"With monsieur le marquis, yes, madame, and the dear lady even added: 'He is a handsome fellow, this grandson of mine, and as generous as a king. Oh, well, as I have had the misfortune to miss Madame Bastien, I may as well go. But say, my good woman,' added madame la marquise, 'I am frightfully thirsty, can't you get me a nice glass of cold water?' 'Certainly, madame la marquise,' I replied, ashamed that such a grand lady should have to remind me to offer her such a courtesy. But I said to myself, 'Madame la marquise asked for water out of politeness, I will show my politeness by giving her a glass of wine;' so I ran to my pantry, and poured out a big tumbler of wine and set it on a clean plate and took it to the carriage."
"You ought to have given Madame de Pont Brillant the glass of water she asked for, but it makes no difference."
"Pardon me, madame, but I did right to take her the wine, for she took it."
"The big tumbler of wine?"
"Yes, madame, that she did. It is true she only moistened her lips with it, but she made another old lady who was with her drink the rest of it, and I think she couldn't have been very fond of wine, for she made a sort of face after she drank it, and madame la marquise added, 'Tell Madame Bastien that we drank to her health and to her beautiful eyes,' and when she returned the glass she slipped these five shining gold pieces into my hand, saying: 'These are for Madame Bastien's servants on condition that they will drink to the health of my grandson, the Marquis de Pont Brillant.Au revoir, my good woman.' And the handsome coach whirled away."
"I am very sorry that you didn't have the delicacy to decline to take the money she offered you."
"What, madame, refuse five louis d'or?"
"It is for the very reason that this is such a large sum of money that I am so sorry you accepted it."
"I didn't know, madame. It is the first time such a thing ever happened. If madame wants me to, I'll take these five gold pieces up to the château, and return them to the lady."
"That would only make a bad matter worse, but if you want to please me, Marguerite, you will give this hundred francs to the poor of our parish."
"I'll do that very thing to-morrow, madame," said Marguerite, bravely, "for these gold pieces burn my fingers, now you tell me I did wrong to take them."
"Thank you, Marguerite, thank you. I always knew you were a good, true woman. But one word more. Does my son know that Madame de Pont Brillant was here?"
"No, madame, for I have not told him, and I was alone in the house when the carriage came."
"Very well. I don't want my son to know anything about this visit, Marguerite."
"I won't breathe a word, then."
"And if Madame de Pont Brillant calls again you are to say that I am not at home, whether I am or not."
"What, madame, you won't see this great lady?"
"I am no great lady, my good Marguerite, and I do not crave the society of those who are so far above me in rank, so let it be understood that I am not at home if Madame de Pont Brillant calls again, and also that my son must remain entirely ignorant of to-day's visit."
"Very well, madame, you may trust me for that."
The next morning Madame Bastien informed M. David of the circumstance, and he commented on two things that had also struck Madame Bastien, though from an entirely different point of view.
"The request for a glass of water was evidently only an excuse for the bestowal of an extraordinarily large gratuity," said David. "The lady also announced her intention of soon coming again, I understand, though—"
"Though she begged me not to trouble myself to return her visit at the château," interrupted Marie. "I noted this humiliating distinction, and though I had not the slightest intention of responding to Madame de Pont Brillant's advances, this warning on her part obliges me to close my doors upon her in future. Far from being flattered by this visit, the possibility of her returning here, particularly with her grandson, alarms me beyond measure, remembering as I do that terrible scene in the forest. But this much is certain, the young Marquis de Pont Brillant knows nothing of Frederick's animosity. If he did, he certainly would not consent to accompany his grandmother here. Ah, monsieur, my brain fairly reels when I try to solve the mystery."
Two or three days more were devoted to fruitless efforts on the part of the mother and tutor.
Frederick remained impenetrable.
At last M. David resorted to heroic measures, and spoke of Raoul de Pont Brillant. Frederick changed colour and hung his head, but remained silent and impassible.
"He must at least have renounced his idea of vengeance," decided David, after studying the youth's face attentively. "The animosity still exists, perhaps, but it will at least be passive henceforth."
Marie shared this conviction, so her fears were to some extent allayed.
One day M. David said to Madame Bastien:
"While accepting with comparative cheerfulness the modest existence led by the members of your household, madame, has he never seemed to crave wealth and luxury, or deplore the fact that he does not possess them?"
"Never, M. David, never have I heard Frederick express a desire of that kind. How often has he tenderly exclaimed:
"'Ah, mother, could any lot be happier than ours? What happiness it is to be able to live on here with you—'"
But the poor mother could not finish the sentence. This recollection of a radiant past was too overpowering.
Each day the intimacy between Henri David and Marie Bastien was increased by their common interests and anxieties. There was a continual interchange of questions, confidences, fears, plans or hopes, alas! only too rare,—all having Frederick for their object.
The long winter evenings were usually passed tête-à-tête, for Madame Bastien's son retired at eight o'clock, feigning fatigue in order to escape from the solicitude that surrounded him, and that he might pursue his gloomy meditations undisturbed.
"I am more unhappy now than ever," he said to himself. "In times gone by my mother's continual questions about my secret malady irritated me; now they break my heart and augment my despair. I understand all my mother must suffer. Each day brings some new proof of her tender commiseration and her untiring efforts to cure me, but, alas! she can never forgive nor forget my crime. I shall be to her henceforth only an object of compassion. I think exactly the same of M. David that I do of my mother. I do full justice to his devotion to me and to my mother, but it is equally powerless to cure me, and to efface the remembrance of the vile and cowardly act of which I was guilty."
Meanwhile Henri David, believing himself on the track at last, was extending his researches to the most trivial subjects, at least apparently. Convinced that Frederick had powerful reasons for concealing his feelings from his mother, he might exercise less constraint in his intercourse with the two old servants on the place. Henri questioned them closely, and thus became cognisant of several highly significant facts. Among others, a beggar to whom Frederick had always been very generous said to the gardener: "M. Frederick has changed very much. He always used to be so kind-hearted, but to-day he gruffly told me: 'Apply to M. le marquis. He is so rich! Let him help you!'"
Madame Bastien usually saw David several times a day.
One day he did not make his appearance at all.
When supper-time came Marguerite went to tell him that the meal was on the table, but David bade the servant say to Madame Bastien that, not feeling very well, would she kindly excuse him for not coming down as usual?
Frederick, too, refused to leave his room, so Marie, for the first time since Henri David's arrival, spent the evening alone.
This loneliness caused a feeling of profound depression, and she was assailed by all sorts of gloomy presentiments.
When she went to her room about eleven o'clock, her son was asleep, or pretended to be asleep, so sadly and silently she slipped on a wrapper and let down her long hair, preparatory to brushing it for the night, when old Marguerite, coming in as usual to inquire if her mistress wanted anything before retiring, remarked, as she was about to withdraw:
"I forgot to ask you if André could have the horse and cart to go to Pont Brillant to-morrow morning, madame?"
"Yes," answered Marie, abstractedly.
"You know why André has got to go to the village, don't you, madame?"
"No," replied Marie, with the same deeply absorbed air.
"Why, it is to take M. David's things. He is going away, it seems."
"Great Heavens!" exclaimed Madame Bastien, letting the mass of hair she had been holding fall upon her shoulders, and, turning suddenly to the old servant, "What are you saying, Marguerite?"
"I say that the gentleman is going away, madame."
"What gentleman?"
"Why, M. David, M. Frederick's new tutor, and it is a pity, for—"
"He is going away?" repeated Madame Bastien, interrupting Marguerite in such a strangely altered voice, and with such an expression of grief and dismay, that the servant gazed at her wonderingly. "There must be some mistake. How do you know that M. David is going away?"
"He is sending his things away."
"Who told you so?"
"André."
"How does he know?"
"Why, yesterday M. David asked André if he could get a horse and cart to send some trunks to Pont-Brillant in a day or two. André told him yes; so I thought I ought to tell you that André intended to use the horse to-morrow, that is all."
"M. David has become discouraged. He abandons the task as an impossibility. The embarrassment and regret he feels are the cause of his holding himself so sedulously aloof all day. My son is lost!"
This was Marie's first and only thought. And, wild with despair, forgetting her disordered toilet and the lateness of the hour, she rushed up-stairs and burst into David's room, leaving Marguerite stupefied with amazement.
WHENMarie presented herself so unexpectedly before him, David was seated at his little table in the attitude of meditation. At the sight of the young woman, pale, weeping, her hair dishevelled, and in the disorder of her night-dress, he rose abruptly, and, turning as pale as Marie herself, at the fear that some dreadful event had taken place, said:
"Madame, what has happened? Has Frederick—"
"M. David!" exclaimed the young woman, "it is impossible for you to abandon us in this way!"
"Madame—"
"I tell you, that you shall not leave, no, you cannot have the heart to do it. My only, my last hope is in you, because—you know it well, oh, my God!—I have no one in the world to help me but you!"
"Madame, a word, I implore you."
Marie, clasping her hands, continued in a supplicating voice:
"Mercy, M. David, be good and generous to the end. Why are you discouraged? The transports of my son have ceased, he has given up his plans for vengeance. That is already a great deal, and that I owe to your influence. Frederick's dejection increases, but that is no reason for despair. My God! My God! Perhaps you think me ungrateful, because I express my gratitude to you so poorly. It is not my fault. My poor child seems as dear to you as to me. Sometimes you sayourFrederick; then I forget that you are a stranger who has had pity on us! Your tenderness toward my son seems to me so sincere that I am no more astonished at your devotion to him than at my own."
In his astonishment, David had not at first been able to find a word; then he experienced such delight in hearing Marie portray her gratitude in such a touching manner that, in spite of himself, he did not reassure her, perhaps, as soon as he could have done so. Nevertheless, reproaching himself for not putting an end to the agony of this unhappy woman, he said:
"Will you listen to me, madame?"
"No, no," cried she, with the impetuosity of grief and entreaty. "Oh, you surely will have pity, you will not kill me with despair, after having made me hope so much! How can I do without you now? Oh, my God! what do you think will become of us if you go away? Oh, monsieur, there is one memory which is all-powerful with you, the memory of your brother. In the name of this memory, I implore you not to abandon Frederick. You have been as tender with him as if he were your own child or your own brother. These are sacred links which unite you and me, and you will not break these links without pity; no, no, it cannot be possible!"
And sobs stifled the voice of the young woman.
Tears came also to the eyes of David, and he hastened to say to Madame Bastien, in a voice full of emotion:
"I do not know, madame, what has made you think that I intended to go away. Nothing was farther from my thought."
"Really!" exclaimed Marie, in a voice which cannot be described.
"And if I must tell you, madame, while I have not been discouraged, I have realised the difficulty of our task; but to-day, at this hour, for the first time I have good hope."
"My God, you hear him!" murmured Marie with religious fervour. "May this hope not be in vain!"
"It will not be, madame, I have every reason to believe, and, far from contemplating departure, I have spent my time in reflecting all this day, because to-morrow may offer something decisive. And in order that my reflections might not be interrupted, I did not appear at dinner, under the pretext of a slight indisposition. Calm yourself, madame, I implore you in my turn. Believe that I have only one thought in the world, the salvation of our Frederick. To-day this salvation is not only possible, but probable. Yes, everything tells me that to-morrow will be a happy day for us."
It is impossible to describe the transformation which, at each word of David, was manifested in the countenance of the young woman. Her face, so pale and distorted by agony, became suddenly bright with joyous surprise; her lovely features, half veiled by her loose and beautiful hair, now shone with ineffable hope.
Marie was so adorably beautiful, thus attired in her white dressing-gown, half open from the violent palpitations of her bosom, that a deep blush mounted to David's brow, and the passionate love that he had so long felt, not without dread, now took possession of his heart.
"M. David," continued Madame Bastien, "surely you will not deceive me with false hope, in order to escape my prayers, and spare yourself the sight of my tears. Oh, forgive me, forgive me! I am ashamed of this last doubt, the last echo of my past terror. Oh, I believe you, yes, I believe you! I am so happy to believe you!"
"You can do so, madame, for I have never lied," replied David, scarcely daring to look up at Marie, whose beauty intoxicated him almost to infatuation. "But who, madame, has led you to suppose that I was going away?"
"It was Marguerite who told me a little while ago in my chamber; then, in my dismay, I ran to you."
These words reminded David that the presence of Madame Bastien in his chamber at a late hour of the night might seem strange to the servants of the house, in spite of the affectionate respect with which they regarded the young mother, so, taking advantage of the excuse she had just offered, he advanced to the threshold of his door, left open during this conversation, and called Marguerite in a loud voice.
"I beg your pardon, madame," said he to Marie, who looked at him with surprise. "I would like to know why Marguerite thought I was going away."
The servant, astonished and frightened by the sudden flight of her mistress, hurried to David's chamber, and he at once said to her:
"My dear Marguerite, you have just been the cause of great distress to Madame Bastien, by telling her that I was preparing to leave the house, and that, too, at a time when Frederick, this poor child whom you have seen from his birth, has need of all our care. In her deep anxiety, Madame Bastien ran up here; fortunately, I have been able to satisfy her; but, again, how came you to think I was about to leave?"
"As I told madame, M. David, you had asked André for a horse and cart to carry trunks to Pont Brillant. Then, I thought—"
"That is true," said David, interrupting Marguerite.
Then, addressing Marie, he said:
"A thousand pardons, madame, for having given reason for the mistake which has caused you so much anxiety. The story is simply this: I had charge of some boxes of books that I was to deliver, upon my arrival at Senegal, to one of my compatriots. In departing from Nantes, I had, in my preoccupation of mind, given order to address my baggage here; these boxes, contrary to my intention, were included in the list, and it was—"
"To return them to Nantes by the coach which passes Pont Brillant that you asked for a horse and cart, was it not, M. David?" said the old servant.
"Exactly, my dear Marguerite."
"It is the fault of André, too," said the servant. "He told me trunks. I said trunks or effects, which are the same thing, but, thank God! you have calmed madame, and you must stay, M. David, because, if left alone, she will have trouble with poor M. Frederick."
During this interchange of explanation between Marguerite and David, Madame Bastien, altogether encouraged, came, so to speak, to herself entirely; then feeling her hair float over her half-naked bosom, she thought of the disorder of her attire; but she was so pure and unaffected, so much the mother more than the woman, that she attached no importance to the fact of her nocturnal interview with David; but when her instinct of natural modesty awakened, she reflected upon the embarrassment and painful awkwardness of running to David's chamber in her night-dress, and she saw at once the delicacy of sentiment which he had obeyed in calling Marguerite and demanding an explanation of the circumstances.
These reflections filled her mind while David and Marguerite were conversing upon the subject.
Not knowing how to arrange her disordered toilet without being seen by David, and feeling that any attempt at arrangement was a tacit avowal of her embarrassment, however excusable, the young woman found a way out of the complication.
The servant wore a large red woollen shawl. Madame Bastien took it and silently wrapped it around herself, then, as many of the women of the country do, she put it over her head and crossed it, so that her floating hair was half hidden and she was enveloped to her waist in the long folds of the shawl.
This was done with so much quickness that David did not perceive the metamorphosis in Marie's costume until she said to her servant, with affectionate familiarity:
"My good Marguerite, forgive me for taking your shawl, but to-night is freezing, and I am cold."
If David had found the young woman adorably beautiful and attractive with dishevelled hair and all in white, he beheld a still more captivating beauty in her as she stood wrapped in this mantle of scarlet; nothing could have more enhanced the soft brilliancy of her large blue eyes, the lovely colour of her brown hair, and the delicate rose of her complexion.
"Good night, M. David," said the young mother; "after having entered your room in despair, I leave it greatly encouraged, since you tell me that to-morrow will be a day of decisive experience for Frederick, and perhaps a day of happiness for us."
"Yes, madame, I have good hope, and if you will permit it, to-morrow morning, before seeing Frederick, I would like to meet you in the library."
"I will await you there, M. David, and with great impatience. God grant that our anticipations may not be mistaken. Good night again, M. David. Come, Marguerite."
Long after the young woman had left the chamber of David, he stood motionless in the same place, trembling with rapture, as he pictured to himself the enchanting loveliness of the face sheltered under the folds of the scarlet shawl.
THEnext morning at eight o'clock David awaited Madame Bastien in the library; she soon arrived there.
"Good morning, madame," said the preceptor to her. "Well, how now about Frederick?"
"Really, M. David, I do not know if I ought to rejoice or feel alarmed, for last night something very strange happened."
"What is that, madame?"
"Overcome by the emotions of yesterday evening, I slept one of those profound and heavy sleeps, the awakening from which often leaves you in a state of torpor for a few moments, and you are hardly conscious of what is passing around you. Suddenly it seemed to me that, half awake, I do not know why, I saw indistinctly by the light of the lamp Frederick leaning over my bed. He looked at me and was weeping as he said, 'Good-bye, mother, good-bye.' I wanted to speak to him and tried to do so, but the torpor against which I was struggling prevented me for some minutes. At last, after a desperate effort of my will, I woke, thoroughly. Frederick had disappeared. Still quite bewildered, I asked myself if this apparition was a dream or a reality. After waiting a while I went to my son's chamber. He was sleeping or pretended to be sleeping soundly. In my doubt, I did not dare awake him, for the poor child sleeps so little now!"
"And have you mentioned the incident of last night to him this morning?"
"Yes; but he appeared to be so sincerely surprised at what I told him, and declared so naturally that he had not left his chamber, that I do not know what to think. Have I been the dupe of an illusion? In my constant thought of Frederick, could I have taken a dream for reality? That is possible. Yet it seems to me I can still see my son's face bathed in tears and hear his distressed voice say to me, 'Good-bye, mother, good-bye!'—but pardon me, monsieur," said Madame Bastien, in an altered voice, holding her handkerchief to her eyes, "the very memory of this word 'good-bye' makes me wretched. Why these good-byes? Where does he wish to go? Dream or reality, this word distresses me, in spite of myself."
"Calm yourself, madame," said David, after having listened attentively to Madame Bastien. "I think, with you, that the apparition of Frederick has been an illusion produced by the continual tension of your mind. A thousand examples attest the possibility of such hallucinations."
"But this word—good-bye? Ah, I cannot tell you the anguish of heart it has caused me, the gloomy foreboding that it leaves with me still."
"Pardon me, madame, but do not attach any importance to a dream. I say dream, because it is difficult to admit the reality of this incident. Would Frederick come and weep by your pillow, and tell you good-bye during your sleep? Why do you think he wishes to leave you? Where could he go, now that our united watchfulness guards his every step?"
"That is true, M. David; yet—"
"Pray, take courage, madame, and, besides, you have just told me that, with the exception of this incident, you did not know whether to rejoice or feel alarm,—what is the cause of that?"
"This morning Frederick appeared calm, almost contented; he no longer had an air of dejection; he smiled, and embraced me as in the past, with tender effusion, imploring me to forgive him for the grief he had caused me, and promising to do everything in the world to make me forget it. So, taking your assuring words of yesterday, and this unexpected language of my son, and the kind of satisfaction that I read in his countenance, together, I ought to be happy—very happy."
"In fact, madame, why should you feel alarmed? This sudden change, which agrees with my hopes and plans so marvellously, ought, on the contrary—"
David was interrupted by the entrance of Frederick.
Pale, as usual, but his brow serene and lips smiling, he advanced to his preceptor with an air of frankness, and said, with a mingling of deference and cordiality:
"M. David, I wish to ask your indulgence and your forgiveness for a poor half-foolish boy, who, upon your arrival here, said such words to you as would have made him blush with shame if he had been aware of his thoughts and actions. Since that time this poor boy has become less rude, although he has remained unimpressed by the thousand evidences of kindness which you have given him. Of all these wrongs he repents. Will you grant me his pardon?"
"With all my heart, my brave boy," replied David, exchanging a look of surprise and happiness with Madame Bastien.
"Thank you, M. David," replied Frederick, pressing with emotion the hands of his preceptor in his own; "thank you for my mother and for myself."
"Ah, my child," said Madame Bastien, quickly, "I cannot tell you how happy you make me; our sad days are all at an end."
"Yes, mother; and I swear to you that it will not be I who will cause you sorrow."
"My dear Frederick," said David, smiling, "you know that I am not an ordinary preceptor, and that I love to take the fields for my study-hall; the weather is quite fine this morning, suppose we go out for a walk."
Frederick started imperceptibly.
Then he replied, immediately:
"I am at your service, M. David."
And turning to Madame Bastien, he said:
"Good-bye, mother!" and embraced the young woman.
It is impossible to describe what Madame Bastien felt when she heard the words, "Good-bye, mother."
These words which, the night before, whether illusion or reality, had filled her heart with such gloomy forebodings!
Marie thought, too, that her son, so to speak, made his kisses linger longer than was his habit, and that his hand that she held trembled in her own.
The emotion of the young mother was so intense that her face became deadly pale, and she exclaimed, in spite of herself, with an accent of fright:
"My God, Frederick, where are you going?"
David's eyes did not leave Madame Bastien a moment; he understood all, and said to her, with the most natural air in the world, at the same time placing intentional stress on certain words:
"Why, madame, Frederick has saidgood-byeto you because he is going to take a walk with me."
"Of course, mother," added the young man, struck with the emotion of Madame Bastien, and secretly throwing on her an anxious and penetrating glance.
David surprised this glance, and he made an expressive sign to Madame Bastien, as much as to say:
"What have you to fear? Am I not there?"
"That is true; my fears are foolish," thought Madame Bastien. "Is not M. David with Frederick?"
All this passed in much less time than it takes to write it. The preceptor, taking Frederick by the arm, said to Madame Bastien, smiling:
"It is probable, madame, that our class in the open field will last until breakfast. You see that I am without pity for my pupil. I wish to bring him back to you weary with fatigue."
Madame Bastien opened the glass door which led into the study hall under the grove.
David and Frederick went out.
The youth evaded his mother's glance a second time.
For a long time the young woman remained sad and thoughtful on the threshold of the door, her eyes fixed on the road that her son and David had taken.
"I leave the choice of our walk to you, my dear child," said David to Frederick, when they had reached the edge of the forest.
"Oh, my God, M. David, it matters little to me," replied Frederick, honestly, "but since you leave the choice to me, I am going to take you to a part of the wood that you perhaps are not acquainted with,—look,—near that clump of fir-trees that you see down there on the top of the hill."
"True, my child, I have never been on that side of the forest," said David, walking with his pupil toward the designated spot.
More and more surprised at the strange coincidence between his hopes and the sudden alteration in the son of Madame Bastien, David observed him attentively and remarked that almost always he held his head down, although, as they crossed the forest, he had two or three times turned involuntarily to look at his mother, whom he could see through the vista of tall trees, standing in the door.
After examining him for some minutes, David discovered that this calmness of Frederick was feigned. Once out of the presence of his mother, the young man not only did not control himself long at a time, but became anxious and abstracted, his features contracting sometimes in pain, and again assuming an expression of painful serenity, if such a thing can be said, which alarmed David no little.
Not to frighten Madame Bastien, he had tried to persuade her that the apparition of Frederick, on the preceding night, was only a dream. But David did not so believe; he regarded Frederick's farewells to his sleeping mother a reality. This circumstance, with what he had just observed in the lad, made him fear that his pupil's sudden change was a piece of acting, and might conceal some sinister motive.
"But, fortunately," thought David, "I am here with him."
When they had left the forest, Frederick took a road covered with turf, across the fallow ground, which, leaving the wood around Pont Brillant to the right, conducted him to the crest of a little hill where stood five or six isolated fir-trees.
"My dear child," said David, at the end of a few minutes, "I am so pleased with the words of affectionate confidence you addressed to me this morning, because they could not have come at a better time."
"Why is that, M. David?"
"Because, secure in this confidence and affection that I have tried to inspire in you up to this time, I will now be able to undertake a task which at first seemed very difficult."
"And what is this task?"
"To make you as happy as you were formerly."
"I!" exclaimed Frederick, involuntarily.
"Yes."
"But," replied Frederick, with self-repression, "I am no longer unhappy, I said so this morning to my mother; the malady that I suffered from, and which has embittered my feelings, has disappeared almost entirely. Besides, M. Dufour has told my mother that it is at an end."
"Truly, my child, you are no longer unhappy? All your sorrows are at an end? Your heart is free, contented, and joyous, as it used to be?"
"Monsieur—"
"Alas! my dear Frederick, the integrity of your heart will prevent your dissimulating a long time. Yes, although you have told your mother this morning she need have no fear, you are suffering this very hour, and perhaps more than in the past."
Frederick's features contracted. David's penetration crushed him, and, to avoid his glances, he looked downward.
David watched him closely, and continued:
"Even your silence, my dear child, proves to me that the task which I have undertaken, to render you as happy as you have been in the past, is still to be fulfilled. No doubt you are astonished that I have not tried to undertake it before. The reason for it is simple enough. I did not wish to venture without absolute certainty, and it was only yesterday that I arrived at a certainty of conviction concerning the malady which oppresses you, indeed, which is killing you. Now I know the cause."
Frederick trembled with dismay. This dismay, mingled with surprise, was painted in every look he cast upon David.
Then, regretting the betrayal of his feelings, the young man relapsed into gloomy silence.
"What I have told you, my child, astonishes you, and it ought to do so," replied David, "but," added he, in a tone of tender reproach, "why are you frightened at my penetration? When our friend, Doctor Dufour, healed you of a mortal ailment, was he not obliged, in order to combat your disease, to know the cause of it?"
Frederick said nothing.
During several minutes, as the two were approaching the hill upon which stood the lonely fir-trees, the son of Madame Bastien had from time to time glanced slyly and uneasily at his companion. He seemed to fear the miscarriage of some project which he had been contemplating since he had left his mother's house.
Just as they finished talking, David observed that the road bordering on the crest of the hill changed into a narrow path which skirted the clump of fir-trees, and that Frederick, in an attitude of apparent deference, had stopped a moment, as if he did not wish to step in advance of his preceptor. David, attaching no importance to so natural and trivial an incident, passed on before the youth.
At the end of a few moments, not hearing Frederick's step behind him, he turned around.
The son of Madame Bastien had disappeared.
DAVID, bewildered with astonishment, continued to look around him.
At his right extended the fallow ground, across which meandered the road which, with Frederick, he had just followed to arrive at the crest of the hill, and he discovered then for the first time, as he took several steps to the left, that on this side this bend of the ground was cut almost perpendicular, in a length of three or four hundred feet, and hung over a great wood, the highest summits of which reached only to a third of the escarpment.
From the culminating point where he stood, David, commanding the plain a long distance, satisfied himself that Frederick was neither before nor behind him, nor was he on his right; he must then have disappeared suddenly by the escarpment on the left.
David's anguish was insupportable when he thought of Madame Bastien's despair if he should return to her alone. But this inactive terror did not last long. A man of great coolness and of a determination often put to the test in perilous journeys, he had acquired a rapidity of decision which is the only hope of safety in extreme danger.
In a second he made the following argument, acting, so to speak, as he thought:
"Frederick has escaped from me only on the side of the escarpment; he has not thrown himself down this precipice, I would have heard the sound of his falling body as it broke the branches of the great trees I see there below me; he has then descended by some place known to himself; the ground is muddy, I ought to discover his tracks; where he has passed I will pass, he cannot be more than five minutes in advance of me."
David had travelled on foot with Indian tribes in North America, and, more than once in the chase, separated from the main body of his companions in the virgin forests of the New World, he had learned from the Indians with whom he hunted how, by means of rare sagacity and observation, to find those who had disappeared from his sight.
Returning then to the spot where he had first perceived that Frederick had disappeared, David saw in the length of five or six metres, no other than that made by his own steps; but suddenly he recognised Frederick's tracks turning abruptly toward the edge of the escarpment, which they coasted for a little, then disappeared.
David looked down below.
At a distance of about fifteen feet the top of an elm extended its immense arms so far as to touch the steep declivity of the escarpment. Between the thick foliage of this tree-top and the spot where he was standing, David observed a large cluster of broom, which one could reach by crawling along a wide gap in the clayey soil; there he discovered fresh footprints.
"Frederick succeeded in reaching this tuft of brushwood," said David, taking the same road with as much agility as daring, "and afterward," thought he, "suspending himself by the hands, he placed his foot on one of the largest branches at the top of the elm, and from there descended from branch to branch until he reached the foot of the tree."
In David the action accompanied the thought always. In a few minutes he had glided to the top of the tree; a few little branches broken recently, and the erosion of the bark in several spots where Frederick had placed his feet, indicated his passage.
When David had slowly descended to the foot of the tree, the thick bed of leaves, detached by the autumn and heaped upon the soil, rendered the exploration of Frederick's path more difficult; but the slight depression of this foliage where he had stepped, and the broken or separated underbrush, very thick in spots he had just crossed, having been carefully noted by David, served to guide him across a vast circumference. When he came out of this ground he heard a hollow sound, not far distant, but quite startling, which he had not noticed before in the midst of the rustling of branches and dry leaves.
This startling noise was the sound of many waters.
The practised ear of David left him no doubt upon the subject. A horrible idea entered his mind, but his activity and resolution, suspended a moment by fright, received a new and vigorous impulse. The enclosure from which he had just issued bordered on a winding walk where the moist soil still showed the tracks of Frederick's feet. David followed it in great haste, because he perceived by the intervals and position of these tracks that in this spot the young man had been running.
But soon a hard, dry soil, as it was sandy and more elevated, succeeded the soft lowlands, and no more tracks could be seen.
David then found himself in a sort of cross-roads where he could hear distinctly the sound of the Loire, whose waters, swollen to an unusual degree in a few days, roared with fury.
David at once resolved to run straight to the river, guiding himself by its sound, since it was impossible any longer to follow Frederick by his tracks. Full of anguish and concern for the boy's mother,—an anguish all the more intense from the recollection of the farewells addressed to her by Frederick,—he darted across the wood in an easterly direction according to the roar of the river.
At the end of ten minutes, leaving the undergrowth, David ran across a prairie which ended with the bluff of the river. This bluff he cleared in a few bounds.
At his feet he saw an immense sheet of water, yellow, rapid, and foaming, the waves of which broke and died upon the sand.
As far as his view extended, David, panting from his precipitate run, could discover nothing.
Nothing but the other shore of the river drowned in mist.
Nothing but a gray and sullen sky, from which a beating rain began to fall.
Nothing but this muddy stream muttering like distant thunder, and forming toward the west a great curve, above which rose the solid mass of the forest of Pont Brillant dominated by its immense castle.
Suddenly reduced to enforced inaction, David felt his strong and valiant soul bow beneath the weight of a great despair.
Against this despair he vainly struggled, hoping that perhaps Frederick had not resolved upon this terrible step. He even went so far as to attribute the disappearance of the young man to a schoolboy's trick.
Alas! David did not keep this illusion long; a sudden blast of wind which blew violently along the current of the river brought almost to David's feet, as it rolled and tossed it upon the sand, a cap of blue cloth bound with a little Scotch border, which Frederick had worn that morning.
"Unhappy child!" exclaimed David, his eyes full of tears, "and his mother, his mother! oh, this is terrible!"
Suddenly he heard, above the roar of the waters, and brought by the wind, a long cry of distress.
Remounting at once the bank opposite the wind which brought this cry to his ears, David ran with all his might in the direction of the call.
Suddenly he stopped.
These words, uttered with a heartrending cry, reached his ear:
"My mother! oh, my mother!"
A hundred steps before him, David perceived, almost at the same time, in the middle of the surging waters, the head of Frederick, livid! frightful! his long hair matted on his temples, his eyes horribly dilated, while his arms, in a last struggle, moved convulsively above the abyss.
Then the preceptor saw no more, save a wider, deeper bubbling in the spot where he had discovered the body.
A light of hope, nevertheless, illumined David's manly face, but feeling the imminence of the peril and the danger of a blind precipitation,—for he had need of all his skill and all his strength, and, too, of all possible freedom from restraint,—he had the self-possession, after having thrown off his coat and vest, to take off his cravat, his stockings, and even his suspenders.
All this was executed with a sort of deliberate quickness which permitted David, while he was removing his garments, to follow with an attentive eye the current of the river, and coolly to calculate how far Frederick would be carried by the current. He calculated correctly. He saw soon, at a little distance, and toward the middle of the river, Frederick's long hair lifted by the waves, and the skirt of his hunting jacket floating on the water.
Then all disappeared again.
The moment had come.
Then David with a firm and sure gaze measured the distance, threw himself in the stream, and began to swim straight to the opposite shore, estimating, and with reason, that in cutting the breadth of the river, keeping count of the drift, he ought to reach the middle of the Loire a little before the current would carry Frederick's body there.
David's foresight made no mistake; he had already gained the middle of the stream when he saw at his left, drifting between two waves, the body of Madame Bastien's son, entirely unconscious.
Seizing Frederick's long hair with one hand, he began to swim with the other hand, and reached the shore by means of the most heroic efforts, tortured every moment with the thought that perhaps, after all, he had rescued only a corpse.
At last he trod upon the shore. Robust and agile, he took the young man in his arms and laid him on the turf, about a hundred steps from the spot where he had left his garments.
Then, kneeling down by Frederick, he put his hand upon the poor boy's heart. It was not beating, his extremities were stiff and cold, his lips blue and convulsively closed, nor did one breath escape from them.
David, terrified, lifted the half-closed eyelid of the youth: his eye was immovable, dull and glassy.
The rain continued to flow in torrents over this inanimate body. David could no longer restrain his sobs. Alone, on this solitary shore, with no help near, when help was so much needed,—powerful and immediate help, even if one spark of life still remained in the body before him!
David was looking around him, in desperate need, when at a little distance he saw a thick column of smoke rising from behind a projecting angle of the embankment, which, no doubt, hid some inhabited house from his sight.
To carry Frederick in his arms, and, in spite of his heavy burden, to run to this hidden habitation, was David's spontaneous act. When he had passed this angle, he perceived at a little distance one of the brick-kilns so numerous on the borders of the Loire, as brickmakers find in this latitude all the necessary materials of clay, sand, water, and wood.
Making use of his reminiscences of travel, David recalled the fact that the Indians inhabiting the borders of the great lakes, often restore their half-drowned companions to life, and awaken heat and circulation of the blood, by means of large stones which are made hot,—a sort of drying-place, upon which they place the body while they rub the limbs with spirits.
The brickmakers came eagerly to David's assistance. Frederick, enveloped in a thick covering, was extended on a bed of warm bricks, and exposed to the penetrating heat which issued from the mouth of the oven. A bottle of brandy, offered by the head workman, was used in rubbing. For some time David doubted the success of his efforts. Nevertheless some little symptoms of sensibility made his heart bound with hope and joy.
An hour after having been carried to the brick-kiln, Frederick, completely restored, was still so feeble, notwithstanding his consciousness, that he was not able to utter a word, although many times he looked at David with an expression of tenderness and unspeakable gratitude.
The preceptor and his pupil were in the modest chamber of the master workman, who had returned to his work near the embankment, and with his labourers was observing the level of the stream, which had not reached such a height in many years, for the inhabitants of these shores were always filled with fear at the thought of an overflow of the Loire.
David had just administered a warm and invigorating drink to Frederick, when the youth said, in a feeble voice:
"M. David, it is to you that I shall owe the happiness of seeing my mother again!"
"Yes, you will see her again, my child," replied the preceptor, pressing the son's hands in his own, "but why did you not think that to kill yourself was to kill your mother?"
"I thought of that too late. Then I felt myself lost, and I cried, 'My mother!' when I should have cried, 'Help!'"
"Fortunately, that supreme cry I heard, my poor child. But now that you are calm, I implore you, tell me—"
Then, interrupting himself, David added:
"No, after what has passed, I have no right to question you. I shall wait for a confession which I wish to owe only to your confidence."
Frederick felt David's delicacy, for it was evident that his preceptor did not desire to abuse the influence given by a service rendered, by forcing a confidence from him.
Then he said, with tears in his eyes:
"M. David, life was a burden to me. I judged of the future by the past, and I wished to end it. Yet, that night, when during my mother's sleep I bade her farewell, my heart was broken. I thought of the sorrow that I would cause her in killing myself, and for a moment I hesitated, but I said to myself, 'My life will cost her more tears perhaps than my death,' and so I decided to put an end to it. This morning I asked her to forgive all the grief I had caused her, I also asked you to forgive me for the wrongs I had done to you, M. David. I did not wish to carry with me the animadversion of anybody. To remove all suspicion I affected calmness, certain of finding during the day some means of escaping your watchfulness and that of my mother. Your invitation to go out this morning served my plans. I was acquainted with the country. I directed our walk toward a spot where I felt sure I could escape from you and from your assistance, and I do not know how it was possible for you to find a trace of me, M. David."
"I will tell you that, my child, but continue."
"The hurry, the eagerness of my flight, the noise of the wind and the waters, seemed to intoxicate me, and then, on the horizon, I saw rise up before me, like an apparition, the—" Here a light flush coloured Frederick's cheeks, and he did not finish his sentence.
David mentally supplied it, and said to himself:
"This unhappy child, in his moment of desperation, saw, as it commanded the shore of the river from afar, the castle of Pont Brillant."
After a short silence, Frederick continued:
"As I told you, M. David, I seemed intoxicated, almost mad, for I do not recollect at what spot on the river I threw myself in. The cold in the water seized me, I thought I was going to die, and then I was afraid. Then the thought of my mother came back to me. I seemed to see her, as in a dream, throw herself upon my cold, dead body. I did not want to die, and I cried, 'My mother! my mother!' as I tried to save myself, for I know very well how to swim; but the cold made me numb, and I felt myself sinking to the bottom. As I heard the river roar above my head I made a desperate effort, and came to the surface of the water, and then I lost consciousness until I found myself here, M. David,—here where you have brought me,—saved me as if I were your child,—here, where my first thought has been of my mother."
And Frederick, fatigued by the emotion of this recital, leaned his elbow on the bed where they had carried him, and remained silent, his head resting on his hand.
THEconversation between David and Frederick was interrupted by the brickmaker, who entered the chamber, looking very much frightened. "Monsieur," said he, hurriedly, to David, "the cart is ready. Go quick."
"What is the matter?" asked David.
"The Loire is still rising, monsieur. Before two hours all my little furniture and effects will be swept away."
"Do you fear an overflow?"
"Perhaps, monsieur, for the rising of the waters is becoming frightful, and, if the Loire overflows, to-morrow nothing will be seen of my brick-kiln but the chimneys. So, for the sake of prudence, I must move you out. The cart which takes you home, will, on its return, carry my furniture away."
"Come, my child," said David to Frederick, "have courage. You see we have not a moment to lose."
"I am ready, M. David."
"Fortunately our clothes are dry, thanks to this hot furnace. Lean on me, my child."
As they left the house, Frederick said to the brickmaker:
"Pardon me, sir, for not being able to thank you better for your kind attention, but I will return."
"May Heaven bless you, my young gentleman, and grant that you may not find a mass of rubbish when you return to this place, instead of this house."
David, without Frederick's knowledge, gave two gold pieces to the brickmaker, as he said, in a low voice:
"That is for the cart."
A few minutes elapsed, and the son of Madame Bastien left the brick-kiln with David in the rustic conveyance filled with a thick layer of straw, and covered over with a cloth, for the rain continued to fall in torrents.
The cart driver, wrapped in a wagoner's coat, and seated on one of the shafts, urged the gait of the horse, that trotted slowly and heavily.
David insisted that Frederick should lie down in the cart, and lean his head on his knees; thus seated in the back of the cart, he held the youth in a half embrace, and watched over him with paternal solicitude.
"My child," said he, carefully wrapping Frederick in the thick covering loaned by the brickmaker, "are you not cold?"
"No, M. David."
"Now, let us agree upon facts. Your mother must never know what has happened this morning. We will say, shall we not, that, surprised by a beating rain, we obtained this cart with great difficulty? The brickmaker thinks you fell in the water by imprudently venturing too near the slope of the embankment. He has promised me not to noise abroad this accident, the reports of which might frighten your mother. Now, that being agreed upon, we will think of it no more."
"What kindness! what generosity! You think of everything. You are right; my mother must not know that you have saved my life at the risk of your own, and yet—"
"What your mother ought to know, my dear Frederick, what she ought to see, is that I have kept the promise that I made to her this morning, for time presses."
"What promise?"
"I promised her to cure you."
"Cure me!" and Frederick bowed his head with grief. "Cure me!"
"And this cure must be accomplished this morning."
"What do you mean?"
"I mean that in an hour, upon our arrival at the farm, you must be the Frederick of former times, the glory and pride of your mother."
"M. David!"
"My child, the moments are numbered, so listen to me. This morning, at the time you disappeared, I said to you, 'I know the cause of your illness.'"
"You did say that to me, truly, M. David."
"Well, now, the cause is envy!"
"Oh, my God!" murmured Frederick, overwhelmed with shame, and trying to slip away from David's embrace.
But the latter pressed Frederick all the more tenderly to his heart, and said, quickly:
"Lift up your head, my child,—there is no need for shame, envy is an excellent quality."
"Envy an excellent quality!" exclaimed Frederick, sitting up and staring at David with bewildered astonishment. "Envy!" repeated he, shuddering. "Ah, monsieur, you do not know what it produces."
"Hatred? so much the better."
"So much the better! but hatred in its turn—"
"Gives birth to vengeance, so much the better still."
"M. David," said the young man, falling back on his straw couch with sadness, "you are laughing at me, and yet—"
"Laughing at you, poor child!" said David, in a voice full of emotion, as he drew Frederick back to him, and pressed him to his breast with affection. "I laugh at you! do not say that. To me, more than to anyone else, grief is sacred. I laugh at you. You do not know then, at first sight of you, I was filled with compassion, with tenderness, because, you see, Frederick, I had a young brother about your age—"
And David's tears flowed, until, choked with emotion, he was obliged to keep silent.
Frederick's tears flowed also, and he in his turn embraced David, looking at him with a heart-broken expression, as if he wished to ask pardon for making him weep.
David understood him.
"Be calm, my child; these tears, too, have their sweetness. Well, the brother I speak of, this young beloved brother, who made my joy and my love, I lost. That is why I felt for you such a quick and keen interest, that is why I wish to return you to your mother as you were in the olden time, because it is to return you to happiness."
The accent, the countenance of David, as he uttered these words, were of such a melancholy, pathetic sweetness that Frederick, more and more affected, answered, timidly:
"Forgive me, M. David, for having thought you were laughing at me, but—"
"But what I said to you seemed so strange, did it not, that you could not believe that I was speaking seriously?"
"That is true."
"So it ought to be, nevertheless my words are sincere, and I am going to prove it to you."
Frederick fixed on David a look full of pain and eager curiosity.
"Yes, my child, envy, in itself, is an excellent quality; only you, up to this time, have applied it improperly,—you have envied wickedly instead of envying well."
"Envy well! Envy an excellent quality!" repeated Frederick, as if he could not believe his ears. "Envy, frightful envy, which corrodes, which devours, which kills!"
"My poor child, the Loire came near, just now, being your tomb. Had that misfortune happened, would not your mother have cried, 'Oh, the accursed river which kills,—accursed river which has swallowed up my son!'"
"Alas, M. David!"
"And if these fears of inundation are realised, how many despairing hearts will cry, 'Oh, accursed river! our houses are swept away, our fields submerged.' Are not these maledictions just?"
"Only too just, M. David."
"Yes; and yet this river so cursed fertilises its shores. It is the wealth of the cities by which it flows. Thousands of boats, laden with provisions of all sorts, plough its waves; this river so cursed accomplishes truly a useful mission, that God has given to everything he has created, because to say that God has created rivers for inundation and disaster would be a blasphemy. No, no! It is man, whose ignorance, whose carelessness, whose egotism, whose greed, and whose disdain change the gifts of the Creator into plagues."
Frederick, struck with his preceptor's words, listened to him with increasing interest.
"Just now, even," continued David, "unless heat from the fire had penetrated your benumbed limbs, you would, perhaps, have died, yet how horrible are the ravages of fire! Must we curse it and its Creator? What more shall I say to you? Shall we curse steam, which has changed the face of the earth, because it has caused so many awful disasters? No, no! God has created forces, and man, a free agent, employs those forces for good or for evil. And as God is everywhere the same in his omnipotence, it is with passions as with elements; no one of them is bad in itself, they are levers. Man uses them for good or for evil, according to his own free will. So, my child, your troubles date from your visit to the castle of Pont Brillant, do they not?"
"Yes, M. David."
"And you felt envy, keenly and deeply, did you not, when you compared the obscurity of your name and your poor, humble life with the splendid life and illustrious name of the young Marquis of Pont Brillant?"
"It is only too true."
"Up to that point, these sentiments were excellent."
"Excellent?"
"Excellent! You brought with you from the castle living and powerful forces; they ought, wisely directed, to have given the widest range to the development of your faculties. Unhappily, these forces have burst in your inexperienced hands, and have wounded you, poor dear child! Thus, to return to yourself, all your pure and simple enjoyments were destroyed by the constant remembrance of the splendours of the castle; then, in your grievous, unoccupied covetousness, you were forced to hate the one who possessed all that you desired; then vengeance."
"You know!" cried Frederick, in dismay.
"I know all, my child."
"Ah, M. David, pardon, I pray you," murmured Frederick, humiliated, "it was remorse for that base and horrible act that led me to think of suicide."
"I believe you, my child, and now that explains to me your unconquerable dejection since I arrived at your mother's house. You meditated this dreadful deed?"
"I thought of it for the first time, the evening of your arrival."
"This suicide was a voluntary expiation. There are more profitable ones, Frederick, my dear boy. Besides, I am certain that if envy was the germ of your hatred toward Raoul de Pont Brillant, the terrible scene in the forest was brought about by circumstances that I am ignorant of, and which ought to extenuate your culpable act."
Frederick hung his head in silence.
"Of that we will speak later," said David. "Now, let us see, my child; what did you envy the most in the young Marquis of Pont Brillant? His riches? So much the better. Envy them ardently, envy them sincerely, and in this incessant, energetic envy, you will find a lever of incalculable power. You will overcome all obstacles. By means of labour, intelligence, and probity, you will become rich. Why not? Jacques Lafitte was poorer than you are. He wished to be rich, and he became a millionaire twenty times over. His reputation is without a stain, and he always extended a hand to poverty, always favoured and endowed honest, courageous work. How many similar examples I could cite you!"
Frederick at first looked at his preceptor with profound surprise; then, beginning to comprehend the significance of his words, he put his hands on his forehead, as if his mind had been dazzled by a sudden light.
David continued:
"Let us go farther. Did the wealth of the marquis fill your heart only with covetous desire, instead of a sentiment of hatred and revolt against a society where some abound with superfluous possession, while others die for want of the necessaries of life? Very well, my child, that is an excellent sentiment; it is sacred and religious, because it inspired the Fathers of the Church with holy and avenging words. So, at the voice of great revolutions, the divine principle of fraternity, of human equality, has been proclaimed. Yes," added David, with a bitter sadness, "but proclaimed in vain. Priests, denying their humble origin, have become accomplices of wealth and power in the hands of kings, and have said to the people, 'Fate has devoted you to servitude, to misery, and to tears, on this earth.' Was not this a blasphemy against the fatherly goodness of the Creator,—a base desertion of the cause of the disinherited? But in our day this cause has valiant defenders, and blessed are these sentiments that the sight of wealth inspires in you, if it throws you among the people of courage who fight for the imperishable cause of equality and human brotherhood."
"Oh!" cried Frederick, with clasped hands, his face radiant, and his heart throbbing with generous enthusiasm, "I understand, I understand."
"Let us see," pursued David, with increasing animation; "for what else did you envy this young marquis? The antiquity of his name? Envy it, envy it, by all means. You will have what is better than an ancient name; you will make your own name illustrious, and more widely celebrated than that of Pont Brillant. Art, letters, war! how many careers are open to your ambition! And you will win reputation. I have studied your works; I know the extent of your ability, when it is increased tenfold by the might of a determined and noble emulation."
"My God! my God!" cried Frederick, with enthusiasm, his eyes filled with tears, "I cannot tell what change has come over me. The darkness of night has been turned to day,—the day of the past, and even brighter than the past. Oh, my mother! my mother!"
"Let us go on," continued David, unwilling to leave the least doubt in Frederick's mind; "does the envy you feel when you hear the ancient name of Pont Brillant manifest itself by a violent hatred of aristocratic tradition, always springing up, sometimes feudal, and sometimes among the citizenship? Exalt this envy, my child. Jean Jacques, in protesting against the inequality of material conditions, was sublimely envious, and our fathers, in destroying the privileges of the monarchy, were heroically, immortally envious."
"Oh!" exclaimed Frederick, "how my heart beats at your noble words, M. David! What a revelation! What was killing me, I realise now, was a cowardly, barren envy. Envy for me was indolence, despair, death. Envy ought to be action, hope, and life. In my impotent rage I only knew how to curse myself, others, and my own nonentity. Envy ought to give me the desire and strength to come out of my obscurity, and I will come out of it."
"Good! good! dear, brave child!" exclaimed David, in his turn, pressing Frederick to his breast. "Oh, I was certain I could cure you! An easy task with a generous nature like yours, so long cherished by the most admirable of mothers. Tender and excellent heart!" added he, no longer able to restrain his tears. "This morning, as you were about to drown, your last cry was, 'My mother! my mother!' You are born again to hope and life, and your first cry is still, 'My mother! my mother!'"
"I owe you my life," murmured Frederick, responding to the ardent embrace of his preceptor. "I owe you the life of my body as well as the life of my soul, M. David."
"Frederick, my child," said David, with inexpressible emotion, "call me your friend. That name I deserve now, do I not? It will replace the sweet and cherished name I can never hear again,—my brother!"
"Oh, my friend!" cried Frederick, with exaltation, "and you will see me worthy of the name of friend."
A moment of silence succeeded this outburst of sentiment, as David and Frederick held each other in close embrace.
The preceptor was the first to speak.
"Now, my dear child, I must appeal to your candour on a last and important matter. It may be severe, even relentless to me, but not unjust. Tell me, if—"
David could not finish. Entirely absorbed in their conversation, the preceptor and his pupil had not noticed the route, until the cart suddenly stopped a short distance from the farm gate.
Marie Bastien, greatly distressed at the prolonged absence of her son, had been standing long under the rustic porch of her house, eagerly looking for his return.
At the sight of the covered cart, as it approached the farm, an inexplicable presentiment told the young woman that her son was there. Then, divided between fear and joy, she ran to meet the cart, and exclaimed:
"Frederick, is it you?"
David was interrupted in his remarks, and the cart stopped.
With one bound, the son of Madame Bastien leaped from the cart, threw himself on his mother's neck, covered it with kisses and tears, as he cried, with a voice broken by sobs:
"Mother, saved! No more trouble! saved, mother, saved!"