CHAPTER III.
The Duchesse de Tarascon occupied a vast apartment in the Rue Royale,
close to the Tuileries. She held a high post among the ladies who graced
the brilliant court of the Empress. She had survived her second husband
the duke, who left no issue, and the title died with him.
Alain and Enguerrand were ushered up the grand staircase, lined with
tiers of costly exotics as if for a fete; but in that and in all kinds of
female luxury, the Duchesse lived in a state of _fete perpetuelle_. The
doors on the landing-place were screened by heavy portieres of Genoa
velvet, richly embroidered in gold with the ducal crown and cipher. The
two salons through which the visitors passed to the private cabinet or
boudoir were decorated with Gobelin tapestries, fresh, with a mixture of
roseate hues, and depicting incidents in the career of the first emperor;
while the effigies of the late duke's father--the gallant founder of a
short-lived race figured modestly in the background. On a table of
Russian malachite within the recess of the central window lay, preserved
in glass cases, the baton and the sword, the epaulettes and the
decorations of the brave Marshal. On the consoles and the mantelpieces
stood clocks and vases of Sevres that could scarcely be eclipsed by those
in the Imperial palaces. Entering the cabinet, they found the Duchesse
seated at her writing-table, with a small Skye terrier, hideous in the
beauty of the purest breed, nestled at her feet. This room was an
exquisite combination of costliness and comfort,--Luxury at home. The
hangings were of geranium-coloured silk, with double curtains of white
satin; near to the writing-table a conservatory, with a white marble
fountain at play in the centre, and a trellised aviary at the back. The
walls were covered with small pictures,--chiefly portraits and miniatures
of the members of the imperial family, of the late Duc, of his father the
Marshal and Madame la Marechale, of the present Duchesse herself, and of
some of the principal ladies of the court.
The Duchesse was still in the prime of life. She had passed her fortieth
year, but was so well "conserved" that you might have guessed her to be
ten years younger. She was tall; not large, but with rounded figure
inclined to _en bon point_; with dark hair and eyes, but fair complexion,
injured in effect rather than improved by pearl-powder, and that
atrocious barbarism of a dark stain on the eyelids which has of late
years been a baneful fashion; dressed,--I am a man, and cannot describe
her dress; all I know is that she had the acknowledged fame of the best-
dressed subject of France. As she rose from her seat there was in her
look and air the unmistakable evidence of grande dame,--a family likeness
in feature to Alain himself, a stronger likeness to the picture of her
first cousin (his mother) which was preserved at Rochebriant. Her
descent was indeed from ancient and noble houses. But to the distinction
of race she added that of fashion, crowning both with a tranquil
consciousness of lofty position and unblemished reputation.
"Unnatural cousin!" she said to Alain, offering her hand to him, with a
gracious smile,--"all this age in Paris, and I see you for the first
time. But there is joy on earth as in heaven over sinners who truly
repent. You repent truly--n'est ce pas?"
It is impossible to describe the caressing charm which the Duchesse threw
into her words, voice, and look. Alain was fascinated and subdued.
"Ah, Madame la Duchesse," said he, bowing over the fait hand he lightly
held, "it was not sin, unless modesty be a sin, which made a rustic
hesitate long before he dared to offer his homage to the queen of the
graces."
"Not badly said for a rustic," cried Enguerrand; "eh, Madame?"
"My cousin, you are pardoned," said the Duchesse. "Compliment is the
perfume of _gentilhommerie_; and if you brought enough of that perfume
from the flowers of Rochebriant to distribute among the ladies at court,
you will be terribly the mode there. Seducer!"--here she gave the
Marquis a playful tap on the cheek, not in a coquettish but in a mother-
like familiarity, and looking at him attentively, said: "Why, you are
even handsomer than your father. I shall be proud to present to their
Imperial Majesties so becoming a cousin. But seat yourselves here,
Messieurs, close to my arm-chair, _caussons_."
The Duchesse then took up the ball of the conversation. She talked
without any apparent artifice, but with admirable tact; put just the
questions about Rochebriant most calculated to please Alain, shunning all
that might have pained him; asking him for descriptions of the
surrounding scenery, the Breton legends; hoping that the old castle would
never be spoiled by modernizing restorations; inquiring tenderly after
his aunt, whom she had in her childhood once seen, and still remembered
with her sweet, grave face; paused little for replies; then turned to
Enguerrand with sprightly small-talk on the topics of the day, and every
now and then bringing Alain into the pale of the talk, leading on
insensibly until she got Enguerrand himself to introduce the subject of
the emperor, and the political troubles which were darkening a reign
heretofore so prosperous and splendid.
Her countenance then changed; it became serious, and even grave in its
expression.
"It is true," she said, "that the times grow menacing, menacing not only
to the throne, but to order and property and France. One by one they are
removing all the breakwaters which the empire had constructed between the
executive and the most fickle and impulsive population that ever shouted
'long live' one day to the man whom they would send to the guillotine the
next. They are denouncing what they call personal government. Grant
that it has its evils; but what would they substitute,--a constitutional
monarchy like the English? That is impossible with universal suffrage
and without an hereditary chamber. The nearest approach to it was the
monarchy of Louis Philippe,--we know how sick they became of that. A
republic?--mon Dieu! composed of Republicans terrified out of their wits
at each other. The moderate men, mimics of the Girondins, with the Reds
and the Socialists and the Communists, ready to tear them to pieces. And
then--What then?--the commercialists, the agriculturists, the middle
class combining to elect some dictator who will cannonade the mob and
become a mimic Napoleon, grafted on a mimic Necker or a mimic Danton.
Oh, Messieurs, I am French to the core. You inheritors of such names
must be as French as I am; and yet you men insist on remaining more
useless to France in the midst of her need than I am,--I, a woman who can
but talk and weep."
The Duchesse spoke with a warmth of emotion which startled and profoundly
affected Alain. He remained silent, leaving it to Enguerrand to answer.
"Dear Madame," said the latter, "I do not see how either myself or our
kinsman can merit your reproach. We are not legislators. I doubt if
there is a single department in France that would elect us, if we offered
ourselves. It is not our fault if the various floods of revolution leave
men of our birth and opinions stranded wrecks of a perished world. The
emperor chooses his own advisers, and if they are bad ones, his Majesty
certainly will not ask Alain and me to replace them."
"You do not answer--you evade me," said the Duchesse; with a mournful
smile. "You are too skilled a man of the world, Monsieur Enguerrand, not
to know that it is not only legislators and ministers that are necessary
to the support of a throne, and the safeguard of a nation. Do you not
see how great a help it is to both throne and nation when that section of
public opinion which is represented by names illustrious in history,
identified with records of chivalrous deeds and loyal devotion, rallies
round the order established? Let that section of public opinion stand
aloof, soured and discontented, excluded from active life, lending no
counter-balance to the perilous oscillations of democratic passion, and
tell me if it is not an enemy to itself as well as a traitor to the
principles it embodies?"
"The principles it embodies, Madame," said Alain, "are those of fidelity
to a race of kings unjustly set aside, less for the vices than the
virtues of ancestors. Louis XV. was the worst of the Bourbons,--he was
the _bien aime_: he escapes. Louis XVI. was in moral attributes the best
of the Bourbons,--he dies the death of a felon. Louis XVIII., against
whom much may be said, restored to the throne by foreign bayonets,
reigning as a disciple of Voltaire might reign, secretly scoffing alike
at the royalty and the religion which were crowned in his person, dies
peacefully in his bed. Charles X., redeeming the errors of his youth by
a reign untarnished by a vice, by a religion earnest and sincere, is sent
into exile for defending established order from the very inroads which
you lament. He leaves an heir against whom calumny cannot invent a tale,
and that heir remains an outlaw simply because he descends from Henry
IV., and has a right to reign. Madame, you appeal to us as among the
representatives of the chivalrous deeds and loyal devotion which
characterized the old nobility of France. Should we deserve that
character if we forsook the unfortunate, and gained wealth and honour in
forsaking?"
"Your words endear you to me. I am proud to call you cousin," said the
Duchesse. "But do you, or does any man in his senses believe that if you
upset the Empire you could get back the Bourbons; that you would not be
in imminent danger of a Government infinitely more opposed to the
theories on which rests the creed of Legitimists than that of Louis
Napoleon? After all, what is there in the loyalty of you Bourbonites
that has in it the solid worth of an argument which can appeal to the
comprehension of mankind, except it be the principle of a hereditary
monarchy? Nobody nowadays can maintain the right divine of a single
regal family to impose itself upon a nation. That dogma has ceased to be
a living principle; it is only a dead reminiscence. But the institution
of monarchy is a principle strong and vital, and appealing to the
practical interests of vast sections of society. Would you sacrifice the
principle which concerns the welfare of millions, because you cannot
embody it in the person of an individual utterly insignificant in
himself? In a word, if you prefer monarchy to the hazard of
republicanism for such a country as France, accept the monarchy you find,
since it is quite clear you cannot rebuild the monarchy you would prefer.
Does it not embrace all the great objects for which you call yourself
Legitimist? Under it religion is honoured, a national Church secured, in
reality if not in name; under it you have united the votes of millions to
the establishment of the throne; under it all the material interests of
the country, commercial, agricultural, have advanced with an unequalled
rapidity of progress; under it Paris has become the wonder of the world
for riches, for splendour, for grace and beauty; under it the old
traditional enemies of France have been humbled and rendered impotent.
The policy of Richelieu has been achieved in the abasement of Austria;
the policy of Napoleon I. has been consummated in the salvation of Europe
from the semi-barbarous ambition of Russia. England no longer casts her
trident in the opposition scale of the balance of European power.
Satisfied with the honour of our alliance, she has lost every other ally;
and her forces neglected, her spirit enervated, her statesmen dreaming
believers in the safety of their island, provided they withdraw from the
affairs of Europe, may sometimes scold us, but will certainly not dare to
fight. With France she is but an inferior satellite; without France she
is--nothing. Add to all this a court more brilliant than that of Louis
XIV., a sovereign not indeed without faults and errors, but singularly
mild in his nature, warm-hearted to friends, forgiving to foes, whom
personally no one could familiarly know and not be charmed with a _bonte_
of character, lovable as that of Henri IV.,--and tell me what more than
all this could you expect from the reign of a Bourbon?"
"With such results," said Alain, "from the monarchy you so eloquently
praise, I fail to discover what the emperor's throne could possibly gain
by a few powerless converts from an unpopular, and you say, no doubt
truly, from a hopeless cause."
"I say monarchy gains much by the loyal adhesion of any man of courage,
ability, and honour. Every new monarchy gains much by conversions from
the ranks by which the older monarchies were strengthened and adorned.
But I do not here invoke your aid merely to this monarchy, my cousin; I
demand your devotion to the interests of France; I demand that you should
not rest an outlaw from her service. Ah, you think that France is in no
danger, that you may desert or oppose the Empire as you list, and that
society will remain safe! You are mistaken. Ask Enguerrand."
"Madame," said Enguerrand, "you overrate my political knowledge in that
appeal; but, honestly speaking, I subscribe to your reasonings. I agree
with you that the empire sorely needs the support of men of honour; it
has one cause of rot which now undermines it,--dishonest jobbery in its
administrative departments; even in that of the army, which apparently is
so heeded and cared for. I agree with you that France is in danger, and
may need the swords of all her better sons, whether against the foreigner
or against her worst enemies,--the mobs of her great towns. I myself
received a military education, and but for my reluctance to separate
myself from my father and Raoul, I should be a candidate for employments
more congenial to me than those of the Bourse and my trade in the glove-
shop. But Alain is happily free from all family ties, and Alain knows
that my advice to him is not hostile to your exhortations."
"I am glad to think he is under so salutary an influence," said the
Duchesse; and seeing that Alain remained silent and thoughtful, she
wisely changed the subject, and shortly afterwards the two friends took
leave.
