The Seven Cardinal Sins: Envy and Indolence. Эжен Сю
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you be kind enough to tell me your master's name?" asked the young woman.
"M. le Marquis de Pont Brillant, madame," replied the groom, with a strong English accent.
Then seeing that his master had started on a brisk trot, the lad did the same.
"Did your hear that, Frederick?" asked Marie, turning to her son. "That was the young Marquis de Pont Brillant. Is he not charming? It is pleasant to see such a worthy representative of rank and fortune, is it not, my son? To be such a high and mighty personage, and so perfectly polite and well-bred, is certainly a charming combination. But why do you not answer me, Frederick? What is the matter, Frederick?" added Madame Bastien, suddenly becoming uneasy.
"There is nothing the matter with me, mother," was the cold reply.
"But there must be. Your face looks so different from what it did a moment ago. You must be suffering, and, great Heavens, how pale you are!"
"The sun has disappeared behind the clouds again, and I am cold!"
"Then let us hasten back, – let us hasten back at once! Heaven grant the improvement you spoke of just now may continue."
"I doubt it very much, mother."
"How despondently you speak."
"I speak as I feel."
"You are not feeling as well, then, my dear child?"
"Not nearly as well," the lad replied. Then added, with a sort of ferocious bitterness, "I have suffered a relapse, a complete relapse, but it is the cold that has caused it, probably."
And the unfortunate youth, who had always adored his mother, now experienced an almost savage delight in increasing his youthful parent's anxiety, thus avenging the poignant suffering which his mother's praises of Raoul de Pont Brillant had caused him.
Yes, for jealousy, a feeling as entirely unknown to Frederick as envy had been heretofore, now increased the resentment he already felt against the young marquis.
The mother and son wended their way homeward, Madame Bastien in inexpressible grief and disappointment, Frederick in gloomy silence, thinking with sullen rage that he had been on the point of confessing to his mother the shameful secret for which he blushed, and that at almost the very same moment that she was lavishing enthusiasm upon the object of his envy, the Marquis de Pont Brillant.
The unconscious comparison which his mother had made between the young marquis and himself, a comparison, alas! so unflattering to himself, changed the almost passive dislike he had heretofore felt for Raoul de Pont Brillant into an intense and implacable hatred.
CHAPTER VII
THE little town of Pont Brillant is situated a few leagues from Blois, and not far from the Loire.
A promenade called the mall, shaded by lofty trees, bounds Pont Brillant on the south. A few houses stand on the left side of the boulevard, which also serves as a fair ground.
Doctor Dufour lived in one of these houses.
About a month had elapsed since the events we have just related.
Early in the month of November, on St. Hubert's Day, – St. Hubert, the reader may or may not recollect, is the hunter's patron saint, – the idlers of the little town had assembled on the mall about four o'clock in the afternoon to await the return of the young Marquis de Pont Brillant's hunting party from the neighbouring forest.
The aforesaid idlers were beginning to become impatient at the long delay, when a clumsy cabriolet, drawn by an old work-horse in a dilapidated harness, tied up here and there with strings, drove up to the doctor's door, and Frederick Bastien, stepping out of this extremely modest equipage, assisted his mother to alight.
The old horse, whose discretion and docility were established beyond all question, was left standing, with the lines upon his neck, close to the pavement in front of the doctor's house, which Madame Bastien and her son immediately entered.
An old servant woman ushered them into the parlour, which was on the second floor, with windows overlooking the mall.
"Can the doctor see me?" inquired Madame Bastien.
"I think so, though he is with one of his friends who has been here for a few days but who leaves for Nantes this evening. I will go and tell him that you are here, though, madame."
Envy, aided by jealousy, – the reader probably has not forgotten the praises so innocently lavished upon the young marquis by Madame Bastien, – had made frightful ravages in Frederick's heart during the past month, and the deterioration in his physical condition having been correspondingly great, one would scarcely have known him. His complexion was not only pale, but jaundiced and bilious, while his hollow cheeks, sunken eyes, which burned with a feverish light, and the bitter smile which was ever upon his lips, imparted an almost ferocious as well as unnatural expression to his face. His abrupt, nervous movements, and his curt, often impatient, voice, also made the contrast between the youth's past and present condition all the more striking.
Marie Bastien seemed utterly disheartened and discouraged, but the gentle melancholy of her face only made her remarkable beauty still more touching in its character.
A cold reserve on Frederick's part had succeeded the demonstrative affection that had formerly existed between mother and son. Marie, in despair, had nearly worn herself out in her efforts to discover the cause of this change in her child, and she was now beginning to fear that M. Dufour had been mistaken in his diagnosis of her son's case. She had accordingly come to consult him again on the subject, not having seen him for some time, as the worthy doctor had been detained at home by the duties and pleasures of a friendly hospitality.
After having gazed sadly at her son for a moment, Marie said to him, almost timidly, as if afraid of irritating him:
"Frederick, as you have accompanied me to the house of our friend, Doctor Dufour, whom I wish to consult in regard to myself, we had better take advantage of the opportunity to speak to him about you."
"It is not at all necessary, mother. I am not ill."
"Great Heavens! how can you say that? All last night you scarcely closed your eyes, my poor child. I went into your room several times to see if you were asleep and always found you wide awake."
"It is so almost every night."
"Alas! I know it, and that is one of the things that worry me so."
"You do very wrong to trouble yourself about it, mother. I shall get over it by and by."
"But consult M. Dufour, I beg of you. Is he not the best friend we have in the world? Tell him your feeling, and listen to his counsels."
"I tell you again there is no need for me to consult M. Dufour," replied the lad, impatiently. "I warn you, too, that I shall not answer one of his questions."
"But, my son, listen to me!"
"Good Heavens! mother, what pleasure do you find in tormenting me like this?" Frederick exclaimed, stamping his foot angrily. "I have nothing to tell M. Dufour, and I shall tell him nothing. You will find out whether I have any will of my own or not."
Just then the doctor's servant came in and said to Madame Bastien that the doctor was waiting for her in his office.
Casting an imploring look at her son, the young mother furtively wiped away her tears and followed the servant to the doctor's office. Frederick, thus left alone in the room, leaned his elbow upon the sill of the open window, which overlooked the mall as we have said before. Between the mall and the Loire stretched a low range of hills, while in the horizon and dominating the forest that surrounded it was the Château de Pont Brillant, half veiled in the autumnal haze.
Frederick's eyes, after wandering aimlessly here and there for a moment, finally fixed themselves upon the château. On beholding it, the unfortunate lad started violently, his features contracted, then became even more gloomy, and with his elbows still resting on the window-sill he lapsed into a gloomy reverie.
So great was his preoccupation that he did not see or hear another person enter the room, a stranger, who, with a book in his hand, seated himself in a corner of the