Clarimonde Read online

so great a scandal to all present,nor deceive the expectation of so many people. All those eyes, all thosewills seem to weigh down upon you like a cope of lead, and, moreover,measures have been so well taken, everything has been so thoroughlyarranged beforehand and after a fashion so evidently irrevocable, thatthe will yields to the weight of circumstances and utterly breaks down.

  As the ceremony proceeded the features of the fair unknown changed theirexpression. Her look had at first been one of caressing tenderness;it changed to an air of disdain and of mortification, as though at nothaving been able to make itself understood.

  With an effort of will sufficient to have uprooted a mountain, I stroveto cry out that I would not be a priest, but I could not speak; mytongue seemed nailed to my palate, and I found it impossible to expressmy will by the least syllable of negation. Though fully awake, I feltlike one under the influence of a nightmare, who vainly strives toshriek out the one word upon which life depends.

  She seemed conscious of the martyrdom I was undergoing, and, as thoughto encourage me, she gave me a look replete with divinest promise. Hereyes were a poem; their every glance was a song.

  She said to me:

  'If thou wilt be mine, I shall make thee happier than God Himself in Hisparadise. The angels themselves will be jealous of thee. Tear off thatfuneral shroud in which thou art about to wrap thyself. I am Beauty, Iam Youth, I am Life. Come to me! Together we shall be Love. Can Jehovahoffer thee aught in exchange? Our lives will flow on like a dream, inone eternal kiss.

  'Fling forth the wine of that chalice, and thou art free. I will conductthee to the Unknown Isles. Thou shalt sleep in my bosom upon a bed ofmassy gold under a silver pavilion, for I love thee and would take theeaway from thy God, before whom so many noble hearts pour forth floods oflove which never reach even the steps of His throne!'

  These words seemed to float to my ears in a rhythm of infinitesweetness, for her look was actually sonorous, and the utterances of hereyes were reechoed in the depths of my heart as though living lips hadbreathed them into my life. I felt myself willing to renounce God,and yet my tongue mechanically fulfilled all the formalities ofthe ceremony. The fair one gave me another look, so beseeching, sodespairing that keen blades seemed to pierce my heart, and I felt mybosom transfixed by more swords than those of Our Lady of Sorrows.

  All was consummated; I had become a priest.

  Never was deeper anguish painted on human face than upon hers. Themaiden who beholds her affianced lover suddenly fall dead at her side,the mother bending over the empty cradle of her child, Eve seated atthe threshold of the gate of Paradise, the miser who finds a stonesubstituted for his stolen treasure, the poet who accidentally permitsthe only manuscript of his finest work to fall into the fire, could notwear a look so despairing, so inconsolable. All the blood had abandonedher charming face, leaving it whiter than marble; her beautiful armshung lifelessly on either side of her body as though their muscleshad suddenly relaxed, and she sought the support of a pillar, for heryielding limbs almost betrayed her. As for myself, I staggered towardthe door of the church, livid as death, my forehead bathed with a sweatbloodier than that of Calvary; I felt as though I were being strangled;the vault seemed to have flattened down upon my shoulders, and it seemedto me that my head alone sustained the whole weight of the dome.

  As I was about to cross the threshold a hand suddenly caught mine--awoman's hand! I had never till then touched the hand of any woman.It was cold as a serpent's skin, and yet its impress remained upon mywrist, burnt there as though branded by a glowing iron. It was she.'Unhappy man! Unhappy man! What hast thou done?' she exclaimed in a lowvoice, and immediately disappeared in the crowd.

  The aged bishop passed by. He cast a severe and scrutinising look uponme. My face presented the wildest aspect imaginable: I blushed andturned pale alternately; dazzling lights flashed before my eyes. Acompanion took pity on me. He seized my arm and led me out. I couldnot possibly have found my way back to the seminary unassisted. At thecorner of a street, while the young priest's attention was momentarilyturned in another direction, a negro page, fantastically garbed,approached me, and without pausing on his way slipped into my handa little pocket-book with gold-embroidered corners, at the same timegiving me a sign to hide it. I concealed it in my sleeve, and there keptit until I found myself alone in my cell. Then I opened the clasp. Therewere only two leaves within, bearing the words, 'Clarimonde. At theConcini Palace.' So little acquainted was I at that time with the thingsof this world that I had never heard of Clarimonde, celebrated as shewas, and I had no idea as to where the Concini Palace was situated. Ihazarded a thousand conjectures, each more extravagant than the last;but, in truth, I cared little whether she were a great lady or acourtesan, so that I could but see her once more.

  My love, although the growth of a single hour, had taken imperishableroot. I did not even dream of attempting to tear it up, so fully was Iconvinced such a thing would be impossible. That woman had completelytaken possession of me. One look from her had sufficed to change my verynature. She had breathed her will into my life, and I no longer livedin myself, but in her and for her. I gave myself up to a thousandextravagancies. I kissed the place upon my hand which she had touched,and I repeated her name over and over again for hours in succession. Ionly needed to close my eyes in order to see her distinctly as thoughshe were actually present; and I reiterated to myself the words she haduttered in my ear at the church porch: 'Unhappy man! Unhappy man! Whathast thou done?' I comprehended at last the full horror of my situation,and the funereal and awful restraints of the state into which I had justentered became clearly revealed to me. To be a priest!--that is, to bechaste, to never love, to observe no distinction of sex or age, to turnfrom the sight of all beauty, to put out one's own eyes, to hide forever crouching in the chill shadows of some church or cloister, to visitnone but the dying, to watch by unknown corpses, and ever bear aboutwith one the black soutane as a garb of mourning for oneself, so thatyour very dress might serve as a pall for your coffin.

  And I felt life rising within me like a subterranean lake, expandingand overflowing; my blood leaped fiercely through my arteries; mylong-restrained youth suddenly burst into active being, like the aloewhich blooms but once in a hundred years, and then bursts into blossomwith a clap of thunder.

  What could I do in order to see Clarimonde once more? I had no pretextto offer for desiring to leave the seminary, not knowing any person inthe city. I would not even be able to remain there but a short time,and was only waiting my assignment to the curacy which I must thereafteroccupy. I tried to remove the bars of the window; but it was at afearful height from the ground, and I found that as I had no ladder itwould be useless to think of escaping thus. And, furthermore, I coulddescend thence only by night in any event, and afterward how should I beable to find my way through the inextricable labyrinth of streets?All these difficulties, which to many would have appeared altogetherinsignificant, were gigantic to me, a poor seminarist who had fallen inlove only the day before for the first time, without experience, withoutmoney, without attire.

  'Ah!' cried I to myself in my blindness, 'were I not a priest I couldhave seen her every day; I might have been her lover, her spouse.Instead of being wrapped in this dismal shroud of mine I would have hadgarments of silk and velvet, golden chains, a sword, and fair plumeslike other handsome young cavaliers. My hair, instead of beingdishonoured by the tonsure, would flow down upon my neck in wavingcurls; I would have a fine waxed moustache; I would be a gallant.' Butone hour passed before an altar, a few hastily articulated words, hadfor ever cut me off from the number of the living, and I had myselfsealed down the stone of my own tomb; I had with my own hand bolted thegate of my prison! I went to the window. The sky was beautifully blue;the trees had donned their spring robes; nature seemed to be makingparade of an ironical joy. The _Place_ was filled with people, somegoing, others coming; young beaux and young beauties were sauntering incouples toward the groves and gardens; merry youths passed by, cheerilytrol
ling refrains of drinking-songs--it was all a picture of vivacity,life, animation, gaiety, which formed a bitter contrast with my mourningand my solitude. On the steps of the gate sat a young mother playingwith her child. She kissed its little rosy mouth still impearled withdrops of milk, and performed, in order to amuse it, a thousand divinelittle puerilities such as only mothers know how to invent. The fatherstanding at a little distance smiled gently upon the charming group, andwith folded arms seemed to hug his joy to his heart. I could not endurethat spectacle. I closed the window with violence, and flung myself onmy bed, my heart filled with frightful hate and jealousy, and gnawed myfingers and my bedcovers like a tiger that has passed ten days withoutfood.

  I know not how long I remained in this condition, but at last, whilewrithing on the bed in a fit of spasmodic fury, I suddenly perceivedthe Abbe Serapion, who was standing erect in the centre of the room,watching me