I.
Who could she be—the little stranger asleep in the cabin?
Nobody could tell.
She must have come aboard unnoticed, hours ago, at the French port where the vessel had been lying for repairs. Had she wandered away from her home, and innocently lain down here to rest? In that home there would be grief, and anxiety, and long waiting, or ever she would return; for the ship was now many leagues out at sea, and the child had just been discovered.
The sound of voices talking the matter over wakened the little girl, and she shrank timidly from all the eyes fixed inquiringly upon her. So the captain sent every one away, and sat down by her, and in her own language questioned:
“How came you here, little one?”
“Is not this, then, the ship which goes to America? There was a man in the street who told me it should go to America. Is it, then, a mistake?”
“No, not a mistake. And you wish to go to America?”
“Oui, monsieur. I go to Julien.”
“And who is Julien?”
“He is my brother.”
“But how does it happen that you go alone?”
“I have none to accompany me.”
“Have you neither father nor mother?”
“Non, monsieur.”
“Does your brother know you are coming?”
“Non, monsieur, he does not know it. It will be a surprise.”
“But what put it into your head, little—what shall I call you? What is your name?”
“Julie Leblanc.”
“Well, then, my little Julie, how is it that you happen to be going to America? America is a long way off, do you know it?”
“But no! is it, then? It cannot be far away where Julien is. Is it farther than Paris?”
“A good deal farther, Julie.”
“But what to do! No home, no friend. Only Julien.”
“No home, no friend!” repeated the captain, stroking the dark hair, pityingly. “Did the father fall in battle?”
“Yes, monsieur, many years ago, before I can remember.”
“And how long is it that little Julie has been without home or friends?”
“Since they took my dear mamma away to the burial,” answered the child, her eyes brimming with tears.
After awhile the captain asked:
“Julie, do you know just where your brother is, in what part of America?”
“In what part, monsieur? Is it then so great a city? But, without doubt, there will be one who can tell me where he lives. In our village one knew everybody.”
“Whew!” exclaimed the captain, twirling his thumbs.
“Or I will stand at the corner of the street until he passes by. I shall know him, without doubt, he is so handsome. Oh, monsieur, I would know him anywhere. I knew him instantly the last time I saw him, although he wore the clothes of Jacques, the mason.”
As the captain seemed interested, Julie explained:
“I awoke in the night. It was the dear mamma who stood by my bed with a candle in the hand, and one with her like Jacques until I meet his beautiful eyes. Then I laugh gaily and cry, ‘Ah, behold thee, my brother, covered with plaster! and thy coat too large for thee! Didst thou think to fool me?’ But our mother lays the finger upon her lip, and her face is very pale; and Julien kisses and embraces me without ceasing, and with tears, and I know not what to make of it. Soon they go out and I fall again to sleep. Oh, monsieur, he came that same night to America! It was not an hour after, while I slept—mamma has told me it—that the wicked gendarmes came and searched the house for him!”
“Ah! the gendarmes! and why?”
“Because—mamma said—he had written something in the journals which meant that the Emperor was not a good Emperor; and for that the wicked gendarmes would have put my poor brother in prison.”
“Go on, my pretty one,” said the captain, smiling, “thou knowest how to talk. Thou art more entertaining than a book. How old art thou?”
“Ten years.”
“You are small for that age. Have you ever been to school?”
“Never, monsieur. It was the governess who taught me.”
“The governess—bah! Did she ever see a geography?”
“Geography, monsieur? What is that? Is it an animal?”
“Bah! What did she teach you?”
“The dance, and the drawing, and the embroidery, and the music—”
“The music?—can you sing?”
“A little, monsieur.”
“Sing me, then, a little song.”
So Julie sang a little song. It was the “Farewell.”
“Bravo!” applauded the captain when she had finished. Then he went up on deck.
Julie recollected something as he passed out. She carefully drew a small package from the folds of her dress and ran after him. The rolling of the ship made her dizzy. She reeled and would have fallen, had not a sailor caught her hand.
“Merci” (thank you), she said.
That brought another to the rescue.
“Merci, merci!” she repeated.
Half a dozen of the crew came to learn the cause of alarm.
“Merci, merci, merci!” she screamed. Would they never understand?
The captain did, and laughed heartily.
“And what can I do for mademoiselle?” he asked as she approached, smiling at sight of his bronzed and furrowed face—already that of an old friend among this crowd of seamen—strangers, from a country where “mercy!” is a frequent exclamation.
“Because this, mamma said, must pay for my voyage.”—Page 99.
“Good monsieur, are you the man who takes the moneys? Because this, mamma said, must pay for my voyage.” She gave to him the little parcel.
The captain opened it, and found therein a beautiful cross of solid gold, curiously wrought and thickly studded with precious stones.
“Will it not do, monsieur? There was nothing else. No money. The woman demanded so much for the room and all! Poor mamma was so long sick! Oh, monsieur, monsieur, but for that—if she had not been sick, she also would have come to America—to Julien! ‘Take it,’ she said—all so slow—she whispered it all so slow—‘Take it and go to Julien. It will pay the passage.’ And she whispered still a little more. I could not hear. But I thought she went to sleep. When the morning came, and I could see her face—so pale! so cold! so still—”
“Here, my little Julie,” interrupted the captain, pressing his hand an instant over his eyes, “take thy cross. Keep it. Thou shalt have it to remember her by. And I—I am very well pleased to have a little passenger.”
“Oh, mon oncle! how good you are!” and the child covered his great brown hand with kisses.
The captain stooped to rub her soft cheek with his grizzled beard.
He had no reason to be surprised; for wherever he went, the wide world over, did not all children call him “Uncle?”
II.
“When was it your brother went away, Julie?—how long ago? can you remember?” the captain asked one day as the little girl paced the deck at his side, her slender hand in his.
“It is a very long time, monsieur mon oncle,” she answered; and after thinking, “it is a year.”
“Now try to remember, if you can, something about the place where he lives. Did he never tell you about it?—did he write no letters?”
“Oh, yes, mon oncle; often to our mother, and for me, one time, a little letter—all in an envelope by itself. Always I carry it with me. Behold it!” she said, drawing it from her pocket.
“Ah! a letter!” cried the captain, greatly relieved, “that will help us.”
It was dated six months before, and postmarked “Philadelphia.” Within, too, was given the name of the street, and even the number of the residence.
“Ah!” gasped the captain, more relieved than ever.
As soon as the vessel arrived in port, he addressed some lines to Julie’s brother. But as the days passed and he received no answer, he went himself to Philadelphia, and to the street and number given in the letter. No. 210 proved to be a boarding-house, where, indeed, the person inquired for had stopped a short time. He had, however, gone away long ago, whither, no one could tell. The captain then inserted in the newspapers a card asking information concerning his whereabouts. While waiting a reply, there came orders to sail with a cargo for the West Indies. (The captain’s was a trading vessel, carrying merchandise from one country to another.)
What was to be done with little Julie? that was the question. The captain went finally to a lawyer, told him her story, charged him to make inquiries for her brother. Then they talked awhile together, and the lawyer did some writing.
After that the captain took Julie in the cars to a town where lived a friend of his. Now, his friend, his wife, and their five children were delighted to see the captain. They always were when he came home from his voyages. Perhaps it was because he never failed to bring such costly presents; this time a beautiful gilt harness for the father—or rather for a pair of fine bays—elegant French silks for the mother, and no end of toys for the small folks. And when he asked Mrs. Lane if she would, as a favor, take Julie into her home and care for her until his return (he did not expect to be gone long, he said), she appeared to be very willing to do so.
But when it came to bidding “good-bye,” and the child clung to him, trembling and sobbing, “Oh, mon oncle! mon oncle!” he looked troubled. He just held her close for a moment, gave her three great sailor kisses that echoed from cellar to garret, and ran out of the house without a word.
No sooner had the captain’s ship set sail than Mrs. Lane took Julie to an orphan asylum.
“Send her off somewhere,” she said to the matron. “A home in the West! that would be the very place for her. Ah, the West! what a glorious place for little homeless wanderers!”
Riding away alone in her easy carriage, she muttered:
“The idea of his bringing that little vagabond for me to look after! I don’t care if he did offer to pay her board (of course it wouldn’t have done to accept). I don’t intend to make my house a harbor for every little straggler that happens along! and right there with the children, too! What do I know about her? What does he? Maybe her story is true, and maybe it isn’t. Those French, they can lie! And then she’d be forever harassing me about that brother of hers. Ha! she’ll never see him again! those French!... And then he’s taken such a fancy to her!—why, she calls him ‘Uncle’ already! Just like him to go and spend upon her the half he owns—educate her, and all that! I won’t have it!... There may be some trouble over my sending her off?... Well, well, I’ll have some pretty excuse ready. Time enough to invent it before he gets back.”
(It was thought that the captain would make the little Lanes his heirs, for they were great favorites with “Uncle Jack.”)
III.
At the asylum, little orphans had a roof to shelter them from the storms, a place to lay their tired selves at night, food to eat when they were hungry, clothes to protect them from the cold. But there was no mamma there, no Julien, no oncle le capitaine. The great clean rooms, with their whitewashed walls, were so bare. No pretty mats on the floors, no carved tables, no silken chairs and sofas, no crimson curtains, no beautiful paintings and statuettes, as in that pleasant village home from which Julie and her mother fled when the terrible armies came marching on, with beat of drum and thundering of cannon. It was dreary and lonesome here. Julie could not understand a word that was spoken, neither could any one understand her. So she could not play with the other children, but sat alone by herself watching them all day—watching in a dream, the roar of the briny billows still ringing in her ears. Now and then she cried a little for very homesickness; and always she wondered why she was in this place and why Julien did not come.
One day a lady was shown into the school-room, where the children sang for her. Looking about upon their faces she asked:
“Who is that delicate little creature in the corner, with the dark hair and eyes?”
The matron told the story she had heard from Mrs. Lane. It was, she said, a little orphan girl who had recently come over in an emigrant ship from France. Her father was killed in the battle of Sedan. Did the lady know of any one who would like to adopt the child?
“Why, I’ve a great mind to take her myself. She could play with Charlie and Lizzie, you know,” turning to her companion, “and in that way they could learn to speak French, couldn’t they?”
So, when this person—she was visiting some cousins in town—when she returned home Julie went with her; why, she did not know, but she supposed it must be the way to find her brother. To be sure, madame let her hold Lizzie a good deal, and holding Lizzie made one’s arms ache. What matter? Julien would be there, where they were going!
But when the long journey was ended, and they left the noisy train, and monsieur met them, all smiles at the sight of wife and baby, and they drove through the streets to monsieur’s house, Julien was not there! The child was ready to cry from disappointment. She sat down by the window and watched the passers-by. Perhaps one would be Julien. Now, a little boy of five or six years, after being fondled and caressed by mamma, and having given baby a dutiful but hasty kiss, came and planted himself in front of her. When he had stared at her to his satisfaction, he demanded:
“Who be you?”
Julie could not understand, and so how could she answer?
“Who be you, I say?”
No reply.
“Why don’t you speak, you ninny, you?”
“Bonjour, mon ami,”[2] said Julie, scared at his rough tones.
“Bonny Jew!—what’s the rest of it? Bonny Jew! Bonny Jew! Ha, ha! What a funny name!”
Charley caught up his cap and ran into the street to tell Willie Wade:
“There’s a girl in there. Her name’s Bonny Jew. She’s deef, I guess, fur I couldn’t make ’er hear till I hollered loud enough to take ’er head off.”
At night, madame led Julie down to the kitchen, saying, “Katrine, you may let her sleep with you,” and left her there.
Katrine’s face flushed scarlet, and her mild eyes flashed as they never flashed before. Was not France at that very hour making war upon her countrymen? Were not all French, then, her enemies? She took up the lamp and strode toward her chamber. Julie, afraid to be left in the dark, followed after. The door was locked in her face.
Madame coming into the basement for a glass of water, late in the evening, stumbled over the child lying asleep on the hall floor, just outside of Katrine’s room. She tried the door, and finding it fastened, called through the keyhole: “Katrine! Katrine!”
Katrine either did not hear or pretended not to. She was snoring right loyally between two immense feather beds which had kept her company all the way from Vaterland. The lounge in the back parlor, with some shawls and cushions, would serve for Julie’s couch this time.
“Katrine,” asked madame, “what did you mean by locking Julie out of your room last night?”
“I vill not haf der Franchen mit me in my ped!”
“Why, Katrine, I think you are very unreasonable.”
“I care not vat you tinks! I vill go find me anodder blace!”
But madame couldn’t afford to lose Katrine. Katrine was a treasure. Katrine could cook, and wash, and iron, and do all kinds of work to perfection. She was tidy, and she was industrious, and always good-tempered till now. So, instead of her finding “anodder blace,” a bed was made for Julie in the attic—the low, wide, windowless attic, where not a breath of air moved in summer, where the winds whistled and moaned in winter, where the rats and mice held revels all the year round—the great, gloomy attic, with its mysterious chests and closets, where curious shadows dwelt; strewn with mysterious hats, and boots and shoes, that took strange shapes after the sun went down; hung about with mysterious outcasts—old gowns, and crinolines, and coats, that weirdly swayed and swung on boisterous autumn nights; the dreadful attic, where, hour after hour, when she ought to have been enjoying sweet, blessed sleep, little tired Julie lay wide-eyed, staring at—she knew not what, listening to—she knew not what, trembling, shivering, the sweat upon her brow.
“Oh, madame, j’ai peur!”[3] she said once, lingering when bedtime came.
But madame didn’t understand.
The weeks passed by. Julien did not come. Would he ever come? The question was often put to madame. But she didn’t understand. Julie began to grow discouraged. Baby was so heavy! and she was cutting teeth, too, and worried and fretted. Some new plaything must be invented every five minutes to amuse and keep her quiet. She must be sung to, rocked, carried backward and forward, to and fro, drawn in her carriage up and down the sidewalk, wearily, wearily, up and down. As for Charley, he learned to speak less good French of Julie than he hurled bad English at her. During his mother’s visit East, he had improved the chance for making acquaintance with all the boys on the street, and thus had considerably increased the list of words at his command. One day, Lizzie’s dimpled fingers found the ribbon about Julie’s neck. Out in full sight flew the precious cross. Julie hastened to hide it, but a pair of keen eyes had caught the glitter.
“What’s that? What’s that shiny thing you’ve got there, Julie? I want to see it!” cried the tormentor, darting toward her.
She thrust out her hand to keep him off. He flung it aside and clutched at the ribbon.
“Non! non!” she screamed, pushing him away.
At that he became furious, kicking and biting, and pulling her hair. Julie, dropping the baby, shrieked with pain. Baby began to cry lustily. The uproar reached the drawing-room, where there were callers. Madame came rushing in to still the noise. Charley, who had succeeded in tearing it away, now, triumphant, held up the cross.
“See, ma, see! She had it hid in ’er neck! She stole it, you bet!”
“Oh, donnez-la moi! donnez-la moi!”[4] sobbed Julie.
Madame hadn’t time to inquire into the matter. She took the cross away from Charley, though he stoutly resisted, locked it in a drawer of her writing-desk, put the key in her pocket and then went back to her guests.
The young gentleman picked at the lock with his pencil.
“You plagued old thing!” he muttered, shaking his fist and scowling at Julie, “if you hadn’t a’ raised such a rumpus she’d never a’ knowed, and I’d a’ traded it off fur Tommy Tough’s pearl-handled penknife—plague take you!”
After the visitors had gone, Julie, pointing to the writing-desk, entreated:
“Oh, madame, la give, la give! à present, s’il vous please!”
“Yes, yes, yes, by and by.”
But “by and by,” madame had forgotten. She did not remember, indeed, until she opened the drawer to get her portemonnaie before going out shopping.
“Some cheap gew-gaw, possibly,” she thought, taking up the cross. “I don’t know, though! Can this be glass? Wonder how she came by it? Can it possibly be of any value?... I’ve a great mind to take it down to Forsyth’s and see what he says. He’ll know the moment he lays eyes on it.”
Down to Forsyth’s she took it.
“Mr. Forsyth,” she said, handing it across the counter, “here is a little trinket that has accidentally come into my possession lately. I’d like your opinion as to its worth.”
The jeweler’s eyes sparkled like the precious gems, as he held them to the light.
“Why, Mrs. ——, you have here a treasure! Those stones!—genuine article!” and examining more closely: “It’s very old. Just observe the chasing. You know nothing of its history?”
“No. You consider it of value, then?”
“Of value? I would give five hundred dollars any day, Mrs. ——, to become possessor of that cross.” He added eagerly, “Could you not be induced to part with it?”
Five hundred dollars! Madame’s glance fell upon a silver tea-service which she had long coveted.
“Possibly. I’ll think about it,” she said, and went her way.
Such a lovely blue moire in one of the shop windows—five dollars a yard. It made one’s mouth water to look at it. Such a lovely Brussels in another!—the parlors needed carpeting anew. Such lovely, lovely things in all the windows! that one really ought to have. As for the child, of what earthly use could that costly trinket ever be to her? Like as not she stole it, as Charley said.
When madame reached home her purse was even better filled than when she started out, and the silver tea-set would be sent up from Forsyth’s to-morrow. Meantime a curious piece of workmanship in the jeweler’s show-case was attracting much attention.
What a queer way to find the brother is this—tending Lizzie and being knocked about by Charley, and robbed of mamma’s last gift! Julie fears she will never get it, for when she asked madame for it again, madame blushed and did not reply. What strange people these Americans are! They make little children take care of little children! And she is afraid of Charley. She trembles now to think of him. And who is that creature peering out of the closet over there?
It is like the woman who let the room where mamma was taken sick.
Why, this is that room! and here is the mother beside her.
Julie leans over and asks:
“Why dost thou not waken, my mother? Behold, the sun is high. Why dost thou sleep so long? Why art thou so cold and pale? Mamma! Mamma!”
The silken lashes are not lifted from the marble cheek; the white lips make no answer.
“She is so weary, I will not disturb her. I will watch until she wakens.”
The morning creeps away, the noon, and the afternoon, and now the evening comes.
“Mamma! my dear mamma!”
Still the eyelids are not lifted, and the white lips are dumb.
The night goes by, and a day, and another night, and the morning dawns once more. And again the woman comes peering through the door.
“She is dead,” Julie hears her say.
Men enter and carry the mother away.
“Where are you going with my poor mamma?”
“We are going to bury her.”
“You shall not bury her! You shall not take her away,” cries Julie.
They thrust her back with rough hands. They will not let her follow. The woman locks her in. She is left alone, alone.
The day goes by, the noon, and the afternoon. The shadows reach out after her like claws. She crouches in the chimney-corner, staring at them through the long, dark hours.
At midnight the woman glides stealthily in, glides stealthily about, peering, peering with wicked eyes. She fumbles among the bedding, opens the trunk, takes out its contents carefully.
“Nothing, nothing!” she hisses between clenched teeth.
She glides stealthily towards the child. Julie holds the cross in her hand.
“What have you there, little wretch?” demands the woman, trying to wrest it from her.
Julie will not give it up. With a sudden bound she escapes, runs out of the room, out of the house, down the path, away, away, through the fields. On, and on, she hurries, not daring to look back. Daylight comes, and still she walks on. After awhile she grows faint. She sits down by the roadside to rest. A peasant girl passes by with a basket on her arm.
“Does this road go to the place where one finds the ships?” asked Julie.
“Oui, mademoiselle.”
When Julie is rested, she rises and walks on. Still on and on. The way is long. At last the houses are thick together. Beyond is the blue sea. There are the ships, many, with white sails.
“Which one goes to America?” asks Julie of a man lounging about the wharf.
He points to one from which floats a beautiful flag.
While she looks, the great flag comes fluttering, fluttering down—fluttering, floating before her, floating about her, wrapping her in its folds; then back it flies, whizzing through the air, up, up, up, among the tall masts, so high above the water! Julie is dizzy, and tries to catch at the ropes. Lo! her hands are pinioned. She cannot move them. A huge serpent is coiled about her—a huge serpent striped its whole length with red and white. The coils are tightening, tightening. She cannot breathe. She struggles to be free. A flaming head swoops suddenly down. Two terrible eyes glare at her—two eyes—two glittering stars.
IV.
“Katrine,” said madame, “go and call Julie. Why, here it’s seven o’clock, and she not up yet! I never knew her to lie abed like this before. Tell her she must come down right away and dress the baby.”
Katrine came back in a few minutes, looking frightened.
“I calls von, dwo, dree dimes. She vill not hear. Den I goes oop der shtep und calls von more dime. She vill not ondershtand. She shtare mit de eyes vide—und see notting! Den she schream like murter.”
“Why, mercy on us, Dolf!” exclaimed madame, glancing across the breakfast-table at her husband, “what if the child’s sick! some fever or other!—something catching!—and these children!—she ought to be got out of the house immediately!... St. Mary’s Hospital! Yes, that’s the place. She’s Catholic, I believe. Katrine!—no, wait! perhaps it isn’t anything serious, after all. We must find out first. Dolf, what if you leave word for Dr. Smith to call round as you go down street? No, stay!” in an undertone, “don’t send him. Get some one that doesn’t go in our set—some stranger. Being up in the attic so, it might get out that we didn’t treat her well. You know how absurdly people will talk, sometimes. Can’t you think of some one else we can call in?”
“Well, I d-o-n’-t know. Let me see. Why, yes, there’s that young fellow who has stuck up his shingle a few doors off from the office. Foreigner, I believe. Hasn’t any too much custom, should judge. Might get him.”
“A foreigner. Oh, yes; that will do very well.”
In half an hour the young physician rang the door-bell. He was shown up to the attic by Katrine. As he mounted the stairs, a pitiful little wail came floating down:
“Oh, Julien, Julien, tu es bien longtemps à venir. Helas! ne te reverrai-je plus?”[5]
Madame, waiting below, wondered if the stranger wasn’t “some exiled nobleman, he looks so distinguished. Rather seedy, though.”
Soon she grew impatient.
“What is he keeping me so long in suspense for, I should like to know?”
When he came down at last, his eyes burned like hot coals, and he had for her questions never a word of answer. He walked swiftly away, and returned with a carriage before she had recovered from her amazement. Still speechless, he again made his way to the attic, and when he descended this time he bore something in his arms very tenderly.
It was little Julie, wrapped in his cloak.
“You are behaving very strangely, sir! What are you doing? Where are you taking her?”
“Where she will be cared for, rest assured!”
“What do you mean, sir?” cried madame, following down the steps. “Do you dare insinuate that she wouldn’t be cared for here? I want to know what right you have to be meddling with that child?”
“The best right in the world, madame—a brother’s right.” To the coachman: “Drive on!” and the carriage rolled away.
A passing glimpse of a tiny, fever-flushed face, wild, unconscious, restless eyes, and lips that moved continually, was the last madame saw of the “delicate little creature” she had “adopted” for a nurse-girl.
When she had recovered breath and collected her scattered wits, she put on her shawl and bonnet, and went down town to the office.
“Dolf, what’s that young doctor’s name, do you know?”
“Name? Never noticed, ’pon my word. Why?”
“It’s out there on his door, or somewhere, isn’t it? Just step out and see, please.”
“Leblanc,” said “Dolf,” returning.
“Leblanc—Leblanc ... yes, and that’s the child’s name, now I recall it. Do you know, he’s her brother!”
The next place madame visited was the jeweler’s. She was very glad she had not purchased the watered silk or the Brussels carpet, and that the silver service had not yet been sent up to the house.
“Mr. Forsyth,” she said, laying a roll of bank-notes on the counter, “I regret our little transaction yesterday. I prefer to keep the cross myself.”
“Well—a—hem!—a bargain’s a bargain, you know.”
“Oh, don’t talk to me about ‘bargains’! we’re old acquaintances. I want that cross. I must have it.”
The jeweler colored, and coughed, and objected. But madame was obstinate. Finally, as they were “old acquaintances,” and as madame’s husband was a lawyer, and as he hadn’t told her anywhere near the full value of the cross, he yielded—on one condition—that it should remain a few days longer in his show-case. It added greatly to the display there, especially since a card had been attached to it, reading thus:
ANTIQUE CROSS,
Formerly owned by the
EMPRESS EUGENIE,
Sold by her in her flight from Paris, to defray the expenses of the journey.
Madame agreed to the condition, thinking:
“If Doctor Leblanc cares anything for his sister he won’t be gaping at jewelers’ windows for some time to come. (Doubtful if she recovers. It’s some fever or other she must have caught on board that emigrant ship. And the children! bless me, I must go the very next thing to Doctor Smith and see if he thinks there’s any danger.) And then if he shouldn’t happen to ask for it, or make any fuss about it, why, I can wear it myself, and everybody in town will suppose it has once been worn by Eugenie!”
A week from that morning little Julie came back from her wanderings, looked up into the face bending over her, and knew it for the first time.
“C’est lui!”[6] she whispered, smiling faintly, closed her weary eyes and fell into a sweet slumber.
“Thank God! she is going to live.”
V.
“What art thou writing, my brother?” asked Julie from among her pillows one day; “something for the journals?”
“Oui, cherie.”
“Oh, dear Julien, take care! do not say that the Emperor of America is not a good Emperor!”
“Fear not, mon enfant: we are in a free country where one says what one pleases.”
Julien brought a basin which had been heating on the stove.
“Here is something for thee, little one.”
“Wilt thou not have of it also, brother? Let us dine together. I never see thee eat.”
“The beef tea is not for strong men: it is for the little invalids.”
“Ah, but thou art not strong! I remember when thy cheeks were like the rose. Now thou art so pale and thin! and I saw thy hand tremble while thou wast writing. Oh, my brother, if thou shouldst be sick, I fear I could not be to thee the good angel thou art to me. Come, take of this a little: it is excellent.”
“I have already dined, cherie.”
“When?”
“While thou wast sleeping.”
“I bet thy dinner was not so good as mine! n’est ce pas?”
No, truly it was not. It was of stale bread, as wee a morsel as ever kept body and soul together. But the little one must never know.
“Tell me, Julie, who is oncle le capitaine?”
“Oh, that is the monsieur charming who gave me a ride in his ship. He promised to find thee for me. But who hast thou heard to speak of him?”
“A little fairy. And so he gave thee the ride?”
“Yes, Julien, was he not good? He would not take the cross—thou rememberest?—our poor mamma’s beautiful cross. It was yesterday, was it not, that I was telling thee how she gave it to me? Madame locked it in the drawer. I wonder if she would not let thee have it if thou wert to ask her? for thou art a man, and thou canst speak English, and she will comprehend. Oh, dear Julien, what is the matter? what have I said? art thou angry with me?”
“No, not with thee, my poor dear little angel! but with those people there—the brutes!”
“Comment! who has told thee of them, my brother?”
“A little fairy.”
“Who is that little fairy that tells thee so much? what is she called?”
“She is called Julie.”
“Comment! what dost thou say? I am she! But how could I tell thee, since thou wilt scarcely allow me to speak a single word, dear monsieur le docteur?”
“My poor little Julie has had bad dreams and talked in her sleep. There, now, thou art weary. Close thy pretty eyes and rest thee. Already, I fear, I have let thee talk too long.”
“But it is so good to be with one who comprehends, and can speak with me our own beautiful language!”
“Poor little sister! when thou art stronger, we will do nothing but talk for a whole day.”
While the child lay sleeping, there came a rap at the outer door. Julien hoped he was going to have a patient. But no, a tall, stout gentleman strode into the office. His face was ruddy, his eyes twinkled merrily. He didn’t look as if he were in any need of medicine.
“I came to ask after the little Julie,” he said. “She came over in my ship,” he explained. “Possibly she has made mention of—”
“Ah! is it ‘oncle le capitaine’?”
“The same,” answered the gentleman, smiling.
“Then let me thank you for your kindness to my little sister!” cried the young man, grasping his hand. “I know not how to express my gratitude.”
“Bah! where is she?”
“In the next room. She sleeps. She is just recovering from a fever—of the brain.”
“Indeed! Strange that woman should not have spoken of it! Has she been very sick?”
“It has been a struggle for life.”
“Ah-h-h, those Lanes! the rascals! Why, sir, I left the child in charge of people I thought I could trust—people I had befriended. Why, that man, Lane, was head and ears in debt! but for me, he and his would be in want and misery to-day! What do they do, the moment I am out of sight, but send her to an orphan asylum! Sent her off! off West! that was all they could tell me at the asylum. Gone West! Nothing definite. No record, no trace. I’ve had a search, I can tell you. Hunted, advertised, from place to place. Yesterday I came here. It was by this cross I found her. I saw it in a shop window and identified it at once with one little Julie had shown me on shipboard. You recognize it?”
“I do, indeed. It is an heir-loom. It has been handed down through I know not how many generations.”
“I made inquiries in the shop, and was directed to a lady who they said was its owner. She proved to be the person who took the child from the asylum. She seemed strangely embarrassed and disinclined to speak about the matter.”
“With good reason! mon Dieu! my blood boils as I think of it. It was the cruelty and overtask that caused my little one’s illness.”
“I suspected something of the kind. Listen to the condition upon which that person acquainted me with your whereabouts—that I ‘shouldn’t mention the matter to any one in town!’ And there’s something wrong about this cross. She said she was afraid the child might lose it, and so had put it under lock and key for safe keeping, and had afterwards lent it to the jeweler as a curiosity. But he was wonderfully inquisitive, and undertook to pump me when I went back after it. What do you think he had labeled it? As one of the jewels of your ex-Empress!”
“C’en est trop![7] these Yankees!” exclaimed Julien; then coloring to the roots of his hair he stammered:
“Pardon, monsieur!”
“No offense,” said the captain, smiling. “I am, then, so genuine a Yankee?”
“I do not say it,” the other slowly answered.
The captain laughed aloud.
Julien opened the inner door.
“Didst thou call, sister?”
“Oui, mon frere. Tell me who is with thee? But I know it—I! It is oncle le capitaine! I heard him laugh!”
“Bonjour, bonjour, mademoiselle l’Empress! how is your Majesty’s health to-day?” cried a voice over Julien’s shoulder. “See, little pale one, I come to bring thee thy cross.”
“Oh, the cross of mamma! the cross of mamma!” exclaimed Julie, seizing it and covering it with kisses, while silent tears crept down her wan cheeks.
Julien turned away to the window, and the captain sat down by the couch and shaded his eyes with his hand.
“But, mon oncle,” said Julie after awhile, “tell me, did you have a good voyage? Did the great waves come and tip the ship right over on its side and almost spill you out? You were gone so long I feared you were drowned. Oh, mon oncle, do not go away again upon the terrible sea; but stay with us, my brother and me.”
“Ah, my little Julie, thy poor old uncle is, upon land, like a fish out of water.”
Julie must not yet hear, the captain thought, the story of that great gale off the coast of the Carolinas, in which his good ship had nearly been wrecked. It would better suit the little convalescent to be told of those islands where he had been; those sunny islands where it is always summer, where oranges and bananas and the rarest and most beautiful flowers grow wild.
While the two were talking, Julien once more took up his pen.
“With monsieur’s permission. An article for the Morning Post. It must be ready within the next two hours.”
“Ah!—a treatise on health, doubtless.”
“A treatise on Louis Napoleon—ce scelerat!”
“My friend, take the advice of your sister’s venerable uncle; let that poor wretch alone. He’s about played out. At all events, you are out of his reach. Stick to your profession. Writing is fool’s business. ‘A jack at all trades is good at none.’”
“But monsieur knows one must find some way to kill time.”
“Ah? Pill-peddling is not a lively business nowadays, I take it.”
“Monsieur, I have set up shop in three cities, and in each have waited three months for a patient.”
“Whew! is that so? Why didn’t you tell me before?”
“Why be in haste to tell of it, monsieur? It is nothing to boast of, surely!”
“Why? Because I can help you. I am going to help you. I intended to when I came here, if I found you were in need of it.”
“I have not said I was in need. I ask no one for help. What I ask for is—work!”
“Young man, you are altogether too proud! You should take lessons of Young America! Young America isn’t afraid of the jingling of coin. Young America doesn’t spurn a good offer. Young America would jump at the chance. But as for work, why, work will come to you if you only wait for it long enough. ‘Patient waiters are no losers.’”
“Wait, wait, wait! mon Dieu! and the child there!”
“Yes, we must think of her! Come, my dear fellow, you’ve had a hard row to hoe. No use denying!”
Julien was silent for a few moments; then he said:
“I will confess, monsieur, that I have seen times when I have wished myself well back in France. There, at least, one could fight for one’s country.”
“Is it worth fighting for? Poor France!—a republic, a kingdom, an empire, a bedlam, by fits! ruled yesterday by an idiot, to-day by a lynx, to-morrow by a pack of bloodhounds! Better off where you are, young man; better off where you are.”
Julien had arisen, and stood glaring at the captain.
“Monsieur forgets he is speaking of the land of my birth!”
“And of the land of his birth, as well,” was the quiet reply.
“Quoi! what do I understand monsieur to say?”
“Have you never heard your mother speak of her brother Jean?”
“Often.”
“I am he.”
“But no! He entered a monastery. He was a monk.”
“Still again, I am he. At your age I grew weary of the cloister. Disguised as a sailor I escaped to the United States; and disguised as a sailor I have knocked about the world ever since. My own country is the one I avoid most of all. I suppose I never should have known aught of Marguerite’s children if the little Julie had not come to me just as she did. Indeed, although she told me her name, I never suspected who she might be until she showed me her poor mother’s cross. In the cloister one is buried from the world. I did not know whom my sister married. He, too, is dead, the child told me. I mean your father.”
“General Leblanc, of the Italian campaign—you have never heard of him? It was there that he lost his life.”
“Poor Marguerite! She was coming to you, it seems, and fell ill upon the way.”
“I first learned it from Julie. I had received no tidings for months. Our home was in the region which has fallen into the enemy’s clutches. Mails, of course, were stopped. What other reason for the silence? Mon Dieu! the agony of suspense! I should have returned immediately when the republic was declared, if I could have seen my way—”
“And you two might have sought each other till your locks were gray—and probably would never have met.”
“Mon oncle, please tell to me also those strange, sad things you have been telling my brother now for a long time in that dreadful English, till suddenly, at this moment, he looks frightened.”
Julien went over to the little questioner and kissed her wondering eyes.
“Thy uncle, sister—dear angel!—has been telling me that he is also my uncle.”