White lies. A novel

Front matter

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PRRSENTI-l) BY j

Chapter 1

Towards the close of the last century, the Baron de Beaurepaire lived in the chateau of that name in Brittany. His family was of prodigious antiquity. Seven successive barons had already flourished on this spot of France when a younger son of the house accompanied his neighbor the Duke of Normandy in his descent on England, and was rewarded by a grant of land, on which he dug a moat and built a chateau, and called it Beaurepaire ; the worthy natives turned this into Borreper without an instant’s delay. Since that day more than twenty gentlemen of the same 'neage had held in turn the original chateau and rands, and handed them down to their present lord.

/ Thus rooted in his native Brittany, Henri Lionel Marie St. Quentin de Beaurepaire was as fortunate as any man can be pronounced before he dies. He had health, rank, a good income, a fair domain, a goodly house, a loving wife, and two lovely young daughters all veneration and affection. Two months every year he visited the Faubourg St. Germain and the Court. At both every gentleman and every lackey knew his name and his face; his return to Brittany after this short absence was celebrated by a rustic/c^e.

Above all, Monsieur de Beaurepaire possessed that treasure of treasures, content. He hunted no heartburns. Ambition did not tempt him. Why should he listen to long speeches, and court the unworthy, and descend to intrigue, for so precarious and equivocal a prize as a place in the government, when he could be De Beaurepaire without trouble or loss of self-respect? Social ambition could get little hold of him. Let />arvenus give balls half in doors half out, and light two thousand lamps, and waste their substance battling and manoeuvring for fashionable distinction ; he had nothing to gain by such foolery, nothing to lose by modest living ; he was the twenty-ninth Baron of Beaurepaire. So wise, so proud, so little vain, so strong in health and wealth and honor, one w’ould have said nothing less than an earthquake could shake this gentleman and his house. Yet both were shaken, though rooted by centuries to the soil.

But it was by no vulgar earthquake.

For years France had bowed in silence beneath two galling burdens : a selfish and corrupt monarchy, and a multitudinous, privileged, lazy, and oppressive aristocracy, by whom the peasant, though in France he is the principal proprietor of the soil, was handled like a Russian serf.

Now when a high-spirited nation has been long silent under oppression — tremble, oppressors! The shallow misunderstand nations as they do men. They fear where no fear is, and play cribbage over a volcano. Such are they who expect a revolt in England whenever England grumbles half a note higher than usual. They do not see that she is venting her ill-humor instead of bottling it, and getting her grievances redressed gradually and safely. Such is the old lady who pinches us when the engine lets off steam with a mighty pother. Then it is she fears an explosion. Such are they who read the frothy bombast of Italian Republicans, and fancy that nation v of song, superstition, and slavery is going to be free, — is worthy to be free, — has the heart or the brains or the soul to be free.

Such were the British placemen, and the pigheaded King, who read the calm, business-like, respectful, yet dignified and determined address of the American colonists, and argued thus : —

“ What, they don’t bluster; these then are men we can bully.”*

Such were the French placemen, who did not see how tremendous the danger to that corrupt government and lawless aristocracy, when an ardent people raised their heads, after centuries of brooding, to avenge centuries of wrong.

We all know this wonderful passage of history. How the feeble king was neither woman, nor man-— could neither concede with grace nor resist with cannon. How his head fell at a moment when it was monstrous to pretend the liberties of the nation ran any risk from the poor old cipher. How the dregs of the nation came uppermost aud passed for “the people.” How law, religion, common sense, and humanity hid their faces, the scaffbld streamed with innocent blood, and terror reigned.

France was preyed on by unclean beasts, half ass, half tiger. They made her a bankrupt, and they were busy cutting her throat, as well as rifling her pockets, when Heaven sent her a Man.

He drove the unclean beasts otf her suffering body, and took her in his hand, and set her on high among the nations.

But ere the Hero came, — among whose many glories let this be written, that he was a fighting man, yet ended civil slaughter, — what wonde

* Compare the manifestoes of Italian Republicans wit the proclamations and addresses of the American cr>innio» — i. e. compare the words of the men . ' '

words of the men of deeds, — the men l men who succeed ; it is a lesson in hui ui differ as a bladder from a bludgeon, oi from Noll Cromwell’s.

WHITE LIES.

1 honest man and good Frenchman ' France. Among these was M. de

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ublicans — murderers of kings, murnen, and persecutors of children — yes, the most horrible monsters Hu- ;roaned under.

black for the King, and received no )rooded in the chateau, and wrote letters ; and these letters all came private hands. He felled timber, rge sums of money upon his estate.

• xhed his opportunity, and on prelurney disappeared from the chateau.

ths after, a cavalier, dusty and pale, courtyard of Beaurepaire, and ask- 0 baroness; he hung his head, and tter. It contained a few sad words d Larochejaquelin. The baron had i y I La Vendee, fighting, like his ances- ■ side of the Crown.

. ‘ ti!., hour till her death the Baroness

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5 ' i'-ner would have been arrested, and ' f'j ',aded, but for a friend, the last in whom the family reckoned for any . ... Doctor St. Aubin had lived in the

• ‘ V wty years. He was a man of science,

) t lb : .ii i^are a button for money ; so he had

.(!.'• I ..:u ;he practice of medicine, and pursued

• ^ ' 1 . b 3 with ease under the baron’s roof.

( d him, and laughed at his occasional . he days of prosperity; and now, in

. c !• ; ds, the protege became the protector,

*1' lishment and his own. But it was ' ' * : ; and downs. This amiable theorist

lis is the less to be wondered at that V Republic is the perfect form of gov- '• If. ; is merely in ])ractice that it is im- 3 only upon going off paper into re- : ing actually to self-govern old nations

territory and time to heat themselves . ' til the fire of politics and the bellows

. that the thing resolves itself into and bloodshed, — each in indefinite

. . Aubin had for years talked and

ir they assumed him to be a Kepubli- ' “i ■ ipplied to him to know whether the j • red her husband’s opinions, and he i, 3d them she did not ; he added,

^ iipil of mine.’’ On this audacious A 1 ‘ 3 y contented themselves with laying on the lands of Beaurepaire. s were abundant at this time, but good

. •, ; per — a notorious coward— had made

a: ; a - nd fied, and specie was creeping into • •: o , like a startled rabbit into its hole.

' a vas paid, but Beaurepaire had to be . fi> .gaged, and the loan bore a high rate

' j ao sooner arranged than it transpired ' on just before his death had con-

• . debts, for which his estate was an-

i ' ess sold her carriage and horses, and i : I her daughters prepared to deny

Ibut the bare necessaries of life, anil • ' ' debts if possible. On this their de-

i away from them ; their fair-weather friends came nci ger near them ; and many a flush of indigni ii crossed their brows, and many an achinJ ang their hearts, as adversity revealed to them baseness and inconstancy pf common people hig.i or low. When the other servants had retired with their wages, one J acintha remained behind, and begged permission to speak to the baroness.

“ What would you with me, my child ?” asked that high-bred lady, with an accent in which a shade of surprise mingled with great politeness.

“ Forgive me, madame the baroness,” began Jacintha with a formal courtesy ; “ but jiow can I leave you and Mademoiselle Joseph!’ id Mademoiselle Laure ? Reflect, madamr as

born at Beaurepaire ; my mother die. he

chateau ; my father died in the village ; he had meat every day from the baron’s owri' ^ . ^le, and fuel from the baron’s wood, and died blessing the house of Beaurepaire — Mademoiselle Laure, speak for me ! Ah, you weep ! it is then that you see it is impossible I can go. Ah no ! madame, I will not go ; forgive me ; I can not go. The others are gone because prosperity is here no longer. Let it be so; I will stay till the sun shines again upon the chateau, and then you shall send me away if it seems good to you ; but not now, my ladies ! Oh, not now ! Oh ! oh ! oh !”

Tlie warm-hearted girl burst out sobbing ungracefully.

“ My child,” said the baroness, “these s itiments touch me, and honor you. But reth.^ if you please, while I consult my daughters.”

.Jacintha cut her sobs dead short, and retreated with a most cold and formal reverence.

The consultation consisted of the baroness opening her arms, and both her daughters embracing her at once.

“My children! there are then some who love you.”

“No ! you, mamma! It is you we all loA’e.”

Three women were now the only pillars, a man of science and a servant of all work the only outside props, the buttresses, of the great old house of Beaurepaire.

As months rolled on, Laure Aglae Rose de Beaurepaire recovered her natural gayety in spite of bereavement and poverty, — so strong are youth and health and temperament. But her elder sister had a grief all her own. Captain Dujardin, a gallant young officer, well born, and his oAvn master, had courted her with her parents’ consent ; and even when the baron began to look coldly on the soldier of the Republic, young Dujardin, though too proud to encounter the baron’s irony and looks of scorn, would not yield love to pique. He came no more to the chateau ; but he would wait hours and hours on the path to the little oratory in the park, on the bare chance of a passing word or even a kind look from Josephine. So much devotion gradually won a heart which in happier times she had been half encouraged to give him ; and when he left her on a military sendee of uncommon danger, the tvoinan’s reserve melted, and, in answer to his prayers and tears, she owned for the first time that she loved him better than any thing in the world, - — except duty and honor.

They parted in deep sorrow, but full of hope.

■Woman- like she comforted him through In tears.

“ Be prudent for my sake, if not for your owi

WHITE ITES.

May G(X -'atcli over you r Your claufjer is our only fear ; ^we are a uuited family. My father \vill never foR-ti \iy inclinations ; these unhappy dissensions will soon cease, and he will love you again. I do not say, ‘ Be constant.’ I will not wrong either myself or you by a doubt ; but promise me to come back in life, oh, Camille, Camille !”

Then it was his turn to comfort and console her. He promised to come back alive, and with fresh honors, and so more worthy the Demoiselle de Beaurepaire.

They pledged their faith to one another.

Letters from the camp breathing a devotion little short of worship fed Josephine’s attachment”; and more than one public mention of his name and services made her proud as well as fond of the fiery young soldier.

The time "was not yet come that she could open her whole heart to her parents. The baron was now too occupied with the state to trouble his head about love fancies. The baroness, like many parents, looked on her daughter as a girl, though she was twenty years old. She belonged, too, to the old school. A passionate love in a lady’s heart before marriage was with her contrary to etiquette, and therefore improper ; and, to her, the great word “ improper” included the little word “ impossible” in one of its many folds. Josephine loved her sister very tenderly ; but Laure was three years her junior, and she shrank witli modest delicacy from making her a confidante of feelings the bare relation of which leaves the female hearer a child no longer.

Thus Josephine hid her heart, and delicious first love nestled deep in her nature, and thrilled in every secret vein and fibre. Alas! the time came that this loving but proud spirit thanked Heaven she had never proclaimed the depth of her attachment for Camille Dujardin.

They had parted two years, and he had joined the army of the Pyrenees about one month, when suddenly all correspondence ceased on his part.

Kestless anxiety rose into terror as this silence continued ; and starting and trembling at every sound, and edging to the window at every foot-step, Josephine expected hourly the tidings of her lover’s death.

IMonths rolled on in silence.

Then a new torture came. Since he was not dead, he must be unfaithful.

At this all the pride of her race was fired in her.

The struggle between love and ire was almost too much for nature.

Violently gay and moody by turns, she alarmed both her mother and the good Doctor St. Aubin. The latter was not, I think, quite without suspicion of the truth ; however, he simply prescribed change of air and place. She must go to Frejus, a watering - place distant about five leagues. ^Mademoiselle de Beaurepaire yielded a languid assent. To her all places Avere alike.

That same night after all had retired to rest, came a low, gentle tap at her door; the next moment Laure came into the room, and, Avithout saying a Avord, put doAvn her candle and glided ujj to Josephine, looked her in the face a moment, then Avreathed her arms round her neck.

Josephine panted a little : she saAV something Avas coming ; the gestures and looks of sisters are A’olumes to them.

Laure clung to her neck.

“What is the matter, my child?”

“I am not a child! there is your mistake. My sister, why is it you love me no longer ?”

“ 1 love you no longer?”

“No! We do not hide our heart from her Ave love ; AA'e do not try to hide it from her Avho loA'es us. We knoAv the attempt Avould be in A'ain.”

Josephine panted heavily; but she ansAvered doggedly : —

“ Our house is burdened A\dth real griefs ; is it for me to intrude vain and unAA’orthy sentim ~ upon our sacred and honorable soitoavs ? 01 my

sister, if you haA'e really detected my folly, do not expose me! but rather help me to cor . and to conquer that for Avhich your elder no - blushes before you !”

And the proud beauty boAved her Avhite £< v, head on the mantel-piece, and turned gcrnly aAvay from her sister.

“Josephine,” said Laure, “I am young, already 1 feel that all troubles are light comp : Avith those of the heart. Besides, we share ovr misfortunes and our bereaA'ement, and com' t one another. It is only you Avho are a miser, and grudge me my right, — a share of all ^ >'o’ joys and all your griefs ; but do you knoAv th,i you are the only one in this chateau Avho dr not loAe me?”

“Ah, Laure, AAdiat AA^ords are these? my 1 '■

is older than yours. ”

“No! no!”

“Yes, my little faAvn, your Josephine lo you the hour you Avere born, and has loved _ eA’er since, Avithout a moment’s coldness.”

“Ah! my sister! — my sister! As if I not know it. Then ybu Avill turn your face me?”

“See!”

“ And embrace me ?”

“There!”

“And, noAv, bosom to bosom, and heart heart ; tell me all ?”

‘ ‘ I Avill — to-morrow. ”

“At least give me your tears ; you see I iv ■ not niggardly in that respect.”

“Tears, loA'e — ah! Avould I could!”

“ By-and-by then ; meantime do not palpitr . * so. See, I unclasi) my arms. You Avill find !• a reasonable person, indulgent eA^en; compc e yourself; or, rather, AA'atch my proceedings ; yo' are interested in them.”

“It appears to me that vou propose to sle ‘o here!’

‘ ‘ Does that vex you ?”

“ On the contrary.”

“There I am!” cried Laure, alighting amoi ; the sheets like a snoAv-flake on Avater. “I aAva- ■ you, mademoiselle.”

Josephine found this lovely face AA'et, yet smiling saucily, upon her pilloAv. She dreAV the fitir OAvner softly to her tender bosom and aching heart, and Avatched the bright eyes close, and the coral lips part and shoAv their pearls in child-like sleep.

In the moiTiing Laure, half awake, felt something SAveep her cheek. She kept her eyes closed, and Josephine, believing her still asleep, fell to kissing her, but only as the south Avind kisses the violets, and embraced her tenderly but furth'ely like a feather curling round a lovely head, caress-

WHITE LIES.

ing yet scarce touching, and murmuring, “Little angel !” sighed gratitude and affection over her ; but took great care not to \vu 3 her with all this. The little angel, who was also a little fox, laystill and feigned sleep, for she felt she was creeping into her sister's lieart of hearts. From that day they were confidantes and friends, as well as sisters, and never had a thought or feeling unshared.

Josephine soon found she had I'ery few facts to reveal.

Laure had watched her closely and keenly for Tionths. It was her feelings, her confidence, the ittle love wanted ; not her secret, — that lay bare ilready to the shrewd young minx, — I beg her lardon, — lynx.

Give sorrow words. The grief that does not speak Whispers the o’er-fraught heart, and bids it break.

A deep observer proclaimed this three hundred ■-ears ago, and every journal that is printed nowadays furnishes the examples.

From this silent, moody, gnawing, maddening orrow', Laure saved her elder sister. She coaxed aer to vent each feeling as it rose ; her grief, her floubt, her mortification, her indignation, her pride, and the terrible love that at times over- . lowered all.

Thus much was gained. These powerful an- ' agonists were no longer cooped up in her bosom 'attling together and teaiing her.

They returned from Frejus : Josejihine with a blicate rose-tint instead of the jiallor that had liiarmed St. Aubin. Her mood fluctuated no more. A gentle pensiveness settled upon her. She looked the goddess Patience.

She was inconceivably lovely.

Laure said to her one day, after a long gaze 'ther: —

“ I fear I shall never hate that madman as I ught. Certainly when I think of his conduct, I ould strike him in the face. ” Here she clenched er teeth, and made her hand into a sort of ir- . 2 gular little snowball. “But when I look at ou I can not hate, I can but pity that imbecile -that—”

“Oh, my sister,” said Josephine, imploringly, let us not degrade one we have honored with :ir esteem, — for our oAvn sakes, not his,” added le, hastily, not looking Laure in the face.

“No! forgive my vivacity. I was going to II you I feel more pity than anger for him.

’ 'oes he mean to turn monk, and forswear the !X? if not, what does he intend to do? Where'' in he hope to find any one he can love after ^ ■ )u? Josephine, the more I see of our sex, the ^ ore I see that you are the most beautiful woman France, and by consequence in Euroj)e.”

The smile this drew was a very faint one.

“ Were this so, surely I could have retained a single heart.” j

“ You have then forgotten vour La Fontaine ?” “Explain.” *' I

“ Does he not sing how a dunghill cock found a pearl necklace, and disdained it. And why ? Not that pearls are worth less than barley-corns ; ! but because he was a sordid bird, and your ' predecessors were w^asted on him, my Josephine, j iSo I pity that dragoon who might have revelled in the love of an angel, and has rejected it, and lost it forever. There, I have made her sigh.” ' “ Forgive me.”

“Forgive her? for sighing? I am, then, very tyrannical.”

One day Laure came into the room where the baroness. Doctor St. Aubin, and Josephine were sitting.

She sat down unobserved.

But Josephine, looking up a minute after, saw at a glance that something had happened. Laui-e, she saw', under a forced calmness, was in great emotion and anxiety. Their eyes met. Laure made her a scarce perceptible signal, and immediately after got up and left the room.

Josephine waited a few seconds ; then she rose and went out, and found Laure in the passage, as she expected.

“ My poor sister, have you courage?”

“ He is dead !” gasped Josephine.

“No! he lives. But he is dead to us and France. Oh, Josephine, have you courage ?”

‘ ‘ I have, ” faltered J osephine, quivering from head to foot.

“You know Dard, who Avorks about here for love of Jacintha? For months past I have set him to .speak to every soldier who passes through the village. ”

“Ah ! you never told me.”

“ Had you known my plan, you W'ould haA'e been forever on the q^li vive ; and your tranquillity was dear to me. It was the first step to happiness. Hundreds of soldiers have passed, and none of them knew him even by name. To-day, Josephine, two haA'e eome that knoAv all!”

“All! Oh, Laure, Laure!”

“ He is disloyal to his country. What aa'oiider he is a traitor to you !”

“It is false!”

“The men are here. Come, Avill you .speak to them ?”

‘ ‘ I can not. But I Avill come ; vou speak : I shall hear.”

They found in the kitchen two dismounted dragoons before AA'hom Jacintha had set a bottle of wine.

Th.ey arose and saluted the ladies.

“Be seated, my brave men,” said Laure, “and tell me Avhat you told Dard about Captain Dujardin.”

“Don’t stain your mouth Avith the captain, my little lady. He is a traitor !”

“ Hoav do you knoAv ?”

“ Marcellus ! Mademoiselle asks us hoAV Ave knoAV Captain Dujardin to be a traitor. Speak ! ”

Marcellus, thus appealed to, told Laure, after his OAvn fiishion, that he kneAV the captain Avell ; that one day the captain rode out of the camp, and never returned ; that at first great anxiety Avas felt on his behalf, for the captain Avas a great favorite, and passed for the smartest soldier in the division; that after a Avhile anxiety gave ])lace to some A’ery aAvkAvard suspicions, and these suspicions it Avas his lot and his comrade’s here to confirm. About a month later he and the said comrade and two more had been sent, Avell mounted, to reconnoitre a Spanish village. At the door of a little inn they had caught sight of a French uniform. This so excited their curiosity that he Avent foi'Avard nearer than prudent, and distinctly recognized Captain Dujardin seated at a table drinking, betAveen tAvo guerrillas ; that he rode back and told the others, Avho then rode up and satisfied themselv'cs it AV'as so ; that if any of the party had entertained a doubt, it

WHITE LIES.

was removed in an unpleasant way. lie, Marcellus, disgusted at the sight of a French uniform drinking among Spaniards, took down his carabine and fired at the group as carefully as a somewhat restive horse permitted, at which, as if by magic, a score or so of guerrillas poured out from Heaven knows where, musket in hand, and delivered a volley: the officer in command of the party fell dead, Jean Jacques got a broken arm, and liis own horse was wounded in two ])laces, and fell from loss of blood a few furlongs from tlie French camp, to the neighborhood of which the vagabonds pursued them hallooing and shouting and firing like barbarous banditti as they were.

“ However, here I am,” concluded Marcellus, who was naturally more interested in himself than in Captain Dujardin, “invalided for a while, my little ladies, but not expended yet: we will soon dash in among them again for death or glory ! Meantime,” concluded he, filling both glasses, “ let us drink to the eyes of beauty (military salute), and to the renown of France, — and double damnation to all her traitors, like that Captain Dujardin — whose neck may the devil twist.”

In the middle of this toast Josephine, who had stood rooted to one place with eyes glaring upon each speaker in tum, uttered a feeble cry like a dying hare, and crept slowly out of the room with the carriage and manner of a woman of fifty.

Laure’s first impulse was to follow Josephine, but this would have attracted attention to her despair. She had the tact and resolution to remain and say a few kind words to the soldiers, and then she retired and darted up by instinct to Josephine’s bedroom. The door was locked.

“Josephine ! Josephine !”

No answer.

“I want to speak to you. I am frightened, — oh ! do not be alone !”

A choking voice answered : —

“I am not alone, — 1 am with God and the saints. Give me a little while to draw my breath.”

Laure sank down at the door, and sat close to it, with her head against it, sobbing bitterly. The sensitive little love was hurt at not being let in, such a friend as she had proved herself. But this pei’sonal feeling was but a small fraction of her grief and anxiety.

A good half-hour liad elapsed when Josephine, pale and stern as no one had ever seen her till that hour, suddenly opened the door. She started at sight of Laure couched sorrowful on the threshold ; her stern look relaxed into tender love and pity ; she sank on her knees and took her sister’s head quickly to her bosom.

“ Oh, my little heart !” cried she, “ have you been here all this time ?”

“ Oh ! oh ! oh !” was all the little heart could reply.

Then Josephine sat down, and took Laure in her lap, and caressed and comforted her, and ])oured words of gratitude and afiection over her like a warm shower.

The sisters rose hand in hand.

Then Laure suddenly seized Josephine, and looked long and anxiously down into her eyes. They flashed fire under the scrutiny.

“Yes,” she replied, “it is ended. I could not despise and love. I am dead to him, as he is dead to France.”

“Ah! I lio^jed so, — I thought so; but you frightened me. My noble sister, were I ever to lose your esteem I should die. Oh, how awful, yet how beautiful is your scorn ! For worlds I would not be that Cam — ”

Josephine laid her hand imperiously on Laure's mouth.

“To mention that man’s name to me '>iU ’ to insult me! l)e Beaurepaire I am, ard Frenchwoman! Come, love, let us go 'lov. i and comfort our mother.”

They went down; and this patient s jf . and high-minded conqueror of her own tc -or ■ took up a commonplace work, and read ir u. for two mortal hours to her mother and S . iubin. Her voice never wavered.

To feel that life is ended, — to Avish exhreix c. too, had ceased; and so to sit down, an : ;

hollow, and take a part and sham an inte c- i twaddle to please others, — such are wcni 'n feats. How like nothing at all they look !

A man would rather sit on the buffe’" - steam-engine and ride at the great Redan.

Laure sat at her elbow, a little behind hes , ni turned the leaves, and on one pretense or iiv held Josephine’s hand nearly all the rest ' rh day. Its delicate fibres remained tense ''I c greyhound’s sinews after a race, and th ■ li. veins rose to sight in it, though her voi( > an eyes were mastered.

So keen was the strife, so matched the ;• . u; onists, so hard the victory !