The Red and the Black. Marie-Henri Beyle

dinner of priests, and he actually let himself praise Napoleon with enthusiasm. He bound his right arm over his breast, pretending that he had dislocated it in moving a trunk of a pine-tree and carried it for two months in that painful position. After this painful penance, he forgave himself. This is the young man of eighteen with a puny physique, and scarcely looking more than seventeen at the outside, who entered the magnificent church of Verrieres carrying a little parcel under his arm.

      He found it gloomy and deserted. All the transepts in the building had been covered with crimson cloth in celebration of a feast. The result was that the sun's rays produced an effect of dazzling light of the most impressive and religious character. Julien shuddered. Finding himself alone in the church, he established himself in the pew which had the most magnificent appearance. It bore the arms of M. de Rênal.

      Julien noticed a piece of printed paper spread out on the stool, which was apparently intended to be read, he cast his eyes over it and saw:—"Details of the execution and the last moments of Louis Jenrel, executed at Besançon the …" The paper was torn. The two first words of a line were legible on the back, they were, "The First Step."

      "Who could have put this paper there?" said Julien. "Poor fellow!" he added with a sigh, "the last syllable of his name is the same as mine," and he crumpled up the paper. As he left, Julien thought he saw blood near the Host, it was holy water which the priests had been sprinkling on it, the ​reflection of the red curtains which covered the windows made it look like blood.

      Finally, Julien felt ashamed of his secret terror. "Am I going to play the coward," he said to himself: "To Arms!" This phrase, repeated so often in the old Surgeon-Major's battle stories, symbolized heroism to Julien. He got up rapidly and walked to M. de Rênal's house. As soon as he saw it twenty yards in front of him he was seized, in spite of his fine resolution, with an overwhelming timidity. The iron grill was open. He thought it was magnificent. He had to go inside.

      Julien was not the only person whose heart was troubled by his arrival in the house. The extreme timidity of Madame de Rênal was fluttered when she thought of this stranger whose functions would necessitate his coming between her and her children. She was accustomed to seeing her sons sleep in her own room. She had shed many tears that morning, when she had seen their beds carried into the apartment intended for the tutor. It was in vain that she asked her husband to have the bed of Stanislas-Xavier, the youngest, carried back into her room.

      Womanly delicacy was carried in Madame de Rênal to the point of excess. She conjured up in her imagination the most disagreeable personage, who was coarse, badly groomed and encharged with the duty of scolding her children simply because he happened to know Latin, and only too ready to flog her sons for their ignorance of that barbarous language.

      1 ↑ The author was sub-lieutenant in the 6th Dragoons in 1800

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CHAPTER VI

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      ENNUI

Non so piu cosa son Cosa facio.

Mozart (Figaro).

      Madame de Rênal was going out of the salon by the folding window which opened on to the garden with that vivacity and grace which was natural to her when she was free from human observation, when she noticed a young peasant near the entrance gate. He was still almost a child, extremely pale, and looked as though he had been crying. He was in a white shirt and had under his arm a perfectly new suit of violet frieze.

      The little peasant's complexion was so white and his eyes were so soft, that Madame de Rênal's somewhat romantic spirit thought at first that it might be a young girl in disguise, who had come to ask some favour of the M. the Mayor. She took pity on this poor creature, who had stopped at the entrance of the door, and who apparently did not dare to raise its hand to the bell. Madame de Rênal approached, forgetting for the moment the bitter chagrin occasioned by the tutor's arrival. Julien, who was turned towards the gate, did not see her advance. He trembled when a soft voice said quite close to his ear:

      "What do you want here, my child."

      Julien turned round sharply and was so struck by Madame de Rênal's look, full of graciousness as it was, that up to a certain point he forgot to be nervous. Overcome by her beauty he soon forgot everything, even what he had come for. Madame de Rênal repeated her question.

      "I have come here to be tutor, Madame," he said at last, quite ashamed of his tears which he was drying as best as he could.

      ​Madame de Rênal remained silent. They had a view or each other at close range. Julien had never seen a human being so well-dressed, and above all he had never seen a woman with so dazzling a complexion speak to him at all softly. Madame de Rênal observed the big tears which had lingered on the cheeks of the young peasant, those cheeks which had been so pale and were now so pink. Soon she began to laugh with all the mad gaiety of a young girl, she made fun of herself, and was unable to realise the extent of her happiness. So this was that tutor whom she had imagined a dirty, badly dressed priest, who was coming to scold and flog her children.

      "What! Monsieur," she said to him at last, "you know Latin?"

      The word "Monsieur" astonished Julien so much that he reflected for a moment.

      "Yes, Madame," he said timidly.

      Madame de Rênal was so happy that she plucked up the courage to say to Julien, "You will not scold the poor children too much?"

      "I scold them!" said Julien in astonishment; "why should I?"

      "You won't, will you, Monsieur," she added after a little silence, in a soft voice whose emotion became more and more intense. "You will be nice to them, you promise me?"

      To hear himself called "Monsieur" again in all seriousness by so well dressed a lady was beyond all Julien's expectations. He had always said to himself in all the castles of Spain that he had built in his youth, that no real lady would ever condescend to talk to him except when he had a fine uniform. Madame de Rênal, on her side, was completely taken in by Julien's beautiful complexion, his big black eyes, and his pretty hair, which was more than usually curly, because he had just plunged his head into the basin of the public fountain in order to refresh himself. She was over-joyed to find that this sinister tutor, whom she had feared to find so harsh and severe to her children, had, as a matter of fact, the timid manner of a girl. The contrast between her fears and what she now saw, proved a great event for Madame de Rênal's peaceful temperament. Finally, she recovered from her surprise. She was astonished to find herself at the gate of her own house talking in this way ​and at such close quarters to this young and somewhat scantily dressed man.

      "Let us go in, Monsieur," she said to him with a certain air of embarrassment.

      During Madame de Rênal's whole life she had never been so deeply moved by such a sense of pure pleasure. Never had so gracious a vision followed in the wake of her disconcerting fears. So these pretty children of whom she took such care were not after all to fall into the hands of a dirty grumbling priest. She had scarcely entered the vestibule when she turned round towards Julien, who was following her trembling. His astonishment at the sight of so fine a house proved but an additional charm in Madame de Rênal's eyes. She could not believe her own eyes. It seemed to her, above all, that the tutor ought to have a black suit.

      "But is it true, Monsieur," she said to him, stopping once again, and in mortal fear that she had made a mistake, so happy had her discovery made her. "Is it true that you know Latin?" These words offended Julien's pride, and dissipated the charming atmosphere which he had been enjoying for the last quarter of an hour.

      "Yes, Madame," he said, trying to assume an air of coldness, "I know Latin as well as the curé, who has been good enough to say sometimes