THE POET FEELS THAT HE IS LOVED TOO WELL
An hour later, Modeste, charmingly equipped in a bottle-green cassimere habit, a small hat with a green veil, buckskin gloves, and velvet boots which met the lace frills of her drawers, and mounted on an elegantly caparisoned little horse, was exhibiting to her father and the Duc d'Herouville the beautiful present she had just received;
she was evidently delighted with an attention of a kind that particularly flatters women.
"Did it come from you, Monsieur le duc?" she said, holding the sparkling handle toward him. "There was a card with it, saying, 'Guess if you can,' and some asterisks. Francoise and Dumay credit Butscha with this charming surprise; but my dear Butscha is not rich enough to buy such rubies. And as for papa (to whom I said, as I remember, on Sunday evening, that I had no whip), he sent to Rouen for this one,"--
pointing to a whip in her father's hand, with a top like a cone of turquoise, a fashion then in vogue which has since become vulgar.
"I would give ten years of my old age, mademoiselle, to have the right to offer you that beautiful jewel," said the duke, courteously.
"Ah, here comes the audacious giver!" cried Modeste, as Canalis rode up. "It is only a poet who knows where to find such choice things.
Monsieur," she said to Melchior, "my father will scold you, and say that you justify those who accuse you of extravagance."
"Oh!" exclaimed Canalis, with apparent simplicity, "so that is why La Briere rode at full gallop from Havre to Paris?"
"Does your secretary take such liberties?" said Modeste, turning pale, and throwing the whip to Francoise with an impetuosity that expressed scorn. "Give me your whip, papa."
"Poor Ernest, who lies there on his bed half-dead with fatigue!" said Canalis, overtaking the girl, who had already started at a gallop.
"You are pitiless, mademoiselle. 'I have' (the poor fellow said to me)
'only this one chance to remain in her memory.'"
"And should you think well of a woman who could take presents from half the parish?" said Modeste.
She was surprised to receive no answer to this inquiry, and attributed the poet's inattention to the noise of the horse's feet.
"How you delight in tormenting those who love you," said the duke.
"Your nobility of soul and your pride are so inconsistent with your faults that I begin to suspect you calumniate yourself, and do those naughty things on purpose."
"Ah! have you only just found that out, Monsieur le duc?" she exclaimed, laughing. "You have the sagacity of a husband."
They rode half a mile in silence. Modeste was a good deal astonished not to receive the fire of the poet's eyes. The evening before, as she was pointing out to him an admirable effect of setting sunlight across the water, she had said, remarking his inattention, "Well, don't you see it?"--to which he replied, "I can see only your hand"; but now his admiration for the beauties of nature seemed a little too intense to be natural.
"Does Monsieur de La Briere know how to ride?" she asked, for the purpose of teasing him.
"Not very well, but he gets along," answered the poet, cold as Gobenheim before the colonel's return.
At a cross-road, which Monsieur Mignon made them take through a lovely valley to reach a height overlooking the Seine, Canalis let Modeste and the duke pass him, and then reined up to join the colonel.
"Monsieur le comte," he said, "you are an open-hearted soldier, and I
know you will regard my frankness as a title to your esteem. When proposals of marriage, with all their brutal,--or, if you please, too civilized--discussions, are carried on by third parties, it is an injury to all. We are both gentlemen, and both discreet; and you, like myself, have passed beyond the age of surprises. Let us therefore speak as intimates. I will set you the example. I am twenty-nine years old, without landed estates, and full of ambition. Mademoiselle Modeste, as you must have perceived, pleases me extremely. Now, in spite of the little defects which your dear girl likes to assume--"
"--not counting those she really possesses," said the colonel, smiling,--
"--I should gladly make her my wife, and I believe I could render her happy. The question of money is of the utmost importance to my future, which hangs to-day in the balance. All young girls expect to be loved WHETHER OR NO--fortune or no fortune. But you are not the man to marry your dear Modeste without a 'dot,' and my situation does not allow me to make a marriage of what is called love unless with a woman who has a fortune at least equal to mine. I have, from my emoluments and sinecures, from the Academy and from my works, about thirty thousand francs a year, a large income for a bachelor. If my wife brought me as much more, I should still be in about the same condition that I am now. Shall you give Mademoiselle a million?"
"Ah, monsieur, we have not reached that point as yet," said the colonel, Jesuitically.
"Then suppose," said Canalis, quickly, "that we go no further; we will let the matter drop. You shall have no cause to complain of me, Monsieur le comte; the world shall consider me among the unfortunate suitors of your charming daughter. Give me your word of honor to say nothing on the subject to any one, not even to Mademoiselle Modeste, because," he added, throwing a word of promise to the ear, "my circumstances may so change that I can ask you for her without 'dot.'"
"I promise you that," said the colonel. "You know, monsieur, with what assurance the public, both in Paris and the provinces, talk of fortunes that they make and unmake. People exaggerate both happiness and unhappiness; we are never so fortunate nor so unfortunate as people say we are. There is nothing sure and certain in business except investments in land. I am awaiting the accounts of my agents with very great impatience. The sale of my merchandise and my ship, and the settlement of my affairs in China, are not yet concluded; and I cannot know the full amount of my fortune for at least six months. I