34. CHAPTER XXXIV.
IN WHICH THE COSMOPOLITAN TELLS THE STORY OF THE GENTLEMANMADMAN.
“Charlemont was a young merchant of French
descent, living in St. Louis—a man not deficient in
mind, and possessed of that sterling and captivating
kindliness, seldom in perfection seen but in youthful
bachelors, united at times to a remarkable sort of gracefully
devil-may-care and witty good-humor. Of course, he
was admired by everybody, and loved, as only mankind
can love, by not a few. But in his twenty-ninth year
a change came over him. Like one whose hair turns
gray in a night, so in a day Charlemont turned from
affable to morose. His acquaintances were passed without
greeting; while, as for his confidential friends, them
he pointedly, unscrupulously, and with a kind of fierceness,
cut dead.
“One, provoked by such conduct, would fain have
resented it with words as disdainful; while another,
shocked by the change, and, in concern for a friend,
magnanimously overlooking affronts, implored to know
what sudden, secret grief had distempered him. But
from resentment and from tenderness Charlemont alike
turned away.
“Ere long, to the general surprise, the merchant
Charlemont was gazetted, and the same day it was reported
that he had withdrawn from town, but not
before placing his entire property in the hands of responsible
assigness for the benefit of creditors.
“Whither he had vanished, none could guess. At
length, nothing being heard, it was surmised that he
must have made away with himself—a surmise, doubtless,
originating in the remembrance of the change some
months previous to his bankruptcy—a change of a sort
only to be ascribed to a mind suddenly thrown from its
balance.
“Years passed. It was spring-time, and lo, one
bright morning, Charlemont lounged into the St. Louis
coffee-houses—gay, polite, humane, companionable, and
dressed in the height of costly elegance. Not only was
he alive, but he was himself again. Upon meeting with
old acquaintances, he made the first advances, and in
such a manner that it was impossible not to meet him
half-way. Upon other old friends, whom he did not
chance casually to meet, he either personally called, or
left his card and compliments for them; and to several,
sent presents of game or hampers of wine.
“They say the world is sometimes harshly unforgiving,
but it was not so to Charlemont. The world
feels a return of love for one who returns to it as he
did. Expressive of its renewed interest was a whisper,
an inquiring whisper, how now, exactly, so long after
his bankruptcy, it fared with Charlemont's purse.
Rumor, seldom at a loss for answers, replied that he had
spent nine years in Marseilles in France, and there acquiring
a second fortune, had returned with it, a man
devoted henceforth to genial friendships.
“Added years went by, and the restored wanderer
still the same; or rather, by his noble qualities, grew up
like golden maize in the encouraging sun of good
opinions. But still the latent wonder was, what had
caused that change in him at a period when, pretty much
as now, he was, to all appearance, in the possession of
the same fortune, the same friends, the same popularity.
But nobody thought it would be the thing to question
him here.
“At last, at a dinner at his house, when all the guests
but one had successively departed; this remaining
guest, an old acquaintance, being just enough under
the influence of wine to set aside the fear of touching
upon a delicate point, ventured, in a way which perhaps
spoke more favorably for his heart than his tact, to beg
of his host to explain the one enigma of his life. Deep
melancholy overspread the before cheery face of Charlemont;
he sat for some moments tremulously silent; then
pushing a full decanter towards the guest, in a choked
voice, said: `No, no! when by art, and care, and time,
flowers are made to bloom over a grave, who would
seek to dig all up again only to know the mystery?—
The wine.' When both glasses were filled, Charlemont
took his, and lifting it, added lowly: `If ever, in days
to come, you shall see ruin at hand, and, thinking you
understand mankind, shall tremble for your friendships,
and tremble for your pride; and, partly through love
for the one and fear for the other, shall resolve to be
beforehand with the world, and save it from a sin by
prospectively taking that sin to yourself, then will you
do as one I now dream of once did, and like him will
you suffer; but how fortunate and how grateful should
you be, if like him, after all that had happened, you
could be a little happy again.'
“When the guest went away, it was with the persuasion,
that though outwardly restored in mind as in
fortune, yet, some taint of Charlemont's old malady
survived, and that it was not well for friends to touch
one dangerous string.”
