Эдвард Бульвер-Литтон
Lucretia — Volume 03
Jean Bellanger is no more. He died, not suddenly, and yet of some quick disease,—nervous exhaustion; his schemes, they said, had worn him out. But the state of Dalibard, though prosperous, is not that of the heir to the dead millionnaire. What mistake is this? The bulk of that wealth must go to the nearest kin,—so runs the law. But the will is read; and, for the first time, Olivier Dalibard learns that the dead man had a son,- -a son by a former marriage,—the marriage undeclared, unknown, amidst the riot of the Revolution; for the wife was the daughter of a proscrit. The son had been reared at a distance, put to school at Lyons, and unavowed to the second wife, who had brought an ample dower, and whom that discovery might have deterred from the altar. Unacknowledged through life, in death at least the son's rights are proclaimed; and Olivier Dalibard feels that Jean Bellanger has died in vain! For days has the pale Provencal been closeted with lawyers; but there is no hope in litigation. The proofs of the marriage, the birth, the identity, come out clear and clearer; and the beardless schoolboy at Lyons reaps all the profit of those nameless schemes and that mysterious death. Olivier Dalibard desires the friendship, the intimacy of the heir; but the heir is consigned to the guardianship of a merchant at Lyons, near of kin to his mother, and the guardian responds but coldly to Olivier's letters. Suddenly the defeated aspirant seems reconciled to his loss. The widow Bellanger has her own separate fortune, and it is large beyond expectation. In addition to the wealth she brought the deceased, his affection had led him to invest vast sums in her name. The widow then is rich,—rich as the heir himself. She is still fair. Poor woman, she needs consolation! But, meanwhile, the nights of Olivier Dalibard are disturbed and broken. His eye in the daytime is haggard and anxious; he is seldom seen on foot in the streets. Fear is his companion by day, and sits at night on his pillow. The Chouan, Pierre Guillot, who looked to George Cadoudal as a god, knows that George Cadoudal has been betrayed, and suspects Olivier Dalibard; and the Chouan has an arm of iron, and a heart steeled against all mercy. Oh, how the pale scholar thirsted for that Chouan's blood! With what relentless pertinacity, with what ingenious research, he had set all the hounds of the police upon the track of that single man! How notably he had failed! An avenger lived; and Olivier Dalibard started at his own shadow on the wall. But he did not the less continue to plot and to intrigue—nay, such occupation became more necessary, as an escape from himself.
And in the mean while, Olivier Dalibard sought to take courage from the recollection that the Chouan had taken an oath (and he knew that oaths are held sacred with the Bretons) that he would keep his hand from his knife unless he had clear evidence of treachery; such evidence existed, but only in Dalibard's desk or the archives of Fouche. Tush, he was safe! And so, when from dreams of fear he started at the depth of night, so his bolder wife would whisper to him with firm, uncaressing lips: "Olivier Dalibard, thou fearest the living: dost thou never fear the dead? Thy dreams are haunted with a spectre. Why takes it not the accusing shape of thy mouldering kinsman?" and Dalibard would answer, for he was a philosopher in his cowardice: "Il n'y a que les morts qui ne reviennent pas."
It is the notable convenience of us narrators to represent, by what is called "soliloquy," the thoughts, the interior of the personages we describe. And this is almost the master-work of the tale-teller,—that is, if the soliloquy be really in words, what self-commune is in the dim and tangled recesses of the human heart! But to this privilege we are rarely admitted in the case of Olivier Dalibard, for he rarely communed with himself. A sort of mental calculation, it is true, eternally went on within him, like the wheels of a destiny; but it had become a mechanical operation, seldom disturbed by that consciousness of thought, with its struggles of fear and doubt, conscience and crime, which gives its appalling interest to the soliloquy of tragedy. Amidst the tremendous secrecy of that profound intellect, as at the bottom of a sea, only monstrous images of terror, things of prey, stirred in cold-blooded and devouring life; but into these deeps Olivier himself did not dive. He did not face his own soul; his outer life and his inner life seemed separate individualities, just as, in some complicated State, the social machine goes on through all its numberless cycles of vice and dread, whatever the acts of the government, which is the representative of the State, and stands for the State in the shallow judgment of history.
Before this time Olivier Dalibard's manner to his son had greatly changed from the indifference it betrayed in England,—it was kind and affectionate, almost caressing; while, on the other hand, Gabriel, as if in possession of some secret which gave him power over his father, took a more careless and independent tone, often absented himself from the house for days together, joined the revels of young profligates older than himself, with whom he had formed acquaintance, indulged in spendthrift expenses, and plunged prematurely into the stream of vicious pleasure that oozed through the mud of Paris.
One morning Dalibard, returning from a visit to Madame Bellanger, found Gabriel alone in the salon, contemplating his fair face and gay dress in one of the mirrors, and smoothing down the hair, which he wore long and sleek, as in the portraits of Raphael. Dalibard's lip curled at the boy's coxcombry,—though such tastes he himself had fostered, according to his ruling principles, that to govern, you must find a foible, or instil it; but the sneer changed into a smile.
"Are you satisfied with yourself, joli garcon?" he said, with saturnine playfulness.
"At least, sir, I hope that you will not be ashamed of me when you formally legitimatize me as your son. The time has come, you know, to keep your promise."
"And it shall be kept, do not fear. But first I have an employment for you,—a mission; your first embassy, Gabriel."
"I listen, sir."
"I have to send to England a communication of the utmost importance— public importance—to the secret agent of the French government. We are on the eve of a descent on England. We are in correspondence with some in London on whom we count for support. A man might be suspected and searched,—mind, searched. You, a boy, with English name and speech, will be my safest envoy. Bonaparte approves my selection. On your return, he permits me to present you to him. He loves the rising generation. In a few days you will be prepared to start."
Despite the calm tone of the father, so had the son, from the instinct of fear and self-preservation, studied every accent, every glance of Olivier,—so had he constituted himself a spy upon the heart whose perfidy was ever armed, that he detected at once in the proposal some scheme hostile to his interests. He made, however, no opposition to the plan suggested; and seemingly satisfied with his obedience, the father dismissed him.
As soon as he was in the streets, Gabriel went straight to the house of Madame Bellanger. The hotel had been purchased in her name, and she therefore retained it. Since her husband's death he had avoided that house, before so familiar to him; and now he grew pale and breathed hard as he passed by the porter's lodge up the lofty stairs.
He knew of his father's recent and constant visits at the house; and without conjecturing precisely what were Olivier's designs, he connected them, in the natural and acquired shrewdness he possessed, with the wealthy widow. He resolved to watch, observe, and draw his own conclusions. As he entered Madame Bellanger's room rather abruptly, he observed her push aside amongst her papers something she had been gazing on,—something which sparkled to his eyes. He sat himself down close to her with the caressing manner he usually adopted towards women; and in the midst of the babbling talk with which ladies generally honour boys, he suddenly, as if by accident, displaced the papers, and saw his father's miniature set in brilliants. The start of the widow, her blush, and her exclamation strengthened the light that flashed upon his mind. "Oh, ho! I see now," he said laughing, "why my father is always praising black hair; and—nay, nay—gentlemen may admire ladies in Paris, surely?"
"Pooh, my dear child, your father is an old friend of my poor husband, and a near relation too! But, Gabriel, mon petit ange, you had better not say at home that you have seen this picture; Madame Dalibard might be foolish enough to be angry."
"To be sure not. I have kept a secret before now!" and again the boy's cheek grew pale, and he looked hurriedly round.
"And you are very fond of Madame Dalibard too; so you must not vex her."
"Who says I'm fond of Madame Dalibard? A stepmother!"
"Why, your father, of course,—il est si bon, ce pauvre Dalibard; and all men like cheerful faces. But then, poor lady,—an Englishwoman, so strange here; very natural she should fret, and with bad health, too."
"Bad health! Ah, I remember! She, also, does not seem likely to live long!"
"So your poor father apprehends. Well, well; how uncertain life is! Who would have thought dear Bellanger would have—"
Gabriel rose hastily, and interrupted the widow's pathetic reflections.
"I only ran in to say Bon jour. I must leave you now."
"Adieu, my dear boy,—not a word on the miniature! By the by, here's a shirt-pin for you,—tu es joli comme un amour."
All was clear now to Gabriel; it was necessary to get rid of him, and forever. Dalibard might dread his attachment to Lucretia,—he would dread still more his closer intimacy with the widow of Bellanger, should that widow wed again, and Dalibard, freed like her (by what means?), be her choice! Into that abyss of wickedness, fathomless to the innocent, the young villanous eye plunged, and surveyed the ground; a terror seized on him,—a terror of life and death. Would Dalibard spare even his own son, if that son had the power to injure? This mission, was it exile only,—only a fall back to the old squalor of his uncle's studio; only the laying aside of a useless tool? Or was it a snare to the grave? Demon as Dalibard was, doubtless the boy wronged him. But guilt construes guilt for the worst.
Gabriel had formerly enjoyed the thought to match himself, should danger come, with Dalibard; the hour had come, and he felt his impotence. Brave his father, and refuse to leave France! From that, even his reckless hardihood shrank, as from inevitable destruction. But to depart,—be the poor victim and dupe; after having been let loose amongst the riot of pleasure, to return to labour and privation,—from that option his vanity and his senses vindictively revolted. And Lucretia, the only being who seemed to have a human kindness to him! Through all the vicious egotism of his nature, he had some grateful sentiments for her; and even the egotism assisted that unwonted amiability, for he felt that, Lucretia gone, he had no hold on his father's house, that the home of her successor never would be his. While thus brooding, he lifted his eyes, and saw Dalibard pass in his carriage towards the Tuileries. The house, then, was clear; he could see Lucretia alone. He formed his resolution at once, and turned homewards. As he did so, he observed a man at the angle of the street, whose eyes followed Dalibard's carriage with an expression of unmistakable hate and revenge; but scarcely had he marked the countenance, before the man, looking hurriedly round, darted away, and was lost amongst the crowd.
Now, that countenance was not quite unfamiliar to Gabriel. He had seen it before, as he saw it now,—hastily, and, as it were, by fearful snatches. Once he had marked, on returning home at twilight, a figure lurking by the house; and something, in the quickness with which it turned from his gaze, joined to his knowledge of Dalibard's apprehensions, made him mention the circumstance to his father when he entered. Dalibard bade him hasten with a note, written hurriedly, to an agent of the police, whom he kept lodged near at hand. The man was still on the threshold when the boy went out on this errand, and he caught a glimpse of his face; but before the police-agent reached the spot, the ill-omened apparition had vanished. Gabriel now, as his eye rested full upon that threatening brow and those burning eyes, was convinced that be saw before him the terrible Pierre Guillot, whose very name blenched his father's cheek. When the figure retreated, he resolved at once to pursue. He hurried through the crowd amidst which the man had disappeared, and looked eagerly into the faces of those he jostled; sometimes at the distance he caught sight of a figure which appeared to resemble the one which he pursued, but the likeness faded on approach. The chase, however, vague and desultory as it was, led him on till his way was lost amongst labyrinths of narrow and unfamiliar streets. Heated and thirsty, he paused, at last, before a small cafe, entered to ask for a draught of lemonade, and behold, chance had favoured him! The man he sought was seated there before a bottle of wine, and intently reading the newspaper. Gabriel sat himself down at the adjoining table. In a few moments the man was joined by a newcomer; the two conversed, but in whispers so low that Gabriel was unable to hear their conversation, though he caught more than once the name of "George." Both the men were violently excited, and the expression of their countenances was menacing and sinister. The first comer pointed often to the newspaper, and read passages from it to his companion. This suggested to Gabriel the demand for another journal. When the waiter brought it to him, his eye rested upon a long paragraph, in which the name of George Cadoudal frequently occurred. In fact, all the journals of the day were filled with speculations on the conspiracy and trial of that fiery martyr to an erring adaptation of a noble principle. Gabriel knew that his father had had a principal share in the detection of the defeated enterprise; and his previous persuasions were confirmed.
His sense of hearing grew sharper by continued effort, and at length he heard the first comer say distinctly, "If I were but sure that I had brought this fate upon George by introducing to him that accursed Dalibard; if my oath did but justify me, I would—" The concluding sentence was lost. A few moments after, the two men rose, and from the familiar words that passed between them and the master of the cafe, who approached, himself, to receive the reckoning, the shrewd boy perceived that the place was no unaccustomed haunt. He crept nearer and nearer; and as the landlord shook hands with his customer, he heard distinctly the former address him by the name of "Guillot." When the men withdrew, Gabriel followed them at a distance (taking care first to impress on his memory the name of the cafe, and the street in which it was placed) and, as he thought, unobserved; he was mistaken. Suddenly, in one street more solitary than the rest, the man whom he was mainly bent on tracking turned round, advanced to Gabriel, who was on the other side of the street, and laid his hand upon him so abruptly that the boy was fairly taken by surprise.
"Who bade you follow us?" said he, with so dark and fell an expression of countenance that even Gabriel's courage failed him. "No evasion, no lies; speak out, and at once;" and the grasp tightened on the boy's throat.
Gabriel's readiness of resource and presence of mind did not long forsake him.
"Loose your hold, and I will tell you—you stifle me." The man slightly relaxed his grasp, and Gabriel said quickly "My mother perished on the guillotine in the Reign of Terror; I am for the Bourbons. I thought I overheard words which showed sympathy for poor George, the brave Chouan. I followed you; for I thought I was following friends."
The man smiled as he fixed his steady eye upon the unflinching child. "My poor lad," he said gently, "I believe you,—pardon me; but follow us no more,—we are dangerous!" He waved his hand, and strode away and rejoined his companion, and Gabriel reluctantly abandoned the pursuit and went homeward. It was long before he reached his father's house, for he had strayed into a strange quarter of Paris, and had frequently to inquire the way. At length he reached home, and ascended the stairs to a small room in which Lucretia usually sat, and which was divided by a narrow corridor from the sleeping-chamber of herself and Dalibard. His stepmother, leaning her cheek upon her hand, was seated by the window, so absorbed in some gloomy thoughts, which cast over her rigid face a shade, intense and solemn as despair, that she did not perceive the approach of the boy till he threw his arms round her neck, and then she started as in alarm.
"You! only you," she said, with a constrained smile; "see, my nerves are not so strong as they were."
"You are disturbed, belle-mere,—has he been vexing you?"
"He—Dalibard? No, indeed; we were only this morning discussing matters of business."
"Business,—that means money."
"Truly," said Lucretia, "money does make the staple of life's business. In spite of his new appointment, your father needs some sums in hand,— favours are to be bought, opportunities for speculation occur, and—"
"And my father," interrupted Gabriel, "wishes your consent to raise the rest of your portion?"
Lucretia looked surprised, but answered quietly: "He had my consent long since; but the trustees to the marriage-settlement—mere men of business, my uncle's bankers; for I had lost all claim on my kindred—refuse, or at least interpose such difficulties as amount to refusal."
"But that reply came some days since," said Gabriel, musingly.
"How did you know,—did your father tell you?"
"Poor belle-mere!" said Gabriel, almost with pity; "can you live in this house and not watch all that passes,—every stranger, every message, every letter? But what, then, does he wish with you?"
"He has suggested my returning to England and seeing the trustees myself.
His interest can obtain my passport."
"And you have refused?"
"I have not consented."
"Consent!—hush!—your maid; Marie is not waiting without;" and Gabriel rose and looked forth. "No, confound these doors! none close as they ought in this house. Is it not a clause in your settlement that the half of your fortune now invested goes to the survivor?"
"It is," replied Lucretia, struck and thrilled at the question. "How, again, did you know this?"
"I saw my father reading the copy. If you die first, then, he has all.
If he merely wanted the money, he would not send you away."
There was a terrible pause. Gabriel resumed: "I trust you, it may be, with my life; but I will speak out. My father goes much to Bellanger's widow; she is rich and weak. Come to England! Yes, come; for he is about to dismiss me. He fears that I shall be in the way, to warn you, perhaps, or to—to— In short, both of us are in his way. He gives you an escape. Once in England, the war which is breaking out will prevent your return. He will twist the laws of divorce to his favour; he will marry again! What then? He spares you what remains of your fortune; he spares your life. Remain here,—cross his schemes, and— No, no; come to England,—safer anywhere than here!"
As he spoke, great changes had passed over Lucretia's countenance. At first it was the flash of conviction, then the stunned shock of horror; now she rose, rose to her full height, and there was a livid and deadly light in her eyes,—the light of conscious courage and power and revenge. "Fool," she muttered, "with all his craft! Fool, fool! As if, in the war of household perfidy, the woman did not always conquer! Man's only chance is to be mailed in honour."
"But," said Gabriel, overhearing her, "but you do not remember what it is. There is nothing you can see and guard against. It is not like an enemy face to face; it is death in the food, in the air, in the touch. You stretch out your arms in the dark, you feel nothing, and you die! Oh, do not fancy that I have not thought well (for I am almost a man now) if there were no means to resist,—there are none! As well make head against the plague,—it is in the atmosphere. Come to England, and return. Live poorly, if you must, but live—but live!"
"Return to England poor and despised, and bound still to him, or a disgraced and divorced wife,—disgraced by the low-born dependant on my kinsman's house,—and fawn perhaps upon my sister and her husband for bread! Never! I am at my post, and I will not fly."
"Brave, brave!" said the boy, clapping his hands, and sincerely moved by a daring superior to his own; "I wish I could help you!"
Lucretia's eye rested on him with the full gaze, so rare in its looks. She drew him to her and kissed his brow. "Boy, through life, whatever our guilt and its doom, we are bound to each other. I may yet live to have wealth; if so, it is yours as a son's. I may be iron to others,— never to you. Enough of this; I must reflect!" She passed her hands over her eyes a moment, and resumed: "You would help me in my self- defence; I think you can. You have been more alert in your watch than I have. You must have means I have not secured. Your father guards well all his papers."
"I have keys to every desk. My foot passed the threshold of that room under the roof before yours. But no; his powers can never be yours! He has never confided to you half his secrets. He has antidotes for every— every—"
"Hist! what noise is that? Only the shower on the casements. No, no, child, that is not my object. Cadoudal's conspiracy! Your father has letters from Fouche which show how he has betrayed others who are stronger to avenge than a woman and a boy."
"Well?"
"I would have those letters. Give me the keys. But hold! Gabriel, Gabriel, you may yet misjudge him. This woman—wife to the dead man—his wife! Horror! Have you no proofs of what you imply?"
"Proofs!" echoed Gabriel, in a tone of wonder; "I can but see and conjecture. You are warned, watch and decide for yourself. But again I say, come to England; I shall go!"
Without reply, Lucretia took the keys from Gabriel's half-reluctant hand, and passed into her husband's writing-room. When she had entered, she locked the door. She passed at once to a huge secretary, of which the key was small as a fairy's work. She opened it with ease by one of the counterfeits. No love-correspondence—the first object of her search, for she was woman—met her eye. What need of letters, when interviews were so facile? But she soon found a document that told all which love- letters could tell,—it was an account of the moneys and possessions of Madame Bellanger; and there were pencil notes on the margin: "Vautran will give four hundred thousand francs for the lands in Auvergne,—to be accepted. Consult on the power of sale granted to a second husband. Query, if there is no chance of the heir-at-law disputing the moneys invested in Madame B.'s name,"—and such memoranda as a man notes down in the schedule of properties about to be his own. In these inscriptions there was a hideous mockery of all love; like the blue lights of corruption, they showed the black vault of the heart. The pale reader saw what her own attractions had been, and, fallen as she was, she smiled superior in her bitterness of scorn. Arranged methodically with the precision of business, she found the letters she next looked for; one recognizing Dalibard's services in the detection of the conspiracy, and authorizing him to employ the police in the search of Pierre Guillot, sufficed for her purpose. She withdrew, and secreted it. She was about to lock up the secretary, when her eye fell on the title of a small manuscript volume in a corner; and as shet read, she pressed one hand convulsively to her heart, while twice with the other she grasped the volume, and twice withdrew the grasp. The title ran harmlessly thus: "Philosophical and Chemical Inquiries into the Nature and Materials of the Poisons in Use between the Fourteenth and Sixteenth Centuries." Hurriedly, and at last as if doubtful of herself, she left the manuscript, closed the secretary, and returned to Gabriel.
"You have got the paper you seek?" he said.
"Yes."
"Then whatever you do, you must be quick; he will soon discover the loss."
"I will be quick."
"It is I whom he will suspect," said Gabriel, in alarm, as that thought struck him. "No, for my sake do not take the letter till I am gone. Do not fear in the mean time; he will do nothing against you while I am here."
"I will replace the letter till then," said Lucretia, meekly. "You have a right to my first thoughts." So she went back, and Gabriel (suspicious perhaps) crept after her.
