The Quest of Glory by Marjorie Bowen (epub e reader txt) đź“–
- Author: Marjorie Bowen
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chair beneath the window.
Outside the birds were singing, and their flying shadows crossed and
recrossed the white corner of the hospice wall. Presently Luc raised
himself on one elbow.
“Jean!” he called.
The man came instantly.
“What time is it, Jean?”
“About half-past two, Monseigneur.”
“Thank you. I am going into the chapel for a little while. I shall be
back when Monsieur, my father, comes.”
He rose stiffly and feebly, and stood leaning against the end of the
bed.
“What is that which continually goes past the window, Jean?”
“Birds, Monseigneur—only little birds.”
Luc smiled.
“Indeed, I cannot see them, Jean.”
The servant waited, not looking at his master. Presently Luc gave a
little nod of dismissal, and Jean returned to the outer room.
Luc decided not to go to the chapel. He had thought that the dark, cool
spaces, the nuns behind their grille, the subdued singing might bring
him fortitude and peace; but now he rejected that idea as weakness.
He had also wished to inquire after Carola Koklinska before he left the
convent. Yet to what purpose? She was lost to the world, and her name
had not passed his lips once during the brief agony of his illness and
the long agony of his convalescence.
He recalled his last interview with her and his words, “If I am
stricken, pray that I may die.”
And now his worst horror had been realized, and he was cast back on life
to die slowly from day to day—an object of disgust and pity. He knew,
though no one else had been told, that he had not very long to live. The
doctor gave him a few years—five, or six, or seven.
Three days ago he had first seen himself in a mirror. Two days ago he
had written to M. Amelot saying that his health did not permit him to
take up the appointment at Madrid.
And to-day he had to see Clémence de Séguy.
He had gently told Jean to leave the mirror, and it hung against the
wall at the foot of his bed.
He turned to it now, took it down and brought it to the full light of
the window, held it between his hands, and gazed into it.
He could only see very imperfectly. Objects had lost their sharp
outlines, their true colours; things beyond the radius of his own
outstretched hand were dim and obscure. He peered into the mirror with
the stoop and concentration of gaze of an old man.
He saw, as behind a blur, his own face, chalk-white, scarred, and seamed
with a faint bluish colour; his eyes frayed, and swollen, yet sunk; his
mouth strained and distorted—a face without bloom, or youth, or
softness—a terrible face, from which all beauty, all expression had
been swept, for in the ruins of these pale features was not one trace of
the fair, mobile, spiritual countenance that had once shown to the world
the soul of Luc de Clapiers.
His fine hazel hair had gone. He wore a curled white peruke, which
further altered his appearance. He was so feeble he could not hold
himself erect; he stooped from the shoulders and was gauntly thin.
Presently he put the mirror on the bed, and two difficult tears forced
themselves out of his worn eyes and ran down his disfigured cheeks.
Outside the birds were flying to and fro, and the fragrant perfumes of
early spring swelled and receded on the full breeze.
The scent of earth, of flowers, of young trees came to Luc’s nostrils.
He shuddered like one struck on an open wound.
He went to the window, stood with his hands on the rough sill, looking
on to the little patch of herb garden and the whitewashed corner of the
building.
“Come, face it,” he said to himself. “You are young, full of energy, of
ardour, of ambition, of desire for glory; you can appreciate all that is
good and beautiful. Yet now, at the flower of your age, you are deprived
of everything that makes life desirable; you have only a few more years
to live, and they will be full of pain and suffering—then—an obscure
death. And all your gifts, your ardours, your hopes, your ambitions will
perish with you, leaving no glimmer behind. Face that, Luc de
Clapiers—face that!”
There was nothing left—nothing but the pitying love of those who would
smooth his way to death, and to a proud soldier’s soul such tenderness
was unendurable.
He picked up the sword he could never use again and buckled it on
slowly, then left the cottage and turned, after all, towards the chapel
attached to the convent. The service was nearly over. Luc seated himself
near the door in the shadows. The nuns were behind their grille; in the
body of the chapel were a few lay sisters.
Presently Luc went on his knees and prayed from a bitterly humbled
heart—prayed incoherently, passionately to the God of his forefathers—
“_God! O God! what have I done? What offence armed your wrath against
me? You have filled my life with bitterness. Pleasure, health, youth are
robbed from me glory that flattered so long the dream of an ambitious
soul—all is gone!_
“_I let my glance fall on the enchanting gifts of the world, and
suddenly they are all taken from me. Miseries, cares, regrets overwhelm
my soul!_”
The silent prayer beat in his brain. His heart swooned in his side. He
felt roof and walls vanish from about him and a sensation as if he were
surrounded by clear heavens and a multitude of swaying clouds. But the
murmur of the service was in his ears only a human thing. The God he
prayed to was foreign; he could not find help here.
“_O my soul, show thyself strong in these great trials, be patient,
trust in thyself; thy ills will end. Nothing is stable; the earth itself
and the skies vanish as a dream. The dawn of eternity will light the
bottom of the tomb, and death shall have no dark places left!_”
The service was over; the nuns departed from behind the grille, the lay
sisters moved away, but Luc remained on his knees.
Yet his thoughts had swept swiftly far from the God to whom this church
was consecrated. Out of his own soul he had drawn strength and
sweetness.
“_How can there be a struggle with misfortune and evil when man is
stronger than either?_” he asked himself. And at one bound his heart
leapt to life and energy.
He rose to his feet.
“_I dedicated my life to virtue and glory. What prevents me from using
the few years left to me in the service of the best things I know? I am
stronger than Fate. There is nothing mightier in creation than the soul
lodged in me. I and God are one. I need not fear anything, for I am the
highest tribunal and the most powerful law, and I can satisfy myself._”
His hand touched the smooth, cold pillar beside him. The feel of the
stone, the sting of the incense were repugnant to him. The heat and glow
in his heart warmed his frail body. He drew his thin, stooping shoulders
erect and left the chapel.
The image of Carola came fiercely to his mind. He trembled to think that
perhaps she had been one of those shrouded figures behind the grille.
Across the black gulf of his illness he beheld her figure beneath the
iron bell and the clusters of ash berries. He heard her words, and felt
her sobbing lips under his kiss and her cold hands in his.
A sister was crossing the courtyard, carrying a basket filled with
herbs. Luc turned on his heel and saluted her.
“I am leaving to-day, my sister. Before I go, may I ask you a question?”
“Yes, Monseigneur.”
“There was a lady came with me—Madame Koklinska.”
“Yes.”
“It was her intention to enter your order.”
“She became a novice, Monseigneur, and helped for a while in the
hospice.”
“For a while?” The scent of the bruised and fainting herbs was borne on
him overpoweringly.
“She took the smallpox, Monseigneur, within a few days of you. She died,
I think, a month ago. We had only one other death from the plague.”
“Thank you, my sister,” answered Luc gravely.
The sister passed on, and Luc stood silent in the sunny courtyard.
Dead I In what faith, in what mood, in what repentance, remorse, or
fear? Dead without consolation, or love, among strangers—young and
beautiful, and, he knew, without fear.
For a moment he was shaken by a wild revulsion, a desperate revolt
against his own renewed triumphant exaltation and proud freedom. In that
moment he would have put on all the shackles of her creed in return for
the certain hope of seeing her again; he would have embraced any faith
that had promised him that they should meet once more—even for a few
minutes. A little while before and he had been prepared to believe that
he would never see her again—prepared even not to think of her. Now he
would have paid any price just to see her tired face and listen to her
low, precise voice. He went back to the gardener’s cottage, and his eyes
sought the little cheap plaster image of St. Joseph in the corner. If
one could believe. He shook off the temptation, the delusion—she was
gone. When he had seen her pass the white wall of the hospice she had
left him for ever—and he had known it even then.
“I—suppose—I—loved—her,” he said to himself; but he had no
understanding of any emotion outside confusion and loneliness. He did
not see the room or the sunshine, but a white, sparkling expanse of
snow, a great silver fir, and a woman on a white horse who leant from
the saddle and looked at him.
He found his father standing where she had stood when he had seen her
for the last time.
“I have come for you, Luc.”
The old Marquis stood erect and proud, handsomely dressed, composed.
“Clémence is waiting for you,” he continued. “She would have accompanied
me, but I thought you would rather meet her at home.”
The name hurt and startled Luc. He made an effort to think coherently.
He forced his thoughts on to the coming moments.
“Monseigneur,” he asked, “Mademoiselle de Séguy—knows?”
“Knows what?” demanded the Marquis in a still voice.
Luc’s dim eyes filled with tenderness. He answered very gently—
“Knows that she is free, my father.”
The old man gallantly kept his pose, his calm.
“You must not speak like that, Luc. Mademoiselle de Séguy loves
you—nothing makes any difference to her. She is eager—”
“Ah, hush!” said Luc sadly, yet serenely. “Look at me, Monseigneur—look
at me—think of her—of any woman. I have known a long while that it
could never be. Surely neither you nor she think I would ask this
sacrifice?”
“This is not the language of love,” said the Marquis firmly. “Do you not
recall how she wished to prove herself? how she wished to show what her
affection meant?”
Luc did remember, with a swift, sharp sense of longing and regret, the
brief days he had spent with his promised wife—her vows—her devotion.
“God bless her for her brave loyalty,” he said unsteadily; “but my life
is too broken now ever to be joined to another. She is a sweet woman. I
hope she will
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