Bernadine

“ Bernadine, sometimes called the Count von Hern, was lunching at the Savoy with the pretty wife of a Cabinet Minister, who was just sufficiently conscious of the impropriety of her action to render the situation interesting.
“I wish you would tell me, Count von Hern,” she said, soon after they had settled down in their places, “why my husband seems to object to you so much. ”

“ Sogrange murmured, “the Press nowadays becomes more unreliable every day. It is apparent, my dear Von Hern, that this account of your death was, to say the least of it, exaggerated.”
Peter said nothing. His eyes were fixed upon the Baroness. She sat in her chair quite motionless, but her face had become like the face of some graven image. She looked at Bernadine, but her eyes said nothing. Every glint of expression seemed to have left her features. ”

“ The Baroness, after her one wild cry, was dumb.
"I am indeed fortunate," Bernadine said. "You have as yet, I see, scarcely commenced. You probably expected me. I am charmed to find so agreeable a party awaiting my arrival."
He divested himself of his ulster and threw it across the arm of the butler who stood behind him.
"Come," he continued, "for a man who has just been killed in a railway accident, I find myself with an appetite. A glass of wine, Carl. I do not know what that toast was the drinking of which my coming interrupted, but let us all drink it together. Aimée, my love to you, dear. ”

“ The beat was scarcely over before Peter, resigning his smoking guns to his loader, lit a cigarette and strolled across to the next stand. He plunged at once into a conversation with Kosuth, notwithstanding Bernadine's ill-concealed annoyance.
"Major Kosuth," he began, "I sympathise with you. It is a hard task for a man whose mind is centred upon great events to sit still and watch a performance of this sort. Be kind to us all and remember that this represents to us merely a few hours of relaxation. We, too, have our more serious moments." ”

“ Bernadine replied smoothly. "I regret the necessity, but you see I can afford to run no risks. At four o'clock in the morning you will be released. It must be part of our agreement that you allow the man who stays behind the others for the purpose of setting you free, to depart unmolested. I think I know you better than to imagine you would be guilty of such gaucherie as an appeal to the police."
"That, unfortunately," de Grost declared, with a little sigh, "is, as you well know, out of the question. You are too clever for me, Bernadine. After all, I shall have to go back to my farm." ”

“ Espionage we can still command—the best, perhaps, in Europe—because here we use a different class of material. But of those underneath we are, for the moment, doubtful. Paris is all in a ferment. Under its outward seemliness a million throats are ready to take up the brazen cry of revolution. One trusts nobody. One fears all the time."
"You or I!" Peter repeated slowly. "It will not be sufficient, then, that we find Bernadine and deliver him over to your country's laws?"
"It will not be sufficient," Sogrange answered sternly. "From those he may escape. For him there must be no escape." ”

“ There is no great work done without difficulties. The greatest difficulty you will have to face in your new life is that man. It is very possible that you may find within the course of a few months that your whole career, your very life, has developed into a duel à outrance with him."
They had turned again, and were once more in sight of the little group. Bernadine had thrown a loose overcoat over his tweed travelling clothes, and with a cigarette between his fingers was engaged in deferential conversation with the woman by his side. ”

“ Afterwards, he walked to Merton House and rang the bell. To the servant who answered it he handed his master's card.
"Will you show me the way to the library?" he asked. "I have some papers to collect for the Baron de Grost."
The man hesitated. Even with the card in his hand, it seemed a somewhat unusual proceeding.
"Will you step inside, sir?" he begged. "I should like to show this to the Baroness. The master is exceedingly particular about anyone entering his study."
"Do what you like so long as you do not keep me waiting," Bernadine replied. "Your master's instructions are clear enough." ”

“ O, Berna, my soul, my life, since the beginning of things we were fated. 'Tis no flesh love, but something deeper, something that has its source at the very core of being. It is not for your sweet face, your gentle spirit, my own, that you are dearer to me than all else: it is because—you are you. If all the world were to turn against you, flout you, stone you, then would I rush to your side, shield you, die with you. If you were attainted with leprosy, I would enter the lazar-house for your sake. ”

“ She looked round and saw one of the English ladies belonging to the Kurhaus; Bernardine had noticed her the previous night. She seemed in capital spirits, and had three or four admirers waiting on her very words. She was a tall, handsome woman, dressed in a superb fur-trimmed cloak, a woman of splendid bearing and address. Bernardine looked a contemptible little piece of humanity beside her. Some such impression conveyed itself to the two men who were walking with Mrs. Reffold. They looked at the one woman, and then at the other, and smiled at each other, as men do smile on such occasions. ”

“ To sit quietly by and hear mother and daughter discuss the man she loved, was as hard for Bernardine to endure as the pangs of death.
"He is sure to be a worshipful husband," said Miss Margaret. "I always said love would be a grand passion with Jay. He will love once, and that will be forever, and to his wife he will be always true."
[Pg 192] Poor, hapless Bernardine could have cried aloud as she listened. What would that proud lady-mother and that haughty sister say if they but knew how he had tricked her into a sham marriage, and abandoned her then and there? ”

“ Bernadou, now that all means of defence was gone from him, and the only thing left to him to deal with was his own life, had become quiet and silent and passionless, as was his habit. He would have fought like a mastiff for his home, but this they had forbidden him to do, and he was passive and without hope. He shut to his door, and sat down with his hand in that of Reine Allix and his arm around his wife.
"There is nothing to do but to wait," he said sadly. ”

“ As soon as she was able to leave her bed, Bernardine sent for the matron.
"You have all been very kind to me," she said, tears shining in her dark eyes. "You have saved my life; but perhaps it would have been better if you had let me die."
"No, no, my dear; you must not say that," responded the good woman, quickly. "The Lord intends you to do much good on earth yet. When you are a little stronger, we will talk about your future."
"I am strong enough to talk about it now," replied Bernardine. "You know I am poor, and the only way by which a poor girl can live is by working." ”

“ With these strong, active people, to be ill and useless is a reproach. And Bernardine felt it as such. But she had changed, and she herself perceived it in many ways. It was not that she was necessarily better, but that she was different; probably more human, and probably less self- confident. She had lived in a world of books, and she had burst through that bondage and come out into a wider and a freer land.
New sorts of interests came into her life. What she had lost in strength, she had gained in tenderness. ”

“ No, Berna, I'll never forget you. It cuts me to the heart I can do nothing now, but we'll meet up there. We can't be divided for long. And you'll be all right, believe me too, little girl. Be good and sweet and true and every one will love and help you. Ah, you must go. Well, well—God bless you, Berna. ”

“ Bernard answered, no less agitated than she herself. "If, while admiring her above all women, valuing her friendship, honouring her for her noble frankness, he were yet unable to give back the love she offered him, and which under other conditions would have made his happiness—if this were so—became his heart had been given before he knew her, and another woman claimed all his devotion——"
She interrupted him with a little inarticulate cry; but only the more closely did she cling to him, "Love me, Bernard," she murmured, and all the passion of her being seemed concentrated in the appeal. ”

“ She has lived so long in the world that she has grown a little cynical and humorous over its fads and follies, and Lady Beranger amuses her immensely. It’s such fun to think that Lady Beranger believes she takes her in, when all the while she reads Lady B. through and through, and knows that she is only asked down to Sandilands for mamma to talk to, while her daughters catch the eligibles. ”

“ Swiftly a shadow came into the bright eyes, the sweet mouth curved pathetically.
"Not even a beggar will seek me, a poor nameless girl travelling in the train of dishonour ... and again, I will never love."
"Yes, you will indeed, girl—infinitely, supremely. I know you, Berna; you'll love as few women do. Your dearest will be all your world, his smile your heaven, his frown your death. ”

“ Beecher Bain conjecture speedily passed into affirmation; and as Bernald’s companion, broad and shaggy in his visibly new evening clothes, moved down the length of the crowded rooms, he was already, to the ladies drawing aside their skirts to let him pass, the interesting Huron of the fable.
How far he was aware of the character ascribed to him it was impossible for Bernald to discover. He was as unconscious as a tree or a cloud, and his observer had never known any one so alive to human contacts and yet so secure from them. ”

“ The request is so simple, so childish, that it brings him down at once from the height to which imagination has raised him to practical every-day existence, and he laughs aloud at his own sentimental folly.
“But what will they say to our escapade? The garden is a large one, and it is close upon twelve o’clock now. You know how strict Lady Beranger’s notions are regarding the bienséances, and that such a nocturnal excursion will be in her eyes, flagrant. Unless indeed,” and he lowers his voice to the most harmonious key, “you were with a man you were engaged to!” ”

“ CHAPTER VII. BERNARDINE. THE crisp mountain air and the warm sunshine began slowly to have their effect on Bernardine, in spite of the Disagreeable Man's verdict. She still looked singularly lifeless, and appeared to drag herself about with painful effort; but the place suited her, and she enjoyed sitting in the sun listening to the music which was played by a scratchy string band. Some of the Kurhaus guests, seeing that she was alone and ailing, made some attempts to be kindly to her. She always seemed astonished that people should concern themselves about her ”

“ Bernardine said. "I never meant to presume; but her indifference had exasperated me."
"Why should you be exasperated about other people's affairs?" he said.
"And why interfere at all?"
"Being interested is not the same as being interfering," she replied quickly.
"It is difficult to be the one without being the other," he said. "It requires a genius. There is a genius for being sympathetic as well as a genius for being good. And geniuses are few."
"But I knew one," Bernardine said. "There was a friend to whom in the first days of my trouble I turned for sympathy. ”

“ But he would not leave his fields barren, and his orchard uncared for, and his wife to sicken and starve, and his grandmother to perish alone in her ninety-third year. They jeered and flouted and upbraided him, those patriots who screamed against the fallen Empire in the wine-shop; but he looked them straight in the eyes, and held his peace, and did his daily work.
“If he is called, he will not be found wanting,” said Reine Allix, who knew him better than did even the young wife whom he loved.
Bernadou clung to his home with a dogged devotion. ”

“ I noticed, too, a world of difference in Berna. She grew light-hearted. She sang and laughed a good deal. The sunshine came back to her eyes, and the shadow seldom lingered there. Sometimes the thought that we were not legally married troubled me, but on all sides were men living with their Klondike wives, either openly or secretly, and where this domestic ménage was conducted in quietness there was little comment on it. We lived to ourselves, and for ourselves. We left our neighbours alone. We made few friends, and in the ferment of social life we were almost unnoticed. ”

“ And Bernardine, hitherto occupied with so-called intellectual pursuits, with problems of the study, of no value to the great world outside the study, or with social problems of the great world, great movements, and great questions, was now just beginning to appreciate the value of the little incidents of that same great world. Or the hour brought its own thoughts, and Bernardine found herself constantly thinking of the Disagreeable Man: always in sorrow and always with sympathy, and sometimes with tenderness. ”

“ The gentleman drew aside a curtain that hung in front of a large cupboard, wherein could be seen hanging a dead man’s bones. Bernage greatly longed to speak to the lady, but durst not do so for fear of the husband. The gentleman, perceiving this, thereupon said to him—
“If it be your pleasure to say anything to her, you will see what manner of grace and speech is hers.”
Then said Bernage to her—“Lady, your patience is as great as your torment. I hold you to be the most unhappy woman alive.” ”

“ Lady Beranger is fair, fat and forty—and a hypocrite—as she awaits her tardy guests, so weary, that under the shelter of her long trailing blue velvet skirts and point de gaze, she indulges in the{5} gallinacious tendency of standing first on one leg and then on the other—her expression is as sweet as if she delighted to be a martyr to these late votaries of fashion. ”