第31章

"He denies Him!" she cried, wringing her hands."Claes, God wields a power that you can never gain."At this argument, which seemed to discredit his beloved Science, he looked at his wife and trembled.

"What power?" he asked.

"Primal force--motion," she replied."This is what I learn from the books your mania has constrained me to read.Analyze fruits, flowers, Malaga wine; you will discover, undoubtedly, that their substances come, like those of your water-cress, from a medium that seems foreign to them.You can, if need be, find them in nature; but when you have them, can you combine them? can you make the flowers, the fruits, the Malaga wine? Will you have grasped the inscrutable effects of the sun, of the atmosphere of Spain? Ah! decomposing is not creating.""If I discover the magistral force, I shall be able to create.""Will nothing stop him?" cried Pepita."Oh! my love, my love! it is killed! I have lost him!"She wept bitterly, and her eyes, illumined by grief and by the sanctity of the feelings that flooded her soul, shone with greater beauty than ever through her tears.

"Yes," she resumed in a broken voice, "you are dead to all.I see it but too well.Science is more powerful within you than your own self;it bears you to heights from which you will return no more to be the companion of a poor woman.What joys can I still offer you? Ah! Iwould fain believe, as a wretched consolation, that God has indeed created you to make manifest his works, to chant his praises; that he has put within your breast the irresistible power that has mastered you-- But no; God is good; he would keep in your heart some thoughts of the woman who adores you, of the children you are bound to protect.

It is the Evil One alone who is helping you to walk amid these fathomless abysses, these clouds of outer darkness, where the light of faith does not guide you,--nothing guides you but a terrible belief in your own faculties! Were it otherwise, would you not have seen that you have wasted nine hundred thousand francs in three years? Oh! do me justice, you, my God on earth! I reproach you not; were we alone Iwould bring you, on my knees, all I possess and say, 'Take it, fling it into your furnace, turn it into smoke'; and I should laugh to see it float away in vapor.Were you poor, I would beg without shame for the coal to light your furnace.Oh! could my body yield your hateful Alkahest, I would fling myself upon those fires with joy, since your glory, your delight is in that unfound secret.But our children, Claes, our children! what will become of them if you do not soon discover this hellish thing? Do you know why Pierquin came to-day? He came for thirty thousand francs, which you owe and cannot pay.I told him that you had the money, so that I might spare you the mortification of his questions; but to get it I must sell our family silver."She saw her husband's eyes grow moist, and she flung herself despairingly at his feet, raising up to him her supplicating hands.

"My friend," she cried, "refrain awhile from these researches; let us economize, let us save the money that may enable you to take them up hereafter,--if, indeed, you cannot renounce this work.Oh! I do not condemn it; I will heat your furnaces if you ask it; but I implore you, do not reduce our children to beggary.Perhaps you cannot love them, Science may have consumed your heart; but oh! do not bequeath them a wretched life in place of the happiness you owe them.

Motherhood has sometimes been too weak a power in my heart; yes, Ihave sometimes wished I were not a mother, that I might be closer to your soul, your life! And now, to stifle my remorse, must I plead the cause of my children before you, and not my own?"Her hair fell loose and floated over her shoulders, her eyes shot forth her feelings as though they had been arrows.She triumphed over her rival.Balthazar lifted her, carried her to the sofa, and knelt at her feet.