SCENE EIGHTH
The General (alone) There must certainly be some key to this enigma! It must be discovered! Yes, and Gertrude shall discover it!
(Scene curtain.)
SCENE NINTH
(Pauline's chamber; a small plain room with a bed in the centre and a round table at the left; the entrance is at the right, but there is a secret entrance on the left.)
Pauline At last I am alone! At last I can be natural! Married? My Ferdinand married? If this is so, he is the falsest, foulest, vilest of men! And I could kill him! Kill him? But I myself could not survive one hour the knowledge that he was actually married. My stepmother I detest! And if she becomes my enemy, there will be war between us, and war in earnest. It would be terrible, for I should tell my father all I know. (She looks at her watch.) Half-past eleven, and he cannot come before midnight, when the whole household is asleep. Poor Ferdinand! He has to risk his life for a few minutes' chat with her he loves! That is what I call true love! Such perils men will not undergo for every woman! But what would I not undergo for him! If my father surprised us, I would be the one to take the first blow. Oh! To suspect the man you love is to suffer greater torment than to lose him! If he dies, you can follow him in death; but doubt – is the cruelest of separations! – Ah! I hear him.
SCENE TENTH
Ferdinand and Pauline (who locks the door).
Pauline
Are you married?
Ferdinand
What a joke! Wouldn't I have told you?
Pauline
Ah! (She sinks back on a chair, then falls upon her knees.) Holy
Virgin, what vows shall I make to thee? (She kisses Ferdinand's hand.)
And you, a thousand blessings on your head!
Ferdinand
Who could have told you such a foolish thing?
Pauline
My stepmother.
Ferdinand Why, she knows all about me, and if she did not, she would set spies to discover all; for suspicion with such women as that is certitude! Listen, Pauline, moments now are precious. It was Madame de Grandchamp who brought me into this house.
Pauline
And why?
Ferdinand
Because she is in love with me.
Pauline
How horrible! And what of my father?
Ferdinand
She was in love with me before her marriage.
Pauline
She is in love with you; but you, are you in love with her?
Ferdinand
Do you think if I were, I should have remained in this house?
Pauline
And she is still in love with you?
Ferdinand Yes, unhappily she is! I ought to tell you that she was at one time beloved by me; but to-day I hate her from the bottom of my heart, and I sometimes ask myself why. Is it because I am in love with you, and every genuine and pure love is by nature exclusive? Is it because the contrast between an angel of purity, such as you, and a devil like her excites in me just as much hatred towards her as it rouses love towards you, my joy, my bliss, my beauteous treasure? I cannot say. But I hate her, and I love you so much that I should not regret dying if your father killed me; for one talk with you, one hour spent in this chamber by your side, seems, even when it is passed away, a whole lifetime to me.
Pauline Oh, say those dear words again! For they bring back my confidence once more. After hearing you speak thus, I forgive you the wrong you have done me in telling that I am not your first and only love, as you are mine. It is but a lost illusion, that is all! Do not be vexed with me. Young girls are foolish, they have no ambition but in their love, and they would fain rule over the past as they rule over the future of their beloved! But you hate her! And in that word, you give me more proof of love than you have given me for the two years that we have loved. If only you knew with what cruelty this stepmother has put me on the rack, by her questions! But I will be avenged!
Ferdinand You must be very careful! She is a very dangerous woman! She rules your father. She is a woman who will fight to the death!
Pauline
To the death! That is as I wish it!
Ferdinand Be prudent, dear Pauline! We are going to act in harmony, are we not? Well, my love, the prosecuting attorney is of opinion that if we would triumph over the difficulties that prevent our union, we must have fortitude enough to part for some time.
Pauline
Oh! Give me two days and I will win over my father!
Ferdinand But you do not know Madame de Grandchamp. She has gone too far to leave off without ruining you, and to do that she will go to any lengths. But I will not go away without giving you what may prove most effective weapons against her.
Pauline
Oh, give them, give them to me!
Ferdinand Not yet. And you must promise me not to make use of them, unless your life is in danger; for what I am doing is certainly a breach of confidence. But it is for your sake I do it.
Pauline
Tell me what it is?
Ferdinand To-morrow I shall put into your hands the letters which she wrote to me, some of them before, some of them after her marriage. Pauline, do not read them! Swear this to me, in the name of our love, in the name of our happiness! It will be sufficient, should it ever become absolutely necessary, that she knows that they are in your possession; at that moment you will see her trembling and groveling at your feet, for all her machinations then are foiled. But do not use them excepting as a last resort, and keep them well concealed.
Pauline
What a terrible duel it will be!
Ferdinand Terrible! But, Pauline be courageous, as you have so far been, in keeping the secret of our love; do not acknowledge it, until you find it no longer possible to deny it.
Pauline Oh, why did your father betray the Emperor? If fathers knew how their children would be punished for the sins of their parents, there would be none but good men!
Ferdinand Perhaps this sad interview will prove the last moment of happiness we shall have!
Pauline (aside) I will rejoin him, if he leaves me – (Aloud) See, I no longer weep, I am full of courage! But tell me, will your friend know the place where you are hiding?
Ferdinand
Eugene will be our confidential friend.
Pauline
And the letters?
Ferdinand
To-morrow! To-morrow! But where will you conceal them?
Pauline
I shall keep them about me.
Ferdinand
Good! Farewell!
Pauline
Oh no, not yet!
Ferdinand
A moment more may ruin us.
Pauline Or unite us for life. Come, let me show you out, I shall not rest until I see you in the garden. Come!
Ferdinand Let me take one more glance at this maiden chamber, in which you will think of me – where all things speak of you.
(Scene curtain.)
SCENE ELEVENTH
(The drawing-room before described.)
Pauline on the veranda; Gertrude at the door of the room.
Gertrude
She is seeing him out! He has been deceiving me! So has she! (Taking
Pauline by the hand, she leads her to the front of the stage.) Will you dare tell me, now, mademoiselle, that you do not love him?
Pauline
Madame, I am deceiving no one.
Gertrude
You are deceiving your father.
Pauline
And you, madame?
Gertrude
So both of you are against me – Oh, I shall —
Pauline
You shall do nothing, either against me or against him.
Gertrude Do not compel me to show my power! You must be obedient to your father, and – he is obedient to me.
Pauline
We shall see!
Gertrude (aside) Her coolness makes my blood boil. My brain reels! (Aloud) Do you know that I would rather die than live without him?
Pauline And so would I, madame. But I am free. I have not sworn as you have to be faithful to a husband – And your husband is my father!
Gertrude (kneeling before Pauline) What have I done to you? I have loved you, I have educated you, I have been a good mother to you.
Pauline
Be a faithful wife, and I will say no more.
Gertrude
Nay! Speak! Say all you like – Ah! the struggle has begun.
SCENE TWELFTH
The same persons and the General.
The General
How is this? What is going on here?
Gertrude (to Pauline) You must feign sickness. Come lie down. (She makes her lie down.) I happened, my dear, to hear moans. Our dear child was calling for help; she was almost suffocated by the flowers in her bedroom.
Pauline Yes, papa, Marguerite had forgotten to take away the vase of flowers, and I almost died.
Gertrude
Come, my daughter, come into the open air.
(Gertrude and Pauline go towards the door.)
The General
Stay a moment. What have you done with the flowers.
Pauline
I do not know where Madame has put them.
Gertrude
I threw them into the garden.
(The General abruptly rushes out, after setting his candle on the card table.)
SCENE THIRTEENTH
Pauline and Gertrude; later, the General.
Gertrude
Go back to your room, lock yourself in! I'll take all the blame.
(Pauline goes to her room.) I will wait for him here.
(Gertrude goes back into her room.)
The General (coming in from the garden) I can find the vase of flowers nowhere. There is some mystery in all these things. Gertrude? – There is no one here! Ah! Madame de Grandchamp, you will have to tell me! – It is a nice thing that I should be deceived by both wife and daughter!
Curtain to the Second Act.
ACT III
SCENE FIRST
(Same stage-setting. Morning.)
Gertrude; then Champagne.
Gertrude (brings a flower vase from the garden and puts it down on the table) What trouble I had to allay his suspicions! One or two more scenes like that and I shall lose control of him. But I have gained a moment of liberty now – provided Pauline does not come to trouble me! She must be asleep – she went to bed so late! – would it be possible to lock her in her room? (She goes to the door of Pauline's chamber, but cannot find the key.) I am afraid not.
Champagne (coming in)
M. Ferdinand is coming, madame.
Gertrude
Thank you, Champagne. He went to bed very late, did he not?
Champagne M. Ferdinand makes his rounds, as you know, every night, and he came in at half-past one o'clock. I sleep over him, and I heard him.
Gertrude
Does he ever go to bed later than that?
Champagne Sometimes he does, but that is according to the time he makes his rounds.
Gertrude Very good. Thank you, Champagne. (Exit Champagne.) As the reward for a sacrifice which has lasted for twelve years, and whose agonies can only be understood by women, – for what man can guess at such tortures! – what have I asked? Very little! Merely to know that he is here, near to me, without any satisfaction saving, from time to time, a furtive glance at him. I wished only to feel sure that he would wait for me. To feel sure of this is enough for us, us for whom a pure, a heavenly love is something never to be realized. Men never believe that they are loved by us, until they have brought us down into the mire! And this is how he has rewarded me! He makes nocturnal assignations with this stupid girl! Ah! He may as well pronounce my sentence of death; and if he has the courage to do so, I shall have the courage at once to bring about their eternal separation; I can do it! But here he comes! I feel faint! My God! Why hast Thou made me love with such desperate devotion him who no longer loves me!
SCENE SECOND
Ferdinand and Gertrude.
Gertrude Yesterday you deceived me. You came here last night, through this room, entering by means of a false key, to see Pauline, at the risk of being killed by M. de Grandchamp! Oh! you needn't lie about it. I saw you, and I came upon Pauline just as you concluded your nocturnal promenade. You have made a choice upon which I cannot offer you my congratulations. If only you had heard us discussing the matter, on this very spot! If you had seen the boldness of this girl, the effrontery with which she denied everything to me, you would have trembled for your future, that future which belongs to me, and for which I have sold myself, body and soul.
Ferdinand (aside) What an avalanche of reproach! (Aloud) Let us try, Gertrude, both of us, to behave wisely in this matter. Above all things, let us try to avoid base accusations. I shall never forget what you have been to me; I still entertain towards you a friendship which is sincere, unalterable and absolute; but I no longer love you.
Gertrude
That is, since eighteen months ago.
Ferdinand
No. Since three years ago.
Gertrude You must admit then that I have the right to detest and make war upon your love for Pauline; for this love has rendered you a traitor and criminal towards me.
Ferdinand
Madame!
Gertrude Yes, you have deceived me. In standing as you did between us two, you made me assume a character which is not mine. I am violent as you know. Violence is frankness, and I am living a life of outrageous duplicity. Tell me, do you know what it is to have to invent new lies, on the spur of the moment, every day, – to live with a dagger at your heart? Oh! This lying! But for us, it is the Nemesis of happiness. It is disgraceful, when it succeeds; it is death, when it fails. And you, other men envy you because you make women love you. You will be applauded, while I shall be despised. And you do not wish me to defend myself! You have nothing but bitter words for a woman who has hidden from you everything – her remorse – her tears! I have suffered alone and without you the wrath of heaven; alone and without you I have descended into my soul's abyss, an abyss which has been opened by the earthquake of sorrow; and, while repentance was gnawing at my heart, I had for you nothing but looks of tenderness, and smiles of gaiety! Come, Ferdinand, do not despise a slave who lies in such utter subjection to your will!
Ferdinand (aside) I must put an end to this. (Aloud) Listen to me, Gertrude. When first we met it was youth alone united us in love. I then yielded, you may say, to an impulse of that egotism which lies at the bottom of every man's heart, though he knows it not, concealed under the flowers of youthful passion. There is so much turbulence in our sentiments at twenty-two! The infatuation which may seize us then, permits us not to reflect either upon life as it really is, or upon the seriousness of its issues —
Gertrude (aside)
How calmly he reasons upon it all! Ah! It is infamous!
Ferdinand And at that time I loved you freely, with entire devotion; but afterwards – afterwards, life changed its aspect for both of us. If you ask why I remained under a roof which I should never have approached, it is because I chose in Pauline the only women with whom it was possible for me to end my days. Come, Gertrude, do not break yourself to pieces against the barrier raised by heaven. Do not torture two beings who ask you to yield to them happiness, and who will ever love you dearly.
Gertrude
Ah, I see! You are the martyr – and I – I am the executioner! Would not
I have been your wife to-day, if I had not set your happiness above the satisfaction of my love?
Ferdinand
Very well! Do the same thing to-day, by giving me my liberty.
Gertrude You mean the liberty of loving some one else. That is not the way you spoke twelve years ago. Now it will cost my life.
Ferdinand It is only in romance that people die of love. In real life they seek consolation.
Gertrude Do not you men die for your outraged honor, for a word, for a gesture? Well, there are women who die for their love, that is, when their love is a treasure which has become their all, which is their very life! And I am one of those women. Since you have been under this roof, Ferdinand, I have feared a catastrophe every moment. Yes. And I always carry about me something which will enable me to quit this life, the very moment that misfortune falls on us. See! (She shows him a phial.) Now you know that life that I have lived!
Ferdinand
Ah! you weep!
Gertrude I swore that I would keep back these tears, but they are strangling me! For you – While you speak to me with that cold politeness which is your last insult, – your last insult to a love which you repudiate! – you show not the least sympathy towards me! You would like to see me dead, for then you would be unhampered by me. But, Ferdinand, you do not know me! I am willing to confess everything to the General, whom I would not deceive. This lying fills me with disgust! I shall take my child, I shall come to your house, we will flee together. But no more of Pauline!
Ferdinand
If you did this, I would kill myself.
Gertrude And I, too, would kill myself! Then we should be united in death, and you would never be hers!
Ferdinand (aside)
What an infernal creature!
Gertrude And there is this consideration. What would you do if the barrier which separates you from Pauline were never broken down?
Ferdinand
Pauline will be able to maintain her own independence.
Gertrude
But if her father should marry her to some one else?
Ferdinand
It would be my death.
Gertrude People die of love in romance. In real life they console themselves with some one else, and a man only does his duty by being true to her with whom he has plighted troth.
The General (outside)
Gertrude! Gertrude!
Gertrude I hear the general calling. (The General appears.) You will then finish your business as quickly as you can, M. Ferdinand, and return promptly; I shall wait for you here.
(Exit Ferdinand.)
SCENE THIRD
The General, Gertrude, then Pauline.
The General This is rather early in the morning for you to be holding a conference with Ferdinand! What were you discussing? The factory?
Gertrude What were we discussing? I will tell you; for you are exactly like your son; when once you begin to ask questions, you must have a direct answer. I had an impression that Ferdinand had something to do with Pauline's refusal to marry Godard.
The General
When I come to think of it, you were perhaps right.
Gertrude I got M. Ferdinand to come here for the purpose of clearing up my suspicions, and you interrupted us at the very moment when I seemed likely to gain some information.
(Pauline pushes the door ajar unseen.)
The General
But if my daughter is in love with M. Ferdinand —
Pauline (aside)
I must listen.
The General I do not see why, when I questioned her yesterday in a paternal manner and with absolute kindness, she should have concealed it from me, for I left her perfectly free, and her feeling for him would be absolutely natural.
Gertrude She probably misunderstood you or you questioned her before she had made up her mind. The heart of a young girl, as you ought to know, is full of contradictions.
The General And why should there not be something between them? This young man toils with the courage of a lion, he is the soul of honor, he is probably of good family.
Pauline (aside)
I understand the situation now.
(Pauline withdraws.)
The General He will give us information on this point. He is above all things trustworthy; but you ought to know his family, for it was you who discovered this treasure for us.
Gertrude
I proposed him to you on the recommendation of old Madame Morin.
The General
But she is dead!
Gertrude (aside)
It is very lucky that I quoted her then! (Aloud) She told me that his mother was Madame de Charny to whom he is devoted; she lives in
Brittany and belongs to the Charnys, an old family of that country.
The General The Charnys. Then if he is in love with Pauline, and Pauline with him, I, for my part, would prefer him to Godard in spite of Godard's fortune. Ferdinand understands the business of the factory, he could buy the whole establishment with the dowry of Pauline. That would be understood. All he has to do is to tell us where he comes from, who he is, and who his father was. But we will see his mother.
Gertrude
Madame Charny?
The General Yes, Madame Charny. Doesn't she live near Saint-Melo? That is by no means at the other end of the world.
Gertrude Just use a little tact, some of the manoeuvres of an old soldier, and be very gentle, and you will soon learn whether this child —
The General
Why should I worry about it? Here comes Pauline herself.
SCENE FOURTH
The same persons, Marguerite, then Pauline.
The General Ah! It is you, Marguerite. You came near causing the death of my daughter last night by your carelessness. You forgot —
Marguerite
I, General, cause the death of my child!
The General You forgot to take away the vase containing flowers of a strong scent, and she was almost suffocated.
Marguerite
Impossible! I took away the vase before the arrival of M. Godard, and
Madame must have seen that it was not there while we were dressing
Mademoiselle —
Gertrude
You are mistaken. It was there.
Marguerite (aside) She's a hard one. (Aloud) Does not Madame remember that she wished to put some natural flowers in Mademoiselle's hair, and that she remarked about the vase being gone?
Gertrude
You are inventing a story. But where did you carry it?
Marguerite
To the foot of the veranda.
Gertrude (to the General)
Did you find it there last night?
The General
No.
Gertrude I took it from the chamber myself last night, and put it where it now stands. (Points to the vase of flowers on the veranda.)
Marguerite
Sir, I swear to you by my eternal salvation —
Gertrude
Do not swear. (Calling.) Pauline!
The General
Pauline!
(Pauline appears.)
Gertrude
Was the vase of flowers in your room last night?
Pauline
Yes. Marguerite, my dear old friend, you must have forgotten it.
Marguerite Why don't you say, Mademoiselle, that some one put it there on purpose to make you ill!
Gertrude
Whom do you mean by some one?
The General You old fool, if your memory failed you, it is unnecessary for you, at any rate, to accuse anybody else.
Pauline (aside to Marguerite)
Keep silence! (Aloud) Marguerite, it was there! You forgot it.
Marguerite
It is true, sir, I was thinking of the day before yesterday.
The General (aside) She has been in my service for twenty years. Strange that she should be so persistent! (Takes Marguerite aside.) Come! What did you say about the flowers for my daughter's hair?
Marguerite (while Pauline makes signs to her)
I said that, sir – I am so old that my memory is treacherous.
The General But even then, why did you suppose that any one in the house had an evil thought towards —
Pauline
Say no more, father! She has so much affection for me, dear
Marguerite, that she is sometimes distracted by it.
Marguerite (aside)
I am quite sure I took away the flowers.
The General (aside) Why should my wife and my daughter deceive me? An old trooper like me doesn't permit himself to be caught between two fires, and there is something decidedly crooked —
Gertrude
Marguerite, we will take tea in this room when M. Godard comes down.
Tell Felix to bring in all the newspapers.
Marguerite
Very good, madame.