Ithuriel crosses the stage in a cloud.
The scene changes and represents an apartment in the house of Sir Aubrey.
"Absurd! absurd!" exclaimed my neighbour. And he resumed his reading of le Pastissier françois.
I did not at all agree with him: I thought the staging magnificent; I had nothing to say about Malvina, for she had not spoken; but Philippe seemed to me exceedingly fine, notwithstanding his paleness, and Moessard very good. Moreover, crude as it was, it was an attempt at Romanticism—a movement almost entirely unknown at that time. This intervention of immaterial and superior beings in human destiny had a fanciful side to it which pleased my imagination, and maybe that evening was responsible for the germ in me from which sprang the Don Juan de Marana of eleven years later. The play began.
Sir Aubrey (the reader will see presently why I underline the word Sir)—Sir Aubrey met Lord Ruthven, a rich English traveller, at Athens, and they became friends. During their wanderings about the Parthenon and their day-dreams by the seashore, they planned means for tying the bonds of their friendship more firmly, and, subject to Malvina's consent, they decided upon a union between the young girl, who was at home in the castle of Staffa, and the noble traveller, who had become her brother's closest friend. Unfortunately, during an excursion which Aubrey and Ruthven made to the suburbs of Athens, to attend the wedding of a young maiden endowed privately by Lord Ruthven, the two companions were attacked by brigands: a sharp defence put the assassins to flight; but Lord Ruthven was struck down mortally wounded. His last words were a request that his friend would place him on a hillock bathed by the moon's rays. Aubrey carried out this last request, and laid the dying man on the place indicated; then, as his friend's eyes closed and his breathing ceased, Aubrey began to search for his scattered servitors; but when he returned with them, an hour later, the body had disappeared. Aubrey fancied that the assassins must have taken the body away to remove all traces of their crime.
When he returned to Scotland, he broke the news of Lord Ruthven's death to his brother, Lord Marsden, and told him of the close relationship that had united them during their travels. Then Marsden claimed succession to his brother's rights, and proposed to marry Malvina, if Malvina would consent to this substitution. Malvina, who did not know either the one or the other, made no objection to Lord Marsden's claim or to her brother's wishes.
Lord Marsden is announced. Malvina feels that slight embarrassment which, like an early morning mist, always comes over the hearts of young maidens at the approach of their betrothed. Aubrey, overjoyed, rushes to greet him; but when he sees him he utters a cry of surprise. It is not Lord Marsden—that is to say, a person hitherto unknown—who stands before him; it is his friend Lord Ruthven!
Aubrey's astonishment is intense; but all is explained. Ruthven did not die; he only fainted: the coolness of the night air brought him back to consciousness. Aubrey's departure and his return to Scotland had been too prompt for Ruthven to send him word; but when he was well he returned to Ireland, to find his brother dead; he inherited his name and his fortune, and, under that name, with twice the fortune he had before, he offered to espouse Malvina, and rejoiced in anticipation at the joy he would cause his beloved Aubrey, by his reappearance before him. Ruthven is charming: his friend has not overrated him. He and Malvina were both so favourably impressed with one another that, under the pretext of very urgent business, he asked to be allowed to marry her within twenty-four hours. Malvina makes a proper show of resistance before yielding. They return to Marsden's castle. The curtain falls.
Now I had been watching my neighbour almost as much as the play, and, to my great satisfaction, I had seen him close his Elzevir and listen to the final scenes. When the curtain fell, he uttered an exclamation of disdain accompanied by a deep-drawn sigh.
"Pooh!" he said.