Thank you, Camille; you are very good, you have once more promised me to live.Get well; come down-stairs; then you will see me every day, you know--there is a temptation.Good-by, Camille!--are you coming, Rose? What are you loitering for? God bless you, and comfort you, and help you to forget what it is madness to remember!"With these wild words she literally fled; and in one moment the room seemed to darken to Camille.
Outside the door Josephine caught hold of Rose."Have I committed myself?""Over and over again.Do not look so terrified; I mean to me, but not to him.How blind he is! and how much better you must know him than I do to venture on such a transparent deceit.He believes whatever you tell him.He is all ears and no eyes.Yes, love, Iwatched him keenly all the time.He really thinks it is pity and remorse, nothing more.My poor sister, you have a hard life to lead, a hard game to play; but so far you have succeeded; yet could look poor Raynal in the face if he came home to-day.""Then God be thanked!" cried Josephine."I am as happy to-day as Ican ever hope to be.Now let us go through the farce of dressing--it is near dinner-time--and then the farce of talking, and, hardest of all, the farce of living."From that hour Camille began to get better very slowly, yet perceptibly.
The doctor, afraid of being mistaken, said nothing for some days, but at last he announced the good news at the dinner-table."He is to come down-stairs in three days," added the doctor.
But I am sorry to say that as Camille's body strengthened some of the worst passions in our nature attacked him.Fierce gusts of hate and love combined overpowered this man's high sentiments of honor and justice, and made him clench his teeth, and vow never to leave Beaurepaire without Josephine.She had been his four years before she ever saw this interloper, and she should be his forever.Her love would soon revive when they should meet every day, and she would end by eloping with him.
Then conscience pricked him, and reminded him how and why Raynal had married her: for Rose had told him all.Should he undermine an absent soldier, whose whole conduct in this had been so pure, so generous, so unselfish?
But this was not all.As I have already hinted, he was under a great personal obligation to his quondam comrade Raynal.Whenever this was vividly present to his mind, a great terror fell on him, and he would cry out in anguish, "Oh! that some angel would come to me and tear me by force from this place!" And the next moment passion swept over him like a flood, and carried away all his virtuous resolves.His soul was in deep waters; great waves drove it to and fro.Perilous condition, which seldom ends well.Camille was a man of honor.In no other earthly circumstance could he have hesitated an instant between right and wrong.But such natures, proof against all other temptations, have often fallen, and will fall, where sin takes the angel form of her they love.Yet, of all men, they should pray for help to stand; for when they fall they still retain one thing that divides them from mean sinners.
Remorse, the giant that rends the great hearts which mock at fear.
The day came in which the doctor had promised his patient he should come down-stairs.First his comfortable sofa was taken down into the saloon for his use: then the patient himself came down leaning on the doctor's arm, and his heart palpitating at the thought of the meeting.He came into the room; the baroness was alone.She greeted him kindly, and welcomed him.Rose came in soon after and did the same.But no Josephine.Camille felt sick at heart.At last dinner was announced; "She will surely join us at dinner,"thought he.He cast his eyes anxiously on the table; the napkins were laid for four only.The baroness carelessly explained this to him as they sat down."Madame Raynal dines in her own room.I am sorry to say she is indisposed."Camille muttered polite regrets: the rage of disappointment drove its fangs into him, and then came the heart-sickness of hope deferred.The next day he saw her, but could not get a word with her alone.The baroness tortured him another way.She was full of Raynal.She loved him.She called him her son; was never weary of descanting on his virtues to Camille.Not a day passed that she did not pester Camille to make a calculation as to the probable period of his return, and he was obliged to answer her.She related to him before Josephine and Rose, how this honest soldier had come to them like a guardian angel and saved the whole family.In vain he muttered that Rose had told him.
"Let me have the pleasure of telling it you my way," cried she, and told it diffusely, and kept him writhing.
The next thing was, Josephine had received no letter from him this month; the first month he had missed.In vain did Rose represent that he was only a few days over his time.The baroness became anxious, communicated her anxieties to Camille among the rest; and, by a torturing interrogatory, compelled him to explain to her before Josephine and them all, that ships do not always sail to a day, and are sometimes delayed.But oh! he winced at the man's name; and Rose observed that he never mentioned it, nor acknowledged the existence of such a person as Josephine's husband, except when others compelled him.Yet they were acquainted; and Rose sometimes wondered that he did not detract or sneer.
"I should," said she; "I feel I should."
