I know the world, and men, and things; I have seen the peace of many a

home destroyed by the blind love of mothers who made themselves in the
end as intolerable to their daughters as to their sons-in-law. The

affection of old people is often exacting and querulous. Perhaps I
could not efface myself as I should. I have the weakness to think

myself still handsome; I have flatterers who declare that I am still
agreeable; I should have, I fear, certain pretensions which might

interfere with your lives. Let me, therefore, make one more sacrifice
for your happiness. I have given you my fortune, and now I desire to

resign to you my last vanities as a woman. Your notary Mathias is
getting old. He cannot look after your estates as I will. I will be

your bailiff; I will create for myself those natural occupations which
are the pleasures of old age. Later, if necessary, I will come to you

in Paris, and second you in your projects of ambition. Come, Paul, be
frank; my proposal suits you, does it not?"

Paul would not admit it, but he was at heart delighted to get his
liberty. The suspicions which Mathias had put into his mind respecting

his mother-in-law were, however, dissipated by this conversation,
which Madame Evangelista carried on still longer in the same tone.

"My mother was right," thought Natalie, who had watched Paul's
countenance. "He IS glad to know that I am separated from her--why?"

That "why" was the first note of a rising distrust; did it prove the
power of those maternal instructions?

There are certain characters which on the faith of a single proof
believe in friendship. To persons thus constituted the north wind

drives away the clouds as rapidly as the south wind brings them; they
stop at effects and never hark back to causes. Paul had one of those

essentially confiding natures, without ill-feelings, but also without
foresight. His weakness proceeded far more from his kindness, his

belief in goodness, than from actual debility of soul.
Natalie was sad and thoughtful, for she knew not what to do without

her mother. Paul, with that self-confident conceit which comes of
love, smiled to himself at her sadness, thinking how soon the

pleasures of marriage and the excitements of Paris would drive it
away. Madame Evangelista saw this confidence with much satisfaction.

She had already taken two great steps. Her daughter possessed the
diamonds which had cost Paul two hundred thousand francs; and she had

gained her point of leaving these two children to themselves with no
other guide than their illogical love. Her revenge was thus preparing,

unknown to her daughter, who would, sooner or later, become its
accomplice. Did Natalie love Paul? That was a question still

undecided, the answer to which might modify her projects, for she
loved her daughter too sincerely not to respect her happiness. Paul's

future, therefore, still depended on himself. If he could make his
wife love him, he was saved.

The next day, at midnight, after an evening spent together, with the
addition of the four witnesses, to whom Madame Evangelista gave the

formal dinner which follows the legal marriage, the bridal pair,
accompanied by their friends, heard mass by torchlight, in presence of

a crowd of inquisitive persons. A marriage celebrated at night always
suggests to the mind an unpleasant omen. Light is the symbol of life

and pleasure, the forecasts of which are lacking to a midnight
wedding. Ask the intrepid soul why it shivers; why the chill of those

black arches enervates it; why the sound of steps startles it; why it
notices the cry of bats and the hoot of owls. Though there is

absolutely no reason to tremble, all present do tremble, and the
darkness, emblem of death, saddens them. Natalie, parted from her

mother, wept. The girl was now a prey to those doubts which grasp the
heart as it enters a new career in which, despite all assurances of

happiness, a thousand pitfalls await the steps of a young wife. She
was cold and wanted a mantle. The air and manner of Madame Evangelista

and that of the bridal pair excited some comment among the elegant
crowd which surrounded the altar.

"Solonet tells me that the bride and bridegroom leave for Paris
to-morrow morning, all alone."

"Madame Evangelista was to live with them, I thought."
"Count Paul has got rid of her already."

"What a mistake!" said the Marquise de Gyas. "To shut the door on the
mother of his wife is to open it to a lover. Doesn't he know what a

mother is?"
"He has been very hard on Madame Evangelista; the poor woman has had

to sell her house and her diamonds, and is going to live at Lanstrac."
"Natalie looks very sad."

"Would you like to be made to take a journey the day after your
marriage?"

"It is very awkward."
"I am glad I came here to-night," said a lady. "I am now convinced of

the necessity of the pomps of marriage and of wedding fetes; a scene
like this is very bare and sad. If I may say what I think," she added,

in a whisper to her neighbor, "this marriage seems to me indecent."
Madame Evangelista took Natalie in her carriage and accompanied her,

alone, to Paul's house.
"Well, mother, it is done!"

"Remember, my dear child, my last advice, and you will be a happy
woman. Be his wife, and not his mistress."

When Natalie had retired, the mother played the little comedy of
flinging herself with tears into the arms of her son-in-law. It was

the only provincial thing that Madame Evangelista allowed herself, but
she had her reasons for it. Amid tears and speeches, apparently half

wild and despairing" target="_blank" title="a.感到绝望的">despairing, she obtained of Paul those concessions which all
husbands make.

The next day she put the married pair into their carriage, and
accompanied them to the ferry, by which the road to Paris crosses the

Gironde. With a look and a word Natalie enabled her mother to see that
if Paul had won the trick in the game of the contract, her revenge was

beginning. Natalie was already reducing her husband to perfect
obedience.

CHAPTER VI
CONCLUSION

Five years later, on an afternoon in the month of November, Comte Paul
de Manerville, wrapped in a cloak, was entering, with a bowed head and

a mysterious manner, the house of his old friend Monsieur Mathias at
Bordeaux.

Too old to continue in business, the worthy notary had sold his
practice and was ending his days peacefully in a quiet house to which

he had retired. An urgent affair had obliged him to be absent at the
moment of his guest's arrival, but his housekeeper, warned of Paul's

coming, took him to the room of the late Madame Mathias, who had been
dead a year. Fatigued by a rapid journey, Paul slept till evening.

When the old man reached home he went up to his client's room, and
watched him sleeping, as a mother watches her child. Josette, the old

housekeeper, followed her master and stood before the bed, her hands
on her hips.

"It is a year to-day, Josette, since I received my dear wife's last
sigh; I little knew then that I should stand here again to see the

count half dead."
"Poor man! he moans in his sleep," said Josette.

"Sac a papier!" cried the old notary, an innocent oath which was a
sign with him of the despair on a man of business before

insurmountable difficulties. "At any rate," he thought, "I have saved
the title to the Lanstrac estate for him, and that of Ausac, Saint-

Froult, and his house, though the usufruct has gone." Mathias counted
his fingers. "Five years! Just five years this month, since his old

aunt, now dead, that excellent Madame de Maulincour, asked for the
hand of that little crocodile of a woman, who has finally ruined him--

as I expected."
And the gouty old gentleman, leaning on his cane, went to walk in the

little garden till his guest should awake. At nine o'clock supper was