La confession d'un enfant du siècle. English

  CHAPTER I. SWEET ANTICIPATIONS

  Having decided on a long tour, we went first to Paris; the necessarypreparations required time, and we took a furnished apartment for onemonth. The decision to leave France had changed everything: joy, hope,confidence, all returned; no more sorrow, no more grief over approachingseparation. We had now nothing but dreams of happiness and vows ofeternal love; I wished, once for all, to make my dear mistress forgetall the suffering I had caused her. How had I been able to resist suchproof of tender affection and courageous resignation? Not only didBrigitte pardon me, but she was willing to make a still greatersacrifice and leave everything for me. As I felt myself unworthy of thedevotion she exhibited, I wished to requite her by my love; at last mygood angel had triumphed, and admiration and love resumed their sway inmy heart. Brigitte and I examined a map to determine where we should goand bury ourselves from the world. We had not yet decided, and we foundpleasure in that very uncertainty; while glancing over the map we said"Where shall we go? What shall we do? Where shall we begin life anew?"How shall I tell how deeply I repented my cruelty when I looked uponher smiling face, a face that laughed at the future, although still palefrom the sorrows of the past! Blissful projects of future joy, you areperhaps the only true happiness known to man! For eight days we spentour time making purchases and preparing for our departure; then a youngman presented himself at our apartments: he brought letters to Brigitte.After their interview I found her sad and distraught; but I could notguess the cause unless the letters were from N------, that villagewhere I had confessed my love and where Brigitte's only relatives lived.Nevertheless, our preparations progressed rapidly and I became impatientto get away; at the same time I was so happy that I could hardly rest.When I arose in the morning and the sun was shining through our windows,I experienced such transports of joy that I was almost intoxicatedwith happiness. So anxious was I to prove the sincerity of my love forBrigitte that I hardly dared kiss the hem of her skirt. Her lightestwords made me tremble as if her voice were strange to me; I alternatedbetween tears and laughter, and I never spoke of the past except withhorror and disgust. Our room was full of personal effects scatteredabout in disorder--albums, pictures, books, and the dear map we loved somuch. We went to and fro about the little apartment; at brief intervalsI would stop and kneel before Brigitte who would call me an idler,saying that she had to do all the work, and that I was good for nothing;and all sorts of projects flitted through our minds. Sicily was faraway, but the winters are so delightful there! Genoa is very prettywith its painted houses, its green gardens, and the Apennines in thebackground! But what noise! What crowds! Among every three men on thestreet, one is a monk and another a soldier. Florence is sad, it is theMiddle Ages living in the midst of modern life. How can any one endurethose grilled windows and that horrible brown color with which all thehouses are tinted?

  What could we do at Rome? We were not travelling in order to forgetourselves, much less for the sake of instruction. To the Rhine? But theseason was over, and although we did not care for the world of fashion,still it is sad to visit its haunts when it has fled. But Spain? Toomany restrictions there; one travels like an army on the march, and mayexpect everything except repose. Switzerland? Too many people go there,and most of them are deceived as to the nature of its attractions;but in that land are unfolded the three most beautiful colors onGod's earth: the azure of the sky, the verdure of the plains, and thewhiteness of the snows on the summits of glaciers.

  "Let us go, let us go!" cried Brigitte, "let us fly away like two birds.Let us pretend, my dear Octave, that we met each other only yesterday.You met me at a ball, I pleased you and I love you; you tell me thatsome leagues distant, in a certain little town, you loved a certainMadame Pierson; what passed between you and her I do not know. You willnot tell me the story of your love for another! And I will whisperto you that not long since I loved a terrible fellow who made me veryunhappy; you will reprove me and close my mouth, and we will agree neverto speak of such things."

  When Brigitte spoke thus I experienced a feeling that resembled avarice;I caught her in my arms and cried:

  "Oh, God! I know not whether it is with joy or with fear that I tremble.I am about to carry off my treasure. Die, my youth; die, all memories ofthe past; die, all cares and regrets! Oh, my good, my brave Brigitte!You have made a man out of a child. If I lose you now, I shall neverlove again. Perhaps, before I knew you, another woman might have curedme; but now you alone, of all the world, have power to destroy me or tosave me, for I bear in my heart the wound of all the evil I have doneyou. I have been an ingrate, blind and cruel. God be praised! You loveme still. If you ever return to that home under whose lindens I firstmet you, look carefully about that deserted house; you will find aphantom there, for the man who left it, and went away with you, is notthe man who entered it."

  "Is it true?" said Brigitte, and her face, all radiant with love, wasraised to heaven; "is it true that I am yours? Yes, far from this odiousworld in which you have grown old before your time, yes, my child, youshall really love. I shall have you as you are, and, wherever we go youwill make me forget the possibility of a day when you will no longerlove me. My mission will have been accomplished, and I shall always bethankful for it."

  Finally we decided to go to Geneva and then choose some resting placein the Alps. Brigitte was enthusiastic about the lake; I thought I couldalready breathe the air which floats over its surface, and the odor ofthe verdure-clad valley; already I beheld Lausanne, Vevey, Oberland,and in the distance the summits of Monte Rosa and the immense plain ofLombardy. Already oblivion, repose, travel, all the delights of happysolitude invited us; already, when in the evening with joined hands, welooked at each other in silence, we felt rising within us that sentimentof strange grandeur which takes possession of the heart on the eve of along journey, the mysterious and indescribable vertigo which has in itsomething of the terrors of exile and the hopes of pilgrimage. Arethere not in the human mind wings that flutter and sonorous chords thatvibrate? How shall I describe it? Is there not a world of meaning in thesimple words: "All is ready, we are about to go"?

  Suddenly Brigitte became languid; she bowed her head in silence. WhenI asked her whether she was in pain, she said "No!" in a voice that wasscarcely audible; when I spoke of our departure, she arose, cold andresigned, and continued her preparations; when I swore to her that shewas going to be happy, and that I would consecrate my life to her, sheshut herself up in her room and wept; when I kissed her she turned pale,and averted her eyes as my lips approached hers; when I told her thatnothing had yet been done, that it was not too late to renounce ourplans, she frowned severely; when I begged her to open her heart to meand told her I would die rather than cause her one regret, she threw herarms about my neck, then stopped and repulsed me as if involuntarily.Finally, I entered her room holding in my hand a ticket on which ourplaces were marked for the carriage to Besancon. I approached her andplaced it in her lap; she stretched out her hand, screamed, and fellunconscious at my feet.