“This is no illusion of the fancy,” said Cavigni, at length breaking
the profound silence.—“No,” said Bertolini; “I heard it myself, now. Yet here is no person in the room but ourselves!”

“This is very extraordinary,” said Montoni, suddenly rising. “This is
not to be borne; here is some deception, some trick. I will know what
it means.”

All the company rose from their chairs in confusion. “It is very odd!” said Bertolini. “Here is really no stranger in the
room. If it is a trick, Signor, you will do well to punish the author
of it severely.”

“A trick! what else can it be?” said Cavigni, affecting a laugh. The servants were now summoned, and the chamber was searched, but no
person was found. The surprise and consternation of the company
increased. Montoni was discomposed. “We will leave this room,” said he,
“and the subject of our conversation also; it is too solemn.” His
guests were equally ready to quit the apartment; but the subject had
roused their curiosity, and they entreated Montoni to withdraw to
another chamber, and finish it; no entreaties could, however, prevail
with him. Notwithstanding his efforts to appear at ease, he was visibly
and greatly disordered. “Why, Signor, you are not superstitious,” cried Verezzi, jeeringly;
“you, who have so often laughed at the credulity of others!”

“I am not superstitious,” replied Montoni, regarding him with stern
displeasure, “though I know how to despise the common-place sentences,
which are frequently uttered against superstition. I will enquire
further into this affair.” He then left the room; and his guests,
separating for the night, retired to their respective apartments. CHAPTER VIII

He wears the rose of youth upon his cheek. SHAKESPEARE


We now return to Valancourt, who, it may be remembered, remained at
Thoulouse, some time after the departure of Emily, restless and
miserable. Each morrow that approached, he designed should carry him
from thence; yet tomorrow and tomorrow came, and still saw him
lingering in the scene of his former happiness. He could not
immediately tear himself from the spot, where he had been accustomed to
converse with Emily, or from the objects they had viewed together,
which appeared to him memorials of her affection, as well as a kind of
surety for its faithfulness; and, next to the pain of bidding her
adieu, was that of leaving the scenes which so powerfully awakened her
image. Sometimes he had bribed a servant, who had been left in the care
of Madame Montoni’s château, to permit him to visit the gardens, and
there he would wander, for hours together, rapt in a melancholy, not
unpleasing. The terrace, and the pavilion at the end of it, where he
had taken leave of Emily, on the eve of her departure from Thoulouse,
were his most favourite haunts. There, as he walked, or leaned from the
window of the building, he would endeavour to recollect all she had
said, on that night; to catch the tones of her voice, as they faintly
vibrated on his memory, and to remember the exact expression of her
countenance, which sometimes came suddenly to his fancy, like a vision;
that beautiful countenance, which awakened, as by instantaneous magic,
all the tenderness of his heart, and seemed to tell with irresistible
eloquence—that he had lost her for ever! At these moments, his hurried
steps would have discovered to a spectator the despair of his heart. The character of Montoni, such as he had received from hints, and such
as his fears represented it, would rise to his view, together with all
the dangers it seemed to threaten to Emily and to his love. He blamed
himself, that he had not urged these more forcibly to her, while it
might have been in his power to detain her, and that he had suffered an
absurd and criminal delicacy, as he termed it, to conquer so soon the
reasonable arguments he had opposed to this journey. Any evil, that
might have attended their marriage, seemed so inferior to those, which
now threatened their love, or even to the sufferings, that absence
occasioned, that he wondered how he could have ceased to urge his suit,
till he had convinced her of its propriety; and he would certainly now
have followed her to Italy, if he could have been spared from his
regiment for so long a journey. His regiment, indeed, soon reminded
him, that he had other duties to attend, than those of love. A short time after his arrival at his brother’s house, he was summoned
to join his brother officers, and he accompanied a battalion to Paris;
where a scene of novelty and gaiety opened upon him, such as, till
then, he had only a faint idea of. But gaiety disgusted, and company
fatigued, his sick mind; and he became an object of unceasing raillery
to his companions, from whom, whenever he could steal an opportunity,
he escaped, to think of Emily. The scenes around him, however, and the
company with whom he was obliged to mingle, engaged his attention,
though they failed to amuse his fancy, and thus gradually weakened the
habit of yielding to lamentation, till it appeared less a duty to his
love to indulge it. Among his brother-officers were many, who added to
the ordinary character of a French soldier’s gaiety some of those
fascinating qualities, which too frequently throw a veil over folly,
and sometimes even soften the features of vice into smiles. To these
men the reserved and thoughtful manners of Valancourt were a kind of
tacit censure on their own, for which they rallied him when present,
and plotted against him when absent; they gloried in the thought of
reducing him to their own level, and, considering it to be a spirited
frolic, determined to accomplish it. Valancourt was a stranger to the gradual progress of scheme and
intrigue, against which he could not be on his guard. He had not been
accustomed to receive ridicule, and he could ill endure its sting; he
resented it, and this only drew upon him a louder laugh. To escape from
such scenes, he fled into solitude, and there the image of Emily met
him, and revived the pangs of love and despair. He then sought to renew
those tasteful studies, which had been the delight of his early years;
but his mind had lost the tranquillity, which is necessary for their
enjoyment. To forget himself and the grief and anxiety, which the idea
of her recalled, he would quit his solitude, and again mingle in the
crowd—glad of a temporary relief, and rejoicing to snatch amusement for
the moment. Thus passed weeks after weeks, time gradually softening his sorrow, and
habit strengthening his desire of amusement, till the scenes around him
seemed to awaken into a new character, and Valancourt, to have fallen
among them from the clouds. His figure and address made him a welcome visitor, wherever he had been
introduced, and he soon frequented the most gay and fashionable circles
of Paris. Among these, was the assembly of the Countess Lacleur, a
woman of eminent beauty and captivating manners.