i need not say that in this transaction, croisilles had kept no money in hand. his house was sold; and there remained to him, for his sole fortune, the clothes he had on his back;—no home, and not a son. with the best will possible, jean could not suppose that his master was reduced to such an extremity; croisilles was not too proud, but too thoughtless to tell him of it. so he determined to sleep under the starry vault, and as for his meals, he made the following calculation; he presumed that the vessel which bore his fortune would be six months before coming back to havre; croisilles, therefore, not without regret, sold a gold watch his father had given him, and which he had fortunately kept; he got thirty-six livres for it. that was sufficient to live on for about six months, at the rate of four sous a day. he did not doubt that it would be enough, and, reassured for the present, he wrote to mademoiselle godeau to inform her of what he had done. he was very careful in his letter not to speak of his distress; he announced to her, on the contrary, that he had undertaken a magnificent commercial enterprise, of the speedy and fortunate issue of which there could be no doubt; he explained to her that la fleurette, a merchant-vessel of one hundred and fifty tons, was carrying to the baltic his cloths and his silks, and implored her to remain faithful to him for a year, reserving to himself the right of asking, later on, for a further delay, while, for his part, he swore eternal love to her.
when mademoiselle godeau received this letter she was sitting before the fire, and had in her hand, using it as a screen, one of those bulletins which are printed in seaports, announcing the arrival and departure of vessels, and which also report disasters at sea. it had never occurred to her, as one can well imagine, to take an interest in this sort of thing; she had in fact never glanced at any of these sheets.
the perusal of croisilles’ letter prompted her to read the bulletin she had been holding in her hand; the first word that caught her eye was no other than the name of la fleurette.
the vessel had been wrecked on the coast of france, on the very night following its departure. the crew had barely escaped, but all the cargo was lost.
mademoiselle godeau, at this news, no longer remembered that croisilles had made to her an avowal of his poverty; she was as heartbroken as though a million had been at stake.
in an instant, the horrors of the tempest, the fury of the winds, the cries of the drowning, the ruin of the man who loved her, presented themselves to her mind like a scene in a romance. the bulletin and the letter fell from her hands. she rose in great agitation, and, with heaving breast and eyes brimming with tears, paced up and down, determined to act, and asking herself how she should act.
there is one thing that must be said in justice to love; it is that the stronger, the clearer, the simpler the considerations opposed to it, in a word, the less common sense there is in the matter, the wilder does the passion become and the more does the lover love. it is one of the most beautiful things under heaven, this irrationality of the heart. we should not be worth much without it. after having walked about the room (without forgetting either her dear fan or the passing glance at the mirror), julie allowed herself to sink once more upon her lounge. whoever had seen her at this moment would have looked upon a lovely sight; her eyes sparkled, her cheeks were on fire; she sighed deeply, and murmured in a delicious transport of joy and pain:
“poor fellow! he has ruined himself for me!”
independently of the fortune which she could expect from her father, mademoiselle godeau had in her own right the property her mother had left her. she had never thought of it.
at this moment, for the first time in her life, she remembered that she could dispose of five hundred thousand francs. this thought brought a smile to her lips; a project, strange, bold, wholly feminine, almost as mad as croisilles himself, entered her head;—she weighed the idea in her mind for some time, then decided to act upon it at once.
she began by inquiring whether croisilles had any relatives or friends; the maid was sent out in all directions to find out.
having made minute inquiries in all quarters, she discovered, on the fourth floor of an old rickety house, a half-crippled aunt, who never stirred from her arm-chair, and had not been out for four or five years. this poor woman, very old, seemed to have been left in the world expressly as a specimen of hungry misery. blind, gouty, almost deaf, she lived alone in a garret; but a gayety, stronger than misfortune and illness, sustained her at eighty years of age, and made her still love life. her neighbors never passed her door without going in to see her, and the antiquated tunes she hummed enlivened all the girls of the neighborhood. she possessed a little annuity which sufficed to maintain her; as long as day lasted, she knitted. she did not know what had happened since the death of louis xiv.
it was to this worthy person that julie had herself privately conducted. she donned for the occasion all her finery; feathers, laces, ribbons, diamonds, nothing was spared. she wanted to be fascinating; but the real secret of her beauty, in this case, was the whim that was carrying her away. she went up the steep, dark staircase which led to the good lady’s chamber, and, after the most graceful bow, spoke somewhat as follows:
“you have, madame, a nephew, called croisilles, who loves me and has asked for my hand; i love him too and wish to marry him; but my father, monsieur godeau, fermier-général of this town, refuses his consent, because your nephew is not rich. i would not, for the world, give occasion to scandal, nor cause trouble to anybody; i would therefore never think of disposing of myself without the consent of my family. i come to ask you a favor, which i beseech you to grant me. you must come yourself and propose this marriage to my father. i have, thank god, a little fortune which is quite at your disposal; you may take possession, whenever you see fit, of five hundred thousand francs at my notary’s. you will say that this sum belongs to your nephew, which in fact it does. it is not a present that i am making him, it is a debt which i am paying, for i am the cause of the ruin of croisilles, and it is but just that i should repair it. my father will not easily give in; you will be obliged to insist and you must have a little courage; i, for my part, will not fail. as nobody on earth excepting myself has any right to the sum of which i am speaking to you, nobody will ever know in what way this amount will have passed into your hands. you are not very rich yourself, i know, and you may fear that people will be astonished to see you thus endowing your nephew; but remember that my father does not know you, that you show yourself very little in town, and that, consequently it will be easy for you to pretend that you have just arrived from some journey. this step will doubtless be some exertion to you; you will have to leave your arm-chair and take a little trouble; but you will make two people happy, madame, and if you have ever known love, i hope you will not refuse me.”
the old lady, during this discourse, had been in turn surprised, anxious, touched, and delighted. the last words persuaded her.
“yes, my child,” she repeated several times, “i know what it is,—i know what it is.”
as she said this she made an effort to rise; her feeble limbs could barely support her; julie quickly advanced and put out her hand to help her; by an almost involuntary movement they found themselves, in an instant, in each other’s arms.
a treaty was at once concluded; a warm kiss sealed it in advance, and the necessary and confidential consultation followed without further trouble.
all the explanations having been made, the good lady drew from her wardrobe a venerable gown of taffeta, which had been her wedding-dress. this antique piece of property was not less than fifty years old; but not a spot, not a grain of dust had disfigured it; julie was in ecstasies over it. a coach was sent for, the handsomest in the town. the good lady prepared the speech she was going to make to monsieur godeau; julie tried to teach her how she was to touch the heart of her father, and did not hesitate to confess that love of rank was his vulnerable point.
“if you could imagine,” said she, “a means of flattering this weakness, you will have won our cause.”
the good lady pondered deeply, finished her toilet without another word, clasped the hands of her future niece, and entered the carriage.
she soon arrived at the godeau mansion; there, she braced herself up so gallantly for her entrance that she seemed ten years younger. she majestically crossed the drawing-room where julie’s bouquet had fallen, and when the door of the boudoir opened, said in a firm voice to the lackey who preceded her:
“announce the dowager baroness de croisilles.”
these words settled the happiness of the two lovers. monsieur godeau was bewildered by them. although five hundred thousand francs seemed little to him, he consented to everything, in order to make his daughter a baroness, and such she became;—who would dare contest her title? for my part, i think she had thoroughly earned it.
