I bought a stamped embroidery strip as I walked home. On entering, I told her that her work had given satisfaction and that she had been entrusted with more. Then, I handed her the few sous I had left, telling her I had received them as her pay. I knew that on the morrow, perhaps, I could not repeat this, and I regretted it. I desired to make her love the savor of bread honestly earned.
Laurence took the money without disturbing herself about the evening meal. She hastened away to purchase a row of velvet-covered buttons for her blue dress, which was already tom and stained. Never had I seen her so active; a quarter of an hour sufficed for her to sew on these buttons. She made a grand toilet, then admired herself. When night came on, she was still walking back and forth in the chamber, looking at her new buttons. As I lighted the lamp, I told her gently to go to work. She did not seem to understand me. I repeated my words, and then she sat down roughly, angrily seizing the embroidery strip. My heart was filled with sorrow.
“Laurence,” said I, “it is not my wish to force you to work; put aside your needle, if you feel inclined to do nothing. I have not the right to impose a task upon you. You are free to be good or bad.”
“No, no,” she replied, “you want me to toil like a slave. I understand that I must pay for my food and my share of the rent. I might even pay your part, too, by working later at night.”
“Laurence!” cried I, sadly. “Go, poor girl, and be happy. You shall not touch a needle again. Give me that embroidery strip.”
And I threw the muslin into the fire. I saw it burn, regretting my hastiness. I had been unable to control my anguish, and was overwhelmed at the thought that Laurence was escaping from me. I had restored her to idleness. I trembled as I thought of the outrageous accusation she had made against me — that I wanted the money she might earn; I realized that it was no longer possible for me to advise her to work.
So, it was all over; a single outburst on her part had sufficed to make me withdraw from her the means of redemption.
Laurence was not in the least surprised at my sudden rage. I have told you that she more readily accepts anger than affection. She even smiled at conquering what she called my weariness. Then she crossed her hands, happy in her idleness.
As I stirred the warm cinders on the hearth, I sadly asked myself what word, what sentiment, could awaken her stupefied soul! I was horror-stricken that I had not yet been able to restore to her the innocence of her childhood. I would have preferred her ignorant, eager to know. I was filled with despair at this sad indifference, this night satisfied with its gloom, and so dense that it refused to admit the light. Vainly had I knocked at Laurence’s heart: no answer had been returned to me. I was tempted to believe that death had passed over it and had dried up all its fibres. But a single quiver and I should have thought the girl saved.
But what was to be done with this nothingness, this desolated creature, this insensible marble which affection could not animate? Statues frighten me: they stare without seeing and have no intellect to understand.
Then, I said to myself that, perhaps, it was my fault if I could not make Laurence understand me. Didier loved Marion; he did not seek to save a soul — he simply loved — and yet he effected the miracle which my reason and kindness had sought in vain to accomplish. A heart awakes only at the voice of a heart. Love is the holy baptism which of itself, without the faith, without the science of good, remits every sin.
I do not love Laurence. That cold and wearied girl causes me only disgust.
Her voice and gestures seem insults in my eyes; her entire form wounds me. Deprived of every delicacy of mind, she makes the kindest word odious, and thrusts an outrage into each one of her smiles. In her everything becomes bad.
I strove to feign tenderness and approached her. She sat motionless, leaning towards the hearth, and allowed me to take her cold and inert hands. Then, I drew her near me. She lifted her head, questioning me with a look. Beneath that look I recoiled, repulsing her.
“Well, what do you want?” she asked.
What did I want! My lips were open to cry to her: “I want you to take off that wretched silk dress and put on honest calico. I want you to cease pining after your past career. I want you to listen to me and understand what I say. I want you to turn your thoughts towards innocence and goodness. I want to make you a worthy woman.”
But, brothers, I did not say this. If I had loved her, I should without doubt have spoken, and, perhaps, she would have understood me.
CHAPTER XI.
ON THE WAY TO THE BALL.
I THINK I have been lacking both in skill and prudence. I was in too great haste; I overshot the mark, without asking Laurence if she understood me. How can I, who am ignorant of life, teach its science? What means do I know how to employ, except the systems, the rules of conduct, dreamed of at sixteen, beautiful in theory, but absurd in practice? Is it enough for me to love the good, to stretch towards an ideal of virtue vague aspirations, the aim of which is itself uncertain? When reality is before me, I know how little these desires take practical shape, how powerless I am in the struggle it offers me. I shall never know how either to bind or conquer it, ignorant as I am of the way in which to seize it and unable even to avow to myself what victory I demand. A voice cries out in me that I do not want the truth, that I do not desire to change it, to transform what is evil in my sight into good. Let the world which exists stand; I have the audacity to wish to create a new land, without making use of the wrecks of the old. Hence, having no solid foundation, the scaffolding of my dreams crumbles at the slightest shock. I am only a useless thinker, a platonic lover of the good nursed by vain reveries, whose power vanishes as soon as he touches the earth.
Brothers, it would be easier for me to give Laurence wings than to give her a woman’s heart.
We are but grown up children. We do not know what to do with that sublime reality, which comes to us from God and which we spoil at pleasure by our dreams. We are so awkward in living, that life, for this reason, becomes bad. Let us learn how to live and evil will disappear. If I possessed the great art of the real, if I had any conception of a human paradise, if I could distinguish the chimera from the possible, I could talk and Laurence would understand me. I would know how to take possession of her again and set her an example to follow. The delicate science which revealed to me the causes of her errors would find a remedy for each wound of her heart. But what can I do when my ignorance erects a barrier between her and me? I am the dream, she is the reality. We shall trudge on side by side without ever meeting, and, our journey finished, she will not have understood me, I will not have comprehended her.
I have decided to retrace my steps, in order to take Laurence such as she is and let her follow the road for which her human feet are fitted. I have resolved to study life with her, to descend that we may rise together. Since I am compelled to undertake this rough and disagreeable task, it is on the lowest step that I desire to start.
Would it not be a recompense great enough if I induced her to give me all the love of which she is capable? Brothers, I have a well grounded fear that our dreams are nothing but deceptions; I realize how weak and puerile they are in the presence of a reality of which I am vaguely conscious. There are days in which, further off than the sunlight and the perfumes, further off than those dim visions which I cannot turn to account, I catch a glimpse of the bold outlines of what is. And I comprehend that this is life, action and truth, while, in the surroundings which I have created for myself, move people strange to man, vain shadows whose eyes do not see me, whose lips cannot speak to me. The child can be pleased with these cold and mute friends; afraid of life, it takes refuge in that which does not live. But we men should not be satisfied with this eternal nothingness. Our arms are made for work.
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