My name is Jean Falcon, otherwise called Beau-Pied, sergeant of the first company of Hulot's veterans, seventy-second half-brigade, nicknamed 'Les Mayencais.' Excuse my vanity; I can only offer you the soul of a sergeant, but that's at your service."He turned on his heel and walked off whistling.
"The lower one goes in social life," said Marie, bitterly, "the more we find generous feelings without display.A marquis returns death for life, and a poor sergeant--but enough of that."When the weary woman was at last in a warm bed, her faithful Francine waited in vain for the affectionate good-night to which she was accustomed; but her mistress, seeing her still standing and evidently uneasy, made her a sign of distress.
"This is called a day, Francine," she said; "but I have aged ten years in it."The next morning, as soon as she had risen, Corentin came to see her and she admitted him.
"Francine," she exclaimed, "my degradation is great indeed, for the thought of that man is not disagreeable to me."Still, when she saw him, she felt once more, for the hundredth time, the instinctive repulsion which two years' intercourse had increased rather than lessened.
"Well," he said, smiling, "I felt certain you were succeeding.Was Imistaken? did you get hold of the wrong man?""Corentin," she replied, with a dull look of pain, "never mention that affair to me unless I speak of it myself."He walked up and down the room casting oblique glances at her, endeavoring to guess the secret thoughts of the singular woman whose mere glance had the power of discomfiting at times the cleverest men.
"I foresaw this check," he replied, after a moment's silence."If you would be willing to establish your headquarters in this town, I have already found a suitable place for you.We are in the very centre of Chouannerie.Will you stay here?"She answered with an affirmative sign, which enabled Corentin to make conjectures, partly correct, as to the events of the preceding evening.
"I can hire a house for you, a bit of national property still unsold.
They are behind the age in these parts.No one has dared buy the old barrack because it belonged to an /emigre/ who was thought to be harsh.It is close to the church of Saint Leonard; and on my word of honor the view from it is delightful.Something can really be made of the old place; will you try it?""Yes, at once," she cried.
"I want a few hours to have it cleaned and put in order for you, so that you may like it.""What matter?" she said."I could live in a cloister or a prison without caring.However, see that everything is in order before night, so that I may sleep there in perfect solitude.Go, leave me; your presence is intolerable.I wish to be alone with Francine; she is better for me than my own company, perhaps.Adieu; go--go, I say."These words, said volubly with a mingling of coquetry, despotism, and passion, showed she had entirely recovered her self-possession.Sleep had no doubt classified the impressions of the preceding day, and reflection had determined her on vengeance.If a few reluctant signs appeared on her face they only proved the ease with which certain women can bury the better feelings of their souls, and the cruel dissimulation which enables them to smile sweetly while planning the destruction of a victim.She sat alone after Corentin had left her, thinking how she could get the marquis still living into her toils.
For the first time in her life this woman had lived according to her inmost desires; but of that life nothing remained but one craving,--that of vengeance,--vengeance complete and infinite.It was her one thought, her sole desire.Francine's words and attentions were unnoticed.Marie seemed to be sleeping with her eyes open; and the long day passed without an action or even a gesture that bore testimony to her thoughts.She lay on a couch which she had made of chairs and pillows.It was late in the evening when a few words escaped her, as if involuntarily.
"My child," she said to Francine, "I understood yesterday what it was to live for love; to-day I know what it means to die for vengeance.
Yes, I will give my life to seek him wherever he may be, to meet him, seduce him, make him mine! If I do not have that man, who dared to despise me, at my feet humble and submissive, if I do not make him my lackey and my slave, I shall indeed be base; I shall not be a woman; Ishall not be myself."
The house which Corentin now hired for Mademoiselle de Verneuil offered many gratifications to the innate love of luxury and elegance that was part of this girl.The capricious creature took possession of it with regal composure, as of a thing which already belonged to her;she appropriated the furniture and arranged it with intuitive sympathy, as though she had known it all her life.This is a vulgar detail, but one that is not unimportant in sketching the character of so exceptional a person.She seemed to have been already familiarized in a dream with the house in which she now lived on her hatred as she might have lived on her love.
"At least," she said to herself, "I did not rouse insulting pity in him; I do not owe him my life.Oh, my first, my last, my only love!
what an end to it!" She sprang upon Francine, who was terrified."Do you love a man? Oh, yes, yes, I remember; you do.I am glad I have a woman here who can understand me.Ah, my poor Francette, man is a miserable being.Ha! he said he loved me, and his love could not bear the slightest test! But I,--if all men had accused him I would have defended him; if the universe rejected him my soul should have been his refuge.In the old days life was filled with human beings coming and going for whom I did not care; it was sad and dull, but not horrible; but now, now, what is life without him? He will live on, and I not near him! I shall not see him, speak to him, feel him, hold him, press him,--ha! I would rather strangle him myself in his sleep!"Francine, horrified, looked at her in silence.
"Kill the man you love?" she said, in a soft voice.
"Yes, yes, if he ceases to love me."