Part 27 (2/2)
”But me, she will see me. Go and tell her it is Mademoiselle de Nailles.”
Moved by her persistence, the footman went in to inquire, and came back immediately with the answer:
”Madame la Comtesse can not see Mademoiselle.”
”Ah!” thought Jacqueline, ”she, too, throws me off, and it is natural.
I have no friends left. No one will tell me anything!--I think it will drive me mad?”
She was half-mad already. She stopped at a newsstand and bought all the evening journals; then, up in her garret, in her poor little nest under the roof-which, as she felt bitterly, was her only refuge, she began to look over those printed papers in which she might possibly find out the true cause of the duel. Nearly all related the event in almost the exact terms used by the Figaro. Ah!--here was a different one! A reporter who knew something more added, in Gil Blas: ”We have stated the cause of the dispute as it has been given to the public, but in affairs of this nature more than in any others, it is safe to remember the old proverb: 'Look for the woman.' The woman could doubtless have been found enjoying herself on the sunny sh.o.r.es of the Mediterranean, while men were drawing swords in her defense.”
Jacqueline went on looking through the newspapers, crumpling up the sheets as she laid them down. The last she opened had the reputation of being a repository of scandals, never to be depended on, as she well knew. Several times it had come to her hand and she had not opened it, remembering what her father had always said of its reputation. But where would she be more likely to find what she wanted than in the columns of a journal whose reporters listened behind doors and peeped through keyholes? Under the heading of 'Les Dessous Parisiens', she read on the first page:
”Two hens lived in peace; a c.o.c.k came And strife soon succeeded to joy; E'en as love, they say, kindled the flame That destroyed the proud city of Troy.
”This quarrel was the outcome of a violent rupture between the two hens in question, ending in the flight of one of them, a young and tender pullet, whose voice we trust soon to hear warbling on the boards at one of our theatres. This was the subject of conversation in a low voice at the Cercle, at the hour when it is customary to tell such little scandals. M. de C-----was enlarging on the somewhat Bohemian character of the establishment of a lovely foreign lady, who possesses the secret of being always surrounded by delightful friends, young ladies who are self-emanc.i.p.ated, quasi- widows who, by divorce suits, have regained their liberty, etc.
He was speaking of one of the beauties who are friends of his friend Madame S----, as men speak of women who have proved themselves careless of public opinion; when M. d'A----, in a loud voice, interrupted him; the lie was given in terms that of course led to the hostile meeting of which the press has spoken, attributing it to a dispute about the Queen of Spades, when it really concerned the Queen of Hearts.”
Then she had made no mistake; it had been her flight from Madame Strahlberg's which had led to her being attacked by one man, and defended by the other! Jacqueline found it hard to recognize herself in this tissue of lies, insinuations, and half-truths. What did the paper mean its readers to understand by its account? Was it a jealous rivalry between herself and Madame Strahlberg?--Was M. de Cymier meant by the c.o.c.k? And Fred had heard all this--he had drawn his sword to refute the calumny. Brave Fred! Alas! he had been prompted only by chivalric generosity. Doubtless he, also, looked upon her as an adventuress.
All night poor Jacqueline wept with such distress that she wished that she might die. She was dropping off to sleep at last, overpowered by fatigue, when a ring at the bell in the early morning roused her. Then she heard whispering:
”Do you think she is so unhappy?”
It was the voice of Giselle.
”Come in--come in quickly!” she cried, springing out of bed. Wrapped in a dressing-gown, with bare feet, her face pale, her eyelids red, her complexion clouded, she rushed to meet her friend, who was almost as much disordered as herself. It seemed as if Madame de Talbrun might also have pa.s.sed a night of sleeplessness and tears.
”You have come! Oh! you have come at last!” cried Jacqueline, throwing her arms around her, but Giselle repelled her with a gesture so severe that the poor child could not but understand its meaning. She murmured, pointing to the pile of newspapers: ”Is it possible?--Can you have believed all those dreadful things?”
”What things? I have read nothing,” said Giselle, harshly. ”I only know that a man who was neither your husband nor your brother, and who consequently was under no obligation to defend you, has been foolish enough to be nearly killed for your sake. Is not that a proof of your downfall? Don't you know it?”
”Downfall?” repeated Jacqueline, as if she did not understand her. Then, seizing her friend's hand, she forcibly raised it to her lips: ”Ah! what can anything matter to me,” she cried, ”if only you remain my friend; and he has never doubted me!”
”Women like you can always find defenders,” said Giselle, tearing her hand from her cousin's grasp.
Giselle was not herself at that moment. ”But, for your own sake, it would have been better he should have abstained from such an act of Quixotism.”
”Giselle! can it be that you think me guilty?”
”Guilty!” cried Madame de Talbrun, her pale face aflame. ”A little more and Monsieur de Cymier's sword-point would have pierced his lungs.”
”Good heavens!” cried Jacqueline, hiding her face in her hands. ”But I have done nothing to--”
”Nothing except to set two men against each other; to make them suffer, or to make fools of them, and to be loved by them all the same.”
”I have not been a coquette,” said Jacqueline, with indignation.
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