第38章

"I know for a certainty," said he, "that M.Leminof loved his wife,--that she was unfaithful to him--that he finished by suspecting her, and that he revenged himself--""False! false!" cried the priest with deep emotion."To hear you one would believe that Count Kostia killed his wife.You have heard lying reports.The truth is, that the Countess Olga poisoned herself, and then feeling the approach of death, became terrified and implored aid.It was useless: they could not counteract the effects of the poison.She then sent in haste for me.I had but just time to receive her confession.Oh! what a frightful scene, my child! Why recall it to me? And above all, whose calumnious tongue--""I have been told, also," pursued the inflexible Gilbert, "that after this deplorable event M.Leminof, holding in abhorrence the localities which witnessed his dishonor, quitted Moscow and Russia, and went to Martinique.Having arrived there, he lost, after some months' residence, one of his two children, a daughter if I am not mistaken, and this death may have been hastened by--""A fresh calumny!" interrupted the priest, looking steadily at Gilbert."The young girl died of yellow fever.Kostia Petrovitch never raised a finger against his children.Ah! tell me what viper's tongue--""It is not a calumny, at least, to state that he has two good reasons for not loving his son.First, because he is the living portrait of his mother, and then because he doubts, perhaps, if this child is really his son.""An impious doubt, which I have combated with all my strength.

This child was born nine years before his mother committed her first and only fault.I have said it, and I repeat it.It has been objected that he was born after six years of a marriage which seemed condemned by Heaven to an eternal sterility:--fatal circumstance, which appeared proof positive to a vindictive and ulcerated heart.But again, who could have told you--""One more word: before leaving for Martinique, M.Leminof did everything he could to discover the lover of his wife.His suspicions fell upon one of his intimate friends named Morlof.In his blind fury he killed him, but nevertheless Morlof was innocent.""Did they tell you that he assassinated him?" said Father Alexis, who became more and more agitated."Another calumny! he killed him in a regular duel.Holy Virgin! the sin was grave enough; but the police hushed up the matter, and absolution has been granted him.""Alas!" resumed Gilbert, "if the church has pardoned, the conscience of the murderer persists in condemning; it curses that rash hand which shed innocent blood, and by a strange aberration it exhorts him to wash out this fatal mistake in the blood of the real offender.This offender, after six years' fruitless search, he has not given up the hope of discovering; he will go into the very bowels of the earth to find him, if he must, and if by chance there is some heart upon which the name is written, he will open that heart with the point of his sword to decipher those letters of blood and of fire!"Gilbert pronounced these last words in a vibrating voice.He had suddenly forgotten where he was and to whom he was speaking.He thought he again saw before him the scene of the corridor, and could again hear those terrible words which had frozen the blood in his veins.The priest was seized with a convulsive trembling; but he soon mastered it.He raised himself slowly and stood up before Gilbert, his arms crossed upon his breast.Within a few moments his face became dignified, and at the same time his language.Now the transformation was complete; Gilbert had no longer before him the timid, easy soul who trembled before a frown, the epicure in quest of agreeable sensations, the vain artist ingeniously begging eulogies.The priest's eyes opened wide and shone like coals of fire; his lips, wreathed in a bitter smile, seemed ready to launch the thunders of excommunication; and a truly sacerdotal majesty diffused itself as if by miracle over his face.Gilbert could scarcely believe his eyes; he looked at him in silence, incapable of recognizing this new Father Alexis, who had just been revealed to him.

Then, said the priest, speaking to himself: