The marquis thereupon calmed down sufficiently to look about him and to see that the June freshet had partially uprooted the trees. The disturbed condition of the ground and the exposed roots attested the truth of what the farmer said. But, unwilling as yet to believe the testimony of his eyes, he said:
"Why didn't you await my orders to take them away? haven't I forbidden you a hundred times to put the axe to a single tree without consulting me?"
"Why, master, don't you remember my coming to tell you of this damage the very day after the freshet? and you said: 'In that case you must take 'em away and set out more'? This is the best time to set 'em out and I was hurrying up to make room, especially as these trees are fine to make long ladders, and I wouldn't have liked to have you lose 'em. If you'll just walk as far as our farmyard, you'll see a dozen of 'em under the shed, and to-morrow we will take the rest there."
"Very well," replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault, ashamed of his precipitation, "I remember now that I gave you leave to do it. I had forgotten. I ought to have come sooner and looked at it."
"Dame!you go out so little, master!" said the honest peasant. "The other day I met Monsieur Emile, as he was going to see you, and I pointed out the damage to him and asked him to remind you of it. Did he forget?"
"Apparently," replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault, "but no matter; you had better go home, for it is dark and the storm is coming."
"But you'll get wet, master; you must come to the house and wait till the rain's over."
"No," said the marquis, "it may last a long while, and I am not so far from home that I can't return in time."
"You won't have time, master; here it is beginning now, and it's going to rain hard!"
"All right, all right, I thank you, I will take care of myself," said the marquis. And he turned his back and walked away, while his farmers and their cattle started for the farm.
"This won't do an old man like him any good!" said the farmer to his son, looking after the marquis, who walked more slowly than ever, not having the support of his cane.
"If he had been willing to wait," replied the young peasant, "we might have gone and got his carriage.—Come, Gaillard! Chauvet!" he shouted to his oxen, "courage, my boys. Gee! steady, boy."
And the father and the son, thinking no more of aught save guiding their horned team across the wet fields, disappeared behind the bushes, followed by all their people, without further anxiety concerning the old master. Such is the peasant's natural heedlessness.
Monsieur de Boisguilbault had reached the end of the field across which he had come and was just about to pass through the hedge, when he turned and saw Jean Jappeloup, who was sitting on a stump among the felled trees, like a conqueror meditating sorrowfully on the battlefield. All of the powerful workman's gayety and ardor had suddenly vanished; he sat perfectly still, indifferent to the rain which was beginning to mingle with the sweat of toil on his brow, and he seemed absorbed in profound melancholy.
"It is my destiny to insult that man, and not to meet him without suffering on both sides," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault to himself. And he hesitated a long while between an ingenuous repentance and a violent feeling of repugnance.
He decided to motion to him to join him, but Jean did not seem to see the motion, although there was still a little daylight. Then he called him in a voice of which the pitch was no longer raised by anger, but Jean did not seem to hear him.
"Well," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault to himself, "you are to blame; you must punish yourself."—And he walked straight to the carpenter.
"Why do you stay here?" he said, touching him on the shoulder.
Jean started, and said in a sharp, irritated tone, as if awakened from a dream:
"What! what do you want of me, I pray you? Have you come back to strike me again? See, here's the rest of your cane! I intended to bring it to you to-morrow to remind you of what happened to you this evening."
"I was wrong," faltered Monsieur de Boisguilbault.
"It's very easy to say 'I was wrong,'" retorted the carpenter; "and with that, when you are old and rich and a marquis, you think that you have made everything right."
"What reparation do you demand of me?"
"You know very well that I can demand nothing of you. I could break you in two with a mere tap, and, besides that, I am your debtor. But I shall bear you a grudge all my life for making gratitude a humiliating and heavy burden for me to bear. I wouldn't have believed that could ever happen to me, for my heart is no more ungrateful than any other man's, and I submitted to the vexation of being unable to thank you. But, mind you, I had rather go to prison or resume my vagabond life, than put up with blows. Go away and leave me in peace. I was arguing myself into a calmer state of mind, and you come and make me angry again. I have to keep telling myself that you are a little mad to avoid saying something worse to you."
"Well, Jean, it is true, I am a little mad," rejoined the marquis sadly, "and this isn't the first time that I have lost control of my reason about a trifle. That is why I live alone, why I never go out, and show myself as little as possible. Am I not punished enough?"
Jean made no reply; that distressing confession caused his anger to give place to compassion.
"Now, tell me what I can do to repair the injury I did you," continued Monsieur de Boisguilbault, in a trembling voice.
"Nothing," said the carpenter, "I forgive you."
"I thank you, Jean. Will you come and work at my house?"
"What's the use, as I am working for you here? My face disturbs you, and it depended entirely on yourself to avoid seeing it. I didn't seek you out. And then, you would want to pay me for my work, and when I work for your farmers you can't compel me to take their money."
"But your work is of benefit to me, since its results add to the value of my property. Jean, I cannot agree to that."
"Ah! you can't agree to it? I don't care whether you can or not! you can't prevent me from paying my debt to you in that way; and since you have beaten me and insulted me, I will pay it,mordieu! just to make you furious. That humiliates you, doesn't it? Very good, that is my revenge."
"Take your revenge some other way."
"How then, pray? Shall I strike you? That wouldn't make us square; I should still be your debtor, and I prefer not to owe you anything."
"Very well, pay your debt, if you choose, as you are so proud and obstinate," said the marquis, losing patience. "You are blind and cruel, as you don't see how I suffer. You would be sufficiently revenged if you understood; but you desire a brutal, cruel revenge. You insist upon reducing yourself to destitution and upon wearing yourself out with fatigue in order to make me blush and weep all the days of my life."
"If you take it that way—" said Jean, half-conquered; "no, I am not a bad man, and I can forgive you for a young man's folly. The devil! your head is still hot and your hand quick. What did it mean? However, let us say no more about it; once more, I forgive you."
"You consent to work for me?"
"At half price. Let us arrange it that way to settle the question."
"There is no comparison between my position and yours. There would be still less between your work and your wages. Be generous; that is the noblest and most perfect revenge. Come and work for me as you work for other people; forget that I did you a service which my purse never so much as discovered, and thus force me to be your debtor, since you will accept, in satisfaction of an irreparable outrage, the most paltry of reparations—money."
"I can't understand a word when you twist it about that way. However, we will see if we can get along together. But suppose I go to your house and my face makes you angry? Come, can't you tell what you have had against me all these years? You surely owe me that. It must be that, without knowing it, I resemble somebody who has injured you. It can't be hereabout: for I don't know of anybody except the curé of Cuzion's old horse that I look anything like."
"Ask me no questions; it is impossible for me to answer. Admit that I am subject to these outbreaks of madness, and love me through pity, as I cannot be loved otherwise."
"Monsieur de Boisguilbault," said the carpenter warmly, "you mustn't talk like that; you don't do yourself justice. You have faults, it is true, crotchets, fits of temper that are a little violent; but you know well that everybody is obliged to respect you in his heart, because you are a just man, because you love to do good and have never made any one about you unhappy; and then you have ideas, which you haven't got from books simply, ideas that rich men don't often have, and that would make the world happy if the world chose to think the same as you do. To have these ideas it isn't enough to be well-educated and sensible, but one must love everybody in the world and not have a stone in place of a heart; that is why it is necessary that God should have a hand in it. So don't talk about loving you through pity; you would have only to put out your hand to be loved, and you wouldn't have to change much to succeed."
"What must I do, in your opinion?"
"The principal thing would be not to try to prevent people who are inclined to love you from doing so."
"When did I ever do that?"
"Many a time, and I don't speak of myself alone, as there are others whose names you surely do not want me to mention——"
"Speak of yourself, Jean," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, with painful eagerness—"or rather—come and take supper and sleep at my house to-night. I propose that we shall be entirely reconciled from this day, but on certain conditions, which I will tell you to-night perhaps, and which have nothing whatever to do with the cause of our quarrel. The rain is increasing, and these branches no longer shelter us."
"No, I will not go to your house to-night," said the carpenter, "but I will go with you to your gate; for yonder's a wicked-looking cloud, and in a few minutes it won't be pleasant walking. Here, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, take my advice and put this leather apron of mine over your shoulders. It isn't handsome, but it never touches anything but wood—my trade is a clean one, that is what I have always liked about it—and it isn't afraid of the water."
"On the contrary, I insist on your putting it on your own back; you are drenched with perspiration, and although you choose to treat me as an old man, you are no longer young yourself, my friend. Come, no ceremony! I am warmly clad. Don't take cold on my account; remember that I struck you to-night."
"You are as sly as the devil! Well, let us be off! It is true, I am no longer young, although I don't feel my years much as yet. But do you know that I am hardly ten years younger than you? Do you remember the time I built the wooden house in your park—your chalet, as you call it? Well, it was nineteen years ago last St. Jean's Day that I raised the frame."
"Yes, that is true, only nineteen years. It seems longer to me. By the way, the little house is very well built, and there are very few repairs to make. Will you look after them?"
"If there's anything to be done, I don't say no. It's a job that gave me a lot of trouble in its time. How often I had to look at your devilish pictures to try to make it look like them!"
"It is your master-piece and you enjoyed it."
"Yes, there were days when I enjoyed it too much, it made me sick; but when you would come and say: 'Jean, that isn't right; you are making a mistake;'dame! how angry you made me!"
"You lost your temper and almost told me to be off!"
"And you used to let me talk in those days. I would never have believed that, after being so patient with me for so many years, you would suddenly fly out at me without telling me why. By the way, what is there to be done to the wooden house?"
"There's a devil of a door that doesn't shut."
"The wood has warped, I suppose. When shall I come?"
"To-morrow. That's why you must come and sleep at my house; the weather's too bad for you to go back to Gargilesse."
"It is black enough to break one's neck, that's a fact. Look out where you step, you are almost in the ditch! But if it rained scythe-blades, I would go home to sleep to-night."
"Have you important business on hand?"
"Yes. I want to see young Emile Cardonnet, to whom I have something to say."
"Emile! Have you seen him to-day?"
"No; I started very early to attend to his matters. If you weren't so peculiar, I would tell you about it, as you know the bulk of his story."
"I don't think he has any secrets for me. However, if he has confided something more to you than to me, I have no desire to know it."
"Never fear, I have no desire to tell it to you, either."
"And you cannot even give me any news of him? I am anxious about him. I had hoped to see him to-day; indeed I came away from home to meet him."
"Ah! in that case I understand how it happens that you, who never leave your park, have strayed so far. But you are wrong to follow the fields like that. They are all cut up with brooks that are of no mean size, and I don't know where we are. Ten million devils! How it comes down! This is just the kind of night that Emile arrived in this region. I met him under a big rock where he had gone for shelter, and I had no idea that when I crept in there I put my hand on a friend, a true manly heart, a treasure!"
"You are very much attached to him, aren't you? He has tried very often to talk to me about you."
"And you would never let him? I suspected as much. He is a man like you; no prouder in the depths of his heart and as ready to give his life as his purse for the unfortunate. But he doesn't lose his temper for nothing, and when he says a pleasant word to you, you aren't afraid that he's going to hit you with a club."
"Oh! I know that he's a much better and very much more amiable man than I am. If you see him to-night or to-morrow morning, tell me how he is. Tell him to come and see me, for I am overwhelmed by his sorrow."
"And so am I; but I have more hope than you and he. However, if I were rich like you——"
"What would you do?"
"I don't know; but money makes everything smooth with people of Père Cardonnet's cut. Suppose you should set him up in some business and sacrifice a few hundred thousand francs—you who have three or four millions and no children! He isn't so rich as he seems to be! Perhaps he may have more income than you, but his capital is smaller, I fancy."
"So you would approve of buying his son's liberty?"
"There are some people who never give anything away, and who sell what they ought to give away. Why, by the blood of the devil, here we are in the pond! Stop! stop! that isn't land, it's water. We have gone too far to the right; but our brains are not fuddled by wine. How are we to get out of this?"
"I have no idea; we have been walking a long while, and we ought to be at Boisguilbault."
"Wait! wait! I know where I am," said the carpenter. "There's a little clearing behind us with one big tree—wait for the flash and look sharp—there it comes! Yes, I know. There's Mère Marlot's house! The devil! There are sick children there—two have typhoid fever, they say! Never mind, she's a good woman, and at all events you are sure of being well received anywhere on your estates."
"Yes, this woman is a tenant of mine if I am not mistaken."
"Who doesn't pay you very much or very often, I fancy! Come, give me your hand."
"I didn't know that her children were sick," said the marquis as they entered the yard in front of the hovel.
"That's natural enough; you seldom go out and never so far as this. But other people have looked after her. See! there's a horse and wagon that I know; they may be of use to us."
"Who is that lady?" said the marquis, looking in at the window.
"Why, don't you know her?" said the carpenter, with suppressed excitement.
"I don't remember that I ever saw her," replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault, scrutinizing the interior more closely. "Some charitable person, I presume, who attends to the duties toward the unfortunate which I neglect."
"It is the curé of Cuzion's sister," replied Jean Jappeloup. "She's a kind-hearted soul, a young widow, and very charitable, as you say. Wait until I give her warning of your arrival, for I know her, and she is a little timid."
He hastened into the hovel, whispered a few hurried words to the old woman and Gilberte, whom, by a sudden inspiration, he had metamorphosed into a curé's sister, then returned to Monsieur de Boisguilbault and led him in, saying:
"Come, monsieur le marquis, come; you won't frighten anybody. The sick children are better, and there's a brisk little fire to dry your clothes."
The weather must needs have been very bad, or the marquis have unconsciously undergone some mysterious influence; for he actually made up his mind to risk a meeting with an entire stranger. He entered, and saluting the pretended widow with timid courtesy, drew near the fire, on which the old woman was hastily tossing fresh branches, deploring the condition of her old master's clothes.
"Oh! good people, is it possible; what a state you're in, monsieur le marquis! Really, I wouldn't 'a' known you if Jean hadn't told me. Warm yourself, warm yourself, monsieur, for there's a chance of catching your death at your age."
And, thinking that she showed great zeal and interest by her sinister predictions, the good woman, completely bewildered by the arrival of such a visitor, came near setting fire to her mantelpiece.
"No, my good woman," said the marquis, "I am very thickly dressed at all times, and I hardly feel the rain."
"Oh! I should say you are well dressed!" she replied, intending to pay him a compliment which she thought well adapted to flatter him, "for you have money enough to be!"
"I do not refer to that," said the marquis; "I mean to say that you need not put yourself out so much or leave your patients for me. I am very comfortable here, and the life of an old man like me is worth less than that of your young children. Have they been sick long?"
"About a fortnight, monsieur. But the worst has passed, thank God!"
"Why don't you come to see me when you have sickness in the house?"
"Oh!nenny, I should never dare to. I should be afraid of vexing you. We peasants are so stupid! We can't talk very well and we're afraid to ask."
"I ought to come and find out about your troubles," said the marquis with a sigh; "but I see that more active and less selfish hearts do it in my place!"
Gilberte was sitting at the other side of the room. Dumb with fright, and not daring to lend her countenance to the carpenter's ruse, she tried to conceal herself behind the coarse serge curtains of the bed in which the youngest child lay. She would have been glad to say nothing at all, and, as she prepared a potion, she kept her face turned to the wall and pulled her little shawl over her shoulders. A scarf of coarse black lace, tied under her chin, concealed or at all events dimmed the golden sheen of her hair, which the marquis might have recognized if he had ever noticed its brilliancy and luxuriance. But Monsieur de Boisguilbault had met Gilberte only twice, on her father's arm. He had recognized Monsieur Antoine in the distance and had turned his head away. When he had been obliged to pass them at close quarters, he had shut his eyes to avoid seeing the girl's dreaded features. Therefore he had no idea of her figure, her face or her carriage.
Jean had lied with so much self-possession and so aptly that the marquis suspected nothing. The features of Sylvain Charasson, who was lying like a cat in the ashes, sound asleep, could not be so unfamiliar to him, for the page of Châteaubrun, a shameless marauder by nature, must have been caught by him many a time clinging to fruit-laden branches along his hedges; but he asked so few questions and took such painstaking care to avoid seeing or knowing anything of what took place outside his park wall, that he had no idea of the child's name or station in life.
Having no feeling of distrust, therefore, and being impelled by the mental and physical agitation he had undergone that evening, to open his heart more than usual, he ventured to follow the charitable lady's movements with his eyes, and even to approach her and ask some questions concerning the invalids. The somewhat shy reserve of this friend of the poor inspired in him profound respect, and it seemed to him worthy of all praise and in the best of taste that, instead of boasting of her good works before him, she seemed disturbed and annoyed to have been taken by surprise in the exercise of her functions as a sister of charity.
Gilberte was so afraid of being recognized that she was afraid to let her voice be heard—as if it were not as unfamiliar to the marquis as her face—and waited for the peasant woman to answer his questions. But Jean, fearing that the old woman would fail to play her part intelligently and would betray Gilberte'sincognitoby her awkwardness, kept constantly in front of her and edged her toward the fireplace, glaring savagely at her whenever Monsieur de Boisguilbault's back was turned. Mère Marlot, trembling from head to foot and having no comprehension of what was taking place in her house, did not know which way to turn and prayed fervently that the rain might cease and she be delivered from the presence of these new guests.
At last, somewhat encouraged by the marquis's soft voice and courteous manners, Gilberte made bold to answer him; and as he continued to accuse himself of negligence, she said:
"I have heard, monsieur, that your health is very delicate and that you read a great deal. I can understand that you are unable to attend to so many things as you have on hand. For my part I have nothing better to do, and I live so near that I deserve no great credit for helping to take care of the sick in the parish."
She glanced at the carpenter as she spoke, as if to call his attention to the fact that she was entering into the spirit of her part at last; and Jean hastened to add, in order to give more weight to that pious sentiment:
"Besides, it is a necessity and a duty of her position. If the curé's sister didn't look after the poor, who would?"
"I should be a little reconciled with my conscience," said the marquis, "if madame would kindly apply to me when it happens that I am ignorant or oblivious of my duties. What my zeal leaves undone, my good will can supply; and while madame reserved for herself the noblest and most difficult task, that of nursing the sick with her own hands, I can increase with my money the limited resources of the priest's charity. Allow me to join you in your good deeds, madame, I entreat you, or, if you do not choose to do me that honor, send all your poor to me. A simple recommendation from you will make them sacred to me."
GILBERTE AND JAPPELOUP ACCOMPANY THE MARQUIS TO HIS CHÂTEAU.The Marquis took the reins, refusing to allow his charming companion to have the trouble of driving. Jean armed himself with the whip, to stimulate poor Lanterne's courage with a sturdy arm.
GILBERTE AND JAPPELOUP ACCOMPANY THE MARQUIS TO HIS CHÂTEAU.
The Marquis took the reins, refusing to allow his charming companion to have the trouble of driving. Jean armed himself with the whip, to stimulate poor Lanterne's courage with a sturdy arm.
"I know that they do not need that, monsieur le marquis," replied Gilberte, "and that you assist many more than I can hope to do."
"You see that is not so, for I have come here entirely by chance, and you are here for the express purpose of doing good."
"Oh no! I did not divine that they needed me," replied Gilberte; "this poor woman came after me; except for that I should probably have known no more about it than you."
"You try in vain to decry your deserts in order to diminish my culpability. They send for you, and they dare not come near me: that fact alone condemns me and glorifies you."
"The deuce! my dear Gilberte," said the carpenter, leading the girl apart, "in my opinion you are performing miracles and you could tame the old owl if you would only have the courage.Ah but! as Janille says, all goes well, and if you will act and talk like me, I will answer for it that you will reconcile him with your father."
"Oh! if I only could! but alas! my father has made me promise, yes, swear, that I would never try it."
"And yet he would give all he owns to have you succeed! Look, you, when he made you promise that, he thought that was impossible which is quite possible to-day—not to-morrow perhaps, but this evening, now! We must strike the iron while it's hot, and you can see that there has been a great change already, as he and I came here together and he talks to me in such a friendly way."
"How on earth did that miracle come about?"
"It was a cane that performed the miracle, on my back; I'll tell you about it later. Meanwhile you must be very lady-like, a little bold, and have your wits about you—in a word be like your friend Jean in everything. Listen, I am going to begin!"
Thereupon, Jean abruptly left Gilberte and went to the old man.
"What do you suppose this young lady just whispered in my ear? That she absolutely insists on taking you home in her carriage. Ah! Monsieur de Boisguilbault, you can't refuse a lady; she says that the roads are too badly washed for you to walk, that you are too wet to wait here for your own carriage, that she has a cabriolet with a good horse, a genuine curé's mare that doesn't lose her temper or take fright at anything and goes fast enough when your arm isn't asleep and there's a lash on the whip. In quarter of an hour you'll be at home, instead of splashing through the mud and stones for an hour."
Monsieur de Boisguilbault thanked the lovely widow warmly but would not accept; but Gilberte herself insisted, with irresistible grace.
"I implore you, monsieur le marquis," she said, turning upon him her beautiful eyes, still frightened like those of a half-tamed dove, "do not pain me by refusing; my carriage is ugly, shabby and muddy, and so is my horse; but they are both strong. I know how to drive and Jean will take me home."
"But it will delay you a long while," said the marquis; "your folks will be anxious."
"No," said Jean, "here is monsieur le curé's page, who serves the mass and rings the bell for him; he's a sure-footed, sharp-eyed rascal, with no more fear of the water than a frog. He has wooden clogs on his feet a little stouter than yours, and he will go to Cuzion as straight and fast as a saw will cut a spruce board. He will tell them not to worry; that madame's in good company and that old Jean will bring her home. So that's settled!—Look you, young wide-awake," he said to Charasson, who yawned as if he would dislocate his jaw and gazed in bewilderment at Monsieur de Boisguilbault; "just come and let me rouse you a bit in the fresh air, and start you on your road."
He dragged, almost carried Sylvain to a short distance from the house, and there, putting his leather apron over his shoulders, he said to him, pulling his ears briskly to fix his words in his memory:
"Run to Châteaubrun and tell Monsieur Antoine that Gilberte is going to Boisguilbault with me; tell him to keep quiet, that all goes well in that direction, and that he needn't worry if she passes the night away from home. Do you hear? do you understand?"
"I hear well enough, but I don't understand," replied Sylvain. "Will you let my ears alone, you old villain of a Jean!"
"I'll make them longer than they are, if you argue; and if you make a botch of my errand, I'll tear them off to-morrow."
"I heard you, that's enough; let me go."
"And if you stop to play on the road, look out!"
"Pardié! it's fine weather to play!"
"And if you lose my goatskin apron!"
"I'm no such fool, it won't do me any harm!"
And the child started off at full speed toward the ruins, picking his way in the darkness with the instinct of a cat.
"Now," said Jean leading the old mare and thebarrowout from under the shed, "it's our turn, honest Lanterne. Oh! don't get excited, Monsieur Sacripant, it's only me! You came with your young mistress, good; but monsieur le marquis, who doesn't look at people, isn't afraid to look at dogs, and he may know you. Do me the favor to follow your friend Charasson. I am sorry to say you must return home on foot."—He cracked the whip at the poor beast and drove him away in the direction Charasson had taken.—"Come, monsieur le marquis, I am waiting for you!" And the marquis, conquered by Gilberte's persistence, mounted the barrow, where he sat between her and Jappeloup.
The stars in heaven did not witness this strange association, for heavy clouds concealed them, and Mère Marlot, the sole witness of this extraordinary adventure, was not sufficiently clear in her mind to indulge in any extended comments. The marquis had put his purse in her hand as he crossed the threshold of her house, and she passed the rest of the night counting the shining coins it contained and waiting on her little ones, saying:
"Dear young lady, she brings us good luck!"
The marquis took the reins, refusing to allow his charming companion to have the trouble of driving. Jean armed himself with the whip, to stimulate poor Lanterne's courage with a sturdy arm. Gilberte, whom Janille, anticipating the storm, had provided with a large umbrella and her father's old cloak when she allowed her to depart on her errand of mercy, gave her attention to sheltering her companions; and as the wind fought for the cloak with her, she held it over Monsieur de Boisguilbault's shoulders with one hand, while she exerted all her strength to hold the umbrella over the old man's head with the other hand, with filial solicitude. The marquis was so touched by these affectionate attentions that he lost all his bashfulness and expressed his gratitude in the warmest terms that his respect would permit. Gilberte trembled at the thought that this sympathetic feeling might change to wrath at any moment, and old Jean laughed in his beard, relying on Providence.
Although it was only nine o'clock, everybody at the château of Boisguilbault had retired when our travellers arrived. No one except old Martin ever paid any attention to the master after sunset, and on this evening Martin had closed the park after seeing the marquis enter his chalet, and had no suspicion that he had gone abroad and was travelling around the country in the rain and thunder, with an old carpenter and a young woman.
Jean was not particularly anxious to go into the courtyard with Gilberte; for, living so near Châteaubrun as they did, it was impossible that some if not all of the servants should not be familiar with the lovely girl's face, and the first exclamation would betray her.
But the rain was still falling, and there was no plausible excuse for making the marquis or Gilberte alight at the outer gate, especially as Monsieur de Boisguilbault absolutely insisted that his companions should come in and wait by the fire until the rain, which was quite cold and continuous, had ceased. Jean meanwhile was dying with longing to seize this pretext for prolonging the interview; but Gilberte refused in dismay to enter the dreadful manor-house of Boisguilbault, and it was certain that there was great peril in doing it.
Luckily the marquis's eccentric habits made it impossible for them to effect an entrance to the château. In vain did they ring the bell again and again, the wind roared so fiercely that the sound was carried far away. No servant, male or female, slept in that part of the building, where a grewsome solitude habitually prevailed; and, as for old Martin, the only person who ever ventured there, he was too deaf to hear anything, the bell or the thunder.
Monsieur de Boisguilbault was extremely mortified by his inability to show the hospitality which all the circumstances combined to impose upon him as a duty; and he was very angry with himself for having failed to anticipate what had happened. His wrath was on the point of breaking out anew and turning against old Martin, who went to bed with the sun. But at last, suddenly making up his mind what course to pursue, he said:
"I see that I must abandon the idea of getting into my own house, for I shall never make anybody hear unless I send for cannon to take the house by assault; but if madame is not afraid to visit an anchorite's cell, I have another lodging, the key of which never leaves me, where we shall find all that we need to enable us to warm ourselves and rest."
As he spoke he turned the horse's head toward the park, alighted at the gate, opened it himself, and led Lanterne in by the bridle, while Jean squeezed the trembling Gilberte's arm to encourage her to risk the adventure. "God forgive me!" he muttered, "he is taking us to his wooden house, where he passes all his nights evoking the devil! Never fear, Gilberte, I am with you, and this is the day we are going to turn Satan out-of-doors here!"
Monsieur de Boisguilbault, having closed the gate behind him, bade the carpenter take the reins and follow him at a foot-pace to a sort of gardener's shed where Emile often hitched Corbeau when he came late or expected to stay late; and while Jean busied himself putting poor Lanterne and Monsieur Antoine's barrow under cover, the marquis offered Gilberte his arm, saying: "I am distressed to ask you to walk a few steps on the gravel; but you will not have time to wet your feet, for my hermitage is right here, behind these rocks."
Gilberte shuddered from head to foot as she entered the chalet, alone with that strange old man whom she had always believed to be a little mad, and who now led the way into the darkness. She was somewhat relieved when he opened a second door, and she saw the corridor lighted by a lamp which stood in a niche decorated with flowers. That retreat, so luxurious and comfortable despite its rustic exterior, pleased her exceedingly, and in her youthful imagination, enamored of poetic simplicity, she fancied that she had found the sort of palace of which she had often dreamed.
Since Emile had been admitted to the mysterious chalet, notable improvements had been made there. He had impressed upon the old man that the stoical habits by which he undertook to protest against his own wealth were beginning to be too severe for a man of his years; and, although Monsieur de Boisguilbault was not as yet attacked by any serious infirmity he admitted that he had suffered much from the cold there during the winter. Emile had himself brought from the château carpets, hangings, thick curtains and suitable furniture; he had frequently lighted a fire in the huge stove for protection against the dampness on rainy nights, and the marquis had yielded to the pleasant sensation of being cared for, a sensation entirely mental to him, in which he saw the proof of a zealous and delicate affection. The young man had also rearranged and beautified the room in which he and the old man often took their evening meal. He had made it into a sort of salon, and Gilberte was delighted to place her little feet, for the first time in her life, on superb bearskin rugs, and to gaze in admiration at the beautiful vases of old Sèvres, filled with the rarest flowers, standing on a marble console.
The fireplace, filled with very dry pine cones, blazed up as if by enchantment when the marquis tossed in a piece of burning paper, and the candles, reflected in a mirror, the oaken frame of which was curiously carved and twisted, soon filled the room with a brilliant light dazzling to the eyes of a girl accustomed to the poor little lamp to which Janille supplied oil with a sparing hand, after the example of the woman in the Bible.
Monsieur de Boisguilbault, for the first time in his life, exerted himself with a sort of coquetry to do the honors of his chalet to such a charming guest. He took an artless pleasure in watching her examine and admire his flowers, and promised her that on the very next day she should have all the grafts and all the seeds to replenish thevicarage garden. Resuming momentarily the animation of youth, he ran hither and thither to find the little curiosities he had brought back from his trip to Switzerland, and offered them to her with ingenuous joy; and when she blushingly refused to accept anything, he took the little basket in which she had taken syrups and sweetmeats to her sick protégés and filled it with pretty bits of wood-work carved at Fribourg, specimens of rock-crystal, agates and cornelians set in seals and rings; and lastly with all the flowers in the vases, of which he made an enormous bouquet as deftly as he could.
The touching grace with which Gilberte in her confusion thanked the old man, her artless questions concerning his travels in Switzerland, of which Monsieur de Boisguilbault retained most enthusiastic recollections, expressed in terms that were far from classic, the interest with which she listened to him, her intelligent comments when she succeeded in recovering her self-possession, the fascinating tones of her voice, the distinction of her simple, natural manners, her absence of coquetry, and the mixture of alarm and enthusiasm in her bearing and her features, which made her beauty even more impressive than usual, her glowing cheeks, her eyes moist with emotion and fatigue, her bosom oppressed by unfamiliar agitation, and her angelic smile which seemed to implore mercy or protection—all combined to produce such a profound impression on the marquis and took possession of him so rapidly, that he suddenly felt that he loved her with all his heart; with a holy love, be it understood, not the base desire of an old man for youth and beauty, but the love of a father for the pure and adorable child. And when the carpenter joined them, himself dazzled and overjoyed to find himself in such a light, warm room, he thought that he was dreaming when he heard Monsieur de Boisguilbault say to Gilberte: "Put your feet to the fire, my dear child; I am terribly afraid you have caught cold to-night, and if you have I shall never forgive myself so long as I live!"
Thereupon, the marquis, impelled by an extraordinary outburst of expansiveness, turned to the carpenter and held out his hand, saying:
"Come and sit down by the fire with us. Poor Jean! you were thinly clad and you are wet to the bone. I am the cause of that too; if you hadn't insisted on accompanying me, you would have gone to the farmhouse and you would be there now; you are hungry, too, and you would have had your supper. How am I to give you anything to eat here? and I am sure that you are dying of hunger!"
"Faith, Monsieur de Boisguilbault," said the carpenter, with a smile, thrusting his clogs into the hot ashes, "I snap my fingers at the rain, but not at hunger. Your wooden house has become deuced fine since I put my hand to it; but if there was a piece of bread in one of these closets, in which I once put shelves, I should think them still prettier. From noon till night I chopped like a deaf man, and I am weaker than a rat at this moment."
"Bless my soul!" cried Monsieur de Boisguilbault, "now I think of it, I haven't supped either. I had entirely forgotten it, and I am sure that there is something here, I don't know where. Come, Jean, let us look and we shall find it."
"Knock and it shall be opened unto you," said the carpenter, gayly, shaking the door at the end of the room.
"Not there, Jean!" said the marquis, hastily; "there's nothing but books there."
"Ah! this is the door that doesn't shut tight," said Jean; "you see, I put my hand right on it. I'll fix it to-morrow; it's simply a matter of taking a little off the top so that the bolt will slide. Isn't your old Martin smart enough to fix that? He was always clumsy and awkward, that fellow!"
Jean, who was stronger than the two old men at Boisguilbault together, closed the door without a suspicion of curiosity, and the marquis was grateful to him for his indifference, having watched him closely and with evident uneasiness so long as he held the knob in his hand.
"There is ordinarily a small table here with my supper all served," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault. "I can't imagine what has become of it, unless Martin forgot me to-night."
"Oh! unless you forgot to wind him up the old clock in his brain has not stopped," said the carpenter, who recalled with pleasure all the details of the marquis's home-life with which he was once so familiar. "What is there behind this screen? Aha! this has a very appetizing and substantial look!" and he folded the screen, revealing a table laden with agalantine, a loaf of bread, a plate of strawberries and a bottle of Bordeaux.
"That's a dainty little supper to offer a lady, Monsieur de Boisguilbault."
"Oh! if I thought that madame would deign to accept it!" said the marquis, rolling the table toward Gilberte.
"Why not!" laughed Jean. "I'll wager that the dear soul thought of other people before thinking about the care of her own body. Come, if she will eat just a few strawberries, and you the meat, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, I'll take care of the bread and a glass of black wine."
"We will eat as all men should eat," replied the marquis, "each according to his appetite; and the experiment will prove, I am sure, that the most solid portion, intended for one person only, will be enough for several. Oh! I beg you, madame, to let me have the pleasure of waiting on you."
"I am not at all hungry," said Gilberte, who had been for several days past too much distressed and excited not to have lost her appetite; "but to induce you two to eat, I will go through the motions."
Monsieur de Boisguilbault sat beside her and waited upon her with great zeal. Jean declared that he was too dirty to sit with them, and, when the marquis insisted, he confessed that he should be very ill at ease in such soft, deep chairs. He took a wooden stool, a relic of the former rustic furniture of the chalet, and, planting himself under the mantel, where he could dry himself from head to foot, began to eat with great zest. His portion was amply sufficient, for Gilberte simply nibbled at the strawberries, and the marquis was a phenomenally small eater. Moreover, even if he had more appetite than usual, he would gladly have stinted himself for the man he had struck two hours earlier, and who had forgiven him so frankly.
The peasant eats slowly and in silence. To him it is not the gratification of a capricious and fugitive craving, but a sort of solemn function; for on a working-day the meal hour is at the same time an hour of rest and reflection. Jappeloup became very grave, therefore, as he methodically cut his bread into small pieces and watched the cones blazing on the hearth. Monsieur de Boisguilbault, having gradually exhausted all that one can say to a person one does not know, relapsed into his usual taciturnity, and Gilberte, overdone by several nights of sleeplessness and weeping, felt an insurmountable drowsiness creep over her, the effect of the heat from the fire following the cold and dampness of the storm. She fought against it as long as she could, but the poor child was little more accustomed than her friend the carpenter to luxurious arm-chairs, fur rugs and candle-light. As she tried to smile and to answer the more and more infrequent remarks of the marquis, she felt as if she were magnetized; her lovely head gradually sank on the back of the chair, her pretty foot slipped nearer to the fire, and her strong, regular breathing suddenly betrayed the victory of sleep over her will-power.
Monsieur de Boisguilbault, seeing that the carpenter was lost in thought, began to scrutinize Gilberte's features more closely than he had as yet dared to do, and a sort of shudder passed over him when he saw, beneath the black lace which had partly fallen from her head, the luxuriant dazzling masses of golden hair. But he was roused from his contemplation by the carpenter, who said to him in an undertone:
"Monsieur de Boisguilbault, I'll bet that you haven't a suspicion of what I am going to tell you. Look carefully at this pretty little lady, and then I will tell you who she is."
Monsieur de Boisguilbault turned pale and gazed at the carpenter with a dismayed expression.
"Well, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, have you looked at her enough," continued the carpenter, with a mischievous, self-satisfied air, "and cannot you yourself guess what should interest you most in her?"
The marquis rose and at once fell back in his chair. A ray of light had passed through his mind at last, and his penetration, so long at fault, suddenly went farther than Jean desired. He thought that he had guessed, and he cried in a tone of intense indignation:
"She shall not stay here an instant longer!"
Gilberte, awakened with a start and terrified beyond words, saw before her the marquis's angry face. She thought that she was lost, and reflecting with despair that, instead of bringing her father and Monsieur de Boisguilbault together, she would be the cause of embittering their enmity, she had no other thought than to take all the blame upon herself and to seek pardon for Monsieur Antoine. Falling on her knees with the grace of a flower bending before the tempest, she seized the marquis's trembling hand, and, too agitated to speak, bowed her lovely head and leaned her pallid brow on the old man's arm.
"Well, well," said the carpenter, seizing the marquis's other arm and shaking it violently, "what are you thinking about, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, to frighten this child so? Is your mania taking hold of you again, and shall I have to lose my temper with you, after all?"
"Who is she?" rejoined the marquis, trying to push Gilberte away, but too nervous to be able to do it; "tell me who she is, I insist upon knowing!"
"You do know, as I have already told you," said Jean with a shrug; "she is the sister of a country curé, with no money and no name. Is that why you speak so roughly to her? Do you want her to know what I know about you. Try not to let her see you in one of your attacks, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; you see that your savage airs make her sick with fright! and it's a devil of a way of entertaining her and doing the honors of your house! She could hardly expect this after being so polite to you; and the worst of it is that I can't tell her what the matter is with you, because I haven't any idea myself."
"I don't know whether you are making sport of me," said the marquis, deeply distressed; "but what did you mean just now?"
"Something that would have given you pleasure, but which I won't tell you now, as you are out of your head."
"Speak, Jean; explain yourself; I can't stand this uncertainty."
"I can't stand it either," said Gilberte, bursting into tears. "I don't know, Jean, what you have said or tried to say about me; I don't know what my position is here, but it is unendurable to me. Let us go!"
"No—no—" said the marquis, beset by irresolution and shame; "it is still raining, the weather is horrible and I don't want you to go."
"Well, then, why did you want to turn her out just now?" retorted Jean with contemptuous tranquillity; "who can understand your whims? For my part, I give it up, and I am going."
"I will not stay here without you!" cried Gilberte, rising and running after the carpenter, as he walked toward the door.
"Mademoiselle—or madame," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, stopping her and detaining the carpenter also, "please listen to me, and if you know nothing of the strange thoughts that assail me at this moment, forgive an agitation which must seem very absurd to you, but which is very painful to me, I assure you! I owe you an explanation of it, however. Jean just gave me to understand that you were not the person that I supposed—but another person—whom I do not wish to see or to know.Mon Dieu! I don't know how to tell you. Either you understand me too well or you cannot understand me at all."
"Ah! I understand you at last," said the crafty carpenter, "and I will tell madame what you cannot succeed in explaining to her.—Madame Rose," he continued, turning to Gilberte and resolutely giving her the name of the curé of Cuzion's sister, "you know Mademoiselle Gilberte de Châteaubrun, your young neighbor? Well, monsieur le marquis has a great grudge against her, so it seems; we must believe that she has offended him shamefully; and just as I was going to tell him something about you and Emile——"
"What do you say?" cried the marquis. "Emile?"
"This doesn't concern you," retorted Jean: "I shall tell you nothing more, I am speaking to Madame Rose. Yes, Madame Rose, Monsieur de Boisguilbault detests Mademoiselle Gilberte; he has taken it into his head that you might be she; that is why he wanted to put you out—by the window in preference to the door."
Gilberte felt a mortal distaste for continuing this extraordinary and audacious mystification; for some minutes past, she had been conscious of such a warm feeling of sympathy for the marquis, that she reproached herself for abusing his error and subjecting him to emotions which seemed to make him suffer as keenly as she herself suffered. She determined to disabuse him gradually, and to be bolder than her facetious companion in daring to face the results of Monsieur de Boisguilbault's wrath.
"There is at least one enigma for me in what you tell me," she said with dignified assurance. "I cannot understand how Gilberte de Châteaubrun can be an object of reprobation on the part of a man so just and so worthy of respect as Monsieur de Boisguilbault. As I know nothing of her which can justify such detestation, and as it is important that I should know what to think about her, I beg monsieur le marquis to tell me all the evil that he knows of her, so that she may at least have an opportunity to exculpate herself in the minds of honorable people who know her."
"I should have preferred," said the marquis, with a profound sigh, "that the name of Châteaubrun should not be mentioned before me."
"Is it a name upon which there is any stain, I pray to know," demanded Gilberte, with an irresistible outburst of pride.
"No—no—I never said that," replied the marquis, whose wrath subsided as quickly as it blazed up. "I accuse nobody, I make no reproach against anybody. I am on unfriendly terms with the person mentioned; I do not wish any one to speak of her to me, nor do I speak of her myself—so why ask me useless questions?"
"Useless questions!" echoed Gilberte; "you cannot deem them such, monsieur le marquis. It is very strange that a man like you should be on bad terms with a mere girl, whom he does not know, whom perhaps he has never seen. Surely she must have been guilty of some detestable action or have said some hateful thing about him, and that is what I want to know, that is what I entreat you to tell me: so that, if Gilberte de Châteaubrun deserves neither esteem nor confidence, I may avoid the society of so dangerous a person."
"That's what I call talking!" cried Jean, clapping his hands. "Say on! I too should be very glad to know what to think about her; for this Gilberte has been very good to me; she has given me food and drink when I was hungry and thirsty; she has spun her wool to make clothes for me when I was cold. To my eyes she has always been charitable, gentle, devoted to her parents, and a good girl if ever there was one! Now, if she has committed some shameful sin, I shall be ashamed to be her debtor, and I will never owe her anything more."
"It was your absurd explanation that caused all this useless discussion," said the marquis to the carpenter. "Where did you pick up all these foolish ideas that you attribute to me? It is the young woman's father with whom I am on bad terms, on account of a quarrel of many years' standing, and not with a child whom I don't know, and against whom I have nothing to say, absolutely nothing."
"And whom you would have turned out of your house, nevertheless, if she had dared to appear here!" said Gilberte, looking closely at the marquis, whose embarrassment was beginning to encourage her materially.
"Turned out?—no; I turn no one out," he replied; "I simply should have considered it a little cruel, a little strange, that she should think of coming here."
"Well, she has thought of it many times, none the less," said Gilberte; "I know it, for I know her thoughts, and I am going to tell you what she has said to me."
"What is the use?" said the marquis, turning his head away; "why spend so much time over an impulsive phrase that escaped me without reflection? I should be distressed beyond words to cause an unkind thought against the girl in anybody's mind. I say again, I do not know her and I can in no way reproach her. The only thing that I desire is that my words may not be repeated, tortured, exaggerated. Do you hear, Jean? you take it upon yourself to interpret the exclamations that escape me, and you do it very badly. I beg you, if you have any affection for me," added the marquis with a painful effort, "never to utter my name at Châteaubrun, and not to discuss me in any way. I also request madame to protect me from any indirect contact, any roundabout explanation, in a word, from every sort of relation with that family; and if, to make sure that my repose shall still be respected in that regard, I must give the lie to what I said without reflection in my excitement, I am ready to protest against anything which could possibly impair the reputation and character of Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun in my mind."
The marquis spoke with a measured coldness which restored to his manner all its customary propriety and dignity. Gilberte would have preferred a fresh outbreak of wrath, which would have led her to expect a reaction marked by weakness and emotion. She no longer felt the courage to insist, and understanding, from the sudden frigidity of the marquis's manner, that she was half divined, and that an unconquerable distrust had taken possession of him, she felt so ill at ease, that she wished to go away at once; but Jean was not at all satisfied with the result of this explanation, and he determined to strike the last blow.
"Well," he said, "it must be as Monsieur de Boisguilbault pleases. He is kind and just at the bottom of his heart, Madame Rose; let us go, and cause him no more pain; but first I would like to have a sort of understanding between you two. Come, let us open our hearts a little! You will blush, scold me, perhaps you will cry. But I know what I am doing, I know that this is an opportunity that may never come again, and that we must be willing to submit to a little trouble to assist and comfort those we love. You look at me in surprise! don't you know that Monsieur de Boisguilbault is our Emile's best friend, that he has his whole confidence, and that he is perfectly well acquainted with all his troubles and yours, although he doesn't know that you are the one?—Yes, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, Madame Rose here is the lady! you understand me, don't you? So speak to her, encourage her, tell her that Emile has done right, and she, too, in refusing to yield to Père Cardonnet's malice. That is what I intended to say to you when you interrupted me with an outcry about Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun, when God knows if I was thinking of her!"
Gilberte became so confused that Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who was beginning to regard her with mingled interest and uneasiness, was touched by her plight and strove to reassure her. He took her hand and said, leading her back to her chair:
"Don't be embarrassed before me; I am an old man and it is another old man who betrays your secrets. Undoubtedly he has a very bold and unusual way of acting; but as his intentions are good and his exceptional character endears him to the person in whom you and I are more interested than in anybody else in the world, let us try to overcome our mutual embarrassment, and, as he says, to make the most of the opportunity!"
But Gilberte, confounded by the carpenter's determination, and terrified to see her heart's secret in the hands of a man who still inspired more terror than confidence, put both her hands over her face and did not answer.
"Well, well!" said the carpenter, whom nothing in the world could deter in his undertakings, whether it was a matter of overcoming a scruple or of felling a forest, "here she is all covered with mortification, and I shall be scolded for my indiscretion! but if Emile was here, he wouldn't disavow me. He would be very glad to have Monsieur de Boisguilbault see with his own eyes whether he has placed his affections wisely, and he will feel more than a little proud to-morrow when Monsieur de Boisguilbault says to him: 'I have seen her, I know her, and I am not surprised any longer!'—Isn't it true that you'll say that, Monsieur de Boisguilbault?"
Monsieur de Boisguilbault did not reply. He was still gazing at Gilberte, struggling between a powerful attraction and a horrible suspicion. He walked several turns up and down the room to overcome a terrible feeling of oppression, and after many sighs and internal conflicts, he returned to Gilberte and took both her hands.
"Whoever you may be," he said, "you have in your hands the destiny of the noblest boy that I in my old age have ever dared to dream of for my staff and my consolation. I shall die before long, and I shall leave this earth without having known an instant's joy, if I do not leave Emile at peace with himself. Oh! I implore you—you who are destined to exercise so great an influence, for good or evil, over his whole future,—retain on the side of truth that heart which is so worthy to be its sanctuary. You are very young, you do not know yet what a woman's love is in the life of a man like him! You do not know perhaps that it depends upon you to make of him a hero or a dastard, a coward or an apostate. Alas! you probably do not understand the bearing of what I am saying to you now. No, you are too young; the more I look at you, the more like a child you seem to me! Poor young thing, without experience and without strength, you are to determine the future of a noble heart, to break it or ennoble it. Forgive me for saying this; I am deeply moved and I cannot find fitting words. I have no desire either to distress you or to cause you embarrassment; but I am depressed and alarmed, and the more fully I realize your innocence, the more I feel that Emile no longer belongs to me."
"Forgive me, monsieur le marquis," said Gilberte, wiping away her tears, "I understand you very well, and although I am in truth very young, I am conscious of my responsibility in God's sight; but I am not in question now, it is not myself whom I wish to defend and justify, but Emile, that noble heart whom you seem to doubt. Oh! have no fear! Emile will lie neither to you, nor his father, nor himself, nor other men. I don't know if I fully understand the importance of his ideas and the depth of yours; but I adore the truth. I am no philosopher, I am too ignorant. But I am pious, I was brought up in the precepts of the Gospel, and I cannot interpret them in a different sense from that Emile gives to them. I understand that his father, who also invokes the Gospel, by the way, when the fancy strikes him, wishes him to be false to the faith of the Gospel, and if I believed that Emile was capable of consenting, I should blush for having been so grossly misled as to love a man without intelligence and conscience; but I am not so unfortunate as that. Emile will be equal to renouncing me, if need be, rather than renounce his own manhood; and as for myself, I shall know how to be brave, if at times his courage seems to waver. But I am not afraid of it; I know that he suffers, and I suffer too; but I will be worthy of his affection, as he is worthy of yours, and God will help us to bear everything, for He does not abandon those who suffer for love of Him and for the glory of His name!"
"Well said!" exclaimed the carpenter; "I wish I could talk like that. But no matter, I think as she does, and the good Lord gives me as much credit."
"Yes, you are right," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, impressed by the depth of conviction revealed by the carpenter's earnest tone; "I did not know, Jean, that you would be as devoted a friend to Emile as myself and perhaps a more useful one."
"I don't say that, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; I know that Emile looks upon you as his real father, in place of the un-Christian father that fate gave him; but I am something of a friend to him, and last night I flatter myself that I cheered him up, as I cheered up some other people this morning. As for her," he said, pointing to Gilberte, "she didn't need any cheering up. I didn't expect she would! From the first moment her mind was made up, and in my opinion it's a fine thing for a girl of her age to be so strong as that, although you don't seem to think very much of it."
The marquis hesitated and continued to pace the floor without speaking; then he stopped at the window, opened it, returned to Gilberte, and said:
"The rain has stopped, and I am afraid your people will be anxious about you. I—I don't want to keep you any longer to-night, but—but we will see each other again, and I shall be better prepared to talk with you,—for I have many things to say to you."
"No, monsieur le marquis," replied Gilberte, rising, "we shall never meet again; for in that case I must continue to deceive you and that would be impossible to me. Chance has thrown us together, and I thought that I was only fulfilling a bounden duty in offering you some trivial attentions which my heart bade me offer. Thus far I was not blameworthy, I leave it to you to judge; for in order to induce you to accept them, it was necessary to tell a falsehood; and furthermore, my father had made me swear that I would never annoy you with his grief, with his repentance for an injury he did you long ago, of which I know nothing, with his affection for you, which has remained like a painful wound in the depths of his heart! In my dreams as a child I often formed a plan of coming and throwing myself at your feet and saying to you: 'My father suffers, he is unhappy on your account. If he has injured you, accept my tears, my humiliation, my enthusiasm, my life if you will, in expiation of his fault; give him your hand and trample me under your feet, and I will bless you, if you remove from my father's heart the grief that preys upon him and pursues him even in his sleep.'—Yes, that is the dream that I used to cherish long ago; but I abandoned it because my father ordered me to, thinking that I should simply add to your anger; and I abandon it more completely than ever to-night, seeing the coldness and aversion which my name inspires in you. So I take my leave without imploring you in his behalf, distressed by a very painful certainty that my father is the victim of very great injustice on your part; but I will put forth all my energies to distract his thoughts and comfort him. And as for you, monsieur le marquis, I leave you the means of punishing me for the innocent stratagem to which I gave my assent this evening in order to save the health and perhaps the life of the man whom my father once loved so dearly! I leave you my secret, which has been disclosed to you against my will, but which I no longer blush to know is in your hands; for it is the secret of a proud heart, and of a love that God has blessed by inspiring it. Have no fear of seeing me again, monsieur le marquis; and have no fear that Jean, our imprudent but generous friend, who has exposed himself to your anger by trying to reconcile us, will ever annoy you by reminding you of us. I shall find a way to make him abandon the task. I have been honored by your hospitality this evening, monsieur le marquis, and you will allow me never to forget it. You will have no reason to repent of it; for you will not have been the victim of a lie, and if it will be a consolation to your hatred, you still have an opportunity to drive Antoine de Châteaubrun's daughter from your presence with insulting touch."
"I would like to see him do it!" cried Jean Jappeloup, taking his stand beside her and putting her arm through his; "I who have done all the harm and told all the lies against her wish; I, who got it into my head that she would succeed in putting her hand in yours! You are obstinate, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; but, by all the devils! you shall not insult my Gilberte, for if you did, I should remember that I cut your cane in two to-night!"
"You talk like a fool, Jean," replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault coldly. "Mademoiselle," he said to Gilberte, "will you allow me to offer you my arm to return to your carriage?"
Gilberte accepted tremblingly; but she felt that the marquis's arm trembled even more. He assisted her into the carriage without speaking; then, noticing that it was still quite cold, although the sky was clear, he said:
"You have come from a very warm room and you are not dressed warmly enough; I will go and get something more for you."
Gilberte thanked him and reminded him that she had her father's cloak.
"But that is damp; it is worse than nothing," said the marquis. And he returned to the chalet.
"The devil take the old fool!" growled Jean, lashing the mare angrily. "I have had enough of him; I am out of temper with him; I have had no sort of success, and I long to get out of his den. I'll never put my feet inside it again; the man's glance gives me a cold in the head. Let's be off and not wait for him."
"Nay, we must wait for him, and not make him run after us," said Gilberte.
"Bah! do you suppose he cares whether you take cold or not? Indeed, he's forgotten all about it; you'll see if he comes back. Let us go."
But when they reached the gate they found that it was locked, that Monsieur de Boisguilbault had kept the key, and that they must either wait for him or go back and ask him for it. Jean was cursing loudly when the marquis suddenly appeared, carrying a package which he placed on Gilberte's knees, saying:
"I kept you waiting a little; I had some difficulty in finding what I wanted. I beg you to keep it for your own use, as well as these little things which you left with your basket. Don't get down, Jappeloup, I will open the gate for you. I shall expect you to-morrow, my dear fellow," he added, when the gate was open.
And he offered the carpenter his hand, which the latter hesitated to take, understanding nothing of the inconsequent impulses of so uncertain and perturbed a mind.
"Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun," the marquis then said in an almost inaudible tone of voice, "will you also shake hands with me before we part?"
Gilberte leaped lightly to the ground, removed her glove and took the old man's hand, which trembled terribly. With an impulsive outburst of respectful compassion she put it to her lips, saying:
"You will not forgive Antoine; do, at least, forgive Gilberte?"
A profound groan issued from the old man's breast. He made a movement as if to put his lips to Gilberte's brow, but recoiled in dismay. Then he took her head in both hands, squeezed it a moment as if he would crush it, and, finally, kissed her hair, which he moistened with a tear as cold as the drop of water that drips from the glacier. Then he suddenly pushed her away with all his strength and fled, hiding his face in his handkerchief. Gilberte fancied that she heard a sob die away in the distance with the sound of his uncertain footsteps on the gravel and the whispering of the breeze among the aspens.
There was something at once ghastly and heartrending in Monsieur de Boisguilbault's strange leave-taking, and Gilberte was so affected by it that she began to weep again herself.
"Well, what's the matter?" said Jean when they were on the road to Châteaubrun; "are you going to lose your eyes this evening. You are about as mad as yonder old man, my Gilberte; for sometimes you are reasonable and talk pure gold, and then suddenly you are as weak and whining as a baby. Let me tell you this: Monsieur de Boisguilbault has a kind heart; but, for all Emile and your father may say, he is a little crack-brained; that's sure. There's no relying on him, but just the same, we need never despair of him. It may be that you will never hear of him again, and it may just as well be that he'll jump on your father's neck some fine day, if he happens to meet him at the right moment. It will depend on the moon!"
"I don't know what to think of him," said Gilberte, "for I really believe I should go mad if I lived with him. He frightens me horribly, and yet I have moments of irresistible affection for him. It's the same feeling that Emile had for him from the beginning. Emile has ended by loving him and losing his fear of him. So that his kindness of heart finally carries the day over the caprice of disease."
"I will tell you more about that later," replied the carpenter, "for I really must go there again and study him."
"But you knew him so well years ago! Wasn't he the same then?"
"Oh! he has grown much worse! He was habitually sad and silent, and sometimes a little hot-headed. But it didn't last long, and he was better after it. The same thing is true now; but it seems to me that it happens once or twice a day where it used to happen once or twice a year, and that he is at the same time uglier and gentler."
"How unhappy he seems!" said Gilberte, whose heart ached as she recalled the sob she heard, which still echoed in her ears.
Janille and Antoine were awaiting Gilberte's return with feverish impatience. Charasson's report had stricken them dumb and, thinking that he was daft, or that he was lying to conceal some accident that had happened to Gilberte, they had hurried to Mère Marlot's to ease their minds. Her story reassured them but gave them no light. Janille was angry with the carpenter and augured no good from this crazy enterprise. Antoine shared her fears at first, and then, in conformity with his hopeful nature, abandoned himself to pleasant illusions and built innumerable castles in Spain.