Chapter Thirteen
No sooner was Rodolphe at home than he sat down quickly at his
bureau under the stag's head that hung as a trophy on the wall.
But when he had the pen between his fingers, he could think of
nothing, so that, resting on his elbows, he began to reflect.
Emma seemed to him to have receded into a far-off past, as if the
resolution he had taken had suddenly placed a distance between
them.
To get back something of her, he fetched from the cupboard at the
bedside an old Rheims biscuit-box, in which he usually kept his
letters from women, and from it came an odour of dry dust and
withered roses. First he saw a handkerchief with pale little
spots. It was a handkerchief of hers. Once when they were walking
her nose had bled; he had forgotten it. Near it, chipped at all
the corners, was a miniature given him by Emma: her toilette
seemed to him pretentious, and her languishing look in the worst
possible taste. Then, from looking at this image and recalling
the memory of its original, Emma's features little by little grew
confused in his remembrance, as if the living and the painted
face, rubbing one against the other, had effaced each other.
Finally, he read some of her letters; they were full of
explanations relating to their journey, short, technical, and
urgent, like business notes. He wanted to see the long ones
again, those of old times. In order to find them at the bottom of
the box, Rodolphe disturbed all the others, and mechanically
began rummaging amidst this mass of papers and things, finding
pell-mell bouquets, garters, a black mask, pins, and hair--hair!
dark and fair, some even, catching in the hinges of the box,
broke when it was opened.
Thus dallying with his souvenirs, he examined the writing and the
style of the letters, as varied as their orthography. They were
tender or jovial, facetious, melancholy; there were some that
asked for love, others that asked for money. A word recalled
faces to him, certain gestures, the sound of a voice; sometimes,
however, he remembered nothing at all.
In fact, these women, rushing at once into his thoughts, cramped
each other and lessened, as reduced to a uniform level of love
that equalised them all. So taking handfuls of the mixed-up
letters, he amused himself for some moments with letting them
fall in cascades from his right into his left hand. At last,
bored and weary, Rodolphe took back the box to the cupboard,
saying to himself, "What a lot of rubbish!" Which summed up his
opinion; for pleasures, like schoolboys in a school courtyard,
had so trampled upon his heart that no green thing grew there,
and that which passed through it, more heedless than children,
did not even, like them, leave a name carved upon the wall.
"Come," said he, "let's begin."
He wrote--
"Courage, Emma! courage! I would not bring misery into your
life."
"After all, that's true," thought Rodolphe. "I am acting in her
interest; I am honest."
"Have you carefully weighed your resolution? Do you know to what
an abyss I was dragging you, poor angel? No, you do not, do you?
You were coming confident and fearless, believing in happiness in
the future. Ah! unhappy that we are--insensate!"
Rodolphe stopped here to think of some good excuse.
"If I told her all my fortune is lost? No! Besides, that would
stop nothing. It would all have to be begun over again later on.
As if one could make women like that listen to reason!" He
reflected, then went on--
"I shall not forget you, oh believe it; and I shall ever have a
profound devotion for you; but some day, sooner or later, this
ardour (such is the fate of human things) would have grown less,
no doubt. Lassitude would have come to us, and who knows if I
should not even have had the atrocious pain of witnessing your
remorse, of sharing it myself, since I should have been its
cause? The mere idea of the grief that would come to you tortures
me, Emma. Forget me! Why did I ever know you? Why were you so
beautiful? Is it my fault? O my God! No, no! Accuse only fate."
"That's a word that always tells," he said to himself.
"Ah, if you had been one of those frivolous women that one sees,
certainly I might, through egotism, have tried an experiment, in
that case without danger for you. But that delicious exaltation,
at once your charm and your torment, has prevented you from
understanding, adorable woman that you are, the falseness of our
future position. Nor had I reflected upon this at first, and I
rested in the shade of that ideal happiness as beneath that of
the manchineel tree, without foreseeing the consequences."
"Perhaps she'll think I'm giving it up from avarice. Ah, well! so
much the worse; it must be stopped!"
"The world is cruel, Emma. Wherever we might have gone, it would
have persecuted us. You would have had to put up with indiscreet
questions, calumny, contempt, insult perhaps. Insult to you! Oh!
And I, who would place you on a throne! I who bear with me your
memory as a talisman! For I am going to punish myself by exile
for all the ill I have done you. I am going away. Whither I know
not. I am mad. Adieu! Be good always. Preserve the memory of the
unfortunate who has lost you. Teach my name to your child; let
her repeat it in her prayers."
The wicks of the candles flickered. Rodolphe got up to, shut the
window, and when he had sat down again--
"I think it's all right. Ah! and this for fear she should come
and hunt me up."
"I shall be far away when you read these sad lines, for I have
wished to flee as quickly as possible to shun the temptation of
seeing you again. No weakness! I shall return, and perhaps later
on we shall talk together very coldly of our old love. Adieu!"
And there was a last "adieu" divided into two words! "A Dieu!"
which he thought in very excellent taste.
"Now how am I to sign?" he said to himself. " 'Yours devotedly?'
No! 'Your friend?' Yes, that's it."
"Your friend."
He re-read his letter. He considered it very good.
"Poor little woman!" he thought with emotion. "She'll think me
harder than a rock. There ought to have been some tears on this;
but I can't cry; it isn't my fault." Then, having emptied some
water into a glass, Rodolphe dipped his finger into it, and let a
big drop fall on the paper, that made a pale stain on the ink.
Then looking for a seal, he came upon the one "Amor nel cor."
"That doesn't at all fit in with the circumstances. Pshaw! never
mind!"
After which he smoked three pipes and went to bed.
The next day when he was up (at about two o'clock--he had slept
late), Rodolphe had a basket of apricots picked. He put his
letter at the bottom under some vine leaves, and at once ordered
Girard, his ploughman, to take it with care to Madame Bovary. He
made use of this means for corresponding with her, sending
according to the season fruits or game.
"If she asks after me," he said, "you will tell her that I have
gone on a journey. You must give the basket to her herself, into
her own hands. Get along and take care!"
Girard put on his new blouse, knotted his handkerchief round the
apricots, and walking with great heavy steps in his thick
iron-bound galoshes, made his way to Yonville.
Madame Bovary, when he got to her house, was arranging a bundle
of linen on the kitchen-table with Felicite.
"Here," said the ploughboy, "is something for you--from the
master."
She was seized with apprehension, and as she sought in her pocket
for some coppers, she looked at the peasant with haggard eyes,
while he himself looked at her with amazement, not understanding
how such a present could so move anyone. At last he went out.
Felicite remained. She could bear it no longer; she ran into the
sitting room as if to take the apricots there, overturned the
basket, tore away the leaves, found the letter, opened it, and,
as if some fearful fire were behind her, Emma flew to her room
terrified.
Charles was there; she saw him; he spoke to her; she heard
nothing, and she went on quickly up the stairs, breathless,
distraught, dumb, and ever holding this horrible piece of paper,
that crackled between her fingers like a plate of sheet-iron. On
the second floor she stopped before the attic door, which was
closed.
Then she tried to calm herself; she recalled the letter; she must
finish it; she did not dare to. And where? How? She would be
seen! "Ah, no! here," she thought, "I shall be all right."
Emma pushed open the door and went in.
The slates threw straight down a heavy heat that gripped her
temples, stifled her; she dragged herself to the closed
garret-window. She drew back the bolt, and the dazzling light
burst in with a leap.
Opposite, beyond the roofs, stretched the open country till it
was lost to sight. Down below, underneath her, the village square
was empty; the stones of the pavement glittered, the weathercocks
on the houses were motionless. At the corner of the street, from
a lower storey, rose a kind of humming with strident modulations.
It was Binet turning.
She leant against the embrasure of the window, and reread the
letter with angry sneers. But the more she fixed her attention
upon it, the more confused were her ideas. She saw him again,
heard him, encircled him with her arms, and throbs of her heart,
that beat against her breast like blows of a sledge-hammer, grew
faster and faster, with uneven intervals. She looked about her
with the wish that the earth might crumble into pieces. Why not
end it all? What restrained her? She was free. She advanced,
looking at the paving-stones, saying to herself, "Come! come!"
The luminous ray that came straight up from below drew the weight
of her body towards the abyss. It seemed to her that the ground
of the oscillating square went up the walls and that the floor
dipped on end like a tossing boat. She was right at the edge,
almost hanging, surrounded by vast space. The blue of the heavens
suffused her, the air was whirling in her hollow head; she had
but to yield, to let herself be taken; and the humming of the
lathe never ceased, like an angry voice calling her.
"Emma! Emma!" cried Charles.
She stopped.
"Wherever are you? Come!"
The thought that she had just escaped from death almost made her
faint with terror. She closed her eyes; then she shivered at the
touch of a hand on her sleeve; it was Felicite.
"Master is waiting for you, madame; the soup is on the table."
And she had to go down to sit at table.
She tried to eat. The food choked her. Then she unfolded her
napkin as if to examine the darns, and she really thought of
applying herself to this work, counting the threads in the linen.
Suddenly the remembrance of the letter returned to her. How had
she lost it? Where could she find it? But she felt such weariness
of spirit that she could not even invent a pretext for leaving
the table. Then she became a coward; she was afraid of Charles;
he knew all, that was certain! Indeed he pronounced these words
in a strange manner:
"We are not likely to see Monsieur Rodolphe soon again, it
seems."
"Who told you?" she said, shuddering.
"Who told me!" he replied, rather astonished at her abrupt tone.
"Why, Girard, whom I met just now at the door of the Cafe
Francais. He has gone on a journey, or is to go."
She gave a sob.
"What surprises you in that? He absents himself like that from
time to time for a change, and, ma foi, I think he's right, when
one has a fortune and is a bachelor. Besides, he has jolly times,
has our friend. He's a bit of a rake. Monsieur Langlois told me--"
He stopped for propriety's sake because the servant came in. She
put back into the basket the apricots scattered on the sideboard.
Charles, without noticing his wife's colour, had them brought to
him, took one, and bit into it.
"Ah! perfect!" said he; "just taste!"
And he handed her the basket, which she put away from her gently.
"Do just smell! What an odour!" he remarked, passing it under her
nose several times.
"I am choking," she cried, leaping up. But by an effort of will
the spasm passed; then--
"It is nothing," she said, "it is nothing! It is nervousness. Sit
down and go on eating." For she dreaded lest he should begin
questioning her, attending to her, that she should not be left
alone.
Charles, to obey her, sat down again, and he spat the stones of
the apricots into his hands, afterwards putting them on his
plate.
Suddenly a blue tilbury passed across the square at a rapid trot.
Emma uttered a cry and fell back rigid to the ground.
In fact, Rodolphe, after many reflections, had decided to set out
for Rouen. Now, as from La Huchette to Buchy there is no other
way than by Yonville, he had to go through the village, and Emma
had recognised him by the rays of the lanterns, which like
lightning flashed through the twilight.
The chemist, at the tumult which broke out in the house ran
thither. The table with all the plates was upset; sauce, meat,
knives, the salt, and cruet-stand were strewn over the room;
Charles was calling for help; Berthe, scared, was crying; and
Felicite, whose hands trembled, was unlacing her mistress, whose
whole body shivered convulsively.
"I'll run to my laboratory for some aromatic vinegar," said the
druggist.
Then as she opened her eyes on smelling the bottle--
"I was sure of it," he remarked; "that would wake any dead person
for you!"
"Speak to us," said Charles; "collect yourself; it is your
Charles, who loves you. Do you know me? See! here is your little
girl! Oh, kiss her!"
The child stretched out her arms to her mother to cling to her
neck. But turning away her head, Emma said in a broken voice
"No, no! no one!"
She fainted again. They carried her to her bed. She lay there
stretched at full length, her lips apart, her eyelids closed, her
hands open, motionless, and white as a waxen image. Two streams
of tears flowed from her eyes and fell slowly upon the pillow.
Charles, standing up, was at the back of the alcove, and the
chemist, near him, maintained that meditative silence that is
becoming on the serious occasions of life.
"Do not be uneasy," he said, touching his elbow; "I think the
paroxysm is past."
"Yes, she is resting a little now," answered Charles, watching
her sleep. "Poor girl! poor girl! She had gone off now!"
Then Homais asked how the accident had come about. Charles
answered that she had been taken ill suddenly while she was
eating some apricots.
"Extraordinary!" continued the chemist. "But it might be that the
apricots had brought on the syncope. Some natures are so
sensitive to certain smells; and it would even be a very fine
question to study both in its pathological and physiological
relation. The priests know the importance of it, they who have
introduced aromatics into all their ceremonies. It is to stupefy
the senses and to bring on ecstasies--a thing, moreover, very
easy in persons of the weaker sex, who are more delicate than the
other. Some are cited who faint at the smell of burnt hartshorn,
of new bread--"
"Take care; you'll wake her!" said Bovary in a low voice.
"And not only," the druggist went on, "are human beings subject
to such anomalies, but animals also. Thus you are not ignorant of
the singularly aphrodisiac effect produced by the Nepeta cataria,
vulgarly called catmint, on the feline race; and, on the other
hand, to quote an example whose authenticity I can answer for.
Bridaux (one of my old comrades, at present established in the
Rue Malpalu) possesses a dog that falls into convulsions as soon
as you hold out a snuff-box to him. He often even makes the
experiment before his friends at his summer-house at Guillaume
Wood. Would anyone believe that a simple sternutation could
produce such ravages on a quadrupedal organism? It is extremely
curious, is it not?"
"Yes," said Charles, who was not listening to him.
"This shows us," went on the other, smiling with benign
self-sufficiency, "the innumerable irregularities of the nervous
system. With regard to madame, she has always seemed to me, I
confess, very susceptible. And so I should by no means recommend
to you, my dear friend, any of those so-called remedies that,
under the pretence of attacking the symptoms, attack the
constitution. No; no useless physicking! Diet, that is all;
sedatives, emollients, dulcification. Then, don't you think that
perhaps her imagination should be worked upon?"
"In what way? How?" said Bovary.
"Ah! that is it. Such is indeed the question. 'That is the
question,' as I lately read in a newspaper."
But Emma, awaking, cried out--
"The letter! the letter!"
They thought she was delirious; and she was by midnight.
Brain-fever had set in.
For forty-three days Charles did not leave her. He gave up all
his patients; he no longer went to bed; he was constantly feeling
her pulse, putting on sinapisms and cold-water compresses. He
sent Justin as far as Neufchatel for ice; the ice melted on the
way; he sent him back again. He called Monsieur Canivet into
consultation; he sent for Dr. Lariviere, his old master, from
Rouen; he was in despair. What alarmed him most was Emma's
prostration, for she did not speak, did not listen, did not even
seem to suffer, as if her body and soul were both resting
together after all their troubles.
About the middle of October she could sit up in bed supported by
pillows. Charles wept when he saw her eat her first
bread-and-jelly. Her strength returned to her; she got up for a
few hours of an afternoon, and one day, when she felt better, he
tried to take her, leaning on his arm, for a walk round the
garden. The sand of the paths was disappearing beneath the dead
leaves; she walked slowly, dragging along her slippers, and
leaning against Charles's shoulder. She smiled all the time.
They went thus to the bottom of the garden near the terrace. She
drew herself up slowly, shading her eyes with her hand to look.
She looked far off, as far as she could, but on the horizon were
only great bonfires of grass smoking on the hills.
"You will tire yourself, my darling!" said Bovary. And, pushing
her gently to make her go into the arbour, "Sit down on this
seat; you'll be comfortable."
"Oh! no; not there!" she said in a faltering voice.
She was seized with giddiness, and from that evening her illness
recommenced, with a more uncertain character, it is true, and
more complex symptoms. Now she suffered in her heart, then in the
chest, the head, the limbs; she had vomitings, in which Charles
thought he saw the first signs of cancer.
And besides this, the poor fellow was worried about money
matters.
