Chapter IV: Earthenware and Crystal

Day followed day. Calm gradually returned to the soul of la
Esmeralda. Excess of grief, like excess of joy is a violent thing
which lasts but a short time. The heart of man cannot remain long
in one extremity. The gypsy had suffered so much, that nothing
was left her but astonishment. With security, hope had returned
to her. She was outside the pale of society, outside the pale of
life, but she had a vague feeling that it might not be impossible
to return to it. She was like a dead person, who should hold in
reserve the key to her tomb.

She felt the terrible images which had so long persecuted her,
gradually departing. All the hideous phantoms, Pierrat Torterue,
Jacques Charmolue, were effaced from her mind, all, even the
priest.

And then, Phœbus was alive; she was sure of it, she had seen him.
To her the fact of Phœbus being alive was everything. After the
series of fatal shocks which had overturned everything within
her, she had found but one thing intact in her soul, one
sentiment,—her love for the captain. Love is like a tree; it
sprouts forth of itself, sends its roots out deeply through our
whole being, and often continues to flourish greenly over a heart
in ruins.

And the inexplicable point about it is that the more blind is
this passion, the more tenacious it is. It is never more solid
than when it has no reason in it.

La Esmeralda did not think of the captain without bitterness, no
doubt. No doubt it was terrible that he also should have been
deceived; that he should have believed that impossible thing,
that he could have conceived of a stab dealt by her who would
have given a thousand lives for him. But, after all, she must not
be too angry with him for it; had she not confessed her crime?
had she not yielded, weak woman that she was, to torture? The
fault was entirely hers. She should have allowed her finger nails
to be torn out rather than such a word to be wrenched from her.
In short, if she could but see Phœbus once more, for a single
minute, only one word would be required, one look, in order to
undeceive him, to bring him back. She did not doubt it. She was
astonished also at many singular things, at the accident of
Phœbus’s presence on the day of the penance, at the young girl
with whom he had been. She was his sister, no doubt. An
unreasonable explanation, but she contented herself with it,
because she needed to believe that Phœbus still loved her, and
loved her alone. Had he not sworn it to her? What more was
needed, simple and credulous as she was? And then, in this
matter, were not appearances much more against her than against
him? Accordingly, she waited. She hoped.

Let us add that the church, that vast church, which surrounded
her on every side, which guarded her, which saved her, was itself
a sovereign tranquillizer. The solemn lines of that architecture,
the religious attitude of all the objects which surrounded the
young girl, the serene and pious thoughts which emanated, so to
speak, from all the pores of that stone, acted upon her without
her being aware of it. The edifice had also sounds fraught with
such benediction and such majesty, that they soothed this ailing
soul. The monotonous chanting of the celebrants, the responses of
the people to the priest, sometimes inarticulate, sometimes
thunderous, the harmonious trembling of the painted windows, the
organ, bursting forth like a hundred trumpets, the three
belfries, humming like hives of huge bees, that whole orchestra
on which bounded a gigantic scale, ascending, descending
incessantly from the voice of a throng to that of one bell,
dulled her memory, her imagination, her grief. The bells, in
particular, lulled her. It was something like a powerful
magnetism which those vast instruments shed over her in great
waves.

Thus every sunrise found her more calm, breathing better, less
pale. In proportion as her inward wounds closed, her grace and
beauty blossomed once more on her countenance, but more
thoughtful, more reposeful. Her former character also returned to
her, somewhat even of her gayety, her pretty pout, her love for
her goat, her love for singing, her modesty. She took care to
dress herself in the morning in the corner of her cell for fear
some inhabitants of the neighboring attics might see her through
the window.

When the thought of Phœbus left her time, the gypsy sometimes
thought of Quasimodo. He was the sole bond, the sole connection,
the sole communication which remained to her with men, with the
living. Unfortunate girl! she was more outside the world than
Quasimodo. She understood not in the least the strange friend
whom chance had given her. She often reproached herself for not
feeling a gratitude which should close her eyes, but decidedly,
she could not accustom herself to the poor bellringer. He was too
ugly.

She had left the whistle which he had given her lying on the
ground. This did not prevent Quasimodo from making his appearance
from time to time during the first few days. She did her best not
to turn aside with too much repugnance when he came to bring her
her basket of provisions or her jug of water, but he always
perceived the slightest movement of this sort, and then he
withdrew sadly.

Once he came at the moment when she was caressing Djali. He stood
pensively for several minutes before this graceful group of the
goat and the gypsy; at last he said, shaking his heavy and
ill-formed head,—

“My misfortune is that I still resemble a man too much. I should
like to be wholly a beast like that goat.”

She gazed at him in amazement.

He replied to the glance,—

“Oh! I well know why,” and he went away.

On another occasion he presented himself at the door of the cell
(which he never entered) at the moment when la Esmeralda was
singing an old Spanish ballad, the words of which she did not
understand, but which had lingered in her ear because the gypsy
women had lulled her to sleep with it when she was a little
child. At the sight of that villanous form which made its
appearance so abruptly in the middle of her song, the young girl
paused with an involuntary gesture of alarm. The unhappy
bellringer fell upon his knees on the threshold, and clasped his
large, misshapen hands with a suppliant air. “Oh!” he said,
sorrowfully, “continue, I implore you, and do not drive me away.”
She did not wish to pain him, and resumed her lay, trembling all
over. By degrees, however, her terror disappeared, and she
yielded herself wholly to the slow and melancholy air which she
was singing. He remained on his knees with hands clasped, as in
prayer, attentive, hardly breathing, his gaze riveted upon the
gypsy’s brilliant eyes.

On another occasion, he came to her with an awkward and timid
air. “Listen,” he said, with an effort; “I have something to say
to you.” She made him a sign that she was listening. Then he
began to sigh, half opened his lips, appeared for a moment to be
on the point of speaking, then he looked at her again, shook his
head, and withdrew slowly, with his brow in his hand, leaving the
gypsy stupefied. Among the grotesque personages sculptured on the
wall, there was one to whom he was particularly attached, and
with which he often seemed to exchange fraternal glances. Once
the gypsy heard him saying to it,—

“Oh! why am not I of stone, like you!”

At last, one morning, la Esmeralda had advanced to the edge of
the roof, and was looking into the Place over the pointed roof of
Saint-Jean le Rond. Quasimodo was standing behind her. He had
placed himself in that position in order to spare the young girl,
as far as possible, the displeasure of seeing him. All at once
the gypsy started, a tear and a flash of joy gleamed
simultaneously in her eyes, she knelt on the brink of the roof
and extended her arms towards the Place with anguish, exclaiming:
“Phœbus! come! come! a word, a single word in the name of heaven!
Phœbus! Phœbus!” Her voice, her face, her gesture, her whole
person bore the heartrending expression of a shipwrecked man who
is making a signal of distress to the joyous vessel which is
passing afar off in a ray of sunlight on the horizon.

Quasimodo leaned over the Place, and saw that the object of this
tender and agonizing prayer was a young man, a captain, a
handsome cavalier all glittering with arms and decorations,
prancing across the end of the Place, and saluting with his plume
a beautiful lady who was smiling at him from her balcony.
However, the officer did not hear the unhappy girl calling him;
he was too far away.

But the poor deaf man heard. A profound sigh heaved his breast;
he turned round; his heart was swollen with all the tears which
he was swallowing; his convulsively-clenched fists struck against
his head, and when he withdrew them there was a bunch of red hair
in each hand.

The gypsy paid no heed to him. He said in a low voice as he
gnashed his teeth,—

“Damnation! That is what one should be like! ’Tis only necessary
to be handsome on the outside!”

Meanwhile, she remained kneeling, and cried with extraordinary
agitation,—

“Oh! there he is alighting from his horse! He is about to enter
that house!—Phœbus!—He does not hear me! Phœbus!—How wicked that
woman is to speak to him at the same time with me! Phœbus!
Phœbus!”

The deaf man gazed at her. He understood this pantomime. The poor
bellringer’s eye filled with tears, but he let none fall. All at
once he pulled her gently by the border of her sleeve. She turned
round. He had assumed a tranquil air; he said to her,—

“Would you like to have me bring him to you?”

She uttered a cry of joy.

“Oh! go! hasten! run! quick! that captain! that captain! bring
him to me! I will love you for it!”

She clasped his knees. He could not refrain from shaking his head
sadly.

“I will bring him to you,” he said, in a weak voice. Then he
turned his head and plunged down the staircase with great
strides, stifling with sobs.

When he reached the Place, he no longer saw anything except the
handsome horse hitched at the door of the Gondelaurier house; the
captain had just entered there.

He raised his eyes to the roof of the church. La Esmeralda was
there in the same spot, in the same attitude. He made her a sad
sign with his head; then he planted his back against one of the
stone posts of the Gondelaurier porch, determined to wait until
the captain should come forth.

In the Gondelaurier house it was one of those gala days which
precede a wedding. Quasimodo beheld many people enter, but no one
come out. He cast a glance towards the roof from time to time;
the gypsy did not stir any more than himself. A groom came and
unhitched the horse and led it to the stable of the house.

The entire day passed thus, Quasimodo at his post, la Esmeralda
on the roof, Phœbus, no doubt, at the feet of Fleur-de-Lys.

At length night came, a moonless night, a dark night. Quasimodo
fixed his gaze in vain upon la Esmeralda; soon she was no more
than a whiteness amid the twilight; then nothing. All was
effaced, all was black.

Quasimodo beheld the front windows from top to bottom of the
Gondelaurier mansion illuminated; he saw the other casements in
the Place lighted one by one, he also saw them extinguished to
the very last, for he remained the whole evening at his post. The
officer did not come forth. When the last passers-by had returned
home, when the windows of all the other houses were extinguished,
Quasimodo was left entirely alone, entirely in the dark. There
were at that time no lamps in the square before Notre-Dame.

Meanwhile, the windows of the Gondelaurier mansion remained
lighted, even after midnight. Quasimodo, motionless and
attentive, beheld a throng of lively, dancing shadows pass
athwart the many-colored painted panes. Had he not been deaf, he
would have heard more and more distinctly, in proportion as the
noise of sleeping Paris died away, a sound of feasting, laughter,
and music in the Gondelaurier mansion.

Towards one o’clock in the morning, the guests began to take
their leave. Quasimodo, shrouded in darkness watched them all
pass out through the porch illuminated with torches. None of them
was the captain.

He was filled with sad thoughts; at times he looked upwards into
the air, like a person who is weary of waiting. Great black
clouds, heavy, torn, split, hung like crape hammocks beneath the
starry dome of night. One would have pronounced them spiders’
webs of the vault of heaven.

In one of these moments he suddenly beheld the long window on the
balcony, whose stone balustrade projected above his head, open
mysteriously. The frail glass door gave passage to two persons,
and closed noiselessly behind them; it was a man and a woman.

It was not without difficulty that Quasimodo succeeded in
recognizing in the man the handsome captain, in the woman the
young lady whom he had seen welcome the officer in the morning
from that very balcony. The place was perfectly dark, and a
double crimson curtain which had fallen across the door the very
moment it closed again, allowed no light to reach the balcony
from the apartment.

The young man and the young girl, so far as our deaf man could
judge, without hearing a single one of their words, appeared to
abandon themselves to a very tender tête-à-tête. The young girl
seemed to have allowed the officer to make a girdle for her of
his arm, and gently repulsed a kiss.

Quasimodo looked on from below at this scene which was all the
more pleasing to witness because it was not meant to be seen. He
contemplated with bitterness that beauty, that happiness. After
all, nature was not dumb in the poor fellow, and his human
sensibility, all maliciously contorted as it was, quivered no
less than any other. He thought of the miserable portion which
Providence had allotted to him; that woman and the pleasure of
love, would pass forever before his eyes, and that he should
never do anything but behold the felicity of others. But that
which rent his heart most in this sight, that which mingled
indignation with his anger, was the thought of what the gypsy
would suffer could she behold it. It is true that the night was
very dark, that la Esmeralda, if she had remained at her post
(and he had no doubt of this), was very far away, and that it was
all that he himself could do to distinguish the lovers on the
balcony. This consoled him.

Meanwhile, their conversation grew more and more animated. The
young lady appeared to be entreating the officer to ask nothing
more of her. Of all this Quasimodo could distinguish only the
beautiful clasped hands, the smiles mingled with tears, the young
girl’s glances directed to the stars, the eyes of the captain
lowered ardently upon her.

Fortunately, for the young girl was beginning to resist but
feebly, the door of the balcony suddenly opened once more and an
old dame appeared; the beauty seemed confused, the officer
assumed an air of displeasure, and all three withdrew.

A moment later, a horse was champing his bit under the porch, and
the brilliant officer, enveloped in his night cloak, passed
rapidly before Quasimodo.

The bellringer allowed him to turn the corner of the street, then
he ran after him with his ape-like agility, shouting: “Hey there!
captain!”

The captain halted.

“What wants this knave with me?” he said, catching sight through
the gloom of that hipshot form which ran limping after him.

Meanwhile, Quasimodo had caught up with him, and had boldly
grasped his horse’s bridle: “Follow me, captain; there is one
here who desires to speak with you!

“_Cornemahom_!” grumbled Phœbus, “here’s a villanous; ruffled
bird which I fancy I have seen somewhere. Holà master, will you
let my horse’s bridle alone?”

“Captain,” replied the deaf man, “do you not ask me who it is?”

“I tell you to release my horse,” retorted Phœbus, impatiently.
“What means the knave by clinging to the bridle of my steed? Do
you take my horse for a gallows?”

Quasimodo, far from releasing the bridle, prepared to force him
to retrace his steps. Unable to comprehend the captain’s
resistance, he hastened to say to him,—

“Come, captain, ’tis a woman who is waiting for you.” He added
with an effort: “A woman who loves you.”

“A rare rascal!” said the captain, “who thinks me obliged to go
to all the women who love me! or who say they do. And what if, by
chance, she should resemble you, you face of a screech-owl? Tell
the woman who has sent you that I am about to marry, and that she
may go to the devil!”

“Listen,” exclaimed Quasimodo, thinking to overcome his
hesitation with a word, “come, monseigneur! ’tis the gypsy whom
you know!”

This word did, indeed, produce a great effect on Phœbus, but not
of the kind which the deaf man expected. It will be remembered
that our gallant officer had retired with Fleur-de-Lys several
moments before Quasimodo had rescued the condemned girl from the
hands of Charmolue. Afterwards, in all his visits to the
Gondelaurier mansion he had taken care not to mention that woman,
the memory of whom was, after all, painful to him; and on her
side, Fleur-de-Lys had not deemed it politic to tell him that the
gypsy was alive. Hence Phœbus believed poor “Similar” to be dead,
and that a month or two had elapsed since her death. Let us add
that for the last few moments the captain had been reflecting on
the profound darkness of the night, the supernatural ugliness,
the sepulchral voice of the strange messenger; that it was past
midnight; that the street was deserted, as on the evening when
the surly monk had accosted him; and that his horse snorted as it
looked at Quasimodo.

“The gypsy!” he exclaimed, almost frightened. “Look here, do you
come from the other world?”

And he laid his hand on the hilt of his dagger.

“Quick, quick,” said the deaf man, endeavoring to drag the horse
along; “this way!”

Phœbus dealt him a vigorous kick in the breast.

Quasimodo’s eye flashed. He made a motion to fling himself on the
captain. Then he drew himself up stiffly and said,—

“Oh! how happy you are to have some one who loves you!”

He emphasized the words “some one,” and loosing the horse’s
bridle,—

“Begone!”

Phœbus spurred on in all haste, swearing. Quasimodo watched him
disappear in the shades of the street.

“Oh!” said the poor deaf man, in a very low voice; “to refuse
that!”

He re-entered Notre-Dame, lighted his lamp and climbed to the
tower again. The gypsy was still in the same place, as he had
supposed.

She flew to meet him as far off as she could see him. “Alone!”
she cried, clasping her beautiful hands sorrowfully.

“I could not find him,” said Quasimodo coldly.

“You should have waited all night,” she said angrily.

He saw her gesture of wrath, and understood the reproach.

“I will lie in wait for him better another time,” he said,
dropping his head.

“Begone!” she said to him.

He left her. She was displeased with him. He preferred to have
her abuse him rather than to have afflicted her. He had kept all
the pain to himself.

From that day forth, the gypsy no longer saw him. He ceased to
come to her cell. At the most she occasionally caught a glimpse
at the summit of the towers, of the bellringer’s face turned
sadly to her. But as soon as she perceived him, he disappeared.

We must admit that she was not much grieved by this voluntary
absence on the part of the poor hunchback. At the bottom of her
heart she was grateful to him for it. Moreover, Quasimodo did not
deceive himself on this point.

She no longer saw him, but she felt the presence of a good genius
about her. Her provisions were replenished by an invisible hand
during her slumbers. One morning she found a cage of birds on her
window. There was a piece of sculpture above her window which
frightened her. She had shown this more than once in Quasimodo’s
presence. One morning, for all these things happened at night,
she no longer saw it, it had been broken. The person who had
climbed up to that carving must have risked his life.

Sometimes, in the evening, she heard a voice, concealed beneath
the wind screen of the bell tower, singing a sad, strange song,
as though to lull her to sleep. The lines were unrhymed, such as
a deaf person can make.

Ne regarde pas la figure,
Jeune fille, regarde le cœur.
Le cœur d’un beau jeune homme est souvent difforme.
Il y a des cœurs où l’amour ne se conserve pas.

Jeune fille, le sapin n’est pas beau,
N’est pas beau comme le peuplier,
Mais il garde son feuillage l’hiver.

Hélas! à quoi bon dire cela?
Ce qui n’est pas beau a tort d’être;
La beauté n’aime que la beauté,
Avril tourne le dos à janvier.

La beauté est parfaite,
La beauté peut tout,
La beauté est la seule chose qui n’existe pas à demi.

Le corbeau ne vole que le jour,
Le hibou ne vole que la nuit,
Le cygne vole la nuit et le jour.[52]

One morning, on awaking, she saw on her window two vases filled
with flowers. One was a very beautiful and very brilliant but
cracked vase of glass. It had allowed the water with which it had
been filled to escape, and the flowers which it contained were
withered. The other was an earthenware pot, coarse and common,
but which had preserved all its water, and its flowers remained
fresh and crimson.

I know not whether it was done intentionally, but La Esmeralda
took the faded nosegay and wore it all day long upon her breast.

That day she did not hear the voice singing in the tower.

She troubled herself very little about it. She passed her days in
caressing Djali, in watching the door of the Gondelaurier house,
in talking to herself about Phœbus, and in crumbling up her bread
for the swallows.

She had entirely ceased to see or hear Quasimodo. The poor
bellringer seemed to have disappeared from the church. One night,
nevertheless, when she was not asleep, but was thinking of her
handsome captain, she heard something breathing near her cell.
She rose in alarm, and saw by the light of the moon, a shapeless
mass lying across her door on the outside. It was Quasimodo
asleep there upon the stones.