第32章

"Have I caused you such grief?" he said, in the tone of a man waking from a painful dream.

"My poor Claes! yes, and you will cause me more, in spite of yourself," she said, passing her hand over his hair."Sit here beside me," she continued, pointing to the sofa."Ah! I can forget it all now, now that you come back to us; all can be repaired--but you will not abandon me again? say that you will not! My noble husband, grant me a woman's influence on your heart, that influence which is so needful to the happiness of suffering artists, to the troubled minds of great men.You may be harsh to me, angry with me if you will, but let me check you a little for your good.I will never abuse the power if you will grant it.Be famous, but be happy too.Do not love Chemistry better than you love us.Hear me, we will be generous; we will let Science share your heart; but oh! my Claes, be just; let us have our half.Tell me, is not my disinterestedness sublime?"She made him smile.With the marvellous art such women possess, she carried the momentous question into the regions of pleasantry where women reign.But though she seemed to laugh, her heart was violently contracted and could not easily recover the quiet even action that was habitual to it.And yet, as she saw in the eyes of Balthazar the rebirth of a love which was once her glory, the full return of a power she thought she had lost, she said to him with a smile:--"Believe me, Balthazar, nature made us to feel; and though you may wish us to be mere electrical machines, yet your gases and your ethereal disengaged matters will never explain the gift we possess of looking into futurity.""Yes," he exclaimed, "by affinity.The power of vision which makes the poet, the power of deduction which makes the man of science, are based on invisible affinities, intangible, imponderable, which vulgar minds class as moral phenomena, whereas they are physical effects.The prophet sees and deduces.Unfortunately, such affinities are too rare and too obscure to be subjected to analysis or observation.""Is this," she said, giving him a kiss to drive away the Chemistry she had so unfortunately reawakened, "what you call an affinity?""No; it is a compound; two substances that are equivalents are neutral, they produce no reaction--""Oh! hush, hush," she cried, "you will make me die of grief.I can never bear to see my rival in the transports of your love.""But, my dear life, I think only of you.My work is for the glory of my family.You are the basis of all my hopes.""Ah, look me in the eyes!"

The scene had made her as beautiful as a young woman; of her whole person Balthazar saw only her head, rising from a cloud of lace and muslin.

"Yes, I have done wrong to abandon you for Science," he said."If Ifall back into thought and preoccupation, then, my Pepita, you must drag me from them; I desire it."She lowered her eyes and let him take her hand, her greatest beauty,--a hand that was both strong and delicate.

"But I ask more," she said.

"You are so lovely, so delightful, you can obtain all," he answered.

"I wish to destroy that laboratory, and chain up Science," she said, with fire in her eyes.

"So be it--let Chemistry go to the devil!""This moment effaces all!" she cried."Make me suffer now, if you will."Tears came to Balthazar's eyes, as he heard these words.

"You were right, love," he said."I have seen you through a veil; Ihave not understood you."

"If it concerned only me," she said, "willingly would I have suffered in silence, never would I have raised my voice against my sovereign.

But your sons must be thought of, Claes.If you continue to dissipate your property, no matter how glorious the object you have in view the world will take little account of it, it will only blame you and yours.But surely, it is enough for a man of your noble nature that his wife has shown him a danger he did not perceive.We will talk of this no more," she cried, with a smile and a glance of coquetry."To-night, my Claes, let us not be less than happy."