Leo Tolstoy - 3 books to know Napoleonic Wars

‘Do you consider that you are under any obligation to me?’ said M. Chelan, without acknowledging his greeting. ‘You will take luncheon with me, meanwhile another horse will be hired for you, and you will leave Verrieres, without seeing anyone.’

‘To hear is to obey,’ replied Julien, with the prim face of a seminarist; and there was no further discussion save of theology and Latin scholarship.

He mounted his horse, rode a league, after which, coming upon a wood, with no one to see him enter it, he hid himself there. At sunset he sent the horse back. Later on, he entered the house of a peasant, who agreed to sell him a ladder, and to go with him, carrying the ladder, to the little wood that overhung the Cours de la Fidelite, in Verrieres.

‘We are a poor conscript deserting — or a smuggler,’ said the peasant, as he took leave of him, ‘but what do I care? My ladder is well paid for, and I myself have had to pass some awkward moments in my life.’

The night was very dark. About one o’clock in the morning, Julien, carrying his ladder, made his way into Verrieres. He climbed down as soon as he could into the bed of the torrent, which ran through M. de Renal’s magnificent gardens at a depth of ten feet, and confined between walls. Julien climbed up easily by his ladder. ‘What sort of greeting will the watch-dogs give me?’ he wondered. ‘That is the whole question.’ The dogs barked, and rushed towards him; but he whistled softly, and they came and fawned upon him.

Then climbing from terrace to terrace, although all the gates were shut, he had no difficulty in arriving immediately beneath the window of Madame de Renal’s bedroom, which, on the garden side, was no more than nine or ten feet above the ground.

There was in the shutters a small opening in the shape of a heart, which Julien knew well. To his great dismay, this little opening was not lighted by the glimmer of a nightlight within.

‘Great God!’ he said to himself; ‘tonight, of all nights, this room is not occupied by Madame de Renal! Where can she be sleeping? The family are at Verrieres, since I found the dogs here; but I may in this room, without a light, come upon M. de Renal himself or a stranger, and then what a scandal!’

The most prudent course was to retire; but the idea filled Julien with horror. ‘If it is a stranger, I shall make off as fast as my legs will carry me, leaving my ladder behind; but if it is she, what sort of welcome awaits me? She is steeped in repentance and the most extreme piety, I may be sure of that; but after all, she has still some memory of me, since she has just written to me.’ With this argument he made up his mind.

His heart trembling, but determined nevertheless to see her or to perish, he flung a handful of gravel against the shutter; no reply. He placed his ladder against the wall by the side of the window and tapped himself on the shutter, softly at first then more loudly. ‘Dark as it is, they may fire a gun at me,’ thought Julien. This thought reduced his mad undertaking to a question of physical courage.

‘This room is unoccupied tonight,’ he thought, ‘or else whoever it is that is sleeping here is awake by this time. So there is no need for any further precaution here; all I need think of is not making myself heard by the people who are sleeping in the other rooms.’

He stepped down, placed his ladder against one of the shutters, climbed up again and passing his hand through the heart-shaped opening, was fortunate in finding almost at once the wire fastened to the latch that closed the shutter. He pulled this wire; it was with an unspeakable joy that he felt that the shutter was no longer closed and was yielding to his efforts. ‘I must open it little by little and let her recognise my voice.’ He opened the shutter sufficiently to pass his head through the gap, repeating in a whisper: ‘It is a friend.’

He made certain, by applying his ear, that nothing broke the profound silence in the room. But decidedly, there was no nightlight, even half extinguished, on the hearth; this was indeed a bad sign.

‘Beware of a gunshot!’ He thought for a moment; then, with one finger, ventured to tap the pane: no response; he tapped more loudly. ‘Even if I break the glass, I must settle this business.’ As he was knocking hard, he thought he could just make out, in the pitch darkness, something like a white phantom coming across the room. In a moment, there was no doubt about it, he did see a phantom which seemed to be advancing with extreme slowness. Suddenly he saw a cheek pressed to the pane to which his eye was applied.

He shuddered, and recoiled slightly. But the night was so dark that, even at this close range, he could not make out whether it was Madame de Renal. He feared an instinctive cry of alarm; he could hear the dogs prowling with muttered growls round the foot of his ladder. ‘It is I,’ he repeated, quite loudly, ‘a friend.’ No answer; the white phantom had vanished. ‘For pity’s sake, open the window. I must speak to you, I am too wretched!’ and he knocked until the window nearly broke.

A little sharp sound was heard; the catch of the window gave way; he pushed it open and sprang lightly into the room.

The white phantom moved away; he seized it by the arms; it was a woman. All his ideas of courage melted. ‘If it is she, what will she say to me?’ What was his state when he realised from a faint cry that it was Madame de Renal.

He gathered her in his arms; she trembled, and had barely the strength to repulse him.

‘Wretch! What are you doing?’

Scarcely could her tremulous voice articulate the words. Julien saw that she was genuinely angry.

‘I have come to see you after fourteen months of a cruel parting.’

‘Go, leave me this instant. Ah! M. Chelan, why did you forbid me to write to him? I should have prevented this horror.’ She thrust him from her with a force that was indeed extraordinary. ‘I repent of my crime; heaven has deigned to enlighten me,’ she repeated in a stifled voice. ‘Go! Fly!’

‘After fourteen months of misery, I shall certainly not leave you until I have spoken to you. I wish to know all that you have been doing. Ah! I have loved you well enough to deserve this confidence . . . I wish to know all.’

In spite of herself Madame de Renal felt this tone of authority exert its influence over her heart.

Julien, who was holding her in a passionate embrace, and resisting her efforts to liberate herself, ceased to press her in his arms. This relaxation helped to reassure Madame de Renal.

‘I am going to draw up the ladder,’ he said, ‘so that it may not compromise us if one of the servants, awakened by the noise, goes the rounds.’

‘Ah! Leave me, leave me rather,’ the answer came with unfeigned anger. ‘What do men matter to me? It is God that sees the terrible wrong you are doing me, and will punish me for it. You are taking a cowardly advantage of the regard that I once felt for you, but no longer feel. Do you hear, Master Julien?’

He drew up the ladder very slowly, so as not to make any noise.

‘Is your husband in town?’ he asked, not to defy her, but from force of habit.

‘Do not speak to me so, for pity’s sake, or I shall call my husband. I am all too guilty already of not having sent you away, at any cost. I pity you,’ she told him, seeking to wound his pride which she knew to be so irritable.

Her refusal to use the tu form, that abrupt method of breaking so tender a bond, and one upon which he still reckoned, roused Julien’s amorous transport to a frenzy.

‘What! Is it possible that you no longer love me!’ he said to her, in those accents of the heart to which it is so difficult to listen unmoved.

She made no reply; as for him, he was weeping bitter tears.