condesa de Emilia Pardo Bazán

“ After taking the seat designated by the monarch, Lecazes inquired solicitously:
"Does your Majesty improve in health?"
"The vulture does not tire of preying upon me. Believe me, Baron, the lives of all men make up equal totals. To reign, having disabled limbs, or to break stone, having nimble ones—'tis a balance. No, I am in error. To break stone, under such conditions, is preferable. After all, the breakers of stone can make love and be merry, while an invalid like me—Poor Zoe! poor Countess! 'Tis true that she and I adore genius and beauty. Who can deprive us of those joys?" ”

“ Jean Vilon! Wretch! Is it thus you obey your master?"
Then, as silence followed:
"René! René!"
Then:
"Silvano! Silvano!"
But no answer came. Picmort, the grim giant, was silent. Again she ran to the door separating her from Dick. He was speaking to her but in a voice so faint that it was scarcely more than a murmur.
"He will die! he will die!" she wailed. "No child can resist such treatment. God have mercy on us both. What have I done to bring such suffering on this baby?—But I might save him; yes, if I renounce René forever. No, no! Rather perish the entire world. ”

“ I am only Naundorff, the mechanic, the chemist. You are taking me from a land where I have known only sorrow to a country of peace and liberty. In Holland my good wife and little children await me. There shall I forget my insensate dreams, the cause of my ills. Because of my refusal to accept the decrees of fate, I have been punished in whom I most love, this daughter. A widow twice, never having been a wife, her life is blighted forever. The prison walls did not lie in speaking to me the terrible words: 'Your friends shall perish.'"
Amélie laid her hand on her father's shoulder. ”

“ The birth of day brought calmness as it does to all human souls. She had no longer need of concealment, so, running to the windows, she flung them wide open, heedless of the warning that death would ensue, which Vilon had given her when she arrived in the Castle. The light streamed into the Marquise's boudoir. The capricious antiquated draperies became illuminated like a stage setting, contrasting with the desolate magnificence of the exterior and the sombre massiveness of the towers which the sun began to brighten. Amélie looked out through those windows for the first time. ”

“ René de Giac was my lover, pledged to be my husband. He is," she observed, as though the detail were of extreme importance, "a scion of the first nobility of France."
"Compose yourself, my daughter," said Naundorff, for her voice had suddenly quavered with emotion. "To love is law. Your father has loved intensely. Your lover is worthy of you."
"That is what remains to be proved," she replied haughtily. "That is what Monsieur le Marquis will demonstrate without delay. ”

“ To be satisfied with killing a spy! What puerility! So little sufficed the inferior nature of Giacinto."
Thus communed Pierre Louis, as the imperious face of Amélie, her mouth drawn in bitter disdain, with a terrible frown as of an avenging archangel, came to his mind's eye. She stood for the feminine suggestion there is in all tragedy. Great souls are lonely. They so love their ideals that they cannot compromise nor forgive. It seemed to him that the splendid eyes of Naundorff's daughter had fearlessly and unhesitatingly shown him the way to the Prince. ”

“ From any other than you, I should pronounce them the ravings of a madman. What inference is to be drawn from your asseverations? None other than that we are a usurper, that the Restoration was a robbery and that as restitution, we must deliver up the throne, after having played the role of thief, and retire into private life amid the jeers of the spectators. What would follow then, think you? Nothing less than an armed intervention of Europe to restore order in France a second time and clear the bandit caves of their booty."
"We are not speaking of an impostor," insisted Ferdinand bravely. ”

“ Trampled by its enemies, humiliated, scourged, manacled, crowned in mockery, buffeted, its purple mantle in shreds, it shall at last be crucified, not to await a glorious resurrection but to crumble to dust in a fleur de lis cemetery.
Fools are those who build above a raging torrent. Lay not the flattering unction to your soul, Thérèse, that you have saved the dynasty by sacrificing your brother. God is no Moloch to be propitiated by such holocausts. Sterile has been your womb as a warning to you, and other lessons, tremendous and desolating, have you yet to learn. ”

“ If you believed yourself a king, why did you marry a plebeian? Why did you not restrain your passions? And you complain of your fate? As for your heart, you have followed its impulses. I married my cousin because the state required the union—Ferdinand separated from his loved Amy Brown and abandoned his children, one of them a son, in order to marry Caroline. Are you willing to do likewise? I know well you are not. Believe me, believe me, Charles Louis, life is not what we would wish but as God ordains it to be. Your fate has been to live far from the throne—Resign yourself to the decree. ”

“ The Duchess's eyes were riveted on the carpet.
"Let us thank God," continued the Duke, "that amid the cohort of adventurers, charlatans and self-deluded fools which is recruited from all quarters, there is not one whose ability and certificates differentiate him sufficiently from the others to claim the attention of Europe. Should such a one arise and triumph over us, the Revolution which we have crushed would break forth with redoubled fury. Thérèse, to outward appearance, we lie on a bed of roses; in reality, a volcano rumbles beneath our feet. ”

“ We no longer fight on the open as in the times of Napoleon. But the duel between Revolution and Reaction is raging none the less fiercely. The hour is ripe for blows and are we, the Knights of Liberty, to content ourselves with Platonic phrases? Are we not to wreak vengeance at last? We are so numerous as scarcely to know one another and yet so little is accomplished. 'Tis a competent leader that we need."
"Platonism is dead," cried Giacinto. "Our business is to grapple with the police. Volpetti's fate will soon be a warning to Lecazes and those who are his masters. ”

“ René, a vicious womb has borne you—the womb of a hyena."
"Amélie," he groaned, "I do not attempt to defend my mother's conduct. She has acted like a fiend. But she is mentally incapable of planning the villainy. She was the instrument of the police. O Amélie, 'tis our parents who accomplish our ruin. Your father sets Volpetti free and my mother delivers you to another man. O I rave! You are mine, mine! No other man exists." ”

“ Her crew appeared like ants, moving to and fro.
"Captain," exclaimed the pilot, "do you not see them signal? They have just fired off a sky rocket."
"Let us give them a sample of our rockets!" answered Soliviac.
"Let us demand the spy," whispered Giacinto.
"Are you crazy?" asked Louis Pierre. "What if the fellow leave them a letter for the government? No. The vessel that has rescued Volpetti must perish. Are you trembling? Have you contracted the scruples of the man who is praying on his knees in the cabin? I also believe in divine justice. I believe that 'tis we who accomplish it." ”

“ The reason that I love your brother Ferdinand is that he is the living reproduction of our ancestor, Henry of Navarre. The 'ultras' are scandalized at his romance with the English girl. Well, we must beautify our life with illusion or we should become stone. I have kept my heart in its place always, even though I have been a wretched invalid. Not that I have given myself up to material joys. We become divine through that exaltation evoked by the presence of woman. The Countess is the intermediary between soul and faith,—faith in the beautiful. ”

“ When returning health sent the impetuous blood of youth through his veins, he declared to his mother an unalterable determination to persist in his love for the stranger girl. Then it was that, like a bomb exploding at his feet, these ominous words fell from the lips of the Duchess:
"It would be insanity in the Marquis de Brezé to bestow his name on the daughter of a mechanic by occupation, a vagabond without lineage, of tainted blood, an adventurer who has roamed over Europe, supported in his youth by a woman of middle age whom there is good reason to suppose was his mistress. ”

“ As I daily sat in darkness awaiting my bread and water, what a world was revealed to me, Thérèse! Retributive justice demanding an eye for an eye stood in my dungeon. I was called upon to balance the accounts of my delinquent ancestry.
Man is a creature of habit. My senses daily grew more accustomed to the pestilential cavern. I began to distinguish the objects in my dungeon. Light seemed to gleam faintly through the joinings of the stones. My pupils dilated like those of nocturnal birds. My hearing grew more acute and recognized the jailer's footfall long before he reached my door. ”

“ These extravagant words caused Amélie's expression to become graver and loftier.
"Who doubts, Louis Pierre," she said in almost affectionate effusion, as from a queen to a subject, "that my father will accomplish his mission? The recital of his unparalleled suffering, his atrocious martyrdom, the refuge he sought and obtained among the people, his children born of a daughter of those people; all this will speak for him eloquently. Humanity has suffered too greatly to remain unmoved before such woes. To my father is reserved the sublime office of reconciling the people and royalty." ”

“ Be it known to you, Captain Soliviac, that were forgiveness banished from the earth, it should find asylum in my breast. My mission is to forgive; my duty, to prevent, even at the loss of my life, the spilling of a drop of blood. I have finished. Do with me as you will."
The Carbonari exchanged looks; in spite of their resentment, Naundorff awed them. At last, Soliviac, somewhat nonplussed exclaimed:
"The devil, Monsieur! That speech is very fine, but there are times when forgiveness of one man is condemnation to many others. That man's life costs our death." ”

“ Better that I repeat with my great-grandfather and Pompadour, 'After us, the deluge.' Had I ambition—You well know how foreign 'tis to my nature—"
Again Lecazes assumed the mellow expression, and again came to his mind words of Talleyrand, uttered many years earlier before Revolutions were dreamed of: "A king loves his crown."
"Were I ambitious," resumed the monarch, "I should now be contented. But ambition is puerile. I was not born for the throne but for art—highest art! Beauty sways my soul. Poetic art rather than the prerogatives of supreme rank should have filled my life. ”

“ Transform yourself, René. He who becomes my friend must adjust to his face a mask, must envelop himself in mystery—for I am a mystery, an abysmal mystery. Here are my pistols—they are loaded. And now farewell, for you must find a place of safety for these things which in my hands incur grave danger. I shall see you again in Calais where Amélie and I shall be one week from today, if all goes satisfactorily, at the Red Fish Inn. Let us not meet again in London, for we are watched. ”

“ The creole was absorbed by one great fear,—the fear of failing to furnish an heir to that adumbrating Empire. Thérèse, let us smile together at the endurance of thrones. Why, a crown scarcely seems worth the commission of a crime. It cannot even bring sleep to eyes that stare widely during whole nights.
Europe resounded with the blare of trumpets and clarions, the reverberations of cannon and the clashing of swords, while skilful needle-women embroidered a purple mantle for the creole's graceful shoulders. ”

“ What say you, Soliviac? I answer for it that our brothers shall as one stand by him. Ah, we carry on the Polipheme a revelation to our country. To the believing we carry faith; to the incredulous proofs," and he motioned toward the documents.
Amélie's clear voice interposed:
"Gentlemen, formulate no plans, foster no hopes. Are you counting on disembarking on French soil? That spy living and free, there is not a safe spot in Europe."
"Mademoiselle speaks the truth," assented Giacinto, who gazed fascinated upon her imperious beauty and splendid poise. "Our danger is great." ”