What Flowers Say by George Sand

Author:George Sand [Sand, George]
Language: eng
Format: epub
ISBN: 9781558618787
Publisher: The Feminist Press at CUNY

The Young Lady of Pictordu

Diane got up, put her shoes back on (she had taken them off when she went to sleep), fastened the hooks on her dress, and asked her papa to lend her the mirror so that she might tidy up a bit while he went with Romanèche to prepare for their departure. Folchardet, knowing she was clean and neat, left her alone, reminding her that if she went out she should be careful in the castle’s rubble and watch where she was walking.

Diane washed up, put everything back neatly in her toilet kit, and seeing her father wasn’t back yet, wandered through the castle, hoping to find once again all the beautiful things she had seen with the fairy during the night. But she couldn’t even find the right rooms. The spiral staircases were broken and the steps were loose, unsupported on the sides by the crumbling tower walls. The rooms of the upper floor had collapsed onto the floor beneath and she could no longer tell what belonged to the main building. She could clearly see that all the structures had been richly decorated; some inside walls still had traces of painting. There were remnants of gilding on broken marble; very beautiful fireplaces still attached to walls were standing in the emptiness. The floor was littered with all kinds of debris. There were sparkling fragments of stained-glass windows strewed over the green of the wild plants and little marble hands, which had belonged to statues of Cupid, and bronze Zephyr’s wings, once gilded, that had fallen from a candelabra. There were shreds of tapestry, gnawed by rats, but still showing the faint outline of a queen or a vase filled with flowers. It was an entire world of riches and pleasures fallen to fragments and dust.

Diane couldn’t understand why such a grand castle, whose facade still stood magnificently on the slope of the ravine, should have been abandoned. What I’m seeing right now must be a dream, she thought. They tell me that when I have a fever, my mind wanders a bit. But I didn’t have one last night; I was seeing things as they really are. I don’t feel sick, but the fairy told me you can only see the castle when she allows it, and I must be content to see it the way she is showing it to me right now.

After looking in vain for the beautiful rooms, the great galleries, the paintings and statues, the gold table loaded with sweets—all the marvelous things among which she had spent the night, Diane went into the garden and found only nettles, brambles, large Aaron’s rod, and lilies. Some instinct convinced her that these plants weren’t uglier than the others, and the overgrown flower beds pleased her just as they were, stripped of their symmetrical design and their colorful stonework. She gathered some colored pebbles from the paths, put them in her pockets, and continued along the edge of the terrace, looking amid the tangle of shrubs for the statue that had spoken to her the night before.

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