Part 40

The duchess's coquetry wished to make a trial of it; for eight days she was indisposed, and the court had no more pretty evenings. The princess, much scandalized by all that the fear she had of her son obliged her to do from the first moments of her widowhood, went to spend those eight days in a convent adjoining the church where the late prince was buried. This interruption of the evenings threw upon the prince's hands an enormous mass of leisure, and dealt a notable setback to the credit of the minister of justice. Ernest V understood all the boredom that threatened him if the duchess left the court, or only ceased to spread joy there. The evenings began again, and the prince showed himself more and more interested in the commedie dell'arte. He had the project of taking a role, but dared not avow this ambition. One day, blushing deeply, he said to the duchess:

--Why should I not act too?

--We are all here at the orders of Your Highness; if she deigns to give me the order, I shall have the plan of a comedy arranged, all the brilliant scenes of Your Highness's role shall be with me, and as in the first days everyone hesitates a little, if Your Highness will look at me with some attention, I shall tell her the replies she must make.

All was arranged, and with infinite skill. The very timid prince was ashamed of being timid; the care the duchess took not to make this innate timidity suffer made a deep impression on the young sovereign.

On the day of his debut, the performance began half an hour earlier than usual, and there were in the salon, at the moment of passing into the theater, only eight or ten elderly women. Such faces imposed little on the prince, and besides, raised at Munich in true monarchical principles, they always applauded. Using her authority as mistress of the robes, the duchess locked with a key the door by which the common run of courtiers entered the spectacle. The prince, who had literary wit and a fine figure, got through his first scenes very well; he repeated with intelligence the phrases he read in the duchess's eyes, or which she indicated to him in a half-voice. At a moment when the rare spectators were applauding with all their might, the duchess made a sign, the door of honor was opened, and the theater was instantly filled by all the pretty women of the court, who, finding the prince a charming figure and a very happy air, began to applaud; the prince blushed with happiness. He played the role of a lover of the duchess. Far from having to suggest words to him, soon she was obliged to engage him to abbreviate the scenes; he spoke of love with an enthusiasm which often embarrassed the actress; his replies lasted five minutes. The duchess was no longer that dazzling beauty of the previous year; the prison of Fabrice, and, far more, the stay on Lake Maggiore with Fabrice, become morose and silent, had added ten years to the beautiful Gina. Her features had grown marked, they had more wit and less youth.

They rarely had any longer the playfulness of the first age; but on the stage, with rouge and all the aids that art furnishes to actresses, she was still the prettiest woman of the court. The passionate tirades, delivered by the prince, put the courtiers on the alert; all said to themselves that evening:

--Here is the Balbi of this new reign.

The count rebelled inwardly. The play finished, the duchess said to the prince before the whole court:

--Your Highness acts too well; they will say that you are in love with a woman of thirty-eight, which will ruin my establishment with the count. Thus, I shall act no more with Your Highness, unless the prince swears to address me as he would a woman of a certain age, Mme the marquise Raversi, for example.

The same play was rehearsed three times; the prince was mad with happiness; but, one evening, he appeared much preoccupied.

--Either I am much mistaken, said the mistress of the robes to her princess, or Rassi seeks to play us some trick; I should advise Your Highness to announce a performance for tomorrow; the prince will act badly, and, in his despair, he will tell you something.

The prince acted very badly indeed; he could scarcely be heard, and he no longer knew how to end his phrases. At the end of the first act, he had almost tears in his eyes; the duchess stood near him, but cold and immobile. The prince, finding himself a moment alone with her, in the actors' greenroom, went to shut the door.

--Never, said he to me, can I play the second and third acts; I absolutely will not be applauded out of complaisance; the applause given me this evening was splitting my heart. Give me counsel, what must be done?

--I shall advance upon the stage, make a deep reverence to His Highness, another to the public, like a true director of comedy, and say that the actor playing the role of Lelio, being suddenly indisposed, the spectacle will terminate with some pieces of music. Count Rusca and little Ghisolfi will be delighted to show their rather shrill little voices to so brilliant an assembly.

The prince took the duchess's hand, and kissed it with transport.

--That you are not a man, said he to me, you would give me good counsel: Rassi has just deposited upon my desk a hundred and eighty-two depositions against the supposed assassins of my father. Besides the depositions, there is an indictment of more than two hundred pages; I must read all that, and, moreover, I have given my word to say nothing of it to the count. This leads straight to tortures; already he wants me to have abducted in France, near Antibes, Ferrante Palla, that great poet whom I so admire. He is there under the name of Poncet.

--The day you hang a liberal, Rassi will be bound to the ministry by iron chains, and that is what he wants before all; but Your Highness will no longer be able to announce a walk two hours in advance. I shall speak neither to the princess nor to the count of the cry of pain that has just escaped you; but, as by my oath I ought to have no secret from the princess, I should be happy if Your Highness would say to his mother the same things that escaped him with me.

This idea diverted the pain of a fallen actor which overwhelmed the sovereign.

--Well! go warn my mother, I am going to her great cabinet.

The prince left the wings, crossed the salon by which one reached the theater, dismissed with a harsh air the grand chamberlain and the aide-de-camp on duty who followed him; for her part the princess left the spectacle precipitately; arrived in the great cabinet, the mistress of the robes made a deep reverence to the mother and son, and left them alone. One may judge of the agitation of the court, these are the things which make it so amusing. At the end of an hour the prince himself presented himself at the door of the cabinet and called the duchess; the princess was in tears, her son had an altogether altered countenance.

"Here are weak people who are out of humor," said the mistress of the robes to herself, "and who seek a pretext to be angry with someone." First the mother and son disputed the word to recount the details to the duchess, who in her replies took great care to put forward no idea. For two deadly hours the three actors of this boring scene did not depart from the roles we have just indicated. The prince went himself to fetch the two enormous portfolios that Rassi had deposited on his desk; on leaving his mother's great cabinet, he found the whole court waiting.

--Begone, leave me in peace! he cried, in a very impolite tone such as had never been seen in him.

The prince did not wish to be seen carrying the two portfolios himself, a prince ought to carry nothing. The courtiers disappeared in the blink of an eye. On repassing, the prince found only the valets de chambre who were extinguishing the candles; he dismissed them with fury, as also the poor Fontana, aide-de-camp on duty, who had had the awkwardness to remain, out of zeal.

--Everyone takes it upon themselves to try my patience this evening, said he with ill humor to the duchess, as he re-entered the cabinet.

He thought her of much wit and was furious that she evidently persisted in not opening an opinion. She, for her part, was resolved to say nothing unless her advice were very expressly asked. There elapsed yet a good half-hour before the prince, who had a sense of his dignity, determined to say to her:

--But, madame, you say nothing.

--I am here to serve the princess, and to forget very quickly what is said before me.

--Well! madame, said the prince blushing deeply, I order you to give me your advice.

--Crimes are punished to prevent their renewal. Was the late prince poisoned? That is very doubtful; was he poisoned by the Jacobins? That is what Rassi would gladly prove, for then he becomes for Your Highness a necessary instrument forever. In that case, Your Highness, who begins his reign, may promise himself many an evening like this one. Your subjects say generally, as is wholly true, that Your Highness has kindness in his character; so long as he has not hanged some liberal, he will enjoy this reputation, and certainly no one will think to prepare poison for him.

--Your conclusion is evident, cried the princess with ill humor; you do not wish that the assassins of my husband be punished!

--That is because apparently, madame, I am bound to them by tender friendship.

The duchess saw in the prince's eyes that he believed her perfectly in accord with his mother to dictate a plan of conduct to him. There was between the two women a rather rapid succession of bitter retorts, after which the duchess protested that she would not say another single word, and she was faithful to her resolution; but the prince, after a long discussion with his mother, ordered her anew to state her opinion.

--That is what I swear to Your Highnesses not to do!

--But this is true childishness! cried the prince.

--I pray you speak, madame the duchess, said the princess with a dignified air.

--That is what I beg you to dispense me from, madame; but Your Highness, added the duchess addressing the prince, reads French perfectly; to calm our agitated minds, would she read us a fable of La Fontaine?

The princess found this *we* very insolent, but she looked at once astonished and amused, when the mistress of the robes, who had gone with the greatest coolness to open the library, returned with a volume of the Fables of La Fontaine; she leafed through it a few moments, then said to the prince, presenting it to him:

--I beseech Your Highness to read the whole fable.

THE GARDENER AND HIS LORD

A lover of gardening Half-bourgeois, half-peasant, Possessed in a certain village A neat garden, and the adjoining close. He had enclosed this space with quick-set plants: There grew at pleasure sorrel and lettuce, Wherewith to make for Margot a bouquet for her feast, Little Spanish jasmine and much wild thyme. This felicity troubled by a hare Made our man complain to the lord of the town. This cursed animal comes to take his fill Evening and morning, said he, and laughs at snares; Stones and sticks lose their credit there: He is a sorcerer, I believe--Sorcerer! I defy him, Replied the lord: were he a devil, Miraut Will catch him soon, despite his tricks. I shall rid you of him, goodman, on my life. --And when?--And as of tomorrow, without further delay. The bargain thus made, he comes with his men. --Come, let us breakfast, said he: are your chickens tender? * * * The hunters' embarrassment succeeds the breakfast. Each stirs and prepares; Trumpets and horns make such a din That the goodman is astonished. The worst was that they put in sorry trim The poor kitchen-garden. Farewell boards, frames; Farewell chicory and leeks; Farewell wherewith to put in the pot. The goodman said: These are princely sports. But they let him talk; and the dogs and the men Did more damage in one hour's time Than all the hares of the province Would have done in a hundred years. Little princes, settle your quarrels among yourselves; To have recourse to kings you would be great fools. Never engage them in your wars, Nor make them enter your lands.

This reading was followed by a long silence. The prince walked in the cabinet, after going himself to replace the volume.

--Well! madame, said the princess, will you deign to speak?

--Not I, certainly, madame! so long as His Highness has not named me minister; in speaking here, I should run the risk of losing my place as mistress of the robes.

New silence of a good quarter of an hour; at last the princess thought of the role once played by Marie de Medicis, mother of Louis XIII: on the preceding days, the mistress of the robes had had the reader read the excellent History of Louis XIII, by M. Bazin. The princess, though much piqued, thought that the duchess might very well leave the country, and then Rassi, who frightened her terribly, might well imitate Richelieu and have her exiled by her son. At this moment, the princess would have given the world to humble her mistress of the robes; but she could not: she rose, and came, with a somewhat exaggerated smile, to take the duchess's hand and say to her:

--Come, madame, prove your friendship by speaking.

--Well! two words and no more: burn, in yonder fireplace, all the papers gathered by that viper Rassi, and never confess to him that they were burned.

She added in a low voice, and with a familiar air, at the princess's ear:

--Rassi may be Richelieu!

--But, the devil! those papers cost me more than eighty thousand francs! cried the prince, angry.

--My prince, replied the duchess with energy, that is what it costs to employ scoundrels of low birth. Would to God you might lose a million, and never give credit to the base knaves who kept your father from sleeping during the last six years of his reign.

The phrase *low birth* had pleased the princess extremely, who found that the count and his friend had too exclusive an esteem for wit, always a little first cousin to Jacobinism.

During the short moment of profound silence, filled by the princess's reflections, the chateau clock struck three. The princess rose, made a deep reverence to her son, and said to him:

--My health does not permit me to prolong the discussion further. Never a minister of low birth; you will not rid me of the idea that your Rassi stole from you half the money he made you spend on espionage.

The princess took two candles from the candelabra and placed them in the fireplace, so as not to extinguish them; then, approaching her son, she added:

--The fable of La Fontaine prevails, in my mind, over the just desire to avenge a husband. Does Your Highness permit me to burn these writings?

The prince remained immobile.

"His countenance is truly stupid," said the duchess to herself; "the count is right: the late prince would not have kept us up until three in the morning, before taking a side."

The princess, still standing, added:

--That little attorney would be very proud, did he know that his scrawls, full of lies, and arranged to procure his advancement, kept awake the two greatest personages of the State.

The prince threw himself upon one of the portfolios like a madman, and emptied all its contents into the fireplace. The mass of papers was on the point of smothering the two candles; the apartment filled with smoke. The princess saw in her son's eyes that he was tempted to seize a carafe and save those papers, which cost him eighty thousand francs.

--Open the window then! she cried to the duchess with ill humor. The duchess hastened to obey; at once all the papers flamed at once; there was a great noise in the fireplace, and soon it was evident that it had caught fire.

The prince had a small soul for all matters of money; he thought he saw his palace in flames, and all the riches it contained destroyed; he ran to the window and called the guard in a wholly changed voice. The soldiers in tumult having run into the court at the prince's voice, he returned near the fireplace which drew the air from the open window with a truly frightful noise; he grew impatient, swore, made two or three turns in the cabinet like a man beside himself, and, finally, went out running.

The princess and her mistress of the robes remained standing, one facing the other, and keeping a profound silence.

"Is the anger going to begin again?" said the duchess to herself; "upon my word, my case is won." And she was preparing to be very impertinent in her replies, when a thought illuminated her; she saw the second portfolio intact. "No, my case is only half won!" She said to the princess, with a rather cold air:

--Does madame order me to burn the rest of these papers?

--And where will you burn them? said the princess with ill humor.

--In the salon fireplace; by throwing them in one after another, there is no danger.

The duchess placed under her arm the portfolio overflowing with papers, took a candle and passed into the adjoining salon. She took time to see that this portfolio was the one of depositions, put five or six bundles of papers in her shawl, burned the rest with much care, then disappeared without taking leave of the princess.

--Here is a fine impertinence, said she laughing; but she had nearly, by her affectations of inconsolable widow, made me lose my head on a scaffold.

On hearing the noise of the duchess's carriage, the princess was outraged against her mistress of the robes.

Despite the untimely hour, the duchess had the count called; he was at the fire of the chateau, but appeared soon with the news that all was finished.

--That little prince truly showed much courage, and I made him my compliment with effusion.

--Examine these depositions quickly, and let us burn them as soon as possible.

The count read and turned pale.

--Upon my word, they came very near the truth; this procedure is very adroitly done, they are quite on the traces of Ferrante Palla; and, if he speaks, we have a difficult role.

--But he will not speak, cried the duchess; that is a man of honor, that one: burn, burn.

--Not yet. Permit me to take the names of twelve or fifteen dangerous witnesses, and that I shall allow myself to have abducted, if ever Rassi wishes to begin again.

--I shall remind Your Excellency that the prince gave his word to say nothing to his minister of justice of our nocturnal expedition.

--Through pusillanimity, and for fear of a scene, he will keep it.

--Now, my friend, here is a night which advances our marriage greatly; I should not have wished to bring you as dowry a criminal trial, and moreover for a sin which my interest in another made me commit.

The count was in love, took her hand, exclaimed; he had tears in his eyes.

--Before leaving, give me counsel on the conduct I ought to hold with the princess; I am exhausted with fatigue, I played comedy on the stage for an hour, and five hours in the cabinet.

--You have been sufficiently avenged for the bitter remarks of the princess, which were only weakness, by the impertinence of your exit. Resume tomorrow with her the tone you had this morning; Rassi is not yet in prison or exiled, we have not yet torn up Fabrice's sentence.

"You asked the princess to take a decision, which always puts princes and even first ministers in ill humor; finally you are her mistress of the robes, that is to say her little servant. By a reaction, which is unfailing in weak people, in three days Rassi will be more in favor than ever; he is going to seek to have someone taken: so long as he has not compromised the prince, he is sure of nothing.

"There was a man wounded at the fire of this night; it is a tailor, who showed, faith, an extraordinary intrepidity. Tomorrow, I am going to engage the prince to lean on my arm, and to come with me to pay a visit to the tailor; I shall be armed to the teeth and have my eye to the watch; besides this young prince is not yet hated. I want to accustom him to walk in the streets, it is a trick I play on Rassi, who certainly will succeed me, and will no longer be able to permit such imprudences. On returning from the tailor's, I shall have the prince pass before the statue of his father; he will remark the stone-throws which broke the Roman skirt with which the noodle of a statuary bedecked him; and, finally, the prince will have very little wit if of himself he does not make this reflection: 'See what one gains by having Jacobins taken.' To which I shall reply: 'One must hang ten thousand or none: the St. Bartholomew destroyed the Protestants in France.'

"Tomorrow, dear friend, before my walk, have yourself announced at the prince's, and say to him: 'Last evening, I did you the service of minister, I gave you counsel, and, by your orders, I incurred the displeasure of the princess; you must pay me.' He will expect a request for money, and frown; you will leave him plunged in this unhappy idea as long as you can; then you will say: 'I pray Your Highness to order that Fabrice be tried contradictorily (which means with him present) by the twelve most respected judges of your States.' And, without losing time, you will present to him to sign a little ordinance written in your beautiful hand, and which I am going to dictate to you; I shall put, of course, the clause that the first sentence is annulled. To this there is but one objection; but, if you lead the affair warmly, it will not come to the prince's mind. He may say to you: 'Fabrice must give himself up prisoner at the citadel.' To which you will answer: 'He shall give himself up prisoner at the town prison (you know that I am master there, every evening your nephew will come see you).' If the prince answers you: 'No, his flight has bruised the honor of my citadel, and I wish, for form's sake, that he re-enter the chamber where he was', you will answer in your turn: 'No, for there he would be at the disposition of my enemy Rassi'. And, by one of those phrases of a woman which you know so well how to fling, you will let him understand that, to bend Rassi, you may well tell him of the auto-da-fe of this night; if he insists, you will announce that you are going to spend fifteen days at your chateau of Sacca."}

“Stories of the world, in your language.”