“Oh, ye lifted up your head,
And it seemed as if ye read,
That this death then should be found
A Valhalla for the crowned,
The heroic who prevail;
None, be sure, could enter in
Far below a Paladin
Of a noble, noble tale. —
So awfully, ye thought upon the dead.”
E. B. Browning.
Meanwhile, to some in Geneva, the days dragged on very heavily. No one realized more fully than Berthelier the peril of the prisoners of Lyons. But its effect upon him was contrary to what might have been expected. He said very little; to Gabrielle scarcely anything, but his manner to her, always gentle, acquired an added tenderness. What was more strange, his health, from the hour he heard of it, seemed actually to improve. He ate his food with determination, if not with appetite; and he made every day a little more exertion. With the help of De Caulaincourt’s arm, he could soon walk a street or two, though very weary afterward. In those days he was always weary, and the longing for rest was strong.
“But not yet,” he would say to himself, “not yet.” “Not while Gabrielle needs me.”
Little indeed could he, or any one, do for Gabrielle now. There is a loneliness in great sorrow, like the loneliness of death, of which it is the shadow. Well-meant words of consolation simply passed over her without making any impression. Many such were spoken; for it was not an age of reticence, and in a community so closely knit together as that of Geneva, it could not now be anything but an open secret that the young missionary Louis de Marsac might have been troth-plight to Gabrielle Berthelier, but for that new law of the consistory which obliged marriage to follow betrothal within the space of six weeks. But she heard all the same courteous indifference. Only once was she known to grow angry, and that was with her mild, inoffensive aunt.
“I think, my dear,” Claudine said to her one day, “we ought not yet to give up hope.”
Gabrielle looked at her with great sad eyes, like those of some gentle animal who suffers without hope, but also without fear or anger.
“You know, my child, if so be they recant, they will be saved — for earth, and the way to heaven is ever open.”
“You know not what you say” flashed the girl. “The very utterance of the word is insult — to God’s blessed martyrs.” And she left the room in wrath, the white, still wrath of a broken heart.
All this time the earth was iron and the heavens were brass to Gabrielle Berthelier. Hitherto, her short life had only one dark hour, the hour when she anticipated a terrible separation from all she loved, and a lonely lot amongst strangers and enemies. She had borne herself right bravely then. For, at the worst, she could die, and to one who knew herself “a daughter of the Lord Almighty,” what was death, that she should fear it? Death could be borne, suffering could be borne — for herself. It was when they touched a dearer life that her heart sank, and “there was no more spirit left in” her. Louis was the very self of self, the very soul of soul to her. During the dreary days since she heard the tidings of his imprisonment, her body was in Geneva, but her true life all the time was lived in that dungeon in Lyons. Every pang of weariness, of hunger, of pain, every natural shrinking from the doom of fire, her shuddering soul passed through, not once but a hundred times. She bore the suffering vicariously, and she bore it by herself. She never dreamed that its bitter waters, as they broke over her hour by hour, were amongst those of which the promise holds good: “When thou passest through the waters, I will be with thee.” That promise belonged to Louis, and for him she pleaded it with agonized earnestness, wrestling sore with the Lord through the silent, wakeful watches of the night. But even for him she could not feel that she was heard. A dark cloud encompassed her, and there was no rift in it through which the light could pierce. “Why did God let this thing happen?” was the cry of her heart continually. With her training — narrow, intense, and above all things true — in absolute, unquestioning submission to the will of God, there was but one source to which she could ascribe such questionings. She had not the relief of the old prophet’s pathetic: “Yet let me talk with Thee concerning Thy judgments; “there was set before her only the lesson — sublime, but oh how stern! “It is the Lord; let Him do what seemeth Him good.”
She said “His will must be done,” but she did not say, “Thy will be done;” and underneath all other pain she was profoundly conscious of the fact. It lay on her heart like a stone, heavy, cold, unmoving. Although not because of this she ceased to know that He was blessing her. She lost the unutterable comfort of feeling, in the darkness, the touch of His hand.
“She is like a dead person walking about,” said Claudine and Marguerite to each other. Possibly she would have really died, had not a little help come to her, as our help in trouble so often does, in the guise of a new misfortune.
One morning she sat as usual, distaff in hand, at the mechanical task which left her thoughts free to dwell in the dungeon with Louis de Marsac. Berthelier sat in the room apparently reading, but really sharing in silence her sorrowful thoughts; Claudine was attending to some household matter, and Marguerite had gone to the market.
There were steps and voices at the street door, then a cry from Claudine that brought Gabrielle downstairs in a moment, whilst Berthelier followed her slowly.
It was Marguerite, borne back to them on a stretcher, groaning with pain. The old woman, though very vigorous for her years, had been for some time growing unfit for these marketing excursions, yet she would by no means depute them to Claudine or Gabrielle, or even to both of them together.
“The damoiselle would faint if she saw a chicken’s neck twisted,” she said; “while Gabrielle would give those thieving Gray-feet every blessed denier they chose to ask; and ‘tis a mercy Master Calvin has put his foot down, and will let no stale vegetables or rotting fruit be sold in the market, or any fool might take the two of them in.”
So she went once too often. Returning with her heavy basket on her arm, she slipped and fell, to be taken up by the market-women, and carried home by the market men with a broken leg. She entreated them, amidst her groans, to bring her at once to the hospital, but this they would not do without the leave of her master, who dismissed the proposal with scorn, and begged the bearers to lay his servant on her own bed. The nearest barber-surgeon was sent for at once, and, with Gabrielle waiting upon him, set the injured limb. He said the old woman’s life was in no danger; but it would be weeks before she was able to put her foot to the ground; if indeed, at her age, she could expect ever to do so again.
Here was a prospect; — for Berthelier in all worldly matters as simple as a child; for Claudine, helpless from her convent life, and more than half an invalid; and for Gabrielle, engulfed in the depths of her sorrow. The neighbors, especially the Calvin next door, were kind and helpful, and a temporary servant was found in the grand-daughter of their faithful Jeannette. But she was a girl younger than Gabrielle, with plenty of goodwill but little sense, and a prodigious talent for forgetting. Anyone who has been in a household deprived suddenly of its one practically executive member, will be able to pity the Bertheliers. It added to their difficulties that Marguerite not only left work, but made work for every one; for she required careful tendance and it is but fair to say that she had it.
She was not a model patient: she bore pain with fortitude, but helplessness galled and fretted her. She not only could not believe that others could do her work as well as she did, which perhaps was true, but she could not believe that they could do it at all, which was not true. Her impatience, and the sharp words she would use to Gabrielle, and still more to the unfortunate little Benoȋte, provoked Claudine to say to her one day “If I were so sure as you seem to be that I was elected by the good God before the foundation of the world to everlasting glory, I should not think it worth my while to be so wroth because the morning soup is just a little burned.”
“Elected?” Marguerite repeated. “At all events, I was elected to see that the master’s food is fit for him to eat.”
Perhaps her theology was better than she knew. Election to glory means also election to duty, or it means nothing at all.
Notwithstanding the many delinquencies which Marguerite noted and reproved, Gabrielle in this emergency did well. She learned the secret of the double life; she could make the soup after Marguerite’s notions and her father’s tastes; she could wash, sweep, and dust, with enough of her mind in these things to guide her hands aright, but with her heart elsewhere. Yet, as division must always weaken, the strain upon her slackened, just enough to let her live. Work was not a cure for her pain, but it was an anodyne; it did not lessen the cause, but it dulled the nerves of suffering.
One day Claudine and Gabrielle went together to the market; for, as Marguerite reflected with grim satisfaction, it took two people now to do badly what it had taken one to do well. As they returned, they met a small party of horsemen, who had just entered the town by the Pont de l’Arve. They were two or three Swiss, who looked like substantial burghers from Berne; there was a young gentleman, dressed after the French fashion, whose bridle was held by a servant who rode beside him, and there was — Norbert. He bowed in silence to his two friends, looking, as Claudine thought, manly, grave, and sad. Gabrielle did not think at all; a mist swam before her eyes, and but for Claudine she would have fallen.
Quickly and silently they went home. As they drew near Claudine whispered “Shall we go next door?”
“No,” Gabrielle answered, “he will come.”
When they came in, she began at once, with feverish energy, to prepare the vegetables they had brought for their meal. But Claudine soon observed that she could not see; her hands were moving vaguely without guidance from her eyes.
“Go to thy chamber, child,” she said. “I will call thee when he comes.”
So Gabrielle went, and knelt beside her bed, not praying — what was there to pray for? — yet sending up out of the depths of her agony humanity’s unconscious, inarticulate cry to the great Father. She knew not whether moments had passed or hours before she heard Berthelier’s voice, that voice which “Aye for (her) Its tenderest tones were keeping,” calling softly, “Gabrielle!”
They were all in the living-room: Berthelier in the easy-chair, which he seldom now left; De Caulaincourt leaning over it; Claudine seated near him; Norbert standing up, straight and tall, his young face touched with a gentle, reverent solemnity. As Gabrielle entered, he turned and looked at her. Henceforward he saw only her, as she saw only him. But they spoke no word of greeting.
“He is with God,” he said.
It seemed to Gabrielle that she had known it for years — for all her life — even though that very morning she had thought of him as suffering still in the dungeon. Something in her face made De Caulaincourt place a chair for her, and draw her gently into it.
“As I can, since I have seen all,” said Norbert. “I saw the martyrs as they heard their sentences. Our brother, Denis Peloquin, was not with them; he was taken thence, and has glorified God elsewhere. But there were three, Etienne Gynet, Henri de Marsac — and Louis. Others were there also, doomed to lesser punishments. After the sentence, the hangman came with halters of rope, which he put on the necks of the condemned. But when he came to Louis, the last save his cousin Henri, he paused, and the judge who presided said that point was excused him, seeing he was of noble birth. Thereat spake Louis with a smile: “By what right, sir, do you deny me the collar of the most excellent Order of Martyrs?” Thus in joy and gladness he went forth to die.” Norbert paused, but presently went on with an effort: God was with him to the end. But I cannot talk of it — yet. Only, there was no sign of fear or pain. While he could speak he prayed. And he threw this to me from the fire.”
It was the little ivory tablet. He gave it into the hand of Gabrielle, saying, as he bent over her —
“There is a message — another time.”
“No,” said Gabrielle, looking up with a strange light in her tearless eyes; “all are friends here.”
He said, “Tell her He that has comforted me will comfort her also; she will have the stronger consolation, because she has the greater need.”“
A quiver ran through her frame as she heard; but otherwise she made no sign. Yet there was something in her face that moved De Caulaincourt to say “Come away, my son; thou hast said enough.”
Norbert felt the touch of an ice-cold hand, and heard a voice which seemed to be miles away, saying, “Thank you.” Then he followed his father out. Claudine went also, with the word —
“I must tell Marguerite.”
There was a great silence in the room. Come hither, my child,” Berthelier said at last.
She came, and knelt down beside his chair. He laid his hand on her head, and said softly
“God comfort thee!”
“Then at last”
Like summer tempest came the tears,”
and with them there mingled presently the slow, reluctant drops of age.
Gabrielle’s tears brought healing with them; or rather they were themselves the token of the healing that had come to her. It was not long before she rose, and stood upon her feet. In her face there was a strange calm, in her eyes a light — the light that comes from beyond the sun or star. Her voice was clear, and did not fail or falter, as she said —
““Thanks be unto God that giveth us the victory, through Jesus Christ our Lord!” For the battle is over now, and the victory is won.”
Thus for Gabrielle the darkness passed, and the light shone out again. At first every thought of sorrow for herself was swallowed up in the wonder and the joy for another. Louis was safe — and free — was with Christ forever. Should she not be glad of this, she who loved him so? If she had drunk of the cup of anguish with him, could she not also drink of the cup of joy? In thought, she went in where he had gone; in thought, she stood with him upon the crystal sea, where there is no more sorrow, nor crying, neither is there any more pain, but the harpers sound upon their harps of gold the praises of God and of the Lamb.
But this mood could not last forever. These glimpses of glory are of their very nature evanescent, and must needs pass from us, else would they destroy the balance and the continuity of our earthly life. But one who has once had them, who has once, even faint and far, seen the gates of Eden gleam,” can never quite forget — can never be quite the same afterward. And perhaps to no one are the visions ever given — or rather, no one is able to receive them — who has not first gone down to the depths of a great agony.