The Wandering Jew, Complete

E >> Eugene Sue >> The Wandering Jew, Complete


"There now, Dagobert, you have begun to scold us already."

"Just at the very commencement," added Blanche.

"Commencement!--what, is there to be a sequel? a finish?"

"A finish? we hope not," said Rose, laughing like mad.

"All we ask is, that it should last forever," added Blanche, sharing in
the hilarity of her sister.

Dagobert looked gravely from one to the other of the two maidens, as if
trying to guess this enigma; but when he saw their sweet, innocent faces
gracefully animated by a frank, ingenuous laugh, he reflected that they
would not be so gay if they had any serious matter for self-reproach, and
he felt pleased at seeing them so merry in the midst of their precarious
position.

"Laugh on, my children!" he said. "I like so much to see you laugh."

Then, thinking that was not precisely the way in which he ought to treat
the singular confession of the young girls, he added in a gruff voice:
"Yes, I like to see you laugh--but not when you receive fair visitors
with blue eyes, young ladies!--Come, acknowledge that I'm an old fool to
listen to such nonsense--you are only making game of me."

"Nay, what we tell you is quite true."

"You know we never tell stories," added Rose.

"They are right--they never fib," said the soldier, in renewed
perplexity.

"But how the devil is such a visit possible? I sleep before your
door--Spoil-sport sleeps under your window--and all the blue eyes and
fair locks in the world must come in by one of those two ways--and, if
they had tried it, the dog and I, who have both of us quick ears, would
have received their visits after our fashion. But come, children! pray,
speak to the purpose. Explain yourselves!"

The two sisters, who saw, by the expression of Dagobert's countenance,
that he felt really uneasy, determined no longer to trifle with his
kindness. They exchanged a glance, and Rose, taking in her little hand
the coarse, broad palm of the veteran, said to him: "Come, do not plague
yourself! We will tell you all about the visits of our friend, Gabriel."

"There you are again!--He has a name, then?"

"Certainly, he has a name. It is Gabriel."

"Is it not a pretty name, Dagobert? Oh, you will see and love, as we do,
our beautiful Gabriel!"

"I'll love your beautiful Gabriel, will I?" said the veteran, shaking his
head--"Love your beautiful Gabriel?--that's as it may be. I must first
know--" Then, interrupting himself, he added: "It is queer. That reminds
me of something."

"Of what, Dagobert?"

"Fifteen years ago, in the last letter that your father, on his return
from France, brought me from my wife: she told me that, poor as she was,
and with our little growing Agricola on her hands, she had taken in a
poor deserted child, with the face of a cherub, and the name of
Gabriel--and only a short time since I heard of him again."

"And from whom, then?"

"You shall know that by and by."

"Well, then--since you have a Gabriel of your own--there is the more
reason that you should love ours."

"Yours! but who is yours? I am on thorns till you tell me."

"You know, Dagobert," resumed Rose, "that Blanche and I are accustomed to
fall asleep, holding each other by the hand."

"Yes, yes, I have often seen you in your cradle. I was never tired of
looking at you; it was so pretty."

"Well, then--two nights ago, we had just fallen asleep, when we beheld--"

"Oh, it was in a dream!" cried Dagobert. "Since you were asleep, it was
in a dream!"

"Certainly, in a dream--how else would you have it?"

"Pray let my sister go on with her tale!"

"All, well and good!" said the soldier with a sigh of satisfaction; "well
and good! To be sure, I was tranquil enough in any case--because--but
still--I like it better to be a dream. Continue, my little Rose."

"Once asleep, we both dreamt the same thing."

"What! both the same?"

"Yes, Dagobert; for the next morning when we awoke we related our two
dreams to each other."

"And they were exactly alike."

"That's odd enough, my children; and what was this dream all about?"

"In our dream, Blanche and I were seated together, when we saw enter a
beautiful angel, with a long white robe, fair locks, blue eyes, and so
handsome and benign a countenance, that we elapsed our hands as if to
pray to him. Then he told us, in a soft voice, that he was called
Gabriel; that our mother had sent him to be our guardian angel, and that
he would never abandon us."

"And, then," added Blanche, "he took us each by the hand, and, bending
his fair face over us, looked at us for a long time in silence, with so
much goodness--with so much goodness, that we could not withdraw our eyes
from his."

"Yes," resumed Rose, "and his look seemed, by turns, to attract us, or to
go to our hearts. At length, to our great sorrow, Gabriel quitted us,
having told us that we should see him again the following night."

"And did he make his appearance?"

"Certainly. Judge with what impatience we waited the moment of sleep, to
see if our friend would return, and visit us in our slumbers."

"Humph!" said Dagobert, scratching his forehead; "this reminds me, young
ladies, that you kept on rubbing your eyes last evening, and pretending
to be half asleep. I wager, it was all to send me away the sooner, and to
get to your dream as fast as possible."

"Yes, Dagobert."

"The reason being, you could not say to me, as you would to Spoil-sport:
Lie down, Dagobert! Well--so your friend Gabriel came back?"

"Yes, and this time he talked to us a great deal, and gave us, in the
name of our mother, such touching, such noble counsels, that the next
day, Rose and I spent our whole time in recalling every word of our
guardian angel--and his face, and his look--"

"This reminds me again, young ladies, that you were whispering all along
the road this morning; and that when I spoke of white, you answered
black."

"Yes, Dagobert, we were thinking of Gabriel."

"And, ever since, we love him as well as he loves us."

"But he is only one between both of you!"

"Was not our mother one between us?"

"And you, Dagobert--are you not also one for us both?"

"True, true! And yet, do you know, I shall finish by being jealous of
that Gabriel?"

"You are our friend by day--he is our friend by night."

"Let's understand it clearly. If you talk of him all day, and dream of
him all night, what will there remain for me?"

"There will remain for you your two orphans, whom you love so much," said
Rose.

"And who have only you left upon earth," added Blanche, in a caressing
tongue.

"Humph! humph! that's right, coax the old man over, Nay, believe me, my
children," added the soldier, tenderly, "I am quite satisfied with my
lot. I can afford to let you have your Gabriel. I felt sure that Spoil
sport and myself could take our rest in quiet. After all, there is
nothing so astonishing in what you tell me; your first dream struck your
fancy, and you talked so much about it that you had a second; nor should
I be surprised if you were to see this fine fellow a third time."

"Oh, Dagobert! do not make a jest of it! They are only dreams, but we
think our mother sends them to us. Did she not tell us that orphan
children were watched over by guardian angels? Well, Gabriel is our
guardian angel; he will protect us, and he will protect you also."

"Very kind of him to think of me; but you see, my dear children, for the
matter of defence, I prefer the dog; he is less fair than your angel, but
he has better teeth, and that is more to be depended on."

"How provoking you are, Dagobert--always jesting!"

"It is true; you can laugh at everything."

"Yes, I am astonishingly gay; I laugh with my teeth shut, in the style of
old Jovial. Come, children, don't scold me: I know I am wrong. The
remembrance of your dear mother is mixed with this dream, and you do well
to speak of it seriously. Besides," added he, with a grave air, "dreams
will sometimes come true. In Spain, two of the Empress's dragoons,
comrades of mine, dreamt, the night before their death, that they would
be poisoned by the monks--and so it happened. If you continue to dream of
this fair angel Gabriel, it is--it is--why, it is, because you are amused
by it; and, as you have none too many pleasures in the daytime, you may
as well get an agreeable sleep at night. But, now, my children, I have
also much to tell you; it will concern your mother; promise me not to be
sad."

"Be satisfied! when we think of her we are not sad, though serious."

"That is well. For fear of grieving you, I have always delayed the moment
of telling what your poor mother would have confided to you as soon as
you were no longer children. But she died before she had time to do so,
and that which I have to tell broke her heart--as it nearly did mine. I
put off this communication as long as I could, taking for pretext that I
would say nothing till we came to the field of battle where your father
was made prisoner. That gave me time; but the moment is now come; I can
shuffle it off no longer."

"We listen, Dagobert," responded the two maidens, with an attentive and
melancholy air.

After a moment's silence, during which he appeared to reflect, the
veteran thus addressed the young girls:

"Your father, General Simon, was the son of a workman, who remained a
workman; for, notwithstanding all that the general could say or do, the
old man was obstinate in not quitting his trade. He had a heart of gold
and a head of iron, just like his son. You may suppose, my children, that
when your father, who had enlisted as a private soldier, became a general
and a count of the empire, it was not without toil or without glory."

"A count of the Empire! what is that, Dagobert?"

"Flummery--a title, which the Emperor gave over and above the promotion,
just for the sake of saying to the people, whom he loved because he was
one of them: Here, children! You wish to play at nobility! You shall be
nobles. You wish to play at royalty! You shall be kings. Take what you
like--nothing is too good for you--enjoy yourselves!"

"Kings!" said the two girls, joining their hands in admiration.

"Kings of the first water. Oh, he was no niggard of his crowns, our
Emperor! I had a bed-fellow of mine, a brave soldier, who was afterwards
promoted to be king. This flattered us; for, if it was not one, it was
the other. And so, at this game, your father became count; but, count or
not, he was one of the best and bravest generals of the army."

"He was handsome, was he not, Dagobert?--mother always said so."

"Oh, yes! indeed he was--but quite another thing from your fair guardian
angel. Picture to yourself a fine, dark man, who looked splendid in his
full uniform, and could put fire into the soldiers' hearts. With him to
lead, we would have charged up into Heaven itself--that is, if Heaven
had, permitted it," added Dagobert, not wishing to wound in any way the
religious beliefs of the orphans.

"And father was as good as he was brave, Dagobert."

"Good, my children? Yes, I should say so!--He could bend a horse-shoe in
his hand as you would bend a card, and the day he was taken prisoner he
had cut down the Prussian artillerymen on their very cannon. With
strength and courage like that, how could he be otherwise than good? It
is then about nineteen years ago, not far from this place--on the spot I
showed you before we arrived at the village--that the general,
dangerously wounded, fell from his horse. I was following him at the
time, and ran to his assistance. Five minutes after we were made
prisoners--and by whom think you?--by a Frenchman."

"A Frenchman?"

"Yes, an emigrant marquis, a colonel in the service of Russia," answered
Dagobert, with bitterness. "And so, when this marquis advanced towards
us, and said to the general: 'Surrender, sir, to a countryman!'--'A
Frenchman, who fights against France,' replied the general, 'is no longer
my countryman; he is a traitor, and I'd never surrender to a traitor!'
And, wounded though he was, he dragged himself up to a Russian grenadier,
and delivered him his sabre, saying: 'I surrender to you my brave
fellow!' The marquis became pale with rage at it."

The orphans looked at each other with pride, and a rich crimson mantled
their cheeks, as they exclaimed: "Oh, our brave father!"

"Ah, those children," said Dagobert, as he proudly twirled his moustache.
"One sees they have soldier's blood in their veins! Well," he continued,
"we were now prisoners. The general's last horse had been killed under
him; and, to perform the journey, he mounted Jovial, who had not been
wounded that day. We arrived at Warsaw, and there it was that the general
first saw your mother. She was called the Pearl of Warsaw; that is saying
everything. Now he, who admired all that is good and beautiful, fell in
love with her almost immediately; and she loved him in return; but her
parents had promised her to another--and that other was the same--"

Dagobert was unable to proceed. Rose uttered a piercing cry, and pointed
in terror to the window.




CHAPTER VII.

THE TRAVELER.

Upon the cry of the young girl, Dagobert rose abruptly.

"What is the matter, Rose?"

"There--there!" she said, pointing to the window. "I thought I saw a hand
move the pelisse."

She had not concluded these words before Dagobert rushed to the window
and opened it, tearing down the mantle, which had been suspended from the
fastening.

It was still dark night, and the wind was blowing hard. The soldier
listened, but could hear nothing.

Returning to fetch the lamp from the table, he shaded the flame with his
hand, and strove to throw the light outside. Still he saw nothing.
Persuaded that a gust of wind had disturbed and shaken the pelisse: and
that Rose had been deceived by her own fears he again shut the window.

"Be satisfied, children! The wind is very high; it is that which lifted
the corner of the pelisse."

"Yet methought I saw plainly the fingers which had hold of it," said
Rose, still trembling.

"I was looking at Dagobert," said Blanche, "and I saw nothing."

"There was nothing to see, my children; the thing is clear enough. The
window is at least eight feet above the ground; none but a giant could
reach it without a ladder. Now, had any one used a ladder, there would
not have been time to remove it; for, as soon as Rose cried out, I ran to
the window, and, when I held out the light, I could see nothing."

"I must have been deceived," said Rose.

"You may be sure, sister, it was only the wind," added Blanche.

"Then I beg pardon for having disturbed you, my good Dagobert."

"Never mind!" replied the soldier musingly, "I am only sorry that Spoil
sport is not come back. He would have watched the window, and that would
have quite tranquillized you. But he no doubt scented the stable of his
comrade, Jovial, and will have called in to bid him good-night on the
road. I have half a mind to go and fetch him."

"Oh, no, Dagobert! do not leave us alone," cried the maidens; "we are too
much afraid."

"Well, the dog is not likely to remain away much longer, and I am sure we
shall soon hear him scratching at the door, so we will continue our
story," said Dagobert, as he again seated himself near the head of the
bed, but this time with his face towards the window.

"Now the general was prisoner at Warsaw," continued he, "and in love with
your mother, whom they wished to marry to another. In 1814, we learned
the finish of the war, the banishment of the Emperor to the Isle of Elba,
and the return of the Bourbons. In concert with the Prussians and
Russians, who had brought them back, they had exiled the Emperor.
Learning all this, your mother said to the general: 'The war is finished;
you are free, but your Emperor is in trouble. You owe everything to him;
go and join him in his misfortunes. I know not when we shall meet again,
but I shall never marry any one but you, I am yours till death!'--Before
he set out the general called me to him, and said: 'Dagobert, remain
here; Mademoiselle Eva may have need of you to fly from her family, if
they should press too hard upon her; our correspondence will have to pass
through your hands; at Paris, I shall see your wife and son; I will
comfort them, and tell them you are my friend.'"

"Always the same," said Rose, with emotion, as she looked affectionately
at Dagobert.

"As faithful to the father and mother as to their children," added
Blanche.

"To love one was to love them all," replied the soldier. "Well, the
general joined the Emperor at Elba; I remained at Warsaw, concealed in
the neighborhood of your mother's house; I received the letters, and
conveyed them to her clandestinely. In one of those letters--I feel proud
to tell you of it my children--the general informed me that the Emperor
himself had remembered me."

"What, did he know you?"

"A little, I flatter myself--'Oh! Dagobert!' said he to your father, who
was talking to him about me; 'a horse-grenadier of my old guard--a
soldier of Egypt and Italy, battered with wounds--an old dare-devil, whom
I decorated with my own hand at Wagram--I have not forgotten him!'--I
vow, children, when your mother read that to me, I cried like a fool."

"The Emperor--what a fine golden face he has on the silver cross with the
red ribbon that you would sometimes show us when we behaved well."

"That cross--given by him--is my relic. It is there in my knapsack, with
whatever we have of value--our little purse and papers. But, to return to
your mother; it was a great consolation to her, when I took her letters
from the general, or talked with her about him--for she suffered
much--oh, so much! In vain her parents tormented and persecuted her; she
always answered: 'I will never marry any one but General Simon.' A
spirited woman, I can tell you--resigned, but wonderfully courageous. One
day she received a letter from the general; he had left the Isle of Elba
with the Emperor; the war had again broken out, a short campaign, but as
fierce as ever, and heightened by soldiers' devotion. In that campaign of
France; my children, especially at Montmirail, your father fought like a
lion, and his division followed his example it was no longer valor--it
was frenzy. He told me that, in Champagne, the peasants killed so many of
those Prussians, that their fields were manured with them for years. Men,
women, children, all rushed upon them. Pitchforks, stones, mattocks, all
served for the slaughter. It was a true wolf hunt!"

The veins swelled on the soldier's forehead, and his cheeks flushed as he
spoke, for this popular heroism recalled to his memory the sublime
enthusiasm of the wars of the republic--those armed risings of a whole
people, from which dated the first steps of his military career, as the
triumphs of the Empire were the last days of his service.

The orphans, too, daughters of a soldier and a brave woman, did not
shrink from the rough energy of these words, but felt their cheeks glow,
and their hearts beat tumultuously.

"How happy we are to be the children of so brave a father!" cried
Blanche.

"It is a happiness and an honor too, my children--for the evening of the
battle of Montmirail, the Emperor, to the joy of the whole army, made
your father Duke of Ligny and Marshal of France."

"Marshal of France!" said Rose in astonishment, without understanding the
exact meaning of the words.

"Duke of Ligny!" added Blanche with equal surprise.

"Yes; Peter Simon, the son of a workman, became duke and marshal--there
is nothing higher except a king!" resumed Dagobert, proudly. "That's how
the Emperor treated the sons of the people, and, therefore, the people
were devoted to him. It was all very fine to tell them 'Your Emperor
makes you food for cannon.' 'Stuff!' replied the people, who are no
fools, 'another would make us food for misery. We prefer the cannon, with
the chance of becoming captain or colonel, marshal, king--or invalid;
that's better than to perish with hunger, cold, and age, on straw in a
garret, after toiling forty years for others.'"

"Even in France--even in Paris, that beautiful city--do you mean to say
there are poor people who die of hunger and misery, Dagobert?"

"Even in Paris? Yes, my children; therefore, I come back to the point,
the cannon is better. With it, one has the chance of becoming, like your
father, duke and marshal: when I say duke and marshal, I am partly right
and partly wrong, for the title and the rank were not recognized in the
end; because, after Montmirail, came a day of gloom, a day of great
mourning, when, as the general has told me, old soldiers like myself
wept--yes, wept!--on the evening of a battle. That day, my children, was
Waterloo!"

There was in these simple words of Dagobert an expression of such deep
sorrow, that it thrilled the hearts of the orphans.

"Alas!" resumed the soldier, with a sigh, "there are days which seem to
have a curse on them. That same day, at Waterloo, the general fell,
covered with wounds, at the head of a division of the Guards. When he was
nearly cured, which was not for a long time, he solicited permission to
go to St. Helena--another island at the far end of the world, to which
the English had carried the Emperor, to torture him at their leisure; for
if he was very fortunate in the first instance, he had to go through a
deal of hard rubs at last, my poor children."

"If you talk in that way, you will make us cry, Dagobert."

"There is cause enough for it--the Emperor suffered so much! He bled
cruelly at the heart believe me. Unfortunately, the general was not with
him at St. Helena; he would have been one more to console him; but they
would not allow him to go. Then, exasperated, like so many others,
against the Bourbons, the general engaged in a conspiracy to recall the
son of the Emperor. He relied especially on one regiment, nearly all
composed of his old soldiers, and he went down to a place in Picardy,
where they were then in garrison; but the conspiracy had already been
divulged. Arrested the moment of his arrival, the general was taken
before the colonel of the regiment. And this colonel," said the soldier,
after a brief pause, "who do you think it was again? Bah! it would be too
long to tell you all, and would only make you more sad; but it was a man
whom your father had many reasons to hate. When he found himself face to
face with him, he said: 'if you are not a coward, you will give me one
hour's liberty, and we will fight to the death; I hate you for this, I
despise you for that'--and so on. The colonel accepted the challenge, and
gave your father his liberty till the morrow. The duel was a desperate
one; the colonel was left for dead on the spot."

"Merciful heaven!"

"The general was yet wiping his sword, when a faithful friend came to
him, and told him he had only just time to save himself. In fact, he
happily succeeded in leaving France--yes, happily--for a fortnight after,
he was condemned to death as a conspirator."

"What misfortunes, good heaven!"

"There was some luck, however, in the midst of his troubles. Your mother
had kept her promise bravely, and was still waiting for him. She had
written to him: 'The Emperor first, and me next!' both unable to do
anything more for the Emperor, nor even for his son, the general,
banished from France, set out for Warsaw. Your mother had lost her
parents, and was now free; they were married--and I am one of the
witnesses to the marriage."

"You are right, Dagobert; that was great happiness in the midst of great
misfortunes!"

"Yes, they were very happy; but, as it happened with all good hearts, the
happier they were themselves, the more they felt for the sorrows of
others--and there was quite enough to grieve them at Warsaw. The Russians
had again begun to treat the Poles as their slaves; your brave mother,
though of French origin, was a Pole in heart and soul; she spoke out
boldly what others did not dare speak in a whisper, and all the
unfortunate called her their protecting angel. That was enough to excite
the suspicions of the Russian governor. One day, a friend of the
general's, formerly a colonel in the lancers, a brave and worthy man, was
condemned to be exiled to Siberia for a military plot against the
Russians. He took refuge in your father's house, and lay hid there; but
his retreat was discovered. During the next night, a party of Cossacks,
commanded by an officer, and followed by a travelling-carriage, arrive at
our door; they rouse the general from his sleep and take him away with
them."

"Oh, heaven! what did they mean to do with him?"

"Conduct him out of the Russian dominions, with a charge never to return,
on pain of perpetual imprisonment. His last words were: 'Dagobert, I
entrust to thee my wife and child!'--for it wanted yet some months of the
time when you were to be born. Well, notwithstanding that, they exiled
your mother to Siberia; it was an opportunity to get rid of her; she did
too much good at Warsaw, and they feared her accordingly. Not content
with banishing her, they confiscated all her property; the only favor she
could obtain was, that I should accompany her, and, had it not been for
Jovial, whom the general had given to me, she would have had to make the
journey on foot. It was thus, with her on horseback, and I leading her as
I lead you, my children, that we arrived at the poverty-stricken village,
where, three months after, you poor little things were born!"