The Red and the Black (66 page)

creatures on earth. The following spring, a mere eleven months later, I was perhaps the happiest young man in my age-group.

But as often as not all this fine reasoning was ineffectual against
the horrors of reality. Every day he saw Mathilde at lunch and dinner.
From the numerous letters dictated to him by M. de La Mole, he knew
she was on the point of marrying M. de Croisenois. This amiable young
man was already making an appearance twice a day at the Hôtel de La
Mole: the jealous eye of a jilted lover did not miss a single one of
his movements.

When he thought he had noticed M
^lle
de La Mole treating her suitor well, Julien could not help looking lovingly at his pistols when he returned to his room.

Ah! how much wiser I would be, he said to himself, to remove my name
from my linen and go off to some solitary forest twenty leagues from
Paris and end this execrable life! As a stranger in the region, my
death would stay hidden for a fortnight, and who would spare a thought
for me after a fortnight!

This line
of reasoning was very sensible. But the next day, a glimpse of
Mathilde's arm visible between the sleeve of her dress and her glove
was enough to plunge our young philosopher into memories of a cruel
sort, which none the less maintained his attachment to life. All
right! he said to himself at that point, I'll follow this Russian
policy to the bitter end. How will it all finish?

As regards the maréchale, once I've copied out these fiftythree letters, I shall certainly not write any others.

As regards Mathilde, six weeks of painful play-acting like this will
either make no difference to her anger, or will win me a moment's
reconciliation. God Almighty! I'd die of happiness! And he was unable
to finish his train of thought.

When,
after a long spell of dreaming, he managed to pick up the thread of
his argument, he said to himself. So then, I'd win a day's happiness,
after which she would revert to her cruel ways, founded, alas! on my
meagre capacity to please her, and I'd have no resources left, I'd be
ruined, destroyed for ever...

What
guarantee can she offer me with a character like hers? Alas! my
unworthiness is the key to everything. My manners will be wanting in
elegance, my way of talking will be heavy and monotonous. God
Almighty! Why am I me?

-431-

To sacrifice oneself to one's passion, fair enough; but to passions one does not feel! O wretched nineteenth century!

GIRODET
^*

HAVING at first read Julien's long letters without any pleasure, M
^me
de Fervaques was beginning to be preoccupied by them, but one thing
distressed her: What a shame M. Sorel isn't a proper priest! One could
admit him to some sort of intimacy; but with that cross, and the
almost bourgeois suit he wears, one lays oneself open to cruel
questions, and what is one to reply? She did not finish her train of
thought: some malicious woman from my circle of friends may assume and
even spread the rumour that he's a little cousin of subordinate rank,
a relative of my father's, some merchant decorated by the National
Guard.

Up until the time she had set eyes on Julien, M
^me
de Fervaques's greatest pleasure had been to write the word
maréchale
beside her name. Thereafter, the unhealthy, hypersensitive vanity of a social climber fought against a nascent attraction.

It would be so easy for me, said the maréchale to herself, to make
him a vicar-general in some diocese near Paris! But plain M. Sorel,
and what's more, petty secretary to M. de La Mole! it's most
distressing.

For the first time, this creature
who was fearful of everything
was moved by an interest alien to her pretensions to rank and
social superiority. Her old porter noticed that when he brought her a
letter from the handsome young man who looked so sad, he was sure to
see the maréchale lose the abstracted and displeased look she was
always careful to adopt at the appearance of any of her servants.

Being bored with a way of life that was always seeking to make an
impression on an audience, without any genuine heartfelt enjoyment of
this kind of success, had become so

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intolerable to the lady since having Julien in her thoughts, that for
the chambermaids not to be ill-treated for a whole day on end, it was
sufficient if, in the course of the previous evening, she had spent
an hour with this unusual young man. His growing influence survived
some anonymous letters, very well written ones too. It was to no avail
that little Tanbeau furnished Messrs de Luz, de Croisenois, and de
Caylus with two or three cunning items of slander which these
gentlemen took pleasure in spreading, without really taking a view on
the truth of the accusations. The maréchale, whose mind was not
constituted to resist these vulgar practices, confided her doubts in
Mathilde, and was always consoled.

One day, having asked three times whether there were any letters, M
^me
de Fervaques made up her mind abruptly to reply to Julien. It was a
victory for boredom. At the second letter, the maréchale was almost
stopped in her tracks by the impropriety of writing such a vulgar
address in her own hand:
To Monsieur Sorel, c/o Monsieur le Marquis de la Mole
.

'Will you please', she said curtly to Julien that evening, 'bring me some envelopes with your address written on them.'

Here I am set up as a manservant-cum-lover, Julien thought, and as he
bowed he took pleasure in putting on a face like Arsène, the
marquis's old valet de chambre.

That
same evening he brought some envelopes, and the next day, very early
in the morning, he received a third letter: he read five or six lines
at the beginning, and two or three towards the end. It was four pages
of tiny, close-written script.

Gradually, the lady adopted the sweet habit of writing almost every
day. Julien answered with faithful copies of the Russian letters, and
such is the advantage of a bombastic style that M
^me
de Fervaques was not in the least astonished at the lack of connection between the answers and her letters.

Just imagine how it would have irked her pride if little Tanbeau, who
had taken it upon himself to spy on Julien's movements, had been able
to inform her that all these unopened letters were flung at random into
Julien's drawer.

One morning, the
porter was on his way to the library with a letter to him from the
maréchale; Mathilde ran into the man, saw the letter and the address
on it in Julien's hand. She went

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into the library as the porter was coming out: the letter was still
on the edge of the table; Julien, who was very busy writing, had not
put it in his drawer.

'This is
something I will not put up with,' Mathilde exclaimed, seizing the
letter; 'you're forgetting all about me, and I'm your bride. Your
conduct is appalling, sir.'

At these
words, her pride, astonished at the dreadful impropriety of what she had
done, choked her; she burst into tears, and soon seemed to Julien to
be quite unable to breathe.

Surprised
and disconcerted, Julien did not perceive clearly what this scene
betokened in the way of wondrous good fortune for him. He helped
Mathilde to sit down; she almost let herself go in his arms.

The first instant when he noticed this movement was one of intense
joy. The second was a thought for Korasov: I may lose everything by a
single word.

His arms stiffened, so
painful was the effort imposed by strategy. I mustn't even allow
myself to clasp to my heart this lovely, yielding body, or she'll
despise and ill-treat me. What an appalling character!

And as he cursed Mathilde's character, he loved her infinitely more for it; he seemed to be holding a queen in his arms.

Julien's impassive coldness increased the pangs of pride which wounded M
^lle
de La Mole to the quick. She did not have anything like the necessary
composure to try to guess from his eyes what his feelings were for
her at that moment. She could not bring herself to look at him; she
was in fear and trembling of being greeted with an expression of
scorn.

Sitting motionless on the sofa
in the library, with her head turned away from Julien, she was racked
with the most acute anguish that pride and love can inflict on a
human soul. What an atrocious step she had just taken!

It was my peculiar fate, wretched woman that I am! to see my most
improper advances rebuffed! And rebuffed by whom? added her
grief-crazed pride. Rebuffed by a servant of my father's.

'I won't put up with this,' she said out loud.

And, rising to her feet in fury, she opened the drawer of

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Julien's table which stood a couple of feet from her. She remained
frozen to the spot in horror when she saw nine or ten unopened letters
identical in every respect to the one which the porter had just
brought up. In all the addresses she recognized Julien's handwriting,
more or less disguised.

'So,' she
exclaimed, quite beside herself, 'not only are you on close terms with
her, but you despise her, what's more. You, a nobody, despising M
^me
la Maréchale de Fervaques!

'Ah! forgive me, darling,' she added, flinging herself down and
clasping his knees, 'despise me if you want, but please love me, I
can't go on living deprived of your love.' And she fell down in a dead
faint.

Here she is then, this proud creature, lying at my feet! said Julien to himself.

-435-

As the blackest sky Foretells the heaviest tempest
Don Juan
, C. I, st. 73

IN the midst of all these great upheavals, Julien was more astonished
than happy. Mathilde's insults showed him how wise the Russian
strategy was.
Speak little
,
act little
, this is my only means of salvation.

He lifted Mathilde up, and without saying a word laid her on the sofa again. Gradually she was overcome with tears.

To hide her embarrassment, she picked up Mme de Fervaques's letters;
slowly she unsealed them. She started visibly when she recognized the
maréchale's writing. She turned over the pages of the letters without
reading them: most of them covered six sheets.

'Answer me this, at least,' Mathilde said at length in the most
pleading of tones, but without daring to look at Julien. 'You're well
aware that I have my pride; it's the misfortune of my position and
even of my character, I'll admit; so M
^me
de Fervaques has
stolen your heart from me... Has she made all the sacrifices for you
that this ill-fated love misled me into making?'

A dismal silence was Julien's only answer. What right has she, he was
thinking, to ask me to commit an indiscretion unworthy of a
gentleman?

Mathilde tried to read the letters; her tear-filled eyes made it impossible.

For a month now she had been unhappy, but so proud a character was
nowhere near admitting her feelings to herself. Chance alone had
brought on this outburst. For a moment jealousy and love had triumphed
over pride. She was seated on the sofa, very close to him too. He saw
her hair and her alabaster neck; for a second he forgot what he owed
to himself;

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he slipped his arm round her waist and almost clasped her to his chest.

She turned her head slowly towards him: he was astonished at the
intense anguish in her eyes, to the point where their usual look was
unrecognizable.

Julien felt his strength abandoning him, so mortally painful was the act of courage he demanded of himself.

Those eyes will soon express nothing but the coldest disdain, Julien
said to himself, if I allow myself to give in to the happiness of
loving her. And yet, in a faint voice, with phrases she scarcely had
the strength to finish, she was at that very moment expressing yet
again to him her heartfelt regret at actions dictated, she supposed,
by too much pride.

'I have my pride
too,' Julien said to her in a barely audible voice, and his features
betrayed that he was on the verge of physical collapse.

Mathilde turned eagerly towards him. To hear his voice caused her
happiness such as she had almost ceased to hope for. At that moment,
she only remembered her haughtiness to curse it, she would have liked
to find unusual, scarcely credible forms of behaviour to prove to him
the extent of her adoration for him and her hatred of herself.

'It's probably on account of my pride', Julien went on, 'that you
favoured me for a brief while; it's certainly on account of my
courageous firmness befitting a man that you respect me at this
moment. I may feel love for the maréchale...'

Mathilde shuddered; her eyes took on a strange expression. She was
about to hear her sentence pronounced. This reflex did not escape
Julien; he felt his courage weaken.

Ah! he said to himself as he listened to the sound of the idle words
his mouth was uttering just as he would have done an extraneous noise;
if only I could smother those pale cheeks with kisses, and you not
feel it!

'I may feel love for the
maréchale,' he went on... and his voice faltered even more; 'but I
certainly don't have any decisive proof of her interest in me...'

Mathilde looked at him: he withstood this look, or at any rate he
hoped his face hadn't given him away. He felt himself imbued with love
right into the innermost recesses of his heart.

-437-