Читать книгу Which? Or, Between Two Women - Ernest Daudet - Страница 7

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Early one morning in the month of March, 1770, a woman bearing in her arms a new-born infant, was hastening along the left bank of the Garden, a small river that rises in the Cevennes, traverses the department of the Gard, and empties into the Rhone, not far from Beaucaire. It would be difficult to find more varied and picturesque scenery than that which borders this stream whose praises have been chanted by Florian, and which certainly should not be unknown to fame since it was here the Romans constructed the Pont du Gard, that gigantic aqueduct which conveyed the waters of Eure to Nîmes.

The woman of whom we speak was at that moment very near the famous Pont du Gard—which is only a short distance from the spot on which the little village of Lafous now stands, and directly opposite Remoulins, a town of considerable size situated on the right bank of the river—and at a point where the highway from Nîmes to Avignon intersects the road leading up from the villages that dot the river banks. The woman paused on reaching the place where these roads meet, not to take breath, but to decide which course she should pursue. But she did not hesitate long. After casting an anxious glance behind her, she hastened on again, directing her steps toward the Pont du Gard, which was distant not more than half a mile.

The air was very cold; the wind had been blowing furiously all night, and at day-break it was still raging, ruffling the water, bending the trees, snatching up great clouds of dust, and moaning and shrieking through the clumps of willows that bordered the stream, while immense masses of gray and white clouds scudding rapidly across the sky, imparted to it the appearance of a tempest-tossed ocean. Some of these clouds were so low that they seemed almost to touch the earth as they rushed wildly on, pursued by the fury of the gale, and assuming strange and fantastic forms in their erratic course. Undeterred by the violence of the tempest, the stranger advanced steadily, apparently with but one aim in view: to reach her journey's end with all possible expedition in order to protect her sleeping infant from the inclemency of the weather.

She was a young woman, not yet twenty years of age. Her luxuriant golden hair hung in wild disorder from the brilliant-hued kerchief that was bound about her head; and her garments were as remarkable for their peculiarity of form as for their diversity of color. She wore a short, full dress of blue de laine bordered with yellow, and confined at the waist by a red silk girdle. Over this, she wore a gray cape of coarse woollen stuff. Her legs were bare, and her feet were protected only by rude sandals, held in place by leathern thongs. Many rents, more or less neatly repaired by the aid of thread or if material of another color, revealed the fact that these faded garments had been in long and constant use. Even the sandals were so dilapidated that the feet of their wearer were upon the ground. Her whole attire, in short, was wretched and poverty-stricken in the extreme.

But no face could be more charming. Her pure and delicate features shone out from their framework of golden hair with marvellous beauty, in spite of the sorrow and fatigue which had left their impress upon her face. Her eyes, shaded by long dark lashes and dewy with tears, were remarkably beautiful and expressive. The sunburn that disfigured her charming face, her exquisitely formed hands and her tiny feet, which were scarcely larger than those of a child, extended no further. Upon those portions of her body that were protected by her clothing, her skin was white and delicate, and scarcely colored by the young blood that coursed through her veins. Such was this woman, and it would have been difficult to divine her origin if the tambourine that hung at her girdle, and the hieroglyphics embroidered upon her sleeves had not revealed it beyond all question.

Tiepoletta, for that was her name, belonged to one of those wandering tribes that leave Spain or Hungary each spring to spend some months in Southern France, advancing as far as Beaucaire, Avignon and Arles—sleeping as fate wills, under the arches of bridges, in tumbledown barns, or in the open air; living sometimes by theft, but oftener by their own exertions; the men dealing in mules and in rags; the women telling fortunes, captivating young peasants, extorting money from them, and selling glassware of their own manufacture—the children imploring charity. These people, scattered throughout Europe—these people, whose manner of life is so mysterious and whose origin is more mysterious still—seem to be closely allied both to the Moors and to the Hindoos, not only in appearance but in their phlegm, fanaticism and rapacity. Such of our readers as have travelled in Southern Europe must have frequently encountered these Bohemians, who come from no one knows where only to disappear again like the swallows at the approach of winter.

Their language is a mixture of the Spanish and the Sclavonic. Some jabber a little French. The men are generally athletic, very dark complexioned and have strong, energetic features, wavy hair and sonorous voices. The women, when young, are remarkably beautiful; but like all who lead an exposed and migratory life, they become hideous before they are thirty. They live in families or tribes, each family consisting of fifteen or twenty members, and obeying the orders of the oldest woman, who is dignified by the title of queen, and from whose decisions there is no appeal, though she, in turn, owes allegiance to one great queen. These Bohemians are tolerated in the countries through which they pass; but people seldom enter into any closer relations with them than are necessary to effect the purchase of a horse or mule, or to obtain a prediction concerning the future. They know the feeling of repulsion they inspire, so they seldom approach thickly settled districts, and only the women and children venture into the villages to solicit alms.

It was to this race that Tiepoletta belonged; and though the color of her hair, the delicacy of her features and the fairness of her skin did not accord with her supposed origin, her memory hinted at nothing that did not harmonize with what had been told her concerning her parentage. It is not the aim of this story to investigate the truth or the falsity of this assertion. That Tiepoletta had Bohemian blood in her veins; that she had, as a child, been stolen from her friends; that she was the fruit of some mysterious love affair; all these hypotheses were equally plausible, but there was nothing to prove that the first was not the true one, nor had her imagination ever engaged in a search for any other; but the people of her tribe seemed to suspect that she was of different blood, for they evidently regarded her with aversion. Preserved from the pernicious counsels and examples of those around her by some secret instinct, she had remained pure. With the aid of a book picked up on the roadside, she had learned to read and to speak a few French words. This was more than enough to convince her companions that she was haughty and proud. When she was a child, they beat her unmercifully because she refused to beg. As she grew older, she had a most cruel enemy in her beauty, which was the cause of much of her misery. Subjected to temptations to which she saw young girls around her yield without a thought, she escaped only by a miracle, but it brought down upon her, anger, hatred and cruel vengeance. She increased these by refusing to choose a husband from among the young men with whom she had been reared.

They resolved to compel her to marry one of her companions. She fled, but they succeeded in recapturing her without much difficulty. They then shut her up, telling her that she should remain a prisoner until she promised obedience. It was the most trying time of her whole life. Beset on every side, beaten, buffetted, tyrannized over, fed on food that was only fit for a dog, she would certainly have died in the struggle had not destiny sent her a protector in the person of Borachio, a young man about twenty-five years of age, whose heart was touched by her misfortunes.

He was so bold, so strong and so terrible in his anger that the whole tribe stood in awe of him. He took compassion on their victim and compelled her tormentors to cease their persecution. Tiepoletta was not ungrateful, and she afterward married her preserver to the great disgust of the young girls of the tribe, with whom Borachio was a great favorite.

According to custom, the queen solemnized the marriage without delay; and at nineteen Tiepoletta had a master whose coarse tenderness was sweet, indeed, in comparison with the harsh treatment to which she had been subjected heretofore. But this happiness was destined to be of short duration. Borachio was found dead upon the roadside one morning, his breast pierced by eight dagger thrusts. Envious of his beauty, his authority and his lovely young wife, one of his comrades had assassinated him and made Tiepoletta a widow some time before she was to become a mother. Six months went by, during which they seemed to respect her grief. Then, in a cave near the Pont du Gard, she gave birth to a daughter. The very next evening, while she was lying, half asleep, on some straw on the floor of the cave, with her child beside her, she overheard a conversation that was going on outside. They were talking of her. She listened eagerly. Picture her fear and horror when she heard them scheming to deprive her of her infant and then drive her from their midst, thus ridding the tribe of a useless member and retaining Borachio's child. It was Corcovita, the mother of the poor heart-broken creature, who was the strongest advocate of this shameful outrage.

"We shall leave here to-morrow to go to Avignon," said she. "We must obtain possession of the child and then find an opportunity to abandon Tiepoletta on the road."

This plan gave general satisfaction, and Corcovita was charged with its execution. Tiepoletta had heard enough. Wild with terror she endeavored to devise some means of escape from this new peril, and during the long watches of the night she finally resolved to flee with her child. The next morning at day-break the little band was on its way. A seat in the carriage was offered to Tiepoletta. She accepted it, knowing she must save all her strength if she would carry her plan into successful execution.

After a long march, they paused at nightfall to encamp near Avignon. Tiepoletta, a prey to the most intense anxiety, had detected the interchange of divers signs that convinced her they were only waiting for her to fall asleep to steal her child from her. She watched. At eight o'clock the men had gone to stroll around the suburbs of the city; the old women were dozing; the young people were laughing and teasing one another, and the children were sound asleep. Tiepoletta profited by a moment when no one was observing her to steal from the camp on tip-toe. She proceeded perhaps a hundred paces in this way, then, seized with sudden fright, she began to run, holding her child pressed close to her heart; fancying she heard her mother's voice behind her, she rushed wildly on, never pausing until she sank exhausted on the lonely road.

She had pursued her flight for more than an hour without even asking herself where she was going, and with no thought save that of escaping from her persecutors. She was now beyond their reach. Still she could not dismiss her fears. Dreading pursuit, she soon resumed her journey, turning her steps in the direction of the Pont du Gard, in the hope that her former companions would not think of looking for her there, and that she might find in the cave they had just deserted a little straw upon which she could rest her weary limbs, and some fragments of food that would keep her alive until she had decided upon her future course. She walked all night. When she found herself near the Pont du Gard day was breaking.

The wind was still blowing; but the clouds had scattered before its violence like a flock of frightened sheep, and a pale light was beginning to shine upon the drenched fields. Gloomy and majestic in its century-old impassibility, the Pont du Gard—a colossus upheld by two mountains, and accustomed to defy alike the tempest and the ravages of time—seemed to laugh at the gale which beat against its massive pillars and rushed into its gigantic arches with a sound like thunder. These strong yet graceful arches seem so many frames through which the astonished eyes of the traveller seize the landscape bit by bit: the quiet valley, watered by the Gardon, the luxuriant green of the willows, the clear waves dancing along over their sandy bed, the blue sky reflected there, the mountains that border the horizon.

Nothing can be more wildly beautiful than this secluded spot, which is as silent and lonely as if it had never been trodden by the foot of man. Judging from the prodigality with which nature has lavished her riches here, it would seem that she wishes the sole credit of this superb panorama. The massive aqueduct alone attests the existence of man. Looming up in its mighty grandeur—the imperishable monument of a departed civilization, and the only one of its kind—the beholder feels that it is no unworthy rival of the works of Deity.

But the majestic scene made no impression upon Tiepoletta. That poor creature, fainting with hunger and fatigue, did not even notice the grandeur around her. With half-closed eyes, arms cramped by the weight of the precious burden upon which she now maintained her hold only by a superhuman effort, and lips parched by the wind, she plodded on with a measured, automatic step. She was hungry; she was thirsty; she was shivering with the cold. Her feet were swollen; but her sufferings were forgotten when she neared her journey's end. She passed under the Pont du Gard. The path on the other side of the aqueduct winds along between the base of the cliffs and the bed of the stream. Under one of these cliffs nature has hewn out a grotto of such liberal dimensions that the people of the neighborhood assemble there on fête days to dance and make merry.

It was there the Bohemians had encamped a few days before; it was there Tiepoletta had given birth to the tiny creature whom she had just rescued from the heartless wretches who had conspired to despoil a mother of her child. This comfortless cavern where she had suffered so much seemed to her now a Paradise, in which she would be content to dwell forever.

She rushed into the cave. The sunlight illumined only a small portion of the grotto; the rest of it was veiled in shadow. Tiepoletta glanced around her and uttered a cry of joy. In one dim corner she discerned a little straw, enough, however, to serve as a bed. She laid her sleeping infant upon it, covered the child with her mantle; then gathering up a few bits of bread and some half-picked bones which had been left upon the floor of the cave, she proceeded to appease her hunger. When this was satisfied, she ran to the river, quenched her thirst, bathed her sore and bleeding feet, and then returned to the cave after walking about awhile in the sunlight to warm herself. Flinging herself down upon the straw, she covered herself with her tattered garments as best she could, and drawing her child to her gave it the breast. The little one roused from its slumber uttered a moan and applied its pale lips to the bosom upon which it was dependent for sustenance; but it soon exhausted the supply of milk, whose abundance had been greatly diminished by the fatigues of the preceding night, and again fell asleep.

Then, in the midst of this profound silence and solitude, Tiepoletta, providentially rescued from her persecutors, experienced an intense joy that made her entirely forget the hardships she had just undergone. There were undoubtedly new misfortunes in store for her. She must, without delay, find some way to earn her own living and that of her child; but their wants were few. Birds and Bohemians are accustomed to scanty fare. She could work: she was accustomed to labor: she was inured to fatigue. Besides, who would be so hard-hearted as to refuse her bread when she said: "I am willing to earn it." This artless creature, whose ambition was so modest, consoled her troubled mind with these hopes, and trembled only when she thought of those from whom she had just fled. No one had ever told Tiepoletta that there was a God. She did not know how to pray; nevertheless, in the refuge she had found, her soul lifted itself up in fervent adoration to the unknown God whose power had protected her, though she was ignorant of His existence and of His name. It was in the midst of this feverish exaltation of spirit that sleep overcame her before she had even thought to ask herself what she should do on awaking.

For several hours she slumbered on undisturbed, but suddenly she woke. She fancied she heard in her sleep a frightful noise like the rumbling of heavy thunder, a noise which mingled with the shrieks of the wind and finally drowned them entirely. At first she thought she must be the victim of some terrible dream. But the sound grew louder and louder. This was no dream; it was reality. She sprang to her feet, seeking some loophole of escape from the unknown peril that threatened her. Above the tumult she could distinguish human cries. She thought these must come from her pursuers. But no; these distant voices were calling for succor. She caught up her child and ran from the cave. A grand but terrible sight met her gaze and riveted her to the spot in motionless horror.

The Gardon had overflowed its banks. With the rapidity that characterizes its sudden inundations and transforms this peaceful stream into the most impetuous of torrents, the water had risen over the banks that border it and flooded the fields, sweeping away everything that stood in its path. This water now laved the feet of the young Bohemian; and as far as the eye could reach she could see nothing but a mass of boiling, turbulent waves, bearing on their crests floating fragments of houses and furniture, as well as trees, animals and occasionally human bodies. The cries she had heard came from some women who had been overtaken by the torrent while engaged in washing their linen at the river, and who had taken refuge upon a rock on the side of the now inundated road.

The river continued to rise. This immense volume of water was vainly seeking an outlet through the narrow defile formed by the hills and which ordinarily sufficed for the bed of the Gardon; but, finding the passage inadequate now, it dashed itself violently against the rocks and against the supports of the aqueduct which haughtily defied the furious flood; then, converted into a mass of seething foam, it returned over the same road it had just traversed until it met the new waves that were being constantly formed by the current. It was the shock of this meeting that caused the noise which had roused Tiepoletta from her slumber. A stormy sea could not have appeared more angry, or formed more formidable billows. One might have called it a fragmentary episode of the universal deluge.

Five minutes more than sufficed to give Tiepoletta an idea of the extent of the inundation. She stood with wild eyes and unbound hair, the picture of terror and dismay. Suddenly an enormous wave broke not far from her with the roar of a wild beast, and the water dashed up to her very feet. She pressed her child closer to her breast and recoiled. Another wave dashed up, blinding her with its spray. Would the water invade the cave? Her blood froze in her veins. Frenzy seized her. This new misfortune, added to those she had suffered during the past three days, was more than she could bear. From that moment she acted under the influence of actual madness caused by her terror. She must flee. But by what road? To reach either of the neighboring villages was impossible. The foaming waters covered the entire plain.

Suddenly Tiepoletta recollected that on the summit of the hill above her there was a château which the Bohemians had visited sometimes in pursuit of alms. She could reach it by means of a broad footpath that intersected the road only a few yards from the grotto. It was there she resolved to go for shelter. But to reach this path she must walk through the raging flood. She did not hesitate. Each moment of delay aggravated her peril, and might place some insurmountable barrier between her and her only chance of salvation. She lifted her skirts, fastened her child upon her back and bravely waded into the torrent.

What agony she endured during that short journey. The water was higher than her waist; the ground was slippery; the current, rapid and capricious. It required an indomitable will to sustain her—to keep her from yielding twenty times to the might of this unchained monster. Frequently she was obliged to pause in order to regain her breath. The struggle lasted only ten minutes, but those ten minutes seemed so many ages. At last she reached the path leading to the château. She was saved!

She let fall her tattered skirts about her slender limbs, and, without wasting time in looking back upon the perilous road she had just traversed, she hastened up the hill. A few moments later she reached the door of the château in a plight most pitiable to behold. It was time. A moment more and her limbs trembling with excitement and exhaustion, would have refused to sustain her. She fell on her knees and deposited her burden upon some tufts of heather; then with a mighty effort she seized and pulled a chain suspended at the side of the door. The sound of a bell was instantly heard. As if her strength had only waited until this moment to desert her, she fell to the ground unconscious at the very instant the door opened.