The baroness looked inquiringly towards Aubertin.He put on an innocent face and said nothing.
"Very good," said the baroness."It's plain I am to learn nothing from you two.But I know somebody who will be more communicative.
Yes: this uncomfortable smiling, and unreasonable crying, and interminable whispering; these appearances of the absent, and disappearances of the present; I shall know this very day what they all mean.""Really, I do not understand you."
"Oh, never mind; I am an old woman, and I am in my dotage.For all that, perhaps you will allow me two words alone with my daughter.""I retire, madame," and he disappeared with a bow to her, and an anxious look at Rose.She did not need this; she clenched her teeth, and braced herself up to stand a severe interrogatory.
Mother and daughter looked at one another, as if to measure forces, and then, instead of questioning her as she had intended, the baroness sank back in her chair and wept aloud.Rose was all unprepared for this.She almost screamed in a voice of agony, "Omamma! mamma! O God! kill me where I stand for ****** my mother weep!""My girl," said the baroness in a broken voice, and with the most touching dignity, "may you never know what a mother feels who finds herself shut out from her daughters' hearts.Sometimes I think it is my fault; I was born in a severer age.A mother nowadays seems to be a sort of elder sister.In my day she was something more.
Yet I loved my mother as well, or better than I did my sisters.But it is not so with those I have borne in my bosom, and nursed upon my knee."At this Rose flung herself, sobbing and screaming, at her mother's knees.The baroness was alarmed."Come, dearest, don't cry like that.It is not too late to take your poor old mother into your confidence.What is this mystery? and why this sorrow? How comes it I intercept at every instant glances that were not intended for me? Why is the very air loaded with signals and secrecy? (Rose replied only by sobs.) Is some deceit going on? (Rose sobbed.) Am I to have no reply but these sullen sobs? will you really tell me nothing?""I've nothing to tell," sobbed Rose.
"Well, then, will you do something for me?"Such a proposal was not only a relief, but a delight to the deceiving but loving daughter.She started up crying, "Oh, yes, mamma; anything, everything.Oh, thank you!" In the ardor of her gratitude, she wanted to kiss her mother; but the baroness declined the embrace politely, and said, coldly and bitterly, "I shall not ask much; I should not venture now to draw largely on your affection; it's only to write a few lines for me."Rose got paper and ink with great alacrity, and sat down all beaming, pen in hand.
The baroness dictated the letter slowly, with an eye gimleting her daughter all the time.
"Dear--Monsieur--Riviere."
The pen fell from Rose's hand, and she turned red and then pale.
"What! write to him?"
"Not in your own name; in mine.But perhaps you prefer to give me the trouble.""Cruel! cruel!" sighed Rose, and wrote the words as requested.
The baroness dictated again,--
"Oblige me by coming here at your very earliest convenience.""But, mamma, if he is in Normandy," remonstrated Rose, fighting every inch of the ground.
"Never you mind where he is," said the baroness."Write as Irequest."
"Yes, mamma," said Rose with sudden alacrity; for she had recovered her ready wit, and was prepared to write anything, being now fully resolved the letter should never go.
"Now sign my name." Rose complied."There; now fold it, and address it to his lodgings." Rose did so; and, rising with a cheerful air, said she would send Jacintha with it directly.
She was half across the room when her mother called her quietly back.
"No, mademoiselle," said she sternly."You will give me the letter.
I can trust neither the friend of twenty years, nor the servant that stayed by me in adversity, nor the daughter I suffered for and nursed.And why don't I trust you? Because YOU HAVE TOLD ME ALIE."
At this word, which in its coarsest form she had never heard from those high-born lips till then, Rose cowered like a hare.
"Ay, A LIE," said the baroness."I saw Edouard Riviere in the park but yesterday.I saw him.My old eyes are feeble, but they are not deceitful.I saw him.Send my breakfast to my own room.I come of an ancient race: I could not sit with liars; I should forget courtesy; you would see in my face how thoroughly I scorn you all."And she went haughtily out with the letter in her hand.
Rose for the first time, was prostrated.Vain had been all this deceit; her mother was not happy; was not blinded.Edouard might come and tell her his story.Then no power could keep Josephine silent.The plot was thickening; the fatal net was drawing closer and closer.
She sank with a groan into a chair, and body and spirit alike succumbed.But that was only for a little while.To this prostration succeeded a feverish excitement.She could not, would not, look Edouard in the face.She would implore Josephine to be silent; and she herself would fly from the chateau.But, if Josephine would not be silent? Why, then she would go herself to Edouard, and throw herself upon his honor, and tell him the truth.
With this, she ran wildly up the stairs, and burst into Josephine's room so suddenly, that she caught her, pale as death, on her knees, with a letter in one hand and a phial of laudanum in the other.
