Chapter IX: Part 9

"Very well, keep it until you have an opportunity to send it back. By the way, are you ready? are the trunks locked? There is a gondola at the door and your house is waiting impatiently for you; supper is already served."

Half an hour later we stopped at the door of a magnificent palace. The stairways were covered with amaranth-colored carpets; the white marble rails with flowering orange-trees, in midwinter, and with light statues which seemed to lean over to salute us. The concierge and four servants came forward to assist us to disembark. Leoni took a candlestick from one of them and raised it so that I could read on the cornice of the peristyle, in silver letters on an azure ground: _Palazzo Leoni_.

"O my love," I cried, "you did not deceive us? You are rich and of noble birth and I am in your house!"

_Leoni took a candlestick * * * and raised it so that I could read on the cornice of the peristyle, in silver letters, on an azure ground_: Palazzo Leoni.

"_O my love," I cried, "you did not deceive us? You are rich and of noble birth, and I am in your house!_"]

I went all over the palace with childlike delight. It was one of the finest in all Venice. The furniture and the hangings, fairly glistening with newness, had been copied from antique models, so that the paintings on the ceilings and the old-fashioned architecture harmonized perfectly with the new accessories. The luxury that we bourgeois and people of the North affect is so paltry, so vulgar, so slovenly, that I had never dreamed of such elegance. I walked through the vast galleries as through an enchanted palace; all the objects about me were of strange shapes, of unfamiliar aspect; I wondered if I were dreaming, or if I were really the mistress and queen of all those marvellous things. Moreover, that feudal magnificence was a fresh source of enchantment to me. I had never realized the pleasure or the advantage of being noble. In France people no longer know what it is, in Belgium they have never known. Here in Italy the few remaining nobles are still proud and fond of display; the palaces are not demolished, but are allowed to crumble away. Between those walls laden with trophies and escutcheons, beneath those ceilings on which the armorial bearings of the family were painted, face to face with Leoni's ancestors painted by Titian and Veronese, some grave and stern in their long cloaks, others elegant and gracious in their black satin doublets, I understood that pride of rank which may be so attractive and so becoming when it does not adorn a fool. All this illustrious environment was so suited to Leoni that it would be impossible for me, even to-day, to think of him as a plebeian. He was the fitting descendant of those men with black beards and alabaster hands, of the type that Van Dyck has immortalized. He had their eagle-like profile, their delicate and refined features, their tall stature, their eyes, at once mocking and kindly. If those portraits could have walked they would have walked as he did; if they had spoken, they would have had his voice.

"Can it be," I said, throwing my arms about him, "that it was you, my lord, Signor Leone Leoni, who were in that chalet among the goats and hens the other day, with a pickaxe over your shoulder and a blouse on your back? Was it you that lived that life for six months, with a nameless, witless girl, who has no other merit than her love for you? And you mean to keep me with you, you will love me always, and tell me so every morning, as at the chalet? Oh, it is a too exalted and too happy lot for me; I had not aspired so high, and it terrifies me at the same time that it intoxicates me."

"Do not be frightened," he said, with a smile, "be my companion and my queen forever. Now, come to supper; I have two guests to present to you. Arrange your hair and make yourself pretty; and when I call you my wife, don't open your eyes as if you were surprised."

We found an exquisite supper served on a table sparkling with porcelain, glass and plate. The two guests were presented to me with due solemnity; they were Venetians both, with attractive faces and refined manners, and, although very inferior to Leoni, they resembled him somewhat in their pronunciation and in the quality of their minds. I asked him in an undertone if they were kinsmen of his.

"Yes," he replied aloud, with a laugh, "they are my cousins."

"Of course," added one of them, who was addressed as the marquis, "we are all cousins."

The next day, instead of two guests, there were four or five different ones at each meal. In less than a week our house was inundated with intimate friends. These assiduous guests consumed many sweet hours that I might have passed alone with Leoni, but had to share with them all. But Leoni, after his long exile, seemed overjoyed to see his friends once more and to lead a gayer life. I could form no wish opposed to his, and I was happy to see him enjoying himself. To be sure, the society of those men was delightful. They were all young and refined, jovial or intelligent, amiable or entertaining. They had excellent manners, and most of them were men of talent. Every morning we had music; in the afternoon we went on the water; after dinner we went to the theatre; and, on returning home, had supper and cards. I did not enjoy looking on at this last amusement, in which enormous sums changed hands every night. Leoni had given me permission to retire after supper, and I never failed. Little by little the number of our acquaintances increased so that I was bored and fatigued by them; but I said nothing about it. Leoni still seemed enchanted by this dissipated life. All the dandies of all nations who were then in Venice met by appointment at our house to drink and gamble and sing. The best singers from the theatres came often to mingle their voices with our instruments and with Leoni's voice, which was neither less beautiful nor less skilfully managed than theirs. Despite the fascination of this society, I felt more and more the longing for repose. To be sure, we still had some pleasant hours tête-à-tête from time to time. The dandies did not come every day, but the regular habitués consisted of a dozen or more men who formed the nucleus of our dinner-parties. Leoni was so fond of them that I could not help feeling some affection for them. They were the ones who enlivened the whole table by their superiority in every respect to the others. Those men were really remarkable, and seemed in some sense reflections of Leoni. They had that sort of family resemblance, that conformity of ideas and language which had impressed me the first day. There was an indefinable air of subtlety and distinction, which was lacking even in the most distinguished of the others. Their glances were more penetrating, their replies more prompt, their self-possession more lordly, their reckless extravagance in better taste. Each one of them exerted a sort of moral authority over a portion of the new-comers. They acted as their models and guides, at first in small matters, afterward in greater ones. Leoni was the soul of the whole body, the superior chief who was the mentor of that brilliant masculine coterie, in style, tone, dissipation and extravagance.

This species of empire pleased him, and I was not surprised at it. I had seen him reign even more openly at Brussels, and I had shared his pride and his glory; but our happy life at the chalet had taught me the secret of purer, more private joys. I regretted that life, and could not refrain from saying so.

"And so do I," said he. "I regret those months of pure delight, superior to all the empty vanities of society; but God did not choose to change the succession of the seasons for us. There is no eternal happiness any more than there is perpetual spring. It is a law of nature which we cannot escape. Be sure that everything is ordered for the best in this wicked world. The strength of a man's heart is no greater than the duration of the blessings of life. Let us submit; let us bend our necks. The flowers droop, wither and are born again every year. The human heart can renew itself like a flower, when it knows its own strength and does not bloom to the bursting point. Six months of unalloyed felicity was a tremendous allowance, my dear; we should have died of too much happiness if that had continued, or else we should have abused it. Destiny bids us come down from our ethereal peaks and breathe a less pure atmosphere in cities. Let us bow to the necessity and believe that it is well for us. When the fine weather returns again, we will return to our mountains. We shall be the more eager to find there all the pleasures of which we are deprived here; we shall better appreciate the value of our peaceful privacy; and that season of love and delight, which the hardships of the winter would have spoiled for us, will come again even lovelier than last year."

"Oh, yes," said I, embracing him, "we will return to Switzerland! How good you are to want to do it and to promise me that you will! But tell me, Leoni, can we not live more simply and more by ourselves here? We see each other now only through the fumes of punch; we speak to each other only amid songs and laughter. Why have we so many friends? Are we not enough for each other?"

"Why, Juliette," he replied, "angels are children, and you are both. You do not know that love is the function of the noblest faculties of the mind, and that we must take care of those faculties as of the apple of one's eye. You do not know, little girl, what your own heart is. Dear, sensitive, confiding creature that you are, you believe that it is an inexhaustible fountain of love; but the sun itself is not eternal. You do not know that the heart becomes tired like the body, and that it must be treated with the same care. Trust to me, Juliette; let me keep the sacred fire alight in your heart. It is my interest to preserve your love, to prevent you from squandering it too rapidly. All women are like you; they are in such a hurry to love that they suddenly cease to love, and do not know why."

"Bad boy," I said, "are these the things you said to me in the evenings on the mountain? Did you urge me not to love you too much? did you think that I was capable of becoming weary of loving you?"

"No, my angel," Leoni replied, kissing my hands, "nor do I think it now. But listen to my experience: external things exert upon our most secret feelings an influence against which the strongest contend in vain. In our valley, surrounded by pure air, by natural perfumes and melodies, we might well be and were certain to be all love, all poesy, all enthusiasm: but remember that, even while we were there, I was sparing of that enthusiasm, which is so easy to lose, so impossible to find again when it is lost; remember our rainy days, when I was more or less harsh with you in forcing you to keep your mind occupied, in order to save you from reflection and the melancholy which is its inevitable consequence. Be sure that too frequent examination of oneself and others is the most dangerous of occupations. We must shake off the selfish craving which impels us to be forever searching our hearts and the hearts of those who love us, like a foolish husbandman who exhausts the soil by dint of calling on it to produce beyond its capacity. We must know how to be unemotional and frivolous at times; such periods of distraction are dangerous only to weak and indolent hearts. An ardent heart ought to seek them in order not to consume itself; it is always rich enough. A word, a glance, is sufficient to send a thrill through it in the midst of the eddying whirl which carries it away, and to bring it back more ardent and more loving to the consciousness of its passion. Here, you see, we must have excitement and variety; these great palaces are beautiful, but they are melancholy. The sea moss clings to their feet, and the limpid water in which they are reflected is often laden with vapors which fall in tears. This magnificence is severe, and these marks of nobility which please you are simply a long succession of epitaphs and tombs which we must decorate with flowers. We must fill with living beings this echoing mansion, where your footsteps would frighten you if you were alone; we must throw money from the window to this populace which has no other bed than the ice-covered parapets of the bridges, so that the spectacle of its misery may not make us sad amid our well-being. Allow yourself to be cheered by our laughter and lulled to sleep by our songs; be good and do not worry; I will undertake to arrange your life and make it pleasant to you, even if I am unable to make it intoxicating. Be my wife and my mistress at Venice; you shall be my angel and my nymph again among the glaciers of Switzerland."

XI

By such speeches he allayed my anxiety and led me, fascinated and confiding, to the brink of the abyss. I thanked him lovingly for the trouble he took to persuade me, when he could make me obey with a sign. We embraced affectionately and returned to the salon where our friends awaited us to part us.

However, as the days succeeded one another, Leoni did not take the same trouble to reconcile me to them. He paid less attention to my growing discontent, and when I mentioned it to him, he argued with me less gently. One day indeed he was short with me and bitter; I saw that I offended him; I determined to complain no more; but I began to suffer really and to be genuinely unhappy. I waited with resignation until Leoni snatched a few moments to come to me. To be sure he was so kind and loving at those times that I deemed myself foolish and cowardly to have suffered so. My courage and my confidence would revive for a few days; but those days of encouragement became more and more infrequent. Leoni, seeing that I was meek and submissive, still treated me with consideration; but he no longer noticed my melancholy. Ennui devoured me, Venice became hateful to me; its canals, its gondolas, its sky, everything about it was distasteful. During the nights of card-playing I wandered alone on the terrace at the top of the house; I shed bitter tears; I recalled my home, my heedless youth, my kind, foolish mother, my poor father, so loving and so good-natured, and even my aunt, with her petty worries and her long sermons. It seemed to me that I was really homesick, that I longed to fly, to go home and throw myself at my parents' feet, to forget Leoni forever. But if a window opened below me, if Leoni, weary of the game and the heat, came out on the balcony to breathe the fresh air from the canal, I would lean over the rail to look at him, and my heart would beat as during the first days of my passion, when he crossed the threshold of my father's house; if the moon shone upon him and enabled me to distinguish that noble figure beneath the rich fancy costume that he always wore in his own palace, I would thrill with pride and pleasure as on the evening that he led me into that ball-room from which we went forth never to return; if his melodious voice, murmuring a measure from some song, rebounded from the resonant marbles of Venice and rose to my ears, I would feel the tears flowing down my cheeks, as on those evenings among the mountains when he sang me a ballad composed for me in the morning.

A few words which I overheard from the mouth of one of his friends increased my depression and my disgust to an intolerable degree. Among Leoni's twelve intimate associates, the Vicomte de Chalm, who called himself an _émigré_ Frenchman, was the one whose attentions were most offensive to me. He was the oldest of them all, and perhaps the cleverest; but underneath his exquisite manners I detected a sort of cynicism which often revolted me. He was satirical, cold-blooded and insolent; furthermore, he was a man without morals and without heart; but I knew nothing of that, and he displeased me, apart from that. One evening when I was on the balcony, hidden from him by the silk curtains, I heard him say to the Venetian marquis: "Why, where's Juliette?"--That mode of speaking of me brought the blood to my cheeks; I kept perfectly still and listened.--"I don't know," the Venetian replied. "Why, are you so much in love with her?"--"Not too much," was the reply, "but enough."--"And Leoni?"--"Leoni will turn her over to me one of these days."--"What! his own wife?"--"Nonsense, marquis! are you mad?" replied the viscount; "she is a girl he seduced at Brussels; when he has had enough of her, and that will be before long, I will gladly take charge of her. If you want her next after me, marquis, put your name down."--"Many thanks," replied the marquis; "I know how you deprave women, and I should be afraid to succeed you."

I heard no more; I leaned over the balustrade half-dead, and, hiding my face in my shawl, wept with rage and shame.

That same night I called Leoni into my room, and demanded satisfaction for the way I was treated by his friends. He took the insult with a coolness which dealt my heart a mortal blow.--"You are a little fool," he said to me; "you don't know what men are; their thoughts are indiscreet and their words still more so; the rakes are the best of them. A strong woman should laugh at their airs instead of losing her temper."

I fell upon a chair and burst into tears, crying;--"O mother! mother! how low has your daughter fallen!"

Leoni exerted himself to soothe me, and succeeded only too quickly. He knelt at my feet, kissed my hands and my arms, implored me to treat with scorn a foolish remark and to think of nothing but him and his love.

"Alas!" said I, "what am I to think when your friends flatter themselves that they can pick me up as they do your old pipes when you want them no longer."

"Juliette," he replied, "wounded pride makes you bitter and unjust. I have been a libertine, as you know; I have often told you of my youthful disorders; but I thought that I had purified myself in the air of our valley. My friends are still living the life that I used to lead; they know nothing of the six months we passed in Switzerland; they could never understand them. But ought you to misinterpret and forget them?"

I begged his pardon, I shed sweeter tears on his brow and his beautiful hair; I strove to forget the uncomfortable impression I had received. I flattered myself moreover that he would make his friends understand that I was not a kept mistress and that they must respect me; but he either did not choose to do it or did not think of it, for on the next and following days I saw that Monsieur de Chalm's eyes followed me and solicited me with revolting insolence.

I was in despair, but I did not know which way to turn to avoid the evils into which I had plunged. I was too proud to be happy, and loved Leoni too dearly to leave him.

One evening I had gone into the salon to get a book I had left on the piano. Leoni was surrounded by a select party of his friends; they were grouped around the tea table at the end of the room, which was dimly lighted, and did not notice my presence. The viscount seemed to be in one of his wickedest teasing moods.

"Baron Leone de Leoni," he said in a dry, mocking voice, "do you know, my dear fellow, that you are getting in very deep?"

"What do you mean?" rejoined Leoni, "I have no debts at Venice yet."

"But you soon will have."

"I hope so," retorted Leoni with the utmost tranquillity.

"_Vive Dieu_!" said the viscount, "you are the first of men when it comes to ruining yourself; half a million in three months! do you know that's running a very pretty rig?"

Surprise had nailed me to my place; motionless and holding my breath, I awaited the end of this strange conversation.

"Half a million?" echoed the Venetian marquis indifferently.

"Yes," said Chalm, "Thaddeus the Jew advanced him five hundred thousand francs at the beginning of the winter."

"That's doing very well," said the marquis. "Have you paid the rent of your ancestral palace, Leoni?"

"_Parbleu_! yes, in advance," said Chalm; "would they have let it to him otherwise?"

"What do you expect to do when you have nothing left?" queried another of Leoni's trusty friends.

"Run in debt," replied Leoni with imperturbable tranquillity.

"That's easier than to find Jews who will leave you at peace for three months," said the viscount. "What will you do when your creditors take you by the collar."

"I will take a pretty little boat," replied Leoni with a smile.

"Good! and go to Trieste?"

"No, that is too near; to Palermo, I have never been there."

"But when you arrive anywhere," said the marquis, "you must cut something of a figure for a few days."

"Providence will provide for that," said Leoni, "she is the mother of the audacious."

"But not of the indolent," said Chalm, "and I know nobody on earth more indolent than you. What the devil did you do in Switzerland with your infanta for six months?"

"Silence on that subject!" retorted Leoni; "I loved her, and I'll throw my glass at the head of any man who sees anything to laugh at in that."

"Leoni, you drink too much," observed another of his friends.

"Perhaps so, but I have said what I have said."

The viscount didn't take up this species of challenge, and the marquis made haste to change the conversation.

"Why, in God's name, aren't you playing?" he asked Leoni.

"_Ventre-Dieu_! I play every day to oblige you, although I detest gambling; you will make a fool of me with your cards and your dice, and your pockets like the cask of the Danaides, and your insatiable hands! You are nothing but a parcel of fools, the whole of you. When you have made a hit, instead of taking a rest and enjoying life like true sybarites, you keep at it until you have spoiled your luck."

"Luck, luck!" said the marquis, "everyone knows what luck is."

"Many thanks!" said Leoni, "I no longer care to know; I was too thoroughly currycombed at Paris. When I think that there is one man, whom may God in his mercy consign to all the devils----!"

"Well?" said the viscount.

"A man," said the marquis, "of whom we must rid ourselves at any cost, if we wish to enjoy liberty again on this earth. But, patience, there are two of us against him."

"Never fear," said Leoni, "I have not so far forgotten the old customs of the country that I don't know how to clear my path of the man who stands in my way. Except for my devil of a love-affair, which filled my brain, I had a fine chance in Brussels."

"You?" said the marquis; "you never did anything in that line, and you will never have the courage."

"Courage?" cried Leoni, half-rising, with flashing eyes.

"No extravagance," replied the marquis, with that horrifying sang-froid which they all had. "Let us understand each other. You have courage to kill a bear or a wild boar, but you have too many sentimental and philosophical ideas in your head to kill a man."

"That may be," said Leoni, resuming his seat, "but I am not sure."

"You don't mean to play at Palermo, then?" said the viscount.

"To the devil with your gambling! If I could get up a passion for something--hunting, or a horse, or an olive-skinned Calabrian--I would go next summer, and shut myself up in the Abruzzi and pass a few more months forgetting you all."

"Rekindle your passion for Juliette," said the viscount, with a sneer.

"I will not rekindle my passion for Juliette," replied Leoni, angrily, "but I will strike you if you mention her name again."

"We must make him drink some tea," said the viscount, "he's dead drunk."

"Come, come, Leoni," cried the marquis, grasping his arm, "you treat us horribly to-night. What's the matter with you, in God's name? Are we no longer friends? do you doubt us? Speak."

"No, I don't doubt you," said Leoni; "you have given me back as much as I took from you. I know what you are worth; good and bad, I judge you all, without prejudice or prepossession."

"Ah! I should like to hear your judgment!" said the viscount, between his teeth.

"Come, come! more punch! more punch!" cried the other guests. "There's no possibility of any more fun unless we drink Chalm and Leoni under the table. They have reached the stage of nervous spasms; let's put them in a trance."

"Yes, my friends, my very dear friends!" cried Leoni, "punch! friendship! life--a jolly life! The deuce take the cards! they are what make me ugly. Here's to drunkenness! Here's to the ladies! Here's to sloth, tobacco, music and money! Here's to the young maids and old countesses! Here's to the devil! Here's to love! Here's to all that makes one live! Everything is good when one is well enough constituted to make the most of it and enjoy it."

They all rose, shouting a drinking song. I fled; I ran upstairs with the frenzy of one who thinks herself pursued, and fell in a swoon on my bedroom floor.

XII

The next morning they found me lying on the floor, as stiff and cold as a corpse; I had brain fever. I believe that Leoni was attentive to me; it seemed to me that I saw him frequently at my bedside, but I had only a vague memory of it. After three days I was out of danger. Then Leoni came from time to time to inquire for me, and to pass part of the afternoon with me. He left the palace every evening at six o'clock, and did not return until next morning. That fact I learned later.

Of all that I had heard I had clearly understood but one thing, which was the cause of my despair: it was that Leoni no longer loved me. Until then I had always refused to believe it, although his conduct should have made it clear to me. I resolved to contribute no farther to his ruin, and not to abuse a remnant of compassion and generosity which led him to continue to show me some consideration. I sent for him as soon as I felt strong enough to endure the interview, and told him what I had heard him say about me in the midst of the revel; I kept silence as to all the rest. I could not see clearly in that confused mass of infamous things which the remarks of his friends had caused me to suspect; I did not choose to understand them. Moreover, I was ready to consent to everything: to desertion, despair and death.

I told him that I had decided to go away in a week, and that I would accept nothing from him thenceforth. I had kept my father's pin; by selling it I could obtain much more than I needed to return to Brussels.

The courage with which I spoke, and which the fever doubtless assisted, dealt Leoni an unexpected blow. He said nothing, but paced the floor excitedly; then he began to sob and cry, and fell, gasping for breath, on a chair. Dismayed by his apparent condition, I left my reclining chair in spite of myself, and went to him with an air of solicitude. Thereupon he seized me in his arms and, pressing me frantically to his breast, cried:

"No, no! you shall not leave me; I will never consent to it; if your pride, perfectly just and legitimate as it is, will not let you yield, I will lie at your feet, across this doorway, and I will kill myself if you step over me. No, you shall not go, for I love you passionately; you are the only woman in the world whom I have ever been able to respect and admire after possessing her for six months. What I said was nonsense, and an infamous lie; you do not know, Juliette, oh! you do not know all my misfortunes! you do not know to what I am condemned by the society of a coterie of abandoned men, to what I am impelled by a soul of brass, fire, gold and mud, which I received from heaven and hell in concert! If you will not love me any longer, then I will live no longer. What have I not done, what have I not sacrificed, what faculties have I not debased, to retain my hold upon this execrable life, made execrable by them! What mocking demon is confined in my brain to make me still find attraction in this life at times, and shatter the most sacred ties to plunge into it still deeper? Ah! it is time to have done with it. Since I was born, I have known but one really beautiful, really pure time, and that was when I possessed and adored you. That purged me of all my wickedness, and I should have remained in the chalet under the snow; I should have died at peace with you, with God and with myself, whereas here I am ruined in your eyes and my own. Juliette, Juliette! mercy, pardon! I feel that my heart will break if you abandon me. I am young still; I want to live, to be happy, and I never shall be, except with you. Will you punish me with death for a blasphemous word that escaped my lips when I was intoxicated? Do you believe what I said? can you believe it? Oh! how I suffer! how I have suffered for a fortnight! I have secrets which burn my vitals; if only I could tell them to you!--but you would never be able to listen to the end."

"I know them," I cried; "and if you loved me, I would care nothing for all the rest."

"You know them!" he exclaimed with an air of bewilderment; "you know them? What do you know?"

"I know that you are ruined, that this palace is not yours, that you have squandered an enormous sum in three months; I know that you have become accustomed to this adventurous life and these dissipated habits. I do not know how you reconstruct your fortune so quickly or how you throw it away; I fancy that gambling is your ruin and your resource; I believe that you have about you a deplorable circle of friends, and that you are struggling against shockingly bad advice; I believe that you are on the brink of a precipice, but that you can still avoid it."

"Well, yes, that is all true," he cried; "you know everything! and you will forgive me?"

"If I had not lost your love," I replied, "I should not consider it a loss to leave this palace, this luxury and this society, all of which are hateful to me. However poor we may be, we can always live as we lived in our chalet--there, or somewhere else, if you are tired of Switzerland. If you still loved me, you would not be ruined; for you would think neither of gambling nor of intemperance, nor of any of the passions which you commemorated in an infernal toast; if you loved me, you would pay what you owe with what you have left, and we would go and bury ourselves and love each other in some secluded spot where I would quickly forget what I have learned, where I would never remind you of it, where I could not suffer because of it--if you loved me!"

"Oh! I do love you, I do love you!" he cried; "let us go! let us fly, save me! Be my benefactress, my angel, as you have always been! Come, and forgive me!"

He threw himself at my feet and all that the most fervent passion can dictate, he said to me with so much warmth that I believed it--and I shall always believe it. Leoni deceived me, degraded me, and loved me at the same time.

One day, to evade the keen reproaches that I heaped upon him, he tried to rehabilitate the passion of gambling.

"Gambling," he said, with the specious eloquence which had only too much power over me, "is a passion much more energetic than love. More fruitful in terrible dramas, it is more intoxicating, more heroic in the acts which combine to attain its end. I must say it, alas! that while that end is vile in appearance, the ardor is irresistible, the audacity is sublime, the sacrifices are blind and unlimited. You must know, Juliette, that women never inspire such passions. Gold has a power superior to theirs. In strength, in courage, in devotion, in perseverance, love, compared with the gambler's stake, is only a feeble child whose efforts are deserving of pity. How many men have you seen sacrifice to a mistress that inestimable treasure, that priceless necessity, that condition of existence without which we feel that existence is unendurable--_honor_? I have known very few whose devotion goes beyond the sacrifice of life. Every day the gambler sacrifices his honor and lives on. The gambler is keen, he is stoical, he takes his triumph coolly, he takes his downfall coolly; he passes in a few hours from the lowest ranks of society to the highest; in a few hours more he goes down again to his starting-point, and all without change of attitude or expression. In a few hours, without leaving the spot to which his demon chains him, he incurs all the vicissitudes of life, he passes through all the phases of fortune which represent the different social conditions. By turns king and beggar, he climbs the long ladder at a single stride, always calm, always self-controlled, always sustained by his sturdy ambition, always spurred on by the intense thirst that consumes him. What will he be an hour hence? prince or slave? How will he come forth from that den? stripped naked or bent beneath the weight of gold? What does it matter? He will return to-morrow to remake his fortune, to lose it or to triple it. The one thing impossible for him is repose; he is like the storm bird that cannot live without raging winds and an angry sea. He is accused of loving gold! he loves it so little that he throws it away by the handful. That gift of hell is powerless to benefit him or satisfy his craving. He is no sooner rich than he is in great haste to be ruined in order to enjoy that nerve-racking, terrible emotion without which life is tasteless to him. What is gold in his eyes? Less in itself than grains of sand in yours. But gold is to him an emblem of the blessings and the evils which he seeks and defies. Gold is his plaything, his enemy, his God, his dream, his demon, his mistress, his poesy: it is the ghost which haunts him, which he attacks, grasps, and then allows to escape, that he may have the pleasure of renewing the struggle and of engaging once more in a hand-to-hand conflict with destiny. It is magnificent, I tell you! It is absurd, to be sure, and should be condemned, because energy thus employed is of no advantage to society, because the man who expends his strength for such an end robs his fellow-men of all the good he might have done, them with less selfishness; but when you condemn him, do not despise him, ye narrow-minded creatures who are capable of neither good nor evil; do not gaze with dismay at the colossus of will-power, struggling thus on a tempestuous sea for the sole purpose of exerting his strength and forcing the sea back. His selfishness leads him into the midst of fatigues and dangers, as yours binds you down to patient, hard-working occupations. How many men in the whole world can you think of who work for their country without thinking of themselves? He voluntarily isolates himself, sets himself apart; he stakes his present, his repose, his honor. He dooms himself to suffering, to fatigue. Deplore his error if you will, but do not compare yourself with him, in the pride of your heart, in order to glorify yourself at his expense. Let his fatal example serve simply to console you for your own harmless nullity."

"O heaven!" I replied, "upon what sophistries your heart feeds, or else how weak my mind must be! What! the gambler is not despicable, you say? O Leoni, why, having so much strength of mind, have you not employed it in overcoming yourself in the interest of your fellow-men?"

"Apparently, because I have misunderstood life," he replied in a bitter, ironical tone. "Because, instead of appearing on a sumptuously appointed stage, I appeared in an open-air theatre; because, instead of spending my time declaiming specious moral apothegms on the stage of society and playing heroic rôles, I amused myself by performing feats of strength and risking my life on a tight-rope, in order to give full play to the strength of my muscles. And even that comparison amounts to nothing: the tight-rope dancer has his vanity as well as the tragedian or the philanthropic orator. The gambler has none; he is neither admired nor applauded nor envied. His triumphs are so short-lived and so hazardous that it is hardly worth while to speak of them. On the other hand, society condemns him, the common herd despises him, especially on the days when he has lost. All his charlatanism consists in showing a bold front, in falling manfully before a group of selfish creatures who do not even look at him, they are so engrossed by their own mental struggles! If in his swift hours of good luck he finds some enjoyment in gratifying the commonplace vanities of luxury, it is a very brief tribute that he pays to human weaknesses. Ere long he will go and sacrifice remorselessly those childish joys of an instant to the devouring activity of his mind, to that infernal fever which does not permit him to live for one whole day as other men live. Vanity in him! Why, he has not the time for it, he has something else to do! Has he not his heart to torture, his brain to overturn, his blood to drink, his flesh to torment, his gold to lose, his life to endanger, to reconstruct, to pull down, to wrench, to tear in pieces, to risk altogether, to reconquer, bit by bit, to put in his purse, to toss on the table every moment? Ask the sailor if he can live on shore, the bird if he can do without his wings, man's heart if it can do without emotions. The gambler then is not criminal in himself; it is always his social position that makes him so, his family, whom he ruins or dishonors. But suppose him to be like me, alone in the world, without attachments, without kindred near enough in degree to be taken into account, free, thrown on his own resources, satiated or deceived in love, as I have so often been, and you will pity his error, you will regret for his sake that he was born with a sanguine and vain rather than with a bilious and reserved temperament. How do you argue that the gambler is in the same category as brigands and filibusters? Ask governments why they derive a part of their revenues from such a shameful source? They alone are guilty of offering those terrible temptations to restlessness, those deplorable resources to despair. But although love of gambling is not in itself so degrading as the majority of other passions, it is the most dangerous of all, the keenest, the most irresistible, and attended by the most wretched consequences. It is almost impossible for the gambler not to dishonor himself for a few years. As for myself," he added, with a gloomier manner and in a less vibrant voice, "after enduring for a long time this life of torture and convulsions with the chivalrous heroism which was the foundation of my character, I allowed myself to be corrupted at last; that is to say, my strength being gradually exhausted by this constant conflict, I lost the stoical courage with which I had accepted reverses, endured the privations of ghastly poverty, recommenced the building of my fortune, sometimes with a single sou, waited, hoped, advanced warily and step by step, sacrificing a whole month to repair the losses of a single day. Such was my life for a long while. But at last, weary of suffering, I began to seek outside of my own will, outside of my virtue,--for it must be admitted that the gambler has a virtue of his own,--the means of regaining more quickly what I had lost; I borrowed and from that moment I was lost myself. At first a man suffers cruelly when he finds himself in an indelicate position; but eventually he gets used to it, as to everything else, becomes numb and indifferent. I did as all gamblers and spendthrifts do; I became dangerous and harmful to my friends. I heaped upon their heads the evils which I had for a long time bravely borne on my own. It was very culpable; I risked my own honor, then the honor and the lives of my nearest and dearest, as I had risked my money. There is this that is horrible about gambling, that it gives you none of those lessons which it is impossible to forget. It is always there, beckoning to you! That inexhaustible pile of gold is always before your eyes. It follows you about, it coaxes you, it bids you hope, and sometimes it keeps its promises, restores your courage, re-establishes your credit, seems to postpone dishonor again; but dishonor is consummated the moment that honor is voluntarily put in peril."

Here Leoni hung his head and relapsed into moody silence; the confession that perhaps he had intended to make to me died on his lips. I saw by his shame and his depression that it was quite useless to expose the sophistical arguments of his disordered brain; his conscience had already undertaken that task.

"Listen to me," he said, when we were reconciled. "To-morrow I close the house to all my friends and go to Milan, where I have to collect a considerable sum that is still due me. While I am gone, take good care of yourself, get well, arrange all the claims of our creditors, and make preparations for our departure. In a week, or a fortnight at most, I will return and pay our debts, take you away, and live with you wherever you choose, forever."

I believed all he said; I consented to everything. He went away and the house was closed. I did not wait until I was entirely well before I set at work to put everything in order and to inspect the tradesmen's bills. I hoped that Leoni would write me on arriving at Milan as he had promised. It was more than a week before I heard from him. He wrote me at last that he was sure of collecting much more money than he owed, but that he would be obliged to remain away three weeks instead of two. I resigned myself to wait. At the end of three weeks another letter informed me that he was compelled to wait for his money until the end of the month. I was discouraged. Alone in that vast palace, where, in order to avoid the insolent attentions of Leoni's boon-companions, I was obliged to conceal myself, to lower my curtains and sustain a sort of siege, consumed with anxiety, ill and weak, abandoned to the blackest thoughts and to all the remorse which the sting of unhappiness arouses, I was tempted many times to put an end to my miserable life.

But I was not at the end of my sufferings.

XIII

One morning, when I thought that I was alone in the great salon, where I sat with an open book on my knees, never thinking of glancing at it, I heard a noise near me, and throwing off my lethargy, I saw the hateful face of Vicomte de Chalm. I uttered an exclamation, and was about to turn him out of doors, when he apologized profusely with an air that was at once respectful and ironical, and I was at a loss for a reply. He said that he had forced my door by virtue of the authority contained in a letter from Leoni, who had specially instructed him to come to inquire about my health and report to him. I put no faith in this pretext, and was on the point of telling him so. He gave me no time, however, but began to talk himself with such impudent self-possession, that it would have been impossible for me to turn him out unless by calling my servants. He had resolved to take no hints.

"I see, madame," he said to me, with a hypocritical air of friendly interest, "that you are aware of the baron's unfortunate position. Be assured that my slender resources are at his disposal; unluckily they amount to very little in the way of satisfying the prodigality of such a magnificent character. What consoles me is that he is brave, enterprising and ingenious. He has rebuilt his fortune several times; he will do it again. But you will have to suffer, madame; you who are so young and delicate, so worthy of a happier lot! It is on your account that I am profoundly distressed by Leoni's follies, and by all those he has still to commit before he obtains what he needs. Poverty is a horrible thing at your age, and when one has always lived in luxury----"

I interrupted him abruptly, for I fancied that I could see what he was coming to with his insulting compassion. I did not yet realize that creature's baseness.

Divining my suspicion, he made haste to destroy it. He gave me to understand, with all the courtesy that his cold and cunning tongue could command, that he considered himself too old and too poor to offer me his support, but that an immensely wealthy young English lord, whom he had introduced to me and who had called on me several times, entrusted to him the honorable mission of tempting me by magnificent promises. I had not the strength to reply to that insult. I was so weak and so prostrated that I began to weep, without speaking. The infamous Chalm thought that I was wavering, and, in order to hasten my decision, informed me that Leoni would not return to Venice, that he was fast bound at the feet of Princess Zagorolo, and that he had given him full power to conclude this affair with me.

Indignation at last restored the presence of mind which I needed to overwhelm that man with contempt and obloquy. But he soon recovered from his confusion.

"I see, madame," he said, "that your youth and innocence have been cruelly abused, and I am incapable of returning hatred for hatred, for you misunderstand me, and therefore accuse me, whereas I know and esteem you. I will listen to your reproaches and your insults with all the stoicism which genuine devotion should have at its command, and then I will tell you into what an abyss you have fallen and from what depths of degradation I desire to rescue you."

He said this with such emphasis and so calmly that my credulous nature was in a measure subjugated. For an instant I thought that I had, perhaps, misjudged a sincere friend in the mental disturbance caused by my misfortunes. Fascinated by the impudent serenity of his features, I forgot the disgusting words I had heard him use, and I gave him time to speak. He saw that he must make the most of that moment of hesitation and weakness, and he made haste to give me information concerning Leoni that bore the stamp of hateful truth.

"I admire," he said, "the way in which your easily persuaded and confiding heart has clung so long to such a character. It is true that nature has endowed him with irresistible fascinations, and that he is extraordinarily skilful in concealing his villainy and assuming the outward appearance of loyalty. All the cities in Europe know him for a delightful rake. Only a very few persons in Italy know that he is capable of any villainy to gratify his innumerable whims. To-day you will see him take Lovelace for his model, to-morrow the shepherd Fido. As he is something of a poet, he is capable of receiving all sorts of impressions, of understanding and mimicking all the virtues, of studying and playing all varieties of rôles. He believes that he really feels all that he imitates, and sometimes he identifies himself so thoroughly with the character he has chosen, that he feels its passions and grasps its grandeur. But, as he is vile and corrupt at bottom, as there is nothing in him save affectation and caprice, vice suddenly springs to life in his blood, the tedium of his hypocrisy drives him into habits directly contrary to those which seemed natural to him. They who have seen him only in one of his deceptive disguises are amazed and think he has gone mad; they who know that it is his nature to be true in nothing, smile and wait quietly for some fresh invention."

Although this shocking portrait revolted me so that I was almost suffocated, yet it seemed to me that I saw in it some shafts of blinding light. I was struck dumb, my nerves contracted. I looked at Chalm with a terror-stricken expression; he congratulated himself on his success and continued:

"This revelation of his character surprises you; if you had had more experience, my dear lady, you would know that such a character is very common in the world. To have it to perfection, one must have a very superior mind; and the reason that many fools do not assume it is that they are incapable of sustaining it. You will notice that a vain man of moderate parts will almost always shut himself up in a sort of obstinacy which he deems peculiar to himself and which consoles him for another's success. He will admit that he is less brilliant, but will claim that he is more reliable and more useful. The world is inhabited by none but intolerable idiots and dangerous madmen. Everything considered, I prefer the latter; I have prudence enough to protect myself from them and tolerance enough to be amused by them. It is much better to laugh with a spiteful buffoon than to yawn with a tiresome virtuous man. That is why you have seen me living on intimate terms with a man whom I neither like nor esteem. Moreover I was attracted to this house by your amiable manners, by your angelic sweetness; I felt a fatherly affection for you. Young Lord Edwards, who from his window saw that you passed many hours motionless and pensive on your balcony, confided to me the violent passion he has conceived for you. I introduced him here, frankly and earnestly hoping that you would remain no longer in the painful and humiliating position in which Leoni's desertion left you; I knew that Lord Edwards had a heart worthy of yours, and that he would make your life happy and honorable. I have come to-day to renew my efforts and to avow his love, which you have not chosen to understand."

I bit my handkerchief in my indignation; but, absorbed by one fixed idea, I rose and said to him with emphasis: