Marjorie Bowen

“ As Luc looked at them he took off his sword, his sash, his scarf, his coat, and laid them across the old wand-bottomed chair in the window-seat.
Then he crossed to the square tortoiseshell-framed mirror that hung by the bed and looked at himself in the murky, greenish glass.
No longer a soldier ... he had taken off his uniform for the last time. He stood the same as when he had last left this chamber, save that it was then all before him, now all behind. He gazed at his own face, white above the white shirt, still noble and pleasing, still young, but frail and wasted and sad. ”

“ In that moment Luc felt that life was endless, glorious, and triumphant to those who had in their hearts this gift of energy, this spur to achievement. He bowed his head in a kind of tumult of thanksgiving, and such an agitation of joy filled his bosom that he had to support himself against the tall window frame. The sound of the opening door sounded, to his ecstatic mood, sharp as a pistol crack; yet in reality the door was both opened and closed softly. Beyond the candlelight stood a girl in a much-frilled rose-coloured muslin gown, holding in her hand a bunch of drooping wild pinks. ”

“ A large black crucifix above the curtained bed showed distinct and gloomy; it recalled to Luc the noble of the pavilion, with his horror of death, his distaste of life, weighed down by the shadow of the Cross, blind to the roses, yawning in the face of the moon.
He rose with a little shiver and began pacing up and down the room; his old fierce yearning for his former life suddenly rushed over him. He wanted to be away from all these people, out on the march again with his beloved companions, Hippolyte and Georges. ”

“ Are not your eyes open on the changes about you? Do you not see that we—that I—are sweeping away God and rank and all the barriers that come between man and man? You are young, Monsieur le Marquis; you may live to see the day when kings are cast down and peasants are called to the government of their country. This is the age of light and freedom; your rank is but a clog to you—your genius might raise you to be a light over France!”
He spoke with such force, passion, such energy of gesture and emphasis that Luc had the sense that something new was being violently disclosed to his view. ”

“ Luc, looking into her fair countenance, knew that she had never known an aspiration nor a sorrow in all her life; she bloomed in Aix like the late lilies he had seen in the garden the day of his return; pure flowers, modest with their own sweetness, they kept their heads bent towards the earth, and never lifted their petals towards heaven or the sun. Luc never looked at Clémence that he did not think of the Countess Carola; red like the trellis roses he pictured her, and, like them, for ever climbing and breathing perfume to the utmost clouds. ”

“ It was easier on the battle-field or in the Cabinet, but it was possible in a garret. It was easier with a body vigorous and healthy; it was possible with a body broken and dying. It was easier when surrounded by encouragement, attention, acclaim; but it was possible, alone and unnoticed, to win a place in that galaxy of glory that lights eternity.
Luc had on his window-sill an evergreen plant with gold leaves, straight and tall in shape, like the silver fir of Bohemia, or the poplars of the Rue Deauville. ”

“ He put his hands on the sill; the stinging heat of it was grateful to his chill blood. He closed his eyes, and felt the sunshine like a red sword across his lids. He leant his sick head against the mullions. The clock of a church near by struck four; it reminded him that this was the hour and the day when he was generally visited by Voltaire or one of his friends—Diderot, d’Alembert, Saint Vincent. Luc loved these men, as he could not fail to love those whose warm regard was sweetening his closing years, but he would not live their lives. ”

“ Luc leant against the tree-trunk, gazing across the blackness. For the second time they were alone together in the cold and dark with a dead child between them; it seemed to him a symbol of what separated them and yet what brought them together: death and sorrow—but endeavour and exaltation. The enigma that had seemed to have poorly solved itself in the house of M. de Richelieu was now suddenly again unsolvable. Was she not brave and kind?—what she had appeared in Bohemia—had not all his estimates been utterly wrong? ”

“ Luc looked from one to the other of these two fair faces, both so serene and loving in expression, and the paleness of his countenance increased, a lustre as of tears came into his eyes. He put his hand on to his father’s and clasped it so firmly that the signet ring was pressed into his palm.
“No, not now,” he said—“not now.”
“What not now?” smiled the old Marquis.
“That is all I have to say, Monseigneur,” replied Luc, with a sudden air of weariness. “Tell me what has happened in Provence.” ”

“ Luc bent his head.
“I know a man in Paris who is shaping the thought of France. I told him once what I meant to do, what goal I set myself, and he gave me advice that I rejected. Now other ways are closed to me I shall take this. I think, after all, that he was right. I am going to Paris to join this man and his friends—the people who are making the future of France, of the world. They will help me to so live my last years, to so express the thoughts that come to me that I may die not utterly useless—perhaps even achieving that inward glory that is the paradise of the soul.” ”

“ Yet these days were not wholly wasted; in the evenings, he would revive his forgotten knowledge of music, and play the clavichord to his mother’s harp; and then his thoughts would fly wide, and drink at immortal wells of unquenchable longing, and see the ineffable hues of skies only to be glimpsed at by mortals.
Sometimes, when he was playing thus in the dark parlour, he would have flashing premonitions of immortality in which this life seemed a mere nothing that he could afford to waste; there was all eternity in which to join Hippolyte and Georges in the quest for glory. ”

“ A bar of clear sunlight fell through the half-open door across her gown and across the floor. The sounds from the carpenter’s shed came distinctly, and then presently the cold call of the convent bell. Luc remained in an attitude of arrested movement, with his hands at his heart and his deep eyes on her. Unnatural beauty rested on his absorbed face, which was flushed and quivering.
“Monsieur,” said Carola, “when you have attained—but words are useless; and after all, I do not think that you will ever forget me.”
“No, Clémence,” he answered, with great sweetness. ”

“ Near the poplars was a plain wooden seat, and behind this showed the sole flowers in the garden—a clump of wallflowers growing out of, and on, the high brick wall.
Luc noticed the poplars first, for their great height and straightness reminded him of the silver firs in Bohemia, then the flowers, their sturdy charm and the bold lustre of their colouring.
“Do you like this place, Monsieur?” asked Carola, as she closed the door behind her.
“It reminds me of a convent or a prison, Madame,” he answered; “but it is doubtless a fair place for meditation.” ”

“ Paris was great, was eternal, held the seed of all future thought, was the theatre of all present action; yet her streets were thronged by the foppish, the foolish, the ignorant, and the starving. Her government was in the hands of men like M. de Richelieu, who in their turn were influenced by women like Carola—greedy soldiers of fortune who kept the point of view of the gutter from whence they came.
Luc’s heart swelled to a sense of agony—the agony of powerlessness. ”

“ The garish lamplight fell full on his countenance, which gave Luc a genuine start of surprise. It was the most perfectly beautiful, the most attractive face he had ever seen in man or woman, in painting or sculpture, or, indeed, ever imagined. M. de Richelieu’s charm was as nothing compared to the grandeur of this face, which seemed to hold the flower and perfection of human loveliness even now, when the eyes were closed and the colouring hidden by the ill-light.
The expression of the man was as remarkable as his beauty. ”

“ The Marquis wondered vaguely why they should have dragged this wagon so far; the covering at the back was open, and the heavy canvas flaps rose and fell sluggishly in the bitter wind, while from the interior had fallen a silver dessert service that glittered curiously on the thick snow and some rolls of straw-coloured silk that the Marquis had once seen hanging on the walls of M. de Belleisle’s room in the Hradcany castle.
He winced at the bitter irony of it; yet the rolls of silk, when shaken out, were some covering for the young Lieutenant, and the wagon was some protection from the wind. ”

“ The heat and glow in his heart warmed his frail body. He drew his thin, stooping shoulders erect and left the chapel.
The image of Carola came fiercely to his mind. He trembled to think that perhaps she had been one of those shrouded figures behind the grille. Across the black gulf of his illness he beheld her figure beneath the iron bell and the clusters of ash berries. He heard her words, and felt her sobbing lips under his kiss and her cold hands in his.
A sister was crossing the courtyard, carrying a basket filled with herbs. Luc turned on his heel and saluted her. ”

“ Luc had never seen such anguish, such fear, such utter terror on any countenance of all the dying and dead he had ever looked on in the war; it was a haunted look—the look a poet might conceive for a damned soul.
After a full moment the man pulled himself together with a long shudder and knocked again desperately. This time the door was opened almost instantly, and he staggered into the house, leaving his cane and hat on the cobbles.
A second after the door was opened again and a servant stepped out, picked up the beaver and cane, retired, and softly closed the door. ”

“ Louis was silent for a little after Luc had gone, but M. de Richelieu laughed, as if he were in possession of a delicious jest.
“What is the matter, Maréchal?” asked Louis at length, turning sleepy eyes on him.
“I was thinking that, after all, your Majesty does it better than I could.”
Louis gave him a sideway glance, revealing, it seemed, that he was not so unconscious of his own arts as he appeared to be.
“Ah,” he answered languidly. “I did not like the fellow,” he added thoughtfully; “he has a bright look of death. I hope he will not come back.” ”

“ There was some key somewhere that unlocked the door of Paris, of life—of that life which meant the scope to exercise, to strain the energies, to put the utmost into endeavour. Where was such a life?
For ten years Luc had been waiting—always round the corner was the promised goal—everything had been beautiful with the glamour of romance. But, looked at coldly, what had these ten years been but wasted? Luc was starting fresh on another road, and seemed as far as ever from the summit of his ambitions. ”

“ He had only been a year in the army and one campaign at the war; every detail of his life still had the intoxication of novelty, and these words, spoken by his captain amidst surroundings exotic as an Eastern fairy tale, fired his ardent imagination and caught his spirit up to regions of bewildering joy.
“You have everything in the world before you,” continued Luc de Clapiers, and his voice, though very soft, had a note of great inner strength. “If anyone should laugh or sneer because you desire to give your life to glory, you must only pity them. ”

“ His thin cheek flushed with enthusiasm; he looked beyond the gorgeous pavilion to the exquisite night.
“His Majesty is to be envied,” said the other coldly.
Luc drew a deep breath.
“To be envied! Imagine, on such a night as this, to stand beneath the heavens, young, a king—and King of France! The whole world waiting to give you her best—the power, the scope, the ardent love and devotion at your feet. Ah, Monsieur, to be such a man is to almost pass humanity.” ”

“ M. de Vauvenargues looked back at the figure of the Polish lady. She appeared to be praying with a real and rather sad fervour; her strange, rich, and flamboyant dress, her disarranged hair, her attitude of supplication made her a fitting figure for the sparkling chapel; she looked more like a youth than a woman; she might have been St. Wenceslas himself just before the knife of Boleslav was plunged into his back.
The Marquis passed out into the bitter sombre night, which was filled with the ringing of the bells of many churches. ”

“ No one once loving this city could ever love another so well.
Luc found the immortal charm of Paris enwrapping him with a sad power; she was the cradle of all the glory of the Western world, the epitome of all that man had achieved in this his last civilization; she had seen all his passions burn themselves out and live again. But as yet Luc was on her threshold, unadmitted, unnoticed. ”

“ The wonderful blue eyes darkened with a sneer.
“You have a high conception of the King!”
“Yes,” smiled Luc proudly. “I know what real loyalty is—no courtier can teach me. I have walked among the dying, who eased their torments by murmuring the name of King Louis. I have beheld men spurred to great achievement by the thought of him; his name is a power that you perhaps cannot conceive of. I believe with thousands that he will, in the splendid ardour of his youth, lead France to greater glories that she has yet attained. Louis the Great will be overshadowed by Louis the Well Beloved!” ”

“ What have you that I have not?”
“Nothing, maybe,” replied Luc gravely.
“Ah,” insisted the Court favourite, “you have the power to come and live—like this.” His superb gesture was as if he indicated a kennel. “You have the power to sacrifice things that must be sweet to you. What inspires you?”
“The love of glory, Monsieur,” smiled Luc. “Call it that. But what is the use of words? My life marches to a different music from yours.”
“Do you despise me?” asked the Maréchal quickly, eagerly. ”