We had climbed about half of the hill: the diligence was a little way behind: the five horses were stamping and striking fire from the pavement as they struggled up with the ponderous vehicle: the other passengers had lingered in the rear with the conductor, who had pointed out a little auberge among some trees. We here saw a man preceding us upon the road carrying a little bundle at the end of a stick over his shoulder: he seemed to advance painfully. Our attention was attracted—I scarcely knew why. He paused a moment—then went on with an uncertain step—paused again, staggered forward, and fell on his face just as we came up. Mlle. Nathalie, with a presence of mind that surprised me, had her smelling-bottle out in an instant, and was soon engaged in restoring the unfortunate traveller to consciousness. I assisted as well as I was able, and trust that my good-will may atone for my awkardness. Nathalie did every thing; and, just as the diligence reached us, was gazing with delight on the languid opening of a pair of as fine eyes as I have ever seen, and supporting in her lap a head covered with beautiful curls. Even at that moment, as I afterwards remembered, she looked upon the young man as a thing over which she had acquired a right of property. "He is going our way," said she: "let us lift him into the diligence."
"A beggarly Parisian; yo, yo!" quoth the postilion as he passed, clacking his long whip.
"Who will answer for his fare?" inquired the conductor.
"I will," replied Nathalie, taking the words out of my mouth.
In a few minutes the young man, who looked bewildered and could not speak, was safely stowed among Nathalie's other parcels; and the crest of the hill being gained, we began rolling rapidly down a steep descent. The little old maid, though in a perfect ecstasy of delight—the incident evidently appeared to her quite an adventure—behaved with remarkable prudence. While I was puzzling my head to guess by what disease this poor young man had been attacked, she was getting ready the remedies that appeared to her the most appropriate, in the shape of some excellent cakes and a bottle of good wine, which she fished out of her huge basket. Her protégé, made tame by hunger, allowed himself to be treated like a child. First she gave him a very small sip of Burgundy, then a diminutive fragment of cake; and then another sip and another piece of cake—insisting on his eating very slowly. Being perfectly useless, I looked quietly on, and smiled to see the suhmissiveness with which this fine, handsome fellow allowed himself to be fed by the fussy old maid, and how he kept his eyes fixed upon her with an expression of wondering admiration.
Before we arrived at Avignon we knew the history of the young man. He was an artist, who had spent several years studying in Paris, without friends, without resources, except a miserable pittance which his mother, a poor peasant woman living in a village not far from Aix, had managed to send him. At first he had been upheld by hope; and although he knew that his mother not only denied herself necessaries, but borrowed money to support him, he was consoled by the idea that the time would come when, by the efforts of his genius, he would be able to repay every thing with the accumulated interest which affection alone would calculate. But his expenses necessarily increased, and no receipts came to meet them. He was compelled to apply to his mother for further assistance. The answer was one word—"impossible." Then he endeavored calmly to examine his position, came to the conclusion that for several years more he must be a burden to his mother if he obstinately pursued his career, and that she must be utterly ruined to insure his success. So he gave up his art, sold every thing he had to pay part of his debts, and set out on foot to return to big village and become a peasant, as his father[pg 230] had been before him. The little money he had taken with him was gone by the time he reached Lyon. He had passed through that city without stopping, and for more than two days, almost for two nights, had incessantly pursued his journey, without rest and without food, until he had reached the spot where, exhausted with fatigue and hunger, he had fallen, perhaps to perish had we not been there to assist him.
Nathalie listened with eager attention to this narrative, told with a frankness which our sympathy excited. Now and then she gave a convulsive start, or checked a hysterical sob, and at last fairly burst into tears. I was interested as well as she, but retained more calmness to observe how moral beauty almost vainly straggled to appear through the insignificant features of this admirable woman. Her little eyes, reddened with weeping; her pinched-up nose, blooming at the point; her thin lips, probably accustomed to sarcasm; her cheeks, with a leaded citron hue; her hair that forked up in unmanageable curls—all combined to obscure the exquisite expression of respect and sympathy, perhaps already of love, sparkling from her kindled soul, that could just be made out by an attentive eye. At length, however, she became for a moment perfectly beautiful, as, when the young painter had finished his story, with an expression that showed how bitterly he regretted his abandoned art, she took both his hands in hers, and exclaimed: "No, mon enfant, you shall not be thus disappointed. Your genius"—she already took it for granted he had genius—"shall have an opportunity for development. Your mother cannot do what is necessary—she has played her part. I will be a—second mother to you, in return f«r the little affection you can bestow on me without ingratitude to her to whom you owe your life."
"My life has to be paid for twice," said he, kissing her hand. Nathalie could not help looking round proudly to me. It was so flattering to receive the gallant attentions of so handsome a young man, that I think she tried to forget how she had bought them.
In the exuberance of her hospitality, the little old maid invited both Claude Richer and myself to spend some time in the large farmhouse of her brother-in-law. I declined, with a promise to be a frequent visitor; but Claude, who was rather commanded than asked, could do nothing but accept. I left them at the diligence office, and saw them walk away, the little Nathalie affecting to support her feeble companion. For the honor of human nature let me add, that the conductor said nothing about the fare. "It would have been indelicate," he said to me, "to remind Mlle. Nathalie of her promise in the young man's presence. I know her well; and she will pay me at a future time. At any rate I must show that there is a heart under this waistcoat." So saying, the conductor thumped his breast with simple admiration of his own humanity, and went away, after recommending me to the Café de Paris—indeed and excellent house.
I shall say nothing of a variety of little incidents that occurred to me at Avignon, nor about my studies on the history of the popes who resided there. I must reserve myself entirely for the development of Nathalie's romance, which I could not follow step by step, but the chief features of which I was enabled to catch during a series of visits I paid to the farmhouse. Nathalie herself was very communicative to me at first, and scarcely deigned to conceal her sentiments. By degrees, however, as the catastrophe approached, she became more and more reserved; and I had to learn from others, or to guess the part she played.