To close this part of my story, dear Gertrude, Le Kain examined St.Amand, and the result of the examination was a confident belief in theprobability of a cure. St. Amand gladly consented to the experiment ofan operation; it succeeded, the blind man saw! Oh, what were Lucille'sfeelings, what her emotion, what her joy, when she found the object ofher pilgrimage, of her prayers, fulfilled! That joy was so intense thatin the eternal alternations of human life she might have foretold fromits excess how bitter the sorrows fated to ensue.
As soon as by degrees the patient's new sense became reconciled to thelight, his first, his only demand was for Lucille. "No, let me not seeher alone; let me see her in the midst of you all, that I may convinceyou that the heart never is mistaken in its instincts." With a fearful,a sinking presentiment, Lucille yielded to the request, to which theimpetuous St. Amand would hear indeed no denial. The father, themother, Julie, Lucille, Julie's younger sisters, assembled in thelittle parlour; the door opened, and St. Amand stood hesitating on thethreshold. One look around sufficed to him; his face brightened, heuttered a cry of joy. "Lucille! Lucille!" he exclaimed, "it is you, Iknow it, _you_ only!" He sprang forward _and fell at the feet of Julie_!
Flushed, elated, triumphant, Julie bent upon him her sparkling eyes;_she_ did not undeceive him.
"You are wrong, you mistake," said Madame le Tisseur, in confusion;"that is her cousin Julie,--this is your Lucille."
St. Amand rose, turned, saw Lucille, and at that moment she wishedherself in her grave. Surprise, mortification, disappointment, almostdismay, were depicted in his gaze. He had been haunting his prison-housewith dreams, and now, set free, he felt how unlike they were to thetruth. Too new to observation to read the woe, the despair, the lapseand shrinking of the whole frame, that his look occasioned Lucille, heyet felt, when the first shock of his surprise was over, that it was notthus he should thank her who had restored him to sight. He hastened toredeem his error--ah! how could it be redeemed?
From that hour all Lucille's happiness was at an end; her fairy palacewas shattered in the dust; the magician's wand was broken up; theAriel was given to the winds; and the bright enchantment no longerdistinguished the land she lived in from the rest of the barrenworld. It is true that St. Amand's words were kind; it is true that heremembered with the deepest gratitude all she had done in his behalf;it is true that he forced himself again and again to say, "She is mybetrothed, my benefactress!" and he cursed himself to think that thefeelings he had entertained for her were fled. Where was the passion ofhis words; where the ardour of his tone; where that play and light ofcountenance which her step, her voice, could formerly call forth? Whenthey were alone he was embarrassed and constrained, and almost cold;his hand no longer sought hers, his soul no longer missed her if she wasabsent a moment from his side. When in their household circle he seemedvisibly more at ease; but did his eyes fasten upon her who had openedthem to the day; did they not wander at every interval with a tooeloquent admiration to the blushing and radiant face of the exultingJulie? This was not, you will believe, suddenly perceptible in oneday or one week, but every day it was perceptible more and more. Yetstill--bewitched, ensnared, as St. Amand was he never perhaps would havebeen guilty of an infidelity that he strove with the keenest remorse towrestle against, had it not been for the fatal contrast, at the firstmoment of his gushing enthusiasm, which Julie had presented to Lucille;but for that he would have formed no previous idea of real and livingbeauty to aid the disappointment of his imaginings and his dreams.He would have seen Lucille young and graceful, and with eyes beamingaffection, contrasted only by the wrinkled countenance and bended frameof her parents, and she would have completed her conquest over himbefore he had discovered that she was less beautiful than others; nay,more,--that infidelity never could have lasted above the first few days,if the vain and heartless object of it had not exerted every art, allthe power and witchery of her beauty, to cement and continue it. Theunfortunate Lucille--so susceptible to the slightest change in thoseshe loved, so diffident of herself, so proud too in that diffidence--nolonger necessary, no longer missed, no longer loved, could not bear toendure the galling comparison between the past and the present. Shefled uncomplainingly to her chamber to indulge her tears, and thus,unhappily, absent as her father generally was during the day, and busiedas her mother was either at work or in household matters, she left Juliea thousand opportunities to complete the power she had begun to wieldover--no, not the heart!--the _senses_ of St. Amand! Yet, still notsuspecting, in the open generosity of her mind, the whole extent of heraffliction, poor Lucille buoyed herself at times with the hope that whenonce married, when, once in that intimacy of friendship, the unspeakablelove she felt for him could disclose itself with less restraint than atpresent,--she would perhaps regain a heart which had been so devotedlyhers, that she could not think that without a fault it was irrevocablygone: on that hope she anchored all the little happiness that remainedto her. And still St. Amand pressed their marriage, but in whatdifferent tones! In fact, he wished to preclude from himself thepossibility of a deeper ingratitude than that which he had incurredalready. He vainly thought that the broken reed of love might be boundup and strengthened by the ties of duty; and at least he was anxiousthat his hand, his fortune, his esteem, his gratitude, should giveto Lucille the only recompense it was now in his power to bestow.Meanwhile, left alone so often with Julie, and Julie bent on achievingthe last triumph over his heart, St. Amand was gradually preparing afar different reward, a far different return, for her to whom he owed soincalculable a debt.
There was a garden, behind the house, in which there was a smallarbour, where often in the summer evenings Eugene and Lucille hadsat together,--hours never to return! One day she heard from her ownchamber, where she sat mourning, the sound of St. Amand's flute swellinggently from that beloved and consecrated bower. She wept as she heardit, and the memories that the music bore softening and endearing hisimage, she began to reproach herself that she had yielded so often tothe impulse of her wounded feelings; that chilled by _his_ coldness, shehad left him so often to himself, and had not sufficiently dared totell him of that affection which, in her modest self-depreciation,constituted her only pretension to his love. "Perhaps he is alone now,"she thought; "the air too is one which he knows that I love;" and withher heart in her step, she stole from the house and sought the arbour.She had scarce turned from her chamber when the flute ceased; as sheneared the arbour she heard voices,--Julie's voice in grief, St. Amand'sin consolation. A dread foreboding seized her; her feet clung rooted tothe earth.
"Yes, marry her, forget me," said Julie; "in a few days you willbe another's, and I--I--forgive me, Eugene, forgive me that I havedisturbed your happiness. I am punished sufficiently; my heart willbreak, but it will break in loving you." Sobs choked Julie's voice.
"Oh, speak not thus," said St. Amand. "I, _I_ only am to blame,--I,false to both, to both ungrateful. Oh, from the hour that these eyesopened upon you I drank in a new life; the sun itself to me was lesswonderful than your beauty. But--but--let me forget that hour. What do Inot owe to Lucille? I shall be wretched,--I shall deserve to be so;for shall I not think, Julie, that I have embittered your life with ourill-fated love? But all that I can give--my hand, my home, my plightedfaith--must be hers. Nay, Julie, nay--why that look? Could I actotherwise? Can I dream otherwise? Whatever the sacrifice, _must_ I notrender it? Ah, what do I owe to Lucille, were it only for the thoughtthat but for her I might never have seen thee!"
Lucille stayed to hear no more; with the same soft step as that whichhad borne her within hearing of these fatal words, she turned back oncemore to her desolate chamber.
That evening, as St. Amand was sitting alone in his apartment, he hearda gentle knock at the door. "Come in," he said, and Lucille entered. Hestarted in some confusion, and would have taken her hand, but she gentlyrepulsed him. She took a seat opposite to him, and looking down, thusaddressed him:--
"My dear Eugene, that is, Monsieur St. Amand, I have something on
mymind that I think it better to speak at once; and if I do not exactlyexpress what I would wish to say, you must not be offended with Lucille:it is not an easy matter to put into words what one feels deeply."Colouring, and suspecting something of the truth, St. Amand would havebroken in upon her here; but she with a gentle impatience motioned himto be silent, and continued:--
"You know that when you once loved me, I used to tell you that you wouldcease to do so could you see how undeserving I was of your attachment. Idid not deceive myself, Eugene; I always felt assured that such would bethe case, that your love for me necessarily rested on your affliction.But for all that I never at least had a dream or a desire but for yourhappiness; and God knows, that if again, by walking barefooted, not toCologne, but to Rome--to the end of the world--I could save you from amuch less misfortune than that of blindness, I would cheerfully do it;yes, even though I might foretell all the while that, on my return, youwould speak to me coldly, think of me lightly, and that the penalty tome would--would be--what it has been!" Here Lucille wiped a few naturaltears from her eyes. St. Amand, struck to the heart, covered hisface with his hands, without the courage to interrupt her. Lucillecontinued:--
"That which I foresaw has come to pass; I am no longer to you what Ionce was, when you could clothe this poor form and this homely face witha beauty they did not possess. You would wed me still, it is true; but Iam proud, Eugene, and cannot stoop to gratitude where I once had love.I am not so unjust as to blame you; the change was natural, wasinevitable. I should have steeled myself more against it; but I am nowresigned. We must part; you love Julie--that too is natural--and _she_loves you; ah! what also more in the probable course of events? Julieloves you, not yet, perhaps, so much as I did; but then she has notknown you as I have, and she whose whole life has been triumph cannotfeel the gratitude that I felt at fancying myself loved; but this willcome--God grant it! Farewell, then, forever, dear Eugene; I leave youwhen you no longer want me; you are now independent of Lucille; whereveryou go, a thousand hereafter can supply my place. Farewell!"
She rose, as she said this, to leave the room; but St. Amand seizing herhand, which she in vain endeavoured to withdraw from his clasp, pouredforth incoherently, passionately, his reproaches on himself, hiseloquent persuasion against her resolution.
"I confess," said he, "that I have been allured for a moment; I confessthat Julie's beauty made me less sensible to your stronger, your holier,oh! far, far holier title to my love! But forgive me, dearest Lucille;already I return to you, to all I once felt for you; make me not cursethe blessing of sight that I owe to you. You must not leave me; nevercan we two part. Try me, only try me, and if ever hereafter my heartwander from you, _then_, Lucille, leave me to my remorse!"
Even at that moment Lucille did not yield; she felt that his prayer wasbut the enthusiasm of the hour; she felt that there was a virtue in herpride,--that to leave him was a duty to herself. In vain he pleaded; invain were his embraces, his prayers; in vain he reminded her of theirplighted troth, of her aged parents, whose happiness had become wrappedin her union with him: "How,--even were it as you wrongly believe,--how,in honour to them, can I desert you, can I wed another?"
"Trust that, trust all, to me," answered Lucille; "your honour shallbe my care, none shall blame _you_; only do not let your marriage withJulie be celebrated here before their eyes: that is all I ask, all theycan expect. God bless you! do not fancy I shall be unhappy, for whateverhappiness the world gives you, shall I not have contributed to bestowit? and with that thought I am above compassion."
She glided from his arms, and left him to a solitude more bitter eventhan that of blindness. That very night Lucille sought her mother; toher she confided all. I pass over the reasons she urged, the argumentsshe overcame; she conquered rather than convinced, and leaving to Madamele Tisseur the painful task of breaking to her father her unalterableresolution, she quitted Malines the next morning, and with a heart toohonest to be utterly without comfort, paid that visit to her aunt whichhad been so long deferred.
The pride of Lucille's parents prevented them from reproaching St.Amand. He could not bear, however, their cold and altered looks; he lefttheir house; and though for several days he would not even see Julie,yet her beauty and her art gradually resumed their empire over him. Theywere married at Courtroi, and to the joy of the vain Julie departed tothe gay metropolis of France. But, before their departure, before hismarriage, St. Amand endeavoured to appease his conscience by obtainingfor M. le Tisseur a much more lucrative and honourable office than thathe now held. Rightly judging that Malines could no longer be a pleasantresidence for them, and much less for Lucille, the duties of the postwere to be fulfilled in another town; and knowing that M. le Tisseur'sdelicacy would revolt at receiving such a favour from his hands, he keptthe nature of his negotiation a close secret, and suffered the honestcitizen to believe that his own merits alone had entitled him to sounexpected a promotion.