“Yes, mother,” said the young man, with the most respectful gravity.
She opened her arms and clasped her son to her heart, shedding a few tears.
“Then let all be forgotten,” said she; “we have lost nothing but the money. I will pray to God that it may be restored to us; and since you still are worthy of your name, kiss me, for I have suffered greatly.”
“I swear to you, my dear mother,” said he, holding out his hand over the bed, “never again to give you the least trouble of the same kind, and to do all in my power to repair my past errors.”
“Come to breakfast, my child,” she said, and she left the room.
If the laws of the stage are to be applied to narrative, Savinien’s arrival, by introducing at Nemours the only actor as yet missing from the personages of this little drama, here completes the prologue.
Part II
The Minoret Property
The action began with a scene so hackneyed in literature, whether old or new, that no one would believe in its effect in 1829 if the principal figure were not an old lady of Brittany, a Kergarouët and an émigrée. But it must at once be made clear that in 1829 the nobility had reconquered in society some of the ground it had lost in political influence. Moreover, the feeling which governs grandparents when matrimonial suitability is in question, is imperishable; it is closely implicated with the existence of civilized society, and founded in family spirit. It is supreme at Geneva as at Vienna, and as at Nemours, where Zélie Levrault had refused her consent to her son’s marrying the daughter of a bastard.
Still, every social law has its exceptions. Savinien proposed trying to bend his mother’s pride before Ursule’s innate nobility. The battle began forthwith. As soon as he was seated at table his mother began to tell him of the dreadful letters, as she called them, written to her by the Kergarouëts and the Portenduères.
“The Family has ceased to exist, my dear mother,” replied Savinien. “Nothing is left but the Individual. The nobility no longer form a compact body. Nowadays no one asks if you are a Portenduère, or if you are brave, or a statesman; all that anyone requires is, How much do you pay in rates and taxes?”
“And the king?” asked the old lady.
“The king stands between the two Chambers, like a man between his lawful wife and his mistress. So I must contrive to marry some rich girl whatever her family may be—a peasant’s daughter if she has a million of francs, and if she is fairly well brought up, that is to say, if she comes from a convent-school.”
“This is quite another matter!” said the old lady.
Savinien knit his brows over this reply. He knew that granite will, called Breton obstinacy, which characterized his mother; and was anxious to know, as soon as possible, what her views were on this delicate subject.
“And so,” said he, “if I should fall in love with a girl—say, for instance, our neighbor’s ward, little Ursule—you would oppose my marrying her?”
“To my dying day,” said she. “After my death you alone will be responsible for the honor and the blood of the Portenduères and the Kergarouëts.”
“Then you would leave me to die of hunger and despair for the sake of a chimera which, in these days, can only become real by acquiring the splendor of wealth.”
“You can serve France and trust in God.”
“You will postpone my happiness till the day after your death.”
“It will be horrible on your part, that is all.”
“Louis XIV was very near marrying Mazarin’s niece—a parvenu.”
“Mazarin himself opposed it.”
“And the widow Scarron?”
“She was a d’Aubigne! Besides, the marriage was secret. But I am a very old woman, my son,” she added, shaking her head. “When I am gone, you can marry to please your own fancy.”
Savinien loved and respected his mother; but at once, though in silence, he set against the obstinacy of the daughter of the Kergarouëts, an obstinacy equal to her own, and determined never to have any wife but Ursule, to whom this opposition gave all the charm of a forbidden joy—as always happens in such cases.
When, after vespers, Doctor Minoret, with Ursule, dressed in pink and white, entered the chill sitting-room, the poor child was seized with nervous trembling, just as if she had found herself in the presence of the Queen of France, and had some favor to ask of her. Since her talk with the doctor, the little house had assumed, to her, the proportions of a palace, and the old lady all the social importance that a duchess must have had in the eyes of a villein’s daughter in the Middle Ages. Never had Ursule measured more hopelessly the distance which divided a Vicomte de Portenduère from the daughter of a bandmaster, a singer in the opera, the natural son of an organist, herself living on the bounty of a physician.
“What ails you, child?” said the lady, making her sit down by her side.
“Madame, I am overcome by the honor you condescend to pay me.”
“Why, child,” replied Madame de Portenduère in her most vinegar accent, “I know how much your guardian loves you, and I wish to do what is agreeable to him, for he has brought home the prodigal son.”
“But, my dear mother,” said Savinien, for it went to his heart to see Ursule’s deep blushes, and the terrible effort by which she repressed her tears, “even if you were under no obligation to Monsieur Minoret, it seems to me we might be gratified by the pleasure mademoiselle is good enough to do us by accepting your invitation.” And the young man pressed the doctor’s hand with meaning as he added:
“You, monsieur, wear the order of Saint-Michael, the oldest French order, which in itself confers nobility.”
Ursule’s great beauty, to which her almost hopeless love had, within the last few days, given
