The Masterpieces of George Sand
Amandine Lucille Aurore Dupin, Baroness
Dudevant, _NOW FOR THE FIRST
TIME COMPLETELY TRANSLATED
INTO ENGLISH THE SIN
OF MONSIEUR ANTOINE, AND LEONE
LEONI BY G. BURNHAM IVES_




_WITH TWELVE PHOTOGRAVURES AFTER PAINTINGS BY
PIERRE VIDAL_




_VOLUME I_




_PRINTED ONLY FOR SUBSCRIBERS BY
GEORGE BARRIE & SON
PHILADELPHIA_




CONTENTS
INTRODUCTION
CHAPTER
I. EGUZON
II. THE MANOR OF CHÂTEAUBRUN
III. MONSIEUR CARDONNET
IV. THE VISION
V. THE DRIBE
VI. JEAN THE CARPENTER
VII. THE ARREST
VIII. GILBERTE
IX. MONSIEUR ANTOINE
X. A GOOD ACTION
XI. A GHOST
XII. INDUSTRIAL DIPLOMACY
XIII. THE STRUGGLE
XIV. FIRST LOVE
XV-. THE STAIRCASE
XVI. THE TALISMAN
XVII. THAW
XVIII. STORM
XIX. THE PORTRAIT
XX. THE FORTRESS OF CROZANT
XXI. MONSIEUR ANTOINE'S NAP
XXII. INTRIGUE
XXIII. THE DEVIL'S ROCK




LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS

THE SIN OF MONSIEUR ANTOINE

_VOLUME I_


EMILE'S FIRST MEETING WITH GILBERTE

EMILE ENTERTAINED BY MONSIEUR ANTOINE

MONSIEUR DE BOISGUILBAULT TRIES EMILE'S HORSE

EMILE IN CONFERENCE WITH HIS FATHER

EMILE EXAMINES THE PORTRAIT OF THE MARQUISE DE
BOISGUILBAULT

GALUCHET SURPRISED




[Illustration: _EMILE'S FIRST MEETING WITH
GILBERTE_

_A fresh young voice was singing, or rather humming, at a little
distance, one of those sweet melodies, which are peculiar to the
country. And the châtelain's daughter, the bachelor's child, whose
mother's name was a mystery to the whole neighborhood, appeared at the
corner of a clump of eglantine, as lovely as the loveliest wild flower
of that charming solitude._]




INTRODUCTION


I wrote the _Sin of Monsieur Antoine_ in the country, during a season of
tranquillity, outward and inward, such as seldom occurs in one's life.
It was in 1845, a period when criticism of society, as it was, and
dreams of an ideal society attained in the press a degree of freedom of
development comparable to that of the eighteenth century. Some day,
perhaps, people will find it difficult to believe the trivial but
exceedingly characteristic fact I am about to mention.

At that period, if one wished to be independent, to maintain directly or
indirectly the boldest ideas opposed to the vices of the existing social
organization and to give expression to the liveliest hopes of the
philosophical sentiment, it was hardly possible to apply to the
opposition newspapers. The most advanced of them unfortunately had not
readers enough to give satisfactory publicity to the ideas one desired
to put forth. The more moderate nourished a profound aversion for
socialism, and, in the course of the last ten years of Louis-Philippe's
reign, one of these organs of the reformist opposition, the most
important by reason of its age and the number of its subscribers, did me
the honor several times to ask me for a serial novel, always on the
condition that it should contain nothing of a socialistic tendency.

That condition was very difficult, perhaps impossible of fulfilment, to
a mind absorbed by the sufferings and the needs of its generation. There
are very few serious-minded artists who do not allow themselves to be
influenced in their work by the threats of the present or the promises
of the future, with more or less adroit circumlocution, with more or
less effusion and enthusiasm. Moreover it was the time to say all that
one thought, all that one believed. It was one's duty to do it, because
it was possible. As the social war did not seem imminent, the monarchy,
making no concessions to the needs of the people, seemed powerful enough
to defy longer than it did the current of ideas.

These ideas, at which only a small number of conservative minds had as
yet taken fright, had really taken firm root only in a small number of
observant and laborious minds. So long as they seemed to have no
application to political actualities, the ruling power worried very
little about theories and allowed every man to make one for himself, to
publish his dream, to construct the future city innocently in his
chimney corner, in the garden of his imagination.

The conservative journals became therefore the refuge of the socialist
novel. Eugène Sue published his in the _Débats_ and the
_Constitutionnel_. I published mine in the _Constitutionnel_ and the
_Epoque_. At about the same time the _National_ was attacking the
socialistic writers in its _feuilletons_, and overwhelming them with
very bitter insults or very clever satire.

The _Epoque_, a journal which had a very brief life, but which began by
surpassing in ardor all the conservative and absolutist organs of the
moment, was the frame wherein I was given absolute liberty to publish a
socialistic novel. On all the blank walls of Paris was placarded in huge
letters: _Read the Epoque_! _Read the Sin of Monsieur Antoine_!

The following year, as we were wandering through the moors of Crozant
and among the ruins of Châteaubrun, a rustic field in which my pen had
always taken delight, a Parisian friend of mine called out facetiously
to the half-civilized shepherds of those solitudes: "Have you read the
_Epoque_? Have you read the _Sin of Monsieur Antoine_?" And as they
fled, terrified by those incomprehensible words, he said to me with a
laugh: "How evident it is that these socialistic novels go to the heads
of the country people!"

An old woman, an excellent talker, came to Châteaubrun to reprove me
because I had written a book _full of lies_ about her and her master.
She thought that I had intended to introduce the proprietor of the
château and herself on my stage. She had heard of the book. People had
told her that there was _not a word of truth_ in it. It was impossible
to make her understand what a novel is, and yet she invented one
herself, for she told us of the assassination of Louis XVI. and Marie
Antoinette, _who were stabbed in their carriage by the populace of
Paris_. They who accuse socialistic writers of inflaming people's minds
should remember that they have forgotten to teach the peasants to read.

Shall I deny, now that the masses are stirring, the communism of
Monsieur de Boisguilbault, a very eccentric and yet not altogether
imaginary character in my novel? God forbid, especially after the
socialists have been accused, in every key, of preaching the division of
property.

The diametrically opposite idea, that of common ownership by
association, should be the least dangerous of all in the eyes of the
conservatives, since it is unfortunately the least understood and the
least popular among the masses. It is especially antipathetic in the
country districts and can be realized only by the initiative of a strong
government or by a philosophic, religious and Christian renovation, the
work of centuries it may be!

Attempts to form workingmen's associations have been made, however,
among the best informed, the most moral, the most patient portion of the
industrial population of the large cities. Enlightened governments,
whatever their motto, will always protect these associations, because
they offer a refuge to the genuinely social and religious thought of the
future. Probably imperfect at their birth, they will perfect themselves
in time, and when it is clearly proved that they do not destroy, but, on
the contrary, preserve respect for family and property, they will
insensibly lead to reciprocity among all classes, and to a union of
interests and attachments,--the only path of safety open to the society
of the future.


                                       GEORGE SAND.




THE SIN OF MONSIEUR ANTOINE




I

EGUZON


There are few localities in France as unattractive as the town of Eguzon
on the confines of La Marche and Berry, in the southwest part of the
latter province. Eighty to a hundred houses, all of more or less
wretched appearance, with the exception of two or three whose opulent
proprietors we will not name for fear of offending their modesty, line
the two or three streets and surround the public square of that
municipality, famous for leagues around by reason of the litigious
nature of its population and the difficulty of reaching it. Despite this
last drawback, which will soon disappear, thanks to the laying out of a
new road, Eguzon sees many travellers boldly traverse the solitudes by
which it is surrounded and risk the springs of their _carrioles_ on its
terrible pavement. The only inn is situated on the only square, which
seems the more vast because it has one side open to the fields as if
awaiting the new buildings of future citizens; and this inn is sometimes
compelled, in the summer, to invite its too numerous guests to accept
accommodation in the neighboring houses, which are thrown open to them,
we are bound to say, with much hospitality. Eguzon, you see, is the
central point of a picturesque neighborhood dotted with imposing ruins,
and whether one desires to visit Châteaubrun, Crozant, Prugne-au-Pot,
or the still habitable and inhabited château of Saint-Germain, he must
necessarily sleep at Eguzon, in order to start betimes on these
different excursions on the following morning.

Several years ago, one lowering, stormy evening in June, the good people
of Eguzon opened their eyes to their fullest extent to see a young man
of attractive exterior crossing the square to leave the town just after
sunset. The weather was threatening; it was growing dark more quickly
than usual, and yet the young traveller, after taking a light repast at
the inn, where he halted just long enough to rest his horse, rode boldly
away toward the north, heedless of the representations of the innkeeper,
and apparently caring naught for the dangers of the road. None knew him;
he had answered all questions with an impatient gesture only, and all
remonstrances with a smile. When the sound of his horse's hoofs had died
away in the distance, the loafers about the inn said to one another:

"That fellow knows the road well or doesn't know it at all. Either he
has been over it a hundred times and knows every stone by name, or he
doesn't suspect what sort of a place it is, and will find himself in a
deal of trouble."

"He's a stranger and not of these parts," said a knowing individual with
a judicial air. "He wouldn't listen to anything but his own head; but
half an hour hence, when the storm breaks, you'll see him coming back
again."

"If he doesn't break his neck first, going down the Pont des Piles,"
observed a third.

"Faith!" said the bystanders in chorus, "that's his business! Let's go
and close our shutters, so that the hail won't break our window-panes."

And throughout the village there was a great noise of doors and windows
being hastily barred, while the wind, which was beginning to moan over
the moors, outstripped the breathless maid-servants, and sent back into
their faces the folding leaves of the heavy shutters wherein the
mechanics of the province, in conformity with the traditions of their
ancestors, spared neither oak nor iron bolts. From time to time a voice
could be heard from one end of the street to the other, and such remarks
as these were shouted from doorway to doorway: "Is all yours in?" "_Ah
oua!_ I've got two loads still on the ground." "And I've got six
standing!" "Well, I don't care, mine are all in the barn." They were
talking about hay.

The traveller, riding an excellent Brenne hackney, left the clouds
behind him and, quickening his pace, flattered himself that he could
outstrip the storm; but, at a sudden turn in the road, he realized that
he must inevitably be taken in flank. He unfolded his cloak, which was
strapped to his valise, tied his cap under his chin, and, digging his
spurs into his horse, galloped on once more, hoping at least to reach
and cross, by daylight, the dangerous spot that had been described to
him. But his hope was disappointed; the road became so difficult that he
had to go at a footpace and watch his horse to keep him from falling
over the rocks with which the ground was strewn. When he reached the top
of the ravine of La Creuse, the storm-cloud had enveloped the whole sky;
it was quite dark, and he could judge the depth of the abyss he was
skirting only by the dull, muffled roar of the torrent.

With the rashness of his twenty years the young man disregarded his
horse's prudent hesitation and forced him to take the chances of a
descent which the docile beast found more uneven and steeper at every
step. But suddenly he stopped and threw himself back on his haunches,
and his rider, who was slightly startled by the shock, saw, by the light
of a brilliant flash, that he was on the extreme edge of a perpendicular
precipice, and that another step would infallibly have hurled him to the
bottom of La Creuse.

The rain was beginning to fall, and a furious squall twisted the tops of
the old chestnut trees on the level of the road. The west wind forced
man and horse alike toward the stream, and the danger became so real
that the traveller was obliged to dismount, in order to present less
surface to the wind and to guide his horse more surely in the darkness.
What the lightning flash had enabled him to see of the landscape had
seemed wonderfully beautiful to him; moreover, his situation whetted the
task for adventure which is characteristic of youth.

A second flash enabled him to distinguish his surroundings, and he
profited by a third to familiarize himself with the objects nearest at
hand. The road was not narrow, but its very width made it hard to
follow. There were some half a dozen vaguely defined tracks, marked only
by hoof-prints and wheel-ruts, forming divers paths, interlaced as if by
chance, on the slope of a hill; and as there was neither hedge, nor
ditch, nor any sign of cultivation, those who passed that way had
climbed the hill wherever they happened to choose; thus with each season
a new road was opened, or some old one reopened which time and nonuse
had closed. Between each two of these capricious tracks were little
mounds of rock or tufts of furze, which looked just alike in the
darkness, and as no two of them were on the same level it was difficult
to pass from one to the other without risking a fall which might well
end in the abyss; for they all sloped sidewise as well as forward, so
that one must lean backward and to the left. Thus no one of these
winding paths was safe; for since the spring all had been trodden
equally hard, the natives taking any one of them at random in broad
daylight; but, on a dark night, it was of the greatest importance not to
lose one's footing, and the young man, who was more careful of the knees
of the horse he loved than of his own life, concluded to halt behind a
rock that was high enough to shelter them both from the violence of the
wind, and to wait there until the sky should brighten up a bit. He
leaned against _Corbeau_, and, raising a corner of his waterproof cloak
in such wise as to protect his companion's quarters and the saddle, he
fell into a romantic reverie, as well pleased to hear the howling of the
tempest as the good people of Eguzon, assuming them to be thinking of
him at all at that moment, supposed him to be anxious and disappointed.

The successive flashes soon afforded him a sufficient acquaintance with
the surrounding country. Directly in front of him the road climbed the
opposite slope of the ravine, equally steep and presenting difficulties
of the same nature. The Creuse, a clear, swift stream, flowed not very
noisily at the foot of the precipice and drew its banks together to pass
with a dull, never-ending roar under the arches of an old bridge that
seemed in a very dilapidated condition. The view opposite was limited by
the steep incline; but at the left he could catch glimpses of sloping,
well-cultivated meadows, through the middle of which the stream wound;
and opposite our traveller, on the crest of a hill bristling with huge
boulders interspersed with rich vegetation, rose the dilapidated towers
of a vast ruined manor. But, even if it had occurred to the young man to
seek shelter there from the storm, it would have been difficult to find
a way of reaching it; for there was no apparent communication between
the road and the ruin, and another ravine, traversed by a stream that
emptied into the Creuse, separated the two hills. The site was most
picturesque and the pallid gleam of the lightning imparted a touch of
the terrible which one would have sought in vain by daylight. Gigantic
chimneys, exposed by the falling of the roofs, towered up toward the
heavy clouds that hovered over the château and seemed to rend it
asunder. When the sky was lighted by the swift flashes, the ruins were
outlined in white against the dark background of the atmosphere, and, on
the contrary, when the eyes had accustomed themselves to the succeeding
darkness, they formed a dark mass against a lighter horizon. A large
star, which the clouds seemed not to dare to cover, shone a long while
over the haughty donjon, like a carbuncle on a giant's head. At last it
disappeared, and the torrents of rain, falling with redoubled force,
made it impossible for the traveller to distinguish anything except
through a thick veil. The water, falling on the rocks near by and on the
ground hardened by the recent extreme heat, rebounded like white foam
and at times resembled clouds of dust raised by the wind.

As he moved forward to shelter his horse more effectually behind the
rock, the young man discovered that he was not alone. Another man had
come to that spot in search of shelter, or perhaps had taken possession
of it first. It was impossible to tell, in those alternations of
dazzling light and intense darkness. The horseman had not time to obtain
a good view of the pedestrian; he seemed to be wretchedly dressed and
not of very attractive appearance. Indeed he seemed inclined to keep out
of sight by crouching as far under the rock as possible; but as soon as
he concluded, from an exclamation of the traveller, that he was
discovered, he unhesitatingly addressed him in a loud, clear voice:

"This is bad weather for riding, monsieur, and if you're wise you will
go back to Eguzon to sleep."

"Much obliged, my friend," replied the young man, making his stout,
lead-handled hunting-crop whistle through the air, in order to give his
problematical companion to understand that he was armed.

The latter understood the warning and answered it by tapping the rock,
as if absent-mindedly, with an enormous holly staff, which broke off
several splinters of stone. The weapon was stout and so was the wrist
that wielded it.

"You won't go far to-night in such weather," continued the pedestrian.

"I shall go as far as I choose," replied the horseman, "and I should not
advise anybody to take it into his head to delay me on the way."

"Are you afraid of robbers that you meet friendly overtures with
threats? I don't know what province you come from, my young man, but you
hardly seem to know what province you are in. Thank God, there are
neither highwaymen, nor assassins among us."

The stranger's proud but frank tone inspired confidence. The young man
rejoined more mildly:

"You're of this province, are you, comrade?"

"Yes, monsieur, I am, and always shall be."

"You are right to propose to remain here; it's a beautiful country."

"Not always though! At this moment, for instance, it's none too
pleasant; the weather is venting its spite, and it will be bad all
night."

"Do you think so?"

"I am sure of it. If you follow the valley of the Creuse you'll have the
storm for company till to-morrow noon, but I fancy that you didn't start
out so late without expecting to find shelter near at hand?"

"To tell you the truth, I am inclined to think that the place I am going
to is farther away than I supposed at first. I fancied that they tried
to keep me at Eguzon by exaggerating the distance and the bad condition
of the roads; but I see, from the little progress I have made in an
hour, that they hardly overstated it."

"Not to be inquisitive, where might you be going?"

"To Gargilesse. How far do you call it?"

"Not far, monsieur, if you could see where you are going; but, if you
don't know the country, it will take you all night; for what you see
from here is nothing in comparison with the break-neck places you have
to descend to go from the ravine of La Creuse to that of Gargilesse, and
you risk your life to boot."

"Well, my friend, will you undertake to guide me, for a good round sum?"

"No, monsieur, thank you."

"Is the road very dangerous that you are so disobliging?"

"The road is not dangerous to me, for I know it as well as you probably
know the streets of Paris; but what reason have I for passing the night
in getting drenched just to please you?"

"I am not particular about it, and I can do without your help; but I
didn't ask you to favor me for nothing; I offered you----"

"Enough! enough! you are rich and I am poor, but I am not a beggar yet,
and I have reasons for not making myself the servant of the first comer.
However, if I knew who you were----"

"Are you suspicious of me?" said the young man, whose curiosity was
aroused by his companion's proud and fearless character. "To prove that
distrust is an unworthy feeling, I will pay you in advance. How much do
you want?"

"I beg your pardon, excuse me, monsieur, I want nothing; I have neither
wife nor children, I need nothing for the moment; besides I have a
friend, a good fellow, whose house is not far away, and I shall take
advantage of the first flash to go there and have supper and sleep on a
good bed. Why should I deprive myself of that for you? Let us see! is it
because you have a good horse and new clothes?"

"I like your pride, so far as that goes! But it seems to me not well
done of you to refuse an exchange of favors."

"I have done you all the service in my power by telling you not to take
any risks at night in such vile weather, on roads that will be
impassable in half an hour. What more do you want?"

"Nothing. When I asked for your assistance I wanted to ascertain the
character of the people of this neighborhood, that's all. I see now that
their good will toward strangers is limited to words."

"Toward strangers!" cried the native, in a melancholy and reproachful
tone which impressed the traveller. "In Heaven's name isn't that too
much for those who have never done us aught but harm? I tell you,
monsieur, men are unjust; but God's sight is clear, and he knows well
that the poor peasant allows himself to be shorn, without revenging
himself, by the shrewd people who come from the great cities."

"Have the people from the cities done so much harm in your country
districts, pray? That is a fact that I know nothing of and am not
responsible for, as this is my first visit."

"You are going to Gargilesse. I suppose of course you are going to see
Monsieur Cardonnet? You are either a relation or friend of his, I am
sure?"

"Who is this Monsieur Cardonnet, whom you seem to hold in ill-will?"
asked the young man, after a moment's hesitation.

"Enough, monsieur," the peasant replied; "if you don't know him anything
that I could say would hardly interest you, and if you are rich you have
nothing to fear from him. The poor people are the only ones he has a
grudge against."

"But after all," rejoined the traveller, with a sort of restrained
emotion, "it may be that I have reasons for wanting to know what people
in this country think of this Monsieur Cardonnet. If you refuse to give
any reason for your bad opinion of him, it must be because you have some
personal spite against him, not at all creditable to yourself."

"I am accountable to nobody," retorted the peasant, "and my opinion is
my own. Good-night, monsieur. See, the rain is a little less violent. I
am sorry to be unable to offer you a shelter; but I have only the
château you see yonder, which is not mine. However," he added, after
taking a few steps, and as if regretting that he had not shown more
respect for the duties of hospitality, "if your heart should prompt you
to come and ask a bed for the night, I can answer for it you would be
welcome."

"Is yonder ruin occupied?" asked the traveller, who had to descend the
ravine to cross the Creuse, and had walked along beside the peasant,
supporting his horse by the rein.

"It is a ruin, in truth," his companion replied, repressing a sigh; "but
although I am not so very old, I have seen that château in perfect
repair, and so magnificent, outside as well as inside, that a king would
have been well lodged there. The owner didn't spend a great deal, but it
didn't require much repairing, it was so solid and well built; and the
walls were so well laid, the stone mantels and window frames so
beautifully carved that it would have been impossible to make it any
finer than the architects and masons did when they built it. But
everything goes, riches like all the rest, and the last lord of
Châteaubrun has just repurchased the château of his ancestors for four
thousand francs."

"Is it possible that such a mass of stone, even in its present
condition, is worth so little?"

"What is left would still be worth a good deal if one could take it down
and carry it away; but where in this vicinity can he find workmen and
machines capable of pulling down those old walls? I don't know what they
built with in old times, but that cement is so hard that you would say
the towers and high walls are made of a single stone. And then, you see
how it was planted on the very top of a mountain, with precipices on all
sides! What carts and what horses could carry down such materials?
Unless the hill crumbles they will stay there as long as the rock that
holds them, and there are still ceilings enough left to cover one poor
gentleman and one poor girl."

"So this last of the Châteaubruns has a daughter, has he?" asked the
young man, pausing to look at the manor with more interest than he had
yet shown. "And she lives there?"

"Yes, yes, she lives there among the gerfalcons and screech-owls, and
yet she is young and pretty, all the same. There's no lack of air and
water here, and in spite of the new laws against free hunting, we still
see hares and partridges now and then on the lord of Châteaubrun's
table. Look you, if you have no business that compels you to risk your
life to arrive before daybreak, come with me; I will undertake to
procure you a warm welcome at the château. Even if you should arrive
there alone, without recommendation, it's enough that the weather is bad
and that you have the face of a Christian, to ensure your being well
received and well treated at Monsieur Antoine de Châteaubrun's."

"But this gentleman is poor, it seems, and I am reluctant to impose on
his goodness of heart."

"On the contrary, you will gratify him. Come, the storm, you see, is
going to begin again with more violence than before, and my conscience
would trouble me if I should leave you thus all alone on the mountain.
You mustn't bear me ill-will because I refused my services. I have my
reasons, which you could not judge fairly, and which there is no need of
my telling you; but I shall sleep better if you follow my advice.
Besides, I know Monsieur Antoine; he would be angry with me for not
holding fast to you and taking you to his house; he would be quite
capable of running after you, which would be a bad thing for him after
supper."

"And you don't think that his daughter would be displeased to have a
stranger arrive thus unexpectedly?"

"His daughter is his daughter; that is to say, she is as good as he is,
if not better, although that seems hardly possible."

The young man hesitated some time longer, but, drawn on by a romantic
attraction, and already drawing in his imagination the portrait of the
pearl of beauty he was about to find behind those frowning walls, he
said to himself that he was not expected at Gargilesse until the
following day; that by arriving at midnight he should disturb his
parents in their sleep; and, lastly, that it would be downright
imprudence to persist in his plan, and that his mother would certainly
dissuade him from it, if she could see him at that moment. Moved by all
the excellent reasons which a man gives himself when the demon of youth
and curiosity takes a hand, he followed his guide in the direction of
the old château.




II

THE MANOR OF CHÂTEAUBRUN


After climbing with difficulty a very steep road, or rather a stairway
cut in the rock, our travellers reached the entrance of Châteaubrun in
about twenty minutes. The wind and the rain redoubled in violence, and
the young man hardly had leisure to observe the huge portal, which
offered to his sight, at that moment, nothing more than an ill-defined
mass of formidable proportions. He noticed simply that the seignorial
portcullis was replaced by a wooden fence like those which enclose all
the fields in the province.

"Wait a moment, monsieur," said his guide. "I will climb over and get
the key; for latterly old Janille has minded to have a padlock here, as
if there were anything to steal in her master's house! However, her
intentions are good, and I don't blame her."

The peasant scaled the fence very cleverly, and, while awaiting for him
to return and admit him, the young man tried in vain to make out the
arrangement of the ruined masses of architecture which he could see
confusedly inside the courtyard; it was like a glimpse of chaos.

After a few moments he saw several persons approaching. The gate was
speedily opened; one took his horse, another his hand, and a third went
ahead carrying a lantern, which was very essential for their guidance
among the rubbish and brushwood that obstructed their passage. At last,
after passing across part of the courtyard and through several enormous
dark rooms, open to all the winds of heaven, they reached a small oblong
room with an arched ceiling, which might formerly have been used as a
pantry or as a store-room between the kitchen and the stables. This room
had been cleaned and whitewashed, and was used by the lord of
Châteaubrun as salon and dining-room. A small fireplace had recently
been built there, with mantel and uprights of polished, glistening wood;
the huge cast-iron plate, which had been taken from one of the great
fireplaces and which filled the whole back, together with the great
fire-dogs of polished iron, sent out the heat and light beautifully into
the bare white room, which, with the aid of a small tin lamp, was
perfectly lighted. A chestnut table, which could be made to hold as many
as six covers on great occasions, a few straw-seated chairs, and a
German cuckoo clock, purchased from a peddler for six francs, composed
the whole furniture of this modest salon. But everything was
scrupulously clean; the table and chairs, roughly carved by some local
cabinet-maker, shone in a way that bore witness to the assiduous use of
the brush and duster. The hearth was carefully swept, the floor sanded
in the English fashion, contrary to the customs of the province; and in
an earthenware pot on the mantel was a huge bunch of roses mingled with
wild-flowers plucked on the hillside roundabout.

At first glance there was nothing _cherché_, in the poetic or
picturesque sense, in that modest interior; and yet, on examining it
more closely, one would see that, in that abode, as in all those of all
mankind, the natural taste and temperament of its presiding genius had
governed in the choice as in the arrangement of the furniture. The young
man, who then entered the room for the first time, and who was left
alone there for a moment while his hosts busied themselves in
preparations to make him as comfortable as possible, soon formed an idea
of the mental condition of the inhabitants of that retreat. It was
evident that they had refined habits and that they still felt a craving
for the comforts of life; that, being in a very precarious financial
condition, they had had the good sense to proscribe every species of
mere external vanity, and had chosen, for their place of assemblage,
among the few still intact apartments in that great building, the one
that could most easily be kept clean, heated, furnished and lighted; and
that, nevertheless, they had instinctively given the preference to a
well-proportioned, attractive room. This little nook was in fact the
first floor of a square pavilion added, toward the close of the
Renaissance, to the venerable buildings which looked upon the principal
courtyard. The artist who had planned this sharp-angled turret had done
his best to soften the transition from one to the other of two such
different styles. For the shape of the windows he had gone back to the
defensive system of loop-holes and small apertures through which to
watch the enemy; but it was easy to see that the small round windows had
never been intended to fire cannon through, and that they were simply
for purposes of ornament. Being tastefully framed with red brick and
white stone, in alternation, they formed an attractive setting for the
interior of the room, and divers recesses between the windows decorated
in the same way, avoided the necessity for papers, hangings, or even
articles of furniture, with which the wall might have been covered,
without adding to their simple and pleasant aspect.

In one of these recesses, the base of which, about three feet from the
floor, was formed by a flagstone white as snow and glistening like
marble, stood a pretty little rustic spinning-wheel, with its distaff
filled with brown flax; and as he contemplated that slight and primitive
instrument of toil the traveller lost himself in reflections from which
he was roused by the rustling of a woman's dress behind him. He turned
hastily; but the sudden rapid beating of his youthful heart was checked
by a severe disappointment. It was an old servant, who had entered the
room noiselessly, thanks to the fine sand with which the floor was
covered, and was leaning over to throw an armful of wild grapevine roots
on the fire.

"Come near the fire, monsieur," she said, lisping with a sort of
affectation, "and give me your cap and cloak, so that I can have them
dried in the kitchen. That's a fine cloak for the rain; I don't know
what they call this material, but I've seen it in Paris. It would be a
good thing to see such a cloak on Monsieur le Comte's shoulders! But it
must cost a lot, and besides, he hasn't said that he would wear it. He
thinks he's still twenty-five years old, and he declares that the water
from the sky never yet gave an honest man a cold; however, he began to
have a touch of sciatica last winter. But a man isn't afraid of those
things at your age. Never mind, warm your bones all the same; here, turn
your chair like this and you'll be more comfortable. You're from Paris,
I am sure; I can tell by your complexion, which is too fresh for our
country; a fine country, monsieur, but very hot in summer and very cold
in winter. You will say that it's as cold to-night as a night in
November; that's true enough, but what can you expect? it's on account
of the storm. But this little room is very comfortable, very easy to
heat; in a moment you'll see if I'm not right. We are lucky to have
plenty of dead wood. There are so many old trees about here, and we can
keep the oven going all winter just with the brambles that grow in the
courtyard. To be sure, we don't do much cooking. Monsieur le Comte is a
small eater and his daughter's like him; the little servant is the
heartiest eater in the house; why, he has to have three pounds of bread
a day; but I bake for him separate, and I don't spare the rye. That's
good enough for him, and with a little bran it goes farther and isn't
bad for the health. Ha! ha! that makes you laugh, does it? and me too.
You see, I have always liked to laugh and talk; the work goes off just
as fast, for I like to be quick in everything. Monsieur Antoine is like
me; when he has once spoken, off you must go like the wind. So we have
always agreed on that point. You'll excuse us, monsieur, if we keep you
waiting a little while. Monsieur has gone down the cellar with the man
who brought you here, and the stairs are so broken down that they can't
go very fast; but it's a fine cellar, monsieur; the walls are more than
ten feet thick, and it's so far underground that when you're down there
you feel as if you were buried alive. Really! it's a funny feeling. They
say that there was a time when they used to put prisoners of war there;
now, we don't put anybody there and our wine keeps very well. What
delays us is that our child has already gone to bed; she had a sick
headache to-day because she went out in the sun without a hat. She says
that she means to get used to it, and that she can get along without hat
or umbrella just as well as I can; but she's mistaken; she's been
brought up like a young lady, as she should have been, poor child! for
when I say _our_ child, I don't mean that I am Mademoiselle Gilberte's
mother; she's no more like me than a goldfinch is like a sparrow; but as
I brought her up, I have always kept the habit of calling her my girl:
she would never let me stop calling her _thou_. She's such a sweet
child! I am sorry she's in bed, but you will see her to-morrow; for you
won't go away without breakfast, you won't be let go, and she'll help me
to serve you a little better than I can do alone. It's not courage that
I lack, however, monsieur, for I have a good pair of legs; I have always
been thin, as you see me, with my short body, and you would never think
me as old as I am. Come! how old would you call me?"

The young man thought that, thanks to this question, he would be able to
put in a word at last, to thank her and to guide her, for he was very
desirous of fuller details concerning Mademoiselle Gilberte; but the
good woman did not await his reply, but continued volubly:

"I am sixty-four years old, monsieur, that is to say, I shall be on
Saint-Jean's day, and I do more work alone than three young hussies
could ever do. My blood runs quick, you see, monsieur. I am not from
Berry, I was born in Marche, more than half a league from here; so you
can understand it. Ah! you are looking at our child's work? Do you know
that is spun as even and fine as the best spinner in the province can do
it? She wanted me to teach her to spin. 'Look you, mother,' she said,
for she always calls me that; she never knew her own mother and always
loved me as if I was, although we were about as much alike as a rose and
a nettle; 'look you, mother,' she said, 'all that embroidery and drawing
and nonsense they taught me at the convent will never do me any good
here. Teach me to spin and knit and sew, so that I can help you make
father's clothes.'"

Just as the good woman's indefatigable monologue was beginning to be
interesting to her weary auditor, she left the room, as she had already
done several times; for she did not remain quiet a moment, and, while
talking, had covered the table with a coarse white cloth, laid plates,
glasses and knives; had swept the hearth, wiped the chairs and rekindled
the fire ten times, always resuming her soliloquy at the point where she
had let it drop. But this time her voice, which began to lisp in the
passageway outside the door, was drowned by other stronger voices, and
the Comte de Châteaubrun and the peasant who had guided our traveller
at last appeared before him, each carrying two large earthenware jugs
which they placed on the table. Not until then had the young man had an
opportunity to see their faces distinctly.

Monsieur de Châteaubrun was a man of some fifty years, of medium
height, with a noble and commanding figure, broad-shouldered, with a
neck like a bull, the limbs of an athlete, a skin quite as tanned as his
companion's, and large hands, calloused and roughened by hunting and by
the sunlight and the cold air; a genuine poacher's hands, if such things
can be, for the worthy nobleman had too little land not to hunt on that
of other people.

He had a frank, ruddy, smiling face, a firm walk and the voice of a
stentor. His hunting costume, neat and clean although patched at the
elbow, his coarse shirt, his leather gaiters, his grizzly beard which
was patiently waiting for Sunday,--everything about him indicated that
his life was rough and wild, whereas his pleasant face, his hearty,
affectionate manners and an ease of bearing, not unmixed with dignity,
recalled the courteous gentleman and the man who was accustomed to
protect and assist, rather than to be protected and assisted.

His companion the peasant was not nearly as presentable. The storm and
the muddy roads had wrought havoc with his jacket and his shoes. While
the nobleman's beard may have been six or seven days old, the villager's
was fully fourteen or fifteen. He was thin, bony and wiry, several
inches taller than the other, and although his face also expressed
good-nature and cordiality, it had, if we may so describe it, flashes of
malevolence, of melancholy and haughty aloofness. It was evident that he
had more intelligence or was more unfortunate than the lord of
Châteaubrun.

"Well, monsieur," said the nobleman, "are you a little dryer than you
were? You are welcome here and my supper is at your service."

"I am grateful for your generous welcome," replied the traveller, "but I
am afraid you will deem me lacking in courtesy if I do not tell you
first of all who I am."

"No matter, no matter," rejoined the count, whom hereafter we shall call
Monsieur Antoine, as he was generally called in the neighborhood; "you
can tell me that later, if you choose; so far as I am concerned, I have
no questions to ask you, and I consider that I can satisfy the demands
of hospitality without making you give your names and titles. You are
travelling, you are a stranger in the province, caught by an infernal
night at the very gate of my house; those are your titles and your
claims. In addition you have an attractive face and a manner that
pleases me; I believe therefore that I shall be rewarded for my
confidences by the pleasure of having accommodated a good fellow. Come,
sit you down, and eat and drink."

"You are too kind and I am touched by your frank and amiable manner of
welcoming strangers. But I do not need any refreshment, monsieur, and it
is quite enough that you should allow me to wait here until the end of
the storm. I had supper at Eguzon hardly an hour ago. So do not serve
anything for me, I beg you."

"You have supped already? why, that's no reason! Is your stomach one of
those that can digest only one meal at a time? At your age I would have
supped every hour in the night if I had had the chance. A ride in the
saddle and the mountain air are quite enough to renew the appetite. To
be sure, one's stomach is less obliging at fifty; so that I consider
myself well-treated if I have half a glass of good wine with a crust of
stale bread. But do not stand on ceremony here. You have come in the
nick of time, for I was just about to sit down, and as my poor little
one has a sick-headache to-day, Janille and I were very depressed at the
idea of eating alone: so your arrival is a comfort to us, and this good
fellow's too, my old playmate, whom I am always glad to see. Come, sit
you down here beside me," he said to the peasant, "and you, Mère
Janille, opposite me. Do the honors; for you know I have a heavy hand,
and when I undertake to carve, I cut the joint and platter and cloth,
and sometimes the table, and you don't like that."

The supper which Dame Janille had spread on the table with an air of
condescension consisted of a goat's-milk cheese, a sheep's-milk cheese,
a plate of nuts, a plateful of prunes, a large round loaf of rye bread,
and four jugs of wine brought by the master in person. The
table-companions set about discussing this frugal meal with evident
satisfaction, with the exception of the traveller, who had no appetite,
and who was well content to observe the good grace with which the worthy
host invited him, without embarrassment or false shame, to partake of
his splendid banquet. There was in that cordial and ingenuous ease
something at once fatherly and childlike which won the young man's
heart.

True to the law of generosity which he had imposed upon himself,
Monsieur Antoine asked his guest no questions and even avoided remarks
which might suggest curiosity in disguise. The peasant seemed a little
more uneasy and was more reserved. But soon, being insensibly drawn into
the general conversation which Monsieur Antoine and Dame Janille had
begun, he laid aside his reserve and allowed his glass to be filled so
often that the traveller began to stare in amazement at a man capable of
drinking so much, not only without losing his wits but without departing
from his usual self-possession and gravity.

But with the master of the house it was very different. He had not drunk
half of the contents of the jug beside him when his eye began to kindle,
his nose to turn red and his hand to tremble. However he did not lose
his wits, even after all the jugs had been emptied by himself and his
friend the peasant--for Janille, whether from economy or from natural
sobriety, merely poured a few drops of wine into her water, and the
traveller, having made a heroic effort to swallow the first bumper,
abstained from further indulgence in that sour, cloudy and execrable
beverage.


[Illustration: _EMILE ENTERTAINED BY MONSIEUR
ANTOINE._

_But this time, her voice, which began to lisp in the passage-way
outside the door, was drowned by other stronger voices, and the Comte de
Châteaubrun and the peasant who had guided our traveller at last
appeared before him, each carrying two large earthenware jugs which they
placed on the table._]


The two countrymen, however, seemed to enjoy it hugely. After a quarter
of an hour, Janille, who could not live without moving about, left the
table, took up her knitting and began to work in the chimney corner,
constantly scratching her head with her needle, but never disturbing the
thin bands of hair, still black as a crow's wing, which protruded from
under her cap. That spruce little old woman might once have been pretty;
her delicate profile did not lack distinction, and if she had been less
affected, less intent upon appearing fashionable and knowing, our
traveller would have been attracted to her as well.

The other persons, who, in the absence of the _young lady_, formed
Monsieur Antoine's household, were a young peasant, of some fifteen
years, wide-awake and light-footed, who performed the functions of
factotum, and an old hunting-dog, with a lifeless eye, thin flanks and a
melancholy, dreamy air; he lay beside his master and dropped asleep
philosophically between every two mouthfuls that he gave him, calling
him monsieur with a gravely jocose air.




III

MONSIEUR CARDONNET


They had been at table more than an hour, and Monsieur Antoine seemed in
nowise weary of sitting there. He and his friend the peasant lingered
over their little cheeses and their great tankards with the majestic
indifference which is almost an art in the native Berrichon. Putting
their knives alternately to that appetizing morsel, the odor of which
was devoid of any agreeable quality, they cut it into small pieces,
which they placed carefully on their earthenware plates and ate crumb by
crumb on their rye bread. Between every two mouthfuls they took a
swallow of the native wine, after touching their glasses and exchanging
such compliments as: "Here's to you, comrade!" "Here's to you, Monsieur
Antoine!" or: "Here's your good health, old fellow!" "The same to you,
master!"

At that rate, the feast might well last all night, and the traveller,
who had exhausted himself in efforts to appear to eat and drink,
although he avoided doing it as far as possible, was beginning to find
it difficult to contend against his drowsiness, when the conversation,
which had thus far been concerned with the weather, the hay crop, the
price of cattle and the new growth of the vines, gradually took a turn
which interested him deeply.

"If this weather continues," said the peasant, listening to the rain
which was falling in torrents, "the streams will fill up this month as
they did in March. The Gargilesse is not in good humor and Monsieur
Cardonnet may suffer some damage."

"So much the worse," rejoined Monsieur Antoine; "it would be a pity, for
he has made some extensive and valuable improvements on that little
stream."

"True, but the little stream snaps its fingers at them," replied the
peasant, "and for my part I don't think it would be such a great pity."

"Yes it would, yes it would! that man has already spent more than two
hundred thousand francs at Gargilesse, and it needs only a fit of temper
on the part of the river, as we say, to ruin it all."

"Well, would that be such a great misfortune, Monsieur Antoine?"

"I don't say that it would be an irreparable misfortune for a man who is
said to be worth a million," rejoined the châtelain, who in his
sincerity persisted in misunderstanding his guest's hostile feeling
toward Monsieur Cardonnet; "but it would be a pity none the less."

"And that is just why I should laugh in my sleeve if a little hard luck
should make that hole in his purse."

"That's a wicked feeling to have, old fellow! Why should you have a
grudge against this stranger? He has never benefited or injured you or
me."

"He has injured you, Monsieur Antoine, and me and the whole province.
Yes, I tell you that he has done it on purpose and that he will keep on
doing it to everybody. Let the buzzard's beak grow and you'll see how
he'll come down on your poultry-yard."

"Still your wrong-headed ideas, old fellow! for you have wrong-headed
ideas, as I've told you a hundred times. You are down on the man because
he's rich. Is that his fault?"

"Yes, monsieur, it is his fault. A man who started perhaps as low as I
did, and who has gone ahead so fast, isn't an honest man."

"Nonsense! What are you talking about? Do you imagine that a man can't
make a fortune without stealing?"

"I don't know anything about it, but I believe it. I know that you were
born rich and that you are not rich now. I know that I was born poor and
always shall be poor; and it's my opinion that if you'd gone off to some
other country without paying your father's debts, and if I had made it
my business to cheat and shave and scrape, we might both be riding in
our carriages to-day. I beg your pardon, if I offend you!" added the
peasant in a proud, uncompromising tone, addressing the young man, who
gave very decided indications of painful excitement.

"Monsieur," said the châtelain, "it may be that you know Monsieur
Cardonnet, that you are in his employ or are under some obligation to
him. I beg you to pay no heed to what this worthy villager may say. He
has exaggerated ideas on many subjects which he doesn't fully
understand. You may be sure that he is neither malignant nor jealous at
bottom, nor capable of inflicting the slightest injury on Monsieur
Cardonnet."

"I attach little importance to his words," replied the young stranger.
"I am simply astonished, monsieur le comte, that a man whom you honor
with your esteem should take pleasure in blackening another man's
reputation without having the slightest fact to allege against him and
without knowing anything of his antecedents. I have already asked your
guest for some information concerning this Monsieur Cardonnet, whom he
seems to hate personally, and he refused to give me any explanation of
his sentiments. I leave it to you: is it possible for one to base a just
opinion on gratuitous imputations, and if you or I should form an
opinion unfavorable to Monsieur Cardonnet, would not your guest have
been guilty of an unworthy act?"

"You speak according to my heart and my mind, young man," replied
Monsieur Antoine. "You," he added, turning to his rustic guest and
striking the table angrily with his fist, while he looked at him with an
expression in which affection and kindliness triumphed over displeasure,
"you are wrong, and you will be good enough to tell us at once what
grievance you have against the said Cardonnet, so that we can judge
whether it has any force. If not, we shall consider that you have a
soured mind and an evil tongue."

"I have nothing to say more than everybody knows," replied the peasant
calmly, and with no sign of being intimidated by the sermon. "We see
things and judge them as we see them; but as this young man doesn't know
Monsieur Cardonnet," he added, with a penetrating glance at the
traveller, "and since he is so anxious to know what sort of man he is,
do you tell him yourself, Monsieur Antoine; and when you have given the
main facts I will fill in the details. I will tell monsieur the cause
and the effect, and he can judge for himself unless he has some better
reason than mine for not saying what he thinks."

"All right, I agree," said Monsieur Antoine, who paid less attention
than his companion to the young man's increasing agitation. "I will tell
things as they are, and, if I go astray, I authorize Mère Janille, who
has the memory and accuracy of an almanac, to interrupt and contradict
me. As for you, you little rascal," he said, turning to the page in
short jacket and wooden shoes, "try not to stare into the whites of my
eyes so when I speak to you. Your fixed stare gives me the vertigo, and
your wide-open mouth looks like a well that I may fall into. Well, what
is it? what are you laughing at? Understand that a ne'er-do-well of your
age should never presume to laugh in his master's presence. Stand behind
me and behave as respectfully as _Monsieur_."

As he spoke, he pointed to his dog, and his manner was so serious and
his voice so loud as he made the jest, that the traveller wondered if he
were not subject to spasms of seignorial domination altogether out of
keeping with his usual good-nature. But a glance at the boy's face was
enough to convince him that it was simply a game to which he was
well-used, for he cheerfully took his place beside the dog and began to
play with him, without a trace of sulkiness or shame.

However, as Monsieur Antoine's manners were marked by an originality
which could hardly be understood at the first meeting, the young man
believed that he was beginning to grow light-headed by dint of much
drinking, and he determined not to attach the least importance to what
he was about to say. But it very rarely happened that the count lost his
head, even after he had lost his legs, and he had resorted to his
favorite pastime of bantering his neighbors only to divert the painful
impression to which this discussion had given rise as between his
guests.

"Monsieur," he began.

But he was at once interrupted by his dog, who, being also accustomed to
his habit of jesting, concluded that he was the person addressed and
walked up to his master and touched his arm, capering as friskily as his
age would permit.

"Well, _Monsieur_," he continued, looking down at him with a playful
stare, "what does this mean? Since when have you been as ill-bred as a
human being? Go to sleep at once, and don't you ever make me spill wine
on the tablecloth again, or you'll have Dame Janille about your ears. It
was on a fine spring day last year, young man----" continued Monsieur
Antoine.

"Excuse me, monsieur," interposed Janille, "it was only the 19th of
March, so it was still winter."

"Is it worth while haggling over a difference of two days? What is
certain is that it was magnificent weather, as warm as it is in June,
and quite dry too."

"That's true enough," exclaimed the little groom, "for I couldn't water
monsieur's horse at the little fountain."

"That has nothing to do with it," said Monsieur Antoine, tapping the
floor with his foot; "hold your tongue, boy. You may speak when you're
spoken to; just open your ears in order to improve your mind and your
heart, if there's room for improvement. I was saying, then, that I was
returning from a country fair one beautiful day, and walking quietly
along on foot, when I met a tall man, very handsome although he was
little if any younger than I, and his black eyes and pale, almost yellow
complexion gave him a somewhat harsh and forbidding look. He was in a
cabriolet, driving down a steep hill, strewn with loose stones as our
fathers used to build roads, and was urging his horse forward,
apparently unconscious of the danger. I could not help warning him.
'Monsieur,' said I, 'no four-wheeled, three-wheeled or two-wheeled
carriage has ever gone down this hill, in the memory of man. In my
opinion it is likely to result in breaking your neck, even if it is not
impossible, and if you prefer a road that is a little longer but much
safer, I'll show you the way.'

"'Much obliged,' he replied with just a suspicion of surliness, 'this
road seems to me practicable enough and I promise you that my horse will
come out all right.'

"'That's your business,' said I, 'and what I said was said from purely
human motives.'

"'I thank you, monsieur, and as you are so courteous, I shall be glad to
reciprocate. You are on foot, going in the same direction that I am; if
you will get in with me, you will reach the valley sooner and I shall
have the pleasure of your company.'"

"All that is true," said Janille; "you told it just like that the same
evening except that you said that the gentleman had on a long blue
overcoat."

"Excuse me, Ma'mselle Janille," said the child, "monsieur said black."

"Blue, I tell you, master upstart!"

"No, Mère Janille, black."

"Blue, I am sure of it!"

"I could swear it was black."

"Come, come, stop your quarrelling, it was green!" cried Monsieur
Antoine. "Don't interrupt again, Mère Janille; and you, you naughty
varlet, go to the kitchen and see if I am there, or put your tongue in
your pocket; take your choice."

"I would rather listen, monsieur; I won't speak again."

"Now then," continued the châtelain, "I hesitated a moment between the
fear of breaking my bones if I accepted and of being considered a coward
if I refused. 'After all,' I said to myself, 'this fellow doesn't look
like a lunatic, and seems to have no reason for risking his life. I have
no doubt he has a wonderful horse and an excellent wagon.' I took my
place beside him, and we began to descend the precipice at a fast trot,
without a single false step on the part of the horse, or a moment's loss
of resolution and self-possession on the part of the master. He talked
to me about this thing and that and asked me many questions about the
province; and I confess that I answered a little crookedly, for I was
not altogether easy in my mind. 'So far so good,' I said to him when we
reached the bank of the Gargilesse without accident; 'we have come
safely down the break-neck, but we can't cross the water here; it's as
low as possible, but even so, it is not fordable at this point; we must
go up a little way to the left.'

"'Do you call this water?' said he, shrugging his shoulders; 'for my
part I see nothing but stones and rushes. Nonsense! the idea of turning
aside for a dry stream!'

"'As you choose,' I rejoined, a little mortified. His scornful audacity
stung me; I knew that he was going straight into a veritable gulf, and
yet, as I am not naturally a coward, and as I did not like the idea of
being called one, I declined his offer to allow me to get down. I would
have liked him to be punished by having reason to be well frightened,
even at the expense of having a dip in the river myself, although I
don't like water.

"But I had neither the satisfaction nor the mortification: the cabriolet
did not founder. In the centre of the stream, which has dug out a
channel with beveled edges, so to speak, in that spot, the horse was in
up to his nostrils; the carriage was lifted up by the current. The
gentleman in the green overcoat--for it was green, Janille--lashed the
horse; she lost her footing, floundered, swam, and by a miracle landed
us on the bank, with no other injury than a rather cool foot-bath. I did
not lose my wits, I can swim as well as any man, but my companion
admitted that he knew no more about it than a stick of wood; and yet he
had neither faltered, nor swore, nor changed color. He's a plucky
fellow, I thought, and his self-possession did not displease me,
although there was something scornful in his perfect tranquillity as
there is in the devil's laugh.

"'If you are going to Gargilesse, we can go on together, for I am going
there too,' I said.

"'Very good,' he replied. 'Where is Gargilesse?'

"'Oh! then you are not going there?'

"'I am not going anywhere to-day,' said he, 'and I am ready to go
anywhere.'

"I am not superstitious, monsieur, and yet my old nurse's stories came
into my mind, I don't know why, and I had a moment of idiotic distrust,
as if I were sitting beside Satan in a cabriolet. I glanced furtively at
this individual who travelled thus across mountains and rivers, with no
end in view, apparently just for the pleasure of exposing himself or me
with him to danger; and I, like a booby, had let him persuade me to get
into his infernal gig!

"Seeing that I did not speak, he thought it advisable to reassure me.

"'My way of travelling about the country surprises you, I see,' he said;
'the fact is that I propose to set up a manufacturing establishment in
whatever place seems to me the most suitable. I have some money to
invest--whether for myself or for other people is of little consequence
to you, I suppose; but you can help me, with a few hints, to attain my
object.'

"'Very good,' I said, my confidence being fully restored when I found
that he talked sensibly; 'but, before advising you, I must know what
sort of an establishment you propose to set up.'

"'If you will answer all the questions I ask you, that will be enough,'
he said, evading my question. 'For example, what is the maximum force of
this little stream we have just crossed, between this spot and the point
where it empties into the Creuse?'

"'It is very irregular; you have just seen it at its minimum; but
freshets are frequent and tremendous; and if you choose to inspect the
principal mill, formerly the property of the religious community of
Gargilesse, you will be convinced of the havoc wrought by the torrent,
of the constant damage suffered by that poor old building, and of the
utter folly of laying out much money on it.'

"'But by laying out money, monsieur, the unruly forces of nature can be
confined! Where the poor, rustic mill goes under, the powerful, solidly
built factory will triumph!'

"'True,' I replied, 'in every river the big fish eat the little ones.'

"He did not take up that suggestion but continued to question me as we
drove along. I, being obliging as a matter of duty, and something of an
idler by nature, took him everywhere. We went into several mills, he
talked with the millers, examined everything with great care, and
returned to Gargilesse, where he talked with the mayor and the principal
men of the town, requesting me to introduce him to them at once. He
accepted the curé's invitation to dinner, allowed himself to be made
much of without ceremony, and hinted that he was in a position to render
greater services than he received. He talked little, but listened
eagerly and asked questions about all manner of things, including some
that seemed to have little connection with business: for instance,
whether the people in this neighborhood were sincerely pious or only
superstitious; whether the bourgeois were fond of luxuries or sacrificed
them to economy; whether the prevailing opinion was liberal or
democratic; of what sort of men the general council of the department
was made up--and Heaven knows what else! At night he hired a guide and
went to Le Pin to sleep, and I did not see him again for three days.
Then he drove by Châteaubrun and stopped at my door, to thank me, he
said, for the courtesy I had shown him; but in reality I think to ask me
some more questions. 'I shall return in a month,' he said, as he took
leave of me, 'and I think that I shall decide on Gargilesse. It is
central, and I like the place, and I have an idea that your little
stream, to which you give such a bad name, will not be very difficult to
subdue. It will cost me less to control it than the Creuse; and,
moreover, the little risk that we ran in crossing it and that we
overcame, makes me think that it is my destiny to conquer in this spot.'

"And with that he left me. That man was Monsieur Cardonnet.

"Less than three weeks after, he returned with an English mill engineer
and several mechanics of the same nation; and since then he has kept
earth and stone and iron constantly in commotion at Gargilesse. Being
entirely absorbed by his work, he rises before daybreak and is the last
to go to bed. No matter what the weather may be, he is in the mud up to
his knees; not a movement on the part of his workmen escapes him; he
knows the why and how of everything, and is pushing forward the
construction of an enormous mill, a dwelling-house, with garden and
buildings, sheds, dams, roads and bridges--in a word, a magnificent
establishment. During his absence, his agents had managed the purchase
of the property without allowing his name to appear. He paid a high
price, but people thought at first that he didn't understand business
and that he had come here to _take it easy_. They laughed at him still
more when he increased the wages of his workmen, and when, to induce the
municipal council to allow him to divert the course of the stream as he
chose, he agreed to build a road, which cost him an enormous sum. They
said: 'He's a fool; the extravagance of his plans will ruin him.' But
after all is said, I believe he's as shrewd as most men, and I will
wager that he will prove to be successful in his choice of a location
and in the investment of his money. The stream troubled him a good deal
last autumn, but luckily it has been very quiet this spring, and he will
have time to finish his buildings before the rains come again, if we
have no unusual storms during the summer. He does things on a large
scale, and puts in more money than is necessary, that's the truth; but
if he has a passion for finishing quickly what he has begun, and has the
means and the inclination to pay a high price for the sweat of the poor
laboring man's brow, where is the harm? It seems to me that it's an
extremely good thing, on the contrary, and that, instead of calling the
man a hare-brained fool, as some do, or a crafty speculator, as others
do, we ought to thank him for bestowing on our province the advantage of
industrial activity, I have said! Now let the other side take its turn."




IV

THE VISION


Before the peasant, who had continued to nibble at his bread with a
thoughtful expression, was prepared to begin, the young man thanked
Monsieur Antoine warmly for his narrative and for his generous
interpretation of Monsieur Cardonnet's course. Without admitting that he
was in any way connected with that gentleman, he seemed to be deeply
touched by the judgment of his character which the Comte de Châteaubrun
expressed, and he added:

"Yes, monsieur, I believe that by seeking the best side of things one
goes astray less often than by doing the opposite. A determined
speculator would be parsimonious in the details of his undertaking, and
then one would be justified in suspecting his rectitude. But when we see
an intelligent and active man pay handsomely for labor----"

"One moment, if you please," interposed the peasant. "You are upright
men and noble hearts; I am glad to believe it of this young gentleman,
as I am sure of it in your case, Monsieur Antoine. But, meaning no
offence, I will venture to tell you that you see no farther than the end
of your nose. Look you. I will suppose that I have a large sum of money
to invest, and that my purpose is not to obtain simply a fair and
legitimate return from it, as it is right for everybody to do, but to
double or treble my capital in a few years. I am not foolish enough to
announce my purpose to the people I am forced to ruin. I begin by
wheedling them, by making a show of generosity, and, to remove all
distrust, by making myself appear, if need be, a brainless prodigal.
That done, I have my dupes where I want them. I have sacrificed a
hundred thousand francs, I will say, on those little wiles. A hundred
thousand francs is a deal of money for the province! but, so far as I am
concerned, if I have several millions, it's simply the bonus that I pay.
Everybody likes me; although some laugh at my simplicity, the greater
number pity me and esteem me. No one takes any precautions. Time flies
fast and my brain still faster; I have cast the net and all the fish are
nibbling. First the little ones--the small fry that you swallow without
anyone noticing it; then the big ones, until they have all disappeared."

"What do you mean by all your metaphors?" said Monsieur Antoine,
shrugging his shoulders. "If you go on talking figuratively, I am going
to sleep. Come, hurry, it's getting late."

"What I mean is plain enough," continued the peasant. "When I have once
ruined all the small concerns that competed with me I become a more
powerful lord than your ancestors were before the Revolution, Monsieur
Antoine! I govern over the head of the laws, and while I have a poor
devil locked up for the slightest peccadillo, I take the liberty to do
whatever pleases me or suits my convenience. I take everybody's
property--with their daughters and wives thrown in, if they take my
fancy--I control the business and supplies of a whole department. By my
skill I have forced down the price of crops; but, when everything is in
my hands, I raise prices to suit myself, and, as soon as I can safely do
it, I obtain a monopoly and starve the people. And then it's a small
matter to kill off competition; I soon get control of the money, which
is the key to everything. I do a banking business on the sly, wholesale
and retail. I oblige so many people, that I am everybody's creditor and
everybody belongs to me. People find out that they no longer like me;
but they see that I am to be feared, and the most powerful handle me
carefully, while the small fry tremble and sigh all about me. However,
as I have some intelligence and cunning, I play the great man from time
to time. I rescue a few families, I contribute to some charitable
organization. It is a method of greasing the wheel of my fortune, which
rolls on the more rapidly for it; for people begin again to have a
little esteem for me. I am no longer considered kind-hearted and
foolish, but just and great. From the prefect of the department to the
village curé and from the curé to the beggar, everyone is in the
hollow of my hand; but the whole province suffers and no one detects the
cause. No other fortune than mine will increase, and every modest
competence will shrink, because I shall have dried up all the springs of
wealth, raised the price of the necessaries of life and lowered that of
the superfluities--just the reverse of what should be. The dealer will
find himself in trouble and the consumer too. But I shall prosper
because I shall be, by virtue of my wealth, the only resource of dealer
and consumer alike. And at last people will say, 'What in heaven's name
is happening? the small tradesmen are stripped and the small buyers are
stripped. We have more pretty houses and more fine clothes staring us in
the face than we used to have, and all those things cost less, so they
say; but we haven't a sou in our pockets. We have all been frantic to
make a show and now we are consumed by debts. But Monsieur Cardonnet
isn't responsible for it all, for he does good and, if it weren't for
him, we should all be ruined. Let us make haste and do something for
Monsieur Cardonnet; let him be mayor, prefect, deputy, minister, king,
if possible, and the province is saved!'

"That, messieurs, is the way I would make other people carry me on their
backs if I were Monsieur Cardonnet, and it is what I am very sure
Monsieur Cardonnet intends to do. Now, tell me that I am wrong to look
askance at him; that I am a prophet of evil, and that nothing of what I
predict will happen. God grant that you may be right! but for my part I
can feel the hail coming in the distance, and there is only one hope
that sustains me; it is that the stream will be less foolish than men;
that it will not allow itself to be bridled by the fine machines they
put between its teeth, and that some fine morning it will give Monsieur
Cardonnet's mills a body blow that will sicken him of playing with it,
and will induce him to take his capital and its consequences and carry
it somewhere else. Now, I have said my say. If I have formed a hasty
judgment, may God who has heard me forgive me!"

The peasant had spoken with great animation. The fire of keen insight
darted from his blue eyes, and a smile of sorrowful indignation played
about his mobile lips. The traveller examined that strongly-marked face,
shaded by a heavy grizzly beard, wrinkled by fatigue, by exposure to the
air, perhaps by disappointment as well; and, despite the pain that his
language caused, he could not help thinking him handsome, and admiring,
in the facility with which he bluntly expressed his thoughts, a sort of
natural eloquence instinct with sincerity and love of justice; for,
although his words, of which we have failed to express all the rustic
homeliness, were simple and sometimes vulgar, his gestures were emphatic
and the tone of his voice commanded attention. A feeling of profound
depression had taken possession of his hearers, while he drew without
any artifice, and unsparingly, the portrait of the pitiless and
persevering rich man. The wine had had no effect upon him, and every
time that he raised his eyes to the young man's face, he seemed to look
into his very soul and sternly question him. Monsieur Antoine, although
slightly affected by the weight of the wine he was carrying, had lost
nothing of his harangue, and submitting as usual to the ascendancy of
that mind, of stouter temper than his own, he heaved a deep sigh from
time to time.

When the peasant had finished, "May God forgive you, indeed, my friend,
if your judgment is at fault," he said, raising his glass as an offering
to the Deity: "and if you are right, may Providence avert such a scourge
from the heads of the poor and weak!"

"Listen to me, Monsieur de Châteaubrun, and you too, my friend," cried
the young man, taking a hand of each of his companions in his own, "God,
who hears all the words of man, and who reads their real sentiments in
the depths of their hearts, knows that these evils are not to be
dreaded, and that your apprehensions are only chimeras. I know the man
of whom you speak; I know him well; and, although his face is cold, his
character obstinate, his intellect active and strong, I will answer to
you for the loyalty of his purposes and the noble use he will make of
his fortune. There is something alarming, I agree, in the firmness of
his will, and I am not surprised that his inflexible manner has caused
a sort of vertigo here, as if a supernatural being had appeared in the
midst of your peaceful fields. But that strength of purpose is based
upon moral and religious principles, which make him, if not the mildest
and most affable of men, the most rigidly just and the most royally
generous."

"So much the better, deuce take it!" rejoined the châtelain, clinking
his glass against the peasant's. "I drink to your health, and I am happy
to have reason to esteem a man when I am on the point of cursing him.
Come, don't be obstinate, old fellow, but believe this young man, who
talks like a book and knows more about the subject than you and I do.
Why, he says that he knows Cardonnet! that he knows him well! what more
do you want? He will answer for him. So we need not worry any more. And
now, friends, let us go to bed," continued the châtelain, delighted to
accept the guaranty of a man of whom he knew nothing at all, not even
his name, for a man of whom he knew little; "the clock is striking
eleven, and that's an undue hour."

"I am going to take my leave of you," said the traveller, "and continue
my journey, asking your permission to come soon to thank you for your
kindness."

"You shall not go away to-night," cried Monsieur Antoine; "it is
impossible, it rains bucketfuls, the roads are drowned, and you couldn't
see your own feet. If you persist in going, I never want to see you
again."

He was so urgent and the storm was in fact so fierce that the young man
was fain to accept the proffered hospitality.

Sylvain Charasson--that was the name of the page--brought a lantern, and
Monsieur Antoine, taking the traveller's arm, guided him among the ruins
of the manor-house in search of a bedroom.

All the floors of the square pavilion were occupied by the Châteaubrun
family; but, in addition to that small wing which was intact and
recently restored, there was an enormous tower on the other side of the
courtyard, the oldest part, the highest, the thickest, the most
impervious of the whole pile, the rooms which it contained, one above
another, being arched with stone and even more solidly constructed than
the square pavilion. The band of speculators who had purchased the
château several years before for purposes of demolition, and had
carried away all the wood and iron to the last door-hinge, had found
nothing to demolish on the lower floors, and Monsieur Antoine had had
one floor cleaned and closed, for use on the rare occasions when he had
an opportunity to entertain a guest. It had been a great display of
magnificence on the poor fellow's part to replace the doors and windows
and put a bed and a few chairs in that apartment, which was not
necessary for the accommodation of his family. He had made the effort
cheerfully, saying to Janille: "It isn't everything to be comfortable
yourself; you must think about being able to give your neighbor
shelter." And yet, when the young man entered that dismal feudal donjon,
and found himself, as it were, confined in a jail, his heart sank, and
he would gladly have followed the peasant, who went, as his custom was,
to lie on the fresh straw with Sylvain Charasson. But Monsieur Antoine
was so pleased and so proud to be able to do the honors of a _guest
chamber_, despite his poverty, that his young guest felt bound to accept
for his lodgings one of the frowning prisons of the Middle Ages.

However, there was a good fire in the huge fireplace, and the bed, which
consisted of a mattress of oat-chaff with a thick quilt spread upon it,
was not to be despised. Everything was cheap and clean. The young man
soon drove away the melancholy thoughts that assail every traveller
quartered in such a place, and, despite the rumbling of the thunder, the
cries of the night-birds and the roar of the wind and rain, which shook
his windows, while the rats made furious assaults upon his door, he was
soon sound asleep.

His sleep, however, was disturbed by strange dreams, and he had a sort
of nightmare just before dawn, as if it were impossible to pass the
night in a place stained with the mysterious crimes of feudal days
without being made the victim of painful visions. He dreamed that
Monsieur Cardonnet entered the room, and as he struggled to get out of
bed and run to meet him, he made an imperative sign to him not to stir;
then, coming to him with an impassive air, he climbed on his chest,
paying no heed to his groans and giving no indication upon his stony
face that he was aware of the agony he caused him.

Crushed beneath that terrible weight, the sleeper struggled in vain for
a space that seemed to him more than a century, and he had the
death-rattle in his throat when he succeeded in rousing himself. But,
although the day was beginning to break, and he could see everything in
the tower distinctly, he remained so completely under the influence of
his dream that he fancied that he still saw that inflexible face before
his eyes and felt the weight of a body as heavy as a mountain of brass
on his crushed and sunken chest. He arose and walked around the room
several times before returning to bed, for, although he was anxious to
make an early start, he was overcome by an unconquerable feeling of
prostration. But his eyes were no sooner closed than the spectre
recurred to his determination to stifle him, until, feeling that he was
at the point of death, the young man cried out in a broken voice:
"Father! father! what have I done to you, and why have you determined to
murder your own son?"

The sound of his own voice woke him, and, finding that he was still
pursued by the apparition, he ran to the window and opened it. As soon
as the cool outer air entered that low room, in the atmosphere of which
there was something lethargic, the hallucination vanished, and he
dressed in haste, in order to leave the place where he had been the
plaything of such a cruel fancy. But, notwithstanding all his efforts to
think of something else, he could not shake off a feeling of painful
disquietude, and the _guest-chamber_ of Châteaubrun seemed to him even
more dismal than on the night before.

The dull, gray light enabled him at last to see the whole of the
château from his window.

It was literally nothing but a heap of ruins, the still magnificent
ruins of a seignorial abode built at different periods. The courtyard,
overgrown with weeds, through which the infrequent going and coming of a
family reduced to the strict necessaries of life had worn only two or
three narrow paths, from the large tower to the small one, and from the
well to the main entrance, was surrounded opposite his window by
crumbling walls which could be recognized as the foundations and lower
courses of several buildings, among others a dainty chapel, of which the
pediment, with a pretty rose-window surrounded by festoons of ivy, was
still standing. At the end of the courtyard, in the centre of which was
a large well, rose the dismantled skeleton of what had once been the
principal abiding-place of the lords of Châteaubrun from the time of
François I. to the Revolution. This once sumptuous edifice was now
naught but a shapeless skeleton, open on all sides, a strange mass of
ruins to which the crumbling away of the interior partitions imparted an
appearance of enormous height. Neither the towers in which the graceful
spiral staircases were enclosed, nor the great frescoed rooms, nor the
beautiful mantels of carved stone had been respected by the hammer of
the demolisher, and some few vestiges of this splendor, which they had
been unable to reach, some fragments of richly decorated friezes, some
garlands of leaves carved by the skilful craftsmen of the Renaissance,
and an escutcheon bearing the arms of France crossed by the baton of
bastardy--all of fine white stone, which time had not yet been able to
darken--presented the melancholy spectacle of a work of art
remorselessly sacrificed to the brutal law of necessity.

When young Cardonnet turned his eyes toward the small pavilion occupied
by the last scion of a once wealthy and illustrious family, he felt a
thrill of compassion as he reflected that there was in that pavilion a
young woman whose ancestresses had had pages, vassals, fine horses and
packs of hounds, whereas this inheritress of a ghastly ruin was destined
perhaps, like the Princess Nausicaa, to wash her own linen at the
fountain.

As he made this reflection he saw a little round window on the upper
floor of the square pavilion open gently, and a woman's head, supported
by the loveliest neck imaginable, lean forward as if to speak to some
one in the courtyard. Emile Cardonnet, although he belonged to a
generation of myopes, had excellent sight, and the distance was not so
great that he could not distinguish the features belonging to that
graceful blond head, whose hair the wind tossed about in some confusion.
It seemed to him what in fact it was, an angel's head, arrayed in all
the bloom of youth, sweet and noble at the same time. The tone of the
voice was fascinating and the pronunciation was remarkably elegant.

"So it rained all night, did it, Jean?" she said. "See how full of water
the courtyard is! All the fields I can see from my window are like
ponds."

"It's a regular deluge, my dear child," the peasant, who seemed to be an
intimate friend of the family, replied from below, "a genuine
water-spout! I don't know whether the worst of the storm broke here or
somewhere else, but I never saw the fountain so full."

"The roads must be all washed out, Jean, and you had better stay here.
Is father awake?"

"Not yet, Gilberte, but Mère Janille is up and about."

"Will you ask her to come up to my room, my old Jean? I have something
to ask her."

"I will go at once."

The girl closed the window without apparently noticing that the
traveller's window was open and that he was standing there looking at
her.

A moment later he was in the courtyard, where the rain had transformed
the paths into little torrents, and he found Sylvain Charasson in the
stable, cleaning his horse and Monsieur Antoine's, and discussing the
effects of such a terrible night with the peasant whose Christian name
Emile Cardonnet had learned at last. The night before, this man had
caused him a sort of indefinable uneasiness, as if there were something
mysterious and fateful about him. He had noticed that Monsieur Antoine
had not once called him by name, and that, on several occasions when
Janille had been on the point of doing so, he had warned her with a
glance to be careful. They called him only _friend_, _comrade_ or _old
fellow_, and it seemed that his name was a secret which they did not
choose to divulge. Who could this man be, who had the outward aspect and
the language of a peasant and who, nevertheless, carried his gloomy
anticipations so far, and his severe criticism to such a point.

Emile strove to enter into conversation with him, but to no purpose; he
was even more reserved than on the preceding day, and when he was
questioned concerning the damage done by the storm, he replied simply:

"I advise you to lose no time in starting for Gargilesse if you want to
find any bridges across the stream, for in less than two hours there'll
be a most infernal _dribe_ there."

"What do you mean by that? I don't understand that word."

"You don't know what a _dribe_ is? Well, you will see one to-day and
you'll never forget it. Good-day, monsieur; be off at once for your
friend Cardonnet will be in trouble before long."

And he turned away without another word.

Impelled by a vague feeling of alarm, Emile hastily saddled his horse
himself, and said to Charasson, tossing him a piece of money:

"Tell your master, my boy, that I have gone without taking leave of him,
but that I shall come again soon to thank him for his kindness to me."

He was riding through the gateway when Janille came running up to detain
him. She insisted on waking Monsieur Antoine; mademoiselle was dressing;
breakfast would be ready in a moment; the roads were too wet; it was
going to rain again. The young man, with many thanks, succeeded in
escaping from her hospitable attentions, and made her also a present,
which she seemed very glad to accept. But he had not reached the foot of
the hill when he heard a horse trotting behind him, his great, heavy
feet just razing the ground. It was Sylvain Charasson, mounted on
Monsieur Antoine's mare, with no other bridle than a rope halter passed
between the animal's teeth, riding hastily after him. "I am going to
guide you, monsieur," he cried, as he passed him; "Mademoiselle Janille
says you'll kill yourself, as you don't know the roads, and that's the
truth too."

"All right, but take the shortest road," replied the young man.

"Never fear," rejoined the rustic page, and, plying his clogs, he urged
the hollow-backed mare into a fast trot, her huge stomach, stuffed with
hay unmixed with oats, presenting a striking contrast to her thin flanks
and bony chest.




V

THE DRIBE


The slopes crowned by Châteaubrun were so steep that the young man and
his new guide were delayed by no torrent of any size and soon reached
the valley. But as they rode rapidly by a small pond full to the brim,
the boy exclaimed, with a glance of amazement: "The _Font-Margot_ full!
That means a lot of damage in the low lands. We shall have trouble
crossing the river. Let's hurry, monsieur!"--He urged the mare to a
gallop; and despite her ungainly build and her broad, flat feet
embellished with a fringe of long hair that trailed on the ground, she
picked her way over the uneven ground with remarkable skill and sureness
of foot.

The extensive plains of this region form great plateaus broken by
ravines, which, with their abrupt and deep declivities, make veritable
mountains to ascend and descend. After riding about an hour, our
travellers found themselves opposite the valley of Gargilesse, and a
fascinating landscape was spread out before them. The village of
Gargilesse, built like a sugar-loaf on a steep knoll, and overlooked by
its pretty church and its ancient monastery, seemed to rise from the
depths of the precipices; and the boy pointed out to Emile a number of
enormous buildings, entirely new and of fine appearance, at the bottom
of the steepest of those precipices, saying:

"Look, monsieur, there are Monsieur Cardonnet's buildings."

It was the first time that Emile, who was a law-student at Poitiers and
passed his vacations at Paris, had visited the region where his father
had been engaged for a year past in an important undertaking. The
natural aspect of the spot seemed to him beautiful, and he was grateful
to his parents for having happened upon a location where industry could
flourish without banishing the influences of poesy.

They had still some distance to ride across the plateau before reaching
the slope, where all the details of the landscape could be embraced in a
single glance. As Emile approached the edge he discovered new beauties,
and the convent-château of Gargilesse, planted proudly on the rock over
the Cardonnet factories, seemed a decoration placed there designedly to
crown the whole picture. The sides of the ravine, into which the little
stream flowed swiftly, were covered with hardy vegetation, and the young
man, who involuntarily allowed his attention to be absorbed by the
external aspect of his new inheritance, observed with satisfaction that,
amid the clearing away that had to be done to install the establishment
in such a thickly-wooded spot, they had spared some magnificent old
trees, which were the noblest ornament of the dwelling-house.

This house, situated a little behind the factory, was convenient,
tasteful, simple in its richness, and the fact that there were curtains
at almost all the windows indicated that it was already occupied. It was
surrounded by a fine garden, terraced along the stream, and from afar he
could distinguish the bright colors of the blooming plants which had
been substituted as if by enchantment for the willow stumps and pools of
stagnant water with which the banks were formerly bordered. The young
man's heart beat fast when he saw a woman descend the steps of this
modern château and walk slowly among her favorite flowers; for it was
his mother. He threw up his arms and waved his cap to attract her
attention, but without success. Madame Cardonnet was intent upon
examining her horticultural pets; she did not expect her son until
evening.

On a more open space Emile saw the complicated,
scientifically-constructed buildings of the factory; and fifty or more
busy workmen moving amid the medley of materials of all sorts--some
cutting stone, others preparing the mortar, others trimming rafters,
others loading carts drawn by enormous horses. As it was absolutely
necessary to descend the steep road at a foot-pace, little Charasson
found opportunity to speak.

"This is a bad place, isn't it, monsieur? Keep a tight rein on your
horse! It would be a good thing if Monsieur Cardonnet would build a road
to take people from our house to his factory. See what fine roads he's
built in other directions! and the pretty bridges! all of stone, you
see! Before he came you had to wet your feet crossing the river in
summer, and in winter you didn't cross at all. He's the kind of man that
everybody ought to kiss the ground he walks on."

"So you don't agree with your friend Jean who says so much ill of him?"

"Oh! Jean! Jean! you needn't pay much attention to his croaking. He's a
man who has _ennuis_, and he sees everything crooked lately, although he
isn't an unkind man, not at all. But he's the only man hereabout who
talks like that; everybody else is all in favor of Monsieur Cardonnet.
He isn't stingy, I tell you. He talks a little hard, he pushes his
workmen a little, but bless me! he pays; you ought to see the wages he
pays! and if you do break your back working, if you're well paid you
ought to be satisfied, eh, monsieur?"

The young man stifled a sigh. He did not absolutely agree with Monsieur
Sylvain Charasson's theory of economic compensations, and, however much
he might desire to approve his father's course, he could not see very
clearly how wages could replace the loss of health and life.

"I'm surprised not to see him on his workmen's backs," added the page of
Châteaubrun ingenuously and with no malicious intent, "for he isn't in
the habit of giving them much time to breathe. Ah, indeed! he's a man to
push work ahead! He isn't like Mère Janille at our house, who's always
making a noise and never lets other people do anything. He doesn't seem
to move about, but anyone would say he did the work with his eyes. When
a workman speaks or puts down his pick to light his pipe, or just takes
a little bit of a nap at noon in the heat of the day, he'll say, without
losing his temper: 'Look here, you can't smoke or sleep comfortably
here; go home, you'll be more comfortable.'--And that's all. He won't
employ him again for a week, and the second time it's a month, and the
third he's done for good."

Emile sighed again: he recognized his father's inflexible severity in
these details, and he had to turn his thoughts toward the presumed
object of his efforts in order to be reconciled to his methods.

"Ah! _pardine_! there he is," cried the boy, pointing to Monsieur
Cardonnet, whose tall figure and dark clothes were discernible on the
other bank. "He's looking at the water; perhaps he's afraid of the
_dribe_, although he usually says it's all nonsense."

"So the _dribe_ is a freshet, is it?" queried Emile, beginning to
understand the word, a corruption of _dérive_.

"Yes, monsieur, it's like a waterspout, that comes with great storms.
But the storm has passed and the _dribe_ hasn't come, and I believe Jean
was all wrong in his prophesying. And yet, monsieur, look at the water,
how low it is! it's almost dried up since yesterday and that's a bad
sign. Let's hurry across, it may come any minute."

They quickened their pace and easily forded the first arm of the stream.
But in the effort that Emile's horse made to climb the somewhat steep
bank of the little island, he broke his girths, and his rider had to
dismount and try to fix his saddle. It was not an easy task, and in his
haste to join his parents Emile bungled over it; the knot that he had
made slipped when he put his foot in the stirrup, and Charasson was
obliged to cut off a piece of the rope he was using for a bridle in
order to make the necessary repairs. All this took some time, during
which their attention was wholly diverted from the disaster Sylvain
dreaded. The island was covered with a dense growth of willows which
made it impossible for them to look ten yards in any direction.

Suddenly a noise like the prolonged rumble of thunder reached their
ears. Emile, mistaking the cause of the noise, looked up at the sky,
which was perfectly clear overhead. But the child turned pale as death.

"The _dribe_!" he cried, "the _dribe_! we must run for it, monsieur!"

They crossed the island at a gallop; but before they were clear of the
willow scrub, they were met by waves of yellowish water covered with
foam. It was already up to their horses' breasts when they found
themselves face to face with the swollen torrent, which was spreading
furiously over the surrounding country.

Emile would have attempted to cross; but his guide clung to him.

"No, monsieur, no," he cried; "it's too late. See the force of the
stream and the logs it's bringing down! No man or beast could go through
that. Let us leave the horses, monsieur, let us leave the horses;
perhaps they will have sense enough to save themselves; but it's too
much of a risk for Christians! Look, there's the footbridge gone! Do as
I do, monsieur, do as I do, or you're a dead man!"

And Charasson, who already had the water up to his shoulders, began to
run nimbly up a tree. Emile, judging from the fury of the torrent, which
increased a foot in depth every second, that courage would be sheer
folly, and thinking of his mother, decided to follow the little
peasant's example.

"Not that one, monsieur, not that one!" cried the boy, seeing him start
to climb an aspen. "That's too weak, it will be carried away like a
straw. Come up here, by me; for the love of God, climb my tree!"

Emile, recognizing the wisdom of Sylvain's suggestion,--for the child,
in the midst of his terror, lost neither his presence of mind nor the
commendable desire to save his neighbor,--ran to the old oak to which he
was clinging and soon succeeded in reaching a position not far from him,
on a stout branch several feet above the water. But they had soon to
abandon that post to the angry element, which continued to rise; and,
ascending in their turn from branch to branch, they succeeded in saving
their lives.

When the inundation had reached its highest point, Emile was far enough
from the ground to see what was taking place in the valley. He concealed
himself as well as he could in the foliage, to avoid being seen from the
house, and imposed silence on Sylvain, who wished to call for help; for
he was afraid that his parents, especially his mother, would be terribly
frightened if they should discover his presence and his perilous
situation. He could see his father, who was watching the effects of the
_dribe_ and retreating slowly as the water rose in his garden and
invaded the whole factory. He seemed to give ground regretfully before
that scourge of the valley, which he had contemned, and which he
pretended to contemn still. At last, he saw him distinctly, standing at
one of the windows of his house with Madame Cardonnet, while the workmen
scattered and fled to the high land, leaving their jackets and
implements in the mud. Some, taken by surprise by the deluge in the
lower floors of the factory, had gone up hastily to the roof; and,
although the more far-sighted may have rejoiced secretly because that
disaster promised a prolongation of their lucrative employment, the
majority yielded to a natural feeling of consternation when they found
the result of their labors lost or endangered.

The stones, the newly rough-cast walls, the freshly-hewn timbers,
everything that did not offer much resistance, was floating about at
random amid eddying masses of foam. The bridges, barely finished, were
swept away, being torn from the newly-built piers, which were unequal to
the task of supporting them. The garden was half under water, and the
sashes of the greenhouse, the boxes of flowers and the gardener's
wheelbarrows could be seen sailing swiftly away among the trees.

Suddenly, loud cries were heard in the factory. A huge piece of timber
had been driven violently against the underpinning of the principal
machine, and the building seemed on the point of falling in under the
violent shock. There were at least twelve persons, men, women and
children, on the roof. They all shrieked and wept. Emile felt a cold
perspiration start out all over him. Heedless of the perils to which he
himself was exposed, if the oak should be uprooted, he was horrified at
the impending fate of those families whom he saw running wildly about in
their distress. He was on the point of jumping into the water to fly to
their assistance. But he heard his father's powerful voice shouting to
them from the stoop, with the aid of a speaking-trumpet.

"Don't stir; the raft is nearly finished; there is no danger where you
are."

Such was the master's ascendancy that they became calm, and Emile
himself instinctively yielded to it.

On the other side of the island there was a far more desolating
spectacle. The villagers were running after their cattle, the women
after their children. Piercing shrieks directed Emile's attention more
particularly toward a point which the vegetation concealed from his
eyes; but he soon saw a powerful man near the opposite bank, swimming
and carrying a child. The current was less strong on that side than it
was at the factory, and yet the swimmer seemed to be making his way
through the water with extraordinary difficulty, and several times the
water covered him completely.

"I will go and help him!" cried Emile, moved even to tears, and
preparing once more to jump from the tree.

"No, monsieur, no!" cried Charasson, holding him back. "See, he's out of
the current now, he's safe; he isn't swimming now, he's walking in the
mud. Poor man! what a hard time he had. But the child isn't dead, he's
crying and yelling like a little devil. Poor little fellow! don't cry
any more, you're safe! But look, will you! may the devil fly away with
me if it wasn't old Jean who pulled him out of the water! Yes, monsieur,
yes, it's Jean. He's a brave fellow, I tell you! Ah! see how the father
thanks him, how the mother hugs his legs, and yet they're not very
clean, those poor legs of his! Ah! monsieur, Jean has a big heart, and
there's not his like in the world. If he knew we were here, he'd come
and help us out of the scrape. I have a mind to call him."

"Do nothing of the kind. We are safe and he would risk his life again.
Yes, I see that he's a fine fellow. Is he any relative to the child and
to those people."

"No, monsieur, no. They are the Michauds, and they're nothing to him or
to me either; but when anything goes wrong anywhere, Jean is sure to
turn up, and where no one else would dare to take the risk, he'll go
ahead, even when there's nothing at all, not even a glass of wine to be
made by it. But the good Lord knows that this country isn't healthy for
Jean, and that this is hardly the place for him."

"Why, is he exposed to any other danger at Gargilesse than that of being
drowned like everybody else?"

Sylvain did not reply, and seemed to blame himself for having said too
much.

"The water is falling a little," he said, to divert Emile's attention;
"in a couple of hours, perhaps we can go back the way we came; but it
will be six hours at least before we can cross over to Monsieur
Cardonnet's."

This prospect was not very attractive; however Emile, who was determined
not to alarm his parents at any price, resigned himself to it as best he
could. But a fresh incident caused him to change his mind before half an
hour had passed. The water receded rapidly from the highest points it
had flooded; and on the other side of the lake it had formed between him
and his father's abode, he saw some workmen leading two horses toward
the house, one entirely bare, the other saddled and bridled.

"Our beasts, monsieur," said Sylvain Charasson; "God bless me! both our
beasts have come out safe! I supposed my poor mare was in the Creuse
before this! Ah! Monsieur Antoine will be glad enough when I bring back
his _Lanterne_! She'll have earned her oats, and perhaps Janille won't
refuse to give her a peck. And your black, monsieur--you're not sorry to
see him on his feet, are you? He must know how to swim a little!"

Emile rapidly considered what would happen. Monsieur Cardonnet did not
know his horse, to be sure, for he had bought him _en route_; but they
would open the valise, they would soon discover that it belonged to him,
and their first thought would be that he was dead. He speedily decided
to show himself, and after many attempts to make his voice heard above
that of the torrent, whose fury was only slightly abated, he succeeded
in making the people on the roof of the factory understand that he was
there and that Monsieur and Madame Cardonnet must be so informed at
once. The news passed from mouth to mouth, through the various places of
refuge, as quickly as he could wish, and he soon espied his mother at
the window, waving her handkerchief, and his father in person on a raft
propelled by two strong men, who were pushing out into the current with
dogged determination. Emile succeeded in turning them back, by shouting
to them, not without many words lost and repeated again and again, that
he was safe, that they must wait a while longer before coming to him,
and that the most important thing was to set free the persons who were
imprisoned in the factory. Everything was done as he desired, and when
there was no longer any danger for any one, he climbed down from the
tree, stepped in the water up to his middle, and walked to meet the
raft, holding little Charasson under the arms and helping him to keep
his footing. Three hours after the passage of the _dribe_, Emile and his
guide were in front of a good fire, Madame Cardonnet was covering her
child with kisses and tears; and the page of Châteaubrun, no less
petted than he, was describing eloquently the perils they had overcome.

Emile adored his mother. His love for her was still the most fervent
passion of his life. He had not seen her since the vacation, which they
had passed together in Paris, free from the constant and frequent
reproofs of their common master, Monsieur Cardonnet. They both suffered
from the yoke they were compelled to wear, and they understood each
other on that point, although they had never mentioned it. Madame
Cardonnet, a gentle, affectionate, weak creature, felt that her son had
a good share of her husband's mental energy and firmness, combined with
a generous and sensitive heart which would expose him to great sorrow
when those two masterful characters should come in collision on those
points as to which their ideas differed. So she had swallowed all the
disappointments of her life, taking care not to reveal them to her son,
who was her only joy and her most dearly cherished consolation. Although
she was not fully convinced of her husband's right to wound her and
oppress her without remission, she had always seemed to accept her
position as if in obedience to a law of nature and a religious precept.
Passive obedience, thus taught by example, had become an instinctive
habit in young Emile; but had it been otherwise, sound reasoning would
long since have led him to adopt a different course. But when he saw
that everybody bowed at the slightest indication of the paternal will,
his mother first of all, it had not occurred to him that things might
and should be different. Meanwhile the weight of the despotic atmosphere
in which he lived had induced in him, from childhood, a sort of
melancholy, of nameless unhappiness, of which he rarely sought the
cause. It is a law of nature that children shall reverse the lessons
that they do not like; and so Emile, early in life, had received from
external facts an impulsion directly contrary to that which his father
would fain have given him.

The consequences of this natural and inevitable antagonism will be
sufficiently developed by the progress of this narrative, so that it is
unnecessary to describe them here.

After giving his mother time to recover in some measure from the emotion
she had experienced, Emile followed his father, who called him to come
and investigate the effects of the disaster. Monsieur Cardonnet
displayed a tranquillity superior to all reverses of fortune, and
whatever annoyance he may have felt he showed nothing of it. He walked
silently through a double line of peasants who had flocked together to
gratify their curiosity and to witness the spectacle of his misfortune,
some with indifference, a few with sincere interest, the majority with
that unavowed but irresistible satisfaction which the poor man prudently
keeps out of sight but which he infallibly feels when he sees the wrath
of the elements visited on the rich man and himself alike. All these
villagers had lost something by the inundation, one a small crop of hay,
another a bit of kitchen garden, a third a lamb, a hen or two, or a pile
of fire-wood; very trivial losses in reality, but comparatively as
severe as the wealthy manufacturer's. But when they saw the wreck of
that fine property, but yesterday so prosperous, they could not forbear
a thrill of consternation, as if wealth had something worthy of respect
in itself, despite the jealousy it arouses.

Monsieur Cardonnet did not wait until the water had entirely receded
before resuming work. He sent men to scour the surrounding fields for
the materials carried away by the current. He armed the others with
spades and pickaxes to clear away the mud and débris which obstructed
the approaches to the factory, and when it was possible to enter, he
entered first of all, in order to avoid any waste of emotion because of
the exaggerations that the first feeling of amazement might extort from
others.




VI

JEAN THE CARPENTER


"Take a pencil, Emile," said the manufacturer to his son, who followed
him, fearing that he might meet with some accident; "make no mistake in
the figures I am going to call off to you.--One, two, three wheels
broken here.--The staircase carried away.--The large engine
damaged--three thousand, five, seven or eight--Let us take the highest
figure; that's the safest way in business.--Put down eight thousand
francs.--What! the dam broken? that's strange! Put down fifteen
thousand. We must rebuild it all in Roman cement. There's a corner that
has given way.--Write, Emile.--Emile, have you written that?"

For an hour Monsieur Cardonnet continued thus to estimate his losses and
the necessary outlay; and when he called upon his son to foot up the
figures, he shrugged his shoulders impatiently because the young man,
whether from distraction or because he was out of practice, did not
perform that task as rapidly as he wished.

"Have you done it?" he asked, after two or three moments of restrained
impatience.

"Yes, father; it amounts to about eighty thousand francs."

"About?" repeated Monsieur Cardonnet with a frown. "What sort of a word
is that? Well, well," he added, glancing at him with a penetrating,
mocking expression, "I see that you are a little confused from being
perched up in a tree. I have made the calculation in my head, and I
regret that I am obliged to tell you that it was done before you had
sharpened your pencil. There'll be eighty-one thousand five hundred
francs to be laid out all over again."

"That's a good deal," said Emile, striving to conceal his impatience
beneath a serious air.

"I wouldn't have believed that this little water-course could have so
much force," observed Monsieur Cardonnet, as calmly as if he were making
an expert estimate of a loss in which he was not interested; "but it
won't take long to repair. Holà! you fellows.--There's a beam caught
between two of the large wheels, and there's just enough water left to
keep it banging. Take it out of there at once or my wheels will be
broken."

They made haste to obey, but the task was more difficult than it seemed.
All the weight of the machinery seemed to rest on that obstacle, which
bade fair not to be the first to give way. Several men rubbed the skin
off their hands to no purpose.

"Look out and not hurt yourselves!" cried Emile instinctively, taking a
hand himself to lessen their difficulty.

But Monsieur Cardonnet shouted in his turn:

"Pull there! push!--Bah! your arms are made of flax!"

The perspiration was rolling down their faces, but they made no headway.

"Get away from there, all of you," suddenly exclaimed a voice that Emile
instantly recognized, "and let me try it--I prefer to do it alone."

And Jean, armed with a crow-bar, quickly pried out a large stone which
no one had noticed. Then, with wonderful dexterity, he gave the beam a
powerful push.

"Gently, deuce take it!" cried Monsieur Cardonnet, "you'll smash
everything."

"If I smash anything, I'll pay for it," retorted the peasant, with
playful bluntness. "Now, two of you boys come here. All together now!
Courage, little Pierre, that's good!--Another bit, my old
Guillaume!--Oh! the clever fellows!--Softly! softly! let me take my foot
away, or you'll crush it for me, son of the devil!--Now she
goes!--push--don't be afraid--I have it!"

And in less than two minutes Jean, whose presence and voice seemed to
electrify the other workmen, relieved the machinery of the extraneous
object which endangered it.

"Come with me, Jean," said Monsieur Cardonnet, thereupon.

"What for?" rejoined the peasant. "I have done enough of that sort of
work for to-day, monsieur."

"That is why I want you to come and drink a glass of my best wine. Come,
I say, I have something to say to you. My son, go and tell your mother
to put some Malaga on my table."

"Your son?" said Jean, looking at Emile with some signs of emotion. "If
he is your son, I will go with you, for he seems to me like a good
fellow."

"Yes, my son is a good fellow, Jean," said Monsieur Cardonnet to the
peasant, when the latter accepted a full glass from Emile's hand. "And
you are a good fellow, too, and it's high time that you should show it a
little better than you have been doing for two months past."

"I beg your pardon, monsieur," replied Jean, looking about him with a
suspicious air, "but I am too old to go to school, and I didn't come
here all in a sweat to listen to moral preaching as cold as hoar-frost.
Here's your health, Monsieur Cardonnet; and I thank you, young man,
whose feelings I must have hurt last night. You bear me no grudge, do
you?"

"Wait a moment," said Monsieur Cardonnet; "before you go back to your
fox's hole, take this _pour-boire_."

And he handed him a piece of gold.

"Keep it, keep it," said Jean testily, pushing away the proffered
gratuity with a movement of his elbow. "I am not self-seeking, as you
must know, and it wasn't to please you that I helped your carpenters. It
was simply to keep them from breaking their backs for nothing. And then
when a man knows his trade it irritates him to see people go about it
wrong end to. My blood's a little quick, and in spite of myself I
meddled in something that didn't concern me."

"Just as you happened to be where you had no business to be," rejoined
Monsieur Cardonnet sternly, and with an evident purpose to awe the
audacious peasant. "Jean, this is the last opportunity for us to come to
an understanding and make each other's acquaintance; make the most of it
or you'll be sorry. When I came here last year, I observed your
activity, your intelligence, and the affection with which all the
workmen and all the people of this village regarded you. I received most
satisfactory accounts of your probity, and I resolved to put you in
charge of my carpentering work; I offered to pay you double wages, by
the day or by the job as you chose. You made me nonsensical answers as
if you did not consider me a serious-minded man."

"That was not the trouble, monsieur, begging your pardon. I told you
that I didn't need your work because I had more work in the village than
I could do."

"A mere pretext and a lie! Your affairs were in bad shape then and now
they're in worse shape than ever! Being prosecuted for debt, you have
been obliged to leave your house, to abandon your workshop, and to hide
in the mountains, like game pursued by hunters."

"When you undertake to argue," rejoined Jean, haughtily, "you should
tell the truth. I am not prosecuted for debt, as you say, monsieur. I
have always been an honest, well-behaved man, and if I owe a sou in the
village or the neighborhood, let some one come forward and say so and
raise his hand against me. Search and you will find no one!"

"None the less, there are three warrants out against you, and the
gendarmes have been chasing you for two months and can't succeed in
apprehending you."

"And so it will be as long as I choose! The great difficulty is that the
worthy gendarmes ride their horses along one bank of the Creuse, while I
ply my legs along the other! They are very sick, poor fellows! being
paid to take the air and make reports as to what they don't do. Don't
pity them so deeply, Monsieur Cardonnet, the government pays them, and
the government is rich enough for me to dodge the payment of a thousand
francs--for it's the truth that I am sentenced to pay a thousand francs
or go to prison! It surprises you, doesn't it, young man, that a poor
devil who has always obliged his neighbor instead of injuring him should
be hunted like an escaped convict? You haven't a bad heart yet, although
you are rich, because you are young. Let me tell you what my crime was.
For sending three bottles of wine from my vineyard to a friend who was
sick, I was arrested by the excisemen for selling wine without paying
the taxes on it; and as I could not lie and humiliate myself for the
sake of compromising, as I told the truth, which is that I did not sell
a drop of wine, and consequently could not be punished, I was sentenced
to pay what they call the minimum fine, five hundred francs. The
minimum, if you please! five hundred francs, my year's wages, for a gift
of three bottles of wine! To say nothing of the fact that my poor
comrade was sentenced too, and that was what made me angriest. And as I
could not pay such an amount, they seized everything, ransacked
everything, sold everything I had, even my carpentering tools. After
that, where was the use of paying for a license to carry on a trade that
wouldn't support me? I stopped doing it; and one day, when I was working
as a journeyman away from home, there was another prosecution and a
quarrel with the deputy, when I almost forgot myself and struck him.
What was to become of me? There was no bread in my chest, so I took my
gun and went out into the furze and killed a hare. Formerly, in this
country, poaching had become a custom and a privilege. The nobles in the
old days didn't keep such close watch, just after the Revolution; they
even poached with us when they had a fancy to do so."

"Witness Monsieur de Châteaubrun, who does it still," said Monsieur de
Cardonnet, ironically.

"As long as he doesn't trespass on your estates, what harm does that do
you?" retorted the peasant in an irritated tone. "However, for shooting
a hare and catching two rabbits in a trap I was taken again and
sentenced to pay a fine, and to imprisonment. But I escaped from the
claws of the gendarmes as they were taking me to the government _inn_,
and since then I have lived as I choose, and haven't chosen to hold out
my arm for the chain to be put on."

"Everyone knows very well how you live, Jean," said Monsieur Cardonnet.
"You wander about night and day, poaching everywhere and at all seasons,
never sleeping two nights in succession in the same place, but generally
in the open air; sometimes accepting hospitality at Châteaubrun, whose
châtelain was nursed by your mother. I do not blame him for assisting
you, but he would act more wisely, from the point of view of your own
interests, to preach work and a regular life to you. But come, we have
had enough of these useless words, and now you must listen to me. I am
sorry for your lot, and I am going to restore your liberty by becoming
surety for you. You will get off with a few days' imprisonment, just for
form's sake. I will pay all your fines, and then you can hold up your
head once more. Isn't that clear?"

"Oh! you are right, father," cried Emile; "you are kind and just. Well,
Jean, did I deceive you?"

"It seems that you have met before," said Monsieur Cardonnet.

"Yes, father," replied Emile warmly. "Jean rendered me a great service
last night; and what draws me to him even more strongly is that I saw
him this morning risk his life seriously to pull a child out of the
water, and he saved him. Jean, accept my father's offer and let his
generosity triumph over misplaced pride."

"That is very well, Monsieur Emile," replied the carpenter. "You love
your father; that is as it should be. I respected mine. But let us see,
Monsieur Cardonnet, on what conditions will you do all this for me?"

"That you work on my buildings," replied the manufacturer. "You shall
have the superintendence of the carpentering."

"Work on your factory, which will be the ruin of so many people!"

"No, but which will make the fortune of all my workmen, and yours, too."

"Well," said Jean, somewhat shaken, "if I don't do your work others will
and I shan't be able to prevent them. I will work for you then, until I
have earned a thousand francs. But who will keep me while I am paying my
debt to you day by day?"

"I will, for I will add a third to your day's wages."

"A third is very little, for I must dress myself. I am stripped bare."

"Well! I will double it. Your day's wages would be thirty sous at the
current rate hereabout; I will pay you three francs and you shall
receive half of it every day, the other half going toward your
indebtedness to me."

"Very well; it will take a long while--at least four years."

"You are wrong; it will be just two years. I think that two years hence
I shall have nothing more to build."

"What, monsieur, I am to work for you every day--every day in the year
without a break?"

"Except Sunday."

"Oh! Sunday--I should think so! But shan't I have one or two days a week
to pass as I choose?"

"Jean, you are growing lazy, I see. There's one result of a vagabond
life already."

"Hush!" exclaimed the carpenter, proudly, "lazy yourself! Jean was never
lazy, and he won't begin at sixty. But I'll tell you, I have an idea
that induces me to take your work. I have an idea of building myself a
little house. As they've sold mine, I prefer to have a new one, built by
myself alone, to suit my taste, my fancy. That's why I want at least one
day a week."

"That is something I will not allow," replied the manufacturer stiffly.
"You will have no house, you will have no tools of your own, you will
sleep under my roof, you will eat under my roof, you will use no tools
but mine, you----"

"That's quite enough to show me that I shall be your property and your
slave. Thanks, monsieur, the bargain's off."

And he walked toward the door.

Emile considered his father's terms very hard; but Jean's plight would
become still harder if he refused them. So he tried to bring about a
compromise.

"Good Jean," he said, retaining him, "reflect, I implore you. Two years
are soon passed, and with the little savings you will be able to make in
that time, especially," he added, looking at Monsieur Cardonnet with an
expression that was at once imploring and firm, "as my father will keep
you in addition to the wages agreed upon----"

"Really?" said Jean, shaken once more.

"Granted," said Monsieur Cardonnet.

"Well, Jean, your clothes are a small matter, and my mother and I will
take pleasure in replenishing your wardrobe. At the end of two years,
therefore, you will have a thousand francs net; that is enough to build
a bachelor's house for your own use, as you are a bachelor."

"A widower, monsieur," sighed Jean, "and a son killed in the field."

"Whereas, if you use up your salary every week," said the elder
Cardonnet, unmoved, "you will waste it, and at the end of the year you
will have built nothing and saved nothing."

"You take too much interest in me; what difference does that make to
you?"

"It makes this difference, that my work, being constantly interrupted,
will progress slowly, that I shall never have you at hand, and that, two
years hence, when you come and offer to work longer for me, I shall not
need you any longer. I shall have been compelled to give your place to
some one else."

"There will always be work to be done keeping the plant in order. Do you
think I mean to cheat you out of your money?"

"No, but I should prefer being cheated to being delayed."

"Ah! what a hurry you are in to enjoy your prosperity! Well! give me one
day a week and let me have my own tools."

"He seems to think a great deal of this day of freedom, father," said
Emile; "let him have it."

"I will let him have Sunday."

"And I accept it only as a day of rest," said Jean, indignantly; "do you
take me for a pagan? I don't work on Sunday, monsieur; that would bring
me ill-luck, and I should do bad work for both you and myself."

"Well, my father will give you Monday----"

"Hush, Emile, not Monday! I don't agree to that. You don't know this
man. Intelligent as he is and prolific in inventions, sometimes
successful, often puerile, he never enjoys himself except when he is
working at absurd things for his own use; he is something of a
carpenter, a cabinet-maker, Heaven knows what! He is clever with his
hands, but when he abandons himself to his own whims, he becomes idle,
absent-minded and incapable of serious work."

"He is an artist, father," said Emile, smiling, but with tears in his
eyes; "have a little compassion for genius!"

Monsieur Cardonnet cast a contemptuous glance at his son, but Jean took
the young man's hand.

"My boy," he said, with his strange and noble familiarity, "I do not
know whether you really do me justice or are laughing at me, but what
you say is true! I have too much of the spirit of invention for the sort
of work he would have me do here. When I work for my friends in the
village, for Monsieur Antoine or the curé or the mayor or poor beggars
like myself, they say: 'Do as you please, carry out your own ideas, old
fellow! it may take a little longer, but it will be all right!' And then
I take pleasure in working, yes, so much pleasure that I don't count the
hours and spend part of the night at it. It tires me, it gives me the
fever, it almost kills me sometimes! but I like it, you see, my boy, as
other men like wine. It's my amusement. Oh! you laugh and make fun of
me, Monsieur Cardonnet; your sneering is an insult, and you shouldn't
have me, no, you shouldn't have me, even if the gendarmes were here and
my head was in danger. Sell myself to you, body and soul, for two years!
Do what pleases you, watch you plan, and not give my opinion! for if you
know me, I know you too: I know what sort of a man you are, and that
there isn't a nail driven on your premises until you've measured it. And
I shall be a day-laborer, working to pay my taxes as my dead and gone
father worked for the abbés of Gargilesse. No, God forbid! I will not
sell my soul to such tiresome, stupid labor. If you would give me my day
of recreation and compensation, to satisfy my old customers and myself!
but no, not an hour!"

"No, not an hour," said Monsieur Cardonnet angrily; for the self-esteem
of the artist was now involved on both sides. "Off with you, I'll have
none of you; take this napoléon and go and get hanged elsewhere."

"They don't hang people now, monsieur," said Jean, throwing the gold
piece on the floor, "and even if they did, I shouldn't be the first
honest man who ever passed through the hangman's hands."

"Emile," said Monsieur Cardonnet, as soon as he was gone, "go and send
up the constable, that man standing on the stoop with a little iron fork
in his hand."

"Great Heaven! what are you going to do?" said Emile in dismay.

"Bring that man back to reason, to respectable behavior, to work, to
safety, to happiness. When he has passed a night in jail, he will be
more tractable, and some day he will bless me for delivering him from
his internal devil."

"But, father, to interfere with personal liberty! You can't----"

"I am mayor since this morning, and it is my duty to lock up vagabonds.
Do as I say, Emile, or I will go myself."

Emile still hesitated. Monsieur Cardonnet, unable to brook the slightest
shade of resistance, pushed him sharply away from the door and went out,
to issue orders to the constable, in the capacity of chief magistrate of
the village, to arrest Jean Jappeloup, native of Gargilesse, a carpenter
by trade, and without any known domicile.

This mission was extremely distasteful to the rustic functionary, and
Monsieur Cardonnet read his hesitation on his face.

"Caillaud," he said, in an imperative tone, "your dismissal within a
week, or twenty francs reward!"

"Very good, monsieur," said Caillaud; and he set off at a round pace,
waving his pike.

He overtook the fugitive within two gun-shots of the village; it was not
a difficult task, for the latter was walking slowly, with his head
hanging forward on his breast, absorbed in painful reflections.

"If it wasn't for my wrong-headedness," he was saying to himself, "I
should be now on the road to rest and comfort, instead of which I must
put on the collar of poverty again, stray like a wolf among the rocks
and bramble-bushes, and be too often a burden to poor Antoine, who is
kind, who always gives me a hearty welcome, but who is poor and gives me
more bread and wine than I can pay for with partridges and hares for his
table, taken in my snares. And then what breaks my heart is the idea of
leaving forever this poor dear village where I was born, where I have
passed all my life, where all my friends are, and where I can never show
my face again unless like a starved dog that runs the risk of a bullet
to get a piece of bread. And yet all the people here are kind to me; and
if they weren't afraid of the gendarmes they would give me shelter!"

As he mused thus Jean heard the bell ringing the evening _Angelus_, and
tears rolled unbidden down his tanned cheeks. "No," he thought, "there
isn't a bell within ten leagues that has such a sweet tone as the bell
of Gargilesse church!"--A nightingale sang among the hawthorns in the
hedge near by.--"You are very lucky," he said, speaking aloud in his
revery, "you can build your nest here, steal from all the gardens I know
so well, and feed on everybody's fruit, without any complaint being
lodged against you."

"Complaint, that's the word," said a voice behind him; "I arrest you in
the name of the law!"

And Caillaud seized him by the collar.




VII

THE ARREST


"You? you, Caillaud?" said the astonished carpenter, with the same
accent that Cæsar must have used when he saw Brutus strike.

"Yes, it's myself, the constable. In the name of the law!" shouted
Caillaud at the top of his voice, in order to be heard by anybody who
happened to be within earshot. But he added in a whisper:--"Off with
you, Père Jean. Come, stand me off and make your legs fly."

"You want me to resist and so get my affairs into a worse mess than
ever? No, Caillaud, that would be worse for me. But how could you make
up your mind to do the work of a gendarme, to arrest the friend of your
family, your godfather, unhappy man?"

"But I don't arrest you, godfather," said Caillaud in an undertone.
"Come, follow me, or I call for help!" he yelled with all his lungs.
"Deuce take it!" he added under his breath, "be off, Père Jean; pretend
to hit me and I'll fall."

"No, my poor Caillaud, that would make you lose your position, or at
least you would be called a coward, a faint-heart. As you have had the
heart to accept the commission, you must go through with it. I see
plainly enough that you were threatened, that your hand was forced; it
surprises me that Monsieur Jarige could make up his mind to treat me
this way."

"But Monsieur Jarige isn't mayor any longer; Monsieur Cardonnet has his
place."

"Then I understand; and it makes me long to beat you as a lesson to you
for not resigning at once."

"You are right, Père Jean," said Caillaud in a heartbroken tone, "I'll
go and resign now; that's the best way. Off with you!"

"Let him go! and do you--keep your place," said Emile, coming out from
behind a clump of bushes. "Down with you, comrade, as you want to fall,"
he added, adroitly tripping him up in schoolboy fashion, "and if you are
asked who contrived this ambush, you can tell my father that his son did
it."

"Ah! it's a good scheme," said Caillaud, rubbing his knee, "and if your
papa has you put in prison it's none of my business. You threw me down a
little hard, all the same, and I should have preferred to fall on the
grass. Well! has that old fool of a Jean gone yet?"

"Not yet," said Jean, who had climbed a knoll and was prepared to take
flight. "Thanks, Monsieur Emile, I shall not forget; I would have
submitted to my fate, if the law alone had been concerned; but since I
know that it's a piece of treachery on your father's part, I would
rather throw myself head first into the river than give way to such a
false, evil-minded man. As for you, you deserve to have come from better
stock; you have a good heart, and as long as I live----"

"Be off," said Emile, walking up to him, "and keep from speaking ill of
my father. I have many things to say to you, but this is not the time.
Will you be at Châteaubrun to-morrow night?"

"Yes, monsieur. Take care that you are not followed, and don't ask for
me in too loud a tone at the gate. Well, thanks to you I still have the
stars over my head, and I am not sorry for it."

He darted away like an arrow; and Emile, turning, saw Caillaud lying at
full length on the ground, as if he had fainted.

"Well? what's the matter?" the young man inquired in dismay; "did I
really hurt you? Are you in pain?"

"I'm doing very well, monsieur," replied the crafty villager; "but you
see I must wait for some one to come and lift me up, so that I may look
as if I had been beaten."

"That is useless, I will take the whole responsibility," said Emile.
"Get up and go and tell my father that I forcibly opposed Jean's arrest.
I will follow close behind you, and the rest is my affair."

"On the contrary, monsieur, you must go first. You see I must limp; for
if I go on the run to tell that you broke my two legs and that I
submitted to it patiently, your papa won't believe me and I shall be
dismissed."

"Take my arm, lean on me and we will go together," said Emile.

"That's the idea, monsieur. Help me a little. Not so fast! The devil! my
whole body's lame!"

"Really? Why I am awfully sorry, my friend."

"Oh! no, monsieur, it's nothing at all; but that's what I must say."

"What does this mean?" said Monsieur Cardonnet sternly, when the
constable appeared, leaning on Emile. "Jean resisted; you, like an
idiot, allowed yourself to be bowled over and the delinquent escaped."

"Excuse me, monsieur, the delinquent did nothing, poor man. It was
monsieur your son here, who, as he passed me, pushed me without meaning
to, just as I was putting my hand on my man; and, _baoun_! down I went
more than fifty feet, head first, on the rocks. The poor dear gentleman
felt very bad indeed, and ran to save me from falling into the river;
and if he hadn't, I'd taken a drink for sure! But I'll tell you who was
well pleased--that was Père Jappeloup, for he ran off while I lay there
all in a heap, not able to move hand or foot to run after him. If you
should be kind enough to let somebody give me a finger of wine, it would
do me a deal of good; for I really believe that my stomach's unhooked."

Emile, recognizing the fact that this peasant with his simple, wheedling
air was much more adroit than he in lying and arranging everything for
the best, hesitated whether he should accept his version of the
adventure. But he very soon read in his father's piercing eyes that he
would not be satisfied with a tacit confirmation and that, to convince
him, he must show no less effrontery than Master Caillaud.

"What absurd, incredible tale is this!" said Monsieur Cardonnet with a
frown. "Since when has my son been so strong, so brutal, so intent upon
following the same road with you? If you are so weak on your legs that a
touch of the elbow upsets you and sends you rolling over like a sack of
meal, you must be drunk I should say! Tell me the truth, Emile. Jean
Jappeloup whipped this fellow, perhaps pushed him into the ravine, and
you, who stand there smiling like the child that you are, thought it a
good joke, went to the assistance of this idiot here, and consented to
assume the responsibility for a pretended accident! That's how it was,
isn't it?"

"No, father, that is not how it was," said Emile with an air of
resolution. "I am a child, it is true; for that reason there may be a
little mischief in my frivolity. Caillaud may think what he pleases of
my way of upsetting people by passing too close to them. If I injured
him I am ready to ask his pardon and to compensate him. Meanwhile,
permit me to send him to your housekeeper, so that she may administer
the cordial he desires; and when we are alone I will tell you frankly
how I came to do this foolish thing."

"Take him to the pantry," said Monsieur Cardonnet, "and return at once."

"Ah! Monsieur Emile," said Caillaud to the young man as they went
downstairs, "I didn't sell you, so don't you betray me, will you?"

"Never fear; drink without losing your wits, and be sure that nobody but
myself will be compromised."

"And why in the devil do you propose to accuse yourself? begging your
pardon, that would be infernally stupid. You don't realize, do you, that
you may be sent to prison for interfering with a public officer in the
discharge of his duties and assaulting him?"

"That's my business. Stick to what you said, for you explained matters
very well; I will explain my intentions as I think best."

"Look you, you have too kind a heart," said Caillaud in amazement;
"you'll never have your father's head!"

"Well, Emile," said Monsieur Cardonnet, whom his son found pacing his
study excitedly, "will you explain this inconceivable occurrence to me?"

"I alone am guilty, father," Emile replied firmly. "Let all the
displeasure and all the effects of my misconduct fall upon me. I give
you my word of honor that Jean Jappeloup had submitted to arrest without
the slightest resistance, when I gave the constable a violent push that
threw him down, and that I did it on purpose."

"Very good," said Monsieur Cardonnet coolly, determined to know the
whole truth; "and the clown let himself be thrown. He let his prey go,
and yet, although he is lying now, he must have seen that it was not
awkwardness but design on your part, mustn't he?"

"The man did not understand my behavior at all," replied Emile. "He was
taken by surprise, disarmed and thrown down; indeed, I think he was
bruised a little by the fall."

"And you allowed him to believe that it was an accident on your part, I
trust!"

"What does it matter what that man thinks of my intentions and what goes
on in the depths of his mind? Your magistracy stops at the threshold of
the conscience, father, and you can judge nothing but facts."

"Is it my son who speaks to me in this way?"

"No, father, it is your victim the delinquent whom you have to try and
to punish. When you question me on my own account I will answer as I
ought. But it is a question now of the poor devil who lives by his
humble office. He is submissive to you, he fears you, and if you order
him to take me to prison he is ready to do it."

"Emile, you arouse my pity. Let us leave this country constable and his
bruises. I forgive him, and I authorize you to give him a handsome
present so that he may hold his tongue, for I don't propose to introduce
you to this neighborhood by an absurd scandal. But will you be kind
enough to explain to me why you are apparently trying to organize a
burlesque drama in the police court? What is this adventure in which you
play the rôle of Don Quixote, taking Caillaud for your Sancho Panza?
Where were you going so fast when you happened to be present at the
carpenter's arrest? What caprice impelled you to deliver that man from
the hands of the law and from my kindly intentions toward him? Have you
gone mad in the six months since we last met? Have you taken a vow of
chivalry, or do you propose to balk my plans and defy me? Answer
seriously if you can, for your father is very serious indeed in his
questions."

"I should have many things to say in answer to you, father, if you
questioned me concerning my feelings and my ideas. But this is a
question of one particular fact of trifling importance, and I will tell
you in a few words just what happened. I was running after the fugitive,
to induce him to avoid the shame and grief of being arrested. I hoped to
outstrip Caillaud and to persuade Jean to return of his own accord,
accept your offers and submit to the law. As I arrived too late, and as
I could not with loyalty urge the constable not to do his duty, I
prevented him from doing it by exposing myself alone to the penalty of
the offence. I acted on the impulse of the moment, without premeditation
or reflection, impelled by an irresistible outburst of compassion and
sorrow. If I did wrong, reprove me; but if I bring Jean back to you of
his own accord, by gentle means and persuasion, within two days, forgive
me, and confess that foolish brains sometimes have happy inspirations."

"Emile," said Monsieur Cardonnet, after walking back and forth in
silence for some moments, "I should reproach you severely for entering
into open revolt, I will not say against the municipal law, as to which
I will not play the pedant. There has been in this matter an immense
manifestation of pride on your part and a very grave failure of respect
for paternal authority. I am not disposed to tolerate such outbreaks
often, you must know me well enough to know that, or else you have
become strangely forgetful since we parted; but I will spare you a more
extended remonstrance to-day, for you do not seem inclined to profit by
it. Moreover, what I see of your conduct and what I know of your frame
of mind prove to my satisfaction that we must have a very serious
discussion concerning the very foundation of your ideas and the nature
of your plans for the future. The disaster that has befallen me to-day
leaves me no time to talk with you at greater length to-night. You have
had considerable excitement in the course of the day, and you must need
rest; go and see your mother and go to bed early. As soon as order and
tranquillity are restored in my establishment, I will tell you why I
have recalled you from what you called your exile, and what I expect
from you hereafter."

"And until this explanation, which I earnestly desire," Emile
replied--"for it will be the first time in my life that you have not
treated me like a child--may I hope, father, that you will not be angry
with me?"

"When I first see you again after such a long separation, it would be
very hard for me not to be indulgent," said Monsieur Cardonnet, pressing
his hand.

"Poor Caillaud will not be dismissed?" queried Emile, embracing his
father.

"No, on condition that you never meddle with the affairs of the
municipality."

"And you will not have poor Jean arrested?"

"I have no answer to make to such a question; I had too much confidence
in you, Emile; I see that we do not think alike on certain subjects, and
until we are agreed, I shall not subject myself to discussions which do
not befit my rôle as head of the family. Let that suffice. Good-night,
my son! I have work to do."

"Can not I help you? you have never believed me capable of sparing you
any fatigue!"

"I hope that you will become so. But you don't know how to add yet."

"Figures! always figures!"

"Go to sleep; I will sit up and work, so that you may be rich some day!"

"Ah! am I not rich enough already?" thought Emile as he left the room.
"If, as my father has often and justly told me, wealth imposes vast
duties, why waste our lives creating for ourselves those duties which
may exceed our strength?"

The following day was devoted to repairing in some degree the confusion
caused by the inundation. Monsieur Cardonnet, despite his strength of
character, was profoundly disturbed when he discovered at every step
some unforeseen damage in one or another of the innumerable details of
his undertaking; his workmen were demoralized. The water, which kept the
factory in operation and whose power it was yet impossible to control,
imparted an irregular movement to the machinery, increasing in force as
it struggled to escape over the dams. The proprietor was grave and
thoughtful; he was secretly annoyed on account of the lack of presence
of mind in the men he employed, who seemed to him more machine-like than
the machinery. He had accustomed them to passive, blind obedience, and
he realized that, at critical moments, when the will of a single man
becomes insufficient, slaves are the worst servants who can be found. He
did not call upon Emile to assist him; on the contrary, whenever the
young man came and offered his services, he put him aside on various
pretexts, as if he were really distrustful of him. This method of
punishing him was the most mortifying one to an impulsive, generous
heart.

Emile tried to find consolation with his mother; but good Madame
Cardonnet was totally lacking in energy, and the ennui which the
constant prostration and, as it were, stupor of her mental faculties
caused all her friends, became in her son's case an unconquerable
feeling of depression, when she tried to divert and entertain him. She
too treated him like a child, and by her manifestations of affection
arrived at the same galling result as her husband. Lacking sufficient
strength of mind to sound the abyss that lay between the two men, and
yet possessing sufficient intelligence to realize its existence, she
turned from it with terror, and strove to play on the brink with her
son, as if it were possible to deceive herself.

She took him through the house and the gardens, making a thousand
foolish observations and trying to prove to him that she was unhappy
because the river had overflowed.

"If you had come a day sooner," she said, "you would have seen how
lovely and neat and well-kept everything was! I looked forward to having
your coffee served in a pretty clump of jasmine that stood on the edge
of the terrace yonder; but alas! there's no trace of it now: the very
ground has been carried away, and the water has given us this nasty
black mud and all these stones in exchange."

"Cheer up, dear mother," said Emile, "we shall soon give it all back to
you; if father's workmen haven't time, I will be your gardener. You will
tell me how it was all arranged; indeed I saw it; it was like a lovely
dream. I had an opportunity to admire your enchanted gardens, your
lovely flowers from the top of the hill, opposite here; and in an
instant they were ruined and destroyed before my eyes; but this damage
can all be repaired: don't grieve so; others are more to be pitied!"

"And when I think that you were nearly carried away yourself by that
hateful stream, which I detest now! O my child! I deplore the day that
your father conceived the idea of settling here. We were overflowed more
than once during the winter, and he had to begin his work all over
again. This affects him and injures him more than he is willing to
admit. His temper is becoming soured, and his health will suffer in the
end. And all on account of this river!"

"But don't you think that this new building and this damp air are bad
for your own health, mother?"

"I don't know at all, my child. I consoled myself for everything with my
flowers and the hope of seeing you again. But here you are, and you have
come to a bog, a sewer, when I had looked forward to seeing you walk on
a carpet of flowers and turf as you smoked your cigar and read! Oh! this
cursed river!"

When night came, Emile discovered that the day had seemed immeasurably
long to him, hearing the river cursed by everybody and in all imaginable
tones. His father alone continued to say that it was nothing at all, and
that six feet more of bank would bring the brook to its senses once for
all; but his pale face and his clenched teeth, when he spoke, denoted an
internal passion more painful to see than all the ejaculations of the
others to hear.

The dinner was dull and cold. Monsieur Cardonnet was interrupted and
left the table a score of times to give orders; and as Madame Cardonnet
treated him with boundless respect, the dishes were carried out to be
kept hot and brought back overdone: he declared that they were
detestable; his wife turned pale and red in turn, went herself to the
kitchen, took innumerable pains, being torn between the desire to wait
for her husband and the desire not to keep her son waiting, who decided
that dinner was a very bad and very tedious meal in that wealthy
household.

They left the table so late, and the fords were still so dangerous in
the darkness, that Emile was compelled to abandon the visit to
Châteaubrun which he had planned. He had described his reception there.

"Oh! I would go and call there to thank them!" cried Madame Cardonnet.
But her husband added: "You may as well do nothing of the kind. I don't
care to have you draw me into the society of that old drunkard, who
lives on equal terms with the peasants, and who would get tipsy in my
kitchen with my workmen."

"His daughter is a charming girl," said Madame Cardonnet timidly.

"His daughter!" retorted the master scornfully. "What daughter! the one
he had by his maidservant?"

"He has acknowledged her."

"He did well, for old Janille would have been sadly embarrassed to
acknowledge the child's father! Whether she's charming or not, I hope
that Emile won't take such a journey to-night. It's a dark night and the
roads are in bad condition."

"Oh no! he won't go to-night," cried Madame Cardonnet; "my dear boy will
not cause me such anxiety. To-morrow, at daybreak, if the river has
returned to its usual limits, will be all right."

"To-morrow then," said Emile, sorely vexed, but yielding to his mother;
"for it is very certain that I owe them a call to thank them for the
cordial hospitality I received."

"You certainly do," said Monsieur Cardonnet, "but that, I trust, will be
the extent of your relations with that family, with whom it does not
suit me to associate. Don't make your visit too long: to-morrow evening
I propose to talk with you, Emile."

At daybreak on the following morning, before his parents had risen,
Emile ordered his horse saddled, and riding across the still disturbed
and angry stream, started off at a gallop on the road to Châteaubrun.




VIII

GILBERTE


The weather was superb and the sun was rising when Emile found himself
opposite Châteaubrun. That ruin, which had seemed to him so
awe-inspiring by the glare of the lightning-flashes, bore now an
appearance of majesty and splendor which triumphed over the ravages of
time and the despoiler. The morning sunbeams bathed it in a rosy-white
glow and the vegetation with which it was covered bloomed
coquettishly--a fitting garment to be the virginal shroud of so noble a
monument.

There are in reality few châteaux with entrances so majestically
disposed and so commandingly situated as that of Châteaubrun. The
square structure which contained the gateway and the ogive peristyle is
of a beautiful design; the hewn stone used in the arch and in the frame
of the former portcullis is of imperishable whiteness. The façade of
the château stands at the top of the knoll, covered with turf and
flowers but built on the solid rock which ends in a precipice, at the
foot of which flows a torrential stream. The trees, rocks and patches of
greensward, scattered without order or regularity over these steep
slopes, have a natural charm which the creations of art could never
surpass. In the other direction the view is more extensive and more
grand: the Creuse, crossed diagonally by two dams, forms, among the
fields and the willows, two gentle and melodious waterfalls in its
lovely stream, sometimes so placid, sometimes so frantic in its course,
but everywhere clear as crystal and everywhere bordered by enchanting
landscapes and picturesque ruins. From the top of the large tower of the
château the eye can follow it as it winds in and out among the steep
cliffs and glides like a streak of quicksilver over the dark verdure and
among the rocks covered with pink heather.

When Emile had crossed the bridge which passes over enormous ditches
partly filled, their banks covered with tufts of grass and flowering
brambles, he observed with pleasure the cleanliness of that vast natural
terrace and all the approaches to the ruin, due to the recent downpour
of rain. All the fragments of plaster had been washed away and all the
scattered pieces of wood, and you would have said that some gigantic
fairy had carefully washed the paths and the old walls, screened the
gravel and cleared the passage of all the rubbish of demolition which
the châtelain would never have been able to have removed. The flood,
which had marred, spoiled, destroyed all the beauty of the new Cardonnet
house, had served to clean and renovate the despoiled monument of
Châteaubrun. Its immovable old walls defied the centuries and the
tempest, and the elevated site they occupied seemed destined to dominate
all the transitory works of later generations.

Although he was proud, as befitted a descendant of the ancient
bourgeoisie, that intelligent, revengeful, wilful race, which has made
such a glorious record in history and which would still be so exalted if
it had held out its hand to the people instead of trampling them under
foot, Emile was impressed by the majestic aspect which that feudal abode
retained amid its ruins, and he was conscious of a thrill of respectful
pity as he entered--he, a rich and powerful plebeian--that domain where
only the pride of a great name was left to contend against the real
superiority of his position. This generous compassion was all the easier
to entertain because there was nothing in the feelings and habits of the
châtelain either to invite it or to repel it. The excellent Antoine,
who was occupied in trimming fruit trees at the entrance to his garden,
placid, unconcerned and amiable, greeted him with a fatherly air, ran to
meet him and said with a smile:

"Welcome, once more, my dear Monsieur Emile; for I know who you are now,
and I am very glad to know you. Upon my word your face took my fancy at
the first glance, and since you overthrew the prejudices that Jean tried
to instill in me against your father, I feel that it will be pleasant to
me to see you often in my ruins. Come with me first of all to the
stable, and I will help you to fasten your horse, for Monsieur Charasson
is busy grafting rose-bushes with my daughter and we mustn't interrupt
the little one in such an important occupation. You will breakfast with
me this time; for we owe you a meal that we stole from you the other
day."

"I did not come to cause you more trouble, my generous host," said
Emile, pressing with an irresistible impulse of friendliness the country
gentleman's broad callous hand. "I wished first of all to thank you for
your kindness to me, and in the second place to meet a man who is your
friend and my own, and with whom I made an appointment for last
evening."

"I know, I know about that," said Monsieur Antoine, putting his finger
to his lips: "he told me the whole story. But he exaggerated his
grievances against your father, as usual. We will talk about that later,
however, and I have to thank you, on my own account, for your interest
in him. He went away at daybreak, and I don't know if he will be able to
return to-day, for he is more hotly pursued than ever; but I am sure
that his affairs will soon take a turn for the better, thanks to you.
You must tell me what you finally obtained from your father in the
direction of my poor friend's safety and satisfaction. I am authorized
to listen to you and to reply to you, for I have full powers to arrange
the terms of pacification; I am sure that any terms that pass through
your mouth will be honorable! But the matter is not so pressing that you
cannot breakfast with us, and I tell you frankly that I will not begin
negotiations on an empty stomach. Let us begin by feeding your horse,
for animals don't know how to ask for what they want, and we ought to
look out for them before we look out for ourselves, lest we forget them.
Look you, Janille! bring your apron full of oats, for this noble beast
is in the habit of eating them every day I am sure, and I want him to
neigh in token of good-will every time he passes my gate; indeed I want
him to come in in spite of his master, if he happens to forget me."

Janille, notwithstanding the parsimonious economy that guided all her
actions, unhesitatingly brought a small quantity of oats which she kept
in reserve for great occasions. She was of the opinion that they were a
useless luxury; but she would have sold her last gown for the honor of
her master's house, and on this occasion she said to herself with
generous shrewdness that the present Emile had made her at their last
interview and the one he would not fail to make her to-day would be more
than enough to feed his horse sumptuously as often as he chose to come.

"Eat, my boy, eat," she said, patting the horse with an air which she
strove to render manly and knowing; then, taking a handful of straw, she
set about rubbing him down.

"Hold, Dame Janille," cried Emile, taking the straw from her hands, "I
will do that myself."

"Pray, do you think I wouldn't do it as well as a man?" said the
omni-competent little woman. "Never fear, monsieur, I am as good in the
stable as in the pantry and the laundry; and if I didn't pay my visit to
the hay-rack and the harness-room every day, that little rattle-brain
_jockey_ would never keep monsieur le comte's mare in decent condition.
See how clean and fat she is, poor old _Lanterne_! She isn't handsome,
monsieur, but she's good; she's like everything else here except my
child, who is handsome and good too."

"Your child!" said Emile, suddenly remembering a fact which deprived
Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun's image of something of its poetic charm.
"You have a child here? I have not seen her."

"Fie, monsieur! what are you saying?" cried Janille, her pale and
glistening cheeks mantling with a modest blush, while Monsieur Antoine
smiled with some embarrassment. "Apparently you are not aware that I am
unmarried."

"Excuse me," said Emile, "I have so recently come into this neighborhood
that I am likely to make many absurd mistakes. I thought that you were
married or a widow."

"It is true that at my age I might have buried several husbands,"
rejoined Janille; "for I have not lacked opportunities. But I have
always had a dislike for marriage, because I like to do as I choose.
When I say _our child_, it's on account of my affection for a child whom
I saw born, as you might say, for I had her with me when she was being
weaned, and monsieur le comte allows me to treat his daughter as if she
belonged to me, which doesn't take away any of the respect I owe her.
But if you had seen mademoiselle, you would have noticed that she no
more looks like me than she does like you, and that she has only noble
blood in her veins. _Jour de Dieu_! if I had such a child, where could I
have got her? I should be so proud of her, that I'd tell everybody, even
if it made people speak ill of me. Ha! ha! you are laughing, are you,
Monsieur Antoine? laugh as much as you choose; I am fifteen years older
than you, and evil tongues have nothing to say against me."

"Nonsense, Janille! nobody dreams of such a thing, so far as I know,"
said Monsieur Châteaubrun, affecting an air of gayety. "That would be
doing me too much honor, and I am not conceited enough to boast of it.
As for my daughter, you certainly have the right to call her what you
please, for you have been more than a mother to her, if such a thing is
possible!"

As he uttered these last words in a serious, agitated tone, there
suddenly came into the châtelain's eyes and voice, as it were a cloud,
and an accent of profound melancholy. But it was incompatible with his
character that any depressing sentiment should be of long duration, and
he soon recovered his usual serenity.

"Go and prepare breakfast, young madcap," he said playfully to his
female majordomo; "I still have two trees to trim and Monsieur Emile
will come and keep me company."

The garden of Châteaubrun had formerly been on a vast and magnificent
scale like the rest of the domain; but a large part of it had been sold
with the park, now transformed into a grain-field, and only a few acres
remained. The part nearest the château was lovely in the natural
disorder of its vegetation; the grass and the ornamental trees, left
undisturbed in their vagabond growth, revealed here and there a step or
two and a few fragments of wall, which had been summer-houses and
labyrinths in the days of Louis XV. There, doubtless, mythological
statues, urns, fountains and so-called rustic pavilions had repeated on
a small scale the dainty and affected ornamentation of the royal
palaces. But now it was all shapeless débris, covered with vines and
ivy, lovelier perhaps in the eyes of an artist or a poet than it had
been in the time of its magnificence.

On a higher level, surrounded with a thorn-hedge to confine the two
goats that grazed at will in the former garden, was the orchard, filled
with venerable trees, whose gnarled and knotty branches, escaping from
the constraint of the pruning-knife and the espalier, assumed odd and
fantastic shapes. There was a curious interlacing of monstrous hydras
and dragons writhing under foot and over head, so that it was difficult
to walk there without tripping over huge roots or leaving one's hat
among the branches.

"These are old servants of the family," said Monsieur Antoine, breaking
out a path for Emile through these patriarchs of the orchard; "they bear
only once in five or six years; but then, such magnificent, juicy fruit
comes from that rich, but sluggish sap! When I repurchased _my estate_,
everybody advised me to cut down these old stumps; my daughter pleaded
for them because of their great beauty, and it was a good thing that I
followed her advice, for they give a fine shade, and although some of
them yield mighty little in a year, we are sufficiently supplied with
fruit. See this huge apple-tree! It must have been here when my father
was born, and I'll wager that it will live to see my grand-children.
Wouldn't it be downright murder to cut down such a patriarch? There's a
quince-tree that bears only about a dozen quinces a year. That's very
few for its size; but they're as big as my head and as yellow as pure
gold; and such a flavor, monsieur! You'll see them in the fall! See,
here's a cherry-tree that has a very good crop. Yes, the old fellows are
still good for something, don't you think? It's only a matter of knowing
how to prune them properly. A theoretical horticulturist would tell you
that you must stop all this development of branches, clip and prune, so
as to force the sap to transform itself into buds. But when a man is old
himself, his own experience tells him something different. When the
fruit tree has lived fifty years with everything sacrificed to increase
its bearing qualities, you must give it its liberty and hand it over for
a few years to the care of nature. Then it enters into its second
childhood; it puts out new twigs and leaves and that rests it. And when,
instead of a mere clipped skeleton, it has become a real tree again, it
thanks you and rewards you by bearing all you choose. For instance,
here's a big branch that seems to be of no use," he continued, opening
his pruning-knife. "But I shall respect it, for such an extensive
amputation would weaken the tree. In these old bodies the blood is not
renewed fast enough for them to stand operations which youth can undergo
safely. It's the same with vegetables. I am just going to take away the
dead wood, scratch the moss, and freshen up the extremities. Look, it's
very simple."

The artless gravity with which Monsieur de Châteaubrun immersed himself
in this innocent occupation touched Emile and presented a constant
contrast to what took place in his own home with regard to similar
matters. While a gardener with a large salary, and two assistants,
busily at work from morning till night, were not enough to keep his
mother's garden sufficiently neat and gorgeous, while she worried over a
rose bud that failed to bloom or an unsuccessful graft, Monsieur Antoine
was happy in the proud savagery of his _pupils_, and in his eyes nothing
was more fruitful and more generous than the will of nature. That
old-fashioned orchard, with its fine soft turf, cropped by the
hard-working teeth of a few patient sheep, allowed to wander there
without dog or keeper, with its hardy and capricious vegetation and its
gently undulating slopes, was a beautiful spot where no fear of jealous
surveillance interrupted one's musing.

"Now that I have finished with my trees," said Monsieur Antoine, putting
on his jacket which he had hung on a branch, "let us go and find my
daughter and have breakfast. You haven't seen my daughter yet, I
believe? But she knows you already, for she is admitted to all of our
poor Jean's little secrets; indeed, he is so fond of her that he often
goes to her for advice instead of me. Go on, _Monsieur_," he said to his
dog, "go and tell your young mistress that breakfast time has come. Ah!
that makes you frisky, doesn't it? Your appetite tells you the time as
well as any watch."

Monsieur Antoine's dog answered to the name of _Monsieur_, which he gave
him when he was pleased with him, and that of _Sacripant_, which was his
real name, but which Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun did not like, so that
his master only used it when hunting or by way of stern rebuke, when it
happened, as it very rarely did, that he committed some impropriety,
such as eating gluttonously, snoring when he was asleep, or barking when
Jean came over the wall in the middle of the night. The faithful beast
seemed to understand what his master said, for he began to laugh, an
expression of merriment very strongly marked in some dogs, which gives
to their faces an almost human look of intelligence and kindliness. Then
he ran ahead and disappeared down the slope toward the stream.

As they followed him, Monsieur Antoine called Emile's attention to the
beauty of the landscape that was gradually unfolded before them. "Our
Creuse also took it into its head to overflow the other day," he said;
"but all the hay along the banks had been housed, thanks to Jean's
advice, for he had warned us not to let it get overripe. Everybody
hereabout looks up to him as an oracle, and it's a fact that he has a
great faculty of observation and a prodigious memory. By the aid of
certain signs that nobody else notices, the color of the water or the
clouds, and especially the influence of the moon in the first fortnight
of spring, he can predict infallibly what sort of weather we are to hope
for or fear throughout the year. He would be an invaluable man for your
father, if he would listen to him. He is good at everything, and if I
were in Monsieur Cardonnet's position, nothing would deter me from
trying to make a friend of him; for it's of no use to think of making
him into an assiduous and well-disciplined servant. He has the nature of
the savage, who dies when he is brought into subjection. Jean Jappeloup
will never do anything good except of his own free will; but just get
hold of his heart, which is the biggest heart God ever made, and you
will see how, on important occasions, that man rises above what he seems
to be! Let Monsieur Cardonnet's establishment be endangered by freshet,
fire or any unforeseen catastrophe, and then he will tell you if Jean
Jappeloup's head and arms can be too dearly bought and sheltered!"

Emile did not listen to the end of this eulogy with the interest which
it would have aroused in him under any other circumstances, for his ears
and his thoughts had taken another direction: a fresh young voice was
singing, or rather humming, at a little distance, one of those melodies,
charming in their melancholy and artless sweetness, which are peculiar
to the country. And the châtelain's daughter, the bachelor's child,
whose mother's name was a mystery to the whole neighborhood, appeared at
the corner of a clump of eglantine, as lovely as the loveliest
wild-flower of that charming solitude.

Fair-haired and pale, and about eighteen or nineteen years of age,
Gilberte de Châteaubrun had, in her face as in her character, an
admixture of good sense beyond her years and her childish gayety, which
few young women would have retained in such a position as hers; for it
was impossible for her not to be aware of her poverty and of the future
of isolation and privations which was in store for her in that age of
cold calculation and selfishness. She seemed, however, to be no more
affected by it than her father, whom she resembled, feature by feature,
morally as well as physically; her fearless, amiable glance was marked
by the most touching serenity. She blushed deeply when she saw Emile,
but it was the effect of surprise rather than embarrassment; for she
came forward and bowed to him without awkwardness, without that
constrained and slyly-bashful air which has been too highly extolled in
young women, for lack of knowledge as to what it means. It did not occur
to Gilberte that her father's young guest would devour her with his
eyes, and that she should assume a dignified air in order to place a
curb upon the audacity of his secret desires. On the contrary, she
looked at him, to see if his face appealed to her as it did to her
father, and with ready perspicacity she observed that he was very
handsome without being in the least degree vain; that he followed the
fashions to a moderate extent; that he was neither stiff, nor arrogant,
nor presuming; in short, that his expressive face was instinct with
candor, courage and delicacy. Satisfied with this scrutiny, she at once
felt as much at her ease as if there were no stranger with her and her
father.

"It is true," she said, completing Monsieur de Châteaubrun's sentence
of introduction, "my father was angry with you for running away the
other day without your breakfast. But I understood perfectly that you
were impatient to see your mother, especially in view of the flood when
everyone might well tremble for his friends. Luckily, Madame Cardonnet
didn't get very much of a fright, we were told, and you lost none of
your workmen."

"Thank God, no one was killed at our place or in the village," Emile
replied.

"But your property was damaged a good deal, wasn't it?"

"That is the least interesting point, mademoiselle; the poor people
suffered much more in proportion. Luckily, my father has the power and
the inclination to repair many disasters."

"They say especially--they say _also_," rejoined the girl, blushing a
little at the word that had escaped her involuntarily--"that madame your
mother is exceedingly kind and charitable. I was talking about her just
now with little Sylvain, whom she overwhelmed with kindness."

"My mother is perfect," said Emile; "but, on that occasion, it was quite
natural that she should manifest much good-will toward that poor child,
but for whom I should very likely have lost my life through imprudence.
I am impatient to see him and thank him."

"Here he is," said Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun, pointing to Charasson,
who was coming behind her with a basket and a little jar of pitch. "We
have made more than fifty grafts, and there are some slips there that
Sylvain picked up in the upper part of your garden. They were in what
the gardener threw away after pruning his rose-bushes, and they will
give us some lovely flowers, if our grafting isn't too badly done. You
will look at it, won't you, father? for I am not very skilful yet."

"Nonsense! you can graft better than I, with your little hands," said
Monsieur Antoine, putting his daughter's pretty fingers to his lips.
"That's woman's work, and requires more deftness than we men can manage.
But you ought to put on your gloves, little one! Those wretched thorns
have no respect for you."

"What harm do they do, father?" said the girl with a smile. "I am no
princess, and I am glad of it. I am freer and happier."

Emile did not lose a word of this last sentiment, although it was
uttered in an undertone for her father's ear only; and although he had
stepped forward to meet little Sylvain and bid him a friendly
good-morning.

"Oh! I am doing very well," replied the page; "I was only afraid of one
thing and that was that the mare might take cold after such a bath. But
by good luck she seems all the better for it, and I was very glad of the
chance to go into your little château and see the beautiful rooms and
your papa's servants, who wear red waistcoats and have gold lace on
their hats!"

"Ah! that is what turned his head more than anything," said Gilberte,
laughing heartily and disclosing two rows of little teeth as white and
close together as a necklace of pearls. "Monsieur Sylvain here is
overflowing with ambition: he has looked with profound scorn upon his
new jacket and his gray hat since he saw your gold-laced lackeys. If he
ever sees a _chasseur_ with his cock's feather and epaulets, he'll go
mad over him."

"Poor child!" said Emile, "if he knew how much freer, happier and
honorable his lot is than that of the bedizened lackeys in the large
cities!"

"He has no suspicion that a livery is degrading," said the girl, "and he
is not aware that he is the luckiest servant that ever lived."

"I don't complain," rejoined Sylvain; "everybody is kind to me here,
even Mademoiselle Janille, although she is a little watchful, and I
wouldn't like to leave these parts, because my father and mother are at
Cuzion, right near the house! But a bit of a costume, you know, makes a
man over!"

"So you would like to be dressed better than your master, would you?"
said Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun. "Look at my father, how simple his
dress is. He would be very unhappy if he had to put on a black coat and
white gloves every day."

"It is quite true that it would be hard for me to take up the habit
again," said Monsieur Antoine. "But do you hear, Janille, my children?
there she is shrieking to us to come to breakfast."

_My children_ was a general term by which Monsieur Antoine, when he was
in an amiable mood, often addressed Janille and Sylvain when they were
together, or the peasants in his vicinity.

Gilberte therefore was amazed at the involuntary rapid glance which
young Cardonnet bestowed upon her. He had started, and a confused thrill
of longing, of dread and of pleasure had made his heart beat fast when
he heard himself joined with the lovely Gilberte in the châtelain's
paternal appellation.




IX

MONSIEUR ANTOINE


The breakfast on this occasion was a little more luxurious than was
customary at Châteaubrun. Janille had had time to make some
preparations. She had procured milk, honey and eggs, and had bravely
sacrificed two pullets which were still cackling when Emile appeared at
the gate, but which had been placed on the gridiron while they were
warm, and were very tender.

The young man had found an appetite in the orchard, and the meal was
most enjoyable. The praise that he bestowed upon it delighted Janille,
who sat as usual opposite her master and did the honors of the table
with much distinction.

She was especially touched by her guest's approbation of the wild
blackberries preserved by herself.

"Little mother," said Gilberte, "you must send a specimen of your skill
with your receipt to Madame Cardonnet, and perhaps she will send us in
exchange some strawberry plants."

"Those great garden strawberries aren't good for anything," replied
Janille; "they smell of nothing but water. I prefer our little mountain
strawberries, so red and so fragrant. But that won't hinder my giving
Monsieur Emile a big jar of my preserves for his mamma, if she will
accept them."

"My mother wouldn't want to deprive you of them, my dear Mademoiselle
Janille," Emile replied, especially touched by Gilberte's frank
generosity, and mentally comparing the sincere kindly impulses of that
poor family with the disdainful manners of his own.

"Oh," said Gilberte with a smile, "that won't be any deprivation to us.
We have plenty of the fruit and we can begin again. Blackberries are not
scarce with us, and if we don't look out, the bramble-bushes that bear
them will pierce our walls and grow in our rooms."

"And whose fault is it," said Janille, "if we are overrun by brambles?
Didn't I want to cut them all down? I certainly could have done it all
without help from anybody if I had been let."

"But I protected the poor brambles against you, dear little mother! They
make such pretty garlands around our ruins, that it would be a great
pity to destroy them."

"I agree that they make a pretty effect," said Janille, "and that you
can't find such fine bushes or such big berries within ten leagues!"

"You hear her, Monsieur Emile," said Monsieur Antoine. "That's Janille
all over! There's nothing beautiful, good, useful or salutary that is
not found at Châteaubrun. It's a saving grace."

"_Pardine_! complain, monsieur," retorted Janille; "yes, I advise you to
complain of something!"

"I complain of nothing," replied the honest nobleman; "God forbid! with
my daughter and you, what more could I ask for my happiness?"

"Oh! yes; you talk like that when any one is listening to you, but if
our backs are turned, and a little fly stings you, you put on a look of
resignation altogether out of place in your position."

"My position is what God has made it," rejoined Monsieur Antoine, with
melancholy gentleness. "If my daughter accepts it without regret, it is
not for you or me to reproach Providence."

"I!" cried Gilberte; "what regret can I have, pray? Tell me, dear
father; for, so far as I am concerned, I should look in vain to find
anything on earth that I lack or that I can ask to have improved."

"And I am of mademoiselle's opinion," said Emile, deeply touched by the
sincere and nobly affectionate expression on that lovely face; "I am
sure that she is happy, because----"

"Because what? Tell us, Monsieur Cardonnet!" said Gilberte playfully;
"you were going to say why, and you stopped short."

"I should be very sorry to seem to say anything insipid," replied Emile,
blushing almost as red as the girl; "but I was thinking that when one
had these three treasures, beauty, youth and amiability, one should be
happy, because one could be sure of being loved."

"I am happier than you think, then," said Gilberte, putting one hand in
her father's and the other in Janille's; "for I am loved dearly without
reference to those other things. Whether I am beautiful and amiable, I
don't know; but I am sure that if I were ugly and cross, my father and
mother would love me just the same. My happiness therefore comes from
their goodness to me and not from any merit of my own."

"We will permit you to believe, however," said Monsieur Antoine to
Emile, pressing his daughter to his heart, "that it comes partly from
one and partly from the other."

"Oh! Monsieur Antoine, see what you've done!" cried Janille; "more of
your absent-mindedness! You've made a mark with your egg on Gilberte's
sleeve."

"That's nothing," said Monsieur Antoine; "I'll wash it out myself."

"No! no! that would make it worse; you'd pour the whole carafe on it and
drown my girl. Come here, my child, and let me take out the stain. I
have a horror of stains! Wouldn't it be a pity to spoil this pretty new
dress?"

Emile looked for the first time at Gilberte's costume. He had hitherto
paid no attention to aught save her graceful figure and the beauty of
her face. She wore a dress of grey drilling, quite new, but coarse, with
a little neckerchief, white as snow, about her neck. Gilberte noticed
his scrutiny, and, instead of being humiliated by it, seemed to take
some pride in saying that she liked her dress, that it was of good
material, that she could defy thorns and briers, and that, as Janille
chose it herself, nothing could be more agreeable to her to wear.

"The dress is charming, in truth," said Emile; "my mother has one just
like it."

That was not true; Emile, although naturally truthful, told this little
lie involuntarily. Gilberte was not deceived by it; but she was grateful
to him for the delicacy of his purpose.

As for Janille, she was visibly flattered by this testimony to her good
taste, for she was almost as proud of that quality as of Gilberte's
beauty.

"My daughter is no coquette," said she, "but I am for her. And what
would you say, Monsieur Antoine, if your child was not dressed genteelly
and becomingly as befits her rank in society?"

"We have nothing to do with society, my dear Janille," said Monsieur
Antoine, "and I don't complain. Don't indulge in any useless illusions."

"You have a disappointed air when you say that, Monsieur Antoine; for my
part, I tell you that rank can't be lost: but that's just like you; you
always throw the blade after the helve!"

"I throw nothing at all," retorted the châtelain; "on the contrary, I
accept everything as it comes."

"Oh! you do!" said Janille, who always longed to quarrel with some one,
to keep her tongue and her lively pantomime in practice. "You are very
good, on my word, to accept such a fate as yours! Wouldn't any one say,
to hear you, that you had to have a deal of sense and philosophy for
that? Bah! you're no better than an ingrate!"

"What's the matter with you, you cross-grained creature?" said Monsieur
Antoine. "I say again that everything is all right and that I am
consoled for everything."

"Consoled! there you go again; consoled for what, if you please? Haven't
you always been the happiest of men?"

"No, not always. My life has had its mixture of bitterness like every
man's; but why should I have been treated any better than so many others
who are as good as I am?"

"No, other men are not so good as you are--I insist upon that, as I also
insist that you have always been treated better than any one. Yes,
monsieur, I'll prove to you, whenever you choose, that you were born
under a lucky star."

"Ah! you would please me exceedingly if you could really prove that,"
said Monsieur Antoine with a smile.

"Very well, I take you at your word, and I will begin. Monsieur
Cardonnet shall be judge and witness."

"We will let her have her say, Monsieur Emile," said Monsieur Antoine.
"We have reached the dessert and there's nothing that will keep Janille
from chattering at this stage of the meal. She will say innumerable
foolish things, I warn you! But she is bright and enthusiastic. You
won't be bored listening to her."

"In the first place," said Janille, bridling up in her determination to
justify this eulogium, "Monsieur was born Comte de Châteaubrun, which
is neither a bad name nor a trifling honor!"

"The honor has no great significance to-day," said Monsieur de
Châteaubrun; "and as for the name my ancestors handed down to me, as I
have been able to do nothing to add to its splendor, I do not much
deserve to bear it."

"Nonsense, monsieur, nonsense!" interposed Janille. "I know what you're
coming at, and I'll come at it myself. Let me talk. Monsieur comes into
the world here--in the loveliest country in the world--and he is nursed
by the prettiest and freshest village girl in the neighborhood, an old
friend of mine, although I was several years younger, honest Jean
Jappeloup's mother; he has always been as devoted to monsieur as the
foot is to the leg. He is in trouble now, but his troubles will soon
come to an end, I've no doubt!"

"Thanks to you!" said Gilberte, looking at Emile; and with that
innocent, kindly glance she paid him for his compliment to her beauty
and her dress.

"If you start on your usual parentheses," said Monsieur Antoine to
Janille, "we shall never finish."

"Yes, we will, monsieur," she replied. "I resume, as monsieur le curé
at Cuzion says at the beginning of his sermons. Monsieur was blessed
with an excellent constitution, and, moreover, he was the handsomest
child that ever was seen. In proof of that is the fact he became one of
the handsomest cavaliers in the province, as the ladies of all ranks
lost no time in discovering."

"Go on, go on, Janille," interposed the châtelain, with a touch of
sadness in his gayety; "there's not much to be said on that subject."

"Never fear," was her reply, "I'll say nothing that it isn't all right
to say. Monsieur was brought up in the country, in this old château,
which was great and fine in those days--and which is very comfortable to
live in to-day! Playing with the youngsters of his age and with little
Jean Jappeloup, his foster-brother, kept him in excellent health. Come,
monsieur, now complain of your health, and tell us if you know a man of
fifty more active and better preserved than you?"

"That's all very well; but you don't say that, as I was born in a period
of civil commotion and revolution my early education was neglected."

"_Pardieu_! monsieur, would you have liked to be born twenty years
earlier and be seventy to-day? That's a strange idea! You were born just
in time, since you still have a long while to live, thank God! As for
education, you lacked nothing; you were sent to school at Bourges, and
you worked very well there."

"On the contrary, very ill. I had not been accustomed to working with my
mind. I fell asleep during the lessons; my memory had never had any
practice; I had more difficulty in learning the elements of things than
other lads in completing a full course of study."

"Very well, then you deserved more credit because you had more trouble.
At all events you knew enough to be a gentleman. You weren't intended
for a curé or a school-master. Did you need so much Greek and Latin?
When you came here in vacation you were an accomplished young man. No
one was more skilful than you in bodily exercises; you could bat your
ball over the high tower, and when you called your dogs your voice was
so loud that you could be heard at Cuzion."

"All that doesn't show hard study," said Monsieur Antoine, laughing at
this panegyric.

"When you were old enough to leave school, it was the time of the war
with the Austrians and Prussians and Russians. You fought well, for you
received several wounds."

"Trifling ones," said Monsieur Antoine.

"Thank God!" rejoined Janille. "Would you have liked to be crippled and
go on crutches! You gathered the laurel, and you returned covered with
glory and with not too many bruises."

"No, no, Janille, very little glory, I assure you. I did my best; but
say what you will, I was born several years too late; my parents fought
too long against my desire to serve my country under the usurper, as
they called him. I had hardly made a start in the army when I had to
return home, _trailing my wing and dragging my foot_, in utter
consternation and despair at the disaster of Waterloo."

"I agree, monsieur, that the fall of the Emperor was not a good thing
for you, and that you were generous enough to regret it, although that
man never behaved very well toward you. With the name you bore, he ought
to have made you a general at once, instead of paying no attention
whatever to you."

"I presume," laughed Monsieur de Châteaubrun, "that his mind was
directed from that duty by other and more pressing affairs. However, you
agree, Janille, that my military career was nipped in the bud, and that,
thanks to my fine education, I was not very well fitted to start on any
other?"

"You might very well have served under the Bourbons, but you wouldn't do
it."

"I had the ideas of my generation. Perhaps I should still have them, if
it were all to be done again."

"Well, monsieur, who could blame you for it? It was very honorable,
according to what people said in the province then, and no one but your
relations condemned you."

"My relations were proud and inflexible in their legitimist opinions.
You cannot deny that they abandoned me to the disaster that threatened
me, and that they worried very little over the loss of my fortune."

"You were even prouder than they, for you would never go on your knees
to them."

"No, whether from recklessness or dignity, I never asked them for
assistance."

"And you lost your fortune in a great lawsuit against your father's
estate; everybody knows that. But you only lost the case because you
chose to."

"And it was the noblest and most honorable thing my father ever did in
his life," interposed Gilberte, with much warmth.

"My children," said Monsieur Antoine, "you mustn't say that I lost the
case; I didn't allow it to come to trial."

"To be sure, to be sure," said Janille; "for if you had, you would have
won it. There was only one opinion on that point."

"But my father, recognizing that possession in fact is not possession of
right," said Gilberte, addressing Emile with animation, "refused to take
advantage of his position. You must know this story, Monsieur Cardonnet,
for my father would never dream of telling it to you, and you have so
recently arrived in the province that you cannot have heard it yet. My
grandfather had contracted debts of honor during my father's minority.
He died before circumstances enabled him or made it an urgent duty to
pay them. The claims of the creditors were of no value in law; but my
father, when he investigated his affairs, found a minute of one of these
claims among my grandfather's papers. He might have destroyed it and no
one would have known of its existence. On the contrary, he produced it
and sold all of the family property to pay a sacred debt. My father has
brought me up upon principles which do not permit me to think that he
did any more than his duty; but many wealthy people thought differently.
Some called him a fool and madman. I am very glad that, when you hear
certain upstarts say that Monsieur Antoine de Châteaubrun was ruined by
his own folly, which in their eyes is the greatest possible dishonor,
you will know what to think about my father's dissipation and
wrong-headedness."

"Ah! mademoiselle," cried Emile, overpowered by his emotion, "how
fortunate you are to be his daughter, and how I envy you this noble
poverty!"

"Don't make me out a hero, my dear child," said Monsieur Antoine,
pressing Emile's hand. "There is always some truth at the bottom of the
judgments pronounced by men, even when they are harsh and unjust for the
most part. It is very certain that I was always a little extravagant,
that I understood nothing about domestic economy, or business, and that
I deserve less credit than another for sacrificing my fortune, because I
regretted it less."

This modest apology inspired in Emile such a warm regard for Monsieur
Antoine, that he stooped over the hand which held his and put his lips
to it with a feeling of veneration with which Gilberte was not wholly
unconnected. Gilberte was more moved than she was prepared to be by this
sudden impulse on their young guest's part. She felt a tear trembling on
her eyelid, and lowered her eyes to hide it; she tried to assume a
serious bearing, and, suddenly carried away by an irresistible impulse
of the heart, she almost held out her own hand to the young man; but she
did not yield to this outburst of feeling and artlessly turned it aside
by rising to take Emile's plate and give him another, with the grace and
simplicity of a patriarch's daughter holding the pitcher to the
wayfarer's lips.

Emile was surprised at first by this act of humble sympathy, so out of
harmony with the conventionalities of the society in which he had lived.
Then he understood it, and his breast was so agitated that he could find
no words to thank the fair hostess of Châteaubrun, his charming
servant.

"After all this," continued Monsieur Antoine, who saw nothing but the
simplest courtesy in his daughter's action, "Janille must surely agree
that there has been a little misfortune in my life; for that lawsuit had
been going on for some time when I discovered the acknowledgment of his
debt that my father had left behind him, in the drawer of an old
abandoned desk. Until then I had not believed in the good faith of his
creditors. It seemed improbable that they could have been unfortunate
enough to lose their proofs, so I slept on both ears. My Gilberte was
born and I had no suspicion that she was doomed to share with me a
hand-to-mouth existence. The dear child's birth made the blow a little
more severe than it would otherwise have been to my natural
improvidence. Seeing that I was absolutely without resource, I resolved
to work for my living, and I had some hard moments at first."

"Yes, monsieur, that is true," said Janille, "but you succeeded in
buckling down to work, and you soon recovered your good humor and your
open-hearted gayety, didn't you?"

"Thanks to you, good Janille, for you did not desert me. We went to
Gargilesse to live with Jean Jappeloup, and the honest fellow found me
something to do."

"What!" said Emile, "you have been a mechanic, monsieur le comte?"

"To be sure, my young friend. I was carpenter's apprentice, journeyman
carpenter, and in a few years carpenter's assistant, and not more than
two years ago you could have seen me with a blouse on my back and a
hatchet over my shoulder, going out for my day's work with Jappeloup."

"That is the reason, then," said Emile, sorely embarrassed, "that----"
He paused, not daring to finish.

"That is the reason, yes, I understand," rejoined Monsieur Antoine;
"that is the reason that you have heard some one say: 'Old Antoine
degenerated terribly during his poverty; he lived with workingmen; he
was seen laughing and drinking with them in wineshops.' Well, that
requires a little explanation, and I will not make myself out any
stronger or purer than I am. According to the ideas of the nobles and
the rich bourgeois of the province, I should have done better doubtless
to remain melancholy and solemn, proudly crushed by my disgrace, working
in silence, sighing in secret, blushing to receive wages,--I who had had
wage-earners under my orders--and taking no part on Sundays in the
merrymaking of the mechanics who permitted me to work beside them during
the week. Well, I do not know if it would have been better so, but, I
confess, that it would have been entirely foreign to my character. I am
so constituted that it is impossible for me to be affected and horrified
for long by anything under heaven. I had been brought up with Jappeloup
and other peasant children of my own age. I had treated them as my
equals in our childish games. Since then I had never played the master
or the nobleman with them. They received me with open arms in my
distress, and offered me their houses, their bread, their advice, their
tools and their custom. How could I have helped being fond of them? How
could their society seem to me to be unworthy of me? How could I help
sharing my week's wages with them on Sunday? Bah! on the contrary, I
suddenly found joy and pleasure in doing it, as a compensation for my
hard work. Their songs, their meetings, under the trellised arbor where
the holly-branch of the wineshop waved in the wind, their frank
familiarity with me, and my indissoluble friendship with dear Jean, my
foster-brother, my master in carpentry, my comforter, made a new life
for me, which I could not but find very pleasant, especially when I had
succeeded in acquiring enough skill at my trade not to be a burden to
them."

"It is true enough that you worked hard," said Janille, "and that you
were soon a very great help to poor Jean. Ah! I remember his fits of
anger with you at the beginning, for he was never patient, the dear man,
and you were so awkward! Really, Monsieur Emile, you'd have laughed to
hear Jean swear after Monsieur le Comte, as he would after any little
apprentice. And then, after it was over, they would make it up and shake
hands, so that I used to feel like crying. But as we have actually set
about telling you our whole history, instead of just quarrelling among
ourselves, as I intended to do at first, I propose to tell you the rest
of it; for if we let Monsieur Antoine do it, he'll never let me put in a
word."

"Go on, Janille, go on!" cried Monsieur Antoine; "I ask your pardon for
having kept you from talking so long!"




X

A GOOD ACTION


"According to Monsieur Antoine," said Janille, "we were entirely without
means; but if that was the case, it didn't last long. After a few years,
when the Châteaubrun estate had been sold in small lots, the debts
paid, and all that rubbish cleared away, we found that monsieur still
had a little capital left, which, if well invested, would bring him in
about twelve hundred francs a year. Oh! that wasn't to be despised. But,
with monsieur's kindness of heart and generosity, it would probably have
disappeared a little fast. Then it was that my dear Janille, who is
talking to you now, saw that she must take the reins into her hands. It
was she who looked after the investment of the funds, and she didn't
manage so very badly. Then what did she say to monsieur? Do you
remember, monsieur, what I said to you at that time?"

"I remember very well, Janille, for you talked very wisely. Repeat it
yourself."

"I said to you: 'Well, Monsieur Antoine, there's enough for you to live
on with your arms folded. But that would be a burden to you, you've
taken a liking to work. You are still young and well, so you can work
for some years to come. You have a daughter, a real treasure, who bids
fair to be as bright as she is pretty; you must think about giving her
an education. We will take her to Paris, put her at boarding-school, and
you will be a carpenter a few years longer.' Monsieur Antoine asked
nothing better. Oh! I must do him the justice to say that he didn't
complain of his work; but, by associating with these peasants, his ideas
had become a little too countrified to suit me. He said that as he was
destined to become a workingman in the country, it would be wiser to
bring up his daughter in accordance with his position in life, to make
an honest village lass of her, to teach her to read, sew, spin and keep
house; but deuce take me if I looked at it in that light! Could I allow
Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun to fall below her rank and not be brought
up like the nobly-born maid she is? Monsieur yielded, and our Gilberte
was educated at Paris, and nothing was spared to give her wit and
talents. She made the most of it like a little angel, and when she was
about seventeen years old I says one day to monsieur: 'I say, Monsieur
Antoine, don't you want to come and take a little walk with me over
Châteaubrun way?' Monsieur, let me bring him here, but, when we were in
the middle of the ruins, he got very depressed.

"'Why did you bring me here, Janille?' he says with a deep sigh. 'I knew
they had destroyed my poor family nest; I had seen that from a distance,
but I have never had the heart to come in and see all this ruin close. I
hadn't any feeling of pride about the château, but I was fond of it
because I passed my youthful years here; because I was happy here and my
parents died here. If anyone had bought it to live in, if I could see it
in good repair and well kept, I should be half-consoled, for we love
things as we ought to love persons--a little more on their account than
our own. But what pleasure can it give you to show me what speculators
have done to the house of my ancestors?'

"'Monsieur,' I answered, 'it was necessary for us to come and see what
the damage is, so that we can tell how much we have to spend, and how we
must go to work to repair it. Just imagine that your estate was ruined
by a hurricane in one night; with such a character as I know yours to
be, instead of crying over it, you would go right to work to rebuild
it.'

"'But there's no rhyme nor reason in your comparison,' says Monsieur
Antoine. 'I haven't the means to repair the château, and even if I had
I should be no better off, for even this carcass no longer belongs to
me.'

"'Wait a bit,' says I. 'How much did they ask you when you offered to
buy back just the house and the little piece of land next to it, the
orchard, the garden, the hill, and the little meadow on the bank of the
river?'

"'I didn't ask it seriously, Janille, but simply to see how low the
value of a fine estate had fallen. They told me ten thousand francs for
what was left, and I retired, knowing well enough that ten thousand
francs and I would never pass through the same door.'

"'Well, monsieur,' says I, 'it's no longer a matter of ten thousand
francs, but only four thousand at this moment. They thought that you
couldn't resist the temptation, and that you would spend what capital
you had left in re-establishing yourself in the ruins of your domain.
That's why they fixed the price at ten thousand francs on a place that
isn't worth the half of it, and that no one but you would ever want; but
since you gave up buying it back they have grown more modest. I have
been bargaining secretly, without your knowledge and under an assumed
name. Say the word, and to-morrow you shall be lord of Châteaubrun.'

"'But what good would it do me, my dear Janille? What could I do with
this pile of stone and these three or four fragments of wall with no
doors or windows?'"

"With that I pointed out to monsieur that the square pavilion was still
in very good condition, that the arches were well preserved, the rooms
perfectly dry inside, and that we should only have to cover it with
tiles, repair the woodwork and furnish it simply--a matter of five
hundred francs at most. At that monsieur cried out: 'Don't put such
ideas into my head, Janille; I should think you were trying to disgust
me with my present condition and feed me on illusions. I haven't ten, or
five, or four thousand francs, and it would require ten more years of
privation to save them. We had much better remain as we are.'"

"'And how do you know, monsieur,' says I, 'that you haven't six thousand
francs, yes, sixty-five hundred? Do you know how much you have? I'll
wager that you know nothing about it.'"

At this point Monsieur Antoine interrupted Janille. "It is true," he
said, "that I knew nothing about it; that I know nothing about it yet;
and that I never shall know how, with an income of twelve hundred
francs, after paying for my daughter's schooling at Paris for six years,
and living at Gargilesse, as a workingman to be sure, but very
comfortably none the less, in a little house which Janille managed
herself--and, I may add that, although she held the purse-strings, she
allowed me to spend two or three francs on Sundays with my friends. No,
I shall never understand how I could have saved six thousand francs! As
it is altogether impossible, I am forced to explain this miracle to
Monsieur Emile Cardonnet, unless he has already guessed its solution."

"Yes, monsieur le comte, I have guessed it," said Emile; "Mademoiselle
Janille had saved money in your service when you were rich, or else she
had some money of her own, and it was she who----"

"No, monsieur," interposed Janille hastily, "nothing of the sort; you
forget that monsieur earned his living at his carpentering, and you can
well believe that mademoiselle's boarding-school wasn't one of the
dearest in Paris, although it was a good school, I flatter myself."

"Nonsense," said Gilberte, kissing her; "you lie very coolly, Mère
Janille; but you will never make my father and me believe that
Châteaubrun was not bought with your money, that it does not really
belong to you, and that we are not living in your house, although you
bought it in our name."

"Not at all, not at all, mademoiselle," replied the noble-hearted
Janille, that strange little woman who liked to boast on every occasion
and to make herself heard on every subject, but who, to maintain the
dignity of her masters' rank, of which she was more careful than they
were themselves, energetically denied the noblest action of her whole
life;--"not at all, I tell you, I had nothing to do with it. Is it my
fault if your papa doesn't know how to count five and if you are as
careless as he? Bah! A lot you know about your receipts and your
expenses, both of you! Leave you to yourselves, and we'll see what will
become of you! I tell you that you are in your own house, and that if
there is anything for me to boast of, it is that I managed your affairs
with so much good sense and economy that monsieur found himself one fine
morning richer than he thought.

"Now," continued Janille, "I will go on and finish our story for
Monsieur Emile. We bought back the château. Jean Jappeloup and Monsieur
Antoine themselves did all the carpentering and cabinet making in this
pavilion, and while they were finishing the work, which lasted hardly
six months, I went to Paris to fetch our child, and happy and proud I
was to bring her back to the château of her ancestors, which she hardly
remembered that she had lived in when she was a baby, poor child! Since
then we have been very happy here, and when I hear Monsieur Antoine
complain of anything, I can't help blaming him; for what man was ever
more blessed than he after all?"

"But I don't complain of anything," rejoined Monsieur Antoine, "and your
reproach is unjust."

"Oh! you sometimes look as if you'd like to say that you don't cut as
good a figure here as you used to do, and in that you are wrong. Come,
were you really any richer when you had thirty thousand francs a year?
People robbed you and cheated you and you knew nothing about it. To-day
you have the necessaries of life, and you need have no fear of thieves;
everybody knows that you have no rolls of gold pieces hidden in your
straw bed. You had ten servants, each a greater glutton and sot and
sluggard than the rest; Parisian servants, that tells the whole story.
To-day you have Monsieur Sylvain Charasson, also a glutton and a
sluggard, I agree." As she said this, Janille raised her voice, so that
Sylvain could hear in the kitchen; then added in a lower tone: "But his
stupidity makes you laugh, and when he breaks something, you are not
sorry to find that you're not the most awkward member of the household.
You had ten horses, always badly kept, and unfit to be used because they
weren't properly taken care of; to-day you have your old _Lanterne_, the
best animal in the world, always well-groomed, full of courage and
sober--you should see her eat dry leaves and rushes, just like a goat!
And speaking of goats, where will you find finer ones? Just like two
deer, excellent milkers, and always amusing you with their pretty
antics, climbing over the ruins for your evening entertainment! And what
about your cellar? You had one that was well supplied, but your rascally
flunkeys baptized themselves with wine as they pleased, and you drank
only what was left. Now you drink your light native wine, which you have
always liked, and which is healthy and refreshing. When I take a hand in
making it, it's as clear as water from the rock and doesn't heat your
stomach. And aren't you satisfied with your clothes? You used to have a
wardrobe that was eaten up by the moths, and your waistcoats went out of
fashion before you had worn them; for you never cared for dress. To-day
you have just what you need to keep cool in summer and warm in winter;
the village tailor fits you beautifully and doesn't make your clothes
too tight at the joints. Come, monsieur, confess that everything is for
the best, that you never had less care, and that you are the luckiest of
men; for I have said nothing yet of the privilege of having a lovely
daughter who is happy with you-----"

"And an incomparable Janille who is intent wholly upon other people's
happiness!" cried Monsieur Antoine with deep emotion mingled with
gayety. "Well! you are right, Janille, and I was persuaded of it
beforehand. _Vive Dieu_! you insult me by doubting it, for I feel that I
am in very truth the spoiled child of Providence, and except for a
secret trouble, of which you are well aware and which you did well not
to mention, there is absolutely nothing which I would change. I drink to
your health, Janille! you have talked like a book! Your health too,
Monsieur Emile! You are young and rich, you are well educated and a
thinking man; therefore you have no reason to envy other people; but I
wish you as pleasant an old age as mine and as tender affections in your
heart. But we have talked enough of ourselves," he added, putting his
glass on the table, "and we mustn't forget our other friends. Let us
talk about the best of them all, after Janille; let us talk about old
Jean Jappeloup and his affairs."

"Yes, let us talk about him!" cried a loud voice which made everybody
start; and Monsieur Antoine, turning his head, saw Jean Jappeloup in the
doorway.

"What! Jean in broad daylight!" he cried, in utter amazement.

"Yes, I have come in broad daylight and through the main gateway too,"
replied the carpenter wiping his forehead. "Oh! but I have run! Give me
a glass of wine, Mère Janille, for I am choked with the heat."

"Poor Jean!" cried Gilberte, running to the door to close it; "were you
pursued? We'll see about hiding you. Perhaps they will come and look for
you here."

"No, no," said Jean, "no, my good girl, leave the doors open, nobody is
following me. I bring you good news and that is why I hurried so. I am
free, I am happy, I am saved!"

"_Mon Dieu_!" cried Gilberte, taking the old peasant's dusty head in her
lovely hands, "so my prayer has been granted! I prayed so earnestly for
you last night!"

"Dear soul from heaven, you brought me good luck," replied Jean, who was
quite unable to return the caresses and answer the questions of Antoine
and Janille.

"But tell us who has given you back your liberty and peace of mind?"
continued Gilberte, when the carpenter had swallowed a large glassful of
wine.

"Oh! some one whom you would never guess, who became my surety at once,
and will pay my fines. Come, I give you a hundred guesses."

"Perhaps it's the curé of Cuzion?" said Janille. "He's such a good man,
although his sermons are a little confused! but he isn't rich enough."

"Who do you think it is, Gilberte?" said Jean.

"I would guess the good curé's sister, Madame Rose, who has such a big
heart--except that she is no richer than her brother."

"No, no! that wouldn't be possible! Your turn, Monsieur Antoine."

"I can't imagine," replied the châtelain. "Tell us quickly; you're
torturing us."

"But I will wager that I have guessed," said Emile; "I guess my father!
for I have talked with him, and I know that he intended----"

"Excuse me, young man," said the carpenter, interrupting him; "I don't
know what your father intended, but I know well enough what I never
intend, and that is to owe him anything, to accept any favor from the
man who began by having me put in prison to force me to accept his
pretended benefactions and his hard terms. Thanks! I esteem you, but as
to your father, let's say no more about him; let's never talk about him
again. Come, come, haven't any of you guessed? Well, what would you say
if I should tell you it was Monsieur de Boisguilbault?"

That name, which Emile had heard before, for somebody had mentioned it
in his presence at Gargilesse as that of one of the richest landed
proprietors in the neighborhood, produced the effect of an electric
shock on the inhabitants of Châteaubrun: Gilberte jumped; Antoine and
Janille stared at each other, unable to utter a word.

"That surprises you a little, does it?" continued the carpenter.

"It seems impossible," replied Janille. "Are you joking? Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, the enemy of all of us?"

"Why say so?" said Monsieur Antoine. "That man is nobody's enemy
intentionally; he has always done good, never harm."

"For my part," said Gilberte, "I was sure that he was capable of a good
action. What did I tell you, dear little mother? he's an unhappy man,
anybody can see that on his face; but----"

"But you don't know him," rejoined Janille, "and you can't say anything
about him. Come, Jean, tell us by what miracle you succeeded in
approaching that cold, stern, haughty man."

"Chance, or rather the good Lord did it all," replied the carpenter. "I
was going through the little wood that skirts his park, and is separated
from it at that point only by a hedge and a narrow ditch. I glanced over
the hedge to see how beautiful and neat and well-kept everything was. I
was thinking, a little sadly, that I had once been perfectly at home in
that park and that château; that I had worked there for twenty years,
and that I had been fond of monsieur le marquis, although he was never
very amiable. Still he had his kind days in those times; and yet, for
another twenty years I hadn't put my foot on his land, and I shouldn't
dare to ask him for shelter after what had taken place between him and
me.

"As I was thinking of all this, I heard two horses trotting, and the
next moment I saw two gendarmes riding straight toward me. They hadn't
seen me then; but if I crossed their road they couldn't fail to see me,
and they knew my face so well! I had no time for reflection. I plunged
into the hedge, ran through it like a fox, and found myself in
Boisguilbault park, where I quietly lay down against the fence, while my
friends the gendarmes rode by without so much as turning their heads in
my direction. When they had gone some little distance, I stood up and
was preparing to go out as I had come, when suddenly I felt a hand on my
shoulder and turned, to find myself face to face with Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, who said to me with his sad face and his sepulchral
voice: 'What are you doing here?'

"'Faith, as you see, monsieur le marquis, I am hiding.'

"'Why are you hiding?'

"'Because there are gendarmes within two yards.'

"'Have you committed a crime, then?'

"'Yes, I snared two rabbits and killed a hare.'

"Thereupon, as I saw that he would not ask me many more questions, I
hastily told him my misfortunes in as few words as possible, for you
know that he's a man who always has something in his mind different from
what you're talking about. You never know whether he hears you; he
always looks as if he wasn't bothering himself to listen to you. It's
many a year since I saw him close, for he lives shut up in his park like
a mole in its hole, and I no longer have access to his house. He seemed
to me to have grown very old and very feeble, although he is still as
straight as a poplar; but he is so thin you can see through him, and his
beard is as white as an old goat's. It made me feel badly, and yet, I
was even more vexed than sorry when I saw him all the time I was talking
to him walk along digging up all the weeds in the path with the little
hoe he always has in his hand. I followed him step by step, talking all
the time, telling him about my troubles, not to beg for his help--I
never thought of such a thing--but to see if he still had a little
friendship for me.

"At last he turned toward me and said, without looking at me: 'Why
didn't you ask some rich man at your village to be your surety?'

"'The devil!' said I; 'there aren't many rich men in Gargilesse.'

"'Isn't there a Monsieur Cardonnet who has come there recently?'

"'Yes, but he's mayor, and it was he who tried to have me arrested.'

"He didn't say anything more for two or three minutes. I thought he had
forgotten that I was there, and I was just going away, when he said:
'Why didn't you come to me?'

"'Why!' said I, 'you know very well why I didn't.'

"'No!'

"'What, no? Why, don't you remember that, after employing me a long
while and never once finding fault with me--I don't think I deserved to
be found fault with, by the way,--you called me into your study one fine
morning and said: "Here's your pay for these last days; off with you!"
And when I asked you when I should come again, your answer was _never_!
And when I was dissatisfied with that kind of treatment, and asked you
wherein I had failed to do my duty to you, you pointed to the door,
without condescending to open your lips? That was twenty years ago, and
it may be that you have forgotten it. But it has always remained on my
heart, and I consider that you were very hard and unjust to a poor
mechanic who worked as he could and was no more awkward than the
average. I thought at first that you had a mad fit and would get over
it; but I waited in vain, you have never sent for me since. I was too
proud to come and ask you for work; besides I had no lack of it, I have
always had all that I wanted; and at this moment, if I wasn't driven to
hide in the woods, I should have plenty of customers; but what hurt me,
you see, was being turned out like a dog--worse than that, like an idler
or a thief, and your not even giving me a chance to justify myself. I
thought that I must have some enemy in your house and that they had told
you lies about me. But I could never guess who it could be, for I have
never known any other enemies than constables and excisemen. I held my
tongue; I never complained of you, but I pitied you for being quick to
believe evil, and as I was somewhat attached to you, I was sorry to find
that you had faults.'"

"Monsieur de Boisguilbault seemed all the time not to be listening to
me, but when I had finished, he asked me in an indifferent tone:

"'How much is your fine?'

"'The whole business amounts to a thousand francs, besides the costs.'

"'Very well; go and tell the mayor of your village--Monsieur Cardonnet,
isn't it?--to send some trustworthy person to me with whom I can settle
your affairs. Tell him that my health is bad and I don't go out, and
that I request him to do me this favor.'

"'Do you offer to be my surety?'

"'No, I will pay your fine. You can go.'

"'And when shall I come and work for you to pay off my debt?'

"'I have no work; don't come at all.'

"'Do you propose to give me alms?'

"'No, but to do you a very small favor, which costs me little. That's
enough, leave me.'

"'And suppose I don't choose to accept it?'

"'You will make a mistake.'

"'And you don't want me to thank you?'

"'It's useless.'

"Thereupon he fairly turned his back on me and went away for good and
all; but I followed him, and, knowing that long-winded compliments were
not to his taste, I said like this: 'Monsieur de Boisguilbault, shake
hands, if you please!'"

"What! you dared to say that to him?" cried Janille.

"Well, why shouldn't I dare? what more straightforward thing can you say
to a man?"

"And what answer did he make? what did he do?" queried Gilberte.

"He took my hand abruptly, without hesitation; and he pressed it quite
hard, although his hand was as cold and stiff as a piece of ice."

"And what did he say?" inquired Monsieur Antoine, who had listened to
this tale with repressed excitement.

"He said 'be off,'" replied the carpenter; "apparently that phrase
denotes friendship with him, and he almost ran away to avoid me, as far
as his poor thin long legs would enable him to run. And I, for my part,
ran here to tell you all this."

"And I," said Emile, "will run to my father to tell him of Monsieur de
Boisguilbault's intentions, so that he may send some one to him at once,
as he requests."

"That hardly sets my mind at rest," replied the carpenter. "Your father
has a grudge against me; he cannot help recognizing the fact that I am
clear of my fine; but he won't want to let me off without the
imprisonment; for he can punish me for being a vagabond and shut me up,
if it's only for a few days--and that would be too much for me."

"Oh!" cried Gilberte, "I know that Jean could never submit to being
taken to prison by the gendarmes: he would do some other mad thing.
Don't let him be exposed to it, Monsieur Emile; speak to monsieur your
father, entreat him, tell him that----"

"Oh! mademoiselle," replied Emile warmly, "do not share Jean's bad
opinion of my father: it is unjust. I am sure that my father would have
done for him to-night or to-morrow what Monsieur de Boisguilbault has
done. And as for prosecuting him as a vagabond, I will answer for it
with my head that----"

"If you will answer for it with your head," interposed Jean, "why not go
at once to Monsieur de Boisguilbault? his house is close at hand. When
you have arranged matters with him, I shall feel more at ease, for I
have confidence in you, and I confess that a single night in prison
would drive me mad. The good Lord's child told you so," he said, looking
at Gilberte, "and she knows me!"

"I will go at once," rejoined Emile, rising, and bestowing upon Gilberte
a glance alight with zeal and devotion. "Will you show me the way?"

"Come," said the carpenter.

"Yes, yes, go!" cried Gilberte, her father and Janille with one breath.
Emile saw that Gilberte was pleased with him, and he ran to get his
horse.

But as he was descending the path on foot with the carpenter, Monsieur
Châteaubrun ran after him and said with some embarrassment:

"My dear boy, you have a generous heart and great delicacy of feeling,
and I can safely confide in you; I must warn you of one thing--of small
importance perhaps, but which it is essential for you to know. It is
this, that for some reason or other--in short, that I am on bad terms
with Monsieur de Boisguilbault, so that there is no use of your
mentioning me to him. Avoid mentioning my name before him or telling him
that you come from my house; if you do, it may irritate him and cool his
kindly disposition toward our poor Jean."

Emile promised to say nothing and followed his guide in the direction of
Boisguilbault, absorbed by his thoughts, and thinking more of the fair
Gilberte than of his companion and his mission.




XI

A GHOST


However, as they approached the manor of Boisguilbault, Emile began to
wonder what sort of man, whether of superior parts or simply eccentric,
he was to deal with, and he was compelled to attend to the information
which the carpenter, with his rustic good sense, tried to give him
concerning that enigmatical personage. From all that Emile could gather
from this somewhat contradictory information, strewn as it was with
conjectures, he concluded that the Marquis de Boisguilbault was
immensely rich, not at all avaricious, although far from extravagant;
generous so far as his shyness and indifference permitted him to
practise benevolence, that is to say assisting all the poor people who
applied to him, but never taking the trouble to investigate their
sufferings or their needs, and giving every one such a cold and
depressing welcome, that only the most imperative necessity could induce
any one to go near him. And yet he was not a hard and unfeeling man; he
never refused to listen to a complaint or questioned the propriety of
alms-giving. But he was so absent-minded and seemed so indifferent to
everything, that one's heart contracted and congealed in his presence.
He rarely scolded and never punished. Jappeloup was almost the only man
he had ever treated harshly, and the way in which he had now made it up
to him led the carpenter to think that if he had been less proud himself
and had shown himself to the marquis sooner, the latter would not have
remembered the whim that had led him to banish him.

"However," continued Jean, "there's another person whom Monsieur de
Boisguilbault dislikes even more than he does me, although he has never
tried to injure him. But they will never be on good terms again; and as
Monsieur Antoine mentioned the subject to you, I may venture to tell
you, monsieur, that in that matter Monsieur de Boisguilbault made many
people think that there was a screw loose in his brain. Just fancy that
after he had been for twenty years the friend and adviser, almost a
father to his neighbor Monsieur Antoine de Châteaubrun, he suddenly
turned his back on him and shut his door in his face, without anybody,
not even Monsieur Antoine himself, knowing what it was all about. At
least the pretext was so absurd that you can't explain it except by
thinking that he was cracked. It was for some offence that Monsieur
Antoine committed while hunting over the marquis's land. And observe
that, ever since he came into the world, Monsieur Antoine had always
hunted over Monsieur de Boisguilbault's estates as if they were his own,
as they were comrades and good friends; that Monsieur de Boisguilbault,
had never in his life touched a gun or shot a piece of game, had never
made any objection to his neighbors shooting his game; and lastly that
he had never notified Monsieur Antoine that he didn't want him to hunt
over his land. The result has been that since that time, that is to say,
about twenty years, the two neighbors have never met, never exchanged a
word, and Monsieur de Boisguilbault can't bear to hear the name of
Châteaubrun. For his part Monsieur Antoine, although it touches him
more than he is willing to admit, has persisted in making no advances,
and seems to avoid Monsieur de Boisguilbault as carefully as he is
avoided by him. As my dismissal from Boisguilbault took place about the
same time, I believe that the marquis's anger overflowed on me, or else
that, knowing that I was much attached to Monsieur Antoine, he was
afraid that I would be bold enough to broach the subject to him and
reprove him for his whim. In that respect he made no mistake, for my
tongue isn't sluggish and it is certain that I should have made monsieur
le marquis hear what I had to say. He preferred to take the initiative;
I can't explain his harshness to me in any other way."

"Has this man a family?" Emile inquired.

"Not any, monsieur. He married a very pretty young lady, a poor
relation, much too young for him. It resembled a love marriage on his
part, but his conduct didn't show it; for he was neither more cheerful,
nor more approachable, nor more amiable after it. He made no change in
his way of living like a bear, saving the respect I owe him. Monsieur
Antoine continued to be almost the only intimate friend of the house,
and madame was so bored there that one day she went to Paris to live,
and her husband never thought of joining her there or of bringing her
back. She died when she was still very young, without bearing him any
children, and since then, whether because a secret grief has turned his
brain, or because the pleasure of being alone consoles him for
everything, he has lived absolutely secluded in his château, with no
companion, not even a poor dog. His family is almost extinct, he is not
known to have any heirs or any friends; so no one can imagine who will
be enriched by his death."

"Evidently, he's a monomaniac," said Emile.

"What's that?" queried the carpenter.

"I mean that his mind is absorbed by a fixed idea."

"Yes, I believe that you are right; but what is that idea? that is what
no one can say. He is known to have only one attachment. That is for the
park you see yonder, which he laid out and planted himself, and which he
almost never leaves. Indeed I think he sleeps there, on his feet,
walking about; for he has been seen walking in the paths like a ghost at
two o'clock in the morning, and he frightened some people who had crept
in there to purloin a little fruit or firewood."

As they had reached a point opposite the park, and from the high path
they were following could look over into it and see a part of it, Emile
was charmed by the beauty of that pleasure-ground, the magnificence of
the trees, the happy arrangement of the shrubbery, the freshness of the
turf and the graceful shape of the different levels, which descended
gradually to the bank of a small stream, one of the bubbling affluents
of the Gargilesse. He thought that no idiot could have created that
species of earthly paradise and turned the charms of nature to account
so successfully. It seemed to him, on the contrary, that a poetic mind
must have guided that arrangement; but the aspect of the château soon
gave the lie to these conjectures. One can imagine nothing uglier,
colder, more unpleasant to the eye than the manor-house of
Boisguilbault. Additions to the original structure had deprived it of
something of its antique character, and the excellent state of repair in
which it was kept made its surroundings all the more repellent.

Jean stopped at the end of the path where it entered the park, and his
young friend, having given him some of his best cigars to encourage him
to be patient, rode toward the house along a path of discouraging
neatness. Not a blade of grass, not a twig of ivy covered the nakedness
of those high walls, painted an iron-gray, and the only architectural
bit that caught his eye was an escutcheon over the iron gate, bearing
the arms of Boisguilbault, which had been scraped and retouched more
recently than the rest, perhaps at the time of the return of the
Bourbons; at all events there was a marked difference between this crest
and its ponderous framework. Emile drew the inference that the marquis
set much store by his titles and ancient privileges.

He rang a long while at an enormous gate before it opened; at last a
spring was pressed somewhere in the distance that made it turn on its
hinges, although nobody appeared; and, the young man having passed
through after tying his horse, the gate closed behind him with little
noise, as if an invisible hand had caught him in a trap. A feeling of
depression, almost of terror, took possession of him when he found
himself imprisoned as it were in a large, bare, gravelled courtyard,
surrounded by buildings of uniform size, and as silent as the graveyard
of a convent. A number of yews, trimmed to a point and planted in front
of the main doorways, added to the resemblance. For the rest, not a
flower, not a breath of fragrance from a plant, not a sprig of vine
about the windows, not a spider's-web on the panes, not a broken pane,
not a human sound, not even the crowing of a cock or the bark of a dog;
not a pigeon, not a patch of moss on the roofs; I verily believe that
not even an insect ventured to fly or buzz in the courtyard of
Boisguilbault.

Emile was looking about for some one to speak to, seeing not even a
footprint on the freshly raked gravel, when he heard a shrill, cracked
voice call to him in a far from pleasing tone:

"What does monsieur want?"

After turning about several times to see where the voice came from,
Emile finally discovered at an air-hole of a basement kitchen, an old,
well-powdered white head, with light, expressionless eyes; and, drawing
nearer, he tried to make himself heard. But the old butler's hearing was
as weak as his sight, and he answered the visitor's questions at random.

"The park can't be seen except on Sunday," he said; "take the trouble to
come again Sunday."

Emile handed him his card, and the old man, slowly taking his spectacles
from his pocket, without leaving his subterranean air-hole, slowly
examined it; after which he disappeared to reappear at a door just above
his hole.

"Very good, monsieur," he said; "monsieur le marquis ordered me to admit
the person who came from Monsieur Cardonnet; Monsieur Cardonnet of
Gargilesse, isn't it?"

Emile bowed in assent.

"Very good, monsieur," continued the old servant, bowing courteously,
evidently very glad of an opportunity to be polite and hospitable
without violating his orders. "Monsieur le marquis did not think that
you would come so soon; he did not expect you before to-morrow at the
earliest. He is in his park, _I will run_ and tell him. But first I
shall have the honor to escort you to the salon."

When he talked of running, the old man uttered a strange boast; he had
the gait and the agility of a centenarian. He led Emile to the low,
narrow doorway of a stairway turret, and slowly selecting a key from his
bunch preceded him upstairs to another door studded with great nails and
locked like the first. Another key; and, after passing through a long
corridor, a third key to open the apartments. Emile was taken through
several rooms, where the contrast to the bright sunlight was so great
that he seemed to be in utter darkness. At last he entered a vast salon
and the valet waved him to a chair, saying:

"Does monsieur wish me to open the blinds?"

Emile made him understand by signs that it was useless, and the old man
left him alone.

When his eyes became accustomed to the dim grayish light that crept into
that room, he was struck by the sumptuous character of the furniture.
Everything dated from the time of Louis XIII. and one would have said
that a connoisseur had guided the selection of even the least important
articles. Nothing was lacking; from the frames of the mirrors to the
tiniest nail in the hangings, there was not the slightest departure from
the prevailing style. And it was all authentic, partly worn, still in
good condition, although somewhat tarnished, at once rich and simple.
Emile admired Monsieur de Boisguilbault's good taste and knowledge. He
learned later that the disinclination to move and the horror of change,
which seemed hereditary in that family, were alone responsible for the
marvellous preservation and transmission from father to son of these
treasures, which it is the present fashion to collect at great expense
in _bric-à-brac_ shops, which are to-day the most sumptuous and
interesting places imaginable.

But the pleasure which the young man experienced in examining these
curiosities was succeeded by a feeling of extraordinary frigidity and
depression. In addition to the icy atmosphere of a house closed at all
seasons to the generous rays of the sun, in addition to the silence
without, there was something funereal in the regularity of that interior
arrangement, which no one ever disturbed, and in that artistic and noble
luxury which no one was invited to enjoy. It was evident from those
tight-locked doors of which the servant kept the keys, from the
cleanliness unmarred by the slightest speck of dust, from the heavy
closed curtains, that the master never entered the salon, and that the
only constant visitors were a broom and a duster. Emile thought with
horror of the life that the dead and gone Marquise de Boisguilbault,
young and lovely as she was, must have led in that house, dumb and dead
for centuries, and he forgave her with all his heart for having gone
elsewhere for a breath of fresh air before she died. "Who knows," he
thought, "that she did not contract in this tomb one of those slow,
deep-seated maladies which cannot be cured when the remedy is sought too
late?"

He was confirmed in that idea when the door slowly opened and the
châtelain in person appeared before him. Save for the coat it was the
statue of the _Commander_ come down from his pedestal; the same measured
gait, the same pallor, the same absence of expression, the same solemn
and petrified face.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault was barely seventy years of age, but his was
one of those organizations which have not, which have never had any age.
He had not originally a bad figure nor an ugly face. His features were
quite regular; his figure was still erect and his step firm, so long as
he did not hurry. But excessive thinness had done away with all pretence
of shape, and his clothes seemed to be hung upon a man of wood. His face
neither repelled by disdain, nor inspired aversion; but as it expressed
absolutely nothing, as one would have sought in vain at the first glance
to detect upon it any trace of a thought or emotion referable to any
known type of humanity, it inspired fear; and Emile involuntarily
thought of the German legend, in which a very well-dressed individual
appears at the door of the château and apologizes for being unable to
enter in the state in which he is, for fear of disturbing the company.
"Why, you seem to me to be very decently dressed," says the hospitable
châtelain. "Come in, I beg you." "No, no," the other replies, "it is
impossible, and you would blame me if I did. Be good enough to listen to
me in the doorway; I bring you news from the other world." "What do you
mean by that? Come in; it rains, and the storm will soon burst." "Look
at me carefully," says the mysterious visitor, "and you will see that I
cannot sit at your table without violating all the laws of hospitality.
Can it be that you don't see that I am dead?" The châtelain looks at
him closely and sees that he is, in very truth, dead. He closes the door
between him and the dead man and returns to the banquet hall, where he
swoons.

Emile did not swoon when Monsieur de Boisguilbault greeted him; but if,
instead of saying, "Excuse me for keeping you waiting, I was in my
park," he had said, "I was just being buried," the young man would not
have been greatly surprised.

The marquis's superannuated costume heightened the ghost-like aspect of
his face. He had been fashionably dressed once in his life, on his
wedding-day. Since then it had never occurred to him to make any change
in his dress, and he had invariably given his tailor for a model the
coat he had just worn out, on the pretext that he was accustomed to it
and that he was afraid he should be uncomfortable in one of a different
cut. He was dressed therefore in the costume of a dandy of the Empire,
which formed a most extraordinary contrast to his withered, melancholy
face. A very short green coat, nankeen breeches, a very stiff
shirt-frill, heart-shaped boots, and, to remain true to his habits, a
little flaxen wig of the color that his hair used to be, gathered up in
a bunch over the middle of his forehead. A very high starched collar,
which raised his long snow-white whiskers to the level of his eyes, gave
to his long face the shape of a triangle. He was scrupulously clean, and
yet a few bits of dry moss on his clothes showed that he had not made
his toilet expressly to receive his guest, but that he was accustomed to
walk alone in his park in that invariable dress.

He sat down without speaking, bowed without speaking, and looked at
Emile without speaking. At first the young man was embarrassed by this
silence, and wondered if he should not attribute it to disdain. But when
he saw that the marquis was awkwardly twisting a twig of honeysuckle in
his hands as if to keep himself in countenance, he realized that the old
man was as timid as a child, whether by nature or because of his
long-continued and persistent abandonment of all social relations.

He determined therefore to begin the conversation, and, wishing to make
himself agreeable to his host, in order to encourage him in his kindly
impulse toward the carpenter, he did not hesitate to be-marquis him at
every word, indulging in secret, it may be, in a feeling of contempt for
his pride of birth.

But this ironical deference seemed as indifferent to the marquis as the
object of Emile's visit. He answered in monosyllables to thank him for
his promptness and to reiterate his undertaking to pay the delinquent's
fines.

"This is a noble and praiseworthy act of yours, monsieur le marquis,"
said Emile, "and your protégé, in whom I am very deeply interested, is
as grateful as he is worthy. You probably do not know that at the time
of the recent inundation he jumped into the river to save a child, and
succeeded in doing it by incurring great risk."

"He saved a child--his own?" asked Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who had
not seemed to hear Emile's words, his manner was so indifferent and
preoccupied.

"No, somebody's else; he didn't know whose. I asked the same question,
and was told that the child's parents were almost strangers to him."

"And he saved him?" the marquis repeated, after a moment's silence,
during which another imaginary world seemed to have passed before his
brain. "He is very lucky."

The marquis's voice and accent were even more repellent than his bearing
and features. He spoke slowly; the words seemed to come from his mouth
with an extreme effort, a dull monotone, without the slightest
inflection. "Evidently he never goes out and sees no one because he
knows that he is dead," said Emile to himself, still thinking of his
German legend.

"Now, monsieur le marquis, will you kindly tell me why you wished my
father to send you an envoy? I am here to receive your instructions."

"Because"--replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault, a little disturbed at
having to make a direct answer and trying to collect his ideas,
"because--I'll tell you. This man you speak of would not like to go to
jail, and we must prevent it. Tell your father to prevent it."

"That doesn't concern my father at all, monsieur le marquis; he
certainly will not invoke the rigor of the law against poor Jean, but he
cannot prevent the law's taking its course."

"I beg your pardon," replied the marquis, "he can speak or send someone
to speak to the local authorities. He has influence or should have."

"But why shouldn't you do this yourself, monsieur le marquis? You have
been in the province longer than my father, and if you believe in
influence, you must rate your privileges in that regard higher than
ours."

"The privileges of birth are no longer fashionable," replied Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, with no indication of vexation or regret. "Your father,
being a manufacturer, is sure to be more highly considered than I am.
And then nobody knows me now, I am too old; I don't even know whom to
apply to; I have forgotten all about it. If Monsieur Cardonnet will take
the trouble to speak, that man will not be prosecuted for vagabondage."

After this long speech, Monsieur de Boisguilbault heaved a great sigh as
if he were thoroughly exhausted. But Emile had already noticed his
strange habit of sighing, which was not precisely the choking of a
victim of asthma nor an expression of mental pain. It was more like a
nervous trick, which did not change the impassibility of his face but
which was so frequent that it acted upon the nerves of his auditor and
eventually produced a most painful impression upon Emile.

"I think, monsieur le marquis," he said, wishing to sound him a little,
"that you would have a poor opinion of a social system wherein any
privilege, either of birth or fortune, was the only protection of the
poor or the weak against too vigorous laws. I prefer to think that moral
force and influence are on the side of the man who can most successfully
invoke the laws of clemency and humanity."

"In that case, monsieur, do you act in my place," the marquis replied.

There was something of humility and something of flattery in that
laconic reply, and yet there was perhaps a touch of irony in it as well.

"Who knows," said Emile to himself, "that this old misanthrope isn't a
pitiless satirist? Very well; I will defend myself."

"I am ready to do all that is in my power to do for your protégé," he
replied; "and if I fail, it will be for lack of ability, not for lack of
energy and good-will."

Perhaps the marquis did not understand this rebuke. He seemed impressed
only by one word which Emile then used for the second time, and he
repeated it in a sort of dazed reverie.

"Protégé," said he, sighing after his wont.

"I should have said your debtor," rejoined Emile, who already regretted
his precipitation and feared that he might have injured the carpenter.
"By whatever name you would have me call him, monsieur le marquis, the
man is overflowing with gratitude for your kindness to him, and, if he
had dared, he would have come with me to thank you again."

A slight flush tinged Monsieur de Boisguilbault's cheeks for an instant,
and he replied in a less hesitating tone:

"I hope he will leave me in peace hereafter."

Emile was wounded by this rebuff and he could not resist the impulse to
manifest his feeling.

"If I were in his place," he said with some warmth, "I should be greatly
distressed to be burdened by an obligation which my devotion, my
gratitude and my services could never remove. You would be even more
generous than you are, monsieur le marquis, if you would allow honest
Jean Jappeloup to offer you his thanks and his services."

"Monsieur," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, picking up a pin and
sticking it into his sleeve, whether to avoid manifesting a sort of
confusion which overcame him, or from an inveterate habit of
orderliness, "I warn you that I am irascible--very irascible."

His voice was so calm and his utterance so slow as he gave Emile this
advice, that he nearly laughed in his face.

"Upon my word," he thought, "we are a little _cracked_, as Jean says. If
I have been so unfortunate as to offend you, monsieur le marquis," he
said, rising, "I will take my leave in order not to aggravate my
offence, for I might perhaps make the mistake of asking you to be
perfect, and it would be your own fault."

"How so?" said the marquis, twisting his sprig of honeysuckle with an
agitation which seemed not to extend beyond the ends of his fingers.

"We are apt to be exacting with those whom we esteem, I would venture to
say with those whom we admire, if I did not fear to offend your
modesty."

"Are you really going?" said the marquis after a moment of problematical
silence and in a still more problematical tone.

"Yes, monsieur le marquis, I offer you my compliments."

"Why will you not dine with me?"

"That is impossible," Emile replied, bewildered and appalled by such a
suggestion.

"You would be terribly bored!" said the marquis, with a sigh which
found, I know not how, the road to Emile's heart.

"Monsieur," he replied, with spontaneous cordiality, "I will come again
and dine with you when you choose."

"To-morrow, then!" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault in a melancholy tone,
which seemed desirous to contradict the heartiness of his invitation.

"To-morrow, so be it," rejoined the young man.

"Oh no! not to-morrow," said the marquis; "to-morrow will be Monday, a
bad day for me. But Tuesday; will that suit you?"

Emile accepted with very good grace, but in his heart he was dismayed at
the idea of a tête-à-tête of some hours with that dead man, and he
regretted an outburst of compassion which he had been unable to resist.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault meanwhile seemed to lay aside his fear; he
insisted upon escorting his visitor to the gate where he had tied his
horse. "You have a pretty little animal there," he said, examining
Corbeau with the eye of a connoisseur. "He's a _Brenne_, well-bred,
strong and quiet. Are you a good horseman?"

"I have more experience and courage than skill," replied Emile; "I have
never had time to learn equestrianism by rule, but I intend to do so as
soon as I have a favorable opportunity."

"It is a noble and useful exercise," said the marquis; "if you care to
come and see me now and then, I will place what little I know at your
service."

Emile accepted the offer courteously, but he could not forbear a
significant glance at the slender individual who put himself forward as
a professor.

"Is this fellow well trained?" Monsieur de Boisguilbault inquired, as he
patted Corbeau's neck.

"He is docile and willing, but otherwise he's as ignorant as his
master."

"I don't care very much for animals," said the marquis; "however, I
sometimes give a little attention to horses and I will show you some
very good pupils of mine. Will you allow me to try the qualities of
yours?"

Emile made haste to turn his courser for the marquis to mount; but he
was so afraid of an accident when he saw how slowly and painfully the
old man hoisted himself into the saddle, that he could not refrain from
warning him, even at the risk of insulting him, that Corbeau was a
little restive and mettlesome.

The marquis received the warning without taking offence, but persisted
none the less in his plan, with comical gravity. Emile trembled for his
venerable host, and Corbeau quivered with anger and dread under that
strange hand. He even tried to rebel, and from the marquis's gentle
manner of dealing with his rebellion, you would have said that he was
rather ill at ease himself. "There, there, my boy," he said, patting his
neck, "let's not get excited."

But that was only a consequence of his theories, which forbade the
maltreatment of a horse as the crime of _lèse-science_. He gradually
quieted his steed without punishing him, and riding him about his great
bare gravelled courtyard as if it were a riding-school, he tried him at
all his gaits, and with extraordinary ease made him go through all the
various evolutions and changes of foot which he would have required from
a well-schooled horse. Corbeau seemed to submit without effort; but when
the marquis turned him over to Emile his distended nostrils and his
quarters, dripping with sweat, revealed the mysterious power to which
that firm hand and those long legs had subjected him.


[Illustration: _MONSIEUR DE BOISGUILBAULT TRIES
EMILE'S HORSE._

_He gradually quieted his steed without punishing him, and riding him
about his great bare gravelled courtyard as if it were a riding-school,
he tried him at all his gaits, and with extraordinary ease made him go
through all the various evolutions and changes of foot which he would
have required from a well-schooled horse._]


"I had no idea that he knew so much!" said Emile, by way of flattering
the marquis.

"He's a very intelligent beast," was the modest reply.

When Emile was in the saddle, Corbeau reared and plunged furiously, as
if to revenge himself upon a less experienced rider for the wearisome
lesson he had received.

"That's a strange _dead man_!" said Emile to himself, as he rode rapidly
along the path that led him back to Jean Jappeloup, thinking of that
asthmatic marquis, who was covered with confusion before a child, and
subdued a spirited horse. "Can it be that corpse-like face and that dead
voice belong to a character of iron?"

He found the carpenter exceedingly impatient and anxious; but when he
had given him an account of the conference, he said:

"That is first-rate; I am obliged to you and I place my interests in
your hands. But a man must do what he can to help himself, and that is
what I propose to do. While you go and write to the authorities, I will
go and see them. Your writing will take time, and I cannot sleep until I
have embraced my friends at Gargilesse in broad daylight, after vespers,
on the steps of our church. I am off to the village----"

"And suppose you are arrested on the way?"

"I shan't be arrested on a road which I know and the gendarmes don't. I
will arrive at night and slip into the king's attorney's kitchen. His
cook is my niece. I have a good tongue and I will explain my position; I
will tell my reasons for what I do, and before sunset to-morrow I will
enter my village with my head in the air."

Without awaiting Emile's reply, the carpenter darted off like a flash
and disappeared in the bushes.




XII

INDUSTRIAL DIPLOMACY


When Emile informed his father that the carpenter had found a protector,
and told him how he had employed his day, Monsieur Cardonnet became
thoughtful, and for some moments maintained a silence as problematical
as Monsieur de Boisguilbault's pauses and sighs. But the apparent
coldness of the two men indicated no resemblance between their
respective characters. In the marquis it was due to instinct, habit and
incapacity, whereas, in the manufacturer it was a quality acquired by a
powerful exertion of the will. In the marquis it was due to the slow and
embarrassed working of the mind; in the other, on the contrary, it
served as a veil and a curb to the activity of a too impetuous mind. In
a word, it was assumed in Monsieur Cardonnet. It was a borrowed dignity,
a rôle assumed in order to make an impression on other men; and, while
he seemed thus to hold himself in check, he was calculating feverishly
the best method of venting the wrath that was about to explode, and its
effects. And so, while Monsieur de Boisguilbault's vexed irresolution
resulted only in a few mysterious monosyllables, Monsieur Cardonnet's
deceptive calm covered a storm, the explosion of which he postponed to
suit himself, but which found vent sooner or later in significant and
unambiguous words. It may be said that the life of one was nourished by
its energetic manifestations, whereas the other's wore itself out in
repressed emotions.

Monsieur Cardonnet was very well aware that his son was not to be easily
convinced, and that it was impossible to intimidate him by violence or
threats. He had come in collision too frequently with that energetic
will, he had had too much experience of his power of resistance,
although it had hitherto been only in regard to trivial matters
pertaining to young men, not to realize that it was essential first of
all to inspire a well-founded respect. He made few false moves therefore
in his presence, but, on the contrary, kept an extremely close watch
upon himself.

"Well, father, do you regret poor Jean's good luck?" said Emile, "and do
you blame me for meeting his protector's kind intentions half-way? I
felt absolutely certain of your approval, and this suspicious carpenter
must be taught to know you, to respect you, yes, and to like you."

"All this," said Monsieur Cardonnet, "is mere talk. You must write in
his behalf at once. My secretary is busy, but I presume that you will be
willing to take his place sometimes in confidential matters."

"Oh! with all my heart," cried Emile.

"Write then, and I will dictate."

And Monsieur Cardonnet dictated several letters overflowing with zeal
and solicitude for the delinquent, and couched in terms of rare
propriety and dignity. He went so far as to offer himself as security
for Jean Jappeloup, in case--although he said it was impossible--that
Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who had anticipated his own intentions,
should recede from his undertaking. When these letters were signed and
sealed, he bade Emile despatch them at once by a messenger, and added:

"Now I have done as you wished; I have interrupted my business so that
your protégé should not be subjected to the slightest delay. I return
to my work. We shall dine in an hour, and then you must stay with your
mother, whom you have neglected a little to-day. But to-night, when the
men have stopped work, I trust that you will hold yourself at my
disposal and that I may be able to talk with you on serious subjects."

"I am at your service, father, this evening and my whole life, as you
know very well," said Emile, embracing him.

Monsieur Cardonnet congratulated himself for not yielding to an angry
impulse; he had recovered all his influence over Emile. In the evening,
when the factory was closed and the workmen dismissed, he betook himself
to a part of his garden which the flood had failed to reach, and walked
there a long while alone, reflecting as to what he should say to this
child who was so hard to manage, not intending to summon him until he
should feel that he was in perfect control of himself.

The feverish fatigue which follows a day of giving orders and
overlooking others, the spectacle of devastation which he still had
before his eyes, and perhaps the state of the atmosphere as well, were
ill adapted to soothe the nervous irritation which had become habitual
with Monsieur Cardonnet. The temperature had indulged in such a sudden
and violent change that the result was abnormal and enervating. The warm
air was laden with vapors, as in November, although it was midsummer.
But it was not the cool, transparent mist of autumn, but rather a
suffocating smoke which exhaled from the ground. The path where the
manufacturer strode was bordered on one side by rose-bushes and other
brilliant flowers. On the other there were only débris, boards piled in
disorder, huge stones brought thither by the water; and from that point,
at which the flood had stopped, to the bank of the stream, several acres
of garden, covered with black mud streaked with red gravel, resembled an
American forest flooded and half-uprooted by the overflow of the Ohio or
Mississippi. The young trees that had been overthrown lay with their
branches interlaced in pools of stagnant water, which could find no
outlet under those fortuitous dikes. Beautiful plants, crushed and
besmirched, tried in vain to rise, but remained lying in the mud, while,
in the case of some others, the abundant moisture had already caused
superb flowers to bloom triumphantly upon half-broken stalks. Their
delicious fragrance struggled against the brackish odor of the slime,
and when a faint breeze raised the mist, that fragrance and that strange
odor reached the nostrils alternately. A multitude of frogs, which
seemed to have fallen with the rain, were croaking with disgusting
energy among the reeds; and the roar of the factory, which it was not
yet possible to stop, so that the machinery was constantly running and
wearing itself out uselessly, made Monsieur Cardonnet feverishly
impatient. Meanwhile the nightingale sang in the thickets that had been
left unharmed, and saluted the full moon with the nonchalance of a lover
or an artist. It was a medley of happiness and consternation, of
ugliness and beauty, as if omnipotent Nature laughed at losses ruinous
to man but trifling to herself, who needed but a day of sunlight and a
cool, damp night to repair them.

Despite Cardonnet's efforts to concentrate his thoughts upon the
interests of his family, he was disturbed and distracted at every turn
by his anxiety concerning his pecuniary interests. "Infernal river," he
thought, glaring involuntarily at the torrent that flowed proudly and
mockingly at his feet, "when will you abandon an impossible fight? I
shall find a way to chain you up and curb you at last. More stone, more
iron, and you will flow within the bounds that my hand marks out for
you. Oh! I shall succeed in overcoming your reckless power, in
anticipating your whims, in stimulating your languor and crushing your
temper. The genius of man is bound to triumph over the blind rebellion
of nature on this spot. Twenty more men, and you will feel the curb.
Money, and more money! It takes a small mountain of money to stop
mountains of water. It is all a question of time and opportunity. My
product must come to hand on the appointed day, to meet my expenses. A
month of carelessness or discouragement would ruin everything. Credit is
a pit that one must dig without hesitation, because at the bottom lies
the treasure of profit. I must dig on! I must keep digging! The man is a
fool and a coward who stops on the way and allows his plans and his
outlay to be swallowed up in space. No, no, treacherous stream, feminine
terror, lying predictions of the envious, you shall not frighten me, you
shall not induce me to abandon my work, when I have made so many
sacrifices on account of it, when the sweat of so many men has already
flowed in vain, when my brain has already expended so much effort and my
intelligence has given birth to so many miracles! Either this stream
shall draw my dead body into its slime, or it shall submissively carry
the results of my toil!"

And in the painful tension of his faculties, Monsieur Cardonnet stamped
his foot on the bank with a sort of frenzied enthusiasm.

Meanwhile the thought came to his mind that from his own blood had come
forth an obstacle more alarming for the future than storms and the
river. His son could ruin or, at least, sadly embarrass everything in a
day. However intense the man's earnestness and the jealousy of his
character, he could never be satisfied to work for himself alone, and
there is no capitalist who does not live in the future by virtue of his
family ties. Cardonnet felt a fierce affection for his son in the depths
of his heart. Oh! if he could only recast that rebellious mind and
identify Emile with his own life! How proud he would be, what a feeling
of security he would enjoy! But this boy, who had superior faculties for
anything except what his father desired, seemed to have conceived a
conscientious contempt for wealth, and it was necessary to find some
joint in his armor, some vulnerable point at which that terrible passion
could be forced into his system. Cardonnet was well aware what chords
must be touched; but could he counteract or change the nature of his own
mental habit and his own talent sufficiently to produce no discord? The
instrument was at once powerful and delicate. The slightest lack of
harmony in the theory he was about to expound would be detected by a
watchful and perspicacious judge.

In a word it was necessary that Cardonnet, a man of violent temper and
at the same time of much adroitness, in whom, however, the habit of
domination was more powerful than the habit of strategy, should fight a
terrific battle with himself, stifle every violent impulse, and speak
the language of a conviction that was not altogether genuine. At last,
feeling calmer, and deeming himself sufficiently prepared, he sent for
Emile and returned to await his coming on the spot where he had lately
been absorbed in a long and painful meditation.

"Well, father," said the young man, taking his hand affectionately and
with evident emotion, for he felt that the moment was at hand when he
should know which was destined to carry the day in his heart, filial
affection, or terror and reproof; "well, father, here I am, ready to
receive the communication you promised me. I am twenty-one years old,
and I feel that I am becoming a man. You have delayed a long while to
set me free from the law of silence and blind confidence; my heart has
submitted as long as it can, but my common sense is beginning to speak
very loudly, and I await your paternal voice to reconcile them. You will
do it, I have no doubt, and throw open the doors of life to me; for thus
far I have done nothing but dream and wait and look. I have been
assailed by strange doubts, and I have suffered much already without
daring to mention it to you. Now you will cure me, you will give me the
key to this labyrinth in which I have gone astray; you will mark out for
me a path to the future which I shall delight to follow; happy and proud
if I can walk beside you!"

"My son," replied Monsieur Cardonnet, somewhat disturbed by this
effusive exordium, "you have acquired, _yonder_, a habit of using
emphatic language which I cannot imitate. This manner of talking is
ill-advised, in that the mind gets heated and excited, and soon goes
astray in an outburst of exaggerated emotion. I know that you love me
and believe in me. You know that I cherish you above all things, and
that your future is my only aim, my only thought. Let us talk
reasonably, then, and coolly, if it is possible. Let us first of all
review your brief and happy life. You were born in comfort, and as I
worked hard and constantly, wealth took its place under your feet, so
quickly and so naturally that you hardly noticed it. Each year increased
the possibilities of your future career, and you were hardly more than a
child when I began to think of your old age and of the future of your
children. You showed a praiseworthy disposition to work--but only at
useless arts, drawing, music, poetry,--ornamental accomplishments. It
was my duty to combat and I did combat the development of these artistic
instincts, when I saw that they threatened to stifle more essential and
more solid faculties.

"By creating your fortune, I created duties for you. The fine arts are
the blessing and the treasure of the poor man; but wealth demands powers
of a sterner temper to support the weight of the obligations it imposes.
I questioned myself; I saw what my own education lacked, and it seemed
to me that we ought to complement each other, since we were, by the law
of blood, partners in the same enterprise. I was well versed in the
industrial theories to which I had devoted myself; but as I had not had
experience in putting them in practice early enough in life, as I had
not studied the practical part of my vocation and could solve problems
in geometry and mechanics only by instinct and a sort of divination, I
was likely to make mistakes, to start upon false scents, to allow myself
to be led astray by my own dreams or those of other people, in a word,
to lose, in addition to large sums of money, days, weeks, years, that is
to say, time, which is the most valuable of all forms of capital. I
determined therefore that you should be instructed in the mechanical
sciences immediately after leaving school, and you forced yourself to
work hard and faithfully, despite your youth. But your mind soon chose
to take a flight which carried you away from my goal.

"The study of the exact sciences led you, against my will and your own,
to a passion for the natural sciences, and, starting off at random, you
thought of nothing but astronomy and of dreaming of worlds to which we
can never go. After a contest in which I was not the stronger, I made
you abandon those sciences, although I was not able to bring you back to
a healthy and profitable application to the others; and, abandoning the
idea of making you a mechanical engineer, I looked about to see in what
way you could be useful to me. When I say useful to me, I assume that
you do not mistake the sense in which I use the words. As my fortune was
yours, it was my duty to train you to the work which will probably wear
my life out to your advantage before long; that is in the natural order
of things. I am happy to do my duty, and I shall persist in doing it in
spite of you, if necessary. But should not good sense and paternal
affection impel me to make you capable of preserving and defending that
fortune, at all events, if not of developing it? My ignorance of the law
had placed me a hundred times at the mercy of foolish or treacherous
advice. I had been victimized by those parasites of pettifoggery who,
having neither any genuine knowledge nor any healthy understanding of
business, demand blind submission from their clients, and endanger their
most valuable interests by folly, obstinacy, presumption, false tactics,
useless subtleties and the rest. Thereupon, I said to myself that with a
keen, quick intellect like yours, you could learn the law in a few years
and obtain a sufficiently accurate idea of the details of procedure to
need no other guide, no other adviser, and, above all, no other
confidant than yourself. I had no desire to make of you an orator, an
advocate, an assize court comedian, but I asked you to obtain your
certificates and pass your examinations. You promised to do it!"

"Well, father, have I ever rebelled, have I broken my promise?" said
Emile, surprised to hear Monsieur Cardonnet speak with superb and as it
were insulting contempt of that profession of which he had done his best
to extol the honor and brilliancy, when it was a question of persuading
his son to study it.

"Emile," rejoined the manufacturer, "I do not propose to reproach you;
but you have a passive, apathetic way of submitting, that is a hundred
times worse than resistance. If I could have foreseen that you would
waste your time, I would very quickly have thought of something else;
for, as I have told you, time is the capital of capital, and here are
two years of your life which have had no result in the way of developing
your faculties and therefore none in the way of assuring your future."

"I flatter myself that the contrary is true," said Emile, with a smile
of mingled sweetness and pride, "and I can assure you, father, that I
have worked hard, read a great deal, thought a great deal--I dare not
say learned a great deal--since I have been at Poitiers."

"Oh! I know very well what you have read and learned, Emile! I should
have found it out from your letters even if I had not learned
it from my correspondent; and I tell you that all this fine
philosophico-metaphysico-politico-economical learning is of all things
the vainest, the falsest, the most chimerical and the most ridiculous,
not to say the most dangerous, for a young man. It has gone so far that
your last letters would have made me roar with laughter as a judge, if I
had not felt a mortal disappointment as a father; and it was precisely
because I saw that you had mounted a new hobby-horse and were about to
take your flight through space once more that I resolved to summon you
here, perhaps for a time only, perhaps for good, if I do not succeed in
restoring you to your senses."

"Your sarcasm and your contempt are very cruel, father, and grieve my
heart more than they wound my self-esteem. That I am not in full accord
with you is possible. I am prepared to hear you deny all my beliefs; but
that you should repulse me with ironical jeers, when, for the first time
in my life, I feel a longing and have the courage to pour all my
thoughts and all my emotions into your bosom--that is a very bitter
thing to me, and does me more harm than you think."

"There is more pride than you think in this puerile gentleness. Am I not
your father, your best friend? Should I not force you to hear the truth
when you are deceiving yourself and lead you back when you go astray?
Come! a truce to vanity between us! I think more of your intelligence
than you do yourself, for I do not propose to allow it to degenerate by
feeding on unhealthy food. Listen to me, Emile! I know very well that it
is the fashion among the young men of to-day to pose as legislators, to
philosophize on every subject, to reform institutions that will last
much longer than they will, and to invent religions and social
systems--a new morality. The imagination delights in these chimeras, and
they are very innocent when they don't last too long. But we must leave
it all on the benches at school, and learn to know and understand
society before destroying it. We soon discover that it is far superior
to us, and that the wisest course is to submit to it, with shrewd
tolerance. You are too big a boy now to waste your desires and
reflections on a subject that has no bottom. I wish you to become
interested in real, positive life; to study the meaning and application
of the laws by which we are governed, instead of exhausting yourself in
criticizing them. On the other hand, if such study tends to create a
spirit of reaction and of disgust with the truth, you must abandon it
and set about finding something useful to do for which you feel that you
are fitted. Come, we are here to have an understanding and arrive at
some conclusion: no vain declamations, no poetic dithyrambs against
heaven and mankind! Poor creatures of a day that we are, we have no time
to waste in trying to ascertain our destiny before and after our brief
appearance on earth. We shall never solve that enigma. It is our bounden
duty to work incessantly here on earth and to go hence without a murmur.
We must account for our labors to the generation that precedes us and
shapes us, and to that which follows us and which we shape. That is why
family bonds are sacred and the rights of inheritance inalienable,
despite your fine communistic theories, which I have never been able to
understand, because they are not ripe and the human race must still wait
for centuries before accepting them. Tell me, what do you propose to
do?"

"I have absolutely no idea," replied Emile, overwhelmed by this
avalanche of narrow-minded, cold commonplaces, uttered with brutal and
arrogant fluency. "You solve with so much assurance questions which it
will probably require my whole life to solve, that I am unable to follow
you in this ardent race toward an unknown goal. I am too weak and my
intelligence is apparently too limited to find in my own energy the
motive or the reward of so many efforts. My tastes in no wise incline me
to make them. I love mental labor, and I should love bodily labor, if it
should become the servant of the other in procuring the gratification of
the heart; but to work in order to hoard, to hoard in order to retain
and increase one's hoard, until death puts an end to this unreasoning
thirst--that has neither sense nor any attraction to me. I possess no
faculty which you can employ for that object; I am not born a gambler
and the enthralling chances of the rise and fall of my fortune will
never cause me the slightest emotion. If my aspirations and my
enthusiasm are chimeras unworthy of a serious mind, if there is no
eternal truth, no divine reason for the existence of things, no ideal
which we can carry in our heart to sustain ourselves and guide our
footsteps through the evils and injustices of the present, then I no
longer exist, I no longer believe in anything; I consent to die for you,
father; but as to living and struggling like you and with you, I have
neither the heart nor the arm nor the head for that sort of work."

Monsieur Cardonnet quivered with rage, but he restrained himself. Not
without design had he thus awkwardly aroused his son's indignation and
spirit of resistance. He had determined to lead him on to speak out his
whole thought, and to test his enthusiasm, so to speak. When he realized
from the young man's bitter tone and desperate expression that it really
was as serious as he had feared, he determined to go around the obstacle
and to manœuvre in such a way as to recover his influence.




XIII

THE STRUGGLE


"Emile," rejoined the manufacturer with well-feigned calmness, "I see
that we have been talking for some moments without understanding each
other, and that if we continue on this tack you will pick a quarrel with
me and treat me as if you were a young saint and I an old heathen. With
whom are you in such a passion? I was quite right, at the outset, to try
to put you on your guard against enthusiasm. All this warmth of brain is
simply youthful effervescence, and when you are as old as I am and have
had a little experience and are accustomed to doing your duty, you won't
think it necessary to flap your wings in order to be honest, or to shout
your convictions so loud. Beware of emphasis, which is nothing more than
the language of self-satisfied vanity. Tell me, boy, do you happen to
believe that honor, morality, good faith in keeping engagements, humane
sentiments, pity for the unfortunate, devotion to country, respect for
the rights of others, domestic virtues and the love of one's neighbor
are very rare and substantially impossible virtues in these days and in
the world we live in?"

"Yes, father, I do firmly believe it."

"Well, I believe nothing of the kind. I am less misanthropic at fifty
than you are at one-and-twenty; I have a better opinion of my
fellow-men, apparently because I don't possess your lights and your
infallible glance!"

"In heaven's name! do not make fun of me, father; you break my heart."

"Very well, let us talk seriously. I will assume with you that those
virtues are the religion and the rule of life of a small number of
people. Will you at least do me the honor to assume that they are not
wholly foreign to your father's character?"

"Most of your acts, father, have convinced me that to do good was your
sole ambition. Why then do your words seem to attempt to show me that
you have a less noble aim?"

"That is precisely what I want to come at. You agree that my conduct is
irreproachable, and yet you are scandalized to hear me appeal to calm
common sense and to the counsel of sound logic! Tell me, what would you
think of your father if, every hour in the day, you should hear him
declaiming against those who do not follow his example? If, setting
himself up as a model, and all puffed out with self-love and
self-admiration, he should weary you at every turn with his own praises
and with anathemas hurled at the rest of mankind? You would hold your
peace and throw a veil over that annoying absurdity; but, do what you
would, the thought would come that your worthy father had one deplorable
weakness and that his vanity detracted from his merit."

"Doubtless, father, I prefer your reserve and your judicious modesty;
but when we are alone together, and on the rare and solemn occasions
when you deign to open your heart to me, should I not be overjoyed to
hear you extol noble ideas and kindle a holy enthusiasm in my heart,
instead of hearing you sneer at my aspirations and trample them
contemptuously in the dirt."

"I do not despise noble ideas, nor do I laugh at your worthy
aspirations. What I do spurn and what I desire to stifle in you are the
declamation and braggadocio of the new humanitarian schools. I cannot
endure their holding up principles as old as the world in the guise of
truths unheard of until this day. I would like you to love duty with
immovable tranquillity, and perform it with the stoical silence of
genuine conviction. Believe me, an acquaintance with good and evil
doesn't date from yesterday, and I did not wait to learn justice until
you had sucked in the celestial manna while smoking your cigar on the
sidewalks of Poitiers."

"All this may be true, generally speaking," said Emile, heated by
Monsieur Cardonnet's persistent irony. "There are old citizens who, like
you, father, practise virtue without ostentation, and there may be
impertinent students who preach it without loving it and, as it were,
without knowing what it is. But your last shaft of satire I can not take
to my own account or that of my young friends. I do not claim to be
anything more than a child and do not pride myself on any experience I
may have had. On the contrary, I come with respect and confidence,
actuated only by good instincts and good intentions, to ask you for the
truth, for advice, example, assistance and instruction. I have on my
side only my youthful ideas, and I lay them at your feet. Disgusted as I
am by the shocking contradictions which the laws of society recognize
and sanction, I implore you to tell me how you have been able to accept
them without protest, and to remain an honest man. I confess that I am
weak and ignorant, for I cannot conceive the possibility of such a
thing. So tell me, I pray you, instead of heaping freezing sarcasm on
me. Am I blameworthy in asking for light? am I insolent and mad because
I desire to know the laws of my conscience and the aim of my life? Yes,
your character is noble and your conduct judicious and wise; your heart
is kind and your hand liberal; you assist the poor man and you pay him
handsomely for his labor. But whither are you going by this straight,
sure road? It seems to me that you sometimes lack indulgence, and your
severity has often frightened me.

"I have always said to myself that your sight was clearer and your mind
more provident than those of tender, timid natures, that the momentary
suffering you inflict was with a view to doing lasting good and to
strengthening the foundations of talent; and so, notwithstanding my
distaste for the studies you imposed upon me, notwithstanding the
sacrifice of my tastes to your hidden purposes, and the constant denial
and stifling of my desires at their birth, I made it the law of my life
to follow you and obey you in everything. But the time has come when you
must open my eyes if you wish me to succeed in this superhuman effort;
for the study of the law doesn't satisfy my conscience; I cannot imagine
myself ever engaging in legal contests, still less compelling myself,
like you, to urge men on to toil for my benefit, unless I see clearly
whither I am going and what sacrifice beneficial to mankind I shall have
consummated at the cost of my happiness."

"Your happiness then would consist in doing nothing and living with your
arms folded, staring at the stars? It seems that work of any sort vexes
and tires you, even the study of the law, which all young men learn in
sport?"

"You are well aware that the contrary is true, father; you saw me become
passionately interested in the most abstract studies, and you stopped me
as if I were rushing to my destruction. You know well, however, what my
wishes were, when you urged me to seek some material application of the
sciences I preferred. You were not willing that I should be an artist or
a poet; perhaps you were right; but I might have been a naturalist, or
at least an agriculturist, and you forbade that. And yet that was a
real, practical application.

"Love of nature impelled me toward life in the country. The infinite
pleasure that I took in investigating nature's laws and mysteries led me
naturally to the discovery of its concealed forces and to the attempt to
guide them and make them more fruitful by intelligent toil. Yes, that
was my vocation, you may be sure. Agriculture is in its infancy; the
peasant wears himself out in monotonous routine tasks; vast tracts of
land are untilled. Science would increase tenfold the richness of the
soil and lighten the labor of man.

"My ideas concerning society were in accord with my dreams of such a
future. I asked you to send me to some model farm to study. I should
have been happy to become a peasant, to work with mind and body, to be
constantly in contact with men and things as nature knows them. I would
have applied myself with zeal, I would have ploughed farther than some
others perhaps in the field of discoveries! And some day I would have
founded, upon some desert, naked tract of land transformed by my labors,
a colony of free men living together like brothers and loving me as a
brother. That was my only ambition, in that direction alone was I
thirsty for fortune and glory. Was it an insane freak? and why did you
require me to go and work like a slave to learn a code of laws that will
never be mine?"

"There you are! there you are!" said Monsieur Cardonnet shrugging his
shoulders; "there we have the Utopia of Brother Emile, Moravian brother,
Quaker, Neo-Christian, Neo-Platonist and God knows what. It is
magnificent, but it is absurd."

"Pray tell me why, father? for again you pronounce sentence without
giving any reasons."

"Because, mingling your socialistic Utopias with your vain speculations
as a scientist, you would have poured treasures upon the barren rock,
you would not have raised wheat from the sterile soil nor would you have
raised men capable of living as brothers from the communistic idea. You
would have spent foolishly with one hand what I had saved with the
other; and, at forty years of age, with your imagination run dry, at the
end of your genius and your confidence, disgusted with the imbecility or
the perversity of your disciples, mad perhaps--for that is what
excitable and romantic minds come to when they seek to put their dreams
in practice, you would have come back to me, crushed by your
helplessness, angry with mankind, and too old to return to the right
road. Whereas, if you listen to me and follow me, we will travel
together over a straight, sure road, and within ten years we shall have
made a fortune of which I don't dare name the amount, for you would not
believe me."

"Let us admit that this is not a dream also, father, for it makes little
difference for my present purpose; what shall we do with this fortune?"

"Whatever you choose, all the good that you may then dream of doing; for
I am not at all disturbed about your common sense and prudence, if you
will wait for experience of life and allow your brain to mature in
peace."

"What do you say? we will do good! you must tell me about that, father,
and I will be all ears! What is the blessing with which we will endow
mankind?"

"You ask the question! In heaven's name, what divine mystery do you
expect to find in human affairs? We shall have bestowed upon a whole
province the benefits of industrial activity! Are we not already on the
way? Is not work the source and sustenance of work? do we not employ
more men here in a day than agriculture and the petty uncivilized trades
that I propose to put down used to employ in a month? Do they not
receive higher wages? Are they not in a fair way to acquire the spirit
of order, prudence, sobriety, all the virtues that they lack? Where are
these virtues, the poor man's only blessing, concealed? In absorbing
work, in salutary fatigue and in proportionate wages. The good mechanic
has the family spirit, respect for property, submission to the laws,
economy, and the habit and the advantages of saving. Idleness, with all
the wretched arguments it engenders, is what ruins him. Keep him busy,
overwhelm him with work; he is strong, and will become stronger; he will
cease to dream of overturning society. He will become orderly in his
conduct, his house will be well kept, he will introduce comfort and
tranquillity there. And if he lives to be old and infirm, however
willing you may be to assist him, it will not be necessary. He will have
thought of the future himself; he will no longer need alms and a
protector like your friend Jappeloup the vagabond; he will be really a
free man. There is no other way to save the people, Emile. I am sorry to
tell you that it will take longer to carry out this plan than to
conceive a fine Utopian scheme; but if it be a long and hard
undertaking, it is worthy of a philosopher like you, and I do not
consider it beyond the strength of a hard worker of my sort."

"What! is that the whole ideal of industry?" said Emile, crushed by this
conclusion. "Have the people no other future than incessant toil, for
the benefit of a class that is never to work at all?"

"That is not my idea," Monsieur Cardonnet replied; "I hate and despise
idlers; that is why I don't like poets and metaphysicians. I think that
everybody should work according to his powers, and my _ideal_, as that
word seems to please you, is not far removed from that of the
Saint-Simonians: 'To every one according to his capacity,' recompense
proportioned to desert. But in these days the manufacturing industry has
not yet become so firmly established that we can think about a moral
system of subdivision. We must look at what is and not speculate as to
what is possible. The whole movement of the age tends toward
manufacturing. Let it reign and triumph then; let all men work, some
with the arm, some with the brain; it is for him who has more brain than
arm to direct the others: it is his right and his duty to make a
fortune. His wealth becomes sacred, since it is destined to increase in
order that there may be more work and higher wages. Society should lend
a hand therefore in every way to establish the power of the sagacious
man; his sagacity is a public blessing; and he himself should struggle
constantly to increase his activity; it is his duty, his religion, his
philosophy. In short he must be rich in order to keep growing richer, as
you said, Emile, not realizing that you were uttering the most valuable
of axioms."

"So, father, you would give to a man only as long as he works? Pray, do
you make no account of the man who cannot work?"

"I find in wealth the means of assisting the infirm and the insane."

"But the sluggard?"

"I try to correct him, and if I fail, I turn him over to the law, since
he is certain before long to become a nuisance and to incur its
penalties."

"In a perfectly constituted society that might be just, because the
sluggard would be a monstrous exception; but in exercising authority
according to such strict rules as yours, when you demand from the
workingman all his strength, all his time, all his thoughts, all his
life, ah! how many would be dismissed as sluggards and abandoned to
their fate!"

"With the advantages accruing from the increase of manufacturing, we
should very soon succeed in increasing the well-being of the poorer
classes to such an extent that we could easily found schools where their
children would be taught the love of work at almost no expense."

"I think that you are mistaken, father; but even if it were true that
the rich would give their attention to the education of the poor, the
love of incessant work, without other compensation than the certainty of
a pittance for one's old age, is so contrary to nature that you can
never kindle it in children. A few exceptional natures, consumed by
energy or ambition, will sacrifice their youth; but whoever is
simple-hearted, loving, inclined to reverie, to innocent and legitimate
pleasures, and under the influence of that craving for affection and
tranquillity which is the lawful privilege of the human race, will fly
from this jail of incessant toil in which you seek to confine him, and
will prefer the chances of poverty to the security of slavery. Ah!
father, your rugged constitution, your untiring energy, your stoical
sobriety and your inveterate habit of working make you an exceptional
man, and you imagine a society formed after your image, you do not see
that there is no suitable place there for any but exceptional men.
Permit me to tell you that that is a Utopian conception far more
appalling than mine."

"Well, Emile, I wish that you believed in it," said Monsieur Cardonnet
warmly; "it is a source of strength, and an invaluable stimulant in this
society of dreamers, idlers and apathetic creatures in which I am
devoured with impatience. Be like me, and if we should find in France,
at this moment, a hundred men like us, I promise you that there would be
no more exceptions a hundred years hence. Activity is contagious,
magnetic, miracle-working! it was through activity that Napoléon held
sway over Europe: he would have owned all Europe if he had been a
manufacturer instead of a fighting man. Oh! since you are an enthusiast,
be enthusiastic for my ideas! shake off your languor and share my fever!
If we do not attract the whole race, we shall make great breaches
through which our descendants will see it moving about in a sacred
frenzy."

"No, father, never!" cried Emile, dismayed by Monsieur Cardonnet's
terrible energy; "for that is not the road for mankind to follow. There
is in it no trace of love or pity or gentleness. Man was not born to
know naught but suffering and to extend his conquests over matter only.
The conquests of the intellect in the domain of ideas, the pleasures and
refinements of the heart, which, according to your plan, should be
carefully regulated accessories in the workingman's life, will always be
the noblest and sweetest aspiration of every normally constituted man.
Do you not see that you cut off one whole side of the benevolent
intentions of God? that you do not give the slave of toil time to
breathe and to know himself? that education directed solely to
moneymaking will make mere brutish machines and not complete men? You
say that you conceive an ideal to be realized in the course of
centuries, that a time may come when every one will be rewarded
according to his capacity. Well, I say that your formula is false
because it is incomplete, and unless we add to it: 'To everyone
according to his needs,' it is unjust, it is simply asserting the right
of him who is strongest in intellect or will, it is aristocracy and
privilege under other forms. O father, instead of fighting with the
strong against the weak, let us fight with the weak against the strong.
Let us try! but in that case let us not think of making our fortunes,
let us renounce the idea of hoarding for our own benefit. Give your
consent, for I, for whom you are working to-day, give my consent. Let us
try to identify our ideals in this way, and let us renounce personal
profit while devoting ourselves to work. Since we cannot by ourselves
alone create a society in which all the members have an equal interest,
let us be the workmen of the future, devoted to the weak and incapable
of the present."


[Illustration: _EMILE IN CONFERENCE WITH HIS
FATHER._

_When he realized from the young man's bitter tone and desperate
expression that it really was as serious as he had feared, he determined
to go around the obstacle and to manœuvre in such a way as to recover
his influence._]


"If Napoléon's genius had been trained to this doctrine, perhaps it
would have converted the world; but let us find a hundred men like us,
let this fever to acquire wealth become a divine zeal, let the longing
to practise charity consume us, let us give all our workmen a share in
all our profits, let our great fortune be not your property and my
heritage, but the property of all those who have assisted us, according
to their abilities and their strength, in amassing it; let the workman
who brings his stone be put in a way to know as much of the material
joys of life as you who bring your genius; let him too be able to live
in a fine house, to breathe pure air, to eat healthy food, to rest after
fatigue, and to educate his children; let us find our reward, not in the
useless luxury with which you and I can surround ourselves, but in the
joy of having made others happy--I can understand that ambition and be
carried away by it. And then, father, dear father, your work will be
blessed.

"This indolence and apathy which irritate you, and which are simply the
result of a struggle in which a few triumph to the detriment of the vast
majority who lose their courage and succumb, will themselves disappear
in the natural course of things. Then you will find so much zeal and
love about you that you will no longer be obliged to wear yourself out
alone in order to stimulate all the others. How could it be otherwise
to-day, and of what do you complain? Under the law of selfishness each
one gives of his strength and his energy in proportion to the share of
the profits he receives. A marvellous result, truly, that you, who
receive all the profit, should be the only zealous, assiduous worker,
while the paid worker, who receives in your employ a trifle more alms
than he would receive elsewhere, brings you only a little more of his
zeal. You pay higher wages--that is a fine thing, certainly, and you are
more to be commended than the majority of your rivals, who would prefer
to lower them; but you have it in your power to increase the zeal of
your employés tenfold, a hundred-fold, to kindle as by a miracle the
flame of devotion, the intelligence of the heart in those benumbed and
paralyzed creatures, and you do not choose to do it!--Why not, father?
It is not that you care for the enjoyments of luxury; for you enjoy
nothing unless it be the intoxication of your plans and your triumphs.
Very well; do away with your individual profit; you have only to do it,
and I will abandon my claim to it with the greatest joy! Let us be
simply the trustees and managers of the common profits. This fortune
that you dream of, of which you dare not tell me the amount, will so
surpass your anticipations and your hopes, that you will soon have the
means to give your workmen moral, intellectual and physical pleasures
which will make new men of them, complete men, true men! and such men I
have never seen anywhere. All equilibrium is destroyed; I see only
knaves and brutes, tyrants and slaves, powerful and greedy eagles and
stupid and cowardly sparrows destined to be their prey. We live
according to the blind law of the savage nature; the code of savage
instinct which governs the brute is still the soul of our pretended
civilization; and we dare to say that the manufacturing industry will
save the world without departing from that path! No, no, father, all
these declamations of political economy are false and misleading! If you
compel me to be rich and powerful, as you have said so many times, and
if, by reason of the vulgar influence of money, the adorers of money
send me to represent their interests in the counsels of the nation, I
shall say what I have in my mind; I shall speak, and I suppose that I
shall speak only once: for they will put me to silence or force me to
leave the hall; but people will remember what I say, and they who chose
me will have reason to repent their choice!"

This discussion was prolonged far into the night, and it will be readily
understood that Emile did not convert his father. Monsieur Cardonnet was
not evil-minded, nor impious, nor voluntarily blameworthy toward God or
man. Indeed, certain practical virtues were very strongly accentuated in
him, and he had great talent in one special field. But his iron will was
the result of the entire absence of idealism in his character.

He loved his son but could not understand him. He was kind and attentive
to his wife, but he had never failed to stifle in her any thought
capable of interfering with his daily routine. He would have liked to be
able to reduce Emile to subjection in the same way; but, realizing that
was impossible, he was intensely annoyed and tears of vexation moistened
his burning eyes more than once during that stormy interview. He
sincerely believed that he was logically right; that his ideas were the
only really admissible and practicable ones.

He asked himself by what fatality he happened to have a dreamer and a
Utopian for a son, and more than once he raised his powerful arms to
heaven, asking with indescribable pain what crime he had committed that
such a calamity should be visited upon him.

Emile, worn out by fatigue and disappointment, was moved to pity at last
for that wounded heart and that incurable blindness.

"Let us talk no more about these matters, father," he said, wiping away
his own tears, which had their source farther down in his heart; "we
cannot become identified with each other. I can only continue to show my
submission and my filial love, thinking no more of myself and of a
happiness which I sacrifice to you. What are your orders? Shall I return
to Poitiers and go on with my studies until I pass my examinations?
Shall I stay here and act as your secretary and steward? I will close my
eyes and work like a machine so long as it is possible for me to do it.
I will look upon myself as your employé; I will enter your service----"

"And you will cease to look upon me as your father?" said Monsieur
Cardonnet. "No, Emile; stay with me, but be perfectly free. I give you
three months, during which, living as you will in the bosom of your
family, far from the declamations of the beardless philosophers who have
ruined you, you will recover your senses unassisted. You are blessed
with a robust temperament, and it may be that absorbing mental labor has
overheated your brain. I look upon you as a sick child whom I have taken
into the country to cure. Walk, ride, hunt; in a word, amuse yourself in
order to reestablish your equilibrium, which seems to me more disturbed
than that of society. I hope that you will abate your intolerance when
you see that your home is not a hotbed of wickedness and corruption.
Before long, perhaps, you will tell me voluntarily that profitless
musing bores you, and that you feel that you must help me."

Emile bowed, without speaking, and left his father, after embracing him
with a feeling of profound sorrow. Monsieur Cardonnet, having been able
to do nothing better than temporize, tossed about a long while in his
bed, and finally fell asleep, saying, to himself, contrary to his
custom, that one must sometimes rely more upon Providence than upon
oneself.




XIV

FIRST LOVE


The energetic Cardonnet, entirely engrossed by his daily occupations, or
sufficiently self-controlled not to allow the slightest trace of his
inward suffering to appear on the surface, resumed his air of glacial
dignity on the following day.

Emile, overwhelmed with dismay and sadness, strove to smile in presence
of his mother, who was disturbed by his distraught air and altered
expression. But she was so overawed that she lacked even the penetration
peculiar to her sex. All her faculties had grown rusty, and at forty she
was already an octogenarian, mentally speaking. And yet she loved her
husband, as the result of a need of loving which had never been
satisfied. She had no definite grievances to allege against him, for he
had never openly maltreated her or made a slave of her; but every
impulse of the heart or the imagination had always been stifled in her
by irony and a sort of contemptuous pity, and she had accustomed herself
to entertain no thought or desire outside of the circle drawn about her
by an inflexible hand.

To oversee all the details of the housekeeping had become something more
than a wise and self-imposed occupation. It had been made a law of her
existence, so serious and so sacred that she might have been compared to
a Roman matron in respect to the trivial solemnity of domestic toil, if
in no other respect.

Thus she presented in her person the strange anachronism of a woman of
our own time, capable of reasoning and feeling, but who had insanely
forced herself to retrograde some thousands of years in order to make
herself like one of those women of ancient times whose glory it was to
proclaim the inferiority of their sex.

The strange and sad feature of her position was that she did not realize
it, and that she acted as she did--so she would say in a whisper--for
the sake of peace. And she did not obtain it! The more she immolated
herself, the more she bored her lord and master.

Nothing weakens and destroys the intelligence so quickly as blind
submission.

Madame Cardonnet was an example of this truth.

Her brain had shrivelled in slavery, and her husband, not realizing that
it was the result of his domination, had reached the point of despising
her in secret.

Several years earlier Cardonnet had been terribly jealous, and his wife,
although faded and worn, still trembled at the idea that he might impute
a vicious thought to her. She had acquired the habit of not listening or
looking, so that she could say confidently when any man was mentioned to
her: "I didn't look at him; I don't know what he said; I paid no
attention to him." The utmost that she dared do was look at her son and
question him; for, as to her husband, if she was made anxious by the
unusual pallor of his cheeks or the increased severity of his glance, he
would speedily compel her to lower her eyes, saying: "In heaven's name,
what is there extraordinary about me that you should stare at me as if
you didn't know me?" Sometimes, at night, he would notice that she had
been weeping, and he would become affectionate once more after his
fashion. "Tell me, what's the matter? Is something troubling the poor
little woman? Would you like a new shawl? Would you like me to take you
to drive? No? Then it must be because the camellias are frozen? We will
have some sent down from Paris that are more hardy and so beautiful that
you won't regret the old ones." And, in truth, he lost no opportunity to
gratify his helpmeet's innocent tastes, at any price. He even required
her to dress more richly than she cared to do. It was his idea that
wives are children who must be rewarded for being good with toys and
gimcracks.

"It is certain," Madame Cardonnet would say to herself at such times,
"that my husband loves me dearly, and he is very attentive to me. What
have I to complain of, and what is the reason that I always feel
depressed?"

She saw that Emile was gloomy and downcast, and she could not extort the
secret of his trouble from him. She questioned him at tedious length
concerning his health, and advised him to go to bed early. She had a
feeling that it was something more serious than the result of insomnia;
but she said to herself that it was much better to allow a sorrow to
fall asleep in silence than to keep it alive by trying to allay it.

That evening Emile, as he was walking near the entrance to the village,
met Jean Jappeloup, who had returned several hours earlier and was
joyously celebrating his arrival with several friends, in the doorway of
a rustic dwelling.

"Well," said the young man holding out his hand, "are your affairs
settled?"

"With the authorities, yes, monsieur, but not with poverty. I made my
submission, I argued as well as I could with the king's attorney and he
listened to me patiently; he said a few stupid things by way of sermon;
but he's not a bad fellow and he was just about to dismiss me, saying
that he would do his best to prevent any prosecution, when your letters
arrived. He read them without making a sign; but he paid some attention
to them, for he said to me: 'Well, set your mind at rest, settle down
somewhere, don't poach any more, find some work, and everything will be
all right.'--So here I am; my friends have received me warmly, as you
see, for I have already been asked to lodge in this house while I look
about. But I must give my mind to my most pressing necessity, which is
to earn something to buy clothes with, and before night I am going to
make the tour of the village, to look for work among the good people."

"Listen, Jean," said Emile, walking beside him; "I have no large amount
of money at my disposal; my father makes me an allowance, but I don't
know whether he will continue it now that I am to live at home; however,
I have a few hundred francs for which I have no use here, and I beg you
to accept them, to buy clothes and provide for your first needs. You
will make me feel aggrieved if you refuse. In a few days your
ill-founded anger against my father will have passed away and you will
come and ask him for work; or better still, authorize me to ask him for
you; he will pay you higher wages than you will get anywhere else, and
he will relax the severity of his original terms, I am sure; so----"

"No, Monsieur Emile," the carpenter replied. "I will take neither your
money nor your father's work. I don't know how Monsieur Cardonnet treats
you, nor how much money he gives you, but I know that a young man like
you is always embarrassed when he hasn't a piece of gold or silver in
his pocket to gratify his whims when occasion offers. You have done
enough for me; I am well pleased with you, and, if I find an
opportunity, you will see that you didn't offer your hand to an ingrate.
But as for serving your father in any way, never! I was very near
committing that folly and God would not permit it. I forgive him for the
way in which he caused my arrest by Caillaud, but it was a contemptible
act! However, as he may not have known that boy is my godson, and as he
has since written kindly of me to the king's attorney to obtain my
pardon, I must think no more of my grievance. In any event I would
trample it under foot now because of you. But as for helping to build
your factories--no! you don't need my arms, you will find plenty of
others, and you know my reasons. What you are doing is a bad thing and
will ruin many people, if it doesn't ruin everybody some day. Already
your dams and your reservoirs are drowning all the small mills on the
stream above you. Already your piles of stone and dirt have ruined the
meadows all around, for the flood carried them all onto your neighbors'
land. Thus, you see, the rich man injures the poor man even against his
will. I don't choose to have it said that Jean Jappeloup lent his hand
to the ruin of his neighborhood. Don't say any more about it. I mean to
take up my trade again in a small way, and I shall have no lack of work.
Now that your great enterprises employ all my fellows, no one in the
village can find anybody to work for him. I shall inherit their
customers but must give them back when your work fails. For mark my
words; your father greases his wheels by paying a high price for the
sweat of the workingman's brow to-day; but he won't be able to continue
long on that footing, or his expenses will exceed his profits. The day
will come--and perhaps it's not far away!--when he will run his
factories at a loss, and then, woe to those who have sacrificed their
position on the strength of fine promises! They will be forced to do
whatever your father chooses and the time will have come to make them
disgorge. You don't believe it? So much the better for you! that proves
that you won't be at all responsible for the trouble that is brewing;
but you won't be able to prevent it. So good night, my fine fellow!
don't speak in my behalf to your father, for I should give you the lie.
The good Lord has helped me out of my trouble; I propose to please Him
in everything now and to do only such things as my conscience will never
blame me for. Being poor myself, I shall be more useful to the poor than
your father with all his wealth. I will build houses for my equals and
they will make more by paying me small wages than by earning big wages
with you. You will see that I am right, Monsieur Emile, and everybody
will tell you so some time; but it will be too late to repent of having
put their necks in the halter!"

Emile could not overcome the carpenter's obstinacy, and he returned home
even more depressed than when he went out. That incorruptible
workingman's predictions caused him a vague alarm.

As he approached the factory he met his father's secretary, Monsieur
Galuchet, a stout young man, very talented in the way of ciphering, but
of very limited capacity in other respects.

It was the hour of repose and Galuchet was taking advantage of it to
fish for gudgeons. This was his favorite pastime; and when he had a
goodly number in his basket, he would count them, and adding the count
to the total of his previous catches, would say proudly as he wound up
his line:

"This is the seven hundred and eighty-second gudgeon I have caught with
this hook in two months. I am very sorry I didn't count what I caught
last year."

Emile leaned against a tree to watch him fish. The fellow's phlegmatic
watchfulness and puerile patience disgusted him. He could not understand
how he could be perfectly happy just because he had a salary that placed
him out of reach of want. He tried to make him talk, saying to himself
that he might perhaps find beneath that thick envelope some ray of
light, some sympathetic chord which would make that young man's society
a source of comfort to him in his distress. But Monsieur Cardonnet
selected his subordinates with an unerring eye and hand. Constant
Galuchet was a fool; he understood nothing, knew nothing outside of
arithmetic and bookkeeping. When he had been at work at his figures for
twelve hours he had just enough reasoning power left to catch gudgeons.

However, Emile by mere chance led him to say certain things that cast an
ominous light into his mind. That human machine was capable of reckoning
profits and losses and of figuring the balance at the foot of a sheet of
paper. While exhibiting the most complete ignorance of Monsieur
Cardonnet's plans and resources, Constant observed that the wages of the
men were exorbitant and that, if they were not reduced by half in two
months, the funds invested in the enterprise would be insufficient.

"But that doesn't disturb monsieur your father," he added; "you pay your
workmen as you feed a horse, according to the amount of work you require
of him. When you double his work you double his pay, as you double the
quantity of oats; then, when you're no longer in such a hurry, you cut
down the pay or the rations proportionately."

"My father won't do that," said Emile; "he might with horses, but not
with men."

"Don't say that, monsieur," rejoined Galuchet; "monsieur your father
knows what he's about, he won't do anything foolish, never fear."

And he carried off his gudgeons, delighted to have had an opportunity to
set the son's mind at rest concerning the father's apparent imprudence.

"Oh! if that should be true!" thought Emile, as he walked excitedly
along the bank of the stream; "if it should prove that this temporary
generosity conceals inhuman cunning! Suppose that Jean's suspicions were
well-founded! that my father, while following the blind doctrines of
society, has no greater store of virtue or intelligence than other
speculators have, to diminish the disastrous results of his ambition!
But no, it is impossible; my father is kind-hearted, he loves his
fellow-men."

But Emile had death in his heart; the thought of all this waste of
energy and of life for the benefit of his future made him recoil in
horror and disgust. He wondered how it was that all these men who were
working to build his fortune did not hate him, and he was ready to hate
himself in order to balance the scales of justice.

On the following day, he was still profoundly distressed, but he hailed
with something like delight the day which he was to devote in part to
Monsieur de Boisguilbault, because he had made up his mind to go and
pass the day at Châteaubrun without saying a word to anybody. As he
mounted his horse, Monsieur Cardonnet made divers satirical remarks:

"You are starting early to go to Boisguilbault! it would seem that the
amiable marquis's society has charms for you; I should never have
suspected it, and I can't imagine what secret method you have of keeping
awake after each of his remarks."

"If this is your way of informing me that you do not like what I am
doing," said Emile, impatiently preparing to dismount, "I am ready to
give it up, although I accepted an invitation for to-day."

"I not like it!" rejoined the manufacturer; "why it is a matter of
perfect indifference to me whether you are bored there or somewhere
else. As your father's house is the place where you find least pleasure,
I am anxious that you should derive some recompense from the society of
the noble personages with whom you associate."

Under any other circumstances, Emile would have postponed his departure
in order to prove, or at least to make him believe that the rebuke was
not merited; but he was beginning to understand that it was his father's
tactics to rally him when he wished to make him talk; and as he felt
invincibly drawn toward Châteaubrun he determined not to allow himself
to be trapped.

Although nothing in the world stung him more keenly than the ridicule of
those whom he loved, he made an effort to seem to take it in good part.

"I anticipate so much pleasure at Monsieur de Boisguilbault's," he said,
"that I propose to go there by the longest road, and my détour will
probably extend to five or six leagues, unless you need me, father, in
which case I will gladly sacrifice to you the delights of a ride in the
hot sun over perpendicular roads."

But Monsieur Cardonnet was not deceived by his stratagem and replied
with a clear and penetrating glance:

"Go where the devil of youth drives you! I am not disturbed about you,
for a very good reason."

"Very good," said Emile to himself as he galloped away, "if you're not
disturbed about me, I won't disturb myself about your threats."

And, feeling the fire of anger blazing in his breast, in spite of his
efforts, he indulged in a long, hard run to calm himself.

"O God," he said after some time, "forgive me for these angry outbreaks,
which I cannot repress. Thou knowest that my heart is full of love, and
that it asks nothing better than to respect and venerate my father, who
makes it his business to stifle all its impulses and to freeze all its
affections."

Whether from hesitation or from prudence, he made a long detour before
he turned his horse's head in the direction of Châteaubrun; and when,
from the crest of a hill, he saw that he was a long distance from the
ruins, which stood out against the sky on the horizon, he so bitterly
regretted the time he had wasted that he drove the spurs into his
horse's sides in order to arrive there more quickly.

He did in fact arrive there from the valley of the Creuse in less than
half an hour, almost as rapidly as a bird on the wing, having endangered
his life a hundred times leaping ditches and galloping on the brink of
precipices. A violent longing, which he did not choose to analyze, gave
him wings.

"I don't love her," he said to himself; "I hardly know her; I cannot
love her! In any event I should love her to no purpose! It is not she
who attracts me any more than her worthy father, his romantic château,
his environment of repose, happiness and freedom from care. I long to
see people who are happy, so that I may forget that I am not and never
shall be!"

He met Sylvain Charasson, who was engaged in stretching cloth in the
Creuse. The child ran to meet him with an eager delighted air.

"You won't find Monsieur Antoine," he said. "He's gone to market to sell
six sheep; but Mademoiselle Janille's at home, and Mademoiselle
Gilberte, too."

"Do you think I shall not disturb them?"

"Oh! not at all, not at all, Monsieur Emile; they'll be very glad to see
you, for they often talk about you with Monsieur Antoine at dinner. They
say that they think a great deal of you."

"Take my horse, then," said Emile, "I can go faster on foot."

"Yes, yes," replied the child. "Look, just behind what used to be the
terrace. You climb the breach, take a little jump and you'll be in the
courtyard. That's _Jean's road_."

Emile leaped down on the grass, which deadened the sound of his
footsteps, and approached the square pavilion without frightening the
two goats, who seemed to know him already.

Monsieur Sacripant, who was no prouder than his master, and did not
disdain to perform at need the duties of sheep dog, although he belonged
to the nobler breed of hunters, had escorted the sheep to market.

As he was about to enter, Emile found that his heart was beating so
fast--a fact that he attributed to his rapid climb up the side of the
cliff--that he paused a moment to recover himself and make his entrée
with due dignity. He heard the sound of a spinning-wheel inside, and no
music had ever struck more pleasantly on his ear. Then the dull hissing
of the little instrument of toil ceased and he heard Gilberte's voice
saying:

"Well, it's quite true, Janille, that I don't enjoy myself the days that
father is away. If you weren't here with me, I should be bored
outright!"

"Work, my child, work," replied Janille; "that's the way to avoid being
bored."

"But I do work, and still I am not amused. I know well enough that
there's no need of being amused; but I always am, and am always ready to
laugh and jump when father's with us. Confess, little mother, that if we
had to live long away from him, we should lose all our happiness and
good spirits! Oh! it would be impossible to live without father! I
should much rather die at once."

"Well, well, those are pretty ideas!" said Janille. "What in heaven's
name will you think about next, little head? Your father is still young
and well, thank God! so what has put all this nonsense into your head
these last two or three days?"

"What do you say? these last two or three days?"

"Why, yes, fully two or three days; several times you have chosen to
worry about what would become of us if we should lose your dear father,
which God forbid!"

"Lose him!" cried Gilberte. "Oh! don't speak of such a thing; it makes
me shudder, and I never thought of it. Oh! no, I could never think of
it!"

"Well, upon my word, if you're not crying! Fie! mademoiselle, do you
want to make your dear Mère Janille cry too? Oh! Monsieur Antoine would
be very pleased to see you with your eyes all red when he comes home! He
would be quite capable of crying too, the dear man! Come, you haven't
walked enough to-day, my child; fasten up your wool and we'll go and
feed the hens. It will amuse you to see the pretty partridges your
little Blanche has just hatched."

Emile heard the motherly kiss from Janille which closed this speech, and
as the two women would surely find him at the door, he stepped back and
coughed slightly to warn them of his presence.

"Someone in the courtyard!" cried Gilberte. "I am so happy; I am sure
it's father!"

And she ran eagerly to meet Emile, so fast, that when she found herself
face to face with him on the threshold, she almost fell into his arms.
But great as her confusion was when she discovered her mistake, it was
less than Emile's; for, in her innocence, she threw it off with a hearty
laugh, while the young man lost his self-possession altogether at the
bare idea that he had been very near receiving an embrace which was not
intended for him.

Gilberte was so lovely with her eyes still moist with tears and her
rippling, childish laugh, that he was dazzled as it were, and ceased to
wonder whether it was honest Antoine, the lovely ruins or the fair
Gilberte that he had been in such haste to see once more.

"Well, well," said Janille, "you almost frightened us; but you are
welcome, Monsieur Emile, as our master says; Monsieur Antoine will
return before long. Meanwhile you must have something cool to drink. I
will go to the cellar and draw some wine."

Emile remonstrated, and said, holding her back by the sleeve:

"If you go to the cellar, I will go with you; not to drink your wine,
but to see the cellar itself, which you said is so interesting, so dark
and deep."

"You mustn't go now," said Janille; "it's too cold there and you are too
warm. Yes, you are warm! you're as red as a strawberry. You go and rest
a bit, and then, while we are waiting for Monsieur Antoine, we'll show
you the cellars, the underground vaults and the whole château, which
you haven't examined very thoroughly yet, although it's well worth
while. Ah! there are people who come a long way to see it; it's a little
bit tiresome to us, and my girl goes to her room and reads while they
are here; but Monsieur Antoine says that we can't refuse to admit them,
especially travellers who have come a long way, and that, when you're
the owner of a curious and interesting piece of property, you haven't
any right to prevent other people from enjoying it."

Janille attributed to her master the argument she had put into his mind
and his mouth. The fact is that she collected a considerable amount from
exhibiting the ruins, which she employed, like everything belonging to
her, in secretly adding to the comfort of the family.

Emile, eagerly accepting whatever they chose to offer him, consented to
take a glass of water, and as Janille ran to fill her pitcher at the
fountain, he was left alone with Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun.




XV

THE STAIRCASE


While a practised rake may congratulate himself upon the unhoped-for
accident which procures him a tête-à-tête with the object of his
pursuit, a pure-hearted young man, who is sincerely in love, is more
likely to be confused, almost terrified, when such good fortune comes to
him for the first time.

So it was with Emile Cardonnet: the respect that Mademoiselle de
Châteaubrun inspired was so profound that he feared to raise his eyes
to hers at that moment, lest he should show himself in any degree
unworthy of the confidence reposed in him.

Gilberte, even more naïve than he, did not feel the same embarrassment.
The thought that Emile could abuse, even by a careless word, her
isolation and her inexperience, found no place in a mind so noble and
innocent as hers, and her sacred ignorance preserved her from any
suspicion of that sort. So she was the first to break the silence, and
her voice, as by enchantment, brought tranquillity to the young
visitor's agitated breast. There are voices so sympathetic and so
penetrating, that to hear them pronounce two or three trivial words is
enough to fill one with affection for the persons whose characters they
describe, even before one sees them. Gilberte's voice was of this
number. On hearing her speak or laugh or sing, you felt that there had
never been in her mind an evil or unkind thought.

The thing that moves and charms us in the song of birds is not so much
the melody, opposed to all our musical conventions, or the extraordinary
power of their flexible organs, as a certain accent of primitive
innocence, of which nothing in the language of men can convey an idea.
It seemed, on listening to Gilberte, that the same comparison could be
aptly applied to her, and that the most indifferent things acquired, on
passing between her lips, a meaning much deeper than that which they
expressed by themselves.

"We saw our friend Jean this morning," she said; "he came at daybreak
and carried away all my father's tools, in order to do his first day's
work; for he has found work already, and we have strong hopes that there
will be no lack of it. He told us all that you did and tried to do for
him last evening, and I assure you, monsieur, that, for all the pride
and perhaps roughness of his refusal, he is as grateful as he ought to
be."

"What I have been able to do for him amounts to so little that I am
ashamed to speak of it," said Emile. "I am especially grieved that he
allows his obstinacy to deprive him of a certainty of employment, for it
seems to me that his position is still very precarious. To begin a life
of toil, at sixty, and to have neither a house, nor clothes, nor even
the necessary tools, is a terrifying prospect, is it not, mademoiselle?"

"Still, I am not terrified," replied Gilberte. "Brought up as I have
been in uncertainty, and living from day to day, as it were, perhaps I
have myself fallen into the habit of looking upon poverty with that same
happy indifference. Either I am naturally of that disposition, or Jean's
heedlessness reassures me; it is certain that none of us felt the least
uneasiness in the congratulations we exchanged this morning. It takes so
little to satisfy Jean! He is as sober and as healthy as a wild man. He
has never been better than during these two months that he has lived in
the woods, walking all day and sleeping most of the time in the open
air. He declares that his sight has grown keener, that his youth has
returned again, and that, if the summer would last all the time, he
would never need to come back to the village to live. But in the bottom
of his heart he has an invincible affection for his native place, and
furthermore he would not be satisfied to be idle long. We urged him this
morning to settle down here with us, and to live as we do, without
thought for the morrow.

"'There is room enough here and plenty of material for you to build
yourself a house,' said my father. 'I have all the stone you need and
enough old trees for your frame, and I'll help you to put it up as you
helped me with mine.'

"But Jean wouldn't listen to that.

"'Very good,' said he, 'but what in heaven's name should I do to kill
time when you have set me up as a country gentleman? I can't live on my
income, and I don't propose to be a burden to you during the thirty
years that I still have to live, it may be. Even if you were rich enough
to support me, I should die of ennui. It's all right for you, Monsieur
Antoine, you were brought up to do nothing. Although you're no sluggard
and you have proved it--it costs you nothing to resume the habit of
living like a _monsieur_; but there's no more hunting and coursing for
me; pray, am I to sit with folded arms? I should go mad at the end of
the first week.'"

"So," said Emile, thinking of his father's theory of incessant toil and
no repose in old age, "so Jean will never feel the longing to be free,
although he makes so many sacrifices to his alleged freedom?"

"Why, are freedom and idleness the same thing?" said Gilberte, in a tone
of surprise. "I think not. Jean is passionately fond of work, and all
his freedom consists in choosing the work that pleases him; when he
works to gratify his inclination and his natural inventiveness, he works
with all the more ardor."

"Yes, mademoiselle, you are right," said Emile, with sudden melancholy,
"and that is the whole secret. Man is born to work always, but to work
according to his aptitudes and in proportion to the enjoyment he derives
from it! Ah! if only I were a skilful carpenter! with what joy I would
go and work with Jean Jappeloup, for the benefit of such a wise and
unselfish man!"

"Well, well, monsieur," said Janille, as she returned to the room,
ostentatiously balancing her earthenware pitcher on her head, to display
her strength, "you talk just like Monsieur Antoine. If you'll believe
it, he wanted to go to Gargilesse this morning with Jean and work with
him as a journeyman, as he used to do! Poor dear man! his kind heart
carried him to that length.

"'You helped me to earn my living long enough,' he said; 'now I propose
to help you earn yours. You refuse to share my table and my house;
accept at least the price of my work, as I don't need it.'"

"And Monsieur Antoine would have done as he said. At his age and with
his rank, he would go and hammer away like a deaf man on those great
blocks of wood!"

"Why did you prevent him, Mère Janille? Why did Jean obstinately
refuse? My father's health would have been no worse for it, and it would
be consistent with all the noble impulses of his life. Ah! why cannot I
too wield an axe and serve my apprenticeship to the man who supported my
father so long, while I, knowing nothing about our means of existence,
learned to sing and draw to please you. Really, women are good for
nothing in this world!"

"What's that! what's that! women good for nothing!" cried Janille; "very
good, let us both start out, climb up on the roofs, square timber and
drive nails. Upon my word I could do better at it than you, old and
small as I am; but meanwhile, your papa, who's about as clever with his
hands as a frog with his tail, will spin our flax and Jean will iron our
caps."

"You are right, mother," replied Gilberte; "my wheel is loaded and I
have done nothing to-day. If we make haste we shall have cloth enough to
make clothes for Jean before next winter. I am going to work and make up
for lost time; but it's true none the less that you are an aristocrat,
not to want my father to be a workman again when he pleases."

"Let me tell you the truth then," said Janille, with a solemn,
confidential air. "Monsieur Antoine never succeeded in being a good
workman. He had more courage than skill, and my only reason for letting
him work was to prevent him from getting depressed and discouraged. Ask
Jean if he didn't have to work twice as hard to mend Monsieur's
mistakes, as he would have done if he'd been working alone. But Monsieur
always seemed to be doing a lot of work, so the customers were satisfied
and he was well paid. But it's true all the same that I was never easy
in my mind in those days and that I don't sigh for them. I always
shuddered for fear Monsieur Antoine would hit his arm or his leg instead
of a timber, or would fall off his ladder when, in his absent-minded
way, he would sit down on the rung as if he were by his own fireside."

"You frighten me, Janille," said Gilberte. "Oh! if that is the case, you
did well to disgust him, by your joking, with the idea of working again,
and in that, as in everything else, you are our Providence!"

Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun spoke even more truly than she knew.
Janille had been the good angel of Antoine de Châteaubrun's existence.
Without her prudence, her motherly domination and her shrewd judgment,
that excellent man would not have passed through the slough of poverty
without deteriorating a little morally. At all events he would not have
retained his external dignity as well as the generous purity of his
instincts. He would often have sinned by too great resignation and
self-abandonment. Being naturally inclined to effusiveness and
prodigality, he would have become intemperate; he would have acquired as
many faults of the common people as of their good qualities, and perhaps
he would have ended by meriting in some degree the disdain which fools
and vainglorious parvenus felt justified in entertaining for him, even
as it was.

But, thanks to Janille, who, without thwarting him openly, had always
maintained the equilibrium and instilled moderation, he had emerged from
the test with honor and had not ceased to deserve the esteem and respect
of judicious people.

The sound of Gilberte's spinning-wheel interrupted the conversation, or
at least made it less coherent. She was unwilling to interrupt her work
again until her task was completed; and yet she seemed to display more
ardor than the apparent motive of her activity called for. She urged
Emile not to subject himself to the tedium of listening to that
monotonous clattering, but to go with Janille and explore the ruins;
but, as Janille also wanted to finish her spinning, Gilberte
unconsciously worked even faster than before, in order to finish as soon
as she, and to be one of the party.

"I am ashamed of my inaction," said Emile, who dared not gaze too fondly
at the young spinstress's lovely arms or watch her motions too closely,
for fear of attracting Janille's sharp little eyes; "haven't you some
work to give me?"

"What can you do?" queried Gilberte with a smile.

"Whatever Sylvain Charasson can do, I flatter myself," he replied.

"I might send you to water my lettuce," said Janille, laughing outright,
"but that would deprive us of your company. Suppose you wind up the
clock, which seems to have stopped?"

"Oh! it stopped three days ago," said Gilberte, "and I haven't been able
to make it go. I think there's something broken."

"Ah! that's the job for me," cried Emile; "I have studied mechanics a
little--unwillingly, to be sure--and I don't believe that this cuckoo
affair is very complicated."

"And suppose you break my clock altogether?" said Janille.

"Oh! let him break it if it amuses him," said Gilberte, with a
good-natured air in which he could detect her father's easy-going
heedlessness.

"I ask the privilege of breaking it, if that is its destiny," said
Emile, "provided that I may be permitted to replace it."

"All right!" said Janille, "if it turns out so, I want one just like it,
no finer and no larger; this one suits us: it strikes clear and yet
doesn't deafen us."

Emile set to work; he took the little German clock apart, and, having
examined it, found nothing more to do than remove a little dust from the
interior. Leaning over the table near Gilberte he carefully cleaned and
readjusted the rough machinery, exchanging with the two women an
occasional remark of a playful turn, which led to a pleasant sort of
familiarity between them.

It is commonly said that people become expansive and confidential while
eating together; but intimacy comes more readily and naturally to those
who work together. All three of them felt it; and when they had finished
their various tasks they were almost members of the same family.

"You're right at home at that business," said Janille, when she saw that
her clock was going; "you would almost do for a clockmaker. Now let's go
for a walk; I will go first and light my lantern to take you into the
cellars."

"Monsieur," said Gilberte, when Janille had left the room, "you said
just now that you expected to dine with Monsieur de Boisguilbault. May I
not ask you what sort of impression that gentleman made upon you?"

"I should have difficulty in defining it," replied Emile. "It is a
mixture of repulsion and sympathy, so strange that I feel that I must
see him again, examine him closely and then reflect further, before
attempting to interpret so odd a character. Don't you know him,
mademoiselle, and can you not assist me to understand him?"

"I do not know him at all; I have seen him only once or twice in my
life, although we live very near him; and, because of what I had heard
about him, I was very anxious to see him; but he was riding on the same
road with my father and myself, and the instant that he caught sight of
us, he spurred his horse, bowed to us without looking at us, apparently
without knowing who we were, and was out of sight in a moment: you would
have said he was trying to hide in the dust that his horse's feet kicked
up."

"Has Monsieur de Châteaubrun no relations with him, although he is so
near a neighbor?"

"Oh! that's a very strange thing," said Gilberte, lowering her voice
confidentially, "but I may speak to you about it, Monsieur Emile,
because it seems to me that you may be able to solve the mystery. My
father was very intimate with Monsieur de Boisguilbault in his younger
days. I know that much, although he never speaks of him, and Janille
avoids answering me when I question her; but Jean, who knows no more
than I do about the cause of their rupture, has often told me that he
can remember a time when they were inseparable. That is what has always
made me think that Monsieur de Boisguilbault is neither so proud nor so
cold as he seems; for my father with his good humor and vivacity could
never have been on warm terms with a haughty disposition and a cold
heart. I must tell you too that I have overheard some conversation about
him between my father and Janille, when they thought that I was not
listening. My father said that the only irreparable misfortune of his
life was the loss of Monsieur de Boisguilbault's friendship, that he
should never be consoled for it, and that he would not hesitate to
sacrifice an eye or an arm or a leg to recover it. Janille called his
lamentations nonsense and advised him not to make the slightest step
toward reconciliation because she knew the man well and he would never
forget the affair that had made the trouble between them.

"'Very well,' said my father, 'I would prefer to have an explanation, to
submit to his reproaches; I would rather have fought a duel with him,
when we were of almost equal strength, than have to endure this
implacable silence and frigid persistence which cuts me to the heart.
No, Janille, no, I shall never be reconciled to it, and if I die without
shaking hands with him, I shall regret that I ever lived.'

"Janille tried to divert his mind, and she succeeded, for my father is
impressionable and too affectionate to be willing to depress others with
his melancholy. But you, Monsieur Emile, who love your parents so
dearly, will understand that this secret grief of my father's has
weighed heavily on my heart ever since I discovered it. So that I can
think of nothing that I would not undertake to relieve him from it. For
a whole year I have been thinking about it constantly, and twenty times
I have dreamed that I went to Boisguilbault, threw myself at that
unforgiving man's feet and said to him:

"'My father is the best of men and your most faithful friend. His
virtues have made him happy in spite of his ill-fortune; he has but one
sorrow, but it is a deep one and you can dispel it with a word.'

"But he repulsed me and turned me out of his house in a rage. I woke in
deadly terror, and one night when I called his name, Janille got up and
took me in her arms and said:

"'Why do you think about that wretched man? he has no power over you and
he wouldn't dare attack your father.'

"From that I saw that Janille hated him; but whenever she happens to say
a word against him, my father warmly defends him. What is there between
them? Almost nothing, perhaps. A puerile sensitiveness, a dispute about
hunting, so Jean Jappeloup declares. If that were certain, wouldn't it
be possible to reconcile them? My father dreams of Monsieur de
Boisguilbault too, and sometimes, when he dozes in his chair after
supper, he mutters his name in a tone of profound distress. Monsieur
Emile, I appeal to your generosity and prudence to induce Monsieur de
Boisguilbault to speak, if possible. I have always intended to grasp the
first opportunity that presented itself to reconcile two men who have
been so closely attached to each other, and if Jean had been fully taken
back into the marquis's favor, I should have hoped great things from his
boldness and his natural shrewdness. But he too is the victim of a
strange caprice on Monsieur de Boisguilbault's part, and I can think of
nobody but you who can help me."

"You cannot doubt that will be my most constant endeavor henceforth,"
said Emile, with fervor. And as he heard Janille returning, her little
clogs clattering on the flagstones, he stood on a chair as if to adjust
the clock, but really to hide the blissful confusion born of Gilberte's
confidence.

Gilberte also was moved. She had made a great effort to summon courage
to open her heart to a young man whom she hardly knew; and she was not
so childish or so countrified that she did not realize that she had gone
beyond conventional propriety.

The loyal creature was distressed at the thought that she had a secret
from Janille; but she took comfort in the purity of her intentions, and
it was impossible to believe Emile capable of taking advantage of her.
For the first time in her life the instinctive craft of her sex guided
her action when the housekeeper returned. She felt that her face was on
fire, and she stooped to pick up a needle which she had purposely
dropped.

Thus Janille's penetration was routed by two children who were far from
adroit in all other respects, and they set forth gayly to explore the
subterranean regions.

The passage directly beneath the square pavilion led to a steep
staircase which descended to a terrifying depth in the solid rock.
Janille went first, at a deliberate gait, with the composure due to her
frequent exercise of the functions of _cicerone_ with visitors. Emile
followed her, to feel the way for Gilberte, who was neither awkward nor
timid, but for whose safety Janille was constantly alarmed.

"Take care, my dear," she said at every step. "Hold her if she falls,
Monsieur Emile. Mademoiselle is absent-minded like her dear father: it
runs in the family. They're a pair of children who would have killed
themselves a hundred times over if I had not always had my eye on them."

Emile was happy to be able to share Janille's task. He pushed the
rubbish aside, and, as the staircase became more and more dilapidated
and difficult, he deemed himself justified in offering his hand, which
was declined at first, but afterward accepted as necessary.

Who can describe the violence and ecstasy of a first love in an ardent
heart? Emile trembled so when he took Gilberte's hand in his that he
could no longer talk and joke with Janille nor reply to Gilberte, who
continued to jest at first, but gradually became more and more agitated
until she could think of nothing to say.

They descended in this way only ten or twelve steps, but meanwhile time
ceased to move for Emile; and when he passed the whole of the following
night trying to review the emotions of that moment, it seemed to him
that it had lasted a century.

His past life appeared thenceforth like a dream, and his personality was
transformed. When he recalled his childhood, the years at school, the
tedium or the pleasure of study, he was no longer the passive, fettered
creature he had hitherto felt himself to be; it was Gilberte's lover who
lived through those years, thenceforth radiant, enlightened with a new
light. He saw himself as a mere child, then as an active, impetuous
school-boy, and, finally, as a dreamy, earnest student; and those
various personages, who had seemed to him to differ like the phases of
his life, became in his eyes a single being, a privileged being, who
moved triumphantly forward toward the bright daylight where Gilberte's
hand was to be placed in his.

The underground staircase led to the base of the rocky hill which was
crowned by the Château. It was a means of exit in case of a siege, and
Janille was not sparing of encomiums upon that difficult and scientific
piece of work.

Although she lived on terms of absolute equality with her masters, and
would not have waived the privilege at any price, so thoroughly
convinced was she of her rights, the little woman none the less had some
strangely persistent feudal ideas; and, by dint of identifying herself
with the ruins of Châteaubrun, she had reached the point of admiring
everything in their past history, of which she had, to tell the truth, a
very confused idea. Perhaps, too, she thought it her duty, to humble the
pride of the wealthy bourgeoisie by vaunting loudly before Emile the
ancient might of Gilberte's ancestors.

"See, monsieur," she said, escorting him from dungeon to dungeon, "this
is where they brought people to their senses. You can still see the iron
rings to which they fastened prisoners after their fetters were put on.
This is a dungeon where they say three men were devoured by a huge
serpent. The great noblemen of long ago had such creatures at their
disposal. We will show to you the _oubliettes_ in a moment: it was no
joke to get into them! Ah! if you had come down here before the
Revolution, perhaps you would have done well to make the sign of the
Cross instead of laughing!"

"Luckily we can laugh here now," said Gilberte, "and think of something
else besides those horrible legends. I thank the good Lord that I was
born in an age when it is very hard to believe in them, and I prefer our
old nest as it is to-day, demolished and harmless forever. You know,
Janille, what my father always says to the people of Cuzion, when they
come and ask him for some of our stone for building purposes: 'Help
yourselves, my friends, help yourselves; it will be the first time it
ever served any good purpose!'"

"Never mind," rejoined Janille, "it's worth something to have been first
in one's province and the master of everybody else!"

"It makes me realize all the more forcibly," replied the girl, "the
pleasure of being everybody else's equal and of no longer causing fear
to anybody."

"Oh! that is a glory and a joy which I envy!" cried Emile.




XVI

THE TALISMAN


If Gilberte had been told a week earlier that a day was coming when the
tranquillity of her heart would be disturbed by strange commotions, when
the circle of her affections would not only be extended to admit a
stranger to a place beside her father, Janille and the carpenter, but
would suddenly be broken in order that a new name might be placed among
those cherished names, she would not have believed that such a miracle
could be and would have been terrified by the suggestion.

And yet she had a vague feeling that henceforth the image of this young
man with the black hair, sparkling eye and slender figure, would dog her
footsteps and follow her even in her sleep.

She spurned the thought of such a fatality, but she could not escape
from it. Her chaste and gentle heart did not go forth to meet the
intoxicating emotion that came to seek it; but she was destined to feel
it when Emile's hand quivered and trembled on touching hers.

Incredible and mysterious power of attraction which nothing can turn
aside and which determines the fate of youth before it has had time to
become acquainted with itself and to prepare for attack or defence!

Somewhat excited by the first stings of this secret flame, Gilberte
received them playfully. Her serenity was not disturbed on the surface,
and while Emile was already compelled to put force upon himself in order
to conceal his emotion, she continued to smile and to talk freely,
pending the time when regret at his departure and impatience for his
return should make her understand that his presence was rapidly becoming
imperatively necessary to her.

Janille did not leave them again; but their conversation gradually
drifted to subjects which Janille, despite her keen penetration, was far
from understanding.

Gilberte had received as thorough an education as any girl educated at a
Parisian boarding-school, and it is undoubtedly true that the education
of women has made notable progress in the majority of those
establishments in the past twenty years. The learning, the good sense
and the manners of the women who have charge of them have undergone a
similar amelioration, and talented men have deemed it not beneath their
dignity to give courses of lectures in history, literature and
elementary science for the benefit of that intelligent and perspicacious
moiety of the human race.

Gilberte had acquired some notion of what are called "accomplishments";
but, while complying with her father's wishes in this respect, she had
given more attention to the development of her intellectual faculties.

She had seasonably reflected that the fine arts would be but a feeble
resource in a life of poverty and retirement, that household cares would
take too much of her time, and that, as she was destined to work with
her hands, it was her duty to train her mind so that she might not
suffer from absence of thought and from a disorderly imagination.

A sub-mistress, a woman of much merit, of whom she had made a friend and
the confidante of her precarious future, had advised this employment of
her faculties, and the girl, impressed by the wisdom of her advice, had
followed it implicitly.

This very pleasure in learning and retaining useful information had,
however, caused the child some unhappiness since she had been deprived
of books in the ruins of Châteaubrun. Monsieur Antoine would have made
any sacrifice to procure books for her, if he could have detected her
desire for them; but Gilberte, seeing how restricted their means were,
and desiring more than all else that her father's comfort should not be
impaired, was very careful not to mention the subject.

Janille had said to herself, once for all, that her girl "had learning
enough," and, judging her by herself--for the old lady was coquettish
still in the matter of dress, with all her parsimony,--she employed her
little savings in buying for her from time to time, a calico dress or a
bit of lace.

Gilberte feigned to receive these little gifts with extreme pleasure, in
order not to lessen the pleasure which her old nurse derived from
bringing them to her. But she sighed to herself at the thought that with
the modest price of that finery she might have given her a volume of
history or poetry.

She devoted her hours of leisure to reading again and again the few
books she had brought from her school, and she almost knew them by
heart.

Once or twice, without divulging her purpose, she had persuaded Janille,
who held the strings of the common purse, to give her the money intended
for a new gown. But on these occasions it happened that Jean needed
shoes, or that some poor people near by had no clothes for their
children; and Gilberte supplied what she called the most urgent needs,
postponing the purchase of her books to better days.

The curé of Cuzion had lent her an Abridgment of some of the Fathers of
the Church, and the _Lives of the Saints_, upon which she had feasted
for a long time; for, when you have no choice, you compel your mind to
enjoy serious things, despite the youthful impulse to indulge in less
austere amusements.

This necessity is sometimes a salutary thing for healthy minds, and when
Gilberte artlessly lamented her ignorance to Emile, he was astonished to
find her, on the contrary, so well informed as to certain fundamental
matters which he himself had accepted on the faith of others, without
studying them.

Love and enthusiasm aiding, he speedily discovered that Gilberte was an
accomplished young woman, and proclaimed her, in his own mind, the most
intelligent and most perfect of human creatures; and it was relatively
true. The greatest and best of mortals is the one who is most
sympathetic with us, who understands us best, who is best able to
develop and nourish the best qualities of our mind; in a word, the one
who would make our life most blissful and complete if our lives could be
absolutely blended.

"Ah! I have done well to keep my heart empty and my mind pure hitherto,"
said Emile to himself, "and I thank thee, O God, for having assisted me!
for surely this is the woman who was destined for me, and without whom I
should simply have vegetated and suffered."

While talking on general subjects, Gilberte allowed her regret at being
deprived of books to appear, and Emile speedily divined that regret was
deeper than she cared to reveal to Janille.

He reflected sorrowfully that there was not a single volume in his
father's house except commercial and industrial treatises, and that,
expecting to return to Poitiers, he had left there what few books he
owned.

But Gilberte suggested that there was a very extensive library at
Boisguilbault. Jean had done some work long ago in a large room full of
books, and it was much to be regretted that the families were at odds,
for she might have taken advantage of the proximity of such a treasure.

At this juncture, Janille, who always knitted as she walked, raised her
head.

"It's probably a lot of tiresome old books," she said, "and for my part
I should be very sorry to put my nose into them; I should be afraid they
would make me a lunatic like the man who lives on them."

"Why, does Monsieur de Boisguilbault read very much?" asked Gilberte;
"he must be very learned."

"Well, what good has it done him to read so much and be so learned? He
has never done anybody any good with it, and it hasn't made him loving
or lovable."

Janille, unwilling to expose herself to further questions concerning a
man whom she hated, without knowing or caring to say why she hated him,
walked toward her goats as if to prevent them from nibbling a vine which
grew around the door of the square pavilion.

Emile took advantage of this moment to say to Gilberte that, if there
were so many books at Boisguilbault, she should soon have them at her
disposal, even if he had to borrow them stealthily.

Gilberte could only thank him with a smile, not daring to add a glance
thereto; she was beginning to feel embarrassed with him when Janille was
not there.

"On my word!" said Janille, retracing her steps, "Monsieur Antoine is in
no hurry to return. I know him: he's chattering somewhere at this
minute! He has met some old friends and is treating them at the
wineshop, forgetting the time and spending his money. And then, if some
whining creature wants to borrow ten or fifteen francs to buy a
miserable goat or a brace or two of scrawny geese, he'll let him have
it! He'd give away all he has about him if he wasn't afraid of being
scolded when he comes home. He took six sheep, you see, and if he only
brings back the price of five in his purse, as it happens too often, let
him look out for _ma mie_ Janille! he won't go to market again without
me! Hark--there's the clock striking four--thanks to Monsieur Emile, who
fixed it so well,--and I'll bet that your father has no more than just
started for home, at the best."

"Four o'clock!" exclaimed Emile; "why that's Monsieur de Boisguilbault's
dinner-hour. I haven't a moment to lose."

"Go at once then," said Gilberte, "for we mustn't make him any more
ill-disposed toward us than he is already."

"What difference does it make to us whether he bears us ill-will or
not?" said Janille. "Do you really mean to go without seeing Monsieur
Antoine?"

"I must, I am very sorry to say!"

"Where is that little villain of a Charasson?" cried Janille. "Asleep in
a corner, I'll warrant, and not thinking about bringing up your horse!
When monsieur is absent, Sylvain disappears. Here, you wicked rascal,
where are you hiding?"

"I wish that you could provide me with a charm!" said Emile to Gilberte,
while Janille was seeking Sylvain and calling him in tones more
vociferous than really angry. "I am going forth, like a knight errant,
to enter the wizard's den and try to extort from him his secrets and the
words that will put an end to your distress."

"Here," said Gilberte, laughingly, taking a flower from her belt, "here
is the loveliest rose from my garden; perhaps its fragrance may possess
the salutary power of putting its enemy's prudence to sleep and
softening his ferocity. Leave it on his table, try to induce him to
admire it and smell it. He is a horticulturist, but I doubt if he has in
his great garden so fine a specimen as this product of my last year's
graft. If I were a châtelaine of the good old days which Janille
regrets, perhaps I could invoke a spell that would impart a magic power
to this flower. But, being a poor girl, I can only pray to God to
instill mercy into that cruel heart, even as he caused the dew to fall
and open this rose-bud."

"Must I leave my talisman, pray?" said Emile, hiding the rose in his
breast: "may I not keep it to use another time?"

The tone in which he asked this question and the emotion discernible
upon his face caused Gilberte a moment's artless surprise. She looked at
him with an uncertain expression, unable as yet to understand the value
he attached to the flower taken from her girdle. She tried to smile, as
at a jest, but felt that the blood rose to her cheeks; and as Janille
reappeared, she made no reply.

Emile, drunk with love, descended with reckless speed the dangerous path
down the hill. When he was at the foot he ventured to turn, and saw
Gilberte following him with her eyes from her rose-covered terrace, her
hands apparently busied trimming her favorite plants.

She surely was not dressed more daintily than usual that day. Her dress
was clean, like everything that passed through Janille's scrupulous
hands; but it had been washed and ironed so many times that the color
had changed from lilac to that indefinable tint which the hortensia
assumes just as it withers.

Her superb golden hair, rebelling against the fetters imposed upon it,
escaped from its confinement and formed a sort of halo of gold about her
head. A snow-white, tightly-fitting chemisette surrounded her lovely
neck and suggested the graceful outlines of her shoulders. In Emile's
eyes she was resplendent in the sunbeams falling full upon her, for she
made no effort to shield herself from them. Sunburn was powerless to
impair that rich carnation, and her pale, faded costume made her seem
all the fresher.

Moreover, the imagination of a lover of twenty years is too rich to be
embarrassed by a mere matter of dress. That faded gown assumed in
Emile's eyes a hue more gorgeous than that of all the richest stuffs of
the Orient, and he wondered why the painters of the Renaissance had
never been able to clothe their smiling madonnas and their triumphant
saints so magnificently.

He stood as if nailed to the spot for several minutes, and, except for
the impatience of his horse tossing his head and pawing the ground, he
would have forgotten entirely that Monsieur de Boisguilbault had another
hour to wait for him.

He had had to make several detours to reach the foot of the hill, and
the distance in a straight line was not so great that the two young
people could not see each other quite plainly. Gilberte observed the
hesitation of the horseman, who could not make up his mind to lose sight
of her; so she went behind the rose-bushes, to conceal herself from him,
but she continued to watch him for a long time through the branches.

Janille had walked in the opposite direction to meet her master. Not
until Gilberte heard her father's voice did she break the spell that
held her. It was the first time that she had ever allowed Janille to
anticipate her in going to meet him and relieve him of his game-bag and
his stick.

As he approached Boisguilbault, Emile made and remade a hundred times
his plan of attack upon the fortress where that incomprehensible
individual lay entrenched.

Impelled by his romantic disposition, he had a sort of presentiment that
Gilberte's destiny--and consequently his own--was written in mysterious
characters in some obscure corner of that old manor, whose high gray
walls rose before him.

Tall, gloomy, melancholy and silent as its aged lord, that isolated
abode seemed to defy the bold attacks of curiosity. But Emile was
spurred on by a passionate determination. As Gilberte's confidant and
agent, he said to himself, pressing the rose, already withered, against
his lips, that he would have the necessary courage and address to
triumph over every obstacle.

He found Monsieur de Boisguilbault alone on his stoop, idle and
impassive as always. He made haste to apologize for delaying the old
gentleman's dinner, on the plea that he had lost his way, and, being as
yet unfamiliar with the neighborhood, had passed nearly two hours
finding it.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault asked no questions as to the route he had
taken. One would have said that he dreaded the name of Châteaubrun;
but, with refinement of courtesy, he assured his guest that he had no
idea of the time and had not thought of being impatient. He had been
somewhat disturbed, none the less, as Emile soon discovered from some
faltering remarks that he made, and the young man fancied that he could
see that, amid the profound tedium of his solitary life, the marquis's
sensitive nature would have suffered keenly if he had broken his word.

The dinner was excellent and served by the old retainer with scrupulous
punctuality. He was the only servant to be seen in the château. The
others, buried in the kitchen, which was underground, did not appear at
all. It seemed that this was the result of a sort of standing order, and
that their dean was the only one who did not offend the master's eye.

The old man was very infirm, but he was so accustomed to his duties that
the marquis had to say almost nothing to him; and when it happened that
he did not anticipate his master's desires, a sign was sufficient to
convey them to him.

His deafness seemed admirably suited to Monsieur de Boisguilbault's
taciturnity, and perhaps the latter was not sorry to have about him a
man whose impaired vision made it impossible for him to read his
features: he was rather a machine than a servant; for, being deprived by
his infirmities of the power of mental communication with his
fellow-men, he no longer had any desire or occasion therefor.

One could readily conceive that those two old men were well fitted to
live together without a thought of being bored by each other's company,
there was so little apparent life in either of them.

The dinner was served with due regularity, but not rapidly. They were
two hours at table. Emile observed that his host ate almost nothing, and
seemed to have no other purpose in eating than to induce him to taste
all the dishes, which were appetizing and toothsome. The wines were
exquisite, and old Martin poured them from bottles covered with the dust
of ages, which he held horizontally, taking care not to jar them in the
slightest degree.

The marquis barely wet his lips, but motioned to his old servant to fill
Emile's glass, who, being habitually very abstemious, kept close watch
upon himself, to see that he did not allow his reason to succumb to the
repeated experiments with the numerous specimens from that seignorial
cellar.

"Is this your ordinary fare, monsieur le marquis?" he asked, marvelling
that such a sumptuous repast should be provided for two persons.

"I--I really don't know," the marquis replied; "I have nothing to do
with it. Martin is my housekeeper. I never have any appetite, and I
never notice what I eat. Do the things seem good to you?"

"Exquisite; and if I had the honor of being admitted to your table
often, I should beg Martin to entertain me less splendidly, for I should
be afraid of becoming a gourmand."

"Why not? it's one variety of enjoyment. Happy are they who have many
others!"

"But there are those which are more elevating and less expensive,"
rejoined Emile; "so many people lack the necessaries of life that I
should be ashamed to find that the luxuries were necessary to me."

"You are right," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, with his accustomed
sigh. "Well, I will tell Martin to serve you a simpler dinner another
time. He supposed that at your age you would have a large appetite; but
it seems to me that you eat like a man who has finished growing. How old
are you?"

"Twenty-one."

"I should have thought that you were older."

"From my face?"

"No, from your ideas."

"I would like my father to hear your opinion, monsieur le marquis, and
to become imbued with it," rejoined Emile with a smile; "for he always
treats me like a child."

"What sort of a man is your father?" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault,
with an ingenuous absent-mindedness which removed the sting from what
might have seemed at first blush a most impertinent question.

"My father," replied Emile, "is a friend whose esteem I desire and whose
blame I dread. I can think of no better way to describe an energetic,
stern and just character."

"I have heard it said that he was a very able man, very wealthy and very
jealous of his influence. Those are not disadvantages if he makes a good
use of them."

"What in your opinion, monsieur le marquis, is the best use that he can
make of them?"

"Ah! it would take a long while to tell!" sighed the marquis; "you ought
to know as well as I."

And, roused momentarily by the confidence Emile designedly manifested in
him in order to induce a similar confidence on his part, he relapsed
into his torpor, as if he feared to make an effort to throw it off.

"I absolutely must break this secular ice," thought Emile. "Perhaps it's
not so difficult as people think. Perhaps I shall be the first who ever
tried it!"

And, while maintaining, as he was bound to do, a discreet silence
concerning the apprehensions which his father's ambition aroused in him,
and concerning the painful conflict between their respective opinions,
he spoke freely and enthusiastically of his own beliefs, of his
sympathies and even of his dreams for the future of the human race.

He was certain that the marquis would take him for a madman, and he
amused himself by inviting contradictions which would enable him at last
to penetrate that mysterious mind.

"If I could only bring about an explosion of contempt or indignation!"
he said to himself; "then I could discover the strength or weakness of
the citadel."

And he unconsciously adopted with the marquis the same tactics that his
father had recently employed with him; he affected to attack and
demolish everything that he assumed to be in any degree sacred in the
old legitimist's eyes; "the nobility, the money power, large estates,
the power of individuals, the slavery of the masses, the Jesuitism of
the church, the alleged divine right of kings, the inequality of
privileges and pleasures which is the basis of society as at present
constituted, the domination of man over woman, who is treated as
merchandise in the marriage contract and as real estate in the contract
of public morality; in a word, all those heathenish laws which the
Gospel has failed to banish from our institutions and which the
political scheming of the Church has consecrated."

Monsieur de Boisguilbault seemed to listen more attentively than usual;
his great blue eyes were wide open, as if, in default of wine, his
amazement at such a sweeping declaration of the rights of man had
utterly stupefied him.

Emile glanced at his glass, which was filled with tokay a hundred years
old, and resolved to have recourse to it for inspiration if the natural
warmth of his youthful enthusiasm was insufficient to avert the
avalanche of snow that was about to fall upon him.

But he did not need that stimulant; for, whether because the snow had
become too hard to be detached from the glacier, or because Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, while seeming to listen, had heard nothing, the rash
profession of faith of that child of the century was not interrupted and
came to an end in the most profound silence.

"Well, monsieur le marquis," said Emile, amazed by this listless
toleration of his views, "do you subscribe to my opinions, or do they
seem to you unworthy of being combated?"

Monsieur de Boisguilbault did not reply; a wan smile played about his
lips, which moved as if to speak but emitted only the problematical
sigh. But he placed his hand on Emile's, and it seemed to the younger
man that he felt a cool moisture, which imparted to that hand of stone
some symptom of life.

At last he rose and said:

"We will take our coffee in the park.--For I am entirely of your
opinion," he added after a pause, as if he were finishing aloud a
sentence he had begun under his breath.

"Really?" cried Emile, resolutely passing his arm through his host's.

"Why not, pray?" rejoined the latter coolly.

"Then all these things are indifferent to you?"

"God grant it!" replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault, with a more
pronounced sigh than usual.




XVII

THAW


Emile had as yet admired the park of Boisguilbault only over the hedges
and through the gate. He was more than ever impressed by the beauty of
that pleasure-ground, by the luxuriance of the plants and their happy
arrangement.

Nature had done much, but art had seconded her with great taste and
judgment. The sloping ground was diversified by innumerable picturesque
irregularities, and an abundant spring, bubbling up among the rocks,
sent forth streams in all directions, keeping all things green under the
superb trees.

The valley and the slope on the other side, which also belonged to the
marquis, were covered with a dense vegetation which partly concealed the
division walls and hedges, so that from all the elevated points, which
afforded views of a beautiful and extensive landscape, the park seemed
to extend to the horizon.

"This is an enchanted spot," said Emile, "and one needs only to see it
to be sure that you are a great poet."

"There are many great poets of my sort," replied the marquis, "that is
to say, people who feel poetry but cannot express it."

"Is the spoken or written word alone interesting, I pray to know?"
exclaimed Emile. "Is not the painter who nobly interprets nature a poet
too? And if that is incontestable, does not the artist who actually
improves upon nature, and modifies it in order to develop all its
beauty,--does not he produce a grand poetic result?"

"You express that very well," rejoined Monsieur de Boisguilbault, in a
tone of indolent indifference, which was not, however, wholly devoid of
kindliness.

But Emile would have preferred discussion to this careless assent to
everything he said, and he was afraid that his main attack had failed.
"What can I invent to vex him and make him come out of his shell?" he
said to himself. "There is no one of the famous sieges in history that
can be compared to this."

The coffee was served in a pretty Swiss chalet; the exactness of the
copy and the scrupulous neatness aroused Emile's admiration for a
moment; but the absence of human beings and domestic animals in that
rustic retreat was so noticeable that it was impossible to maintain the
illusion. And yet nothing was missing: the moss-covered hillside studded
with firs, nor the thread of sparkling water falling into a stone basin
at the door, and flowing from it with a gentle murmur; the chalet,
constructed entirely of resinous wood with a pretty arrangement of
balustrades and built against huge granite rocks, the pretty overhanging
roof, the interior furnished in the German fashion, even to the service
of blue earthenware--all new and clean and glistening and
deserted--resembled a dainty Fribourg toy rather than a rustic dwelling.

Even the stiff, lifeless figures of the old marquis and his old
majordomo gave one the impression of painted wooden images, placed there
to complete the resemblance.

"You have been in Switzerland, I presume, monsieur le marquis," said
Emile, "and this is a reminiscence of some favorite spot?"

"I have traveled very little," Monsieur de Boisguilbault replied,
"although I set out one day with the intention of making the tour of the
world. Switzerland happened to be in my way; the country pleased me and
I went no farther, saying to myself that I should probably find nothing
better after taking a deal of trouble."

"I see that you prefer this country to all others, and that you have
come back here forever?"

"Forever, most assuredly."

"This is Switzerland in miniature, and if the imagination is less keenly
aroused by grand spectacles, the fatigues and dangers of travel are much
less great."

"I had other reasons for settling down on my own estate."

"Is it indiscreet to ask you what they are?"

"Are you really curious to know, then?" said the marquis with an
equivocal smile.

"Curious! no; I am not curious in the impertinent and ridiculous meaning
of the word; but to one of my age, one's own destiny and other people's
is an enigma, and one always imagines that he may derive valuable
information from the experience and wisdom of certain men."

"Why do you say _certain men_? Am I not like the rest of the world?"

"Oh! not at all, monsieur le marquis!"

"You surprise me greatly," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault in exactly the
same tone in which he had said, a few moments earlier: _I am entirely of
your opinion_. And he added: "Won't you put some sugar in your coffee?"

"I am more surprised," said Emile, mechanically helping himself to
sugar, "that you do not realize how solemn and impressive your solitude,
your gravity, and I will venture to add, your melancholy, must be to a
child like myself."

"Do I frighten you?" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault with a deep sigh.

"You frighten me terribly, monsieur le marquis, I frankly admit; but do
not take my ingenuousness in bad part, for it is no less certain that I
am impelled by an entirely contrary sentiment of irresistible
attraction, to overcome that sentiment of fear."

"That is strange," said the marquis, "very strange: pray explain it to
me."

"It is very simple. As a young man of my age goes about seeking the
solution of his own future in the present or in the past of men of
maturer years, it terrifies him to see an invincible sadness and a dumb
but profound distaste for life, written upon austere brows."

"Yes, that is why my external appearance repels you. Do not be afraid to
say it. You are not the first and I expected it."

"Repel is not the word, since, notwithstanding the sort of magnetic
stupor into which you cast me, I am drawn toward you by a peculiar
attraction."

"Peculiar!--aye, very peculiar, and you are the more eccentric of us
two. I was struck, the first moment I saw you, by the manifest
dissimilarity of your character to that of the men whom I knew in my
younger days."

"And was that impression unfavorable to me, monsieur le marquis?"

"Quite the contrary," replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault in that voice,
utterly without inflection, which made it impossible to estimate the
bearing of his replies. "Martin," he added, leaning toward his old
servant who bent himself double to hear him, "you can take all this
away. Are there any workmen left in the park?"

"No, monsieur le marquis, nobody."

"In that case, close the gate when you go away."

Emile remained alone with his host in the solitude of the vast park. The
marquis took his arm and led him to a seat on the cliffs above the
chalet, where there was a lovely view.

The sun, as it sank toward the horizon, projected the shadows of the
tall poplars from one side to the other of the ravine, like a dark
curtain intersected by brilliant streaks. The violet rays shot up into
an opal-hued sky, above an ocean of dark verdure; and as the sounds of
toil in the fields died gradually away, the voice of the mountain
streams and the plaintive note of the turtle doves could be heard more
distinctly.

It was a magnificent evening, and young Cardonnet, turning his eyes and
thoughts upon the distant hills of Châteaubrun, fell into a pleasant
reverie. He was reflecting that he might venture to indulge in that
mental recreation before making another assault, when his adversary
suddenly made an unexpected sortie and broke the silence.

"Monsieur Cardonnet," said he, "if, when you told me that you felt a
sort of sympathy for me despite the ennui that I cause you, you did not
say it simply to be polite, or by way of jest, this is the reason: we
profess the same principles, we are both communists."

"Can it be true?" cried Emile, astounded by this declaration and
thinking that he must be dreaming. "I thought just now that you answered
me as you did simply to be courteous or by way of jest; but am I really
so fortunate as to find in you a justification of my desires and my
dreams?"

"What is there surprising in that?" rejoined the marquis calmly. "May
not the truth make itself known in solitude as well as in a crowd, and
have I not lived long enough to be able to distinguish good from evil,
the true from the false? You take me for a very matter-of-fact, very
cold man. It is possible that I am; at my age a man is too tired of
himself to care to examine himself; but, outside of our individuality,
there are general realities sufficiently worthy of interest to divert
our thoughts from our ennui.

"For a long time I retained the opinions and prejudices in which I was
reared; my natural indolence was content not to scrutinize them too
closely, and then I had internal anxieties which kept me from thinking
about them. But since old age has set me free from all pretension to
happiness and from every sort of regret or special interest in anything,
I have felt the need of obtaining an insight into the general life of my
fellow-men, and, consequently, into the meaning of the divine laws as
applied to mankind.

"Certain Saint-Simonian pamphlets fell into my hands by chance, I read
them to pass the time, having as yet no idea that they could go beyond
the bold theories of Jean-Jacques and Voltaire, with whom careful study
had reconciled me.

"I determined to know more of the principles of this new school, and I
passed from that to the study of Fourier. I admitted everything,
although I did not very clearly distinguish their contradictions, and it
still saddened me to see the ancient world crumble under the weight of
theories invincible in their system of criticism, confused and
incomplete in their principles of organization. It was not until five or
six years ago that I accepted with perfect disinterestedness and great
mental satisfaction the principle of a social revolution.

"The attempts at communism had seemed to me monstrous at first, on the
faith of those who combated them. I read the newspapers and publications
of all the schools, and I gradually lost myself in that labyrinth,
without being repelled by fatigue. Little by little the communist
hypothesis came forth from its clouds; able expositions shed light into
my mind. I felt that I must go back to the teaching of history and to
the tradition of the human race.

"I had a well-selected library of the best documents and the most
serious works of the past. My father had been fond of reading, and I had
hated it for so many years that I did not even know what precious
resources he had left me for my old age. I set to work all alone. I
learned again the dead languages, which I had forgotten; I read for the
first time, in the original sources, the history of religions and
philosophies, and the day came at last when the great men, the saints,
the prophets, the poets, the martyrs, the heretics, the scholars, the
enlightened orthodox believers, the innovators, the artists, the
reformers of all times, all countries, of all the revolutions and of all
the forms of worship seemed to me to be in accord, proclaiming in every
form, and even in their apparent contradictions, one eternal truth, as
logical and as clear as the light of day, namely the equality of rights,
and the inevitable necessity of equality of enjoyment thereof as a
rigorous consequence of the first.

"Since then I have been surprised by only one thing, and that is that in
the time in which we live, with so many resources and discoveries, so
much activity, intelligence and freedom of opinion, the world is still
plunged in such utter ignorance of the logical results of the facts and
ideas which are forcing it to transform itself; that there are so many
self-styled theologians encouraged and supported by the State and by the
Church, and that no one of them has ever thought of devoting his life to
the very simple labor which led me to certainty; and lastly, that while
rushing onward to the catastrophe of its dissolution, the world of the
past thinks to preserve itself by the strength and wrath of the destiny
which hurries it on and swallows it, whereas those who know the secret
of the law of the future have not as yet sufficient tranquillity and
good sense to laugh at insults and to proclaim, with head erect, that
they are communists and nothing else.

"You talk of dreams and Utopias with eloquence and enthusiasm, Monsieur
Cardonnet; I forgive you for making use of those expressions because at
your age truth arouses enthusiasm, and one makes of it an ideal which he
purposely places rather high and rather far away, in order to have the
pleasure of reaching it by earnest effort. But I can not work myself up
as you do over this truth, which seems to me as simple, as manifest and
as incontestable as it seems to you novel, bold and romantic. In my case
it is the result of a deeper study and of a more firmly seated
certainty. I do not dislike your vivacity, but I should not blame myself
if I were to combat it a little in order to prevent you from endangering
the doctrine by over-eagerness.

"Beware of that: you are too happily endowed ever to become ridiculous,
and you will please even those people who fight against you; but be
careful lest, by talking too fast and to too many disaffected persons of
matters so serious and so worthy of respect, you tempt them to resort to
systematic contradictions and to defend themselves in bad faith.

"What would you say of a young priest who should deliver sermons at the
dinner-table? You would say that he belittled the majesty of his texts.
Communistic truth is as deserving of respect as gospel truth, since it
is in reality the same truth. Let us not speak of it lightly, therefore,
and after the manner of political discussion. If you are excited, you
must make sure that you are entirely master of yourself before
proclaiming it; if you are phlegmatic, like me, you must wait until you
acquire a little self-confidence and mental activity before opening your
heart to other men on such a subject.

"You see, Monsieur Cardonnet, people must not have a chance to say that
this is all folly, idle dreaming, feverish declamation, or a vision of
mysticism. That has been said quite enough, and enough weak minds have
given people the right to say it.

"We have seen Saint-Simonism pass through its phase of trances and
feverish and disordered visions; that did not prevent the survival of
whatever was viable in Saint-Simonism.

"Despite the aberrations of Fourier, the lucid portions of his system
survive and will bear a critical examination. Truth triumphs and pursues
its way through whatever disguise one views it and in whatever disguise
one clothes it. But it would be much better that, in the age of reason
which we have reached, the ridiculous manifestations of a blind
enthusiasm should disappear entirely. Is not that your opinion? Has not
the hour struck when serious-minded people should take possession of
their true domain, and when those things that are logically proved
should be professed by logicians?

"What does it matter if they are said to be inapplicable? Does it
follow, because the majority of men still know and practise only what is
wrong and false, that the clear-sighted man must follow the blind over
the precipice?

"It's of no use to urge upon me the necessity of obeying bad laws and
wrongful prejudices. Although my acts may be forced to conform to them,
my mind will be only the more firmly convinced of the necessity of
protesting against them.

"Was Jesus Christ in error because, during eighteen centuries, the
truths demonstrated by him have germinated slowly, and have not yet
bloomed in legislation?

"And now that the problems suggested by his ideal are beginning to
approach a solution in the minds of some of us, how is it that we are
taxed with madness because we see and believe what will be seen and
believed by all men a hundred years hence? Be assured therefore that it
is not necessary to be a poet or a seer to be perfectly convinced of the
reality of what you are pleased to call sublime dreams. To be sure,
truth is sublime, and the men who discover it are sublime as well. But
they who, having received it and touched it, conform their lives to it
as an excellent thing, have not really the right to be proud; for if,
when they have once understood it, they reject it, they would be nothing
less than idiots or madmen."

Monsieur de Boisguilbault spoke with a facility most extraordinary for
him, and he might have talked on for a long while before the stupefied
Emile would have thought of interrupting him.

Emile would never have believed that what he called his faith and his
ideal could bloom in so cold and apathetic a mind, and he asked himself
at first if it were not enough to sicken himself with it to find himself
in the company of such an adept. But, little by little, notwithstanding
his moderate way of speaking, the monotony of his accent and the
immobility of his features, Monsieur de Boisguilbault acquired an
extraordinary influence over him. That impassive man seemed to him an
embodiment of the living law, the voice of destiny pronouncing its
decrees over the abyss of eternity.

The solitude of that beautiful spot, the cloudless sky which, as the
afterglow faded, seemed to raise its blue vault higher and higher toward
the empyrean, the darkness gathering under the great trees, and the
murmur of the rippling stream, which seemed in its placid continuity,
the natural accompaniment of that calm, even voice--all combined to
plunge Emile into a profound emotion akin to the mysterious awe which
the response of the oracle in the sacred oaks must have produced in the
youthful neophytes.

"Monsieur de Boisguilbault," said the young man, deeply impressed by
what he had heard, "I cannot better express my submission to your
enlightened views than by asking your pardon, from the bottom of my
heart, for the way in which I extorted them from you. I was far from
believing that you entertained such ideas, and I was drawn toward you by
curiosity rather than by respect. But be sure that you will find in me
henceforth the devotion of a son if you deem me worthy to manifest it."

"I never had any children," replied the marquis, taking Emile's hand in
his and retaining it several moments; for he seemed to be revivified,
and a sort of vital warmth enlivened his soft, dry skin. "Perhaps I was
not worthy of having them; perhaps I should have brought them up badly!
Nevertheless, I have deeply regretted that I have never had that joy.
Now, I am entirely resigned to death; but if a little affection should
come to me from without, I should accept it gratefully. I am not very
trustful. Solitude breeds distrust. But I will make for your sake some
effort to overcome my natural disposition, so that you may not be
offended by my defects, especially by my surly humor, which horrifies
everybody."

"That is because nobody knows you," rejoined Emile. "People look upon
you as very different from what you are. You are thought to be proud and
obstinately attached to the chimera of ancient privileges. You have
evidently taken care, with great cruelty toward yourself, not to allow
your real character to be divined by any one."

"Why should I have explained myself? What does it matter what people
think of me? for, in the society in which I vegetate, my real opinions
would seem even more ridiculous than those commonly attributed to me. If
the cause which my mind has embraced would derive any benefit from a
public declaration of my homage or my adhesion, no ridicule would turn
me from it; but such adhesion on the part of a man so little loved as I
am would be more harmful than useful to the progress of the truth. I
cannot lie, and if any one had ever taken the trouble to come and
question me, during these latter years since my opinions became fixed,
it is probable that I should have said to him what I have said to you;
but the circle of solitude grows wider about me every day and I have no
right to complain. One must be amiable, in order to please, and I do not
know how to make myself amiable, God having denied me certain gifts,
which it is impossible for me to feign."

Emile strove earnestly and affectionately to allay, so far as he could,
the secret bitterness concealed beneath Monsieur de Boisguilbault's
resignation.

"It is very easy for me to be content with the present," said the old
man with a sad smile. "I have very few years to live; although I am
neither very old nor very ill, I feel that my vital thread is worn out,
and my blood congeals and thickens every day. I might perhaps complain
of having had no joys in the past; but when the past has fled, what does
it matter what it was?--bliss or despair, strength or weakness, it has
all vanished like a dream."

"But not without leaving traces behind," said Emile. "Even if memory
itself should disappear, our emotions, according as they were pleasant
or painful, will have deposited their balm or their poison, and our
hearts will be tranquil or broken according to the experience they have
had. I think that you must have suffered terribly in the past, although
your brave heart refuses to descend to lamentation, and that suffering,
which you conceal with too much pride, perhaps, increases my respect and
my sympathy for you."

"I have suffered more from the absence of happiness than from what is
commonly called unhappiness. I agree that a sort of pride has already
prevented me from seeking a remedy in the sympathy of others. Friendship
must needs come to seek me out, for I could not run after it."

"But in that case, would you have accepted it?"

"Oh! certainly," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, still in a cold tone,
but with a sigh that went to Emile's heart.

"And is it too late now?" asked the young man, with profound and
respectful pity.

"Now--why, I should have to believe in it," replied the marquis, "or
dare to ask for it--and from whom, pray?"

"Why not from him who listens to you and understands you to-day? Perhaps
he is the first who has done so for a long time."

"That is true!"

"Very well, do you despise my youth? Do you deem me incapable of a
serious sentiment, and do you fear that you will grow younger by
bestowing a little affection on a boy?"

"But suppose I should make you grow older, Emile?"

"Very good; as I shall strive, for my part, to make you retrace your
steps, the struggle will be advantageous to both of us. I shall gain in
wisdom unquestionably, and perhaps you will find some alleviation of the
wearisome monotony of your life. Believe in me, Monsieur de
Boisguilbault: at my age one cannot pretend; if I dare to offer you my
respectful attention, it is because I am capable of performing the
duties that accompany it, and of appreciating the advantages of your
affection!"

Monsieur de Boisguilbault took Emile's hand once more, and pressed it
very warmly, but made no reply.

By the light of the moon, which was just rising, the young man saw a
tear glisten an instant on the old man's withered cheek and disappear in
his silvery whiskers.

Emile had conquered; he was happy and proud.

The youth of to-day profess a malignant contempt for old age, but our
hero, on the contrary, felt a legitimate pride in triumphing over the
reserve and distrust of that venerable and unhappy man. He was flattered
by the thought that he had brought some consolation to that desolate
patriarch and had made up to him for the neglect or injustice of other
men.

He walked with him a long time in his beautiful park, and asked him many
questions, the confiding artlessness of which did not offend the
marquis. He expressed his surprise, for instance, that Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, being wealthy and unhampered by family ties, had not
tried to put his opinions in practice and to found some communistic
association.

"That would be impossible for me," the old man replied. "I have not a
trace of the initiative spirit; my indolence is invincible, and I have
never, in my whole life, been able to exert any influence upon others. I
should be less fitted for it now than ever, especially as it would not
be merely a matter of devising a simple plan of organization applicable
to the present time, but we must have moral and religious formulas, an
exposition of principles and sentiment. I recognize the necessity of
sentiment to convince men's minds; but it is not in my line. I have not
the faculty of laying my heart bare, and my heart has not enough
vitality to impart eloquence to my words. Nor do I think the time has
come--you do not think that it has, do you? Very well, I do not propose
to disturb your conviction; you are built for difficult enterprises, may
you find the opportunity to act! As for myself, I have projects for the
future--after my death. Some day, perhaps I will tell you what they are.
Look at this beautiful garden that I have created--I have not done it
without a purpose--but I want to know you better before explaining my
plans; will you forgive me?"

"I bow to your wish, and I am certain beforehand that your predilection
for this earthly paradise is not simply the mania of an idle landowner."

"I began in that way, however. My house had become distasteful to me;
nothing gratifies indolence and disgust like immutable order, and that
is why the house is so carefully kept and orderly. But I care for
nothing that it contains, and I may tell you in confidence that I have
not slept in it for fifteen years. The chalet where we took our coffee
is my real home. There is a bedroom there and a study, which I did not
show you and which no one has entered since they were built, not even
Martin. Please not mention this to anybody, for perhaps public
inquisitiveness would follow me there. It already besieges the park
persistently enough on Sundays. All the idlers of the neighborhood stay
here until eleven o'clock at night, and I stay away until the closing of
the gates compels them to leave. On Monday I rise very late so that the
workmen may have time to remove all traces of the invasion before I have
seen them. Martin looks out for that. Don't accuse me of misanthropy,
although perhaps I deserve the charge to some extent. Try rather to
explain the anomaly of a man thoroughly imbued with the necessity of
life in common, and yet compelled by his instincts to shun the presence
of his fellow-men. I belong to this generation of individual egotists,
and that which is a vice in others is a disease in me. There are reasons
for this. But I prefer not to discuss them in order that I may not have
to recall them."

Emile dared not ask any direct questions, although he resolved that he
would discover one by one all Monsieur de Boisguilbault's secrets, or at
least all those in which the Châteaubrun family was interested. But he
considered that he had won enough victories for one day, and that he
must win the marquis's esteem and affection, if possible, before
obtaining his full confidence.

He desired simply to obtain access to the library, and the marquis
promised to throw it open to him at their next interview, for which,
however, they appointed no time. Monsieur de Boisguilbault, perhaps
because of a return of his former distrust, wished to see if Emile would
come again soon of his own motion.




XVIII

STORM


From that day Emile no longer lived at his parents' house. He was there
in the body at night, to be sure, and during some hours of the day; but
his mind was more frequently at Boisguilbault and his heart almost
always at Châteaubrun.

He went frequently to Boisguilbault, more frequently than he would have
done, perhaps, had it not been for the proximity of Châteaubrun and the
pretexts afforded by his first visit.

In the first place there were books to carry to Gilberte, and although
the marquis gave him permission to draw upon the library at his
discretion, he was careful to carry them one by one, so that he might
always have an excuse for calling upon her.

It did not occur to Monsieur Antoine or Janille to be surprised at the
pleasure which Gilberte derived from reading, or to superintend her
choice of books; for Janille could not read, and prudence was not
Monsieur Antoine's forte. But the maid's guardian angel was no more
heedful of the purity of her thoughts than was Emile. His love enveloped
Gilberte with an inviolable respect, and the child's saintlike innocence
was a treasure of which he showed himself a more jealous guardian than
her father, to whom, as Janille expressed it, good fortune had always
come when he was asleep.

How carefully therefore did he turn the leaves of a volume before
handing it to her,--whatever its subject,--history, morals, poetry or
romance,--lest it should contain some word that might make her blush!

If, in her trustful ignorance, she asked him to procure her some book in
which he remembered that there were certain passages that ought not to
be put before the eyes of a young virgin, he would reply that he had
looked through the collection at Boisguilbault in vain; that it was not
there.

A mother could have acted no more wisely under such circumstances than
Gilberte's young lover, and in proportion as the father, in his
affectionate heedlessness, unwittingly smoothed the way for attempts at
corruption, Emile made it his sacred and cherished duty to justify the
confidence of those ingenuous hearts.

Emile's opportunities for talking with Gilberte as to what took place
between himself and Monsieur de Boisguilbault were very rare and brief,
for Janille almost never left them; and when they were with Monsieur
Antoine, Gilberte instinctively and from habit clung to her father's
side.

However she soon learned that the friendship between young Cardonnet and
the old marquis was making great strides, and that it was based upon a
remarkable harmony of principles and ideas. But Emile did his best to
conceal from her the ill success of his attempts to bring about a
reconciliation between the two families: we shall set forth, in due
time, the result of his efforts in that direction.

Hoping always to succeed in time, Emile dissembled his frequent rebuffs;
and Gilberte, divining the embarrassments and the delicate nature of the
mission he had accepted, did not press him in the fear of displaying too
great eagerness and persistence.

And then, it should be said that Gilberte gradually became less
interested in the success of the enterprise, while Emile, for his part,
felt that his resolution became day by day more earnest.

Love absorbs every other thought; and these two young people, by dint of
thinking of each other soon had no leisure to think of anything else.
Their whole existence became sentiment, that is to say passion, and the
hours flew by in the intoxication of being together, or dragged heavily
in anticipation of the moment which was to bring them together.

It was a strange thing to Monsieur Cardonnet, who was watching his son
closely, and to Emile, who no longer realized what was going on within
him, and yet it was entirely natural, inevitable indeed, that the
passion which had absorbed our hero's first youth,--that is to say, the
desire to acquire knowledge, to understand and take part in general
life,--gave place to a gentle slumber of the intellect and to something
like forgetfulness of his favorite theories.

In a society where all things were in harmony, love would surely become
a stimulant to patriotism and to social virtue. But when bold and
generous impulses are doomed to maintain a painful conflict with the men
and things that surround us, the personal affections capture us and
dominate us to the point of producing a sort of numbness of the other
faculties.

The common people seek in intoxication by alcohol oblivion of their
privations, and the lover finds in the intoxication produced by his
mistress's eyes a sort of philter that induces oblivion of everything
else. Emile was too young to know how to suffer and to desire to suffer,
but he had already suffered much. Now that happiness had come in search
of him, how could he think of eluding it? Let us admit, without too much
shame for the poor boy, that he no longer thought of laws or facts or
the future, of the past of the world, of the vices of society, or the
means of saving it, of human misery or the divine will, of Heaven or
earth. Earth, Heaven, God's law, destiny, the world--his love was all of
these; and provided he could see Gilberte and read his fate in her eyes,
it mattered little to him if the universe crumbled about his ears.

He could not open a book or sustain a discussion. When he had tired
himself out scouring all the paths that led in the direction of his
beloved, he dozed beside his mother's chair or read the newspapers to
her without understanding a word of what his voice said; and when he was
alone in his chamber, he would undress very hurriedly so that he could
put out his light and avoid the sight of external objects.

Then the darkness would be illuminated by the inward fire which gave him
life, and his radiant vision would appear before him. In that ecstatic
state he ceased to have the sensations of sleep or of waking. He dreamed
with his eyes open, he saw with his eyes closed.

A word of playful affection, a smile from Gilberte, the touch of her
dress brushing against him as she passed, a blade of grass which she had
broken and which he had seized upon,--any one of these was enough to
occupy his mind during the night; and no sooner did the first rays of
dawn appear than he ran to groom his horse himself so that he might
start the earlier. He forgot to eat and considered it perfectly natural
that he should live on the morning dew and the breeze that blew from
Châteaubrun.

He dared not go there every day, although he might have done so without
fear that Monsieur Antoine would receive him less warmly. But there is
in love a shrinking modesty which takes fright at happiness at the
moment of grasping it. So he wandered about in every direction, and hid
in the woods, where he could gaze at the ruins of Châteaubrun through
the branches, as if he were afraid of being caught in the act of
adoration.

At night, when Jean Jappeloup had finished his day's work, as he did not
as yet earn enough to hire a house and did not choose to be a burden to
his friends, and as the nights were warm and pleasant, he repaired to a
small abandoned chapel, on the hill which formed the centre of the
village, and before lying down on the straw with which he had made a
bed, went to say his prayers at the pretty little church of Gargilesse.

He went down, from preference, into the Roman crypt which still bears
traces of the curious frescoes of the fifteenth century. From the
daintily-carved window of that underground apartment one overlooks walls
of rock and the green ravines through which the Gargilesse flows.

The carpenter had been deprived longer than he liked of the sight of his
dear native place, and he often interrupted his placid, pensive prayer
to gaze on the landscape, still half-praying, half-musing, in that
peculiar frame of mind characteristic of simple-hearted folk, peasants,
especially after the fatigue of the day.

It was then that Emile, when he had dined and walked a while with his
mother, came to join the carpenter, to admire the pretty structure with
him, and then to chat on the hill-top of everything that he could not
talk about at home--of Châteaubrun, Monsieur Antoine, Janille, and,
lastly, of Gilberte.

There was one person who loved Gilberte almost as dearly as Emile, but
with another kind of love: that person was Jean. He did not precisely
look upon her as his daughter, for, blended with the paternal sentiment,
there was a sort of respect for a nature so adorable, a sort of
unpolished enthusiasm which he would not have had for his own children.
But he was proud of her beauty, of her goodness, of her common sense and
of her courage, like a man who knows the value of those qualities, and
feels keenly the honor of a noble attachment.

The familiarity with which he expressed himself concerning her, dropping
the title of mademoiselle in accordance with his habit of calling every
one by his or her name, in no wise detracted from his instinctive
veneration for her, and Emile's ears were not wounded thereby, although
he would never have dared do the same.

The young man took keen delight in hearing of Gilberte's childish sports
and pretty ways, of her kindly impulses, of her generous and delicate
attentions to the friend who, but for her, would have lacked everything.

"When I was wandering in the mountains not long ago," said Jappeloup, "I
was pressed so close sometimes that I dared not leave the hole in the
cliff or the branches of some tree with dense foliage, in which I had
hidden in the morning. At such times hunger took hold of me, and one
night when I was thoroughly done up with weakness and fatigue, and was
creeping round the mountain, saying to myself that it was a long, long
way to Châteaubrun, and if I should happen to meet gendarmes on the way
I shouldn't have the strength to run, I saw a little wagon on the road
with several bundles of straw, and Gilberte walking alongside and making
signs to me. She had come all that distance with Sylvain Charasson,
looking for me everywhere, and watching like a little quail under a
bush. I lay down and hid in the straw. Gilberte sat down by my side, and
Sylvain led us back to Châteaubrun, where I went in under the noses of
the gendarmes, who were hunting for me not two steps away.

"Another time we had agreed that Sylvain should bring me something to
eat and put it in the hollow trunk of an old willow about a league from
Châteaubrun. It was horrible weather, pelting rain, and I had a strong
suspicion that the little rascal, who likes to be comfortable, would
pretend to forget me or would eat my dinner on the road. However, I went
there at the time agreed upon, and I found the little basket well filled
and well out of sight. But what do you suppose I spied near the willow?
The print of a cunning little foot on the damp sand, and I was able to
follow the poor little foot along the ground, where it had sunk in more
than once over the ankle. The dear child had got wet through, dirty and
tired, because she wouldn't trust anyone but herself to look after her
old friend!

"And still another day she saw the bloodhounds marching straight for an
old ruin, where, thinking that I was perfectly safe, I was calmly taking
a nap at midday. It was terribly hot that day! It was the very day you
arrived in the neighborhood. Well, Gilberte took the short cut, a very
rough and dangerous path, where the horsemen could not have followed
her, and arrived a quarter of an hour ahead of them, all red and all out
of breath, to wake me and tell me to make tracks. She was sick
afterward, poor dear heart, and her people knew nothing about it. That
was what made me particularly anxious that evening, when we took supper
at Châteaubrun and Janille told us that she had gone to bed.

"Ah! yes, the little one has always had a great heart. If the King of
France knew her worth he would be too much honored to obtain her hand
for the best of his sons. When she was no bigger than my fist, any one
could see that she would be as pretty and lovable a creature as ever
was. You may seek as you will among the greatest and richest ladies, my
boy, you will never find a Gilberte like Gilberte de Châteaubrun!"

Emile listened with delight, asked him innumerable questions, and made
him repeat the same stories ten times over.

It was not long before Monsieur Cardonnet discovered the cause of the
change that had taken place in Emile. There was no more melancholy, no
more painful reticence, no more indirect reproof. It seemed as if Emile
had never been in opposition to him on any subject whatever, or at least
had never noticed that his father had different ideas from his own. He
had become a child once more in many respects. He did not heave sighs at
this or that plan of study; he seemed not to see things which might have
offended his principles; he dreamed of naught but lovely, sunny
mornings, long walks, precipices to climb, solitudes to explore; and yet
he brought back neither sketches, nor plants, nor mineralogical
specimens, as he would have done at other times.

Country life pleased him above all things. It was the loveliest region
in the world; the open air and exercise in the saddle did him a vast
amount of good; in a word, everything was for the best, provided that he
was allowed to have his way; and if he fell into a fit of musing, he
would come out of it with a smile that seemed to say:

"I have things within me to occupy my mind, and what you say to me is
nothing compared to what I think."

If Monsieur Cardonnet, by some artifice, succeeded in keeping him at
home, he seemed distressed for a moment, then, suddenly assuming an air
of resignation, like a man whom it is impossible to dispossess of his
stock of happiness, he made haste to obey, and set about his task in
order to have done with it the sooner.

"There's a pretty girl at the bottom of all this," said Monsieur
Cardonnet to himself, "and it is love that makes this rebellious mind so
docile. It's a very good thing to know. So the philosophical,
argumentative fever may give way to thirst for pleasure or to
sentimental reveries! I was very foolish not to reckon on his youth and
the passions of youth! I must let this storm rage--it will blow away the
obstacle upon which I should have gone to pieces; and when it is time to
stay the storm, I will see what it is best to do. Make haste with your
riding about the country and your loving, my poor Emile! It's the same
with you as with this mountain stream that has declared war on me: you
will both submit when you feel the hand of the master!"

Monsieur Cardonnet was not conscious of his cruelty. He believed neither
in the force nor duration of love, and attached no more importance to a
young man's despair than to a child's tears. If he had thought that
Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun could become the victim of his plan of
waiting, he might perhaps have been conscience-stricken. But the spirit
of a proprietor and of _everyone for himself_, prevented him from
foreseeing the danger of another.

"It's old Antoine's business to look out for his daughter," he thought.
"If the old sot sleeps on his own perils, he has at all events a
servant-mistress who has nothing better to do than put the key of the
famous pavilion in her pocket at night. I can open the duenna's eyes
when the time comes."

With this persuasion he left Emile almost free, both as to his time and
his acts. He confined himself to ridiculing and bitterly decrying the
family of Châteaubrun when opportunity offered, in order to protect
himself from the reproach of having openly encouraged his son's suit.

In his opinion, Antoine de Châteaubrun was really a poor creature, a
man of no consideration, whom poverty had degraded and idleness
brutalized. He saw with vainglorious pleasure the former lords of the
soil, thus fallen from their high estate, take refuge in the arms of the
people, not daring to have recourse to the protection and companionship
of the newly rich.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault found no favor in his eyes, although it was
difficult to reproach him with dissipation and impropriety of conduct.
The wealth which he had succeeded in retaining gave much more umbrage to
Cardonnet than the name of Châteaubrun, and while he despised the
count, he had a sort of hatred for the marquis. He declared that he was
a fit subject for the lunatic hospital, and he blushed for him, he said,
because of the idiotic use he had made of so long a life and so vast a
fortune.

Emile took pains to defend Monsieur de Boisguilbault, but without
avowing that he saw him two or three times a week. He was afraid that
his father, by suggesting to him that he must make his visits more
infrequent, would deprive him of the excuse he had for making a short
call on the family at Châteaubrun as he rode by. He needed that excuse
particularly on Gilberte's account, for he was confident that Monsieur
Antoine would make no comment; but he was afraid that Janille might
convince Mademoiselle that her dignity demanded that she should keep at
a respectful distance a young man who was too wealthy to marry her,
according to worldly ideas.

He foresaw clearly enough that the day would come when his assiduity
would be observed.

"But by that time," he said to himself, "perhaps she will love me, and I
can explain the seriousness of my attentions."

This thought naturally led him to anticipate a long and vehement
opposition on Monsieur Cardonnet's part; but thereupon there rose in him
a sort of well-spring of courage and determination; his heart beat like
that of a soldier rushing forward to the assault, burning to plant his
flag on the breach with his own hand; he felt that he quivered like the
war-horse intoxicated by the smell of powder.

Sometimes, when his father overwhelmed one of his workmen with his cold,
concentrated wrath, he would fold his arms and involuntarily measure him
with his eye.

"We shall see," he would say to himself, "if such things will terrify
me, and if such a blast will make me bend when he raises his hand
against the sacred ark of my love.--O father! you have succeeded in
turning me aside from the studies to which I was devoted, in stifling
all my aspirations in my bosom, in wounding my self-esteem with impunity
and trampling on my sympathies. If you demand the sacrifice of my
intelligence and my inclinations, why, I will submit once more. But the
sacrifice of my love! Ah! you are too prudent, too discerning to demand
it, for if you did, you would see that, while I am your son to love you,
I have your blood in my veins to resist you. We should shatter ourselves
against each other, like two machines of equal strength, and you would
have to become a parricide in order to win the victory."

Awaiting that terrible day, which Emile accustomed himself to
contemplate, he allowed his father's secret rancor to vent itself in
empty words against the worthy Antoine and his faithful Janille. It had
even become a matter of indifference whether he did or did not allude to
the doubtful parentage of the count's daughter. It mattered little to
him whether she had plebeian blood in her veins, and he hardly heard
what Monsieur Cardonnet said on that subject.

It seemed to him, furthermore, that it would have been an insult to
Gilberte's father to seek to defend him against the other accusations of
his father. He smiled almost like a martyr, who receives a wound and
defies pain.

Thus, despite all his shrewdness, Cardonnet was on the wrong road and
was dragging his son with him into the abyss, flattering himself that he
could readily hold him back when they had reached the brink. He thought
that he knew the human heart, because he knew the secret of human
weaknesses; but he who knows only the weak and miserable side of men and
things, knows only half of the truth.

"I have made him submit on more important occasions," he said to
himself; "an _amourette_ is of no account."

He was right as to _amourettes_; perhaps he had had experience of them;
but a great passion was to him an inaccessible ideal, and he had no
conception of the sublime or disastrous resolutions it can inspire.

It may be that Monsieur de Boisguilbault contributed in some degree to
allay Emile's tempestuous ardor in regard to social questions; sometimes
his tone of glacial security had aroused the impetuous youth's
impatience; but more frequently he realized that tranquil prophet was
right in submitting patiently to the present, in view of what the future
was certain to bring forth.

When the marquis discoursed to him in the name of the logic of
ideas--sovereign of all worlds and mother of human destinies--instead of
irritating him as Monsieur Cardonnet did by invoking the false and
clumsy logic of facts, he succeeded in pacifying and convincing him.

If the contrast between the two sometimes caused a sort of generous
irritability in the least patient of the two, the more tranquil soon
recovered his influence and disclosed the power that was concealed
within him and that made him, so to speak, superior to himself.

Monsieur Cardonnet's raillery had wounded Emile deeply, and had almost
driven him to the exaggeration of fanaticism. Monsieur de
Boisguilbault's exalted good sense reconciled him to himself, and he
felt proud to have the sanction of an old man so enlightened and so
rigid in his deductions. As they were in perfect accord as to the
fundamental points, their discussions could not last long, and as
communism was the only subject capable of rousing the marquis from his
usual taciturnity, it often happened that they were silent for a long
while in a sort of reverie _à deux_.

But Emile was never bored at Boisguilbault. The beauty of the park, the
library, and, above all, the reserved but indubitable pleasure which the
marquis derived from his society, made his visits agreeably restful and
delightful to him as a relief from more intense emotions. He created for
himself there, unconsciously, a second home, much more in conformity
with his tastes than the noisy factory and his father's household,
managed as it was with military strictness.

Châteaubrun would have been a retreat even more after his heart. There
he loved everything and everybody, without exception: the family, the
old ruins, even the domestic animals and the plants. But to enjoy the
happiness of passing his life there, he must scale the walls of heaven;
and as he must needs fall back to the earth after his dream, Emile found
that the fall was less severe at Boisguilbault than at Gargilesse.
Boisguilbault was a sort of half-way station between the bottomless pit
and heaven; the _limbo_ between purgatory and paradise. He was so warmly
welcomed there, and so warmly urged to remain, that he became accustomed
to the idea that he was at home there. He busied himself about the park,
arranged the books, and took riding-lessons in the main courtyard.

Gradually the old marquis yielded to the pleasures of companionship, and
sometimes his smile indicated genuine cheerfulness. He did not realize
the fact or did not choose to admit it: but the young man became
necessary to him and brought life to him. For hours at a time he seemed
to accept the boon indifferently, but when Emile was about to leave him
that pale face would gradually change its expression, and the wheeze of
asthma would become a sigh of affection and regret when the young man
leaped upon his horse, impatient to descend the hill.

At last it became evident to Emile, who was learning day by day to
decipher that mysterious book, that the old man's heart was affectionate
and sympathetic, that he regretted, secretly but constantly, that he had
adopted a life of solitude, and that he had other reasons for taking
that course than a misanthropic temperament simply.

He believed that the time had come to probe the wound and suggest the
remedy. The name of Antoine de Châteaubrun, which he had already
mentioned many times to no purpose, and which had died away, leaving no
echo, in the silence of the park, came once more to his lips and clung
there more obstinately. The marquis was forced to hear it and make some
reply.

"My dear Emile," he said, in the most solemn tone he had as yet assumed
with him, "you can cause me much pain, and if such is your purpose, I
will furnish you with the means, namely, to speak to me of the person
you have just mentioned."

"I know," replied the young man, "but----"

"You know!" Monsieur de Boisguilbault interrupted him; "what do you
know?"

And, as he asked this question, he seemed so indignant, and his lifeless
eyes were filled with such threatening fire, that Emile, taken by
surprise, remembered what was said at their first interview about his
alleged irascibility, although it was said in such a tone that at the
time he had been unable to view it in any other light than as a boastful
joke.

"Answer me!" continued Monsieur de Boisguilbault, in a milder voice but
with a bitter smile. "If you know the causes of my resentment, how dare
you remind me of them?"

"If they are serious," replied Emile, "I certainly know nothing of them;
for what I have been told is so frivolous that I am entirely unable to
credit it, seeing how angry you are with me."

"Frivolous! frivolous! In heaven's name what has anyone told you? Be
honest: don't hope to deceive me!"

"Since when, pray, have I given you the right to suspect me of anything
so base as falsehood?" retorted Emile, becoming a little heated in his
turn.

"Monsieur Cardonnet," said the marquis, taking the young man's arm in a
hand that trembled like the leaf fluttering in the autumn breeze, "I do
not think that you will seek to make sport of my suffering. Speak,
therefore, and tell me what you know, for I must hear it."

"I know what people say and no more. They say that you broke off a
friendship of twenty years' standing because of a quarrel about a deer.
One of those creatures, which you had tamed for your amusement, escaped
from your enclosure, and Monsieur de Châteaubrun, having fallen in with
it a short distance from your park, was inconsiderate enough to kill it.
It would have been exceedingly inconsiderate, it is true, as there are
no deer in this region, so that he must have known that it was one of
your pets; Monsieur de Châteaubrun has always been very absent-minded,
and that is not an injury of the sort for which one cannot forgive a
friend."

"Who told you that story? He, I suppose?"

"He has never mentioned the subject to me. It was Jean, the carpenter,
another man whom you won't talk about, although you have been very kind
to him, who told me that he has never known of any other reason for
misunderstanding between you."

"And from whom did he obtain this interesting explanation? from the
maid-servant, doubtless?"

"No, monsieur le marquis. The servant never mentions you any more than
the master does. What I have told you is the story generally believed
among the peasants."

"And the basis of it is true," rejoined Monsieur de Boisguilbault, after
a long pause, which seemed to restore his tranquillity entirely. "Why
should you be surprised, Emile? Don't you know that it only takes a drop
of water to make a lake overflow?"

"But if your lake of bitterness was filled with such drops of water
only, how can I fail to be surprised by your sensitiveness? I can
discover no other fault in Monsieur de Châteaubrun than constant
inertia and heedlessness. If it was a series of absent-minded freaks and
_gaucheries_ that made his presence insupportable to you, I must say
that I do not recognize your accustomed good judgment and tolerant
spirit. I, whom you often call a volcano in eruption, should have been
more patient than you, for Monsieur Antoine's fits of abstraction amuse
me rather than irritate me, and I see in them a proof of his openness of
heart and the artlessness of his mind."

"Emile, Emile, you are not qualified to judge of such matters," rejoined
Monsieur de Boisguilbault with an embarrassed air. "I am very
absent-minded myself, and I suffer from my own mistakes. Those of other
people are evidently more than I can stand, you see. Affection lives
only upon contrasts, they say. Two deaf or two blind men are sadly bored
together. In short, I was tired of that man! say no more to me about
him."

"I cannot believe that prohibition is intended seriously. O my
noble-hearted friend, turn your wrath upon me alone; if I insist; but it
is impossible for me to avoid seeing that this rupture is one of the
principal causes of your sadness. At the bottom of your heart you
reproach yourself with it as an act of injustice; and who can say that
it is not the only source of your misanthropy? We find it difficult to
tolerate other men when there is in the depths of our minds something
for which we cannot give ourselves absolution. I believe, and I dare to
tell you, that you would be comforted if you should repair the injury
which you inflicted on one of your fellow-men so many years ago."

"The injury I inflicted on him? What injury, pray? What revenge did I
take on him? to whom did I ever say an unkind word of him? to whom have
I complained? what do you yourself know of my inmost feelings toward
him? The miserable fellow had better hold his peace! he will commit a
great sin if he complains of my conduct."

"He does not complain of it, monsieur le marquis, but he deplores the
loss of your friendship. That regret disturbs his sleep and sometimes
obscures the serenity of his amiable and resigned heart. He does not of
his own accord mention your name, but if anybody mentions it in his
presence, he speaks of you in the highest terms and his eyes fill with
tears. And then, too, there is some one very near to him who suffers
even more than himself in his sorrow, some one who respects you, who
fears you and who dares not implore you, but whose affection and
gratitude would be a blessing in your loneliness and a support in your
old age."

"What do you mean, Emile?" said the marquis, painfully affected. "Are
you speaking of yourself? Does your friendship for me depend upon that
condition? That would be very cruel on your part."

"There is no question of me in this matter," Emile replied. "My
attachment to you is too profound, and my sympathy too instinctive for
me to put any price on them. I am speaking of some one who knows you
only through me, but who had already divined your character and who does
full justice to your noble qualities; of a person a thousand times more
estimable than I, whom you would love with a father's affection if you
knew her; in a word, I am speaking of an angel, of Mademoiselle Gilberte
de Châteaubrun."

Emile had no sooner pronounced that name, upon which he relied as a
magic charm, than he saw his host's expression change in an alarming
manner. The knobs of his thin, sallow cheeks flushed purple; his eyes
started from their sockets; his arms and legs twitched convulsively. He
tried to speak and stammered unintelligible words. At last he succeeded
in saying this:

"Enough, monsieur, that is enough, too much. Never be so misguided as to
mention that _demoiselle's_ name to me!"

And, leaving the cliff in the park, where this conversation took place,
he entered the chalet and closed the door violently behind him.




XIX

THE PORTRAIT


Emile did not return to Boisguilbault for several days. His sorrow was
deep-seated. At first he was annoyed and angry at the marquis's
distressing and incomprehensible caprice. But soon, after reflecting
upon that strange episode, he conceived an immense pity for that
diseased mind, which, amid ideas so lucid and instincts so affectionate,
nourished a deplorable sort of mania, paroxysms of hatred or resentment
closely akin to mental alienation.

That was the only explanation that the young man could conceive of the
violent effect produced on his venerable friend by the adored name of
Gilberte. He was so dismayed by the discovery, that he no longer felt
the courage to pursue so hopeless an undertaking and determined to
inform Mademoiselle frankly of his failure.

He bent his steps toward the ruins one evening, depressed by his
discomfiture, and for the first time he was sad on his arrival. But love
is a magician who overturns all our anticipations by unexpected favors
or cruelties.

Gilberte was alone. To be sure, Janille was not far away; but as she
left the house to find one of her goats, and as Gilberte did not know in
what direction she had gone, so that they could not go to meet her, they
had a plausible excuse for indulging in a tête-à-tête. Gilberte also
seemed a little sad. She would have been sorely embarrassed to say why,
or how it happened that, after passing five minutes with Emile, she
entirely forgot that she had had any gloomy thoughts prior to his
arrival.

They had dined at Châteaubrun long before: according to a custom of
many years' standing, they ate at the same hours as the peasants, that
is to say, in the morning, at noon, and after the day's work--a
perfectly logical arrangement for those who do not turn night into day.

The sun was sinking when Emile arrived: it was the hour when all things
are lovely--grave and smiling at once. Emile fancied that he had never
before appreciated Gilberte's beauty, he was so impressed by it at that
moment; as if it were the first time, as if he had not been living for
six weeks in an ecstasy of contemplation.

No matter; he persuaded himself that he had hitherto noticed only the
half of her hair and only the hundredth part of the charms contained in
her smile, of her grace of movement, of the inestimable treasures of her
glance.

He had some important things to say to her, he remembered nothing. He
could think of nothing but looking at her and listening to her. All that
she said was so striking, so novel to him! How redolent she was of the
richness of nature, how she made him realize the perfection of its most
trivial details! If she showed him a flower, he discovered shades of
coloring therein whose delicacy or beauty he had never before
appreciated; if she spoke in terms of admiration of the sky, he
discovered that he had never seen the sky so lovely. The landscape at
which she gazed assumed a magical aspect and he could think of nothing
to say, except:

"Oh! yes, how lovely it is! Oh! you are right. Of course, of course,
what you see and what you say is so true!"

There is a delicious stupidity in the mind of a lover: everything means
_I love you_! and it would be a vain task to seek any other meaning to
their monotonous agreement on all subjects. Still, although she was even
less experienced than Emile, Gilberte, being a woman, understood a
little more clearly what she herself felt, whereas Emile loved, as we
breathe, without reflecting that a problem or a prodigy is connected
with every minute of our lives.

Gilberte questioned herself more and was more overcome with
astonishment. She speedily made an effort to change the form of their
conversation, in which, by dint of saying nothing at all, they said far
too much.

She mentioned Monsieur de Boisguilbault, and Emile was compelled to say
that he had no hope. All his disappointment reawoke at that admission
and he bitterly lamented the destiny that deprived him of his sole
opportunity to make himself useful to Monsieur de Châteaubrun and to
gratify Gilberte.

"Oh! have no fear on that score," said the girl innocently, "I shall be
none the less under obligation to you; for thanks to your zeal and
courage my mind is at rest on the main point. Let me tell you what
worried me most. In view of the marquis's haughty obstinacy and my
father's generous humility, an intolerable suspicion had found its way
into my mind. I fancied that my dear father might have inflicted some
grave injury upon him--unintentionally, I am sure,--and I was anxious to
discover the secret so that I could take upon myself to repair it. Oh! I
would have done it at the cost of my life! But now----"

"But now! well, now," said Monsieur Antoine, suddenly appearing around a
clump of wild shrubs, and smiling with his usual expression of frank
trustfulness, "what the deuce are you telling in such a serious tone,
and what is it that you would repair at the cost of your life, my dear
love? I see, Emile, that she has taken you for her confessor, and that
she is accusing herself of killing a fly with too much temper. What is
it? Come, speak out; for your embarrassed air makes me long to laugh.
Can it be by any chance that you have secrets from your old father?"

"Oh! no, father! I never will have a secret from you!" cried Gilberte,
throwing an arm around Antoine's neck and laying her pink cheek against
his copper-colored one. "And then you listen at keyholes in the open
air, so you are going to be compelled to hear what is under
consideration. If you find any reason to blame us, remember that you
have forfeited the right to do it by taking me by surprise and
criticising my words. Listen, Monsieur Emile, I am going to tell him
everything, for it is much better that he should know it. My dear
father, you are unhappy over Monsieur de Boisguilbault's unjust
resentment against you on account of a mere trifle."

"Ah! _diantre_! do you propose to talk about that? What's the use? You
know well that it's a painful subject to me!" said Monsieur Antoine, his
good-humored face suddenly becoming clouded.

"You must talk about it, as it is for the last time," said Gilberte.
"What I am going to say will pain you, and yet I am sure that it will
take a great weight off your heart. Come, come, dear father, don't turn
your head away, and don't put on that careworn expression that makes
your Gilberte feel so pained. I know very well that you don't want me to
mention the marquis's name before you; you say that it's none of my
affair and that I can do nothing to bring you together. But it is too
bad to treat me as a little girl, and I am quite old enough to know a
little something of your sorrows so that I can help you to find
consolation for them. Very good; I was making inquiries of Monsieur
Cardonnet,--who sees Monsieur de Boisguilbault frequently, and to whom
he has given his confidence on many important matters,--as to that
gentleman's frame of mind toward us. I was saying to him that to relieve
you from the regret which you still feel for having unintentionally
wounded him, I would give my life--wasn't that what I was saying?"

"And then?" queried Monsieur de Châteaubrun, putting his daughter's
pretty hand to his lips with a preoccupied air.

"And then," she continued, "Monsieur Emile had already told me what I
wanted to know, namely, that Monsieur de Boisguilbault still nourishes
an intense resentment, but that we need think no more about it, because
it is founded upon nothing at all, and you have, thank God! nothing with
which to reproach yourself! Indeed, I was sure of it, dearest father; I
simply dreaded one of your fits of absent-mindedness. But now you can
set your mind at rest, although you will be distressed, I am sure, at
your old friend's deplorable condition. Monsieur de Boisguilbault really
is what he is said to be, and you must recognize it as everybody else
does--the poor man is mad."

"Mad!" cried Monsieur Antoine, terror-stricken and grief-stricken at
once, "really mad? Have you heard him talk wildly, Emile? Does he suffer
much? does he complain? has he been pronounced mad by the doctors? Oh!
that is horrible news to me!"

And honest Antoine, sinking upon a bench, tried in vain to repress his
sobs. His robust breast swelled as if it would burst.

"_O mon Dieu_! see how he loves him still!" cried Gilberte, throwing
herself on her knees at her father's feet and covering him with kisses.
"Oh! forgive me, forgive me, father dear! I spoke too hastily! I have
pained you! Come and help me to console him, Emile."

Emile started when Gilberte, in her excitement, forgot for the first
time to call him _monsieur_. It seemed that she looked upon him as a
brother, and, in an outburst of emotion, he too knelt beside poor
Antoine, who seemed to be threatened with an apoplectic stroke, he was
so red and so oppressed.

"Never fear," said Emile, "matters have not reached that point and never
will, I trust. Monsieur de Boisguilbault is not ill; he has the full
enjoyment of all his faculties. His monomania, if we may so describe his
professed repulsion for your family, is not a new disease; only, finding
that strange freak in a man so tranquil and tolerant in all other
respects, I believed for a long while that there must be some serious
reasons for it, and I am forced to admit now that there are none; that
it is a streak of temporary madness, which he will forget if it is not
stirred up again, and that you are not the sole object of it, since
other persons, of whom he has never had any reason to complain, and whom
he does not know at all, inspire the same unhealthy feeling of horror
and repulsion."

"Explain yourself," said Monsieur Antoine, beginning to breathe once
more; "who are these other persons?"

"Why, Jean, for one," replied Emile. "You know very well that he has no
reason to dread his presence as he does, and that excellent man is
entirely at sea as to any possible cause of ill-will the marquis can
have toward him."

"He has no reason to reproach him, nor anyone else; but I know very well
what he imagines. Go on! if Jean is the only other one, the marquis is
not mad in the least degree, he is simply unjust or mistaken as to our
friend the carpenter. But it is as impossible to convince him of his
mistake as to close the wound that is bleeding in his heart. Poor
Boisguilbault! Ah! Gilberte, I would gladly sacrifice my life to enable
him to forget the past. Let us say no more about it."

"One word more," said Gilberte, "for that word will enlighten you,
father. Jean Jappeloup is not the only one whom the marquis detests so
bitterly; he has the same feeling against me, whom he has hardly seen,
who have never spoken to him, and of whom he most assuredly can have no
reason to complain. Upon mentioning my name, with the purpose of calming
him, Monsieur Cardonnet, who will tell you so himself, found that his
anger sprang up afresh, and he slammed the door, shouting, as if he had
heard the name of a mortal enemy:

"'Woe to you if you ever mention that _demoiselle_ to me!'"

Monsieur de Châteaubrun hung his head and sat for some moments without
speaking. Several times he wiped the perspiration from his broad brow
with his coarse blue and white handkerchief. Then he took Gilberte's
hand and Emile's in his, unconsciously placing them so that they
touched, so engrossed was he by every other subject except the
possibility of their love.

"My children," he said, "you thought that you were doing me good, and
you have added to my grief. I thank you none the less for your kind
intentions, but I wish you both to give me your word not to refer to
this subject again with me, nor with each other, nor in Janille's
presence or Jean's, nor you, Emile, with Monsieur de Boisguilbault.
Never, never--do you understand?" he added, in the most solemn and
impressive tone of which he was capable. Then, addressing Emile more
particularly, and pressing his hand against Gilberte's with less
consciousness than before of his acts:

"My dear Monsieur Emile," he said, with emotion, "you have been led by
your friendship for me to do a very imprudent thing. Remember that the
first time you went to Boisguilbault I said to you: 'Do not mention my
name in that house, if you do not wish to injure my friend Jean!' And
now you have injured me myself by forgetting my injunction. All that I
can tell you is that Monsieur de Boisguilbault is no more insane than
any of us three, and that, if he is unjust to Jean or my daughter, who
are both innocent of my wrong-doing, it is because one naturally
includes an enemy's friends and kindred in the hatred which he inspires.
Monsieur de Boisguilbault would be very cruel not to forgive me if he
could read my heart; but his suffering is too great to allow him to do
it. Respect his grief, therefore, Emile, and do not call a man insane
whose misfortunes deserve the consolation of your friendship and all the
consideration of which you are capable. Come! promise me that you will
not conspire together for my repose any more, for whatever you do will
really be conspiring against it."

Emile and Gilberte promised, trembling with excitement; whereupon
Antoine said to them: "That is well, my children; there are incurable
diseases and griefs that one must learn to submit to in silence. Now let
us go to see if Janille has found her goat. I have in my basket some
apricots I have been picking for you two; for I saw Emile coming up the
path, and I was determined to regale him with the first ripe fruit from
my old trees."

After divers efforts, Antoine recovered his cheerful humor--with greater
ease than Gilberte and Emile. The latter dared make no further comments
or investigations; for whatever concerned Gilberte was sacred to him,
and Antoine's earnest injunction to give no more thought to the matter
was sufficient inducement for him to try and put it out of his mind. But
there were many other subjects of anxiety in his heart, and love had
taken such deep root there that he fell into fits of abstraction more
complete than Monsieur Antoine's.

When he found himself on the road to Gargilesse, at the point where the
road to Boisguilbault branches off, his horse, which was equally
attached to both places, turned toward Boisguilbault. Emile did not
notice it at first, and, when he did notice it, he said to himself that
Providence willed it so; that he had left the melancholy old man, whom
he had promised to love as his father, all alone for three days; and
that, at the risk of being coldly received, he must go at once and
obtain his pardon.

The gates of the park were not closed for the night when he arrived at
the foot of the hill. He entered and rode in the direction of the
chalet, expecting that, even if he did not find the marquis there, he
would surely arrive as soon as it was dark.

Having hitched _Corbeau_ to the balcony rail of the ground floor, he
knocked softly at the door of the Swiss chalet, and, as a little breeze
had sprung up with the sunset, it seemed to him that he could hear
sounds inside and the marquis's feeble voice bidding him come in. But it
was a pure illusion, for when he had opened the door he noticed that the
interior was empty.

However, Monsieur de Boisguilbault might be in the invisible room to
which he was accustomed to retire at night. Emile coughed and stamped on
the floor to give notice of his presence, determined to go away without
seeing him, rather than pass through the door that was closed to
everybody without exception.

As no sound replied to the noise he made, he concluded that the marquis
was still at the château, and he was about to walk in that direction
when a gust of wind blew a window violently open, also a door at the end
of the room. He turned toward the door, expecting to see Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, but no one appeared, and Emile found himself looking into
a small study, the disorderly arrangement of which was as noticeable as
the scrupulous neatness of the apartments at the château.

He would have considered it an impertinence on his part to enter the
room or even to scrutinize from a distance the cheap, common furniture
and the mass of old books and papers which he saw confusedly at the
first glance. But there was one thing that arrested his attention in
spite of himself--a life-size portrait of a woman, hung at the farther
end of that den, directly opposite him, so that it was impossible for
him not to see it, to say nothing of the fact that it would have been
difficult not to gaze at so fine a painting and so charming a face.


[Illustration: _EMILE EXAMINES THE PORTRAIT OF
THE MARQUISE DE BOISGUILBAULT._

_Nothing could be more refined and charming than that youthful face;
doubtless it was Madame de Boisguilbault, and our hero forgot himself
altogether as he gazed with deep interest at the features of that woman,
whose life and death must have had so vast an influence on the destiny
of the recluse._]


The lady was dressed in the style of the Empire; but a sky-blue shawl
richly embroidered and draped over her shoulders, concealed the apparent
deformity produced by the fashionable short waist of that period. The
arrangement of her hair, in so-called natural curls, was most becoming,
and the hair itself was of a magnificent golden hue.

Nothing could be more refined and charming than that youthful face;
doubtless it was Madame de Boisguilbault, and our hero forgot himself
altogether as he gazed with deep interest at the features of that woman,
whose life and death must have had so vast an influence on the destiny
of the recluse.

But it rarely happens that a portrait gives us a just idea of the
original; indeed, in the majority of cases one may say that nothing
resembles the person so little as his image.

Emile had thought of the marchioness as a pale, melancholy creature; he
saw a fashionable beauty, with a proud, sweet smile, with a noble and
triumphant bearing. Was she like that before or after her marriage? Or
was hers a nature entirely different from what he had supposed?

One thing of which he was certain was that he had before him a most
fascinating face, and, as it was impossible for him to look upon the
image of youth and beauty without thinking instantly of Gilberte, he
began to compare the two types, in which it seemed to him that he
discovered points of resemblance. The light was rapidly failing, and, as
Emile dared not take a step toward the mysterious study, the outlines of
the portrait soon became very indistinct. The white flesh and golden
hair, standing forth from the shadow, produced so powerful an illusion
upon him, that he thought that he had a portrait of Gilberte before him,
and when he could no longer see aught but a sort of mist filled with
dancing sparks, he had to make a strong effort of his will to remember
that in his first impression, the only reliable one under such
circumstances, there had been no thought of a resemblance between Madame
de Boisguilbault's face and Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun's.

He left the chalet, and, meeting no one in the park, went on to the
château.

The same silence and solitude reigned in the courtyard. He mounted the
stairs in the turret, but did not as usual meet Martin coming to
announce him in that ceremonious tone from which he never departed, even
with the only habitué of the house.

At last he reached the salon, which was always very dark, the blinds
being closed night and day; and, seized with a vague alarm, as if death
had entered that house in which there was so little life at the best, he
ran through the other rooms and at last found Monsieur de Boisguilbault
lying on a bed. He was as pale and motionless as a corpse. The last rays
of daylight cast a vague and melancholy reflection into the room, and
old Martin, whose deafness prevented him from hearing Emile's approach,
had every appearance of a statue as he sat at his master's pillow.

Emile darted to the bed and seized the marquis's hand. It was burning;
and as the two old men awoke, one from the troubled sleep of fever, the
other from the drowsiness of fatigue or inaction, the young man soon
satisfied himself that the marquis's indisposition was in itself of
little consequence. However, the ravages which two days of illness had
wrought in that feeble, worn out frame were most disquieting for the
future.

"Ah! you have done well to come!" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault,
pressing Emile's hand feebly; "ennui would soon have consumed me if you
had abandoned me!"

And Martin, who had not heard his master's words, but seemed to receive
his thoughts on the rebound, repeated in a louder voice than he
supposed:

"Ah! Monsieur Emile, you did well to come! Monsieur le marquis was
suffering terribly from ennui because you didn't come."

Thereupon he told him that monsieur le marquis had been taken with the
fever as he was about to go to the park two nights before, and had
tranquilly made up his mind that he was going to die. He had insisted on
going to bed in that very room, although he was not accustomed to sleep
there, and he had given him instructions as if he never expected to get
up again. He had a very restless night and the next morning he said to
him:

"I feel much better; this will not amount to anything; but I feel as
tired as if I had made a long journey and I need to rest a little.
Perfect silence, Martin; little light, little nursing and no doctor;
those are my orders. Don't be alarmed about me."

"And as I couldn't help being frightened," continued the old retainer,
"monsieur le marquis said to me:

"'Never fear, my dear fellow, my time hasn't come yet.'"

"Is monsieur le marquis subject to such attacks?" Emile inquired; "are
they serious? do they last long?"

But he had forgotten that Martin could hear nobody but his master, and,
at a signal from the latter, he had already left the room.

"I allowed the poor old deaf fellow to have his say," said Monsieur de
Boisguilbault, "for it would have been of no use to try to interrupt
him. But don't take me for a coward from his story. I am not afraid of
death, Emile; I used to long for it; now I await it calmly. I have been
conscious of its approach for a long time; but it comes slowly, and I
shall die as I have lived, without haste. I am subject to intermittent
fevers which take away my appetite and my sleep, but which no one ever
discovers because they leave me enough strength for the little I have to
do. I do not believe in medicine; thus far it has found no means of
curing disease without attacking the vital principle. In whatever form
it assumes, it is empiricism, and I prefer bending under God's hand to
leaping and capering under the hand of a man. This time I was harder hit
than usual; I felt weaker mentally, and I will confess without shame,
Emile, that I realized that I could no longer live alone. Old men are
like children for falling in love with a new pleasure; but when it comes
to losing it, they are not easily consoled like children. They become
old men again and die. Don't be embarrassed by what I say: it is the
fever that makes me so talkative. When I am cured, I shall not say it, I
shall not even think it; but I shall always feel it as an instinct
beneath my apathy. Do not feel that you are chained henceforth to my sad
old age. It is of little importance whether I live a year more or less,
or whether a friendly hand closes the eyes of him who has lived alone.
But I thank you for coming again. Let us talk no more of me, but of you.
What have you been doing during these sad days?"

"I have been sad myself because I have passed them away from you," Emile
replied.

"Is it possible! Such is life, such is man. To make oneself suffer by
making others suffer! That is a convincing proof of the brotherhood of
souls."

Emile passed two hours with the marquis, and found him more confidential
and more affectionate than he had ever been. He felt that his attachment
to him became stronger, and he determined that he would cause him no
more suffering. And when, upon taking his leave, he expressed some
anxiety because he had allowed him to talk so earnestly, the marquis
replied:

"Never fear. Come again to-morrow and you will find me on my feet. That
is not the kind of thing that tires one; it is the absence of
opportunities for pouring out one's heart that dries up and kills."




XX

THE FORTRESS OF CROZANT


The marquis was in fact almost well on the following day, and
breakfasted with Emile. Thenceforth nothing disturbed that curious
friendship between an old man and a very young man; and, thanks to
Monsieur de Châteaubrun's final declarations, the painful apprehensions
of insanity no longer impaired the pleasure which Emile took in Monsieur
de Boisguilbault's society. He refrained, as he had promised Antoine,
from ever mentioning his name, and made up for it by opening his heart
to the marquis concerning all his other secrets; for it was impossible
for him not to describe his past life, not to impart to him his plans
for the future, and, as a consequence thereof, the suffering, allayed
for a time, but inevitably lasting, which his father's opposition had
caused him and was certain to cause him at the first provocation.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault encouraged Emile in his projects of respect
and submission; but he was amazed at the pains Monsieur Cardonnet had
always taken to stifle the legitimate instincts of a son so well
inclined to work and so richly endowed.

The liking for agriculture and the intelligent understanding of it
displayed by Emile seemed to point to a noble and generous vocation for
him, and the marquis said to himself that if he had had the good fortune
to possess such a son, he would have been able to make use in his
lifetime of the great fortune which he had destined for the poor, but of
which he had been unable to make any use in the present.

He could not refrain from saying with a sigh that a man was blessed of
heaven who found in a son, in a friend, in another self, a mind fertile
in invention and the means of completing in all seriousness the work of
his destiny. In his heart he accused Cardonnet of seeking to consecrate
to evil purposes the forces and the instruments which God had given him
to assist him in doing good, and he looked upon him as a blind and
obstinate tyrant, who placed money above the happiness of his fellows
and his own, as if man were the slave of material things and not the
servant of truth before all else.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault was not however essentially religious. Emile
found him always too indifferent in that respect. When the marquis had
said: "I believe in God," he thought that he could dispense with saying:
"I adore Him." When his thoughts, taking the highest flight of which he
was capable, rose to a sort of invocation which was not so much prayer
as homage, he said to God: "Thy name is wisdom!" Emile added: "Thy name
is love!" Whereupon the old man would reply: "It is the same thing;" and
he was right.

Emile could hardly contradict him; but in that disposition to insist
upon the sublime character of the divine logic and rectitude, one could
but be conscious of the absence of that exalted passion for the
inexhaustible loving-kindness of the Omnipotent, which Emile bore in his
bosom. But, when the facts, the miseries of life, human weakness, and
all the evil that is done on earth seemed to give the lie to that theory
of a merciful Providence, and Emile became in a measure discouraged, the
old logician triumphed in the superiority of his faith.

He never doubted, he could not doubt. He did not need to see in order to
know, he said, and the coming and going of the plagues of this world no
more disturbed in his eyes the moral order of eternal affairs than the
passing of a cloud over the sun disturbed their physical order. His
resignation was not due to a feeling of humility or affection; for he
admitted that he had never been able to reconcile himself to his own
sorrows except outwardly; but he believed in a well-spring of optimistic
fatalism for the universe at large which was in striking contrast with
his personal pessimism, and which formed the most unique feature of his
mind and his character.

"Just see," he would say, "logic is everywhere! It is infinite in the
works of God; but it is incomplete and intangible in everything, because
everything is finite, even man himself, although he is the most
impressive reflection of the infinite on this little earth. No man can
understand infinite wisdom except as an abstract idea; for, if he looks
within himself and about him, he cannot grasp it or fix it in his mind
in any way. You often call me a logician; I accept the name: I love
logic and cultivate it. I have a tremendous craving for it and I care
for nothing that is not akin to it. But am I logical in my acts and my
instincts? Less than any one on earth. The more I test myself, the more
conscious I am of the abyss of contradictions, the chaotic confusion
within me. Very good; I am a special example of what man is in general;
and the more illogical I am in my own eyes, the more strongly I feel
that the logic of God is soaring over my poor feeble head, which would
go astray without that celestial compass and would foolishly hold the
earth responsible for its own weakness."

Once he took Emile into the country and they explored, on horseback, the
marquis's vast estates. Emile was struck by the small income produced by
such territorial wealth.

"All these farms are let at the lowest possible price," said the
marquis; "when one is unable to escape from the present economical
notions, the best he can do is to bear as lightly as possible on the
hard-working cultivator of the soil. These people are grateful to me, as
you see, and wish me long life. God save the mark! They consider me very
kind, although they do not much like my face. They do not know that I do
not care for them as they understand the word, and that I see in them
only victims whom I cannot save, but whose executioner I do not choose
to be. I know very well that, under logical legislation, this estate
should produce a hundred times as much as it does. My dissatisfaction is
allayed when I think of it; but in order to think of it and to sustain
myself with the certainty that it will some day be the instrument of the
voluntary labor of a multitude of prudent men, I must avoid seeing it in
its present state, for this spectacle saddens me and turns me cold; for
this reason I very rarely expose myself to it."

It was in fact about two years since Monsieur de Boisguilbault had
visited his farms and made the circuit of his domain. He could make up
his mind to do it only in case of absolute necessity. He was greeted
everywhere with demonstrations of respect and affection which were not
without a touch of superstitious terror; for his solitude and eccentric
habits had given him the reputation of a sorcerer with many peasants.

Many a time, during a storm, they had said sadly: "Ah! if Monsieur de
Boisguilbault chose to prevent the hail, he could do it! but, instead of
doing what he can, he is always looking for something else that nobody
knows and that he will never find perhaps!"

"Well, Emile, what would you do with all this, if it were yours?" said
the marquis as they rode home; "for in asking you to make this tiresome
round of visits with me, I had no other purpose than to question you."

"I would try!" Emile replied, warmly.

"Of course," said the marquis, "I would try to found a genuine _commune_
if I could. But I should try in vain, I should fail. And you, too,
perhaps!"

"What does it matter?"

"That is the generous, insane cry of youth: what does it matter if you
fail, providing only that you are doing something, eh? You yield to a
craving for activity and do not see the obstacles. There are obstacles,
however, and the worst of all is this: that there are no men. In that
sense your father is right in appealing to a brutal but none the less
powerful fact. Men's minds are not ripe, their hearts are not
well-disposed; I see much land and many arms, but I do not see a single
mind detached from the _ego_ which governs the earth. A little more
time, Emile, for the idea to bloom and spread; it will not be so long as
people think; I shall not see it, but you will. Be patient, therefore!"

"What do you mean? does time do anything without us?"

"No, but it will do nothing without us _all_. There are times when one
should be consoled for not being at work, if one is learning; then comes
the time when one can learn and work at the same time. Do you feel that
you are strong?"

"Very!"

"So much the better! And I believe it!--Well, Emile, we will talk some
day--soon perhaps, in my next attack of fever, when my pulse beats a
little faster than it does to-day."

In such conversations as this Emile found strength to live through the
hours that he could not pass with Gilberte. There was something lacking
in his friendship with Monsieur de Boisguilbault: it was the being able
to speak to him of her and to tell him of his love. But there is in
happy love a something superb which can do very well without advice of
others, and the time when Emile would feel the need of complaining and
of seeking a support under the burden of despair had not yet arrived.

In what did this happiness consist, do you ask? In the first place, he
was in love--that is almost enough for him who loves dearly. And then he
knew that he was loved, although he had never dared to ask the question
and she would have dared even less to tell him so.

Meanwhile clouds were gathering on the horizon and Emile was destined to
feel the approach of the storm. One day Janille said to him as he was
leaving Châteaubrun: "Don't come again for three or four days; we have
some business to attend to in the neighborhood and we shall be away."
Emile turned pale: he thought that he was receiving his sentence, and he
hardly had strength to ask what day the family would have returned to
its penates. "Oh! toward the end of the week, I suppose," said Janille.
"Indeed it is probable that I shall stay here; I am too old to run about
over mountains, and you might come in as you ride by and ask if Monsieur
Antoine and his daughter have returned."

"You will allow me then to call upon you?" said Emile, striving to
conceal his mortal suffering.

"Why not, if your heart bids you?" replied the little old woman, drawing
herself up with an air in which the distrustful Emile fancied that he
could detect a touch of malice. "I am not afraid of being compromised!"

"It's all over," thought Emile. "My assiduity has been observed, and
although Monsieur Antoine and his daughter have no suspicion as yet,
Janille has made up her mind to turn me out. Her power here is absolute
and the critical moment has arrived. Well, Mademoiselle Janille," he
said, "I will come to see you to-morrow. I shall take great pleasure in
talking with you."

"How well that happens," said Janille; "I am very anxious to talk too!
But I have some flax to pick to-morrow and I shall not expect you until
the next day. That is understood; I shall be at home all day; don't fail
to come. Good-night, Monsieur Emile, we will have a good friendly talk.
Oh! you see I too am very fond of you!"

There was no longer any doubt in Emile's mind; the housekeeper at
Châteaubrun had opened her eyes to his love. Some officious neighbor
was beginning to be surprised to see him so often on the road to the
ruins. Antoine knew nothing as yet, nor Gilberte; for the latter, when
she told him that her father was going away for a few days, could not
have foreseen that Janille would arrange for her to go with him. The
shrewd housekeeper had laid her plans well: first to get Emile out of
the way, and then to arrange for Gilberte to go away unexpectedly, thus
making sure of a few days in which to avert the little outbreak which
she anticipated on the young man's part.

"Well, then, I must speak," said Emile to himself; "and why should I
recoil from the inevitable end of my secret aspirations? I will tell her
loyal governess and her excellent father that I love her and aspire to
her hand. I will ask for a little time to broach the subject to my
father and come to an understanding with him as to my choice of a
career, for I have made none as yet, and my fate must be decided. There
will be a fierce struggle, but I shall be strong, for I love. It is not
a question of myself alone, so I shall have invincible courage, I shall
have the gift of persuasion, I shall carry the day!"

Despite all this confidence, Emile passed the night in horrible
perplexity. He imagined the conversation he was about to have with
Janille, and he could have written out the questions and answers, so
well he knew the little woman's self-possession and outspokenness.

"Ah! but you must speak to your father first of all, monsieur,"--she
would surely say,--"and have an understanding with him; for it is quite
useless to disturb Monsieur Antoine's mind with a conditional request,
with projects that may not be realized. Meanwhile, do not come here any
more, or come very little, for no one is supposed to be aware of your
intentions, and Gilberte is not the girl to listen to you unless she is
sure that she can be your wife."

Then, too, he feared that Janille, who was very matter-of-fact, would
treat the possibility of Monsieur Cardonnet's consent as a pure
delusion, and would forbid him to make frequent visits unless he should
produce satisfactory proof that he was at liberty to choose for himself.

Thus was it fully demonstrated that Emile must enter upon the conflict
with his father first of all, and must govern his actions accordingly;
that is to say, go infrequently to Châteaubrun until he had reason to
entertain a strong hope of victory, or, if he had no ground for hope, to
abstain forever from destroying the happiness of the family of
Châteaubrun by fruitless overtures--in a word, he must go away and
renounce Gilberte.

But it was utterly impossible for Emile to include that alternative
among the possibilities. The idea of death would find its way more
easily into an infant's head than that of renouncing the woman he loves
into the head of a man who is deeply in love.

Thus Emile could more readily conceive the possibility of blowing out
his brains before his father's eyes than of yielding to his will. "Very
well!" he said to himself, "I will speak to-morrow to this terrible
master, and I will speak to him in such a way that I shall be able to
appear at Châteaubrun with my head erect."

And yet, when the morrow came, Emile, instead of feeling inspired by all
the force of his determination, felt so exhausted by insomnia, and so
overwhelmed by sadness, that he feared his own weakness and did not
speak. Indeed, what can be more painful, when the heart has revelled in
a blissful dream, than to find oneself brought suddenly face to face
with a cruel reality? When one has enjoyed all by oneself the delicious
secret of a chastely hidden passion, to be forced to reveal it in cold
blood to those who do not understand it or who scorn it?

Whether Emile should make the avowal to his father or to Janille, he
must lay bare his heart, filled as it was with a modest languor and a
holy ecstasy, to hearts that had never known or had long been closed to
sentiments of that nature. And he had dreamed of such a sublime
_dénouement_! Should not Gilberte, alone with him under the eye of God,
be the first to receive in her heart the sacred word love when it should
escape from his lips?

The world and the laws of honor, so unfeeling in such cases, were to
deprive the virginity of his passion of all that was purest and most
ideal about it! He suffered intensely, and it seemed to him that a
century of bitter sorrow had elapsed between his dreams of the day
before and the gloomy day that was beginning.

He mounted his horse, determined to seek at a distance, in some solitary
spot, the calm and resignation necessary to enable him to withstand the
first shock. He intended to avoid Châteaubrun; but he found himself
near the ruin, unconscious how he had come thither. He rode by without
turning his head, ascended the rough road where, in the howling storm,
he had first seen the château by the light of the lightning flashes. He
recognized the rocks behind which he had found shelter with Jean
Jappeloup, and he could not realize that more than two months had passed
since that night when he was so light-hearted, so self-controlled, so
different from what he had since become.

He rode on toward Eguzon, in order to see once more the whole of the
road he had then passed over, as he had not visited it since. But when
he reached the first houses, the sight of the villagers scrutinizing him
caused the same thrill of horror and misanthropy which Monsieur de
Boisguilbault would have been likely to feel at such a time. He turned
sharply into a dark, wooded road at his left and rode into the country,
without any definite goal.

This rough but fascinating road, passing now over broad, flat rocks, now
over the fresh green sward, now over fine sand, and bordered by
venerable chestnuts with furrowed trunks and enormous roots, conducted
him to vast moors, where he rode slowly along, content to be alone at
last in a desolate region. The road stretched before him, sometimes in
zigzag fashion, sometimes straight up and down, through fields covered
with broom and furze, and over sandy hillocks intersected by brooks that
had no well-defined bed and no fixed course.

From time to time a partridge skimmed along the grass at his feet, or a
kingfisher flew like an arrow across a swamp, a flash of blue and fiery
red.

After an hour's ride, being still absorbed in his thoughts, he saw that
the path became narrower, plunged into the bushes, and finally
disappeared under his feet. He raised his eyes and saw before him,
beyond steep precipices and deep ravines, the ruins of Crozant rising
like a sharp arrow over curiously jagged peaks of such extent that one
could hardly embrace the whole at a single glance.

Emile had already visited that interesting fortress, but by a more
direct road, and as his preoccupation had prevented him from taking his
bearings, he was uncertain for a moment where he was. Nothing could be
more consonant with his frame of mind than that wild locality and those
desolate ruins. He left his horse at a hut and descended on foot the
narrow path that led down to the bed of the torrent by a series of steps
cut in the rock. Then he ascended by similar means and buried himself in
the ruins, where he remained for several hours, a prey to an intensity
of suffering which the aspect of a spot that was so horrifying and so
sublime exalted at times almost to delirium.

Few fortresses so advantageously situated as that of Crozant were
erected in the first centuries of feudalism. The mountain on which it
stands descends perpendicularly on all sides, to two mountain streams,
the Creuse and the Sédelle, which unite tumultuously at the end of the
peninsula and keep up a constant roaring as they leap over huge
fragments of stone. The sides of the mountain are very peculiar,
bristling everywhere with long, grayish rocks, which rise from the abyss
like giants or hang like stalactites over the torrent.

The ruins of the château have taken on so completely the color and
shape of the surrounding rocks that in many places one can hardly
distinguish them at a little distance.

It is hard to say which was the bolder and the more tragically inspired
in that spot, nature or man, and one cannot imagine, upon such a stage,
other than scenes of implacable fury and unending despair.

A drawbridge, several dark posterns and a double encircling wall,
flanked by towers and bastions, the remains of which can still be seen,
made this fortress impregnable before the invention of cannon. And yet
almost nothing is known of the history of a place that was of such
importance in the wars of the Middle Ages.

A vague tradition attributes its construction to certain Saracen chiefs
who are said to have defended themselves there for a long while. The
frost, which is severe and of long duration in that region, accelerates
each year the destruction of those fortifications which cannon-balls
have shattered and years have reduced to dust. The great square donjon,
however, which has the aspect of a Saracen structure, still stands in
the centre, and, being undermined, threatens to fall at any moment, like
all the rest. Several towers, of which a single side only is standing,
planted upon cone-shaped points of rock, present the appearance of sharp
rocky peaks around which clouds of birds of prey scream incessantly.

The circuit of the fortress cannot be made without danger. In many
places there is no trace of a path, and the foot trembles on the brink
of precipices over which the water plunges headlong.

The approach of the enemy could be detected only from the top of the
towers of observation; for on a level with the lower portions of the
buildings and the summit of the mountain, the view was restricted by
other barren mountains. But to-day there are gaps in their rocky sides,
patches of fertile soil where noble trees grow freely, often uprooted by
the rising of the waters when they have reached a considerable height.

A few goats, less wild than the wretched children who guard them, cling
to the ruins and climb fearlessly over the precipitous cliffs.

The whole spot is so magnificently desolate and so rich in contrasts
that the painter knows not where to stop. The imagination of the artist
would find a superfluity of material in that gorgeous panorama of terror
and menace.

Emile passed several hours there, plunged in the chaos of his
uncertainty and his projects. As he had left home at daybreak, he was
consumed by hunger, but paid no heed to the physical discomfort which
aggravated his mental distress. Stretched out upon a rock, he was
watching the vultures hovering overhead and thinking of the tortures of
Prometheus, when the distant sound of a man's voice, which seemed not
unfamiliar to him, sent a thrill through his whole being. He rose and
ran to the edge of the precipice and saw three persons descending the
path on the opposite side of the ravine.

A man in a blouse and broad-brimmed gray hat rode ahead, turning from
time to time to warn those who came behind to be careful; next to him
came a peasant leading a donkey by the bridle, and on the donkey was a
woman in a faded lilac dress and a simple straw hat.

Emile darted to meet them, without asking himself if Janille had spoken,
if they were on their guard against him, if they were likely to greet
him coldly. He ran and leaped like a stone thrown down the steep side of
the ravine. He ran as the crow flies, crossing the stream, which bounded
with empty threats over the slippery stones, and reached the other slope
to receive a hearty welcome from honest Antoine, and to take from the
hands of Sylvain Charasson the bridle of the modest steed who bore
Gilberte and her sweet smile and her blushing cheek and the joyous air
which she tried in vain to restrain. Janille was not there. Janille had
not spoken!

How much sweeter joy seems after sorrow, and how quickly love makes up
for the time wasted in suffering! Emile no longer remembered the day
before and thought no more of the morrow.

When he was among the ruins of Crozant once more, leading his beloved in
triumph, he broke off all the branches he could reach and threw them
under the donkey's feet, as the Hebrews of old strewed pearls along the
track of the divine Master's humble beast.

Then he took Gilberte in his arms to put her down upon the loveliest bit
of greensward he could find, although she needed no such assistance to
alight from so small and placid a creature. Emile was no longer timid,
for he was mad; and if Antoine had not been the least clear-sighted of
mankind, he would have realized that it was of no more use to think of
holding in check that exalted passion, than of preventing the Creuse or
the Sédelle from flowing and roaring.

"Well, I am dying of hunger," said Monsieur Antoine, "and before I
inquire how it happens that we meet so opportunely, I should like to
hear something about luncheon. One guest more does not alarm us, for
Janille has stuffed us with provender. Open your game-bag, you young
rascal," he said to Sylvain, "while I go and cut a hole in the bag that
my daughter has _en croupe_. Then Emile will run to the house yonder and
obtain a supply of brown bread. Let us stay by the stream, it is pure
water from the rock and is excellent when taken in small quantities with
a generous quantity of wine."

The repast was soon spread on the grass, Gilberte took a huge lotus leaf
for a plate, and her father carved with a sort of sabre which he called
a clasp-knife. In addition to the bread, Emile brought milk for Gilberte
and wild cherries which were voted delicious, their bitter taste having
at all events the merit of stimulating the appetite. Sylvain, perched
like a monkey on an overhanging bough, had as generous a share as the
others and ate with the more enjoyment, he said, because Mademoiselle
Janille's eyes were not there to count his mouthfuls with an air of
reproof. Emile was satisfied in a moment. Laugh as you will at the
heroes in novels who never eat, it is very certain that lovers have
little appetite, and that therein novels are as true as life itself.

What bliss for Emile, after believing that when he saw Gilberte again,
she would be stern and distrustful of him, to find her as he had left
her the day before, entirely without constraint and overflowing with
dignified trustfulness! And how he loved Antoine for being incapable of
a suspicion and for displaying the same open-hearted gayety.

Never had he felt so light-hearted himself; never had he seen a lovelier
day than that mild September day, never a more cheerful and enchanted
spot than that frowning fortress of Crozant! And Gilberte wore that day
her lilac dress, which he had not seen for a long while, and which
reminded him of the day and hour when he had fallen madly in love with
her!

He learned that they had set out to visit a relative at La Clavière
before going to Argenton for two days, and that, finding no one at that
château, they had determined to make a detour to Crozant and remain
there until evening; and it was only midday! Emile imagined that he had
all eternity before him. Monsieur Antoine lay down in the shade after
luncheon and slept soundly. The two lovers, followed by Charasson,
undertook to make the circuit of the fortress.




XXI

MONSIEUR ANTOINE'S NAP


The page of Châteaubrun amused the young couple for a few moments with
his ingenuous remarks; but he was speedily vanquished by the longing to
run, and started off in pursuit of the goats, narrowly escaped having
trouble with their keepers, and ended by making it up with them and
playing at quoits on the bank of the Creuse, while Emile and Gilberte
attempted to follow the course of the Sédelle on the other side of the
mountain.

As the torrent has eaten away the base of the cliff in many places, they
had sometimes to crawl, sometimes to retrace their steps, sometimes to
step on stones that were level with the water, and all of this not
without some difficulty and some danger. But youth is adventurous and
love is afraid of nothing.

A special providence protects both alike, and our lovers came bravely
forth from all the perils of their undertaking,--Emile trembling with an
emotion very different from fear when he lifted Gilberte or held her in
his arms; Gilberte laughing to conceal her confusion or to forget it.

Gilberte was strong, active and brave, like a true child of the
mountain; and yet, by dint of passing over a constant succession of
obstacles, she became breathless, sank on the moss beside the leaping
stream, and threw her hat on the grass, having to put up her hair which
had fallen over her shoulders.

"Do go and pick me that lovely digitalis over yonder," she said to
Emile, thinking that she would have time to rearrange her locks before
he returned. But he went and came again so quickly that he found her
still inundated by the golden flood which her little hands could hardly
gather up into a single braid.

Standing beside her, he gazed in admiration at those treasures which she
twisted up behind her head with more impatience than pride, and which
she would have cut off long before as being an annoying burden, if
Antoine and Janille had not strenuously objected.

At that moment, however, she was grateful to them for refusing to allow
it; for, although she was little inclined to coquetry, she saw that
Emile was lost in admiration, and she had done nothing to arouse it. If
there are some triumphs of beauty, which love cannot refuse to enjoy,
they are those above all which are unforeseen and involuntary. That
beautiful hair would have been a genuine compensation to an ugly woman,
and in Gilberte's case it was a lavish outlay of nature added to all her
other gifts.

It should be said that Gilberte, like her father, was industrious rather
than clever with her hands, and moreover, she had lost all her pins
while running and the heavy braid, hurriedly twisted, twice burst its
bonds and fell to her feet.

Emile's eyes were still fixed upon her; Gilberte did not see them, but
she felt them, as if the atmosphere were filled with the fire of that
passionate gaze. She soon became so confused that she forgot to be
merry, and finally, as ordinarily, made an effort to relieve, by a jest,
their mutual emotion.

"I wish this hair was _my own_," she said; "then I would cut it off and
throw it into the stream."

There was an opportunity for a well-turned compliment; but Emile was
careful not to take advantage of it. What could he say about that hair
which would express the love he bore it? He had never touched it and he
was dying with the longing to do so. He glanced furtively about. A
circle of rocks and shrubs isolated Gilberte and himself from the whole
world. There was no spot on the mountain from which they could be seen.
One would have said that she had selected that sheltered retreat to
tempt him, and yet the innocent maiden had not thought of it, nor did
she think that she was in any danger there.

Emile was no longer master of himself. Insomnia, alarm, grief and joy
had kindled fever in his blood. He knelt beside Gilberte and took a
handful of her rebellious hair in his trembling hand; then, as she
started, he dropped it again, saying:

"I thought it was a wasp, but it is only a bit of moss."

"You frightened me," said Gilberte, shaking her head; "I thought it was
a snake."

Meanwhile Emile's hand was clinging to her hair and could not let it go.
On the pretext of assisting Gilberte to collect the scattered locks of
which the breeze disputed possession with her, he touched it a hundred
times, and at last put his lips to it stealthily. Gilberte did not seem
to notice it, and hurriedly replacing her hat upon the ill-assured mass,
she rose and said with an air which she strove to render unconcerned:

"Let us go to see if my father has awakened."

But she was trembling; a sudden pallor had driven the brilliant color
from her cheeks; her heart was ready to burst; she staggered and leaned
against the rock to keep from falling. Emile was at her feet.

What did he say to her? He did not know himself, and the echoes of
Crozant did not retain his words. Gilberte did not hear them distinctly;
she had the roar of the torrent in her ears, increased a hundredfold by
the throbbing of the blood in her arteries, and it seemed to her that
the mountain, seized with convulsions, was swaying to and fro over her
head.

She had no legs with which to fly, indeed she did not think of it. In
vain does one fly from love; when it has found its way into the heart,
it takes root there and accompanies it everywhere. Gilberte did not know
that there was any other peril in love than that of allowing her heart
to be taken by surprise, and, in truth, there were no others for her
with Emile. That danger was great enough, Heaven knows, and the vertigo
it caused was full of irresistible delights.

All that Gilberte could say was to repeat with a sort of terror,
instinct with regret and pain:

"No, no! you must not love me!"

"That means that you hate me then!" rejoined Emile; and Gilberte turned
her face away, for she had not the courage to lie. "Very well," he
continued; "if you do not love me, what harm does it do for you to know
that I love you? Let me tell you so, since I can conceal it no longer.
It is a matter of indifference to you, and one does not fear what one
despises. Know that it is true then, and if I leave you, if I am to see
you no more, at all events understand why it is: it is because I am
dying for love of you, because I cannot sleep or work, because I am
losing my wits and shall soon find myself telling your father what I am
telling you now. I would rather be driven away by you than by the
others. So drive me away; but you shall hear me now, because my secret
is suffocating me; I love you, Gilberte, I love you so that it is
killing me!"--And Emile's heart was so full that it overflowed in sobs.

Gilberte attempted to leave him; but she sat down only a few feet away
and began to weep. There was more joy than bitterness behind those
tears. So that Emile soon went to her to comfort her and was soon
comforted in his turn; for there was naught but affection and regret in
the terror that she felt.

"I am a poor girl," she said, "you are rich and your father, they say,
thinks of nothing but increasing his fortune. You cannot marry me, and I
ought not to think of marrying in my position. It would be by mere
chance if I should fall in with a man as poor as myself, who had
received a little education; and I have never counted on that chance. I
said to myself long ago that I must make the best of my lot, in order to
accustom myself to a sense of true dignity, which consists in not
envying others and in forming oneself to simple tastes and honorable
employment. So I do not think of marriage at all, since it would
probably be necessary to change my way of thinking in order to find a
husband. I must tell you that Janille got an idea into her head several
days ago that troubles me a great deal. She wants my father to seek a
husband for me. Seek a husband! Isn't that shameful and humiliating? Can
you imagine anything more repulsive? And yet the dear old soul cannot
understand my objection, and as my father was going to Argenton to
receive the quarterly payment of his small pension, she suddenly decided
this morning that he must take me and introduce me to some of his
acquaintances. We can't resist Janille, so we started; but my father,
thank heaven! doesn't know how to find husbands, and I shall be so
cunning about helping him not to think of it, that this little excursion
will result in nothing. You see, Monsieur Emile, that you mustn't pay
your court to a girl who has no illusions and who has made up her mind,
without regret or shame, to remain unmarried. I supposed that you would
understand this, and that your friendly sentiments would prevent you
from seeking to ruffle my quiet life. So forget this folly which has
passed through your mind, and look upon me simply as a sister, who will
forget what you have said, if you promise to love her with a calm and
brotherly love. Why should we part? it would be a great sorrow to my
father and me!"

"It would be a great sorrow to you, Gilberte?" said Emile; "why is it
that you weep when you say such cold words to me? Either I do not
understand you, or you are concealing something from me. And do you want
me to tell you what I think that I divine? that you have not enough
esteem for me to listen to me with confidence. You take me for a young
madman, who prates of love without religion or conscience, and you think
that you can treat me like a child to whom you would say: 'I forgive
you, don't do it again.' But, if you believe that a genuine, serious
passion can be allayed by a few cold words, you are a child yourself,
Gilberte, and you have no feeling at all for me in the depths of your
heart. O my God, can it be possible? and do those eyes that avoid mine,
that hand that spurns me, mean contempt or incredulity?"

"Haven't I said enough? Do you think that I can consent to love you,
with the certainty that you will belong to another sooner or later? It
seems to me that love means living together forever: that is why, when I
renounced the thought of marriage, I had to renounce the thought of
love."

"I understand it so, too, Gilberte: love means living together forever!
To my mind not even death can put an end to it; did I not say all that
to you when I told you that I loved you? Ah! cruel Gilberte, you failed
to understand me, or else you do not choose to understand me; but if you
loved me you would not doubt. You would not tell me that you are poor,
you would forget all about it as I do."

"O _mon Dieu_! I do not doubt you, Emile; I know that you are as
incapable as myself of being guided by self-interest. But I ask you
again, are we stronger than destiny, than your father's will, for
instance?"

"Yes, Gilberte, yes, stronger than the whole world, if--we love each
other."

It is quite useless to repeat the remainder of the interview. We might
describe certain interludes of dismay and discouragement, when Gilberte,
becoming reasonable, that is to say miserable, once more, pointed out
obstacles and manifested a pride which, while not strongly marked, was
sufficiently intense to lead her to prefer eternal solitude to the
humiliation of a struggle against arrogance and wealth. We might tell by
what honorable and manly arguments Emile sought to restore her
confidence. But the strongest arguments, those to which Gilberte found
no reply, are those which we cannot transcribe, for they were all
enthusiasm and ingenuous pantomime.

Lovers are not eloquent after the manner of rhetoricians, and their
words written down have never had much meaning for those to whom they
were not addressed. If we could remember in cooler moments the
insignificant remark that caused us to lose our wits, we should not
understand how it could be and should jeer at ourselves.

But the tone and the glance find magical resources in passion, and Emile
soon succeeded in persuading Gilberte of what he himself believed at
that moment: namely that nothing was simpler or easier than for them to
marry, consequently that nothing was more legitimate and necessary than
that they should love each other with all their strength.

The noble-hearted girl loved Emile too dearly to harbor the thought that
he was a rash and presumptuous youth. He said that he would overcome any
possible resistance on his father's part, and Gilberte knew nothing of
Monsieur Cardonnet except by vague rumors. Emile guaranteed his loving
mother's consent and that assurance set Gilberte's conscience at rest.
She soon shared all his illusions, and it was agreed that he should
speak to his father before applying to Monsieur Antoine.

A selfish or ambitious girl would have been more prudent. She would have
made the avowal of her feelings depend upon harsher conditions. She
would have refused to see her lover again until such time as he should
come prepared to go through with all the formalities, including the
request for her hand. But Gilberte's mind never entertained such
precautions.

She felt in her heart a something infinite, a faith in and respect for
her lover's word, which had no bounds. She was no longer disturbed save
by one thing; the thought that she might become a source of discord and
affliction in Emile's family on the day that he spoke to his father.

She could entertain no doubt of the victory which he was so certain of
winning; but the thought of the battle pained her and she would have
liked to postpone the awful moment.

"Listen," she said, with angelic naïveté, "there is no hurry; we are
happy as we are, and young enough to wait. I am afraid indeed that will
be your father's principal and strongest objection; you are only
twenty-one, and he may fear that you have not made your choice with
sufficient care, that you have not examined your fiancée's character
closely enough. If he talks to you about waiting, and asks for time to
reflect, submit to every test. Even if we should not be united for
several years, what does it matter, provided that we see each other,
since we cannot doubt each other's constancy?"

"Oh! you are a saint!" Emile replied, kissing the edge of her scarf,
"and I will be worthy of you."

When they returned to the place where they had left Antoine, they saw
him at some distance talking with a miller of his acquaintance, and they
went to the foot of the great tower to meet him.

The hours passed for them like seconds, and yet they were as full of
events as centuries. How many things they said to each other, and how
many more they did not say! Then the happiness of looking at each other,
of understanding and loving each other, became so intense that they were
seized with a wild gayety, and, joining hands, ran down the steep
slopes, leaping like deer, throwing stones to the foot of the
precipices, so transported with an unfamiliar joy that they were no more
conscious of danger than young children.

Emile pushed the débris from his path or jumped over it excitedly. One
would have said that he fancied that he was confronted by obstacles
placed in his way by destiny. Gilberte had no fear, either for him or
for herself. She laughed aloud; she shouted and sang like a bird in the
air, and forgot to fasten up her hair, which floated in the wind, and
sometimes completely enveloped her like a veil of fire.

When her father surprised her in the midst of her excitement she rushed
to him and embraced him passionately, as if she wished to communicate to
him all the joy with which her heart was flooded. The good man's hat
fell off during this sudden embrace and started to roll into the ravine.
Gilberte darted like a flash to catch it, and Antoine, terrified by her
impetuosity, darted to catch his daughter. Both were in great danger
when Emile passed them, seized the flying hat on the wing, and, as he
replaced it on Antoine's head, took his turn at pressing that fond
father in his arms.

"_Vive Dieu_!" cried Antoine, ordering them back to a less perilous
spot, "you both receive me very warmly, but you frighten me even more!
For God's sake did you meet the devil's goat that makes those whom it
bewitches with its glance run and jump about like lunatics? Is it the
mountain air that makes you so wild, little girl? All the better say I,
but don't run such risks as that. What color! What a sparkling eye! I
see that I must take you out for a walk often, that you don't have
enough exercise at the house. She has made me anxious lately, do you
know, Emile? She doesn't eat, she reads too much, and I have been
thinking of throwing all your books out of the window if it goes on.
Luckily she seems different to-day, and, that being the case, I am
tempted to take her as far as Saint-Germain-Beaupré. It's a fine place
to look at. We will pass the day there to-morrow, and if you choose to
come with us we will have a royal good time. Come, Emile, what do you
say? What does it matter if we go to Argenton a day later, eh, Gilberte?
And even suppose we spend only one day there?"

"Or don't go there at all?" said Gilberte, jumping for joy. "Let's go to
Saint-Germain, father; I have never been there. Oh! what a fine idea!"

"We are on the road," continued Monsieur de Châteaubrun, "but we must
go to pass the night at Fresselines, for staying here is not to be
thought of. However, Fresselines and Confolens are well worth seeing.
The roads are not good, and we must start before dark. Monsieur
Charasson, go and give poor Lanterne some oats. She likes journeys, for
they are the only opportunities she ever has for feasting. You will take
the donkey back to the people who lent him to you, up at Vitra, and then
go to wait for us, with the barrow and Monsieur Emile's horse, on the
other side of the stream. We will be there in two hours."

"And I," said Emile, "will write a line to my mother, so that she won't
worry over my absence, and I will find a child somewhere to carry my
note."

"Send one of these little savages so far? that won't be easy. Upon my
word! we are in luck, for yonder is someone from your place if I am not
mistaken."

Emile turned and saw Constant Galuchet, his father's secretary, who had
just thrown his coat on the grass, and, having enveloped his head in a
pocket handkerchief, was engaged in baiting his hook.

"Hallo! Constant, do you come as far as this to catch gudgeons?" asked
Emile.

"Oh! no indeed, monsieur," replied Galuchet, with a serious air, "I
cherish the hope of catching a trout."

"But do you expect to return to Gargilesse to-night?"

"Certainly, monsieur. Your father didn't want me to-day, so he gave me
permission to take the whole day; but as soon as I have caught my trout,
please God, I shall leave this wretched spot."

"And suppose you catch nothing?"

"Then I shall curse still more bitterly the idea that occurred to me of
coming so far to see such a hovel. What a horrible place, monsieur? Can
anyone imagine a more melancholy country and a château in worse
condition? And to think that tourists tell you that it's superb, and
that nobody should live on the Creuse without going to see Crozant!
Unless there are fish in this stream, I'll be hanged if you ever catch
me here again. But I have no faith in their stream. This clear water is
detestable for angling, and the constant noise makes your headache. I am
sick with it."

"I see that you haven't had a very pleasant walk," said Gilberte, who
had never seen Galuchet's absurd face before, and who was sorely tempted
to laugh at his prosaic scorn. "But you must agree that these ruins are
very impressive; at all events they are unique. Have you been up in the
great tower?"

"God forbid, mademoiselle!" replied Galuchet, flattered by Gilberte's
attention, and gazing at her with his wide-open round eyes, which were
extraordinarily far apart and separated by a curious little bunch of
sandy eyebrows. "I can see the interior of the barrack from here, as it
is open on all sides like a lantern, and I don't think it's worth the
trouble of breaking one's neck." And taking Gilberte's smile for
approval of this stinging satire, he added, in a tone which he
considered jocose and clever: "A fine country, on my word! not even
dog-tooth will grow here! If the Moorish kings were no better housed
than that, I congratulate them! Those fellows had vile taste, and they
must have cut a curious figure! Doubtless they wore clogs and ate with
their fingers."

"That is a very wise historical commentary," said Emile to Gilberte, who
was biting her handkerchief to avoid laughing outright at Monsieur
Galuchet's knowing tone and comical countenance.

"Oh! I see that monsieur is very sarcastic," she replied. "He is
entitled to be, as he comes from Paris where everybody is witty and has
fine manners, while here he is among savages."

"I cannot say that at this moment," retorted Galuchet, shooting a
killing glance at the fair Gilberte whom he found very much to his
liking; "but frankly, this province is a little behind the times. The
people are very dirty. Look at those barefooted, ragged children! In
Paris everybody has shoes, and those who haven't any don't go out on
Sunday. I tried to get something to eat at a house to-day: there was
nothing except black bread that a dog wouldn't eat, and goat's milk that
smelt decidedly rank. Those people have no shame, to live so miserably!"

"May it not be that they are too poor to do better?" said Gilberte,
disgusted by Monsieur Galuchet's aristocratic tone.


[Illustration: _GALUCHET SURPRISED._

_Emile turned and saw Constant Galuchet, his father's secretary, who had
just thrown his coat on the grass, and, having enveloped his head in a
pocket handkerchief, was engaged in baiting his hook._]


"It is rather because they are too lazy," he replied, somewhat
bewildered by that suggestion, which had not occurred to him.

"What do you know about it, pray?" retorted Gilberte, with an
indignation which he did not understand.

"This young woman is very piquant," he thought, "and her little air of
determination pleases me immensely. If I should talk to her long, I
would show her that I am no blockhead of a provincial."

"Well," said Emile to Gilberte, while Constant hunted for worms under
the stones, in order to bait his hook, "you have seen the features of a
perfect idiot."

"I am afraid he is more conceited than foolish," she replied.

"Come, come, children, you are not indulgent," observed honest Antoine.
"That young man is not handsome, I agree, but he seems to be a good
fellow, and Monsieur Cardonnet is well satisfied with him. He is very
obliging and has offered several times to do little favors for me.
Indeed he once gave me a very nice line, such as we can't find
hereabout; unfortunately I lost it before I went home, so that Janille
scolded me that day almost as much as she did the day I lost my hat. By
the way, Monsieur Galuchet," he added, raising his voice, "you promised
to come to fish in our neighborhood; I don't disturb my fish much, I
haven't your patience, so that you are likely to find some. I count upon
seeing you one of these days; come to breakfast at the house and then I
will take you to a good place; there are plenty of barbel, and they are
good sport."

"You are too kind, monsieur," said Galuchet; "I will certainly come some
Sunday, since you are pleased to overwhelm me with your courtesy."

And Galuchet, enchanted to have perpetrated that sentence, bowed as
gracefully as he could and took his leave, after Emile had given him his
message for his parents.

Gilberte was somewhat disposed to find fault with her father for such
excessive benevolence to so dull and unattractive a subject; but she was
too kind-hearted herself not to overcome her repugnance very quickly,
and in a moment she had ceased to think of it, the more readily because
on that day it was impossible for her to feel vexed at anything.

Thanks to their frame of mind, our lovers found all the incidents of the
remainder of their journey agreeable and amusing. Monsieur Antoine's old
mare, hitched to a sort of open buggy, which he was justified in calling
his wheelbarrow, performed prodigies of skill and courage in the
shocking roads that they had to follow to reach their destination. The
vehicle had room for three persons, and Sylvain Charasson, seated in the
middle, drove the peaceful Lanterne _superlatively_--to use his own
expression.

The horrible jolting of a carriage so poorly hung in no wise disturbed
Gilberte and her father, who were accustomed to occasional discomfort
and never allowed their plans to be disarranged by the weather or the
state of the roads.

Emile rode in front on horseback, to give warning and to help them to
alight when the road became too dangerous. Then, when they came out on
the soft sandy soil of the moors, he dropped behind, to chat with the
others, and above all to look at Gilberte.

Never was dandy in the Bois de Boulogne, darting his eyes into his
triumphant mistress's superb calèche, so happy and so proud as Emile,
as he followed the lovely country girl whom he adored, along the
ill-defined roads of that desert, by the light of the first stars.

What did it matter to him whether she was seated on a sort of litter
drawn by a sorry nag, or in a fine carriage? whether she was dressed in
silk and velvet, or in a faded calico? She wore torn gloves which showed
the tips of her pink fingers resting on the back of the wagon. To save
her Sunday scarf she had folded it and placed it on her knee. Her
graceful figure, slender and willowy, was even more graceful without it.
The soft evening breeze seemed to caress with zest her alabaster neck.
Emile's breath mingled with the breezes and he was bound like the slave
to the chariot of the conqueror.

There was one time when the vehicle, owing to Sylvain's lack of caution,
stopped short, and nearly came in collision with Emile's horse's head.

Monsieur Sacripant had placed one paw on the step, to signify that he
was tired and that they must take him inside. Monsieur Antoine alighted
to seize him by the skin of his neck and toss him in on the floor of the
wagon, for the poor beast no longer had enough spring in his legs to
jump so high. Meanwhile Gilberte patted Corbeau's nose and passed her
little hand through his black mane. Emile felt that his heart was
beating as if a magnetic current conveyed her caresses to him. He was on
the point of making some remark concerning Corbeau's happiness, as
naïve as those Galuchet would have been likely to make on such an
occasion; but he contented himself with being stupid silently. One is so
happy when, having no lack of wit, he is conscious of an attack of such
stupidity!

It was quite dark when they reached Fresselines. The trees and rocks had
become simply black masses, whence the solemn and majestic roar of the
stream came forth.

A delicious lassitude and the cool night air cast Emile and Gilberte
into a sort of blissful drowsiness. They had before them the whole of
the next day, a whole century of happiness.

The inn at which they alighted, and which was the best in the village,
had only two beds, in two different rooms. They decided that Gilberte
should have the better room, and that Monsieur Antoine and Emile should
share the other, each taking a mattress. But when they came to inspect
the beds, they found that there was but one mattress to each, and Emile
took a childish pleasure in the thought of sleeping on the straw in the
barn.

This arrangement, which threatened Charasson with a like fate, seemed
sorely to displease the page of Châteaubrun. That young man liked his
comfort, especially when he was travelling. Being accustomed to attend
his master in all his journeys, he made amends for the austere régime
of Janille at Châteaubrun by eating and sleeping to his heart's content
when away from home.

Monsieur Antoine, while making sport of him with a rough sort of gayety,
overlooked all his whims and made himself his slave, talking to him as
to a negro all the while. Thus, while Sylvain made a pretence of
grooming the horse and harnessing him, it was always his master who
handled the curry-comb and lifted the shafts.

If the child fell asleep while driving, Antoine would rub his eyes, pick
up the reins, and struggle against sleep rather than wake his page.

If there were only one portion of meat at supper, Monsieur Antoine would
say to Charasson, as he feasted his eyes on the appetizing dish: "You
may share the bones with Monsieur Sacripant;" but the goodman would,
almost unconsciously, gnaw the bones himself and leave the best piece
for Sylvain. Thus the crafty urchin knew his master's ways, and the more
he was threatened with having to go hungry and work and lose his sleep,
the more surely he relied on his lucky star.

However, when he saw that Monsieur Antoine paid no attention to the
matter of his sleeping accommodations, and that Emile was content with
the straw, he began, while he was serving the supper, to yawn and
stretch, and to observe that they had a long journey, that infernal
place was at the world's end, and that he had really thought they would
never get there.

Antoine turned a deaf ear to it all, and, although the supper was far
from dainty, ate with excellent appetite.

"This is how I like to travel," he said, clinking his glass against
Emile's every other minute, as a consequence of the habit he had fallen
into with Jean Jappeloup; "when I have all the comforts and everybody I
love with me. Don't talk to me about taking long journeys in a
post-chaise or on a ship, wandering about the world, alone and
miserable, in quest of fortune. It's very nice to enjoy the little money
one may have, riding about a beautiful region where you know everybody
you meet by name, and every house, every tree and every rut! Am I not
just as comfortable here as at home? If I had Jean and Janille at the
table, I should think I was at Châteaubrun, for I have my daughter here
and one of my best friends; and my dog, too, and even Monsieur
Charasson, who is as pleased as a king to see the world and be quartered
according to his deserts."

"It pleases you to say that, monsieur," replied Charasson, who, instead
of waiting on the table, had seated himself in the chimney corner; "this
is an abominable inn, and they make you sleep with the dogs."

"Well, you good-for-naught, isn't that too good for you?" retorted
Monsieur Antoine, in his sternest voice; "you're very lucky not to be
sent to perch with the hens! Deuce take it, you sybarite, you have straw
to sleep on; but I suppose you are afraid of dying of hunger in the
night, eh?"

"Excuse me, monsieur, the straw here is hay and hay makes your
headache."

"If that's so, you can lie on the floor at the foot of my bed, to teach
you to complain. You stand like a hunchback, so a hard bed like that
will do you a deal of good. Go and prepare your master's bed and spread
the horse blanket for Monsieur Sacripant."

Emile wondered what would be the end of this jest, which Monsieur
Antoine seemed determined to carry on to the end with a sober face, and,
when Gilberte had gone to her room, he followed Monsieur Antoine to his
to find out whether he would persuade his page to make the best of the
straw.

The count amused himself by causing himself to be waited on like a man
of quality. "Come," he said, "pull off my boots, give me my nightcap and
put out the lights. You can stretch yourself on the bricks here, and
look out for yourself if you are unlucky enough to snore! Good-night,
Emile. Go to bed; you won't be vexed with the company of this rascal,
who would prevent you from sleeping. He'll sleep on the floor, to punish
him for his absurd complaints."

After about two hours' sleep, Emile was awakened with a start by the
fall of a heavy body on the straw beside him. "It's nothing, it's only
I," said Monsieur Antoine; "don't let me disturb you. I undertook to
share my bed with that good-for-naught; but my gentleman, on the plea
that he is growing, must needs have the fidgets in his legs, and he
kicked me so many times that I abandoned the field to him. Let him sleep
in a bed, as he's so set upon it! for my part, I shall be much more
comfortable here."

Such was the exemplary punishment which the page of Châteaubrun
underwent at Fresselines.




XXII

INTRIGUE


We will leave Emile to forget his appointment with Janille, and to
wander over hill and dale with the object of his thoughts; and we will
take up the thread of the events in which his destiny is involved, at
the Cardonnet factory.

Monsieur Cardonnet was beginning to be seriously annoyed by Emile's
continual absences, and to say to himself that the time would soon come
to keep watch on and regulate his actions. "Now that his mind is
diverted from his socialism," he thought, "it is time for him to take
hold of some profitable reality. Argument will have little effect on a
mind so addicted to discussion. It seems that his hobby-horse is in the
stable for a while, and I won't do anything to make him take him out;
but let us see if we cannot replace theories by practice. At his age a
man is led by instinct rather than by ideas, although he proudly fancies
that the contrary is true; first of all let us bind him down to some
practical work and make him devote himself to it, against his will, if
necessary. He is too hard-working and intelligent not to do well what he
is compelled to do. Gradually whatever employment I may have provided
for him will become a necessity to him. He was always like that. Even
although he detested the study of the law, he learned the law. Very
good, let him finish his law-studies, even if he is destined to hate it
more and more, and to relapse into the aberrations which have disturbed
me so. I know now that it won't take very much time or a very clever
coquette to rid him of the coat of pedagogy of the new schools."

But it was the middle of vacation, and Monsieur Cardonnet had no
immediate pretext for sending Emile back to Poitiers. Moreover, he had
great hopes of his stay at Gargilesse; for, little by little, Emile
overcame his repugnance to the occupations which his father marked out
for him from time to time, and seemed to be no longer engrossed by the
object for which he had fought so earnestly. All the work that Emile did
he did in a superior way and Monsieur Cardonnet flattered himself that
he could drive love from his mind when he chose, without impairing the
submission and the talents of which he sometimes reaped the fruits.

Nothing was farther from Madame Cardonnet's intention than to call her
husband's attention to Emile's strange conduct. If she could have
divined the joy which her son derived from absenting himself thus, and
the secret of that joy, she would have assisted to save appearances and
with more affection than prudence, would have become his accomplice. But
she imagined that Monsieur Cardonnet's manner, which was often cold and
sarcastic, was the only cause of the discomfort Emile suffered in his
father's house; and, nursing a secret grudge against her lord and master
therefor, she suffered bitterly because she enjoyed so little of her
son's society. When Galuchet returned with the information that Monsieur
Emile would not be at home until the evening of the next day or the next
but one, she could not restrain her tears, and said in an undertone:
"Now he has begun to pass the night away from home! He is not willing
even to sleep here; he must be very unhappy!"

"Upon my word, that's a pretty subject for lamentation!" said Monsieur
Cardonnet with a shrug. "Is your son a girl, that you are so frightened
for him to pass a night away from home? If you begin this way, you are
not at the end of your troubles; for this is only the beginning of the
escapades a young man is likely to indulge in! Constant," he said to his
secretary when they were alone, "who were the people in whose company
you met my son?"

"Oh! a very agreeable party, monsieur. Monsieur Antoine de Châteaubrun,
who is a high-liver, a stout, jovial man, altogether agreeable in his
manners; and his daughter, a superb woman, with a perfect figure, the
most attractive creature you can imagine."

"I see that you are a connoisseur, Galuchet, and that you missed none of
the damsel's charms."

"_Dame!_ monsieur, when a man has eyes, he uses them," said Galuchet,
with a loud laugh of self-satisfaction; for it very rarely happened that
his employer did him the honor to talk with him on a subject unconnected
with his duties.

"And it is with these same persons, I suppose, that my son continued his
romantic excursions?"

"I think so, monsieur; for I saw him in the distance on horseback, as if
accompanying them."

"Have you ever been to Châteaubrun, Galuchet?"

"Yes, monsieur, I went there once when the masters were absent, and if I
had known that I should find no one there but the old servant I wouldn't
have been such a fool."

"Why?"

"Because I might have seen the château for nothing at another time, I
have no doubt; whereas that old witch, after showing me around her den,
demanded fifty centimes, monsieur, as the price of her condescension!
It's a shame to bleed people for showing them such a ruin!"

"I thought that old Antoine had made some repairs since I was there."

"Repairs, monsieur! it's a pitiful sight! They have rebuilt one corner,
about as big as your hand, and they didn't even have money enough to put
wall-papers on their rooms. The master isn't half so well lodged as I am
in your house! It's a depressing place, inside! Heaps of stones in the
courtyard to break your legs over, nettles, brambles, no door under a
great archway that resembles the entrance to the château of Vincennes
and which would be pretty enough if they would give it a coat of plaster
of Paris; but all the rest in such a state! Not a wall secure, not a
staircase that doesn't shake, cracks big enough to hold a man, ivy that
they don't even take the pains to tear down, although it would be easy
enough, and rooms that have neither floor nor ceiling! On my word, the
people hereabout are genuine Gascons for boasting about their old
châteaux, and sending you about on break-neck roads, to find
what?--ruins and thistles! Crozant is a stupendous fraud, and
Châteaubrun is little better than Crozant!"

"So you were not charmed with Crozant either? But my son seemed to like
it immensely, I'll be bound?"

"Monsieur Emile might very well like it, with such a pretty slip of a
girl on his arm! If I had been in his shoes I shouldn't have complained
overmuch about the place; but for my part, as I went there hoping to
catch a trout and didn't get as much as a gudgeon, I am not very well
satisfied with my walk, especially as it is twenty kilometres each way,
making four myriameters on foot."

"Are you tired, Galuchet?"

"Yes, monsieur, very tired and very dissatisfied! they'll never catch me
in their Moorish kings' fortress again."

And Galuchet, recalling with pride his jest of the morning, repeated
complacently and with a cunning smile:

"Those kings must have cut a curious figure! doubtless they wore clogs
and ate with their fingers."

"You are very bright to-night, Galuchet," rejoined Monsieur Cardonnet,
not deigning to smile; "but, smitten as you are, if you were brighter
you would find some pretext for calling on old Châteaubrun from time to
time."

"I need no pretexts, monsieur," replied Galuchet in an important tone.
"I am well acquainted with him; he has often invited me to fish in his
stream, and again to-day he urged me to go to breakfast with him some
Sunday."

"Very well, why don't you go? I am glad to allow you a little recreation
from time to time."

"You are too kind, monsieur; if you don't need me, I will go next
Sunday, for I am very fond of fishing."

"Galuchet, my boy, you are an idiot!"

"What's that, monsieur?" said Galuchet, disconcerted.

"I tell you, my dear fellow, you are an idiot," Cardonnet calmly
repeated. "You think of nothing but catching gudgeons, when you might be
paying court to a pretty girl."

"Oh! I don't know about that, monsieur!" said Galuchet, scratching his
ear with a fatuous air; "I should like the girl well enough, that's
true! she's a jewel! blue eyes, fair hair that's a metre and a half
long, I'll wager, superb teeth, and a mischievous little glance. I could
be dead in love with her, if I chose!"

"And why don't you choose?"

"_Dame!_ if I had ten thousand francs of my own, I might suit her! but
when one has nothing, one is hardly a suitable match for a girl who has
nothing."

"Is your salary equal to her income?"

"Why her income is contingent, and old Janille, who is supposed to be
her mother--I must confess, it would be a little distasteful to me to be
the son-in-law of a servant,--old Janille would certainly insist on a
small sum to begin housekeeping with."

"Do you think ten thousand francs would be enough?"

"I have no idea; but it seems to me that those people have no right to
be very ambitious. Their hovel isn't worth four thousand francs; the
mountain, the garden, a bit of meadow on the edge of the stream, all
overgrown with rushes, and the orchard where there are some fruit trees
good for nothing but to burn,--all those together wouldn't bring in a
hundred francs a year. They say Monsieur Antoine has a little capital in
government securities. It can't be much, judging from the life they
lead. But, if I were sure of a thousand francs a year, I would arrange
matters with the girl. She pleases me and I am old enough to settle
down."

"Monsieur Antoine has twelve hundred francs a year, I know."

"Reverting to his daughter, monsieur?"

"I am sure of it."

"But, although he has recognized her, she is a natural daughter and
entitled to only half of it."

"Well, do you feel that you can aspire to her hand now?"

"Thanks, monsieur! What are we to live on? and bring up children?"

"Of course you would need a little capital. We might be able to find
that for you, Galuchet, if your happiness absolutely depended on it."

"I do not know how to acknowledge your kindness, monsieur, but----"

"But what? come, don't scratch your ear so much, but answer."

"I don't dare, monsieur."

"Why not? don't I talk to you as if I were your friend?"

"I am deeply touched by it," rejoined Galuchet, "but----"

"But you annoy me. Speak, in heaven's name!"

"Well, monsieur, even though you should call me a fool again, I will say
what I think. I think that Monsieur Emile is paying court to that young
lady."

"Do you mean it?" exclaimed Monsieur Cardonnet, feigning surprise.

"If monsieur is not aware of it, I should be very sorry to be the cause
of trouble between him and his son."

"Is there any common rumor to that effect?"

"I don't know whether people are talking about it; I pay little
attention to gossip; but I myself have noticed that Monsieur Emile goes
to Châteaubrun very often."

"What does that prove?"

"That is as monsieur may choose to think, and it is all the same to me.
I simply meant to say that if I had any idea of marrying a young woman,
I should not be very well pleased to come in second."

"I can imagine that. But it is hardly likely that my son would pay
serious attention to a young woman whom he neither would nor could
marry. My son has lofty sentiments, he would never descend to a
falsehood, to false promises. If the girl is virtuous, be assured that
her relations with Emile are entirely innocent. Isn't that your
opinion?"

"I will have whatever opinion monsieur may desire on that subject."

"That is altogether too accommodating! If you were in love with
Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun, wouldn't you try to find out the truth for
yourself?"

"Certainly, monsieur; but I can hardly be in love with her, having seen
her but once."

"Well, listen to me, Galuchet: you can do me a service. What you have
just told me makes me a little more anxious than it makes you, and all
that we have been saying, by way of conjecture and jest, will have at
all events, the serious result of having warned me of certain dangers. I
tell you again that my son is too honorable a man to seduce a penniless,
inexperienced girl; but it might happen to him, if he sees her too
often, to conceive for her somewhat too warm a feeling, which would
expose them both to temporary but unnecessary suffering. It would be
very easy for me to cut the whole thing off short by sending Emile away
at once; but that would interfere with the plan I have formed of
training him to share my occupations, and I regret to be compelled for
so unimportant a reason to part with him under present circumstances.
Consent therefore to help me. You are sure of a warm welcome at
Châteaubrun; go there often, as often as my son; make yourself the
friend of the family. Père Antoine's unsuspecting nature will assist
you. Look about you, observe, and report to me all that happens. If your
presence annoys my son, it will be a proof that the danger exists; if he
tries to have you turned out, stand your ground, and pose unhesitatingly
as an aspirant to the young lady's hand."

"And what if I am accepted?"

"So much the better for you!"

"That depends, monsieur, on how far things have gone between her and
your son."

"You must be very simple if with time and address you can't find out
about that, as you are going there in the quality of an observer."

"And suppose I find that I have arrived too late?"

"You will retire."

"I shall have made a ridiculous campaign, and Monsieur Emile will bear
me a grudge for it."

"Galuchet, I don't ask anything for nothing. Certainly, all this can't
be done without some ennui and some unpleasantness for you; but there's
a good bonus at the end of all the sacrifices I ask you to make."

"That's enough, monsieur, and I have only one other word to say; and
that is that in case the girl should suit me, and I should suit her too,
I should be too poor at this moment to go to housekeeping."

"We have already anticipated that contingency. I would assist you to
make a position for yourself. For example, you undertake to work for me
for a certain time, and I make you an advance of five thousand francs on
your salary, and a bonus of five thousand francs in addition, if
necessary."

"This is no longer a jest, a conjecture, I suppose?" said Galuchet,
scratching his head harder than ever.

"I don't often jest, as you know, and this time I am not jesting at
all."

"Very good, monsieur; you are too kind to me. I will plant myself beside
Monsieur Emile, and he will be very shrewd if I lose sight of him!"

"He will be shrewder than you, and that will not be difficult," thought
Monsieur Cardonnet as soon as Galuchet had retired; "but a rival of your
sort will be enough to make him feel humiliated by his choice, very
soon; and if she prefers a dull lout like you for a husband to a
handsome chance suitor like him, he will have received a useful lesson.
In that event a trifling sacrifice for Monsieur Galuchet's establishment
would not be draining the sea dry, especially as that would keep him in
my service and cut short his ambition to leave me. But that is the worst
possible result of my plan, and Galuchet has twenty chances to one of
being shown the door sooner or later. Meanwhile I shall have had time to
think of something better, and I shall at all events have succeeded in
worrying Emile, in disenchanting him, in fastening to his sides an enemy
whom he will hardly know how to combat--ennui in the shape of Constant
Galuchet."

Cardonnet's idea did not lack depth, and if it had not been too soon or
too late for Emile to renounce his illusions, it might have been
successful. Any sort of competition stimulates vulgar minds, but a
refined mind suffers from an unworthy rivalry. An exalted nature will
infallibly be disgusted with the being who takes pleasure in the homage
of stupidity; the mere fact that the object of his adoration tolerates
such homage too patiently may be enough to cause him to blush and take
himself away. But Cardonnet reckoned without Gilberte's pride.

Emile returned from his excursion more inflamed with passion than ever,
and in such a state of blissful enthusiasm that it seemed to him
impossible that he should not triumph over everything. The generous
Gilberte had powerfully assisted his illusion by sharing it, and therein
she had shown herself, by her lack of prudence and her openness of
heart, the worthy child of Antoine. Emile might well have reproached
himself, however, for having gone so far with her without having first
made sure of Monsieur Cardonnet's consent. That was a terrible
imprudence; indeed it was culpable rashness; for, unless a miracle
should happen, he could reckon on his father's refusal. But Emile was in
that state of delirious excitement in which one reckons on miracles and
deems himself almost a god because he is loved.

However, he returned to Gargilesse without having made up his mind at
what moment he would announce his sentiments to his family; for Gilberte
had insisted that he should do nothing suddenly, and had received his
promise to begin by gradually appealing to the affection of his parents,
by governing his conduct in accordance with their wishes. Thus Emile was
to make amends for an absence which had doubtless caused them some
anxiety, by staying with them all the rest of the week and working
zealously at whatever his father chose to give him to do. "You must not
come to see us until next Sunday," Gilberte had said when they parted,
"and then we will arrange our plans for the following week." The poor
child felt that she must live from day to day, and, like Emile, she
derived infinite pleasure from caressing in her thoughts the mystery of
a love of which they alone realized the charm and the depth.

Emile kept his word. He did not absent himself from home during the
week, and contented himself with writing Monsieur de Boisguilbault an
affectionate letter to set his mind at rest concerning his sentiments,
in case the suspicious old man should take alarm because he did not see
him. He followed his father like a shadow; he even asked him for
employment, and devoted himself to the construction of the factory like
one who took the deepest interest in the success of the undertaking.
But, as it is not natural to do violence to one's own heart for long, it
was impossible for him to push the indolent workmen. Monsieur Cardonnet
derived no sort of benefit from the employment of men of that
description. They lacked energy, and the rivalry of the more active
produced discouragement in them instead of emulation. They were well
paid, but, as they saw, from the master's dissatisfaction, that they
would not be retained long, they determined to make the most of the
present, and consequently economized in their food. When Emile saw them
sitting on the damp stones, with their feet in the mud, eating a piece
of black bread and raw onions, like the Hebrew slaves employed in
building the Pyramids, he had such a feeling of compassion for them that
he would have preferred giving them his own blood to drink, to
abandoning them to that slow death of toil and starvation.

Thereupon, he tried to persuade his father, since he could not save all
those numerous lives, to afford them at all events some temporary relief
by feeding them better than they fed themselves, or by giving them, at
least, a little wine. But Monsieur Cardonnet reminded him, only too
justly, that, as all the vines were frozen in the preceding year, they
could not obtain wine in that country except at a very high price, and
that it was for the table of the bourgeois only. Where no general system
of economy was practised, it was easy to prove that economy in special
directions was powerless to bring about any important amelioration, and
to demonstrate, by the unanswerable evidence of figures, that they must
either abandon the idea of building or compel the mechanic to undergo
the unpleasant necessities of his position. Monsieur Cardonnet did his
utmost to remedy the evil, but that utmost was confined within narrow
limits. Emile submitted and sighed; he could give Gilberte no stronger
proof of his love than to hold his peace.

"Well," said Monsieur Cardonnet, "I see that you will never be very
sharp in the matter of superintending; but when I am no longer in this
world, it will be enough if you realize the need of having a good
superintendent in my place. The material part of the work is the least
poetic; you will find your field of activity in the direction of art and
science, which have their place in manufacturing as in everything else.
Come to my study, help me to understand the things that escape my
comprehension, and place your genius at the service of my energy."

During that week Emile had to read, to study, to comprehend and to
summarize several works on hydrostatics. Monsieur Cardonnet did not
think that he really needed to have that work done, but it was one way
of testing Emile, and he was overjoyed by his rapidity and mental
keenness. Such studies could arouse no disgust in a mind occupied with
theories. Anything connected with science may have some useful
application in the future, and when one has not under his eyes the
deplorable conditions through which social inequality compels the men of
the present day to pass, in the execution of any work, he may well
become deeply interested in the abstract theories of science. Monsieur
Cardonnet recognized Emile's lofty intelligence and said to himself
that, with such eminent faculties, it was not possible that he would
always close his eyes to what he called evidence.

When Sunday arrived, it seemed to Emile that a century had passed since
he had seen that enchanted palace of Châteaubrun, where, in his eyes,
nature was lovelier, the air softer and the light more glorious than in
any spot on earth. He began with Boisguilbault however; for he
remembered that Constant Galuchet was to breakfast at Châteaubrun, and
he hoped that uninteresting individual would have departed or would be
busy with his fishing when he arrived; but he was far from anticipating
Monsieur Constant's Machiavelism. He found him still at table with
Monsieur Antoine, a little overburdened by the native wine, to which he
was not accustomed, shuffling about on his chair and making commonplace
remarks, while Gilberte, sitting in the courtyard, waited impatiently
until a relaxation of vigilance on Janille's part should enable her to
go out on the terrace and watch for her lover's coming.

But Janille did not relax her vigilance; she was prowling about in every
corner of the ruins and was on the spot to receive half the salutation
which Emile addressed to Gilberte. But Emile saw, at the first glance,
that she had said nothing.

"Really, monsieur," she said, lisping with more affectation than usual,
"you are not polite, and you have nearly caused a rivals' quarrel
between my girl and me. What! you lead me to hope that you will come and
keep me company in her absence, you even go so far as to appoint a day,
and then, instead of coming here, you go and enjoy yourself taking an
excursion with mademoiselle, on the pretext that she is forty years
younger than me! as if that was my fault, and as if I am not as light of
foot and as lively to talk with as a mere girl! It was very rude on your
part, and you have done well to let my anger lie for a few days; for if
you had come sooner you would have had a very cold reception."

"Hasn't Monsieur Antoine justified me," rejoined Emile, "by telling you
how entirely unforeseen our meeting at Crozant was, and that our trip to
Saint Germain was suggested by him on the spur of the moment? Forgive
me, dear Mademoiselle Janille, and be sure that nothing less than being
ten leagues away would have induced me to break my appointment with
you."

"I know, I know," said Janille, in a meaning tone, "that it was Monsieur
Antoine who did all the harm; he is so inconsiderate! but I should have
thought that you would be more reasonable."

"I am very reasonable, my dear Janille," replied Emile in the same tone,
"and I have proved it by passing the week with my father, working to
please him, in spite of my longing to come and obtain my pardon."

"And you did well, my boy; for it is a good thing for young men to be
employed."

"You will be satisfied with me hereafter," said Emile, glancing at
Gilberte, "and my father has already forgiven me for the time I have
wasted. He is very kind to me, and I will show my appreciation of his
kindness by forcing myself to undergo the most painful sacrifices, even
that of seeing you a little less frequently henceforth, Mademoiselle
Janille; so scold me to-day, quickly, but not too hard, and forgive me
even more quickly, for I shall probably be able to come here very seldom
for several weeks. I have much work to do, and my courage would fail me
if I knew that you were angry with me."

"Well, well, you are a good boy, and no one can bear you a grudge," said
Janille. "I see," she added with a knowing air, lowering her voice,
"that we understand each other perfectly without any further
explanation, and that it's a good thing to have people of honor and good
sense like you to deal with."

This result of the explanations threatened by Janille relieved Emile
from a great anxiety. His position was quite serious enough, without
being complicated by the alarms and questions of that faithful retainer.
The advice Gilberte had given him, to come more rarely and to let time
do its work, was thus proved to be most judicious, and if she had been a
trained diplomatist, she could not have acted more shrewdly on that
occasion. In very truth, how many marriages between persons of unequal
fortune would become possible, did not the woman, by her exactions, her
pride or her suspicion, involve the man enamored of her in a labyrinth
of suffering and anxiety, amid which his prudence and courage in
overcoming obstacles fail him! With Gilberte's childlike innocence was
blended calm common sense and unselfish courage. She did not look upon
her union with Emile as possible until after several years, and she felt
that her love was strong enough to wait. That cruel future appeared to
her heart, overflowing with faith, like a day radiant with sunshine; and
therein she was not so foolish as some might think. It is faith and not
prudence that moves mountains.




XXIII

THE DEVIL'S ROCK


Emile had forgotten even Constant Galuchet's name when he found himself
once more within the walls of the dear old château; and when he went in
to salute Monsieur Antoine, the stupid features of his father's clerk
produced the same effect upon him that a caterpillar produces upon one
who puts out his hand unsuspiciously to pluck a fruit. Galuchet had
prepared to greet Emile with the assured air of a man who has taken
possession first of a coveted seat, and who can afford an affable
greeting to those who come too late. A little more and he would have
done the honors of the château to Emile. But the young man's cold and
mocking glance, as he replied to his familiar and effusive salutation,
disconcerted him sadly; that glance seemed to say to him:

"What are you doing here?"

Meanwhile Galuchet, who thought much more of earning Monsieur
Cardonnet's liberality than of winning Gilberte's good graces, made a
mighty effort to recover his self-possession, and his face, while not
expressing actual hostility, assumed an unaccustomed air of insolence
which was, under the circumstances, as injudicious as possible.

Emile had determined to make the best of the native wine, and, in order
not to offend Monsieur de Châteaubrun, he did not refuse to drink with
him on his arrival. It may be that, by virtue of the utter fascination
which took possession of him in the place where Gilberte passed her
days, he really considered that thin, sour beverage better than all the
choice wines in his father's cellar. But on this occasion it seemed
bitter to him, when Galuchet, assuming the air of a man who condescends
to howl with the wolves, put out his glass toward his, proposing to
touch glasses after the manner of Monsieur de Châteaubrun. He
accompanied this familiarity with an unpleasantly vulgar movement of the
elbow and shoulder, thinking to imitate in jovial mood Monsieur
Antoine's patriarchal simplicity.

"Monsieur le comte," said Emile, ostentatiously treating Antoine with
even more respect than usual, "I fear that you have induced Monsieur
Constant Galuchet to drink too much. See how red his eyes are and how he
stares! Be careful; I warn you that his head is very weak."

"My head weak, Monsieur Emile! why do you say that my head is weak?"
retorted Galuchet. "You have never seen me drunk, so far as I know."

"This will be the first time that I shall have had that pleasure, if you
continue to drink as you are doing."

"So it would give you pleasure to see me commit an impropriety?"

"I trust that will not happen, if you follow my advice."

"Very good," said Galuchet, rising, "if Monsieur Antoine cares to take a
walk, I shall be glad to offer my arm to Mademoiselle Gilberte, and then
you can see if I walk crooked."

"I prefer not to risk the experiment," said Gilberte, who was sitting at
the door of the pavilion, caressing Monsieur Sacripant.

"So you take sides against me, too, Mademoiselle Gilberte?" rejoined
Galuchet, walking toward her; "do you believe what Monsieur Emile says?"

"My daughter takes sides against no one, monsieur," said Janille, "and I
don't understand why you bother your head about somebody who doesn't
bother her head about you."

"If you forbid her to take my arm," replied Galuchet, "I have nothing to
say. It seems to me, however, that it's no breach of true French
courtesy to offer a young lady your arm."

"My mother does not forbid me to accept your arm, monsieur," said
Gilberte, sweetly but with much dignity; "but I thank you for your
courtesy. I am not a Parisian and I can hardly appreciate the custom of
taking a support in walking. Besides, our paths do not permit that
custom."

"Your paths are no worse than those at Crozant, and the rougher they are
the more need there is for people to help one another. I saw you plainly
enough at Crozant put your lovely hand on Monsieur Emile's shoulder, to
go down the mountain; oh! I saw it, Mademoiselle Gilberte, and I would
have liked right well to be in his place!"

"Monsieur Galuchet, if you had not drunk beyond all reason," said Emile,
"you would not concern yourself so much about me, and I beg you not to
concern yourself about me at all."

"Hoity-toity! now you are losing your temper, are you?" said Galuchet,
trying to adopt a good-natured tone. "Everybody is hard on me here,
except Monsieur Antoine."

"Perhaps that is because you are a little too familiar with everybody,"
retorted Emile.

"What's going on here?" said Jean Jappeloup, entering the room. "Are you
quarreling? Here am I, to make peace. Good-day, _ma mie_ Janille;
good-day, my Gilberte du bon Dieu; good-day, friend Emile; good-day,
Antoine, my master: and good-day, you," he said to Galuchet; "I don't
know you, but it's all the same. Ah! it's Père Cardonnet's man of
business!--Ah! good-day to you, my dear Monsieur Sacripant; I didn't
notice your greeting."

"_Vive Dieu_!" cried Antoine, "better late than never; but do you know,
Jean, you are going wrong? When we only have one day a week to see
you,--and God knows how long the week is without you!--you get here at
noon on Sunday!"

"Listen, master----"

"I don't want you to call me master."

"What if I choose to call you so? I was your master long enough, and it
would be a bore to me to give orders all the time. Now, I choose to be
your apprentice, for a little change. Come, give me something fresh and
cool to drink, quickly, Janille. I am warm! Not that I am hungry; they
wouldn't let me go after mass, my good friends at Gargilesse! I must
needs stop and chatter a little with Mère Laroze, and you can't keep
your throat from getting dry when you talk without drinking. But I came
fast, because I knew you would be thinking about me here. You see,
Gilberte, since I came back to the old place the Sunday would have to be
forty-eight hours long to allow me to satisfy all the friends who are
glad to see me!"

"Well, my dear Jean, if you are happy, that consoles us a little for
seeing you less often," said Gilberte.

"Happy?" rejoined the carpenter; "there's no happier man than I on the
face of the earth!"

"That's easy to see," said Janille. "See how he has cheered up since he
ceased to be tracked every morning like an old rabbit! And then he
shaves every Sunday now, and he has new clothes that look very well on
him."

"And who was it who spun the wool for this pretty drugget?" said Jean.
"Why, _ma mie_ Janille and the good Lord's child! And who gave the wool?
my master's sheep. And who paid the cost? it is paid in friendship here.
You don't have coats like this, bourgeois. I wouldn't change my fustian
jacket for your black broadcloth swallow-tail."

"I would be satisfied with the spinstress," observed Galuchet, glancing
at Gilberte.

"You?" said Jean, good-humoredly bringing his hand down on Galuchet's
shoulder with force enough to crush an ox; "you have spinstresses like
this one? Why, _ma mie_ Janille is too young for you, my boy; and as for
the other, I would kill her if she should spin a bit of wool as long as
your nose for you!"

Galuchet was wounded by this allusion to his flat nose, and retorted,
rubbing his shoulder:

"Look you, peasant, your manners are _too touching_; joke with your
equals, I have nothing to say to you."

"What's this gentleman's name?" Jean asked Monsieur Antoine. "I can't
remember his devil of a name."

"Come, come, Jean, you go a little too fast, old fellow," replied
Monsieur Antoine. "Don't undertake to tease Monsieur Galuchet; he's a
very worthy young man, and, furthermore, he is my guest."

"Well said, master! Let us make peace, Monsieur Maljuché. Will you have
a pinch of snuff?"

"I don't use it," replied Galuchet, haughtily. "With Monsieur Antoine's
permission, I will leave the table."

"At your pleasure, young man, at your pleasure," said the châtelain.
"Monsieur Emile doesn't enjoy long sessions either, and you can stroll
about a bit. Janille will show you the château, or, if you prefer to go
down to the brook, get your lines ready. We will join you directly, and
take you where you will find good sport."

"Oh! yes," said the carpenter, "he's a fisher of small fry! He does
nothing else every evening at Gargilesse, and when anyone speaks to him
he makes a wry face because it disturbs his fish. Well, we will go
directly and help him to catch something better than his small fry. Look
you, Monsieur Maljuché, if I don't put you in the way of carrying home
a salmon for your supper, I'll agree to change names with you. You don't
need to be in such a hurry. The boat should be in good condition, for I
nailed a plank in its belly not long ago. We'll find an old harpoon
somewhere, and the _Devil's Rock_, where the salmon usually go to take a
nap in the sun, isn't far away. But it's a dangerous place, and you must
not go alone."

"We will all go," said Gilberte, "if Jean manages the boat. It's very
interesting sport, and the place itself is magnificent."

"Oh! if you are coming, Mademoiselle Gilberte, I will await your
pleasure," said Galuchet.

"Hear that! wouldn't anyone think she was going on your account,
paper-scratcher? This youngster is impertinent beyond everything. Is
everybody like that where you come from? Oh! don't put on that indignant
expression and look over your shoulder, for it doesn't frighten me much.
If you choose to be agreeable, I will be, too; but if, just because you
are dressed in black like a notary, you think you can leave the table
when I remain, you are much mistaken. Sit down, sit down, Maljuché! I
haven't finished drinking, and you are going to drink with me."

"I have had enough," said Galuchet, resisting. "I tell you I have had
enough!"

But the carpenter would have broken him in two like a lath rather than
let him go. He forced him to sit down again on the bench and swallow
several more bumpers, Galuchet striving to show a bold front to
evil-fortune, and Monsieur Antoine shielding him ineffectually against
his old friend's malicious shafts, although he did not share the
antipathy which the secretary's face and manners aroused in the rest of
the family.

Emile had slowly followed Gilberte and Janille into the courtyard, and,
despite the little old woman's jealous watchfulness, he had succeeded in
telling his sweetheart that he had obeyed her orders zealously, and that
he found his father in such a favorable frame of mind that he could
safely risk some overture in the following week. But Gilberte thought
that the risk would be too great, and urged him to persevere in that
sedentary, laborious life. Courage seemed easy to them both. Now that
Emile was sure that he was loved, he was so happy that he thought that
he could demand nothing more of fortune for a long while. There was a
divine tranquillity in the depths of his heart. Gilberte's clear and
searching glance said so many things to him now!

There is, in the dawn of a lover's happiness, a moment of tranquil
beatitude, when the most penetrating observer would have difficulty in
detecting the secret on the surface. The desire to see and speak to each
other every hour seems to disappear with the anxious longing to reach an
understanding. When their hearts are bound together by a mutual avowal,
neither witnesses nor separation can embarrass them or part them in
reality. Thus the clear-sighted Janille was deceived by their peaceful
merriment and by the prudence which comes only when suffering and doubt
are at an end. The perturbation which Janille had often noticed in young
Cardonnet, the sudden flush that rose to Gilberte's cheeks at certain
words of which she alone had grasped the meaning, her sadness and her
ill-designed agitation when he was late in coming, all had vanished
since the trip to Crozant, and Janille was amazed that an incident the
consequences of which she had dreaded had caused a favorable change in
the state of affairs.

"I was mistaken," she said to herself. "My girl is not thinking too much
about him; and if he thinks of her, he will know enough to say nothing,
and draw back little by little, rather than endanger our repose. He is
behaving well, and it would be a pity to hurt his feelings, since he
understood me with half a word, and is carrying out my wishes of his own
accord."

If Jean Jappeloup had conspired with Emile to take vengeance on Galuchet
for his pretensions, he could have done no better than he did; for
during more than an hour, while the lovers were strolling about with
Janille in the neighborhood of the pavilion, he employed sometimes
cunning raillery, sometimes open force to keep him at the table and make
him drink, _willy-nilly_. In this test, which was beyond his strength,
Galuchet soon lost the little good sense with which nature had endowed
him. He was much scandalized at first by the châtelain's habits and
conceived a profound contempt for him whom he regarded as the count's
companion in debauchery. In a word, Galuchet, who had no trace of
elevation in his feelings or his ideas, and who was not worth a single
hair from the heads of those two rough-spoken worthies, deemed himself
degraded, and promised himself that he would, in his report to his
master, depict in startling colors the painful task he had undertaken.
But, as he drank, his wits went astray altogether, his vulgar instincts
gained the upper hand of his secret vanity, and he began to laugh, to
pound on the table, to talk loud, to boast of innumerable feats of
valor, and to make such a pitiful exhibition of himself, that Jappeloup,
who was as refined as his manners were abrupt, took compassion on him
and gave him a severe lecture with a cold and serious air.

"You don't know how to drink, my friend," he said; "you are ugly when
you laugh and you are stupid when you try to be witty. If I ventured to
give Monsieur Antoine a piece of advice, it would be to give you a glass
of water when you come to breakfast with him, otherwise you might make
remarks before his daughter that would force me to put you out of doors.
You thought, when you saw us all so merry and so unceremonious with one
another, that we were vulgar folk and that you must become vulgar to
descend to our level. You made a mistake. Whoever has nothing evil in
his heart or unclean in his mind can let himself go; and even if I
should be so drunk that I couldn't stand, I shouldn't be afraid that I
could be made to blush the next day for anything I had said. It seems
that it's not the same with you; that is why you do well to dress in
black from head to foot and make people who don't know you think you're
a gentleman; for if there is a peasant here, you are the man!"

Antoine tried to soften the sermon, and Galuchet tried to get angry.
Jean shrugged his shoulders and left the table to avoid having to give
him a lesson more appropriate to the state of his intellect.

When they left the pavilion Galuchet was still walking straight; but his
head was so heavy and so heated, that he dared not utter a word before
Gilberte, for fear of saying one thing for another.

"Well," said Gilberte to Jappeloup, "are we going to the Devil's Rock?
It's more than a year since I was there; Janille will never let father
take me there because she says it's too dangerous and one can't afford
to be absent-minded there; but she will let me go with you, my good
Jean! Do you feel that your hand is still strong and your eye sure
enough?"

"I?" said Jappeloup, "why, I feel as well equal to the task as if I were
no more than twenty-five."

"And you are not tipsy?" said Janille, taking hold of Jean's sleeve and
standing on tiptoe to look into his eyes.

"Look, look all you please," said he. "If you can do this, I will agree
that I am tipsy!" And he placed on his head a pitcher of water that
Janille was carrying, and ran several yards without upsetting it.

"Very good," said Janille; "I could do as much if I chose, but it's no
use; I am sure of you, and I trust my girl with you. For my part, I
haven't the time to go along. Do you, Monsieur Emile, just keep an eye
on the father, for he is quite capable of trying to step ashore in
mid-stream, if he is busy laughing or talking."

"And who will keep an eye on Maljuché?" queried Jappeloup, pointing to
Galuchet, who had gone ahead with Monsieur Antoine. "I won't be
responsible for him."

"Nor I," said Gilberte.

"Never fear," said Emile, "I will undertake to keep him quiet."

"It's not at all certain that you will succeed," rejoined Jean; "if he
isn't drunk, he's something like it. You can't say that he's downright
_rich_, but he's just _comfortable_. A bed would be better for him than
a boat."

"You can notice how he goes down the mountain," suggested Janille; "and
if there's danger of his sinking you, leave him on the rocks on the
bank."

Galuchet was already in the boat with Monsieur de Châteaubrun when the
others arrived. He was flushed and silent. But when they were in
midstream the swift current made him dizzy and he began to sway so
violently from side to side that Jappeloup, losing patience, took a rope
and bound his body securely to the thwart on which he sat. He fell
asleep in that position.

"You have a delightful secretary there," said Gilberte to Emile. "I
trust, dear papa, that you won't invite him to breakfast again."

"Oh! bless my soul, it's not his fault," replied Monsieur Antoine, "but
Jean's, who made him drink more than he wanted."

"What does a man amount to who can't drink without getting drunk?" said
Jean; "he's worse than nobody."

The boat glided swiftly down-stream to a spot where the rocks on each
side approached so nearly that it was impossible to pass without great
danger. Jean was one of the most powerful men in the province. His
fearless nature and his strong will added tenfold to his physical
strength. He was accustomed to enter into the most trivial undertakings
with as much passionate enthusiasm as if he were setting out to conquer
the world; and yet, notwithstanding this youthful excitability, his
presence of mind was wonderful. He guided the boat in the centre of the
current, and, when they entered the narrow passage, threw her across the
stream and avoided the shock of a collision with the cliff by leaning
out and grasping it with his hand. Emile, who seconded him, gallantly
relieved him from time to time, and, the boat being thus held in place,
they made ready the harpoon and waited in silence for the prey to pass.
Every one knows that the fish always try to swim up against the current,
but they were frightened by the unusual barrier and kept approaching and
retreating. The lookout leaned forward, stretching his arms as far as he
could. Monsieur Antoine and Gilberte, kneeling behind him, watched to
see that the movement he made in throwing the harpoon did not sink the
boat or drag him overboard. Gilberte, when it was the carpenter's turn,
clung to his coat, fearing that he would fall into the water; and when
Emile's turn came, she earnestly urged her father to hold him with all
his strength. But soon, trusting to no one else, she seized his jacket
herself, and more than once he felt the touch of her lovely arms, ready
to embrace him in case of accident.

In this situation, which was dangerous for all, Jean's attention and
Antoine's was completely absorbed by the excitement of fishing, and the
same excitement served the two lovers as a pretext for exchanging
glances and words, which Galuchet, although half awake, was in no
condition to observe. What would Monsieur Cardonnet have thought could
he have seen how well his agent was earning his reward!

At last a salmon was speared, amid frantic shouts from Jean Jappeloup,
and Galuchet, partly aroused by the sight of the capture, tried to take
a hand in landing him. But his clumsiness and obstinacy spoiled
everything, and Jean, beside himself with wrath, turned the boat around,
saying:

"When you want to fish for salmon, you will go with somebody besides me.
Gudgeons of this size aren't in your line, and if we stayed here long, I
should break your head with the shaft of my harpoon."

"God preserve me from coming again with such a boor as you," retorted
Galuchet, sitting on the edge of the boat.

"Don't sit there," said the carpenter; "you are in my way, and you would
do much better to help me pull up against this current, which runs like
a mill-race. Here is Monsieur Emile working like a good fellow, and you,
stout and strong as you are, fold your arms and watch the sweat roll off
us."

"Faith, it's your own fault," retorted Galuchet; "you made me drink and
I am good for nothing."

"Very good, but you are heavy, and as you are not working you can go
ashore. To the bank, to the bank, my little Emile! let us get rid of
bundles that are in the way!"

They headed for the shore; but Galuchet considered the proposed step
insulting, and refused to land, blaspheming in the most reckless way.

"Ten thousand devils!" cried Jappeloup, thoroughly angry, "you have made
me lose a superb salmon, but you shan't make me break my back in your
service!"

And he pushed him out of the boat; but Galuchet, because he resisted,
fell between the boat and the bank, into the water, up to his waist.

"Faith, that's well done," said Jappeloup, "that will put a little water
in your wine."

And he pulled the boat rapidly out of Galuchet's reach, for, in his
rage, he tried to upset her.

"Ah! the miserable fellow!" cried the carpenter, "confess, that if there
are some good beasts, there are many vicious ones. Let him wallow," he
said to his companions, who feared that poor Galuchet, because of his
fuddled condition, might drown, although the water was not dangerously
deep. "If he sinks too far I'll stick my harpoon in his belt and fish
him up like a salmon. Bah! if it were anything of value, we might have
reason to be anxious, but things that are good for nothing, dead cats
and empty bottles, always float."

In a few moments Galuchet jumped up on the bank, shook his fist and
vanished.

This ridiculous incident depressed Gilberte. For the first time she
detected a serious inconvenience in her father's too great good-nature.
His rustic and simple manners, which were those of the people about him
and were the expression of a kindly and innocent nature, began to
terrify her, as not affording such enlightened and judicious protection
as her age and sex demanded.

"I am a poor country girl," she said to herself, "and I can get along
very well with peasants; but on the condition that no ill-bred
semi-bourgeois undertakes to interfere; for then the peasants become a
little too violent in their wrath, and the life I lead does not put me
out of reach of a coward's revenge."

Thereupon she thought of Emile as a protector destined for her by
heaven; but she asked herself amid what surroundings he himself was
compelled to live, and the idea that Monsieur Cardonnet employed people
of the Galuchet species caused her a sort of vague alarm with regard to
his character and habits.

When Jean Jappeloup returned to Gargilesse that evening, he found
Galuchet lying like a dead man in the middle of the road. The poor
devil, sobered momentarily by the bath he had taken, had entered a
wineshop to dry his clothes, and as he was afraid of his health, he had
allowed himself to be persuaded to take a glass of eau-de-vie, which had
finished him. He was returning home literally on all fours. Jean had had
time to forget his anger, nor was he the man to leave a fellow-man in
danger of being trampled upon by horses' feet. He lifted him up,
submitted patiently to his threats and insults, and led him, more than
half carrying him, to the factory; and Galuchet, who did not recognize
him, went in, swearing that he would be revenged on the scoundrel who
had tried to drown him.