The Red and the Black by Stendhal Read Free Book Online

hesitantly repeated question: 'What harm can this
gentleman from Paris do to the prisoners?', he was about to lose his
temper, when she let out a cry of alarm. Her second son had just
climbed on to the top of the terrace wall and was running along it,
although there was a drop of more than twenty feet from the wall to
the vineyard on the other side. Fear of startling her son and making
him fall stopped M me de Rênal from calling out to him.
Eventually the child, laughing at his feat of daring, glanced at his
mother and saw how pale she was; he jumped down on to the path and ran
over to her. He got a good scolding.
    This little incident gave a new turn to the conversation.
    'I'm determined to take on young Sorel, the sawyer's son, as part of
the household,' said M. de Rênal. 'He can keep an eye on the children,
who are becoming rather a handful for us. He's a young priest, or as
good as, knows his Latin, and the children will learn a great deal
from him; he's made of stern stuff, according to Father Chélan. I
shall give him three hundred francs and his keep. I did have some
doubts about his morality, as he was the blue-eyed boy of that old
surgeon who was a member of the Legion of Honour and came to board at
the Sorels' on the strength of being a cousin of theirs. The fellow
may well really have been a secret agent of the liberals. He used to
say that our mountain air did his asthma good, but there's no proof of
that. He had taken part in all Buonaparté's campaigns
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in Italy, and even, so they say, voted 'no' to the Empire * in the past. This liberal taught young Sorel Latin, and left him
the stock of books he had brought with him. So I should never have
thought of putting the carpenter's son * in charge of our children, had the priest not told me, on the very
day before the incident which has just made us enemies for good, that
young Sorel has been studying theology for three years with the
intention of going to the seminary. So he isn't a liberal, and he does
know Latin.
    'This arrangement works
out in more ways than one,' went on M. de Rênal, glancing at his wife
with a diplomatic look on his face. ' Valenod is as proud as anything
of the two fine Normandy cobs he has just bought for his barouche; but
he hasn't got a tutor for his children.'
    'He might well get in before us with this one.'
    'So you approve of my plan?' said M. de Rênal with a smile to thank
his wife for the excellent idea she had just had. 'Right, that's
settled then.'
    'Heavens above! my dearest, you are quick to make up your mind!'
    'That's because I'm a person of character, I am, and this much was
obvious to the priest. Let's make no bones about it, we're surrounded
by liberals here. All the cloth merchants are envious of me, I know
for certain they are; and two or three of them are getting filthy
rich. Well, you see, I like the idea of their seeing M. de Rênal's
children going past on their walk, in the charge of their tutor. Everyone will be impressed. My grandfather would often tell us how in
his youth he'd had a tutor. It may cost me as much as a hundred
crowns, but it must be reckoned a necessary expenditure to maintain
our station.'
    This sudden resolve left M me de Rênal deep in thought. She was a tall, well-built woman who had
been the local beauty, as they say in the mountains round here. She
had an artless air about her, and a youthful way of walking. To the
eyes of a Parisian, this natural charm, full of lively innocence,
would even have been enough to conjure up thoughts of sweet
pleasure. Had she known she had this kind of success, M me de Rênal would have felt deeply ashamed of it. Her heart was
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quite untouched by coquetry or affectation. M. Valenod, the wealthy
master of the workhouse, was believed to have tried to win her
favours, but with no success. This had cast a dazzling light on her
virtue since this M. Valenod, a tall, powerfully built young man with a
ruddy