The Seven Cardinal Sins: Envy and Indolence

CHAPTER I

IN the year 1828 any tourist who was on his way from Blois to the little town of Pont Brillant to visit – as travellers seldom fail to do – the famous castle of that name, the magnificent feudal abode of the Marquises Pont Brillant, would have been obliged to pass a farmhouse standing near the edge of the road, about two miles from the château.

If this lonely dwelling attracted the attention of the traveller, he would have been almost certain to have regarded it with mingled melancholy and disgust as one of the too numerous specimens of hideous rural architecture in France, even when these habitations belong to persons possessed of a competence. This establishment consisted of a large barn and storehouse, with two long wings in the rear. The interior of the sort of parallelogram thus formed served as a courtyard, and was filled with piles of manure rotting in pools of stagnant water, for cow, horse, and sheep stables all opened into this enclosure, where all sorts of domestic animals, from poultry to hogs, were scratching and rooting.

One of the wings in the rear served as the abode of the family. It was a story and a half high, and had no outlook save this loathsome courtyard, with the dirty, worm-eaten doors of the cow-stable for a horizon. On the other side of the structure, where no window pierced the wall, stood a superb grove of century-old oaks, a couple of acres in extent, through which flowed a beautiful stream that served as an outlet for several distant lakes. But this grove, in spite of its beauty, had become well-nigh a desert on account of the large amount of gravel that had been deposited there, and the thick growth of rushes and thistles that covered it; besides, the stream, for want of cleaning out and of a sufficient fall, was becoming turbid and stagnant.

But if this same tourist had passed this same farmhouse one year afterward, he would have been struck by the sudden metamorphosis that the place had undergone, though it still belonged to the same owner. A beautiful lawn, close and fine as velvet, and ornamented with big clumps of rose-bushes, had taken the place of the dirty manure-strewn courtyard. New doors had been cut on the other side of the horse and cow stables; the old doors had been walled up, and the house itself, as well as the big barn at the foot of the courtyard, had been whitewashed and covered with a green trellis up which vigorous shoots of honeysuckle, clematis, and woodbine were already climbing.

The wing in which the family lived had been surrounded with flowering plants and shrubbery. A gravel path led up to the main doorway, which was now shaded by a broad, rustic porch with a thatched roof in which big clumps of houseleek and dwarf iris were growing. This rustic porch, overhung with luxuriant vines, evidently served as the family sitting-room. The window-frames, which were painted a dark green, contrasted strikingly with the dazzling whiteness of the curtains and the clearness of the window-panes, and on each sill was a small jardinière made of silver birch bark, and filled with freshly gathered flowers. A light fence, half concealed by roses, lilacs, and acacias, had been run from one wing of the establishment to the other, parallel with the barn, thus enclosing this charming garden. The grove had undergone a no less complete transformation. A rich carpet of velvety turf, cut with winding walks of shining yellow sand, had superseded the rushes and thistles; the formerly sluggish stream, turned into a new bed and checked in the middle of its course by a pile of large, moss-covered rocks three or four feet high, plunged from the height in a little bubbling, dancing waterfall, then continued its clear and rapid course on a level with its grassy borders.

A few beds of scarlet geraniums, whose brilliant hues contrasted vividly with the rich, green turf, brightened this charming spot, in which the few bright sunbeams that forced their way through dense foliage made a bewitching play of light and shade, especially in the vista through which one could see in the distance the forest of Pont Brillant, dominated by its ancient castle.

The details of this complete transformation, effected in so short a time by such simple and inexpensive means, seem puerile, perhaps, but are really highly significant as the expression of one of the thousand different phases of maternal love. Yes, a young woman sixteen years of age, married when only a little over fifteen, exiled here in this solitude, had thus metamorphosed it.

It was the desire to surround her expected child with bright and beautiful objects here in this lonely spot where he was to live, that had thus developed the young mother's taste, and each pleasing innovation which she had effected in this gloomy, unattractive place, had been planned merely with the purpose of providing a suitable setting for this dear little eagerly expected child.

On the greensward in the carefully enclosed courtyard the child could play as an infant. The porch would afford a healthful shelter in case it rained or the sun was too hot. Later, when he outgrew his babyhood, he could play and run about in the shady grove, under his mother's watchful eye, and amuse himself by listening to the soft murmur of the waterfall, or by watching it dance and sparkle along over the mossy rocks. The limpid stream, kept at a uniform depth of barely two feet now, held no dangers for the child, who, on the contrary, as soon as the warm summer days came, could bathe, whenever the desire seized him, in the crystal-clear water that filtered through a bed of fine gravel.

In this, as in many other details, as we shall see by and by, a sort of inspiration seemed to have guided this young mother in her plan of changing this untidy, ugly farmhouse into a cheerful and attractive home.

At the date at which this story begins, – the last of the month of June, 1845, – the young mother had been residing in this farmhouse for seventeen years. The shrubs in the courtyard had become trees; the buildings were almost completely hidden under a luxuriant mantle of flowering vines, while even in winter the walls and porch were thickly covered with ivy; while in the adjoining grove the melancholy murmur of the little cascade and the stream were still heard. The glass door of a large room which served at the same time as a parlour for the mother and a schoolroom for her son, now sixteen years of age, opened out upon this grove. This room likewise served as a sort of museum – one might be disposed to smile at this rather pretentious word, so we will say instead a maternal shrine or reliquary, for a large but inexpensive cabinet contained a host of articles which the fond mother had carefully preserved as precious mementoes of different epochs in her son's life.

Everything bore a date, from the infant's rattle to the crown of oak leaves which the youth had won at a competitive examination in the neighbouring town of Pont Brillant, where the proud mother had sent her son to test his powers. There, too, everything had its significance, from the little broken toy gun to the emblem of white satin fringed with gold, which neophytes wear so proudly at their first communion.

These relics were puerile, even ridiculous perhaps, and yet, when we remember that all the incidents of her son's life with which these articles were associated had been important, touching, or deeply solemn events to this young mother living in complete solitude and idolising her son, we can forgive this worship of the past and also understand the feeling that had prompted her to place among these relics a small porcelain lamp, by the subdued light of which the mother had watched over her son during a long and dangerous illness from which his life had been saved by a modest but clever physician of Pont Brillant.

It is almost needless to say, too, that the walls of the room were ornamented with frames containing here a page of infantile, almost unformed handwriting, there a couple of verses which the youth had composed for his mother's birthday the year before. Besides there were the inevitable heads of Andromache and of Niobe, upon which the inexperienced crayon of the beginner usually bestows such drawn mouths and squinting eyes, apparently gazing in a sort of sullen surprise at a pretty water-colour representing a scene on the banks of the Loire; while the lad's first books were no less carefully preserved by the mother in a bookcase containing some admirably chosen works on history, geography, travel, and literature. A piano, a music-rack, and a drawing-table completed the modest furnishings of the room.

Late in the month of June, Marie Bastien – for that was the name of this young mother – found herself in this room with her son. It was nearly five o'clock in the afternoon, and the golden rays of the declining sun, though obstructed to some extent by the slats of the Venetian blinds, were, nevertheless, playing a lively game of hide-and-seek, now with the dark woodwork, now with the big bouquets of fresh flowers in the china vases on the mantel.

A dozen or more superb half-open roses in a tall glass vase diffused a delightful perfume through the room, and brightened the table covered with books and papers, on either side of which the mother and son were busily writing.

Madame Bastien, though she was thirty-one years of age, did not look a day over twenty, so radiant was her enchanting face with youthful, we might almost say, virginal freshness, for the angelic beauty of this young woman seemed worthy to inspire the words so often addressed to the Virgin, "Hail, Mary, full of grace."

Madame Bastien wore a simple dress of pale blue and white striped percaline; a broad pink ribbon encircled her slender, supple waist, which a man could have easily spanned with his two hands. Her pretty arms were bare, or rather only slightly veiled with long lace mitts which reached above her dimpled elbows. Her luxuriant chestnut hair, with frequent glints of gold entangled in its meshes, waved naturally all over her shapely head. It was worn low over her ears, thus framing the perfect oval of her face, the transparent whiteness of which was charmingly set off by the delicate rose tint of her cheeks. Her large eyes, of the deepest and tenderest blue, were fringed with long lashes, a deep brown like her beautifully arched eyebrows, while the rich coral of her lips, the brilliant whiteness of her teeth, and the firmness of her perfect arms were convincing proofs of a naturally pure, rich blood, preserved so by the regular habits of a quiet, chaste life, a life concentrated in a single passion, maternal love.

Marie Bastien's physiognomy was singularly contradictory in expression, for if the shape of the forehead and the contour of the eyebrows indicated remarkable energy as well as uncommon strength of will combined with an unusual amount of intelligence, the expression of the eyes was one of ineffable kindness, and her smile full of sweetness and gaiety, – gaiety, as two entrancing little dimples, created by the frequency of her frank smile a little way from the velvety corners of her lips, indicated beyond a doubt. In fact this young mother fully equalled her son in joyous animation, and when the time for recreation came, the younger of the two was not always the most boisterous and gay and childish by any means, and certainly, seeing the two seated together writing, one would have taken them for brother and sister instead of mother and son.

Frederick Bastien strongly resembled his mother, though his beauty was of a more pronounced and virile type. His skin was darker, and his hair a deeper brown than his mother's, and his jet black eyebrows imparted a wonderful charm to his large blue eyes, for Frederick had his mother's eyes and expression, as well as her straight nose, kindly smile, white teeth, and scarlet lips, upon which the down of puberty was already visible.

Reared in the wholesome freedom and simplicity of rural life, Frederick, whose stature considerably exceeded that of his mother, was a model of health, youth, and grace, while one seldom saw a more intelligent, resolute, affectionate, and cheery face.

It was easy to see that maternal pride had presided over the youth's toilet; though his attire was of the simplest, most inexpensive kind, yet the pretty cerise satin cravat was remarkably becoming to a person of his complexion, his shirt front was dazzling in its whiteness, there were large pearl buttons on his nankeen vest, and his hands, far from resembling the frightful paws of the average schoolboy, with dirty nails often bitten down to the quick, and grimy, ink-stained knuckles, were as well cared for as those of his young mother, and like hers were adorned with pink, beautifully kept nails of faultless colour. (Mothers of sixteen-year-old sons will understand and appreciate these apparently insignificant details.)

As we have already remarked, Frederick and his mother, seated opposite each other at the same table, were working, or rather digging away hard, as school-boys say, each having a volume of "The Vicar of Wakefield" to the left of them, and in front of them a sheet of foolscap which was already nearly filled.

"Pass me the dictionary, Frederick," said Madame Bastien, without raising her eyes, but extending her pretty hand to her son.

"Oh, the dictionary," responded Frederick, in a tone of mocking compassion, "the idea of being obliged to depend upon a dictionary!"

But he gave the book to his mother, not without kissing the pretty hand extended for it, however.

Marie, still without taking her eyes from her book, smiled without replying, then, placing her ivory penholder between her little teeth, which made the penholder look almost yellow in comparison, began to turn the leaves of the dictionary.

Profiting by this moment of inattention, Frederick rose from his chair, and placing his two hands upon the table, leaned over to see now far his mother had proceeded with her translation.

"Ah, ah, Frederick, you are trying to copy," said Marie, gaily, dropping the dictionary and placing her hands on the paper as if to protect it from her son's eyes. "I have caught you this time."

"No, nothing of the kind," replied Frederick, dropping into his chair again. "I only wanted to see if you were as far along as I am."

"All I know is that I have finished," responded Madame Bastien, with a triumphant air.

"What, already?" exclaimed Frederick, humbly.

As he spoke, the tall clock in the corner, after an ominous creaking and groaning, began to strike five.

"Good, it is time for recess!" exclaimed Marie, joyfully. "Do you hear, Frederick?"

And springing up, the young woman ran to her son.

"Give me ten minutes, and I will be done," pleaded Frederick, writing for dear life; "just ten minutes!"

But with charming petulance the young mother placed a paper-weight on the unfinished translation, slammed her son's books together, took his pen out of his hand, and half led, half dragged him out into the grove.

It must be admitted that Frederick offered no very determined resistance to his mother's despotic will, however.

CHAPTER II

FIVE minutes afterward an exciting game of shuttlecock was going on between Frederick and his mother.

It was a charming picture upon which the few rays of sunshine that succeeded in making their way through the dense canopy of green shone, for every movement and attitude of the participants was instinct with agility and grace.

Marie, her eyes gleaming with mischief, her red lips wreathed with a charming smile, the rose tint in her cheeks deepening, one shapely foot extended, but with her supple form thrown well back from her slim waist upward, met the shuttlecock with her racket, then sent it flying off in an entirely different direction from what Frederick had anticipated; but not in the least discomfited, the youth, throwing back the curling locks of brown hair from his brow by a sudden toss of the head, with a quick, lithe bound skilfully intercepted the winged messenger as it was about to touch the earth, and sent it flying back to his mother, who intercepted it in her turn, and with a no less adroit blow despatched it swiftly through space again. When, after describing its parabola, it made straight for Frederick's nose, whereupon the youth, in a violent effort to interpose his racket between the rapidly descending shuttlecock and his upturned face, lost his balance and fell headlong on the thick turf, after which the laughter and oft repeated bursts of hilarity on the part of the two players necessarily put an end to the game.

After their mirth had partially subsided, the mother and son, with crimson cheeks, and eyes still swimming with the tears their merriment had evoked, walked to a rustic bench in front of the waterfall to rest.

"Goodness, how absurd it is to laugh in this fashion!" exclaimed Frederick.

"You must admit that it does one good, though. It may be absurd to laugh so, as you say, but it consoles one to feel that only happy people like ourselves can ever give way to such mad fits of merriment."

"Yes, mother, you are right," said Frederick, resting his head on his mother's shoulder, "we are happy. As I sit here in the shade, this beautiful summer evening, with my head on your shoulder, gazing with half-closed eyes through the golden sunlight at our pretty home, while the soft murmur of the cascade fills the air, it seems to me it would be delightful to remain here just as we are for a hundred years."

And Frederick settled his head still more comfortably on his mother's shoulder, as if he would indeed like to spend an eternity there. The young mother, taking care not to disturb Frederick, bent her head a little to one side in order to lay her cheek upon his, and taking one of his hands in hers, replied:

"It is true that this corner of the earth has always been a sort of paradise for us, and but for the recollection of the month that you were so ill, I think we should find it difficult to recollect a single unhappy moment. Is that not so, Frederick?"

"You have always spoiled me so."

"M. Frederick doesn't know what he is talking about, evidently," responded Madame Bastien, with an affectation of grave displeasure. "There is nothing more disagreeable, and above all more unhappy, than a spoiled child. I should like to know what idle fancies and caprices I have ever encouraged in you, monsieur. Mention one if you can."

"I should think I could. In the first place you never give me the time to be bored, but take quite as much interest in my diversions and pleasures as I do. I really don't know how you manage it, but time passes so quickly in your company that I cannot believe that this is the last of June, and when the first of January comes, I know I shall say the same thing."

"Oh, you needn't try to get out of answering my question by flattering me, monsieur. Just tell me when I ever spoiled you unduly, and if I am not, on the contrary, very severe and exacting, especially in relation to your hours of study?"

"Ah, you do well to boast of being exacting in that particular. Don't you share my studies as well as my play, so study has always been as amusing as recreation to me? Consequently, I maintain that if I am happy, it is due to you. If I know anything, if I am of account, in short, it is all due to you and solely to you. Have I ever left you? Everything that is good in me, I owe to you; all that is bad, my obstinacy, for example – "

"Yes, it is true that this dear little head has a will of its own," said Madame Bastien, interrupting him and kissing him on the forehead. "I don't know any one who has a stronger will than yours, but so long as you will to be the tenderest and best of sons, as you have up to the present time, why, I am not disposed to complain. Each day brings some fresh proof of the kindness and generosity of your heart, and if I needed any auxiliary to convince you, I should invoke the testimony of the friend I see coming over there," she added, pointing out some one to Frederick. "He knows you almost as well as I do, and you must admit that his sincerity is beyond all question."

The newcomer to whom Madame Bastien had alluded, and who was now advancing through the grove, was about forty years of age, a small, delicate-looking man, very carelessly dressed. He was singularly ugly, too, but his ugliness was of the clever, good-humoured type. His name was Dufour; he practised medicine at Pont Brillant, and, by dint of skill and unremitting attention, he had cured Frederick of a serious illness the year before.

"How do you do, my dear Madame Bastien?" he said, cheerfully, as he approached the pair. "How do you do, my boy?" he added, pressing Frederick's hand cordially.

"Ah, doctor, you came just in time to get scolded," exclaimed Madame Bastien, with affectionate gaiety.

"Scolded?"

"Certainly. Isn't it more than a fortnight since you came to see us?"

"Fie! fie!" cried M. Dufour, "you must be egotistical to demand a doctor's visits with health as flourishing as yours."

"Fie!" retorted Madame Bastien, no less gaily, "and what right have you, pray, to so disdain the gratitude of those you have saved as to deprive them of the pleasure of saying to him often, very often,'Thank you, my preserver, thank you'?"

"Yes, my mother is right, M. Dufour," added Frederick. "You think because you have restored me to life that all is over between us. How ungrateful you are!"

"If mother and son have both declared war upon me, there is nothing left for me but to beat a retreat," exclaimed the doctor, drawing back a step or two.

"Oh, well, we will not take an unfair advantage; but only upon one condition, doctor. That is that you will dine with us."

"I left home with that very laudable intention," replied the doctor, quite seriously this time, "but just as I was leaving Pont Brillant, a woman stopped me and begged me to come at once to her son. I did so, but unfortunately his malady is of such a serious character that I shall not feel easy in mind if I do not see my patient again before seven o'clock."

"Of course I can make no protest under circumstances like these, my dear doctor," replied Madame Bastien, "and I am doubly grateful to you for granting us a few moments."

"And I have been looking forward to such a delightful evening," remarked the doctor. "It would have rounded out my day so well, for this morning I had a most delightful surprise."

"So some unexpected piece of good fortune has befallen you, my dear doctor. How glad I am!"

"Yes," replied the doctor; "for some time past I have been extremely uneasy about my best friend, an inveterate traveller, who had undertaken a dangerous journey through some of the least known portions of South America. Having heard nothing from him for more than eight months, I was beginning to feel very much alarmed, when this morning I received a letter from him written in London, where he had stopped for a few days on his return from Lima. He promises to come and spend some time with me, so you can judge how delighted I am, my dear Madame Bastien. He is like a brother to me, and not only has the best heart in the world, but is one of the most interesting as well as the most gifted men I know. What a pleasure it will be to have him all to myself!"

Here the doctor was interrupted by an elderly servant woman, who was leading a poorly clad child of seven or eight years by the hand, and who, from the threshold of the door where she was standing, called to the youth:

"It is six o'clock, M. Frederick."

"I'll see you again presently, mother," said the lad, kissing his young mother on the forehead.

Then, turning to the doctor, he added:

"I shall see you, too, doctor, before you go, shall I not?"

After which he hastily joined the child and old servant, and entered the house in company with them.

"Where is he going?" asked the doctor.

"To give his lesson. Didn't you see his scholar?"

"What scholar?"

"That child is the son of a day labourer who lives too far from Pont Brillant to be able to send his child to the village school, so Frederick is teaching the little fellow to read. He gives him two lessons a day, and I assure you that I am as well pleased with the teacher as with the pupil, doctor, for Frederick displays in his teaching a zeal, patience, and sweetness of disposition that delights me."