abroad, could not fail to reach the ever open, ever greedy ears of the vile and sensual tyrant who sat on the throne of france, at that time heaping upon his people that load of suffering and anguish which was in after-times to be avenged so bitterly and bloodily upon the innocent heads of his unhappy descendants.
259 louis had, moreover, heard years before, nay, looked upon the nascent loveliness of melanie d’argenson, and, with that cold-blooded voluptuary, to look on beauty was to lust after it, to lust after it was to devote all the powers his despotism could command to win it.
hence as the abbé de chastellar soon made his unfortunate nephew and pupil comprehend, a settled determination had arisen on the part of the odious despot to break off the marriage of the lovely girl with the young soldier whom it was well known that she fondly loved, and to have her the wife of one who would be less tender of his honor, and less reluctant to surrender, or less difficult to be deprived of a bride, too transcendently beautiful to bless the arms of a subject, even if he were the noblest of the noble.
all this was easily arranged, the base father of melanie was willing enough to sell his exquisite and virtuous child to the splendid infamy of becoming a king’s paramour, and the yet baser chevalier de la rochederrien was eager to make the shameful negotiation easy, and to sanction it to the eyes of the willingly hoodwinked world, by giving his name and rank to a woman, who was to be his wife but in name, and whose charms and virtue he had precontracted to make over to another.
the infamous contract had been agreed upon by the principal actors; nay, the wages of the iniquity had been paid in advance. the sieur d’argenson had grown into the comte of the same, with the governorship of the town of morlaix added, by the revenues of which to support his new dignities; while the chevalier de la rochederrien had become no less a personage than the marquis de ploermel, with a captaincy in the musquetaires, and heaven knows what beside of honorary title and highly-gilded sinecure, whereby to reconcile him to such depth of sordid infamy as the meanest galley-slave could have scarce undertaken as the price of exchange between his fetters260 and his oars, and the great noble’s splendor.
such were the tidings which greeted raoul on his return from honorable service to his king—service for which he was thus repaid; and, before he had even time to reflect on the consequences, or to comprehend the anguish thus entailed upon him, his eyes were opened instantly to comprehension of two or three occurrences which previously he had been unable to explain to himself, or even to guess at their meaning by any exercise of ingenuity. the first of these was the singular ignorance in which he had been kept of the death of his parents by the government officials in the east, and the very evident suppression of the letters which, as his uncle informed him, had been despatched to summon him with all speed homeward.
the second was the pertinacity with which he had been thrust forward, time after time, on the most desperate and deadly duty—a pertinacity so striking, that, eager as the young soldier was, and greedy of any chance of winning honor, it had not failed to strike him that he was frequently ordered on duty of a nature which, under ordinary circumstances, is performed by volunteers.
occurrences of this kind are soon remarked in armies, and it had early become a current remark in the camp that to serve in raoul’s company was a sure passport either to promotion or to the other world. but to such an extent was this carried, that when time after time that company had been decimated, even the bravest of the brave experienced an involuntary sinking of the heart when informed that they were transferred or even promoted into those fatal ranks.
nor was this all, for twice it had occurred, once when he was a captain in command of a company, and again when he had a whole regiment under his orders as its colonel, that his superiors, after detaching him on duty so desperate that it might almost be regarded as a forlorn hope, had entirely neglected261 either to support or recall him, but had left him exposed to almost inevitable destruction.
in the first instance, not a man whether officer or private of his company had escaped, with the exception of himself. and he was found, when all was supposed to be over, in the last ditch of the redoubt which he had been ordered to defend to the uttermost, after it had been retaken, with his colors wrapped around his breast, still breathing a little, although so cruelly wounded that his life was long despaired of, and was only saved at last by the vigor and purity of an unblemished and unbroken constitution. on the second occasion, he had been suffered to contend alone for three entire days with but a single battalion against a whole oriental army; but then, that which had been intended to destroy him had won him deathless fame, for by a degree of skill in handling his little force, which had by no means been looked for in so young an officer, although his courage and his conduct were both well known, he had succeeded in giving a bloody repulse to the overwhelming masses of the enemy, and when at length he was supported—doubtless when support was deemed too late to avail him aught—by a few hundred native horse and a few guns, he had converted that check into a total and disastrous route.
so palpable was the case that although raoul suspected nothing of the reasons which had led to that disgraceful affair, he had demanded an inquiry into the conduct of his superior; and that unfortunate personage being clearly convicted of unmilitary conduct, and having failed in the end which would have justified the means in the eyes of the voluptuous tyrant, was ruthlessly abandoned to his fate, and actually died on the scaffold with a gag in his mouth, as did the gallant lally a few years afterward to prevent his revelation of the orders which he had received and for obeying which he perished.
262 all this, though strange and even extraordinary, had failed up to this moment to awaken any suspicion of undue or treasonable agency in the mind of raoul.
but now as his uncle spoke the scales fell from his eyes, and he saw all the baseness, all the villany of the monarch and his satellites, in its true light.
“is it so? is it, indeed, so?” he said mournfully. and it really appeared that grief at detecting such a dereliction on the part of his king, had a greater share in the feelings of the noble youth than indignation or resentment. “is it indeed so?” he said; “and could neither my father’s long and glorious services, nor my poor conduct, avail aught to turn him from such infamy? but tell me,” he continued, the blood now mounting fiery red to his pale face, “tell me this, uncle, is she true to me? is she pure and good? forgive, me, heaven, that i doubt her; but in such a mass of infamy where may a man look for faith or virtue? is melanie true to me, or is she, too, consenting to this scheme of infamous and loathsome guilt?”
“she was true, my son, when i last saw her,” replied the good clergyman; “and you may well believe that i spared no argument to urge her to hold fast to her loyalty and faith, and she vowed then, by all that was most dear and holy, that nothing should induce her ever to become the wife of rochederrien. but they carried her off into the province, and have immured her, i have heard men say, almost in a dungeon, in her father’s castle, for now above a twelvemonth. what has fallen out no one as yet knows certainly; but it is whispered now that she has yielded, and the court scandal goes that she has either wedded him already, or is to do so now within a few days. it is said that they are looked for ere the month is out in paris.”
“then i will to horse, uncle,” replied raoul, “before this night is two hours older for st. renan.”
“great heaven! to what end, raoul? for the sake of all that is good—by your father’s memory—i implore you, 263do nothing rashly!”
“to know of my own knowledge if she be true or false, uncle.”
“and what matters it, raoul? my boy, my unhappy boy! false or true, she is lost to you alike, for ever! you have that against which to contend, which no human energy can conquer.”
“i know not the thing which human energy can not conquer, uncle! it is years now ago that my good father taught me this—that there is no such word as cannot! i have proved it before now, uncle-abbé: i may, should i find it worth the while, prove it again, and that shortly. if so, let the guilty and the traitors look to themselves—they were best, for they shall need it!”
such was the state of st. renan’s affections and his hopes when he left the gay capital of france, within a few hours after his arrival, and hurried down at the utmost speed of man and horse into bretagne, whither he made his way so rapidly, that the first intimation his people received of his return from the east was his presence at the gates of the castle.
great, as may be imagined, was the real joy of the old, true-hearted servitors of the house, at finding their lord thus unexpectedly restored to them, at a time when they had in fact almost abandoned every hope of seeing him again. the same infernal policy which had thrust him so often, as it were, into the very jaws of death—which had intercepted all the letters sent to him from home, and taken, in one word, every step that ingenuity could suggest to isolate him altogether in that distant world—had taken measures as deep and iniquitous at home to cause him to be regarded as one dead, and to obliterate all memory of his existence.
three different times reports so circumstantial, and accompanied by such minute details of time and place, as to render it264 almost impossible for men to doubt their authenticity, had been circulated with regard to the death of the young soldier; and as no tidings had been received of him from any more direct source, the last news of his fall had been generally received as true, no motive appearing why it should be discredited.
his appearance, therefore, at the castle of st. renan, was hailed as that of one who had been lost and was now found—of one who had been dead, and lo! he was alive. the banc-loche of the old feudal pile rang forth its blithest and most jovial notes of greeting; the banner, with the old armorial bearings of st. renan, was displayed upon the keep; and a few light pieces of antique artillery—falcons, and culverins, and demi-cannon, which had kept their places on the battlements since the days of the leagues—sent forth their thunders far and wide over the astonished country.
so generally, however, had the belief of raoul’s death been circulated, and so absolute had been the credence given to the rumor, that when those unwonted sounds of rejoicing were heard to proceed from the long-silent walls of st. renan, men never suspected that the lost heir had returned to enjoy his own again, but fancied that some new master had established his claim to the succession, and was thus celebrating his investiture with the rights of the counts of st. renan.
nor was this wonderful, for ocular proof was scarcely enough to satisfy the oldest retainers of the family of the young lord’s identity; and indeed ocular proof was rendered in some sort dubious by the great alteration which had taken place in the appearance of the personage in question.
between the handsome stripling of sixteen and the grown man of twenty summers there is a greater difference than the same lapse of time will produce at any other period of human life. and this change had been rendered even greater than usual by the burning climate to which raoul had been exposed,265 by the stout endurance of fatigues which had prematurely enlarged and hardened his youthful frame, and above all by the dark experience which had spread something of the thoughtful cast of age over the smooth and gracious lineaments of boyhood.
when he left home, the viscount de douarnenez was a slight, slender, graceful stripling, with a fair, delicate complexion, a profusion of light hair waving in soft curls over his shoulders, a light, elastic step, and a frame which, though it showed the promise already of strength to be attained with maturity, was conspicuous as yet for ease, and agility, and pliability, rather than for power or robustness.
on his return, he had lost, it is true, no jot of his gracefulness or ease of demeanor, but he had shot up and expanded into a tall, broad-shouldered, round-chested, thin-flanked man, with a complexion burned to the darkest hue of which a european skin is susceptible, and which perhaps required the aid of the full, soft blue eye to prove it to be european—with a glance as quick, as penetrating, and at the same time as calm and steady, as that of the eagle when he gazes undazzled at the noontide splendor.
his hair had been cut short to wear beneath the casque, which was still carried by cavaliers, and had grown so much darker, that this alteration alone would have gone far to defy the recognition of his friends. he wore a thick, dark mustache on his upper lip, and a large “royal,” which we should now-a-days call an “imperial,” on his chin.
the whole aspect and expression of face, moreover, was altered, even in a greater degree than his complexion or his person. all the quick, sparkling play and mobility of feature, the sharp flash of rapidly-succeeding sentiments and strong emotions, expressed on the ingenuous face as soon as they were conceived within the brain—all these had disappeared completely—disappeared,266 never to return.
the grave composure of the thoughtful, self-possessed, experienced soldier, sufficient in himself to meet every emergency, every alternation of fortune, had succeeded the imaginative, impulsive ardor of the impetuous, gallant boy.
there was a shadow, too, a heavy shadow of something more than thought; for it was, in truth, deep, real, heartfelt melancholy, which lent an added gloom to the cold fixity of eye and lip—which had obliterated all the gay and gleeful flashes which used, from moment to moment, to light up the countenance so speaking and so frank in its disclosures.
yet it would have been difficult to say whether raoul de st. renan—grave, dark, and sorrowful, as he now showed—was not both a handsomer and more attractive person than he had been in his earlier days, as the gay and thoughtless viscount de douarnenez.
there was a depth of feeling as well as of thought now perceptible in the pensive brow and calm eye; and if the ordinary expression of those fine and placid lineaments was fixed and cold, that coldness and rigidity vanished when his face was lighted up by a smile, as quickly as the thin ice of an april morning melts away before the first glitter of the joyous sunbeams. nor were these smiles rare or forced, though not now as habitual as in those days of youth unalloyed by calamity, and unsunned by passion, which, once departed, never can return in this world!
the morning of the young lord’s arrival passed gloomily enough. it was the very height of summer, it is true, and the sun was shining his brightest over field, and tree, and tower, and everything appeared to partake of the delicious influence of the charming weather, and to put on its blithest and most radiant apparel.
267 never perhaps had the fine grounds with their soft, mossy, sloping lawns, tranquil, brimful waters, and shadowy groves of oak and elm—great, immemorial trees—looked lovelier than they did that day to greet their long-absent master.
but, inasmuch as nothing in this world is more delightful, nothing more unmixed in its means of conveying pleasure, than the return, after long wanderings in foreign climes, among vicissitudes, and cares, and sorrows, to an unchanged and happy home, where the same faces are assembled to smile on your late return which wept at your departure—so nothing can be imagined sadder or more depressing to the spirit than, so returning, to find all things inanimate unchanged, or if changed, more beautiful and brighter for the alteration, but all the living, breathing, sentient creatures—the creatures whose memory has cheered our darkest days of sorrow, whose love we desire most to find unaltered—gone, never to return, swallowed by the cold grave, deaf, silent, unresponsive to our fond affection!
such was st. renan’s return to the house of his fathers. until a few short days before, he had pictured to himself his father’s moderate and manly pleasure, his mother’s holy kiss and chastened rapture at beholding once again, at clasping to her happy bosom, the son, whom she sent forth a boy, returned a man worthy the pride of the most ambitious parent.
all this raoul de st. renan had anticipated, and bitter, bitter was the pang when he perceived all this gay and glad anticipation thrown to the winds irreparably.
there was not a room in the old house, not a view from a single window, not a tree in the noble park, not a winding curve of a trout-stream glimmering through the coppices, but was in some way connected with his tenderest and most sacred recollections—but had a memory of pleasant hours attached to it—but recalled the sound of the kindliest and dearest words, couched in the sweetest tones—the sight of persons but to think of whom made his heart thrill and quiver to its inmost268 core.
and for hours he had wandered through the long, echoing corridors, the stately and superb saloons, feeling their solitude as if it had been actual presence weighing upon his soul, and peopling every apartment with the phantoms of the loved and lost.
thus had the day lagged onward; and, as the sun stooped toward the west, darker and sadder had become the young man’s fancies, and he felt as if his last hope were about to fade out with the fading light of the declining day-god. so gloomy, indeed, were his thoughts—so sadly had he become inured to wo within the last few days—so certainly had the reply to every question he had asked been the very bitterest and most painful he could have met—that he had, in truth, lacked the courage to assure himself of that on which he could not deny to himself that his last hope of happiness depended. he had not ventured yet to ask even of his own most faithful servants whether melanie d’argenson—who was, he well knew, living scarcely three bow-shots distant from the spot where he stood—was true to him—was a maiden or a wedded wife!
and the old servitors, well aware of the earnest love which had existed between the young people, and of the contract which had been entered into with the consent of all parties, knew not how their young master now stood affected toward the lady, and consequently feared to speak on the subject.
at length, when he had dined some hours, while he was sitting with the old bailiff, who had been endeavoring to seduce him into an examination of i know not what of rents and leases, dues and droits, seignorial and manorial—while the bottles of ruby-colored bordeaux wine stood almost untouched before them—the young man made an effort, and raising his head suddenly after a long and thoughtful silence, asked his companion whether the comte d’argenson was at that time resident at269 the chateau.
“oh, yes, monseigneur,” the old man returned immediately, “he has been here all the summer, and the chateau has been full of gay company from paris. never such times have been known in my days: hawking-parties one day, and hunting-matches the next, and music and balls every night, and cavalcades of bright ladies, and cavaliers all ostrich-plumes and cloth of gold and tissue, that you would think our old woods here were converted into fairy-land. the young lady melanie was wedded only three days since to the marquis de ploermel; but you will not know him by that name, i trow: he was the chevalier only—the chevalier de la rochederrien—when you were here before.”
“ah, they are wedded, then,” replied the youth, mastering his passions by a terrible exertion, and speaking of what rent his very heartstrings asunder, as if it had been a matter which concerned him not so much even as a thought; “i heard it was about to be so shortly, but knew not that it had yet taken place.”
“yes, monseigneur, three days since; and it is very strangely thought of in the country, and very strange things are said on all sides concerning it.”
“as what, matthieu?”
“why, the marquis is old enough to be her father, or some say her grandfather, for that matter; and little rosalie, her fille-de-chambre, has been telling all the neighborhood that mademoiselle melanie hated him with all her heart and soul, and would far rather die than go to the altar as his bride.”
“pshaw! is that all, good matthieu?” answered the youth, very bitterly—“is that all? why, there is nothing strange in that; that is an every-day event. a pretty lady changes her mind, breaks her faith, and weds a man she hates and despises! well! that is perfectly in rule; that is precisely270 what is done every day at court! if you could tell just the converse of this tale—that a beautiful woman had kept her inclinations unchanged, her faith unbroken, her honor pure and bright—that she had rejected a rich man or a powerful man because he was base or bad, and wedded a poor and honorable one because she loved him—then, indeed, my good matthieu, you would be telling something that would make men open their eyes wide enough, and marvel what should follow. is this all that you call strange?”
“you are jesting at me, monseigneur, for that i am country bred,” replied the steward, staring at his youthful master with big eyes of astonishment; “you can not mean that which you say!”
“i do mean precisely what i say, my good friend; and i never felt less like jesting in the whole course of my life. i know that you good folk down here in the quiet country judge of these things as you have spoken; but that is entirely on account of your ignorance of court life, and what is now termed nobility. what i tell you is strictly true: that falsehood, and intrigue, and lying—that daily sales of honor—that adultery and infamy of all kinds—are every-day occurrences in paris; and that the wonders of the time are truth and sincerity, and keeping faith and honor! this, i doubt not, seems strange to you, but it in true for all that.”
“at least, it is not our custom down here in bretagne,” returned the old man, “and that, i suppose, is the reason why it appears to be so extraordinary to us here. but you will not say, i think, monsieur le comte, that what else i shall tell you is nothing strange or new.”
“what else will you tell me, matthieu? let us hear it, and then i shall be better able to decide.”
“why, they say, monseigneur, that she is no more the marquis de ploermel’s wife than she is yours or mine, except in271 name alone; and that he does not dare to kiss her hand, much less her lips; and that they have separate apartments, and are, as it were, strangers altogether; and that the reason of all this is, that ma’mselle melanie is never to be his wife at all, but that she is to go to paris in a few days, and to become the king’s mistress! will you tell me that this is not strange—and more than strange, infamous—and dishonoring to the very name of man and woman?”
“even in this, were it true, there would be nothing, i am grieved to say, very wondrous now-a-days—for there have been several base and terrible examples of such things, i am told, of late; for the rest, i must sympathize with you in your disgust and horror of such doings, even if i prove myself thereby a mere country hobereau, and no man of the world, or of fashion. but you must not believe all these things to be true which you hear from the country gossips,” he added, desirous still of shielding melanie, so long as her guilt should be in the slightest possible degree doubtful, from the reproach which seemed already to attach to her. “i hardly can believe such things possible of so fair and modest a demoiselle as the young lady of d’argenson: nor is it easy to me to believe that the count would consent to any arrangement so disgraceful, or that the chevalier de la rocheder—i beg his pardon, the marquis de ploermel, would marry a lady for such an infamous object. i think, therefore, good matthieu, that, although there would not even in this be anything very wonderful, it is yet neither probable nor true.”
“oh, yes, it is true! i am well assured that it is true, monseigneur,” replied the old man, shaking his head obstinately; “i do not believe that there is much truth or honor in this lady either, or she would not so easily have broken one contract, or forgotten one lover!”
272 “hush, hush, matthieu!” cried raoul, “you forget that we were mere children at that time; such early troth plightings are foolish ceremonials at the best; besides, do you not see that you are condemning me also as well as the lady?”
“oh, that is different—that is quite different!” replied the old steward, “gentlemen may be permitted to take some little liberties which with ladies are not allowable. but that a young demoiselle should break her contract in such wise is disgraceful.”
“well, well, we will not argue it to-night, matthieu,” said the young soldier, rising and looking out of the great oriel window over the sunshiny park; “i believe i will go and walk out for an hour or two and refresh my recollections of old times. it is a lovely afternoon as i ever beheld in france or elsewhere.”
and with the word he took up his rapier which lay on a slab near the table at which he had been sitting, and hung it to his belt, and then throwing on his plumed hat carelessly, without putting on his cloak, strolled leisurely out into the glorious summer evening.
for a little while he loitered on the esplanade, gazing out toward the sea, the ridgy waves of which were sparkling like emeralds tipped with diamonds in the grand glow of the setting sun. but ere long he turned thence with a sigh, called up perhaps by some fancied similitude between that bright and boundless ocean, desolate and unadorned even by a single passing sail, and his own course of life so desert, friendless, and uncompanioned.
thence he strolled listlessly through the fine garden, inhaling the rare odors of the roses, hundreds of which bloomed on every side of him, there in low bushes, there in trim standards, and not a few climbing over tall trellices and bowery alcoves in one mass of living bloom. he saw the happy swallows darting and wheeling to and fro through the pellucid azure, in273 pursuit of their insect prey. he heard the rich mellow notes of the blackbirds and thrushes, thousands and thousands of which were warbling incessantly in the cool shadow of the yew and holly hedges. but his diseased and unhappy spirit took no delight in the animated sounds, or summer-teeming sights of rejoicing nature. no, the very joy and merriment, which seemed to pervade all nature, animate or inanimate around him, while he himself had no present joys to elevate, no future promises to cheer him, rendered him, if that were possible, darker and gloomier, and more mournful.
the spirits of the departed seemed to hover about him, forbidding him ever again to admit hope or joy as an inmate to his desolate heart; and, wrapt in these dark phantasies, with his brow bent, and his eyes downcast, he wandered from terrace to terrace through the garden, until he reached its farthest boundary, and then passed out into the park, through which he strolled, almost unconscious whither, until he came to the great deer-fence of the utmost glen, through a wicket of which, just as the sun was setting, he entered into the shadowy woodland.
then a whole flood of wild and whirling thoughts rushed over his brain at once. he had strolled without a thought into the very scene of his happy rambles with the beloved, the faithless, the lost melanie. carried away by a rush of inexplicable feelings, he walked swiftly onward through the dim wildwood path toward the devil’s drinking-cup. he came in sight of it—a woman sat by its brink, who started to her feet at the sound of his approaching footsteps.
it was melanie—alone—and if his eyes deceived him not, weeping bitterly.
she gazed at him, at the first, with an earnest, half-alarmed, half-inquiring glance, as if she did not recognise his face, and, perhaps, apprehended rudeness, if not danger, from the approach274 of a stranger.
gradually, however, she seemed in part to recognise him. the look of inquiry and alarm gave place to a fixed, glaring, icy stare of unmixed dread and horror; and when he had now come to within six or eight paces of her, still without speaking, she cried, in a wild, low voice—
“great god! great god! has he come up from the grave to reproach me! i am true, raoul; true to the last, my beloved!”
and with a long, shivering, low shriek, she staggered, and would have fallen to the earth had he not caught her in his arms.
but she had fainted in the excess of superstitious awe, and perceived not that it was no phantom’s hand, but a most stalwart arm of human mould that clasped her to the heart of the living raoul de st. renan.
