Page:The Works of Honoré de Balzac Volume 29.djvu/169

Rh most surrounded it, so that it was only possible to reach the mansion by following one narrow causeway. That part of the peninsula on which the house and gardens stood was protected at some distance from the back of the château by a wide moat which received all the overflow from the two ponds with which it communicated. In this way an island was formed, which was an almost impregnable retreat, and therefore invaluable for a party leader, who could only be surprised here by treachery.

As the gate creaked on its rusty hinges, and she passed under the pointed archway that had been ruined in the previous war, Mlle. de Verneuil stretched out her head. The gloomy colors of the picture presented to her gaze all but effaced the thoughts of love and coquetry with which she had been soothing herself. The coach entered a great courtyard, almost square in shape, and bounded by the steep banks of the ponds. These rough embankments were kept dank by the water with its great patches of green weed, and bore such trees as love marshy places, for their sole adornment. They stood leafless now. The stunted trunks and huge heads gray with lichens rose above the reeds and undergrowth like misshapen dwarfs. These uncomely hedges seemed to have a sort of life in them, and to find a language when the frogs escaped from them, croaking as they went; and the water-hens, in alarm at the sounds made by the coach, flew and splashed across the surface of the pools. The courtyard, surrounded by tall withered grasses, gorse, dwarf shrubs and creeping plants, put an end to any preconceived ideas of order or of splendor.

The château itself seemed to have been a long while deserted. The roofs appeared to bend under an accumulation of vegetable growths; and although the walls were built very solidly of the schistous stone of the district, there were numerous cracks where the ivy had found a hold. The château fronted the pond, and consisted of two wings which met at right angles in a high tower, and that was all. The doors and shutters hung loose and rotten: the balustrades