“So you see I am as much rooted to Clochegourde as one of the leaden finials is to the roof. I have kept nothing from you, monsieur. The neighbors know nothing of the secrets of Clochegourde; you now know them all. Say nothing of the place but what is kind and pleasant, and you will earn my esteem—my gratitude,” she added in a softened tone. “On these conditions you can always come to Clochegourde—you will find friends here.”
“But I have never known what it is to suffer,” exclaimed I. “You alone—”
“Nay,” said she, with that resigned woman’s smile that might melt granite, “do not be dismayed by my confidences. They show you life as it is, and not as your fancy had led you to hope. We all have our faults and our good points. If I had married a spendthrift, he would have ruined me. If I had been the wife of some ardent and dissipated youth, he would have been a favorite with women; perhaps he would have been unfaithful, and I should have died of jealousy.—I am jealous!” she exclaimed in an excited tone that rang like the thunderclap of a passing storm.
“Well, Monsieur de Mortsauf loves me as much as it is in him to love; all the affection of which his heart is capable is poured out at my feet, as the Magdalen poured out her precious balm at the feet of the Saviour. Believe me when I tell you that a life of love is an exception to every earthly law; every flower fades, every great joy has a bitter morrow—when it has a morrow. Real life is a life of sorrow; this nettle is its fit image; it has sprouted in the shade of the terrace, and grows green on its stem without any sunshine. Here, as in northern latitudes, there are smiles in the sky, rare, to be sure, but making amends for many griefs. After all, if a woman is exclusively a mother, is she not tied by sacrifices rather than by joys? I can draw down on myself the storms I see ready to break on the servants or on my children, and as I thus conduct them I feel some mysterious and secret strength. The resignation of one day prepares me for the next.
“And God does not leave me hopeless. Though I was at one time in despair over my children’s health, I now see that as they grow up they grow stronger. And, after all, our house is improved, our fortune is amended. Who knows whether Monsieur de Mortsauf’s old age may not bring me happiness?
“Believe me, the human being who can appear in the presence of the Great Judge, leading any comforted soul that had been ready to curse life, will have transformed his sorrows into delight. If my suffering has secured the happiness of my family, is it really suffering?”
“Yes,” replied I. “Still, it was necessary suffering, as mine has been, to make me appreciate the fruit that has ripened here among stones. And now perhaps we may eat of it together, perhaps we may admire its wonders!—the flood of affection it can shed on the soul, the sap which can revive the fading leaves. Then life is no longer a burden; we have cast it from us. Great God! can you not understand?” I went on, in the mystical strain to which religious training had accustomed us both. “See what roads we have trodden to meet at last! What lodestone guided us across the ocean of bitter waters to the fresh springs flowing at the foot of the mountains, over sparkling sands, between green and flowery banks? Have not we, like the Kings of the East, followed the same star? And we stand by the manger where lies an awakened Babe—a divine Child who will shoot his arrows at the head of the lifeless trees, who will wake the world to new life for us by his glad cries, who will lend savor to life by continual delights, and give slumbers by night and contentment by day. Are we not more than brother and sister? What Heaven has joined, put not asunder.
“The sorrows of which you speak are the grain scattered freely abroad by the hand of the sower, to bring forth a harvest already golden under the most glorious sun. Behold and see! Shall we not go forth together and gather it ear by ear?—What fervor is in me that I dare to speak to you thus? Answer me, or I will never cross the Indre again.”
“You have spared me the name of Love,” said she, interrupting me in a severe tone; “but you have described a feeling of which I know nothing—which to me is prohibited. You are but a boy, and again I forgive you; but it is for the last time. Understand, monsieur, my whole heart is drunk, so to speak, with motherhood. I love Monsieur de Mortsauf, not as a social duty, nor as an investment to earn eternal bliss, but from an irresistible feeling, clinging to him by every fibre of my heart. Was I forced into this marriage? I chose it out of sympathy with misfortune. Was it not the part of woman to heal the bruises of time, to comfort those who had stood in the breach and come back wounded?
“How can I tell you? I felt a sort of selfish pleasure in seeing that you could amuse him. Is not that purely motherly? Has not my long story shown you plainly that I have three children who must never find me wanting, on whom I must
