The Lily in the Valley by Honoré De Balzac

Author:Honoré De Balzac
Language: eng
Format: epub
Publisher: New York Review Books
Published: 2024-07-23T00:00:00+00:00

TWO WOMEN

MY PASSION, which harked back to the medieval age of chivalry, became known somehow or other; perhaps the king or the Duc de Lenoncourt had gossiped. How did that simple, romantic story of a young man who piously adored a beautiful woman not at court, grandiose in her solitude, loyal to her family duties, spread so quickly from that august sphere to the heart of the Faubourg Saint-Germain? I found I was the object of embarrassing questions in salons, since a modest life, out the public eye, has a disadvantage: once it has been experienced, it makes being the center of attention quite intolerable. Just as eyes used to seeing only soft colors are hurt by the brightness of day, so some minds cannot stand violent contrasts. Then I belonged to that category; it will astonish you today, but don’t worry, I shall explain the peculiar behavior of the present-day Vandenesse. I found women engaging and the social round perfect. After the Duc de Berri’s marriage, the court revived and the French liking for festivities surged again! The foreign occupation ended, prosperity resumed, and pleasure was possible. People renowned by rank or celebrated for their wealth rushed in huge numbers from all ends of Europe to its intellectual capital, where the benefits and vices of other countries existed, but were magnified and sharpened by French wit. Five months after I had left Clochegourde in the midwinter, my good angel wrote me a despairing letter in which she recounted her son’s grave illness, which he had survived, though it augured badly for the future; the doctor had spoken of the necessary precautions to take to protect his chest and lungs, a horrible prognosis that, when backed by scientific evidence, blackens a mother’s every moment. Hardly had Henriette caught her breath, hardly had Jacques begun his convalescence, when his sister became cause for concern. Madeleine, that pretty flower who responded so well to her mother’s care, suffered an attack that had been anticipated and fought off, but which threatened her frail constitution. Already laid low by the exhaustion brought on by Jacques’s long illness, the countess couldn’t find the courage to face another setback, and the spectacle presented by those two dear creatures inured her to the double torture inflicted by her husband’s character. Ever more devastating, gravel-laden storms, in a succession of howling gusts, wrenched out the hopes planted so deeply in her heart. She was at the mercy of the count’s tyranny, who, ever since she had grown weary of war, had regained his lost terrain.

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When I was funneling all my strength into my children, she wrote to me, how could I deploy it against M. de Mortsauf and defend myself from his attacks by defending myself against death? Today as I walk between the two young melancholy souls at my sides, an irrepressible hatred of life descends upon me. What hurt can I feel, what affection can I return, when I see Jacques standing motionless on the terrace,

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