The penpusher’s heart was melted, and he told her everything:
‘Your lover has been in the Bastille for nearly a year, and without your intervention he would probably stay there for the rest of his life.’
At these words the soft-hearted young lady fell into a swoon. When she had come to, the clerk went on:
‘I have no means of doing you a good turn; my whole power is limited to making occasional mischief. Take my advice; go and see Monsieur de St Pouange, who can do both good and evil.He’s Monseigneur de Louvois’ cousin and a favourite of his. The Minister has two familiars, Monsieur de St Pouange is one, and Madame de Belloy is the other, but she is not at Versailles at present. All you can do is to soften the heart of the patron I have told you about.’
Pursued by her brother and worshipping her beloved, the lovely St Yves was in a pitiful state. She felt a spark of joy, but it was quenched with violent grief; hopes gave place to dismal apprehensions; she brushed her tears away, but as she did so, shed more; then, trembling and weak as she was, she plucked up her courage, and ran as fast as she could to see Monsieur de St Pouange.
CHAPTER 14
THE CHILD OF NATURE’S INTELLECTUAL PROGRESS
THE Child of Nature made rapid progress in knowledge, and most of all in the study of man. The rapid development of his mind was almost as much due to his savage upbringing as to the spirit he was endowed with, for having been taught nothing during his childhood, he had not acquired any prejudices. Since his understanding had not been warped by error, it had retained its original rectitude. He saw things as they are, whereas the ideas we have been given in childhood compel us to see them in false lights all our lives .
‘Your persecutors are abominable,’ he told his friend Gordon. ‘I pity you for being oppressed, but I also pity you for being a Jansenist. Every sect seems to me a rallying point for error. Tell me now, are there any sects in geometry?’
‘No, my dear child,’ said the worthy Gordon, with a sigh. ‘All men are agreed about the truth when it can be proved. But they are all divided about hidden truths.’
‘Or shall we say hidden untruths. If there had been one single truth hidden under that pile of arguments that has been minutely examined through so many centuries, it would surely have been discovered, and the world would have been in agreement on that point at least. If this truth were one that is necessary to us, as the sun is to the earth, it would shine forth as the sun does. It is an absurdity, nay, it is an insult to the human race, I will even say it is an outrage against the Infinite and the Supreme Being, to declare that there is a truth essential to man, and God has hidden it.’
Everything said by this ignorant young man, educated by Nature, made a profound impression on the mind of the unfortunate old scholar.
‘Can it be true,’ he cried, ‘that I have submitted myself to real misery, all for the sake of unreal fancies? I am much more certain of my misery than I am of efficacious grace. I have wasted days in reasoning about the liberty of God and the human race, but I have lost my own, and neither St Augustine nor St Prosper will rescue me from this abyss.’
The Child of Nature, yielding to his instinct, said at last: ‘Will you allow me to speak to you freely and boldly? I have no great opinion of the wisdom of those who let themselves be persecuted for these vain scholastic disputes; but as for the persecutors, I think they are monsters.’
The two captives were thus in complete agreement about the injustice of their captivity.
‘I am a hundred times more to be pitied than you are,’ said the Child of Nature. ‘I was born free as air. I lived for two things, my liberty and the object of my love, and they have been taken from me. We are both in chains, without knowing why or being able to ask. For twenty years I was a Huron; they are called savages because they take revenge on their enemies, but at least they have never oppressed their friends. I had hardly set foot in France before I shed my blood in her defence; I may even have saved a province; and as my reward I am shut up in a living tomb, where I would have died of rage without your company. Are there no laws in this country, that men are condemned without a hearing? It’s not like that in England. It wasn’t the English I should have been fighting.’
Thus, his increasing command of philosophy could not control a nature outraged in its basic rights, and left the way open to righteous anger.
His companion did not contradict him. Absence always intensifies unsatisfied love, and philosophy does not diminish it. The young man talked as often about his dear St Yves as about morality and metaphysics. The purer his feelings became, the more he loved her. He read several new novels but found few that depicted the state of his soul. He fancied that his heart always went beyond what he read.
‘Nearly all these authors have only wit and artifice,’ he remarked with a sigh.
And so the good Jansenist priest gradually became the confidant of his passion. Till then he had known nothing of love except as a sin to be admitted at confession. He now learnt to recognize it as a sentiment at once noble and tender, one which can elevate the soul as well as soften it, and even lead it into the paths of virtue on occasion. So here was the greatest miracle of all, that a Huron should convert a jansenist.
CHAPTER 15
THE LOVELY ST YVES RESISTS CERTAIN DELICATE PROPOSITIONS
THE lovely St Yves, who was even more devoted than her lover, went straight to see Monsieur de St Pouange, accompanied by the friend with whom she was lodging, their hoods pulled well down over their faces. The first thing she saw at the gate was her brother, the Abbe de St Yves, coming away. She was alarmed, but her pious friend reassured her :
‘If someone has been speaking against you, that is all the more reason to speak for yourself. Remember that in this country the prosecutor is always believed, unless you hasten to answer his accusations. Besides, unless I am greatly mistaken, your presence will have more effect than your brother’s words.’
It does not need much encouragement to make a passionate young woman fearless. Mademoiselle de St Yves appeared in audience, and drew everyone’s attention by her youth, her charms, and her tender eyes moist with tears. For one moment all the Under-Secretary’s toadies forgot the image of power to contemplate that of beauty. St Pouange took her into his office, where she spoke with such tenderness and grace that he was touched. She trembled, and he reassured her.
‘Come back this evening,’ he told her. ‘Your affairs need consideration; we must discuss them at leisure. There is too much of a crowd here, and one has to hurry too quickly through the audiences. We must get to the bottom of this whole business of yours.’ Then, after commending her beauty and her sentiments, he advised her to come back at seven o’clock that evening.
She did not fail, and returned at the appointed time with her devout friend, who remained in the antechamber studying Outreman’s Christian Pedagogy, while St Pouange and the lovely St Yves occupied the inner office.
‘Would you believe it, Mademoiselle?’ he began. ‘Your brother has been here demanding an order of summary imprisonment against you. I should really much prefer to issue one to send him packing to Lower Brittany.’
The lady sighed, and said:
‘I see, Sir, how liberal you are in government offices with your imprisonment orders, since people come from the furthest parts of the kingdom begging for them as if they were pensions. I have no desire to take one out against my brother. I have much to complain of where he is concerned, but I respect human liberty; and that is what I ask, for a man I want to marry; a man to whom the King is indebted for the saving of a province, one who can serve him well, and who is the son of an officer killed in his service. What is he accused of? How can it be that he is treated so cruelly, without even a hearing?’
The Under-Secretary then showed her the letter from the Jesuit spy, and the one written by the treacherous Magistrate.
‘Gracious Heaven!’ she cried. ‘Can there really be such monsters in the world? And am I, then, to be forced into marrying the ridiculous son
of a man as ridiculous as he is wicked! And this is the sort of evidence on which the fate of our countrymen hangs!’
She fell on her knees and sobbed as she begged for the freedom of the brave man she adored. Her charms appeared at their greatest advantage while she was in this state. She was so lovely that St Pouange lost all shame, and hinted to her that she would succeed if only she began by giving him the first fruits of what she was reserving for her lover. Shocked and confused as she was by this request, Mademoiselle de St Yves pretended not to understand him; and he had to explain more clearly. He uttered first one indecent word, then a stronger one, followed by another more expressive still. He offered her not only the cancellation of the order against her lover, but compensation, money, honours, and establishments; the more he offered, the more anxious he became not to be refused.
Mademoiselle de St Yves burst into tears; she lay choked with sobs, half prostrate upon a sofa, hardly able to believe what she saw and heard. St Pouange for his part fell on his knees. He was not unattractive, and would have been able to prevail over a less dedicated heart; but Mademoiselle de St Yves adored her lover, and considered it a horrible crime to betray him in order to serve him. St Pouange redoubled his prayers and promises. At last his head was so completely turned that he told her that this was the only way she could release from prison the man in whom she took such a violent yet tender interest.
This strange conversation went on and on. The devout woman in the antechamber said to herself, as she read her Christian Pedagogy:
‘Heavens! What can they have been doing in there for two hours? Monseigneur de St Pouange has never given such a long audience before! Perhaps he has refused this poor young girl everything, and that’s why she’s still pleading with him.’
At last her companion came out of the inner room utterly bewildered and unable to speak. She was meditating on the character of the great and their underlings, who so lightly sacrifice the freedom of men and the honour of women.
She said not a word on the way home; but when they got back to her friend’s house, she burst out and told her all. The devout woman crossed herself and said :
‘My dear friend, tomorrow we must consult our spiritual director, Father All-to-All. He has a great deal of influence on Monseigneur de St Pouange, for he is confessor to several servant-girls in his house. He is a pious and helpful man, who also advises ladies of quality. Put your faith in him; that is what I do, and it always turns out well. We poor women need a man to manage our affairs.’
‘Very well, dear friend,’ she replied. ‘Tomorrow I will go and find Father All-to-All.’
CHAPTER 16
SHE CONSULTS A JESUIT
As soon as the lovely and disconsolate Mademoiselle de St Yves was closeted with her kind confessor, she confided to him that a powerful and sensual man was offering to procure the release of her future husband and demanding a high price for the service; she added that such infidelity was extremely repugnant to her, and if it was only a question of saving her own life she would sacrifice it gladly rather than agree to the proposal.
‘What an abominable sinner!’ said Father All-to-All. ‘You had better tell me this wretch’s name. Some Jansenist, I’ll warrant. I shall denounce him to the Reverend Father de La Chaise, who will put him in the prison where your dear one is now lying.’
The poor girl was much embarrassed, and hesitated a long time before she finally resolved to name St Pouange.
‘Monsieur de St Pouange!’ exclaimed the Jesuit. ‘But, daughter, that’s quite another matter I He’s a cousin of the greatest Minister we have ever had; he’s a good man, who has our cause at heart, and a good Christian too. He cannot have had such a thought. You must have misunderstood him.’
‘I understood him only too well, Father,’ she sighed. ‘I am lost whatever I do. I can choose only between misery and shame. Either my lover remains buried alive, or I make myself unfit to live. I cannot leave him to perish, nor can I save him.’
Father All-to-All tried to calm her with these soothing words:
‘In the first place, daughter, never use that word “lover”.
There is something worldly about it which might offend God. Say “my husband”. For although he is not so yet, you regard him as such, and nothing could be more respectable.
‘Secondly, although he is your husband in imagination and in prospect, he is not so in fact. Thus, you would not be committing adultery, a heinous sin which must be avoided as far as possible.
‘Thirdly, actions are not entirely malicious or culpable when the intentions are pure, and nothing could be purer than the wish to rescue your husband.
‘Fourthly, you have examples in the ancient records of Holy Church, which can miraculously guide your conduct. St Augustine reports that under the proconsulate of Septimius Acyndinus, in the year of our Lord, 340, a poor man who could not pay unto Caesar that which belonged to Caesar was condemned to death, quite justly, in spite of the maxim “Where there is nothing, the King loses his rights”. It was a matter of a gold sovereign. Now the condemned man had a wife in whom God had combined beauty with prudence. A wealthy old man promised to give her a sovereign, and even more, on condition that he should commit this loathsome sin with her. The lady did not believe she was doing wrong in saving her husband’s life, and St Augustine strongly approved of her generous submission. It is true that the wealthy old man deceived her, and perhaps her husband was hanged none the less; but she had done everything in her power to save him.
‘You may be sure, daughter, that when a Jesuit quotes St Augustine to you, the saint must be absolutely right. I give you no advice. You are sensible, and presumably you will do your husband a service. Monsieur de St Pouange is a gentleman and will not let you down. That is all I can say to you. I will pray to God for you, and hope that everything will turn out to His greater glory.’
The lovely St Yves, no less terrified by the Jesuit’s discourse than by the Under-Secretary’s propositions, came back to her friend’s house distraught. She was tempted to let death deliver her from the horror of having to choose between leaving the lover she adored in fearful captivity, and the shame of delivering him at the price of her most precious possession, which should belong only to the unfortunate lover.
CHAPTER 17
HER VIRTUE HER DOWNFALL
SHE begged her friend to put an end to her life; but the woman, no less indulgent than the Jesuit, was even more out-spoken :
‘Alas,’ she sighed, ‘delightful, polite, and famous as this court is, that is usually the way things happen nowadays. The humbler positions, as well as the larger prizes, nearly always depend upon someone paying the price which you are being asked to pay. Listen. You have moved me to confide in you, out of friendship. I tell you that if I had been as fastidious as you are, my husband would have had no chance of the minor post which is what he lives on. He is well aware of this, and far from being annoyed, he considers me his benefactress, and looks upon himself as owing everything to me. Do you really imagine that all who are in command in the provinces, or for that matter in the army, have earned their honours and their fortunes simply by their services? Many of them are in debt to their wives. Military honours are often bargained for, and the place has gone to the husband of the loveliest woman.
‘Your position is even more interesting; for it is a question of restoring your lover to freedom, and then marrying him. It is a sacred duty which you are bound to carry out. Nobody has ever held it against the beauties and the fine ladies I have been talking about, and neither will you be considered anything but praiseworthy. It will be said that you only allowed yourself a little weakness because you had too much virtue.’
‘Virtue indeed!’ cried the lovely St Yves. ‘What a sink of iniquity! What a country this is! How well I begin to know men! A certain Father de La Chaise and a ridiculous Magistrate have put my lover in prison; my family persecute me, and the only help I can get in my tribulation leads to my dishonour. One Jesuit has ruined a fine yo
ung man, another wants to ruin me. There are nothing but pitfalls around me, and I have reached the very brink of misery. I must either kill myself or speak to the King : I will throw myself at his feet when he is on his way to Mass or the theatre.’
‘You would never be allowed near enough,’ her good friend told her, ‘and if you did have the misfortune to say what is on your mind, Monseigneur de Louvois and the Reverend Father de La Chaise would have you buried in the depths of a convent for the rest of your days.’
While this excellent person was thus adding to the perplexities of that despairing soul and twisting the dagger in her heart, a messenger arrived from Monsieur de St Pouange with a letter and a beautiful pair of earrings. Mademoiselle de St Yves, in tears, refused to touch them; but her friend took charge of them.
As soon as the messenger had left, the confidential friend read the letter, in which the two ladies were invited to a little supper-party that evening. Mademoiselle de St Yves swore that nothing would make her go. The pious woman wanted her to try on the diamond earrings; but Mademoiselle de St Yves could not bear the sight of them, and fought against the idea all day long. At last, with no other thought in her mind than her lover, she was won over, and allowed herself to be led to the fatal supper.
Nothing had been able to persuade her to wear the earrings, but her friend brought them and put them on in spite of her, before they sat down to table. Mademoiselle de St Yves was in such a state of confusion and distress that she endured the torment; the master of the house took this for a very favourable sign. Towards the end of the meal, the confidant discreetly withdrew. Then the patron showed her a document revoking the order for imprisonment, another order for
a considerable recompense, and a commission to take charge of a company. Nor was he sparing in promises.