Volume 2 — Introductory material (continued 3)

"Come and sit down by the fire with us. Poor Jean! you were thinly clad and you are wet to the bone. I am the cause of that too; if you hadn't insisted on accompanying me, you would have gone to the farmhouse and you would be there now; you are hungry, too, and you would have had your supper. How am I to give you anything to eat here? and I am sure that you are dying of hunger!"

"Faith, Monsieur de Boisguilbault," said the carpenter, with a smile, thrusting his clogs into the hot ashes, "I snap my fingers at the rain, but not at hunger. Your wooden house has become deuced fine since I put my hand to it; but if there was a piece of bread in one of these closets, in which I once put shelves, I should think them still prettier. From noon till night I chopped like a deaf man, and I am weaker than a rat at this moment."

"Bless my soul!" cried Monsieur de Boisguilbault, "now I think of it, I haven't supped either. I had entirely forgotten it, and I am sure that there is something here, I don't know where. Come, Jean, let us look and we shall find it."

"Knock and it shall be opened unto you," said the carpenter, gayly, shaking the door at the end of the room.

"Not there, Jean!" said the marquis, hastily; "there's nothing but books there."

"Ah! this is the door that doesn't shut tight," said Jean; "you see, I put my hand right on it. I'll fix it to-morrow; it's simply a matter of taking a little off the top so that the bolt will slide. Isn't your old Martin smart enough to fix that? He was always clumsy and awkward, that fellow!"

Jean, who was stronger than the two old men at Boisguilbault together, closed the door without a suspicion of curiosity, and the marquis was grateful to him for his indifference, having watched him closely and with evident uneasiness so long as he held the knob in his hand.

"There is ordinarily a small table here with my supper all served," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault. "I can't imagine what has become of it, unless Martin forgot me to-night."

"Oh! unless you forgot to wind him up the old clock in his brain has not stopped," said the carpenter, who recalled with pleasure all the details of the marquis's home-life with which he was once so familiar. "What is there behind this screen? Aha! this has a very appetizing and substantial look!" and he folded the screen, revealing a table laden with a galantine, a loaf of bread, a plate of strawberries and a bottle of Bordeaux.

"That's a dainty little supper to offer a lady, Monsieur de Boisguilbault."

"Oh! if I thought that madame would deign to accept it!" said the marquis, rolling the table toward Gilberte.

"Why not!" laughed Jean. "I'll wager that the dear soul thought of other people before thinking about the care of her own body. Come, if she will eat just a few strawberries, and you the meat, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, I'll take care of the bread and a glass of black wine."

"We will eat as all men should eat," replied the marquis, "each according to his appetite; and the experiment will prove, I am sure, that the most solid portion, intended for one person only, will be enough for several. Oh! I beg you, madame, to let me have the pleasure of waiting on you."

"I am not at all hungry," said Gilberte, who had been for several days past too much distressed and excited not to have lost her appetite; "but to induce you two to eat, I will go through the motions."

Monsieur de Boisguilbault sat beside her and waited upon her with great zeal. Jean declared that he was too dirty to sit with them, and, when the marquis insisted, he confessed that he should be very ill at ease in such soft, deep chairs. He took a wooden stool, a relic of the former rustic furniture of the chalet, and, planting himself under the mantel, where he could dry himself from head to foot, began to eat with great zest. His portion was amply sufficient, for Gilberte simply nibbled at the strawberries, and the marquis was a phenomenally small eater. Moreover, even if he had more appetite than usual, he would gladly have stinted himself for the man he had struck two hours earlier, and who had forgiven him so frankly.

The peasant eats slowly and in silence. To him it is not the gratification of a capricious and fugitive craving, but a sort of solemn function; for on a working-day the meal hour is at the same time an hour of rest and reflection. Jappeloup became very grave, therefore, as he methodically cut his bread into small pieces and watched the cones blazing on the hearth. Monsieur de Boisguilbault, having gradually exhausted all that one can say to a person one does not know, relapsed into his usual taciturnity, and Gilberte, overdone by several nights of sleeplessness and weeping, felt an insurmountable drowsiness creep over her, the effect of the heat from the fire following the cold and dampness of the storm. She fought against it as long as she could, but the poor child was little more accustomed than her friend the carpenter to luxurious arm-chairs, fur rugs and candle-light. As she tried to smile and to answer the more and more infrequent remarks of the marquis, she felt as if she were magnetized; her lovely head gradually sank on the back of the chair, her pretty foot slipped nearer to the fire, and her strong, regular breathing suddenly betrayed the victory of sleep over her will-power.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault, seeing that the carpenter was lost in thought, began to scrutinize Gilberte's features more closely than he had as yet dared to do, and a sort of shudder passed over him when he saw, beneath the black lace which had partly fallen from her head, the luxuriant dazzling masses of golden hair. But he was roused from his contemplation by the carpenter, who said to him in an undertone:

"Monsieur de Boisguilbault, I'll bet that you haven't a suspicion of what I am going to tell you. Look carefully at this pretty little lady, and then I will tell you who she is."

Monsieur de Boisguilbault turned pale and gazed at the carpenter with a dismayed expression.

XXXI UNCERTAINTY

"Well, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, have you looked at her enough," continued the carpenter, with a mischievous, self-satisfied air, "and cannot you yourself guess what should interest you most in her?"

The marquis rose and at once fell back in his chair. A ray of light had passed through his mind at last, and his penetration, so long at fault, suddenly went farther than Jean desired. He thought that he had guessed, and he cried in a tone of intense indignation:

"She shall not stay here an instant longer!"

Gilberte, awakened with a start and terrified beyond words, saw before her the marquis's angry face. She thought that she was lost, and reflecting with despair that, instead of bringing her father and Monsieur de Boisguilbault together, she would be the cause of embittering their enmity, she had no other thought than to take all the blame upon herself and to seek pardon for Monsieur Antoine. Falling on her knees with the grace of a flower bending before the tempest, she seized the marquis's trembling hand, and, too agitated to speak, bowed her lovely head and leaned her pallid brow on the old man's arm.

"Well, well," said the carpenter, seizing the marquis's other arm and shaking it violently, "what are you thinking about, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, to frighten this child so? Is your mania taking hold of you again, and shall I have to lose my temper with you, after all?"

"Who is she?" rejoined the marquis, trying to push Gilberte away, but too nervous to be able to do it; "tell me who she is, I insist upon knowing!"

"You do know, as I have already told you," said Jean with a shrug; "she is the sister of a country curé, with no money and no name. Is that why you speak so roughly to her? Do you want her to know what I know about you. Try not to let her see you in one of your attacks, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; you see that your savage airs make her sick with fright! and it's a devil of a way of entertaining her and doing the honors of your house! She could hardly expect this after being so polite to you; and the worst of it is that I can't tell her what the matter is with you, because I haven't any idea myself."

"I don't know whether you are making sport of me," said the marquis, deeply distressed; "but what did you mean just now?"

"Something that would have given you pleasure, but which I won't tell you now, as you are out of your head."

"Speak, Jean; explain yourself; I can't stand this uncertainty."

"I can't stand it either," said Gilberte, bursting into tears. "I don't know, Jean, what you have said or tried to say about me; I don't know what my position is here, but it is unendurable to me. Let us go!"

"No—no—" said the marquis, beset by irresolution and shame; "it is still raining, the weather is horrible and I don't want you to go."

"Well, then, why did you want to turn her out just now?" retorted Jean with contemptuous tranquillity; "who can understand your whims? For my part, I give it up, and I am going."

"I will not stay here without you!" cried Gilberte, rising and running after the carpenter, as he walked toward the door.

"Mademoiselle—or madame," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, stopping her and detaining the carpenter also, "please listen to me, and if you know nothing of the strange thoughts that assail me at this moment, forgive an agitation which must seem very absurd to you, but which is very painful to me, I assure you! I owe you an explanation of it, however. Jean just gave me to understand that you were not the person that I supposed—but another person—whom I do not wish to see or to know. Mon Dieu! I don't know how to tell you. Either you understand me too well or you cannot understand me at all."

"Ah! I understand you at last," said the crafty carpenter, "and I will tell madame what you cannot succeed in explaining to her.—Madame Rose," he continued, turning to Gilberte and resolutely giving her the name of the curé of Cuzion's sister, "you know Mademoiselle Gilberte de Châteaubrun, your young neighbor? Well, monsieur le marquis has a great grudge against her, so it seems; we must believe that she has offended him shamefully; and just as I was going to tell him something about you and Emile——"

"What do you say?" cried the marquis. "Emile?"

"This doesn't concern you," retorted Jean: "I shall tell you nothing more, I am speaking to Madame Rose. Yes, Madame Rose, Monsieur de Boisguilbault detests Mademoiselle Gilberte; he has taken it into his head that you might be she; that is why he wanted to put you out—by the window in preference to the door."

Gilberte felt a mortal distaste for continuing this extraordinary and audacious mystification; for some minutes past, she had been conscious of such a warm feeling of sympathy for the marquis, that she reproached herself for abusing his error and subjecting him to emotions which seemed to make him suffer as keenly as she herself suffered. She determined to disabuse him gradually, and to be bolder than her facetious companion in daring to face the results of Monsieur de Boisguilbault's wrath.

"There is at least one enigma for me in what you tell me," she said with dignified assurance. "I cannot understand how Gilberte de Châteaubrun can be an object of reprobation on the part of a man so just and so worthy of respect as Monsieur de Boisguilbault. As I know nothing of her which can justify such detestation, and as it is important that I should know what to think about her, I beg monsieur le marquis to tell me all the evil that he knows of her, so that she may at least have an opportunity to exculpate herself in the minds of honorable people who know her."

"I should have preferred," said the marquis, with a profound sigh, "that the name of Châteaubrun should not be mentioned before me."

"Is it a name upon which there is any stain, I pray to know," demanded Gilberte, with an irresistible outburst of pride.

"No—no—I never said that," replied the marquis, whose wrath subsided as quickly as it blazed up. "I accuse nobody, I make no reproach against anybody. I am on unfriendly terms with the person mentioned; I do not wish any one to speak of her to me, nor do I speak of her myself—so why ask me useless questions?"

"Useless questions!" echoed Gilberte; "you cannot deem them such, monsieur le marquis. It is very strange that a man like you should be on bad terms with a mere girl, whom he does not know, whom perhaps he has never seen. Surely she must have been guilty of some detestable action or have said some hateful thing about him, and that is what I want to know, that is what I entreat you to tell me: so that, if Gilberte de Châteaubrun deserves neither esteem nor confidence, I may avoid the society of so dangerous a person."

"That's what I call talking!" cried Jean, clapping his hands. "Say on! I too should be very glad to know what to think about her; for this Gilberte has been very good to me; she has given me food and drink when I was hungry and thirsty; she has spun her wool to make clothes for me when I was cold. To my eyes she has always been charitable, gentle, devoted to her parents, and a good girl if ever there was one! Now, if she has committed some shameful sin, I shall be ashamed to be her debtor, and I will never owe her anything more."

"It was your absurd explanation that caused all this useless discussion," said the marquis to the carpenter. "Where did you pick up all these foolish ideas that you attribute to me? It is the young woman's father with whom I am on bad terms, on account of a quarrel of many years' standing, and not with a child whom I don't know, and against whom I have nothing to say, absolutely nothing."

"And whom you would have turned out of your house, nevertheless, if she had dared to appear here!" said Gilberte, looking closely at the marquis, whose embarrassment was beginning to encourage her materially.

"Turned out?—no; I turn no one out," he replied; "I simply should have considered it a little cruel, a little strange, that she should think of coming here."

"Well, she has thought of it many times, none the less," said Gilberte; "I know it, for I know her thoughts, and I am going to tell you what she has said to me."

"What is the use?" said the marquis, turning his head away; "why spend so much time over an impulsive phrase that escaped me without reflection? I should be distressed beyond words to cause an unkind thought against the girl in anybody's mind. I say again, I do not know her and I can in no way reproach her. The only thing that I desire is that my words may not be repeated, tortured, exaggerated. Do you hear, Jean? you take it upon yourself to interpret the exclamations that escape me, and you do it very badly. I beg you, if you have any affection for me," added the marquis with a painful effort, "never to utter my name at Châteaubrun, and not to discuss me in any way. I also request madame to protect me from any indirect contact, any roundabout explanation, in a word, from every sort of relation with that family; and if, to make sure that my repose shall still be respected in that regard, I must give the lie to what I said without reflection in my excitement, I am ready to protest against anything which could possibly impair the reputation and character of Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun in my mind."

The marquis spoke with a measured coldness which restored to his manner all its customary propriety and dignity. Gilberte would have preferred a fresh outbreak of wrath, which would have led her to expect a reaction marked by weakness and emotion. She no longer felt the courage to insist, and understanding, from the sudden frigidity of the marquis's manner, that she was half divined, and that an unconquerable distrust had taken possession of him, she felt so ill at ease, that she wished to go away at once; but Jean was not at all satisfied with the result of this explanation, and he determined to strike the last blow.

"Well," he said, "it must be as Monsieur de Boisguilbault pleases. He is kind and just at the bottom of his heart, Madame Rose; let us go, and cause him no more pain; but first I would like to have a sort of understanding between you two. Come, let us open our hearts a little! You will blush, scold me, perhaps you will cry. But I know what I am doing, I know that this is an opportunity that may never come again, and that we must be willing to submit to a little trouble to assist and comfort those we love. You look at me in surprise! don't you know that Monsieur de Boisguilbault is our Emile's best friend, that he has his whole confidence, and that he is perfectly well acquainted with all his troubles and yours, although he doesn't know that you are the one?—Yes, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, Madame Rose here is the lady! you understand me, don't you? So speak to her, encourage her, tell her that Emile has done right, and she, too, in refusing to yield to Père Cardonnet's malice. That is what I intended to say to you when you interrupted me with an outcry about Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun, when God knows if I was thinking of her!"

Gilberte became so confused that Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who was beginning to regard her with mingled interest and uneasiness, was touched by her plight and strove to reassure her. He took her hand and said, leading her back to her chair:

"Don't be embarrassed before me; I am an old man and it is another old man who betrays your secrets. Undoubtedly he has a very bold and unusual way of acting; but as his intentions are good and his exceptional character endears him to the person in whom you and I are more interested than in anybody else in the world, let us try to overcome our mutual embarrassment, and, as he says, to make the most of the opportunity!"

But Gilberte, confounded by the carpenter's determination, and terrified to see her heart's secret in the hands of a man who still inspired more terror than confidence, put both her hands over her face and did not answer.

"Well, well!" said the carpenter, whom nothing in the world could deter in his undertakings, whether it was a matter of overcoming a scruple or of felling a forest, "here she is all covered with mortification, and I shall be scolded for my indiscretion! but if Emile was here, he wouldn't disavow me. He would be very glad to have Monsieur de Boisguilbault see with his own eyes whether he has placed his affections wisely, and he will feel more than a little proud to-morrow when Monsieur de Boisguilbault says to him: 'I have seen her, I know her, and I am not surprised any longer!'—Isn't it true that you'll say that, Monsieur de Boisguilbault?"

Monsieur de Boisguilbault did not reply. He was still gazing at Gilberte, struggling between a powerful attraction and a horrible suspicion. He walked several turns up and down the room to overcome a terrible feeling of oppression, and after many sighs and internal conflicts, he returned to Gilberte and took both her hands.

"Whoever you may be," he said, "you have in your hands the destiny of the noblest boy that I in my old age have ever dared to dream of for my staff and my consolation. I shall die before long, and I shall leave this earth without having known an instant's joy, if I do not leave Emile at peace with himself. Oh! I implore you—you who are destined to exercise so great an influence, for good or evil, over his whole future,—retain on the side of truth that heart which is so worthy to be its sanctuary. You are very young, you do not know yet what a woman's love is in the life of a man like him! You do not know perhaps that it depends upon you to make of him a hero or a dastard, a coward or an apostate. Alas! you probably do not understand the bearing of what I am saying to you now. No, you are too young; the more I look at you, the more like a child you seem to me! Poor young thing, without experience and without strength, you are to determine the future of a noble heart, to break it or ennoble it. Forgive me for saying this; I am deeply moved and I cannot find fitting words. I have no desire either to distress you or to cause you embarrassment; but I am depressed and alarmed, and the more fully I realize your innocence, the more I feel that Emile no longer belongs to me."

"Forgive me, monsieur le marquis," said Gilberte, wiping away her tears, "I understand you very well, and although I am in truth very young, I am conscious of my responsibility in God's sight; but I am not in question now, it is not myself whom I wish to defend and justify, but Emile, that noble heart whom you seem to doubt. Oh! have no fear! Emile will lie neither to you, nor his father, nor himself, nor other men. I don't know if I fully understand the importance of his ideas and the depth of yours; but I adore the truth. I am no philosopher, I am too ignorant. But I am pious, I was brought up in the precepts of the Gospel, and I cannot interpret them in a different sense from that Emile gives to them. I understand that his father, who also invokes the Gospel, by the way, when the fancy strikes him, wishes him to be false to the faith of the Gospel, and if I believed that Emile was capable of consenting, I should blush for having been so grossly misled as to love a man without intelligence and conscience; but I am not so unfortunate as that. Emile will be equal to renouncing me, if need be, rather than renounce his own manhood; and as for myself, I shall know how to be brave, if at times his courage seems to waver. But I am not afraid of it; I know that he suffers, and I suffer too; but I will be worthy of his affection, as he is worthy of yours, and God will help us to bear everything, for He does not abandon those who suffer for love of Him and for the glory of His name!"

"Well said!" exclaimed the carpenter; "I wish I could talk like that. But no matter, I think as she does, and the good Lord gives me as much credit."

"Yes, you are right," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, impressed by the depth of conviction revealed by the carpenter's earnest tone; "I did not know, Jean, that you would be as devoted a friend to Emile as myself and perhaps a more useful one."

"I don't say that, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; I know that Emile looks upon you as his real father, in place of the un-Christian father that fate gave him; but I am something of a friend to him, and last night I flatter myself that I cheered him up, as I cheered up some other people this morning. As for her," he said, pointing to Gilberte, "she didn't need any cheering up. I didn't expect she would! From the first moment her mind was made up, and in my opinion it's a fine thing for a girl of her age to be so strong as that, although you don't seem to think very much of it."

The marquis hesitated and continued to pace the floor without speaking; then he stopped at the window, opened it, returned to Gilberte, and said:

"The rain has stopped, and I am afraid your people will be anxious about you. I—I don't want to keep you any longer to-night, but—but we will see each other again, and I shall be better prepared to talk with you,—for I have many things to say to you."

"No, monsieur le marquis," replied Gilberte, rising, "we shall never meet again; for in that case I must continue to deceive you and that would be impossible to me. Chance has thrown us together, and I thought that I was only fulfilling a bounden duty in offering you some trivial attentions which my heart bade me offer. Thus far I was not blameworthy, I leave it to you to judge; for in order to induce you to accept them, it was necessary to tell a falsehood; and furthermore, my father had made me swear that I would never annoy you with his grief, with his repentance for an injury he did you long ago, of which I know nothing, with his affection for you, which has remained like a painful wound in the depths of his heart! In my dreams as a child I often formed a plan of coming and throwing myself at your feet and saying to you: 'My father suffers, he is unhappy on your account. If he has injured you, accept my tears, my humiliation, my enthusiasm, my life if you will, in expiation of his fault; give him your hand and trample me under your feet, and I will bless you, if you remove from my father's heart the grief that preys upon him and pursues him even in his sleep.'—Yes, that is the dream that I used to cherish long ago; but I abandoned it because my father ordered me to, thinking that I should simply add to your anger; and I abandon it more completely than ever to-night, seeing the coldness and aversion which my name inspires in you. So I take my leave without imploring you in his behalf, distressed by a very painful certainty that my father is the victim of very great injustice on your part; but I will put forth all my energies to distract his thoughts and comfort him. And as for you, monsieur le marquis, I leave you the means of punishing me for the innocent stratagem to which I gave my assent this evening in order to save the health and perhaps the life of the man whom my father once loved so dearly! I leave you my secret, which has been disclosed to you against my will, but which I no longer blush to know is in your hands; for it is the secret of a proud heart, and of a love that God has blessed by inspiring it. Have no fear of seeing me again, monsieur le marquis; and have no fear that Jean, our imprudent but generous friend, who has exposed himself to your anger by trying to reconcile us, will ever annoy you by reminding you of us. I shall find a way to make him abandon the task. I have been honored by your hospitality this evening, monsieur le marquis, and you will allow me never to forget it. You will have no reason to repent of it; for you will not have been the victim of a lie, and if it will be a consolation to your hatred, you still have an opportunity to drive Antoine de Châteaubrun's daughter from your presence with insulting touch."

"I would like to see him do it!" cried Jean Jappeloup, taking his stand beside her and putting her arm through his; "I who have done all the harm and told all the lies against her wish; I, who got it into my head that she would succeed in putting her hand in yours! You are obstinate, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; but, by all the devils! you shall not insult my Gilberte, for if you did, I should remember that I cut your cane in two to-night!"

"You talk like a fool, Jean," replied Monsieur de Boisguilbault coldly. "Mademoiselle," he said to Gilberte, "will you allow me to offer you my arm to return to your carriage?"

Gilberte accepted tremblingly; but she felt that the marquis's arm trembled even more. He assisted her into the carriage without speaking; then, noticing that it was still quite cold, although the sky was clear, he said:

"You have come from a very warm room and you are not dressed warmly enough; I will go and get something more for you."

Gilberte thanked him and reminded him that she had her father's cloak.

"But that is damp; it is worse than nothing," said the marquis. And he returned to the chalet.

"The devil take the old fool!" growled Jean, lashing the mare angrily. "I have had enough of him; I am out of temper with him; I have had no sort of success, and I long to get out of his den. I'll never put my feet inside it again; the man's glance gives me a cold in the head. Let's be off and not wait for him."

"Nay, we must wait for him, and not make him run after us," said Gilberte.

"Bah! do you suppose he cares whether you take cold or not? Indeed, he's forgotten all about it; you'll see if he comes back. Let us go."

But when they reached the gate they found that it was locked, that Monsieur de Boisguilbault had kept the key, and that they must either wait for him or go back and ask him for it. Jean was cursing loudly when the marquis suddenly appeared, carrying a package which he placed on Gilberte's knees, saying:

"I kept you waiting a little; I had some difficulty in finding what I wanted. I beg you to keep it for your own use, as well as these little things which you left with your basket. Don't get down, Jappeloup, I will open the gate for you. I shall expect you to-morrow, my dear fellow," he added, when the gate was open.

And he offered the carpenter his hand, which the latter hesitated to take, understanding nothing of the inconsequent impulses of so uncertain and perturbed a mind.

"Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun," the marquis then said in an almost inaudible tone of voice, "will you also shake hands with me before we part?"

Gilberte leaped lightly to the ground, removed her glove and took the old man's hand, which trembled terribly. With an impulsive outburst of respectful compassion she put it to her lips, saying:

"You will not forgive Antoine; do, at least, forgive Gilberte?"

A profound groan issued from the old man's breast. He made a movement as if to put his lips to Gilberte's brow, but recoiled in dismay. Then he took her head in both hands, squeezed it a moment as if he would crush it, and, finally, kissed her hair, which he moistened with a tear as cold as the drop of water that drips from the glacier. Then he suddenly pushed her away with all his strength and fled, hiding his face in his handkerchief. Gilberte fancied that she heard a sob die away in the distance with the sound of his uncertain footsteps on the gravel and the whispering of the breeze among the aspens.

XXXII A WEDDING PRESENT

There was something at once ghastly and heartrending in Monsieur de Boisguilbault's strange leave-taking, and Gilberte was so affected by it that she began to weep again herself.

"Well, what's the matter?" said Jean when they were on the road to Châteaubrun; "are you going to lose your eyes this evening. You are about as mad as yonder old man, my Gilberte; for sometimes you are reasonable and talk pure gold, and then suddenly you are as weak and whining as a baby. Let me tell you this: Monsieur de Boisguilbault has a kind heart; but, for all Emile and your father may say, he is a little crack-brained; that's sure. There's no relying on him, but just the same, we need never despair of him. It may be that you will never hear of him again, and it may just as well be that he'll jump on your father's neck some fine day, if he happens to meet him at the right moment. It will depend on the moon!"

"I don't know what to think of him," said Gilberte, "for I really believe I should go mad if I lived with him. He frightens me horribly, and yet I have moments of irresistible affection for him. It's the same feeling that Emile had for him from the beginning. Emile has ended by loving him and losing his fear of him. So that his kindness of heart finally carries the day over the caprice of disease."

"I will tell you more about that later," replied the carpenter, "for I really must go there again and study him."

"But you knew him so well years ago! Wasn't he the same then?"

"Oh! he has grown much worse! He was habitually sad and silent, and sometimes a little hot-headed. But it didn't last long, and he was better after it. The same thing is true now; but it seems to me that it happens once or twice a day where it used to happen once or twice a year, and that he is at the same time uglier and gentler."

"How unhappy he seems!" said Gilberte, whose heart ached as she recalled the sob she heard, which still echoed in her ears.

Janille and Antoine were awaiting Gilberte's return with feverish impatience. Charasson's report had stricken them dumb and, thinking that he was daft, or that he was lying to conceal some accident that had happened to Gilberte, they had hurried to Mère Marlot's to ease their minds. Her story reassured them but gave them no light. Janille was angry with the carpenter and augured no good from this crazy enterprise. Antoine shared her fears at first, and then, in conformity with his hopeful nature, abandoned himself to pleasant illusions and built innumerable castles in Spain.

"Janille," he said, "our child and our good old Jean can perform miracles between them. What would you say if you should see Boisguilbault come home with them?"

"Ah! that's like your crazy head!" retorted Janille. "You forget that is impossible, and that the old fox is more capable of wringing our daughter's neck than of listening to sound arguments. And, then, how can people who know nothing at all make use of pretexts?"

"That is just my point. All that Boisguilbault fears is that we have taken our people into our confidence; for it is wounded pride, quite as much as betrayed friendship, alas! that makes him so timid and so unhappy. Poor Boisguilbault! Perhaps our child's innocence and Jean's loyalty will touch him. May he find it possible to forgive me of what I can never forget!"

"How can you complain when you have a treasure like Gilberte? But don't expect her to tame him. He will no more come to Châteaubrun than Cardonnet's handsome son will, and our ruins will never see either of them again."

"Emile will return with his father's consent or not at all, Janille, I have promised you; but meanwhile his conduct is worthy of all praise; Jean proved it to us this morning."

"That is to say, that you didn't understand anything about it, any more than I did; but, because you are weak, you pretended to be persuaded! you never do anything different, and you don't see that by praising that young man's noble conduct you inflame your daughter's mind. You would do better to disgust her with him by proving to her that he's mad, or that he doesn't care for her."

Their discussion was interrupted by the sound of Lanterne's hoofs, which produced a familiar cadence as she trotted over the smooth rock. They ran to meet Gilberte, and when they had almost dragged her into the pavilion, amid the hurried questions on one side and the broken replies on the other, the package which the marquis had handed Gilberte and which she had not thought of opening, caught Janille's eye.

"What's all this?" she cried, unfolding a superb Indian cashmere, sky-blue, embroidered with gold thread; "why, it's a cloak fit for a queen!"

"Ah! great Heaven!" cried Monsieur Antoine, touching the shawl with a trembling hand and turning pale as death: "I recognize this."

"And what is this box?" said Janille, opening a jewel-case which fell from the shawl.

"Those are mineral specimens, I believe," replied Gilberte suddenly, "crystals from Mont-Blanc which he picked up himself."

"No, no, you are mistaken, these shine much brighter; just look at them!"

And Gilberte to her unbounded amazement saw that it was a necklace of huge diamonds of dazzling brilliancy.

"Mon Dieu! mon Dieu! I recognize that too," stammered Monsieur de Châteaubrun, overwhelmed by intense emotion.

"Hush, monsieur," said Janille, nudging him with her elbow; "you know diamonds and cashmere shawls when you see them, that's likely enough; you have been rich enough to have plenty of 'em. Is that any reason why you should talk so loud and prevent us from looking at them? Diantre! my girl, you didn't waste your time! They may be worth enough to rebuild our château, and Monsieur de Boisguilbault is no such skinflint as I thought."

Gilberte, who had seen very few diamonds in her life, persisted in believing that the necklace was of rock crystal cut like diamonds; but Monsieur de Châteaubrun, having examined the stones and the clasp, replaced them in the box, saying with a sort of pensive melancholy:

"Those diamonds are worth more than a hundred thousand francs. Monsieur de Boisguilbault has given you a marriage-portion, my child!"

"A hundred thousand francs!" cried Janille, "a hundred thousand francs! Think of what you are saying, monsieur! is it possible?"

"Those glistening little stones worth so much money!" exclaimed Jappeloup, in artless amazement entirely free from covetousness; "and they are kept like that in a little box, and not used for anything?"

"People wear them," said Janille, putting the necklace around Gilberte's neck, "and they make a woman look lovely, I should say. Put the shawl over your shoulders, my girl! Not like that! I have seen ladies wearing them in Paris; but I am blessed if I can remember how they fixed them."

"They are very fine, but very uncomfortable," said Gilberte, "and it seems to me as if I were disguised with this shawl and these jewels. Come, let us fold the shawl and put the stones in the box, to send back to Monsieur de Boisguilbault. He must have felt about in the dark and made a mistake. He meant to give me some trifle and he has given me the wedding presents he gave his wife."

"Yes," said the carpenter, "he made a mistake, for sure; for a man doesn't give his dead wife's things to a stranger. He was so excited, poor man! You're not the only man whose wits go wool gathering, Monsieur Antoine."

"No, he made no mistake," said Monsieur Antoine. "He knows what he is doing, and Gilberte can keep these presents."

"Yes, yes, of course," cried Janille. "They are hers, aren't they, Monsieur Antoine? They all belong to her rightfully—since Monsieur de Boisguilbault gives them to her!"

"But it's out of the question, father! I don't want them," said Gilberte; "what should I do with them? I should cut a ridiculous figure going out to drive in our barrow in my calico dress, covered with diamonds and a cashmere shawl!"

"Dame! you would rather make people laugh," said the carpenter; "the ladies of the province would burst with envy. And then, too, all the moths would come and flutter about your diamonds, for they plunge like idiots at everything that shines; in that they are like men. If Monsieur de Boisguilbault chooses to give you a dot, to show that he is reconciled to Monsieur Antoine, he would do much better to give you one of his small farms with a half interest in eight oxen."

"That is all very fine," said Janille, "but with the little shining stones, we raise money, we make the pavilion larger, we redeem estates, we obtain an income of two or three thousand francs, and we find a husband who brings us as much more. Then we are in comfortable circumstances for the rest of our days and we snap our fingers at Messieurs Cardonnet, father and son!"

"True enough," said Monsieur Antoine, "with these your future is assured, my child. Ah! how nobly Monsieur de Boisguilbault revenges himself! I knew what I was saying when I stood up for him against you, Janille! Will you still claim that he's a cruel, unforgiving man?"

"Nenni, monsieur, nenni! he has a good heart, I agree. Come, tell us how it all came about, you two."

They talked until midnight, recalling the most trivial details, indulging in innumerable conjectures concerning the marquis's conduct toward Antoine in the future. As it was too late for Jean Jappeloup to return to his village, he slept in Châteaubrun. Monsieur Antoine fell asleep to dream of happiness; Janille, of wealth. She had forgotten Emile and her recent disappointment. "That will all pass by," she said, "and the hundred thousand francs will remain. We shall have no more to do with your Galuchets, when we are possessed of a tidy little fortune in the country." And she ran over in her mind all the young rustics in the neighborhood who might aspire to Gilberte's hand.

"If a mere plebeian offers himself," she thought, "he must have at least two hundred thousand francs' worth of land."—And she placed under her bolster the key to the cupboard in which she had locked Gilberte's pot au lait.

Gilberte, yielding to extreme fatigue, fell asleep at last, after forming a momentous resolution. The next morning she talked a long while with her father, without Janille's knowledge, then asked the latter to allow her to carry Monsieur de Boisguilbault's presents to her own room, so that she could look at them at her leisure. The good woman handed them to her unsuspectingly, for Gilberte felt obliged on this occasion to resort to dissimulation with her obstinate governess. Then she wrote a letter which she showed to her father.

"What you are doing is all right, my child," he said, with a profound sigh, "but look out for Janille when she finds it out!"

"Don't you be afraid, dear father," was the reply; "we won't tell her that I took you into my confidence, and all her anger will fall on me alone."

"Now," said Monsieur Antoine, "we must wait for our friend Jean, for we can't trust things of such value to a hare-brained chap like Master Charasson."

Gilberte awaited the carpenter's return with the more impatience because she expected to receive news of Emile from him. She had no idea that Emile was ill. But at the very thought of his mental suffering she was so beset by anxiety that she could not think of herself; and these days of separation, which she had thought that she could endure so courageously, seemed to her so long and so depressing that she asked herself in dismay how Emile could endure them. She flattered herself that he would find a way to write to her, although she would not authorize him to do it; or, at least, that the carpenter would repeat their conversation to her, to the most unimportant words.

But the carpenter did not appear, and evening came without bringing any relief to the girl's painful anxiety. Her secret grief was augmented by a real annoyance. Monsieur Antoine showed signs of weakening in regard to the resolution Gilberte had formed—and which he had at first approved—to refuse Monsieur de Boisguilbault's gifts. He threatened again and again to consult Janille, without whose advice he had taken no important step for twenty years, and Gilberte trembled lest her old nurse's imperative veto should block the proposed restitution.

Jean did not come on the following day either. Doubtless he was working for Monsieur de Boisguilbault, and Gilberte was surprised that, being within so short a distance, he did not divine her longing to talk with him, were it only for a moment. A vague uneasiness guided her in that direction. She set out for Mère Marlot's hut, and as usual put in her basket the modest delicacies which she took from her own dinner for her invalids. But fearing that Monsieur de Châteaubrun would open his heart to Janille in her absence and that the governess's seal would be affixed to the jewel-case, she wrapped it up in the shawl, and placed the whole at the bottom of her basket, determined not to part with them again except to despatch them to their destination.

Living in the country, in more than modest circumstances, Gilberte was accustomed to go about alone in the neighborhood of her home. Poverty dispenses with etiquette, and it would seem that the virtue of wealthy maidens is more fragile or more precious than that of their poorer sisters, as the former are never allowed to take a step without an escort.

Gilberte went about alone on foot with as much security as a young peasant girl, and she was in reality even less exposed, for she was known, loved and respected by all whom she was likely to meet.

She was afraid neither of dogs, nor cows, nor snakes, nor of a loose colt. Children brought up in the country know how to protect themselves from those trifling dangers, which a little presence of mind and coolness are sufficient to avert. So she did not take her rustic page, nor use the family vehicle, except when the weather was threatening or she was in a hurry. On this afternoon the sun was still shining in a clear sky, and she started off with a light foot on the path across the fields. Mère Marlot's hut was almost equidistant from Châteaubrun and Boisguilbault.

The poor woman's children were fairly convalescent, and Gilberte did not stay long with them. Mère Marlot told her that Monsieur de Boisguilbault had left her a hundred francs on the day of their meeting in her hovel, and that Jean Jappeloup was working at the wooden house in the park. She had seen him pass in the morning, carrying various tools.

Gilberte thereupon thought that she might hope to meet the carpenter as he returned to Gargilesse, and she determined to go to wait for him on the road. But, fearing that she might be seen and recognized loitering about the park, she borrowed a fustian cape from Mère Marlot, on the pretext that the air was a little cool and that she felt slightly indisposed. She put the hood over her fair hair, and, thus enveloped, walked in a straight line, gliding through the bushes like a fawn, to the park gate opening on the Gargilesse road. There she hid beneath the willows on the bank of the stream, not far from the spot where it ran along the edge of the park. She noticed that the gate was still open, a proof that Monsieur de Boisguilbault was not yet in the park; for as soon as he stepped inside all the gates were carefully closed and locked, and this uncivilized custom of the châtelain was well known throughout the neighborhood.

This circumstance emboldened her, and she walked as far as the gate, to try to see Jean Jappeloup. The roof of the chalet caught her eye; it was very near. The path was in shadow and deserted.

Stealing cautiously forward, Gilberte, who was as light as a bird, could fly in time, and, disguised as she was, need not fear being recognized. Jean would be there of course, and if she found him alone she would beckon to him and satisfy her frantic impatience to have news of Emile.

The chalet was open; there was no one inside; carpenter's tools were lying about on the floor. Profound silence reigned everywhere. Gilberte walked forward on tiptoe and placed on the table the package and the letter she had brought. Then, as she reflected that objects of value might be too much exposed in a place so ill guarded, she looked about, placed her hand on a door which seemed to open into a closet, and, noticing that the lock was removed, said to herself justly enough that Jean was probably repairing it and would doubtless come and replace it, and that there was nothing better for her to do than to place her treasure in the hands of the most faithful of friends. But as she opened the supposed closet to put the package inside, she found herself on the threshold of a study, wherein everything was in disorder, facing a large portrait of a woman.

Gilberte did not need to look long at the portrait to recognize the original of a miniature which she had seen in her father's hands and had always supposed to be that of the unknown mother who had brought her into the world. If the resemblance had not been most striking, at the first glance, because of the difference in size of the two portraits, yet the attitude, the costume, the very blue shawl which Gilberte had in her hand at that moment, would have convinced her that the miniature had been made at the same time as the large portrait, or rather that it was a reduced copy of it. She stifled a cry of surprise, and, as her chaste imagination refused to grasp the possibility of an adulterous connection, she persuaded herself that, as the result of a secret marriage, of the sort we read about in novels, she was perhaps a near kinswoman, the niece or grand-niece, of Monsieur de Boisguilbault. At that moment she thought that she heard footsteps on the floor above, and, terror-stricken, she threw the package on the mantel and fled with the swiftness of an arrow.

XXXIII THE STORY OF ONE TOLD BY THE OTHER

A few moments after Gilberte's flight, Jean returned to replace the lock of the study, followed by Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who awaited his departure to order the park to be closed. The carpenter had noticed the marquis's uneasiness and how closely he watched all his movements while he was at work at that door; annoyed by his employer's evident distrust of his curiosity, he raised his head and said with his accustomed outspokenness:

"Pardieu! Monsieur de Boisguilbault, you are terribly afraid that I will look at what you have hidden in there! Just remember that I might have looked at it an hour ago if I had chosen; but I care nothing about it, and I should prefer to have you say: 'Shut your eyes,' instead of watching me as you do."

Monsieur de Boisguilbault's expression changed and he frowned. He glanced into the study and saw that the wind had blown down a piece of green cloth with which he had covered the portrait awkwardly enough, and that Jean must have seen it unless he was blind. Thereupon, he formed a sudden resolution, threw the door wide open, and said with forced calmness:

"I am hiding nothing here; you can look, if you choose."

"Oh! I am not at all curious to see your big books," laughed the carpenter; "I know nothing about them and I can't understand why it was necessary to write so many words just to know how to do what's right. But there's the portrait of your deceased wife! I recognize her, it is her sure enough. How came you to put it here? in my time it was in the château."

"I had it put here so that I could see it all the time," said the marquis sadly; "and, since it has been here, I have hardly looked at it. I come into this study as little as I can, and if I dreaded to have you see it, it was because I dreaded to see it myself. It makes me ill. Close that door, if you don't need to have it open any longer."

"And then you are afraid that some one will speak of your sorrow, eh? I can understand that, and after what you have just said, I'll wager that you have never got over your wife's death! Well, it's the same way with me, and you needn't be ashamed of it before me, Monsieur de Boisguilbault; for old as I am, I tell you something seems to cut my heart in two when I think that I am alone in the world! And yet I am naturally of a cheerful disposition and I wasn't always happy in my home; but what difference does it make? my feelings are stronger than I am, for I loved that woman! The devil couldn't have prevented me from loving her."

"My friend," said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, visibly touched, and making a painful effort to restrain his emotion, "she loved you, so do not complain too bitterly; and, then, you were a father. What became of your son? Where is he?"

"He is underground with my wife, Monsieur de Boisguilbault."

"I didn't know it. I knew only that you were a widower. Poor Jean! forgive me for reminding you of your sorrows! Oh! I pity you from the bottom of my heart! To have a child and lose it!"

The marquis placed his hand on the carpenter's shoulder as he leaned over his work, and all his kindness of heart appeared on his face. Jean dropped his tools and said impulsively, with one knee on the floor:

"Do you know, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, I have been unhappier than you. You can't imagine half of what I have suffered!"

"Tell me about it, if it's a relief to you. I shall understand it."

"Well, I will tell you, for you are a man of learning and judge things in this world better than anyone I know, when your mind is calm. I will tell you something that many people in my village know, but that I have never been willing to talk about with anybody. My life has been a strange one, I tell you! I was loved and I wasn't; I had a son and I wasn't sure that I was his father."

"What do you say? No! don't say that; you must never tell about such things!" said the marquis, in sore distress.

"You are right, while the thing is going on; but at our ages a man can talk of anything, and you are not like the idiots who can see nothing but a cause for laughter in the greatest misfortune with which their neighbor can be afflicted. You are neither sneering nor unkind, and I want you to tell me whether I behaved badly, whether I acted like a man or a brute—in short, whether you would have done as I did; for everybody blamed me more or less at the time, and if I had not had a strong arm and a sharp tongue at the end of it, everybody would have laughed in my face. You are to judge! My wife, my poor Nannie, loved one of my friends, a handsome fellow—yes, and a good fellow—and yet she loved me too. I don't know how the devil it came about, but I discovered one fine morning that my son looked more like Pierre than like Jean. Anybody could see it, monsieur! and there were times when I longed to beat Nannie, to strangle the child and knock out Pierre's brains. And then—and then—I said nothing at all. I wept and prayed. Oh! how I suffered! I beat my wife on the pretext that she didn't keep the house in order; I pulled the little one's ears on the pretext that he made too much noise in mine; I picked a quarrel with Pierre over a game of tenpins, and I nearly broke both his legs with the ball. And then, when everybody else wept, I wept, too, and looked on myself as a villain. I brought up the child and I wept for him; I buried my wife and I still weep for her; I kept the friend and I still love him. And that's how matters ended with me. What do you say to it?"

Monsieur de Boisguilbault did not reply. He was pacing the room and making the floor creak under his feet.

"You think me a great coward and a great fool, I'll be bound," said the carpenter, rising; "but, at all events, you see that your troubles are nothing like mine."

The marquis dropped into a chair and said nothing. Tears rolled slowly down his cheeks.

"Well, well, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, why are you weeping?" continued Jean, with artless candor. "Are you trying to make me weep too? You can't do it, I promise you! I shed so many tears of anger and grief in those days that there wasn't a single one left in my body, I'll be bound. Come, come! think of your past with patience and offer your present to God; for there are people more badly treated than you, as you see. You had for your wife a beautiful woman, virtuous, well educated and quiet. Perhaps she didn't give you quite so many kisses and caresses as I received from mine, but, at all events, she didn't deceive you, and you proved that you had no fears of her by letting her go to Paris without you whenever she wanted to. You were not jealous, and had no reason to be; while I had a thousand devils in my brain every hour of the day and night. I watched, I played the spy, I hid, because I was jealous; I blushed for it, but I suffered martyrdom; and the more I watched, the more I was convinced that she was very cunning about deceiving me. I never was able to take her by surprise. Nannie was shrewder than I was; and, when I had wasted my time watching her, she would make a scene because I suspected her. When the child was old enough to resemble anybody—and I saw that I wasn't the one—what could you expect? I thought that I should go mad; but I got accustomed to loving him, petting him, working to support him, trembling when he bumped his head, seeing him caper round my bench, ride horseback on my timber and amuse himself dulling my tools. I had only that one! I had thought he was mine—no others came—and I couldn't get along without a child, you see. And he loved me so dearly, the little rascal! He was so bright! and, when I scolded him, he wept as if his heart would break. At last I set about forgetting my suspicions, and I succeeded so well in persuading myself that I was his father, that when he was shot in the war, I longed to shoot myself. He was handsome and brave, a good workman and as good a soldier, and it wasn't his fault if he wasn't my son! He would have made my life happy; he would have helped me with my work, and I shouldn't have had to grow old all alone. I should have had some one to keep me company, to talk with me in the evening after my day's work, to take care of me when I am sick, to put me to bed when I am tipsy, to talk to me about his mother, whom I never dare to mention to anybody, because everybody except him knew all about my unhappiness. I tell you, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, you haven't had so much to bear! You didn't have a contraband heir given you; and if you haven't had the pleasure, neither have you had the shame!"

"And I should not have had the courage you had," said the marquis. "Open that door again, Jean, and let me look at the marchioness's portrait. You have given me courage. I was insane the day I turned you out of my house. You would have saved me from becoming weak and mad. I thought that I was getting rid of an enemy, and I deprived myself of a friend."

"But why in the devil did you take me for your enemy?"

"Have you no idea?" replied the marquis, fixing his eyes upon him in a piercing glance.

"Not the least," said the carpenter emphatically.

"On your honor?" added Monsieur de Boisguilbault, wringing his hand fiercely.

"On my everlasting salvation!" replied Jean, raising his hand above his head with dignity. "I hope that you are going to tell me at last."

The marquis seemed not to hear this direct and sincere appeal. He felt that Jean told the truth, and he had resumed his seat. Turning his chair toward the study door, which Jean had opened, he gazed with profound sadness at his wife's features.

"I can understand that you continued to love your wife, that you forgave the innocent child," he said; "but how you could endure and continue to meet the friend who betrayed you—that is what passes my comprehension!"

"Ah! Monsieur de Boisguilbault, that was in fact the most difficult thing of all! especially as it was not my duty, and everybody would have applauded me if I had broken every bone in his body. But I tell you what disarmed me: I saw that he was terribly remorseful and really unhappy. So long as the fever of love had hold of him, he would have walked over my body to join his mistress. She was as lovely as a rose in May; I don't know whether you ever saw her, or remember her, but I know that Nannie was as beautiful in her way as Madame de Boisguilbault. I was mad over her, and so was he! He would have turned heathen for her, and I turned idiot. But when the youthful ardor began to die away I saw well enough that they no longer loved each other and that they were ashamed of their sin. My wife began to love me again, seeing that I was kind and generous to her, and as for him, his sin was so heavy on his heart, that, when we drank together, he always wanted to confess to me; but I wouldn't have it, and sometimes, when he was drunk, he would kneel at my feet, yelling:

"'Kill me, Jean, kill me! I deserve it and I shall be satisfied!'

"When he was sober, he forgot about that, but he would have let himself be chopped to pieces for me; and at this moment he's my best friend, next to Monsieur Antoine. The subject of our suffering no longer exists, and our friendship has endured. It was on his account that I had my trouble with the excise people and became a vagabond for a while. Well, he worked for my customers, so as to keep them for me; he brought me money, and when I was free again gave my customers back to me; he has nothing that doesn't belong to me, and as he is younger than I am, I trust that he will close my eyes. He owes me that much; but after all, it seems to me that I love him on account of the injury he did me and the courage it required to forgive him!"

"Alas! alas!" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault, "we are sublime when we are not afraid of being ridiculous!"

He closed the study door gently and walked back toward the fireplace, when his eye fell at last on the package and a letter addressed to him.

"MONSIEUR LE MARQUIS:

"I promised you that you should hear no more of me; but you yourself compel me to remind you that I exist, and I am going to do it for the last time.

"Either you made a mistake in handing me certain objects of great value, or you intended to bestow alms on me.

"I should not blush to accept your charity if I were reduced to the necessity of imploring it; but you are mistaken, monsieur le marquis, if you think I am in want.

"Our circumstances are comfortable, considering our necessities and tastes, which are modest and simple. You are rich and generous; I should be blameworthy to accept benefactions which you might bestow on so many others; it would be robbing the poor.

"The one thing which it would have been very sweet to me to carry away from your house, and which I would have given all my blood to obtain, is a word of forgiveness, a friendly word for my father. Ah! monsieur, you cannot conceive what a child's heart suffers when she sees her father unjustly accused and knows not how to set him right. You did not furnish me with the means to do so, for you persisted in keeping silent as to the cause of your resentment; but how could you fail to understand that, under the present circumstances, I could not accept your gifts and take advantage of your kindness!

"I retain, however, a small cornelian ring which you placed on my finger when I entered your house under an assumed name. It is an object of trifling value, you told me, a souvenir of your travels. It is very precious to me, although it was not as a pledge of reconciliation that you chose to give it to me: but it will remind me of a very sweet yet very painful moment, when I felt all my heart go out toward you, with vain hopes that vanished instantly. I ought to hate you, for you hate a father whom I adore! I know not how it is I esteem your gifts with no feeling of wounded pride, and that I renounce your friendship with profound grief.

"Accept, monsieur le marquis, the deep respect of

"GILBERTE DE CHÂTEAUBRUN."

XXXIV RESURRECTION

"Was it you who brought this package and letter, Jean?" queried Monsieur de Boisguilbault.

"No, monsieur, I brought nothing at all, and I don't know what they are," replied the carpenter, with the accent of truth.

"How am I to believe you?" rejoined the marquis, "when you lied to me so coolly the day before yesterday, when you introduced one person to me under the name of another?"

"The day before yesterday I lied, but I wouldn't have sworn to what I said; to-day, I swear that I saw no one come in and I do not know who brought those things. But, as you choose to mention what happened the day before yesterday, let me tell you something that I wouldn't have dared to speak of otherwise: that the poor child cried all the way home, thinking of you, and that——"

"I beg you, Jean, don't talk to me about that young woman or her father! I promised you that I would mention them when it was necessary, and on that condition you agreed not to torment me. Wait till I question you."

"All right! but suppose you keep me waiting too long and I lose patience?"

"Perhaps I shall never mention them to you and you will hold your tongue forever," said the marquis in a tone of very marked ill-humor.

"The deuce you say!" retorted the carpenter, "that wasn't our agreement."

"Off with you!" said Monsieur de Boisguilbault tartly. "Your day's work is finished, you refuse to take supper here, and no doubt Emile is waiting for you impatiently. Tell him to have courage and that I will come and see him soon—to-morrow perhaps."

"If you treat him as you do me, if you refuse to talk to him or let him talk about Gilberte, what good do you suppose a visit from you will do him? That's not the kind of thing that will cure him."

"Jean, you wear out my patience, you make me ill! Be off, I say!"

"Oho! the wind has changed," thought the carpenter. "I must wait till the sun comes out again."

He put on his jacket and walked across the park. Monsieur de Boisguilbault accompanied him, to close the gate after him. It was still light. The marquis noticed on the recently raked gravel the prints of a woman's tiny foot going to and coming from the chalet. He did not call the attention of the carpenter, who failed to notice the marks.

Meanwhile Gilberte had waited longer than she intended. The sun had set ten minutes before and the time seemed mortally long to her. As the approach of night and the fear of meeting some one from the château who might recognize her, increased her uneasiness and impatience, she ventured to leave the place where she was hiding and go down a little way toward the stream, so that she would still be near enough to recognize the carpenter. But she had not taken three steps in the open when she heard footsteps behind her, and, turning hurriedly, she saw Constant Galuchet, armed with his fishing-pole, going toward Gargilesse.

She pulled her hood over her face, but not so quickly that the angler for gudgeons did not see a lock of golden hair, a blue eye and a rosy cheek. Moreover, it would have been very difficult for Gilberte to deceive anyone who was following her so closely. There was nothing of the peasant in her carriage, and the fustian cape was not long enough to hide the hem of a light dress and a pretty foot encased in a shapely and tight-fitting little gaiter. Constant Galuchet's curiosity was keenly aroused by this meeting. He had too much contempt for the peasant girls to make love to them on his excursions; but the sight of a young lady in disguise gave a fillip to his aristocratic curiosity, and a vague, instinctive feeling that those golden locks so difficult of concealment were Gilberte's, induced him to follow her and frighten her.

So he plodded along in her wake, sometimes walking immediately behind her, sometimes beside her, moderating or quickening his pace to defeat the little ruses to which she resorted to let him pass her and to fall behind; stopping when she stopped, leaning toward her as he brushed by, and darting inquisitive and insolent glances under her hood.

Gilberte, terrified beyond measure, looked about for some house in which she could take refuge; and seeing none she kept on in the direction of Gargilesse, hoping that the carpenter would overtake her and rid her of her troublesome escort.

But hearing no footsteps and unable to endure being followed thus, she stooped as if to look in her basket, to make her tormenter think that she had forgotten or lost something; then turned back toward the park, thinking that Galuchet, having no excuse for following her in that direction, would not have the audacity to do it.

It was too late; Constant had recognized her and an impulse of base vindictiveness took possession of him.

"Oho! my fair villager," he said, darting to her side, "what are you looking for with so much mystery? Can't I help you to find it? You don't answer! I understand: you have a nice little assignation hereabout, and I interfere with it. So much the worse for girls who wander about the country alone at night! they run the risk of meeting one gallant instead of another, and the absent are always in the wrong. Come, come, don't look at me so hard; all cats are gray in the dark, so take my arm. If we don't find the man you want, we must try to fill his place so that you won't miss him too much."

Gilberte, alarmed by this coarse talk, began to run. Being more adroit and more slender than Galuchet, she plunged in among the trees where they were thickest, and soon thought herself out of danger; but a sort of frenzy had taken possession of him when he saw her escape him so easily. In three bounds, after bumping and scratching himself a little among the branches, he was by her side once more, opposite the gate of Boisguilbault park.

Thereupon he seized her cape, saying:

"I propose to see if you are worth the trouble of chasing you in this way! If you are ugly, you have no need to run, my love, for I shall not run myself into a perspiration for you; but if you are young and pretty, you'll find yourself in difficulty, my dear!"

Gilberte struggled bravely, striking Galuchet's face and breast with her basket; but the battle was too one-sided: at the risk of wounding her with the buckle of her cape, he fiercely tore off her hood.

At this moment two men appeared at the park gate, and Gilberte, tearing herself free with a desperate effort, rushed toward them and sought protection from the one who was nearest to her. She was received in Monsieur de Boisguilbault's arms.

As she was almost fainting with fear and indignation, she hid her face on the old man's breast, and neither he nor the carpenter had time to recognize her; but when he saw Galuchet running away, all Jean's rancor against him awoke, and he rushed after him.

Monsieur Cardonnet's clerk was short and stout, and Jean, despite his age, had the advantage in build and activity. Seeing that he was on the point of being overtaken, Galuchet turned to meet him, relying on his strength.

Thereupon a struggle took place between them, and Galuchet, who was a sturdy fellow, sustained the first attack not unsuccessfully; but Jean was an athlete, and he soon brought him to the ground on the bank of the stream.

"Ah! so you are not content to play the trade of spy!" he said, putting his knees on his chest and clutching his throat so tight that the poor devil was forced to relax his hold, "but you needs must insult women, you miserable cur! I ought to crush such a venomous beast as you are; but you are such a coward that you would prosecute me for it. Well! you shan't have that pleasure; you shall leave my hands without a scratch that you can show; I will content myself with a shave that's just fit for you."

Whereupon the carpenter picked up a handful of black mud on the bank of the stream and rubbed Galuchet's face and shirt and cravat with it; then he let him go and said, standing in front of him:

"Just try to touch me, and see if I won't make you eat some of it!"

Galuchet had had altogether too rough a demonstration of the power of the carpenter's arm to expose himself to it again. He longed to throw a stone at his head when he calmly turned his back on him. But it occurred to him that it might turn out a serious matter, and that he would have to pay dear for it, if he failed to lay him low at the first blow.

So he beat a retreat, not without pouring forth insults and threats against him and the hussy who had claimed his protection; but he dared not mention Gilberte's name or let it be known that he had recognized her. He was not perfectly sure that she would not eventually become his employer's daughter-in-law, for Monsieur Cardonnet had seemed terribly anxious and irresolute since Emile had been sick.

Gilberte and the marquis did not witness this scene. The girl was suffocating with excitement, and, hardly conscious of her surroundings, allowed herself to be led toward the chalet. Monsieur de Boisguilbault, sorely embarrassed by the adventure, but resolved to lend his aid like a loyal gentleman to an insulted female, dared not speak to her or let her know that he had recognized her. His distrust returned; he wondered if this scene had not been prearranged to throw the fluttering dove into his bosom: but when she fell fainting at the door of the chalet, and he saw her pallor, her glazed eyes and purple lips, he was seized with affectionate sympathy and with fierce indignation against the man who was capable of insulting a defenceless woman. Thereupon he said to himself that the noble girl had incurred that danger in order to prove to him her pride and disinterestedness. He lifted her, carried her to a chair, and said as he rubbed her icy hands:

"Have courage, Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun; be calm, I implore you! you are safe here and you are welcome."

"Gilberte!" cried the carpenter, as he entered the room and recognized Monsieur Antoine's daughter; "my Gilberte! God in heaven! is it possible? Ah! if I had known this I wouldn't have spared the villain! but he isn't far away and I must catch him and kill him!"

Frantic with rage, he was about to go in pursuit of Galuchet, but the marquis and Gilberte, who had partly recovered consciousness, detained him. They had some difficulty, for Jean was beside himself. At last the marquis made him understand that in the interest of Mademoiselle de Châteaubrun's reputation, he should pursue his vengeance no farther.

Meanwhile the marquis continued to be exceedingly embarrassed in Gilberte's presence. She wished to go, he longed, in his heart, to have her stay, but he could not make up his mind to tell her so, except by insisting upon the necessity of her taking a little time to rest and recover from her emotion. But Gilberte was afraid of making her father and Janille anxious again, and declared that she felt quite strong enough to go. The marquis offered her his carriage; he offered ether; he looked for a phial and could not find it; he hovered about her; he tried to think of something to say to her in reply to her action and her letter; and although he lacked neither good manners nor ease of manner when his mind was once made up, he was more awkward and embarrassed than a young student making his début in society, when he was struggling with the pitiful irresolution of his character.

Finally, as Gilberte rose to take her leave with Jean, who was to escort her to Châteaubrun, he also rose, took his hat and grasped his new cane with a determined air which made the carpenter smile.

"You will allow me to accompany you too," he said. "That scoundrel may be in ambush somewhere, and two champions are better than one."

"Let him come!" Jean whispered to Gilberte, who was on the point of declining his offer.

They left the park, and at first the marquis walked some distance behind or in front, as if to act as a guard. At last he found himself beside Gilberte, and, observing that she seemed prostrated and could hardly walk, he decided to offer her his arm. Little by little he fell into conversation with her and gradually felt more at ease. He talked at first on general subjects, then of herself more particularly. He questioned her concerning her tastes, her occupations, her reading; and although she was very modest and reserved, he soon discovered that she was endowed with superior intelligence, and that she had a very solid foundation of useful knowledge.

Impressed by this discovery, he sought to ascertain where and how she had learned so many serious things, and she admitted that she had derived the larger part of her knowledge from the library at Boisguilbault.

"I am proud and delighted to hear it," said the marquis, "and I place all my books at your disposal. I trust that you will send and ask for what you want, unless you will consent to trust me to select for you and to send you a parcel every week. Jean will consent to be our messenger until Emile can take his place again."

Gilberte sighed; she could hardly believe, in view of Emile's alarming silence, that happy time would ever come.

"Pray lean on my arm," said the marquis; "you seem ill and you are not willing that I should assist you."

When they reached the foot of the hill of Châteaubrun, Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who seemed to have forgotten his whereabouts, began to show signs of excitement, like a restive horse. Suddenly he stopped and gently withdrew Gilberte's arm from his and placed it in the carpenter's.

"I leave you at your door and with a devoted friend," he said. "You have no further need of me, but I carry away your promise to make use of my books."

"If only I could carry you farther with me!" said Gilberte in a supplicating tone; "I would agree never to open a book in my life, although it would be a great deprivation to me."

"Unfortunately it is impossible!" he replied with a sigh; "but time and chance bring about unexpected meetings. I hope, mademoiselle, that I do not say adieu to you forever; for that thought would be very painful to me."

He bowed and returned to his chalet, where he locked himself in and passed a portion of the night writing, arranging papers and gazing at the marchioness's portrait.

The next day, at noon, Monsieur de Boisguilbault donned his green coat, cut in the style of the Empire, his lightest wig, doe-skin breeches, gloves, and half-boots armed with short swan's-neck silver spurs. A servant, in the full dress livery of an esquire, brought him the finest horse in his stables, and, mounting himself a beast almost as perfect, followed him at a slow trot along the Gargilesse road, carrying a small casket slung over his arm by a strap.

Great was the surprise of the village folk when they saw the marquis ride within their walls, erect and stiff on his white horse, like a teacher of horsemanship of the olden time, in ceremonious costume, with gold spectacles and a gold-headed hunting-crop, which he carried somewhat like a taper. It was at least ten years since Monsieur de Boisguilbault had entered a town or a village. The children followed him, dazzled by the magnificence of his equipment, the women rushed to their door-steps, and the men carrying burdens halted in stupefaction in the middle of the street.

He rode slowly up the precipitous thoroughfare and down on the other side to Monsieur Cardonnet's factory, being too good a horseman to indulge in imprudent antics; and, resuming the trot à la Française as he rode into the factory yard, he regulated his horse's gait so perfectly that his hoof-beats sounded like the ticking of a clock in perfect order. Certainly he still made a gallant appearance, and the women said: "You see that he is a sorcerer, for he hasn't grown a day older in the ten years since we last saw him here."

He asked for Monsieur Emile Cardonnet and found the young man in his bedroom, sitting on a sofa, with his father at his right and the doctor at his left. Madame Cardonnet was sitting opposite him, gazing anxiously into his face.

Emile was very pale, but his condition was in no wise alarming. He rose and went to meet Monsieur de Boisguilbault, who, after embracing him affectionately, bowed low to Madame Cardonnet and with less warmth to Monsieur Cardonnet. For a few moments there was no talk of aught save the invalid's health. He had had a sharp attack of fever and had been bled the night before; he had passed a comfortable night, and in the morning the fever had entirely disappeared. They were urging him to go for a drive in the cabriolet, and he was contemplating making a call upon Monsieur de Boisguilbault when that gentleman entered.

The marquis had learned all the details of his illness from the carpenter, who had carefully concealed them from Gilberte. There was no longer any ground for fear. The doctor observed that his patient needed a good dinner, and took his leave with the remark that he should come the next day only to satisfy his conscience.

Monsieur de Boisguilbault meanwhile kept a close watch on Monsieur Cardonnet's face. He detected there an expression of triumph rather than of joy. Doubtless the manufacturer had trembled at the idea of losing his son, but, that fear being dissipated, the victory was won: Emile could endure grief.

For his part Monsieur Cardonnet examined the marquis's strange figure and considered it supremely ridiculous. His gravity and his moderation in speaking were the more annoying to him because Monsieur de Boisguilbault, being in reality more embarrassed than he chose to appear, simply made commonplace remarks in a most sententious tone. The manufacturer, after a few moments, bowed to him again and left the room to return to his business. Thereupon, Madame Cardonnet, divining from Emile's restlessness that he desired to talk with his old friend in private, left them together, after urging her son not to talk too much.

"Well," said Emile when they were alone, "you can bring me the martyr's crown! I have passed through the ordeal of fire; but God protects those who call upon him, and I have come out of it with clean hands and with no apparent burns: a little used up, to be sure, but calm and full of faith in the future. This morning, in full possession of my reasoning power and in perfect tranquillity of mind, I told my father what I had told him in the excitement, perhaps the delirium, of fever. He knows now that I shall never renounce my opinions, and that no fooling with my passion can procure him that triumph. He seems quite satisfied; for he thinks that he has succeeded in disgusting me with a marriage which he dreaded more than the fervor of my principles. He talked this morning about distracting my thoughts, sending me abroad, to Italy. I told him that I did not wish to leave France, nor this neighborhood even, unless he turned me out of his house. He smiled, and would not contradict me, because I was bled yesterday; but to-morrow he will talk to me in the character of the stern friend, the day after to-morrow as the irritated father, and the next day as the imperious master. Don't be alarmed about me, my friend; I shall be brave, calm and patient. Whether he condemns me to exile, or keeps me with him to torture me, I will show him that love is very strong when it is inspired by enthusiasm for the true, and sustained by the ideal."

"Emile," said the marquis, "I know through your friend Jean all that has taken place between your father and yourself, also the great victory that your heart has won. My mind was at rest before I came here."

"I knew, my friend, that you had become reconciled with that simple-hearted but admirable man. He told me that you were coming to see me; I was expecting you."

"Did he tell you nothing more?" said the marquis, gazing intently at Emile.

"No, nothing more, I assure you," Emile replied, with the emphasis of perfect sincerity.

"He did well to keep his promise," rejoined Monsieur de Boisguilbault; "you were too much excited by fever to endure fresh emotion. I have undergone violent emotions myself since we last met, but I am satisfied with the result, and I will tell you what it is. But not yet, Emile; you are too pale, and I am not sure enough of myself as yet. Don't come and see me to-day; I have other places to go to, and perhaps I will see you again when I return this way to-night. Will you promise me to eat some dinner and take care of yourself—in a word, to get well?"

"I promise, my friend. If I only could send word to the woman I love that, on resuming the free exercise of my life and my faculties, I find my love more ardent and more absolute than ever in the depths of my heart."

"Very well, Emile, write a few lines; not enough to tire you. I will come again to-night, and, if she doesn't live too far away, I will undertake to send your letter to her."

"Alas! my friend, I cannot tell you her name; but if the carpenter would take charge of it, now that I have recovered my strength and am no longer watched every moment, I could write."

"Write then, seal your letter, and do not address it The carpenter is working for me, and he shall have the letter before night."

While the young man was writing, Monsieur de Boisguilbault left the room and asked to speak with Monsieur Cardonnet. He was told that he had just driven away in his cabriolet.

"Do you know where I can find him?" asked the marquis, half convinced by this hurried departure.

He had not said where he was going, but they thought to Châteaubrun, as he had taken that road, and as he had been there the week before.

Upon receiving this reply, Monsieur de Boisguilbault displayed surprising activity. He returned to Emile's room, took the letter, felt his pulse, found that he was a little excited, mounted his horse, and rode out of the village quietly as he had come. But he urged his horse to a gallop as soon as he was on level ground.

XXXV ABSOLUTION

Meanwhile Monsieur Cardonnet had arrived at Châteaubrun, and was in presence of Gilberte, her father and Janille.

"Monsieur de Châteaubrun," he said, taking a seat with perfect self-possession amid those three persons, who were filled with consternation by a visit which boded fresh unhappiness, "you know doubtless all that has taken place between my son and myself with regard to mademoiselle your daughter. My son has had the good taste and the good sense to choose her for his wife. Mademoiselle, and you, monsieur, have had the extreme kindness to accept his attentions, without any very definite knowledge as to whether I approve them."

At this point Janille made an angry gesture, Gilberte lowered her eyes and turned pale, and Monsieur Antoine flushed and opened his mouth to interrupt Monsieur Cardonnet. But he, giving him no time to do so, continued thus:

"I did not approve of this union at first, I agree: but I came here, I saw mademoiselle, and I yielded—on very mild and simple conditions. My son is ultra-democratic in his notions, and I am a moderate conservative. I foresaw that his exaggerated opinions would ruin his intellect and his credit. I demanded that he should abandon them and return to judicious and decent ideas. I thought that I could easily obtain that sacrifice. I rejoiced over it in anticipation; I announced it to you as indubitable in a letter addressed to mademoiselle; but, to my great surprise, Emile persists in his madness, and sacrifices to it a love which I believed to be deeper and more devoted. I am forced, therefore, to tell you that he renounced mademoiselle's hand irrevocably this morning, and I thought it my duty to inform you immediately, in order that, being fully aware of his intentions and my own, you should have no ground for accusing me of irresolution and imprudence. Whether it seems fitting to you now to authorize his love and to permit his attentions, is for you to say; I wash my hands of it."

"Monsieur Cardonnet," said Antoine, who had risen, "I know all this, and I know, also, that you never lack fine phrases to make sport of us; but I say that, if you are so well informed, it is because you sent spies into our house and lackeys to insult us by revolting offers for my daughter's hand. You have already caused us much distress by your diplomacy, and we request you, without ceremony, to stop where you are. We are not simple enough not to understand that you do not propose to unite your wealth with our poverty at any price. We have not been deceived by your devious manœuvres, and when you invented the extraordinary scheme of placing your son between a moral submission, which is impossible so far as his opinions are concerned, and a marriage to which you would not have consented, even if he had been willing to descend to falsehood, we swore that we would have no falsehood and no dissimulation between him and you and ourselves. Allow me to tell you, therefore, that we know very well what it befits us to do; that I am quite as well able to protect my daughter's honor and dignity as you are to protect your son's wealth, and that I have no occasion for advice or lessons from anybody in that regard."

Having spoken thus with a firmness which Monsieur Cardonnet was far from expecting on the part of the old sot of Châteaubrun, Monsieur Antoine resumed his seat and looked the manufacturer in the eye. Gilberte felt as if she were dying; but she thought it her duty to support with her pride the just pride of her father. She too looked Monsieur Cardonnet in the face, and her glance seemed to confirm all that Monsieur Antoine had said.

Janille, unable to contain herself any longer, deemed it her duty to speak.

"Never fear, monsieur," she said, "we can get along very well without your name. We have one which is quite as good; and as for the matter of money, we had more glory in losing what we had than you in making what you didn't have."

"I know, Mademoiselle Janille," retorted Monsieur Cardonnet, with the artificial calmness of profound contempt, "that you are very proud of the name Monsieur de Châteaubrun has bestowed on your daughter. For my own part, I would not have been so proud, and would have closed my eyes to certain irregularities of birth; but I can imagine that the fortune of a plebeian, acquired by hard labor, may seem contemptible to a person born, as you apparently were, in the splendors of idleness. It only remains for me to wish you all much joy, and to ask mademoiselle's pardon for having caused her some slight grief. My wrongdoing was unintentional, but I think that I can atone for it by a bit of sound advice: remember that young people who venture to make free with the wishes of their parents are sometimes intoxicated by an ephemeral caprice rather than inspired by an enduring passion. Emile's conduct with regard to her proves what I say, I think, and I am a little ashamed for him."