The Marquis and the Maiden

A group of elegantly dressed and distinguished-looking men, ready to mount some fine and fiery-looking steeds, were gathered in momentary converse at the great gate of an old chateau, opening out upon some picturesque forest lands which stretched in broad magnificence on either hand. Before them the morning was bright and clear, the breeze blowing freshly upon their brows, and, by the pawing and snorting of the impatient animals, it was plain they were anxious to break forth into a wild, triumphant gallop.

Conspicuous among them was a young man of a noble and handsome presence. While his companions were idly talking, he was bending a pleased and astonished look upon the bright and beautiful head of a bashful maiden, whose brown rippling hair added to her beauty; her simplicity and modest demeanour rendered her an object of interest to a passionate admirer of the beautiful, as he really was. His ardent glance had caused her to cast down her eyes, and the long fringing lashes, so delicately pencilled and drawn in a straight line almost across the forehead, gave to her countenance a charm and grace which rivetted his look in wonder.

But the observer, in turn, was not unobserved, for a pair of fierce flashing eyes, full of daring and defiance, were bent upon him. A youth, in the undress of a groom, holding one of the horses by the bridle, scowled upon him with that peculiar fire which is the result of mingled jealously and hate. He was faultless in his form and build, a young Apollo, with that careless ease of manner, and with a certain bold frankness of air, which, in its unconsciousness, distinguished him even in the midst of that striking group.

“Come, Marquis,” said the elder of the noblemen, tapping the unconscious gazer on the arm, “lost in reverie, or has the beauty of the forester’s daughter witched you? In truth, Elodie is very handsome, and I do not wonder you acknowledge it.”

The Marquis gave a slight start, lifted up his eyes, and met the full angry glance of the youth bent upon him unquailing and defiant.¹Unvanquished or undaunted.

For a moment he was surprised at the daring of the groom, then an imperceptible sneer curled on his handsome lip, which made the groom’s cheek flush with a dusky red, but the eyes fell not. With a shrug he turned away, muttering–

“She is lovely, truly, is the forester’s daughter! and that audacious boor is doubtless her lover! Hem! a precious rival, truly.”

Making some commonplace reply to his friends, they now proceeded to mount their horses, and as Bazil (the groom) held the stirrup for the Marquis (de Funeste), the latter darted a scornful glance at the servitor, whose cheeks only crimsoned the more under the insolent stare. ²Funeste – French, meaning dreadful or fatal. He said–

“Ah, sir groom, you have a pretty companion in this solitude of yours. She lacks but a little of the polish of the city to be fully fitting the bounds of your ambition.”

“My Lord Marquis,” replied the other, steadily, “do not you seek to fill her head with any such false notion. It might not be for her good, and your name–”

“How now, sirrah!” cried the Marquis, frowning, and lifting up his riding whip, from which the groom did not shrink, though a fiery gleam was in his eye; “you are saucy, and must be curbed.”

“What’s the matter, Marquis–what has Bazil said to anger you?” cried the elder nobleman, the Sieur du Chatillon, Bazil’s master. “I do not allow my people to bandy words with their superiors.”

“Oh, my Lord, ‘tis nothing. I am competent to deal with grooms who are rude. It is your Bazil, here, who amuses me.”

“Oh!” said the Sieur, and turned his horse away.

“My Lord Marquis, I am neither rude nor saucy,” Bazil said between his teeth; “I only give you a warning–”

“Which I can take as I please; but peste !³Peste – a French interjection to indicate shock. I may admire this Elodie of yours, I hope, without fear of having my throat cut!”

“Do so, my Lord, but leave her here; she will wither in the city. She blossoms here like a wild flower;” and a look of ineffable love beamed in his handsome but darkened face. “In the capital she will pine and wither away–leave her in peace.”

“We will see,” returned the Marquis, with haughty coldness; “and now, sir, release my horse’s bridle, and restrain your temper;” and, with a careless cut of the whip across the servitor’s shoulder, he galloped after his companions, first gallantly kissing his gloved hand to the shrinking Elodie.

“Good, good!” muttered Bazil. “It is well. Nothing is our own which you great ones covet; but, by all the saints, it will be well to hold your own degree, and to leave us–peasants, serfs, and grooms as we are–in peace. Why, oh, why,” he added, “did her evil fate send him here? His whip–a blow–a lash! Hush! kenneled hound, and learn submission,” and, with another fiery glance cast after the richly garbed and handsome horseman, Bazil turned gloomily to the gateway.

Elodie had gone into the quaint and pretty lodge–its grey walls covered with climbing ivy and creeping odorous blossoms, and was looking forth, with a pale and frightened face, through the open lattice upon the stern, thoughtful brow of Bazil, as he closed the gate with an impatient clang.

He entered the lodge. The forester was abroad at his duties; her mother was at the hall. Elodie and Bazil were alone, save that a fine old hound lay basking in the shade, and the cat was lazily purring in the sunshine.

It was a lovely day. Birds sang in the high embowering trees of the demesne, and sunshine fell upon formal walks and velvet sward, between the slanting branches. In Bazil’s bosom there was no sunshine now. The glad, buoyant, joyous spirit, so usually characterizing him, lay in dull, dark shadow. There had come upon him a sense of some impending ill.

“Elodie!” he said, as he entered the little chamber; “Elodie!”

“Well, Bazil,” she said, now afraid of him–of him at whom, and with whom, she used to laugh with the utter glee of a heart entirely free from all dread or care. “I–I–listen. You should not be so cross–so bold–so, so rude, Bazil. It will anger the Sieur, and I–yes–I am very angry; do you hear?–very angry, at your showing so much temper–yes, temper.” The maiden was plucking up courage, like many more of us, who seek, by taking the initiative, to divert some expected censure. In this she failed, for Bazil was not a man to be caught after the manner of a surprise.

“Elodie,” he said, with a calm that made her dumb, “do you know that I love you?”

The eloquent blood mantling in her fair cheeks very likely told that this announcement was no news. But she could not reply.

“Yes, love you, adore you. You are to me life and honour, joy and happiness. I am your–your slave; but,” he continued, with the air of a reasonless despot, who would decapitate a subject upon a point of contradistinction, “I am also your protector.”

“My father protects me–my mother. I can protect myself.”

“You, you poor child!” and his tone was that of mingled tenderness and pity–the pity of a titan towards a helpless pigmy; and if it had not been for the large and honest manliness that was so easily read in his countenance, as if it had been a book, and which was not to be trifled with, it might have piqued her. Bazil was a noble fellow. She loved him–like a “sister”. Elodie thus qualified it to herself, and now she was in awe of him.

“You are in a strange mood, to-day, Bazil,” she said.

“I have not told you, in outright words, until to-day, that I love you;” he looked into her eyes, but how grave his eyes were! “You have known it–you know it now. When one has a little treasure–as a schoolboy his bird’s nest–as one has a flower-bed–as you have your pet pigeons–and none comes to enter in a claim for part or whole, one does not care to boast about the possession. It is only when that does occur that the assertion, ‘It is mine,’ is needed. You were mine–don’t start; mine–your voice, dear as music–the beauty of your flowing hair–the very glances of your eyes were mine–just as if the wind, blowing over some odorous shrubs or flowers, bore the delicious perfume to me, and made it mine. I must now say more.”

“Bazil!” and she looked reproachfully–as reproachfully as she could.

“Plain words–plain meaning–and no affectation, Elodie. I am your lover–heart and life, body and being. Can you–can you love me in turn, Elodie?” and his impetuous tones became broken.

“Oh, Bazil!” she exclaimed with a start, “what ails you to-day?”

“Can you not hear me? Do I speak plainly? It is because to-day comes the crisis of our destiny in life–yours and mine.”

“You frighten me. I do not understand you,” stammered Elodie.

“The Marquis de Funeste loves you, Elodie; do you know it, coquette?” and he gripped her hand. “Has he told you so? –quick!”⁴Coquette – French, refers to someone who flirts excessively or attempts to seduce others. Bazil is implying that Elodie is searching out the Marquis’ attention and trying to seduce him.

“No–oh, no!” she hastily returned, while a burning blush suffused her face. “You frighten me, Bazil.”

“I frighten you–you whom I love so deeply and so dearly!” he said sorrowfully. “It is ever the same–a man’s love and a man’s devotion go for little when there is a decision, a choice, to be made.”

“A choice!” and Elodie looked up at him in turn.

“Listen, then. I love you. The Marquis loves you; but oh! not–not as I do, Elodie. He will give you rich clothing, fine raiment, much gold, jewels–jewels, girl! And I–I can give you but one jewel–not saleable, truly, but one to outweigh all his–all he possesses–all he can command–my heart, my love, my life! Will you tell me, Elodie?”

“Will I tell you what?” asked Elodie, shrinking.

“Ah, you hesitate–you trifle with me! Well, if you love him, love him. Let him marry you–make you his wife; for if he does not–”

“Oh, Bazil, you are mad–mad!” she cried.

“I will kill him, and–” here he broke forth into a great burst of tears. “I am mad–but it is you who play with my feelings. Elodie! when the day comes that you would recal this hour, this moment, think of me–think of Bazil, who loves you.”

“Stay, Bazil, stay!” she cried in alarm; “you know I love you.”

This time his cry was triumphant and loud. He drew her to his breast ere she knew of the movement, had kissed her on the face and forehead, and saying, “Do not forget–you love me–I adore you, Elodie; you are mine, now, mine for ever!” rushed forth from the lodge, and disappeared amidst the great wooded wilderness surrounding the bewildered and startled girl’s dwelling.

Days went by, and matters at the old chateau went on pretty much as usual. The Sieur du Chatillon was entertaining a party of friends from the great capital, whose time was spent in hunting, feasting, holiday fêtes, and other species of revelry.⁵Fêtes – a French word that can either be used in reference to holidays, feasts, or parties. Foremost among them all, handsome, titled, wealthy, ardent in any pursuit of the moment, was the Marquis de Funeste. The first sight of Elodie had kindled both his admiration and his ardour, and which the words of the impetuous Bazil wrought into a determined intention.

For these two natures, so lofty and so lowly, were in their unbending and resolute stubbornness, identical. The same spirit of antagonism and resistance were equally meted out in the bosom of the noble and the peasant. The Marquis might hold his host’s menial in contempt, but this was met on the other hand by a disdain equally lofty on the side of Bazil; and, as this was a period when rank was yet slavishly respected, the stately and independent air which Bazil assumed towards the Marquis was the more astonishing.⁶Menial is a nominalization of the adjective, used in reference to the people employed by the Sieur du Chatillon, specifically Bazil. At first this amused the Marquis de Funeste, then irritated, and finally angered him.

If Elodie, after the startling confession of love made to her by Bazil with such a mixture of fierceness and fervour–if she entertained any apprehension that he might become troublesome, exacting, haunting her presence every hour of the day, and dinning those sweet litanies of love in her ears which, doubtless, must be very tiring and wearisome, she was utterly mistaken. His love was like a calm, strong, slowly-gliding stream, its almost majestic flow arising out of its very depth. His nature was steadfast, trusting, and firm. He would devour her beauty with a serene and adoring look which, more than words or protestations, spoke its intensity.

The Marquis, with that audacity belonging to youth and his rank, and with that joyous freedom which deprives a purpose of all apparent intention, while it wins by its condescension and affability, would wander through the park, halt at the forester’s lodge, converse with “papa” Gaspard about hounds and deer, chat with Nanette about her fowls, and, when their blushing daughter Elodie came nigh, would compliment her with bewitching effrontery and swear, with the elegant oaths of the day, how perfect their little wild rose would be if she could be spared a month at the capital. Nay, he offered to exercise his influence with a married sister of his, the Countess Clémence d’Orgueil, in order to obtain for Elodie the privilege of waiting upon her and being near to her person–that is to say, to live, and move, and breathe in the very atmosphere of the court.⁷Orgeuil – French for pride.

“Of the court, Monseiur le Marquis–to be near our monarch!” the ambitious mother gasped.

“Even so,” said the Marquis, with his bewitching smile; “and what do you say to this, Père Gaspard?”

“I say, my Lord Marquis,” returned the bluff forester, “that Elodie has all she needs or wishes to have; that my wife Nanette is a bit of a fool–stop! that won’t quite do, but she’s as vain of her daughter as of her bantams. I say, my Lord, that I am satisfied with things as they are, and that Elodie is going to be married at the next Easter-tide.”

“Married!” ejaculated the Marquis, biting his lip. “Ah! That’s news; and pray, Père Gaspard, who may it be to?”

“To me, my Lord Marquis,” said a quiet voice by his side.

The Marquis turned round, and beheld, standing near him, a figure, steady and straight as a lance, as if carved of stone, with a quiet, impassive look upon his brown manly face, expressing neither doubt, fear, disquiet, nor any other kind of emotion whatever. The Marquis could not but acknowledge the steady, equable calm of that indomitable temper. By this time he began to know the man more thoroughly. It was Bazil.

With an ironical bow, the Marquis took off his hat, and, congratulating mademoiselle upon her choice, and Monsieur l’Ecuyer upon his taste, he bade the forester and family a good day, and strode off to join the dinner party at the chateau.⁸Écuyer (here spelled Ecuyer) – French for groom, specifically the groom of a soldier or lord.

Within another week the party of guests at the chateau broke up, each departing his way; the Marquis to Paris, but with him also departed the Sieur du Chatillon and his family, and, by entreaty or command, Elodie departed also, being pressed into the service of the Sieur’s lady to wait upon her daughter. Bazil’s marriage was, of course, deferred. He made no “scene” at being thus parted from his mistress.

Elodie embraced him in tears, and Bazil kissed them away. If he had any suspicions, he did not betray them. The lovers separated; and Bazil resumed his ordinary avocations, heeding as little Gaspard’s dissatisfied grumbling, as Nanette’s elation at her daughter’s path to distinction. Impassive, to all outward appearance Bazil bore his disappointment without complaint, and time wore on.

It wore on wearily for some months, when the Sieur du Chatillon and his family returned, but Elodie returned not with them. To the inquiries of her parents it was said that, in compliance with the warmly-expressed wishes of the Countess Clémence d’Orgueil, Elodie had been transferred to her service, where she was left well and happy.

“Well and happy!” The words fell on Bazil’s ear without eliciting remark–to Gaspard’s indignation, and to Nanette’s new triumph. Not that she objected to Bazil for a son-in-law; but then–– Then Elodie was really a superior girl, and might do better. “She might also do worse,” growled Gaspard, in reply to this, but said no more. On the other hand, the undemonstrative Bazil kept all he thought to himself. One early day, however, he departed without the ceremony of leave-taking. Some little wages had been paid him, and, without confiding his intention to anyone, and little heeding the Sieur du Chatillon’s anger, he left the matter of his absence to arrange itself, and set forth to the capital.

A considerable period after this, there might have been seen rambling about the streets of Paris a gaunt, gloomy man, coarsely garbed, young still, but with his haggard cheeks, untrimmed beard, and long black hair, remarkable for some remains of masculine beauty, both in face and form–a grim and wrecked Antinous. To the inquiries of the police, his reply was that he was seeking a lost or missing sister, and, as he became known to that ubiquitous body, he was left unmolested at last. For some hours of the day, he worked about the “quais,” or joined the fraternity of water-carriers, after the usual desperate opposition to the entry of another amongst the brotherhood.⁹Quais – French for docks. The rest of his time he spent in “haunting” the higher quartiers, and in occasional visits to the theatres—just where his fancy led him, and where he was not refused entrance.¹⁰Quartiers – groupings of neighborhoods with distinct character used to divide Paris.

Bazil had, on first arriving in Paris, with his few crowns in his pocket, his humble bundle (don’t read humble-bumble, dear reader) on his shoulder, and his rustic garb, sought the Hôtel d’Orgueil, and made inquiries after Elodie.¹¹Hôtel – French, used in this context to refer to the lodgings of nobility within the city. The valets—the “varlets”—and other servitors in the vestibule tittered first at the blunt query, then, seeing the tears starting into the eyes of the apparently young stoic, the titter broke into a laugh.¹²Varlet is an archaic form of valet. Here it seems to be used to indicate and make fun of Bazil’s ignorance. It was enough to show the volcanic element beneath that cold exterior. When his most gigantic magnificence—the Countess’s own chasseur—felt a gripe upon his throat that went nigh to strangling him, the laugh ceased, and physical force was attempted to drive him forth; but the maddened Bazil held them at bay.¹³Chasseur – French for hunter; a term used to refer to foot soldiers; here the chasseur is the personal guard of the Countess. He then descended the steps, and, clenching his hand with a gesture of immortal hatred at the evil house—for such he held it to be—took his solitary way.

He was close to one of the great theatres of the city. A gilded carriage hastily driving along caused him, as he was crossing the street in a dolorous reverie, to leap on to the pathway by the pillars of the theater. His glance caught at once the handsome face of the Marquis de Funeste; but the face that froze him was that of the superb Elodie—so lovely, so beautiful, so radiant in her dress and gems—her rippling hair one mingled mass of brilliancy and beauty—and involuntarily he cried out her name.

“Elodie! Elodie!”

She started, turned, looked, beheld him! He had sunk almost upon his knees with outstretched hands.

“Come here, Elodie, Père Gaspard wants you. Your poor mother pines for you, and I–I die for you!” and he sank to the ground.

When he awoke from his delirium, he was the inmate of a prison; but, explaining his vague errand in his own manner (as indicated), he was released, and, in five minutes, was permitted to wander in his own fashion. He had betrayed no name that might have locked him in the Bastile for years, or sent him to the galleys probably—the noblesse had great power then, and the Marquis not a slight share of it—and he was pronounced harmless, utterly intact.¹⁴Bastile – Bastille, an infamous French prison. Noblesse – French term used to refer to the landed and titled nobility of this period.

So time still progressed, but he saw her—watching her furtively after—and, in his inner soul, he moaned and sorrowed for her brilliant sin. He saw her grow paler, sadder, and, at last, neglected, and then—aye, then, his anguish felt relief, but the vast smothering fire was kindled afresh. With the awful patience of Fate he waited, waited, watched and waited, his oath already recorded, and, one day, he plunged into the Seine after a drowning woman who had cast herself in. It was his beloved, his own betrothed, Elodie! He struggled with her to the shore. With the setting sun she departed.

She had lain with dripping dress and dabbled hair upon his poor pallet. She had told him a sad, sad—an old, old story. She loved him, she said; but here the man knit his brows, and put his face within his hands.

“When you see them at—at home— oh, where is mine?—tell them to bless me, for I have yearned for the old porch, and prayed, I trust, for those who passed beneath it. Bid my father believe me of less worth than-than I am; but no!” she cried, with sudden energy, “bid him not do so, for on my head lies the sin of trust and broken faith, and you—you Bazil—you—”

“I,” said Bazil gently, “am not to be taken into count. I could only love you, I could not make you a splendid and guilty thing, nor lavish on you what was not mine—”

“Bazil, he—he—wronged—me—wronged me, do you hear?”

“Good—I hear you! I understand!” said Bazil, in a hushed, awful whisper.

“Kiss me—give me, Bazil, one kiss of forgiveness, one kiss of parting, for I am dying—one kiss of love—of eternal farewell.”

Bazil kissed her on the lips and forehead, and, with a shivering sigh, but also with a heavenly smile upon her lips, her soul passed away. She died upon his breast. Her head, once so bright and beautiful, lost its radiance, as a flower droops and dims when the stalk is crushed and broken.

“Adieu, my love, my darling, my life!” murmured Bazil, hanging over her, and gazing upon the exquisite face, growing out of its first rigid pallor into a placid beatitude of expression which filled him with wonder.¹⁵Adieu – French for “to God,” adieu is used as a farewell when the speaker knows they will not see the other person until they meet God; it is a permanent farewell. For hours he sat by the corpse. At daybreak the next morning he went forth to order her funeral, and, a day or two after her obsequies were over—Bazil the only mourner—clad in his best apparel, with trimmed beard, and with an air that was both refined and noble, but marked also by such degrees of his great wordless sorrow and anguish as he could not repress, presented himself at the hotel of the Marquis de Funeste. He found some difficulty in obtaining an interview; but Bazil was possessed of that invincible pertinacity which, without being clamorous or violent, fully obtains its purpose. Hat in hand, he stood before the Marquis.

“I am Bazil, my Lord Marquis,” he began, “once servitor to the Sieur du Chatillon.”

“I recognise you,” was the haughty remark. “I recollect having put my whip on your shoulder.”

“Good!” returned Bazil with phlegm. “It was an honour I did not forget. You have not forgotten also Elodie, the forester’s daughter?”

“No. Do you know what has become of her?” demanded the Marquis quickly.

“Have you missed her, then, so soon, and so much?”

“Slave!” cried the Marquis, stamping his foot in a rage, “tell me what you know of her.”

“I know that I was to have been her husband—”

“Bah! the fates altered that,” said the Marquis.

“I am now to become her avenger,” continued Bazil.

“Her—avenger!” exclaimed the Marquis, in amazement.

“I warned you once against tampering with Elodie, and you must suffer for your deed.”

“Where is Elodie? quick! or I will have you scourged.”

“There!” and, with a gesture that was both grand and simple, Bazil, with his finger, pointed upwards.

The Marquis shuddered and shrank back, and his face grew very pale. His limbs and whole frame trembled.

“What, what is this I hear?” he murmured. “I am not, surely, dreaming?”

” Oh, no, my Lord. You are fully awake; but she—Elodie is sleeping very soundly. She will awaken no more.”

“I do not understand you. Explain,” stammered the nobleman.

“I drew a drowning woman—young and beautiful even in the last hour of her life—drew her out of the Seine. It was Elodie. You had cast her forth—”

“No, on my honour—” began the Marquis.

“Ah, your heart had then— Well, she died in my little chamber—she died on my breast, after all. That was all I had of my beautiful betrothed. I have laid her in her grave, and now come to demand satisfaction for the wrong you have done her.”

“You would have me fight with you. You, a peasant!” and his curling lip expressed his scorn.

“Yes, I would have you cross swords with me, my Lord. I know how to use a weapon. If you were not too great to wrong a forester’s daughter, you ought not to be too great to render satisfaction to her peasant lover.”

“I refuse—do you hear?—I refuse. Get you gone,” cried the Marquis, “and on your peril cross my path no more.”

“I go,” said Bazil, “but you will fulfil your name. It is your fate,” and he strode out of the chamber.

Three mornings after, the dead body of the Marquis was found a few paces from his hotel. He had been assassinated; but, for all the search made, the assassin could not be discovered. A paper was affixed to the haft of the knife buried in the breast of the unfortunate man. On it was written the words—

“This is to avenge Elodie!”

Some weeks elapsed, when a letter from a distant province reached the old forester’s hands. Trembling, the bereaved and unhappy father tore it open and read the following brief lines—

“Père Gaspard, Elodie is in her grave. Her beautiful eyes are closed in shame and death. I buried her, and I avenged her. The Marquis de Funeste, who robbed her of her innocence and shortened her life, is no more. I bless you, and bid you adieu for ever.”

BAZIL.

What became of Bazil was never afterwards known. He possibly perished in the wars of the period, and the story of Elodie became a tradition of the past, until oblivion fell over the whole, and none were left to mourn for her. Nanette, her mother, died heart-broken, and the old forester did not long survive his desolation.

Word Count: 5288