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CHAPTER XI - THE PORTRESS'S CABINET
It was summer and very hot. Georgette, the youngest of Madame Beck's
children, took a fever. Desiree, suddenly cured of her ailments, was,
together with Fifine, packed off to Bonne-Maman, in the country, by
way of precaution against infection. Medical aid was now really
needed, and Madame, choosing to ignore the return of Dr. Pillule, who
had been at home a week, conjured his English rival to continue his
visits. One or two of the pensionnaires complained of headache, and in
other respects seemed slightly to participate in Georgette's ailment.
"Now, at last," I thought, "Dr. Pillule must be recalled: the prudent
directress will never venture to permit the attendance of so young a
man on the pupils."
The directress was very prudent, but she could also be intrepidly
venturous. She actually introduced Dr. John to the school-division of
the premises, and established him in attendance on the proud and
handsome Blanche de Melcy, and the vain, flirting Angelique, her
friend. Dr. John, I thought, testified a certain gratification at this
mark of confidence; and if discretion of bearing could have justified
the step, it would by him have been amply justified. Here, however, in
this land of convents and confessionals, such a presence as his was
not to be suffered with impunity in a "pensionnat de demoiselles." The
school gossiped, the kitchen whispered, the town caught the rumour,
parents wrote letters and paid visits of remonstrance. Madame, had she
been weak, would now have been lost: a dozen rival educational houses
were ready to improve this false step--if false step it were--to her
ruin; but Madame was not weak, and little Jesuit though she might be,
yet I clapped the hands of my heart, and with its voice cried "brava!"
as I watched her able bearing, her skilled management, her temper and
her firmness on this occasion.
She met the alarmed parents with a good-humoured, easy grace for
nobody matched her in, I know not whether to say the possession or the
assumption of a certain "rondeur et franchise de bonne femme;" which
on various occasions gained the point aimed at with instant and
complete success, where severe gravity and serious reasoning would
probably have failed.
"Ce pauvre Docteur Jean!" she would say, chuckling and rubbing
joyously her fat little white hands; "ce cher jeune homme! le meilleur
creature du monde!" and go on to explain how she happened to be
employing him for her own children, who were so fond of him they would
scream themselves into fits at the thought of another doctor; how,
where she had confidence for her own, she thought it natural to repose
trust for others, and au reste, it was only the most temporary
expedient in the world; Blanche and Angelique had the migraine; Dr.
John had written a prescription; voila tout!
The parents' mouths were closed. Blanche and Angelique saved her all
remaining trouble by chanting loud duets in their physician's praise;
the other pupils echoed them, unanimously declaring that when they
were ill they would have Dr. John and nobody else; and Madame laughed,
and the parents laughed too. The Labassecouriens must have a large
organ of philoprogenitiveness: at least the indulgence of offspring is
carried by them to excessive lengths; the law of most households being
the children's will. Madame now got credit for having acted on this
occasion in a spirit of motherly partiality: she came off with flying
colours; people liked her as a directress better than ever.
To this day I never fully understood why she thus risked her interest
for the sake of Dr. John. What people said, of course I know well: the
whole house--pupils, teachers, servants included--affirmed that she
was going to marry him. So they had settled it; difference of age
seemed to make no obstacle in their eyes: it was to be so.
It must be admitted that appearances did not wholly discountenance
this idea; Madame seemed so bent on retaining his services, so
oblivious of her former protege, Pillule. She made, too, such a point
of personally receiving his visits, and was so unfailingly cheerful,
blithe, and benignant in her manner to him. Moreover, she paid, about
this time, marked attention to dress: the morning dishabille, the
nightcap and shawl, were discarded; Dr. John's early visits always
found her with auburn braids all nicely arranged, silk dress trimly
fitted on, neat laced brodequins in lieu of slippers: in short the
whole toilette complete as a model, and fresh as a flower. I scarcely
think, however, that her intention in this went further than just to
show a very handsome man that she was not quite a plain woman; and
plain she was not. Without beauty of feature or elegance of form, she
pleased. Without youth and its gay graces, she cheered. One never
tired of seeing her: she was never monotonous, or insipid, or
colourless, or flat. Her unfaded hair, her eye with its temperate blue
light, her cheek with its wholesome fruit-like bloom--these things
pleased in moderation, but with constancy.
Had she, indeed, floating visions of adopting Dr. John as a husband,
taking him to her well-furnished home, endowing him with her savings,
which were said to amount to a moderate competency, and making him
comfortable for the rest of his life? Did Dr. John suspect her of such
visions? I have met him coming out of her presence with a mischievous
half-smile about his lips, and in his eyes a look as of masculine
vanity elate and tickled. With all his good looks and good-nature, he
was not perfect; he must have been very imperfect if he roguishly
encouraged aims he never intended to be successful. But did he not
intend them to be successful? People said he had no money, that he was
wholly dependent upon his profession. Madame--though perhaps some
fourteen years his senior--was yet the sort of woman never to grow
old, never to wither, never to break down. They certainly were on good
terms. _He_ perhaps was not in love; but how many people ever
_do_ love, or at least marry for love, in this world. We waited
the end.
For what _he_ waited, I do not know, nor for what he watched; but
the peculiarity of his manner, his expectant, vigilant, absorbed,
eager look, never wore off: it rather intensified. He had never been
quite within the compass of my penetration, and I think he ranged
farther and farther beyond it.
One morning little Georgette had been more feverish and consequently
more peevish; she was crying, and would not be pacified. I thought a
particular draught ordered, disagreed with her, and I doubted whether
it ought to be continued; I waited impatiently for the doctor's coming
in order to consult him.
The door-bell rang, he was admitted; I felt sure of this, for I heard
his voice addressing the portress. It was his custom to mount straight
to the nursery, taking about three degrees of the staircase at once,
and coming upon us like a cheerful surprise. Five minutes elapsed--
ten--and I saw and heard nothing of him. What could he be doing?
Possibly waiting in the corridor below. Little Georgette still piped
her plaintive wail, appealing to me by her familiar term, "Minnie,
Minnie, me very poorly!" till my heart ached. I descended to ascertain
why he did not come. The corridor was empty. Whither was he vanished?
Was he with Madame in the _salle-a-manger?_ Impossible: I had
left her but a short time since, dressing in her own chamber. I
listened. Three pupils were just then hard at work practising in three
proximate rooms--the dining-room and the greater and lesser drawing-
rooms, between which and the corridor there was but the portress's
cabinet communicating with the salons, and intended originally for a
boudoir. Farther off, at a fourth instrument in the oratory, a whole
class of a dozen or more were taking a singing lesson, and just then
joining in a "barcarole" (I think they called it), whereof I yet
remember these words "fraiche," "brise," and "Venise." Under these
circumstances, what could I hear? A great deal, certainly; had it only
been to the purpose.
Yes; I heard a giddy treble laugh in the above-mentioned little
cabinet, close by the door of which I stood--that door half-unclosed;
a man's voice in a soft, deep, pleading tone, uttered some, words,
whereof I only caught the adjuration, "For God's sake!" Then, after a
second's pause, forth issued Dr. John, his eye full shining, but not
with either joy or triumph; his fair English cheek high-coloured; a
baffled, tortured, anxious, and yet a tender meaning on his brow.
The open door served me as a screen; but had I been full in his way, I
believe he would have passed without seeing me. Some mortification,
some strong vexation had hold of his soul: or rather, to write my
impressions now as I received them at the time I should say some
sorrow, some sense of injustice. I did not so much think his pride was
hurt, as that his affections had been wounded--cruelly wounded, it
seemed to me. But who was the torturer? What being in that house had
him so much in her power? Madame I believed to be in her chamber; the
room whence he had stepped was dedicated to the portress's sole use;
and she, Rosine Matou, an unprincipled though pretty little French
grisette, airy, fickle, dressy, vain, and mercenary--it was not,
surely, to _her_ hand he owed the ordeal through which he seemed
to have passed?
But while I pondered, her voice, clear, though somewhat sharp, broke
out in a lightsome French song, trilling through the door still ajar:
I glanced in, doubting my senses. There at the table she sat in a
smart dress of "jaconas rose," trimming a tiny blond cap: not a living
thing save herself was in the room, except indeed some gold fish in a
glass globe, some flowers in pots, and a broad July sunbeam.
Here was a problem: but I must go up-stairs to ask about the medicine.
Dr. John sat in a chair at Georgette's bedside; Madame stood before
him; the little patient had been examined and soothed, and now lay
composed in her crib. Madame Beck, as I entered, was discussing the
physician's own health, remarking on some real or fancied change in
his looks, charging him with over-work, and recommending rest and
change of air. He listened good-naturedly, but with laughing
indifference, telling her that she was "trop bonne," and that he felt
perfectly well. Madame appealed to me--Dr. John following her movement
with a slow glance which seemed to express languid surprise at
reference being made to a quarter so insignificant.
"What do you think, Miss Lucie?" asked Madame. "Is he not paler and
thinner?"
It was very seldom that I uttered more than monosyllables in Dr.
John's presence; he was the kind of person with whom I was likely ever
to remain the neutral, passive thing he thought me. Now, however, I
took licence to answer in a phrase: and a phrase I purposely made
quite significant.
"He looks ill at this moment; but perhaps it is owing to some
temporary cause: Dr. John may have been vexed or harassed." I cannot
tell how he took this speech, as I never sought his face for
information. Georgette here began to ask me in her broken English if
she might have a glass of _eau sucree_. I answered her in
English. For the first time, I fancy, he noticed that I spoke his
language; hitherto he had always taken me for a foreigner, addressing
me as "Mademoiselle," and giving in French the requisite directions
about the children's treatment. He seemed on the point of making a
remark; but thinking better of it, held his tongue.
Madame recommenced advising him; he shook his head, laughing, rose and
bid her good-morning, with courtesy, but still with the regardless air
of one whom too much unsolicited attention was surfeiting and
spoiling.
When he was gone, Madame dropped into the chair he had just left; she
rested her chin in her hand; all that was animated and amiable
vanished from her face: she looked stony and stern, almost mortified
and morose. She sighed; a single, but a deep sigh. A loud bell rang
for morning-school. She got up; as she passed a dressing-table with a
glass upon it, she looked at her reflected image. One single white
hair streaked her nut-brown tresses; she plucked it out with a
shudder. In the full summer daylight, her face, though it still had
the colour, could plainly be seen to have lost the texture of youth;
and then, where were youth's contours? Ah, Madame! wise as you were,
even _you_ knew weakness. Never had I pitied Madame before, but
my heart softened towards her, when she turned darkly from the glass.
A calamity had come upon her. That hag Disappointment was greeting her
with a grisly "All-hail," and her soul rejected the intimacy.
But Rosine! My bewilderment there surpasses description. I embraced
five opportunities of passing her cabinet that day, with a view to
contemplating her charms, and finding out the secret of their
influence. She was pretty, young, and wore a well-made dress. All very
good points, and, I suppose, amply sufficient to account, in any
philosophic mind, for any amount of agony and distraction in a young
man, like Dr. John. Still, I could not help forming half a wish that
the said doctor were my brother; or at least that he had a sister or a
mother who would kindly sermonize him. I say _half_ a wish; I
broke it, and flung it away before it became a whole one, discovering
in good time its exquisite folly. "Somebody," I argued, "might as well
sermonize Madame about her young physician: and what good would that
do?"
I believe Madame sermonized herself. She did not behave weakly, or
make herself in any shape ridiculous. It is true she had neither
strong feelings to overcome, nor tender feelings by which to be
miserably pained. It is true likewise that she had an important
avocation, a real business to fill her time, divert her thoughts, and
divide her interest. It is especially true that she possessed a
genuine good sense which is not given to all women nor to all men; and
by dint of these combined advantages she behaved wisely--she behaved
well. Brava! once more, Madame Beck. I saw you matched against an
Apollyon of a predilection; you fought a good fight, and you overcame!
Content of CHAPTER XI - THE PORTRESs' CABINET [Charlotte Bronte's novel: Villette]
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