“Ointment and perfume rejoice the heart; so doth the sweetness of a man’s friend by hearty counsel.”
TWO beds instead of one, and a cheerful fire, changed the aspect of Gerard’s prison room considerably. But more than a week passed away before the second bed received an occupant. At last one morning the turnkey ushered in a young man, and laid on the floor a portmanteau, bearing traces of the rigorous search to which it had been subjected.
With unbounded amazement Gerard saw before him Gustave Adolphe Bairdon. He would have uttered a cry, but Gustave laid his finger on his lips, enjoining silence in the presence of the turnkey. “Surely,” thought Gerard, “the poor lad must be―not the promised attendant―but a fellow-prisoner, consigned for some offense to this dismal place. What can he have done?”
“Hush!” said Gustave as the turnkey left the room. “Hush, M. Gerard! he is coming back again. I hope they have not broken the thing in pieces amongst them.”
“What thing?” Gerard asked mechanically.
“Wait and see.”
The turnkey presently came again, carrying something wrapped in green baize, which he laid down and withdrew. Gustave pulled off the covering and disclosed Gerard’s harpsichord, a little the worse for the stringent examination to which the Major of the Bastille had thought it necessary to submit so extraordinary an article.
Overpowering was the emotion the sight caused Gerard. All his past came back to him―dead hopes, dead joys, love that would not die―and bowing his head he wept long and passionately.
For a time his strange companion, apparently absorbed in the task of unpacking his portmanteau, did not seem to notice him. But at last he said, looking up, “M. Gerard, is this my welcome here?”
Gerard rose and embraced him, but tried in vain to speak.
Gustave received and returned the embrace, as though all recollection of their last singular interview were quite obliterated from his mind. “Remember, M. Gerard,” he said, “I am no longer Gustave Adolphe. I am Jacques Schopin, monsieur’s most obedient servant, hired for him by his friend, M. Pelletier, at four louis a month and my food, including a bottle of good Burgundy every day. I would not bury myself in this dismal hole for a centime less, you understand,” he added, with a critical glance around the room.
“Gustave, you overwhelm me,” faltered Gerard. That this youth―cold, worldly, hardened as he had been wont to think him, accustomed to mock at noble sentiments, and to vaunt the selfish creed of Helvetius―should do for him, in his need, more than brother might have done for brother, or son for father! It touched him to the heart; it almost crushed him.
Meanwhile Gustave quietly returned to the portmanteau, which contained his own clothes and a few that he had been allowed to bring for Gerard. As he emptied it he sang to himself, in a low and very unmusical voice, a popular song of the hour.
“Gustave, my friend, I cannot understand this,” Gerard said at length, coming to his side as he knelt on the floor, and laying his hand on his shoulder.
“―Paree que c’était affaire étrangére, étrangére―
Paree que c’était affaire étrangére” ―
Gustave still went on humming as he looked up, but Gerard saw that there were tears in his eyes. “Yes, M. Gerard, it must seem a strange affair to you. But trust and wait. There is one thing that I must say now, however. I owe you reparation for some unjust and cruel words, spoken under a misapprehension. M. Prosper deceived me―but he is heartily sorry. He blames himself, moreover, for your imprisonment, and is moving heaven and earth to aid you. So are others. We all know the excellent Madame Geoffrin does not care to compromise herself, but in her own way she is not idle, and some of her clique are working hard for you. M. Marmontel, whose connection with the Marquis de Marigny might have been of use, is still in disgrace with the Court because he will not betray the confidence of a friend to gratify the petty spite of the Duc d’Aumont. But there are others who have friends at Versailles, and even in the petits appartements.’”
Gerard’s pale face flushed as he answered, “I hope my friends understand that I would rather die in prison than solicit my freedom from such as I should be ashamed to thank for it. But, Gustave, there are themes which interest me even more than my hopes of freedom. Your father, your mother?”
“They are well, M. Gerard, and it may comfort you to know that I come hither with their entire approval. My father has returned from Italy, having had quite enough of the role of ambassador between the Chevalier de St. George and his Italian friends. He does not say much; but, if I mistake not, he is convinced at last that the Stuarts have played their game and lost their stake. But it is hard; the cause was dear to his heart.”
“And Madame Bairdon?”
“Oh, she is well enough; but―” Gustave rose and went hastily to the fire, turning his back upon Gerard. Presently he said, “‘Tis scarcely fair to ask a man to speak of his mother, when he knows he has not been the best of sons, and has just said farewell to her. Of course she feels the past. But, there, M. Gerard, not another word! I have to inform you that I have made a solemn vow, which I will thank you to respect, not to speak of my home, or of any of its inmates, for the space of three calendar months from this day.”
“Oh, Gustave!” Gerard cried reproachfully. “While there is so much I long―nay, yearn―to hear, as a wounded man yearns for a cup of water in his agony! And ere three months are over, I may be―no doubt shall be―where no voice can reach my ear, were it even that sweetest voice of all, silent now forever.”
Gustave turned on him a face full of emotion. A struggle was taking place within; not until it was over did he speak, but when he spoke his voice was low and gentle “My friend must trust me―for a little while. It is true I have never done much to deserve trust, but you saved my life, M. Gerard.”
“Your presence here gives you a right―” Gerard began, but the spasmodic cough produced by the prison chills interrupted his words.
The paroxysm left him exhausted. Gustave found a little wine remaining from his last meal, and gave it to him, saying, “We must apply to M. le Gouverneur for the physician.”
“Oh no, it is over now. How strange it seems to be cared for, served―to think it matters to any one whether I live or die!”
“It matters to so many, M. Gerard, that you must make up your mind to live, at least out of ‘benevolence and philanthropy.’ Have the kindness to seat yourself here by the fire, and I will tell you, not certainly whatever you may please to ask, but whatever it may do you good to hear.”
Gerard took the chair Gustave placed for him, and the young attendant, kneeling beside him, began in an undertone, “Prosper’s first intimation of your arrest was a domiciliary visit from one of the confidential agents of M. de Sartines. At first he was terrified, and no wonder; not knowing who was suspected, or of what. He was required to produce any writings of yours he had, and in particular all your letters. He tells me he gave the exempt the gratification of perusing half a score of billets, about appointments for parties of pleasure, and such trifles. But the officer, not satisfied, insisted upon having your letter from Pontoise. Prosper marveled; till the truth suddenly occurred to him―his answer had been intercepted. But even had he been capable of betraying you, it was out of his power, as your letter, fortunately, was in ashes. Commanded to disclose its purport, he said for you the least dangerous things that occurred to him at the moment; and I am charged to tell you what he said, Test upon examination each should give the other the lie. Your friends have the key of the situation, through M. Pelletier, from the Abbé d’Arboissère. And they have agreed to save you if possible, at the expense of the noble duke under whom you have been acting; hinting that your indignation was aroused by witnessing the unscrupulous manner in which he enriched himself at the royal cost. This is not a hopeless, though a dangerous game. For his credit with the king is waning, and the most powerful person in the kingdom is his enemy. If, through her, his majesty can be brought to believe that your intended revelations touched his agent’s honor, not his own, your prison doors may open yet.”
Gerard sighed. “My friends are kind,” he said; “but I fear their toil is useless. Even if the affair of the letter were smoothed over, there is the pamphlet.”
“What pamphlet?”
“An unfinished pamphlet on the corn trade, which was seized with my other papers.”
“Great interest is being made on your behalf with the royal censor, to whom your papers were consigned,” Gustave answered. “And M. de Terew, like other men of the world, does not care to make the ‘Philosophers’ his enemies. He has burned his fingers already by his condemnation of ‘L’Esprit,’ and has been well laughed at for his pains. Moreover, there is no one concerned in the business, from M. de Terew himself to the archer who brought him your packets, who would not joyfully betray the king and all his interests, if he could do it with impunity. So we need not despair.”
“No―not despair,” Gerard said, with a gentleness born of patience rather than of hope. “Gustave, what did Prosper say to you and your present enterprise?” he resumed, after an interval.
Gustave smiled slightly, and something of its old expression passed over his face as he answered, “Nothing very flattering, M. Gerard. He said, ‘Boys are always in extremes; and in these little minds the distance between one extreme and the other is not great. I ever guessed the precocious cynic of fifteen would do something absurdly Quixotic before he was twenty.’”
Gerard was surprised into a laugh, the first since he entered the Bastille.
As days wore on, Gustave proved himself a most thoughtful and efficient attendant. When the weather grew mild and warm, he urged Gerard to accept the offered boon of an hour’s daily exercise in the court. This, however, was not an enlivening pastime; no two prisoners might enjoy it at the same time, and if a chance visitor, or even a workman employed about the fortress, crossed the court during the hour, the captive was obliged to hide himself in a small dark sentry box erected for the purpose; on no account must his features be recognized.
Nothing met his view except the high towers and massive walls of his dungeon, and the patch of sky that even these could not altogether shut out. The very clock, which stood facing the court, seemed designed, like everything else, to remind him of his misery. Chains, curiously intertwined, encircled its dial, and two figures, chained together by the neck, the waist, the feet, adorned it.
Gerard’s strength was usually exhausted long before the turnkey, who always accompanied him, announced the termination of his hour of exercise; but the consequent weariness procured him at least sounder slumbers. Another grace, offered him about this time, he respectfully declined. He had no desire to attend mass in the prison chapel, which was so arranged that the small number of prisoners who enjoyed this valued boon could see the priest as he elevated the host, and nothing else. But Gustave requested that he himself might be permitted to attend, and the request was granted immediately. Gerard was surprised, though he had noticed that every night and morning Gustave knelt beside his pallet for the space of a Paternoster or two.
“Do you really care for that mummery?” he asked one day, when Gustave had been led back to the cell and locked in with quite as much precaution as though he had been himself a criminal.
“Oh, it is amusing,” Gustave answered with a yawn. Then evidently reproaching himself for a frivolity that was merely assumed― “The fact is, M. Gerard, I have not made up my mind yet upon some matters. But while I am trying to find out whether the King has or has not given certain commands, I think it best, on the whole, to be found obeying.”
“If once you believe that the King is, Gustave.”
Gustave did not answer for a few moments. Then he said, “There was a good story of that witty little Abbé Galiani, whom you used to meet at Madame Geoffrin’s dinners, current in the city at the time I came into retreat here.”
“What was that?”
“One day your fine friends of the clique Holbachique were talking atheism, according to their wont, at the table of M. d’Holbach. ‘The pretty little abbé,’ as they call him, heard them to the end in silence, being the only one there of a contrary opinion. But as they were about to separate, he promised that if they would meet there the next Tuesday at dinner, he would answer and refute them all. The hour being come, and the men, our little abbé seated himself, tailor fashion, in an armchair, took off his wig, swung it in one hand, gesticulated with the other, and began,― ‘I will imagine, messieurs, that he among you who is most convinced the world is the result of chance is playing at dice, I do not say in a gambling house, but in the best house in Paris, and that his antagonist throws―once, twice, three times, four times, every time, in fact―double sixes. Before the game had lasted very long, my friend Diderot, who would thus lose his money, would say, without hesitation, without a moment’s doubt,” The dice are loaded, I am swindled! “Ah, philosophers! Because ten or twelve times in succession the dice happened to fall in such a way that you lose a five-franc piece, you would firmly believe that it was a cunning trick, a concealed swindle; and yet, seeing in this universe such a prodigious number of combinations, ten thousand times more complicated, more continuous, and more useful, you do not suspect that nature’s dice are also loaded, and there is a grand Rogue above who is laughing at you all.’”
Gerard shuddered.
“Terrible,” he said; “and, perhaps, true.”
“True? yes. Terrible? I don’t know. Man is great, wise, and strong, yet withal scarcely fit to be king of the universe. I have long thought that in his heart of hearts he suspects as much, that he knows very well he is not strong enough for the place, and would thank a kind fate to depose him, and give him a master.”
A half-stifled cry of pain and desolation broke unawares from the lips of Gerard.
“You speak truth, sad truth,” he said. “I dread torture more than most men, yet I think no torture could have been so horrible as the anguish I have passed through since I entered this place―ay, and before it. The dreary thought that I was alone―the void, the emptiness everywhere! The sense that in that emptiness my voice died away unheard―that no one, in earth or heaven, knew or cared for the agonies of my breaking heart! Often would I have given my life to touch a living hand in that darkness, even though it were raised to strike me. ‘God is angry’ is less terrible than ‘God is not.’”
“Then,” said Gustave, very gravely and thoughtfully, “M. Galiani may be right so far as this―what happens to us is not chance, but the will of a Being stronger and greater than we.”
“Softly, my friend. May we not be the sport of powerful but unconscious elemental forces? Wind and fire are stronger than we, but they have neither mind nor will.”
“True; but if yonder fire made a piece of iron into a file, I should say there was mind directing its force, and if the file was made for us when we wanted it, I should say there was will also. And good-will to us, moreover.”
“‘Peace and goodwill to man.’ Those are the words of some old chant or hymn, I think,” Gerard murmured dreamily.
Gustave’s eyes glistened as he saw the direction Gerard’s thoughts were taking. He brought him the harpsichord, untouched till now.
“I am sure you remember the air, M. Gerard,” he said; “I should like so much to hear it.”
Gerard could not resist the appeal; and the instrument once touched, he played over several airs, principally chants, hymns, and fragments of Masses.
“How beautiful they are!” said Gustave. “Pray go on, M. Gerard, if it does not tire you.”
“Tire me? Oh no. But you were not wont to care for music, Gustave.” He raised his eyes, and fixed them on the face of his companion. “I see it all, you think it comforts me,” he said. Then suddenly rising from his seat, he threw his arms round his neck and drew him close to him. “Gustave, Gustave! why have you done all this for me? Your love is sweet, most sweet to me. But the pang it brings is agonizing. For my sake you are doomed to languish here, a captive, in the bright morning of your days, shut out from life, hope, love. Gustave, when I look on you, I wish to die, since my death would set you free.”
“I was sent here, M. Gerard, that you might not die, but live.”
“Was sent? Nay, you came.”
Gustave’s voice sank to a whisper as he answered, “Love unseen is ofttimes the strongest love of all. Did I see you in the crowd the day you rushed under the horses’ hoofs to cave me? And afterward, when I forsook my home a lost wanderer, did I see the love that followed me? Did I dream that one whom I had scorned and mocked would seek me, find me―ay, die for me―because he loved me? Those were his own words, M. Gerard. And perhaps also there is love unseen watching over you. Perhaps I have been sent here to prove it. Perhaps all this time there is One above, not laughing at us, but loving us. And perhaps―who knows?―that old tale is true, and He has sent his Son to prove it.”