headerCHAPTER V.SIDONIE.
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Scarcely had the door closed upon the crowd when Monsieur Eugène threw off his coat, and bending over Bruno’s prostrate form said:
“First let us see if there is life.”
With these words he rested his head on Bruno’s chest. Jean Manant could hardly breathe, so deep was his dread of the possible truth; while poor little Sidonie was choked with anguish. After a moment of cruel suspense Eugène raised his head sadly, as if to regain his breath, and then once more inclined his ear.
Jean Manant and Sidonie were in despair. Catherine alone remained calm and collected. A few more moments of suspense passed, and then with a little cry Monsieur Eugène sprang up.
“He is living. His heart is beating, though faintly,” said he. “Wait!”
He immediately selected a lance from an unpretentious little surgeon’s case near by and summoned the three women to help him.
“Here, Jeannille,” he quickly called, “support Bruno’s head and shoulders—like that. And you, MadameBarrau, will you kindly hold his wrist firmly? You are not easily frightened, are you? I am going to bleed him.”
“All right,” answered Catherine, without a sign of flinching, as she seized his wrist, but poor Sidonie was trembling like an aspen-leaf.
Under the lance the vein was opened and there spurted out a stream of blood, the sight of which nearly distracted the little lame girl.
“Good! good!” said Monsieur Eugène, with a smile.
“Is he saved?” asked Jean in a trembling whisper.
“At all events, the chances are in his favor.”
“But those cattle must have crushed his bones,” insisted Manant, who was still possessed by a horrible doubt.
“Jean, my boy, it is a miracle; but, barring more or less severe contusions, Bruno has escaped.”
Still incredulous, Jean regarded Monsieur Eugène steadily for half a minute as if to read the truth in the latter’s face. Calmly Eugène returned his gaze and soon Jean’s doubts vanished, for a sigh fell from Bruno’s lips.
A great joy illumined Manant’s face and Sidonie lifted her eyes in prayer. Old Jeannille sat unmoved and impenetrable. Catherine looked at the young man a little curiously. He seemed too slender and delicate a fellow to be so daring. His white arm was like a woman’s. Indeed, what woman in St. Benoit could not boast of more muscle than he? And his slender wrist inspired a sort of pity in her breast.
“Poor fellow!” she murmured to herself, as she reflected how ardently, though respectfully, Bruno loved her—not daring to confess it.
Poor fellow, indeed!
Sidonie gazed upon his shapely form in mute admiration. How perfect he seemed to her. How noble and graceful. Ah! could he but learn to love her!
Bruno moved gently. Another sigh—a deeper one than before—came from his lips. Monsieur Eugène was bathing his wounds with arnica and bandaging them. Bruno’s long-fringed drooping eyelids feebly opened, and he slowly looked around him.
Catherine affected an air of cool indifference, but Sidonie wore a look of absolute devotion. Bruno abruptly changed his gaze from the lame girl’s enraptured face to Madame Barrau’s, and his own became radiant for a moment. A bit of color crept into his cheeks. Catherine continued to hold his wrist while the vein was bleeding, and the contact of her soft hand sent a delicious magnetic thrill through his body.
“Thank you, Madame Catherine,” he murmured—hardly above a whisper—and then, with a smile on his lips, he again fainted away.
Catherine also smiled, but in a spirit of triumph, and Jeannille turned upon her a look of such frigidity that the gamekeeper’s wife, blushing and disconcerted, asked if the operation was not nearly over.
“A moment more; but if you are tired Jean will relieve you,” answered Monsieur Eugène. Jean Manant did not require a second bidding. With a delicacy that was wonderful in so clumsy a man, he took Bruno’s arm in his hands. In a few minutes Bruno returned to consciousness.
“Where do you suffer?” asked Monsieur Eugène.
“I am not in pain,” said Bruno, his eyes riveted on Catherine’s face. Just then the door slammed.
“Who’s there?” shouted Eugène, impatiently.
“It is I, Monsieur,” answered the awkward Firmin, as he entered.
“What do you want? Didn’t they tell you I was engaged and did not wish to be disturbed?”
“But important business brings me.”
“Well, well, speak quickly.”
“I wish to ask Monsieur my rights.”
“In what respect?”
“Monsieur knows of the stampede. Well, I had just bought a pair of oxen from Carassol, who lives at Bocasse, but they had not been surrendered to me when the stampede commenced.”
“Well?”
“Well, they did like all the rest. They ran away.”
“Ah! And Carassol claims that the transaction was concluded in good faith and that he is not responsible for the oxen?”
“Exactly.”
“Let us see, Finnin. Had you been drinking?”
“To speak honestly, a little, Monsieur.”
“That is right—be honest. Do you know where Carassol’s oxen were standing?”
“Near the watering-trough.”
“And you wish my opinion in the matter? Listen. Carassol must assist you to recover the oxen, and you must make a diligent search for them.”
“But I have paid for the beasts.”
“Then Carassol is in the right.”
“I will go to law about it.”
“You will lose the case, my boy.”
“Well, we shall see,” returned Firmin, who, seeing Catherine, immediately approached her.
“Ah, good-day, Madame Barrau. Are you well? I perceive that you are charming as ever.”
Blushing a little at this bold overture, Catherine answered quietly with a word. Firmin assumed such an offensive manner toward her that, obliged to treat it as insolence, she prepared to leave. Firmin, too, showed his intention to depart.
“Au revoir,” said he. “Thanks for your advice, Monsieur.”
Catherine, with disgust, turning to go, observed near the door old Jeannille, who was staring at her with cold, penetrating eyes.
Catherine again changed color. “It seems as though she were playing the spy on me,” she thought. “Can it be that my husband has put a watch over me? If I knew that to be the fact——”
Always impulsive, Catherine now imagined the worst. She fancied she had discovered a plot in which everybody was arrayed against her. “This is the third time I have caught that old hag watching me as if she would read my thoughts.”
Firmin, meanwhile, was walking by her side.
“Go away,” said Catherine disdainfully. “One would think you had taken it upon yourself to compromise me.”
The man certainly was a sot, but he possessed an enormous amount of vanity. Catherine’s words therefore flattered his self-conceit.
“Upon my honor, Madame——”
Firmin for several years had served as valet to a Parisian gentleman, and he once had heard his master speak thus to a great lady. So thinking to please Catherine he made use of the high-sounding phrase, addingsottovocein her ear: “Meet me to-morrow at three o’clock at Bemacle’s Cross,chèremadame,” and without waiting for her reply he passed on ahead with rapid step.
Catherine shrugged her shoulders. A feeling of indignation took possession of her. She redoubled her pace and proceeded home. Since the day when Savin humiliated her before the peasants she had been enraged and miserable. “On my knees,” she would repeat a dozen times a day, “he compelled me to ask pardon. On my knees!” And through her brain all sorts of schemes of vengeance were flitting. With all the force of her darker nature she had begun to hate the valiant soldier whose generosity she should have recognized and reciprocated. Haunted by the idea that ever since that memorable day people had distrusted her, she felt able less and less to strive against the evil spirit to which she had fallen a prey.
On every side as she walked homeward an extraordinary confusion reigned. Many were engaged in a search after the missing cattle. The men taunted each other and quarrelled, and more than one peasant, after searching in vain for his cow, ox, or bull, took the one nearest him and declared without hesitation that it belonged to him. Nobody can be more ferocious than the peasant who loses his worldly goods, and in the present instance more than fifty had been dispossessed.
Fadard stood leaning against the wall in the bar-room of the inn when Andoche entered. His face had been rendered hideous by a large gash—the result of a blow from a bottle. Night was approaching. The sun, in a flood of glowing crimson and amber, was sinking beyond the world’s west. The leaves of the tall poplars were gently soughing as the twilight breeze, prodigalwith caresses, wooed them into soothing accents. Still the wrathy peasants haggled and disputed the claims of possession as the animals slowly and with great difficulty were recaptured. No one claimed the dead cattle. The controversy was alone confined to the living. The sun in a final burst of glory flashed a brilliant farewell to this section of the earth as Madame Barrau, excited to hatred and anger and imagining all kinds and degrees of troubles to be hers, went on her way with downcast eyes. Once, however, she glanced at the parting orb, whose lustrous rays recalled to her mind Bruno’s look of joy when he beheld her beside the couch.
If Catherine had allowed herself to remember only Savin’s generosity instead of harboring wicked thoughts; if she had studied the situation and reflected a little, she would have realized what a meagre sacrifice of self-love would have won her husband over to devotion once more. But this effort seemed to her out of the question. She only remembered that if Savin did not love her two other men did. Had not Firmin and Bruno evinced how much she was to be desired? Ah! they would know—either one of them—how to appreciate her beauty and fine qualities. Thus onward she walked, with vengeance in her heart.
Beyond the village comparative calm prevailed. Here no disputes were heard. On the rustic little bridge she met Mother Mathurine. The poor woman was hurrying toward St. Benoit.
“Have you seen Bruno, Madame Catherine?” she asked, with heart-broken sobs.
“Do not take on so, Mother Mathurine. He is safe. Monsieur Eugène is taking care of him.”
“Tell me the worst, Madame,” pleaded the old woman.
“I have, Madame. It is true—but he owes his life to Jean Manant.”
“Tohim? Didhesave him?”
“Yes, Madame. From under the trampling herd he rescued him.”
“Again!Thanks, Madame Catherine. But I must hasten to Bruno’s side. I may be able to do something for him.”
And with quickened steps Mother Mathurine proceeded to Monsieur Eugène’s house, where she arrived a few moments later, breathless and trembling. Through the yard all instinctively made way for her to pass.
“Where is my son?” she asked, hoarsely. They pointed to the front room. Seeing her enter, Monsieur Eugène came forward to speak to her.
“One moment before you embrace Bruno. He has just fainted again.”
“You would tell me he is dead!”
“No! no! He is living and doing well. But you may embrace a brave lad here and thank him for his courage,” and Monsieur Eugène pointed to Jean Manant.
Mother Mathurine, turning, seized his hands and kissed them.
“Mother Mathurine,” cried the brawny Jean, somewhat embarrassed, “do not thankme.”
“What! When you have saved his life for the fourth time!Mon Dieu!What courage!”
“It was nothing,” answered he, astonished that his action in Bruno’s behalf should be judged so meritorious.
At this moment Bruno stirred.
“Bruno wants to embrace you,” observed Monsieur Eugène to Mother Mathurine.
“O Bruno! Naughty, careless boy,” she cried. “Did you not promise me that you would not again expose yourself to danger? You will be the death of me—running so many risks.”
“What could I do, mother? Could I leave a child to die without raising a finger to save her?”
“O my boy! You know how much I love you. Do not torment me again. Be more careful in the future.”
“But you forget, mother, that my friend Jean comes in time to save me always,” and he seized Manant’s hand, the latter trying to conceal his emotion. Some one was silently weeping tears of joy in a secluded corner of the room. Poor little Sidonie! Ordinarily she would have hastened to embrace Mother Mathurine. But now a fear possessed her and she could not trust herself to speak. For worlds she would not expose her swollen eyes that Bruno might see what she endured.
“Are you suffering now?” asked Mother Mathurine.
“My body seems broken, but I have no actual pain,” answered Bruno.
“What a miracle that your brain was not crushed. God be praised!” said the grateful mother. “But can you not come home?”
“I believe so.”
“No imprudence, if you please,” expostulated Eugène. “Bruno must remain here for a few days or a week if necessary.”
“You are too good, Monsieur Eugène,” said the young man. “Already I have given you so much trouble. With Jean’s assistance I can easily go home.”
Sidonie was hoping that Bruno would mention her presence. The poor girl was looking reproachfully at him when Mother Mathurine noticed her for the first time.
“Why, Sidonie, child! You have been very quiet. How long have you been here? Come and kiss me.”
“Madame Catherine also assisted Monsieur Eugène when he bled my arm.Sheheld it for him,” broke out Bruno, unconsciously wounding the already suffering Sidonie.
“Yes, I know. I met her on the way here. Poor Catherine! She looked unhappy!”
“But she ought to be the happiest woman in the village,” said Monsieur Eugène earnestly.
Bruno’s countenance assumed a peculiar expression, while Madame Mathurine, who understood matters, drew little Sidonie closer to her side. “Ah, my dear,” she said in a whisper, “if it ever depends upon me it is you he shall choose.” Sidonie clasped Mother Mathurine with gracious joy.
By the side of Monsieur Eugène old Jeannille sat as though transfixed, with her eyes sharply directed at the lame girl. One by one the stars began to blossom in the heavens. Night was come. Nature had fallen asleep and the beautiful silver lights were keeping guard on high.
With renewed thanks to his kind benefactor Bruno, assisted by Mother Mathurine, Jean, and Sidonie, started for home. Sidonie’s face beamed with pleasure as the young man leaned his right arm on her shoulder. Happy Sidonie! How tender were her thoughts for him! She stepped with great care lest her limp should bother him.
The moon now hanging high in the heavens lent anenchantment to the scene, touching with its mellow light the grand old trees and tender flowers. A silence more eloquent than words fell upon the little train; but all in their hearts thanked God for the beautiful night and for preserving the well-beloved Bruno from a violent death.
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