The Vicar of Tours

H >> Honore de Balzac >> The Vicar of Tours


Like the seconds or sponsors who in the Middle Age armed the champion,
and strengthened his valor by useful counsel until he entered the
lists, so the sly old fox had said to the baroness at the last moment:
"Don't forget your cue. You are a mediator, and not an interested
party. Troubert also is a mediator. Weigh your words; study the
inflection of the man's voice. If he strokes his chin you have got
him."

Some sketchers are fond of caricaturing the contrast often observable
between "what is said" and "what is thought" by the speaker. To catch
the full meaning of the duel of words which now took place between the
priest and the lady, it is necessary to unveil the thoughts that each
hid from the other under spoken sentences of apparent insignificance.
Madame de Listomere began by expressing the regret she had felt at
Birotteau's lawsuit; and then went on to speak of her desire to settle
the matter to the satisfaction of both parties.

"The harm is done, madame," said the priest, in a grave voice. "The
pious and excellent Mademoiselle Gamard is dying." ("I don't care a
fig for the old thing," thought he, "but I mean to put her death on
your shoulders and harass your conscience if you are such a fool as to
listen to it.")

"On hearing of her illness," replied the baroness, "I entreated
Monsieur Birotteau to relinquish his claims; I have brought the
document, intending to give it to that excellent woman." ("I see what
you mean, you wily scoundrel," thought she, "but we are safe now from
your calumnies. If you take this document you'll cut your own fingers
by admitting you are an accomplice.")

There was silence for a moment.

"Mademoiselle Gamard's temporal affairs do not concern me," said the
priest at last, lowering the large lids over his eagle eyes to veil
his emotions. ("Ho! ho!" thought he, "you can't compromise me. Thank
God, those damned lawyers won't dare to plead any cause that could
smirch me. What do these Listomeres expect to get by crouching in this
way?")

"Monsieur," replied the baroness, "Monsieur Birotteau's affairs are no
more mine than those of Mademoiselle Gamard are yours; but,
unfortunately, religion is injured by such a quarrel, and I come to
you as a mediator--just as I myself am seeking to make peace." ("We
are not decieving each other, Monsieur Troubert," thought she. "Don't
you feel the sarcasm of that answer?")

"Injury to religion, madame!" exclaimed the vicar-general. "Religion
is too lofty for the actions of men to injure." ("My religion is I,"
thought he.) "God makes no mistake in His judgments, madame; I
recognize no tribunal but His."

"Then, monsieur," she replied, "let us endeavor to bring the judgments
of men into harmony with the judgments of God." ("Yes, indeed, your
religion is you.")

The Abbe Troubert suddenly changed his tone.

"Your nephew has been to Paris, I believe." ("You found out about me
there," thought he; "you know now that I can crush you, you who dared
to slight me, and you have come to capitulate.")

"Yes, monsieur; thank you for the interest you take in him. He returns
to-night; the minister, who is very considerate of us, sent for him;
he does not want Monsieur de Listomere to leave the service."
("Jesuit, you can't crush us," thought she. "I understand your
civility.")

A moment's silence.

"I did not think my nephew's conduct in this affair quite the thing,"
she added; "but naval men must be excused; they know nothing of law."
("Come, we had better make peace," thought she; "we sha'n't gain
anything by battling in this way.")

A slight smile wandered over the priests face and was lost in its
wrinkles.

"He has done us the service of getting a proper estimate on the value
of those paintings," he said, looking up at the pictures. "They will
be a noble ornament to the chapel of the Virgin." ("You shot a sarcasm
at me," thought he, "and there's another in return; we are quits,
madame.")

"If you intend to give them to Saint-Gatien, allow me to offer frames
that will be more suitable and worthy of the place, and of the works
themselves." ("I wish I could force you to betray that you have taken
Birotteau's things for your own," thought she.)

"They do not belong to me," said the priest, on his guard.

"Here is the deed of relinquishment," said Madame de Listomere; "it
ends all discussion, and makes them over to Mademoiselle Gamard." She
laid the document on the table. ("See the confidence I place in you,"
thought she.) "It is worthy of you, monsieur," she added, "worthy of
your noble character, to reconcile two Christians,--though at present
I am not especially concerned for Monsieur Birotteau--"

"He is living in your house," said Troubert, interrupting her.

"No, monsieur, he is no longer there." ("That peerage and my nephew's
promotion force me to do base things," thought she.)

The priest remained impassible, but his calm exterior was an
indication of violent emotion. Monsieur Bourbonne alone had fathomed
the secret of that apparent tranquillity. The priest had triumphed!

"Why did you take upon yourself to bring that relinquishment," he
asked, with a feeling analogous to that which impels a woman to fish
for compliments.

"I could not avoid a feeling of compassion. Birotteau, whose feeble
nature must be well known to you, entreated me to see Madaemoiselle
Gamard and to obtain as the price of his renunciation--"

The priest frowned.

"of rights upheld by distinguished lawyers, the portrait of--"

Troubert looked fixedly at Madame de Listomere.

"the portrait of Chapeloud," she said, continuing: "I leave you to
judge of his claim." ("You will be certain to lose your case if we go
to law, and you know it," thought she.)

The tone of her voice as she said the words "distinguished lawyers"
showed the priest that she knew very well both the strength and
weakness of the enemy. She made her talent so plain to this
connoisseur emeritus in the course of a conversation which lasted a
long time in the tone here given, that Troubert finally went down to
Mademoiselle Gamard to obtain her answer to Birotteau's request for
the portrait.

He soon returned.

"Madame," he said, "I bring you the words of a dying woman. 'The Abbe
Chapeloud was so true a friend to me,' she said, 'that I cannot
consent to part with his picture.' As for me," added Troubert, "if it
were mine I would not yield it. My feelings to my late friend were so
faithful that I should feel my right to his portrait was above that of
others."

"Well, there's no need to quarrel over a bad picture." ("I care as
little about it as you do," thought she.) "Keep it, and I will have a
copy made of it. I take some credit to myself for having averted this
deplorable lawsuit; and I have gained, personally, the pleasure of
your acquaintance. I hear you have a great talent for whist. You will
forgive a woman for curiosity," she said, smiling. "If you will come
and play at my house sometimes you cannot doubt your welcome."

Troubert stroked his chin. ("Caught! Bourbonne was right!" thought
she; "he has his quantum of vanity!")

It was true. The vicar-general was feeling the delightful sensation
which Mirabeau was unable to subdue when in the days of his power he
found gates opening to his carriage which were barred to him in
earlier days.

"Madame," he replied, "my avocations prevent my going much into
society; but for you, what will not a man do?" ("The old maid is going
to die; I'll get a footing at the Listomere's, and serve them if they
serve me," thought he. "It is better to have them for friends than
enemies.")

Madame de Listomere went home, hoping that the archbishop would
complete the work of peace so auspiciously begun. But Birotteau was
fated to gain nothing by his relinquishment. Mademoiselle Gamard died
the next day. No one felt surprised when her will was opened to find
that she had left everything to the Abbe Troubert. Her fortune was
appraised at three hundred thousand francs. The vicar-general sent to
Madame de Listomere two notes of invitation for the services and for
the funeral procession of his friend; one for herself and one for her
nephew.

"We must go," she said.

"It can't be helped," said Monsieur de Bourbonne. "It is a test to
which Troubert puts you. Baron, you must go to the cemetery," he
added, turning to the lieutenant, who, unluckily for him, had not left
Tours.

The services took place, and were performed with unusual
ecclesiastical magnificence. Only one person wept, and that was
Birotteau, who, kneeling in a side chapel and seen by none, believed
himself guilty of the death and prayed sincerely for the soul of the
deceased, bitterly deploring that he was not able to obtain her
forgiveness before she died.

The Abbe Troubert followed the body of his friend to the grave; at the
verge of which he delivered a discourse in which, thanks to his
eloquence, the narrow life the old maid had lived was enlarged to
monumental proportions. Those present took particular note of the
following words in the peroration:--

"This life of days devoted to God and to His religion, a life adorned
with noble actions silently performed, and with modest and hidden
virtues, was crushed by a sorrow which we might call undeserved if we
could forget, here at the verge of this grave, that our afflictions
are sent by God. The numerous friends of this saintly woman, knowing
the innocence and nobility of her soul, foresaw that she would issue
safely from her trials in spite of the accusations which blasted her
life. It may be that Providence has called her to the bosom of God to
withdraw her from those trials. Happy they who can rest here below in
the peace of their own hearts as Sophie now is resting in her robe of
innocence among the blest."

"When he had ended his pompous discourse," said Monsieur de Bourbonne,
after relating the incidents of the internment to Madame de Listomere
when whist was over, the doors shut, and they were alone with the
baron, "this Louis XI. in a cassock--imagine him if you can!--gave a
last flourish to the sprinkler and aspersed the coffin with holy
water." Monsieur de Bourbonne picked up the tongs and imitated the
priest's gesture so satirically that the baron and his aunt could not
help laughing. "Not until then," continued the old gentleman, "did he
contradict himself. Up to that time his behavior had been perfect; but
it was no doubt impossible for him to put the old maid, whom he
despised so heartily and hated almost as much as he hated Chapeloud,
out of sight forever without allowing his joy to appear in that last
gesture."

The next day Mademoiselle Salomon came to breakfast with Madame de
Listomere, chiefly to say, with deep emotion: "Our poor Abbe Birotteau
has just received a frightful blow, which shows the most determined
hatred. He is appointed curate of Saint-Symphorien."

Saint-Symphorien is a suburb of Tours lying beyond the bridge. That
bridge, one of the finest monuments of French architecture, is
nineteen hundred feet long, and the two open squares which surround
each end are precisely alike.

"Don't you see the misery of it?" she said, after a pause, amazed at
the coldness with which Madame de Listomere received the news. "It is
just as if the abbe were a hundred miles from Tours, from his friends,
from everything! It is a frightful exile, and all the more cruel
because he is kept within sight of the town where he can hardly ever
come. Since his troubles he walks very feebly, yet he will have to
walk three miles to see his old friends. He has taken to his bed, just
now, with fever. The parsonage at Saint-Symphorien is very cold and
damp, and the parish is too poor to repair it. The poor old man will
be buried in a living tomb. Oh, it is an infamous plot!"

To end this history it will suffice to relate a few events in a simple
way, and to give one last picture of its chief personages.

Five months later the vicar-general was made Bishop of Troyes; and
Madame de Listomere was dead, leaving an annuity of fifteen hundred
francs to the Abbe Birotteau. The day on which the dispositions in her
will were made known Monseigneur Hyacinthe, Bishop of Troyes, was on
the point of leaving Tours to reside in his diocese, but he delayed
his departure on receiving the news. Furious at being foiled by a
woman to whom he had lately given his countenance while she had been
secretly holding the hand of a man whom he regarded as his enemy,
Troubert again threatened the baron's future career, and put in
jeopardy the peerage of his uncle. He made in the salon of the
archbishop, and before an assembled party, one of those priestly
speeches which are big with vengeance and soft with honied mildness.
The Baron de Listomere went the next day to see this implacable enemy,
who must have imposed sundry hard conditions on him, for the baron's
subsequent conduct showed the most entire submission to the will of
the terrible Jesuit.

The new bishop made over Mademoiselle Gamard's house by deed of gift
to the Chapter of the cathedral; he gave Chapeloud's books and
bookcases to the seminary; he presented the two disputed pictures to
the Chapel of the Virgin; but he kept Chapeloud's portrait. No one
knew how to explain this almost total renunciation of Mademoiselle
Gamard's bequest. Monsieur de Bourbonne supposed that the bishop had
secretly kept moneys that were invested, so as to support his rank
with dignity in Paris, where of course he would take his seat on the
Bishops' bench in the Upper Chamber. It was not until the night before
Monseigneur Troubert's departure from Tours that the sly old fox
unearthed the hidden reason of this strange action, the deathblow
given by the most persistent vengeance to the feeblest of victims.
Madame de Listomere's legacy to Birotteau was contested by the Baron
de Listomere under a pretence of undue influence!

A few days after the case was brought the baron was promoted to the
rank of captain. As a measure of ecclesiastical discipline, the curate
of Saint-Symphorien was suspended. His superiors judged him guilty.
The murderer of Sophie Gamard was also a swindler. If Monseigneur
Troubert had kept Mademoiselle Gamard's property he would have found
it difficult to make the ecclestiastical authorities censure
Birotteau.

At the moment when Monseigneur Hyacinthe, Bishop of Troyes, drove
along the quay Saint-Symphorien in a post-chaise on his way to Paris
poor Birotteau had been placed in an armchair in the sun on a terrace
above the road. The unhappy priest, smitten by the archbishop, was
pale and haggard. Grief, stamped on every feature, distorted the face
that was once so mildly gay. Illness had dimmed his eyes, formerly
brightened by the pleasures of good living and devoid of serious
ideas, with a veil which simulated thought. It was but the skeleton of
the old Birotteau who had rolled only one year earlier so vacuous but
so content along the Cloister. The bishop cast one look of pity and
contempt upon his victim; then he consented to forget him, and went
his way.

There is no doubt that Troubert would have been in other times a
Hildebrand or an Alexander the Sixth. In these days the Church is no
longer a political power, and does not absorb the whole strength of
her solitaries. Celibacy, however, presents the inherent vice of
concentating the faculties of man upon a single passion, egotism,
which renders celibates either useless or mischievous. We live at a
period when the defect of governments is to make Man for Society
rather than Society for Man. There is a perpetual struggle going on
between the Individual and the Social system which insists on using
him, while he is endeavoring to use it to his own profit; whereas, in
former days, man, really more free, was also more loyal to the public
weal. The round in which men struggle in these days has been
insensibly widened; the soul which can grasp it as a whole will ever
be a magnificent exception; for, as a general thing, in morals as in
physics, impulsion loses in intensity what it gains in extension.
Society can not be based on exceptions. Man in the first instance was
purely and simply, father; his heart beat warmly, concentrated in the
one ray of Family. Later, he lived for a clan, or a small community;
hence the great historical devotions of Greece and Rome. After that he
was a man of caste or of a religion, to maintain the greatness of
which he often proved himself sublime; but by that time the field of
his interests became enlarged by many intellectual regions. In our
day, his life is attached to that of a vast country; sooner or later
his family will be, it is predicted, the entire universe.

Will this moral cosmopolitanism, the hope of Christian Rome, prove to
be only a sublime error? It is so natural to believe in the
realization of a noble vision, in the Brotherhood of Man. But, alas!
the human machine does not have such divine proportions. Souls that
are vast enough to grasp a range of feelings bestowed on great men
only will never belong to either fathers of families or simple
citizens. Some physiologists have thought that as the brain enlarges
the heart narrows; but they are mistaken. The apparent egotism of men
who bear a science, a nation, a code of laws in their bosom is the
noblest of passions; it is, as one may say, the maternity of the
masses; to give birth to new peoples, to produce new ideas they must
unite within their mighty brains the breasts of woman and the force of
God. The history of such men as Innocent the Third and Peter the
Great, and all great leaders of their age and nation will show, if
need be, in the highest spheres the same vast thought of which
Troubert was made the representative in the quiet depths of the
Cloister of Saint-Gatien.



ADDENDUM

The following personages appear in other stories of the Human Comedy.

Birotteau, Abbe Francois
The Lily of the Valley
Cesar Birotteau

Bourbonne, De
Madame Firmiani

Listomere, Baronne de
Cesar Birotteau
The Muse of the Department

Troubert, Abbe Hyacinthe
The Member for Arcis

Villenoix, Pauline Salomon de
Louis Lambert
A Seaside Tragedy