The American by Henry James (free e reader txt) 📕

he to do with it? He got up, in his agitation, and stood before the chimney-piece, still looking at Newman. He was a longer time thinking what to say than one would have expected.

“If you can’t render me the service I ask,” said Newman, “say it out!”

“Let me hear it again, distinctly,” said Bellegarde. “It’s very important, you know. I shall plead your cause with my sister, because you want—you want to marry her? That’s it, eh?”

“Oh, I don’t say plead my cause, exactly; I shall try and do that myself. But say a good word for me, now and then—let her know that you think well of me.”

At this, Bellegarde gave a little light laugh.

“What I want chiefly, after all,” Newman went on, “is just to let you know what I have in mind. I suppose that is what you expect, isn’t it? I want to do what is customary over here. If there is anything particular to be done, let me know and I will do it. I wouldn’t for the world approach Madame de Cintré without all the proper forms. If I ought to go and tell your mother, why I will go and tell her. I will go and tell your brother, even. I will go and tell anyone you please. As I don’t know anyone else, I begin by telling you. But that, if it is a social obligation, is a pleasure as well.”

“Yes, I see—I see,” said Bellegarde, lightly stroking his chin. “You have a very right feeling about it, but I’m glad you have begun with me.” He paused, hesitated, and then turned away and walked slowly the length of the room. Newman got up and stood leaning against the mantel-shelf, with his hands in his pockets, watching Bellegarde’s promenade. The young Frenchman came back and stopped in front of him. “I give it up,” he said; “I will not pretend I am not surprised. I am—hugely! Ouf! It’s a relief.”

“That sort of news is always a surprise,” said Newman. “No matter what you have done, people are never prepared. But if you are so surprised, I hope at least you are pleased.”

“Come!” said Bellegarde. “I am going to be tremendously frank. I don’t know whether I am pleased or horrified.”

“If you are pleased, I shall be glad,” said Newman, “and I shall be—encouraged. If you are horrified, I shall be sorry, but I shall not be discouraged. You must make the best of it.”

“That is quite right—that is your only possible attitude. You are perfectly serious?”

“Am I a Frenchman, that I should not be?” asked Newman. “But why is it, by the bye, that you should be horrified?”

Bellegarde raised his hand to the back of his head and rubbed his hair quickly up and down, thrusting out the tip of his tongue as he did so. “Why, you are not noble, for instance,” he said.

“The devil I am not!” exclaimed Newman.

“Oh,” said Bellegarde a little more seriously, “I did not know you had a title.”

“A title? What do you mean by a title?” asked Newman. “A count, a duke, a marquis? I don’t know anything about that, I don’t know who is and who is not. But I say I am noble. I don’t exactly know what you mean by it, but it’s a fine word and a fine idea; I put in a claim to it.”

“But what have you to show, my dear fellow, what proofs?”

“Anything you please! But you don’t suppose I am going to undertake to prove that I am noble. It is for you to prove the contrary.”

“That’s easily done. You have manufactured wash-tubs.”

Newman stared a moment. “Therefore I am not noble? I don’t see it. Tell me something I have not done—something I cannot do.”

“You cannot marry a woman like Madame de Cintré for the asking.”

“I believe you mean,” said Newman slowly, “that I am not good enough.”

“Brutally speaking—yes!”

Bellegarde had hesitated a moment, and while he hesitated Newman’s attentive glance had grown somewhat eager. In answer to these last words he for a moment said nothing. He simply blushed a little. Then he raised his eyes to the ceiling and stood looking at one of the rosy cherubs that was painted upon it. “Of course I don’t expect to marry any woman for the asking,” he said at last; “I expect first to make myself acceptable to her. She must like me, to begin with. But that I am not good enough to make a trial is rather a surprise.”

Bellegarde wore a look of mingled perplexity, sympathy, and amusement. “You should not hesitate, then, to go up to-morrow and ask a duchess to marry you?”

“Not if I thought she would suit me. But I am very fastidious; she might not at all.”

Bellegarde’s amusement began to prevail. “And you should be surprised if she refused you?”

Newman hesitated a moment. “It sounds conceited to say yes, but nevertheless I think I should. For I should make a very handsome offer.”

“What would it be?”

“Everything she wishes. If I get hold of a woman that comes up to my standard, I shall think nothing too good for her. I have been a long time looking, and I find such women are rare. To combine the qualities I require seems to be difficult, but when the difficulty is vanquished it deserves a reward. My wife shall have a good position, and I’m not afraid to say that I shall be a good husband.”

“And these qualities that you require—what are they?”

“Goodness, beauty, intelligence, a fine education, personal elegance—everything, in a word, that makes a splendid woman.”

“And noble birth, evidently,” said Bellegarde.

“Oh, throw that in, by all means, if it’s there. The more the better!”

“And my sister seems to you to have all these things?”

“She is exactly what I have been looking for. She is my dream realized.”

“And you would make her a very good husband?”

“That is what I wanted you to tell her.”

Bellegarde laid his hand on his companion’s arm a moment, looked at him with his head on one side, from head to foot, and then, with a loud laugh, and shaking the other hand in the air, turned away. He walked again the length of the room, and again he came back and stationed himself in front of Newman. “All this is very interesting—it is very curious. In what I said just now I was speaking, not for myself, but for my tradition, my superstitions. For myself, really, your proposal tickles me. It startled me at first, but the more I think of it the more I see in it. It’s no use attempting to explain anything; you won’t understand me. After all, I don’t see why you need; it’s no great loss.”

“Oh, if there is anything more to explain, try it! I want to proceed with my eyes open. I will do my best to understand.”

“No,” said Bellegarde, “it’s disagreeable to me; I give it up. I liked you the first time I saw you, and I will abide by that. It would be quite odious for me to come talking to you as if I could patronize you. I have told you before that I envy you; vous m’imposez, as we say. I didn’t know you much until within five minutes. So we will let things go, and I will say nothing to you that, if our positions were reversed, you would not say to me.”

I do not know whether in renouncing the mysterious opportunity to which he alluded, Bellegarde felt that he was doing something very generous. If so, he was not rewarded; his generosity was not appreciated. Newman quite failed to recognize the young Frenchman’s power to wound his feelings, and he had now no sense of escaping or coming off easily. He did not thank his companion even with a glance. “My eyes are open, though,” he said, “so far as that you have practically told me that your family and your friends will turn up their noses at me. I have never thought much about the reasons that make it proper for people to turn up their noses, and so I can only decide the question off-hand. Looking at it in that way I can’t see anything in it. I simply think, if you want to know, that I’m as good as the best. Who the best are, I don’t pretend to say. I have never thought much about that either. To tell the truth, I have always had rather a good opinion of myself; a man who is successful can’t help it. But I will admit that I was conceited. What I don’t say yes to is that I don’t stand high—as high as anyone else. This is a line of speculation I should not have chosen, but you must remember you began it yourself. I should never have dreamed that I was on the defensive, or that I had to justify myself; but if your people will have it so, I will do my best.”

“But you offered, a while ago, to make your court as we say, to my mother and my brother.”

“Damn it!” cried Newman, “I want to be polite.”

“Good!” rejoined Bellegarde; “this will go far, it will be very entertaining. Excuse my speaking of it in that cold-blooded fashion, but the matter must, of necessity, be for me something of a spectacle. It’s positively exciting. But apart from that I sympathize with you, and I shall be actor, so far as I can, as well as spectator. You are a capital fellow; I believe in you and I back you. The simple fact that you appreciate my sister will serve as the proof I was asking for. All men are equal—especially men of taste!”

“Do you think,” asked Newman presently, “that Madame de Cintré is determined not to marry?”

“That is my impression. But that is not against you; it’s for you to make her change her mind.”

“I am afraid it will be hard,” said Newman, gravely.

“I don’t think it will be easy. In a general way I don’t see why a widow should ever marry again. She has gained the benefits of matrimony—freedom and consideration—and she has got rid of the drawbacks. Why should she put her head into the noose again? Her usual motive is ambition: if a man can offer her a great position, make her a princess or an ambassadress she may think the compensation sufficient.”

“And—in that way—is Madame de Cintré ambitious?”

“Who knows?” said Bellegarde, with a profound shrug. “I don’t pretend to say all that she is or all that she is not. I think she might be touched by the prospect of becoming the wife of a great man. But in a certain way, I believe, whatever she does will be the improbable. Don’t be too confident, but don’t absolutely doubt. Your best chance for success will be precisely in being, to her mind, unusual, unexpected, original. Don’t try to be anyone else; be simply yourself, out and out. Something or other can’t fail to come of it; I am very curious to see what.”

“I am much obliged to you for your advice,” said Newman. “And,” he added with a smile, “I am glad, for your sake, I am going to be so amusing.”

“It will be more than amusing,” said Bellegarde; “it will be inspiring. I look at it from my point of view, and you from yours. After all, anything for a change! And only yesterday I was yawning so as to dislocate my jaw, and declaring that there was nothing new under the sun! If it isn’t new to see you come into the family as a suitor, I am very much mistaken. Let me say that, my dear fellow; I won’t call it anything else, bad or good; I will simply call it new.” And overcome with a sense of the novelty thus foreshadowed, Valentin de Bellegarde threw himself into a deep armchair before the fire, and, with a fixed, intense smile, seemed to