Paz

III

Clemen­tine came home the next day, and the day af­ter that Paz be­held her again, more beau­ti­ful and grace­ful than ev­er. Af­ter din­ner, dur­ing which the count­ess treat­ed Paz with an air of per­fect in­dif­fer­ence, a lit­tle scene took place in the sa­lon be­tween the count and his wife when Thad­deus had left them. On pre­tence of ask­ing Adam's ad­vice, Thad­deus had left Mala­ga's let­ter with him, as if by mis­take.

“Poor Thad­deus!” said Adam, as Paz dis­ap­peared, “what a mis­for­tune for a man of his dis­tinc­tion to be the play­thing of the low­est kind of cir­cus-​rid­er. He will lose ev­ery­thing, and get low­er and low­er, and won't be rec­og­niz­able be­fore long. Here, read that,” added the count, giv­ing Mala­ga's let­ter to his wife.

Clemen­tine read the let­ter, which smelt of to­bac­co, and threw it from her with a look of dis­gust.

“Thick as the ban­dage is over his eyes,” con­tin­ued Adam, “he must have found out some­thing; Mala­ga tricked him, no doubt.”

“But he goes back to her,” said Clemen­tine, “and he will for­give her! It is for such hor­ri­ble wom­en as that that you men have in­dul­gence.”

“Well, they need it,” said Adam.

“Thad­deus used to show some de­cen­cy--in liv­ing apart from us,” she re­marked. “He had bet­ter go al­to­geth­er.”

“Oh, my dear an­gel, that's go­ing too far,” said the count, who did not want the death of the sin­ner.

Paz, who knew Adam thor­ough­ly, had en­joined him to se­cre­cy, pre­tend­ing to ex­cuse his dis­si­pa­tions, and had asked his friend to lend him a few thou­sand francs for Mala­ga.

“He is a very firm fel­low,” said Adam.

“How so?” asked Clemen­tine.

“Why, for hav­ing spent no more than ten thou­sand francs on her, and let­ting her send him that let­ter be­fore he would ask me for enough to pay her debts. For a Pole, I call that firm.”

“He will ru­in you,” said Clemen­tine, in the sharp tone of a Parisian wom­an, when she shows her fe­line dis­trusts.

“Oh, I know him,” said Adam; “he will sac­ri­fice Mala­ga, if I ask him.”

“We shall see,” re­marked the count­ess.

“If it is best for his own hap­pi­ness, I sha'n't hes­itate to ask him to leave her. Con­stantin says that since Paz has been with her he, sober as he is, has some­times come home quite ex­cit­ed. If he takes to in­tox­ica­tion I shall be just as grieved as if he were my own son.”

“Don't tell me any­thing more about it,” cried the count­ess, with a ges­ture of dis­gust.

Two days lat­er the cap­tain per­ceived in the man­ner, the tones of voice, but, above all, in the eyes of the count­ess, the ter­ri­ble re­sults of Adam's con­fi­dences. Con­tempt had opened a gulf be­tween the beloved wom­an and him­self. He was sud­den­ly plunged in­to the deep­est dis­tress of mind, for the thought gnawed him, “I have my­self made her de­spise me!” His own fol­ly stared him in the face. Life then be­came a bur­den to him, the very sun turned gray. And yet, amid all these bit­ter thoughts, he found again some mo­ments of pure joy. There were times when he could give him­self up whol­ly to his ad­mi­ra­tion for his mis­tress, who paid not the slight­est at­ten­tion to him. Hang­ing about in cor­ners at her par­ties and re­cep­tions, silent, all heart and eyes, he nev­er lost one of her at­ti­tudes, nor a tone of her voice when she sang. He lived in her life; he groomed the horse which SHE rode, he stud­ied the ways and means of that splen­did es­tab­lish­ment, to the in­ter­ests of which he was now more de­vot­ed than ev­er. These silent plea­sures were buried in his heart like those of a moth­er, whose heart a child nev­er knows; for is it know­ing any­thing un­less we know it all? His love was more per­fect than the love of Pe­trar­ch for Lau­ra, which found its ul­ti­mate re­ward in the trea­sures of fame, the tri­umph of the po­em which she had in­spired. Sure­ly the emo­tion that the Cheva­lier d'As­sas felt in dy­ing must have been to him a life­time of joy. Such emo­tions as these Paz en­joyed dai­ly,--with­out dy­ing, but al­so with­out the guer­don of im­mor­tal­ity.

But what is Love, that, in spite of all these in­ef­fa­ble de­lights, Paz should still have been un­hap­py? The Catholic re­li­gion has so mag­ni­fied Love that she has wed­ded it in­dis­sol­ubly to re­spect and no­bil­ity of spir­it. Love is there­fore at­tend­ed by those sen­ti­ments and qual­ities of which mankind is proud; it is rare to find true Love ex­ist­ing where con­tempt is felt. Thad­deus was suf­fer­ing from the wounds his own hand had giv­en him. The tri­al of his for­mer life, when he lived be­side his mis­tress, un­known, un­ap­pre­ci­at­ed, but gen­er­ous­ly work­ing for her, was bet­ter than this. Yes, he want­ed the re­ward of his virtue, her re­spect, and he had lost it. He grew thin and yel­low, and so ill with con­stant low fever that dur­ing the month of Jan­uary he was obliged to keep his bed, though he re­fused to see a doc­tor. Comte Adam be­came very un­easy about him; but the count­ess had the cru­el­ty to re­mark: “Let him alone; don't you see it is on­ly some Olympian trou­ble?” This re­mark, be­ing re­peat­ed to Thad­deus, gave him the courage of de­spair; he left his bed, went out, tried a few amuse­ments, and re­cov­ered his health.

About the end of Febru­ary Adam lost a large sum of mon­ey at the Jock­ey-​Club, and as he was afraid of his wife, he begged Thad­deus to let the sum ap­pear in the ac­counts as if he had spent it on Mala­ga.

“There's noth­ing sur­pris­ing in your spend­ing that sum on the girl; but if the count­ess finds out that I have lost it at cards I shall be low­ered in her opin­ion, and she will al­ways be sus­pi­cious in fu­ture.”

“Ha! this, too!” ex­claimed Thad­deus, with a sigh.

“Now, Thad­deus, if you will do me this ser­vice we shall be for­ev­er quits,--though, in­deed, I am your debtor now.”

“Adam, you will have chil­dren; don't gam­ble any more,” said Paz.

“So Mala­ga has cost us an­oth­er twen­ty thou­sand francs,” cried the count­ess, some time lat­er, when she dis­cov­ered this new gen­eros­ity to Paz. “First, ten thou­sand, now twen­ty more,--thir­ty thou­sand! the in­come of which is fif­teen hun­dred! the cost of my box at the Opera, and the whole for­tune of many a bour­geois. Oh, you Poles!” she said, gath­er­ing some flow­ers in her green­house; “you are re­al­ly in­com­pre­hen­si­ble. Why are you not fu­ri­ous with him?”

“Poor Paz is--”

“Poor Paz, poor Paz, in­deed!” she cried, in­ter­rupt­ing him, “what good does he do us? I shall take the man­age­ment of the house­hold my­self. You can give him the al­lowance he re­fused, and let him set­tle it as he likes with his Cir­cus.”

“He is very use­ful to us, Clemen­tine. He has cer­tain­ly saved over forty thou­sand francs this last year. And be­sides, my dear an­gel, he has man­aged to put a hun­dred thou­sand with Nucin­gen, which a stew­ard would have pock­et­ed.”

Clemen­tine soft­ened down; but she was none the less hard in her feel­ings to Thad­deus. A few days lat­er, she re­quest­ed him to come to that boudoir where, one year ear­li­er, she had been sur­prised in­to com­par­ing him with her hus­band. This time she re­ceived him alone, with­out per­ceiv­ing the slight­est dan­ger in so do­ing.

“My dear Paz,” she said, with the con­de­scend­ing fa­mil­iar­ity of the great to their in­fe­ri­ors, “if you love Adam as you say you do, you will do a thing which he will not ask of you, but which I, his wife, do not hes­itate to ex­act.”

“About Mala­ga?” said Thad­deus, with bit­ter­ness in his heart.

“Well, yes,” she said; “if you wish to end your days in this house and con­tin­ue good friends with us, you must give her up. How an old sol­dier--”

“I am on­ly thir­ty-​five, and haven't a white hair.”

“You look old,” she said, “and that's the same thing. How so care­ful a man­ag­er, so dis­tin­guished a--”

The hor­ri­ble part of all this was her ev­ident in­ten­tion to rouse a sense of hon­or in his soul which she thought ex­tinct.

“--so dis­tin­guished a man as you are, Thad­deus,” she re­sumed af­ter a mo­men­tary pause which a ges­ture of his hand had led her to make, “can al­low your­self to be caught like a boy! Your pro­ceed­ings have made that wom­an cel­ebrat­ed. My un­cle want­ed to see her, and he did see her. My un­cle is not the on­ly one; Mala­ga re­ceives a great many gen­tle­men. I did think you such a no­ble soul. For shame! Will she be such a loss that you can't re­place her?”

“Madame, if I knew any sac­ri­fice I could make to re­cov­er your es­teem I would make it; but to give up Mala­ga is not one--”

“In your po­si­tion, that is what I should say my­self, if I were a man,” replied Clemen­tine. “Well, if I ac­cept it as a great sac­ri­fice there can be no ill-​will be­tween us.”

Paz left the room, fear­ing he might com­mit some great fol­ly, and feel­ing that wild ideas were get­ting the bet­ter of him. He went to walk in the open air, light­ly dressed in spite of the cold, but with­out be­ing able to cool the fire in his cheeks or on his brow.

“I thought you had a no­ble soul,”--the words still rang in his ears.

“A year ago,” he said to him­self, “she thought me a hero who could fight the Rus­sians sin­gle-​hand­ed!”

He thought of leav­ing the ho­tel La­gin­ski, and tak­ing ser­vice with the spahis and get­ting killed in Africa, but the same great fear checked him. “With­out me,” he thought, “what would be­come of them? they would soon be ru­ined. Poor count­ess! what a hor­ri­ble life it would be for her if she were re­duced to even thir­ty thou­sand francs a year. No, since all is lost for me in this world,--courage! I will keep on as I am.”

Ev­ery one knows that since 1830 the car­ni­val in Paris has un­der­gone a trans­for­ma­tion which has made it Eu­ro­pean, and far more bur­lesque and oth­er­wise live­ly than the late Car­ni­val of Venice. Is it that the di­min­ish­ing for­tunes of the present time have led Parisians to in­vent a way of amus­ing them­selves col­lec­tive­ly, as for in­stance at their clubs, where they hold sa­lons with­out hostess­es and with­out man­ners, but very cheap­ly? How­ev­er this may be, the month of March was prodi­gal of balls, at which danc­ing, jok­ing, coarse fun, ex­cite­ment, grotesque fig­ures, and the sharp satire of Parisian wit, pro­duced ex­trav­agant ef­fects. These car­ni­val fol­lies had their spe­cial Pan­de­mo­ni­um in the rue Saint-​Hon­ore and their Napoleon in Musard, a small man born ex­press­ly to lead an or­ches­tra as noisy as the dis­or­der­ly au­di­ence, and to set the time for the ga­lop, that witch­es' dance, which was one of Auber's tri­umphs, for it did not re­al­ly take form or poesy till the grand ga­lop in “Gus­tave” was giv­en to the world. That tremen­dous fi­nale might serve as the sym­bol of an epoch in which for the last fifty years all things have hur­ried by with the ra­pid­ity of a dream.

Now, it hap­pened that the grave Thad­deus, with one di­vine and im­mac­ulate im­age in his heart, pro­posed to Mala­ga, the queen of the car­ni­val dances, to spend an evening at the Musard ball; be­cause he knew the count­ess, dis­guised to the teeth, in­tend­ed to come there with two friends, all three ac­com­pa­nied by their hus­bands, and look on at the cu­ri­ous spec­ta­cle of one of these crowd­ed balls.

On Shrove Tues­day, of the year 1838, at four o'clock in the morn­ing, the count­ess, wrapped in a black domi­no and sit­ting on the low­er step of the plat­form in the Baby­lo­ni­an hall, where Valenti­no has since then giv­en his con­certs, be­held Thad­deus, as Robert Macaire, thread­ing the ga­lop with Mala­ga in the dress of a sav­age, her head gar­nished with plumes like the horse of a hearse, and bound­ing through the crowd like a will-​o-​the-​wisp.

“Ah!” said Clemen­tine to her hus­band, “you Poles have no hon­or at all! I did be­lieve in Thad­deus. He gave me his word that he would leave that wom­an; he did not know that I should be here, see­ing all un­seen.”

A few days lat­er she re­quest­ed Paz to dine with them. Af­ter din­ner Adam left them alone to­geth­er, and Clemen­tine re­proved Paz and let him know very plain­ly that she did not wish him to live in her house any longer.

“Yes, madame,” said Paz, humbly, “you are right; I am a wretch; I did give you my word. But you see how it is; I put off leav­ing Mala­ga till af­ter the car­ni­val. Be­sides, that wom­an ex­erts an in­flu­ence over me which--”

“An in­flu­ence!--a wom­an who ought to be turned out of Musard's by the po­lice for such danc­ing!”

“I agree to all that; I ac­cept the con­dem­na­tion and I'll leave your house. But you know Adam. If I give up the man­age­ment of your prop­er­ty you must show en­er­gy your­self. I may have been to blame about Mala­ga, but I have tak­en the whole charge of your af­fairs, man­aged your ser­vants, and looked af­ter the very least de­tails. I can­not leave you un­til I see you pre­pared to con­tin­ue my man­age­ment. You have now been mar­ried three years, and you are safe from the temp­ta­tions to ex­trav­agance which come with the hon­ey­moon. I see that Parisian wom­en, and even ti­tled ones, do man­age both their for­tunes and their house­holds. Well, as soon as I am cer­tain not so much of your ca­pac­ity as of your per­se­ver­ance I shall leave Paris.”

“It is Thad­deus of War­saw, and not that Cir­cus Thad­deus who speaks now,” said Clemen­tine. “Go, and come back cured.”

“Cured! nev­er,” said Paz, his eyes low­ered and fixed on Clemen­tine's pret­ty feet. “You do not know, count­ess, what charm, what un­ex­pect­ed pi­quan­cy of mind she has.” Then, feel­ing his courage fail him, he added hasti­ly, “There is not a wom­an in so­ci­ety, with her minc­ing airs, that is worth the hon­est na­ture of that young an­imal.”

“At any rate, I wish noth­ing of the an­imal about me,” said the count­ess, with a glance like that of an an­gry viper.

Af­ter that evening Comte Paz showed Clemen­tine the ex­act state of her af­fairs; he made him­self her tu­tor, taught her the meth­ods and dif­fi­cul­ties of the man­age­ment of prop­er­ty, the prop­er prices to pay for things, and how to avoid be­ing cheat­ed by her ser­vants. He told her she could re­ly on Con­stantin and make him her ma­jor-​do­mo. Thad­deus had trained the man thor­ough­ly. By the end of May he thought the count­ess ful­ly com­pe­tent to car­ry on her af­fairs alone; for Clemen­tine was one of those far-​sight­ed wom­en, full of in­stinct, who have an in­nate ge­nius as mis­tress of a house­hold.

This po­si­tion of af­fairs, which Thad­deus had led up to nat­ural­ly, did not end with­out fur­ther cru­el tri­als; his suf­fer­ings were fat­ed not to be as sweet and ten­der as he was try­ing to make them. The poor lover for­got to reck­on on the haz­ard of events. Adam fell se­ri­ous­ly ill, and Thad­deus, in­stead of leav­ing the house, stayed to nurse his friend. His de­vo­tion was un­wea­ried. A wom­an who had any in­ter­est in em­ploy­ing her per­spi­cac­ity might have seen in this de­vo­tion a sort of pun­ish­ment im­posed by a no­ble soul to re­press an in­vol­un­tary evil thought; but wom­en see all, or see noth­ing, ac­cord­ing to the con­di­tion of their souls--love is their sole il­lu­mi­na­tor.

Dur­ing forty-​five days Paz watched and tend­ed Adam with­out ap­pear­ing to think of Mala­ga, for the very good rea­son that he nev­er did think of her. Clemen­tine, feel­ing that Adam was at the point of death though he did not die, sent for all the lead­ing doc­tors of Paris in con­sul­ta­tion.

“If he comes safe­ly out of this,” said the most dis­tin­guished of them all, “it will on­ly be by an ef­fort of na­ture. It is for those who nurse him to watch for the mo­ment when they must sec­ond na­ture. The count's life is in the hands of his nurs­es.”

Thad­deus went to find Clemen­tine and tell her this re­sult of the con­sul­ta­tion. He found her sit­ting in the Chi­nese pavil­ion, as much for a lit­tle rest as to leave the field to the doc­tors and not em­bar­rass them. As he walked along the wind­ing grav­elled path which led to the pavil­ion, Thad­deus seemed to him­self in the depths of an abyss de­scribed by Dante. The un­for­tu­nate man had nev­er dreamed that the pos­si­bil­ity might arise of be­com­ing Clemen­tine's hus­band, and now he had drowned him­self in a ditch of mud. His face was con­vulsed, when he reached the kiosk, with an agony of grief; his head, like Medusa's, con­veyed de­spair.

“Is he dead?” said Clemen­tine.

“They have giv­en him up; that is, they leave him to na­ture. Do not go in; they are still there, and Bian­chon is chang­ing the dress­ings.”

“Poor Adam! I ask my­self if I have not some­times pained him,” she said.

“You have made him very hap­py,” said Thad­deus; “you ought to be easy on that score, for you have shown ev­ery in­dul­gence for him.”

“My loss would be ir­repara­ble.”

“But, dear, you judged him just­ly.”

“I was nev­er blind to his faults,” she said, “but I loved him as a wife should love her hus­band.”

“Then you ought, in case you lose him,” said Thad­deus, in a voice which Clemen­tine had nev­er heard him use, “to grieve for him less than if you lost a man who was your pride, your love, and all your life,-- as some men are to you wom­en. Sure­ly you can be frank at this mo­ment with a friend like me. I shall grieve, too; long be­fore your mar­riage I had made him my child, I had sac­ri­ficed my life to him. If he dies I shall be with­out an in­ter­est on earth; but life is still beau­ti­ful to a wid­ow of twen­ty-​four.”

“Ah! but you know that I love no one,” she said, with the im­pa­tience of grief.

“You don't yet know what it is to love,” said Thad­deus.

“Oh, as hus­bands are, I have sense enough to pre­fer a child like my poor Adam to a su­pe­ri­or man. It is now over a month that we have been say­ing to each oth­er, 'Will he live?' and these al­ter­na­tions have pre­pared me, as they have you, for this loss. I can be frank with you. Well, I would give my life to save Adam. What is a wom­an's in­de­pen­dence in Paris? the free­dom to let her­self be tak­en in by ru­ined or dis­si­pat­ed men who pre­tend to love her. I pray to God to leave me this hus­band who is so kind, so oblig­ing, so lit­tle fault- find­ing, and who is be­gin­ning to stand in awe of me.”

“You are hon­est, and I love you the bet­ter for it,” said Thad­deus, tak­ing her hand which she yield­ed to him, and kiss­ing it. “In solemn mo­ments like these there is un­speak­able sat­is­fac­tion in find­ing a wom­an with­out hypocrisy. It is pos­si­ble to con­verse with you. Let us look to the fu­ture. Sup­pose that God does not grant your prayer,--and no one cries to him more than I do, 'Leave me my friend!' Yes, these fifty nights have not weak­ened me; if thir­ty more days and nights are need­ed I can give them while you sleep,--yes, I will tear him from death if, as the doc­tors say, nurs­ing can save him. But sup­pose that in spite of you and me, the count dies,--well, then, if you were loved, oh, adored, by a man of a heart and soul that are wor­thy of you--”

“I may have wished for such love, fool­ish­ly, but I have nev­er met with it.”

“Per­haps you are mis­tak­en--”

Clemen­tine looked fixed­ly at Thad­deus, imag­in­ing that there was less of love than of cu­pid­ity in his thoughts; her eyes mea­sured him from head to foot and poured con­tempt up­on him; then she crushed him with the words, “Poor Mala­ga!” ut­tered in tones which a great la­dy alone can find to give ex­pres­sion to her dis­dain. She rose, leav­ing Thad­deus half un­con­scious be­hind her, slow­ly re-​en­tered her boudoir, and went back to Adam's cham­ber.

An hour lat­er Paz re­turned to the sick-​room, and be­gan anew, with death in his heart, his care of the count. From that mo­ment he said noth­ing. He was forced to strug­gle with the pa­tient, whom he man­aged in a way that ex­cit­ed the ad­mi­ra­tion of the doc­tors. At all hours his watch­ful eyes were like lamps al­ways light­ed. He showed no re­sent­ment to Clemen­tine, and lis­tened to her thanks with­out ac­cept­ing them; he seemed both dumb and deaf. To him­self he was say­ing, “She shall owe his life to me,” and he wrote the thought as it were in let­ters of fire on the walls of Adam's room. On the fif­teenth day Clemen­tine was forced to give up the nurs­ing, lest she should ut­ter­ly break down. Paz was un­wea­ried. At last, to­wards the end of Au­gust, Bian­chon, the fam­ily physi­cian, told Clemen­tine that Adam was out of dan­ger.

“Ah, madame, you are un­der no obli­ga­tion to me,” he said; “with­out his friend, Comte Paz, we could not have saved him.”

The day af­ter the meet­ing of Paz and Clemen­tine in the kiosk, the Mar­quis de Ron­querolles came to see his nephew. He was on the eve of start­ing for Rus­sia on a se­cret diplo­mat­ic mis­sion. Paz took oc­ca­sion to say a few words to him. The first day that Adam was able to drive out with his wife and Thad­deus, a gen­tle­man en­tered the court­yard as the car­riage was about to leave it, and asked for Comte Paz. Thad­deus, who was sit­ting on the front seat of the caleche, turned to take a let­ter which bore the stamp of the min­istry of For­eign af­fairs. Hav­ing read it, he put it in­to his pock­et in a man­ner which pre­vent­ed Clemen­tine or Adam from speak­ing of it. Nev­er­the­less, by the time they reached the porte Mail­lot, Adam, full of cu­rios­ity, used the priv­ilege of a sick man whose caprices are to be grat­ified, and said to Thad­deus: “There's no in­dis­cre­tion be­tween broth­ers who love each oth­er,--tell me what there is in that despatch; I'm in a fever of cu­rios­ity.”

Clemen­tine glanced at Thad­deus with a vexed air, and re­marked to her hus­band: “He has been so sulky with me for the last two months that I shall nev­er ask him any­thing again.”

“Oh, as for that,” replied Paz, “I can't keep it out of the news­pa­pers, so I may as well tell you at once. The Em­per­or Nicholas has had the grace to ap­point me cap­tain in a reg­iment which is to take part in the ex­pe­di­tion to Khi­va.”

“You are not go­ing?” cried Adam.

“Yes, I shall go, my dear fel­low. Cap­tain I came, and cap­tain I re­turn. We shall dine to­geth­er to-​mor­row for the last time. If I don't start at once for St. Pe­ters­burg I shall have to make the jour­ney by land, and I am not rich, and I must leave Mala­ga a lit­tle in­de­pen­dence. I ought to think of the on­ly wom­an who has been able to un­der­stand me; she thinks me grand, su­pe­ri­or. I dare say she is faith­less, but she would jump--”

“Through the hoop, for your sake and come down safe­ly on the back of her horse,” said Clemen­tine sharply.

“Oh, you don't know Mala­ga,” said the cap­tain, bit­ter­ly, with a sar­cas­tic look in his eyes which made Clemen­tine thought­ful and un­easy.

“Good-​by to the young trees of this beau­ti­ful Bois, which you Parisians love, and the ex­iles who find a home here love too,” he said, present­ly. “My eyes will nev­er again see the ev­er­greens of the av­enue de Made­moi­selle, nor the aca­cias nor the cedars of the rond- points. On the bor­ders of Asia, fight­ing for the Em­per­or, pro­mot­ed to the com­mand, per­haps, by force of courage and by risk­ing my life, it may hap­pen that I shall re­gret these Champs-​El­ysees where I have driv­en be­side you, and where you pass. Yes, I shall grieve for Mala­ga's hard­ness--the Mala­ga of whom I am now speak­ing.”

This was said in a man­ner that made Clemen­tine trem­ble.

“Then you do love Mala­ga very much?” she asked.

“I have sac­ri­ficed for her the hon­or that no man should ev­er sac­ri­fice.”

“What hon­or?”

“That which we de­sire to keep at any cost in the eyes of our idol.”

Af­ter that re­ply Thad­deus said no more; he was silent un­til, as they passed a wood­en build­ing on the Champs El­ysees, he said, point­ing to it, “That is the Cir­cus.”

He went to the Rus­sian Em­bassy be­fore din­ner, and thence to the For­eign of­fice, and the next morn­ing he had start­ed for Havre be­fore the count and count­ess were up.

“I have lost a friend,” said Adam, with tears in his eyes, when he heard that Paz had gone,--“a friend in the true mean­ing of the word. I don't know what has made him aban­don me as if a pesti­lence were in my house. We are not friends to quar­rel about a wom­an,” he said, look­ing in­tent­ly at Clemen­tine. “You heard what he said yes­ter­day about Mala­ga. Well, he has nev­er so much as touched the lit­tle fin­ger of that girl.”

“How do you know that?” said Clemen­tine.

“I had the nat­ural cu­rios­ity to go and see Made­moi­selle Tur­quet, and the poor girl can't ex­plain even to her­self the ab­so­lute re­serve which Thad--”

“Enough!” said the count­ess, re­treat­ing in­to her bed­room. “Can it be that I am the vic­tim of some no­ble mys­ti­fi­ca­tion?” she asked her­self. The thought had hard­ly crossed her mind when Con­stantin brought her the fol­low­ing let­ter writ­ten by Thad­deus dur­ing the night:--

"Count­ess,--To seek death in the Cau­ca­sus and car­ry with me your con­tempt is more than I can bear. A man should die un­taint­ed. When I saw you for the first time I loved you as we love a wom­an whom we shall love for­ev­er, even though she be un­faith­ful to us. I loved you thus,--I, the friend of the man you had cho­sen and were about to mar­ry; I, poor; I, the stew­ard,--a vol­un­tary ser­vice, but still the stew­ard of your house­hold.

"In this im­mense mis­for­tune I found a hap­py life. To be to you an in­dis­pens­able ma­chine, to know my­self use­ful to your com­fort, your lux­ury, has been the source of deep en­joy­ments. If these en­joy­ments were great when I thought on­ly of Adam, think what they were to my soul when the wom­an I loved was the main­spring of all I did. I have known the plea­sures of ma­ter­ni­ty in my love. I ac­cept­ed life thus. Like the pau­pers who live along the great high­ways, I built my­self a hut on the bor­ders of your beau­ti­ful do­main, though I nev­er sought to ap­proach you. Poor and lone­ly, struck blind by Adam's good for­tune, I was, nev­er­the­less, the giv­er. Yes, you were sur­round­ed by a love as pure as a guardian- an­gel's; it waked while you slept; it ca­ressed you with a look as you passed; it was hap­py in its own ex­is­tence,--you were the sun of my na­tive land to me, poor ex­ile, who now writes to you with tears in his eyes as he thinks of the hap­pi­ness of those first days.

"When I was eigh­teen years old, hav­ing no one to love, I took for my ide­al mis­tress a charm­ing wom­an in War­saw, to whom I con­fid­ed all my thoughts, my wish­es; I made her the queen of my nights and days. She knew noth­ing of all this; why should she? I loved my love.

"You can fan­cy from this in­ci­dent of my youth how hap­py I was mere­ly to live in the sphere of your ex­is­tence, to groom your horse, to find the new-​coined gold for your purse, to pre­pare the splen­dor of your din­ners and your balls, to see you eclips­ing the el­egance of those whose for­tunes were greater than yours, and all by my own good man­age­ment. Ah! with what ar­dor I have ran­sacked Paris when Adam would say to me, 'SHE wants this or that.' It was a joy such as I can nev­er ex­press to you. You wished for a tri­fle at one time which kept me sev­en hours in a cab scour­ing the city; and what de­light it was to weary my­self for you. Ah! when I saw you, un­seen by you, smil­ing among your flow­ers, I could for­get that no one loved me. On cer­tain days, when my hap­pi­ness turned my head, I went at night and kissed the spot where, to me, your feet had left their lu­mi­nous traces. The air you had breathed was balmy; in it I breathed in more of life; I in­haled, as they say per­sons do in the trop­ics, a va­por laden with cre­ative prin­ci­ples.

"I MUST tell you these things to ex­plain the strange pre­sump­tion of my in­vol­un­tary thoughts,--I would have died rather than avow it un­til now.

"You will re­mem­ber those few days of cu­rios­ity when you wished to know the man who per­formed the house­hold mir­acles you had some­times no­ticed. I thought,--for­give me, madame,--I be­lieved you might love me. Your good-​will, your glances in­ter­pret­ed by me, a lover, seemed to me so dan­ger­ous--for me--that I in­vent­ed that sto­ry of Mala­ga, know­ing it was the sort of li­ai­son which wom­en can­not for­give. I did it in a mo­ment when I felt that my love would be com­mu­ni­cat­ed, fa­tal­ly, to you. De­spise me, crush me with the con­tempt you have so of­ten cast up­on me when I did not de­serve it; and yet I am cer­tain that, if, on that evening when your aunt took Adam away from you, I had said what I have now writ­ten to you, I should, like the tamed tiger that sets his teeth once more in liv­ing flesh, and scents the blood, and--

"Mid­night.

"I could not go on; the mem­ory of that hour is still too liv­ing. Yes, I was mad­dened. Was there hope for me in your eyes? then vic­to­ry with its scar­let ban­ners would have flamed in mine and fas­ci­nat­ed yours. My crime has been to think all this; per­haps wrong­ly. You alone can judge of that dread­ful scene when I drove back love, de­sire, all the most in­vin­ci­ble forces of our man­hood, with the cold hand of grat­itude,--grat­itude which must be eter­nal.

"Your ter­ri­ble con­tempt has been my pun­ish­ment. You have shown me there is no re­turn from loathing or dis­dain. I love you mad­ly. I should have gone had Adam died; all the more must I go be­cause he lives. A man does not tear his friend from the arms of death to be­tray him. Be­sides, my go­ing is my pun­ish­ment for the thought that came to me that I would let him die, when the doc­tors said that his life de­pend­ed on his nurs­ing.

"Adieu, madame; in leav­ing Paris I lose all, but you lose noth­ing now in my be­ing no longer near you.

“Your de­vot­ed ”Thad­deus Paz."

“If my poor Adam says he has lost a friend, what have I lost?” thought Clemen­tine, sink­ing in­to a chair with her eyes fixed on the car­pet.

The fol­low­ing let­ter Con­stantin had or­ders to give pri­vate­ly to the count:--

"My dear Adam,--Mala­ga has told me all. In the name of all your fu­ture hap­pi­ness, nev­er let a word es­cape you to Clemen­tine about your vis­its to that girl; let her think that Mala­ga has cost me a hun­dred thou­sand francs. I know Clemen­tine's char­ac­ter; she will nev­er for­give you ei­ther your loss­es at cards or your vis­its to Mala­ga.

"I am not go­ing to Khi­va, but to the Cau­ca­sus. I have the spleen; and at the pace at which I mean to go I shall be ei­ther Prince Paz in three years, or dead. Good-​by; though I have tak­en six­ty- thou­sand francs from Nucin­gen, our ac­counts are even.

“Thad­deus.”

“Id­iot that I was,” thought Adam; “I came near to cut­ting my throat just now, talk­ing about Mala­ga.”

It is now three years since Paz went away. The news­pa­pers have as yet said noth­ing about any Prince Paz. The Comtesse La­gin­ska is im­mense­ly in­ter­est­ed in the ex­pe­di­tions of the Em­per­or Nicholas; she is Rus­sian to the core, and reads with a sort of avid­ity all the news that comes from that dis­tant land. Once or twice ev­ery win­ter she says to the Rus­sian am­bas­sador, with an air of in­dif­fer­ence, “Do you know what has be­come of our poor Comte Paz?”

Alas! most Parisian wom­en, those be­ings who think them­selves so clever and clear-​sight­ed, pass and repass be­side a Paz and nev­er rec­og­nize him. Yes, many a Paz is un­known and mis­con­ceived, but--hor­ri­ble to think of!--some are mis­con­ceived even though they are loved. The sim­plest wom­en in so­ci­ety ex­act a cer­tain amount of con­ven­tion­al sham from the great­est men. A no­ble love sig­ni­fies noth­ing to them if rough and un­pol­ished; it needs the cut­ting and set­ting of a jew­eller to give it val­ue in their eyes.

In Jan­uary, 1842, the Comtesse La­gin­ska, with her charm of gen­tle melan­choly, in­spired a vi­olent pas­sion in the Comte de La Palfer­ine, one of the most dar­ing and pre­sump­tu­ous li­ons of the day. La Palfer­ine was well aware that the con­quest of a wom­an so guard­ed by re­serve as the Comtesse La­gin­ska was dif­fi­cult, but he thought he could in­vei­gle this charm­ing crea­ture in­to com­mit­ting her­self if he took her un­awares, by the as­sis­tance of a cer­tain friend of her own, a wom­an al­ready jeal­ous of her.

Quite in­ca­pable, in spite of her in­tel­li­gence, of sus­pect­ing such treach­ery, the Comtesse La­gin­ska com­mit­ted the im­pru­dence of go­ing with her so-​called friend to a masked ball at the Opera. About three in the morn­ing, led away by the ex­cite­ment of the scene, Clemen­tine, on whom La Palfer­ine had ex­pend­ed his se­duc­tions, con­sent­ed to ac­cept a sup­per, and was about to en­ter the car­riage of her faith­less friend. At this crit­ical mo­ment her arm was grasped by a pow­er­ful hand, and she was tak­en, in spite of her strug­gles, to her own car­riage, the door of which stood open, though she did not know it was there.

“He has nev­er left Paris!” she ex­claimed to her­self as she rec­og­nized Thad­deus, who dis­ap­peared when the car­riage drove away.

Did any wom­an ev­er have a like ro­mance in her life? Clemen­tine is con­stant­ly hop­ing she may again see Paz.

AD­DEN­DUM

The fol­low­ing per­son­ages ap­pear in oth­er sto­ries of the Hu­man Com­edy.

Bian­chon, Ho­race Fa­ther Gori­ot The Athe­ist's Mass Ce­sar Birot­teau The Com­mis­sion in Lu­na­cy Lost Il­lu­sions A Dis­tin­guished Provin­cial at Paris A Bach­elor's Es­tab­lish­ment The Se­crets of a Princess The Gov­ern­ment Clerks Pier­rette A Study of Wom­an Scenes from a Cour­te­san's Life Hon­orine The Seamy Side of His­to­ry The Mag­ic Skin A Sec­ond Home A Prince of Bo­hemia Let­ters of Two Brides The Muse of the De­part­ment The Mid­dle Class­es Cousin Bet­ty The Coun­try Par­son In ad­di­tion, M. Bian­chon nar­rat­ed the fol­low­ing: An­oth­er Study of Wom­an La Grande Breteche

La­gin­ski, Comte Adam Mit­gis­las An­oth­er Study of Wom­an Cousin Bet­ty

La Palfer­ine, Comte de A Prince of Bo­hemia A Man of Busi­ness Cousin Bet­ty Beat­rix

Lelewel The Seamy Side of His­to­ry

Nathan, Madame Raoul The Muse of the De­part­ment Lost Il­lu­sions A Dis­tin­guished Provin­cial at Paris Scenes from a Cour­te­san's Life The Gov­ern­ment Clerks A Bach­elor's Es­tab­lish­ment Ur­sule Mirou­et Eu­ge­nie Grandet A Prince of Bo­hemia A Daugh­ter of Eve The Un­con­scious Hu­morists

Paz, Thaddee Cousin Bet­ty

Ron­querolles, Mar­quis de The Peas­antry Ur­sule Mirou­et A Wom­an of Thir­ty An­oth­er Study of Wom­an The Thir­teen The Mem­ber for Ar­cis

Rou­vre, Mar­quis du A Start in Life Ur­sule Mirou­et

Rou­vre, Cheva­lier du Ur­sule Mirou­et

Schin­ner, Hip­poly­te The Purse A Bach­elor's Es­tab­lish­ment Pierre Gras­sou A Start in Life Al­bert Savarus The Gov­ern­ment Clerks Mod­este Mignon The Un­con­scious Hu­morists

Ser­izy, Comtesse de A Start in Life The Thir­teen Ur­sule Mirou­et A Wom­an of Thir­ty Scenes from a Cour­te­san's Life An­oth­er Study of Wom­an

Ser­izy, Vi­comte de A Start in Life Mod­este Mignon

Souchet, Fran­cois The Purse A Daugh­ter of Eve

Stein­bock, Count Wences­las Cousin Bet­ty

Tur­quet, Mar­guerite The Muse of the De­part­ment A Man of Busi­ness Cousin Bet­ty

End of The Project Guten­berg Etext of Paz, by Hon­ore de Balzac