THE COMPLETE WORKS OF ÉMILE ZOLA. Эмиль Золя
it?”
“Ask the waves,” the young woman answered, with a laugh.
She held out her hands to Marius, who kissed them passionately. It was now quite dark, and the dull moan of the sea lingered voluptuously in the gloom. The young man bent over the young woman and their lips met. Then they talked as lovers do, in the puerile way of children, going from recollections of the past to projects for the future. Their voices were a music which caressed them, and they talked to hear each other speak, to feel one another’s warm breath play about their faces. They were so happy in the obscurity, in face of the infinite which lay open before them!
“Listen,” said Fine, “we will get married when your brother is free. Philippe must be placed in safety first.”
At the mention of Philippe’s name, Marius shuddered. He had forgotten his brother. The sad reality rose before him. For two hours he had been living in the seventh heaven, and now he had fallen back to the earth from the height of his dream.
“Philippe,” he murmured despondently, “yes, we must think of him. O heavens! is my happiness already dead? You love my brother, do you not? For mercy’s sake, tell me the truth.”
Fine said nothing, but burst into sobs. The young man’s words were breaking her heart. In his despair, he pressed for an answer, and at last the flower-girl cried:
“I love you because you are good, because you know how to love. So you see well enough that I cannot love Philippe.”
There was such a burst of faith and love in this cry that Marius at last understood. He placed his arms around her in a sudden transport of adoration. And then he had a slight feeling of remorse.
“We are happy,” he observed, “and egotistical. Whilst we are breathing here the free air of heaven, our brother is pining in prison. Ah! we know not how to work for his deliverance.”
“Yes, you’ll see!” Fine replied. “You’ll see what one can do, when one’s in love and loved in return.”
They remained hand in hand, without saying another word, while the sea continued to lull their love with its monotonous voice. The stars were shining brightly as they reentered Marseille, their hearts full of their young hopes and affection.
CHAPTER X
HOSTILITIES ARE RENEWED
BLANCHE passed her days in tears. The autumn was giving a pale hue to the melancholy horizon, the season was becoming cold and dreary. Chill blasts stirred the sea whose voice had changed into a wail, whilst the trees were casting their leaves upon the ground. Beneath the mournful nudity of the heavens lay the bareness of the sea and shore.
This sadness of the air, this last farewell of summer spread over Blanche’s surroundings the despair which already filled her heart. She led a retired life in the little house by the shore. It was situated a short distance from the village of Saint Henri, stood alone upon a cliff and overlooked the sea which beat against the rocks beneath the windows. Blanche would spend whole days together watching and listening to the waves, whose constant noise soothed her sufferings. This was her sole diversion; she followed with her eyes the great sheets of foam which broke and leapt into the air; her aching being found relief in presence of the mild and monotonous immensity.
Occasionally of an evening she would go out, accompanied by her companion. She would descend to the seashore and seat herself on a fragment of rock. The cool night breeze calmed the fever that was consuming her. She would linger in the darkness, deafened by the breaking of the waves upon the beach, and not return home until she was shivering with the cold. The same thought was ever oppressing her. At each succeeding hour it was there, overwhelming, inexorable. In the chilliness of the night or the warmth of the day, in presence of the infinite or before the void of darkness, Blanche thought of Philippe and her unborn babe.
Fine was her great consoler. If the flower-girl had not consented to spend the Sunday afternoons with her, the poor young creature would have died of despair. She felt an imperious need of confiding her grief to some kind soul. Solitude frightened her; for, when she found herself alone again, her remorse rose before her like a spectre and filled her with terror. Directly Fine arrived, they both went up to a little room where they shut themselves in to talk and weep undisturbed. The window stood open, and far away, on the blue velvet of the sea, white sails would pass like messengers of hope. And, on each occasion, the same tears were shed, the same words spoken, heartrending and pathetic.
“Oh! how gloomy life is,” said Blanche. “I’ve been thinking all day of the hours I passed with Philippe among the rocks of Jaumegarde and the Infernets. I ought to have killed myself in those gulfs, have fallen down some precipice.”
“Why be always weeping, ever regretting?” Fine gently replied. “You’re no longer a little girl, and have sacred duties to fulfil. For heaven’s sake, think of the present, and no longer linger in an ever irreparable past. You will end by making yourself ill, by killing your child.”
Blanche shuddered.
“Kill my child!” she resumed, amidst her sobs. “Do not say that. The child must live to atone for my transgression and obtain my pardon. Ah! Philippe was right when he said that I should belong to him for ever. Though I denied him, I have vainly tried to tear the memory of him from my heart. My pride has been crushed, and I have been obliged to yield to the love filled with remorse which is torturing me. And, today, I love Philippe more than ever I did before, with all my regrets and all my despair.”
Fine said nothing. She would have liked to have seen Blanche stronger and prepared for the difficult task maternity was about to bring her. But Mademoiselle de Cazalis was always the poor, weak creature who could do nothing but cry. The flower-girl determined to act herself when the time came.
“If you knew,” continued Blanche, “how I suffer when you’re not here! I feel Philippe torturing me: he lives again in my child, and is ever with me, reproaching me with my perjury. He is always before me, or about me. I can see him on his pallet, in his cell, I hear him complaining and cursing me. I would I had no heart, then I might live in peace.”
“Come, you must be calm,” said Fine.
With such despair consolation is often powerless. The young woman assisted with a certain terror at these scenes of distress. She studied Blanche’s shattered love like a physician studies some strange and terrible malady, and said to herself: “That is how one suffers, that is what one becomes, when one loves timidly.”
One day, when in one of her fits of despair, Blanche said in a broken voice, with her eyes fixed upon her companion:
“You are going to marry him, are you not?”
Fine did not at first understand Blanche, who added hastily:
“Hide nothing from me. I would rather know all. You are a good girl and will make him happy, and I prefer to see him married to you than to know he is gadding about Marseille. When I am dead, tell him that I always loved him.”
And she burst into sobs. The flower-girl gently took her hands.
“I beg you,” she said, “think no more of your lover, but think of your child. If possible, forget everything for it. Besides, be easy, I shall never marry Philippe, though I may become his sister — “
“His sister?” interrupted Mademoiselle de Cazalis.
“Yes,” answered Fine, smiling sweetly as she thought of Marius. “I love and am beloved.”
And she told her the story of her love, appeasing her fever by speaking to her of Marius. As she listened to the recital of this peaceful courtship, Blanche’s tears fell less fast. From that day forth, she loved Fine far more; she felt only a faint sadness when thinking of Philippe, and determined to devote herself to her child. True love, the devoted generous love of her friend had entered her heart.
Sometimes, Fine found Abbé Chastanier in the little house on the cliff. The priest took Blanche the