White Lies Part 32

"It is no use. Heaven has no mercy for me. Take my advice; stay where you are; don't hurry; for what remains of your life you gave to pa.s.s with me, do you understand that?"

"Ah!" And she turned pale.

"Can you read my riddle?"

She looked him in the face. "I can read your eyes, and I know you love me. I think you mean to kill me. I have heard men kill the thing they love."

"Of course they do; sooner than another should have it, they kill it--they kill it."

"G.o.d has not made them patient like us women. Poor Camille!"

"Patience dies when hope dies. Come, Madame Raynal, say a prayer, for you are going to die."

"G.o.d bless you, Camille!" said the poor girl, putting her hands together in her last prayer. At this sweet touch of affection, Camille hung his head, and sobbed. Then suddenly las.h.i.+ng himself into fury, he cried,--

"You are my betrothed! you talk of duty; but you forget your duty to me.

Are you not my betrothed this four years? Answer me that."

"Yes, Camille, I was."

"Did I not suffer death a hundred times for you, to keep faith with you, you cold-blooded traitress with an angel's face?"

"Ah, Camille! can you speak so bitterly to me? Have I denied your right to kill me? You shall never dishonor me, but you shall kill me, if it is your pleasure. I do not resist. Why, then, speak to me like that; must the last words I hear from your mouth be words of anger, cruel Camille?"

"I was wrong. But it is so hard to kill her I love in cold blood. I want anger as well as despair to keep me to it. Come, turn your head away from me, and all our troubles shall end."

"No, Camille, let me look at you. Then you will be the last thing I shall see on earth."

At this he hesitated a moment; then, with a fierce stamp at what he thought was weakness, he levelled a pistol at her.

She put up her hands with a piteous cry, "Oh! not my face, Camille! pray do not disfigure my face. Here--kill me here--in my bosom--my heart that loved you well, when it was no sin to love you."

"I can't shoot you. I can't spill your blood. The river will end all, and not disfigure your beauty, that has driven me mad, and cost you, poor wretch, your life."

"Thank you, dear Camille. The water does not frighten me as a pistol does; it will not hurt me; it will only kill me."

"No, it is but a plunge, and you will be at peace forever; and so shall I. Come, take my hand, Madame Raynal, Madame Raynal."

She gave him her hand with a look of infinite love. She only said, "My poor mother!" That word did not fall to the ground. It flashed like lightning at night across the demented lover, and lighted up his egotism (suicide, like homicide, is generally a fit of maniacal egotism), even to his eyes blinded by fury.

"Wretch that I am," he shrieked. "Fly, Josephine, fly! escape this moment, that my better angel whispers to me. Do you hear? begone, while it is time."

"I will not leave you, Camille."

"I say you shall. Go to your mother and Rose; go to those you love, and I can pity; go to the chapel and thank Heaven for your escape."

"Yes, but not without you, Camille. I am afraid to leave you."

"You have more to fear if you stay. Well, I can't wait any longer. Stay, then, and live; and learn from me how to love Jean Raynal."

He levelled the pistol at himself.

Josephine threw herself on him with a cry, and seized his arm. With the strength excitement lent her she got the better, and all but overpowered him. But, as usual, the man's strength lasted longer, and with a sustained effort he threw her off; then, pale and panting, raised the pistol to take his life. This time she moved neither hand nor foot; but she palsied his rash hand with a word.

"No; I LOVE YOU."

CHAPTER XIII.

There lie the dead corpses of those words on paper; but my art is powerless to tell you how they were uttered, those words, potent as a king's, for they saved a life.

They were a cry of terror and a cry of reproach and a cry of love unfathomable.

The weapon shook in his hand. He looked at her with growing astonishment and joy; she at him fixedly and anxiously, her hands clasped in supplication.

"As you used to love me?"

"More, far more. Give me the pistol. I love you, dearest. I love you."

At these delicious words he lost all power of resistance, she saw; and her soft and supple hand stole in and closed upon his, and gently withdrew the weapon, and threw it into the water. "Good Camille! now give me the other."

"How do you know there is another?"

"I know you are not the man to kill a woman and spare yourself. Come."

"Josephine, have pity on me, do not deceive me; pray do not take this, my only friend, from me, unless you really love me."

"I love you; I adore you," was her reply.

She leaned her head on his shoulder, but with her hand she sought his, and even as she uttered those loving words she coaxed the weapon from his now unresisting grasp.

"There, it is gone; you are saved from death--saved from crime." And with that, the danger was over, she trembled for the first time, and fell to sobbing hysterically.

He threw himself at her knees, and embraced them again and again, and begged her forgiveness in a transport of remorse and self-reproach.

She looked down with tender pity on him, and heard his cries of penitence and shame.

"Rise, Camille, and go home with me," said she faintly.

"Yes, Josephine."

They went slowly and in silence. Camille was too ashamed and penitent to speak; too full of terror too at the abyss of crime from which he had been saved. The ancients feigned that a virgin could subdue a lion; perhaps they meant that a pure gentle nature can subdue a nature fierce but generous. Lion-like Camille walked by Josephine's side with his eyes bent on the ground, the picture of humility and penitence.

"This is the last walk you and I shall take together," said Josephine solemnly.