LET US tell what became of the Countess de Charny, while the scene we have described took place between the count and the queen—that scene which crushed so painfully a long series of griefs.
In the first place, to us who know the secrets of her heart, it is easy to see what she suffered on account of the absence of Isidor.
She trembled, because the great project would be either an escape or a failure. If it succeeded, she knew well enough the devotion of the count to his sovereigns, to be aware that, when they were in exile, he would never quit them. If it failed, she knew Charny's courage well enough to be sure that he would struggle to the last moment, as long as hope remained, and even when it was gone, against any imaginable obstacles.
As soon as Isidor had bade her adieu, the countess had her eye constantly open to seize every light, her ear constantly attentive to perceive every noise.
On the next day, she, with the rest of the people of Paris, learned that the king and royal family had left the city during the night. No accident had made the departure remarkable. As there was a flight, Charny knew of it, and had therefore left her.
She uttered a profound sigh—knelt, and prayed for a happy return.
Then, for two days, all Paris remained mute and silent, and without an echo. On the morning of the third day an echo pervaded all Paris. The king had been arrested at Varennes.
M. de Bouille, it was said, had followed and attacked the royal escort, and after the contest had retired, leaving the king in the hands of the people.
Charny had participated in this contest, she knew. He would be the last to retire, if he had not remained on the field of battle.
Then it was said that one of the three guardsmen who had accompanied the king had been killed.
Then the name transpired; hut none knew if it were Count Isidor or Olivier de Charny.
For the two days during which this question was undecided she suffered inexpressible anguish.
At last the return of the king and royal family was announced for Saturday the 26th.
Calculating time and space by the ordinary measure, the king should be in Paris before noon. If he came by the most direct route, he would enter Paris through the Faubourg St. Martin.
At eleven o'clock, Madame de Charny, in a costume of the greatest simplicity, and with a veil over her face, went to the harrier.
At that hour, the first waves of the crowd passing before her announced that the king was going around Paris, and would enter the city through the Champs Elysees.
She had to pass through the whole city, and pass through it on foot. None dared to drive through the compact crowd which filled the streets. Never since the taking of the Bastille had the Boulevard been so encumbered.
Andree did not hesitate, but crossing the Champs Elysees, was one of the first to reach the barrier.
She waited there three hours!—three mortal hours!
At last the cortege appeared: we have described how and in what order it marched.
Andree saw the carriage pass. She uttered a cry of joy, for she saw Charny on the seat. A cry which seemed an echo to her own, had it not been a cry of grief, replied.
Andree hurried towards the side whence came the cry. A young girl was struggling in the arms of three or four persons who sought to assist her. She seemed the prey of violent despair.
Perhaps Andree would have bestowed more attention to the young girl if she had not heard muttered around her all possible imprecations against the three men who sat on the royal coach.
The wrath of the people would be expended on them. They would be the rams to replace the great royal sacrifice; they would be torn to pieces as soon as the carriage approached and halted.
Charny was one of the three men.
Andree resolved to find out what she should do in order to enter the garden of the Tuileries. She had to pass around the whole crowd to go to the bank of the river—that is to say, along the Quai de la Conference, and, if possible, reach that of the Tuileries.
After many attempts, and running the risk of being crushed twenty times, she passed the gate. Such a crowd, however, pressed round the place where the carriage was to stop, that she could not reach the front rank.
Andree thought that from the terrace above the water she would be able to see everything, though the distance would be too great to enable her to distinguish anything certainly and surely. It mattered not; she would see and hear as well as she could; and that was better than not seeing or hearing at all.
She then ascended the terrace on the bank of the river. She could see the seat of the coach, Charny and the two guardsmen.
Had she but known that at that very moment Charny pressed her letter to his bosom, and his thought offered her the last sigh which he would ever exhale!
At last the carriage paused amid cries, howlings, and clamours. Almost immediately there was a loud cry around the carriage, a great motion and tumult. Bayonets, pikes, and sabres were lifted: one might almost think a harvest of steel was rising after a storm. The three men were thrown from the sent, and disappeared as if they had been cast into a gulf. There was such an excitement in this multitude that its outer ranks were pushed back and broke against the wall sustaining the terrace.
Andree was wrapped in a veil of anguish; she saw and heard nothing. She cast herself panting, with outstretched arms and inarticulate sounds, amid the terrible concert composed of maledictions, cries, and blasphemies.
She could no longer render an account of what passed; the earth turned, the heavens became red, a murmur like that of the sea sounded in her ears. She then fell half fainting, knowing that she lived only by her sufferings.
An impression of freshness recalled her to consciousness. A woman applied a handkerchief dipped in the water of the Seine to her brow, while another applied a bottle of Seine water to her lips.
She remembered that the second woman was the one whom, like herself, she had seen dying at the barrier, and by the unknown bonds of grief seemed attached to her.
When she returned to herself, the first word was, “Are they dead?”
Compassion is quick-sighted. Those who surrounded Andree at once understood that she referred to the three men, the lives of whom had been so cruelly menaced.
“No!” said they, “they are saved!”
“Oh Lord, be praised! where are they?”
And lifting herself up, shaking her head with a wild eye, the young woman left by the gate on the bank to re-enter by the wicket of the Louvre.
She fancied that on that side the crowd would be less compact, and she was right. The Rue des Orties was almost empty. She crossed the corner of the Place du Carousel, and hurried to the gate. The porter knew the countess, for he had seen her go in and out during the two or three days after the return from Versailles. He had then seen her leave to return no more, on the day she had taken away Sebastian.
The keeper of the gate promised to obtain information for her. Passing through the interior corridors, he soon reached the centre of the castle. The three officers were saved, and M. de Charny had gone safely to his room. A quarter of an hour after, he left his room in the uniform of a naval officer, and had gone to the queen, where he still was.
Andree gave her purse to the man who had given her such news, and panting and overcome, asked for a glass of water.
She thanked the good man, and returned to Rue Coq Heron.
When there, she sank, not on a chair or a sofa, but on her prie-Dieu.
She did not pray with her month. There are moments when gratitude to God is so great that words fail us—then the arms, eyes, body and heart all rush to heaven.
She was plunged in that happy ecstasy when she heard the door open; she returned slowly, not understanding this earthly noise which came to seek her in the depth of her reverie.
Her femme de chambre was standing lost in obscurity. Beside the woman stood a shadow of undecided form, but to which her instinct at once gave a name.
“M. le Comte de Charny, “said the femme de chambre.
Andree wished to look up, but her strength failed her, and she sank again on the cushion, and, half turning round, rested her arm on the front of the prie-Dieu.
Andree made a sign which the woman understood. She got out of the doorway to suffer Charny to pass, and closed the door.
Charny and the countess were alone.
“They told me that you had come home, madame; am I indiscreet in having followed you so closely?”
“No,” said she, with a trembling voice, “no, sir, you are welcome. I was so uneasy, that I went out to ascertain what was going on.”
“In the morning. I went first to the Barriere St. Martin, and to the Champs Elysees; there I saw—I saw—“she hesitated—“I saw the king and royal family; I saw you, and I was for the time comforted; I was afraid that you would be in danger in your descent from the carriage. I then went into the garden of the Tuileries. Oh! I thought I should die.”
“Yes,” said Charny, “the crowd was very great; you must have been almost crushed and stifled.”
“No,” said Andree, shaking her head, “it was not that! At last I inquired and learned that you were saved; I returned here, and you see, I was thanking God on my knees.”
“As you are on your knees, madame, I beg you will not rise until you have prayed God for my poor brother.”
“Isidor! Ah!” said Andree, “then it was him, poor young man.”
She let her head fall on her two hands.
Charny advanced, and looked with an expression of deep sadness and melancholy at this chaste and tearful creature. His heart was also filled with commiseration, mildness, and pity. He felt, also, something like a repressed desire to explain himself. Had not the queen said, or rather suffered to escape her, that she loved him?
Her prayer being finished, the countess turned around. “He is dead?” said she.
“Dead; yes, madame, like poor Georges, for the same cause, and discharging the same duty.”
“And amid the great grief caused by a brother's death, you had yet time to think of me?” said Andree, in a voice so feeble that her words were scarcely intelligible.
“Madame,” said he, “did you not charge my brother with a commission for me—with a letter?”
“Monsieur?” said Andree, shuddering.
“After the death of poor Isidor, his papers were given me, and among them your letter.”
“You read it,” said Andree, hiding her face in her hands; “ah!”
“Madame, I was to know its contents only in case I was wounded, and you see I am safe and sound.”
“Is here untouched, as you gave it to Isidor.”
“Oh,” murmured Andree, taking the letter, “you have acted well, or rather cruelly.”
Charny opened his arms, and took the hand of Andree with both of his. Andree sought to withdraw hers. Charny insisted, and uttered a sigh almost of terror. Powerless, however, herself, she left her damp, humid hands in Charny's.
Then, embarrassed, not knowing how to extricate herself from the glance of Charny, which was fixed on her as she knelt at the prie-Dieu:
“Yes, I understand,” said she, “and you have come to give me the letter.”
“For that purpose, madame, and also for another; I have, countess, to beseech you to pardon me.”
Andree's heart beat quickly; it was the first time he had preceded the word countess by madame.
He pronounced the whole phrase with an intonation of infinite sweetness.
“Pardon from me, count?—why? for what?”
“For the way I have acted towards you for six years.”
Andree looked at him with great surprise. “Did I ever complain, monsieur?” she said.
“No, madame; because you are an angel.”
Andree's eyes became suffused, in spite of herself, and the tears quivered on her lids.
“You weep, Andree?” said Charny.
“Ah!” said Andree, bursting into tears, “forgive me, sir, but I am not used to hear you speak thus.”
She threw herself on a sofa, and hid her face. After a moment, she withdrew her hands, shook her head, and said, “Really, I am mad!”
She paused; while her hands were before her face, Charny had knelt before her.
“You at my feet? you on your knees to me?” said she.
“Did I not say, Andree, that I had come to beg your pardon?''
“On your knees!—at my feet!” said she, as if she could not believe the impressions received from her own senses.
“Andree,” said Charny, “you withdrew your hands.”
He reached out his hand again to the young woman. She shrank back, however, with an expression of terror. “What means this?'' said she.
Andree placed her hand on her heart, and uttered a ci-y. Then, rising as if a spring had been beneath her feet, and clasping her temples in her hands, she said: “He loves me!—he loves me!” repeated she; “it is impossible!”
“Say, Andree, that it is impossible for you to love me, but not for me to worship you.”
She looked down on Charny, as if to be sure that he spoke the truth; the great black eyes of the count told much more than his words had said. Andree, who might have doubted his words, could not doubt his looks.
“Ah,” murmured she, “my God! my God! was ever any one so unhappy as I am?”
“Andree,” said Charny, “tell me that you love me, or if not, say at least that you do not hate me.”
And then her calm limpid eyes suffered a double light to escape them.
“Oh, sir, you would not be unjust, to take for hatred the feeling you inspire me with.”
“If it be not hatred, Andree, if it be not love, what is it?”
“It is not love, for you will not suffer me to love you. Did you not hear me say just now that I was the most unfortunate being alive? And why is it not permitted you to love me? Did you not hear me say, just now, that I was the most unfortunate woman on earth?”
“And why may you not love me, Andree, when I love you with all my heart?”
“Ah! I would not have you do that, because I dare not say why,” said Andree, wringing her hands.
“But,” said Charny, speaking in a yet kinder tone, “if what you will not and cannot, another person has told me?”
Andree placed her hands on Charny's shoulder.
“What if I knew?” said Charny.
“And if, on account of that very misfortune, I thought you more interesting—if that very misfortune made you more attractive, and induced me to tell you that I loved you'(”
“If so, sir, you would be the noblest and most interesting of men!”
“I love you, And rue,” said Charny. “I love you! I love you!”
“Oh!” said Andree, looking to heaven, “I did not know there could be such joy in the world!”
“But tell me, Andree, that you love me!” said Charny.
“No! no! I dare not! but read this letter, which was to be given you only at your death!”
She gave him the letter he had returned to her.
Andrew covered her face with her Lands, while Charny broke the seal of the letter, read the first lines, uttered a cry, and then clasped Andree to his heart.
“Since the day you saw me, for six years; how, oh! blessed creature! can I atone for the sufferings I have caused you?”
“My God!” said Andree, bending like a reed beneath the weight of such happiness, “if this be a dream, let me never awake, or die when I do!”
And now let us forget the happy, to return to those who suffer, who struggle, or who hate; perhaps their evil fate will forget them, as we have forgotten them.
