FullReads

The Marana pulled the Italian to the side of her daughter’s bed and said to him, in a low voice,–

“If I spare you, give thanks for the rest of your life; but, remember this, if your tongue ever injures my daughter you will see me again. Go!–How much ‘dot’ do you give her?” she continued, going up to Perez.

“She has two hundred thousand gold piastres,” replied the Spaniard.

“And that is not all, monsieur,” said the Marana, turning to Diard. “Who are you?–Go!” she repeated to Montefiore.

The marquis, hearing this statement of gold piastres, came forward once more, saying,–

“I am really free–“

A glance from Juana silenced him.

“You are really free to go,” she said.

And he went immediately.

“Alas! monsieur,” said the girl, turning to Diard, “I thank you with admiration. But my husband is in heaven. To-morrow I shall enter a convent–“

“Juana, my Juana, hush!” cried the mother, clasping her in her arms. Then she whispered in the girl’s ear. “You MUST have another husband.”

Juana turned pale. She freed herself from her mother and sat down once more in her arm-chair.

“Who are you, monsieur?” repeated the Marana, addressing Diard.

“Madame, I am at present only the quartermaster of the 6th of the line. But for such a wife I have the heart to make myself a marshal of France. My name is Pierre-Francois Diard. My father was provost of merchants. I am not–“

“But, at least, you are an honest man, are you not?” cried the Marana, interrupting him. “If you please the Signorina Juana di Mancini, you can marry her and be happy together.–Juana,” she continued in a grave tone, “in becoming the wife of a brave and worthy man remember that you will also be a mother. I have sworn that you shall kiss your children without a blush upon your face” (her voice faltered slightly). “I have sworn that you shall live a virtuous life; expect, therefore, many troubles. But, whatever happens, continue pure, and be faithful to your husband. Sacrifice all things to him, for he will be the father of your children–the father of your children! If you take a lover, I, your mother, will stand between you and him. Do you see that dagger? It is in your ‘dot,'” she continued, throwing the weapon on Juana’s bed. “I leave it there as the guarantee of your honor so long as my eyes are open and my arm free. Farewell,” she said, restraining her tears. “God grant that we may never meet again.”

At that idea, her tears began to flow.

“Poor child!” she added, “you have been happier than you knew in this dull home.–Do not allow her to regret it,” she said, turning to Diard.

The foregoing rapid narrative is not the principal subject of this Study, for the understanding of which it was necessary to explain how it happened that the quartermaster Diard married Juana di Mancini, that Montefiore and Diard were intimately known to each other, and to show plainly what blood and what passions were in Madame Diard.

CHAPTER III

THE HISTORY OF MADAME DIARD

By the time that the quartermaster had fulfilled all the long and dilatory formalities without which no French soldier can be married, he was passionately in love with Juana di Mancini, and Juana had had time to think of her coming destiny.

An awful destiny! Juana, who felt neither esteem nor love for Diard, was bound to him forever, by a rash but necessary promise. The man was neither handsome nor well-made. His manners, devoid of all distinction, were a mixture of the worst army tone, the habits of his province, and his own insufficient education. How could she love Diard, she, a young girl all grace and elegance, born with an invincible instinct for luxury and good taste, her very nature tending toward the sphere of the higher social classes? As for esteeming him, she rejected the very thought precisely because he had married her. This repulsion was natural. Woman is a saintly and noble creature, but almost always misunderstood, and nearly always misjudged because she is misunderstood. If Juana had loved Diard she would have esteemed him. Love creates in a wife a new woman; the woman of the day before no longer exists on the morrow. Putting on the nuptial robe of a passion in which life itself is concerned, the woman wraps herself in purity and whiteness. Reborn into virtue and chastity, there is no past for her; she is all future, and should forget the things behind her to relearn life. In this sense the famous words which a modern poet has put into the lips of Marion Delorme is infused with truth,–