“when half-gods go,
the gods arrive.”
“then,” said the baroness de mélide, “i shall go down to st. germain en pré, and say my prayers.” and she rang the bell for her carriage.
on all great occasions in life, the baroness de mélide had taken her overburdened heart in a carriage and pair to st. germain en pré. for she had always had a carriage and pair for the mere ringing of a bell ever since her girlhood, when the baron de mélide had, with much assistance from her, laid his name and fortune at her feet. when she had helped him to ask her to be his wife, she had ordered the carriage thus, as she was ordering it now in the month of august, 1870, on being told by her husband that the battle of w?rth had been fought and lost, and that lory de vasselot was safe.
“the madeleine is nearer,” suggested the baron, a large man, with a vacant face which concealed a very mine of common sense, “and you could give me a lift as far as the club.”
“the madeleine is all very well for a wedding or a funeral or a great public festivity of any sort,” said the baroness, with a harmless, light manner of talking of grave subjects which is a closed book to the ordinary stolid british mind; “but when one has a prayer, there is nowhere like st. germain en pré, which is old and simple and dirty, so that one feels like a poor woman. i shall put on an old dress.”
she looked at her husband with a capable nod, as if to convey the comforting assurance that he could leave this matter entirely to her.
“yes,” said the baron; “do as you will.”
which permission the world was pleased to consider superfluous in the present marital case.
“it is,” he said, “the occasion for a prayer; and say a word for france. and lory is safe—one of very, very few survivors. remember that in your prayers, ma mie, and remember me.”
“i will see about it,” answered the baroness. “if i have time, i will perhaps put in a word for one who is assuredly a great stupid—no name mentioned, you understand.”
so the baroness de mélide went to the gloomy old church of her choice, and sent up an incoherent prayer, such as were arising from all over france at this time. on returning by the boulevard st. germain, she met a friend, a woman whose husband had fallen at weissembourg, who gave her more news from the front. the streets were crowded and yet idle. the men stood apart in groups, talking in a low voice: the women stood apart and watched them—for it is only in times of peace that the women manage france.
the baroness went home, nervous, ill at ease. she hardly noticed that the door was held open by a maid-servant. the men had all gone out for news—some to enroll themselves in the national guard. she went up to the drawing-room, and there, seated at her writing-table with his back turned towards her, was lory de vasselot. all the brightness had gone from his uniform. he turned as she entered the room.
“mon dieu!” she said, “what is it?”
“what is what?” he answered gravely.
“why, your face,” said the baroness. “look—look at it!” she took him by the arm, and turned him towards a mirror, half hidden in hot-house flowers. “look!” she cried again. “mon dieu! it is a tragedy, your face. what is it?”
lory shrugged his shoulders.
“i was at w?rth,” he explained, “two days ago. i suppose w?rth will be written for life in the face of every frenchman who was there. they were three to one. they are three to one wherever we turn.”
he sat down again at the writing-table, and the baroness stood behind him.
“and this is war,” she said, tapping slowly on the carpet with her foot.
she laid her hand on his shoulder, and, noting a quick movement of withdrawal, glanced down.
“ach!” she exclaimed, in a whisper, as she drew back.
the shoulder and sleeve of his tunic were stained a deep brown. the gold lace was green in places and sticky. in an odd silence she unbuttoned her glove, and laid it quietly aside.
“it seems, mon ami, that we have only been playing at life up to now,” she said, after a pause.
and lory did not answer her. he had several letters lying before him, and had taken up his pen again.
“what brings you to paris?” asked the baroness, suddenly.
“the emperor,” he answered. “it is a queer story, and i can tell you part of it. after w?rth, i was given a staff appointment—and why? because my occupation was gone; i had no men left.” with a quick gesture he described the utter annihilation of his troop. “and i was sent into metz with despatches. while i was still there—judge of my surprise!—the emperor sent for me. you know him. he was sitting at a table, and looked a big man. afterwards, when he stood up, i saw he was small. he bowed as i entered the room—for he is polite even to the meanest private of a line regiment—and as he bowed he winced. even that movement gave him pain. and then he smiled, with an effort. 'monsieur de vasselot,' he said; and i bowed. 'a corsican,' he went on. 'yes, sire.' then he took up a pen, and examined it. he wanted something to look at, though he might safely have looked at me. he could look any man in the face at any time, for his eyes tell no tales. they are dull and veiled; you know them, for you have spoken to him often.”
“yes; and i have seen the great snake at the jardin d'acclimatation,” answered the baroness de mélide, quietly.
“then,” continued lory, “still looking at the pen, he spoke slowly as if he had thought it all out before i entered the room. 'when my uncle fell upon evil times he naturally turned to his fellow-countrymen.' 'yes, sire.' 'i do not know you, monsieur de vasselot, but i know your name. i am going to trust you entirely. i want you to go to paris for me.'”
“and that is all you are going to tell me?” said the baroness.
“that is all i can tell you. whatever he may be, he is more than a brave man—he is a stoic. i arrived an hour ago, and went to the club for my letters, but i did not dare to go in, because it is evident that i am from the front. look at my clothes. that is why i come here and present myself before you as i am. i must beg your hospitality for a few hours and the run of your writing-table.”
the baroness nodded her head repeatedly as she looked at him. it was not only from his gold-laced uniform that the brightness had gone, but from himself. his manner was abrupt. he was almost stern. this, again, was war.
“you know that now, as always, our house is yours,” she said quietly; for it is not all light hearts that have nothing in them.
then, being a practical frenchwoman—and there is no more practical being in the world—she rang for luncheon.
“one sees,” she said, “that you are hungry. one must eat though empires fall.”
“ah!” said lory, turning sharply to look at her. “you talk like that in paris, do you?”
“in the streets, my cousin, they speak plainer language than that. but henri will tell you what they are saying on the pavement. i have sent for him to the club to come home to luncheon. he forgives me much, that poor man, but he would never forgive me if i did not tell him that you were in paris.”
“thank you,” answered lory. “i shall be glad to see him. there are things which he ought to know, which i cannot tell you.”
“you think i am not discreet,” said the baroness, slowly drawing the pins from her smart hat.
lory looked up at her with a laugh, which was perhaps what she wanted, for there is no cunning like the cunning of a woman who seeks to charm a man from one humour to another. and when the baroness had first seen lory, she thought that his heart was broken—by w?rth.
“you are beautiful, but not discreet,” he answered.
“that is the worst of men,” she said reflectively, as she laid her hat aside—“they always want an impossible combination.”
she looked back at him over her shoulder and laughed, for she saw that she was gaining her point. the quiet of this luxurious house, her own personality, the subtle domesticity of her action in taking off her hat in his presence—all these were soothing a mind rasped and torn by battle and defeat. but there was something yet which she had not grasped, and she knew it. she glanced at the letters on the table before him. as if the thought were transmitted across the room to him, lory took up an open telegram, and read it with a puzzled face. he half turned towards her as if about to speak, but closed his lips again.
“yes,” said the baroness, lightly. “what is it?”
“it is,” he explained, after a pause, “that i have had so little to do with women.”
“except me, mon cousin,” said the baroness, coming nearer to the writing-table.
“except you, ma cousine,” he answered, turning in his chair and taking her hand.
he glanced up at her with eyes that would appear to the ordinary british mind to express a passionate devotion, eminently french and thrilling and terrible, but which really reflected only a very honest and brotherly affection. for a frenchman never hates or loves as much as he thinks he does.
“well,” said the baroness, practically, “what is it?”
“at the club,” explained lory, “i found a letter and a telegram from corsica.”
“both from denise?” asked the baroness, rather bluntly.
“both from mademoiselle lange. see how things hinge upon a trifling chance—how much, we cannot tell! i happened to open the telegram first, and it told me to return the letter unopened.”
as he spoke he handed her the grey sheet upon which were pasted the narrow blue paper ribbons bearing the text. the baroness read the message slowly and carefully. she glanced over the paper, down at his head, with a little wise smile full of contempt for his limited male understanding.
“and the letter?” she inquired.
he showed her a sealed envelope addressed by himself to denise at perucca. she took it up and turned it over slowly. it was stamped and ready for the post. she then threw it down with a short laugh.
“i was thinking,” she explained, “of the difference between men and women. a woman would have filled a cup with boiling water and laid that letter upon it. it is quite easy. why, we were taught it at the convent school! you could have opened the letter and read it, and then closed it again and returned it. by that simple subterfuge you would have known the contents, and would still have had the credit for doing as you were told. and i think three women out of five would have done it, and the whole five would have wanted to do it. ah! you may laugh. you do not know what wretches we are compared to men—compared especially to some few of them; to a baron henri de mélide or a count de vasselot—who are honourable men, my cousin.”
she touched him lightly on the shoulder with one finger, and then turned away to look with thoughtful eyes out of the window.
“i wonder what is in that letter,” said lory, returning to his pen.
the baroness turned on her heel and looked at him with her contemptuous smile again.
“oh,” she said carelessly, “she was probably in a difficulty, which solved itself after the letter was posted. or she was afraid of something, and found that her fears were unnecessary. that is all, no doubt.”
there is, it appears, an esprit de sexe which prevents women from giving each other away.
“so you merely placed the letter in an envelope and are returning it, thus, without comment?” inquired the baroness.
“yes,” answered lory, who was writing a letter now.
and his cousin stood looking at him with an amused and yet tender smile in her gay eyes. she remained silent until he had finished.
“there,” he said, taking an envelope and addressing it hurriedly, “that is done. it is to the abbé susini at olmeta; and it contains some of those things, my cousin, that i cannot tell you.”
“do you think i care,” said the baroness, “for your stupid politics? do you think any woman cares for politics who has found some stupid man to care for her? there is my stupid in the street—on his new horse.”
in a moment lory was at the window.
“a new horse,” he said earnestly. “i did not know that. why did you not tell me?”
“we were talking of empires,” replied the baroness. “by the way,” she added, in after-thought, “is our good friend colonel gilbert in corsica?”
“yes—he is at bastia.”
“ah,” said the baroness, looking reflectively at denise's telegram, which she still held in her hand, “i thought he was.”
then that placid man, the baron henri de mélide, came into the room, and shook hands in the then novel english fashion, looking at his lifelong friend with a dull and apathetic eye.
“from the frontier?” he inquired.
lory laughed curtly. he had returned from that last frontier, where each one of us shall inevitably be asked “si monsieur a quelque chose à déclarer?”
“i shall give you ten minutes for your secrets, and then luncheon will be ready,” said the baroness, quitting the room.
and lory told his friend those things which were not for a woman's hearing.
at luncheon both men were suspiciously cheerful; and, doubtless, their companion read them like open books. immediately after coffee lory took his leave.
“i leave paris to-night,” he said, with his old cheerfulness. “this war is not over yet. we have not the shadow of a chance of winning, but we shall perhaps be able to show the world that france can still fight.”
which prophecy assuredly came true.