Dumas, Alexandre – The Black Tulip

perfect gardener, my pretty Rosa. But I am afraid the

nursing of my tulip will take up all your time.”

“Yes, it will,” said Rosa; “but never mind. Your tulip is my

daughter. I shall devote to it the same time as I should to

a child of mine, if I were a mother. Only by becoming its

mother,” Rosa added, smilingly, “can I cease to be its

rival.”

“My kind and pretty Rosa!” muttered Cornelius casting on her

a glance in which there was much more of the lover than of

the gardener, and which afforded Rosa some consolation.

Then, after a silence of some moments, during which

Cornelius had grasped through the openings of the grating

for the receding hand of Rosa, he said, —

“Do you mean to say that the bulb has now been in the ground

for six days?”

“Yes, six days, Mynheer Cornelius,” she answered.

“And it does not yet show leaf”

“No, but I think it will to-morrow.”

“Well, then, to-morrow you will bring me news about it, and

about yourself, won’t you, Rosa? I care very much for the

daughter, as you called it just now, but I care even much

more for the mother.”

“To-morrow?” said Rosa, looking at Cornelius askance. “I

don’t know whether I shall be able to come to-morrow.”

“Good heavens!” said Cornelius, “why can’t you come

to-morrow?”

“Mynheer Cornelius, I have lots of things to do.”

“And I have only one,” muttered Cornelius.

“Yes,” said Rosa, “to love your tulip.”

“To love you, Rosa.”

Rosa shook her head, after which followed a pause.

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“Well,” — Cornelius at last broke the silence, — “well,

Rosa, everything changes in the realm of nature; the flowers

of spring are succeeded by other flowers; and the bees,

which so tenderly caressed the violets and the wall-flowers,

will flutter with just as much love about the honey-suckles,

the rose, the jessamine, and the carnation.”

“What does all this mean?” asked Rosa.

“You have abandoned me, Miss Rosa, to seek your pleasure

elsewhere. You have done well, and I will not complain. What

claim have I to your fidelity?”

“My fidelity!” Rosa exclaimed, with her eyes full of tears,

and without caring any longer to hide from Cornelius this

dew of pearls dropping on her cheeks, “my fidelity! have I

not been faithful to you?”

“Do you call it faithful to desert me, and to leave me here

to die?”

“But, Mynheer Cornelius,” said Rosa, “am I not doing

everything for you that could give you pleasure? have I not

devoted myself to your tulip?”

“You are bitter, Rosa, you reproach me with the only

unalloyed pleasure which I have had in this world.”

“I reproach you with nothing, Mynheer Cornelius, except,

perhaps, with the intense grief which I felt when people

came to tell me at the Buytenhof that you were about to be

put to death.”

“You are displeased, Rosa, my sweet girl, with my loving

flowers.”

“I am not displeased with your loving them, Mynheer

Cornelius, only it makes me sad to think that you love them

better than you do me.”

“Oh, my dear, dear Rosa! look how my hands tremble; look at

my pale cheek, hear how my heart beats. It is for you, my

love, not for the black tulip. Destroy the bulb, destroy the

germ of that flower, extinguish the gentle light of that

innocent and delightful dream, to which I have accustomed

myself; but love me, Rosa, love me; for I feel deeply that I

love but you.”

“Yes, after the black tulip,” sighed Rosa, who at last no

longer coyly withdrew her warm hands from the grating, as

Cornelius most affectionately kissed them.

“Above and before everything in this world, Rosa.”

“May I believe you?”

“As you believe in your own existence.”

“Well, then, be it so; but loving me does not bind you too

much.”

“Unfortunately, it does not bind me more than I am bound;

but it binds you, Rosa, you.”

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“To what?”

“First of all, not to marry.”

She smiled.

“That’s your way,” she said; “you are tyrants all of you.