It was my heart's first love, and, like every first love, it was naïf, thoughtless, careless, allowing itself to float idly on the smiling and pure stream of passion, lulled by the harmony of the first wakenings of the heart, and, like the old mythological emblem, with eyes closed for fear of seeing the horizon.
These three months, with their freedom from all thought of the future, were, nevertheless, delightful, and it is with delight that I recall the smallest detail of their happy moments. Soon after the arrival of Madame de Verteuil and her daughter at Serval, I asked Hélène one day to ride on horseback, like her friend, who took that exercise for her health. I had caused two very gentle ponies to be brought from England, for Hélène was extremely timid. Before I could prevail on her to accompany Mlle. de Verteuil and myself on one of our excursions outside of the park limits, it was necessary, in order to overcome her first alarms, for me to walk beside her pony for quite a long time.
Nothing could be more charming than the little shadows of fear that would creep over her lovely face, the upper half of which, shaded from the sun by a large straw hat, was seen in a luminous golden half obscurity, while her red lips and rosy chin shone in the bright sunshine. She always wore white dresses and a wide gray moiré sash to mark the waist, which was so slender and flexible that she would bend like a reed before the breeze at each jolt of the little black Scotch pony, whose thick mane and long tail went streaming in the wind.
I held the bridle, and Hélène, at the least movement of little Black, would suddenly place her hand on my shoulder. This foolish timidity caused much merriment to Mlle. de Verteuil, who, much braver than her friend, and wishing to encourage her, would often gallop off and leave us alone.
We usually took these promenades on the green turf of a long avenue of leafy oak-trees. As long as Mlle. de Verteuil remained with us I was gay and talkative, and Hélène, who was naturally dreamy, would brighten up and become quite animated; but as soon as Sophie left us we fell into interminable silences, of which I was quite ashamed, but which seemed to me perfectly blissful.
I soon afterwards wrote to a friend in London to send me some fine horses, several grooms, and two or three carriages of different sorts. My season of mourning was about to end. The arrival of all these equipages made a sort of little fête at Serval. I had kept it a secret, and I well remember Hélène's childish and simple pleasure, when one beautiful evening in August, upon expressing a wish to drive in the forest, she saw, instead of one of our ordinary carriages, a charming calèche, with four black horses, harnessed en d'Aumont, and mounted by two little English postilions, dressed in pearl gray velveteen.
She climbed into the chariot, accompanied by her mother and her friend. I rode beside them on horseback through that magnificent forest, and we returned slowly to the château, in the beautiful moonlight, which shone so picturesquely through the long, dark avenues of grand old trees.
While speaking of this drive, I should wish to state that I have never met with a woman who seemed more in keeping with luxurious surroundings, or, rather, one who heightened the effect of luxury more than Hélène; she possessed such stateliness, joined to such an enchanting and involuntary grace, that it was impossible to think of her except as constantly surrounded by every object of the best and most cultivated taste.