Complete Works of Emile Zola (36 page)

Madame Tellier was laughing nervously. She, also, seemed to have passed a bad night The fact was that Lorin’s proposal had exasperated her, and she had to reason with herself for a long time, so as not to have an outbreak of passion. She knew that Jeanne was becoming a dangerous rival, and the best thing she could do would be to get rid of her as soon as possible. It would be at the cost of an admirer — she called Lorin her admirer — but it was better to sacrifice one of the number, she thought, than to keep this little girl near her with her clear, ringing, and dangerous laugh. She tried in this way to console herself, but she was really beside herself with anger.

Lorin was paying his court to Jeanne. With his heart free he played the part of a lover to perfection. Moreover, he appreciated his full value, and had no ridiculous affectation of eagerness about him.

But the face that Daniel studied with the greatest anxiety was that of Jeanne herself. The young girl had resumed her Parisian coquetry, and was happy in being courted. She willingly allowed it. If she did not show too lively a joy outwardly, yet she seemed charmed with Lorin’s attentions, and talked of Paris like a school-girl talks of a ball.

Then Daniel, with terror, understood how cowardly he had been in forgetting himself in the sweet voluptuousness of Mesuil Rouge. During those long excursions he ought to have made known to her in what light he stood to her; whilst they were there, the young girl and himself, in the silence and freshness of the islets, far from the world, he ought to have opened his heart to her. And now the world stood between them once more.

Jeanne, during that period, had simply amused herself in playing about like a big child. Now, Lorin’s presence was sufficient to bring back her evil spirit. He seemed to her to be a good enough fellow, rather foolish, but otherwise very well behaved.

When she was made acquainted with his proposal — which she expected, by the way — she recklessly accepted it, seeing only in the marriage a means of having an establishment of her own; otherwise she knew nothing.

Daniel had an instinct of what was passing through that young head, and he vowed with ungovernable anger that he could never allow such a marriage to take place. It was revolting to him. In fact, he had forgotten his mission; he no longer sought to conform simply to the wish of the dead woman; his whole being was urging him to snatch Jeanne from Lorin’s arms.

In the evening, after a long day of agony, he stopped the young girl on the banks of the Seine.

“Are you going to be married?” he asked her, abruptly.

“Yes,” she answered, amazed at the emotion he betrayed.

“Do you know Monsieur Lorin well?”

“Most decidedly.”

“But it is twelve years since I first met him, and I have not the least respect for him.”

Jeanne drew herself up haughtily. She was about to answer him when Daniel violently stayed her, saying:

“Not a word! Believe me, the marriage is an impossible one. I will not allow you to marry this man.”

He spoke as a master, an angered father who intends to be obeyed. Jeanne looked at him with an expression of contemptuous stupefaction.

For one instant Daniel had the thought of telling her everything, and of commanding her in the name of her mother to dismiss Lorin. He, however, deferred the confession, and only added in a more gentle voice: “For pity’s sake, reflect, and do not drive me to desperation.”

Jeanne set off laughing. The astonishing audacity of the secretary disarmed her. She merely said: “Monsieur Daniel, do you then happen to be in love with me?”

Then, as if warned of the devotion and affection of the poor young man, she added, in a milder voice: “Come, my friend, do not talk foolishly. We must not part in anger.” When she had gone Daniel stood there motionless, crushed, mechanically repeating the young girl’s words: “Do you then happen to be in love with me?” There was, as it were, a great buzzing in his head which prevented him from hearing himself; and suddenly he fled towards the park, muttering as he went: “She has said it, she has said it. I am in love.” A fire seemed to be raging within him and he staggered like a drunken man. A fine, cold rain began to fall, and so he went out into the dark night, deliriously weeping, seeing at last clearly, in his coma, the true state of things.

He loved Jeanne, poor wretched youth that he was, and he repeated it to himself a dozen times in deep despair. What! had he succeeded in lying to himself? Was all this self-sacrifice nothing but love? He only wished to protect the young girl from Lorin, because he wanted to keep her for himself. At this thought he was ready to sink with shame, for he realised that he would not have the courage to fight for her any more.

After all, what was he to Jeanne? Not even a friend. What right had he to come and speak like a master in this family, and of what account would his orders be to them? His powerlessness and mean position were always crushing him.

If he asserted that Lorin was a dishonourable man, he had no proof to give of it; if he spoke of the mission he had to accomplish, they would look on him as a madman, they would laugh at him, drive him out of the house, and tell him plainly that he was jealous and in love.

And they would be right. He loved Jeanne when she was only six years of age. He quite realised it now. In the impasse St. Dominique d’Enfer he had loved the sweet image his heart had formed of the child. Later he had begun to adore the young girl. He had in truth grown jealous, and wickedly followed her everywhere, dreading lest her heart should be snatched away from him.

After that he went on to think of their excursions to the islets, of all the tender solace he then felt in his love. How happy he was when he did not know himself! How good it was to watch over the dear object of his affection, and think that all his sentiments were only those of a father!

Now he knew all! And, while remorse tortured him, passion gnawed at his heart, he sank to the ground and lay shivering under the falling rain. In his agony, in the abuse he heaped on himself, in his shame and suffering, a thought came unceasingly to his mind — an implacable, bitter thought. It was that Jeanne would belong to another. He strove desperately to drive away this image. He desired to kill his passion. He recalled with despair the memory of his good saint. But Jeanne and Lorin were always there mockingly before him, young and smiling. Then his head throbbed as if ready to burst, and he saw everything of a blood-red colour.

In this way he spent a greater part of the night. An overwhelming despondency succeeded this crisis of self-abnegation and shame. In the morning he felt that he had no longer any business or right at the Tellier’s, that the battle was finished, and that he was beaten. He gave way faint-heartedly before what he considered accomplished facts; the whole of his sorrow-stricken being clamoured for peace.

He determined to go away by himself, and reach Paris some hours before the household from the Mesuil Rouge arrived.

He went to George’s lodgings. The latter abstained from asking any questions, and he spent several months there in a state of utter prostration. Only once he betook himself to the rue d’Amsterdam to bid farewell to the deputy. An irresistible longing, which he would not confess to himself, drove him to the house. He felt a desire to know the exact date of the celebration of the marriage; the uncertainty tortured him. But when he had satisfied his curiosity he suffered still more. He counted the days, and every fresh hour which brought him nearer to the fatal date became more burdensome.

He had sworn not to be present at the ceremony, but the night before the fateful day a fever seized him which drove him irresistibly to the church. There he passed through all the horrors of death. He hid himself behind a pillar, shuddering, thinking it was all some hideous nightmare.

When he reached home again George imagined he was drunk, and put him to bed as though he were a child.

But the next day, notwithstanding the fever which was upon him, Daniel got up and declared that he was leaving Paris, that he would be off and go back to Saint-Henri by the seaside, where he had lived so peacefully in olden times. George was unwilling to let him leave. He saw that his friend was extremely feeble, but in the face of Daniel’s fierce determination he could only beseech him to at least allow him to accompany him. Daniel grew angry and refused all consolation. He had a longing desire for solitude.

He left, leaving George in despair and ignorant of everything that had happened to his friend.

When Daniel saw the great blue ocean stretched out before him he felt calmer, but he still suffered a profound sadness. He hired a room, of which the window looked on to the sea, and there he lived a whole year doing nothing, not finding it irksome, though he was eating up, day by day, the little saving he had hoarded up. For whole days he remained perfectly motionless, facing the sea. The sound of the waves had, as it were, an echo in his bosom and allowed him to nurse his thoughts. He sat down at a corner of the rocks, turning his back to the world of the living, absorbed in the infinite. And he was only happy when the waves had put his memory to sleep, and he could sit there inert, in an ecstasy, sleeping, so to speak, with his eyes wide open.

Then a strange hallucination haunted him.

He imagined himself the sport of the waves, he thought the sea had risen to seize him, and was now rocking him — rocking him gently to and fro. It was in this unceasing contemplation, in this absorption of mind, that he brought peace to his heart. A moment came when he suffered no longer, and no longer thought of Jeanne as a sweetheart. His wound was closed, and only a dull heaviness was left. He thought himself cured. Little by little his active habits returned to him. He ran about the rocks; he relaxed his limbs that had been stiffened during his long period of despondency. All his old thoughts were awakened one by one. He wrote to George, and asked him what was going on in Paris; but he dared not yet leave the seaside, which had kept him from despair, and more.

This new inrush of vitality worried him, for he did not know what to do with his renewed vigour. He almost wished to begin the fight all over again, to suffer once more, and recommence loving and weeping. Now that the fever of love troubled him no longer, he felt indignant with himself at his idleness; all he asked for was an active, stirring life, even at the price of being beaten again.

One morning, as he lay partly awake and partly asleep in his bed, he heard a voice he had heard in days long gone by — the voice of a dying woman — saying to him: “If she marries a man with a bad disposition you will still have to fight for her, still have to protect her; solitude is burdensome for a wife, and she must have a great deal of moral resolution and strength not to go astray. Whatever happens, never desert her.”

The next day Daniel left for Paris. He was going to finish his task. He felt now an invincible courage, a firm hope.

CHAPTER XII

ON reaching Paris Daniel took up his quarters with George.

“What, you!” cried his friend, not expecting him in the least But he received him like a prodigal son, with all kinds of marks of goodwill and the deepest joy.

He dared not ask him any questions for fear of hearing of a new and early departure. Daniel reassured him by telling him that he had come to set to work again at their common task. Their sweet life of former days was about to begin once more. During the journey to Paris he had considered the course of life he should pursue. He decided to resume his interrupted labours, to try for fame once again. As of old, Jeanne was his goal. When necessity demanded it he had sacrificed the pursuit of science and the brilliant future for her sake which had opened out before him; he had taken up a mean occupation solely to live near her. To-day the position was changed. He must be a simple employé no longer, for he had to ascend the social scale, to become celebrated, and to make the doors of the fashionable world open to him because of his own position. And he determined to set to work again and hasten the hour that should enable him to meet her on an equal footing.

George and he took up their labours once more with ardour. They dedicated several essays to the Institute, which drew upon them the attention of the world of learning.

Daniel now consented to inscribe his name on their essays, and the names of the two friends were always seen side by side, uniting them in the same renown. At last the great work at which they had been labouring ever since they had lived in the impasse St. Dominique d’Enfer was completed and published. It caused a lively sensation and any amount of discussion. And a most unusual thing happened for a scientific work; the report of it even reached the core of the fashionable world. Daniel, who had more especially taken charge of its compiling, had set his whole soul on that.

The two young authors had become celebrated; they found themselves received everywhere with open arms. George, who had attained the end he had aspired to, lived in a state of serene happiness. Daniel, on the contrary, seemed to be conscientiously acquitting himself of a task whose accomplishment left him unmoved.

One day George invited him to an evening reception given by some great personage, and Daniel went, driven there by a presentiment — such as we all have at times. The first person he met on entering the drawing-room was Jeanne, on the arm of Lorin. He had only just had a glimpse of her once or twice since his return to Paris, and he felt anxious at the look of sadness on her face. She no longer laughed with the light, disdainful air of a young girl. The smile had faded from her lips; tears had made her eyelids heavy and gray.

Lorin perceived his old acquaintances and rushed to meet them. He was delighted at being able to shake hands with them in full view of the crowd.

“At last, I see you once more!” he said, in such a loud voice that every one could hear him. “For a whole month I have been hunting for you. I really must scold you for deserting your old comrade in this way.”

George stared at him, scarcely knowing whether to laugh or be angry. Daniel, who was considering Jeanne, hastened to answer.