Jean-Christophe Journey's End

by Romain Rolland

"Yes. No. I don't know. I am ill all over."

On that he had a fresh fit of coughing, violent and exaggerated. Grazia was alarmed: she had a feeling that he was forcing himself to cough: but she was ashamed of her thought, as she saw the boy sweating and choking for breath. She kissed him and spoke to him tenderly: he seemed to grow calmer; but as soon as she tried to leave him he broke out coughing again. She had to stay shivering by his bedside, for he would not even allow her to go away to dress herself, and insisted on her holding his hand; and he would not let her go until he fell asleep again. Then she went to bed, chilled, uneasy, harassed. And she found it impossible to gather up the threads of her dreams.

The boy had a singular power of reading his mother's thoughts. This instinctive genius is often—though seldom in such a high degree—to be found in creatures of the same stock: they hardly need to look at each other to know each other's thoughts: they can guess them by the breathing, by a thousand imperceptible signs. This natural aptness, which is fortified by living together, was in Lionello sharpened and refined by his ever wakeful malevolence. He had the insight of the desire to hurt. He detested Christophe. Why? Why does a child take a dislike to a person who has never done him any harm? It is often a matter of chance. It is enough for a child to have begun by persuading himself that he detests some one, for it to become a habit, and the more he is argued with the more desperately he will cling to it. But often, again, there are deeper reasons for it, which pass the child's understanding: he has no idea of them…. From the first moment when he saw Christophe, the son of Count Berény had a feeling of animosity towards the man whom his mother had loved. It was as though he had instinctively felt the exact moment when Grazia began to think of marrying Christophe. From that moment on he never ceased to spy upon them. He was always between them, and refused to leave the room whenever Christophe came; or he would manage to burst in upon them when they were sitting together. More than that, when his mother was alone, thinking of Christophe, he seemed to divine her thoughts. He would sit near her and watch her. His gaze would embarrass her and almost make her blush. She would get up to conceal her unease.—He would take a delight in saying unkind things about Christophe in her presence. She would bid him be silent, but he would go on. And if she tried to punish him, he would threaten to make himself ill. That was the strategy he had always used successfully since he was a child. When he was quite small, one day when he had been scolded, he had, out of revenge, undressed himself and lain naked on the floor so as to catch cold.—Once, when Christophe brought a piece of music that he had composed for Grazia's birthday, the boy took the manuscript and hid it. It was found in tatters in a wood-box. Grazia lost her patience and scolded him severely. Then he wept and howled, and stamped his feet, and rolled on the ground, and had an attack of nerves. Grazia was terrified, and kissed and implored him, and promised to do whatever he wanted.

From that day on he was the master: for he knew it: and very frequently he had recourse to the weapon with which he had succeeded. There was never any knowing how far his attacks were natural and how far counterfeit. Soon he was not satisfied with using them vengefully when he was opposed in any way, but took to using them out of spite whenever his mother and Christophe planned to spend the evening together. He even went so far as to play his dangerous game out of sheer idleness, or theatricality, to discover the extent of his power. He was extraordinarily ingenious in inventing strange, nervous accidents; sometimes in the middle of dinner he would be seized with a convulsive trembling, and upset his glass or break his plate; sometimes, as he was going upstairs, he would clutch at the banisters with his hand: his fingers would stiffen: he would pretend that he could not open them again; or he would have a sharp pain in his side and roll about, howling; or he would choke. Of course, in the end he developed a genuine nervous illness. Christophe and Grazia were at their wits' end. Their peaceful meetings—their quiet talks, their readings, their music, which were as a festival to them—all their humble happiness was henceforth disturbed.

Every now and then, however, the little imp would, give them a respite, partly because he was tired of his play-acting, partly because his child's nature took possession of him again, and made him think of something else. (He was sure now that he had won the day.)

Then, quickly, quietly, they would seize their opportunity. Every hour that they could steal in this way was the more precious to them as they could never be sure of enjoying it to the end. How near they felt to each other! Why could they not always be so!… One day Grazia herself confessed to her regret. Christophe took her hand.

"Yes. Why?" he asked.

"You know why, my dear," she said, with a miserable smile.

Christophe knew. He knew that she was sacrificing their happiness to her son: he knew that she was not deceived by Lionello's lies, that she still adored him: he knew the blind egoism of such domestic affections which make the best pour out their reserves of devotion to the advantage of the bad or mediocre creatures of their blood, so that there is nothing left for them to give to those who would be more worthy, whom they love best, but who are not of their blood. And although he was irritated by it, although there were times when he longed to kill the little monster who was destroying their lives, yet he bowed his head in silence, and understood that Grazia could not do otherwise.

So they renounced their life without vain recrimination. But if the happiness which was their right could be snatched from them, nothing could prevent the union of their hearts. Their very renunciation, their common sacrifice, held them by bonds stronger than those of the flesh. Each confided the sorrow of it all to the other, passed over the burden of it, and took on the other's suffering: so even their sorrow became joy. Christophe called Grazia "his confessor." He did not hide from her the weaknesses from which his pride had to suffer: rather he accused himself with too great contrition, and she would smilingly soothe his boyish scruples. He even confessed to her his material poverty; but he could only bring himself to do that after it had been agreed between them that she should neither offer him, nor he accept from her, any help. It was the last barrier of pride which he upheld and she respected. In place of the well-being which she could not bring into her friend's life, she found many ways of filling it with what was infinitely more precious to him—namely, her tenderness. He felt the breath of it all about him, during every hour of the day: he never opened his eyes in the morning, never closed them at night, without a prayer of love and adoration. And when she awoke, or at night, as often happened, lay for hours without sleeping, she thought: