CHAPTER XLIV. THE PRICE OF FAME
If the triumphs of genius be amongst the most exalted pleasures of our nature, its defeats and reverses are also the very saddest of all afflictions. He who has learned to live, as it were, on the sympathies of his fellows—to be inspired by them at times, and inspire them at others—to feel his existence like a compact with the world, wherein he alternately gives and receives, cannot endure the thought of being passed over and forgotten. The loss of that favor in which, as in a sunshine, he basked, is a bereavement too great to be borne. He may struggle for a while against this depression—he may arm himself with pride against what his heart denounces as injustice—he may even deceive him* self into a mock indifference of such judgments; but, do all he will, he comes at the last to see that his greatest efforts were prompted by the very enthusiasm they evoked,—that the impression he produced upon others was like an image in a mirror, by which he could view the proportions of his mind, and that the flame of his intellect burned purest and brightest when fanned by the breath of praise.
It will be seen that I limit these observations to dramatic success; that I am only speaking of the stage and the actor. For him there is no refuge in the calmer judgment of posterity; there is no appeal to a dispassionate future. The value stamped upon him now is to be his fame forever. No other measure of his powers can be taken than the effect he produced upon his contemporaries; and hence the great precariousness of a career wherein each passing mood of illness, sorrow, anxiety, or exhaustion may influence the character of a reputation that might seem established beyond reversal.
How leniently, then, should we deal with those who labor for our pleasure in these capacities! How indulgent should we show ourselves even to their caprices,—justly remembering the arduous nature of a struggle in which so many requirements are summoned, and that genius itself is insufficient, if there be not the vigor of health, the high promptings of ambition, and the consciousness of power that springs from unimpaired faculties.
I have come to think over these things with a sad heart. Within the circle of such memories lies enshrined the greatest sorrow of a life that has not been without its share of trials. I had intended to have revealed to my reader a painful incident, but I find that age has not yet blunted the acute misery of my feelings; nor can I, with all the weight of long years upon me, endure to open up again a grief whose impress has stamped every hour of existence. Let me not be supposed as uttering these words in any spirit of querulousness with fortune; I have had much, far more than most men, to feel grateful for. Well do I know, besides, that to my successes in life I can lay no claim in any merits or deservings of my own; that my shortcomings have been numerous, and leniently dealt with. I speak, therefore, not complainingly. I would not, moreover, like to spend in repinings the last hours of a long life: the goal cannot well be distant now; and as, footsore and weary, I tread the few remaining miles of my earthly pilgrimage, I would rather cheer my heart with the prospect of rest before me, than darken the future with one shadow of the past.
Margot had insisted on remaining. She felt as though a challenge had been offered to her, and it would be cowardice to decline it. Over and over again was she wont to repeat to herself the contempt she felt for that applause in which it was believed she exulted. She burned, therefore, for a moment wherein she could display this haughty contempt, and throw back with proud disdain their homage, by showing herself as indifferent to rebuke as she had ever been to adulation. The day was passed in moods of silence, or paroxysms of the wildest excitement. After an hour or more perhaps of unbroken calm, she would burst forth into a passionate denunciation of the world's injustice, with bitter and poignant regrets for the hour when she became a suppliant for its favors. The proudest efforts she would make to rise above this were sure to be defeated by some sudden sense of defeat,—an agonizing conviction that threw her into violent weeping; a state of suffering that even now I dread to think of.
She grew calmer towards evening, but it was a calm that terrified me: there was a slow and careful precision in every word she spoke that denoted effort; her smile, too, had a fixity in it that remained for seconds after the emotion which occasioned it; and while a stern and impassive quietude characterized her expression generally, her eyes at times flashed and sparkled like the glaring orbs of a lioness. She descended to the drawing-room most magnificently attired, a splendid diamond tiara on her head, and a gorgeous bouquet of rubies and brilliants on the corsage of her dress. Although pale as death,—for she wore no rouge,—I had never seen her look so beautiful. There is a Titian picture of Pompey's daughter receiving the tidings of Pharsalia, and, while too proud to show her agony, is yet in the very struggle of a breaking heart: the face is like enough to have been her portrait, and even to the color of the massive, waving hair, is wonderfully identical.
The play had already begun when we arrived at the theatre, and in the little bustle caused by our entry into the box, a half impatient expression ran through the audience; but as suddenly suppressed, it became a murmur of wondering admiration. The stage was forgotten, and every eye turned at once towards her who so often had moved their hearts by every emotion, and who now seemed even more triumphant in the calm self-possession of her beauty. Rank over rank leaned forward in the boxes to gaze at her, and the entire pit turned and stood, as it were, spell-bound at her feet. Had she wished for a triumph over her rival, she could not have imagined a more signal one; for none now directed their attention to the business of the play, but all seemed forgetful of everything save her presence. Margot appeared to accept this homage with the naughty consciousness of its being her due; her eyes ranged proudly over the dense crowd, and slowly turned away, as though she had seen nothing there to awaken one sentiment of emotion.
There was less an expression of disdain than of utter indifference in her look,—it was almost like the cold impassive-ness of a statue.
For myself I am unable to speak. I saw nothing of the play or the actors. Margot, and Margot alone, filled my eyes; and I sat far back in the box. My glances revelled on her, watching with unceasing anxiety that pale and passionless face. In the fourth act comes the scene where Roxalane, aware of her lover's falsehood, hears him profess the vows that he but feigns to feel. It was the great triumph of Margot's genius,—the passage of power in which she rose unapproachably above all others; and now in the stilled and silent assembly might be noted the anxiety with which they awaited her rival's delineation. Unlike the cold, unmoved, and almost patient bearing which Margot displayed at first, as though, having schooled her mind to a lesson, she would practise it, had not aversion or contempt overmastered her, and in the very sickness of her soul revealed her sorrow, the other burst forth into a wild and passionate declamation,—an outburst of vulgar rage. A low murmur of discontent ran through the house, and, swelling louder and louder, drowned the words of the piece. The actress faltered and stopped; and, as if by some resistless impulse, turned towards the box where Margot sat, still and motionless. The entire audience turned likewise, and every eye was now bent on her whose genius had become so interwoven with the scene that it was as though associated with her very identity. Slowly rising from her seat, Margot stood erect, gazing on that dense mass with the proud look of one who defied them. The same stern, cold stare of insult she had once bestowed on the stage she now directed on the spectators. It was a moment of terrible interest, as thus she stood, confronting, almost daring, those who had presumed to condemn her; and then, in the same words Roxalane uses, she addressed them, every accent tremulous with passion, and every syllable vibrating with the indignant hate that worked within her. The measured distinctness of every word rang out clear and full. It was less invective than scornful, and scorn that seemed to sicken her as she spoke it.
The effect upon the audience will best evidence the power of the moment. On all sides were seen groups gathered around one who had swooned away. Many were carried out insensible, and fearful cries of hysteric passion betrayed the secret sympathies her words had smitten. She paused, and, with that haughty gesture with which she takes eternal farewell of her lover, she seemed to say, “Adieu forever!” and then pushing back her dark ringlets, and tearing away the diamond coronet from her brows, she burst into a fit of laughter. Oh! how terribly its very cadence sounded,—sharp, ringing, and wild! the cry of an escaped intellect,—the shriek of an intelligence that had fled forever!
Margot was mad. The violent conflict of passion to which her mind was exposed had made shipwreck of a glorious intellect, and the very exercise of emotion had exhausted the wells of feeling. I cannot go on. Already have these memories sapped the last foundations of my broken strength, and my old eyes are dimmed with tears.
The remainder of her life was passed in a little château near Sèvres, where Mademoiselle Mars had made arrangements for her reception. She lingered for three years, and died out, like one exhausted. As for me, I worked as a laborer in the garden of the château to the day of her death; and although I never saw her, the one thought that I was still near her sustained and supported me,—not, indeed, with hope, for I had long ceased to hope.
I knew the window of the room she sat in; and when, at evening, I left the garden, I knew it was the time she walked there. These were the two thoughts that filled up all my mind; and out of these grew the day-dreams in which my hours were passed. Still fresh as yesterday within my heart are the sensations with which I marked a slight change in the curtain of her window, or bent over the impress of her foot upon the gravel. How passionately have I kissed the flowers that I hoped she might have plucked! how devotedly knelt beside the stalks from which she had broken off a blossom!
These memories live still, nor would I wish it otherwise. In the tender melancholy, I can sit and ponder over the past, more tranquilly, may be, than if they spoke of happiness.