Part 37 (1/2)
”You ought to make a great many calls,” the minister had frequently said. ”It would divert your mind and it is well to appear to know a great many persons.”
But she only found pleasure in making one visit, she gave the coachman the address of the apartments on Chaussee-d'Antin, where she had lived long, happy years with Sulpice, sweet and peaceful under the clear light of the lamp. She entered this deserted apartment, now as cold as a tomb, and had the shutters opened by the concierge in order that she might see the sunlight penetrate the room and set all the motes dancing in its cheerful rays. She shut herself in and remained there happy, consoled; sitting in the armchair formerly occupied by Sulpice, she pictured him at the table at which he used to work, his inkstand before him and surrounded by his books, his cherished books! She lived again the vanished life. ”Return!” she said to the dream, the humble dream she had at last recovered. She rambled about those deserted rooms that on every side reminded her of some sweet delight, here it was a kiss of chaste and eternal love, there a smile. Ah! how easy life would have been there all alone, happy for ever!
The Ministry! Power! Popularity! Fame! Authority! What were they worth?
Is all that worth one of the blessed hours in this little dwelling, where the cup of bliss would have been full if the wife could have heard the clear laugh or the faint cry of a child?
Poor Sulpice! how he was exhausting himself now in an overwhelming task!
He was giving his health and life to politics, while here he only experienced peace, consoling caresses and the quieting of every excitement. On the study-table there still remained some pens and some books that were formerly in constant use.
Adrienne went away with reddened eyes from these pilgrimages, as it were, to her former happiness. She returned to her carriage and moistened her cambric pocket handkerchief with her warm breath, in order to wipe her eyes so that Sulpice might not see that she had been weeping. Then when her well-known carriage pa.s.sed before the shops in the Faubourg Saint-Honore, the wives of mercers or booksellers, dressmakers, young girls, all of whom enviously shook their heads, said to each other:
”The minister's wife!--Ah! she has had a glorious dream!--She is happy!”
III
Marianne was contented. Not that her ambition was completely satisfied, but after all, Sulpice in place of Rosas was worth having. Though a minister was only a pa.s.sing celebrity, he was a personage. From the depths of the bog in which she lately rolled, she would never have dared to hope for so speedy a revenge.
Speedy, a.s.suredly, but perhaps not sufficient. Her eager hunger increased with her success. Since Vaudrey was hers, she sought some means of bringing about some adventure that would give her fortune. What could be asked or exacted from Sulpice? She recalled the traditions of fantastic bargains, of extensive furnis.h.i.+ngs. She would find them. She had but to desire, since he had abandoned himself, bound hand and foot, like a child.
She knew him now, all his candor, all his weakness, for, in the presence of this blase woman, weary of love, Vaudrey permitted himself to confide his thoughts with unreserved freedom, opening his heart and disclosing himself with a clean breast in this duel with a woman:--a duel of self-interest which he mistook for pa.s.sion.
She had studied him at first and speedily ranked him, calling him:
”An innocent!”
She felt that in this house in Rue p.r.o.ny, where she was really not in her own home but was installed as in a conquered territory, Sulpice was dazzled. Like a provincial, as Granet described him so often, he entered there into a new world.
Uncle Kayser frequently called to see his niece. Severe in taste, he cast long, disdainful looks at the tapestries and the artistic trifles that adorned the house. In his opinion, it was rubbish and the luxury of a decaying age. He never changed his tune, always riding the hobby-horse of an aesthetic moralist.
”It lacks severity, all this furnis.h.i.+ng of yours,” was his constantly repeated criticism to Marianne, as he sat smoking his pipe on a divan, as was his custom in his own, wretched studio.
Then, in an abrupt way, with his eye wandering over the ceiling as if he were following the flight of a chimera, he would say:
”Why! your minister must do a great deal, if all this comes from the ministry!”
Marianne interrupted him. It was no business of his to mix himself up with matters that did not concern him. Above all, he must hold his tongue. Did he forget that Vaudrey was married? The least indiscretion--
”Oh! don't alarm yourself,” the painter broke in, ”I am as dumb as a carp, the more so since your escapade is not very praiseworthy!--For you have, in fact, deserted the domestic hearth--yes, you have deserted the hearth.--It is pretty here, a little like a courtesan's, perhaps, but pretty, all the same.--But you must acknowledge that it is a case of interloping. It is not the genuine home with its dignity, its virtuous severity, its--What time does your minister come? I would like to speak to him--”
”To preach morality to him?” asked Marianne, glancing at her uncle with an ironical expression.
”Not at all. I am considered to be ignorant--No, I have a plan to decorate in a uniform way, all the mayors' offices in Paris and I want to propose it to him--_The Modern Marriage_, an allegorical treatment!--_Law Imposing Duty on Love_. Something n.o.ble, full of expression, moralizing. Art that will set people thinking, for the contemplation of lofty works can alone improve the morals and the ma.s.ses--You understand?”
”Perfectly. You want a commission!”
”Ah! that's a contemptible word, hold! A commission! Is a true artist commissioned? He obeys his inspiration, he follows his ideal--A commission! a commission! Ugh!--On my word, you would break the wings of faith! Little one, have you any of that double zero k.u.mmel left, that you had the other day?”