Lucie

“ Lucie, Baroness von Crefeldt, was one of those persons who, after a probationary term in the character of woman, have become men, but of whom offended man, amazed by the flowering up of that hard rough jaw from the tender blooming promise of a petticoat, finds it impossible to imagine they had once on a sweet Spring time the sex’s gentleness and charm of aspect. ”

“ Having somewhat rearranged her dress she sat down, and her mother, coming in at that moment, complimented me upon my good looks and my bright countenance, and told Lucie to dress herself to attend mass. Lucie came back an hour later, and expressed her joy and her pride at the wonderful cure she thought she had performed upon me, for the healthy appearance I was then shewing convinced her of my love much better than the pitiful state in which she had found me in the morning. “If your complete happiness,” she said, “rests in my power, be happy; there is nothing that I can refuse you.” ”

“ Lucie’s quick and comprehensive mind had already gone forward and spanned the gulf between a sublieutenant and a lieutenant-colonel. Madame Bernard sighed again. All womanly women are natural romancers and love a lover, and she did not think less of Paul for his determined stand. She began to see dimly that this prompt and quiet decision in Paul’s character was one of the reasons why Lucie loved him, and it would be the most wholesome corrective possible to the faults in Lucie’s temperament. ”

“ The burning ardour of my love was increased by the abstinence to which I condemned myself, although Lucie did everything in her power to make me break through my determination. She could not fully enjoy the sweetness of the forbidden fruit unless I plucked it without reserve, and the effect produced by our constantly lying in each other's arms was too strong for a young girl to resist. ”

“ Lucie, who was accustomed to luxury, adapted herself with ingenuous perversity to the plain way of living of the Ravenels. She even learned to make omelettes herself, and with her little lace-trimmed gown tucked up around her waist, to the horror of Harper, the nursery governess, actually learned to broil a chop as well as Sophie could. ”

“ But Lucie was so charming! Like many a grown up man his judgment and his heart went different ways. Lucie had his heart—there was no question about it.
Lucie would have liked to stay a long time with Paul, and Paul would have enjoyed staying with [Pg 71] Lucie, but, looking up, he saw his father and mother approaching, on their way to the terrace, where, like all the other inhabitants of Bienville, they spent their summer afternoons having ices or drinking tea and listening to the music. The Verneys were a comfortable-looking couple, fond of each other and adoring Paul. ”

“ With such gradation and difference of sorrow will the recent death of a very remarkable woman, Lucie, Lady Duff Gordon, be mourned for by all who knew her, and with such a sense of blank loss will they long continue to lament one whose public success as an author was only commensurate with the charm of her private companionship. ”

“ Lucie was unblushingly happy and demanded that as soon as he arrived at Beaupré he should present himself at the château and pay his respects to Madame Bernard. Of course, he did it, wicked as he knew it to be, with the result that he was the only man whom Lucie really encouraged. And in a little while, as natures quickly adjust themselves to each other, Paul acquired a species [Pg 187] of control over Lucie, a thing which no one but Sophie Ravenel had ever done before. ”

“ I tell Lucie to keep her arms raised after she shall have awakened. Hardly is she in the normal state when up go her arms above her head, but she pays no attention to them. She goes, comes, converses, holding her arms high in the air. ”

“ After living for two or three years in the vilest haunts in London, Lucie came to Holland, where, not being able to sell her own person any longer, she became a procuress—a natural ending to her career. Lucie was only thirty-three, but she was the wreck of a woman, and women are always as old as they look. ”

“ When we keep busy there is less time for grieving. You must try to keep grandpère and Paulette in good heart.”
These words encouraged Lucie to show a braver spirit. She no longer wept, but stood looking very grave and thoughtful. “You will write, mamma, very soon,” she said. ”

“ The quick noise and movement of the court's emptying itself by many passages had not ceased, when Lucie stood stretching out her arms towards her husband, with nothing in her face but love and consolation. ”

“ Again, Adrienne remembered certain incidents in Lucie's childhood which Lucie had wholly forgotten. Once more—and this last suggestion points to positive rather than to negative conclusions—Adrienne possessed a faculty, the muscular sense, of which Lucie was devoid. I am anxious that this point especially should be firmly grasped, for I wish the reader's mind to be perfectly open as regards the relative faculties of the Conscious and the Unconscious Self. It is plain that we must be on the watch for completion, for evolution, as well as for partition, for dissolution, of the corporate being. ”

“ So much of what had happened in that dreadful time as could be kept from the knowledge of Lucie was so well concealed from her, that not until long afterwards, when France and she were far apart, did she know that eleven hundred defenceless prisoners of both sexes and all ages had been killed by the populace; ”

“ Austin was appointed Royal Commissioner to inquire into the grievances of the Maltese. His wife accompanied him, but so hot a climate was not considered good for a young girl, and Lucie was sent to a school at Bromley. She must have been as great a novelty to the school as the school-life was to her, for with a great deal of desultory knowledge she was singularly deficient in many rudiments of ordinary knowledge. ”

“ Usually this phase is, with each patient, a thing so stereotyped as to seem automatic, and doubts have even been expressed as to whether any consciousness exists while it lasts. When, however, the patient Lucie’s tactile sensibility came back in her state of Lucie 3, she explained the origin of her hysteric crises in a great fright which she had had when a child, on a day when certain men, hid behind the curtains, had jumped out upon her ”

“ Something—was it a breath? a sigh?—made me look back into the attic where Lucy's clothes clung to the high-backed chair, like flower petals blown against a wall. The pier-glass had caught all the glory of the morning and was releasing it in quivering spears of light that dazzled me for a moment; I rubbed my eyes, and stared, and shook a little, for in the midst of all this splendour I saw Lucy! No pallid, rigid ghost, but something warm, eager with life, spreading the folds of the lilac gown like a butterfly warming its new wings in the strength of the sun. ”

“ Anyway, Lady Lucy, it was not much like hating you when God brought back your father from the prison and gave you such a nice home and such a nice lady to take care of you."
Lucy looked puzzled. "Did he do that? I never thought of that."
"Of course he did. He gives us all things. That is the reason we call him our Father, I suppose."
"I never thought of that," said Lucy, again. "I thought he was like a great king, who sat up in heaven and did not care what happened, only to punish people when they do wrong. I never thought of his being any thing like my father." ”

“ It will be all one when we come to heaven, though I would have liked to have seen Willy again; but ‘tis the cross the Lord sends, so don’t ye take on,” and then Lady Lucy sits down on the ground, and looks up in her face, as if her plain words did her more good than anything we can say, or even the clergyman, who is constantly going from one to the other. Whenever the men come to work, or go away, tired out, Lady Lucy thanks them from the bottom of her heart; and a look at her serves to inspirit and force them on to wonderful exertions. ”

“ Lady Lucy was young,—only a little past eleven years old,—and small for her age: nevertheless, she was the rightful heir of the splendid room in which she now sat, with its heavy carved furniture, its worked tapestry hangings, and inlaid cabinets,—of the fine old house, Stanton Court,—of the lovely gardens and shrubbery which lay stretched before the windows, and the beautiful park, and many a farm and moorland besides. ”

“ Lucy. I don’t believe it would be anything; do you, Miss Anne?
Miss Anne. I don’t know anything about it. I should not think that Royal would break his promise.
Lucy. He does break his promises. He won’t mend old Margaret’s nose.
Royal. Well, Lucy, that is because my46 putty has all dried up. I am going to do it, just as soon as I can get any more putty.
Lucy. And that makes me think about the thing in your cap. I mean to ask Miss Anne if you did not tell a falsehood. He said there was something in his cap, and there was nothing in it at all. ”

“ In our state of life, Lucy, we cannot, like the happy country maid, give our hand at once where our heart is given, and seldom--seldom through ages, is it the lot of woman to find so happy a fate as mine, where the first lot I drew was the chief prize of the whole world--he whom alone my heart could ever love, and he who was destined to return it well.--He loves you, Lucy, I think,--this young captive lord? ”

“ James went, forgiven, to his Bishops and Deans, and to lunch with his Johnny Mallet and the tufted. Lucy, her household duties done, arrayed herself for the tulips of the Park.
The grey watches of the night with their ache and moments of panic, the fever and fret, the wearing down of rage and emptying of wonder [Pg 140] and dismay, the broken snatches of dream-sleep, and the heavy slumber which exhaustion finally gave her—all this had brought downstairs, to be kissed, embraced and forgiven, a Lucy disillusioned and tired to death, but schooled to patience. ”

“ So Lucy had her little scarlet flannel dressing gown on, and her shoes and stockings, and a wonderful old knitted hood with a tippet to it, and then she was rolled round and round in all her bed-clothes, and Mrs. Bunker took her up like a very big baby, not letting any one else touch her. How Mrs. Bunker got safe down all the stairs no one can tell, but she did, and into the fly, and there poor little Lucy looked back and saw at the windows Mamma's face, and Papa's, and Maude's, and all the rest, all nodding and smiling to her, but Maude was crying all the time, and perhaps Mamma was too. ”

“ No, indeed! We meet at home, and out of doors," said Lucy; "my friend Annie and I walk together."
"Walk together! what, in the street? Shocking! You cannot be a lady."
"Indeed I am," said Lucy, coloring up. "My papa is a gentleman. And see how many books we have, and how much we have to learn! French, and music, and sums, and grammar, and history, and geography."
"I WILL not be a Frank! No, no! I will not learn," said the alarmed Amina on hearing this catalogue poured forth.
"Geography is very nice," said Lucy; "here are our maps. I will show you where you live. ”

“ Look! That way we shall see it come; these two mirrors reflect everything up and down the street."
"Are you dressed for church?" asked Lucy. "You have no hat on."
"Where does your grace come from not to know that a mantilla is what is fit for church? Mamma is being dressed in her black silk and her black mantilla."
"And your shoes?"
"I could not wear great, coarse, hard shoes," said the little Doña Iñes; "it would spoil my feet. Ah! I shall have time to show the Senorita what I can do. Can your grace dance?"
"I danced with Uncle Joe at our last Christmas party," said Lucy, with great dignity. ”

“ Omar, the colour of new boxwood or old ivory, pale, with eyes like a cow, full lips, full chin and short nose, not the least negro, but perfectly Egyptian, the eyes wide apart—unlike the Arab—moustache like a woman’s eyebrow, curly brown hair, bad hands and feet and not well made, but graceful in movement and still more in countenance, very inferior in beauty to the pure Arab blood which prevails here, but most sweet in expression. ”

“ Which is his real mother Lucy cannot quite make out, for she sees an immense party of black women, all shiny and polished, with a great many beads wound round their heads, necks, ankles, and wrists; and nothing besides the tiniest short petticoats: and all the fattest are the smartest; indeed, they have gourds of milk beside them, and are drinking it all day long to keep themselves fat. No sooner however is Lucy led in among them, than they all close round, some singing and dancing, and others laughing for joy, and crying, "Welcome, little daughter from the land of spirits!" ”

“ GETTING LOST. One afternoon, a short time after dinner, Lucy was sitting upon a seat under a trellis, near the door which led towards the garden, when her mother came out.
“Lucy,” said she, “I have got some rather bad news for you.”
“What is it?” said Lucy.
“I am rather afraid to tell you, for fear it will make you cry.”
“O no, mother; I shall not cry,” said Lucy.
“Well,” said her mother, “we shall see. The news is, that we are all going away this afternoon, and are going to leave you at home.”
“What, all alone?” said Lucy.
“Not quite alone; for Joanna will be here,” said her mother. ”

“ True! women there are (self-named women of mind!) Who love rather liberty—liberty, yes! To choose and to leave—than the legalized stress Of the lovingest marriage. But she—is she so? I will not believe it. Lucile! O no, no! Not Lucile! "But the world? and, ah, what would it say? O the look of that man, and his laughter, to-day! The gossip's light question! the slanderous jest! She is right! no, we could not be happy. 'Tis best As it is. I will write to her—write, O my heart! And accept her farewell. OUR farewell! must we part— Part thus, then—forever, Lucile? ”