Part 3 (1/2)
”Why do you ask that question, little mother? and to-day more than yesterday> Why have you thrown me with him?”
”If you and I had to part forever would you still persist in the marriage?”
”I should give it up--and I should not die of grief.”
”You do not love him, my dear,” said the mother, kissing her daughter's forehead.
”But why, my dear mother, are you playing the Grand Inquisitor?”
”I wished to know if you desired the marriage without being madly in love with the husband.”
”I love him.”
”And you are right. He is a count; we will make him a peer of France between us; nevertheless, there are certain difficulties.”
”Difficulties between persons who love each other? Oh, no. The heart of the Pink of Fas.h.i.+on is too firmly planted here,” she said, with a pretty gesture, ”to make the very slightest objection. I am sure of that.”
”But suppose it were otherwise?” persisted Madame Evangelista.
”He would be profoundly and forever forgotten,” replied Natalie.
”Good! You are a Casa-Reale. But suppose, though he madly loves you, suppose certain discussions and difficulties should arise, not of his own making, but which he must decide in your interests as well as in mine--hey, Natalie, what then? Without lowering your dignity, perhaps a little softness in your manner might decide him--a word, a tone, a mere nothing. Men are so made; they resist a serious argument, but they yield to a tender look.”
”I understand! a little touch to make my Favori leap the barrier,” said Natalie, making the gesture of striking a horse with her whip.
”My darling! I ask nothing that resembles seduction. You and I have sentiments of the old Castilian honor which will never permit us to pa.s.s certain limits. Count Paul shall know our situation.”
”What situation?”
”You would not understand it. But I tell you now that if after seeing you in all your glory his look betrays the slightest hesitation,--and I shall watch him,--on that instant I shall break off the marriage; I will liquidate my property, leave Bordeaux, and go to Douai, to be near the Claes. Madame Claes is our relation through the Temnincks. Then I'll marry you to a peer of France, and take refuge in a convent myself, that I may give up to you my whole fortune.”
”Mother, what am I to do to prevent such misfortunes?” cried Natalie.
”I have never seen you so beautiful as you are now,” replied her mother.
”Be a little coquettish, and all is well.”
Madame Evangelista left Natalie to her thoughts, and went to arrange her own toilet in such a way that would bear comparison with that of her daughter. If Natalie ought to make herself attractive to Paul she ought, none the less, to inflame the ardor of her champion Solonet. The mother and daughter were therefore under arms when Paul arrived, bearing the bouquet which for the last few months he had daily offered to his love. All three conversed pleasantly while awaiting the arrival of the notaries.
This day brought to Paul the first skirmish of that long and wearisome warfare called marriage. It is therefore necessary to state the forces on both sides, the position of the belligerent bodies, and the ground on which they are about to manoeuvre.
To maintain a struggle, the importance of which had wholly escaped him, Paul's only auxiliary was the old notary, Mathias. Both were about to be confronted, unaware and defenceless, by a most unexpected circ.u.mstance; to be pressed by an enemy whose strategy was planned, and driven to decide on a course without having time to reflect upon it. Where is the man who would not have succ.u.mbed, even though a.s.sisted by Cujas and Barthole? How should he look for deceit and treachery where all seemed compliant and natural? What could old Mathias do alone against Madame Evangelista, against Solonet, against Natalie, especially when a client in love goes over to the enemy as soon as the rising conflict threatens his happiness? Already Paul was damaging his cause by making the customary lover's speeches, to which his pa.s.sion gave excessive value in the ears of Madame Evangelista, whose object it was to drive him to commit himself.
The matrimonial condottieri now about to fight for their clients, whose personal powers were to be so vitally important in this solemn encounter, the two notaries, on short, represent individually the old and the new systems,--old fas.h.i.+oned notarial usage, and the new-fangled modern procedure.
Maitre Mathias was a worthy old gentleman sixty-nine years of age, who took great pride in his forty years' exercise of the profession. His huge gouty feet were encased in shoes with silver buckles, making a ridiculous termination to legs so spindling, with knees so bony, that when he crossed them they made you think of the emblems on a tombstone.
His puny little thighs, lost in a pair of wide black breeches fastened with buckles, seemed to bend beneath the weight of a round stomach and a torso developed, like that of most sedentary persons, into a stout barrel, always b.u.t.toned into a green coat with square tails, which no man could remember to have ever seen new. His hair, well brushed and powdered, was tied in a rat's tail that lay between the collar of his coat and that of his waistcoat, which was white, with a pattern of flowers. With his round head, his face the color of a vine-leaf, his blue eyes, a trumpet nose, a thick-lipped mouth, and a double-chin, the dear old fellow excited, whenever he appeared among strangers who did not know him, that satirical laugh which Frenchmen so generously bestow on the ludicrous creations Dame Nature occasionally allows herself, which Art delights in exaggerating under the name of caricatures.
But in Maitre Mathias, mind had triumphed over form; the qualities of his soul had vanquished the oddities of his body. The inhabitants of Bordeaux, as a rule, testified a friendly respect and a deference that was full of esteem for him. The old man's voice went to their hearts and sounded there with the eloquence of uprightness. His craft consisted in going straight to the fact, overturning all subterfuge and evil devices by plain questionings. His quick perception, his long training in his profession gave him that divining sense which goes to the depths of conscience and reads its secret thoughts. Though grave and deliberate in business, the patriarch could be gay with the gaiety of our ancestors.
He could risk a song after dinner, enjoy all family festivities, celebrate the birthdays of grandmothers and children, and bury with due solemnity the Christmas log. He loved to send presents at New Year, and eggs at Easter; he believed in the duties of a G.o.dfather, and never deserted the customs which colored the life of the olden time. Maitre Mathias was a n.o.ble and venerable relic of the notaries, obscure great men, who gave no receipt for the millions entrusted to them, but returned those millions in the sacks they were delivered in, tied with the same twine; men who fulfilled their trusts to the letter, drew honest inventories, took fatherly interest in their clients, often barring the way to extravagance and dissipation,--men to whom families confided their secrets, and who felt so responsible for any error in their deeds that they meditated long and carefully over them. Never during his whole notarial life, had any client found reason to complain of a bad investment or an ill-placed mortgage. His own fortune, slowly but honorably acquired, had come to him as the result of a thirty years'
practice and careful economy. He had established in life fourteen of his clerks. Religious, and generous in secret, Mathias was found whenever good was to be done without remuneration. An active member on hospital and other benevolent committees, he subscribed the largest sums to relieve all sudden misfortunes and emergencies, as well as to create certain useful permanent inst.i.tutions; consequently, neither he nor his wife kept a carriage. Also his word was felt to be sacred, and his coffers held as much of the money of others as a bank; and also, we may add, he went by the name of ”Our good Monsieur Mathias,” and when he died, three thousand persons followed him to his grave.