Madelene

“ Only those who realize how powerful is the influence of intimate association will appreciate what an effect living with Madelene had upon Arthur's character—in withering the ugly in it, in developing its quality, and in directing its strength.
When Scarborough gave Arthur his "chance," Madelene took it as the matter of course. "I'm sorry it has come so soon," said she, "and in just this way. But it couldn't have been delayed long. With so much to be done and so few able or willing to do it, the world can't wait long enough for a man really to ripen. ”

“ I won't!... And, Ebenezer, she's bad, she is! She's going to have a—"
Frederick wheeled around desperately. Madelene was placing him at the extreme of his endurance. Human nature could bear no more.
"Oh, my God, such a woman!" he exclaimed.
"There, you see!" gasped Madelene. "He won't listen to a thing against her, and he's been acting as guilty as he could all the way home.... No wonder I don't believe a word he says!"
Mrs. Waldstricker picked up her work, folded it, and laid it on the table.
"But, Madelene, it's so bewildering," she exclaimed. ”

“ No, Madelene, till she is old enough to understand the whole—and I agree with you that till she has come really to know you and Ermine, it may be best to avoid explanations—I think the less society she sees the better. And one outlay I will not object to for her—let her have a few thoroughly good lessons, the best you can get; it will give her occupation, and at the same time fit her to be independent—should the worst come to the worst so to speak? ”

“ A man that could write that letter, couldn't run away. The last sentence in his letter proved that. It said: "Remember, dear Madelene, that somewhere, somehow, I am thinking of you always; that whether you see me or not, you will some day come to know that I love your soul, not your face; that your life is dear to me, and no calamity can make any difference." ”

“ It is only Madelene—I don’t even feel sure that Ermine herself wants it. She, I must say, always seems pleased to put me forward. I’ll never forget Madelene’s face when she saw whom I was dancing with that evening at the Manor.” Madelene however did not seem as devoid of interest in her young sister, as Ella in her present mood would have liked to imagine. One of the prettiest of the frocks she had brought with her from her aunt’s, was looked out and revived by Mélanie’s skilful hands, under Miss St Quentin’s own supervision, and Ermine herself assisted at Ella’s toilet. ”

“ By night Madelene had decided upon a farm near the village of Epernon.
"We can get in to the city to shop, Marie," she told her maid. "But Mr. Graves simply can't stand the hot weather in town."
"He does look sick and worried, ma'am, doesn't he?" agreed the maid.
Twenty-four hours later Frederick and Madelene were settled in a pretty villa nestled at the edge of the140 forest. Nature in its noblest expression surrounded them. At the going down of the sun, Madelene stood beside her husband on the porch, and pressed her cheek fondly against his shoulder. ”

“ Ermine went on. “But I am afraid she has a very fiery temper, Maddie.”
“Fiery, perhaps, but I hope not sulky or ungenerous,” said Madelene. “The difficulty will be to carry out papa’s wishes without rousing her ill-will. He is so determined that we are not to spoil her, and, in some ways, no doubt, she is spoilt already, and it will make it much more difficult to—at all put her back, as it were. I quite agree with papa about giving her plenty of occupation; she has lots of energy and I fancy she is clever.” ”

“ It was nearly dark when the Coombesthorpe carriage, which had been sent to the Manor to fetch the two sisters, drove up to their own door. Ella who had spent the afternoon in restless Sittings about the house, unable to settle to anything and anticipating half nervously the meeting with Madelene and Ermine, was in the hall to receive them.
“Will you go to papa?” she said gently. “He is anxious to see you—he is a good deal better. I shall have tea ready for you in the library in a quarter of an hour, if that will do.” ”

“ That night he lingered behind the others when they dispersed for the night, and went up to Madelon and threw an arm around her, and laid his cheek against hers. “Oh, Madelon, I wish—” he began, and then he caught his breath, and his cheek against hers was wet, and Madelon turned and comforted him, as a woman will turn and comfort a man for even his pity for her sorrow.
“There is no need for you to fret,” she said, with a sort of gentle authority, as if she had been his mother. “I've got my life to live, and I've got strength enough to live it. I shall do well enough.” ”

“ Hitherto his life had passed amid the sombre shades of domestic life, and with all Madeline’s noble traits of character, she lacked the tact, so truly feminine, which enables a woman to throw sunshine around the humblest home. The cheerful song, the pleasant jest, the merry voice, the bright smile, the buoyant step—all the lighter graces without which a woman’s character, however elevated and noble, is but as a Corinthian column without its capital, or as a rose without its perfume—were wanting to the unbending nature of Madeline. ”

“ Madeline had been his great ambition; and when that had fallen, all the others had fallen with it, even to the dust. He simply did his duty, whatever it might be, as well as in him lay, without fear of blame or hope of praise—shunning men, and never, if he could avoid it, speaking to a woman, content to earn his livelihood, and for the rest rendered colourless by his secret and pathetic passion.
And now it appeared that Madeline was a widow, which meant—and his heart beat fast at the thought—that she was a free woman. Madeline was a free woman, and he was within a few minutes' walk of her. ”

“ Madeline assents. She sits in the window allowing the widow to stroke her feverishly burning hand; but as that strange drowsiness oppresses her more and more, she goes to bed and falls into a heavy slumber.
When she awakens it is broad day; a figure dressed in black is bending above her, holding a tray. Madeline rubs her eyes—then, looking through a mist which seems to obscure her sight, she recognises the pale, bloodless features of Madame de Fontenay; she looks round the room, everything is misted; she rises in bed, and finds she can scarcely sit up. ”

“ Their eyes were slyly keen upon Dorothy Fair, softly wrapped in her blue wadded silk and swan's-down, holding up her head with gentle state in the parson's pew; upon Burr Gordon, somewhat pale and moody in his smart Sunday coat; and Madelon, up in the singing-seats. They never, in those days, saw Madelon elsewhere. She went to meeting every Sabbath day and sang as usual, but between the hymns she sat with her beautiful face as irresponsive to all around her as a painted portrait, and more so, for the eyes of a portrait will often seem to follow an ardent gazer. ”

“ So, before all the decencies of Hendrik had recovered from the shock of the Hoop, she threw them into a new and worse "conniption" by an even more daring innovation upon their good, easy notions of her; for the next thing she did was—a basque and flounces. Thus it happened:—
Madeline had become quite another Madeline,—say a Magdalen, rather, —under the gentle discipline of her admirable angel. Her wonted distraction had subsided into a pensive sadness, which manifested itself in many a grateful, graceful tenderness toward that glorifier of the skimped delaine. ”

“ Very pretty it was, as well as pitiful, to see Madeline (whom we shall call by her assumed name no longer) lead the little man to the garden seat, sit by his side, hold his hand, and look fondly in his eyes, as she questioned him, lifting his rough hand to kiss it from time to time. The weight of years, the burden of sorrow, had rolled away from her in a moment, and she was a child again, while the heaven that ‘bends above us in our infancy’ was opening over her—bright, tranquil, peaceful, and divine. ”

“ No, my Madeline; I have no doubt of your affection. When you loved such as me, I knew at once how blind, how devoted must be that love. You were not won through the usual avenues to a woman’s heart; neither wit nor gaiety, nor youth nor beauty, did you behold in me. Whatever attracted you towards me, that which must have been sufficiently powerful to make you overlook these ordinary allurements, will be also sufficiently enduring to resist all ordinary changes. But listen, Madeline. ”

“ I said, holding out my hand to Madeline; and leaning back in my chair with unaffected weariness, at least. "Is Mr. Rollin down stairs?"
"They call him that, I believe," said Madeline, sententiously; "things don't always get their right names in this world."
"Well, you may tell him," I said; "that I can't see him."
Madeline's countenance changed wonderfully in an instant. She gave me a bright look, and without waiting for another word, ran down the stairs. ”

“ So it was speedily settled, and Madeline was soon installed, as an informal boarder, in the De Berny household, having a little room upstairs next to the gorgeous chamber occupied by Mademoiselle Mathilde.
The grief of childhood heals quickly, and with childhood’s inquisitiveness Madeline was soon busy observing the manners and customs of her new friends. Though her heart was still wild and weary, and though every night she sobbed as she thought of her happy home at Grayfleet, hers was too quick and keen a nature to be quite deadened by its sorrow. ”

“ He takes her hand, bends over it, and kisses it—and leaves the girl alone.
For a time Madeline stands quite still, stupefied by the very intensity of her relief. She rests her elbow on the mantelpiece, drops her cheeks upon her hands, and fixes her eyes upon the windows, as if to watch the slowly gathering gloom. She feels no self-pity; on the events which will probably transpire on the morrow her imagination refuses to dwell; she can think only of M’sieur Belleisle—of his goodness, his self-sacrifice, his devotion. ”

“ Madelon Hautville, opposite her, in her snow-powdered cloak, with her face like a flash of white fire in her snow-powdered silk hood, seemed in comparison a female of another and an older race. She might well, from the look of her, have come a nearer and straighter road from the inmost heart of things, from the unpruned tangle of woods and undammed course of streams, from all primitive and untempered love and passion and religion, than this gentlewoman formed upon the models of creeds and scholars. ”

“ It was certainly not such a home as one would picture as the abode of the queen of the night; for White, whose circumstances had never been affluent, had been brought lower than ever of late through the demands made upon him by Madeline, whom it had been necessary to fit out superbly before she could be presented to the gaze of the world. Still, poor as they were, the rooms were dear to Madeline, and as she entered them she felt stealing over her a sense of security and peace which she had not experienced all that evening before. ”

“ To think that when she was rising so rapidly she could throw herself away upon a man who only betrayed her; that she should cause her father to die of a broken heart, and bring me to this!’ As Madeline listened she sank into a chair, and let her weary head rest upon her hands. Her face was paler than it had been before, and Madame de Berny looking at her saw that a look of terrible sadness, which she had often noticed before, was creeping again into her eyes. ”

“ Madeline’s tears were rarely seen; Madeline was always bright, cheery, almost gay, at the very worst of times; and now came a reaction, and she was weeping as he had never seen any one weep before.
“Don’t, Maddie, don’t,” he whispered, feebly stroking her hair; “you will be better without me, though you don’t think so now. You are young—only nineteen—many bright days may be in store for you. I will leave you contentedly, if your father has come home. The greatest horror I have ever known will be lifted from my mind. ”

“ How could she be pleased over her wedding-clothes if she did not love you? She does, Burr! She is a child—I can talk to her. I will make her. Let me go, Burr! You wait here, and not fret. Oh, how pale you look! I tell you, you shall have her, Burr!”
“I tell you, Madelon, she does not love me, and I will not have you go.”
Madelon stood looking at him, her face all at once changing curiously as if from some revelation from within. She remembered suddenly that old scene with Eugene, and a suspicion seized her. “There's somebody else!” she cried out, fiercely. “There's no truth in her. ”

“ Madelon kept glancing at him as she picked. Compunction and pity softened more and more her fiery heart, the more so since she felt the guilt of happiness in the face of the woe of another upon her. Finally she said, with that fond reversion to the little homely truths and waysides of life with which the feminine mind strives often to comfort, that she would put up for him a jug of her blackberry cordial, and furthermore that she hoped his cough was better. ”

“ If I had stayed in New York—’
‘Yes?’ said Madeline. ‘I shall wake up presently,’ she reflected, ‘and find that I have been dreaming melodrama.’ But that was a fantastic underscoring of her experience. She knew very well she was making it.
Mrs. Innes, again wrapped in astonished contemplation, did not reply. Then she jumped to her feet with a gesture that cast fortunes back into the lap of fate.
‘One thing is certain,’ she said; ‘I can’t do anything NOW, can I?’
Madeline laid hold of silence and made armour with it. At all events, she must have time to think. ”