The Last Fay Page 9

  “Before your arteries have pulsed ten times,” replied the djinni, “you shall have what you desire.” He disappeared, and reappeared immediately; he set one knee on the ground and indicated a large bag of gold, which the negro dropped on the ground. They waited for Abel to give the order to withdraw, and soon departed, singing

  An emanation of extraordinary sweetness filled the air with its perfume. Catherine and Juliette, astounded, stood there in a daze, looking alternately at Abel, his lamp and the stone—but at Abel longer than the others, for he seemed to them, by virtue of his attitude, an angel descended from the heavens.

  Juliette, the fortunate Juliette, contemplated him with an effusion of the heart that made her face shine with the intoxicating joy that fortunate amour gives, and immediately, her initial grace and gaiety reappeared in her stance and her movements.

  “If you’re a man,” she said, with a delicate smile, “you will be almost a rival of Antoine in my soul; your place will always be marked in the corner of the hearth in our cottage, and no one else will take it.”

  “Now you’re happy!” Catherine said to her, sighing.

  “Oh yes, very happy!” Juliette replied, turning her gaze to the farm where the man she loved amorously was asleep.

  A melancholy smile strayed over Catherine’s lips, and she said, with a hint of bitterness: “For women who marry their beloved, virtues are not difficult to practice.”

  Abel looked at them with a naïve curiosity, and did not understand the thanks of which he was the object, for he experienced a great pleasure, which he felt owed something to Juliette and Catherine.

  He took their hands, and pressed them to his heart, which made Catherine shiver, and said to them with the enthusiasm of youth that has something endearing about it, because it emerged direct from the soul: “Oh, you have made me know the pleasure of the fays! Will you bring me all the unfortunate people?”

  Juliette promised to come back often to the stone on the hill, and the two young women, lifting up the bag filled with gold, went away, often turning their heads. Abel watched them go down the hill and reach the village.

  Chapter IX

  The Empire of the Fays

  Abel remained plunged for some time in the charming state of mind that follows an extreme pleasure. To have rendered someone happy is an enjoyment that comes from a sixth sense, which not everyone has. Those who have it will understand perfectly what Abel felt, and those who do not would never understand it, even if there were twenty printed pages here explaining it to them.

  Abel thought that his dear fay would come that night, but he was mistaken, and spent all the time desiring her, thinking alternately about the enchantments he had overcome, the brilliant lake that he had traversed, and above all, the cradle of nacre in the bosom of which he had admired the Pearl Fay. The pressure of the hand by which they had mutually testified their pleasure was retraced in Abel’s imagination with such fidelity that he thought at times that he was still holding the fay’s hand.

  In the morning, he felt mortally sad; he went to the slab and tried to lift it in order to discover the way to the enchanted palace, but his efforts were futile. He came back to sit on his rustic bench, trying to consume time in order to disguise from himself the interval that separated him from the next night, during which he hoped the fay would reappear. Like the children of nature who only ever have one idea, one desire, and cannot conceive that they might be distracted from it, Abel only wanted one thing and only thought about one thing: his fay.

  Suddenly, he heard a celestial voice that was murmuring a song of amour so softly that the air was barely stirred by it. She was there behind him: more tricks!

  A simple white robe garnished at the hem by a few pearls; a white satin girdle; white roses in her hair, and pretty white cothurnes made up her attire.

  She sat down beside Abel, and before he had pronounced a single word she said to him: “I’ve come to see you devoid of all my pomp, for you have placed yourself almost at the level of a fay by the use you have made of the talisman.” Trembling slightly, she added: “Abel, if genius is the fire and the sublime sound of a beautiful soul, benevolence is the perfume it exhales. Pure benevolence, without any other goal than doing good, is one of the traits of the God to whom fays and humans owe everything.” Looking at him, and immediately lowering her eyes, she said: “I’m content.”

  The delicate smile with which she accompanied her final remark intoxicated poor Abel so much that he could make no reply, and they both remained mute, as if ashamed. The fay especially appeared to be enjoying a sensation long desired; she was contemplating Abel with an air of anxiety that seemed to be saying: Will he speak to me? Her eyes radiated desire and amour, and nothing was more attractive than that visage resplendent with grace and tenderness.

  “Oh,” said Abel, after having admired her covertly, darting one of those oblique glances at her that are so voluptuous, “you can put on the garments of a mortal, but it will always be evident that you’re a fay.”

  “No,” she replied, “at this moment, I’m no longer a fay. You can speak to me as your equal, and I have no strength to take offense at what you say.”

  All of Abel’s countenance had already said “I love you,” but while thinking it, an indescribable modesty, preventing him from pronouncing that divine statement, which seemed to him a veritable crime—or rather, the fear of offending the fay and learning that she did not share a love so insensate, held his tongue captive. At that moment he was, to a supreme degree, under the influence of that modesty, the prerogative of great souls, which ensures that, at a young age, one can only shiver at the aspect of a youthful beauty, adore her in silence, count the touch of her robe as the greatest of pleasures, and kiss her footprints when she has gone.

  The little fay perceived that mute homage of an extreme amour clearly, so she savored it in silence with an inexpressible delight. For who can see oneself reigning despotically over a heart full of love—a heart in which no other object can find room—without an indescribable joy?

  “Abel,” she said, “You won’t see me again for several days, because I’m obliged to go to a great fête, at which many fays and enchanters will be present.”

  “How beautiful that must be!” Abel exclaimed, “And how I’d like to see such an assembly—in which you would doubtless be the most beautiful!”

  “Nothing is simpler,” replied the fay, “and if your desire isn’t satisfied when I’ve told you what happens there, I’ll take you there one day. Listen to me carefully. At the hour when everything in nature is asleep, the fays and enchanters mount their chariots and arrive, one after another, at the palace of the djinni that is giving the fête; all the fays take care to try to arrive last, in order that her adornment, being seen last, obtains the victory, for fays are singularly intent on making their costume triumph.

  “That singular circumstance changes time and its modifications in the Empire of the Fays, for if one is invited to go to the palace at ten o’clock, that signifies midnight, and no one arrives before one o’clock in the morning. The enchanters are all dressed in black, because they think, sagely, that the absence of any color is advantageous to them, because colors are at the moment an object of trouble and confusion in the realm of the fays. Red, blue and white have been successively fashionable, with the consequence that their combination is a subject of scandal, and the present king is a white djinni. The blue djinn are the enemies of the white djinn and the red djinn are even more terrible.

  “If the white djinn were not retained by the king of the fays, they would already have put all the blues and reds in bottles; so, in order to avoid disorder, everyone dresses in black, so that one can only recognize them by their language, for each color has its grimoire, its manner of speaking and its habits. The white djinn see everything in rosy shades; the blue djinn see everything blackly; and the red djinn don’t see anything at all. For the first, the sight of water that always finds it level is a horrible thing; for the second, t
he sight of a palace and chariot containing djinn who don’t refer to themselves simply as djinn, and live on a de, is a fatal scene; finally, the third class of djinn would like to break all the enchanters’ wands and turn everything upside down, in order to give every fay a equal power; those sorts of djinn all have a banner, and a slogan to which they attach their actions and thoughts, and don’t perceive that they all want to same thing under different names.

  “There are also many quartered djinn, who are all colors, but their dictionary is so short and their belly so fat, since it contains all shades, that they have little esteem, for they’re always in favor of the strongest. It’s the bottom of the barrel of power that the enchanters are disputing. They all say the same thing, and assemble at the statues in the gardens, which all the property-owners have, so that they’re recognized immediately, all the more so as they have no wand, because their power is subordinate to that of the daylight enchanter, which means that they’re always hungry, and always have the appearance of eating for the hunger to come, because they’re afraid that one day, one of the three parties will be strong enough, and, having no more need of them, might be seen for what they are—which is to say, horses for any saddles, sacks for any grain, mobile consciences—and might be sent to reign in the air and direct fleeting clouds or group mists around the sun, or, better still, supervise the colors of the rainbow.

  “There are enchanters of all these classes who come to these gatherings with a multitude of fays, and this is what happens there. When the old fays arrive, they’re placed on benches of honor along the walls, and there they’re content to watch what happens without taking part in it, because they’re old; but their tongue, having inherited all the activity of their body, compensates them by gossiping about the young fays and the enchanters. If a djinni looks too much at a little fay they cry scandal, and the entire tapestry stirs as if it were a matter of a revolution. As everything has been anticipated, the old fays have little pieces of wood garnished with satin, and when they get bored they extend the satin in front of their faces and yawn silently, for it’s forbidden in the Empire of the Fays to open one’s mouth other than to speak.

  “The old fays also guard the places and the mantles of the young, and render them a thousand petty services, like revealing to the enchanters that some fay who seems to them to be as straight as a reed only achieves that delightful figure by rounding herself out with cleverly-positioned cushions. They can spot, from a league away, fays who put a red substance on their overly pale lips, and tell the enchanters to beware of kissing them, for fear of carrying their colors away. They divine the padding that a fay puts in her shoes when one is too short, and lay bare all the tricks that they once practiced.

  “Then the young fays get their revenge by stepping on the tails of little dogs, of which the old fays are very fond. In fact, if a dog dies, they keep its portrait in a locket, like that of a cherished lover. Or, again, the young fays mock the pretentions of the old—and that, my dear Abel, is one of their greatest amusements.

  “The palace is illuminated by artificial fires, reproduced by diamonds, and it is ornamented with pebbles crushed and powdered in great mirrors, in order that a fay, in passing by, can see whether her costume is disordered, or make a sign to some enchanter or other, having understood, by some sign or other, that he wants to talk to her.

  “Then, when almost everyone has arrived, each enchanter takes a fay, and they all start dancing to the sounds of an orchestra, traversing the principal hall of the palace in a more or less pretty fashion, tracing bizarre figures with their dancing to see who can jump, dance, traverse and turn with the most skill. Finally, when everyone is leaping, dancing and laughing, more serious affairs are treated. A djinni who leaps is much more tractable; one obtains what one wants from him much more easily.

  “If one of you came in then, without hearing the music, he would see the most singular spectacle in the world: he would see two hundred divinities, almost all in the air, plying their feet without any goal, without wanting to get anywhere, and moving their heads, their eyes and their tongues at random. On that stupid momentary feast, for that aerial dance, the most sumptuous costumes are lavished, when their price could relieve thousands of unfortunates.

  “Finally, the enchanters and the old fays, all of whose joints are stiff, whose sinews are too hard, and who, in consequence, can no longer leap, go into other rooms. There, they all stand in front of a table, occupied in watching two enchanters holding little pieces of cardboard; that is their most sublime occupation, their most cherished language, their favorite amusement, their dream, their unique thought.

  “In fact, throughout the time that the fête lasts, the room where the green tables and the cards are, never empties; all the djinn, male and female, blue white or red—for in that occupation all ranks, opinions and distinctions disappear—never take their eyes off the little colored cards that go back and forth; and if one of you, wanting to take advantage of the admirable discourses that the greatest of enchanters ought to make when they are assembled, on listening, he would hear: ‘Four to five, four to four, three to one, one, two, three, one to four, four to nothing, three to nothing, won, sunk, no more bets, twenty francs to win, a dancer, the king, the trick, the royal fork, etc.’ Those words and those cards are so attractive that the fays and djinn forget to eat and drink, and if the room collapsed they would not even notice it until someone told them that the palace had ‘played its hand.’12

  “When the fays and the djinn are weary of traversing the enchanter’s reception rooms in every direction, and they see the dawn expand its freshness, they go away, without saying anything to the enchanter who has received them, as if they had not even sought him out on arriving. It often happens that an enchanter who gives a fête does not even know who the djinn he has seen are.

  “Such is the principal amusement of fays; it is one of their favorite pleasures, for the duration of which they forget the earth and its inhabitants, the unfortunate, the ill, everything, and even glory at these assemblies in speaking in a jocular fashion, in which everything, including the most serious and lamentable things, is presented with witty modifications, and assaults are mounted of cruel jests. If an unfortunate on earth is ruined, and a pretty little fay is told, she replies: ‘He won’t ride in a carriage anymore!’ If famine desolates a region, and there is no grain with which to make bread, they will say: ‘Let them eat cake!”

  “I’d rather help some Juliette with my lamp than savor those pleasures,” said Abel.

  “Dear child,” exclaimed the fay, “you’re lucky to be alone in this little cottage, for the empire of the fays has many other singularities, which I’ll explain to you some day, and our power is sold to us more dearly than you might think.”

  “It is, however,” he replied, timidly, “a place such that all cottages are places of suffering when one has seen it...”

  “I understand,” replied the fay, smiling. “Well, wouldn’t you like to accompany me for a moment along this terrestrial path…toward that place?”

  He stood up and, taking her by the hand, walked with her toward the forest. Abel’s head was full of new ideas, to which the fay’s singular story had given birth, so there was silence between the two of them, like a common friend serving as a mediator, and to whom they were confiding their thoughts. At times, Abel looked at his beautiful and genteel companion, covertly, as if he had some secret thought to reveal to her; then he lowered his eyes and dared not speak for fear of offending her. At such times one is more than ever inclined to ask insignificant questions, either to embolden ne to speak or to evade the devouring desire.

  “We’re going toward the forest,” said Abel, “Tell me more, I beg you, about what happens in the empire of the fays, for I’m hungry for your speech; it nourishes me, and I love the sound of your voice as I once loved the sight of my father…”

  “Dear child,” she replied, with a keen emotion, “the more I introduce you to the usages of the empire of the fays
, the more you will find to complain of its inhabitants. For instance, do you think that he marriage of a fay and an enchanter happens as you imagine the union of two beings ought to be made? Let’s see, Abel, what do you think about amour? What has it revealed to your pure soul?”

  “Oh,” said Abel, “amour is the fusion of two souls into one alone; it’s a sympathy that unites two hearts to such an extent that one has not a single thought that the other does not have; it’s...but no, that sentiment loses in being defined, for I sense something immense that confounds me, and here I understand that human language stops, and that one ought only to speak of it with the soul alone. In sum, I imagine—to try to say something that might express what I think—that once one is in love, amour takes such full possession of us and of nature that there is nothing else but it, heaven and us, as, when one is on the ocean in a boat, there is no longer anything but the celestial vault and the water.”

  “Well, Abel,” said the fay, “in our empire, no one worries about sentiments; as soon as an enchanter has a little fay to be married, one begins by dressing her up a little better than usual, and calculating how many flying dragons the family has in its stables, and how many slaves in the palace, but above all, once examinees with a curious care the weight of the family wand, whether that wand is made of diamond, gold, silver, copper or iron, and what title it has.

  “Once these important observations are made the father and mother make their daughter repeated speeches, which amount to this: ‘My child, you’re eighteen years old—for fays have an age exactly like mortals—and it’s shameful not to be married by twenty; try, therefore, to extend your nets and catch a husband, the year might perhaps be good. But given that we have two hippogriffs for our chariot, one slave behind, that our family wand weighs thirty carats, is gold and has a first-rate title, you need an enchanter who has a wand worthy of yours. You will have no virtues, you will be unworthy to live, if you don’t find an enchanter who also has a chariot with two hippogriffs. We have three hundred years of antiquity; in the empire of the fays, it’s also necessary that your husband be of an enchanter family equal to ours. Refrain, therefore, from ever raising your eyes toward the djinn; walk straight; conserve yourself for the man that pleases you, but who has a fine wand, two fine dragons hitched to his chariot as at least two hundred years of antiquity.’