16 This quotation is difficult to imagine from the mouth or pen of Mirabeau.
Chapter Thirty-Five: A Thunderstorm
the course of a year, but is also expecting you not to look any more ridiculous than you have to." (The priest also saw, in so large a sum thrown to so young a man, the commission of a sin.) "The marquis also writes," Father Pirard went on, "that Monsieur Julien de La Vernaye has had this money from his father, who needs no further designation. It will be up to Monsieur de La Vernaye to decide if he wants to give something to Monsieur Sorel, a carpenter in Verrières, in whose charge he was, as a child...I can take care of that part of the commission," the priest added. "I have finally brought Monsieur de La Mole to the point of settling with Father de Frilair, that ultimate Jesuit. His influence is definitely stronger than ours. The implicit recognition of your high birth, by that man who rules Besançon, will be one of the tacit terms of the settlement." Unable to control his excitement, Julien embraced the priest. He saw himself acknowledged. "What nonsense!" said Father Pirard, pushing him away. "What's the meaning of such worldly vanity? As for Sorel and his sons, I will offer them, in my name, an annual pension of five hundred francs each, to be paid so long as I hear no evil of them." Julien had already become cold and distant. He expressed his thanks, but in the vaguest language, and without committing himself to anything. "Might it be possible," he was asking himself, "that I could be the natural son of some great lord, exiled to our mountains by the dreaded Napoleon?" The more he considered it, the idea seemed to him less and less improbable..."My hatred for my father would be one thing that proved it.. .. And I wouldn't be a monster!" A few days later, the Fifteenth Cavalry Regiment, one of the army's shining units, was in battle formation on the Strasbourg parade ground. Chevalier de La Vernaye rode the finest horse in all Alsace, which had cost him six thousand francs. He had been mustered in as a lieutenant, without ever having been a second lieutenant, except on the rolls of a regiment he'd never heard of. His imperturbable demeanor, his severe and almost malicious eyes, his pallor, and his invariable calm coolness began to frame his reputation. Soon, his perfect, measured politeness, his swordsmanship and skill with his pistol, which he neither hid nor affectedly advertised, eliminated the possibility of open, audible jesting about him. Matters hung in the balance for five or six days, but then regimental opinion publicly declared itself in his favor. "This young fellow has everything," pronounced bantering senior officers, "except youth." From Strasbourg, Julien wrote to Father Chélan, formerly parish priest at Verrières, who was reaching the outer limits of extreme old age: You will have heard, with a joy I cannot doubt, of the events which have induced my family to make me rich. I enclose five hundred francs which I beg you to distribute, very quietly, and with no mention of my name, to such miserable wretches as, once, I myself used to be, people you are surely helping as once you helped me. Julien was drunk with ambition, not with vanity, but all the same most of his attention was devoted to his appearance. His horses, his and his servants' uniforms, received such care as would have done honor to the fastidiousness of a great English lord. Though very newly commissioned, just two days since, and by preferential treatment, he was already calculating that to be commander in chief by, at the latest, age thirty (as all great generals were), by the time he was twenty-three he must be more than a mere lieutenant. All he thought about were glory and his son. It was thus in the midst of the most ungoverned ecstasies of ambition that he was surprised by a young de La Mole footman, who came bearing a letter:
The Red and the Black
We're completely ruined [Mathilde wrote]. Hurry as fast as you can, sacrifice everything, desert if necessary. When you come, wait for me in a taxi, near the garden's little door, at number —— of ——— Street. I'll come and speak with you; perhaps I can bring you into the garden. We're ruined, I believe, beyond any hope whatever. You can count on me: you'll see that, in adversity, I am both devoted and constant. I love you. In a matter of minutes, Julien obtained a leave from his colonel and left Strasbourg at full gallop. But he was too horribly upset, consumed by anxiety, to continue this mode of travel any farther than Metz. He threw himself into a mail coach and, with a speed that seemed almost incredible, reached the place she had indicated, near the little door to the de La Mole garden. The door was opened. And in a moment, forgetting all concern for what others might see, Mathilde dashed into his arms. Fortunately, it was only five in the morning, and the street was still deserted. "We're completely ruined. My father, afraid of my tears, left Thursday night. For where? No one knows. Here is his letter. Read it." And she got into the cab with him. I could pardon anything, but not a plan to seduce you because you're rich. That, my ill- fated daughter, is the ghastly truth. I give you my word of honor that I will never consent to your marrying this man. I promise him an income of ten thousand francs, if he wishes to live abroad, outside the borders of France, or best of all in America. Read the letter I received, in response to the inquiries I made. The shameless fellow himself is responsible for my writing to Madame de Rênal. If you write to me about him, I will never read a line of it. I loathe both Paris and you. Try to keep totally secret that which will be happening. Renounce—renounce sincerely —this vile man, and you will regain a father. "Where is Madame de Rênal's letter?" Julien asked, coldly. "Here it is. I didn't want you to see it till you were ready." My duty to the sacred cause of religion and morality requires me, sir, to proceed with the painful step I am about to take, in writing to you. An infallible law now orders me to do harm to my neighbor, but in order to prevent an even greater disgrace. The sorrow I feel must yield to my sense of duty. It is entirely true, sir, that the person in question's conduct, about which you seek full and accurate information, might be considered inexplicable, or even honorable. I might have thought it proper to hide, or to disguise, some part of the truth; prudence might so desire, as might, also, religion. But the conduct about which you inquire has in fact been extraordinarily blameworthy—indeed, more than I can tell you. Poor and voraciously greedy, this man sought position and reputation by the most consummate hypocrisy, as well as by the seduction of a weak and miserable woman. One part of my painful duty is to add, here, that I believe Monsieur J——— has absolutely no religious beliefs. In good conscience, I am obliged to believe that one of his roads to success, in any house into which he comes, is to search for and seduce the woman whose assets are the greatest. Cloaked by a pretense of unselfishness, and by romantic talk, his great, and his sole, goal is to enable himself to make use of the master of the house and of his fortune. He leaves behind him misery and eternal regret, etc., etc. This extremely long letter, partially erased by tears, had in fact been written by Madame de Rênal. She had written it, indeed, more carefully than usual. "I can't blame Monsieur de La Mole," said Julien when he had finished reading. "He is fair and sensible. What father would give his beloved daughter to such a man! Farewell!" Julien jumped down from the cab and ran to a mail coach, which had stopped at the end of the street. He appeared to have forgotten Mathilde, who took several steps as if to follow after him. But staring merchants, coming to the doors of their shops—people very well aware of who she was—forced her to turn and hurriedly go back into the garden.
Chapter Thirty-Six: Somber Details
Julien was going to Verrières. During this rapid trip, he was unable to write to Mathilde, as he had planned: the only marks he made on paper were illegible scribblings. It was Sunday morning when he reached Verrières. He went into a local gunsmith's shop, where he was covered with compliments for his recent good fortune. Everyone was talking about it. It was not easy for Julien to make the man understand that what he wanted was a pair of pistols. At his request, the gunsmith loaded and charged them. He heard three bells tolling: it was a familiar signal, in French villages. After the various morning bells had been rung, this announced that mass would soon be said. He went into Verrières's new church. All the building's high windows were draped with crimson curtains. He found himself standing a few steps behind Madame de Rênal's pew. He thought she was praying quite fervently. Seeing this woman, for whom he had felt such love, made Julien's limbs tremble so much that, at first, he could not do what he had planned. "I can't do it," he was saying to himself. "It's physically impossible, shaking like this." Just then, the young priest who was saying mass rang the little bell, announcing elevation of the Host. Madame de Rênal bent her head, and for a moment she was completely hidden beneath the folds of her shawl. Julien could no longer see her as plainly as he had. He fired the first pistol at her, and missed. He fired the second, and she fell. Chapter Thirty-Six: Somber Details Don't expect me to show weakness. I have taken my revenge. I deserve death, and here I am. Pray for my soul. —Schiller Julien remained motionless; he could not see. When he came back to himself, just a little, he became aware that all the faithful had fled from the church. The priest had left the altar. Julien began to walk, very slowly, behind several women who were screaming as they ran. One woman, wanting to run faster than the others, shoved him, roughly, and he fell. His feet became entangled in a chair, knocked over by the rushing crowd. As he rose, he felt his neck tightly gripped. It was a policeman, in full uniform, who was holding him. Automatically, Julien tried to reach for his pistols, but a second policeman grasped his arms. He was brought to prison. They came into a room; chains were put on his wrists. He was left all alone. The door had been double-locked. Everything had happened quickly, and he had no idea what was going on. "My God, it's all over," he said out loud, as he came back to himself..."Yes, fifteen days, and then the guillotine...or I kill myself, between now and then." His thinking could go no further. His head felt as if it had been violently compressed. He looked around to see if someone had hold of it. Almost immediately afterward, he fell into a very deep sleep. Madame de Rênal had not been fatally wounded. The first ball had gone through her hat. The second shot had been fired as she was turning around. The ball had hit her in the shoulder and, astonishingly, had been redirected by the shoulder bone which, however, it had cracked; the ball had ended by striking a Gothic pillar, from which it had split off an enormous sliver of stone. Later, after a long, painful dressing and bandaging, when the serious-faced surgeon told her, "I answer for your life as I would for my own," she was profoundly distressed. For a long while, she wished sincerely for death. The letter, written to Monsieur de La Mole on the order of her current confessor, had been the final blow to a creature weakened by
The Red and the Black
unremitting misery. This misery was Julien's absence; she called it, she herself, remorse. Her confessor, a young, fervently virtuous priest, newly arrived from Dijon, was not taken in. "To die this way, but not by my own hand: that's not a sin," thought Madame de Rênal. "God will perhaps pardon me for rejoicing in my death." She did not dare add: "And to die at Julien's hand, that is the very height of bliss." She was barely free of the surgeon, and all the friends crowding around, when she summoned Elisa, her chambermaid. "The jailer," she told her, blushing deeply, "is a savage man. He will surely mistreat Julien, believing I would want that...I cannot endure the idea. Might you yourself go and bring the jailer this little package, which contains some gold coins? You'll tell him that religion does not allow him to mistreat a prisoner...Above all, he must not go around talking about receipt of this money." And this, which we have just been recounting, was responsible for the Verrières jailer's humanity to Julien. This was, as ever, Monsieur Noiroud, the perfect bureaucrat, in whom we have seen Monsieur Appert's presence strike such notable fear. A judge came to the prison. "I killed by premeditation," Julien told him. "I bought the pistols from, and had them loaded and charged by, Monsieur So-and-So, a gunsmith. Article 1342 of the Code is clear: I deserve a sentence of death, and I expect it." Astonished by this kind of response, the judge wanted to ask a whole batch of questions, so that the accused might have an opportunity to give conflicting answers. "But don't you see," said Julien, smiling, "that I'm making myself as guilty as you could ever want? Face it, sir: there'll be no difficulty nabbing the victim you're chasing. You will have the pleasure of sentencing him. Spare me, please, having to deal with you." "I have one boring duty to fulfill," Julien thought. "I must write to Mademoiselle de La Mole." I have had my revenge [he told her]. Unfortunately, my name will appear in the newspapers; I cannot escape, incognito, from this world. I will die in two months. It was a revenge entirely ghastly, as is my sorrow at being separated from you. From this moment on, I forbid myself either to write or to speak your name. Never speak of me, even to my son: silence is the only way of honoring me. For the vulgar herd, I will be a coarse assassin...Let me be allowed to speak the truth, at this supreme moment: you will forget me. This immense catastrophe—as to which I advise you never to say a word, not to any living being—will for several years have drained away everything romantic and adventurous, so far as I can see, in your nature. You were made to dwell with the heroes of the Middle Ages: exhibit that same firmness in your own character. What must take place will be done in secret, without in any way compromising you. You will take an assumed name, and you will confide in no one. If you absolutely need a friend's help, let me leave you Father Pirard. Speak to no one else, and above all not to people of your own class: the de Cayluses, the de Luzes. When I've been dead a year, marry Monsieur de Croisenois: please, I am commanding you, as your husband. Do not write to me; I will not reply. Since I'm not as evil as Iago,17 at least in my own mind, I'm going to say to you, as he said: "From this time forth I never will speak word." I will not speak or write to anyone. You alone will have my final words, as also my final adoration.