He led her to Christ, the consoler, showing her how the joy of
religion will calm all sorrow; and she knelt at the confessional,
humbling herself, feeling herself small and weak in presence of this
priest, who appeared to be about fifteen.
He was, however, very soon detested in all the countryside. Inflexibly
severe toward himself, he was implacably intolerant toward others, and
the one thing that especially roused his wrath and indignation was
love. The young men and girls looked at each other slyly across the
church, and the old peasants who liked to joke about such things
disapproved his severity. All the parish was in a ferment. Soon the
young men all stopped going to church.
The curé dined at the château every Thursday, and often came during
the week to chat with his penitent. She became enthusiastic like
himself, talked about spiritual matters, handling all the antique and
complicated arsenal of religious controversy.
They walked together along the baroness' avenue, talking of Christ and
the apostles, the Virgin Mary and the Fathers of the Church as though
they were personally acquainted with them.
Julien treated the new priest with great respect, saying constantly:
"That priest suits me, he does not back down." And he went to
confession and communion, setting a fine example. He now went to the
Fourvilles' nearly every day, gunning with the husband, who was never
happy without him, and riding with the comtesse, in spite of rain and
storm. The comte said: "They are crazy about riding, but it does my
wife good."
The baron returned to the château about the middle of November. He was
changed, aged, faded, filled with a deep sadness. And his love for his
daughter seemed to have gained in strength, as if these few months of
dreary solitude had aggravated his need of affection, confidence and
tenderness. Jeanne did not tell him about her new ideas, and her
friendship for the Abbé Tolbiac. The first time he saw the priest he
conceived a great aversion to him. And when Jeanne asked him that
evening how he liked him, he replied: "That man is an inquisitor! He
must be very dangerous."
When he learned from the peasants, whose friend he was, of the
harshness and violence of the young priest, of the kind of persecution
which he carried on against all human and natural instincts, he
developed a hatred toward him. He, himself, was one of the old race of
natural philosophers who bowed the knee to a sort of pantheistic
Divinity, and shrank from the catholic conception of a God with
bourgeois instincts, Jesuitical wrath, and tyrannical revenge. To him
reproduction was the great law of nature, and he began from farm to
farm an ardent campaign against this intolerant priest, the persecutor
of life.
Jeanne, very much worried, prayed to the Lord, entreated her father;
but he always replied: "We must fight such men as that, it is our duty
and our right. They are not human."
And he repeated, shaking his long white locks: "They are not human;
they understand nothing, nothing, nothing. They are moving in a morbid
dream; they are anti-physical." And he pronounced the word
"anti-physical" as though it were a malediction.
The priest knew who his enemy was, but as he wished to remain ruler of
the château and of Jeanne, he temporized, sure of final victory. He
was also haunted by a fixed idea. He had discovered by chance the
amours of Julien and Gilberte, and he desired to put a stop to them at
all costs.
He came to see Jeanne one day and, after a long conversation on
spiritual matters, he asked her to give her aid in helping him to
fight, to put an end to the evil in her own family, in order to save
two souls that were in danger.
She did not understand, and did not wish to know. He replied: "The
hour has not arrived. I shall see you some other time." And he left
abruptly.
The winter was coming to a close, a rotten winter, as they say in the
country, damp and mild. The abbé called again some days later and
hinted mysteriously at one of those shameless intrigues between
persons whose conduct should be irreproachable. It was the duty, he
said, of those who were aware of the facts to use every means to bring
it to an end. He took Jeanne's hand and adjured her to open her eyes
and understand and lend him her aid.
This time she understood, but she was silent, terrified at the thought
of all that might result in the house that was now peaceful, and she
pretended not to understand. Then he spoke out clearly.
She faltered: "What do you wish me to do, Monsieur l'Abbé?"
"Anything, rather than permit this infamy. Anything, I say. Leave him.
Flee from this impure house!"
"But I have no money; and then I have no longer any courage; and,
besides, how can I go without any proof? I have not the right to do
so."
The priest arose trembling: "That is cowardice, madame; I am mistaken
in you. You are unworthy of God's mercy!"
She fell on her knees: "Oh, I pray you not to leave me, tell me what
to do!"
"Open M. de Fourville's eyes," he said abruptly. "It is his place to
break up this intrigue."
This idea filled her with terror. "Why, he would kill them, Monsieur
l'Abbé! And I should be guilty of denouncing them! Oh, never that,
never!"
He raised his hand as if to curse her in his fury: "Remain in your
shame and your crime; for you are more guilty than they are. You are
the complaisant wife! There is nothing more for me to do here." And he
went off so furious that he trembled all over.
She followed him, distracted and ready to do as he suggested. But he
strode along rapidly, shaking his large blue umbrella in his rage. He
perceived Julien standing outside the gate superintending the lopping
of the trees, so he turned to the left to go across the Couillard
farm, and he said: "Leave me alone, madame, I have nothing further to
say to you."
Jeanne was entreating him to give her a few days for reflection, and
then if he came back to the château she would tell him what she had
done, and they could take counsel together.
Right in his road, in the middle of the farmyard, a group of children,
those of the house and some neighbor's children, were standing around
the kennel of Mirza, the dog, looking curiously at something with
silent and concentrated attention. In the midst of them stood the
baron, his hands behind his back, also looking on with curiosity. One
would have taken him for a schoolmaster. When he saw the priest
approaching, he moved away so as not to have to meet him and speak to
him.
The priest did not call again; but the following Sunday from the
pulpit he hurled imprecations, curses and threats against the château,
anathematizing the baron, and making veiled allusions, but timidly, to
Julien's latest intrigue. The vicomte was furious, but the dread of a
shocking scandal kept him silent. At each service thereafter the
priest declared his indignation, predicting the approach of the hour
when God would smite all his enemies.
Julien wrote a firm, but respectful letter to the archbishop; the abbé
was threatened with suspension. He was silent thereafter.
Gilberte and Julien now frequently met him during their rides reading
his breviary, but they turned aside so as not to pass him by. Spring
had come and reawakened their love. As the foliage was still sparse
and the grass damp, they used to meet in a shepherd's movable hut that
had been deserted since autumn. But one day when they were leaving it,
they saw the Abbé Tolbiac, almost hidden in the sea rushes on the
slope.
"We must leave our horses in the ravine," said Julien, "as they can be
seen from a distance and would betray us." One evening as they were
coming home together to La Vrillette, where they were to dine with the
comte, they met the curé of Étouvent coming out of the château. He
stepped to the side of the road to let them pass, and bowed without
their eyes meeting. They were uneasy for a few moments, but soon
forgot it.
One afternoon, Jeanne was reading beside the fire while a storm of
wind was raging outside, when she suddenly perceived Comte Fourville
coming on foot at such a pace that she thought some misfortune had
happened.
She ran downstairs to meet him, and when she saw him she thought he
must be crazy. He wore a large quilted cap that he wore only at home,
his hunting jacket, and looked so pale that his red mustache, usually
the color of his skin, now seemed like a flame. His eyes were haggard,
rolling as though his mind were vacant.
He stammered: "My wife is here, is she not?" Jeanne, losing her
presence of mind, replied: "Why, no, I have not seen her to-day."
He sat down as if his legs had given way. He then took off his cap and
wiped his forehead with his handkerchief mechanically several times.
Then starting up suddenly, he approached Jeanne, his hands stretched
out, his mouth open, as if to speak, to confide some great sorrow to
her. Then he stopped, looked at her fixedly and said as though he were
wandering: "But it is your husband--you also----" And he fled, going
toward the sea.
Jeanne ran after him, calling him, imploring him to stop, her heart
beating with apprehension as she thought: "He knows all! What will he
do? Oh, if he only does not find them!"
But she could not come up to him, and he disregarded her appeals. He
went straight ahead without hesitation, straight to his goal. He
crossed the ditch, then, stalking through the sea rushes like a giant,
he reached the cliff.
Jeanne, standing on the mound covered with trees, followed him with
her eyes until he was out of sight. Then she went into the house,
distracted with grief.
He had turned to the right and started to run. Threatening waves
overspread the sea, big black clouds were scudding along madly,
passing on and followed by others, each of them coming down in a
furious downpour. The wind whistled, moaned, laid the grass and the
young crops low and carried away big white birds that looked like
specks of foam and bore them far into the land.
The hail which followed beat in the comte's face, filling his ears
with noise and his heart with tumult.
Down yonder before him was the deep gorge of the Val de Vaucotte.
There was nothing before him but a shepherd's hut beside a deserted
sheep pasture. Two horses were tied to the shafts of the hut on
wheels. What might not happen to one in such a tempest as this?
As soon as he saw them the comte crouched on the ground and crawled
along on his hands and knees as far as the lonely hut and hid himself
beneath the hut that he might not be seen through the cracks. The
horses on seeing him became restive. He slowly cut their reins with
the knife which he held open in his hand, and a sudden squall coming
up, the animals fled, frightened at the hail which rattled on the
sloping roof of the wooden hut and made it shake on its wheels.
The comte then kneeling upright, put his eye to the bottom of the door
and looked inside. He did not stir; he seemed to be waiting.
A little time elapsed and then he suddenly rose to his feet, covered
with mud from head to foot. He frantically pushed back the bolt which
closed the hut on the outside, and seizing the shafts, he began to
shake the hut as though he would break it to pieces. Then all at once
he got between the shafts, bending his huge frame, and with a
desperate effort dragged it along like an ox, panting as he went. He
dragged it, with whoever was in it, toward the steep incline.
Those inside screamed and banged with their fists on the door, not
understanding what was going on.
When he reached the top of the cliff he let go the fragile dwelling,
which began to roll down the incline, going ever faster and faster,
plunging, stumbling like an animal and striking the ground with its
shafts.
An old beggar hidden in a ditch saw it flying over his head and heard
frightful screams coming from the wooden box.
All at once a wheel was wrenched off and it fell on its side and began
to roll like a ball, as a house torn from its foundations might roll
from the summit of a mountain. Then, reaching the ledge of the last
ravine, it described a circle, and, falling to the bottom, burst open
as an egg might do. It was no sooner smashed on the stones than the
old beggar, who had seen it going past, went down toward it slowly
amid the rushes, and with the customary caution of a peasant, not
daring to go directly to the shattered hut, he went to the nearest
farm to tell of the accident.
They all ran to look at it and raised the wreck of the hut. They found
two bodies, bruised, crushed and bleeding. The man's forehead was
split open and his whole face crushed; the woman's jaw was hanging,
dislocated in one of the jolts, and their shattered limbs were soft as
pulp.
"What were they doing in that shanty?" said a woman.
The old beggar then said that they had apparently taken refuge in it
to get out of the storm and that a furious squall must have blown the
hut over the cliff. He said he had intended to take shelter there
himself, when he saw the horses tied to it, and understood that some
one else must be inside. "But for that," he added in a satisfied tone,
"I might have rolled down in it." Some one remarked: "Would not that
have been a good thing?"
The old man, in a furious rage, said: "Why would it have been a good
thing? Because I am poor and they are rich! Look at them now." And
trembling, ragged and dripping with rain, he pointed to the two dead
bodies with his hooked stick and exclaimed: "We are all alike when we
get to this."
The comte, as soon as he saw the hut rolling down the steep slope, ran
off at full speed through the blinding storm. He ran in this way for
several hours, taking short cuts, leaping across ditches, breaking
through the hedges, and thus got back home at dusk, not knowing how
himself.
The frightened servants were awaiting his return and told him that the
two horses had returned riderless some little time before, that of
Julien following the other one.
Then M. de Fourville reeled and in a choked voice said: "Something
must have happened to them in this dreadful weather. Let every one
help to look for them."
He started off himself, but he was no sooner out of sight than he
concealed himself in a clump of bushes, watching the road along which
she whom he even still loved with an almost savage passion was to
return dead, dying or maybe crippled and disfigured forever.
And soon a carriole passed by carrying a strange burden.
It stopped at the château and passed through the gate. It was that, it
was she. But a fearful anguish nailed him to the spot, a fear to know
the worst, a dread of the truth, and he did not stir, hiding as a
hare, starting at the least sound.
He waited thus an hour, two hours perhaps. The buggy did not come out.
He concluded that his wife was expiring, and the thought of seeing
her, of meeting her gaze filled him with so much horror that he
suddenly feared to be discovered in his hiding place and of being
compelled to return and be present at this agony, and he then fled
into the thick of the wood. Then all of a sudden it occurred to him
that she perhaps might be needing his care, that no one probably could
properly attend to her. Then he returned on his tracks, running
breathlessly.
On entering the château he met the gardener and called out to him,
"Well?" The man did not dare answer him. Then M. de Fourville almost
roared at him: "Is she dead?" and the servant stammered: "Yes, M. le
Comte."
He experienced a feeling of immense relief. His blood seemed to cool
and his nerves relax somewhat of their extreme tension, and he walked
firmly up the steps of his great hallway.
The other wagon had reached "The Poplars." Jeanne saw it from afar.
She descried the mattress; she guessed that a human form was lying
upon it, and understood all. Her emotion was so vivid that she swooned
and fell prostrate.
When she regained consciousness her father was holding her head and
bathing her temples with vinegar. He said hesitatingly: "Do you know?"
She murmured: "Yes, father." But when she attempted to rise she found
herself unable to do so, so intense was her agony.
That very night she gave birth to a stillborn infant, a girl.
Jeanne saw nothing of the funeral of Julien; she knew nothing of it.
She merely noticed at the end of a day or two that Aunt Lison was
back, and in her feverish dreams which haunted her she persistently
sought to recall when the old maiden lady had left "The Poplars," at
what period and under what circumstances. She could not make this out,
even in her lucid moments, but she was certain of having seen her
subsequent to the death of "little mother."
Jeanne did not leave her room for three months and was so wan and pale
that no one thought she would recover. But she picked up by degrees.
Little father and Aunt Lison never left her; they had both taken up
their abode at "The Poplars." The shock of Julien's death had left her
with a nervous malady. The slightest sound made her faint and she had
long swoons from the most insignificant causes.
She had never asked the details of Julien's death. What did it matter
to her? Did she not know enough already? Every one thought it was an
accident, but she knew better, and she kept to herself this secret
which tortured her: the knowledge of his infidelity and the
remembrance of the abrupt and terrible visit of the comte on the day
of the catastrophe.
And now she was filled with tender, sweet and melancholy recollections
of the brief evidences of love shown her by her husband. She
constantly thrilled at unexpected memories of him, and she seemed to
see him as he was when they were betrothed and as she had known him in
the hours passed beneath the sunlight in Corsica. All his faults
diminished, all his harshness vanished, his very infidelities appeared
less glaring in the widening separation of the closed tomb. And
Jeanne, pervaded by a sort of posthumous gratitude for this man who
had held her in his arms, forgave all the suffering he had caused her,
to remember only moments of happiness they had passed together. Then,
as time went on and month followed month, covering all her grief and
reminiscences with forgetfulness, she devoted herself entirely to her
son.
He became the idol, the one thought of the three beings who surrounded
him, and he ruled as a despot. A kind of jealousy even arose among his
slaves. Jeanne watched with anxiety the great kisses he gave his
grandfather after a ride on his knee, and Aunt Lison, neglected by him
as she had been by every one else and treated often like a servant by
this little tyrant who could scarcely speak as yet, would go to her
room and weep as she compared the slight affection he showed her with
the kisses he gave his mother and the baron.
Two years passed quietly, and at the beginning of the third winter it
was decided that they should go to Rouen to live until spring, and the
whole family set out. But on their arrival in the old damp house, that
had been shut up for some time, Paul had such a severe attack of
bronchitis that his three relatives in despair declared that he could
not do without the air of "The Poplars." They took him back there and
he got well.
Then began a series of quiet, monotonous years. Always around the
little one, they went into raptures at everything he did. His mother
called him Poulet, and as he could not pronounce the word, he said
"Pol," which amused them immensely, and the nickname of "Poulet" stuck
to him.
The favorite occupation of his "three mothers," as the baron called
his relatives, was to see how much he had grown, and for this purpose
they made little notches in the casing of the drawing-room door,
showing his progress from month to month. This ladder was called
"Poulet's ladder," and was an important affair.
A new individual began to play a part in the affairs of the
household--the dog "Massacre," who became Paul's inseparable
companion.
Rare visits were exchanged with the Brisevilles and the Couteliers.
The mayor and the doctor alone were regular visitors. Since the
episode of the mother dog and the suspicion Jeanne had entertained of
the priest on the occasion of the terrible death of the comtesse and
Julien, Jeanne had not entered the church, angry with a divinity that
could tolerate such ministers.
The church was deserted and the priest came to be looked on as a
sorcerer because he had, so they said, driven out an evil spirit from
a woman who was possessed, and although fearing him the peasants came
to respect him for this occult power as well as for the unimpeachable
austerity of his life.
When he met Jeanne he never spoke. This condition of affairs
distressed Aunt Lison, and when she was alone, quite alone with Paul,
she talked to him about God, telling him the wonderful stories of the
early history of the world. But when she told him that he must love
Him very much, the child would say: "Where is He, auntie?" "Up there,"
she would say, pointing to the sky; "up there, Poulet, but do not say
so." She was afraid of the baron.
One day, however, Poulet said to her: "God is everywhere, but He is
not in church." He had told his grandfather of his aunt's wonderful
revelations.
When Paul was twelve years old a great difficulty arose on the subject
of his first communion.
Lison came to Jeanne one morning and told her that the little fellow
should no longer be kept without religious instruction and from his
religious duties. His mother, troubled and undecided, hesitated,
saying that there was time enough. But a month later, as she was
returning a call at the Brisevilles', the comtesse asked her casually
if Paul was going to make his first communion that year. Jeanne,
unprepared for this, answered, "Yes," and this simple word decided
her, and without saying a word to her father, she asked Aunt Lison to
take the boy to the catechism class.
All went well for a month, but one day Paul came home with a
hoarseness and the following day he coughed. On inquiry his mother
learned that the priest had sent him to wait till the lesson was over
at the door of the church, where there was a draught, because he had
misbehaved. So she kept him at home and taught him herself. But the
Abbé Tobiac, despite Aunt Lison's entreaties, refused to admit him as
a communicant on the ground that he was not thoroughly taught.
The same thing occurred the following year, and the baron angrily
swore that the child did not need to believe all that tomfoolery, so
it was decided that he should be brought up as a Christian, but not as
an active Catholic, and when he came of age he could believe as he
pleased.
The Brisevilles ceased to call on her and Jeanne was surprised,
knowing the punctiliousness of these neighbors in returning calls, but
the Marquise de Coutelier haughtily told her the reason. Considering
herself, in virtue of her husband's rank and fortune, a sort of queen
of the Norman nobility, the marquise ruled as a queen, said what she
thought, was gracious or the reverse as occasion demanded,
admonishing, restoring to favor, congratulating whenever she saw fit.
So when Jeanne came to see her, this lady, after a few chilling
remarks, said drily: "Society is divided into two classes: those who
believe in God and those who do not believe in Him. The former, even
the humblest, are our friends, our equals; the latter are nothing to
us."
Jeanne, perceiving the insinuation, replied: "But may one not believe
in God without going to church?"
"No, madame," answered the marquise. "The faithful go to worship God
in His church, just as one goes to see people in their homes."
Jeanne, hurt, replied: "God is everywhere, madame. As for me, who
believes from the bottom of my heart in His goodness, I no longer feel
His presence when certain priests come between Him and me."
The marquise rose. "The priest is the standard bearer of the Church,
madame. Whoever does not follow the standard is opposed to Him and
opposed to us."
Jeanne had risen in her turn and said, trembling: "You believe,
madame, in a partisan God. I believe in the God of upright people."
She bowed and took her leave.
The peasants also blamed her among themselves for not having let
Poulet make his first communion. They themselves never attended
service or took the sacrament unless it might be at Easter, according
to the rule ordained by the Church; but for boys it was quite another
thing, and they would have all shrunk in horror at the audacity of
bringing up a child outside this recognized law, for religion is
religion.
She saw how they felt and was indignant at heart at all these
discriminations, all these compromises with conscience, this general
fear of everything, the real cowardice of all hearts and the mask of
respectability assumed in public.
The baron took charge of Paul's studies and made him study Latin, his
mother merely saying: "Above all things, do not get over tired."
As soon as the boy was at liberty he went down to work in the garden
with his mother and his aunt.
He now loved to dig in the ground, and all three planted young trees
in the spring, sowed seed and watched it growing with the deepest
interest, pruned branches and cut flowers for bouquets.
Poulet was almost fifteen, but was a mere child in intelligence,
ignorant, silly, suppressed between petticoat government and this kind
old man who belonged to another century.
One evening the baron spoke of college, and Jeanne at once began to
sob. Aunt Lison timidly remained in a dark corner.
"Why does he need to know so much?" asked his mother. "We will make a
gentleman farmer of him. He can cultivate his land, as many of the
nobility do. He will live and grow old happily in this house, where we
have lived before him and where we shall die. What more can one do?"
But the baron shook his head. "What would you say to him if he should
say to you when he is twenty-five: 'I amount to nothing, I know
nothing, all through your fault, the fault of your maternal
selfishness. I feel that I am incapable of working, of making
something of myself, and yet I was not intended for a secluded, simple
life, lonely enough to kill one, to which I have been condemned by
your shortsighted affection.'"
She was weeping and said entreatingly: "Tell me, Poulet, you will not
reproach me for having loved you too well?" And the big boy, in
surprise, promised that he never would. "Swear it," she said. "Yes,
mamma." "You want to stay here, don't you?" "Yes, mamma."
Then the baron spoke up loud and decidedly: "Jeanne, you have no right
to make disposition of this life. What you are doing is cowardly and
almost criminal; you are sacrificing your child to your own private
happiness."
She hid her face in her hands, sobbing convulsively, and stammered out
amid her tears: "I have been so unhappy--so unhappy! Now, just as I am
living peacefully with him, they want to take him away from me. What
will become of me now--all by myself?" Her father rose and, sitting
down beside her, put his arms round her. "And how about me, Jeanne?"
She put her arms suddenly round his neck, gave him a hearty kiss and
with her voice full of tears, she said: "Yes, you are right perhaps,
little father. I was foolish, but I have suffered so much. I am quite
willing he should go to college."
And without knowing exactly what they were going to do with him,
Poulet in his turn began to weep.
Then the three mothers began to kiss him and pet him and encourage
him. When they retired to their rooms it was with a weight at their
hearts, and they all wept, even the baron, who had restrained himself
up to that.
It was decided that when the term began to put the young boy to school
at Havre, and during the summer he was petted more than ever; his
mother sighed often as she thought of the separation. She prepared his
wardrobe as if he were going to undertake a ten years' voyage. One
October morning, after a sleepless night, the two women and the baron
got into the carriage with him and set out on their journey.
They had previously selected his place in the dormitory and his desk
in the school room. Jeanne, aided by Aunt Lison, spent the whole day
in arranging his clothes in his little wardrobe. As it did not hold a
quarter of what they had brought, she went to look for the
superintendent to ask for another. The treasurer was called, but he
pointed out that all that amount of clothing would only be in the way
and would never be needed, and he refused, on behalf of the directors,
to let her have another chest of drawers. Jeanne, much annoyed,
decided to hire a room in a small neighboring hotel, begging the
proprietor to go himself and take Poulet whatever he required as soon
as the boy asked for it.
They then took a walk on the pier to look at the ships coming and
going. They went into a restaurant to dine, but they were none of them
able to eat, and looked at one another with moistened eyes as the
dishes were brought on and taken away almost untouched.
They now returned slowly toward the school. Boys of all ages were
arriving from all quarters, accompanied by their families or by
servants. Many of them were crying.
Jeanne held Poulet in a long embrace, while Aunt Lison remained in the
background, her face hidden in her handkerchief. The baron, however,
who was becoming affected, cut short the adieus by dragging his
daughter away. They got into the carriage and went back through the
darkness to "The Poplars," the silence being broken by an occasional
sob.
Jeanne wept all the following day and on the day after drove to Havre
in the phaeton. Poulet seemed to have become reconciled to the
separation. For the first time in his life he now had playmates, and
in his anxiety to join them he could scarcely sit still on his chair
when his mother called. She continued her visits to him every other
day and called to take him home on Sundays. Not knowing what to do
with herself while school was in session until recreation time, she
would remain sitting in the reception room, not having the strength or
the courage to go very far from the school. The superintendent sent to
ask her to come to his office and begged her not to come so
frequently. She paid no attention to his request. He therefore
informed her that if she continued to prevent her son from taking his
recreation at the usual hours, obliging him to work without a change
of occupation, they would be forced to send him back home again, and
the baron was also notified to the same effect. She was consequently
watched like a prisoner at "The Poplars."
She became restless and worried and would ramble about for whole days
in the country, accompanied only by Massacre, dreaming as she walked
along. Sometimes she would remain seated for a whole afternoon,
looking out at the sea from the top of the cliff; at other times she
would go down to Yport through the wood, going over the ground of her
former walks, the memory of which haunted her. How long ago--how long
ago it was--the time when she had gone over these same paths as a
young girl, carried away by her dreams.
Poulet was not very industrious at school; he was kept two years in
the fourth form. The third year's work was only tolerable and he had
to begin the second over again, so that he was in rhetoric when he was
twenty.
He was now a big, fair young man, with downy whiskers and a faint sign
of a mustache. He now came home to "The Poplars" every Sunday, riding
over in a couple of hours, his mother, Aunt Lison and the baron
starting out early to go and meet him.
Although he was a head taller than his mother, she always treated him
as though he were a child, and when he returned to school in the
evening she would charge him anxiously not to go too fast and to think
of his poor mother, who would break her heart if anything happened to
him.
One Saturday morning she received a letter from Paul, saying that he
would not be home on the following day because some friends had
arranged an excursion and had invited him. She was tormented with
anxiety all day Sunday, as though she dreaded some misfortune, and on
Thursday, as she could endure it no longer, she set out for Havre.
He seemed to be changed, though she could not have told in what
manner. He appeared excited and his voice seemed deeper. And suddenly,
as though it were the most natural thing in the world, he said: "I
say, mother, as long as you have come to-day, I want to tell you that
I will not be at 'The Poplars' next Sunday, for we are going to have
another excursion."
She was amazed, smothering, as if he had announced his departure for
America. At last, recovering herself, she said: "Oh, Poulet, what is
the matter with you? Tell me what is going on."
He began to laugh, and kissing her, replied: "Why, nothing, nothing,
mamma. I am going to have a good time with my friends; I am just at
that age."
She had nothing to say, but when she was alone in the carriage all
manner of ideas came into her mind. She no longer recognized him, her
Poulet, her little Poulet of former days. She felt for the first time
that he was grown up, that he no longer belonged to her, that he was
going to live his life without troubling himself about the old people.
It seemed to her that one day had wrought this change in him. Was it
possible that this was her son, her poor little boy who had helped her
to replant the lettuce, this great big bearded youth who had a will of
his own!
For three months Paul came home only occasionally, and always seemed
impatient to get away again, trying to steal off an hour earlier each
evening. Jeanne was alarmed, but the baron consoled her, saying: "Let
him alone; the boy is twenty years old."
One morning, however, an old man, poorly dressed, inquired in
German-French for "Madame la Vicomtesse," and after many ceremonious
bows, he drew from his pocket a dilapidated pocketbook, saying: "Che un
betit bapier bour fous," and unfolding as he handed it to her a piece
of greasy paper. She read and reread it, looked at the Jew, read it
over again and asked: "What does it mean?"
He obsequiously explained: "I will tell you. Your son needed a little
money, and as I knew that you are a good mother, I lent him a trifle
to help him out."
Jeanne was trembling. "But why did he not ask me?" The Jew explained
at length that it was a question of a debt that must be paid before
noon the following day; that Paul not being of age, no one would have
lent him anything, and that his "honor would have been compromised"
without this little service that he had rendered the young man.
Jeanne tried to call the baron, but had not the strength to rise, she
was so overcome by emotion. At length she said to the usurer: "Would
you have the kindness to ring the bell?"
He hesitated, fearing some trap, and then stammered out: "If I am
intruding, I will call again." She shook her head in the negative. He
then rang, and they waited in silence, sitting opposite each other.
When the baron came in he understood the situation at once. The note
was for fifteen hundred francs. He paid one thousand, saying close to
the man's face: "And on no account come back." The other thanked him
and went his way.
The baron and Jeanne set out at once for Havre. On reaching the
college they learned that Paul had not been there for a month. The
principal had received four letters signed by Jeanne saying that his
pupil was not well and then to tell how he was getting along. Each
letter was accompanied by a doctor's certificate. They were, of
course, all forged. They were all dumbfounded, and stood there looking
at each other.
The principal, very much worried, took them to the commissary of
police. Jeanne and her father stayed at a hotel that night. The
following day the young man was found in the apartment of a courtesan
of the town. His grandfather and mother took him back to "The Poplars"
and not a word was exchanged between them during the whole journey.
A week later they discovered that he had contracted fifteen thousand
francs' worth of debts within the last three months. His creditors had
not come forward at first, knowing that he would soon be of age.
They entered into no discussion about it, hoping to win him back by
gentleness. They gave him dainty food, petted him, spoiled him. It was
spring and they hired a boat for him at Yport, in spite of Jeanne's
fears, so that he might amuse himself on the water.
They would not let him have a horse, for fear he should ride to Havre.
He was there with nothing to do and became irritable and occasionally
brutally so. The baron was worried at the discontinuance of his
studies. Jeanne, distracted at the idea of a separation, asked herself
what they could do with him.
One evening he did not come home. They learned that he had gone out in
a boat with two sailors. His mother, beside herself with anxiety, went
down to Yport without a hat in the dark. Some men were on the beach,
waiting for the boat to come in. There was a light on board an
incoming boat, but Paul was not on board. He had made them take him to
Havre.
The police sought him in vain; he could not be found. The woman with
whom he had been found the first time had also disappeared without
leaving any trace; her furniture was sold and her rent paid. In Paul's
room at "The Poplars" were found two letters from this person, who
seemed to be madly in love with him. She spoke of a voyage to England,
having, she said, obtained the necessary funds.
The three dwellers in the château lived silently and drearily, their
minds tortured by all kinds of suppositions. Jeanne's hair, which had
become gray, now turned perfectly white. She asked in her innocence
why fate had thus afflicted her.
She received a letter from the Abbé Tolbiac: "Madame, the hand of God
is weighing heavily on you. You refused Him your child; He took him
from you in His turn to cast him into the hands of a prostitute. Will
not you open your eyes at this lesson from Heaven? God's mercy is
infinite. Perhaps He may pardon you if you return and fall on your
knees before Him. I am His humble servant. I will open to you the door
of His dwelling when you come and knock at it."
She sat a long time with this letter on her lap. Perhaps it was true
what the priest said. And all her religious doubts began to torment
her conscience. And in her cowardly hesitation, which drives to church
the doubting, the sorrowful, she went furtively one evening at
twilight to the parsonage, and kneeling at the feet of the thin abbé,
begged for absolution.
He promised her a conditional pardon, as God could not pour down all
His favors on a roof that sheltered a man like the baron. "You will
soon feel the effects of the divine mercy," he declared.
Two days later she did, indeed, receive a letter from her son, and in
her discouragement and grief she looked upon this as the commencement
of the consolation promised her by the abbé. The letter ran:
"My Dear Mamma: Do not be uneasy. I am in London, in good health, in
very great need of money. We have not a sou left, and we do not have
anything to eat some days. The one who is with me, and whom I love
with all my heart, has spent all that she had so as not to leave
me--five thousand francs--and you see that I am bound in honor to
return her this sum in the first place. So I wish you would be kind
enough to advance me fifteen thousand francs of papa's fortune, for I
shall soon be of age. This will help me out of very serious
difficulties.
"Good-by, my dear mamma. I embrace you with all my heart, and also
grandfather and Aunt Lison. I hope to see you soon.
"Your son,
"Vicomte Paul de Lamare."
He had written to her! He had not forgotten her then. She did not care
anything about his asking for money! She would send him some as long
as he had none. What did money matter? He had written to her! And she
ran, weeping for joy, to show this letter to the baron. Aunt Lison was
called and read over word by word this paper that told of him. They
discussed each sentence.
Jeanne, jumping from the most complete despair to a kind of
intoxication of hope, took Paul's part. "He will come back, he will
come back as he has written."
The baron, more calm, said: "All the same he left us for that
creature, so he must love her better than us, as he did not hesitate
about it."
A sudden and frightful pang struck Jeanne's heart, and immediately she
was filled with hatred of this woman who had stolen her son from her,
an unappeasable, savage hate, the hatred of a jealous mother. Until
now all her thoughts had been given to Paul. She scarcely took into
consideration that a girl had been the cause of his vagaries. But the
baron's words had suddenly brought before her this rival, had revealed
her fatal power, and she felt that between herself and this woman a
struggle was about to begin, and she also felt that she would rather
lose her son than share his affection with another. And all her joy
was at an end.
They sent him the fifteen thousand francs and heard nothing more from
him for five months.
Then a business man came to settle the details of Julien's
inheritance. Jeanne and the baron handed over the accounts without any
discussion, even giving up the interest that should come to his
mother. When Paul came back to Paris he had a hundred and twenty
thousand francs. He then wrote four letters in six months, giving his
news in concise terms and ending the letters with coldly affectionate
expressions. "I am working," he said; "I have obtained a position on
the stock exchange. I hope to go and embrace you at 'The Poplars' some
day, my dear parents."
He did not mention his companion, and this silence implied more than
if he had filled four pages with news of her. Jeanne, in these cold
letters, felt this woman in ambush, the implacable, eternal enemy of
mothers, the courtesan.
The three lonely beings discussed the best plan to follow in order to
rescue Paul, but could decide on nothing. A voyage to Paris? What good
would it do?
"Let his passion exhaust itself. He will come back then of his own
accord," said the baron.
Some time passed without any further news. But one morning they were
terrified at the receipt of a despairing letter:
"My Poor Mamma: I am lost. There is nothing left for me to do but to
blow out my brains unless you come to my aid. A speculation that gave
every prospect of success has fallen through, and I am eighty-five
thousand dollars in debt. I shall be dishonored if I do not pay
up--ruined--and it will henceforth be impossible for me to do
anything. I am lost. I repeat that I would rather blow out my brains
than undergo this disgrace. I should have done so already, probably,
but for the encouragement of a woman of whom I never speak to you,
and who is my providence.
"I embrace you from the bottom of my heart, my dear mamma--perhaps for
the last time. Good-by.
"Paul."
A package of business papers accompanying the letter gave the details
of the failure.
The baron answered by return mail that they would see what could be
done. Then he set out for Havre to get advice and he mortgaged some
property to raise the money which was sent to Paul.
The young man wrote three letters full of the most heartfelt thanks
and passionate affection, saying he was coming home at once to see his
dear parents.
But he did not come.
A whole year passed. Jeanne and the baron were about to set out for
Paris to try and make a last effort, when they received a line to say
that he was in London again, setting an enterprise on foot in
connection with steamboats under the name of "Paul de Lamare & Co." He
wrote: "This will give me an assured fortune, and perhaps great
wealth, and I am risking nothing. You can see at once what a splendid
thing it is. When I see you again I shall have a fine position in
society. There is nothing but business these days to help you out of
difficulties."
Three months later the steamboat company failed and the manager was
being sought for on account of certain irregularities in business
methods. Jeanne had a nervous attack that lasted several hours and
then she took to her bed.
The baron again went to Havre to make inquiries, saw some lawyers,
some business men, some solicitors and bailiffs and found that the
liabilities of the De Lamare concern were two hundred and thirty-five
thousand francs, and he once more mortgaged some property. The château
of "The Poplars" and the two farms and all that went with them were
mortgaged for a large sum.
One evening as he was arranging the final details in the office of a
business man, he fell over on the floor with a stroke of apoplexy.
A man was sent on horseback to notify Jeanne, but when she arrived he
was dead.
She took his body back to "The Poplars," so overcome that her grief
was numbness rather than despair.
Abbé Tolbiac refused to permit the body to be brought to the church,
despite the distracted entreaties of the two women. The baron was
interred at twilight without any religious ceremony.
Paul learned of the event through one of the men who was settling up
his affairs. He was still in hiding in England. He wrote to make
excuses for not having come home, saying that he had learned of his
grandfather's death too late. "However, now that you have helped me
out of my difficulties, my dear mamma, I shall go back to France and
hope to embrace you soon."
Jeanne was so crushed in spirit that she appeared not to understand
anything. Toward the end of the winter Aunt Lison, who was now
sixty-eight, had an attack of bronchitis that developed into pneumonia,
and she died quietly, murmuring with her last breath: "My poor
little Jeanne, I will ask God to take pity on you."
Jeanne followed her to the grave, and as the earth fell on her coffin
she sank to the ground, wishing that she might die also, so as not to
suffer, to think. A strong peasant woman lifted her up and carried her
away as if she had been a child.
When she reached the château Jeanne, who had spent the last five
nights at Aunt Lison's bedside, allowed herself to be put to bed
without resistance by this unknown peasant woman, who handled her with
gentleness and firmness, and she fell asleep from exhaustion, overcome
with weariness and suffering.
She awoke about the middle of the night. A night light was burning on
the mantelpiece. A woman was asleep in her easy chair. Who was this
woman? She did not recognize her, and leaning over the edge of her
bed, she sought to examine her features by the dim light of the wick
floating in oil in a tumbler of water.
It seemed to her that she had seen this face. But when, but where? The
woman was sleeping peacefully, her head to one side and her cap on the
floor. She might be about forty or forty-five. She was stout, with a
high color, squarely built and powerful. Her large hands hung down at
either side of the chair. Her hair was turning gray. Jeanne looked at
her fixedly, her mind in the disturbed condition of one awaking from a
feverish sleep after a great sorrow.
She had certainly seen this face! Was it in former days? Was it of
late years? She could not tell, and the idea distressed her, upset her
nerves. She rose noiselessly to take another look at the sleeping
woman, walking over on tiptoe. It was the woman who had lifted her up
in the cemetery and then put her to bed. She remembered this
confusedly.
But had she met her elsewhere at some other time of her life or did
she only imagine she recognized her amid the confused recollections of
the day before? And how did she come to be there in her room and why?
The woman opened her eyes and, seeing Jeanne, she rose to her feet
suddenly. They stood face to face, so close that they touched one
another. The stranger said crossly: "What! are you up? You will be
ill, getting up at this time of night. Go back to bed!"
"Who are you?" asked Jeanne.
But the woman, opening her arms, picked her up and carried her back to
her bed with the strength of a man. And as she laid her down gently
and drew the covers over her, she leaned over close to Jeanne and,
weeping as she did so, she kissed her passionately on the cheeks, her
hair, her eyes, the tears falling on her face as she stammered out:
"My poor mistress, Mam'zelle Jeanne, my poor mistress, don't you
recognize me?"
"Rosalie, my girl!" cried Jeanne, throwing her arms round her neck and
hugging her as she kissed her, and they sobbed together, clasped in
each other's arms.
Rosalie was the first to regain her calmness. "Come," she said, "you
must be sensible and not catch cold." And she covered her up warm and
straightened the pillow under her former mistress' head. The latter
continued to sob, trembling all over at the recollections that were
awakened in her mind. She finally inquired: "How did you come back, my
poor girl?"
"Pardi! do you suppose I was going to leave you all alone like that,
now?" replied Rosalie.
"Light a candle, so I may see you," said Jeanne. And when the candle
was brought to the bedside they looked at each other for some time
without speaking a word. Then Jeanne, holding out her hand to her
former maid, murmured: "I should not have recognized you, my girl, you
have changed greatly; did you know it? But not as much as I have." And
Rosalie, looking at this white-haired woman, thin and faded, whom she
had left a beautiful and fresh young woman, said: "That is true, you
have changed, Madame Jeanne, and more than you should. But remember,
however, that we have not seen each other for twenty-five years."
They were silent, thinking over the past. At length Jeanne said
hesitatingly: "Have you been happy?"
Rosalie, fearful of awakening certain painful souvenirs, stammered
out: "Why--yes--yes--madame. I have nothing much to complain of. I
have been happier than you have--that is sure. There was only one
thing that always weighed on my heart, and that was that I did not
stay here--" And she stopped suddenly, sorry she had referred to that
unintentionally. But Jeanne replied gently: "How could you help it, my
girl? One cannot always do as they wish. You are a widow now, also,
are you not?" Then her voice trembled with emotion as she said: "Have
you other--other children?"
"No, madame."
"And he--your--your boy--what has become of him? Has he turned out
well?"
"Yes, madame, he is a good boy and works industriously. He has been
married for six months, and he can take my farm now, since I have come
back to you."
Jeanne murmured in a trembling voice: "Then you will never leave me
again, my girl?"
"No, indeed, madame, I have arranged all that."
Jeanne, in spite of herself, began to compare their lives, but without
any bitterness, for she was now resigned to the unjust cruelty of
fate. She said: "And your husband, how did he treat you?"
"Oh, he was a good man, madame, and not lazy; he knew how to make
money. He died of consumption."
Then Jeanne, sitting up in bed, filled with a longing to know more,
said: "Come, tell me everything, my girl, all about your life. It will
do me good just now."
Rosalie, drawing up her chair, began to tell about herself, her home,
her people, entering into those minute details dear to country people,
describing her yard, laughing at some old recollection that reminded
her of good times she had had, and raising her voice by degrees like a
farmer's wife accustomed to command. She ended by saying: "Oh, I am
well off now. I don't have to worry." Then she became confused again,
and said in a lower tone: "It is to you that I owe it, anyhow; and you
know I do not want any wages. No, indeed! No, indeed! And if you will
not have it so, I will go."
Jeanne replied: "You do not mean that you are going to serve me for
nothing?"
"Oh, yes, indeed, madame. Money! You give me money! Why, I have almost
as much as you. Do you know what is left to you will all your jumble
of mortgages and borrowing, and interests unpaid which are mounting up
every year? Do you know? No, is it not so? Well, then, I can promise
you that you have not even ten thousand francs income. Not ten
thousand, do you understand? But I will settle all that for you, and
very quickly."
She had begun talking loud again, carried away in her indignation at
these interests left unpaid, at this threatening ruin. And as a faint,
tender smile passed over the face of her mistress, she cried in a tone
of annoyance: "You must not laugh, madame, for without money we are
nothing but laborers."
Jeanne took hold of her hands and kept them in her own; then she said
slowly, still full of the idea that haunted her: "Oh, I have had no
luck. Everything has gone against me. Fate has a grudge against my
life."
But Rosalie shook her head: "You must not say that, madame. You
married badly, that's all. One should not marry like that, anyway,
without knowing anything about one's intended."
And they went on talking about themselves just as two old friends
might have done.
The sun rose while they were still talking.
In a week's time Rosalie had taken absolute control of everything and
everyone in the château. Jeanne was quite resigned and obeyed
passively. Weak and dragging her feet as she walked, as little mother
had formerly done, she went out walking leaning on Rosalie's arm, the
latter lecturing her and consoling her with abrupt and tender words as
they walked slowly along, treating her mistress as though she were a
sick child.
They always talked of bygone days, Jeanne with tears in her throat,
and Rosalie in the quiet tone of a phlegmatic peasant. The servant
kept referring to the subject of unpaid interests; and at last
requested Jeanne to give her up all the business papers that Jeanne,
in her ignorance of money matters, was hiding from her, out of
consideration for her son.
After that, for a week, Rosalie went to Fécamp every day to have
matters explained to her by a lawyer whom she knew.
One evening, after having put her mistress to bed, she sat down by the
bedside and said abruptly: "Now that you are settled quietly, madame,
we will have a chat." And she told her exactly how matters stood.
When everything was settled, there would be about seven thousand
francs of income left, no more.
"We cannot help it, my girl," said Jeanne. "I feel that I shall not
make old bones, and there will be quite enough for me."
But Rosalie was annoyed: "For you, madame, it might be; but M.
Paul--will you leave nothing for him?"
Jeanne shuddered. "I beg you not to mention him again. It hurts me too
much to think about him."
"But I wish to speak about him, because you see you are not brave,
Madame Jeanne. He does foolish things. Well! what of it? He will not
do so always; and then he will marry and have children. He will need
money to bring them up. Pay attention to me: you must sell 'The
Poplars.'"
Jeanne sprang up in a sitting posture. "Sell 'The Poplars'! Do you
mean it? Oh, never, never!"
But Rosalie was not disturbed. "I tell you that you will sell the
place, madame, because it must be done." And then she explained her
calculations, her plans, her reasons.
Once they had sold "The Poplars" and the two farms belonging to it to
a buyer whom she had found, they would keep four farms situated at St.
Leonard, which, free of all mortgage, would bring in an income of
eight thousand three hundred francs. They would set aside thirteen
hundred francs a year for repairs and for the upkeep of the property;
there would then remain seven thousand francs, five thousand of which
would cover the annual expenditures and the other two thousand would
be put away for a rainy day.
She added: "All the rest has been squandered; there is an end of it.
And then I am to keep the key, you understand. As for M. Paul, he will
have nothing left, nothing; he would take your last sou from you."
Jeanne, who was weeping silently, murmured:
"But if he has nothing to eat?"
"He can come and eat with us if he is hungry. There will always be a
bed and some stew for him. Do you believe he would have acted as he
has done if you had not given him a sou in the first place?"
"But he was in debt, he would have been disgraced."
"When you have nothing left, will that prevent him from making fresh
debts? You have paid his debts, that is all right; but you will not
pay any more; it is I who am telling you this. Now goodnight, madame."
And she left the room.
Jeanne did not sleep, she was so upset at the idea of selling "The
Poplars," of going away, of leaving this house to which all her life
was linked.
When Rosalie came into the room next morning she said to her: "My poor
girl, I never could make up my mind to go away from here."
But the servant grew angry: "It will have to be, however, madame; the
lawyer will soon be here with the man who wants to buy the château.
Otherwise, in four years you will not have a rap left."
Jeanne was crushed, and repeated: "I could not do it; I never could."
An hour later the postman brought her a letter from Paul asking for
ten thousand francs. What should she do? At her wit's end, she
consulted Rosalie, who threw up her hands, exclaiming: "What was I
telling you, madame? Ah! You would have been in a nice fix, both of
you, if I had not come back." And Jeanne, bending to her servant's
will, wrote as follows to the young man:
"My Dear Son: I can do nothing more for you. You have ruined me; I am
even obliged to sell 'The Poplars.' But never forget that I shall
always have a home whenever you want to seek shelter with your old
mother, to whom you have caused much suffering. Jeanne."
When the notary arrived with M. Jeoffrin, a retired sugar refiner, she
received them herself, and invited them to look over the château.
A month later, she signed a deed of sale, and also bought herself a
little cottage in the neighborhood of Goderville, on the high road to
Montiviliers, in the hamlet of Batteville.
Then she walked up and down all alone until evening, in little
mother's avenue, with a sore heart and troubled mind, bidding
distracted and sobbing farewells to the landscape, the trees, the
rustic bench under the plane tree, to all those things she knew so
well and that seemed to have become part of her vision and her soul,
the grove, the mound overlooking the plain, where she had so often
sat, and from where she had seen the Comte de Fourville running toward
the sea on that terrible day of Julian's death, to an old elm whose
upper branches were missing, against which she had often leaned, and
to all this familiar garden spot.
Rosalie came out and took her by the arm to make her come into the
house.
A tall young peasant of twenty-five was waiting outside the door. He
greeted her in a friendly manner as if he had known her for some time:
"Good-morning, Madame Jeanne. I hope you are well. Mother told me to
come and help you move. I would like to know what you are going to
take away, seeing that I shall do it from time to time so as not to
interfere with my farm work."
It was her maid's son, Julien's son, Paul's brother.
She felt as if her heart stopped beating; and yet she would have liked
to embrace this young fellow.
She looked at him, trying to find some resemblance to her husband or
to her son. He was ruddy, vigorous, with fair hair and his mother's
blue eyes. And yet he looked like Julien. In what way? How? She could
not have told, but there was something like him in the whole makeup of
his face.
The young man resumed: "If you could show me at once, I should be much
obliged."
But she had not yet decided what she was going to take with her, as
her new home was very small; and she begged him to come back again at
the end of the week.
She was now entirely occupied with getting ready to move, which
brought a little variety into her very dreary and hopeless life. She
went from room to room, picking out the furniture which recalled
episodes in her life, old friends, as it were, who have a share in our
life and almost of our being, whom we have known since childhood, and
to which are linked our happy or sad recollections, dates in our
history; silent companions of our sad or sombre hours, who have grown
old and become worn at our side, their covers torn in places, their
joints shaky, their color faded.
She selected them, one by one, sometimes hesitating and troubled, as
if she were taking some important step, changing her mind every
instant, weighing the merits of two easy chairs or of some old
writing-desk and an old work table.
She opened the drawers, sought to recall things; then, when she had
said to herself, "Yes, I will take this," the article was taken down
into the dining-room.
She wished to keep all the furniture of her room, her bed, her
tapestries, her clock, everything.
She took away some of the parlor chairs, those that she had loved as a
little child; the fox and the stork, the fox and the crow, the ant and
the grasshopper, and the melancholy heron.
Then, while wandering about in all the corners of this dwelling she
was going to forsake, she went one day up into the loft, where she was
filled with amazement; it was a chaos of articles of every kind, some
broken, others tarnished only, others taken up there for no special
reason probably, except that they were tired of them or that they had
been replaced by others. She saw numberless knick-knacks that she
remembered, and that had disappeared suddenly, trifles that she had
handled, those old little insignificant articles that she had seen
every day without noticing, but which now, discovered in this loft,
assumed an importance as of forgotten relics, of friends that she had
found again.
She went from one to the other of them with a little pang, saying:
"Why, it was I who broke that china cup a few evenings before my
wedding. Ah! there is mother's little lantern and a cane that little
father broke in trying to open the gate when the wood was swollen with
the rain."
There were also a number of things that she did not remember that had
belonged to her grandparents or to their parents, dusty things that
appeared to be exiled in a period that is not their own, and that
looked sad at their abandonment, and whose history, whose experiences
no one knows, for they never saw those who chose them, bought them,
owned them, and loved them; never knew the hands that had touched them
familiarly, and the eyes that looked at them with delight.
Jeanne examined carefully three-legged chairs to see if they recalled
any memories, a copper warming pan, a damaged foot stove that she
thought she remembered, and a number of housekeeping utensils unfit
for use.
She then put together all the things she wished to take, and going
downstairs, sent Rosalie up to get them. The servant indignantly
refused to bring down "that rubbish." But Jeanne, who had not much
will left, held her own this time, and had to be obeyed.
One morning the young farmer, Julien's son, Denis Lecoq, came with his
wagon for the first load. Rosalie went back with him in order to
superintend the unloading and placing of furniture where it was to
stand.
Rosalie had come back and was waiting for Jeanne, who had been out on
the cliff. She was enchanted with the new house, declaring it was much
more cheerful than this old box of a building, which was not even on
the side of the road.
Jeanne wept all the evening.
Ever since they heard that the château was sold, the farmers were not
more civil to her than necessary, calling her among themselves "the
crazy woman," without knowing exactly why, but doubtless because they
guessed with their animal instinct at her morbid and increasing
sentimentality, at all the disturbance of her poor mind that had
undergone so much sorrow.
The night before they left she chanced to go into the stable. A growl
made her start. It was Massacre, whom she had hardly thought of for
months. Blind and paralyzed, having reached a great age for an animal,
he existed in a straw bed, taken care of by Ludivine, who never forgot
him. She took him in her arms, kissed him, and carried him into the
house. As big as a barrel, he could scarcely carry himself along on
his stiff legs, and he barked like the wooden dogs that one gives to
children.
The day of departure finally came. Jeanne had slept in Julien's old
room, as hers was dismantled. She got up exhausted and short of breath
as if she had been running. The carriage containing the trunks and the
rest of the furniture was in the yard ready to start. Another
two-wheeled vehicle was to take Jeanne and the servant. Old Simon and
Ludivine were to stay until the arrival of a new proprietor, and then
to go to some of their relations, Jeanne having provided a little
income for them. They had also saved up some money, and being now very
old and garrulous, they were not of much use in the house. Marius had
long since married and left.
About eight o'clock it began to rain, a fine icy rain, driven by a
light breeze. On the kitchen table, some cups of café au lait were
steaming. Jeanne sat down and sipped hers, then rising, she said,
"Come along."
She put on her hat and shawl, and while Rosalie was putting on her
overshoes, she said in a choking voice: "Do you remember, my girl, how
it rained when we left Rouen to come here?"
As she said this, she put her two hands to her breast and fell over on
her back, unconscious. She remained thus over an hour, apparently
dead. Then she opened her eyes and was seized with convulsions
accompanied by floods of tears.
When she was a little calmer she was so weak that she could not stand
up, and Rosalie, fearing another attack if they delayed their
departure, went to look for her son. They took her up and carried her
to the carriage, placed her on the wooden bench covered with leather;
and the old servant got in beside her, wrapped her up with a big
cloak, and holding an umbrella over her head, cried: "Quick, Denis,
let us be off." The young man climbed up beside his mother and whipped
up the horse, whose jerky pace made the two women bounce about
vigorously.
As they turned the corner to enter the village, they saw some one
stalking along the road; it was Abbé Tolbiac, who seemed to be
watching for them to go by. He stopped to let the carriage pass. He
was holding up his cassock with one hand, to keep it out of the mud,
and his thin legs, encased in black stockings, ended in a pair of
enormous muddy shoes.
Jeanne lowered her eyes so as not to meet his glance, and Rosalie, who
had heard all about him, flew into a rage. "Peasant! Peasant!" she
murmured; and then seizing her son's hand: "Give him a good slash with
the whip."