“I know the world, men and things; I have seen many a household rendered unhappy by the blind affection of a mother who made herself intolerable, as much to her daughter as to her son-in-law. The affection of old people is often petty and vexatious; perhaps I should not succeed in effacing myself. I am weak enough to think myself handsome still; some flatterers try to persuade me that I am lovable, and I might assume an inconvenient prominence. Let me make one more sacrifice to your happiness.—I have given you my fortune; well, now I surrender my last womanly vanities.—Your good father Mathias is growing old; he cannot look after your estates. I will constitute myself your bailiff. I shall make such occupation for myself as old folks must sooner or later fall back on; then, when you need me, I will go to Paris and help in your plans of ambition.
“Come, Paul, be honest; this arrangement is to your mind? Answer.”
Paul would not admit it, but he was very glad to be free. The suspicions as to his mother-in-law’s character, implanted in his mind by the old notary, were dispelled by this conversation, which Madame Evangelista continued to the same effect.
“My mother was right,” thought Natalie, who was watching Paul’s expression. “He is really glad to see me parted from her.—But why?”
Was not this Why? the first query of suspicion, and did it not add considerable weight to her mother’s instructions?
There are some natures who, on the strength of a single proof, can believe in friendship. In such folks as these the north wind blows away clouds as fast as the west wind brings them up; they are content with effects, and do not look for the causes. Paul’s was one of these essentially confiding characters, devoid of ill-feeling, and no less devoid of foresight. His weakness was the outcome of kindness and a belief in goodness in others, far more than of want of strength of mind.
Natalie was pensive and sad; she did not know how to do without her mother. Paul, with the sort of fatuity that love can produce, laughed at his bride’s melancholy mood, promising himself that the pleasures of married life and the excitement of Paris would dissipate it. It was with marked satisfaction that Madame Evangelista encouraged Paul in his confidence, for the first condition of revenge is dissimulation. Overt hatred is powerless.
The Creole lady had made two long strides already. Her daughter had possession of splendid jewels which had cost Paul two hundred thousand francs, and to which he would, no doubt, add more. Then, she was leaving the two young people to themselves, with no guidance but unregulated love. Thus she had laid the foundations of revenge of which her daughter knew nothing, though sooner or later she would be accessory to it.
Now, would Natalie love Paul?—This was as yet an unanswered question, of which the issue would modify Madame Evangelista’s schemes; for she was too sincerely fond of her daughter not to be tender of her happiness. Thus Paul’s future life depended on himself. If he could make his wife love him, he would be saved.
Finally, on the following night, after an evening spent with the four witnesses whom Madame Evangelista had invited to the lengthy dinner which followed the legal ceremony, at midnight the young couple and their friends attended mass by the light of blazing tapers in the presence of above a hundred curious spectators.
A wedding celebrated at night always seems of ill omen; daylight is a symbol of life and enjoyment, and its happy augury is lacking. Ask the staunchest spirit the cause of this chill, why the dark vault depresses the nerves, why the sound of footsteps is so startling, why the cry of owls and bats is so strangely audible. Though there is no reason for alarm, everyone quakes; darkness, the forecast of death, is crushing to the spirit.
Natalie, torn from her mother, was weeping. The girl was tormented by all the doubts which clutch the heart on the threshold of a new life, where, in spite of every promise of happiness, there are a thousand pitfalls for a woman’s feet. She shivered with cold, and had to put on a cloak.
Madame Evangelista’s manner and that of the young couple gave rise to comments among the elegant crowd that stood round the altar.
“Solonet tells me that the young people go off to Paris tomorrow morning alone.”
“Madame Evangelista was to have gone to live with them.”
“Count Paul has got rid of her!”
“What a mistake!” said the Marquise de Gyas. “The man who shuts his door on his mother-in-law opens it to a lover. Does he not know all that a mother is?”
“He has been very hard on Madame Evangelista. The poor woman has had to sell her house, and is going to live at Lanstrac.”
“Natalie is very unhappy.”
“Well, would you like to spend the day after your wedding on the highroad?”
“It is very uncomfortable.”
“I am glad I came,” said another lady, “to convince myself of the necessity of surrounding a wedding with all the usual ceremonies and festivities, for this seems to me very cold and dismal. Indeed, if I were to tell the whole truth,” she whispered, leaning over to her neighbor, “it strikes me as altogether unseemly.”
Madame Evangelista took Natalie in her own carriage to Count Paul’s house.
“Well, mother, it is all over—”
“Remember my advice, and you will be happy. Always be his wife, and not his mistress.”
When Natalie had gone to her room, Madame Evangelista went through the little farce of throwing herself into her son-in-law’s arms and weeping on his shoulder. It was the only provincial detail Madame Evangelista had allowed herself; but she had her reasons. In the midst of her apparently wild and desperate tears and speeches, she extracted from Paul such concessions as a husband will always make.
The next day she saw the young people into their
