Circumstances having conducted our dramatis personæ to this point, how could it fall out otherwise than that the grateful Walter should fall desperately in love (which, by the by, he did at first sight) with la belle Adrienne, and that she should determine to fall obstinately in love with him! He, poor fellow! in pure simplicity of heart, really gazed himself into a devoted passion for the youthful beauty, without one interested view towards the charms of the heiress. But, besides thinking him the handsomest man she had ever seen, she was determined in her choice, by knowing it was in direct opposition to the wishes of her parents, who had long selected for her future husband a person so every way unexceptionable, that their fair daughter was very likely to have selected him for herself, had they not committed the fatal error of expressing their wishes with regard to him. There was PERSUASION and DISSUASION—mild opposition and systematic wilfulness—a few tears, got up with considerable effort—vapeurs and migraines in abundance—loss of appetite—hints about broken hearts—and the hearts of the tender parents could hold out no longer—Walter Barnard was received into the family as the future husband of its lovely daughter.
All this time, what had become of la petite Madelaine? What does become of little girls just half-way through their teens, when associated, under similar circumstances, with young ladies who are women grown? Why, they are to be patient listeners to the lover’s perfections when he is out of the way, and more patient companions (because perfectly unnoticed at such times) of the lovers’ romantic walks; shivering associates (at discreet distance) of their tender communings on mossy banks, under willow and acacia, by pond-sides and brook-sides—by daylight, and twilight, and moonlight—at all seasons, and in all temperatures—so that by the time the pastoral concludes with matrimony, it may be accounted an especial mercy if the “mutual friend” is not crippled with the rheumatism for life, or brought into the first stage of a galloping consumption. No such fatal results were, however, in reserve for the termination of la petite Madelaine’s official duties; and those, while in requisition, were made less irksome to her than they are in general to persons so circumstanced,—in part through the happy influence of her own sweet nature, which always apportioned to itself some share of the happiness it witnessed; in part through her long-acquired habits of patience and self-sacrifice; and, in part also, because Walter Barnard was an especial favourite with her—and little wonder that he was so—the gay and happy young man, devoted as he was to Adrienne in all the absorbing interest of a first successful passion, had yet many a kind word and beaming smile to spare for the poor little cousin, who often but for him would have sat quite unnoticed at her tent-stitch, even in the family circle; and when she was the convenient tiers in the romantic rambles of himself and his lady-love, thanks to his unfailing good-nature, even then she did not feel herself utterly forgotten.
For even in spite of discouraging looks from la belle Adrienne, of which in truth he was not quick to discern the meaning, he would often linger to address a few words to the silent little girl, who had been tutored too well to speak unspoken to, or even to walk quite within ear-shot of her soi-disant companions. And when he had tenderly assisted Adrienne to pass over some stile or brooklet in their way, seldom it happened but that his hand was next at the service of Madelaine; and only those whose spirits have been long subdued by a sense of insignificance, impressed by the slighting regards or careless notice of cold friends or condescending patrons, can conceive the enthusiastic gratitude with which those trivial instances of kindness were treasured up in her heart’s records. So it was, that la petite Madelaine, far from wearying of Walter’s praises, when it pleased Adrienne to descant upon them in his absence, was apt to think her fair cousin did him scant justice, and that if she had been called on as his eulogist, oh! how far more eloquently could she speak! In short, la petite Madelaine, inexperienced as of course she was in such matters, saw with the acuteness of feeling, that Walter had obtained an interest only in the vanity and self-love, not in the heart of his fair mistress. “Poor Adrienne! she cannot help it, if she has no heart,” was Madelaine’s sage soliloquy. “Mais quel dommage pour ce bon Walter, qui en a tant!”
“Le bon Walter” might possibly have made the same discovery, had the unrestricted intercourse of the lovers been of long continuance; and he might have also ascertained another point, respecting which certain dubious glimmerings had begun at intervals to intrude themselves on his meditations couleur de rose,—was it possible that the moral and intellectual perfections of his idol could be less than in perfect harmony with her outward loveliness? The doubt was sacrilegious, detestable, dismissed with generous indignation, but again and again some demon (or was it his good genius?) recalled a startling frown, an incautious word or tone, a harsh or fretful expression from the eye and voice of his beloved, addressed to la petite cousine or to himself, when in lightness of spirit, and frank-hearted kindness, he had laughed and talked with the latter, as with a young engaging sister. And then, except on one topic, his passion for la belle Adrienne, and her transcendent charms, of which, as yet, he was ever ready to pour out the heart’s eloquent nonsense, somehow their conversations always languished. She had no eye for the natural beauties, of which he was an enthusiastic admirer; yawned or looked puzzled or impatient, when he stopped to gaze upon some glorious sunset, or violet-hued distance, melting into the roseate sky. And though she did not reject his offering of wild roses, or dewy honeysuckles, it was received with a half-contemptuous indifference, that invited no frequent renewal of the simple tribute; and from the date of a certain walk, when the lover’s keen glance observed that the bunch of wild-flowers, carelessly dropt by Adrienne a few minutes after he had given them to her, was furtively picked up by la petite Madelaine as she followed in the narrow woodpath, and placed as furtively within the folds of her fichu—if Monsieur Walter, from that time forth, pulled a wild rose from the spray, or a violet from the bank, it was tendered with a smile to one whose hand at least was less careless than Adrienne’s; and for her heart, that mattered not (farther than in brotherly kindness) to the reputed possessor of la belle St Hilaire’s. Yet, in long after days, when silver threads began to streak the soft fair hair of Madelaine du Résnél, and the thick black clustering curls of Walter Barnard were more than sprinkled with the same paly hue, he found in turning over the leaves of an old French romance, in which her name was inscribed, the dried, faded, scentless forms of what had been a few sweet wild-flowers. On the margin of the page, to which time had glued them, was a date, and a few written words. And the sight of those frail memorials, associated with those age-tinted characters, must have awakened tender and touching recollections in his heart who gazed upon them; for a watery film suffused his eyes as he raised them from the volume, and turned with a half-pensive smile to one who sat beside him, quietly busied with her knitting needles in providing for his winter comfort.
“Mais revenons à nos moutons.” Our present business is with the young lover and his fair mistress, and the still younger Madelaine. Time will overtake them soon enough. We need not anticipate his work. The old inexorable brought to a conclusion Walter’s leave of absence, just as certain discoveries to which we have alluded were beginning to break upon him; just as la belle Adrienne began to weary of playing at parfait amour, enacting the adorable to her lover, and the aimable to her cousin in his presence; just as Monsieur and Madame, her weak but worthy parents, were secretly praying for their future son-in-law’s departure, in the forlorn hope (as they had stipulated that even les fiançailles should not take place for a twelve-month to come) that some unexpected page might yet turn over in the chapter of accidents, whereon might be written the name of Jules Marquis d’Arval, instead of that of the landless, untitled Walter Barnard, for the husband of their beautiful heiress.
Just at this critical juncture arrived the day of separation—of separation for a year certain! Will it be doubted that with the parting hour, rushed back upon Walter’s heart a flood of tenderness, even more impassioned than that with which it had first pledged itself to the beautiful Adrienne? The enthusiasm of his nature, acting as a stimulus to her apathetic temperament, communicated to her farewell so much of the appearance of genuine feeling, that the young soldier returned to his country, and to his military duties, imbued with the blissful assurance that, whatever unworthy doubts had been suggested occasionally by fallacious appearances, the heart of his fair betrothed was as faultless as her person, and exclusively devoted to himself. So wholly had the “sweet sorrow” of that farewell absorbed his every faculty, that it was not till he was miles from St Hilaire on his way to the coast, that Walter remembered la petite Madelaine; remembered that he had bid HER no farewell; that she had slipt away to her own home the last evening of his stay at St Hilaire, unobserved by all but an old bonne, who was commissioned to say Mademoiselle Madelaine had a headache, and that she had not reappeared the next morning, the morning of his departure. “Dear little Madelaine! how could I forget her?” was the next thought to that which had recalled her. “But she shall live with us when we are married.” So having laid the flattering unction to his conscience, by that satisfactory arrangement for her future comfort, he “whistled her image down the wind” again, and betook himself with redoubled ardour to the contemplation of Adrienne.
And where was la petite Madelaine?—What became of her, and what was she doing that livelong day? Never was she so much wanted at St Hilaire—to console—to support—to occupy the “fair forsaken;” and yet she came not. “What insensibility—what ingratitude! at such a time!”—exclaimed the parents of the lovely desolate—so interesting in her becoming character of a lone bird “reft of its mutual heart,” so amiable in her attempted exculpation of the neglectful Madelaine! “She does not mean to be unkind—to be cruel—as her conduct seems”—sweetly interposed the meek apologist.—“But she is thoughtless—insouciante—and you know, chère Maman! I always told you la petite Madelaine has no sensibility—Ah Ciel!”——That mine were less acute!—was, of course, the implied sense of that concluding apostrophe—and every one will feel the eloquence of the appeal, so infinitely more affecting than the full-length sentence would have been. If vagueness is one great source of the sublime—it is also a grand secret in the arcana of sensibility.
But we may remember that poor little Madelaine had slipt away to her own home the preceding evening, pleading a headache as the excuse for her evasion. Perhaps the same cause—(was it headache?) holds her still captive in her little chamber, the topmost chamber in the western pepper-box turret, four of which flank the four corners of the old Chateau du Résnél. Certain it is, from that same lofty lodging Madelaine has not stirred the livelong day—scarcely from that same station;—