Jacqueline, vol 2 | Page 6

Madame de Villegry, who was living near her friend
Madame de Nailles, recruiting herself after the fatigues of the winter
season. Such being the situation, the young girls of the Blue Band
might have tried in vain to make any impression upon him. But the
hatred with which he inspired Fred found some relief in the
composition of fragments of melancholy verse, which the young
midshipman hid under his mattresses. It is not an uncommon thing for
naval men to combine a love of the sea with a love of poetry. Fred's
verses were not good, but they were full of dejection. The poor fellow
compared Raoul Wermant to Faust, and himself to Siebel. He spoke of
The youth whose eyes were brimming with salt tears, Whose heart was
troubled by a thousand fears, Poor slighted lover!-since in his heavy
heart All his illusions perish and depart.
Again, he wrote of Siebel:
O Siebel!--thine is but the common fate! They told thee Fortune upon
youth would wait; 'Tis false when love's in question-and you may--
Here he enumerated all the proofs of tenderness possible for a woman
to give her lover, and then he added:
You may know all, poor Siebel!--all, some day, When weary of this life
and all its dreams, You learn to know it is not what it seems; When
there is nothing that can cheer you more, All that remains is fondly to
adore!
And after trying in vain to find a rhyme for lover, he cried:
Oh! tell me--if one grief exceeds another Is not this worst, to feel mere
friendship moves To cruel kindness the dear girl he loves?
Fred's mother surprised him one night while he was watering with his
tears the ink he was putting to so sorry a use. She had been aware that
he sat up late at night--his sleeplessness was not the insomnia of

genius--for she had seen the glare of light from his little lamp burning
later than the usual bedtime of the chateau, in one of the turret
chambers at Lizerolles.
In vain Fred denied that he was doing anything, in vain he tried to put
his papers out of sight; his mother was so persuasive that at last he
owned everything to her, and in addition to the comfort he derived
from his confession, he gained a certain satisfaction to his
'amour-propre', for Madame d'Argy thought the verses beautiful. A
mother's geese are always swans. But it was only when she said, "I
don't see why you should not marry your Jacqueline--such a thing is not
by any means impossible," and promised to do all in her power to
insure his happiness, that Fred felt how dearly he loved his mother. Oh,
a thousand times more than he had ever supposed he loved her!
However, he had not yet done with the agonies that lie in wait for
lovers.
Madame de Monredon arrived one day at the Hotel de la Plage,
accompanied by her granddaughter, whom she had taken away from the
convent before the beginning of the holidays. Since she had fully
arranged the marriage with M. de Talbrun, it seemed important that
Giselle should acquire some liveliness, and recruit her health, before
the fatal wedding-day arrived. M. de Talbrun liked ladies to be always
well and always lively, and it was her duty to see that Giselle
accommodated herself to his taste; sea- bathing, life in the open air, and
merry companions, were the things she needed to make her a little less
thin, to give her tone, and to take some of her convent stiffness out of
her. Besides, she could have free intercourse with her intended husband,
thanks to the greater freedom of manners permitted at the sea-side.
Such were the ideas of Madame de Monredon.
Poor Giselle! In vain they dressed her in fine clothes, in vain they
talked to her and scolded her from morning till night, she continued to
be the little convent-bred schoolgirl she had always been; with
downcast eyes, pale as a flower that has known no sunlight, and timid
to a point of suffering. M. de Talbrun frightened her as much as ever,
and she had looked forward to the comfort of weeping in the arms of

Jacqueline, who, the last time she had seen her, had been herself so
unhappy. But what was her astonishment to find the young girl, who, a
few weeks before, had made her such tragic confidences through the
grille in the convent parlor, transformed into a creature bent on
excitement and amusement. When she attempted to allude to the
subject on which Jacqueline had spoken to her at the convent, and to
ask her what it was that had then made her so unhappy, Jacqueline
cried: "Oh! my dear, I have forgotten