“I did not hesitate between my social dignity and my own little dignity—a secret between me and my conscience. Though I have fits of melancholy, like the clouds which float across the clearest sky, to which we women like to give way, I silence them at once; they would look like regret. Dear me! I so fully understood the extent of my debt to him, that I have equipped myself with unlimited indulgence; but hitherto Gennaro has not roused my sensitive jealousy. Indeed, I cannot see how my dear great genius can do wrong. I am, my dear, rather like the devotees who argue with their God, for is it not to you that I owe my happiness? And you cannot doubt that I have often thought of you.
“At last I have seen Italy! As you saw it, as it ought to be seen, illuminated to the soul by love, as it is by its glorious sun and its masterpieces of art. I pity those who are incessantly fired by the admiration it calls for at every step when they have not a hand to clasp, a heart into which they may pour the overflow of emotions which then subside as they grow deeper. These two years are to me all my life, and my memory will have reaped a rich harvest. Did you not, as I did, dream of settling at Chiavari, of buying a palace at Venice, a villa at Sorrento, a house at Florence? Do not all women who love shun the world? And I, forever an outcast, could I help longing to bury myself in a lovely landscape, in a heap of flowers, looking out on the pretty sea, or a valley as good as the sea, like the valley you look on from Fiesole?
“But, alas, we are poor artists, and want of money is dragging the wanderers back to Paris again. Gennaro cannot bear me to feel that I have left all my luxury, and he is bringing a new work, a grand opera, to be rehearsed in Paris. Even at the cost of my love, I cannot bear to meet one of those looks from a woman or a man which would make me feel murderous. Yes! for I could hack anyone to pieces who should condescend to pity me, should offer me the protection of patronage—like that enchanting Château-neuf, who, in the time of Henri III, I think, spurred her horse to trample down the Provost of Paris for some such offence.
“So I am writing to tell you that without delay I shall arrive to join you at les Touches, and wait for our Gennaro in that quiet spot. You see how bold I am with my benefactress and sister. Still, the magnitude of the obligation will not betray my heart, like some others, into ingratitude.
“You have told me so much about the difficulties of the journey that I shall try to reach le Croisic by sea. This idea occurred to me on hearing that there was here a little Danish vessel, loaded with marble, which will put in at le Croisic to take up salt on its way back to the Baltic. By this voyage I shall avoid the fatigue and expense of traveling by post. I know you are not alone, and I am glad of it; I had some remorse in the midst of my happiness. You are the only person with whom I could bear to be alone without Conti. Will it not be a pleasure to you, too, to have a woman with you who will understand your happiness and not be jealous of it?
“Well, till our meeting! The wind is fair, and I am off, sending you a kiss.”
“Well, well, she, too, knows how to love!” said Calyste to himself, folding up the letter with a sad expression.
This sadness flashed on his mother’s heart like a gleam lighting up an abyss. The Baron had just left the room. Fanny bolted the door to the turret, and returned to lean over the back of the chair in which her boy was sitting, as Dido’s sister bends over her in Guérin’s picture. She kissed his forehead and said:
“What is the matter, my child? what makes you unhappy? You promised to account to me for your constant visits to les Touches; I ought to bless its mistress, you say?”
“Yes, indeed,” he replied. “She, my dear mother, has shown me all the defects of my education in these times, when men of noble birth must acquire personal merit if they are to restore their names to life again. I was as remote from my day as Guérande is from Paris. She has been, in a way, the mother of my intelligence.”
“Not for that
