Anthony Trollope

“ There is not the slightest real reason on earth why we should have been separated. Yet he,—he alone has done it; and we,—we are to break our hearts over it! Or rather he has not done it. He is about to do it. The sacrifice is not yet made, and yet it must be made, because my father is so unreasonable that no one will dare to point out to him where lies the way to his own happiness and to the happiness of those he loves!’ It was thus that George Voss thought of it as he listened to his father’s wailings. ”

“ But brave as Marie was, she was afraid to do this. He had told her how he suffered when they two did not stand well together, and she feared to be accused by him of unkindness and ingratitude. And how would it be with her if she did accept the man? She was sufficiently alive to the necessities of the world to know that it would be well to have a home of her own, and a husband, and children if God would send them. She understood quite as well as Michel Voss did that to be head-waiter at the Lion d’Or was not a career in life of which she could have reason to be proud. ”

“ I have made hatred and bitterness between those who should love each other better than all the world!’ Then Madame Voss was able to guess what had been the cause of the quarrel.
‘Marie,’ said George very slowly, ‘if you will only ask your own heart what you ought to do, and be true to what it tells you, there is no reason even yet that you should be sorry that you came to Granpere. But if you marry a man whom you do not love, you will sin against him, and against me, and against yourself, and against God!’ Then he took up his hat and went out. ”

“ Then the cook and Peter began with a copious flow of domestic eloquence to declare how great a marriage this was for the Lion d’Or—how pleasing to the master, how creditable to the village, how satisfactory to the friends, how joyous to the bridegroom, how triumphant to the bride! ‘No doubt she will have plenty to eat and drink, and fine clothes to wear, and an excellent house over her head,’ said George in his bitterness.
‘And she will be married to one of the most respectable young men in all Switzerland,’ said Madame Voss in a tone of much anger. ”

“ I never saw a fellow more in love with a girl. Come, Marie, you need not mind saying the word to me, though you could not bring yourself to say it to him.’
‘I can’t say that word, uncle, either to you or to him.’
‘And why the devil not?’ said Michel Voss, who was beginning to be tired of being eloquent.
‘I would rather stay at home with you and my aunt.’
‘O, bother!’
‘Some girls stay at home always. All girls do not get married. I don’t want to be taken to Basle.’
‘This is all nonsense,’ said Michel, getting up. ”

“ I am sure that you have too much sense to think that a young woman like yourself should refuse to hear her friends.’ Marie had it almost on her tongue to tell the priest that the only friends to whom she chose to listen were her uncle and her aunt, but she thought that it might perhaps be better that she should remain silent. ‘Of course, my dear, a young person like you must know that she must walk by advice, and I am sure you must feel that no one can give it you more fittingly than your own priest.’ Then he took a large pinch of snuff. ”

“ I shall always respect Adrian Urmand because he has known better than to take up with one of your town-bred girls, who never learn anything except how to flaunt about with as much finery on their backs as they can get their people to give them. He might have had the pick of them at Basle,—or at Strasbourg either, for the matter of that; but he has thought my girl better than them all; and I love him for it—so I do. It was to be expected that a young fellow with means to please himself should choose to have a good-looking wife to sit at his table with him. ”

“ After all, what could he have said to Adrian Urmand? or what could he have done to him?
‘He hasn’t written, has he, to say that he is off his bargain?’ Poor Madame Faragon was almost pathetic in her anxiety to learn what had really occurred at the Lion d’Or.
‘Certainly not. He has not written at all.’
‘Then what is it, George?’
‘I suppose it is this,—that Marie Bromar cares nothing for him.’
‘But so rich as he is! And they say, too, such a good-looking young man.’
‘It is wonderful, is it not? It is next to a miracle that there should be a girl deaf and blind to such charms. ”

“ Will you go away and leave us at peace? They say you are rich and have a grand house. Surely you can do better than marry a poor innkeeper’s niece—a girl that has worked hard all her life?’
‘I could do better if I chose,’ said Adrian Urmand.
‘Then go and do better. Do you not perceive that even my father is becoming tired of all the trouble you are making? Surely you will not wait till you are turned out of the house?’
‘Who will turn me out of the house?’
‘Marie will, and my father. ”

“ George, she thought, had come back a man more to be worshipped than ever, as far as appearance went. What woman could doubt for a moment between two such men? Adrian Urmand was no doubt a pretty man, with black hair, of which he was very careful, with white hands, with bright small dark eyes which were very close together, with a thin regular nose, a small mouth, and a black moustache, which he was always pointing with his fingers. It was impossible to deny that he was good-looking after a fashion; but Marie despised him in her heart. ”

“ At last the happy idea of a picnic occurred to Michel himself. ‘I never thought about the time of the year,’ he said; ‘but when friends are here and we want to do our best for them, we always take them to the ravine, and have dinners on the rocks.’ It had seemed to him, and as he declared to Urmand also, that if something like a jubilee could be got up before the young man’s departure, it would appear as though there could not have been much disappointment.
‘We shall all catch our death of cold,’ said Madame Voss. ”

“ What unsuccessful lover fails of being angry with his happy rival? And then George had behaved with outrageous impropriety. Urmand was beginning now to have a clear insight of the circumstances. George and Marie had been lovers, and then George, having been sent away, had forgotten his love for a year or more. But when the girl had been accommodated with another lover, then he thrust himself forward and disturbed everybody’s arrangements! No conduct could have been worse than this. But, nevertheless, Urmand’s anger was the hottest against Michel Voss himself. ”

“ The proper thing for a young woman is to get herself well settled, if she has the opportunity. There are people who think so much of money, that they’d give a child almost to anybody as long as he was rich. I shouldn’t like to see you marry a man as old as myself.’
‘I shouldn’t care how old he was if I loved him.’
‘Nor to a curmudgeon,’ continued Michel, not caring to notice the interruption, ‘nor to an ill-tempered fellow, or one who gambled, or one who would use bad words to you. But here is a young man who has no faults at all.’
‘I hate people who have no faults,’ said Marie. ”

“ And then this marriage was undoubtedly a good marriage—a match that would make all the world declare how well Michel Voss had done for the girl whom he had taken under his protection. It was a marriage that he could not bear to see go out of the family. It was not probable that the young linen-merchant, who was so well to do in the world, and who, no doubt, might have his choice in larger places than Granpere—it was not probable, Michel thought, that he would put up with many refusals. The girl would lose her chance, unless he, by his firmness, could drive this folly out of her. ”

“ She knew good wine from bad by the perfume; she knew whether bread was the full weight by the touch; with a glance of her eye she could tell whether the cheese and butter were what they ought to be; in a matter of poultry no woman in all the commune could take her in; she was great in judging eggs; knew well the quality of linen; and was even able to calculate how long the hay should last, and what should be the consumption of corn in the stables. Michel Voss was well aware before Marie had been a year beneath his roof that she well earned the morsel she ate and the drop she drank ”

“ Had he, then, been imprudent in allowing himself to love such a girl? Could there be any good reason why his father should have wished that a ‘fortune,’ in every way so desirable, should go out of the family? ‘She’ll have nothing to do of that sort if she goes to Basle,’ said George moodily.
‘That is more than you can say,’ replied his father. ‘A woman married to a man of business can always find her share in it if she pleases. And with such a one as Adrian Urmand her side of the house will not be the least considerable.’
‘I suppose he is little better than a fool,’ said George. ”

“ If Marie would hold out, there would be no need that he should lay violent hands upon Adrian Urmand, or have resort to any process of choking. If she would only be firm, they could not succeed in making her marry the linen-merchant. He was not in the least afraid of M. le Curé Gondin; nor was he afraid of Adrian Urmand. He was not much afraid of Madame Voss. He was afraid only of his father. ‘A man cannot yield on such a matter,’ he said. ‘No man yields in such an affair,—though he may be beaten.’ Madame Voss listened to him, but said nothing farther. ”

“ There was no man whose face would become more radiant with satisfaction than that of Michel Voss—when he was satisfied. Please him—and immediately there would be an effort on his part to please everybody around him. ‘My darling, my own one,’ he said, ‘it is all right.’ She kissed him again and pressed his arm, but said not a word. ‘I am so glad,’ he exclaimed; ‘I am so glad!’ And he knocked off his cap with his hand, not knowing what he was doing. ‘We shall have but a poor house without you, Marie—a very poor house. ”

“ George Voss was very careful to make no demonstration of affection for a girl who had forgotten him, and who was now, as he believed, betrothed to another man; and Marie was determined that certainly no sign of the old love should first be shown by her. He had come back,—perhaps just in time. He had returned just at the moment in which something must be decided. She had felt how much there was in the little word which she had spoken to her uncle. When a girl says that she will try to reconcile herself to a man’s overtures, she has almost yielded. ”

“ Don’t you know that a young woman like you ought to be married some day—that is if she can get a fitting man to take her? What would the neighbours say of me if we kept you at home to drudge for us, instead of settling you out in the world properly? You forget, Marie, that I have a duty to perform, and you should not make it so difficult.’
‘But if I don’t want to be settled?’ said Marie. ‘Who cares for the neighbours? If you and I understand each other, is not that enough?’
‘I care for the neighbours,’ said Michel Voss with energy. ”

“ She had borne many of a woman’s cares, and had known much of woman’s sorrows before she had become wife to Michel Voss; and then when the babes came, and she had settled down as mistress of that large household, and taught herself to regard George Voss and Marie Bromar almost as her own children, all idea that she was much younger than her husband departed from her. She was a woman who desired to excel her husband in nothing,—if only she might be considered to be in some things his equal. ”

“ That is what I shall do; and you must let me tell him, Marie, that you repent having written the letter.’
‘But I don’t repent it, Uncle Michel; I don’t, indeed. I can’t repent it. How can I repent it when I really mean it? I shall never become his wife;—indeed I shall not. O, Uncle Michel, pray, pray, pray do not go to Basle!’
But Michel Voss resolved that he would go to Basle, and to Basle he went. ”

“ An elderly man is so apt to look upon his own son as a boy, and on a girl who has grown up under his nose as little more than a child! And then George in those days had had no business of his own, and should not have thought of such a thing! In this way the mind of Michel Voss had been forced into strong hostility against the idea of a marriage between Marie and his son, and had filled itself with the spirit of a partisan on the side of Adrian Urmand. ”

“ Let things go as they may with a man in an affair of love, let him be as far as possible from the attainment of his wishes, there will always be consolation to him if he knows that he is loved. To be preferred to all others, even though that preference may lead to no fruition, is in itself a thing enjoyable. He had believed that Marie had forgotten him,—that she had been captivated either by the effeminate prettiness of his rival, or by his wealth and standing in the world. ”

“ Though he had remained a whole year in Colmar without seeing Marie, or hearing of her, without hardly ever having had her name upon his lips, without even having once assured himself during the whole time that the happiness of his life would depend on the girl’s constancy to him,—now that he heard that she was to be married to another man, he was torn to pieces by anger and regret. He had sworn to love her, and had never even spoken a word of tenderness to another girl. ”

“ It had been possible for her to accept the hand of Adrian Urmand because she had become assured that George Voss no longer regarded her as his promised bride. She would have stood firm against her uncle and her aunt, she would have stood against all the world, had it not seemed to her that the evidence of her cousin’s indifference was complete. Had not that evidence been complete at all points, it would have been impossible to her to think of becoming the wife of another man. ”

“ But at last Michel Voss got upon his legs, his wife giving him various twitches on the sleeve as he did so. ‘I never was so much affected in my life,’ said he, ‘and upon my word I think that our excellent friend Adrian Urmand has behaved as well in a trying difficulty as,—as,—as any man ever did. I needn’t say much about it, for we all know what it was. And we all know that young women will be young women, and that they are very hard to manage.’ ‘Don’t, Uncle Michel’ said Marie in a whisper. ”

“ Whether it be the sale of linen that has produced the large inn at Granpere, or the delicious air of the place, or the ravine and the bridge, matters little to our story; but the fact of the inn matters very much. There it is,—a roomy, commodious building, not easily intelligible to a stranger, with its widely distributed parts, standing like an inverted V, with its open side towards the main road. On the ground-floor on one side are the large stables and coach-house, with a billiard-room and café over them, and a long balcony which runs round the building ”

“ He had twice seen Marie in her bed during that day spoken of in the last chapter. On both occasions he had meant to be very firm; but it was not easy for such a one as Michel Voss to be firm to a young woman in her night-cap, rather pale, whose eyes were red with weeping. A woman in bed was to him always an object of tenderness, and a woman in tears, as his wife well knew, could on most occasions get the better of him. When he first saw Marie, he merely told her to lie still and take a little broth. ”