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44

JOSEPH JASPER.

Another fact Mewks carried to his master--namely, that, as Mary came near the door of the house, she was met by "a rough-looking man," who came walking slowly along, as if he had been going up and down waiting for her. He made her an awkward bow as she drew near, and she stopped and had a long conversation with him--such at least it seemed to Mewks, annoyed that he could hear nothing of it, and fearful of attracting their attention--after which the man went away, and Mary went into the house. This report made his master grin, for, through the description Mewks gave, he suspected a thief disguised as a workman; but, his hopes being against the supposition, he dwelt the less upon it. The man who stopped Mary, and whom, indeed, she would have stopped, was Joseph Jasper, the blacksmith. That he was rough in appearance, no one who knew him would have wished himself able to deny, and one less like a thief would have been hard to find. His hands were very rough and ingrained with black; his fingers were long, but chopped off square at the points, and had no resemblance to the long, tapering fingers of an artist or pickpocket. His clothes were of corduroy, not very grimy, because of the huge apron of thick leather he wore at his work, but they looked none the better that he had topped them with his tall Sunday hat. His complexion was a mixture of brown and browner; his black eyebrows hung far over the blackest of eyes, the brightest flashing of which was never seen, because all the time he played he kept them closed tight. His face wore its natural clothing--a mustache thick and well-shaped, and a beard not too large, of a color that looked like black burned brown. His hair was black and curled all over his head. His whole appearance was that of a workman; a careless glance could never have suspected him a poet-musician; as little could even such a glance have failed to see in him an honest man. He was powerfully built, over the middle height, but not tall. He spoke very fair old-fashioned English, with the Yorkshire tone and turn. His walk was rather plodding, and his movements slow and stiff; but in communion with his violin they were free enough, and the more delicate for the strength that was in them; at the anvil they were as supple as powerful. On his face dwelt an expression that was not to be read by the indifferent--a waiting in the midst of work, as of a man to whom the sense of the temporary was always present, but present with the constant reminder that, just therefore, work must be as good as work can be that things may last their due time. The following was the conversation concerning the purport of which Mewks was left to what conjecture was possible to a serving-man of his stamp. Mary held out her hand to Jasper, and it disappeared in his. He held it for a moment with a great but gentle grasp, and, as he let it go, said: "I took the liberty of watching for you, miss. I wanted to ask a favor of you. It seemed to me you would take no offense." "You might be sure of that," Mary answered. "You have a right to anything I can do for you." He fixed his gaze on her for a moment, as if he did not understand her. "That's where it is," he said: "I've _done_ nothing for your people. It's all very well to go playing and playing, but that's not doing anything; and, if _he_ had done nothing, there would ha' been no fiddling. You understand me, miss, I know: work comes before music, and makes the soul of it; it's not the music that makes the doing. I'm a poor hand at saying without my fiddle, miss: you'll excuse me." Mary's heart was throbbing. She had not heard a word like this--not since her father went to what people call the "long home"--as if a home could be too long! What do we want but an endless home? --only it is not the grave! She felt as if the spirit of her father had descended on the strange workman, and had sent him to her. She looked at him with shining eyes, and did not speak. He resumed, as fearing he had not conveyed his thought. "What I think I mean is, miss, that, if the working of miracles in his name wouldn't do it, it's not likely playing the fiddle will." "Oh, I understand you so well!" said Mary, in a voice hardly her own, "--so well! It makes me happy to hear you! Tell me what I can do for you." "The poor gentleman in there must want all the help you can give him, and more. There must be something left, surely, for a man to do. He must want lifting at times, for instance, and that's not fit for either of you ladies." "Thank you," said Mary, heartily. "I will mention it to Mrs. Helmer, and I am sure she will be very glad of your help sometimes." "Couldn't you ask her now, miss? I should like to know at what hour I might call. But perhaps the best way would be to walk about here in the evening, after my day's work is over, and then you could run down any time, and look out: that would be enough; I should be there. Saturday nights I could just as well be there all night." To Tom and Letty it seemed not a little peculiar that a man so much a stranger should be ready to walk about the street in order to be at hand with help for them; but Mary was only delighted, not surprised, for what the man had said to her made the thing not merely intelligible, but absolutely reasonable. Joseph was not, however, allowed to wander the street. The arrangement made was, that, as soon as his work was over, he should come and see whether there was anything he could do for them. And he never came but there was plenty to do. He took a lodging close by, that he might be with them earlier, and stay later; and, when nothing else was wanted of him, he was always ready to discourse on his violin. Sometimes Tom enjoyed his music much, though he found no little fault with his mode of playing, for Tom knew something about everything, and could render many a reason; at other times, he preferred having Mary read to him. On one of these latter occasions, Mary, occupied in cooking something for the invalid, asked Joseph to read for her. He consented, but read very badly--as if he had no understanding of the words, but, on the other hand, stopping every few lines, apparently to think and master what he had read. This was not good reading anyway, least of all for an invalid who required the soothing of half-thought, molten and diluted in sweet, even, monotonous sound, and it was long before Mary asked him again. Many things showed that he had had little education, and therefore probably the more might be made of him. Mary saw that he must be what men call a genius, for his external history had been, by his own showing, of an altogether commonplace type. His father, who was a blacksmith before him, and a local preacher, had married a second time, and Joseph was the only child of the second marriage. His father had brought him up to his own trade, and, after his death, Joseph came to work in London, whither his sister had preceded him. He was now thirty, and had from the first been saving what he could of his wages in the hope of one day having a smithy of his own, and his time more at his ordering. Mary saw too that in his violin he possessed a grand fundamental undeveloped education; he was like a man going about the world with a ten-thousand-pound-note in his pocket, and not many sixpences to pay his way with. But there was another education working in him far deeper, and already more developed, than that which divine music even was giving him; this also Mary thoroughly recognized; this it was in him that chiefly attracted her; and the man himself knew it as underlying all his consciousness. Though he could ill read aloud, he could read well for his inward nourishment; he could write tolerably, and, if he could not spell, that mattered a straw, and no more; he had never read a play of Shakespeare--had never seen a play; knew nothing of grammar or geography--or of history, except the one history comprising all. He knew nothing of science; but he could shoe a horse as well as any man in the three Ridings, and make his violin talk about things far beyond the ken of most men of science. So much of a change had passed upon Tom in his illness, that Mary saw it not unreasonable to try upon him now and then a poem of her favorite singer. Occasionally, of course, the feeling was altogether beyond him, but even then he would sometimes enter into the literary merit of the utterance. "I had no idea there were such gems in George Herbert, Mary!" he said once. "I declare, some of them are even in their structure finer than many things that have nothing in them to admire except the structure." "That is not to be wondered at," replied Mary. "No," said Joseph; "it is not to be wondered at; for it's clear to me the old gentleman plied a good bow. I can see that plain enough." "Tell us how you see it," said Mary, more interested than she would have liked to show. "Easily," he answered. "There was one poem"--he pronounced it _pome_--"you read just now--" "Which? which?" interrupted Mary, eagerly. "That I can not tell you; but, all the time you were reading it, I heard the gentleman--Mr. George Herbert, you call him--playing the tune to it." "If you heard him so well," ventured Mary, "you could, I fancy, play the tune over again to us." "I think I could," he answered, and, rising, went for his instrument, which he always brought, and hung on an old nail in the wall the moment he came in. He played a few bars of a prelude, as if to get himself into harmony with the recollection of what he had heard the master play, and then began a lively melody, in which he seemed as usual to pour out his soul. Long before he reached the end of it, Mary had reached the poem. "This is the one you mean, is it not?" she said, as soon as he had finished--and read it again. In his turn he did not speak till she had ended. "That's it, miss," he said then; "I can't mistake it; for, the minute you began, there was the old gentleman again with his fiddle." "And you know now what it says, don't you?" asked Mary. "I heard nothing but the old gentleman," answered the musician. Mary turned to Tom. "Would you mind if I tried to show Mr. Jasper what I see in the poem? He can't get a hold of it himself for the master's violin in his ears; it won't let him think about it." "I should like myself to hear what you have got to say about it, Mary! Go on," said Tom. Mary had now for a long time been a student of George Herbert; and anything of a similar life-experience goes infinitely further, to make one understand another, than any amount of learning or art. Therefore, better than many a poet, Mary was able to set forth the scope and design of this one. Herself at the heart of the secret from which came all his utterance, she could fit herself into most of the convolutions of the shell of his expression, and was hence able also to make others perceive in his verse not a little of what they were of themselves unable to see. "We shall have you lecturing at the Royal Institution yet, Mary," said Tom; "only it will be long before its members care for that sort of antique." Tom's insight had always been ahead of his character, and of late he had been growing. People do grow very fast in bed sometimes. Also he had in him plenty of material, to which a childlike desire now began to give shapes and sequences. The musician's remark consisted in taking his violin, and once more giving his idea of the "old gentleman's" music, but this time with a richer expression and fuller harmonies. Mary had every reason to be satisfied with her experiment. From that time she talked a good deal more about her favorite writers, and interested both the critical taste of Tom and the artistic instinct of the blacksmith. But Joseph's playing had great faults: how could it be otherwise? --and to Mary great seemed the pity that genius should not be made perfect in faculty, that it should not have that redemption of its body for which unwittingly it groaned. And the man was one of those childlike natures which may indeed go a long time without discovering this or that external fault in themselves, patent to the eye of many an inferior onlooker--for the simple soul is the last to see its own outside--but, once they become aware of it, begin that moment to set the thing right. At the same time he had not enough of knowledge to render it easy to show him by words wherein any fault consisted--the nature, the being of the fault, that is--what it simply was; but Mary felt confident that, the moment he saw a need, he would obey its law. She had taken for herself the rooms below, formerly occupied by the Helmers, with the hope of seeing them before long reinstated in them; and there she had a piano, the best she could afford to hire: with its aid she hoped to do something toward the breaking of the invisible bonds that tied the wings of Jasper's genius. His great fault lay in his time. Dare I suggest that he contented himself with measuring it to his inner ear, and let his fingers, like horses which he knew he had safe in hand, play what pranks they pleased? A reader may, I think, be measuring verse correctly to himself, and yet make of it nothing but rugged prose to his hearers. Perhaps this may be how severe masters of quantity in the abstract are so careless of it in the concrete--in the audible, namely, where alone it is of value. Shall I analogize yet a little further, and suggest the many who admire righteousness and work iniquity; who say, "Lord, Lord," and seldom or never obey? Anyhow, a man may have a good enough ear, with which he holds all the time a secret understanding, and from carelessness offend grievously the ears he ought to please; and it was thus with Joseph Jasper. Mary was too wise to hurry anything. One evening when he came as usual, and she knew he was not at the moment wanted, she asked him to take a seat while she played something to him. But she was not a little disappointed in the reception he gave her offering--a delicate morsel from Beethoven. She tried something else, but with no better result. He showed little interest: he was not a man capable of showing where nothing was, for he never meant to show anything; his expression was only the ripple of the unconscious pool to the sway and swirl of the fishes below. It seemed as if he had only a narrow entrance for the admission of music into his understanding--but a large outlet for the spring that rose within him, and was, therefore, a somewhat remarkable exception to the common run of mortals: in such, the capacity for reception far exceeds the capability of production. His dominant thoughts were in musical form, and easily found their expression in music; but, mainly no doubt from want of practice in reception, and experience of variety in embodiment, the forms in which others gave themselves utterance could not with corresponding readiness find their way to the sympathetic place in him. But pride or repulsion had no share in this defect. The man was open and inspired, and stupid as a child. The next time she made the attempt to open this channel between them, something she played did find him, and for a few minutes he seemed lost in listening. "How nice it would be," she said, "if we could play together sometimes!" "Do you mean both at once, miss?" he asked. "Yes--you on your violin, and I on the piano." "That could hardly be, I'm afraid, miss," he answered; "for, you see, I don't know always--not exactly--what I'm going to play; and if I don't know, and you don't know, how are we to keep together?" "Nobody can play your own things but yourself, of course--that is, until you are able to write them down; but, if you would learn something, we could play that together." "I don't know how to learn. I've heard tell of the notes and all that, but I don't know how to work them." "You have heard the choir in the church--all keeping with the organ," said Mary. "Scarcely since I was a child--and not very often then--though my mother took me sometimes. But I was always wanting to get out again, and gave no heed." "Do you never go to church now?" "No, miss--not for long. Time's too precious to waste." "How do you spend it, then?" "As soon as I've had my breakfast--that's on a Sunday, I mean--I get up and lock my door, and set myself to have a day of it. Then I read the next thing where I stopped last--whether it be a chapter or a verse--till I get the sense of it--if I can't get that, it's no manner of use to me; and I generally know when I've got it by finding the bow in one hand and the fiddle in the other. Then, with the two together, I go stirring and stirring about at the story, and the music keeps coming and coming; and when it stops, which it does sometimes all at once, then I go back to the book." "But you don't go on like that all day, do you?" said Mary. "I generally go on till I'm hungry, and then I go out for something to eat. My landlady won't get me any dinner. Then I come back and begin again." "Will you let me teach you to read music?" said Mary, more and more delighted with him, and desirous of contributing to his growth--the one great service of the universe. "If you would, miss, perhaps then I might be able to learn. You see, I never was like other people. Mother was the only one that didn't take me for an innocent. She used to talk big things about me, and the rest used to laugh at her. She gave me her large Testament when she was dying, but, if it hadn't been for Ann, I should never have been able to read it well enough to understand it. And now Ann tells me I'm a heathen and worship my fiddle, because I don't go to chapel with her; but it do seem such a waste of good time. I'll go to church, though, miss, if you tell me it's the right thing to do; only it's hard to work all the week, and be weary all the Sunday. I should only be longing for my fiddle all the time. You don't think, miss, that a great person like God cares whether we pray to him in a room or in a church?" "No, I don't," answered Mary. "For my own part, I find I can pray best at home." "So can I," said Joseph, with solemn fervor. "Indeed, miss, I can't pray at all sometimes till I get my fiddle under my chin, and then it says the prayers for me till I grow able to pray myself. And sometimes, when I seem to have got to the outside of prayer, and my soul is hungrier than ever, only I can't tell what I want, all at once I'm at my fiddle again, and it's praying for me. And then sometimes it seems as if I lost myself altogether, and God took me, for I'm nowhere and everywhere all at once." Mary thought of the "groanings that can not be uttered." Perhaps that is just what music is meant for--to say the things that have no shape, therefore can have no words, yet are intensely alive--the unembodied children of thought, the eternal child. Certainly the musician can groan the better with the aid of his violin. Surely this man's instrument was the gift of God to him. All God's gifts are a giving of himself. The Spirit can better dwell in a violin than in an ark or in the mightiest of temples. But there was another side to the thing, and Mary felt bound to present it. "But, you know, Mr. Jasper," she said, "when many violins play together, each taking a part in relation to all the rest, a much grander music is the result than any single instrument could produce." "I've heard tell of such things, miss, but I've never heard them." He had never been to concert or oratorio, any more than the play. "Then you shall hear them," said Mary, her heart filling with delight at the thought. " --But what if there should be some way in which the prayers of all souls may blend like many violins? We are all brothers and sisters, you know--and what if the gathering together in church be one way of making up a concert of souls? --Imagine one mighty prayer, made up of all the desires of all the hearts God ever made, breaking like a huge wave against the foot of his throne!" "There would be some force in a wave like that, miss!" said Joseph. "But answer me one question: Ain't it Christ that teaches men to pray?" "Surely," answered Mary. "He taught them with his mouth when he was on the earth; and now he teaches them with his mind." "Then, miss, I will tell you why it seems to me that churches can't be the places to tune the fiddles for that kind of consort--and that's just why I more than don't care to go into one of them: I never heard a sermon that didn't seem to be taking my Christ from me, and burying him where I should never find him any more. For the somebody the clergy talk about is not only nowise like my Christ, but nowise like a live man at all. It always seemed to me more like a guy they had dressed up and called by his name than the man I read about in my mother's big Testament." "How my father would have delighted in this man!" said Mary to herself. "You see, miss," Jasper resumed, "I can't help knowing something about these matters, because I was brought up in it all, my father being a local preacher, and a very good man. Perhaps, if I had been as clever as Sister Ann, I might be thinking now just as she does; but it seems to me a man that is born stupid has much to be thankful for: he can't take in things before his heart's ready for believing them, and so they don't get spoiled, like a child's book before he is able to read it. All that I heard when I went with my father to his preachings was to me no more than one of the chapters full of names in the Book of Chronicles--though I do remember once hearing a Wesleyan clergyman say that he had got great spiritual benefit from those chapters. I wasn't even frightened at the awful things my father said about hell, and the certainty of our going there if we didn't lay hold upon the Saviour; for, all the time, he showed but such a ghost or cloud of a man that he called the Saviour as it wasn't possible to lay hold upon. Not that I reasoned about it that way then; I only felt no interest in the affair; and my conscience said nothing about it. But after my father and mother were gone, and I was at work away from all my old friends--well, I needn't trouble you with what it was that set me a-thinking--it was only a great disappointment, such as I suppose most young fellows have to go through--I shouldn't wonder," he added with a smile, "if that was what you ladies are sent into this world for--to take the conceit out of the likes of us, and give us something to think about. What came of it was, that I began to read my mother's big Testament in earnest, and then my conscience began to speak. Here was a man that said he was God's son, and sent by him to look after us, and we must do what he told us or we should never be able to see our Father in heaven! That's what I made out of it, miss. And my conscience said to me, that I must do as he said, seeing he had taken all that trouble, and come down to look after us. If he spoke the truth, and nobody could listen to him without being sure of that, there was nothing left but just to do the thing he said. So I set about getting a hold of anything he did say, and trying to do it. And then it was that I first began to be able to play on the fiddle, though I had been muddling away at it for a long time before. I knew I could play then, because I understood what it said to me, and got help out of it. I don't really mean that, you know, miss; for I know well enough that the fiddle in itself is nothing, and nothing is anything but the way God takes to teach us. And that's how I came to know you, miss." "How do you mean that?" asked Mary. "I used to be that frightened of Sister Ann that, after I came to London, I wouldn't have gone near her, but that I thought Jesus Christ would have me go; and, if I hadn't gone to see her, I should never have seen you. When I went to see her, I took my fiddle with me to take care of me; and, when she would be going on at me, I would just give my fiddle a squeeze under my arm, and that gave me patience." "But we heard you playing to her, you know." "That was because I always forgot myself while she was talking. The first time, I remember, it was from misery--what she was saying sounded so wicked, making God out not fit for any honest man to believe in. I began to play without knowing it, and it couldn't have been very loud, for she went on about the devil picking up the good seed sown in the heart. Off I went into that, and there I saw no end of birds with long necks and short legs gobbling up the corn. But, a little way off, there was the long beautiful stalks growing strong and high, waving in God's wind; and the birds did not go near them." Mary drew a long breath, and said to herself: "The man is a poet!" --"You're not afraid of your sister now?" she said to him. "Not a bit," he answered. "Since I knew you, I feel as if we had in a sort of a way changed places, and she was a little girl that must be humored and made the best of. When she scolds, I laugh, and try to make a bit of fun with her. But she's always so sure she's right, that you wonder how the world got made before she was up." They parted with the understanding that, when he came next, she should give him his first lesson in reading music. With herself Mary made merry at the idea of teaching the man of genius his letters. But, when once, through trying to play with her one of his own pieces which she had learned from hearing him play it, he had discovered how imperative it was to keep good time, he set himself to the task with a determination that would have made anything of him that he was only half as fit to become as a musician. When, however, in a short time, he was able to learn from notes, he grew so delighted with some of the music Mary got for him, entering into every nicety of severest law, and finding therein a better liberty than that of improvisation, that he ceased for long to play anything of his own, and Mary became mortally afraid lest, in developing the performer, she had ruined the composer. "How can I go playing such loose, skinny things," he would say, "when here are such perfect shapes all ready to my hand!" But Mary said to herself that, if these were shapes, his were odors.

45

THE SAPPHIRE.

One morning, as Mary sat at her piano, Mewks was shown into the room. He brought the request from his master that she would go to him; he wanted particularly to see her. She did not much like it, neither did she hesitate. She was shown into the room Mr. Redmain called his study, which communicated by a dressing-room with his bedroom. He was seated, evidently waiting for her. "Ah, Miss Marston!" he said; "I have a piece of good news for you--so good that I thought I should like to give it you myself." "You are very kind, sir," Mary answered. "There!" he went on, holding out what she saw at once was the lost ring. "I am so glad!" she said, and took it in her hand. "Where was it found?" "There's the point!" he returned. "That is just why I sent for you! Can you suggest any explanation of the fact that it was found, after all, in a corner of my wife's jewel-box? Who searched the box last?" "I do not know, sir." "Did you search it?" "No, sir. I offered to help Mrs. Redmain to look for the ring, but she said it was no use. Who found it, sir?" "I will tell you who found it, if you will tell me who put it there." "I don't know what you mean, sir. It must have been there all the time." "That's the point again! Mrs. Redmain swears it was not, and could not have been, there when she looked for it. It is not like a small thing, you see. There is something mysterious about it." He looked hard at Mary. Now, Mary had very much admired the ring, as any one must who had an eye for stones; and had often looked at it--into the heart of it--almost loving it; and while they were talking now, she kept gazing at it. When Mr. Redmain ended, she stood silent. In her silence, her attention concentrated itself upon the sapphire. She stood long, looking closely at it, moving it about a little, and changing the direction of the light; and, while her gaze was on the ring, Mr. Redmain's gaze was on her, watching her with equal attention. At last, with a sigh, as if she waked from a reverie, she laid the ring on the table. But Mr. Redmain still stared in her face. "Now what is it you've got in your head?" he said at last. "I have been watching you think for three minutes and a half, I do believe. Come, out with it!" "Hardly _think_, sir," answered Mary. "I was only plaguing myself between my recollection of the stone and the actual look of it. It is so annoying to find what seemed a clear recollection prove a deceitful one! It may appear a presumptuous thing to say, but my recollection seems of a finer color." While she spoke, she had again taken the ring, and was looking at it. Mr. Redmain snatched it from her hand. "The devil!" he cried. "You haven't the face to hint that the stone has been changed?" Mary laughed. "Such a thing never came into my head, sir; but now that you have put it there, I could almost believe it." "Go along with you!" he cried, casting at her a strange look which she could not understand, and the same moment pulling the bell hard. That done, he began to examine the ring intently, as Mary had been doing, and did not speak a word. Mewks came. "Show Miss Marston out," said his master; "and tell my coachman to bring the hansom round directly." "For Miss Marston?" inquired Mewks, who had learned not a little cunning in the service. "No!" roared Mr. Redmain; and Mewks darted from the room, followed more leisurely by Mary. "I don't know what's come to master!" ventured Mewks, as he led the way down the stair. But Mary took no notice, and left the house. For about a week she heard nothing. In the meantime Mr. Redmain had been prosecuting certain inquiries he had some time ago begun, and another quite new one besides. He was acquainted with many people of many different sorts, and had been to jewelers and pawnbrokers, gamblers and lodging-house keepers, and had learned some things to his purpose. Once more Mary received from him a summons, and once more, considerably against her liking, obeyed. She was less disinclined to go this time, however, for she felt not a little curious about the ring. "I want you to come back to the house," he said, abruptly, the moment she entered his room. For such a request Mary was not prepared. Even since the ring was found, so long a time had passed that she never expected to hear from the house again. But Tom was now so much better, and Letty so much like her former self, that, if Mrs. Redmain had asked her, she might perhaps have consented. "Mr. Redmain," she answered, "you must see that I can not do so at your desire." "Oh, rubbish! humbug!" he returned, with annoyance. "Don't fancy I am asking you to go fiddle-faddling about my wife again: I don't see how you _can_ do that, after the way she has used you! But I have reasons for wanting to have you within call. Go to Mrs. Perkin. I won't take a refusal." "I can not do it, Mr. Redmain," said Mary; "the thing is impossible." And she turned to leave the room. "Stop, stop!" cried Mr. Redmain, and jumped from his chair to prevent her. He would not have succeeded had not Mewks met her in the doorway full in the face. She had to draw back to avoid him, and the man, perceiving at once how things were, closed the door the moment he entered, and stood with his back against it. "He's in the drawing-room, sir," said Mewks. A scarcely perceptible sign of question was made by the master, and answered in kind by the man. "Show him here directly," said Mr. Redmain. Then turning to Mary, "Go out that way, Miss Marston, if you will go," he said, and pointed to the dressing-room. Mary, without a suspicion, obeyed; but, just as she discovered that the door into the bedroom beyond was locked, she heard the door behind her locked also. She turned, and knocked. "Stay where you are," said Mr. Redmain, in a low but imperative voice. "I can not let you out till this gentleman is gone. You must hear what passes: I want you for a witness." Bewildered and annoyed, Mary stood motionless in the middle of the room, and presently heard a man, whose voice seemed not quite strange to her, greet Mr. Redmain like an old friend. The latter made a slight apology for having sent for him to his study--claiming the privilege, he said, of an invalid, who could not for a time have the pleasure of meeting him either at the club or at his wife's parties. The visitor answered agreeably, with a touch of merriment that seemed to indicate a soul at ease with itself and with the world. But here Mary all at once came to herself, and was aware that she was in quite a false position. She withdrew therefore to the farthest corner, sat down, closed her ears with the palms of her hands, and waited. She had sat thus for a long time, not weary, but occupied with such thoughts as could hardly for a century or two cross the horizon line of such a soul as Mr. Redmain's, even if he were at once to repent, when she heard a loud voice calling her name from a distance. She raised her head, and saw the white, skin-drawn face of Mr. Redmain grinning at her from the open door. When he spoke again, his words sounded like thunder, for she had removed her hands from her ears. "I fancy you've had a dose of it!" he said. As he spoke, she rose to her feet, her countenance illumined both with righteous anger and the tender shine of prayer. Her look went to what he had of a heart, and the slightest possible color rose to his face. "Gone a step too far, damn it!" he murmured to himself. "There's no knowing one woman by another!" "I see!" he said; "it's been a trifle too much for you, and I don't wonder! You needn't believe a word I said about myself. It was all hum to make the villain show his game." "I have not heard a word, Mr. Redmain," she said with indignation. "Oh, you needn't trouble yourself!" he returned. "I meant you to hear it all. What did I put you there for, but to get your oath to what I drew from the fellow? A fine thing if your pretended squeamishness ruin my plot! What do you think of yourself, hey? --But I don't believe it." He looked at her keenly, expecting a response, but Mary made him none. For some moments he regarded her curiously, then turned away into the study, saying: "Come along. By Jove! I'm ashamed to say it, but I half begin to believe in you. I did think I was past being taken in, but it seems possible for once again. Of course, you will return to Mrs. Redmain now that all is cleared up." "It is impossible," Mary answered. "I can not live in a house where the lady mistrusts and the gentleman insults me." She left the room, and Mr. Redmain did not try to prevent her. As she left the house she burst into tears; and the fact Mewks carried to his master. The man was the more careful to report everything about Mary, that there was one in the house of whom he never reported anything, but to whom, on the contrary, he told everything he thought she would care to know. Till Sepia came, he had been conventionally faithful--faithful with the faith of a lackey, that is--but she had found no difficulty in making of him, in respect of her, a spy upon his master. I will now relate what passed while Mary sat deaf in the corner. Mr. Redmain asked his visitor what he would have, as if, although it was quite early, he must, as a matter of course, stand in need of refreshment. He made choice of brandy and soda-water, and the bell was rung. A good deal of conversation followed about a disputed point in a late game of cards at one of the clubs. The talk then veered in another direction--that of personal adventure, so guided by Mr. Redmain. He told extravagant stories about himself and his doings, in particular various _ruses_ by which he had contrived to lay his hands on money. And whatever he told, his guest capped, narrating trick upon trick to which on different occasions he had had recourse. At all of them Mr. Redmain laughed heartily, and applauded their cleverness extravagantly, though some of them were downright swindling. At last Mr. Redmain told how he had once got money out of a lady. I do not believe there was a word of truth in it. But it was capped by the other with a narrative that seemed specially pleasing to the listener. In the midst of a burst of laughter, he rose and rang the bell. Count Galofta thought it was to order something more in the way of "refreshment," and was not a little surprised when he heard his host desire the man to request the favor of Miss Yolland's presence. But the Count had not studied non-expression in vain, and had brought it to a degree of perfection not easily disturbed. Casting a glance at him as he gave the message, Mr. Redmain could read nothing; but this was in itself suspicious to him--and justly, for the man ought to have been surprised at such a close to the conversation they had been having. Sepia had been told that Galofta was in the study, and therefore received the summons thither--a thing that had never happened before--with the greater alarm. She made, consequently, what preparation she could against surprise. Thoroughly capable of managing her features, her anxiety was sufficient nevertheless to deprive her of power over her complexion, and she entered the room with the pallor peculiar to the dark-skinned. Having greeted the Count with the greatest composure, she turned to Mr. Redmain with question in her eyes. "Count Galofta," said Mr. Redmain in reply, "has just been telling me a curious story of how a certain rascal got possession of a valuable jewel from a lady with whom he pretended to be in love, and I thought the opportunity a good one for showing you a strange discovery I have made with regard to the sapphire Mrs. Redmain missed for so long. Very odd tricks are played with gems--such gems, that is, as are of value enough to make it worth a rogue's while." So saying, he took the ring from one drawer, and from another a bottle, from which he poured something into a crystal cup. Then he took a file, and, looking at Galofta, in whose well-drilled features he believed he read something that was not mere curiosity, said, "I am going to show you something very curious," and began to file asunder that part of the ring which immediately clasped the sapphire, the setting of which was open. "What a pity!" cried Sepia; "you are destroying the ring! What will Cousin Hesper say?" Mr. Redmain filed away, heedless; then with the help of a pair of pincers freed the stone, and held it up in his hand. "You see this?" he said. "A splendid sapphire!" answered Count Galofta, taking it in his fingers, but, as Mr. Redmain saw, not looking at it closely. "I have always heard it called a splendid stone," said Sepia, whose complexion, though not her features, passed through several changes while all this was going on: she was anxious. Nor did her inquisitor fail to surprise the uneasy glances she threw, furtively though involuntarily, in the face of the Count--who never once looked in hers: tolerably sure of himself, he was not sure of her. "That ring, when I bought it--the stone of it," said Mr. Redmain, "was a star sapphire, and worth seven hundred pounds; now, the whole affair is worth about ten." As he spoke, he threw the stone into the cup, let it lie a few moments, and took it out again; when, almost with a touch, he divided it in two, the one a mere scale. "There!" he said, holding out the thin part on the tip of a finger, "that is a slice of sapphire; and there!" holding out the rest of the seeming stone, "that is glass." "What a shame!" cried Sepia. "Of course," said the Count, "you will prosecute the jeweler." "I will not prosecute the jeweler," answered Mr. Redmain; "but I have taken some trouble to find out who changed the stones." With that he threw both the bits of blue into a drawer, and the contents of the cup into the fire. A great flame flew up the chimney, and, as if struck at the sight of it, he stood gazing for a moment after it had vanished. When he turned, the Count was gone, as he had expected, and Sepia stood with eyes full of anger and fear. Her face was set and colorless, and strange to look upon. "Very odd--ain't it?" said Mr. Redmain, and, opening the door of his dressing-room, called out: "Miss Marston!" When he turned, Sepia too was gone. I would not have my reader take Sepia for an accomplice in the robbery. Even Mr. Redmain did not believe that: she was much too prudent! His idea was, that she had been wearing the ring--Hesper did not mind what she wore of hers--and that (I need not give his conjecture in detail), with or without her knowledge, the fellow had got hold of it and carried it away, then brought it back, treating the thing as a joke, when she was only too glad to restore it to the jewel-case, hoping the loss of it would then pass for an oversight on the part of Hesper. If he was right in this theory of the affair, then the Count had certainly a hold upon her, and she dared not or would not expose him! He had before discovered that, about the time when the ring disappeared, the Count had had losses, and was supposed unable to meet them, but had suddenly showed himself again "flush of money," and from that time had had an extraordinary run of luck. When he went out of the door of Mr. Redmain's study, he vanished from the house and from London. Turning the first corner he came to, and the next and the next, he stepped into a mews, the court of which seemed empty, and slipped behind the gate. He wore a new hat, and was clean shaved except his upper lip. Presently a man came out of the mews in a Scotch cap and a full beard. What had become of him Mr. Redmain did not care. He had no desire to punish him. It was enough he had found him out, proved his suspicion correct, and obtained evidence against Sepia. He did not at once make up his mind how he would act on this last; while he lived, it did not matter so much; and he had besides a certain pleasure in watching his victim. But Hesper, free, rich, and beautiful, and far from wise, with Sepia for counselor, was not an idea to be contemplated with equanimity. Still he shrank from the outcry and scandal of sending her away; for certainly his wife, if it were but to oppose him, would refuse to believe a word against her cousin. For the present, therefore, the thing seemed to blow over. Mr. Redmain, who had pleasure in behaving handsomely so far as money was concerned, bought his wife the best sapphire he could find, and, for once, really pleased her. But Sepia knew that Mr. Redmain had now to himself justified his dislike of her; and, as he said nothing, she was the more certain he meant something. She lived, therefore, in constant dread of his sudden vengeance, against which she could take no precaution, for she had not even a conjecture as to what form it might assume. From that hour she was never at peace in his presence, and hardly out of it; from every possible _tete-a-tete_ with him she fled as from a judgment. Nor was it a small addition to her misery that she imagined Mary cognizant of Mr. Redmain's opinion and intention with regard to her, and holding the worst possible opinion of her. For, whatever had passed first between the Count and Mr. Redmain, she did not doubt Mary had heard, and was prepared to bring against her when the determined moment should arrive. How much the Count might or might not have said, she could not tell; but, seeing their common enemy had permitted him to escape, she more than dreaded he had sold her secret for his own impunity, and had laid upon her a burden of lies as well.

46

REPARATION.

With all Mr. Redmain's faults, there was a certain love of justice in the man; only, as is the case with most of us, it had ten times the reference to the action of other people that it had to his own: I mean, he made far greater demand for justice upon other people than upon himself; and was much more indignant at any shortcoming of theirs which crossed any desire or purpose of his than he was anxious in his own person to fulfill justice when that fulfillment in its turn would cross any wish he cherished. Badly as he had himself behaved to Mary, he was now furious with his wife for having treated her so heartlessly that she could not return to her service; for he began to think she might be one to depend upon, and to desire her alliance in the matter of ousting Sepia from the confidence of his wife. However indifferent a woman may be to the opinion of her husband, he can nevertheless in general manage to make her uncomfortable enough if he chooses; and Mr. Redmain did choose now, in the event of her opposition to his wishes: when he set himself to do a thing, he hated defeat even more than he loved success. The moment Mary was out of the study, he walked into his wife's boudoir, and shut the door behind him. His presence there was enough to make her angry, but she took no notice of it. "I understand, Mrs. Redmain," he began, "that you wish to bring the fate of Sodom upon the house." "I do not know what you mean," she answered, scarcely raising her eyes from her novel--and spoke the truth, for she knew next to nothing of the Bible, while the Old Testament was all the literature Mr. Redmain was "up in." "You have turned out of it the only just person in it, and we shall all be in hell soon!" "How dare you come to my room with such horrid language!" "You'll hear worse before long, if you keep on at this rate. My language is not so bad as your actions. If you don't have that girl back, and in double-quick time, too, I shall know how to make you!" "You have taught me to believe you capable of anything." "You shall at least find me capable of a good deal. Do you imagine, madam, I have found you a hair worse than I expected?" "I never took the trouble to imagine anything about you." "Then I need not ask you whether I married you to please you or to please myself?" "You need not. You can best answer that question yourself." "Then we understand each other." "We do not, Mr. Redmain; and, if this occurs again, I shall go to Durnmelling." She spoke with a vague idea that he also stood in some awe of the father and mother whose dread, however well she hid it, she would never, while she lived, succeed in shaking off. But to the husband it was a rare delight to speak with conscious rectitude in the moral chastisement of his wife. He burst into a loud and almost merry laugh. "Happy they will be to see you there, madam! Why, you goose, if I send a telegram before you, they won't so much as open the door to you! They know better which side their bread is buttered." Hesper started up in a rage. This was too much--and the more too much, that she believed it would be as he said. "Mr. Redmain, if you do not leave the room, I will." "Oh, don't!" he cried, in a tone of pretended alarm. His pleasure was great, for he had succeeded in stinging the impenetrable. "You really ought to consider before you utter such an awful threat! I will go myself a thousand times rather! --But will you not feel the want of pocket-money when you come to pay a rough cabman? The check I gave you yesterday will not last you long." "The money is my own, Mr. Redmain." "But you have not yet opened a banking-account in your own name." "I suppose you have a meaning, Mr. Redmain; but I am not in the habit of using cabs." "Then you had better get into the habit; for I swear to you, madam, if you don't fetch that girl home within the week, I will, next Monday, discharge your coachman, and send every horse in the stable to Tattersall's! Good morning." She had no doubt he would do as he said; she knew Mr. Redmain would just enjoy selling her horses. But she could not at once give in. I say "_could_ not," because hers was the weak will that can hardly bring itself to do what it knows it must, and is continually mistaken for the strong will that defies and endures. She had a week to think about it, and she would see! During the interval, he took care not once to refer to his threat, for that would but weaken the impression of it, he knew. On the Sunday, after service, she knocked at his door, and, being admitted, bade him good morning, but with no very gracious air--as, indeed, he would have been the last to expect. "We have had a sermon on the forgiveness of injuries, Mr. Redmain," she said. "By Jove!" interrupted her husband, "it would have been more to the purpose if I, or poor Mary Marston, had had it; for I swear you put our souls in peril!" "The ring was no common one, Mr. Redmain; and the young woman had, by leaving the house, placed herself in a false position: every one suspected her as much as I did. Besides, she lost her temper, and talked about forgiving _me_, when I was in despair about my ring!" "And what, pray, was your foolish ring compared to the girl's character?" "A foolish ring, indeed! --Yes, it was foolish to let you ever have the right to give it me! But, as to her character, that of persons in her position is in constant peril. They have to lay their account with that, and must get used to it. How was I to know? We can not read each other's hearts." "Not where there is no heart in the reader." Hesper's face flushed, but she did her best not to lose her temper. Not that it would have been any great loss if she had, for there is as much difference in the values of tempers as in those who lose them. She said nothing, and her husband resumed: "So you came to forgive me?" he said. "And Marston," she answered. "Well, I will accept the condescension--that is, if the terms of it are to my mind." "I will make no terms. Marston may return when she pleases." "You must write and ask her." "Of course, Mr. Redmain. It would hardly be suitable that _you_ should ask her." "You must write so as to make it possible to accept your offer." "I am not deceitful, Mr. Redmain." "You are not. A man must be fair, even to his wife." "I will show you the letter I write." "If you please." She had to show him half a score ere he was satisfied, declaring he would do it himself, if she could not make a better job of it. At length one was dispatched, received, and answered: Mary would not return. She had lost all hope of being of any true service to Mrs. Redmain, and she knew that, with Tom and Letty, she was really of use for the present. Mrs. Redmain carried the letter, with ill-concealed triumph, to her husband; nor did he conceal his annoyance. "You must have behaved to her very cruelly," he said. "But you have done your best now--short of a Christian apology, which it would be folly to demand of you. I fear we have seen the last of her." --"And there was I," he said to himself, "for the first time in my life, actually beginning to fancy I had perhaps thrown salt upon the tail of that rare bird, an honest woman! The devil has had quite as much to do with my history as with my character! Perhaps that will be taken into the account one day." But Mary lay awake at night, and thought of many things she might have said and done better when she was with Hesper, and would gladly have given herself another chance; but she could no longer flatter herself she would ever be of any real good to her. She believed there was more hope of Mr. Redmain even. For had she not once, for one brief moment, seen him look a trifle ashamed of himself? while Hesper was and remained, so far as she could judge, altogether satisfied with herself. Equal to her own demands upon herself, there was nothing in her to begin with--no soil to work upon.

47

ANOTHER CHANGE.

For some time Tom made progress toward health, and was able to read a good part of the day. Most evenings he asked Joseph to play to him for a while; he was fond of music, and fonder still of criticism--upon anything. When he had done with Joseph, or when he did not want him, Mary was always ready to give the latter a lesson; and, had he been a less gifted man than he was, he could not have failed to make progress with such a teacher. The large-hearted, delicate-souled woman felt nothing strange in the presence of the workingman, but, on the contrary, was comfortably aware of a being like her own, less privileged but more gifted, whose nearness was strength. And no teacher, not to say no woman, could have failed to be pleased at the thorough painstaking with which he followed the slightest of her hints, and the delight his flushed face would reveal when she praised the success he had achieved. It was not long before he began to write some of the things that came into his mind. For the period of quiescence as to production, which followed the initiation of more orderly study, was, after all, but of short duration, and the return tide of musical utterance was stronger than ever. Mary's delight was great when first he brought her one of his compositions very fairly written out--after which others followed with a rapidity that astonished her. They enabled her also to understand the man better and better; for to have a thing to brood over which we are capable of understanding must be more to us than even the master's playing of it. She could not be sure this or that was correct, according to the sweet inexorability of musical ordainment, but the more she pondered them, the more she felt that the man was original, that the material was there, and the law at hand, that he brought his music from the only bottomless well of utterance, the truth, namely, by which alone the soul most glorious in gladness, or any other the stupidest of souls, can live. To the first he brought her she contrived to put a poor little faulty accompaniment; and when she played his air to him so accompanied, his delight was touching, and not a little amusing. Plainly he thought the accompaniment a triumph of human faculty, and beyond anything he could ever develop. Never pupil was more humble, never pupil more obedient; thinking nothing of himself or of anything he had done or could do, his path was open to the swiftest and highest growth. It matters little where a man may be at this moment; the point is whether he is growing. The next point will be, whether he is growing at the ratio given him. The key to the whole thing is _obedience_, and nothing else. What the gift of such an instructor was to Joseph, my reader may be requested to imagine. He was like a man seated on the grass outside the heavenly gate, from which, slow-opening every evening as the sun went down, came an angel to teach, and teach, until he too should be fit to enter in: an hour would arrive when she would no longer have to come out to him where he sat. Under such an influence all that was gentlest and sweetest in his nature might well develop with rapidity, and every accidental roughness--and in him there was no other--by swift degrees vanish from both speech and manners. The angels do not want tailors to make their clothes: their habits come out of themselves. But we are often too hard upon our fellows; for many of those in the higher ranks of life--no, no, I mean of society--whose insolence wakens ours, as growl wakes growl in the forest, are not yet so far removed from the savage--I mean in their personal history--as some in the lowest ranks. When a nobleman mistakes the love of right in another for a hatred of refinement, he can not be far from mistaking insolence for good manners. Of such a nobility, good Lord, deliver us from all envy! As to falling in love with a lady like Mary, such a thing was as far from Jasper's consciousness as if she had been a duchess. She belonged to another world from his, a world which his world worshiped, waiting. He might miss her even to death; her absence might, for him, darken the universe as if the sun had withdrawn his brightness; but who thinks of falling in love with the sun, or dreams of climbing nearer to his radiance? The day will one day come--or what of the long-promised kingdom of heaven? --when a woman, instead of spending anxious thought on the adornment of her own outward person, will seek with might the adornment of the inward soul of another, and will make that her crown of rejoicing. Nay, are there none such even now? The day will come when a man, rather than build a great house for the overflow of a mighty hospitality, will give himself, in the personal labor of outgoing love, to build spiritual houses like St. Paul--a higher art than any of man's invention. O my brother, what were it not for thee to have a hand in making thy brother beautiful! Be not indignant, my reader: not for a moment did I imagine thee capable of such a mean calling! It is left to a certain school of weak enthusiasts, who believe that such growth, such embellishment, such creation, is all God cares about; these enthusiasts can not indeed see, so blind have they become with their fixed idea, how God could care for anything else. They actually believe that the very Son of the life-making God lived and died for that, and for nothing else. That such men and women are fools, is and has been so widely believed, that, to men of the stamp of my indignant reader, it has become a fact! But the end alone will reveal the beginning. Such a fool was Prometheus, with the vulture at his heart--but greater than Jupiter with his gods around him. There soon came a change, however, and the lessons ceased altogether. Tom had come down to his old quarters, and, in the arrogance of convalescence, had presumed on his imagined strength, and so caught cold. An alarming relapse was the consequence, and there was no more playing; for now his condition began to draw to a change, of which, for some time, none of them had even thought, the patient had seemed so certainly recovering. The cold settled on his lungs, and he sank rapidly. Joseph, whose violin was useless now, was not the less in attendance. Every evening, when his work was over, he came knocking gently at the door of the parlor, and never left until Tom was settled for the night. The most silently helpful, undemonstrative being he was, that doctor could desire to wait upon patient. When it was his turn to watch, he never closed an eye, but at daybreak--for it was now spring--would rouse Mary, and go off straight to his work, nor taste food until the hour for the mid-day meal arrived. Tom speedily became aware that his days were numbered--phrase of unbelief, for are they not numbered from the beginning? Are our hairs numbered, and our days forgotten--till death gives a hint to the doctor? He was sorry for his past life, and thoroughly ashamed of much of it, saying in all honesty he would rather die than fall for one solitary week into the old ways--not that he wished to die, for, with the confidence of youth, he did not believe he could fall into the old ways again. For my part, I think he was taken away to have a little more of that care and nursing which neither his mother nor his wife had been woman enough to give the great baby. After all, he had not been one of the worst of babies. Is it strange that one so used to bad company and bad ways should have so altered, in so short a time, and without any great struggle? The assurance of death at the door, and a wholesome shame of things that are past, may, I think, lead up to such a swift change, even in a much worse man than Tom. For there is the Life itself, all-surrounding, and ever pressing in upon the human soul, wherever that soul will afford a chink of entrance; and Tom had not yet sealed up all his doors. When he lay there dead--for what excuse could we have for foolish lamentation, if we did not speak of the loved as _lying dead? _--Letty had him already enshrined in her heart as the best of husbands--as her own Tom, who had never said a hard word to her--as the cleverest as well as kindest of men who had written poetry that would never die while the English language was spoken. Nor did "The Firefly" spare its dole of homage to the memory of one of its gayest writers. Indeed, all about its office had loved him, each after his faculty. Even the boy cried when he heard he was gone, for to him too he had always given a kind word, coming and going. A certain little runnel of verse flowed no more through the pages of "The Firefly," and in a month there was not the shadow of Tom upon his age. But the print of him was deep in the heart of Letty, and not shallow in the affection of Mary; nor were such as these, insignificant records for any one to leave behind him, as records go. Happy was he to have left behind him any love, especially such a love as Letty bore him! For what is the loudest praise of posterity to the quietest love of one's own generation? For his mother, her memory was mostly in her temper. She had never understood her wayward child, just because she had given him her waywardness, and not parted with it herself, so that between them the two made havoc of love. But she who gives her child all he desires, in the hope of thus binding his love to herself, no less than she who thwarts him in everything, may rest assured of the neglect she has richly earned. When she heard of his death, she howled and cursed her fate, and the woman, meaning poor Letty, who had parted her and her Tom, swearing she would never set eyes upon her, never let her touch a farthing of Tom's money. She would not hear of paying his debts until Mary told her she then would, upon which the fear of public disapprobation wrought for right if not righteousness. But what was Mary to do now with Letty? She was little more than a baby yet, not silly from youth, but young from silliness. Children must learn to walk, but not by being turned out alone in Cheapside. She was relieved from some perplexity for the present, however, by the arrival of a letter from Mrs. Wardour to Letty, written in a tone of stiffly condescendent compassion--not so unpleasant to Letty as to her friend, because from childhood she had been used to the nature that produced it, and had her mind full of a vast, undefined notion of the superiority of the writer. It may be a question whether those who fill our inexperienced minds with false notions of their greatness, do us thereby more harm or good; certainly when one comes to understand with what an arrogance and self-assertion they have done so, putting into us as reverence that which in them is conceit, one is ready to be scornful more than enough; but, rather than have a child question such claims, I would have him respect the meanest soul that ever demanded respect; the first shall be last in good time, and the power of revering come forth uninjured; whereas a child judging his elders has already withered the blossom of his being. But Mrs. Wardour's letter was kind-perhaps a little repentant; it is hard to say, for ten persons will repent of a sin for one who will confess it--I do not mean to the priest--that may be an easy matter, but to the only one who has a claim to the confession, namely, the person wronged. Yet such confession is in truth far more needful to the wronger than to the wronged; it is a small thing to be wronged, but a horrible thing to wrong. The letter contained a poverty-stricken expression of sympathy, and an invitation to spend the summer months with them at her old home. It might, the letter said, prove but a dull place to her after the gayety to which she had of late been accustomed, but it might not the less suit her present sad situation, and possibly uncertain prospects. Letty's heart felt one little throb of gladness at the thought of being again at Thornwick, and in peace. With all the probable unpleasant accompaniments of the visit, nowhere else, she thought, could she feel the same sense of shelter as where her childhood had passed. Mary also was pleased; for, although Letty might not be comfortable, the visit would end, and by that time she might know what could be devised best for her comfort and well-being.

48

DISSOLUTION.

It was now Mary's turn to feel that she was, for the first time in her life, about to be cut adrift--adrift, that is, as a world is adrift, on the surest of paths, though without eyes to see. For ten days or so, she could form no idea of what she was likely or would like to do next. But, when we are in such perplexity, may not the fact be accepted as showing that decision is not required of us--perhaps just because our way is at the moment being made straight for us? Joseph called once or twice, but, for Letty's sake, they had no music. As they met so seldom now, Mary, anxious to serve him as she could, offered him the loan of some of her favorite books. He accepted it with a gladness that surprised her, for she did not know how much he had of late been reading. One day she received an unexpected visit--from Mr. Brett, her lawyer. He had been searching into the affairs of the shop, and had discovered enough to make him uneasy, and indeed fill him with self-reproach that he had not done so with more thoroughness immediately on her father's death. He had come to tell her all he knew, and talk the matter over with her, that they might agree what proceedings should be taken. I will not weary myself or my readers with business detail, for which kind of thing I have no great aptitude, and a good deal of incapacitating ignorance; but content myself with the briefest statement of the condition in which Mr. Brett found the affairs of Mr. Turnbull. He had been speculating in several companies, making haste to be rich, and had periled and lost what he had saved of the profits of the business, and all of Mary's as well that had not been elsewhere secured. He had even trenched on the original capital of the firm, by postponing the payment of moneys due, and allowing the stock to run down and to deteriorate, and things out of fashion to accumulate, so that the business had perceptibly fallen off. But what displeased Mary more than anything was, that he had used money of her father's to speculate with in more than one public-house; and she knew that, if in her father's lifetime he had so used even his own, it would have been enough to make him insist on dissolving partnership. It was impossible to allow her money to remain any longer in the power of such a man, and she gave authority to Mr. Brett to make the necessary arrangements for putting an end to business relations between them. It was a somewhat complicated, therefore tedious business; and things looked worse the further they were searched into. Unable to varnish the facts to the experience of a professional eye, Mr. Turnbull wrote Mary a letter almost cringing in its tone, begging her to remember the years her father and he had been as brothers; how she had grown up in the shop, and had been to him, until misunderstandings arose, into the causes of which he could not now enter, in the place of a daughter; and insisting that her withdrawal from it had had no small share in the ruin of the business. For these considerations, and, more than all, for the memory of her father, he entreated her to leave things as they were, to trust him to see after the interests of the daughter of his old friend, and not insist upon measures which must end in a forced sale, in the shutting up of the shop of Turnbull and Marston, and the disgracing of her father's name along with his. Mary replied that she was acting by the advice of her father's lawyer, and with the regard she owed her father's memory, in severing all connection with a man in whom she no longer had confidence; and insisted that the business must be wound up as soon as possible. She instructed Mr. Brett, at the same time, that, if it could be managed, she would prefer getting the shop, even at considerable loss, into her own hands, with what stock might be in it, when she would attempt to conduct the business on principles her father would have approved, whereby she did not doubt of soon restoring it to repute. While she had no intention, she said, of selling so _well_ as Mr. Turnbull would fain have done, she believed she would soon be able to buy to just as good advantage as he. It would be necessary, however, to keep her desire a secret, else Mr. Turnbull would be certain to frustrate it. Mr. Brett approved of her plan, for he knew she was much respected, and had many friends. Mr. Turnbull would be glad, he said, to give up the whole to escape prosecution--that at least was how Mary interpreted his somewhat technical statement of affairs between them. The swindler wrote again, begging for an interview--which she declined, except in the presence of her lawyer. She made up her mind that she would not go near Testbridge till everything was settled, and the keys of the shop in Mr. Brett's hands; and remained, therefore, where she was--with Letty, who to keep her company delayed her departure as long as she could without giving offense at Thornwick. A few days before Letty was at last compelled to leave, Jasper called, and heard about as much as they knew themselves of their plans. When Mary said to him she would miss her pupil, he smiled in a sort of abstracted way, as if not quite apprehending what she said, which seemed to Mary a little odd, his manners in essentials being those of a gentleman, as judged by one a little more than a lady; for there is an unnamed degree higher than the ordinary _lady_. So Mary was left alone--more alone than she had ever been in her life. But she did not feel lonely, for the best of reasons--that she never fancied herself alone, but knew that she was not. Also she had books at her command, being one of the few who can read; and there were picture-galleries to go to, and music-lessons to be had. Of these last she crowded in as many as her master could be persuaded to give her--for it would be long, she knew, before she was able to have such again. Joseph Jasper never came near her. She could not imagine why, and was disappointed and puzzled. To know that Ann Byrom was in the house was not a great comfort to her--she regarded so much that Mary loved as of earth and not of heaven. God's world even she despised, because men called it nature, and spoke of its influences. But Mary did go up to see her now and then. Very different she seemed from the time when first they were at work together over Hesper's twilight dress! Ever since Mary had made the acquaintance of her brother, she seemed to have changed toward her. Perhaps she was jealous; perhaps she believed Mary was confirming him in his bad ways. Just where they were all three of one mind--just _there_ her rudimentary therefore self-sufficient religion shut them out from her sympathy and fellowship. Alone, and with her time at her command, Mary was more inclined than she had ever been, except for her father's company, to go to church. The second Sunday after Letty left her, she went to the one nearest, and in the congregation thought she saw Joseph. A week before, she would have waited for him as he came out, but, now that he seemed to avoid her, she would not, and went home neither comforted by the sermon nor comfortable with herself. For the parson, instead of recognizing, through all defects of the actual, the pattern after which God had made man, would fain have him remade after the pattern of the middle-age monk--a being far superior, no doubt, to the most of his contemporaries, but as far from the beauty of the perfect man as the mule is from that of the horse; and she was annoyed with herself that she was annoyed with Joseph. It was the middle of summer before the affairs of the firm were wound up, and the shop in the hands of the London man whom Mr. Brett had employed in the purchase. Lawyer as he was, however, Mr. Brett had not been sharp enough for Turnbull. The very next day, a shop in the same street, that had been to let for some time, displayed above its now open door the sign, _John Turnbull, late_--then a very small of--_Turnbull and Marston;_ whereupon Mr. Brett saw the oversight of which he had been guilty. There was nothing in the shop when it was opened, but that Turnbull utilized for advertisement: he had so arranged, that within an hour the goods began to arrive, and kept arriving, by every train, for days and days after, while all the time he made public show of himself, fussing about, the most triumphant man in the town. It made people talk, and if not always as he would have liked to hear them talk, yet it was talk, and, in the matter of advertisement, that is the main thing. When it was told Mary, it gave her not the smallest uneasiness. She only saw what had several times seemed on the point of arriving in her father's lifetime. She would not have moved a finger to prevent it. Let the two principles meet, with what result God pleased! Whether he had suspected her design, and had determined to challenge her before the public, I can not tell; but his wife's aversion to shopkeeping was so great, that one who knew what sort of scene passed because of it between them, would have expected that, but for some very strong reason, he would have been glad enough to retire from that mode of gaining a livelihood. As it was, things appeared to go on with them just as before. They still inhabited the villa, the wife scornful of her surroundings, and the husband driving a good horse to his shop every morning. How he managed it all, nobody knew but himself, and whether he succeeded or not was a matter of small interest to any except his own family and his creditors. He was a man nowise beloved, although there was something about him that carried simple people with him--for his ends, not theirs. To those who alluded to the change, he represented it as entirely his own doing, to be rid of the interference of Miss Marston in matters of which she knew nothing. He knew well that a confident lie has all the look of truth, and, while fact and falsehood were disputing together in men's mouths, he would be selling his drapery. The country people were flattered by the confidence he seemed to put in them by this explanation, and those who liked him before sought the new shop as they had frequented the old one. Unlike most men, not to say lawyers, Mr. Brett was fully recognizant to Mary of his oversight, and was not a little relieved to be assured she would not have had the thing otherwise: she would gladly meet Mr. Turnbull in a fair field--not that she would in the least acknowledge or think of him as a rival; she would simply carry out her own ideas of right, without regard to him or any measures he might take; the result should be as God willed. Mr. Brett shook his head: he knew her father of old, and saw the daughter prepared to go beyond the father. Theirs were principles that did not come within the range of his practice! He said to himself and his wife that the world could not go on for a twelvemonth if such ways were to become universal: whether by the world he meant his own profession, I will not inquire. Certainly he did not make the reflection that the new ways are intended to throw out the old ways; and the worst argument against any way is that the world can not go on so; for that is just what is wanted--that the world should not go on so. Mr. Brett nevertheless admired not only Mary's pluck, but the business faculty which every moment she manifested: there is a holy way of doing business, and, little as business men may think it, that is the standard by which they must be tried; for their judge in business affairs is not their own trade or profession, but the man who came to convince the world concerning right and wrong and the choice between them; or, in the older speech-to reprove the world of sin, and of righteousness, and of judgment.

49

THORNWICK.

It was almost with bewilderment that Mrs. Helmer revisited Thornwick. The near past seemed to have vanished like a dream that leaves a sorrow behind it, and the far past to take its place. She had never been accustomed to reflect on her own feelings; things came, were welcome or unwelcome, proved better or worse than she had anticipated, passed away, and were mostly forgotten. With plenty of faculty, Letty had not yet emerged from the chrysalid condition; she lived much as one in a dream, with whose dream mingle sounds and glimmers from the waking world. Very few of us are awake, very few even alive in true, availing sense. "Pooh! what stuff!" says the sleeper, and will say it until the waking begins to come. On the threshold of her old home, then, Letty found her old self awaiting her; she crossed it, and was once more just Letty, a Letty wrapped in the garments of sorrow, and with a heaviness at the heart, but far from such a miserable Letty as during the last of her former life there. Little joy had been hers since the terrible night when she fled from its closed doors; and now that she returned, she could take up everything where she had left it, except the gladness. But peace is better than gladness, and she was on the way to find that. Mrs. Wardour, who, for all her severity, was not without a good-sized heart, and whoso conscience had spoken to her in regard of Letty far oftener than any torture would have made her allow, was touched with compassion at sight of her worn and sad look; and, granting to herself that the poor thing had been punished enough, even for her want of respect to the house of Thornwick, broke down a little, though with well-preserved dignity, and took the wandering ewe-lamb to her bosom. Letty, loving and forgiving always, nestled in it for a moment, and in her own room quietly wept a long time. When she came out, Mrs. Wardour pleased herself with the fancy that her eyes were red with the tears of repentance; but Letty never dreamed of repenting, for that would have been to deny Tom, to cut off her married life, throw it from her, and never more see Tom. By degrees, rapid yet easy, she slid into all her old ways; took again the charge of the dairy as if she had never left it; attended to the linen; darned the stockings; and in everything but her pale, thin face, and heavy, exhausted heart, was the young Letty again. She even went to the harness-room to look to Cousin Godfrey's stirrups and bits; but finding, morning after morning for a whole week, that they had not once been neglected, dismissed the care-not without satisfaction. Mrs. Wardour continued kind to her; but every now and then would allow a tone as of remembered naughtiness to be sub-audible in speech or request. Letty, even in her own heart, never resented it. She had been so used to it in the old days, that it seemed only natural. And then her aunt considered her health in the kindest way. Now that Letty had known some of the troubles of marriage, she felt more sympathy with her, did not look down upon her from quite such a height, and to Letty this was strangely delightful. Oh, what a dry, hard, cold world this would grow to, but for the blessing of its many sicknesses! When Godfrey saw her moving about the house as in former days, but changed, like one of the ghosts of his saddest dreams, a new love began to rise out of the buried seed of the old. In vain he reasoned with himself, in vain he resisted. The image of Letty, with its trusting eyes fixed on him so "solemn sad," and its watching looks full of ministration, haunted him, and was too much for him. She was never the sort of woman he could have fancied himself falling in love with; he did in fact say to himself that she was only _almost_ a lady-but at the word his heart rebuked him for a traitor to love and its holy laws. Neither in person was she at all his ideal. A woman like Hesper, uplifted and strong, broad-fronted and fearless, large-limbed, and full of latent life, was more of the ideal he could have written poetry about. But we are deeper than we know. Who is capable of knowing his own ideal? The ideal of a man's self is hid in the bosom of God, and may lie ages away from his knowledge; and his ideal of woman is the ideal belonging to this unknown self: the ideal only can bring forth an ideal. He can not, therefore, know his own ideal of woman; it is, nevertheless--so I presume--this his own unknown ideal that makes a man choose against his choice. Gladly would Godfrey now have taken Letty to his arms. It was no longer anything that from boyhood he had vowed rather to die unmarried, and let the land go to a stranger, than marry a widow. He had to recall every restraining fact of his and her position to prevent him from now precipitating that which he had before too long delayed. But the gulf of the grave and the jealousy of a mother were between them; for, if he were again to rouse her suspicions, she would certainly get rid of Letty, as she had before intended, so depriving her of a home, and him of opportunity. He kept, therefore, out of Letty's way as much as he could, went more about the farm, and took long rides. Nothing was further from Letty than any merest suspicion of the sort of regard Godfrey cherished for her. There was in her nothing of the self-sentimental. Her poet was gone from her, but she did not therefore take to poetry; nay, what poetry she had learned to like was no longer anything to her, now her singing bird had flown to the land of song. To her, Tom was the greatest, the one poet of the age; he had been hers--was hers still, for did he not die telling her that he would go on watching till she came to him? He had loved her, she knew; he had learned to love her better before he died. She must be patient; the day would come when she should be a Psyche, as he had told her, and soar aloft in search of her mate. The sense of wifehood had grown one with her consciousness. It mingled with all her prayers, both in chamber and in church. As she went about the house, she was dreaming of her Tom--an angel in heaven, she said to herself, but none the less her husband, and waiting for her. If she did not read poetry, she read her New Testament; and if she understood it only in a childish fashion, she obeyed it in a child-like one, whence the way of all wisdom lay open before her. It is not where one is, but in what direction he is going. Before her, too, was her little boy--borne in his father's arms, she pictured him, and hearing from him of the mother who was coming to them by and by, when God had made her good enough to rejoin them! But, while she continued thus simple, Godfrey could not fail to see how much more of a woman she had grown: he was not yet capable of seeing that she would--could never hare got so far with him, even if he had married her. Love and marriage are of the Father's most powerful means for the making of his foolish little ones into sons and daughters. But so unlike in many cases are the immediate consequences to those desired and expected, that it is hard for not a few to believe that he is anywhere looking after their fate--caring about them at all. And the doubt would be a reasonable one, if the end of things was marriage. But the end is life--that we become the children of God; after which, all things can and will go their grand, natural course; the heart of the Father will be content for his children, and the hearts of the children will be content in their Father. Godfrey indulged one great and serious mistake in reference to Letty, namely, that, having learned the character of Tom through the saddest of personal experience, she must have come to think of him as he did, and must have dismissed from her heart every remnant of love for him. Of course, he would not hint at such a thing, he said to himself, nor would she for a moment allow it, but nothing else could be the state of her mind! He did not know that in a woman's love there is more of the specially divine element than in a man's--namely, the original, the unmediated. The first of God's love is not founded upon any merit, rests only on being and need, and the worth that is yet unborn. The Redmains were again at Durnmelling--had been for some weeks; and Sepia had taken care that she and Godfrey should meet--on the footpath to Testbridge, in the field accessible by the breach in the ha-ha--here and there and anywhere suitable for a little detention and talk that should seem accidental, and be out of sight. Nor was Godfrey the man to be insensible to the influence of such a woman, brought to bear at close quarters. A man less vulnerable--I hate the word, but it is the right one with Sepia concerned, for she was, in truth, an enemy--might perhaps have yielded room to the suspicion that these meetings were not all so accidental as they appeared, and as Sepia treated them; but no glimmer of such a thought passed through the mind of Godfrey. He knew nothing of all that my readers know to Sepia's disadvantage, and her eyes were enough to subdue most men from the first--for a time at least. Had it not been for the return of Letty, she would by this time have had him her slave: nothing but slavery could it ever be to love a woman like her, who gave no love in return, only exercised power. But although he was always glad to meet her, and his heart had begun to beat a little faster at sight of her approach, the glamour of her presence was nearly destroyed by the arrival of Letty; and Sepia was more than sharp enough to perceive a difference in the expression of his eyes the next time she met him. At the very first glance she suspected some hostile influence at work--intentionally hostile, for persons with a consciousness like Sepia's are always imagining enemies. And as the two worst enemies she could have were the truth and a woman, she was alternately jealous and terrified: the truth and a woman together, she had not yet begun to fear; that would, indeed, be too much! She soon found there was a young woman at Thornwick, who had but just arrived; and ere long she learned who she was--one, indeed, who had already a shadowy existence in her life--was it possible the shadow should be now taking solidity, and threatening to foil her? Not once did it occur to her that, were it so, there would be retribution in it. She had heard of Tom's death through "The Firefly," which had a kind, extravagant article about him, but she had not once thought of his widow--and there she was, a hedge across the path she wanted to go! If the house of Durnmelling had but been one story higher, that she might see all round Thornwick! For some time now, as I have already more than hinted, Sepia had been fashioning a man to her thrall--Mewks, namely, the body-servant of Mr. Redmain. It was a very gradual process she had adopted, and it had been the more successful. It had got so far with him that whatever Sepia showed the least wish to understand, Mewks would take endless trouble to learn for her. The rest of the servants, both at Durnmelling and in London, were none of them very friendly with her--least of all Jemima, who was now with her mistress as lady's-maid, the accomplished attendant whom Hesper had procured in place of Mary being away for a holiday. The more Sepia realized, or thought she realized, the position she was in, the more desirous was she to get out of it, and the only feasible and safe way, in her eyes, was marriage: there was nothing between that and a return to what she counted slavery. Rather than lift again such a hideous load of irksomeness, she would find her way out of a world in which it was not possible, she said, to be both good and comfortable: she had, in truth, tried only the latter. But if she could, she thought, secure for a husband this gentleman-yeoman, she might hold up her head with the best. Even if Galofta should reappear, she would know then how to meet him: with a friend or two, such as she had never had yet, she could do what she pleased! It was hard work to get on quite alone--or with people who cared only for themselves! She must have some love on her side! some one who cared for _her_! From all she could learn, there was nothing that amounted even to ordinary friendship between Mr. Wardour and the young widow. She was in the family but as a distant poor relation--"Much as I am myself!" thought Sepia, with a bitter laugh that even in her own eyes she should be comparable to a poor creature like Letty. The fact, however, remained that Godfrey was a little altered toward her: she must have been telling him something against her--something she had heard from that detestable little hypocrite who was turned away on suspicion of theft! Yes--that was how Sepia talked _to herself_ about Mary. One morning, Letty, finding she had an hour's leisure, for her aunt did not pursue her as of old time, wandered out to the oak on the edge of the ha-ha, so memorable with the shadowy presence of her Tom. She had not been seated under it many minutes before Godfrey caught sight of her from his horse's back: knowing his mother was gone to Testbridge, he yielded to an urgent longing, took his horse to the stable, and crossed the grass to where she sat. Letty was thinking of Tom--what else was there of her own to do? --thinking like a child, looking up into the cloud-flecked sky, and thinking Tom was somewhere there, though she could not see him: she must be good and patient, that she might go up to him, as he could not come down to her--if he could, he would have come long ago! All the enchantment of the first days of her love had come back upon the young widow; all the ill that had crept in between had failed from out her memory, as the false notes in music melt in the air that carries the true ones across ravine and river, meadow and grove, to the listening ear. Letty lived in a dream of her husband--in heaven, "yet not from her"--such a dream of bliss and hope as in itself went far to make up for all her sorrows. She was sitting with her back toward the tree and her face to Thornwick, and yet she did not see Godfrey till he was within a few yards of her. She smiled, expecting his kind greeting, but was startled to hear from behind her instead the voice of a lady greeting him. She turned her head involuntarily: there was the head of Sepia rising above the breach in the ha-ha, and Godfrey had turned aside and run to give her his hand. Now Letty knew Sepia by sight, from the evening she had spent at the old hall; more of her she knew nothing. From the mind of Tom, in his illness, her baleful influence had vanished like an evil dream, and Mary had not thought it necessary to let him know how falsely, contemptuously, and contemptibly, she had behaved toward him. Letty, therefore, had no feeling toward Sepia but one of admiration for her grace and beauty, which she could appreciate the more that they were so different from her own. "Thank you," said Sepia, holding fast by Godfrey's hand, and coming up with a little pant. "What a lovely day it is for your haymaking! How can you afford the time to play knight-errant to a distressed damsel?" "The hay is nearly independent of my presence," replied Godfrey. "Sun and wind have done their parts too well for my being of much use." "Take me with you to see how they are getting on. I am as fond of hay as Bottom in his translation." She had learned Godfrey's love of literature, and knew that one quotation may stand for much knowledge. "I will, with pleasure," said Godfrey, perhaps a little consoled in the midst of his disappointment; and they walked away, neither taking notice of Letty. "I did not know," she said to herself, "that the two houses had come together at last! What a handsome couple they make!" What passed between them is scarcely worthy of record. It is enough to say that Sepia found her companion distrait, and he felt her a little invasive. In a short while they came back together, and Sepia saw Letty under the great bough of the Durnmelling oak. Godfrey handed her down the rent, careful himself not to invade Durnmelling with a single foot. She ran home, and up to a certain window with her opera-glass. But the branches and foliage of the huge oak would have concealed pairs and pairs of lovers. Godfrey turned toward Letty. She had not stirred. "What a beautiful creature Miss Yolland is!" she said, looking up with a smile of welcome, and a calmness that prevented the slightest suspicion of a flattering jealousy. "I was coming to _you_," returned Godfrey. "I never saw her till her head came up over the ha-ha. --Yes, she is beautiful--at least, she has good eyes." "They are splendid! What a wife she would make for you, Cousin Godfrey! I should like to see such a two." Letty was beyond the faintest suggestion of coquetry. Her words drove a sting to the heart of Godfrey. He turned pale. But not a word would he have spoken then, had not Letty in her innocence gone on to torture him. She sprang from the ground. "Are you ill, Cousin Godfrey?" she cried in alarm, and with that sweet tremor of the voice that shows the heart is near. "You are quite white! --Oh, dear! I've said something I oughtn't to have said! What can it be? Do forgive me, Cousin Godfrey." In her childlike anxiety she would have thrown her arms round his neck, but her hands only reached his shoulders. He drew back: such was the nature of the man that every sting tasted of offense. But he mastered himself, and in his turn, alarmed at the idea of having possibly hurt her, caught her hands in his. As they stood regarding each other with troubled eyes, the embankment of his prudence gave way, and the stored passion broke out. "You don't _mean_ you would like to see me married, Letty?" he groaned. "Yes, indeed, I do, Cousin Godfrey! You would make such a lovely husband!" "Ah! I thought as much! I knew you never cared for me, Letty!" He dropped her hands, and turned half aside, like a figure warped with fire. "I care for you more than anybody in the world--except, perhaps, Mary," said Letty: truthfulness was a part of her. "And I care for you more than all the world! --more than very being--it is worthless without you. O Letty! your eyes haunt me night and day! I love you with my whole soul." "How kind of you, Cousin Godfrey!" faltered Letty, trembling, and not knowing what she said. She was very frightened, but hardly knew why, for the idea of Godfrey in love with her was all but inconceivable. Nevertheless, its approach was terrible. Like a fascinated bird she could not take her eyes off his face. Her knees began to fail her; it was all she could do to stand. But Godfrey was full of himself, and had not the most shadowy suspicion of how she felt. He took her emotion for a favorable sign, and stupidly went on: "Letty, I can't help it! I know I oughtn't to speak to you like this--so soon, but I can't keep quiet any longer. I love you more than the universe and its Maker. A thousand times rather would I cease to live, than live without you to love me. I have loved you for years and years--longer than I know. I was loving you with heart and soul and brain and eyes when you went away and left me." "Cousin Godfrey!" shrieked Letty, "don't you know I belong to Tom?" And she dropped like one lifeless on the grass at his feet. Godfrey felt as if suddenly damned; and his hell was death. He stood gazing on the white face. The world, heaven, God, and nature were dead, and that was the soul of it all, dead before him! But such death is never born of love. This agony was but the fog of disappointed self-love; and out of it suddenly rose what seemed a new power to live, but one from a lower world: it was all a wretched dream, out of which he was no more to issue, in which he must go on for ever, dreaming, yet acting as one wide awake! Mechanically he stooped and lifted the death-defying lover in his arms, and carried her to the house. He felt no thrill as he held the treasure to his heart. It was the merest material contact. He bore her to the room where his mother sat, laid her on the sofa, said he had found her under the oak-tree--and went to his study, away in the roof. On a chair in the middle of the floor he sat, like a man bereft of all. Nothing came between him and suicide but an infinite scorn. A slow rage devoured his heart. Here he was, a man who knew his own worth, his faithfulness, his unchangeableness, cast over the wall of the universe, into the waste places, among the broken shards of ruin! If there was a God--and the rage in his heart declared his being--why did he make him? To make him for such a misery was pure injustice, was willful cruelty! Henceforward he would live above what God or woman could do to him! He rose and went to the hay-field, whence he did not return till after midnight. He did not sleep, but he came to a resolution. In the morning he told his mother that he wanted a change; now that the hay was safe, he would have a run, he hardly knew where--possibly on the Continent; she must not be uneasy if she did not hear from him for a week or two; perhaps he would have a look at the pyramids. The old lady was filled with dismay; but scarcely had she begun to expostulate when she saw in his eyes that something was seriously amiss, and held her peace--she had had to learn that with both father and son. Godfrey went, and courted distraction. Ten years before, he would have brooded: that he would not do now: the thing was not worth it! His pride was strong as ever, and both helped him to get over his suffering, and prevented him from gaining the good of it. He intrenched himself in his pride. No one should say he had not had his will! He was a strong man, and was going to prove it to himself afresh! Thus thought Godfrey; but he is in reality a weak man who must have recourse to pride to carry him through. Only, if a man has not love enough to make a hero of him, what is he to do? He was away a month, and came back in seeming health and spirits. But it was no small relief to him to find on his arrival that Letty was no longer at Thornwick. She had gone through a sore time. To have made Godfrey unhappy, made her miserable; but how was she to help it? She belonged to Tom! Not once did she entertain the thought of ceasing to be Tom's. She did not even say to herself, what would Tom do if she forgot and forsook him--and for what he could not help! for having left her because death took him away! But what was she to do? She must not remain where she was. No more must she tell his mother why she went. She wrote to Mary, and told her she could not stay much longer. They were very kind, she said, but she must be gone before Godfrey came back. Mary suspected the truth. The fact that Letty did not give her any reason was almost enough. The supposition also rendered intelligible the strange mixture of misery and hardness in Godfrey's behavior at the time of Letty's old mishap. She answered, begging her to keep her mind easy about the future, and her friend informed of whatever concerned her. This much from Mary was enough to set Letty at comparative ease. She began to recover strength, and was able to write a letter to Godfrey, to leave where he would find it, in his study. It was a lovely letter--the utterance of a simple, childlike spirit--with much in it, too, I confess, that was but prettily childish. She poured out on Godfrey the affection of a womanchild. She told him what a reverence and love he had been to her always; told him, too, that it would change her love into fear, perhaps something worse, if he tried to make her forget Tom. She told him he was much too grand for her to dare love him in that way, but she could look up to him like an angel--only he must not come between her and Tom. Nothing could be plainer, simpler, honester, or stronger, than the way the little woman wrote her mind to the great man. Had he been worthy of her, he might even yet, with her help, have got above his passion in a grand way, and been a great man indeed. But, as so many do, he only sat upon himself, kept himself down, and sank far below his passion. When he went to his study the day after his return, he saw the letter. His heart leaped like a wild thing in a trap at sight of the ill-shaped, childish writing; but--will my lady reader believe it? --the first thought that shot through it was--"She shall find it too late! I am not one to be left and taken at will!" When he read it, however, it was with a curling lip of scorn at the childishness of the creature to whom he had offered the heart of Godfrey Wardour. Instead of admiring the lovely devotion of the girl-widow to her boy-husband, he scorned himself for having dreamed of a creature who could not only love a fool like Tom Helmer, but go on loving him after he was dead, and that even when Godfrey Wardour had condescended to let her know he loved her. It was thus the devil befooled him. Perhaps the worst devil a man can be posessed withal, is himself. In mere madness, the man is beside himself; but in this case he is inside himself; the presiding, indwelling, inspiring sprit of him is himself, and that is the hardest of all to cast out. Godfrey rose form the reading of that letter _cured,_ as he called it. But it was a cure that left the wound open as a door to the entrance of evil things. He tore the letter into a thousand pieces, and throw them into the empty grate--not even showed it the respect of burning it with fire. Mary had got her affairs settled, and was again in the old place, the hallowed temple of so many holy memories. I do not forget it was a shop I call a temple. In that shop God had been worshiped with holiest worship--that is, obedience--and would be again. Neither do I forget that the devil had been worshiped there too--in what temple is he not? He has fallen like lightning from heaven, but has not yet been cast out of the earth. In that shop, however, he would be worshiped no more for a season. At once she wrote to Letty, saying the room which had been hers was at her service as soon as she pleased to occupy it: she would take her father's. Letty breathed a deep breath of redemption, and made haste to accept the offer. But to let Mrs. Wardour know her resolve was a severe strain on her courage. I will not give the conversation that followed her announcement that she was going to visit Mary Marston. Her aunt met it with scorn and indignation. Ingratitude, laziness, love of low company, all the old words of offense she threw afresh in her face. But Letty could not help being pleased to find that her aunt's storm no longer swamped her boat. When she began, however, to abuse Mary, calling her a low creature, who actually gave up an independent position to put herself at the beck and call of a fine lady, Letty grew angry. "I must not sit and hear you call Mary names, aunt," she said. "When you cast me out, she stood by me. You do not understand her. She is the only friend I ever had-except Tom." "You dare, you thankless hussy, to say such a thing in the house where you've been clothed and fed and sheltered for so many years! You're the child of your father with a vengeance! Get out of my sight!" "Aunt--" said Letty, rising. "No aunt of yours!" interrupted the wrathful woman. "Mrs. Wardour," said Letty, with dignity, "you have been my benefactor, but hardly my friend: Mary has taught me the difference. I owe you more than you will ever give me the chance of repaying you. But what friendship could have stood for an hour the hard words you have been in the way of giving me, as far back as I can remember! Hard words take all the sweetness from shelter. Mary is the only Christian _I_ have ever known." "So we are all pagans, except your low-lived lady's-maid! Upon my word!" "She makes me feel, often, often," said Letty, bursting into tears, "as if I were with Jesus himself--as if he must be in the room somewhere." So saying, she left her, and went to put up her things. Mrs. Wardour locked the door of the room where she sat, and refused to see or speak to her again. Letty went away, and walked to Testbridge. "Godfrey will do something to make her understand," she said to herself, weeping as she walked. Whether Godfrey ever did, I can not tell.

50

WILLIAM AND MARY MARSTON.

The same day on which Turnbull opened his new shop, a man was seen on a ladder painting out the sign above the old one. But the paint took time to dry. The same day, also, Mary returned to Testbridge, and, going in by the kitchen-door, went up to her father's room, of which and of her own she had kept the keys--to the indignation of Turnbull, who declared he did not know how to get on without them for storage. But, for all his bluster, he was afraid of Mary, and did not dare touch anything she had left. That night she spent alone in the house. But she could not sleep. She got up and went down to the shop. It was a bright, moonlit night, and all the house, even where the moon could not enter, was full of glimmer and gleam, except the shop. There she lighted a candle, sat down on a pile of goods, and gave herself up to memories of the past. Back and back went her thoughts as far as she could send them. God was everywhere in all the story; and the clearer she saw him there the surer she was that she would find him as she went on. She was neither sad nor fearful. The dead hours of the night came, that valley of the shadow of death where faith seems to grow weary and sleep, and all the things of the shadow wake up and come out and say, "Here we are, and there is nothing but us and our kind in the universe!" They woke up and came out upon Mary now, but she fought them off. Either there is mighty, triumphant life at the root and apex of all things, or life is not--and whence, then, the power of dreaming horrors? It is life alone--life imperfect--that can fear; death can not fear. Even the terror that walketh by night is a proof that I live, and that it shall not prevail against me. And to Mary, besides her heavenly Father, her William Marston seemed near all the time. Whereever she turned she saw the signs of him, and she pleased herself to think that perhaps he was there to welcome her. But it would not have made her the least sad to know for certain that he was far off, and would never come near her again in this world. She knew that, spite of time and space, she was and must be near him so long as she loved and did the truth. She knew there is no bond so strong, none so close, none so lasting as the truth. In God alone, who is the truth, can creatures meet. The place was left in sad confusion and dirt, and she did not a little that night to restore order at least. But at length she was tired, and went up to her room. On the first landing there was a window to the street. She stopped and looked out, candle in hand, but drew back with a start: on the opposite side of the way stood a man, looking up, she thought, at the house! She hastened to her room, and to bed. If God was not watching, no waking was of use; and if God was watching, she might sleep in peace. She did sleep, and woke refreshed. Her first care in the morning was to write to Letty--with the result I have set down. The next thing she did was to go and ask Beenie to give her some breakfast. The old woman was delighted to see her, and ready to lock her door at once and go back to her old quarters. They returned together, while Testbridge was yet but half awake. Many things had to be done before the shop could be opened. Beenie went after charwomen, and soon a great bustle of cleaning arose. But the door was kept shut, and the front windows. In the afternoon Letty came fresh from misery into more than counterbalancing joy. She took but time to put off her bonnet and shawl, and was presently at work helping Mary, cheerful as hope and a good conscience could make her. Mary was in no hurry to open the shop. There was "stock to be taken," many things had to be rearranged, and not a few things to be added, before she could begin with comfort; and she must see to it all herself, for she was determined to engage no assistant until she could give her orders without hesitation. She was soon satisfied that she could not do better than make a proposal to Letty which she had for some time contemplated--namely, that she should take up her permanent abode with her, and help her in the shop. Letty was charmed, nor ever thought of the annoyance it would be to her aunt. Mary had thought of that, but saw that, for Letty to allow the prejudices of her aunt to influence her, would be to order her life not by the law of that God whose Son was a workingman, but after the whim and folly of an ill-educated old woman. A new spring of life seemed to bubble up in Letty the moment Mary mentioned the matter; and in serving she soon proved herself one after Mary's own heart. Letty's day was henceforth without a care, and her rest was sweet to her. Many customers were even more pleased with her than with Mary. Before long, Mary, besides her salary, gave her a small share in the business. Mrs. Wardour carried her custom to the Turnbulls. When the paint was dry which obliterated the old sign, people saw the now one begin with an _M_. , and the sign-writer went on until there stood in full, _Mary Marston_. Mr. Brett hinted he would rather have seen it without the Christian name; but Mary insisted she would do and be nothing she would not hold just that name to; and on the sign her own name, neither more nor less, should stand. She would have liked, she said, to make it _William and Mary Marston_; for the business was to go on exactly as her father had taught her; the spirit of her father should never be out of the place; and if she failed, of which she had no fear, she would fail trying to carry out his ideas-but people were too dull to understand, and she therefore set the sign so in her heart only. Her old friends soon began to come about her again, and it was not many weeks before she saw fit to go to London to add to her stock. The evening of her return, as she and Letty sat over a late tea, a silence fell, during which Letty had a brooding fit. "I wonder how Cousin Godfrey is getting on?" she said at last, and smiled sadly. "How do you mean _getting on_?" asked Mary. "I was wondering whether Miss Yolland and he--" Mary started from her seat, white as the table-cloth. "Letty!" she said, in a voice of utter dismay, "you don't mean that woman is--is making friends with _him_?" "I saw them together more than once, and they seemed--well, on very good terms." "Then it is all over with him!" cried Mary, in despair. "O Letty! what _is_ to be done? Why didn't you tell me before? He'll be madly in love with her by this time! They always are." "But where's the harm, Mary? She's a very handsome lady, and of a good family." "We're all of good enough family," said Mary, a little petulantly. "But that Miss Yolland--Letty--that Miss Yolland--she's a bad woman, Letty." "I never heard you say such a hard word of anybody before, Mary! It frightens me to hear you." "It's a true word of her, Letty." "How can you be so sure?" Mary was silent. There was that about Letty that made the maiden shrink from telling the married woman what she knew. Besides, in so far as Tom had been concerned, she could not bring herself, even without mentioning his name, to talk of him to his wife: there was no evil to be prevented and no good to be done by it. If Letty was ever to know those passages in his life, she must hear them first in high places, and from the lips of the repentant man himself! "I can not tell you, Letty," she said. "You know the two bonds of friendship are the right of silence and the duty of speech. I dare say you have some things which, truly as I know you love me, you neither wish nor feel at liberty to tell me." Letty thought of what had so lately passed between her and her cousin Godfrey, and felt almost guilty. She never thought of one of the many things Tom had done or said that had cut her to the heart; those had no longer any existence. They were swallowed in the gulf of forgetful love--dismissed even as God casts the sins of his children behind his back: behind God's back is just nowhere. She did not answer, and again there was silence for a time, during which Mary kept walking about the room, her hands clasped behind her, the fingers interlaced, and twisted with a strain almost fierce. "There's no time! there's no time!" she cried at length. "How are we to find out? And if we knew all about it, what could we do? O Letty! what _am_ I to do?" "Anyhow, Mary dear, _you_ can't be to blame! One would think you fancied yourself accountable for Cousin Godfrey!" "I _am_ accountable for him. He has done more for me than any man but my father; and I know what he does not know, and what the ignorance of will be his ruin. I know that one of the best men in the world"--so in her agony she called him--"is in danger of being married by one of the worst women; and I can't bear it--I can't bear it!" "But what can you do, Mary?" "That's what I want to know," returned Mary, with irritation. "What _am_ I to do? What _am_ I to do?" "If he's in love with her, he wouldn't believe a word any one--even you--told him against her." "That is true, I suppose; but it won't clear me. I must do something." She threw herself on the couch with a groan. "It's horrid!" she cried, and buried her face in the pillow. All this time Letty had been so bewildered by Mary's agitation, and the cause of it was to her so vague, that apprehension for her cousin did not wake. But when Mary was silent, then came the thought that, if she had not so repulsed him--but she could not help it, and would not think in that direction. Mary started from the couch, and began again to pace the room, wringing her hands, and walking up and down like a wild beast in its cage. It was so unlike her to be thus seriously discomposed, that Letty began to be frightened. She sat silent and looked at her. Then spoke the spirit of truth in the scholar, for the teacher was too troubled to hear. She rose, and going up to Mary from behind, put her arm round her, and whispered in her ear: "Mary, why don't you ask Jesus?" Mary stopped short, and looked at Letty. But she was not thinking about her; she was questioning herself: why had she not done as Letty said? Something was wrong with her: that was clear, if nothing else was! She threw herself again on the couch, and Letty saw her body heaving with her sobs. Then Letty was more frightened, and feared she had done wrong. Was it her part to remind Mary of what she knew so much better than she? "But, then, I was only referring her to herself!" she thought. A few minutes, and Mary rose. Her face was wet and white, but perplexity had vanished from it, and resolution had taken its place. She threw her arms round Letty, and kissed her, and held her face against hers. Letty had never seen in her such an expression of emotion and tenderness. "I have found out, Letty, dear," she said. "Thank you, thank you, Letty! You are a true sister." "What have you found out, Mary?" "I have found out why I did not go at once to ask Him what I ought to do. It was just because I was afraid of what he would tell me to do." And with that the tears ran down her cheeks afresh. "Then you know now what to do?" asked Letty. "Yes," answered Mary, and sat down.

51

A HARD TASK.

The next morning, leaving the shop to Letty, Mary set out immediately after breakfast to go to Thornwick. But the duty she had there to perform was so distasteful, that she felt her very limbs refuse the office required of them. They trembled so under her that she could scarcely walk. She sent, therefore, to the neighboring inn for a fly. All the way, as she went, she was hoping she might be spared an encounter with Mrs. Wardour; but the old lady heard the fly, saw her get out, and, imagining she had brought Letty back in some fresh trouble, hastened to prevent either of them from entering the house. The door stood open, and they met on the broad step. "Good morning, Mrs. Wardour," said Mary, trying to speak without betraying emotion. "Good morning, Miss Marston," returned Mrs. Wardour, grimly. "Is Mr. Wardour at home?" asked Mary. "What is your business with _him_?" rejoined the mother. "Yes; it is with him," returned Mary, as if she had mistaken her question, and there had been a point of exclamation after the _What_. "About that hussy?" "I do not know whom you call by the name," replied Mary, who would have been glad indeed to find a fellow-protector of Godfrey in his mother. "You know well enough whom I mean. Whom should it be, but Letty Lovel!" "My business has nothing to do with her," answered Mary. "Whom has it to do with, then?" "With Mr. Wardour." "What is it?" "Only Mr. Wardour himself must hear it. It is his business, not mine." "I will have nothing to do with it." "I have no desire to give you the least trouble about it," rejoined Mary. "You can't see Mr. Wardour. He's not one to be at the beck and call of every silly woman that wants him." "Then I will write, and tell him I called, but you would not allow me to see him." "I will give him a message, if you like." "Then tell him what I have just said. I am going home to write to him. Good morning." She was getting into the fly again, when Mrs. Wardour, reflecting that it must needs be something of consequence that brought her there so early in a fly, and made her show such a determined front to so great a personage as herself, spoke again. "I will tell him you are here; but you must not blame me if he does not choose to see you. We don't feel you have behaved well about that girl." "Letty is my friend. I have behaved to her as if she were my sister." "You had no business to behave to her as if she were your sister. You had no right to tempt her down to your level." "Is it degradation to earn one's own living?" "You had nothing to do with her. She would have done very well if you had but let her alone." "Excuse me, ma'am, but I have _some_ right in Letty. I am sorry to have to assert it, but she would have been dead long ago if I had behaved to her as you would have me." "That was all her own fault." "I will not talk with you about it: you do not know the circumstances to which I refer. I request to see Mr. Wardour. I have no time to waste in useless altercation." Mary was angry, and it did her good; it made her fitter to face the harder task before her. That moment they heard the step of Godfrey approaching through a long passage in the rear. His mother went into the parlor, leaving the door, which was close to where Mary stood, ajar. Godfrey, reaching the hall, saw Mary, and came up to her with a formal bow, and a face flushed with displeasure. "May I speak to you alone, Mr. Wardour?" said Mary. "Can you not say what you have to say here?" "It is impossible." "Then I am curious to know--" "Let your curiosity plead for me, then." With a sigh of impatience he yielded, and led the way to the drawing-room, which was at the other end of the hall. Mary turned and shut the door he left open. "Why all this mystery, Miss Marston?" he said. "I am not aware of anything between you and me that can require secrecy." He spoke with unconcealed scorn. "When I have made my communication, you will at least allow secrecy to have been necessary." "Some objects may require it!" said Wardour, in a tone itself an insult. "Mr. Wardour," returned Mary, "I am here for your sake, not my own. May I beg you will not render a painful duty yet more difficult?" "May _I_ beg, then, that you will be as brief as possible? I am more than doubtful whether what you have to say will seem to me of so much consequence as you suppose." "I shall be very glad to find it so." "I can not give you more than ten minutes." Mary looked at her watch. "You have lately become acquainted with Miss Yolland, I am told," she began. "Whew!" whistled Godfrey, yet hardly as if he were surprised. "I have been compelled to know a good deal of that lady." "As lady's-maid in her family, I believe." "Yes," said Mary--then changing her tone after a slight pause, went on: "Mr. Wardour, I owe you more than I can ever thank you for. I strongly desire to fulfill the obligation your goodness has laid upon me, though I can never discharge it. For the sake of that obligation--for your sake, I am risking much--namely, your opinion of me." He made a gesture of impatience. "I _know_ Miss Yolland to be a woman without principle. I know it by the testimony of my own eyes, and from her own confession. She is capable of playing a cold-hearted, cruel game for her own ends. Be persuaded to consult Mr. Redmain before you commit yourself. Ask him if Miss Yolland is fit to be the wife of an honest man." There was nothing in Godfrey's countenance but growing rage. Turning to the door, Mary would have gone without another word. "Stay!" cried Godfrey, in a voice of suppressed fury. "Do not dare to go until I have told you that you are a vile slanderer. I knew something of what I had to expect, but you should never have entered this room had I known how far your effrontery could carry you. Listen to me: if anything more than the character of your statement had been necessary to satisfy me of the falsehood of every word of it, you have given it me in your reference to Mr. Redmain--a man whose life has rendered him unfit for the acquaintance, not to say the confidence of any decent woman. This is a plot--for what final object, God knows--between you and him! I should be doing my duty were I to expose you both to the public scorn you deserve." "Now I am clear!" said Mary to herself, but aloud, and stood erect, with glowing face and eyes of indignation: "Then why not do your duty, Mr. Wardour? I should be glad of anything that would open your eyes. But Miss Yolland will never give Mr. Redmain such an opportunity. Nor does he desire it, for he might have had it long ago, by the criminal prosecution of a friend of hers. For my part, I should be sorry to see her brought to public shame." "Leave the house!" said Godfrey through his teeth, and almost under his breath. "I am sorry it is so hard to distinguish between truth and falsehood," said Mary, as she went to the door. She walked out, got into the fly, and drove home; went into the shop, and served the rest of the morning; but in the afternoon was obliged to lie down, and did not appear again for three days. The reception she had met with did not much surprise her: plainly Sepia had been before her. She had pretended to make Godfrey her confidant, had invented, dressed, and poured out injuries to him, and so blocked up the way to all testimony unfavorable to her. Was there ever man in more pitiable position? It added to Godfrey's rage that he had not a doubt Mary knew what had passed between Letty and him. That, he reasoned, was at the root of it all: she wanted to bring them together yet: it would be a fine thing for her to have her bosom-friend mistress of Thornwick! What a cursed thing he should ever have been civil to her! And what a cursed fool he was ever to have cared a straw for such a low-minded creature as that Letty! Thank Heaven, he was cured of that! Cured? --He had fallen away from love--that was all the cure! Like the knight of the Red Cross, he was punished for abandoning Una, by falling in love with Duessa. His rage against Letty, just because of her faithfulness, had cast him an easy prey into the arms of the clinging Sepia. And now what more could Mary do? Just one thing was left: Mr. Redmain could satisfy Mr. Wardour of the fact he would not hear from her! --so, at least, thought Mary yet. If Mr. Redmain would take the trouble to speak to him, Mr. Wardour must be convinced! However true might be what Mr. Wardour had said about Mr. Redmain, fact remained fact about Sepia! She sat down and wrote the following letter: "Sir: I hardly know how to address you without seeming to take a liberty; at the same time I can not help hoping you trust me enough to believe that I would not venture such a request as I am about to make, without good reason. Should you kindly judge me not to presume, and should you be well enough in health, which I fear may not be the case, would you mind coming to see me here in my shop? I think you must know it--it used to be Turnbull and Marston--the Marston was my father. You will see my name over the door. Any hour from morning to night will do for me; only please let it be as soon as you can make it convenient. "I am, sir, "Your humble and grateful servant, "MARY MARSTON" "What the deuce is she grateful to me for?" grumbled Mr. Redmain when he read it. "I never did anything for her! By Jove, the gypsy herself wouldn't let me! I vow she's got more brains of her own than any half-dozen women I ever had to do with before!" The least thing bearing the look of plot, or intrigue, or secret to be discovered or heard, was enough for Mr. Redmain. What he had of pride was not of the same sort as Wardour's: it made no pretense to dignity, and was less antagonistic, so long at least as there was no talk of good motive or righteous purpose. Far from being offended with Mary's request, he got up at once, though indeed he was rather unwell and dreading an attack, ordered his brougham, and drove to Testbridge. There, careful of secrecy, he went to several shops, and bought something at each, but pretended not to find the thing he wanted. He then said he would lunch at the inn, told his coachman to put up, and, while his meal was getting ready, went to Mary's shop, which was but a few doors off. There he asked for a certain outlandish stuff, and insisted on looking over a bale not yet unpacked. Mary understood him, and, whispering Letty to take him to the parlor, followed a minute after. As soon as she entered-- "Come, now, what's it all about?" he said. Mary began at once to tell him, as directly as she could, that she was under obligation to Mr. Wardour of Thornwick, and that she had reason to fear Miss Yolland was trying to get a hold of him--"And you know what that would be for any man!" she said. "No, by Jove! I don't," he answered. "What would it be?" "Utter ruin," replied Mary. "Then go and tell him so, if you want to save him." "I have told him. But he does not like me, and won't believe me." "Then let him take his own course, and be ruined." "But I have just told you, sir, I am under obligation to him--great obligation!" "Oh! I see! you want him yourself! --Well, as you wish it, I would rather you should have him than that she-devil. But come, now, you must be open with me." "I am. I will be." "You say so, of course. Women do. --But you confess you want him yourself?" Mary saw it would be the worst possible policy to be angry with him, especially as she had given him the trouble to come to her, and she must not lose this her last chance. "I do not want him," she answered, with a smile; "and, if I did, he would never look at one in my position. He would as soon think of marrying the daughter of one of his laborers--and quite right, too--for the one might just be as good as the other." "Well, now, that's a pity. I would have done a good deal for _you_--I don't know why, for you're a little humbug if ever there was one! But, if you don't care about the fellow, I don't see why I should take the trouble. Confess--you're a little bit in love with him--ain't you, now? Confess to that, and I will do what I can." "I can't confess to a lie. I owe Mr. Wardour a debt of gratitude--that is all--but no light thing, you will allow, sir!" "I don't know; I never tried its weight. Anyhow, I should make haste to be rid of it." "I have sought to make him this return, but he only fancies me a calumniator. Miss Yolland has been beforehand with me." "Then, by Jove! I don't see but you're quits with him. If he behaves like that to you, don't you see, it wipes it all out? Upon my soul! I don't see why you should trouble your head about him. Let him take his way, and go to--Sepia." "But, sir, what a dreadful thing it would be, knowing what she is, to let a man like him throw himself away on her!" "I don't see it. I've no doubt he's just as bad as she is. We all are; we're all the same. And, if he weren't, it would be the better joke. Besides, you oughtn't to keep up a grudge, don't you know; you ought to let the--the _woman_ have a chance. If he marries her--and that must be her game this time--she'll grow decent, and be respectable ever after, you may be sure--go to church, as you would have her, and all that--never miss a Sunday, I'll lay you a thousand." "He's of a good old family!" said Mary, foolishly, thinking that would weigh with him. "Good old fiddlestick! Damned old worn-out broom-end! _She's_ of a good old family--quite good enough for his, you may take your oath! Why, my girl! the thing's not worth burning your fingers with. You've brought me here on a goose-errand. I'll go and have my lunch." He rose. "I'm sorry to have vexed you, sir," said Mary, greatly disappointed. "Never mind. --I'm horribly sold," he said, with a tight grin. "I thought you must have some good thing in hand to make it worth your while to send for me." "Then I must try something else," reflected Mary aloud. "I wouldn't advise you. The man's only the surer to hate you and stick to her. Let him alone. If he's a stuck-up fellow like that, it will take him down a bit--when the truth comes out, that is, as come out it must. There's one good thing in it, my wife'll get rid of her. But I don't know! there's an enemy, as the Bible says, that sticketh closer than a brother. And they'll be next door when Durnmelling is mine! But I can sell it." "If he _should_ come to you, will you tell him the truth?" "I don't know that. It might spoil my own little game." "Will you let him think me a liar and slanderer?" "No, by Jove! I won't do that. I don't promise to tell him all the truth, or even that what I do tell him shall be exactly true; but I won't let him think ill of my little puritan; that would spoil _your_ game. Ta, ta!" He went out, with his curious grin, amused, and enjoying the idea of a proud fellow like that being taken in with Sepia. "I hope devoutly he'll marry her!" he said to himself as he went to his luncheon. "Then I shall hold a rod over them both, and perhaps buy that miserable little Thornwick. Mortimer would give the skin off his back for it." The thing that ought to be done had to be done, and Mary had done it--alas! to no purpose for the end desired: what was left her to do further? She could think of nothing. Sepia, like a moral hyena, must range her night. She went to bed, and dreamed she was pursued by a crowd, hooting after her, and calling her all the terrible names of those who spread evil reports. She woke in misery, and slept no more.

52

A SUMMONS.

One hot Saturday afternoon, in the sleepiest time of the day, when nothing was doing; and nobody in the shop, except a poor boy who had come begging for some string to help him fly his kite, though for the last month wind had been more scarce than string, Jemima came in from Durnmelling, and, greeting Mary with the warmth of the friendship that had always been true between them, gave her a letter. "Whom is this from?" asked Mary, with the usual human waste of inquiry, seeing she held the surest answer in her hand. "Mr. Mewks gave it me," said Jemima. "He didn't say whom it was from." Mary made haste to open it: she had an instinctive distrust of everything that passed through Mewks's hands, and greatly feared that, much as his master trusted him, he was not true to him. She found the following note from Mr. Redmain: "DEAR MISS MARSTON: Come and see me as soon as you can; I have something to talk to you about. Send word by the bearer when I may look for you. I am not well. "Yours truly, "F. G. REDMAIN." Mary went to her desk and wrote a reply, saying she would be with him the next morning about eleven o'clock. She would have gone that same night, she said, but, as it was Saturday, she could not, because of country customers, close in time to go so far. "Give it into Mr. Redmain's own hand, if you can, Jemima," she said. "I will try; but I doubt if I can, miss," answered the girl. "Between ourselves, Jemima," said Mary, "I do not trust that man Mewks." "Nobody does, miss, except the master and Miss Yolland." "Then," thought Mary, "the thing is worse than I had supposed." "I'll do what I can, miss," Jemima went on. "But he's so sharp! --Mr. Mewks, I mean." After she was gone, Mary wished she had given her a verbal message; that she might have insisted on delivering in person. Jemima, with circumspection, managed to reach Mr. Redmain's room unencountered, but just as she knocked at the door, Mewks came behind her from somewhere, and snatching the letter out of her hand, for she carried it ready to justify her entrance to the first glance of her irritable master, pushed her rudely away, and immediately went in. But as he did so he put the letter in his pocket. "Who took the note?" asked his master. "The girl at the lodge, sir." "Is she not come back yet?" "No, sir, not yet. She'll be in a minute, though. I saw her coming up the avenue." "Go and bring her here." "Yes, sir." Mewks went, and in two minutes returned with the letter, and the message that Miss Marston hadn't time to direct it. "You damned rascal! I told you to bring the messenger here." "She ran the whole way, sir, and not being very strong, was that tired, that, the moment she got in, the poor thing dropped in a dead faint. They ain't got her to yet." His master gave him one look straight in the eyes, then opened the letter, and read it. "Miss Marston will call here tomorrow morning," he said; "see that _she_ is shown up at once--here, to my sitting-room. I hope I am explicit." When the man was gone, Mr. Redmain nodded his head three times, and grinned the skin tight as a drum-head over his cheek-bones. "There isn't a damned soul of them to be trusted!" he said to himself, and sat silently thoughtful. Perhaps he was thinking how often he had come short of the hope placed in him; times of reflection arrive to most men; and a threatened attack of the illness he believed must one day carry him off, might well have disposed him to think. In the evening he was worse. By midnight he was in agony, and Lady Margaret was up with him all night. In the morning came a lull, and Lady Margaret went to bed. His wife had not come near him. But Sepia might have been seen, more than once or twice, hovering about his door. Both she and Mewks thought, after such a night, he must have forgotten his appointment with Mary. When he had had some chocolate, he fell into a doze. But his sleep was far from profound. Often he woke and again dozed off. The clock in the dressing-room struck eleven. "Show Miss Marston up the moment she arrives," he said--and his voice was almost like that of a man in health. "Yes, sir," replied the startled Mewks, and felt he must obey. So Mary was at once shown to the chamber of the sick man. To her surprise (for Mewks had given her no warning), he was in bed, and looking as ill as ever she had seen him. His small head was like a skull covered with parchment. He made the slightest of signs to her to come nearer--and again. She went close to the bed. Mewks sat down at the foot of it, out of sight. It was a great four-post-bed, with curtains. "I'm glad you're come," he said, with a feeble grin, all he had for a smile. "I want to have a little talk with you. But I can't while that brute is sitting there. I have been suffering horribly. Look at me, and tell me if you think I am going to die--not that I take your opinion for worth anything. That's not what I wanted you for, though. I wasn't so ill then. But I want you the more to talk to now. _You_ have a bit of a heart, even for people that don't deserve it--at least I'm going to believe you have; and, if I am wrong, I almost think I would rather not know it till I'm dead and gone! --Good God! where shall I be then?" I have already said that, whether in consequence of remnants of mother-teaching or from the movements of a conscience that had more vitality than any of his so-called friends would have credited it with, Mr. Redmain, as often as his sufferings reached a certain point, was subject to fits of terror--horrible anguish it sometimes amounted to--at the thought of hell. This, of course, was silly, seeing hell is out of fashion in far wider circles than that of Mayfair; but denial does not alter fact, and not always fear. Mr. Redmain laughed when he was well, and shook when he was suffering. In vain he argued with himself that what he held by when in health was much more likely to be true than a dread which might be but the suggestion of the disease that was slowly gnawing him to death: as often as the sickness returned, he received the suggestion afresh, whatever might be its source, and trembled as before. In vain he accused himself of cowardice--the thing was there--_in him_--nothing could drive it out. And, verily, even a madman may be wiser than the prudent of this world; and the courage of not a few would forsake them if they dared but look the danger in the face. I pity the poor ostrich, and must I admire the man of whose kind he is the type, or take him in any sense for a man of courage? Wait till the thing stares you in the face, and then, whether you be brave man or coward, you will at all events care little about courage or cowardice. The nearer a man is to being a true man, the sooner will conscience of wrong make a coward of him; and herein Redmain had a far-off kindred with the just. After the night he had passed, he was now in one of his terror-fits; and this much may be said for his good sense--that, if there was anywhere a hell for the use of anybody, he was justified in anticipating a free entrance. "Mewks!" he called, suddenly, and his tone was loud and angry. Mewks was by his bedside instantly. "Get out with you! If I find you in this room again, without having been called, I will kill you! I am strong enough for that, even without this pain. They won't hang a dying man, and where I am going they will rather like it." Mewks vanished. "You need not mind, my girl," he went on, to Mary. "Everybody knows I am ill--very ill. Sit down there, on the foot of the bed, only take care you don't shake it, and let me talk to you. People, you know, say nowadays there ain't any hell--or perhaps none to speak of?" "I should think the former more likely than the latter," said Mary. "You don't believe there is any? I _am_ glad of that! for you are a good girl, and ought to know." "You mistake me, sir. How can I imagine there is no hell, when _he_ said there was?" "Who's _he_?" "The man who knows all about it, and means to put a stop to it some day." "Oh, yes; I see! Hm! --But I don't for the life of me see what a fellow is to make of it all--don't you know? Those parsons! They will have it there's no way out of it but theirs, and I never could see a handle anywhere to that door!" " _I_ don't see what the parsons have got to do with it, or, at least, what you have got to do with the parsons. If a thing is true, you have as much to do with it as any parson in England; if it is not true, neither you nor they have anything to do with it." "But, I tell you, if it be all as true as--as--that we are all sinners, I don't know what to do with it!" "It seems to me a simple thing. _That_ man as much as said he knew all about it, and came to find men that were lost, and take them home." "He can't well find one more lost than I am! But how am I to believe it? How can it be true? It's ages since he was here, if ever he was at all, and there hasn't been a sign of him ever since, all the time!" "There you may be quite wrong. I think I could find you some who believe him just as near them now as ever he was to his own brothers--believe that he hears them when they speak to him, and heeds what they say." "That's bosh. You would have me believe against the evidence of my senses!" "You must have strange senses, Mr. Redmain, that give you evidence where they can't possibly know anything! If that man spoke the truth when he was in the world, he is near us now; if he is not near us, there is an end of it all." "The nearer he is, the worse for me!" sighed Mr. Redmain. "The nearer he is, the better for the worst man that ever breathed." "That's queer doctrine! Mind you, I don't say it mayn't be all right. But it does seem a cowardly thing to go asking him to save you, after you've been all your life doing what ought to damn you--if there be a hell, mind you, that is." "But think," said Mary, "if that should be your only chance of being able to make up for the mischief you have done? No punishment you can have will do anything for that. No suffering of yours will do anything for those you have made suffer. But it is so much harder to leave the old way than to go on and let things take their chance!" "There may be something in what you say; but still I can't see it anything better than sneaking, to do a world of mischief, and then slink away into heaven, leaving all the poor wretches to look after themselves." "I don't think Jesus Christ is worse pleased with you for feeling like that," said Mary. "Eh? What? What's that you say? --Jesus Christ worse pleased with me? That's a good one! As if he ever thought about a fellow like me!" "If he did not, you would not be thinking about him just this minute, I suspect. There's no sense in it, if he does not think about you. He said himself he didn't come to call the righteous, but sinners to repentance." "I wish I could repent." "You can, if you will." "I can't make myself sorry for what's gone and done with." "No; it wants him to do that. But you can turn from your old ways, and ask him to take you for a pupil. Aren't you willing to learn, if he be willing to teach you?" "I don't know. It's all so dull and stupid! I never could bear going to church." "It's not one bit like that! It's like going to your mother, and saying you're going to try to be a good boy, and not vex her any more." "I see. It's all right, I dare say! But I've had as much of it as I can stand! You see, I'm not used to such things. You go away, and send Mewks. Don't be far off, though, and mind you don't go home without letting me know. There! Go along." She had just reached the door, when he called her again. "I say! Mind whom you trust in this house. There's no harm in Mrs. Redmain; she only grows stupid directly she don't like a thing. But that Miss Yolland! --that woman's the devil. I know more about her than you or any one else. I can't bear her to be about Hesper; but, if I told her the half I know, she would not believe the half of that. I shall find a way, though. But I am forgetting! you know her as well as I do--that is, you would, if you were wicked enough to understand. I will tell you one of these days what, I am going to do. There! don't say a word. I want no advice on _such_ things. Go along, and send Mewks." With all his suspicion of the man, Mr. Redmain did not suspect _how_ false Mewks was: he did not know that Miss Yolland had bewitched him for the sake of having an ally in the enemy's camp. All he could hear--and the dressing-room door was handy--the fellow duly reported to her. Already, instructed by her fears, she had almost divined what Mr. Redmain meant to do. Mary went and sat on the lowest step of the stair just outside the room. "What are you doing there?" said Lady Margaret, coming from the corridor. "Mr. Redmain will not have me go yet, my lady," answered Mary, rising. "I must wait first till he sends for me." Lady Margaret swept past her, murmuring, "Most peculiar!" Mary sat down again. In about an hour, Mewks came and said his master wanted her. He was very ill, and could not talk, but he would not let her go. He made her sit where he could see her, and now and then stretched out his hand to her. Even in his pain he showed a quieter spirit. "Something may be working--who can tell!" thought Mary. It was late in the afternoon when at length he sought further conversation. "I have been thinking, Mary," he said, "that if I do wake up in hell when I die, no matter how much I deserve it, nobody will be the better for it, and I shall be all the worse." He spoke with coolness, but it was by a powerful effort: he had waked from a frightful dream, drenched from head to foot. Coward? No. He had reason to fear. "Whereas," rejoined Mary, taking up his clew, "everybody will be the better if you keep out of it--everybody," she repeated, "--God, and Jesus Christ, and all their people." "How do you make that out?" he asked. "God has more to do than look after such as me." "You think he has so many worlds to look to--thousands of them only making? But why does he care about his worlds? Is it not because they are the schools of his souls? And why should he care for the souls? Is it not because he is making them children--his own children to understand him and be happy with his happiness?" "I can't say I care for his happiness. I want my own. And yet I don't know any that's worth the worry of it. No; I would rather be put out like a candle." "That's because you have been a disobedient child, taking your own way, and turning God's good things to evil. You don't know what a splendid thing life is. You actually and truly don't know, never experienced in your being the very thing you were made for." "My father had no business to leave me so much money." "You had no business to misuse it." "I didn't _quite_ know what _I_ was doing." "You do now." Then came a pause. "You think God hears prayer--do you?" "I do." "Then I wish you would ask him to let me off--I mean, to let me die right out when I do die. What's the good of making a body miserable?" "That, I am sure it would be of no use to pray for. He certainly will not throw away a thing he has made, because that thing may be foolish enough to prefer the dust-hole to a cabinet." "Wouldn't you do it now, if I asked you?" "I would not. I would leave you in God's hands rather than inside the gate of heaven." "I don't understand you. And you wouldn't say so if you cared for me! Only, why should you care for me?" "I would give my life for you." "Come, now! I don't believe that." "Why, I couldn't be a Christian if I wouldn't!" "You are getting absurd!" he cried. But he did not look exactly as if he thought it. "Absurd!" repeated Mary. "Isn't that what makes _him_ our Saviour? How could I be his disciple, if I wouldn't do as he did?" "You are saying a good deal!" "Can't you see that I have no choice?" " _I_ wouldn't do that for anybody under the sun!" "You are not his disciple. You have not been going about with him." "And you have?" "Yes--for many years. Besides, I can not help thinking there is one for whom you would do it." "If you mean my wife, you never were more mistaken. I would do nothing of the sort." "I did not mean your wife. I mean Jesus Christ." "Oh, I dare say! Well, perhaps; if I knew him as you do, and if I were quite sure he wanted it done for him." "He does want it done for him--always and every day--not for his own sake, though it does make him very glad. To give up your way for his is to die for him; and, when any one will do that, then he is able to do everything for him; for then, and not till then, he gets such a hold of him that he can lift him up, and set him down beside himself. That's how my father used to teach me, and now I see it for myself to be true." "It's all very grand, no doubt; but it ain't nowhere, you know. It's all in your own head, and nowhere else. You don't, you _can't_ positively believe all that!" "So much, at least, that I live in the strength and hope it gives me, and order my ways according to it." "Why didn't you teach my wife so?" "I tried, but she didn't care to think. I could not get any further with her. She has had no trouble yet to make her listen." "By Jove! I should have thought marrying a fellow like me might have been trouble enough to make a saint of her." It was impossible to fix him to any line of thought, and Mary did not attempt it. To move the child in him was more than all argument. A pause followed. "I don't love God," he said. "I dare say not," replied Mary. "How should you, when you don't know him?" "Then what's to be done? I can't very well show myself where I hate the master of the house!" "If you knew him, you would love him." "You are judging by yourself. But there is as much difference between you and me as between light and darkness." "Not quite that," replied Mary, with one of those smiles that used to make her father feel as if she were that moment come fresh from God to him. "If you knew Jesus Christ, you could not help loving him, and to love him is to love God." "You wear me out! Will you never come to the point? _Know Jesus Christ! _ How am I to go back two thousand years?" "What he was then he is now," answered Mary. "And you may even know him better than they did at the time who saw him; for it was not until they understood him better, by his being taken from them, that they wrote down his life." "I suppose you mean I must read the New Testament?" said Mr. Redmain, pettishly. "Of course!" answered Mary, a little surprised; for she was unaware how few have a notion what the New Testament is, or is meant for. "Then why didn't you say so at first? There I have you! That's just where I learn that I must be damned for ever!" "I don't mean the Epistles. Those you can't understand--yet." "I'm glad you don't mean _them. _ I hate them." "I don't wonder. You have never seen a single shine of what they are; and what most people think them is hardly the least like them. What I want you to read is the life and death of the son of man, the master of men." "I can't read. I should only make myself twice as ill. I won't try." "But I will read to you, if you will let me." "How comes it you are such a theologian? A woman is not expected to know about that sort of thing." "I am no theologian. There just comes one of the cases in which those who call themselves his followers do not believe what the Master said: he said God hid these things from the wise and prudent, and revealed them to babes. I had a father who was child enough to know them, and I was child enough to believe him, and so grew able to understand them for myself. The whole secret is to do the thing the Master tells you: then you will understand what he tells you. The opinion of the wisest man, if he does not do the things he reads, is not worth a rush. He may be partly right, but you have no reason to trust him." "Well, you shall be my chaplain. To-morrow, if I'm able to listen, you shall see what you can make of the old sinner." Mary did not waste words: where would have been the use of pulling up the poor spiritual clodpole at every lumbering step, at any word inconsistent with the holy manners of the high countries? Once get him to court, and the power of the presence would subdue him, and make him over again from the beginning, without which absolute renewal the best observance of religious etiquette is worse than worthless. Many good people are such sticklers for the proprieties! For myself, I take joyous refuge with the grand, simple, every-day humanity of the man I find in the story--the man with the heart like that of my father and my mother and my brothers and sisters. If I may but see and help to show him a little as he lived to show himself, and not as church talk and church ways and church ceremonies and church theories and church plans of salvation and church worldliness generally have obscured him for hundreds of years, and will yet obscure him for hundreds more! Toward evening, when she had just rendered him one of the many attentions he required, and which there was no one that day but herself to render, for he would scarcely allow Mewks to enter the room, he said to her: "Thank you; you are very good to me. I shall remember you. Not that I think I'm going to die just yet; I've often been as bad as this, and got quite well again. Besides, I want to show that I have turned over a new leaf. Don't you think God will give me one more chance, now that I really mean it? I never did before." "God can tell whether you mean it without that," she answered, not daring to encourage him where she knew nothing. "But you said you would remember me, Mr. Redmain: I hope you didn't mean in your will." "I did mean in my will," he answered, but in a tone of displeasure. "I must say, however, I should have preferred you had not _shown_ quite such an anxiety about it. I sha'n't be in my coffin to-morrow; and I'm not in the way of forgetting things." "I _beg_ you," returned Mary, flushing, "to do nothing of the sort. I have plenty of money, and don't care about more. I would much rather not have any from you." "But think how much good you might do with it!" said Mr. Redmain, satirically. " --It was come by honestly--so far as I know." "Money can't do half the good people think. It is stubborn stuff to turn to any good. And in this case it would be directly against good." "Nobody has a right to refuse what comes honestly in his way. There's no end to the good that may be done with money--to judge, at least, by the harm I've done with mine," said Mr. Redmain, this time with seriousness. "It is not in it," persisted Mary. "If it had been, our Lord would have used it, and he never did." "Oh, but he was all an exception!" "On the contrary, he is the only man who is no exception. We are the exceptions. Every one but him is more or less out of the straight. Do you not see? --he is the very one we must all come to be the same as, or perish! No, Mr. Redmain! don't leave me any money, or I shall be altogether bewildered what to do with it. Mrs. Redmain would not take it from me. Miss Yolland might, but I dared not give it to her. And for societies, I have small faith in them." "Well, well! I'll think about it," said Mr. Redmain, who had now got so far on the way of life as to be capable of believing that when Mary said a thing she meant it, though he was quite incapable of understanding the true relations of money. Few indeed are the Christians capable of that! The most of them are just where Peter was, when, the moment after the Lord had honored him as the first to recognize him as the Messiah, he took upon him to object altogether to his Master's way of working salvation in the earth. The Roman emperors took up Peter's plan, and the devil has been in the church ever since--Peter's Satan, whom the Master told to get behind him. They are poor prophets, and no martyrs, who honor money as an element of any importance in the salvation of the world. Hunger itself does incomparably more to make Christ's kingdom come than ever money did, or ever will do while time lasts. Of course money has its part, for everything has; and whoever has money is bound to use it as best he knows; but his best is generally an attempt to do saint-work by devil-proxy. "I can't think where on earth-you got such a sackful of extravagant notions!" Mr. Redmain added. "I told you before, sir, I had a father who set me thinking!" answered Mary. "I wish I had had a father like yours," he rejoined. "There are not many such to be had." "I fear mine wasn't just what he ought to be, though he can't have been such a rascal as his son: he hadn't time; he had his money to make." "He had the temptation to make it, and you have the temptation to spend it: which is the more dangerous, I don't know. Each has led to many crimes." "Oh, as to crimes--I don't know about that! It depends on what you call crimes." "It doesn't matter whether men call a deed a crime or a fault; the thing is how God regards it, for that is the only truth about it. What the world thinks, goes for nothing, because it is never right. It would be worse in me to do some things the world counts perfectly honorable, than it would be for this man to commit a burglary, or that a murder. I mean my guilt might be greater in committing a respectable sin, than theirs in committing a disreputable one." Had Mary known anything of science, she might have said that, in morals as in chemistry, the qualitative analysis is easy, but the quantitative another affair. The latter part of this conversation, Sepia listening heard, and misunderstood utterly. All the rest of the day Mary was with Mr. Redmain, mostly by his bedside, sitting in silent watchfulness when he was unable to talk with her. Nobody entered the room except Mewks, who, when he did, seemed to watch everything, and try to hear everything, and once Lady Margaret. When she saw Mary seated by the bed, though she must have known well enough she was there, she drew herself up with grand English repellence, and looked scandalized. Mary rose, and was about to retire. But Mr. Redmain motioned her to sit still. "This is my spiritual adviser, Lady Margaret," he said. Her ladyship cast a second look on Mary, such as few but her could cast, and left the room. On into the gloom of the evening Mary sat. No one brought her anything to eat or drink, and Mr. Redmain was too much taken up with himself, soul and body, to think of her. She was now past hunger, and growing faint, when, through the settled darkness, the words came to her from the bed: "I should like to have you near me when I am dying, Mary." The voice was a softer than she had yet heard from Mr. Redmain, and its tone went to her heart. "I will certainly be with you, if God please," she answered. "There is no fear of God," returned Mr. Redmain; "it's the devil will try to keep you away. But never you heed what any one may do or say to prevent you. Do your very best to be with me. By that time I may not be having my own way any more. Be sure, the first moment they can get the better of me, they will. And you mustn't place confidence in a single soul in this house. I don't say my wife would play me false so long as I was able to swear at her, but I wouldn't trust her one moment longer. You come and be with me in spite of the whole posse of them." "I will try, Mr. Redmain," she answered, faintly. "But indeed you must let me go now, else I may be unable to come to-morrow." "What's the matter?" he asked hurriedly, half lifting his head with a look of alarm. "There's no knowing," he went on, muttering to himself, "what may happen in this cursed house." "Nothing," replied Mary, "but that I have not had anything to eat since I left home. I feel rather faint." "They've given you nothing to eat!" cried Mr. Redmain, but in a tone that seemed rather of satisfaction than displeasure. "Ring--no, don't." "Indeed, I would rather not have anything now till I get home," said Mary. "I don't feel inclined to eat where I am not welcome." "Right! right! right!" said Mr. Redmain. "Stick to that. Never eat where you are not welcome. Go home directly. Only say when you will come to-morrow." "I can't very well during the day," answered Mary. "There is so much to be done, and I have so little help. But, if you should want me, I would rather shut up the shop than not come." "There is no need for that! Indeed, I would much rather have you in the evening. The first of the night is worst of all. It's then the devils are out. --Look here," he added, after a short pause, during which Mary, for as unfit as she felt, hesitated to leave him, "--being in business, you've got a lawyer, I suppose?" "Yes," she answered. "Then you go to him to-night the first thing, and tell him to come to me to-morrow, about noon. Tell him I am ill, and in bed, and particularly want to see him; and he mustn't let anything they say keep him from me, not even if they tell him I am dead." "I will," said Mary, and, stroking the thin hand that lay outside the counterpane, turned and left him. "Don't tell any one you are gone," he called after her, with a voice far from feeble. "I don't want any of their damned company."

53

A FRIEND IN NEED.

Mary left the house, and saw no one on her way. But it was better, she said to herself, that he should lie there untended, than be waited on by unloving hands. The night was very dark. There was no moon, and the stars were hidden by thick clouds. She must walk all the way to Testbridge. She felt weak, but the fresh air was reviving. She did not know the way so familiarly as that between Thornwick and the town, but she would enter the latter before arriving at the common. She had not gone far when the moon rose, and from behind the clouds diminished the darkness a little. The first part of her journey lay along a narrow lane, with a small ditch, a rising bank, and a hedge on each side. About the middle of the lane was a farmyard, and a little way farther a cottage. Soon after passing the gate of the farmyard, she thought she heard steps behind her, seemingly soft and swift, and naturally felt a little apprehension; but her thoughts flew to the one hiding-place for thoughts and hearts and lives, and she felt no terror. At the same time something moved her to quicken her pace. As she drew near the common, she heard the steps more plainly, still soft and swift, and almost wished she had sought refuge in the cottage she had just passed--only it bore no very good character in the neighborhood. When she reached the spot where the paths united, feeling a little at home, she stopped to listen. Behind her were the footsteps plain enough! The same moment the clouds thinned about the moon, and a pale light came filtering through upon the common in front of her. She cast one look over her shoulder, saw something turn a corner in the lane, and sped on again. She would have run, but there was no place of refuge now nearer than the corner of the turnpike-road, and she knew her breath would fail her long before that. How lonely and shelterless the common looked! The soft, swift steps came nearer and nearer. Was that music she heard? She dared not stop to listen. But immediately, thereupon, was poured forth on the dim air such a stream of pearly sounds as if all the necklaces of some heavenly choir of woman-angels were broken, and the beads came pelting down in a cataract of hurtless hail. From no source could they come save the bow and violin of Joseph Jasper! Where could he be? She was so rejoiced to know that he must be somewhere near, that, for very delight of unsecured safety, she held her peace, and had almost stopped. But she ran on again. She was now nigh the ruined hut with which my narrative has made the reader acquainted. In the mean time the moon had been growing out of the clouds, clearer and clearer. The hut came in sight. But the look of it was somehow altered--with an undefinable change, such as might appear on a familiar object in a dream; and leaning against the side of the door stood a figure she could not mistake for another than her musician. Absorbed in his music, he did not see her. She called out, "Joseph! Joseph!" He started, threw his bow from him, tucked his violin under his arm, and bounded to meet her. She tried to stop, and the same moment to look behind her. The consequence was that she fell--but safe in the smith's arms. That instant appeared a man running. He half stopped, and, turning from the path, took to the common. Jasper handed his violin to Mary, and darted after him. The chase did not last a minute; the man was nearly spent. Joseph seized him by the wrist, saw something glitter in his other hand, and turned sick. The fellow had stabbed him. With indignation, as if it were a snake that had bit him, the blacksmith flung from him the hand he held. The man gave a cry, staggered, recovered himself, and ran. Joseph would have followed again, but fell, and for a minute or two lost consciousness. When he came to himself, Mary was binding up his arm. "What a fool I am!" he said, trying to get up, but yielding at once to Mary's prevention. "Ain't it ridic'lous now, miss, that a man of my size, and ready to work a sledge with any smith in Yorkshire, should turn sick for a little bit of a job with a knife? But my father was just the same, and he was a stronger man than I'm like to be, I fancy." "It is no such wonder as you think," said Mary; "you have lost a good deal of blood." Her voice faltered. She had been greatly alarmed--and the more that she had not light enough to get the edges of the wound properly together. "You've stopped it--ain't you, miss?" "I think so." "Then I'll be after the fellow." "No, no; you must not attempt it. You must lie still awhile. But I don't understand it at all! That cottage used to be a mere hovel, without door or window! It can't be you live in it?" "Ay, that I do! and it's not a bad place either," answered Joseph. "That's what I went to Yorkshire to get my money for. It's mine--bought and paid for." "But what made you think of coming here?" "Let's go into the smithy--house I won't presume to call it," said Joseph, "though it has a lean-to for the smith--and I'll tell you everything about it. But really, miss, you oughtn't to be out like this after dark. There's too many vagabonds about." With but little need of the help Mary yet gave him, Joseph got up, and led her to what was now a respectable little smithy, with forge and bellows and anvil and bucket. Opening a door where had been none, he brought a chair, and making her sit down, began to blow the covered fire on the hearth, where he had not long before "boiled his kettle" for his tea. Then closing the door, he lighted a candle, and Mary looking about her could scarcely believe the change that had come upon the miserable vacuity. Joseph sat down upon his anvil, and begged to know where she had just been, and how far she had run from the rascal. When he had learned something of the peculiar relations in which Mary stood to the family at Durnmelling, he began to think there might have been something more in the pursuit than a chance ruffianly assault, and the greater were his regrets that he had not secured the miscreant. "Anyhow, miss," he said, "you'll never come from there alone in the dark again!" "I understand you, Joseph," answered Mary, "for I know you would not have me leave doing what I can for the poor man up there, because of a little danger in the way." "No, that I wouldn't, miss. That would be as much as to say you would do the will of God when the devil would let you. What I mean is, that here am I--your slave, or servant, or soldier, or whatever you may please to call me, ready at your word." "I must not take you from your work, you know, Joseph." "Work's not everything, miss," he answered; "and it's seldom so pressing but that--except I be shoeing a horse--I can leave it when I choose. Any time you want to go anywhere, don't forget as you've got enemies about, and just send for me. You won't have long to wait till I come. But I am main sorry the rascal didn't have something to keep him in mind of his manners." Part of this conversation, and a good deal more, passed on their way to Testbridge, whither, as soon as Joseph seemed all right, Mary, who had forgotten her hunger and faintness, insisted on setting out at once. In her turn she questioned Joseph, and learned that, as soon as he knew she was going to settle at Testbridge, he started off to find if possible a place in the neighborhood humble enough to be within his reach, and near enough for the hope of seeing her sometimes, and having what help she might please to give him. The explanation afforded Mary more pleasure than she cared to show. She had a real friend near her--one ready to help her on her own ground--one who understood her because he understood the things she loved! He told her that already he had work enough to keep him going; that the horses he once shod were always brought to him again; that he was at no expense such as in a town; and that he had plenty of time both for his violin and his books. When they came to the suburbs, she sent him home, and went straight to Mr. Brett with Mr. Redmain's message. He undertook to be at Durnmelling at the time appointed, and to let nothing prevent him from seeing his new client.

54

THE NEXT NIGHT.

Mr. Bratt found no difficulty in the way of the interview, for Mr. Redmain had given Mewks instructions he dared not disobey: his master had often ailed, and recovered again, and he must not venture too far! As soon as he had shown the visitor into the room he was dismissed, but not before he had satisfied himself that he was a lawyer. He carried the news at once to Sepia, and it wrought no little anxiety in the house. There was a will already in existence, and no ground for thinking a change in it boded anything good. Mr. Mortimer never deigned to share his thoughts, anxieties, or hopes with any of his people; but the ladies met in deep consultation, although of course there was nothing to be done. The only operative result was that it let Sepia know how, though for reasons somewhat different, her anxiety was shared by the others: unlike theirs, her sole desire was--_not_ to be mentioned in the will: that could only be for the sake of leaving her a substantial curse! Mr. Redmain's utter silence, after, as she well knew, having gathered damning facts to her discredit, had long convinced her he was but biding his time. Certain she was he would not depart this life without leaving his opinion of her and the proofs of its justice behind him, carrying weight as the affidavit of a dying man. Also she knew Hesper well enough to be certain that, however she might delight in opposition to the desire of her husband, she would for the sake of no one carry that opposition to a point where it became injurious to her interests. Sepia's one thought therefore was: could not something be done to prevent the making of another will, or the leaving of any fresh document behind him? What he might already have done, she could nowise help; what he might yet do, it would be well to prevent. Once more, therefore, she impressed upon Mewks, and that in the names of Mrs. Redmain and Lady Margaret, as well as in her own person, the absolute necessity of learning as much as possible of what might pass between his master and the lawyer. Mewks was driven to the end of his wits, and they were not a few, to find excuses for going into the room, and for delaying to go out again, while with all his ears he listened. But both client and lawyer were almost too careful for him; and he had learned positively nothing when the latter rose to depart. He instantly left the room, with the door a trifle ajar, and listening intently, heard his master say that Mr. Brett must come again the next morning; that he felt better, and would think over the suggestions he had made; and that he must leave the memoranda within his reach, on the table by his bedside. Ere the lawyer issued, Mewks was on his way with all this to his tempter. Sepia concluded there had been some difference of opinion between Mr. Redmain and his adviser, and hoped that nothing had been finally settled. Was there any way to prevent the lawyer from seeing him again? Could she by any means get a peep at the memoranda mentioned? She dared not suggest the thing to Hesper or Lady Malice--of all people they were those in relation to whom she feared their possible contents--and she dared not show herself in Mr. Redmain's room. Was Mewks to be trusted to the point of such danger as grew in her thought? The day wore on. Toward evening he had a dreadful attack. Any other man would have sent before now for what medical assistance the town could afford him, but Mr. Redmain hated having a stranger about him, and, as he knew how to treat himself, it was only when very ill that he would send for his own doctor to the country, fearing that otherwise he might give him up as a patient, such visits, however well remunerated, being seriously inconvenient to a man with a large London practice. But now Lady Margaret took upon herself to send a telegram. An hour before her usual time for closing the shop, Mary set out for Durnmelling; and, at the appointed spot on the way, found her squire of low degree in waiting. At first sight, however, and although she was looking out for him, she did not certainly recognize him. I would not have my reader imagine Joseph one of those fools who delight in appearing something else than they are; but while every workman ought to look a workman, it ought not to be by looking less of a man, or of a _gentleman_ in the true sense; and Joseph, having, out of respect to her who would honor him with her company, dressed himself in a new suit of unpretending gray, with a wide-awake hat, looked at first sight more like a country gentleman having a stroll over his farm, than a man whose hands were hard with the labors of the forge. He took off his hat as she approached--if not with ease, yet with the clumsy grace peculiar to him; for, unlike many whose manners are unobjectionable, he had in his something that might be called his own. But the best of it was, that he knew nothing about his manners, beyond the desire to give honor where honor was due. He walked with her to the door of the house; for they had agreed that, from whatever quarter had come the pursuit, and whatever might have been its object, it would be well to show that she was attended. They had also arranged at what hour, and at what spot close at hand, he was to be waiting to accompany her home. But, although he said nothing about it, Joseph was determined not to leave the place until she rejoined him. It was nearly dark when he left her; and when he had wandered up and down the avenue awhile, it seemed dark enough to return to the house, and reconnoiter a little. He had already made the acquaintance of the farmer who occupied a portion of the great square, behind the part where the family lived: he had had several of his horses to shoe, and had not only given satisfaction by the way in which he shod them, but had interested their owner with descriptions of more than one rare mode of shoeing to which he had given attention; he was, therefore, the less shy of being discovered about the place. From the back he found his way into the roofless hall, and there paced quietly up and down, measuring the floor, and guessing at the height and thickness of the walls, and the sort of roof they had borne. He noted that the wall of the house rose higher than those of the ruin with which it was in contact; and that there was a window in it just over one of those walls. Thinking whether it had been there when the roof was on, he saw through it the flickering of a fire, and wondered whether it could be the window of Mr. Redmain's room. Mary, having resolved not to give any notice of her arrival, if she could get in without it, and finding the hall-door on the latch, entered quietly, and walked straight to Mr. Redmain's bedroom. When she opened the door of it, Mewks came hurriedly to meet her, as if he would have made her go out again, but she scarcely looked at him, and advanced to the bed. Mr. Redmain was just waking from the sleep into which he had fallen after a severe paroxysm. "Ah, there you are!" he said, smiling her a feeble welcome. "I am glad you are come. I have been looking out for you. I am very ill. If it comes again to-night, I think it will make an end of me." She sat down by the bedside. He lay quite still for some time, breathing like one very weary. Then he seemed to grow easier, and said, with much gentleness: "Can't you talk to me?" "Would you like me to read to you?" she asked. "No," he answered; "I can't bear the light; it makes my head furious." "Shall I talk to you about my father?" she asked. "I don't believe in fathers," he replied. "They're always after some notion of their own. It's not their children they care about." "That may be true of some fathers," answered Mary; "but it is not the least true of mine." "Where is he? Why don't you bring him to see me, if he is such a good man? He might be able to do something for me." "There is none but your own father can do anything for you," said Mary. "My father is gone home to him, but if he were here, he would only tell you about _him_." There was a moment's silence. "Why don't you talk?" said Mr. Redmain, crossly. "What's the good of sitting there saying nothing! How am I to forget that the pain will be here again, if you don't say a word to help me?" Mary lifted up her heart, and prayed for something to say to the sad human soul that had never known the Father. But she could think of nothing to talk about except the death of William Marston. So she began with the dropping of her watch, and, telling whatever seemed at the moment fit to tell, ended with the dream she had the night of his funeral. By that time the hidden fountain was flowing in her soul, and she was able to speak straight out of it. "I can not tell you, sir," she said, closing the story of her dream, "what a feeling it was! The joy of it was beyond all expression." "You're not surely going to offer me a dream in proof of anything!" muttered the sick man. "Yes," answered Mary--"in proof of what it can prove. The joy of a child over a new toy, or a colored sweetmeat, shows of what bliss the human soul is made capable." "Oh, capable, I dare say!" "And more than that," Mary went on, adding instead of replying, "no one ever felt such gladness without believing in it. There must be somewhere the justification of such gladness. There must be the father of it somewhere." "Well! I don't like to say, after your kindness in coming here to take care of me, that you talk the worst rubbish I ever heard; but just tell me of what use is it all to me, in the state I am in! What I want is to be free of pain, and have some pleasure in life--not to be told about a father." "But what if the father you don't want is determined you shall not have what you do want? What if your desire is not worth keeping you alive for? And what if he is ready to help your smallest effort to be the thing he wants you to be--and in the end to give you your heart's desire?" "It sounds very fine, but it's all so thin, so up in the clouds! It don't seem to have a leg to stand upon. Why, if that were true, everybody would be good! There would be none but saints in the world! What's in it, I'm sure I don't know." "It will take ages to know what is in it; but, if you should die now, you will be glad to find, on the other side, that you have made a beginning. For my part, if I had everything my soul could desire, except God with me, I could but pray that he would come to me, or not let me live a moment longer; for it would be but the life of a devil." "What do you mean by a devil?" "A power that lives against its life," said Mary. Mr. Redmain answered nothing. He did not perceive an atom of sense in the words. They gave him not a glimmer. Neither will they to many of my readers; while not a few will think they see all that is in them, and see nothing. He was silent for a long time--whether he waked or slept she could not tell. The annoyance was great in the home conclave when Mewks brought the next piece of news--namely, that there was that designing Marston in the master's room again, and however she got into the house he was sure _he_ didn't know. "All the same thing over again, miss! --hard at it a-tryin' to convert 'im! --And where's the use, you know, miss? If a man like my master's to be converted and get off, I don't for my part see where's the good o' keepin' up a devil." "I am quite of your opinion, Mewks," said Sepia. But in her heart she was ill at ease. All day long she had been haunted with an ever-recurring temptation, which, instead of dismissing it, she kept like a dog in a string. Different kinds of evil affect people differently. Ten thousand will do a dishonest thing, who would indignantly reject the dishonest thing favored by another ten thousand. They are not sufficiently used to its ugly face not to dislike it, though it may not be quite so ugly as their _protege_. A man will feel grandly honest against the dishonesties of another trade than his, and be eager to justify those of his own. Here was Sepia, who did not care the dust of a butterfly's wing for causing any amount of family misery, who would without a pang have sacrificed the genuine reputation of an innocent man to save her own false one--shuddering at an idea as yet bodiless in her brain--an idea which, however, she did not dismiss, and so grew able to endure! I have kept this woman--so far as personal acquaintance with her is concerned--in the background of my history. For one thing, I am not fond of _post-mortem_ examinations; in other words, I do not like searching the decompositions of moral carrion. Analysis of such is, like the use of reagents on dirt, at least unpleasant. Nor was any true end to be furthered by a more vivid presentation of her. Nosology is a science doomed, thank God, to perish! Health alone will at last fill the earth. Or, if there should be always the ailing to help, a man will help them by being sound himself, not by knowing the ins and outs of disease. Diagnosis is not therapy. Sepia was unnatural--as every one is unnatural who does not set his face in the direction of the true Nature; but she had gone further in the opposite direction than many people have yet reached. At the same time, whoever has not faced about is on the way to a capacity for worse things than even our enemies would believe of us. Her very existence seemed to her now at stake. If by his dying act Mr. Redmain should drive her from under Hesper's roof, what was to become of her! Durnmelling, too, would then be as certainly closed against her, and she would be compelled to take a situation, and teach music, which she hated, and French and German, which gave her no pleasure apart from certain strata of their literature, to insolent girls whom she would be constantly wishing to strangle, or stupid little boys who would bore her to death. Her very soul sickened at the thought--as well it might; for to have to do such service with such a heart as hers, must indeed be torment. All hope of marrying Godfrey Wardour would be gone, of course. Did he but remain uncertain as to the truth or falsehood of a third part of what Mr. Redmain would record against her, he would never meet her again! Since the commencement of this last attack of Mr. Redmain's malady, she had scarcely slept; and now what Mewks reported rendered her nigh crazy. For some time she had been generally awake half the night, and all the last night she had been wandering here and there about the house, not unfrequently couched where she could hear every motion in Mr. Redmain's room. Haunted by fear, she in turn haunted her fear. She could not keep from staring down the throat of the pit. She was a slave of the morrow, the undefined, awful morrow, ever about to bring forth no one knows what. That morrow could she but forestall! If any should think that anxiety and watching must have so wrought on Sepia that she came to be no longer accountable for her actions, I will not oppose the kind conclusion. For my own part, until I shall have seen a man absolutely one with the source of his being, I do not believe I shall ever have seen a man absolutely sane. What many would point to as plainest proofs of sanity, I should regard as surest signs of the contrary. A sign of my own insanity is it? Your insanity may be worse than mine, for you are aware of none, and I with mine do battle. I believe all insanity has moral as well as physical roots. But enough of this. There are questions we can afford to leave. Sepia had got very thin during these trying days. Her great eyes were larger yet, and filled with a troubled anxiety. Not paleness, for of that her complexion was incapable, but a dull pallor possessed her cheek. If one had met her as she roamed the house that night, he might well have taken her for some naughty ancestor, whose troubled conscience, not yet able to shake off the madness of some evil deed, made her wander still about the place where she had committed it. She believed in no supreme power who cares that right should be done in his worlds. Here, it may be, some of my unbelieving acquaintances, foreseeing a lurid something on the horizon of my story, will be indignant that the capacity for crime should be thus associated with the denial of a Live Good. But it remains a mere fact that it is easier for a man to commit a crime when he does not fear a willed retribution. Tell me there is no merit in being prevented by fear; I answer, the talk is not of merit. As the world is, that is, as the race of men at present is, it is just as well that the man who has no merit, and never dreamed of any, should yet be a little hindered from cutting his neighbor's throat at his evil pleasure. --No; I do not mean hindered by a lie--I mean hindered by the poorest apprehension of the grandest truth. Of those who do not believe, some have never had a noble picture of God presented to them; but whether their phantasm is of a mean God because they refuse him, or they refuse him because their phantasm of him is mean, who can tell? Anyhow, mean notions must come of meanness, and, uncharitable as it may appear, I can not but think there is a moral root to all chosen unbelief. But let God himself judge his own. With Sepia, what was _best_ meant what was best for her, and _best for her_ meant _most after her liking_. She had in her time heard a good deal about _euthanasia_, and had taken her share in advocating it. I do not assume this to be anything additional against her; one who does not believe in God, may in such an advocacy indulge a humanity pitiful over the irremediable ills of the race; and, being what she was, she was no worse necessarily for advocating that than for advocating cremation, which she did--occasionally, I must confess, a little coarsely. But the notion of _euthanasia_ might well work for evil in a mind that had not a thought for the case any more than for the betterment of humanity, or indeed for anything but its own consciousness of pleasure or comfort. Opinions, like drugs, work differently on different constitutions. Hence the man is foolish who goes scattering vague notions regardless of the soil on which they may fall. She was used to asking the question, What's the good? but always in respect of something she wanted out of her way. "What's the good of an hour or two more if you're not enjoying it?" she said to herself again and again that Monday. "What's the good of living when life is pain--or fear of death, from which no fear can save you?" But the question had no reference to her own life: she was judging for another--and for another not for his sake, or from his point of view, but for her own sake, and from where she stood. All the day she wandered about the house, such thoughts as these in her heart, and in her pocket a bottle of that concentrated which Mr. Redmain was taking much diluted for medicine. But she _hoped not to have to use it_. If only Mr. Redmain would yield the conflict, and depart without another interview with the lawyer! But if he would not, and two drops from the said bottle, not taken by herself, but by another, would save her, all her life to come, from endless anxiety and grinding care, from weariness and disgust, and indeed from want; nor that alone, but save likewise that other from an hour, or two hours, or perhaps a week, or possibly two weeks, or--who could tell? --it might be a month of pain and moaning and weariness, would it not be well? --must it not be more than well? She had not learned to fear temptation; she feared poverty, dependence, humiliation, labor, _ennui_, misery. The thought of the life that must follow and wrap her round in the case of the dreaded disclosure was unendurable; the thought of the suggested frustration was not _so_ unendurable--was not absolutely unendurable--was to be borne--might be permitted to come--to return--was cogitated--now with imagined resistance, now with reluctant and partial acceptance, now with faint resolve, and now with determined resolution--now with the beaded drops pouring from the forehead, and now with a cold, scornful smile of triumphant foil and success. Was she so very exceptionally bad, however? You who hate your brother or your sister--you do not think yourself at all bad! But you are a murderer, and she was only a murderer. You do not feel wicked? How do you know she did? Besides, you hate, and she did not hate; she only wanted to take care of herself. Lady Macbeth did not hate Duncan; she only wanted to give her husband his crown. You only hate your brother; you would not, you say, do him any harm; and I believe you would not do him mere bodily harm; but, were things changed, so that hate-action became absolutely safe, I should have no confidence what you might not come to do. No one can tell what wreck a gust of passion upon a sea of hate may work. There are men a man might well kill, if he were anything less than ready to die for them. The difference between the man that hates and the man that kills may be nowhere but in the courage. These are _grewsome_ thinkings: let us leave them--but hating with them. All the afternoon Sepia hovered about Mr. Rcdmain's door, down upon Mewks every moment he appeared. Her head ached; she could hardly breathe. Rest she could not. Once when Mewks, coming from the room, told her his master was asleep, she crept in, and, softly approaching the head of the bed, looked at him from behind, then stole out again. "He seems dying, Mewks," she said. "Oh, no, miss! I've often seen him as bad. He's better." "Who's that whispering?" murmured the patient, angrily, though half asleep. Mewks went in, and answered: "Only me and Jemima, sir." "Where's Miss Marston?" "She's not come yet, sir." "I want to go to sleep again. You must wake me the moment she comes." "Yes, sir." Mewks went back to Sepia. "His voice is much altered," she said. "He most always speaks like that now, miss, when he wakes--very different from I used to know him! He'd always swear bad when he woke; but Miss Marston do seem t' 'ave got a good deal of that out of him. Anyhow, this last two days he's scarce swore enough to make it feel home-like." "It's death has got it out of him," said Sepia. "I don't think he can last the night through. Fetch me at once if--And don't let that Marston into the room again, whatever you do." She spoke with the utmost emphasis, plainly clinching instructions previously given, then went slowly up the stair to her own room. Surely he would die to-night, and she would not be led into temptation! She would then have but to get a hold of the paper! What a hateful and unjust thing it was that her life should be in the power of that man--a miserable creature, himself hanging between life and death! --that such as he should be able to determine her fate, and say whether she was to be comfortable or miserable all the rest of a life that was to outlast his so many years! It was absurd to talk of a Providence! She must be her own providence! She stole again down the stair. Her cousin was in her own room safe with a novel, and there was Mewks fast asleep in an easy-chair in the study, with the doors of the dressing-room and chamber ajar! She crept into the sick-room. There was the tumbler with the medicine! and her fingers were on the vial in her pocket. The dying man slept. She drew near the table by the bed. He stirred as if about to awake. Her limbs, her brain seemed to rebel against her will. --But what folly it was! the man was not for this world a day longer; what could it matter whether he left it a few hours earlier or later? The drops on his brow rose from the pit of his agony; every breath was a torture; it were mercy to help him across the verge; if to more life, he would owe her thanks; if to endless rest, he would never accuse her. She took the vial from her pocket. A hand was on the lock of the door! She turned and fled through the dressing-room and study, waking Mewks as she passed. He, hurrying into the chamber, saw Mary already entered. When Sepia learned who it was that had scared her, she felt she could kill her with less compunction than Mr. Redmain. She hated her far worse. "You _must_ get the viper out of-the house, Mewks," she said. "It is all your fault she got into the room." "I'm sure I'm willing enough," he answered, "--even if it wasn't you as as't me, miss! But what am I to do? She's that brazen, you wouldn' believe, miss! It wouldn' be becomin' to tell you what I think that young woman fit to do." "I don't doubt it," responded Sepia. "But surely," she went on, "the next time he has an attack, and he's certain to have one soon, you will be able to get her hustled out!" "No, miss--least of all just then. She'll make that a pretense for not going a yard from the bed--as if me that's been about him so many years didn't know what ought to be done with him in his paroxes of pain better than the likes of her! Of all things I do loathe a row, miss--and the talk of it after; and sure I am that without a row we don't get her out of that room. The only way is to be quiet, and seem to trust her, and watch for the chance of her going out--then shut her out, and keep her out." "I believe you are right," returned Sepia, almost with a hope that no such opportunity might arrive, but at the same time growing more determined to take advantage of it if it should. Hence partly it came that Mary met with no interruption to her watching and ministering. Mewks kept coming and going--watching her, and awaiting his opportunity. Mr. Redmain scarcely heeded him, only once and again saying in sudden anger, "What can that idiot be about? He might know by this time I'm not likely to want _him_ so long as _you_ are in the room!" And said Mary to herself: "Who knows what good the mere presence of one who trusts may be to him, even if he shouldn't seem to take much of what she says! Perhaps he may think of some of it after he is dead--who knows?" Patiently she sat and waited, full of help that would have flowed in a torrent, but which she felt only trickle from her heart like a stream that is lost on the face of the rock down which it flows. All at once she bethought herself, and looked at her watch: Joseph had been waiting for her more than an hour, and would not, she knew, if he stopped all night, go away without her! And for her, she could not forsake the poor man her presence seemed to comfort! He was now lying very still: she would slip out and send Joseph away, and be back before the patient or any one else should miss her! She went softly from the room, and glided down the stairs, and out of the house, seeing no one--but not unseen: hardly was she from the room, when the door of it was closed and locked behind her, and hardly from the house, when the house-door also was closed and locked behind her. But she heard nothing, and ran, without the least foreboding of mishap, to the corner where Joseph was to meet her. There he was, waiting as patiently as if the hour had not yet come. "I can't leave him, Joseph. My heart won't let me," she said. "I can not go back before the morning. I will look in upon you as I pass." So saying, and without giving him time to answer, she bade him good night, and ran back to the house, hoping to get in as before without being seen. But to her dismay she found the door already fast, and concluded the hour had arrived when the house was shut up for the night. She rang the bell, but there was no answer--for there was Mewks himself standing close behind the door, grinning like his master an evil grin. As she knocked and rang in vain, the fact flashed upon her that she was intentionally excluded. She turned away, overwhelmed with a momentary despair. What was she to do? There stood Joseph! She ran back to him, and told him they had shut her out. "It makes me miserable," she went on, "to think of the poor man calling me, and me nowhere to answer. The worst of it is, I seem the only person he has any faith in, and what I have been telling him about the father of us all, whose love never changes, will seem only the idler tale, when he finds I am gone, and nowhere to be found--as they're sure to tell him. There's no saying what lies they mayn't tell him about my going! Rather than go, I will sit on the door-step all night, just to be able to tell him in the morning that I never went home." "Why have they done it, do you think? asked Joseph. "I dare hardly allow myself to conjecture," answered Mary. "None of them like me but Jemima--not even Mrs. Redmain now, I am afraid; for you see I never got any of the good done her I wanted, and, till something of that was done, she could not know how I felt toward her. I shouldn't a bit wonder if they fancy I have a design on his money--as if anybody fit to call herself a woman would condescend to such a thing! But when a woman would marry for money, she may well think as badly of another woman." "This is a serious affair," said Joseph. "To have a dying man believe you false to him would be dreadful! We must find some way in. Let us go to the kitchen-door." "If Jemima happened to be near, then, perhaps!" rejoined Mary; "but if they want to keep me out, you may be sure Mewks has taken care of one door as well as another. He knows I'm not so easy to keep out." "If you did get in," said Joseph, speaking in a whisper as they went, "would you feel quite safe after this?" "I have no fear. I dare say they would lock me up somewhere if they could, before I got to Mr. Redmain's room: once in, they would not dare touch me." "I shall not go out of hearing so long as you are in that house," said Joseph, with decision. "Not until I have you out again do I leave the premises. If anything should make you feel uncomfortable, you cry out, miss, and I'll make a noise at the door that everybody at Thornwick over there shall hear me." "It is a large house, Joseph: one might call in many a part of it, and never be heard out of doors. I don't think you could hear me from Mr. Redmain's room," said Mary, with a little laugh, for she was amused as well as pleased at the protection Joseph would give her; "it is up two flights, and he chose it himself for the sake of being quiet when he was ill." As she spoke, they reached the door they sought--the most likely of all to be still open: it was fast and dark as if it had not been unbolted for years. One or two more entrances they tried, but with no better success. "Come this way," whispered Joseph. "I know a place where we shall at least be out of their sight, and where we can plan at our leisure." He led her to the back entrance to the old hall. Alas! even that was closed. "This _is_ disappointing," he said; "for, if we were only in there, I think something might be done." "I believe I know a way," said Mary, and led him to a place near, used for a wood-shed. At the top of a great heap of sticks and fagots was an opening in the wall, that had once been a window, or perhaps a door. "That, I know, is the wall of the tower," she said; "and there can be no difficulty in getting through there. Once in, it will be easy to reach the hall--that is, if the door of the tower is not locked." In an instant Joseph was at the top of the heap, and through the opening, hanging on, and feeling with his feet. He found footing at no great distance, and presently Mary was beside him. They descended softly, and found the door into the hall wide open. "Can you tell me what window is that," whispered Joseph, "just above the top of the wall?" "I can not," answered Mary. "I never could go about this house as I did about Mr. Redmain's; my lady always looked so fierce if she saw me trying to understand the place. But why do you ask?" "You see the flickering of a fire? Could it be Mr. Redmain's room?" "I can not tell. I do not think it. That has no window in this direction, so far as I know. But I could not be certain." "Think how the stairs turn as you go up, and how the passages go to the room. Think in what direction you look every corner you turn. Then you will know better whether or not it might be." Mary was silent, and thought. In her mind she followed every turn she had to take from the moment she entered the house till she got to the door of Mr. Redmain's room, and then thought how the windows lay when she entered it. Her conclusion was that one side of the room must be against the hall, but she could remember no window in it. "But," she added, "I never was in that room when I was here before, and, the twice I have now been in it, I was too much occupied to take much notice of things about me. Two windows, I know, look down into a quiet little corner of the courtyard, where there is an old pump covered with ivy. I remember no other." "Is there any way of getting on to the top of that wall from this tower?" asked Joseph. "Certainly there is. People often walk round the top of those walls. They are more than thick enough for that." "Are you able to do it?" "Yes, quite. I have been round them more than once. But I don't like the idea of looking in at a window." "No more do I, miss; but you must remember, if it is his room, it will only be your eyes going where the whole of you has a right to be; and, if it should not be that room, they have driven you to it: such a necessity will justify it." "You must be right," answered Mary, and, turning, led the way up the stair of the tower, and through a gap in the wall out upon the top of the great walls. It was a sultry night. A storm was brooding between heaven and earth. The moon was not yet up, and it was so dark that they had to feel their way along the wall, glad of the protection of a fence of thick ivy on the outer side. Looking down into the court on the one hand, and across the hall to the lawn on the other, they saw no living thing in the light from various windows, and there was little danger of being discovered. In the gable was only the one window for which they were making. Mary went first, as better knowing the path, also as having the better right to look in. Through the window, as she went, she could see the flicker, but not the fire. All at once came a great blaze. It lasted but a moment--long enough, however, to let them see plainly into a small closet, the door of which was partly open. "That is the room, I do believe," whispered Mary. "There is a closet, but I never was in it." "If only the window be not bolted!" returned Joseph. The same instant Mary heard the voice of Mr. Redmain call in a tone of annoyance--"Mary! Mary Marston! I want you. Who is that in the room? --Damn you! who are you?" "Let me pass you," said Joseph, and, making her hold to the ivy, here spread on to the gable, he got between Mary and the window. The blaze was gone, and the fire was at its old flicker. The window was not bolted. He lifted the sash. A moment and he was in. The next, Mary was beside him. Something, known to her only as an impulse, induced Mary to go softly to the door of the closet, and peep into the room. She saw Hesper, as she thought, standing--sidewise to the closet--by a chest of drawers invisible from the bed. A candle stood on the farther side of her. She held in one hand the tumbler from which, repeatedly that evening, Mary had given the patient his medicine: into this she was pouring, with an appearance of care, something from a small dark bottle. With a sudden suspicion of foul play, Mary glided swiftly into the room, and on to where she stood. It was Sepia! She started with a smothered shriek, turned white, and almost dropped the bottle; then, seeing who it was, recovered herself. But such a look as she cast on Mary! such a fire of hate as throbbed out of those great black eyes! Mary thought for a moment she would dart at her. But she turned away, and walked swiftly to the door. Joseph, however, peeping in behind Mary, had caught a glimpse of the bottle and tumbler, also of Sepia's face. Seeing her now retiring with the bottle in her hand, he sprang after her, and, thanks to the fact that she had locked the door, was in time to snatch it from her. She turned like a wild beast, and a terrible oath came hissing as from a feline throat. When, however, she saw, not Mary, but the unknown figure of a powerful man, she turned again to the door and fled. Joseph shut and locked it, and went back to the closet. Mary drew near the bed. "Where have you been all this time?" asked the patient, querulously; "and who was that went out of the room just now? What's all the hurry about?" Anxious he should be neither frightened nor annoyed, Mary replied to the first part of his question only. "I had to go and tell a friend, who was waiting for me, that I shouldn't be home to-night. But here I am now, and I will not leave you again." "How did the door come to be locked? And who was that went out of the room?" While he was thus questioning, Joseph crept softly out of the window; and all the rest of the night he lay on the top of the wall under it. "It was Miss Yolland," answered Mary. "What business had she in my room?" "She shall not enter it again while I am here." "Don't let Mewks in either," he rejoined. "I heard the door unlock and lock again: what did it mean?" "Wait till to-morrow. Perhaps we shall find out then." He was silent a little. "I must get out of this house, Mary," he sighed at length. "When the doctor comes, we shall see," said Mary. "What! is the doctor coming? I am glad of that. Who sent for him?" "I don't know; I only heard he was coming." "But your lawyer, Mary--what's his name? --will be here first: we'll talk the thing over with him, and take his advice. I feel better, and shall go to sleep again." All night long Mary sat by him and watched. Not a step, so far as she knew, came near the door; certainly not a hand was laid upon the lock. Mr. Redmain slept soundly, and in the morning was beyond a doubt better. But Mary could not think of leaving him until Mr. Brett came. At Mr. Redmain's request she rang the bell. Mewks made his appearance, with the face of a ghost. His master told him to bring his breakfast. "And see, Mewks," he added, in a tone of gentleness that terrified the man, so unaccustomed was he to such from the mouth of his master--"see that there is enough for Miss Marston as well. She has had nothing all night. Don't let my lady have any trouble with it. --Stop," he cried, as Mewks was going, "I won't have you touch it either; I am fastidious this morning. Tell the young woman they call Jemima to come here to Miss Marston." Mewks slunk away. Jemima came, and Mr. Redmain ordered her to get breakfast for himself and Mary. It was done speedily, and Mary remained in the sick-chamber until the lawyer arrived.

55

DISAPPEARANCE.

"I am afraid I must ask you to leave us now, Miss Marston," said Mr. Brett, seated with pen, ink, and paper, to receive his new client's instructions. "No," said Mr. Redmain; "she must stay where she is. I fancy something happened last night which she has got to tell us about." "Ah! What was that?" asked Mr. Brett, facing round on her. Mary began her story with the incident of her having been pursued by some one, and rescued by the blacksmith, whom she told her listeners she had known in London. Then she narrated all that had happened the night before, from first to last, not forgetting the flame that lighted the closet as they approached the window. "Just let me see those memoranda," said Mr. Brett to Mr. Redmain, rising, and looking for the paper where he had left it the day before. "It was of that paper I was this moment thinking," answered Mr. Redmain. "It is not here!" said Mr. Brett. "I thought as much! The fool! There was a thousand pounds there for her! I didn't want to drive her to despair: a dying man must mind what he is about. Ring the bell and see what Mewks has to say to it." Mewks came, in evident anxiety. I will not record his examination. Mr. Brett took it for granted he had deliberately and intentionally shut out Mary, and Mewks did not attempt to deny it, protesting he believed she was boring his master. The grin on that master's face at hearing this was not very pleasant to behold. When examined as to the missing paper, he swore by all that was holy he knew nothing about it. Mr. Brett next requested the presence of Miss Yolland. She was nowhere to be found. The place was searched throughout, but there was no trace of her. When the doctor arrived, the bottle Joseph had taken from her was examined, and its contents discovered. Lady Malice was grievously hurt at the examination she found had been going on. "Have I not nursed you like my own brother, Mr. Redmain?" she said. "You may be glad you have escaped a coroner's inquest in your house, Lady Margaret!" said Mr. Brett. "For me," said Mr. Redmain, "I have not many days left me, but somehow a fellow does like to have his own!" Hesper sought Mary, and kissed her with some appearance of gratitude. She saw what a horrible suspicion, perhaps even accusation, she had saved her from. The behavior and disappearance of Sepia seemed to give her little trouble. Mr. Brett got enough out of Mewks to show the necessity of his dismissal, and the doctor sent from London a man fit to take his place. Almost every evening, until he left Durnmelling, Mary went to see Mr. Redmain. She read to him, and tried to teach him, as one might an unchildlike child. And something did seem to be getting into, or waking up in, him. The man had never before in the least submitted; but now it looked as if the watching spirit of life were feeling through the dust-heap of his evil judgments, low thoughts, and bad life, to find the thing that spirit had made, lying buried somewhere in the frightful tumulus: when the two met and joined, then would the man be saved; God and he would be together. Sometimes he would utter the strangest things--such as if all the old evil modes of thinking and feeling were in full operation again; and sometimes for days Mary would not have an idea what was going on in him. When suffering, he would occasionally break into fierce and evil language, then be suddenly silent. God and Satan were striving for the man, and victory would be with him with whom the man should side. For some time it remained doubtful whether this attack was not, after all, going to be the last: the doctor himself was doubtful, and, having no reason to think his death would be a great grief in the house, did not hesitate much to express his doubt. And, indeed, it caused no gloom. For there was little love in the attentions the Mortimers paid him; and in what other hope could Hesper have married, than that one day she would be free, with a freedom informed with power, the power of money! But to the mother's suggestions as to possible changes in the future, the daughter never responded: she had no thought of plans in common with her. Strange rumors came abroad. Godfrey Wardour heard something of them, and laughed them to scorn. There was a conspiracy in that house to ruin the character of the loveliest woman in creation! But when a week after week passed, and he heard nothing of or from her, he became anxious, and at last lowered his pride so far as to call on Mary, under the pretense of buying something in the shop. His troubled look filled her with sympathy, but she could not help being glad afresh that he had escaped the snares laid for him. He looked at her searchingly, and at last murmured a request that she would allow him to have a little conversation with her. She led the way to her parlor, closed the door, and asked him to take a seat. But Godfrey was too proud or too agitated to sit. "You will be surprised to see me on such an errand, Miss Marston!" he said. "I do not yet know your errand," replied Mary; "but I may not be so much surprised as you think." "Do not imagine," said Godfrey, stiffly, "that I believe a word of the contemptible reports in circulation. I come only to ask you to tell me the real nature of the accusations brought against Miss Yolland: your name is, of course, coupled with them." "Mr. Wardour," said Mary, "if I thought you would believe what I told yon, I would willingly do as you ask me. As it is, allow me to refer you to Mr. Brett, the lawyer, whom I dare say you know." Happily, the character of Mr. Brett was well known in Testbridge and all the country round; and from him Godfrey Wardour learned what sent him traveling on the Continent again--not in the hope of finding Sepia. What became of her, none of her family ever learned. Some time after, it came out that the same night on which the presence of Joseph rescued Mary from her pursuer, a man speaking with a foreign accent went to one of the surgeons in Testbridge to have his shoulder set, which he said had been dislocated by a fall. When Joseph heard it, he smiled, and thought he knew what it meant. Hesper was no sooner in London, than she wrote to Mary, inviting her to go and visit her. But Mary answered she could no more leave home, and must content herself with the hope of seeing Mrs. Redmain when she came to Durnmelling. So long as her husband lived, the time for that did not again arrive; but when Mary went to London, she always called on her, and generally saw Mr. Redmain. But they never had any more talk about the things Mary loved most. That he continued to think of those things, she had one ground of hoping, namely, the kindness with which he invariably received her, and the altogether gentler manner he wore as often and as long as she saw him. Whether the change was caused by something better than physical decay, who knows save him who can use even decay for redemption? He lived two years more, and died rather suddenly. After his death, and that of her father, which followed soon, Hesper went again to Durnmelling, and behaved better to her mother than before. Mary sometimes saw her, and a flicker of genuine friendship began to appear on Hesper's part. Mr. Turnbull was soon driving what he called a roaring trade. He bought and sold a great deal more than Mary, but she had business sufficient to employ her days, and leave her nights free, and bring her and Letty enough to live on as comfortably as they desired--with not a little over, to use, when occasion was, for others, and something to lay by for the time of lengthening shadows. Turnbull seemed to hare taken a lesson from his late narrow escape, for he gave up the worst of his speculations, and confined himself to "_genuine business-principles_"--the more contentedly that, all Marston folly swept from his path, he was free to his own interpretation of the phrase. He grew a rich man, and died happy--so his friends said, and said as they saw. Mrs. Turnbull left Testbridge, and went to live in a small county-town where she was unknown. There she was regarded as the widow of an officer in her Majesty's service, and, as there was no one within a couple of hundred miles to support an assertion to the contrary, she did not think it worth her while to make one: was not the supposed brevet a truer index to her consciousness of herself than the actual ticket by ill luck attached to her--Widow of a linen-draper? George carried on the business; and, when Mary and he happened to pass in the street, they nodded to each other. Letty was diligent in business, but it never got into her heart. She continued to be much liked, and in the shop was delightful. If she ever had another offer of marriage, the fact remained unknown. She lived to be a sweet, gracious little old lady--and often forgot that she was a widow, but never that she was a wife. All the days of her appointed time she waited till her change should come, and she should find her Tom on the other side, looking out for her, as he had said he would. Her mother-in-law could not help dying; but she never "forgave" her--for what, nobody knew. After a year or so, Mrs. Wardour began to take a little notice of her again; but she never asked her to Thornwick until she found herself dying. Perhaps she then remembered a certain petition in the Lord's prayer. But will it not be rather a dreadful thing for some people if they are forgiven as they forgive? Old Mr. Duppa died, and a young man came to minister to his congregation who thought the baptism of the spirit of more importance than the most correct of opinions concerning even the baptizing spirit. From him Mary found she could learn, and would be much to blame if she did not learn. From him Letty also heard what increased her desire to be worth something before she went to rejoin Tom. Joseph Jasper became once more Mary's pupil. She was now no more content with her little cottage piano, but had an instrument of quite another capacity on which to accompany the violin of the blacksmith. To him trade came in steadily, and before long he had to build a larger shoeing-shed. From a wide neighborhood horses were brought him to be shod, cart-wheels to be tired, axles to be mended, plowshares to be sharpened, and all sorts of odd jobs to be done. He soon found it necessary to make arrangement with a carpenter and wheelwright to work on his premises. Before two years were over, he was what people call a flourishing man, and laying by a little money. "But," he said to Mary, "I can't go on like this, you know, miss. I don't want money. It must be meant to do something with, and I must find out what that something is."

56

A CATASTROPHE.

One winter evening, as soon as his work was over for the day, Joseph locked the door of his smithy, washed himself well, put on clean clothes, and, taking his violin, set out for Testbridge: Mary was expecting him to tea. It was the afternoon of a holiday, and she had closed early. Was there ever a happier man than Joseph that night as he strode along the footpath? A day of invigorating and manly toil behind him, folded up in the sense of work accomplished; a clear sky overhead, beginning to breed stars; the pale amber hope of to-morrow's sunrise low down in the west; a frosty air around him, challenging to the surface the glow of the forge which his day's labor had stored in his body; his heart and brain at rest with his father in heaven; his precious violin under his arm; before him the welcoming parlor, where two sweet women waited his coming, one of them the brightest angel, in or out of heaven, to him; and the prospect of a long evening of torrent-music between them--who, I repeat, could have been more blessed, heart, and soul, and body, than Joseph Jasper? His being was like an all-sided lens concentrating all joys in the one heart of his consciousness. God only knows how blessed he could make us if we would but let him! He pressed his violin-case to his heart, as if it were a living thing that could know that he loved it. Before he reached the town, the stars were out, and the last of the sunset had faded away. Earth was gone, and heaven was all. Joseph was now a reader, and read geology and astronomy: "I've got to do with them all!" he said to himself, looking up. "There lie the fields of my future, when this chain of gravity is unbound from my feet! Blessed am I here now, my God, and blessed shall I be there then." When he reached the suburbs, the light of homes was shining through curtains of all colors. "Every nest has its own birds," said Joseph; "every heart its own joys!" Just then, he was in no mood to think of the sorrows. But the sorrows are sickly things and die, while the joys are strong divine children, and shall live for evermore. When he reached the streets, all the shops he passed were closed, except the beer-shops and the chemists'. "The nettle and the dock!" said Joseph. When he reached Mary's shop, he turned into the court to the kitchen-door. "Through the kitchen to the parlor!" he said. "Through the smithy to the presence-chamber! O my God--through the mud of me, up to thy righteousness!" He was in a mood for music--was he not? One might imagine the violin under his arm was possessed by an angel, and, ignoring his ears, was playing straight into his heart! Beenie let him in, and took him up to the parlor. Mary came half-way to meet him. The pressure as of heaven's atmosphere fell around him, calming and elevating. He stepped across the floor, still, stately, and free. He laid down his violin, and seated himself where Mary told him, in her father's arm-chair by the fire. Gentle nothings with a down of rainbows were talked until tea was over, and then without a word they set to their music--Mary and Joseph, with their own hearts and Letty for their audience. They had not gone far on the way to fairyland, however, when Beenie called Letty from the room, to speak to a friend and customer, who had come from the country on a sudden necessity for something from the shop. Letty, finding herself not quite equal to the emergency, came in her turn to call Mary: she went as quietly as if she were leaving a tiresome visitor. The music was broken, and Joseph left alone with the dumb instruments. But in his hands solitude and a violin were sure to marry in music. He began to play, forgot himself utterly, and, when the customer had gone away satisfied, and the ladies returned to the parlor, there he stood with his eyes closed, playing on, nor knowing they were beside him. They sat down, and listened in silence. Mary had not listened long before she found herself strangely moved. Her heart seemed to swell up into her throat, and it was all she could do to keep from weeping. A little longer and she was compelled to yield, and the silent tears flowed freely. Letty, too, was overcome--more than ever she had been by music. She was not so open to its influences as Mary, but her eyes were full, and she sat thinking of her Tom, far in the regions that are none the less true that we can not see them. A mood had taken shape in the mind of the blacksmith, and wandered from its home, seeking another country. It is not the ghosts of evil deeds that alone take shape, and go forth to wander the earth. Let but a mood be strong enough, and the soul, clothing itself in that mood as with a garment, can walk abroad and haunt the world. Thus, in a garment of mood whose color and texture was music, did the soul of Joseph Jasper that evening, like a homeless ghost, come knocking at the door of Mary Marston. It was the very being of the man, praying for admittance, even as little Abel might have crept up to the gate from which his mother had been driven, and, seeing nothing of the angel with the flaming sword, knocked and knocked, entreating to be let in, pleading that all was not right with the world in which he found himself. And there Mary saw Joseph stand, thinking himself alone with his violin; and the violin was his mediator with her, and was pleading and pleading for the admittance of its master. It prayed, it wept, it implored. It cried aloud that eternity was very long, and like a great palace without a quiet room. "Gorgeous is the glory," it sang; "white are the garments, and lovely are the faces of the holy; they look upon me gently and sweetly, but pitifully, for they know that I am alone--yet not alone, for I love. Oh, rather a thousand-fold let me love and be alone, than be content and joyous with them all, free of this pang which tells me of a bliss yet more complete, fulfilling the gladness of heaven!" All the time Joseph knew nothing of where his soul was; for he thought Mary was in the shop, and beyond the hearing of his pleader. Nor was this exactly the shape the thing took to the consciousness of the musician. He seemed to himself to be standing alone in a starry and moonlit night, among roses, and sweet-peas, and apple-blossoms--for the soul cares little for the seasons, and will make its own month out of many. On the bough of an apple-tree, in the fair moonlight, sat a nightingale, swaying to and fro like one mad with the wine of his own music, singing as if he wanted to break his heart and have done, for the delight was too much for mortal creature to endure. And the song of the bird grew the prayer of a man in the brain and heart of the musician, and thence burst, through the open fountain of the violin, and worked what it could work, in the world of forces. "I love thee! I love thee! I love thee!" cried the violin; and the worship was entreaty that knew not itself. On and on it went, ever beginning ere it ended, as if it could never come to a close; and the two sat listening as if they cared but to hear, and would listen for ever--listening as if, when the sound ceased, all would be at an end, and chaos come again. Ah, do not blame, thou who lovest God, and fearest the love of the human! Hast thou yet to learn that the love of the human is love, is divine, is but a lower form of a part of the love of God? When thou lovest man, or woman, or child, yea, or even dog, aright, then wilt thou no longer need that I tell thee how God and his Christ would not be content with each other alone in the glories even of the eternal original love, because they could create more love. For that more love, together they suffered and patiently waited. He that loveth not his brother whom he hath seen, how shall he love God whom he hath not seen? A sob, like a bird new-born, burst from Mary's bosom. It broke the enchantment in which Joseph was bound. That enchantment had possessed him, usurping as it were the throne of his life, and displacing it; when it ceased, he was not his own master. He started--to conscious confusion only, neither knowing where he was nor what he did. His limbs for the moment were hardly his own. How it happened he never could tell, but he brought down his violin with a crash against the piano, then somehow stumbled and all but fell. In the act of recovering himself, he heard the neck of his instrument part from the body with a tearing, discordant cry, like the sound of the ruin of a living world. He stood up, understanding now, holding in his hand his dead music, and regarding it with a smile sad as a winter sunset gleaming over a grave. But Mary darted to him, threw her arms round him, laid her head on his bosom, and burst into tears. Tenderly he laid his broken violin on the piano, and, like one receiving a gift straight from the hand of the Godhead, folded his arms around the woman--enough, if music itself had been blotted from his universe! His violin was broken, but his being was made whole! his treasure taken--type of his self, and a woman given him instead! "It's just like him!" he murmured. He was thinking of him who, when a man was brought him to be delivered from a poor palsy, forgave him his sins.

57

THE END OF THE BEGINNING.

Joseph Jasper and Mary Marston were married the next summer. Mary did not leave her shop, nor did Joseph leave his forge. Mary was proud of her husband, not merely because he was a musician, but because he was a blacksmith. For, with the true taste of a right woman, she honored the manhood that could do hard work. The day will come, and may I do something to help it hither, when the youth of our country will recognize that, taken in itself, it is a more manly, and therefore in the old true sense a more _gentle_ thing, to follow a good handicraft, if it make the hands black as a coal, than to spend the day in keeping books, and making up accounts, though therein the hands should remain white--or red, as the case may be. Not but that, from a higher point of view still, all work, set by God, and done divinely, is of equal honor; but, where there is a choice, I would gladly see boy of mine choose rather to be a blacksmith, or a watchmaker, or a bookbinder, than a clerk. Production, making, is a higher thing in the scale of reality, than any mere transmission, such as buying and selling. It is, besides, easier to do honest work than to buy and sell honestly. The more honor, of course, to those who are honest under the greater difficulty! But the man who knows how needful the prayer, "Lead us not into temptation," knows that he must not be tempted into temptation even by the glory of duty under difficulty. In humility we must choose the easiest, as we must hold our faces unflinchingly to the hardest, even to the seeming impossible, when it is given us to do. I must show the blacksmith and the shopkeeper once more--two years after marriage--time long enough to have made common people as common to each other as the weed by the roadside; but these are not common to each other yet, and never will be. They will never complain of being _desillusionnes_, for they have never been illuded. They look up each to the other still, because they were right in looking up each to the other from the first. Each was, and therefore each is and will be, real. " .... The man is honest." "Therefore he will be, Timon." It was a lovely morning in summer. The sun was but a little way above the horizon, and the dew-drops seemed to have come scattering from him as he shook his locks when he rose. The foolish larks were up, of course, for they fancied, come what might of winter and rough weather, the universe founded in eternal joy, and themselves endowed with the best of all rights to be glad, for there was the gladness inside, and struggling to get outside of them. And out it was coming in a divine profusion! How many baskets would not have been wanted to gather up the lordly waste of those scattered songs! in all the trees, in all the flowers, in every grass-blade, and every weed, the sun was warming and coaxing and soothing life into higher life. And in those two on the path through the fields from Testbridge, the same sun, light from the father of lights, was nourishing highest life of all--that for the sake of which the Lord came, that he might set it growing in hearts of whose existence it was the very root. Joseph and Mary were taking their walk together before the day's work should begin. Those who have a good conscience, and are not at odds with their work, can take their pleasure any time--as well before their work as after it. Only where the work of the day is a burden grievous to be borne, is there cause to fear being unfitted for duty by antecedent pleasure. But the joy of the sunrise would linger about Mary all the day long in the gloomy shop; and for Joseph, he had but to lift his head to see the sun hastening on to the softer and yet more hopeful splendors of the evening. The wife, who had not to begin so early, was walking with her husband, as was her custom, even when the weather was not of the best, to see him fairly started on his day's work. It was with something very like pride, yet surely nothing evil, that she would watch the quick blows of his brawny arm, as he beat the cold iron on the anvil till it was all aglow like the sun that lighted the world--then stuck it into the middle of his coals, and blew softly with his bellows till the flame on the altar of his work-offering was awake and keen. The sun might shine or forbear, the wind might blow or be still, the path might be crisp with frost or soft with mire, but the lighting of her husband's forge-fire, Mary, without some forceful reason, never omitted to turn by her presence into a holy ceremony. It was to her the "Come let us worship and bow down" of the daily service of God-given labor. That done, she would kiss him, and leave him: she had her own work to do. Filled with prayer she would walk steadily back the well-known way to the shop, where, all day long, ministering with gracious service to the wants of her people, she would know the evening and its service drawing nearer and nearer, when Joseph would come, and the delights of heaven would begin afresh at home, in music, and verse, and trustful talk. Every day was a life, and every evening a blessed death--type of that larger evening rounding our day with larger hope. But many Christians are such awful pagans that they will hardly believe it possible a young loving pair should think of that evening, except with misery and by rare compulsion! That morning, as they went, they talked--thus, or something like this: "O Mary!" said Joseph, "hear the larks! They are all saying: 'Jo-seph! Jo-seph! Hearkentome, Joseph! Whatwouldyouhavebeenbutfor Ma-ry, Jo-seph?' That's what they keep on singing, singing in the ears of my heart, Mary!" "You would have been a true man, Joseph, whatever the larks may say." "A solitary melody, praising without an upholding harmony, at best, Mary!" "And what should I have been, Joseph? An inarticulate harmony--sweetly mumbling, with never a thread of soaring song!" A pause followed. "I shall be rather shy of your father, Mary," said Joseph. "Perhaps he won't be content with me." "Even if you weren't what you are, my father would love you because I love you. But I know my father as well as I know you; and I know you are just the man it must make him happy afresh, even in heaven, to think of his Mary marrying. You two can hardly be of two minds in anything!" "That was a curious speech of Letty's yesterday! You heard her say, did you not, that, if everybody was to be so very good in heaven, she was afraid it would be rather dull?" "We mustn't make too much of what Letty says, either when she's merry or when she's miserable. She speaks both times only out of half-way down." "Yes, yes! I wasn't meaning to find any fault with her; I was only wishing to hear what you would say. For nobody can make a story without somebody wicked enough to set things wrong in it, and then all the work lies in setting them right again, and, as soon as they are set right, then the story stops." "There's no thing of the sort in music, Joseph, and that makes one happy enough." "Yes, there is, Mary. There's strife and difference and compensation and atonement and reconciliation." "But there's nothing wicked." "No, that there is not." "Well!" said Mary, "perhaps it may only be because we know so little about good, that it seems to us not enough. We know only the beginnings and the fightings, and so write and talk only about them. For my part, I don't feel that strife of any sort is necessary to make me enjoy life; of all things it is what makes me miserable. I grant you that effort and struggle add immeasurably to the enjoyment of life, but those I look upon as labor, not strife. There may be whole worlds for us to help bring into order and obedience. And I suspect there must be no end of work in which is strife enough--and that of a kind hard to bear. There must be millions of spirits in prison that want preaching to; and whoever goes among them will have that which is behind of the afflictions of Christ to fill up. Anyhow there will be plenty to do, and that's the main thing. Seeing we are made in the image of God, and he is always working, we could not be happy without work." "Do you think we shall get into any company we like up there?" said Joseph. "I must think a minute. When I want to understand, I find myself listening for what my father would say. Yes, I think I know what he would say to that: 'Yes; but not till you are fit for it; and then the difficulty would be to keep out of it. For all that is fit must come to pass in the land of fitnesses--that is, the land where all is just as it ought to be.' --That's how I could fancy I heard my father answer you." "With that answer I am well content," said Joseph. --"But you don't want to die, do you, Mary?" "No; I want to live. And I've got such a blessed plenty of life while waiting for more, that I am quite content to wait. But I do wonder that some people I know, should cling to what they call life as they do. It is not that they are comfortable, for they are constantly complaining of their sufferings; neither is it from submission to the will of God, for to hear them talk you must think they imagine themselves hardly dealt with; they profess to believe the Gospel, and that it is their only consolation; and yet they speak of death as the one paramount evil. In the utmost weariness, they yet seem incapable of understanding the apostle's desire to depart and be with Christ, or of imagining that to be with him can be at all so good as remaining where they are. One is driven to ask whether they can be Christians any further than anxiety to secure whatever the profession may be worth to them will make them such." "Don't you think, though," said Joseph, "that some people have a trick of putting on their clothes wrong side out, and so making themselves appear less respectable than they are? There was my sister Ann: she used to go on scolding at people for not believing, all the time she said they could not believe till God made them--if she had said _except_ God made them, I should have been with her there! --and then talking about God so, that I don't see how, even if they could, any one would have believed in such a monster as she made of him; and then, if you objected to believe in such a God, she would tell you it was all from the depravity of your own heart you could not believe in him; and yet this sister Ann of mine, I know, once went for months without enough to eat--without more than just kept body and soul together, that she might feed the children of a neighbor, of whom she knew next to nothing, when their father lay ill of a fever, and could not provide for them. And she didn't look for any thanks neither, except it was from that same God she would have to be a tyrant from the beginning--one who would calmly behold the unspeakable misery of creatures whom he had compelled to exist, whom he would not permit to cease, and for whom he would do a good deal, but not all that he could. Such people, I think, are nearly as unfair to themselves as they are to God." "You're right, Joseph," said Mary. "If we won't take the testimony of such against God, neither must we take it against themselves. Only, why is it they are always so certain they are in the right?" "For the perfecting of the saints," suggested Joseph, with a curious smile. "Perhaps," answered Mary. "Anyhow, we may get that good out of them, whether they be here for the purpose or not. I remember Mr. Turnbull once accusing my father of irreverence, because he spoke about God in the shop. Said my father, 'Our Lord called the old temple his father's house and a den of thieves in the same breath.' Mr. Turnbull saw nothing but nonsense in the answer. Said my father then, 'You will allow that God is everywhere?' 'Of course,' replied Mr. Turnbull. 'Except in this shop, I suppose you mean?' said my father. 'No, I don't. That's just why I wouldn't have you do it.' 'Then you wouldn't have me think about him either?' 'Well! there's a time for everything.' Then said my father, very solemnly, 'I came from God, and I'm going back to God, and I won't have any gaps of death in the middle of my life.' And that was nothing to Mr. Turnbull either." To one in ten of my readers it may be something. Just ere they came in sight of the smithy, they saw a lady and gentleman on horseback flying across the common. "There go Mrs. Redmain and Mr. Wardour!" said Joseph. "They're to be married next month, they say. Well, it's a handsome couple they'll make! And the two properties together'll make a fine estate!" "I hope she'll learn to like the books he does," said Mary. "I never could get her to listen to anything for more than three minutes." Though Joseph generally dropped work long before Mary shut the shop, she yet not unfrequently contrived to meet him on his way home; and Joseph always kept looking out for her as he walked. That very evening they were gradually nearing each other--the one from the smithy, the other from the shop--with another pair between them, however, going toward Testbridge--Godfrey Wardour and Hesper Redmain. "How strange," said Hesper, "that after all its chances and breakings, old Thornwick should be joined up again at last!" Partly by a death in the family, partly through the securities her husband had taken on the property, partly by the will of her father, the whole of Durnmelling now belonged to Hesper. "It is strange," answered Godfrey, with an involuntary sigh. Hesper turned and looked at him. It was not merely sadness she saw on his face. There was something there almost like humility, though Hesper was not able to read it as such. He lifted his head, and did not avoid her gaze. "You are wondering, Hesper," he said, "that I do not respond with more pleasure. To tell you the truth, I have come through so much that I am almost afraid to expect the fruition of any good. Please do not imagine, you beautiful creature! it is of the property I am thinking. In your presence that would be impossible. Nor, indeed, have I begun to think of it. I shall, one day, come to care for it, I do not doubt--that is, when once I have you safe; but I keep looking for the next slip that is to come--between my lip and this full cup of hap-piness. I have told you all, Hesper, and I thank you that you do not despise me. But it may well make me solemn and fearful, to think, after all the waves and billows that have gone over me, such a splendor should be mine! --But, do you really love me, Hesper--or am I walking in my sleep? I had thought, 'Surely now at last I shall never love again!' --and instead of that, here I am loving, as I never loved before! --and doubting whether I ever did love before!" "I never loved before," said Hesper. "Surely to love must be a good thing, when it has made you so good! I am a poor creature beside you, Godfrey, but I am glad to think whatever I know of love you have taught me. It is only I who have to be ashamed!" "That is all your goodness!" interrupted Godfrey. "Yet, at this moment, I can not quite be sorry for some things I ought to be sorry for: but for them I should not be at your side now--happier than I dare allow myself to feel. I dare hardly think of those things, lest I should be glad I had done wrong." "There are things I am compelled to know of myself, Godfrey, which I shall never speak to you about, for even to think of them by your side would blast all my joy. How plainly Mary used to tell me what I was! I scorned her words! It seemed, then, too late to repent. And now I am repenting! I little thought ever to give in like this! But of one thing I am sure--that, if I had known you, not all the terrors of my father would have made me marry the man." Was this all the feeling she had for her dead husband? Although Godfrey could hardly at the moment feel regret she had not loved him, it yet made him shiver to hear her speak of him thus. In the perfected grandeur of her external womanhood, she seemed to him the very ideal of his imagination, and he felt at moments the proudest man in the great world; but at night he would lie in torture, brooding over the horrors a woman such as she must have encountered, to whom those mysteries of our nature, which the true heart clothes in abundant honor, had been first presented in the distortions of a devilish caricature. There had been a time in Godfrey's life when, had she stood before him in all her splendor, he would have turned from her, because of her history, with a sad disgust. Was he less pure now? He was more pure, for he was humbler. When those terrible thoughts would come, and the darkness about him grow billowy with black flame, "God help me," he would cry, "to make the buffeted angel forget the past!" They had talked of Mary more than once, and Godfrey, in part through what Hesper told him of her, had come to see that he was unjust to her. I do not mean he had come to know the depth and extent of his injustice--that would imply a full understanding of Mary herself, which was yet far beyond him. A thousand things had to grow, a thousand things to shift and shake themselves together in Godfrey's mind, before he could begin to understand one who cared only for the highest. Godfrey and Hesper made a glorious pair to look at--but would theirs be a happy union? --Happy, I dare say--and not too happy. He who sees to our affairs will see that the _too_ is not in them. There were fine elements in both, and, if indeed they loved, and now I think, from very necessity of their two hearts, they must have loved, then all would, by degrees, by slow degrees, most likely, come right with them. If they had been born again both, before they began, so to start fresh, then like two children hand in hand they might have run in through the gates into the city. But what is love, what is loss, what defilement even, what are pains, and hopes, and disappointments, what sorrow, and death, and all the ills that flesh is heir to, but means to this very end, to this waking of the soul to seek the home of our being--the life eternal? Verily we must be born from above, and be good children, or become, even to our self-loving selves, a scorn, a hissing, and an endless reproach. If they had had but Mary to talk to them! But they did not want her: she was a good sort of creature, who, with all her disagreeableness, meant them well, and whom they had misjudged a little and made cry! They had no suspicion that she was one of the lights of the world--one of the wells of truth, whose springs are fed by the rains on the eternal hills. Turning a clump of furze-bushes on the common, they met Mary. She stepped from the path. Mr. Wardour took off his hat. Then Mary knew that his wrath was past, and she was glad. They stopped. "Well, Mary," said Hesper, holding out her hand, and speaking in a tone from which both haughtiness and condescension had vanished, "where are you going?" "To meet my husband," answered Mary. "I see him coming." With a deep, loving look at Hesper, and a bow and a smile to Godfrey, she left them, and hastened to meet her working-man. Behind Godfrey Wardour and Hesper Redmain walked Joseph Jasper and Mary Marston, a procession of love toward a far-off, eternal goal. But which of them was to be first in the kingdom of heaven, Mary or Joseph or Hesper or Godfrey, is not to be told: they had yet a long way to walk, and there are first that shall be last, and last that shall be first.

1

LE ROI EST MORT

“There; that's it. That's where they buried Frenchman,” said Andrew--known as River Andrew. For there was another Andrew who earned his living on the sea. River Andrew had conducted the two gentlemen from “The Black Sailor” to the churchyard by their own request. A message had been sent to him in the morning that this service would be required of him, to which he had returned the answer that they would have to wait until the evening. It was his day to go round Marshford way with dried fish, he said; but in the evening they could see the church if they still set their minds on it. River Andrew combined the light duties of grave-digger and clerk to the parish of Farlingford in Suffolk with a small but steady business in fish of his own drying, nets of his own netting, and pork slain and dressed by his own weather-beaten hands. For Farlingford lies in that part of England which reaches seaward toward the Fatherland, and seems to have acquired from that proximity an insatiable appetite for sausages and pork. On these coasts the killing of pigs and the manufacture of sausages would appear to employ the leisure of the few, who for one reason or another have been deemed unfit for the sea. It is not our business to inquire why River Andrew had never used the fickle element. All that lay in the past. And in a degree he was saved from the disgrace of being a landsman by the smell of tar and bloaters that heralded his coming, by the blue jersey and the brown homespun trousers which he wore all the week, and by the saving word which distinguished him from the poor inland lubbers who had no dealings with water at all. He had this evening laid aside his old sou'wester--worn in fair and foul weather alike--for his Sunday hat. His head-part was therefore official and lent additional value to the words recorded. He spoke them, moreover, with a dim note of aggressiveness which might only have been racy of a soil breeding men who are curt and clear of speech. But there was more than an East Anglian bluffness in the statement and the manner of its delivery, as his next observation at once explained. “Passen thinks it's over there by the yew-tree--but he's wrong. That there one was a wash-up found by old Willem the lighthouse keeper one morning early. No! this is where Frenchman was laid by.” He indicated with the toe of his sea-boot a crumbling grave which had never been distinguished by a headstone. The grass grew high all over Farlingford churchyard, almost hiding the mounds where the forefathers slept side by side with the nameless “wash-ups,” to whom they had extended a last hospitality. River Andrew had addressed his few remarks to the younger of his two companions, a well-dressed, smartly set-up man of forty or thereabouts, who in turn translated the gist of them into French for the information of his senior, a little white-haired gentleman whom he called “Monsieur le Marquis.” He spoke glibly enough in either tongue, with a certain indifference of manner. This was essentially a man of cities, and one better suited to the pavement than the rural quiet of Farlingford. To have the gift of tongues is no great recommendation to the British born, and River Andrew looked askance at this fine gentleman while he spoke French. He had received letters at the post-office under the name of Dormer Colville: a name not unknown in London and Paris, but of which the social fame had failed to travel even to Ipswich, twenty miles away from this mouldering churchyard. “It's getting on for twenty-five years come Michaelmas,” put in River Andrew. “I wasn't digger then; but I remember the burial well enough. And I remember Frenchman--same as if I see him yesterday.” He plucked a blade of grass from the grave and placed it between his teeth. “He were a mystery, he were,” he added, darkly, and turned to look musingly across the marshes toward the distant sea. For River Andrew, like many hawkers of cheap wares, knew the indirect commercial value of news. The little white-haired Frenchman made a gesture of the shoulders and outspread hands indicative of a pious horror at the condition of this neglected grave. The meaning of his attitude was so obvious that River Andrew shifted uneasily from one foot to the other. “Passen,” he said, “he don't take no account of the graves. He's what you might call a bookworm. Always a sitting indoors reading books and pictures. Butcher Franks turns his sheep in from time to time. But along of these tempests and the hot sun the grass has shot up a bit. Frenchman's no worse off than others. And there's some as are fallen in altogether.” He indicated one or two graves where the mound had sunk, and suggestive hollows were visible in the grass. “First, it's the coffin that bu'sts in beneath the weight, then it's the bones,” he added, with that grim realism which is begotten of familiarity. Dormer Colville did not trouble to translate these general truths. He suppressed a yawn as he contemplated the tottering headstones of certain master-mariners and Trinity-pilots taking their long rest in the immediate vicinity. The churchyard lay on the slope of rising ground upon which the village of Farlingford straggled upward in one long street. Farlingford had once been a town of some commercial prosperity. Its story was the story of half a dozen ports on this coast--a harbour silted up, a commerce absorbed by a more prosperous neighbour nearer to the railway. Below the churchyard was the wide street which took a turn eastward at the gates and led straight down to the river-side. Farlingford Quay--a little colony of warehouses and tarred huts--was separated from Farlingford proper by a green, where the water glistened at high tide. In olden days the Freemen of Farlingford had been privileged to graze their horses on the green. In these later times the lord of the manor pretended to certain rights over the pasturage, which Farlingford, like one man, denied him. “A mystery,” repeated River Andrew, waiting very clearly for Mr. Dormer Colville to translate the suggestive word to the French gentleman. But Colville only yawned. “And there's few in Farlingford as knew Frenchman as well as I did.” Mr. Colville walked toward the church porch, which seemed to appeal to his sense of the artistic; for he studied the Norman work with the eye of a connoisseur. He was evidently a cultured man, more interested in a work of art than in human story. River Andrew, seeing him depart, jingled the keys which he carried in his hand, and glanced impatiently toward the older man. The Marquis de Gemosac, however, ignored the sound as completely as he had ignored River Andrew's remarks. He was looking round him with eyes which had once been dark and bright, and were now dimly yellow. He looked from tomb to tomb, vainly seeking one that should be distinguished, if only by the evidence of a little care at the hands of the living. He looked down the wide grass-grown street--partly paved after the manner of the Netherlands--toward the quay, where the brown river gleamed between the walls of the weather-beaten brick buildings. There was a ship lying at the wharf, half laden with hay; a coasting craft from some of the greater tidal rivers, the Orwell or the Blackwater. A man was sitting on a piece of timber on the quay, smoking as he looked seaward. But there was no one else in sight. For Farlingford was half depopulated, and it was tea-time. Across the river lay the marshes, unbroken by tree or hedge, barren of even so much as a hut. In the distance, hazy and grey in the eye of the North Sea, a lighthouse stood dimly, like a pillar of smoke. To the south--so far as the eye could pierce the sea haze--marshes. To the north--where the river ran between bare dykes--marshes. And withal a silence which was only intensified by the steady hum of the wind through the gnarled branches of the few churchyard trees which turn a crouching back toward the ocean. In all the world--save, perhaps, in the Arctic world--it would be hard to find a picture emphasising more clearly the fact that a man's life is but a small matter, and the memory of it like the seed of grass upon the wind to be blown away and no more recalled. The bearer of one of the great names of France stood knee-deep in the sun-tanned grass and looked slowly round as if seeking to imprint the scene upon his memory. He turned to glance at the crumbling church behind him, built long ago by men speaking the language in which his own thoughts found shape. He looked slowly from end to end of the ill-kept burial ground, crowded with the bones of the nameless and insignificant dead, who, after a life passed in the daily struggle to wrest a sufficiency of food from a barren soil, or the greater struggle to hold their own against a greedy sea, had faded from the memory of the living, leaving naught behind them but a little mound where the butcher put his sheep to graze. Monsieur de Gemosac was so absorbed in his reflections that he seemed to forget his surroundings and stood above the grave, pointed out to him by River Andrew, oblivious to the cold wind that blew in from the sea, deaf to the clink of the sexton's inviting keys, forgetful of his companion who stood patiently waiting within the porch. The Marquis was a little bent man, spare of limb, heavy of shoulder, with snow-white hair against which his skin, brown and wrinkled as a walnut shell, looked sallow like old ivory. His face was small and aquiline; not the face of a clever man, but clearly the face of an aristocrat. He had the grand manner too, and that quiet air of self-absorption which usually envelops the bearers of historic names. Dormer Colville watched him with a good-natured patience which pointed, as clearly as his attitude and yawning indifference, to the fact that he was not at Farlingford for his own amusement. Presently he lounged back again toward the Marquis and stood behind him. “The wind is cold, Marquis,” he said, pleasantly. “One of the coldest spots in England. What would Mademoiselle say if I allowed you to take a chill?” De Gemosac turned and looked at him over his shoulder with a smile full of pathetic meaning. He spread out his arms in a gesture indicative of horror at the bleakness of the surroundings; at the mournfulness of the decaying village; the dreary hopelessness of the mouldering church and tombs. “I was thinking, my friend,” he said. “That was all. It is not surprising... that one should think.” Colville heaved a sigh and said nothing. He was, it seemed, essentially a sympathetic man; not of a thoughtful habit himself, but tolerant of thought in others. It was abominably windy and cold, although the corn was beginning to ripen; but he did not complain. Neither did he desire to hurry his companion in any way. He looked at the crumbling grave with a passing shadow in his clever and worldly eyes, and composed himself to await his friend's pleasure. In his way he must have been a philosopher. His attitude did not suggest that he was bored, and yet it was obvious that he was eminently out of place in this remote spot. He had nothing in common, for instance, with River Andrew, and politely yawned that reminiscent fish-curer into silence. His very clothes were of a cut and fashion never before seen in Farlingford. He wore them, too, with an air rarely assumed even in the streets of Ipswich. Men still dressed with care at this time; for d'Orsay was not yet dead, though his fame was tarnished. Mr. Dormer Colville was not a dandy, however. He was too clever to go to that extreme and too wise not to be within reach of it in an age when great tailors were great men, and it was quite easy to make a reputation by clothes alone. Not only was his dress too fine for Farlingford, but his personality was not in tune with this forgotten end of England. His movements were too quick for a slow-moving race of men; no fools, and wiser than their midland brethren; slow because they had yet to make sure that a better way of life had been discovered than that way in which their Saxon forefathers had always walked. Colville seemed to look at the world with an exploiting eye. He had a speculative mind. Had he lived at the end of the Victorian era instead of the beginning he might have been a notable financier. His quick glance took in all Farlingford in one comprehensive verdict. There was nothing to be made of it. It was uninteresting because it obviously had no future, nor encouraged any enterprise. He looked across the marshes indifferently, following the line of the river as it made its devious way between high dykes to the sea. And suddenly his eye lighted. There was a sail to the south. A schooner was standing in to the river mouth, her sails glowing rosily in the last of the sunset light. Colville turned to see whether River Andrew had noticed, and saw that landsman looking skyward with an eye that seemed to foretell the early demise of a favouring wind. “That's 'The Last Hope,'” he said, in answer to Dormer Colville's question. “And it will take all Seth Clubbe's seamanship to save the tide. 'The Last Hope.' There's many a 'Hope,' built at Farlingford, and that's the last, for the yard is closed and there's no more building now.” The Marquis de Gemosac had turned away from the grave, but as Colville approached him he looked back to it with a shake of the head. “After eight centuries of splendour, my friend,” he said. “Can that be the end--that?” “It is not the end,” answered Colville, cheerfully. “It is only the end of a chapter. Le roi est mort--vive le roi!” He pointed with his stick, as he spoke, to the schooner creeping in between the dykes.

2

VIVE LE ROI

“The Last Hope” had been expected for some days. It was known in Farlingford that she was foul, and that Captain Clubbe had decided to put her on the slip-way at the end of the next voyage. Captain Clubbe was a Farlingford man. “The Last Hope” was a Farlingford built ship, and Seth Clubbe was not the captain to go past his own port for the sake of saving a few pounds. “Farlingford's his nation,” they said of him down at the quay. “Born and bred here, man and boy. He's not likely to put her into a Thames dry-dock while the slip-way's standing empty.” All the village gossips naturally connected the arrival of the two gentlemen from London with the expected return of “The Last Hope.” Captain Clubbe was known to have commercial relations with France. It was currently reported that he could speak the language. No one could tell the number of his voyages backward and forward from the Bay to Bristol, to Yarmouth, and even to Bergen, carrying salt-fish to those countries where their religion bids them eat that which they cannot supply from their own waters, and bringing back wine from Bordeaux and brandy from Charente. It is not etiquette, however, on these wind-swept coasts to inquire too closely into a man's business, and, as in other places, the talk was mostly among those who knew the least--namely, the women. There had been a question of repairing the church. The generation now slowly finding its way to its precincts had discussed the matter since their childhood and nothing had come of it. One bold spirit put forth the suggestion that the two gentlemen were London architects sent down by the Queen to see to the church. But the idea fell to the ground before the assurance from Mrs. Clopton's own lips that the old gentleman was nothing but a Frenchman. Mrs. Clopton kept “The Black Sailor,” and knew a deal more than she was ready to tell people; which is tantamount to saying that she was a woman in a thousand. It had leaked out, however, that the spokesman of the party, Mr. Dormer Colville, had asked Mrs. Clopton whether it was true that there was claret in the cellars of “The Black Sailor.” And any one having doubts could satisfy himself with a sight of the empty bottles, all mouldy, standing in the back yard of the inn. They were wine-merchants from France, concluded the wiseacres of Farlingford over their evening beer. They had come to Farlingford to see Captain Clubbe. What could be more natural! For Farlingford was proud of Captain Clubbe. It so often happens that a man going out into the world and making a great name there, forgets his birthplace and the rightful claim to a gleam of reflected glory which the relations of a great man--who have themselves stayed at home and done nothing--are always ready to consider their due reward for having shaken their heads over him during the earlier struggles. Though slow of tongue, the men of Farlingford were of hospitable inclination. They were sorry for Frenchmen, as for a race destined to smart for all time under the recollection of many disastrous defeats at sea. And of course they could not help being ridiculous. Heaven had made them like that while depriving them of any hope of ever attaining to good seamanship. Here was a foreigner, however, cast up in their midst, not by the usual channel indeed, but by a carriage and pair from Ipswich. He must feel lonesome, they thought, and strange. They, therefore, made an effort to set him at his ease, and when they met him in “the street” jerked their heads at him sideways. The upward jerk is less friendly and usually denotes the desire to keep strictly within the limits of acquaintanceship. To Mr. Dormer Colville they gave the upward lift of the chin as to a person too facile in speech to be desirable. The dumbness of the Marquis de Gemosac appealed perhaps to a race of seafaring men very sparingly provided by nature with words in which to clothe thoughts no less solid and sensible by reason of their terseness. It was at all events unanimously decided that everything should be done to make the foreigner welcome until the arrival of “The Last Hope.” A similar unanimity characterised the decision that he must without delay be shown Frenchman's grave. River Andrew's action and the unprecedented display of his Sunday hat on a week-day were nothing but the outcome of a deep-laid scheme. Mrs. Clopton had been instructed to recommend the gentlemen to inspect the church, and the rest had been left to the wit of River Andrew, a man whose calling took him far and wide, and gave him opportunities of speech with gentlefolk. These opportunities tempted River Andrew to go beyond his instructions so far as to hint that he could, if encouraged, make disclosures of interest respecting Frenchman. Which was untrue; for River Andrew knew no more than the rest of Farlingford of a man who, having been literally cast up by the sea at their gates, had lived his life within those gates, had married a Farlingford woman, and had at last gone the way of all Farlingford without telling any who or what he was. From sundry open cottage doors and well-laden tea-tables glances of inquiry were directed toward the strangers' faces as they walked down the street after having viewed the church. Some prescient females went so far as to state that they could see quite distinctly in the elder gentleman's demeanour a sense of comfort and consolation at the knowledge thus tactfully conveyed to him that he was not the first of his kind to be seen in Farlingford. Hard upon the heels of the visitors followed River Andrew, wearing his sou'wester now and carrying the news that “The Last Hope” was coming up on the top of the tide. Farlingford lies four miles from the mouth of the river, and no ship can well arrive unexpected at the quay; for the whole village may see her tacking up under shortened sail, heading all ways, sometimes close-hauled, and now running free as she follows the zigzags of the river. Thus, from the open door, the villagers calculated the chances of being able to finish the evening meal at leisure and still be down at the quay in time to see Seth Clubbe bring his ship alongside. One by one the men of Farlingford, pipe in mouth, went toward the river, not forgetting the kindly, sideward jerk of the head for the old Frenchman already waiting there. It was nearly the top of the tide and the clear green water swelled and gurgled round the weedy piles of the quay, bringing on its surface tokens from the sea--shadowy jelly-fish, weed, and froth. “The Last Hope” was quite close at hand now, swinging up in mid-stream. The sun had set and over the marshes the quiet of evening brooded hazily. Captain Clubbe had taken in all sail except a jib. His anchor was swinging lazily overside, ready to drop. The watchers on the quay could note the gentle rise and fall of the crack little vessel as the tide lifted her from behind. She seemed to be dancing to her home like a maiden back from school. The swing of her tapering masts spoke of the heaving seas she had left behind. It was characteristic of Farlingford that no one spoke. River Andrew was already in his boat, ready to lend a hand should Captain Clubbe wish to send a rope ashore. But it was obvious that the captain meant to anchor in the stream for the night: so obvious that if any one on shore had mentioned the conclusion his speech would have called for nothing but a contemptuous glance from the steady blue eyes all round him. It was equally characteristic of a Farlingford ship that there were no greetings from the deck. Those on shore could clearly perceive the burly form of Captain Clubbe, standing by the weather rigging. Wives could distinguish their husbands, and girls their lovers; but, as these were attending to their business with a taciturn concentration, no hand was raised in salutation. The wind had dropped now. For these are coasts of quiet nights and boisterous days. The tide was almost slack. “The Last Hope” was scarcely moving, and in the shadowy light looked like a phantom ship sailing out of a dreamy sunset sky. Suddenly the silence was broken, so unexpectedly, so dramatically, that the old Frenchman, to whose nature such effects would naturally appeal with a lightning speed, rose to his feet and stood looking with startled eyes toward the ship. A clear strong voice had broken joyously into song, and the words it sang were French: “C'est le Hasard, Qui, tot ou tard, Ici bas nous seconde; Car, D'un bout du monde A l'autre bout, Le Hasard seul fait tout.” Not only were the words incongruous with their quaint, sadly gay air of a dead epoch of music and poetry; but the voice was in startling contrast to the tones of a gruff and slow-speaking people. For it was a clear tenor voice with a ring of emotion in it, half laughter, half tears, such as no Briton could compass himself, or hear in another without a dumb feeling of shame and shyness. But those who heard it on the shore--and all Farlingford was there by this time--only laughed curtly. Some of the women exchanged a glance and made imperfectly developed gestures, as of a tolerance understood between mothers for anything that is young and inconsequent. “We've gotten Loo Barebone back at any rate,” said a man, bearing the reputation of a wit. And after a long pause one or two appreciators answered: “You're right,” and laughed good-humouredly. The Marquis de Gemosac sat down again, with a certain effort at self-control, on the balk of timber which had been used by some generations of tide-watchers. He turned and exchanged a glance with Dormer Colville, who stood at his side leaning on his gold-headed cane. Colville's expression seemed to say: “I told you what it would be. But wait: there is more to come.” His affable eyes made a round of the watching faces, and even exchanged a sympathetic smile with some, as if to hint that his clothes were only fine because he belonged to a fine generation, but that his heart was as human as any beating under a homelier coat. “There's Passen,” said one woman to another, behind the corner of her apron, within Colville's hearing. “It takes a deal to bring him out o' doors nowadays, and little Sep and--Miss Miriam.” Dormer Colville heard the words. And he heard something unspoken in the pause before the mention of the last name. He did not look at once in the direction indicated by a jerk of the speaker's thumb, but waited until a change of position enabled him to turn his head without undue curiosity. He threw back his shoulders and stretched his legs after the manner of one cramped by standing too long in one attitude. A hundred yards farther up the river, where the dyke was wider, a grey-haired man was walking slowly toward the quay. In front of him a boy of ten years was endeavouring to drag a young girl toward the jetty at a quicker pace than she desired. She was laughing at his impetuosity and looking back toward the man who followed them with the abstraction and indifference of a student. Colville took in the whole picture in one quick comprehensive glance. But he turned again as the singer on board “The Last Hope” began another verse. The words were clearly audible to such as knew the language, and Colville noted that the girl turned with a sudden gravity to listen to them. “Un tel qu'on vantait Par hasard etait D'origine assez mince; Par hasard il plut, Par hasard il fut Baron, ministre, et prince.” Captain Clubbe's harsh voice broke into the song with the order to let go the anchor. As the ship swung to the tide the steersman, who wore neither coat nor waistcoat, could be seen idly handling the wheel still, though his duties were necessarily at an end. He was a young man, and a gay salutation of his unemployed hand toward the assembled people--as if he were sure that they were all friends--stamped him as the light-hearted singer, so different from the Farlingford men, so strongly contrasted to his hearers, who nevertheless jerked their heads sideways in response. He had, it seemed, rightly gauged the feelings of these cold East Anglians. They were his friends. River Andrew's boat was alongside “The Last Hope” now. Some one had thrown him a rope, which he had passed under his bow thwart and now held with one hand, while with the other he kept his distance from the tarry side of the ship. There was a pause until the schooner felt her moorings, then Captain Clubbe looked over the side and nodded a curt salutation to River Andrew, bidding him, by the same gesture, wait a minute until he had donned his shore-going jacket. The steersman was pulling on his coat while he sought among the crowd the faces of his more familiar friends. He was, it seemed, a privileged person, and took it for granted that he should go ashore with the captain. He was, perhaps, one of those who seemed to be privileged at their birth by Fate, and pass through life on the sunny side with a light step and laughing lips. Captain Clubbe was the first to step ashore, with one comprehensive nod of the head for all Farlingford. Close on his heels the younger sailor was already returning the greetings of his friends. “Hullo, Loo!” they said; or, “How do, Barebone?” For their tongues are no quicker than their limbs, and to this day, “How do?” is the usual greeting. The Marquis de Gemosac, who was sitting in the background, gave a sharp little exclamation of surprise when Barebone stepped ashore, and turned to Dormer Colville to say in an undertone: “Ah--but you need say nothing.” “I promised you,” answered Colville, carelessly, “that I should tell you nothing till you had seen him.”

3

THE RETURN OF “THE LAST HOPE”

Not only France, but all Europe, had at this time to reckon with one who, if, as his enemies said, was no Bonaparte, was a very plausible imitation of one. In 1849 France, indeed, was kind enough to give the world a breathing space. She had herself just come through one of those seething years from which she alone seems to have the power of complete recovery. Paris had been in a state of siege for four months; not threatened by a foreign foe, but torn to pieces by internal dissension. Sixteen thousand had been killed and wounded in the streets. A ministry had fallen. A ministry always does fall in France. Bad weather may bring about such a descent at any moment. A monarchy had been thrown down--a king had fled. Another king; and one who should have known better than to put his trust in a people. Half a dozen generals had attempted to restore order in Paris and confidence in France. Then, at the very end of 1848, the fickle people elected this Napoleon, who was no Bonaparte, President of the new Republic, and Europe was accorded a breathing space. At the beginning of 1849 arrangements were made for it--military arrangements--and the year was almost quiet. It was in the summer of the next year, 1850, that the Marquis de Gemosac journeyed to England. It was not his first visit to the country. Sixty years earlier he had been hurried thither by a frenzied mother, a little pale-faced boy, not bright or clever, but destined to pass through days of trial and years of sorrow which the bright and clever would scarcely have survived. For brightness must always mean friction, while cleverness will continue to butt its head against human limitations so long as men shall walk this earth. He had been induced to make this journey thus, in the evening of his days, by the Hope, hitherto vain enough, which many Frenchmen had pursued for half a century. For he was one of those who refused to believe that Louis XVII. had died in the prison of the Temple. Not once, but many times, Dormer Colville laughingly denied any responsibility in the matter. “I will not even tell the story as it was told to me,” he said to the Marquis de Gemosac, to the Abbe Touvent and to the Comtesse de Chantonnay, whom he met frequently enough at the house of his cousin, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, in that which is now the Province of the Charente Inferieure. “I will not even tell you the story as it was told to me, until one of you has seen the man. And then, if you ask me, I will tell you. It is nothing to me, you understand. I am no dreamer, but a very material person, who lives in France because he loves the sunshine, and the cuisine, and the good, kind hearts, which no government or want of government can deteriorate.” And Madame de Chantonnay, who liked Dormer Colville--with whom she admitted she always felt herself in sympathy--smiled graciously in response to his gallant bow. For she, too, was a materialist who loved the sunshine and the cuisine; more especially the cuisine. Moreover, Colville never persuaded the Marquis de Gemosac to come to England. He went so far as to represent, in a realistic light, the discomforts of the journey, and only at the earnest desire of many persons concerned did he at length enter into the matter and good-naturedly undertake to accompany the aged traveller. So far as his story was concerned, he kept his word, entertaining the Marquis on the journey and during their two days' sojourn at the humble inn at Farlingford with that flow of sympathetic and easy conversation which always made Madame de Chantonnay protest that he was no Englishman at all, but all that there was of the most French. Has it not been seen that Colville refused to translate the dark sayings of River Andrew by the side of the grass-grown grave, which seemed to have been brought to the notice of the travellers by the merest accident? “I promised you that I should tell you nothing until you had seen him,” he repeated, as the Marquis followed with his eyes the movements of the group of which the man they called Loo Barebone formed the centre. No one took much notice of the two strangers. It is not considered good manners in a seafaring community to appear to notice a new-comer. Captain Clubbe was naturally the object of universal attention. Was he not bringing foreign money into Farlingford, where the local purses needed replenishing now that trade had fallen away and agriculture was so sorely hampered by the lack of roads across the marsh? Clubbe pushed his way through the crowd to shake hands with the Rev. Septimus Marvin, who seemed to emerge from a visionary world of his own in order to perform that ceremony and to return thither on its completion. Then the majority of the onlookers straggled homeward, leaving a few wives and sweethearts waiting by the steps, with patient eyes fixed on the spidery figures in the rigging of “The Last Hope.” Dormer Colville and the Marquis de Gemosac were left alone, while the rector stood a few yards away, glaring abstractedly at them through his gold-rimmed spectacles as if they had been some strange flotsam cast up by the high tide. “I remember,” said Colville to his companion, “that I have an introduction to the pastor of the village, who, if I am not mistaken, is even now contemplating opening a conversation. It was given to me by my banker in Paris, who is a Suffolk man. You remember, Marquis, John Turner, of the Rue Lafayette?” “Yes--yes,” answered the Marquis, absently. He was still watching the retreating villagers, with eyes old and veiled by the trouble that they had seen. “I will take this opportunity of presenting myself,” said Colville, who was watching the little group from the rectory without appearing to do so. He rose as he spoke and went toward the clergyman, who was probably much younger than he looked. For he was ill-dressed and ill-shorn, with straggling grey hair hanging to his collar. He had a musty look, such as a book may have that is laid on a shelf in a deserted room and never opened or read. Septimus Marvin, the world would say, had been laid upon a shelf when he was inducted to the spiritual cure of Farlingford. But no man is ever laid on a shelf by Fate. He climbs up there of his own will, and lies down beneath the dust of forgetfulness because he lacks the heart to arise and face the business of life. Seeing that Dormer Colville was approaching him, he came forward with a certain scholarly ease of manner as if he had once mixed with the best on an intellectual equality. Colville's manners were considered perfect, especially by those who were unable to detect a fine line said to exist between ease and too much ease. Mr. Marvin recollected John Turner well. Ten years earlier he had, indeed, corresponded at some length with the Paris banker respecting a valuable engraving. Was Mr. Colville interested in engravings? Colville confessed to a deep and abiding pleasure in this branch of art, tempered, he admitted with a laugh, by a colossal ignorance. He then proceeded to give the lie to his own modesty by talking easily and well of mezzotints and etchings. “But,” he said, interrupting himself with evident reluctance, “I am forgetting my obligations. Let me present to you my companion, an old friend, the Marquis de Gemosac.” The two gentlemen bowed, and Mr. Marvin, knowing no French, proceeded to address the stranger in good British Latin, after the manner of the courtly divines of his day. Which Latin, from its mode of pronunciation, was entirely unintelligible to its hearer. In return, the rector introduced the two strangers to his niece, Miriam Liston. “The mainstay of my quiet house,” he added, with his vague and dreamy smile. “I have already heard of you,” said Dormer Colville at once, with his modest deference, “from my cousin, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence.” He seemed, as sailors say, never to be at a loose end; but to go through life with a facile readiness, having, as it were, his hands full of threads among which to select, with a careless affability, one that must draw him nearer to high and low, men and women, alike. They talked together for some minutes, and, soon after the discovery that Miriam Liston was as good a French scholar as himself, and therefore able to converse with the Marquis de Gemosac, Colville regretted that it was time for them to return to their simple evening meal at “The Black Sailor.” “Well,” said Colville to Monsieur de Gemosac, as they walked slowly across the green toward the inn, embowered in its simple cottage-garden, all ablaze now with hollyhocks and poppies--“well, after your glimpse at this man, Marquis, are you desirous to see more of him?” “My friend,” answered the Frenchman, with a quick gesture, descriptive of a sudden emotion not yet stilled, “he took my breath away. I can think of nothing else. My poor brain is buzzing still, and I know not what answers I made to that pretty English girl. Ah! You smile at my enthusiasm; you do not know what it is to have a great hope dangling before the eyes all one's life. And that face--that face!” In which judgment the Marquis was no doubt right. For Dormer Colville was too universal a man to be capable of concentrated zeal upon any one object. He laughed at the accusation. “After dinner,” he answered, “I will tell you the little story as it was told to me. We can sit on this seat, outside the inn, in the scent of the flowers and smoke our cigarette.” To which proposal Monsieur de Gemosac assented readily enough. For he was an old man, and to such the importance of small things, such as dinner or a passing personal comfort, are apt to be paramount. Moreover, he was a remnant of that class to which France owed her downfall among the nations; a class represented faithfully enough by its King, Louis XVI., who procrastinated even on the steps of the guillotine. The wind went down with the sun, as had been foretold by River Andrew, and the quiet of twilight lay on the level landscape like sleep when the two travellers returned to the seat at the inn door. A distant curlew was whistling cautiously to its benighted mate, but all other sounds were still. The day was over. “You remember,” said Colville to his companion, “that six months after the execution of the King, a report ran through Paris and all France that the Dillons had succeeded in rescuing the Dauphin from the Temple.” “That was in July, 1793--just fifty-seven years ago--the news reached me in Austria,” answered the Marquis. Colville glanced sideways at his companion, whose face was set with a stubbornness almost worthy of the tenacious Bourbons themselves. “The Queen was alive then,” went on the Englishman, half diffidently, as if prepared for amendment or correction. “She had nearly three months to live. The separation from her children had only just been carried out. She was not broken by it yet. She was in full possession of her health and energy. She was one of the cleverest women of that time. She was surrounded by men, some of whom were frankly half-witted, others who were drunk with excess of a sudden power for which they had had no preparation. Others, again, were timorous or cunning. All were ignorant, and many had received no education at all. For there are many ignorant people who have been highly educated, Marquis.” He gave a short laugh and lighted a cigarette. “Mind,” he continued, after a pause devoted to reflection which appeared to be neither deep nor painful, for he smiled as he gazed across the hazy marshes, “mind, I am no enthusiast, as you yourself have observed. I plead no cause. She was not my Queen, Marquis, and France is not my country. I endeavour to look at the matter with the eye of common-sense and wisdom. And I cannot forget that Marie Antoinette was at bay: all her senses, all her wit alert. She can only have thought of her children. Human nature would dictate such thoughts. One cannot forget that she had devoted friends, and that these friends possessed unlimited money. Do you think, Marquis, that any one man of that rabble was above the reach--of money?” And Mr. Dormer Colville's reflective smile, as he gazed at the distant sea, would seem to indicate that, after a considerable experience of men and women, he had reluctantly arrived at a certain conclusion respecting them. “No man born of woman, Marquis, is proof against bribery or flattery--or both.” “One can believe anything that is bad of such dregs of human-kind, my friend,” said Monsieur de Gemosac, contemptuously. “I speak to one,” continued Colville, “who has given the attention of a lifetime to the subject. If I am wrong, correct me. What I have been told is that a man was found who was ready, in return for a certain sum paid down, to substitute his own son for the little Dauphin--to allow his son to take the chance of coming alive out of that predicament. One can imagine that such a man could be found in France at that period.” Monsieur de Gemosac turned, and looked at his companion with a sort of surprise. “You speak as if in doubt, Monsieur Colville,” he said, with a sudden assumption of that grand manner with which his father had faced the people on the Place de la Revolution--had taken a pinch of snuff in the shadow of the guillotine one sunny July day. “You speak as if in doubt. Such a man was found. I have spoken with him: I, who speak to you.”

4

THE MARQUIS'S CREED

Dormer Colville smiled doubtfully. He was too polite, it seemed, to be sceptical, and by his attitude expressed a readiness to be convinced as much from indifference as by reasoning. “It is intolerable,” said the Marquis de Gemosac, “that a man of your understanding should be misled by a few romantic writers in the pay of the Orleans.” “I am not misled, Marquis; I am ignorant,” laughed Colville. “It is not always the same thing.” Monsieur de Gemosac threw away his cigarette and turned eagerly toward his companion. “Listen,” he said. “I can convince you in a few words.” And Colville leaned back against the weather-worn seat with the air of one prepared to give a post-prandial attention. “Such a man was found as you yourself suggest. A boy was found who could not refuse to run that great risk, who could not betray himself by indiscreet speech--because he was dumb. In order to allay certain rumours which were going the round of Europe, the National Convention sent three of its members to visit the Dauphin in prison, and they themselves have left a record that he answered none of their questions and spoke no word to them. Why? Because he was dumb. He merely sat and looked at them solemnly, as the dumb look. It was not the Dauphin at all. He was hidden in the loft above. The visit of the Conventionals was not satisfactory. The rumours were not stilled by it. There is nothing so elusive or so vital as a rumour. Ah! you smile, my friend.” “I always give a careful attention to rumours,” admitted Colville. “More careful than that which one accords to official announcements.” “Well, the dumb boy was not satisfactory. Those who were paid for this affair began to be alarmed. Not for their pockets. There was plenty of money. Half the crowned heads in Europe, and all the women, were ready to open their purses for the sake of a little boy, whose ill-treatment appealed to their soft hearts: who in a sense was sacred, for he was descended from sixty-six kings. No! Barras and all the other scoundrels began to perceive that there was only one way out of the difficulty into which they had blundered. The Dauphin must die! So the dumb boy disappeared. One wonders whither he went and what his fate might be--” “With so much to tell,” put in Dormer Colville, musingly; “so much unspoken.” It was odd how the roles had been reversed. For the Marquis de Gemosac was now eagerly seeking to convince his companion. The surest way to persuade a man is to lead him to persuade himself. “The only solution was for the Dauphin to die--in public. So another substitution was effected,” continued Monsieur de Gemosac. “A dying boy from the hospital was made to play the part of the Dauphin. He was not at all like him; for he was tall and dark--taller and darker than a son of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette could ever have been. The prison was reconstructed so that the sentry on guard could not see his prisoner, but was forced to call to him in order to make sure that he was there. It was a pity that he did not resemble the Dauphin at all, this scrofulous child. But they were in a hurry, and they were at their wits' ends. And it is not always easy to find a boy who will die in a given time. This boy had to die, however, by some means or other. It was for France, you understand, and the safety of the Great Republic.” “One hopes that he appreciated his privilege,” observed Colville, philosophically. “And he must die in public, duly certified for by persons of undoubted integrity. They called in, at the last moment, Desault, a great doctor of that day. But Desault was, unfortunately, honest. He went home and told his assistant that this was not the Dauphin, and that, whoever he might be, he was being poisoned. The assistant's name was Choppart, and this Choppart made up a medicine, on Desault's prescription, which was an antidote to poison.” Monsieur de Gemosac paused, and, turning to his companion, held up one finger to command his full attention. “Desault died, my friend, four days later, and Choppart died five days after him, and the boy in the Temple died three days after Choppart. And no one knows what they died of. They were pretty bunglers, those gentlemen of the Republic! Of course, they called in others in a hurry; men better suited to their purpose. And one of these, the citizen Pelletan, has placed on record some preposterous lies. These doctors certified that this was the Dauphin. They had never seen him before, but what matter? Great care was taken to identify the body. Persons of position, who had never seen the son of Louis XVI., were invited to visit the Temple. Several of them had the temerity to protect themselves in the certificate. 'We saw what we were informed was the body of the Dauphin,' they said.” Again the old man turned, and held up his hand in a gesture of warning. “If they wanted a witness whose testimony was without question--whose word would have laid the whole question in that lost and forgotten grave for ever--they had one in the room above. For the Dauphin's sister was there, Marie Therese Charlotte, she who is now Duchess of Angouleme. Why did they not bring her down to see the body, to testify that her brother was dead and the line of Louis XVI. ended? Was it chivalry? I ask you if these had shown chivalry to Madame de Lamballe? to Madame Elizabeth? to Marie Antoinette? Was it kindness toward a child of unparalleled misfortune? I ask you if they had been kind to those whom they called the children of the tyrant? No! They did not conduct her to that bedside, because he who lay there was not her brother. Are we children, Monsieur, to be deceived by a tale of a sudden softness of heart? They wished to spare this child the pain! Had they ever spared any one pain--the National Assembly?” And the Marquis de Gemosac's laugh rang with a hatred which must, it seems, outlive the possibility of revenge. “There was to be a public funeral. Such a ceremony would have been of incalculable value at that time. But, at the last minute, their courage failed them. The boy was thrown into a forgotten corner of a Paris churchyard, at nine o'clock one night, without witnesses. The spot itself cannot now be identified. Do you tell me that that was the Dauphin? Bah! my friend, the thing was too childish!” “The ignorant and the unlettered,” observed Colville, with the air of making a concession, “are always at a disadvantage--even in crime.” “That the Dauphin was, in the mean time, concealed in the garret of the Tower appears to be certain. That he was finally conveyed out of the prison in a clothes-basket is as certain, Monsieur, as it is certain that the sun will rise to-morrow. And I believe that the Queen knew, when she went to the guillotine, that her son was no longer in the Temple. I believe that Heaven sent her that one scrap of comfort, tempered as it was by the knowledge that her daughter remained a prisoner in their hands. But it was to her son that her affections were given. For the Duchess never had the gift of winning love. As she is now--a cold, hard, composed woman--so she was in her prison in the Temple at the age of fifteen. You may take it from one who has known her all his life. And from that moment to this--” The Marquis paused, and made a gesture with his hands, descriptive of space and the unknown. “From that moment to this--nothing. Nothing of the Dauphin.” He turned in his seat and looked questioningly up toward the crumbling church, with its square tower, stricken, years ago, by lightning; with its grass-grown graveyard marked by stones all grey and hoary with immense age and the passage of cold and stormy winters. “Who knows,” he added, “what may have become of him? Who can say where he lies? For a life begun as his began was not likely to be a long one. Though troubles do not kill. Witness myself, who am five years his senior.” Colville looked at him in obedience to an inviting gesture of the hand; looked as at something he did not understand, something beyond his understanding, perhaps. For the troubles had not been Monsieur de Gemosac's own troubles, but those of his country. “And the Duchess?” said the Englishman at length, after a pause, “at Frohsdorf--what does she say--or think?” “She says nothing,” replied the Marquis de Gemosac, sharply. “She is silent, because the world is listening for every word she may utter. What she thinks.... Ah! who knows? She is an old woman, my friend, for she is seventy-one. Her memories are a millstone about her neck. No wonder she is silent. Think what her life has been. As a child, three years of semi-captivity at the Tuileries, with the mob howling round the railings. Three and a half years a prisoner in the Temple. Both parents sent to the guillotine--her aunt to the same. All her world--massacred. As a girl, she was collected, majestic; or else she could not have survived those years in the Temple, alone--the last of her family. What must her thoughts have been, at night in her prison? As a woman, she is cold, sad, unemotional. No one ever lived through such troubles with so little display of feeling. The Restoration, the Hundred Days, the second Restoration, Louis XVIII., and his flight to England; Charles X. and his abdication; her own husband, the Duc d'Angouleme--the Dauphin for many years, the King for half an hour--these are some of her experiences. She has lived for forty years in exile in Mittau, Memel, Warsaw, Konigsberg, Prague, England; and now she is at Frohsdorf, awaiting the end. You ask me what she says? She says nothing, but she knows--she has always known--that her brother did not die in the Temple.” “Then--” suggested Colville, who certainly had acquired the French art of putting much meaning into one word. “Then why not seek him? you would ask. How do you know that she has not done so, my friend, with tears? But as years passed on, and brought no word of him, it became less and less desirable. While Louis XVIII. continued to reign there was no reason to wish to find Louis XVII., you understand. For there was still a Bourbon, of the direct line, upon the throne. Louis XVIII. would scarcely desire it. One would not expect him to seek very diligently for one who would deprive him of the crown. Charles X., knowing he must succeed his brother, was no more enthusiastic in the search. And the Duchess d'Angouleme herself, you ask? I can see the question in your face.” “Yes,” conceded Colville. “For, after all, he was her brother.” “Yes--and if she found him, what would be the result? Her uncle would be driven from the throne; her father-in-law would not inherit; her own husband, the Dauphin, would be Dauphin no longer. She herself could never be Queen of France. It is a hard thing to say of a woman--” Monsieur de Gemosac paused for a moment in reflection. “Yes,” he said at length, “a hard thing. But this is a hard world, Monsieur Colville, and will not allow either men or women to be angels. I have known and served the Duchess all my life, and I confess that she has never lost sight of the fact that, should Louis XVII. be found, she herself would never be Queen of France. One is not a Bourbon for nothing.” “One is not a stateswoman and a daughter of kings for nothing,” amended Colville, with his tolerant laugh; for he was always ready to make allowances. “Better, perhaps, that France should be left quiet, under the regime she had accepted, than disturbed by the offer of another regime, which might be less acceptable. You always remind me--you, who deal with France--of a lion-tamer at a circus. You have a very slight control over your performing beasts. If they refuse to do the trick you propose, you do not press it, but pass on to another trick; and the bars of the cage always appear to the onlooker to be very inadequate. Perhaps it was better, Marquis, to let the Dauphin go; to pass him over, and proceed to the tricks suitable to the momentary humour of your wild animals.” The Marquis de Gemosac gave a curt laugh, which thrilled with a note of that fearful joy known to those who seek to control the uncontrollable. “At that time,” he admitted, “it might be so. But not now. At that time there lived Louis XVIII. and Charles X., and his sons, the Duc d'Angouleme and the Duc de Berri, who might reasonably be expected to have sons in their turn. There were plenty of Bourbons, it seemed. And now--where are they? What is left of them?” He gave a nod of the head toward the sea that lay between him and Germany. “One old woman, over there, at Frohsdorf, the daughter of Marie Antoinette, awaiting the end of her bitter pilgrimage--and this Comte de Chambord. This man who will not when he may. No, my friend, it has never been so necessary to find Louis XVII. as it is now. Necessary for France--for the whole world. This Prince President, this last offshoot of a pernicious republican growth, will drag us all in the mud if he gets his way with France. And those who have watched with seeing eyes have always known that such a time as the present must eventually come. For France will always be the victim of a clever adventurer. We have foreseen it, and for that reason we have treated as serious possibilities these false Dauphins who have sprung up like mushrooms all over Europe and even in America. And what have they proved? What have the Bourbons proved in frustrating their frauds? That the son of Louis XVI. did not die in the Temple. That is all. And Madame herself has gathered further strength to her conviction that the little King was not buried in that forgotten corner of the graveyard of Sainte Marguerite. At the same time, she knows that none of these--neither Naundorff, nor Havergault, nor Bruneau, nor de Richemont, nor any other pretender--was her brother. No! The King, either because he did not know he was King, or because he had had enough of royalty, never came forward and never betrayed his whereabouts. He was to be sought; he is still to be sought. And it is now that he is wanted.” “That is why I offer to tell you this story now. That is my reason for bringing you to Farlingford now,” said Colville, quietly. It seemed that he must have awaited, as the wise do in this world, the propitious moment, and should it never come they are content to forego their purpose. He gave a light laugh and stretched out his long legs, contemplating his strapped trousers and neat boots with the eye of a connoisseur. “And should I be the humble means of doing a good turn to France and others, will France--and others--remember it, I wonder. Perhaps I hold in my hands the Hope of France, Marquis.” He paused, and lapsed for a moment into thought. It was eight o'clock, and the long northern twilight was fading into darkness now. The bell of Captain Clubbe's ship rang out the hour--a new sound in the stillness of this forgotten town. “The Last Hope,” added Dormer Colville, with a queer laugh.

5

ON THE DYKE

Neither had spoken again when their thoughts were turned aside from that story which Colville, instead of telling, had been called upon to hear. For the man whose story it presumably was passed across the green ere the sound of the ship's bell had died away. He had changed his clothes, or else it would have appeared that he was returning to his ship. He walked with his head thrown up, with long lithe steps, with a gait and carriage so unlike the heavy tread of men wearing sea-boots all their working days, that none would have believed him to be born and bred in Farlingford. For it is not only in books that history is written, but in the turn of a head, in the sound of a voice, in the vague and dreamy thoughts half formulated by the human mind 'twixt sleeping and waking. Monsieur de Gemosac paused, with his cigarette held poised halfway to his lips, and watched the man go past, while Dormer Colville, leaning back against the wall, scanned him sideways between lowered lids. It would seem that Barebone must have an appointment. He walked without looking about him, like one who is late. He rather avoided than sought the greeting of a friend from the open cottage-doors as he passed on. On reaching the quay he turned quickly to the left, following the path that led toward the dyke at the riverside. “He is no sailor at heart,” commented Colville. “He never even glanced at his ship.” “And yet it was he who steered the ship in that dangerous river.” “He may be skilful in anything he undertakes,” suggested Colville, in explanation. “It is Captain Clubbe who will tell us that. For Captain Clubbe has known him since his birth, and was the friend of his father.” They sat in silence watching the shadowy figure on the dyke, outlined dimly against the hazy horizon. He was walking, still with haste as if to a certain destination, toward the rectory buried in its half circle of crouching trees. And already another shadow was hurrying from the house to meet him. It was the boy, little Sep Marvin, and in the stillness of the evening his shrill voice could be heard in excited greeting. “What have you brought? What have you brought?” he was crying, as he ran toward Barebone. They seemed to have so much to say to each other that they could not wait until they came within speaking distance. The boy took Barebone's hand, and turning walked back with him to the old house peeping over the dyke toward the sea. He could scarcely walk quietly, for joy at the return of his friend, and skipped from side to side, pouring out questions and answering them himself as children and women do. But Barebone gave him only half of his attention and looked before him with grave eyes, while the boy talked of nests and knives. Barebone was looking toward the garden, concealed like an intrenchment behind the dyke. It was a quiet evening, and the rector was walking slowly backward and forward on the raised path, made on the dyke itself, like a ship-captain on his quarter-deck, with hands clasped behind his bent back and eyes that swept the horizon at each turn with a mechanical monotony. At one end of the path, which was worn smooth by the Reverend Septimus Marvin's pensive foot, the gleam of a white dress betrayed the presence of his niece, Miriam Liston. “Ah, is that you?” asked the rector, holding out a limp hand. “Yes. I remember Sep was allowed to sit up till half-past eight in the hope that you might come round to see us. Well, Loo, and how are you? Yes--yes.” And he looked vaguely out to sea, repeating below his breath the words “Yes--yes” almost in a whisper, as if communing secretly with his own thoughts out of hearing of the world. “Of course I should come round to see you,” answered Barebone. “Where else should I go? So soon as we had had tea and I could change my clothes and get away from that dear Mrs. Clubbe. It seems so strange to come back here from the racketing world--and France is a racketing world of its own--and find everything in Farlingford just the same.” He had shaken hands with the rector and with Miriam Liston as he spoke, and his speech was not the speech of Farlingford men at all, but rather of Septimus Marvin himself, of whose voice he had acquired the ring of education, while adding to it a neatness and quickness of enunciation which must have been his own; for none in Suffolk could have taught it to him. “Just the same,” he repeated, glancing at the book Miriam had laid aside for a moment to greet him and had now taken up again. “That book must be very large print,” he said, “for you to be able to read by this light.” “It is large print,” answered the girl, with a friendly laugh, as she returned to it. “And you are still resolved to be a sailor?” inquired Marvin, looking at him with kind eyes for ever asleep, it would appear, in some long slumber which must have been the death of one of the sources of human energy--of ambition or of hope. “Until I find a better calling,” answered Loo Barebone, with his eager laugh. “When I am away I wonder how any can be content to live in Farlingford and let the world go by. And when I am here I wonder how any can be so foolish as to fret and fume in the restless world while he might be sitting quietly at Farlingford.” “Ah,” murmured the rector, musingly, “you are for the world. You, with your capacities, your quickness for learning, your--well, your lightness of heart, my dear Loo. That goes far in the great world. To be light of heart--to amuse. Yes, you are for the world. You might do something there.” “And nothing in Farlingford?” inquired Barebone, gaily; but he turned, as he spoke, and glanced once more at Miriam Liston as if in some dim way the question could not be answered by any other. She was absorbed in her book again. The print must indeed have been large and clear, for the twilight was fading fast. She looked up and met his glance with direct and steady eyes of a clear grey. A severe critic of that which none can satisfactorily define--a woman's beauty--would have objected that her face was too wide, and her chin too square. Her hair, which was of a bright brown, grew with a singular strength and crispness round a brow which was serene and square. In her eyes there shone the light of tenacity, and a steady purpose. A student of human nature must have regretted that the soul looking out of such eyes should have been vouchsafed to a woman. For strength and purpose in a man are usually exercised for the good of mankind, while in a woman such qualities must, it would seem, benefit no more than one man of her own generation, and a few who may follow her in the next. “There is nothing,” she said, turning to her book again, “for a man to do in Farlingford.” “And for a woman--?” inquired Barebone, without looking at her. “There is always something--everywhere.” And Septimus Marvin's reflective “Yes--yes,” as he paused in his walk and looked seaward, came in appropriately as a grave confirmation of Miriam's jesting statement. “Yes--yes,” he repeated, turning toward Barebone, who stood listening to the boy's chatter. “You find us as you left us, Loo. Was it six months ago? Ah! How time flies when one remains stationary. For you, I dare say, it seems more.” “For me--oh yes, it seems more,” replied Barebone, with his gay laugh, and a glance toward Miriam. “A little older,” continued the rector. “The church a little mouldier. Farlingford a little emptier. Old Godbold is gone--the last of the Godbolds of Farlingford, which means another empty cottage in the street.” “I saw it as I came down,” answered Barebone. “They look like last year's nests--those empty cottages. But you have been all well, here at the rectory, since we sailed? The cottages--well, they are only cottages after all.” Miriam's eyes were raised for a moment from her book. “Is it like that they talk in France?” she asked. “Are those the sentiments of the great republic?” Barebone laughed aloud. “I thought I could make you look up from your book,” he answered. “One has merely to cast a slur upon the poor--your dear poor of Farlingford--and you are up in arms in an instant. But I am not the person to cast a slur, since I am one of the poor of Farlingford myself, and owe it to charity--to the charity of the rectory--that I can read and write.” “But it came to you very naturally,” observed Marvin, looking vaguely across the marshes to the roofs of the village, “to suggest that those who live in cottages are of a different race of beings--” He broke off, following his own thoughts in silence, as men soon learn to do who have had no companion by them capable of following whithersoever they may lead. “Did it?” asked Barebone, sharply. He turned to look at his old friend and mentor with a sudden quick distress. “I hope not. I hope it did not sound like that. For you have never taught me such thoughts, have you? Quite the contrary. And I cannot have learned it from Clubbe.” He broke off with a laugh of relief, for he had perceived that Septimus Marvin's thoughts were already elsewhere. “Perhaps you are right,” he added, turning to Miriam. “It may be that one should go to a republic in order to learn--once for all--that all men are not equal.” “You say it with so much conviction,” was the retort, “that you must have known it before.” “But I do not know it. I deny such knowledge. Where could I have learned such a principle?” He spread out his arms in emphatic denial. For he was quick in all his gestures--quick to laugh or be grave--quick, with the rapidity of a woman to catch a thought held back by silence or concealed in speech. Marvin merely looked at him with a dreamy smile and lapsed again into those speculations which filled his waking moments; for the business of life never received his full attention. He contemplated the world from afar off, and was like that blind man at Bethsaida who saw men as trees walking, and rubbed his eyes and wondered. He turned at the sound of the church clock and looked at his son, whose attitude towards Barebone was that of an admiring younger brother. “Sep,” he said, “your extra half-hour has passed. You will have time to-morrow and for many days to come to exchange views with Loo.” The boy was old before his time, as the children of elderly parents always are. “Very well,” he said, with a grave nod. “But you must not tell Loo where those young herons are after I am gone to bed.” He went slowly toward the house, looking back suspiciously from time to time. “Herons? no. Why should I? Where are they?” muttered Mr. Marvin, vaguely, and he absent-mindedly followed his son, leaving Miriam Liston sitting in the turf shelter, built like an embrasure in the dyke, and Barebone standing a little distance from her, looking at her. A silence fell upon them--the silence that follows the departure of a third person when those who are left behind turn a new page. Miriam laid her book upon her lap and looked across the river now slowly turning to its ebb. She did not look at Barebone, but her eyes were conscious of his proximity. Her attitude, like his, seemed to indicate the knowledge that this moment had been inevitable from the first, and that there was no desire on either part to avoid it or to hasten its advent. “I had a haunting fear as we came up the river,” he said at length, quietly and with an odd courtesy of manner, “that you might have gone away. That is the calamity always hanging over this quiet house.” He spoke with the ease of manner which always indicates a long friendship, or a close camaraderie, resulting from common interests or a common endeavour. “Why should I go away?” she asked. “On the other hand, why should you stay?” “Because I fancy I am wanted,” she replied, in the lighter tone which he had used. “It is gratifying to one's vanity, you know, whether it be true or not.” “Oh, it is true enough. One cannot imagine what they would do without you.” He was watching Septimus Marvin as he spoke. Sep had joined him and was walking gravely by his side toward the house. They were ill-assorted. “But there is a limit even to self-sacrifice and--well, there is another world open to you.” She gave a curt laugh as if he had touched a topic upon which they would disagree. “Oh--yes,” he laughed. “I leave myself open to a tu quoque, I know. There are other worlds open to me also, you would say.” He looked at her with his gay and easy smile; but she made no answer, and her resolute lips closed together sharply. The subject had been closed by some past conversation or incident which had left a memory. “Who are those two men staying at 'The Black Sailor'”, she asked, changing the subject, or only turning into a by-way, perhaps. “You saw them.” She seemed to take it for granted that he should have seen them, though he had not appeared to look in their direction. “Oh--yes. I saw them, but I do not know who they are. I came straight here as soon as I could.” “One of them is a Frenchman,” she said, taking no heed of the excuse given for his ignorance of Farlingford news. “The old man--I thought so. I felt it when I looked at him. It was perhaps a fellow feeling. I suppose I am a Frenchman after all. Clubbe always says I am one when I am at the wheel and let the ship go off the wind.” Miriam was looking along the dyke, peering into the gathering darkness. “One of them is coming toward us now,” she said, almost warningly. “Not the Marquis de Gemosac, but the other--the Englishman.” “Confound him,” muttered Barebone. “What does he want?” And to judge from Mr. Dormer Colville's pace it would appear that he chiefly desired to interrupt their tete-a-tete.

6

THE STORY OF THE CASTAWAYS

When River Andrew stated that there were few at Farlingford who knew more of Frenchman than himself, it is to be presumed that he spoke by the letter, and under the reserve that Captain Clubbe was not at the moment on shore. For Captain Clubbe had known Frenchman since boyhood. “I understand,” said Dormer Colville to him two or three days after the arrival of “The Last Hope,” “that the Marquis de Gemosac cannot do better than apply to you for some information he desires to possess. In fact, it is on that account that we are here.” The introduction had been a matter requiring patience. For Captain Clubbe had not laid aside in his travels a certain East Anglian distrust of the unknown. He had, of course, noted the presence of the strangers when he landed at Farlingford quay, but his large, immobile face had betrayed no peculiar interest. There had been plenty to tell him all that was known of Monsieur de Gemosac and Dormer Colville, and a good deal that was only surmised. But the imagination of even the darksome River Andrew failed to soar successfully under the measuring blue eye, and the total lack of comment of Captain Clubbe. There was, indeed, little to tell, although the strangers had been seen to go to the rectory in quite a friendly way, and had taken a glass of sherry in the rector's study. Mrs. Clacy was responsible for this piece of news, and her profession giving her the entree to almost every back door in Farlingford enabled her to gather news at the fountain-head. For Mrs. Clacy went out to oblige. She obliged the rectory on Mondays, and Mrs. Clubbe, with what was technically described as the heavy wash, on Tuesdays. Whatever Mrs. Clacy was asked to do she could perform with a rough efficiency. But she always undertook it with reluctance. It was not, she took care to mention, what she was accustomed to, but she would do it to oblige. Her charge was eighteen-pence a day with her dinner, and (she made the addition with a raised eyebrow, and the resigned sigh of one who takes her meals as a duty toward those dependent on her) a bit of tea at the end of the day. It was on a Wednesday that Dormer Colville met Captain Clubbe face to face in the street, and was forced to curb his friendly smile and half-formed nod of salutation. For Captain Clubbe went past him with a rigid face and steadily averted eyes, like a walking monument. For there was something in the captain's deportment dimly suggestive of stone, and the dignity of stillness. His face meant security, his large limbs a slow, sure action. Colville and Monsieur de Gemosac were on the quay in the afternoon at high tide when “The Last Hope” was warped on to the slip-way. All Farlingford was there too, and Captain Clubbe carried out the difficult task with hardly any words at all from a corner of the jetty, with Loo Barebone on board as second in command. Captain Clubbe could not fail to perceive the strangers, for they stood a few yards from him, Monsieur de Gemosac peering with his yellow eyes toward the deck of “The Last Hope,” where Barebone stood on the forecastle giving the orders transmitted to him by a sign from his taciturn captain. Colville seemed to take a greater interest in the proceedings, and noted the skill and precision of the crew with the air of a seaman. Presently, Septimus Marvin wandered down the dyke and stood irresolutely at the far corner of the jetty. He always approached his flock with diffidence, although they treated him kindly enough, much as they treated such of their own children as were handicapped in the race of life by some malformation or mental incapacity. Colville approached him and they stood side by side until “The Last Hope” was safely moored and chocked. Then it was that the rector introduced the two strangers to Captain Clubbe. It being a Wednesday, Clubbe must have known all that there was to know, and more, of Monsieur de Gemosac and Dormer Colville; for Mrs. Clacy, it will be remembered, obliged Mrs. Clubbe on Tuesdays. Nothing, however, in the mask-like face, large and square, of the ship-captain indicated that he knew aught of his new acquaintances, or desired to know more. And when Colville frankly explained their presence in Farlingford, Captain Clubbe nodded gravely and that was all. “We can wait, however, until a more suitable opportunity presents itself,” Colville hastened to add. “You are busy, as even a landsman can perceive, and cannot be expected to think of anything but your vessel until the tide leaves her high and dry.” He turned and explained the situation to the Marquis, who shrugged his shoulders impatiently as if at the delay. For he was a southerner, and was, perhaps, ignorant of the fact that in dealing with any born on the shores of the German Ocean nothing is gained and, more often than not, all is lost by haste. “You hear,” Colville added, turning to the Captain, and speaking in a curter manner; for so strongly was he moved by that human kindness which is vaguely called sympathy that his speech varied according to his listener. “You hear the Marquis only speaks French. It is about a fellow countryman of his buried here. Drop in and have a glass of wine with us some evening; to-night, if you are at liberty.” “What I can tell you won't take long,” said Clubbe, over his shoulder; for the tide was turning, and in a few minutes would be ebbing fast. “Dare say not. But we have a good bin of claret at 'The Black Sailor,' and shall be glad of your opinion on it.” Clubbe nodded, with a curt laugh, which might have been intended to deprecate the possession of any opinion on a vintage, or to express his disbelief that Dormer Colville desired to have it. Nevertheless, his large person loomed in the dusk of the trees soon after sunset, in the narrow road leading from his house to the church and the green. Monsieur de Gemosac and his companion were sitting on the bench outside the inn, leaning against the sill of their own parlour-window, which stood open. The Captain had changed his clothes, and now wore those in which he went to church and to the custom-house when in London or other large cities. “There walks a just man,” commented Dormer Colville, lightly, and no longer word could have described Captain Clubbe more aptly. He would rather have stayed in his own garden this evening to smoke his pipe in contemplative silence. But he had always foreseen that the day might come when it would be his duty to do his best by Loo Barebone. He had not sought this opportunity, because, being a wise as well as a just man, he was not quite sure that he knew what the best would be. He shook hands gravely with the strangers, and by his manner seemed to indicate his comprehension of Monsieur de Gemosac's well-turned phrases of welcome. Dormer Colville appeared to be in a silent humour, unless perchance he happened to be one of those rare beings who can either talk or hold their tongues as occasion may demand. “You won't want me to put my oar in, I see,” observed he, tentatively, as he drew forward a small table whereon were set three glasses and a bottle of the celebrated claret. “I can understand French, but I don't talk it,” replied the Captain, stolidly. “And if I interpret as we go along, we shall sit here all night, and get very little said.” Colville explained the difficulty to the Marquis de Gemosac, and agreed with him that much time would be saved if Captain Clubbe would be kind enough to tell in English all that he knew of the nameless Frenchman buried in Farlingford churchyard, to be translated by Colville to Monsieur de Gemosac at another time. As Clubbe understood this, and nodded in acquiescence, there only remained to them to draw the cork and light their cigars. “Not much to tell,” said Clubbe, guardedly. “But what there is, is no secret, so far as I know. It has not been told because it was known long ago, and has been forgotten since. The man's dead and buried, and there's an end of him.” “Of him, yes, but not of his race,” answered Colville. “You mean the lad?” inquired the Captain, turning his calm and steady gaze to Colville's face. The whole man seemed to turn, ponderously and steadily, like a siege-gun. “That is what I meant,” answered Colville. “You understand,” he went on to explain, as if urged thereto by the fixed glance of the clear blue eye--“you understand, it is none of my business. I am only here as the Marquis de Gemosac's friend. Know him in his own country, where I live most of the time.” Clubbe nodded. “Frenchman was picked up at sea fifty-five years ago this July,” he narrated, bluntly, “by the 'Martha and Mary' brig of this port. I was apprentice at the time. Frenchman was a boy with fair hair and a womanish face. Bit of a cry-baby I used to think him, but being a boy myself I was perhaps hard on him. He was with his--well, his mother.” Captain Clubbe paused. He took the cigar from his lips and carefully replaced the outer leaf, which had wrinkled. Perhaps he waited to be asked a question. Colville glanced at him sideways and did not ask it. “Dark night,” the Captain continued, after a short silence, “and a heavy sea, about mid-channel off Dieppe. We sighted a French fishing-boat yawing about abandoned. Something queer about her, the skipper thought. Those were queer times in France. We hailed her, and getting no answer put out a boat and boarded her. There was nobody on board but a woman and a child. Woman was half mad with fear. I have seen many afraid, but never one like that. I was only a boy myself, but I remember thinking it wasn't the sea and drowning she was afraid of. We couldn't find out the smack's name. It had been painted out with a tar-brush, and she was half full of water. The skipper took the woman and child off, and left the fishing-smack as we found her yawing about--all sail set. They reckoned she would founder in a few minutes. But there was one old man on board, the boatswain, who had seen many years at sea, who said that she wasn't making any water at all, because he had been told to look for the leak and couldn't find it. He said that the water had been pumped into her so as to waterlog her; and it was his belief that she had not been abandoned many minutes, that the crew were hanging about somewhere near in a boat waiting to see if we sighted her and put men on board.” Mr. Dormer Colville was attending to the claret, and pressed Captain Clubbe by a gesture of the hand to empty his glass. “Something wrong somewhere?” he suggested, in a conversational way. “By daylight we were ramping up channel with three French men-of-war after us,” was Captain Clubbe's comprehensive reply. “As chance had it, the channel squadron hove in sight round the Foreland, and the Frenchmen turned and left us.” Clubbe marked a pause in his narrative by a glass of claret taken at one draught like beer. “Skipper was a Farlingford man, name of Doy,” he continued. “Long as he lived he was pestered by inquiries from the French government respecting a Dieppe fishing-smack supposed to have been picked up abandoned at sea. He had picked up no fishing-smack, and he answered no letters about it. He was an old man when it happened, and he died at sea soon after my indentures expired. The woman and child were brought here, where nobody could speak French, and, of course, neither of them could speak any English. The boy was white-faced and frightened at first, but he soon picked up spirit. They were taken in and cared for by one and another--any who could afford it. For Farlingford has always bred seafaring men ready to give and take.” “So we were told yesterday by the rector. We had a long talk with him in the morning. A clever man, if--” Dormer Colville did not complete the remark, but broke off with a sigh. He had no doubt seen trouble himself. For it is not always the ragged and unkempt who have been sore buffeted by the world, but also such as have a clean-washed look almost touching sleekness. “Yes,” said Clubbe, slowly and conclusively. “So you have seen the parson.” “Of course,” Colville remarked, cheerfully, after a pause; for we cannot always be commiserating the unfortunate. “Of course, all this happened before his time, and Monsieur de Gemosac does not want to learn from hearsay, you understand, but at first hand. I fancy he would, for instance, like to know when the woman, the--mother died.” Clubbe was looking straight in front of him. He turned in his disconcerting, monumental way and looked at his questioner, who had imitated with a perfect ingenuousness his own brief pause before the word mother. Colville smiled pleasantly at him. “I tell you frankly, Captain,” he said, “it would suit me better if she wasn't the mother.” “I am not here to suit you,” murmured Captain Clubbe, without haste or hesitation. “No. Well, let us say for the present that she was the mother. We can discuss that another time. When did she die?” “Seven years after landing here.” Colville made a mental calculation and nodded his head with satisfaction at the end of it. He lighted another cigarette. “I am a business man, Captain,” he said at length. “Fair dealing and a clean bond. That is what I have been brought up to. Confidence for confidence. Before we go any further--” He paused and seemed to think before committing himself. Perhaps he saw that Captain Clubbe did not intend to go much further without some quid pro quo. “Before we go any further, I think I may take it upon myself to let you into the Marquis's confidence. It is about an inheritance, Captain. A great inheritance and--well, that young fellow may well be the man. He may be born to greater things than a seafaring life, Captain.” “I don't want any marquis to tell me that,” answered Clubbe, with his slow judicial smile. “For I've brought him up since the cradle. He's been at sea with me in fair weather and foul--and he is not the same as us.”

7

ON THE SCENT

Dormer Colville attached so much importance to the captain's grave jest that he interpreted it at once to Monsieur de Gemosac. “Captain Clubbe,” he said, “tells us that he does not need to be informed that this Loo Barebone is the man we seek. He has long known it.” Which was a near enough rendering, perhaps, to pass muster in the hearing of two persons imperfectly acquainted with the languages so translated. Then, turning again to the sailor, he continued: “Monsieur de Gemosac would naturally wish to know whether there were papers or any other means of identification found on the woman or the child?” “There were a few papers. The woman had a Roman Catholic Missal in her pocket, and the child a small locket with a miniature portrait in it.” “Of the Queen Marie Antoinette?” suggested Colville, quickly. “It may well have been. It is many years since I saw it. It was faded enough. I remember that it had a fall, and would not open afterward. No one has seen it for twenty-five years or so.” “The locket or the portrait?” inquired Colville, with a light laugh, with which to disclaim any suggestion of a cross-examination. “The portrait.” “And the locket?” “My wife has it somewhere, I believe.” Colville gave an impatient laugh. For the peaceful air of Farlingford had failed to temper that spirit of energy and enterprise which he had acquired in cities--in Paris, most likely. He had no tolerance for quiet ways and a slow, sure progress, such as countrymen seek, who are so leisurely that the years slide past and death surprises them before they have done anything in the world but attend to its daily demand for a passing effort. “Ah!” he cried, “but all that must be looked into if we are to do anything for this young fellow. You will find the Marquis anxious to be up and doing at once. You go so slowly in Farlingford, Captain. The world is hurrying on and this chance will be gone past before we are ready. Let us get these small proofs of identity collected together as soon as possible. Let us find that locket. But do not force it open. Give it to me as it is. Let us find the papers.” “There are no papers,” interrupted Captain Clubbe, with a calm deliberation quite untouched by his companion's hurry. “No papers?” “No; for Frenchman burnt them before my eyes.” Dormer Colville meditated for a moment in silence. Although his manner was quick, he was perhaps as deliberate in his choice of a question as was Captain Clubbe in answering it. “Why did he do that? Did he know who he was? Did he ever say anything to you about his former life--his childhood--his recollections of France?” “He was not a man to say much,” answered Clubbe, himself no man to repeat much. Colville had been trying for some time to study the sailor's face, quietly through his cigar smoke. “Look here, Captain,” he said, after a pause. “Let us understand each other. There is a chance, just a chance, that we can prove this Loo Barebone to be the man we think him, but we must all stand together. We must be of one mind and one purpose. We four, Monsieur de Gemosac, you, Barebone, and my humble self. I fancy--well, I fancy it may prove to be worth our while.” “I am willing to do the best I can for Loo,” was the reply. “And I am willing to do the best I can for Monsieur de Gemosac, whose heart is set on this affair. And,” Colville added, with his frank laugh, “let us hope that we may have our reward; for I am a poor man myself, and do not like the prospect of a careful old age. I suppose, Captain, that if a man were overburdened with wealth he would scarcely follow a seafaring life, eh?” “Then there is money in it?” inquired Clubbe, guardedly. “Money,” laughed the other. “Yes--there is money for all concerned, and to spare.” Captain Clubbe had been born and bred among a people possessing little wealth and leading a hard life, only to come to want in old age. It was natural that this consideration should carry weight. He was anxious to do his best for the boy who had been brought up as his own son. He could think of nothing better than to secure him from want for the rest of his days. There were many qualities in Loo Barebone which he did not understand, for they were quite foreign to the qualities held to be virtues in Farlingford; such as perseverance and method, a careful economy, and a rigid common sense. Frenchman had brought these strange ways into Farlingford when he was himself only a boy of ten, and they had survived his own bringing up in some of the austerest houses in the town, so vitally as to enable him to bequeath them almost unchastened to his son. As has been noted, Loo had easily lived down the prejudices of his own generation against an un-English gaiety, and inconsequence almost amounting to emotion. And nothing is, or was in the solid days before these trumpet-blowing times, so unwelcome in British circles as emotion. Frenchman had no doubt prepared the way for his son; but the peculiarities of thought and manner which might be allowed to pass in a foreigner would be less easily forgiven in Loo, who had Farlingford blood in his veins. For his mother had been a Clubbe, own cousin, and, as gossips whispered, once the sweetheart of Captain Clubbe himself and daughter of Seth Clubbe of Maiden's Grave, one of the largest farmers on the Marsh. “It cannot be for no particular purpose that the boy has been created so different from any about him,” Captain Clubbe muttered, reflectively, as he thought of Dormer Colville's words. For he had that simple faith in an Almighty Purpose, without which no wise man will be found to do business on blue water. “It is strange how a man may be allowed to inherit from a grandfather he has never seen a trick of manner, or a face which are not the manner or face of his father,” observed Colville, adapting himself, as was his habit, to the humour of his companion. “There must, as you suggest, be some purpose in it. God writes straight on crooked lines, Captain.” Thus Dormer Colville found two points of sympathy with this skipper of a slow coaster, who had never made a mistake at sea nor done an injustice to any one serving under him: a simple faith in the Almighty Purpose and a very honest respect for money. This was the beginning of a sort of alliance between four persons of very different character which was to influence the whole lives of many. They sat on the tarred seat set against the weather-beaten wall of “The Black Sailor” until darkness came stealing in from the sea with the quiet that broods over flat lands, and an unpeopled shore. Colville had many questions to ask and many more which he withheld till a fitter occasion. But he learnt that Frenchman had himself stated his name to be Barebone when he landed, a forlorn and frightened little boy, on this barren shore, and had never departed from that asseveration when he came to learn the English language and marry an English wife. Captain Clubbe told also how Frenchman, for so he continued to be called long after his real name had been written twice in the parish register, had soon after his marriage destroyed the papers carefully preserved by the woman whom he never called mother, though she herself claimed that title. She had supported herself, it appeared, by her needle, and never seemed to want money, which led the villagers to conclude that she had some secret store upon which to draw when in need. She had received letters from France, which were carefully treasured by her until her death, and for long afterward by Frenchman, who finally burnt all at his marriage, saying that he was now an Englishman and wanted to retain no ties with France. At this time, Clubbe remembered, Louis XVIII. was firmly established on the throne of France, the Restoration--known as the Second--having been brought about by the Allied Powers with a high hand after the Hundred Days and the final downfall of Napoleon. Frenchman may well have known that it might be worth his while to return to France and seek fortune there; but he never spoke of this knowledge nor made reference to the recollections of his childhood, which cast a cold reserve over his soul and steeped it with such a deadly hatred of France and all things French, that he desired to sever all memories that might link him with his native country or awake in the hearts of any children he should beget the desire to return thither. A year after his marriage his wife died, and thus her son, left to the care of a lonely and misanthropic father, was brought up a Frenchman after all, and lisped his first words in that tongue. “He lived long enough to teach him to speak French and think like a Frenchman, and then he died,” said Captain Clubbe--“a young man reckoning by years, but in mind he was an older man than I am to-day.” “And his secret died with him?” suggested Dormer Colville, looking at the end of his cigar with a queer smile. But Captain Clubbe made no answer. “One may suppose that he wanted it to die with him, at all events,” added Colville, tentatively. “You are right,” was the reply, a local colloquialism in common use, as a clincher to a closed argument or an unwelcome truth. Captain Clubbe rose as he spoke and intimated his intention of departing, by jerking his head sideways at Monsieur de Gemosac, who, however, held out his hand with a Frenchman's conscientious desire to follow the English custom. “I'll be getting home,” said Clubbe, simply. As he spoke he peered across the marsh toward the river, and Colville, following the direction of his gaze, saw the black silhouette of a large lug-sail against the eastern sky, which was softly grey with the foreglow of the rising moon. “What is that?” asked Colville. “That's Loo Barebone going up with the sea-breeze. He has been down to the rectory. He mostly goes there in the evening. There is a creek, you know, runs down from Maiden's Grave to the river.” “Ah!” answered Colville thoughtfully, almost as if the creek and the large lug-sail against the sky explained something which he had not hitherto understood. “I thought he might have come with you this evening,” he added, after a pause. “For I suppose everybody in Farlingford knows why we are here. He does not seem very anxious to seek his fortune in France.” “No,” answered Clubbe, lifting his stony face to the sky and studying the little clouds that hovered overhead awaiting the moon. “No--you are right.” Then he turned with a jerk of the head and left them. The Marquis de Gemosac watched him depart, and made a gesture toward the darkness of the night, into which he had vanished, indicative of a great despair. “But,” he exclaimed, “they are of a placidity--these English. There is nothing to be done with them, my friend, nothing to be done with such men as that. Now I understand how it is that they form a great nation. It is merely because they stand and let you thump them until you are tired, and then they proceed to do what they intended to do from the first.” “That is because we know that he who jumps about most actively will be the first to feel fatigue, Marquis,” laughed Colville, pleasantly. “But you must not judge all England from these eastern people. It is here that you will find the concentrated essence of British tenacity and stolidity--the leaven that leavens the whole.” “Then it is our misfortune to have to deal with these concentrated English--that is all.” The Marquis shrugged his shoulders with that light despair which is incomprehensible to any but men of Latin race. “No, Marquis! there you are wrong,” corrected Dormer Colville, with a sudden gravity, “for we have in Captain Clubbe the very man we want--one of the hardest to find in this chattering world--a man who will not say too much. If we can only make him say what we want him to say he will not ruin all by saying more. It is so much easier to say a word too much than a word too little. And remember he speaks French as well as English, though, being British, he pretends that he cannot.” Monsieur de Gemosac turned to peer at his companion in the darkness. “You speak hopefully, my friend,” he said. “There is something in your voice--” “Is there?” laughed Colville, who seemed elated. “There may well be. For that man has been saying things, in that placid monotone which would have taken your breath away had you been able to understand them. A hundred times I rejoiced that you understood no English, for your impatience, Marquis, might have silenced him as some rare-voiced bird is silenced by a sudden movement. Yes, Marquis, there is a locket containing a portrait of Marie Antoinette. There are other things also. But there is one drawback. The man himself is not anxious to come forward. There are reasons, it appears, here in Farlingford, why he should not seek his fortune elsewhere. To-morrow morning--” Dormer Colville rose and yawned audibly. It almost appeared that he regretted having permitted himself a moment's enthusiasm on a subject which scarcely affected his interests. “To-morrow morning I will see to it.”

8

THE LITTLE BOY WHO WAS A KING

The Reverend Septimus Marvin had lost his wife five years earlier. It was commonly said that he had never been the same man since. Which was untrue. Much that is commonly said will, on investigation, be found to be far from the truth. Septimus Marvin had, so to speak, been the same man since infancy. He had always looked vaguely at the world through spectacles; had always been at a loss among his contemporaries--a generation already tainted by that shallow spirit of haste which is known to-day as modernity--at a loss for a word; at a loss for a companion soul. He was a scholar and a learned historian. His companions were books, and he communed in spirit with writers who were dead and gone. Had he ever been a different man his circumstances would assuredly have been other. His wife, for instance, would in all human probability have been alive. His avocation might have been more suited to his capabilities. He was not intended for a country parish, and that practical human comprehension of the ultimate value of little daily details, without which a pastor never yet understood his flock, was not vouchsafed to him. “Passen takes no account o' churchyard,” River Andrew had said, and neither he nor any other in Farlingford could account for the special neglect to which was abandoned that particular corner of the burial ground where the late Mrs. Marvin reposed beneath an early Victorian headstone of singular hideousness. Mr. Marvin always went round the other way. “Seems as he has forgotten her wonderful quick,” commented the women of Farlingford. But perhaps they were wrong. If he had forgotten, he might be expected to go round by the south side of the church by accident occasionally, especially as it was the shorter way from the rectory to the porch. He was an absent-minded man, but he always remembered, as River Andrew himself admitted, to go north about. And his wife's grave was overgrown by salted grass as were the rest. Farlingford had accepted him, when his College, having no use for such a dreamer elsewhere, gave him the living, not only with resignation, but with equanimity. This remote parish, cut off from the busier mainland by wide heaths and marshes, sparsely provided with ill-kept roads, had never looked for a bustling activity in its rectors. Their forefathers had been content with a gentleman, given to sport and the pursuits of a country squire, marked on the seventh day by a hearty and robust godliness. They would have preferred Parson Marvin to have handled a boat and carried a gun. But he had his good qualities. He left them alone. And they are the most independent people in the world. When his wife died, his sister, the widow of an Indian officer, bustled eastward, from a fashionable Welsh watering-place, just to satisfy herself, as she explained to her West-country friends, that he would not marry his cook before six months elapsed. After that period she proposed to wash her hands of him. She was accompanied by her only child, Miriam, who had just left school. Six months later Septimus Marvin was called upon to give away his sister to a youthful brother officer of her late husband, which ceremony he performed with a sigh of relief audible in the farthest recess of the organ loft. While the wedding-bells were still ringing, the bride, who was not dreamy or vague like her brother, gave Septimus to understand that he had promised to provide Miriam with a home--that he really needed a woman to keep things going at the rectory and to watch over the tender years of little Sep--and that Miriam's boxes were packed. Septimus had no recollection of the promise. And his sister was quite hurt that he should say such a thing as that on her wedding day and spoil everything. He had no business to make the suggestion if he had not intended to carry it out. So the bride and bridegroom went away in a shower of good wishes and rice to the life of organized idleness, for which the gentleman's education and talents eminently befitted him, and Miriam returned to Farlingford with Septimus. In those days the railway passed no nearer to Farlingford than Ipswich, and before the arrival of their train at that station Miriam had thoroughly elucidated the situation. She had discovered that she was not expected at the rectory, and that Septimus had never offered of his own free will the home which he now kindly pressed upon her--two truths which the learned historian fondly imagined to be for ever locked up in his own heart, which was a kind one and the heart of a gentleman. Miriam also learned that Septimus was very poor. She did not need to be informed that he was helpless. Her instinct had told her that long ago. She was only nineteen, but she looked at men and women with those discerning grey eyes, in which there seemed to lurk a quiet light like the light of stars, and saw right through them. She was woman enough--despite the apparent inconsequence of the schoolroom, which still lent a vagueness to her thoughts and movements--to fall an easy victim to the appeal of helplessness. Years, it would appear, are of no account in certain feminine instincts. Miriam had probably been woman enough at ten years of age to fly to the rescue of the helpless. She did not live permanently at the rectory, but visited her mother from time to time, either in England, or at one of the foreign resorts of idle people. But the visits, as years went by, became shorter and rarer. At twenty-one Miriam came into a small fortune of her own, left by her father in the hands of executors, one of whom was that John Turner, the Paris banker, who had given Dormer Colville a letter of introduction to Septimus Marvin. The money was sorely needed at the rectory, and Miriam drew freely enough on John Turner. “You are an extravagant girl,” said that astute financier to her, when they met at the house of Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, at Royan, in France. “I wonder what you spend it on! But I don't trouble my head about it. You need not explain, you understand. But you can come to me when you want advice or help. You will find me--in the background. I am a fat old man, in the background. Useful enough in my way, perhaps, even to a pretty girl with a sound judgment.” There were many, who, like Loo Barebone, reflected that there were other worlds open to Miriam Liston. At first she went into those other worlds, under the flighty wing of her mother, and looked about her there. Captain and Mrs. Duncan belonged to the Anglo-French society, which had sprung into existence since the downfall of Napoleon I., and was in some degree the outcome of the part played by Great Britain in the comedy of the Bourbon and Orleanist collapse. Captain Duncan had retired from the army, changing career from one of a chartered to an unchartered uselessness, and he herded with tarnished aristocracy and half-pay failures in the smoking-rooms of Continental clubs. Miriam returned, after a short experience of this world, to Farlingford, as to the better part. At first she accepted invitations to some of the country houses open to her by her connection with certain great families. But after a time she seemed to fall under the spell of that quiet life which is still understood and lived in a few remote places. “What can you find to do all day and to think about at night at that bleak corner of England?” inquired her friends, themselves restless by day and sleepless by night by reason of the heat of their pursuit of that which is called pleasure. “If he wants to marry his cook let him do it and be done with us,” wrote her mother from the south of France. “Come and join us at Biarritz. The Prince President will be here this winter. We shall be very gay.... P.S. We shall not ask you to stay with us as we are hard up this quarter; but to share expenses. Mind come.” But Miriam remained at Farlingford, and there is nothing to be gained by seeking to define her motive. There are two arguments against seeking a woman's motive. Firstly, she probably has none. Secondly, should she have one she will certainly have a counterfeit, which she will dangle before your eyes, and you will seize it. Dormer Colville might almost be considered to belong to the world of which Captain and Mrs. Duncan were such brilliant ornaments. But he did not so consider himself. For their world was essentially British, savoured here and there by a French count or so, at whose person and title the French aristocracy of undoubted genuineness looked askance. Dormer Colville counted his friends among these latter. In fact, he moved in those royalist circles who thought that there was little to choose between the Napoleonic and the Orleanist regime. He carefully avoided intimacy with Englishmen whose residence in foreign parts was continuous and in constant need of explanation. Indeed, if a man's life needs explanation, he must sooner or later find himself face to face with some one who will not listen to him. Colville, however, knew all about Captain Duncan, and knew what was ignored by many, namely, that he was nothing worse than foolish. He knew all about Miriam, for he was in the confidence of Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. He knew that that lady wondered why Miriam preferred Farlingford to the high-bred society of her own circle at Royan and in Paris. He thought he knew why Loo Barebone showed so little enterprise. And he was, as Madame de Chantonnay had frequently told him, more than half a Frenchman in the quickness of his intuitions. He picked a flower for his buttonhole from the garden of the “Black Sailor,” and set forth the morning after his interview with Captain Clubbe toward the rectory. It was a cool July morning, with the sun half obscured by a fog-bank driven in from the sea. Through the dazzling white of that which is known on these coasts as the water-smoke the sky shone a cloudless blue. The air was light and thin. It is the lightest and thinnest air in England. Dormer Colville hummed a song under his breath as he walked on the top of the dyke. He was a light-hearted man, full of hope and optimism. “Am I disturbing your studies?” he asked, with his easy laugh, as he came rather suddenly on Miriam and little Sep in the turf-shelter at the corner of the rectory garden. “You must say so if I am.” They had, indeed, their books, and the boy's face wore that abstracted look which comes from a very earnest desire not to see the many interesting things on earth and sea, which always force themselves upon the attention of the young at the wrong time. Colville had already secured Sep's friendship by the display of a frank ignorance of natural history only equalled by his desire to be taught. “We're doing history,” replied Sep, frankly, jumping up and shaking hands. “Ah, yes. William the Conqueror, ten hundred and sixty-six, and all the rest of it. I know. At least I knew once, but I have forgotten.” “No. We're doing French history. Miriam likes that best, but I hate it.” “French history,” said Colville, thoughtfully. “Yes. That is interesting. Miss Liston likes that best, does she? Or, perhaps, she thinks that it is best for you to know it. Do you know all about Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette?” “Pretty well,” admitted Sep, doubtfully. “When I was a little chap like you, I knew many people who had seen Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. That was long, long ago,” he added, turning to Miriam to make the admission. “But those are not the things that one forgets, are they, Miss Liston?” “Then I wish Sep could know somebody who would make him remember,” answered Miriam, half closing the book in her hand; for she was very quick and had seen Colville's affable glance take it in in passing, as it took in everything within sight. “A King, for instance,” he said, slowly. “A King of France. Others--prophets and righteous men--have desired to see that, Miss Liston.” It seemed, however, that he had seen enough to know the period which they were studying. “I suppose,” he said, after a pause, “that in this studious house you talk and think history, and more especially French history. It must be very quiet and peaceful. Much more restful than acting in it as my friend de Gemosac has done all his life, as I myself have done in a small way. For France takes her history so much more violently than you do in England. France is tossed about by it, while England stands and is hammered on the anvil of Time, as it were, and remains just the same shape as before.” He broke off and turned to Sep. “Do you know the story of the little boy who was a King?” he asked, abruptly. “They put him in prison and he escaped. He was carried out in a clothes-basket. Funny, is it not? And he escaped from his enemies and reached another country, where he became a sailor. He grew to be a man and he married a woman of that country, and she died, leaving him with a little boy. And then he died himself and left the little boy, who was taken care of by his English relations, who never knew that he was a King. But he was; for his father was a King before him, and his grandfathers--far, far back. Back to the beginning of the book that Miss Liston holds in her hand. The little boy--he was an orphan, you see--became a sailor. He never knew that he was a King--the Hope of his country, of all the old men and the wise men in it--the holder of the fate of nations. Think of that.” The story pleased Sep, who sat with open lips and eager eyes, listening to it. “Do you think it is an interesting story? What do you think is the end of it?” “I don't know,” answered Sep, gravely. “Neither do I. No one knows the end of that story yet. But if you were a King--if you were that boy--what would you do? Would you go and be a King, or would you be afraid?” “No. I should go and be a King. And fight battles.” “But you would have to leave everybody. You would have to leave your father.” “I should not mind that,” answered Sep, brutally. “You would leave Miss Liston?” “I should have to,” was the reply, with conviction. “Ah, yes,” said Colville, with a grave nod of the head. “Yes. I suppose you would have to if you were anything of a man at all. There would be no alternative--for a real man.” “Besides,” put in Sep, jumping from side to side on his seat with eagerness, “she would make me--wouldn't you, Miriam?” Colville had turned away and was looking northward toward the creek, known as Maiden's Grave, running through the marshes to the river. A large lug-sail broke the flat line of the horizon, though the boat to which it belonged was hidden by the raised dyke. “Would she?” inquired Colville, absent-mindedly, without taking his eyes from the sail which was creeping slowly toward them. “Well--you know Miss Liston's character better than I do, Sep. And no doubt you are right. And you are not that little boy, so it doesn't matter; does it?” After a pause he turned and glanced sideways at Miriam, who was looking straight in front of her with steady eyes and white cheeks. They could hear Loo Barebone singing gaily in the boat, which was hidden below the level of the dyke. And they watched, in a sudden silence, the sail pass down the river toward the quay.

9

A MISTAKE

The tide was ebbing still when Barebone loosed his boat, one night, from the grimy steps leading from the garden of Maiden's Grave farm down to the creek. It was at the farm-house that Captain Clubbe now lived when on shore. He had lived there since the death of his brother, two years earlier--that grim Clubbe of Maiden's Grave, whose methods of life and agriculture are still quoted on market days from Colchester to Beccles. The evenings were shorter now, for July was drawing to a close, and the summer is brief on these coasts. The moon was not up yet, but would soon rise. Barebone hoisted the great lug-sail, that smelt of seaweed and tannin. There was a sleepy breeze blowing in from the cooler sea, to take the place of that hot and shimmering air which had been rising all day from the corn-fields. He was quicker in his movements than those who usually handled these stiff ropes and held the clumsy tiller. Quick--and quiet for once. He had been three nights to the rectory, only to find the rector there, vaguely kind, looking at him with a watery eye, through the spectacles which were rarely straight upon his nose, with an unasked question on his hesitating lips. For Septimus Marvin knew that Colville, in the name of the Marquis de Gemosac, had asked Loo Barebone to go to France and institute proceedings there to recover a great heritage, which it seemed must be his. And Barebone had laughed and put off his reply from day to day for three days. Few knew of it in Farlingford, though many must have suspected the true explanation of the prolonged stay of the two strangers at the “Black Sailor.” Captain Clubbe and Septimus Marvin, Dormer Colville and Monsieur de Gemosac shared this knowledge, and awaited, impatiently enough, an answer which could assuredly be only in the affirmative. Clubbe was busy enough throughout the day at the old slip-way, where “The Last Hope” was under repair--the last ship, it appeared likely, that the rotten timbers could support or the old, old shipwrights mend. Loo Barebone was no less regular in his attendance at the river-side, and worked all day, on deck or in the rigging, at leisurely sail-making or neat seizing of a worn rope. He was gay, and therefore incomprehensible to a slow-thinking, grave-faced race. “What do I want with a heritage?” he asked, carelessly. “I am mate of 'The Last Hope'--and that is all. Give me time. I have not made up my mind yet, but I think it will be No.” And oddly enough, it was Colville who preached patience to his companions in suspense. “Give him time,” he said. “There can only be one answer to such a proposal. But he is young. It is not when we are young that we see the world as it really is, but live in a land of dreams. Give him time.” The Marquis de Gemosac was impatient, however, and was for telling Barebone more than had been disclosed to him. “There is no knowing,” he cried, “what that canaille is doing in France.” “There is no knowing,” admitted Colville, with his air of suppressing a half-developed yawn, “but I think we know, all the same--you and I, Marquis. And there is no hurry.” After three days Loo Barebone had still given no answer. As he hoisted the sail and felt for the tiller in the dark, he was, perhaps, meditating on this momentous reply, or perhaps he had made up his mind long before, and would hold to the decision even to his own undoing, as men do who are impulsive and not strong. The water lapped and gurgled round the bows, for the wind was almost ahead, and it was only by nursing the heavy boat that he saved the necessity of making a tack across the narrow creek. In the morning he had, as usual, run down into the river and to the slip-way, little suspecting that Miriam and Sep were just above him behind the dyke, where they had sat three days before listening to Dormer Colville's story of the little boy who was a King. To-night he ran the boat into the coarse and wiry grass where Septimus Marvin's own dinghy lay, half hidden by the reeds, and he stumbled ashore clutching at the dewy grass as he climbed the side of the dyke. He went toward the turf-shelter half despondently, and then stopped short a few yards away from it. For Miriam was there. He thought she was alone, and paused to make sure before he spoke. She was sitting at the far corner, sheltered from the north wind. For Farlingford is like a ship--always conscious of the lee- and the weather-side, and all who live there are half sailors in their habits--subservient to the wind. “At last,” said Loo, with a little vexed laugh. He could see her face turned toward him, but her eyes were only dark shadows beneath her hair. Her face looked white in the darkness. Her answering laugh had a soothing note in it. “Why--at last?” she asked. Her voice was frank and quietly assured in its friendliness. They were old comrades, it seemed, and had never been anything else. The best friendship is that which has never known a quarrel, although poets and others may sing the tenderness of a reconciliation. The friendship that has a quarrel and a reconciliation in it is like a man with a weak place left in his constitution by a past sickness. He may die of something else in the end, but the probability is that he must reckon at last with that healed sore. The friendship may perish from some other cause--a marriage, or success in life, one of the two great severers--but that salved quarrel is more than likely to recur and kill at last. These two had never fallen out. And it was the woman who, contrary to custom, fended the quarrel now. “Oh! because I have been here three nights in succession, I suppose, and did not find you here. I was disappointed.” “But you found Uncle Septimus in his study. I could hear you talking there until quite late.” “Of course I was very glad to see him and talk with him. For it is to him that I owe a certain half-developed impatience with the uneducated--with whom I deal all my life, except for a few hours now and then in the study and here in the turf-shelter with you. I can see--even in the dark--that you look grave. Do not do that. It is not worth that.” He broke off with his easy laugh, as if to banish any suggestion of gravity coming from himself. “It is not worth looking grave about. And I am sorry if I was rude a minute ago. I had no right, of course, to assume that you would be here. I suppose it was impertinent--was that it?” “I will not quarrel,” she answered, soothingly--“if that is what you want.” Her voice was oddly placid. It almost seemed to suggest that she had come to-night for a certain purpose; that one subject of conversation alone would interest her, and that to all others she must turn a deaf ear. He came a little nearer, and, leaning against the turf wall, looked down at her. He was suddenly grave now. The roles were again reversed; for it was the woman who was tenacious to one purpose and the man who seemed inconsequent, flitting from grave to gay, from one thought to another. His apology had been made graciously enough, but with a queer pride, quite devoid of the sullenness which marks the pride of the humbly situated. “No; I do not want that,” he answered. “I want a little sympathy, that is all; because I have been educated above my station. And I looked for it from those who are responsible for that which is nearly always a catastrophe. And it is your uncle who educated me. He is responsible in the first instance, and, of course, I am grateful to him.” “He could never have educated you,” put in Miriam, “if you had not been ready for the education.” Barebone put aside the point. He must, at all events, have learnt humility from Septimus Marvin--a quality not natural to his temperament. “And you are responsible, as well,” he went on, “because you have taught me a use for the education.” “Indeed!” she said, gently and interrogatively, as if at last he had reached the point to which she wished to bring him. “Yes; the best use to which I could ever put it. To talk to you on an equality.” He looked hard at her through the darkness, which was less intense now; for the moon was not far below the horizon. Her face looked white, and he thought that she was breathing quickly. But they had always been friends; he remembered that just in time. “It is only natural that I should look forward, when we are at sea, to coming back here--” He paused and kicked the turf-wall with his heel, as if to remind her that she had sat in the same corner before and he had leant against the same wall, talking to her. “They are good fellows, of course, with a hundred fine qualities which I lack, but they do not understand half that one may say, or think--even the Captain. He is well educated, in his way, but it is only the way of a coasting-captain who has risen by his merits to the command of a foreign-going ship.” Miriam gave an impatient little sigh. He had veered again from the point. “You think that I forget that he is my relative,” said Loo, sharply, detecting in his quickness of thought a passing resentment. “I do not. I never forget that. I am the son of his cousin. I know that, and thus related to many in Farlingford. But I have never called him cousin, and he has never asked me to.” “No,” said Miriam, with averted eyes, in that other voice, which made him turn and look at her, catching his breath. “Oh!” he said, with a sudden laugh of comprehension. “You have heard what, I suppose, is common talk in Farlingford. You know what has brought these people here--this Monsieur de Gemosac, and the other--what is his name? Dormer Colville. You have heard of my magnificent possibilities. And I--I had forgotten all about them.” He threw out his arms in a gesture of gay contempt; for even in the dark he could not refrain from adding to the meaning of mere words a hundred-fold by the help of his lean hands and mobile face. “I have heard of it, of course,” she admitted, “from several people. But I have heard most from Captain Clubbe. He takes it more seriously than you do. You do not know, because he is one of those men who are most silent with those to whom they are most attached. He thinks that it is providential that my uncle should have had the desire to educate you, and that you should have displayed such capacity to learn.” “Capacity?” he protested--“say genius! Do not let us do things by halves. Genius to learn--yes; go on.” “Ah! you may laugh,” Miriam said, lightly, “but it is serious enough. You will find circumstances too strong for you. You will have to go to France to claim your--heritage.” “Not I, if it means leaving Farlingford for ever and going to live among strange people, like the Marquis de Gemosac, for instance, who gives me the impression of a thousand petty ceremonies and a million futile memories.” He turned and lifted his face to the breeze which blew from the sea over flat stretches of sand and seaweed--the crispest, most invigorating air in the world except that which blows on the Baltic shores. “I prefer Farlingford. I am half a Clubbe--and the other half! --Heaven knows what that is! The offshoot of some forgotten seedling blown away from France by a great storm. If my father knew, he never said anything. And if he knew, and said nothing, one may be sure that it was because he was ashamed of what he knew. You never saw him, or you would have known his dread of France, or anything that was French. He was a man living in a dream. His body was here in Farlingford, but his mind was elsewhere--who knows where? And at times I feel that, too--that unreality--as if I were here, and somewhere else at the same time. But all the same, I prefer Farlingford, even if it is a dream.” The moon had risen at last; a waning half-moon, lying low and yellow in the sky, just above the horizon, casting a feeble light on earth. Loo turned and looked at Miriam, who had always met his glance with her thoughtful, steady eyes. But now she turned away. “Farlingford is best, at all events,” he said, with an odd conviction. “I am only the grandson of old Seth Clubbe, of Maiden's Grave. I am a Farlingford sailor, and that is all. I am mate of 'The Last Hope'--at your service.” “You are more than that.” He made a step nearer to her, looking down at her white face, averted from him. For her voice had been uncertain--unsteady--as if she were speaking against her will. “Even if I am only that,” he said, suddenly grave, “Farlingford may still be a dream--Farlingford and--you.” “What do you mean?” she asked, in a quick, mechanical voice, as if she had reached a desired crisis at last and was prepared to act. “Oh, I only mean what I have meant always,” he answered. “But I have been afraid--afraid. One hears, sometimes, of a woman who is generous enough to love a man who is a nobody--to think only of love. Sometimes--last voyage, when you used to sit where you are sitting now--I have thought that it might have been my extraordinary good fortune to meet such a woman.” He waited for some word or sign, but she sat motionless. “You understand,” he went on, “how contemptible must seem their talk of a heritage in France, when such a thought is in one's mind, even if--” “Yes,” she interrupted, hastily. “You were quite wrong. You were mistaken.” “Mistaking in thinking you--” “Yes,” she interrupted again. “You are quite mistaken, and I am very sorry, of course, that it should have happened.” She was singularly collected, and spoke in a matter-of-fact voice. Barebone's eyes gleamed suddenly; for she had aroused--perhaps purposely--a pride which must have accumulated in his blood through countless generations. She struck with no uncertain hand. “Yes,” he said, slowly; “it is to be regretted. Is it because I am the son of a nameless father and only the mate of 'The Last Hope'?” “If you were before the mast--” she answered--“if you were a King, it would make no difference. It is simply because I do not care for you in that way.” “You do not care for me--in that way,” he echoed, with a laugh, which made her move as if she were shrinking. “Well, there is nothing more to be said to that.” He looked at her slowly, and then took off his cap as if to bid her good-bye. But he forgot to replace it, and he went away with the cap in his hand. She heard the clink of a chain as he loosed his boat.

10

IN THE ITALIAN HOUSE

The Abbe Touvent was not a courageous man, and the perspiration, induced by the climb from the high-road up that which had once been the ramp to the Chateau of Gemosac, ran cold when he had turned the key in the rusty lock of the great gate. It was not a dark night, for the moon sailed serenely behind fleecy clouds, but the shadows cast by her silvery light might harbour any terror. It is easy enough to be philosophic at home in a chair beside the lamp. Under those circumstances, the Abbe had reflected that no one would rob him, because he possessed nothing worth stealing. But now, out here in the dark, he recalled a hundred instances of wanton murder duly recorded in the newspaper which he shared with three parishioners in Gemosac. He paused to wipe his brow with a blue cotton handkerchief before pushing open the gate, and, being alone, was not too proud to peep through the keyhole before laying his shoulder against the solid and weather-beaten oak. He glanced nervously at the loopholes in the flanking towers and upward at the machicolated battlement overhanging him, as if any crumbling peep-hole might harbour gleaming eyes. He hurried through the passage beneath the vaulted roof without daring to glance to either side, where doorways and steps to the towers were rendered more fearsome by heavy curtains of ivy. The enceinte of the castle of Gemosac is three-sided, with four towers jutting out at the corners, from which to throw a flanking fire upon any who should raise a ladder against the great curtains, built of that smooth, white stone which is quarried at Brantome and on the banks of the Dordogne. The fourth side of the enceinte stands on a solid rock, above the little river that loses itself in the flat-lands bordering the Gironde, so that it can scarce be called a tributary of that wide water. A moss-grown path round the walls will give a quick walker ten minutes' exercise to make the round from one tower of the gateway to the other. Within the enceinte are the remains of the old castle, still solid and upright; erected, it is recorded, by the English during their long occupation of this country. A more modern chateau, built after the final expulsion of the invader, adjoins the ancient structure, and in the centre of the vast enclosure, raised above the walls, stands a square house, in the Italian style, built in the time of Marie de Medici, and never yet completed. There are, also, gardens and shaded walks and vast stables, a chapel, two crypts, and many crumbling remains inside the walls, that offered a passive resistance to the foe in olden time, and as successfully hold their own to-day against the prying eye of a democratic curiosity. Above the stables, quite close to the gate, half a dozen rooms were in the occupation of the Marquis de Gemosac; but it was not to these that the Abbe Touvent directed his tremulous steps. Instead, he went toward the square, isolated house, standing in the middle of that which had once been the great court, and was now half garden, half hayfield. The hay had been cut, and the scent of the new stack, standing against the walls of the oldest chateau and under its leaking roof, came warm and aromatic to mix with the breath of the evening primrose and rosemary clustering in disorder on the ill-defined borders. The grim walls, that had defended the Gemosacs against franker enemies in other days, served now to hide from the eyes of the villagers the fact--which must, however, have been known to them--that the Marquis de Gemosac, in gloves, kept this garden himself, and had made the hay with no other help than that of his old coachman and Marie, that capable, brown-faced bonne-a-tout-faire, who is assuredly the best man in France to-day. In this clear, southern atmosphere the moon has twice the strength of that to which we are accustomed in mistier lands, and the Abbe looked about him with more confidence as he crossed the great court. There were frogs in a rainwater tank constructed many years ago, when some enterprising foe had been known to cut off the water-supply of a besieged chateau, and their friendly croak brought a sense of company and comfort to the Abbe's timid soul. The door of the Italian house stood open, for the interior had never been completed, and only one apartment, a lofty banqueting-hall, had ever been furnished. Within the doorway, the Abbe fumbled in the pocket of his soutane and rattled a box of matches. He carried a parcel in his hand, which he now unfolded, and laid out on the lid of a mouldy chest half a dozen candles. When he struck a match a flight of bats whirred out of the doorway, and the Abbe's breath whistled through his teeth. He lighted two candles, and carrying them, alight, in one hand--not without dexterity, for candles played an important part in his life--he went forward. The flickering light showed his face to be a fat one, kind enough, gleaming now with perspiration and fear, but shiny at other times with that Christian tolerance which makes men kind to their own failings. It was very dark within the house, for all the shutters were closed. The Abbe lighted a third candle and fixed it, with a drop of its own wax, on the high mantel of the great banqueting-hall. There were four or five candlesticks on side-tables, and a candelabra stood in the centre of a long table, running the length of the room. In a few minutes the Abbe had illuminated the apartment, which smelt of dust and the days of a dead monarchy. Above his head, the bats were describing complicated figures against a ceiling which had once been painted in the Italian style, to represent a trellis roof, with roses and vines entwined. Half a dozen portraits of men, in armour and wigs, looked down from the walls. One or two of them were rotting from their frames, and dangled a despondent corner out into the room. There were chairs round the table, set as if for a phantom banquet amid these mouldering environments, and their high carved backs threw fantastic shadows on the wall. While the Abbe was still employed with the candles, he heard a heavy step and loud breathing in the hall without, where he had carefully left a light. “Why did you not wait for me on the hill, malhonnete?” asked a thick voice, like the voice of a man, but the manner was the manner of a woman. “I am sure you must have heard me. One hears me like a locomotive, now that I have lost my slimness.” She came into the room as she spoke, unwinding a number of black, knitted shawls, in which she was enveloped. There were so many of them, and of such different shape and texture, that some confusion ensued. The Abbe ran to her assistance. “But, Madame,” he cried, “how can you suspect me of such a crime? I came early to make these preparations. And as for hearing you--would to Heaven I had! For it needs courage to be a Royalist in these days--especially in the dark, by one's self.” He seemed to know the shawls, for he disentangled them with skill and laid them aside, one by one. The Comtesse de Chantonnay breathed a little more freely, but no friendly hand could disencumber her of the mountains of flesh, which must have weighed down any heart less buoyant and courageous. “Ah, bah!” she cried, gaily. “Who is afraid? What could they do to an old woman? Ah! you hold up your hands. That is kind of you. But I am no longer young, and there is my Albert--with those stupid whiskers. It is unfilial to wear whiskers, and I have told him so. And you--who could harm you--a priest? Besides, no one could be a priest, and not a Royalist, Abbe!” “I know it, Madame, and that is why I am one. Have we been seen, Madame la Comtesse? The village was quiet, as you came through?” “Quiet as my poor husband in his grave. Tell me, Abbe, now, honestly, am I thinner? I have deprived myself of coffee these two days.” The Abbe walked gravely round her. It was quite an excursion. “Who would have you different, Madame, to what you are?” he temporized. “To be thin is so ungenerous. And Albert--where is he? You have not surely come alone?” “Heaven forbid! --and I a widow!” replied Madame de Chantonnay, arranging, with a stout hand, the priceless lace on her dress. “Albert is coming. We brought a lantern, although it is a moon. It is better. Besides, it is always done by those who conspire. And Albert had his great cloak, and he fell up a step in the courtyard and dropped the lantern, and lost it in the long grass. I left him looking for it, in the dark. He was not afraid, my brave Albert!” “He has the dauntless heart of his mother,” murmured the Abbe, gracefully, as he ran round the table setting the chairs in order. He had already offered the largest and strongest to the Comtesse, and it was creaking under her now, as she moved to set her dress in order. “Assuredly,” she admitted, complacently. “Has not France produced a Jeanne d'Arc and a Duchesse de Berri? It was not from his father, at all events, that he inherited his courage. For he was a poltroon, that man. Yes, my dear Abbe, let us be honest, and look at life as it is. He was a poltroon, and I thought I loved him--for two or three days only, however. And I was a child then. I was beautiful.” “Was?” echoed the Abbe, reproachfully. “Silence, wicked one! And you a priest.” “Even an ecclesiastic, Madame, may have eyes,” he said, darkly, as he snuffed a candle and, subsequently, gave himself a mechanical thump on the chest, in the region of the heart. “Then they should wear blinkers, like a horse,” said Madame, severely, as if wearied by an admiration so universal that it palled. At this moment, Albert de Chantonnay entered the room. He was enveloped in a long black cloak, which he threw off his shoulders and cast over the back of a chair, not without an obvious appreciation of its possibilities of the picturesque. He looked round the room with a mild eye, which refused to lend itself to mystery or a martial ruthlessness. He was a young man with a very thin neck, and the whiskers, of which his mother made complaint, were scarcely visible by the light of the Abbe's candles. “Good!” he said, in a thin tenor voice. “We are in time.” He came forward to the table, with long, nervous strides. He was not exactly impressive, but his manner gave the assurance of a distinct earnestness of purpose. The majority of us are unfortunately situated toward the world, as regards personal appearance. Many could pass for great if their physical proportions were less mean. There are thousands of worthy and virtuous young men who never receive their due in social life because they have red hair or stand four-feet-six high, or happen to be the victim of an inefficient dentist. The world, it would seem, does not want virtue or solid worth. It prefers appearance to either. Albert de Chantonnay would, for instance, have carried twice the weight in Royalist councils if his neck had been thicker. He nodded to the Abbe. “I received your message,” he said, in the curt manner of the man whose life is in his hand, or is understood, in French theatrical circles, to be thus uncomfortably situated. “The letter?” “It is here, Monsieur Albert,” replied the Abbe, who was commonplace, and could not see himself as he wished others to see him. There was only one Abbe Touvent, for morning or afternoon, for church or fete, for the chateau or the cottage. There were a dozen Albert de Chantonnays, fierce or tender, gay or sad, a poet or a soldier--a light persifleur, who had passed through the mill, and had emerged hard and shining, or a young man of soul, capable of high ideals. To-night, he was the politician--the conspirator--quick of eye, curt of speech. He held out his hand for the letter. “You are to read it, as Monsieur le Marquis instructs me, Monsieur Albert,” hazarded the Abbe, touching the breast pocket of his soutane, where Monsieur de Gemosac's letter lay hidden, “to those assembled.” “But, surely, I am to read it to myself first,” was the retort; “or else how can I give it proper value?”

11

A BEGINNING

There may be some who refuse to take seriously a person like Albert de Chantonnay because, forsooth, he happened to possess a sense of the picturesque. There are, as a matter of fact, thousands of sensible persons in the British Isles who fail completely to understand the average Frenchman. To the English comprehension it is, for instance, surprising that in time of stress--when Paris was besieged by a German army--a hundred franc-tireur corps should spring into existence, who gravely decked themselves in sombreros and red waist-cloths, and called themselves the “Companions of Death,” or some claptrap title of a similar sound. Nevertheless, these “Companions of Death” fought at Orleans as few have fought since man walked this earth, and died as bravely as any in a government uniform. Even the stolid German foe forgot, at last, to laugh at the sombrero worn in midwinter. It is useless to dub a Frenchman unreal and theatrical when he gaily carries his unreality and his perception of the dramatic to the lucarne of the guillotine and meets imperturbably the most real thing on earth, Death. Albert de Chantonnay was a good Royalist--a better Royalist, as many were in France at this time, than the King--and, perhaps, he carried his loyalty to the point that is reached by the best form of flattery. Let it be remembered that when, on the 3rd of May, 1814, Louis XVIII. was reinstated, not by his own influence or exertions, but by the allied sovereigns who had overthrown Napoleon, he began at once to issue declarations and decrees as of the nineteenth year of his reign, ignoring the Revolution and Napoleon. Did this Bourbon really take himself seriously? Did he really expect the world to overlook Napoleon, or did he know as all the world knows to-day, that long after the Bourbons have sunk into oblivion the name of Napoleon will continue to be a household word? If a situation is thus envisaged by a King, what may the wise expect from a Royalist? In the absence of the Marquis de Gemosac, Albert de Chantonnay was considered to be the leader of the party in that quiet corner of south-western France which lies north of Bordeaux and south of that great dividing river, the Loire. He was, moreover, looked upon as representing that younger blood of France, to which must be confided the hopes and endeavours of the men, now passing away one by one, who had fought and suffered for their kings. It was confidently whispered throughout this pastoral country that August Persons, living in exile in England and elsewhere, were in familiar and confidential correspondence with the Marquis de Gemosac, and, in a minor degree, with Albert de Chantonnay. For kings, and especially deposed kings, may not be choosers, but must take the instrument that comes to hand. A constitutional monarch is, by the way, better placed in this respect, for it is his people who push the instrument into his grasp, and in the long run the people nearly always read a man aright despite the efforts of a cheap press to lead them astray. “If it were not written in the Marquis's own writing I could not have believed it,” said Albert de Chantonnay, speaking aloud his own thoughts. He turned the letter this way and that, examining first the back of it and then the front. “It has not been through the post,” he said to the Abbe, who stood respectfully watching his face, which, indeed, inspired little confidence, for the chin receded in the wrong way--not like the chin of a shark, which indicates, not foolishness, but greed of gain--and the eyes were large and pale like those of a sheep. “Oh, Heaven forbid!” cried the Abbe. “Such a letter as that! Where should we all be if it were read by the government? And all know that letters passing through the post to the address of such as Monsieur Albert are read in passing--by the Prince President himself, as likely as not.” Albert gave a short, derisive laugh, and shrugged his shoulders, which made his admiring mother throw back her head with a gesture, inviting the Abbe to contemplate, with satisfaction, the mother of so brave a man. “Voila,” she said, “but tell us, my son, what is in the letter?” “Not yet,” was the reply. “It is to be read to all when they are assembled. In the mean time--” He did not finish the sentence in words, but by gesture conveyed that the missive, now folded and placed in his breast-pocket, was only to be obtained bespattered with his life's blood. And the Abbe wiped his clammy brow with some satisfaction that it should be thus removed from his own timorous custody. Albert de Chantonnay was looking expectantly at the door, for he had heard footsteps, and now he bowed gravely to a very old gentleman, a notary of the town, who entered the room with a deep obeisance to the Comtesse. Close on the notary's heels came others. Some were in riding costume, and came from a distance. One sprightly lady wore evening dress, only partially concealed by a cloak. She hurried in with a nod for Albert de Chantonnay, and a kiss for the Comtesse. Her presence had the immediate effect of imparting an air of practical common-sense energy to the assembly, which it had hitherto lacked. There was nothing of the old regime in this lady, who seemed to over-ride etiquette, and cheerfully ignore the dramatic side of the proceedings. “Is it not wonderful?” she whispered aloud, after the manner of any modern lady at one of those public meetings in which they take so large a part with so small a result in these later days. “Is it not wonderful?” And her French, though pure enough, was full and round--the French of an English tongue. “I have had a long letter from Dormer telling me all about it. Oh--” And she broke off, silenced by the dark frown of Albert de Chantonnay, to which her attention had been forcibly directed by his mother. “I have been dining with Madame de Rathe,” she went on, irrepressibly, changing the subject in obedience to Albert de Chantonnay's frown. “The Vicomtesse bids me make her excuses. She feared an indigestion, so will be absent to-night.” “Ah!” returned the Comtesse de Chantonnay. “It is not that. I happen to know that the Vicomtesse de Rathe has the digestion of a schoolboy. It is because she has no confidence in Albert. But we shall see--we shall see. It is not for the nobility of Louis Philippe to--to have a poor digestion.” And the Comtesse de Chantonnay made a gesture and a meaning grimace which would have been alarming enough had her hand and face been less dimpled with good nature. There were now assembled about a dozen persons, and the Abbe was kept in countenance by two others of his cloth. There were several ladies; one of whom was young and plain and seemed to watch Albert de Chantonnay with a timid awe. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, seated next to the Comtesse de Chantonnay, was the only lady who made any attempt at gay apparel, and thus stood rather conspicuous among her companions clad in sober and somewhat rusty black. All over the west of France such meetings of the penniless Royalists were being held at this time, not, it has been averred, without the knowledge of the Prince President, who has been credited with the courage to treat the matter with contempt. About no monarch, living or dead, however, have so many lies been written, by friend or foe, with good or ill intent, as about him, who subsequently carried out the astounding feat of climbing to the throne of France as Napoleon III. And it seems certain that he has been given credit for knowing much of which he must have been ignorant to an extent hardly credible, even now, in face of subsequent events. The Comtesse de Chantonnay was still tossing her head, at intervals, at the recollection of the Vicomtesse de Rathe's indigestion. This was only typical of the feelings that divided every camp in France at this time--at any time, indeed, since the days of Charlemagne--for the French must always quarrel among themselves until they are actually on the brink of national catastrophe. And even when they are fallen into that pit they will quarrel at the bottom, and bespatter each other with the mud that is there. “Are we all here?” asked Albert de Chantonnay, standing in an effective attitude at the end of the table, with his hand on the back of his chair. He counted the number of his fellow-conspirators, and then sat down, drawing forward a candelabra. “You have been summoned in haste,” he said, “by the request of the Marquis de Gemosac to listen to the perusal of a letter of importance. It may be of the utmost importance--to us--to France--to all the world.” He drew the letter from his pocket and opened it amid a breathless silence. His listeners noted the care with which he attended to gesture and demeanour, and accounted it to him for righteousness; for they were French. An English audience would have thought him insincere, and they would have been wrong. “The letter is dated from a place called Farlingford, in England. I have never heard of it. It is nowhere near to Twickenham or Claremont, nor is it in Buckinghamshire. The rest of England--no one knows.” Albert paused and held up one hand for silence. “At last,” he read--“at last, my friends, after a lifetime of fruitless search, it seems that I have found--through the good offices of Dormer Colville--not the man we have sought, but his son. We have long suspected that Louis XVII. must be dead. Madame herself, in her exile at Frohsdorff, has admitted to her intimates that she no longer hoped. But here in the full vigour of youth--a sailor, strong and healthy, living a simple life on shore as at sea--I have found a man whose face, whose form, and manner would clearly show to the most incredulous that he could be no other than the son of Louis XVII. A hundred tricks of manner and gesture he has inherited from the father he scarce remembers, from the grandfather who perished on the guillotine many years before he himself was born. No small proof of the man's sincerity is the fact that only now, after long persuasion, has he consented to place himself in our hands. I thought of hurrying at once to Frohsdorff to present to the aged Duchess a youth whom she cannot fail to recognize as her nephew. But better counsels have prevailed. Dormer Colville, to whom we owe so much, has placed us in his farther debt for a piece of sage advice. 'Wait,' he advises, 'until the young man has learned what is expected of him, until he has made the personal acquaintance of his supporters. Reserve until the end the presentation to the Duchesse d'Angouleme, which must only be made when all the Royalists in France are ready to act with a unanimity which will be absolute, and an energy which must prove irresistible.' “There are more material proofs than a face so strongly resembling that of Louis XVI. and Monsieur d'Artois, in their early manhood, as to take the breath away; than a vivacity inherited from his grandmother, together with an independence of spirit and impatience of restraint; than the slight graceful form, blue eyes, and fair skin of the little prisoner of the Temple. There are dates which go to prove that this boy's father was rescued from a sinking fishing-boat, near Dieppe, a few days after the little Dauphin was known to have escaped from the Temple, and to have been hurried to the north coast disguised as a girl. There is evidence, which Monsieur Colville is now patiently gathering from these slow-speaking people, that the woman who was rescued with this child was not his mother. And there are a hundred details known to the villagers here which go to prove what we have always suspected to be the case, namely, that Louis XVII. was rescued from the Temple by the daring and ingenuity of a devoted few who so jealously guarded their secret that they frustrated their own object; for they one and all must have perished on the guillotine, or at the hands of some other assassin, without divulging their knowledge, and in the confusion and horror of those days the little Dauphin was lost to sight. “There is a trinket--a locket--containing a miniature, which I am assured is a portrait of Marie Antoinette. This locket is in the possession of Dormer Colville, who suggests that we should refrain from using violence to open it until this can be done in France in the presence of suitable witnesses. A fall or some mishap has so crushed the locket that it can only be opened by a jeweller provided with suitable instruments. It has remained closed for nearly a quarter of a century, but a reliable witness in whose possession it has been since he, who was undoubtedly Louis XVII., died in his arms, remembers the portrait, and has no doubt of its authenticity. I have told you enough to make it clear to you that my search is at last ended. What we require now is money to enable us to bring this King of France to his own; to bring him, in the first place, to my humble chateau of Gemosac, where he can lie hidden until all arrangements are made. I leave it to you, my dear Albert, to collect this preliminary sum.” De Chantonnay folded the letter and looked at the faces surrounding the dimly lighted table. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, who must have known the contents of the letter, and, therefore, came provided, leaned across the table with a discreet clink of jewellery and laid before Albert de Chantonnay a note for a thousand francs. “I am only an Englishwoman,” she said, simply, “but I can help.”

12

THE SECRET OF GEMOSAC

There is no sentiment so artificial as international hatred. In olden days it owed its existence to churchmen, and now an irresponsible press foments that dormant antagonism. Wherever French and English individuals are thrown together by a common endeavour, both are surprised at the mutual esteem which soon develops into friendship. But as nations we are no nearer than we were in the great days of Napoleon. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence was only one-quarter French and three-quarters English. Her grandmother had been a St. Pierre; but it was not from that lady that she inherited a certain open-handedness which took her French friends by surprise. “It is not that she has the cause at heart,” commented Madame de Chantonnay, as she walked laboriously on Albert's arm down the ramp of the Chateau de Gemosac at the termination of the meeting. “It is not for that that she throws her note of a thousand francs upon the table and promises more when things are in train. It is because she can refuse nothing to Dormer Colville. Allez, my son! I have a woman's heart! I know!” Albert contented himself with a sardonic laugh. He was not in the humour to talk of women's hearts; for Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's action had struck a sudden note of British realism into the harmony of his political fancies. He had talked so much, had listened to so much talk from others, that the dream of a restored monarchy had at last been raised to those far realms of the barely possible in which the Gallic fancy wanders in moments of facile digestion. It was sufficient for the emergency that the others present at the meeting could explain that one does not carry money in one's pocket in a country lane at night. But in their hearts all were conscious of a slight feeling of resentment toward Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence; of a vague sense of disappointment, such as a dreamer may experience on being roughly awakened. The three priests folded their hands with complacency. Poverty, their most cherished possession, spoke for itself in their case. The notary blinked and fumbled at his lips with yellow fingers in hasty thought. He was a Royalist notary because there existed in the country of the Deux Sevres a Royalist clientele. In France, even a washerwoman must hold political views and stand or fall by them. It was astounding how poor every one felt at that moment, and it rested, as usual, with a woman's intuition to grasp the only rope within reach. “The vintage,” this lady murmured. The vintage promised to be a bad one. Nothing, assuredly, could be undertaken, and no promise made, until the vintage was over. So the meeting broke up without romance, and the conspirators dispersed to their homes, carrying in their minds that mutual distrust which is ever awakened in human hearts by the chink of gold, while the dormant national readiness to detect betrayal by England was suddenly wide awake. Nevertheless, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had supplied the one ingredient necessary to leaven the talk of these dreamers into action. Even the notary found himself compelled to contribute when Albert de Chantonnay asked him outright for a subscription. And the priests, ably led by the Abbe Touvent, acted after the manner of the sons of Levi since olden times. They did not give themselves, but they told others to give, which is far better. In due course the money was sent to England. It was the plain truth that the Marquis de Gemosac had not sufficient in his pocket to equip Loo Barebone with the clothes necessary to a seemly appearance in France; or, indeed, to cover the expense of the journey thither. Dormer Colville never had money to spare. “Heaven shaped me for a rich man,” he would say, lightly, whenever the momentous subject was broached, “but forgot to fill my pockets.” It was almost the time of the vintage, and the country roads were dotted with the shambling figures of those knights of industry who seem to spring from the hedgerows at harvest-time in any country in the world, when the Abbe Touvent sought out Marie in her cottage at the gates of the chateau. “A la cave,” answered the lady's voice. “In the cellar--do you not know that it is Monday and I wash?” The Abbe did not repeat his summons on the kitchen table with the handle of his stick, but drew forward a chair. “I know it is very hot, and that I am tired,” he shouted toward the cellar door, which stood open, giving egress to a warm smell of soap. “Precisely--and does Monsieur l'Abbe want me to come up as I am?” The suggestion was darkly threatening, and the Abbe replied that Marie must take her time, since it was washing-day. The cottage was built on sloping ground at the gate of the chateau, probably of the stones used for some earlier fortification. That which Marie called the cellar was but half underground, and had an exit to the garden which grew to the edge of the cliff. It was not long before she appeared at the head of the stone steps, a square-built woman with a face that had been sunburnt long ago by work in the vineyards, and eyes looking straight at the world from beneath a square and wrinkled forehead. “Monsieur l'Abbe,” she said, shortly--a salutation and a comment in one; for it conveyed the fact that she saw it was he and perceived that he was in his usual health. “It is news from Monsieur, I suppose,” she added, slowly, turning down her sleeves. “Yes, the Marquis writes that he is on his way to Gemosac and wishes you to prepare the chateau for his return.” The Abbe waved his hand toward the castle gates with an air suggestive of retainers and lackeys, of busy stables and a hundred windows lighted after dark. His round eyes did not meet the direct glance fixed on his face, but wandered from one object to another in the room, finally lighting on the great key of the chateau gate, which hung on a nail behind the door. “Then Monsieur le Marquis is coming into residence,” said Marie, gravely. And by way of reply the Abbe waved his hand a second time toward the castle walls. “And the worst of it is,” he added, timidly, to this silent admission, “that he brings a guest.” He moistened his fat lips and sat smiling in a foolish way at the open door; for he was afraid of all women, and most afraid of Marie. “Ah!” she retorted, shortly. “To sleep in the oubliette, one may suppose. For there is no other bed in the chateau, as you quite well know, Monsieur l'Abbe. It is another of your kings no doubt. Oh! you need not hold up your hands--when Monsieur Albert reads aloud that letter from Monsieur le Marquis, in England, without so much as closing the door of the banquet hall! It is as well that it was no other than I who stood on the stairs outside and heard all.” “But it is wrong to listen behind doors,” protested the Abbe. “Ah, bah!” replied this unregenerate sheep of his flock. “But do not alarm yourself, Monsieur l'Abbe, I can keep a quiet tongue. And a political secret--what is it? It is an amusement for the rich--your politics--but a vice for the poor. Come, let us go to the chateau, while there is still day, and you can see for yourself whether we are ready for a guest.” While she spoke she hastily completed a toilet, which, despite the Abbe's caution, had the appearance of incompleteness, and taking the great key from behind the door, led the way out into the glare of the setting sun. She unlocked the great gate and threw her weight against it with quick, firm movements like the movements of a man. Indeed, she was a better man than her companion; of a stronger common sense; with lither limbs and a stouter heart; the best man that France has latterly produced, and, so far as the student of racial degeneration may foretell, will ever produce again--her middle-class woman. Built close against the flanking tower on the left hand of the courtyard was a low, square house of two stories only. The whole ground floor was stabling, room and to spare for half a hundred horses, and filled frequently enough, no doubt, in the great days of the Great Henry. On the first floor, to which three or four staircases gave access, there were plenty of apartments; indeed, suites of them. But nearly all stood empty, and the row of windows looked blank and curtainless across the crumbling garden to the Italian house. It was one of the many tragedies of that smiling, sunny land where only man, it seems, is vile; for nature has enclosed within its frontier-lines all the varied wealth and beauty of her treasures. Marie led the way up the first staircase, which was straight and narrow. The carpet, carefully rolled and laid aside on the landing, was threadbare and colourless. The muslin curtains, folded back and pinned together, were darned and yellow with frequent washing and the rust of ancient damp. She opened the door of the first room at the head of the stairs. It had once been the apartment of some servitor; now it contained furniture of the gorgeous days of Louis XIV., with all the colour gone from its tapestry, all the woodwork grey and worm-eaten. “Not that one,” said Marie, as the Abbe struggled with the lever that fastened the window. “That one has not been opened for many years. See! the glass rattles in the frame. It is the other that opens.” Without comment the Abbe opened the other window and threw back the shutters, from which all the paint had peeled away, and let in the scented air. Mignonette close at hand--which had bloomed and died and cast its seed amid the old walls and falling stones since Marie Antoinette had taught the women of France to take an interest in their gardens; and from the great plains beyond--flat and fat--carefully laid there by the Garonne to give the world its finest wines, rose up the subtle scent of vines in bloom. “The drawing-room,” said Marie, and making a mock-curtsey toward the door, which stood open to the dim stairs, she made a grand gesture with her hand, still red and wrinkled from the wash-tub. “Will the King of France be pleased to enter and seat himself? There are three chairs, but one of them is broken, so his Majesty's suite must stand.” With a strident laugh she passed on to the next room through folding doors. “The principal room,” she announced, with that hard irony in her voice, which had, no doubt, penetrated thither from the soul of a mother who had played no small part in the Revolution. “The guest-chamber, one may say, provided that Monsieur le Marquis will sleep on the floor in the drawing-room, or in the straw down below in the stable.” The Abbe threw open the shutter of this room also and stood meekly eyeing Marie with a tolerant smile. The room was almost bare of furniture. A bed such as peasants sleep on; a few chairs; a dressing-table tottering against the window-breast, and modestly screened in one corner, the diminutive washing-stand still used in southern France. For Gemosac had been sacked and the furniture built up into a bonfire when Marie was a little child and the Abbe Touvent a fat-faced timorous boy at the Seminary of Saintes. “Beyond is Mademoiselle's room,” concluded Marie, curtly. She looked round her and shrugged her shoulders with a grim laugh which made the Abbe shrink. They looked at each other in silence, the two participants in the secret of Gemosac; for Marie's husband, the third who had access to the chateau, did not count. He was a shambling, silent man, now working in the vineyard beneath the walls. He always did what his wife told him, without comment or enthusiasm, knowing well that he would be blamed for doing it badly. The Abbe had visited the rooms once before, during a brief passage of the Marquis, soon after his wife's death in Paris. But, as a rule, only Marie and Jean had access to the apartment. He looked round with an eye always ready with the tear of sympathy; for he was a soft-hearted man. Then he looked at Marie again, shamefacedly. But she, divining his thoughts, shrugged her shoulders. “Ah, bah!” she said, “one must take the world as it is. And Monsieur le Marquis is only a man. One sees that, when he announces his return on washing-day, and brings a guest. You must write to him, that is all, and tell him that with time I can arrange, but not in a hurry like this. Where is the furniture to come from? A chair or two from the banquet-hall; I can lend a bed which Jean can carry in after dark so that no one knows; you have the jug and basin you bought when the Bishop came, that you must lend--” She broke off and ran to the window. “Good,” she cried, in a despairing voice, “I hear a carriage coming up the hill. Run, Monsieur l'Abbe--run to the gate and bolt it. Guest or no guest, they cannot see the rooms like this. Here, let me past.” She pushed him unceremoniously aside at the head of the stairs and ran past him. Long concealment of the deadly poverty within the walls had taught her to close the gates behind her whenever she entered, but now for greater security, or to gain time, she swung the great oaken beam round on its pivot across the doors on the inside. Then turning round on her heels she watched the bell that hung above her head. The Abbe, who had followed her as quickly as he could, was naively looking for a peep-hole between the timbers of the huge doors. A minute later the bell swung slowly, and gave a single clang which echoed beneath the vaulted roof, and in the hollow of the empty towers on either side. “Marie, Marie!” cried a gay girlish voice from without. “Open at once. It is I.” “There,” said Marie, in a whisper. “It is Mademoiselle, who has returned from the good Sisters. And the story that you told of the fever at Saintes is true.”

13

WITHIN THE GATES

The great bell hanging inside the gates of Gemosac was silent for two days after the return of Juliette de Gemosac from her fever-stricken convent school, at Saintes. But on the third day, soon after nightfall, it rang once more, breaking suddenly in on the silence of the shadowy courts and gardens, bidding the frogs in the tank be still with a soft, clear voice, only compassed by the artificers who worked in days when silver was little accounted of in the forging of a bell. It was soon after eight o'clock, and darkness had not long covered the land and sent the workers home. There was no moon. Indeed, the summons to the gate, coming so soon after nightfall, seemed to suggest the arrival of a traveller, who had not deemed it expedient to pass through the winding streets of Gemosac by daylight. The castle lies on a height, sufficiently removed from the little town to temper the stir of its streets to a pleasant and unobtrusive evidence of neighbourhood. Had the traveller come in a carriage, the sound of its wheels would certainly have been heard; and nearer at hand, the tramp of horses on the hollow of the old drawbridge, not raised these hundred years, must have heralded the summons of the bell. But none of these sounds had warned Juliette de Gemosac, who sat alone in the little white room upstairs, nor Marie and her husband, dumb and worn by the day's toil, who awaited bedtime on a stone seat by the stable door. Juliette, standing at the open window, heard Jean stir himself, and shuffle, in his slippers, toward the gate. “It is some one who comes on foot,” she heard Marie say. “Some beggar--the roads are full of them. See that he gets no farther than the gate.” She heard Jean draw back the bolts and answer gruffly, in a few words, through the interstice of a grudging door, what seemed to be inquiries made in a voice that was not the voice of a peasant. Marie rose and went to the gate. In a few minutes they returned, and Juliette drew back from the window, for they were accompanied by the new-comer, whose boots made a sharper, clearer sound on the cobble-stones. “Yes,” Juliette heard him explain, “I am an Englishman, but I come from Monsieur de Gemosac, for all that. And since Mademoiselle is here, I must see her. It was by chance that I heard, on the road, that there is fever at Saintes, and that she had returned home. I was on my way to Saintes to see her and give her my news of her father.” “But what news?” asked Marie, and the answer was lost as the speakers passed into the doorway, the new-comer evidently leading the way, the peasant and his wife following without protest, and with that instinctive obedience to unconscious command which will survive all the iconoclasm of a hundred revolutions. There followed a tramping on the stairs and a half-suppressed laugh as the new-comer stumbled upward. Marie opened the door slowly. “It is a gentleman,” she announced, “who does not give his name.” Juliette de Gemosac was standing at the far side of the table, with the lamp throwing its full light upon her. She was dressed in white, with a blue ribbon at her waist and wrists. Another ribbon of the same colour tied back her hair, which was of a bright brown, with curls that caught the light in a score of tendrils above her ears. No finished coquette could have planned a prettier surprise than that which awaited Loo Barebone, as he made Marie stand aside, and came, hat in hand, into the room. He paused for an instant, breathless, before Juliette, who stood, with a little smile of composed surprise parting her lips. This child, fresh from the quiet of a convent-school, was in no wise taken aback nor at a loss how to act. She did not speak, but stood with head erect, not ungracious, looking at him with clear brown eyes, awaiting his explanation. And Loo Barebone, all untaught, who had never spoken to a French lady in his life, came forward with an assurance and a readiness which must have lain dormant in his blood, awaiting the magic of this moment. “Since my name would convey nothing to Mademoiselle,” he said, with a bow which he had assuredly not learnt in Farlingford, “it was useless to mention it. But it is at the disposal of Mademoiselle, nevertheless. It is an English name--Barebone. I am the Englishman who has been fortunate enough to engage the interest of your father, who journeyed to England to find me--and found me.” He broke off with a laugh, spreading out his arms to show himself, as it were, and ask indulgence. “I have a heritage, it appears, in France,” he went on, “but know nothing of it, yet. For the weather has been bad and our voyage a stormy one. I was to have been told during the journey, but we had no time for that. And I know no more than you, mademoiselle.” Juliette had changed colour, and her cheeks, which were usually of a most delicate pink, were suddenly quite white. She did not touch upon the knowledge to which he referred, but went past it to its object. “You do not speak like an Englishman,” she said. “For I know one or two. One came to the school at Saintes. He was a famous English prelate, and he had the manner--well, of a tree. And when he spoke, it was what one would expect of a tree, if it suddenly had speech. But you--you are not like that.” Loo Barebone laughed with an easy gaiety, which seemed infectious, though Marie did not join in it, but stood scowling in the doorway. “Yes,” he said, “you have described them exactly. I know a hundred who are like great trees. Many are so, but they are kind and still like trees--the English, when you know them, mademoiselle.” “They?” she said, with her prettily arched eyebrows raised high. “We, I mean,” he answered, quickly, taking her meaning in a flash. “I almost forgot that I was an Englishman. It is my heritage, perhaps, that makes me forget--or yourself. It is so easy and natural to consider one's self a Frenchman--and so pleasant.” Marie shuffled with her feet and made a movement of impatience, as if to remind them that they were still far from the business in hand and were merely talking of themselves, which is the beginning of all things--or may be the beginning of the inevitable end. “But I forgot,” said Barebone, at once. “And it is getting late. Your father has had a slight misfortune. He has sprained his ankle. He is on board my ship, the ship of which I am--I have been--an officer, lying at anchor in the river near here, off the village of Mortagne. I came from Mortagne at your father's request, with certain messages, for yourself, mademoiselle, and for Marie--if Madame is Marie.” “Yes,” replied the grim voice in the doorway. “Madame is Marie.” Loo had turned toward her. It seemed his happy fate to be able to disarm antagonism at the first pass. He looked at Marie and smiled; and slowly, unwillingly, her grim face relaxed. “Well,” he said, “you are not to expect Monsieur le Marquis to-night, nor yet, for some time to come. For he will go on to Bordeaux, where he can obtain skilled treatment for his injured ankle, and remain there until he can put his foot to the ground. He is comfortable enough on board the ship, which will proceed up the river to-morrow morning to Bordeaux. Monsieur le Marquis also told me to set your mind at rest on another point. He was to have brought with him a guest--” Loo paused and bowed to Marie, with a gay grace. “A humble one. But I am not to come to Gemosac just now. I am going, instead, with Monsieur Dormer Colville, to stay at Royan with Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. It is, I hope, a pleasure deferred. I cannot, it appears, show myself in Bordeaux at present, and I quit the ship to-night. It is some question of myself and my heritage in France, which I do not understand.” “Is that so?” said Marie. “One can hardly believe it.” “What do you mean?” “Oh, nothing,” replied Marie, looking at his face with a close scrutiny, as if it were familiar to her. “And that is all that I had to tell you, Madame Marie,” concluded Barebone. And, strangely enough, Marie smiled at him as he turned away, not unkindly. “To you, mademoiselle,” he went on, turning again to Juliette, whose hand was at her hair, for she had been taken by surprise, “my message is simpler. Monsieur, your father, will be glad to have your society at Bordeaux, while he stays there, if that is true which the Gironde pilot told him--of fever at Saintes, and the hurried dispersal of the schools.” “It is true enough, monsieur,” answered Juliette, in her low-pitched voice of the south, and with a light of anticipation in her eye; for it was dull enough at Gemosac, all alone in this empty chateau. “But how am I to reach Bordeaux?” “Your father did not specify the route or method. He seemed to leave that to you, mademoiselle. He seemed to have an entire faith in your judgment, and that is why I was so surprised when I saw you. I thought--well, I figured to myself that you were older, you understand.” He broke off with a laugh and a deprecatory gesture of the hand, as if he had more in his mind but did not want to put it into words. His meaning was clear enough in his eyes, but Juliette was fresh from a convent-school, where they seek earnestly to teach a woman not to be a woman. “One may be young, and still have understanding, monsieur,” she said, with the composed little smile on her demure lips, which must only have been the composure of complete innocence: almost a monopoly of children, though some women move through life without losing it. “Yes,” answered Loo, looking into her eyes. “So it appears. So, how will you go to Bordeaux? How does one go from Gemosac to Bordeaux?” “By carriage to Mortagne, where a boat is always to be obtained. It is a short journey, if the tide is favourable,” broke in Marie, who was practical before she was polite. “Then,” said Loo, as quick as thought, “drive back with me now to Mortagne. I have left my horse in the town, my boat at the pier at Mortagne. It is an hour's drive. In an hour and a half you will be on board 'The Last Hope,' at anchor in the river. There is accommodation on board for both you and Madame; for I, alas! leave the ship to-night with Monsieur Colville, and thus vacate two cabins.” Juliette reflected for a moment, but she did not consult, even by a glance, Marie; who, in truth, appeared to expect no such confidences, but awaited the decision with a grim and grudging servitude which was as deeply pressed in upon her soul as was the habit of command in the soul of a de Gemosac. “Yes,” said Juliette, at length, “that will be best. It is, of course, important that my father should reach Bordeaux as soon as possible.” “He will be there at midday to-morrow, if you will come with me now,” answered Loo, and his gay eyes said “Come!” as clearly as his lips, though Juliette could not, of course, be expected to read such signals. The affair was soon settled, and Jean ordered to put the horse into the high, old-fashioned carriage still in use at the chateau. For Juliette de Gemosac seemed to be an illustration of the fact, known to many much-tried parents, that one is never too young to know one's mind. “There is a thunder-storm coming from the sea,” was Jean's only comment. There was some delay in starting; for Marie had to change her own clothes as well as pack her young mistress's simple trunks. But the time did not hang heavily on the hands of the two waiting in the little drawing-room, and Marie turned an uneasy glance toward the open door more than once at the sound of their laughter. Barebone was riding a horse hired in the village of Mortagne, and quitted the chateau first, on foot, saying that the carriage must necessarily travel quicker than he, as his horse was tired. The night was dark, and darkest to the west, where lightning danced in and out among heavy clouds over the sea. As in all lands that have been torn hither and thither by long wars, the peasants of Guienne learnt, long ago, the wisdom of dwelling together in closely built villages, making a long journey to their fields or vineyards every day. In times past, Gemosac had been a walled town, dominated, as usual, by the almost impregnable castle. Barebone rode on, alone, through the deserted vineyards, of which the scent, like that of a vinery in colder lands, was heavy and damp. The road runs straight, from point to point, and there was no chance of missing the way or losing his companions. He was more concerned with watching the clouds, which were rising in dark towers against the western sky. He had noted that others were watching them, also, standing at their doors in every street. It was the period of thunder and hailstorms--the deadly foe of the vine. At length Barebone pulled up and waited; for he could hear the sound of wheels behind him, and noted that it was not increasing in loudness. “Can you not go faster?” he shouted to Jean, when, at length, the carriage approached. Jean made no answer, but lashed his horse and pointed upward to the sky with his whip. Barebone rode in front to encourage the slower horse. At the village of Mortagne he signed to Jean to wait before the inn until he had taken his horse to the stable and paid for its hire. Then he clambered to the box beside him and they rattled down the long street and out into the open road that led across the marshes to the port--a few wooden houses and a jetty, running out from the shallows to the channel. When they reached the jetty, going slowly at the last through the heavy dust, the air was still and breathless. The rounded clouds still towered above them, making the river black with their deep shadows. A few lights twinkled across the waters. They were the lightships marking the middle bank of the Gironde, which is many miles wide at this spot and rendered dangerous by innumerable sandbanks. “In five minutes it will be upon us,” said Jean. “You had better turn back.” “Oh, no,” was the reply, with a reassuring laugh. “In the country where I come from they do not turn back.”

14

THE LIFTED VEIL

“Where is the boatman?” asked Marie, as she followed Juliette and Barebone along the deserted jetty. A light burnt dimly at the end of it and one or two boats must have been moored near at hand; for the water could be heard lapping under their bows, a secretive, whispering sound full of mystery. “I am the boatman,” replied Loo, over his shoulder. “Are you afraid?” “What is the good of being afraid?” asked this woman of the world, stopping at the head of the steps and peering down into the darkness into which he had descended. “What is the good of being afraid when one is old and married? I was afraid enough when I was a girl, and pretty and coquette like Mademoiselle, here. I was afraid enough then, and it was worth my while--allez!” Barebone made no answer to this dark suggestion of a sprightly past. The present darkness and the coming storm commanded his full attention. In the breathless silence, Juliette and Marie--and behind them, Jean, panting beneath the luggage balanced on his shoulder--could hear the wet rope slipping through his fingers and, presently, the bump of the heavy boat against the timber of the steps. This was followed by the gurgle of a rope through a well-greased sheave and the square lug, which had been the joy of little Sep Marvin at Farlingford, crept up to the truck of the stubby mast. “There is no wind for that,” remarked Marie, pessimistically. “There will be to spare in a few minutes,” answered Barebone, and the monosyllabic Jean gave an acquiescent grunt. “Luggage first,” said Barebone, lapsing into the curtness of the sea. “Come along. Let us make haste.” They stumbled on board as best they could, and were guided to a safe place amidships by Loo, who had thrown a spare sail on the bottom of the boat. “As low as you can,” he said. “Crouch down. Cover yourselves with this. Right over your heads.” “But why?” grumbled Marie. “Listen,” was all the answer he gave her. And as he spoke, the storm rushed upon them like a train, with the roar and whirl of a locomotive. Loo jumped aft to the tiller. In the rush of the hail, they heard him give a sharp order to Jean, who must have had some knowledge of the sea, for he obeyed at once, and the boat, set free, lurched forward with a flap of her sail, which was like the report of a cannon. For a moment, all seemed confusion and flapping chaos, then came a sense of tenseness, and the boat heeled over with a swish, which added a hundred-weight of solid water to the beating of the hail on the spare sail, beneath which the women crouched. “What? Did you speak?” shouted Loo, putting his face close to the canvas. “It is only Marie calling on the saints,” was the answer, in Juliette's laughing voice. In a few minutes it was over; and, even at the back of the winds, could be heard the retreat of the hail as it crashed onward toward the valleys of which every slope is a named vineyard, to beat down in a few wild moments the result of careful toil and far-sighted expenditure; to wipe out that which is unique, which no man can replace--the vintage of a year. When the hail ceased beating on it, Juliette pushed back the soaked canvas, which had covered them like a roof, and lifted her face to the cooler air. The boat was rushing through the water, and close to Juliette's cheek, just above the gunwale, rose a curved wave, green and white, and all shimmering with phosphorescence, which seemed to hover like a hawk above its prey. The aftermath of the storm was flying overhead in riven ribbons of cloud, through which the stars were already peeping. To the westward the sky was clear, and against the last faint glow of the departed sun the lightning ran hither and thither, skipping and leaping, without sound or cessation, like fairies dancing. Immediately overhead, the sail creaked and tugged at its earings, while the wind sang its high clear song round mast and halliards. Juliette turned to look at Barebone. He was standing, ankle deep, in water, leaning backward to windward, in order to give the boat every pound of weight he could. The lambent summer-lightning on the western horizon illuminated his face fitfully. In that moment Juliette saw what is given to few to see and realise--though sailors, perforce, lie down to sleep knowing it every night--that under Heaven her life was wholly and solely in the two hands of a fellow-being. She knew it, and saw that Barebone knew it, though he never glanced at her. She saw the whites of his eyes gleaming as he looked up, from moment to moment, to the head of the sail and stooped again to peer under the foot of it into the darkness ahead. He braced himself, with one foot against the thwart, to haul in a few inches of sheet, to which the clumsy boat answered immediately. Marie was praying aloud now, and when she opened her eyes the sight of the tossing figure in the stern of the boat suddenly turned her terror into anger. “Ah!” she cried, “that Jean is a fool. And he, who pretends to have been a fisherman when he was young--to let us come to our deaths like this!” She lifted her head, and ducked it again, as a sea jumped up under the bow and rattled into the boat. “I see no ship,” she cried. “Let us go back, if we can. Name of God! --we shall be drowned! I see no ship, I tell you!” “But I do,” answered Barebone, shaking the water from his face, for he had no hand to spare. “But I do, which is more important. And you are not even wet!” And he laughed as he brought the boat up into the wind for a few seconds, to meet a wild gust. Juliette turned in surprise at the sound of his voice. In the safe and gentle seclusion of the convent-school no one had thought to teach her that death may be faced with equanimity by others than the ordained of the Church, and that in the storm and stress of life men laugh in strange places and at odd times. Loo was only thinking of his boat and watching the sky for the last of the storm--that smack, as it were, in the face--with which the Atlantic ends those black squalls that she sends us, not without thunder and the curtailed lightning of northern seas. He was planning and shaping his course; for the watchers on board “The Last Hope” had already seen him, as he could ascertain by a second light, which suddenly appeared, swung low, casting a gleam across the surf-strewn water, to show him where the ladder hung overside. “Tell Monsieur de Gemosac that I have Mademoiselle and her maid here in the boat,” Barebone called out to Captain Clubbe, whose large face loomed above the lantern he was holding overside, as he made fast the rope that had been thrown across his boat and lowered the dripping sail. The water was smooth enough under the lee of “The Last Hope,” which, being deeply laden, lay motionless at her anchor, with the stream rustling past her cables. “Stand up, mademoiselle,” said Barebone, himself balanced on the after-thwart. “Hold on to me, thus, and when I let you go, let yourself go.” There was no time to protest or to ask questions. And Juliette felt herself passed on from one pair of strong arms to another, until she was standing on the deck under the humming rigging, surrounded by men who seemed huge in their gleaming oil-skins. “This way, mademoiselle,” said one, who was even larger than the others, in English, of which she understood enough to catch his meaning. “I will take you to your father. Show a light this way, one of you.” His fingers closed round her arm, and he led her, unconscious of a strength that almost lifted her from her feet, toward an open door, where a lamp burnt dimly within. It smelt abominably of an untrimmed wick, Juliette thought, and the next minute she was kissing her father, who lay full length on a locker in the little cabin. She asked him a hundred questions, and waited for few of the answers. Indeed, she supplied most of them herself; for she was very quick and gay. “I see,” she cried, “that your foot has been tied up by a sailor. He has tried to mend it as if it were a broken spar. I suppose that was the Captain who brought me to you, and then ran away again, as soon as he could. Yes; I have Marie with me. She is telling them to be careful with the luggage. I can hear her. I am so glad we had a case of fever at the school. It was a lay sister, a stupid woman. But how lucky that I should be at home just when you wanted me!” She stood upright again, after deftly loosening the bandage round her father's ankle, and looked at him and laughed. “Poor, dear old papa,” she said. “One sees that you want some one to take care of you. And this cabin-oh! mon Dieu! how bare and uncomfortable! I suppose men have to go to sea alone because they can persuade no woman to go with them.” She pounced upon her father again, and arranged afresh the cushions behind his back, with a little air of patronage and protection. Her back was turned toward the door, when some one came in, but she heard the approaching steps and looked quickly round the cabin walls. “Heavens!” she exclaimed, in a gay whisper. “No looking-glass! One sees that it is only men who live here.” And she turned, with smiling eyes and a hand upraised to her disordered hair, to note the new-comer. It was Dormer Colville, who laid aside his waterproof as he came and greeted her as an old friend. He had, indeed, known her since her early childhood, and had always succeeded in keeping pace with her, even in the rapid changes of her last year at school. “Here is an adventure,” he said, shaking hands. “But I can see that you have taken no harm, and have not even been afraid. For us, it is a pleasant surprise.” He glanced at her with a smiling approbation, not without a delicate suggestion of admiration, such as he might well permit himself, and she might now even consider her due. He was only keeping pace. “I stayed behind to initiate your maid, who is, of course, unused to a ship, and the steward speaks but little French. But now they are arranging your cabin together.” “How delightful!” cried Juliette. “I have never been on a ship before, you know. And it is all so strange and so nice. All those big men, like wet ghosts, who said nothing! I think they are more interesting than women; perhaps it is because they talk less.” “Perhaps it is,” admitted Colville, with a sudden gravity, similar to that with which she had made the suggestion. “You should hear the Sisters talk--when they are allowed,” she said, confidentially. “And whisper when they are not. I can imagine it,” laughed Colville. “But now you have left all that behind, and have come out into the world--of men, one may say. And you have begun at once with an adventure.” “Yes! And we are going to Bordeaux, papa and I, until his foot is well again. Of course, I was in despair when I was first told of it, but now that I see him I am no longer anxious. And your messenger assured me that it was not serious.” She paused to look round the cabin, to make sure that they were alone. “How strange he is!” she said to both her hearers, in confidence, looking from one to the other with a quick, birdlike turn of the head and bright eyes. “I have never seen any one like him.” “No?” said Dormer Colville, encouragingly. “He said he was an Englishman; but, of course, he is not. He is French, and has not the manner of a bourgeois or a sailor. He has the manner of an aristocrat--one would say a Royalist--like Albert de Chantonnay, only a thousand times better.” “Yes,” said Colville, glancing at Monsieur de Gemosac. “More interesting, and so quick and amusing. He spoke of a heritage in France, and yet he said he was an Englishman. I hope he will secure his heritage.” “Yes,” murmured Colville, still looking at Monsieur de Gemosac. “And then, when we were in the boat,” continued Juliette, still in confidence to them both, “he changed quite suddenly. He was short and sharp. He ordered us to do this and that; and one did it, somehow, without question. Even Marie obeyed him without hesitating, although she was half mad with fear. We were in danger. I knew that. Any one must have known it. And yet I was not afraid; I wonder why? And he--he laughed--that was all. Mon Dieu! he was brave. I never knew that any one could be so brave!” She broke off suddenly, with her finger to her lips; for some one had opened the cabin door. Captain Clubbe came in, filling the whole cabin with his bulk, and on his heels followed Loo Barebone, his face and hair still wet and dripping. “Mademoiselle was wondering,” said Dormer Colville, who, it seemed, was quick to step into that silence which the object of a conversation is apt to cause--“Mademoiselle was wondering how it was that you escaped shipwreck in the storm.” “Ah! because one has a star. Even a poor sailor may have a star, mademoiselle. As well as the Prince Napoleon, who boasts that he has one of the first magnitude, I understand.” “You are not a poor sailor, monsieur,” said Juliette. “Then who am I?” he asked, with a gay laugh, spreading out his hands and standing before them, beneath the swinging lamp. The Marquis de Gemosac raised himself on one elbow. “I will tell you who you are,” he said, in a low, quick voice, pointing one hand at Loo. “I will tell you.” And his voice rose. “You are the grandson of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette. You are the Last Hope of the French. That is your heritage. Juliette! this is the King of France!” Juliette turned and looked at him, with all the colour gone from her face. Then, instinctively, she dropped on one knee, and before he had understood, or could stop her, had raised his hand to her lips.

15

THE TURN OF THE TIDE

“Tide's a-turning, sir,” said a voice at the open doorway of the cabin, and Captain Clubbe turned his impassive face toward Dormer Colville, who looked oddly white beneath the light of the lamp. Barebone had unceremoniously dragged his hand away from the hold of Juliette's fingers. He made a step back and then turned toward the door at the sound of his shipmate's well-known voice. He stood staring out into the darkness like one who is walking in his sleep. No one spoke, and through the open doorways no sound came to them but the song of the wind through the rigging. At last Barebone turned, and there was no sign of fear or misgiving in his face. He looked at Clubbe, and at no one else, as if the Captain and he were alone in the cabin where they had passed so many years together in fair weather, to bring out that which is evil in a man, and foul, to evolve the good. “What do YOU say?” he asked, in English, and he must have known that Captain Clubbe understood French better than he was ready to admit. Clubbe passed his hand slowly across his cheek and chin, not in order to gain time, or because he had not an answer ready, but because he came of a slow-speaking race. His answer had been made ready weeks before while he sat on the weather-beaten seat set against the wall of “The Black Sailor” at Farlingford. “Tide's turned,” he answered, simply. “You'd better get your oilskins on again and go.” “Yes,” said Loo, with a queer laugh. “I fancy I shall want my oilskins.” The boat which had been sent from Royan, at the order of the pilot, who went ashore there, had followed “The Last Hope” up the river, and was now lying under the English ship's stern awaiting her two passengers and the turn of the tide. Dormer Colville glanced at the cabin clock. “Then,” he said, briskly, “let us be going. It will be late enough as it is before we reach my cousin's house.” He turned and translated his remark for the benefit of the Marquis and Juliette, remembering that they must needs fail to understand a colloquy in the muttered and clipped English of the east coast. He was nervously anxious, it would appear, to tide over a difficult moment; to give Loo Barebone breathing space, and yet to avoid unnecessary question and answer. He had not lived forty adventurous years in the world without learning that it is the word too much which wrecks the majority of human schemes. Their preparations had been made beforehand in readiness for the return of the tide, without the help of which the voyage back to Royan against a contrary wind must necessarily be long and wearisome. There was nothing to wait for. Captain Clubbe was not the man to prolong a farewell or waste his words in wishes for the future, knowing how vain such must always be. Loo was dazed still by the crash of the storm and the tension of the effort to bring his boat safely through it. The rest had not fully penetrated to his inmost mind yet. There had been only time to act, and none to think, and when the necessity to act was past, when he found himself crouching down under the weather gunwale of the French fishing-boat without even the necessity of laying hand on sheet or tiller, when, at last, he had time to think, he found that the ability to do so was no longer his. For Fortune, when she lifts up or casts down, usually numbs the understanding at the first turn of her wheel, sending her victim staggering on his way a mere machine, astonishingly alive to the necessity of the immediate moment, careful of the next step, but capable of looking neither forward nor backward with an understanding eye. The waning moon came up at last, behind a distant line of trees on the Charente side, lighting up with a silver lining the towering clouds of the storm, which was still travelling eastward, leaving in its wake battered vines and ruined crops, searing the face of the land as with a hot iron. Loo lifted his head and looked round him. The owner of the boat was at the tiller, while his assistant sat amidships, his elbows on his knees, looking ahead with dreamy eyes. Close to Barebone, crouching from the wind which blew cold from the Atlantic, was Dormer Colville, affably silent. If Loo turned to glance at him he looked away, but when his back was turned Loo was conscious of watching eyes, full of sympathy, almost uncomfortably quick to perceive the inward working of another's mind, and suit his own thereto. Thus the boat plunged out toward the sea and the flickering lights that mark the channel, tacking right across to that spit of land lying between the Gironde and the broad Atlantic, where grows a wine without match in all the world. Thus Loo Barebone turned his back on the ship which had been his home so long and set out into a new world; a new and unknown life, with the Marquis de Gemosac's ringing words buzzing in his brain yet; with the warm touch of Juliette's lips burning still upon his hand. “You are the grandson of Louis XVI. and Marie Antoinette! You are the Last Hope of France!” And he remembered the lights and shadows on Juliette's hair as he looked down upon her bent head. Colville was talking to the “patron” now. He knew the coast, it seemed, and, somewhere or other, had learnt enough of such matters of local seafaring interest as to set the fisherman at his ease and make him talk. They were arranging where to land, and Colville was describing the exact whereabouts of a little jetty used for bathing purposes, which ran out from the sandy shore, quite near to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's house, in the pine-trees, two miles south of Royan. It was no easy matter to find this spot by the dim light of a waning moon, and, half-mechanically, Loo joined in the search, and presently, when the jetty was reached, helped to make fast in a choppy sea. They left the luggage on the jetty and walked across the silent sand side by side. “There,” said Colville, pointing forward. “It is through that opening in the pine-trees. A matter of five minutes and we shall be at my cousin's house.” “It is very kind of Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence,” answered Barebone, “to--well, to take me up. I suppose that is the best way to look at it.” Colville laughed quietly. “Yes--put it thus, if you like,” he said. They walked on in silence for a few yards, and then Dormer Colville slipped his hand within his companion's arm, as was the fashion among men even in England in those more expansive days. “I think I know how you feel,” he said, suiting his step to Barebone's. “You must feel like a man who is set down to a table to play a game of which he knows nothing, and on taking up his cards finds that he holds a hand all court-cards and trumps--and he doesn't know how to play them.” Barebone made no answer. He had yet to unlearn Captain Clubbe's unconscious teaching that a man's feelings are his own concern and no other has any interest or right to share in them, except one woman, and even she must guess the larger half. “But as the game progresses,” went on Colville, reassuringly, “you will find out how it is played. You will even find that you are a skilled player, and then the gambler's spirit will fire your blood and arouse your energies. You will discover what a damned good game it is. The great game--Barebone--the great game! And France is the country to play it in.” He stamped his foot on the soil of France as he spoke. “The moment I saw you I knew that you would do. No man better fitted to play the game than yourself; for you have wit and quickness,” went on this friend and mentor, with a little pressure on his companion's arm. “But--you will have to put your back into it, you know.” “What do you mean?” “Well--I noticed at Farlingford a certain reluctance to begin. It is in the blood, I suppose. There is, you know, in the Bourbon blood a certain strain of--well, let us say of reluctance to begin. Others call it by a different name. One is not a Bourbon for nothing, I suppose. And everything--even if it be a vice--that serves to emphasise identity is to be cultivated. But, as I say, you will have to put your back into it later on. At present there will be less to do. You will have to play close and hold your hand, and follow any lead that is given you by de Gemosac, or by my humble self. You will find that easy enough, I know. For you have all a Frenchman's quickness to understand. And I suppose--to put it plainly as between men of the world--now that you have had time to think it over--you are not afraid, Barebone?” “Oh no!” laughed Barebone. “I am not afraid.” “One is not a Barebone--or a Bourbon--for nothing,” observed Colville, in an aside to himself. “Gad! I wish I could say that I should not be afraid myself under similar circumstances. My heart was in my mouth, I can tell you, in that cabin when de Gemosac blurted it all out. It came suddenly at the end, and--well! --it rather hit one in the wind. And, as I say, one is not a Bourbon for nothing. You come into a heritage, eight hundred years old, of likes and dislikes, of genius and incapacity, of an astounding cleverness, and a preposterous foolishness without compare in the history of dynasties. But that doesn't matter nowadays. This is a progressive age, you know; even the Bourbons cannot hold back the advance of the times.” “I come into a heritage of friends and of enemies,” said Barebone, gaily--“all ready made. That seems to me more important.” “Gad! you are right,” exclaimed Colville. “I said you would do the moment I saw you step ashore at Farlingford. You have gone right to the heart of the question at the first bound. It is your friends and your enemies that will give you trouble.” “More especially my friends,” suggested Loo, with a light laugh. “Right again,” answered Colville, glancing at him sideways beneath the brim of his hat. And there was a little pause before he spoke again. “You have probably learnt how to deal with your enemies at sea,” he said thoughtfully at length. “Have you ever noticed how an English ship comes into a foreign harbour and takes her berth at her moorings? There is nothing more characteristic of the nation. And one captain is like another. No doubt you have seen Clubbe do it a hundred times. He comes in, all sail set, and steers straight for the berth he has chosen. And there are always half a dozen men in half a dozen small boats who go out to meet him. They stand up and wave their arms, and point this way and that. They ask a hundred questions, and with their hands round their faces, shout their advice. And in answer to one and the other the Captain looks over the side and says, 'You be damned.' That will be the way to deal with some of your friends and all your enemies alike, Barebone, if you mean to get on in France. You will have to look over the side at the people in small boats who are shouting and say, 'You be damned.'” They were at the gate of a house now, set down in a clearing amid the pine-trees. “This is my cousin's house,” said Dormer Colville. “It is to be your home for the present. And you need not scruple, as she will tell you, to consider it so. It is not a time to think of obligations, you understand, or to consider that you are running into any one's debt. You may remember that afterward, perhaps, but that is as may be. For the present there is no question of obligations. We are all in the same boat--all playing the same game.” And he laughed below his breath as he closed the gate with caution; for it was late and the house seemed to hold none but sleepers. “As for my cousin herself,” he continued, as they went toward the door, “you will find her easy to get on with-a clever woman, and a good-looking one. Du reste--it is not in that direction that your difficulties will lie. You will find it easy enough to get on with the women of the party, I fancy--from what I have observed.” And again he seemed to be amused.

16

THE GAMBLERS

In a sense, politics must always represent the game that is most attractive to the careful gambler. For one may play at it without having anything to lose. It is one of the few games within the reach of the adventurous, where no stake need be cast upon the table. The gambler who takes up a political career plays to win or not to win. He may jump up from the gutter and shout that he is the man of the moment, without offering any proof of his assertion beyond the loudness of a strident voice. And if no one listens to him he loses nothing but his breath. And in France the man who shouts loudest is almost certain to have the largest following. In England the same does not yet hold good, but the day seems to be approaching when it will. In France, ever since the great Revolution, men have leapt up from the gutter to grasp the reins of power. Some, indeed, have sprung from the gutter of a palace, which is no more wholesome, it would appear, than the drain of any street, or a ditch that carries off the refuse of a cheap Press. There are certain rooms in the north wing of the Louvre, in Paris, rooms having windows facing across the Rue de Rivoli toward the Palais Royal, where men must have sat in the comfortable leather-covered chair of the High Official and laughed at the astounding simplicity of the French people. But he laughs best who laughs last, and the People will assuredly be amused in a few months, or a few years, at the very sudden and very humiliating discomfiture of a gentleman falling face-foremost into the street or hanging forlornly from a lamp-post at the corner of it. For some have quitted these comfortable chairs, in these quiet double-windowed rooms overlooking the Rue de Rivoli, for no better fate. It was in the August of 1850 that a stout gentleman, seated in one of these comfortable chairs, succumbed so far to the warmth of the palace corridors as to fall asleep. He was not in the room of a high official, but in the waiting-room attached to it. He knew, moreover, that the High Official himself was scarcely likely to dismiss a previous visitor or a present occupation any the earlier for being importuned; for he was aware of the official's antecedents, and knew that a Jack-in-office, who has shouted himself into office, is nearly always careful to be deaf to other voices than his own. Moreover, Mr. John Turner was never pressed for time. “Yes,” he had been known to say, “I was in Paris in '48. Never missed a meal.” Whereas others, with much less at stake than this great banker, had omitted not only meals, but their night's rest--night after night--in those stirring times. John Turner was still asleep when the door leading to the Minister's room was cautiously opened, showing an inner darkness such as prevails in an alcove between double doors. The door opened a little wider. No doubt the peeping eye had made sure that the occupant of the waiting-room was asleep. On the threshold stood a man of middle height, who carried himself with a certain grace and quiet dignity. He was pale almost to sallowness, a broad face with a kind mouth and melancholy eyes, without any light in them. The melancholy must have been expressed rather by the lines of the brows than by the eye itself, for this was without life or expression--the eye of a man who is either very short-sighted or is engaged in looking through that which he actually sees, to something he fancies he perceives beyond it. His lips smiled, but the smile died beneath a neatly waxed moustache and reached no higher on the mask-like face. Then he disappeared in the outer darkness between the two doors, and the handle made no noise in turning. In a few minutes an attendant, in a gay uniform, came in by the same door, without seeking to suppress the clatter of his boots on the oak floor. “Hola! monsieur,” he said, in a loud voice. And Mr. John Turner crossed his legs and leant farther back in the chair, preparatory to opening his eyes, which he did directly on the new-comer's face, without any of that vague flitting hither and thither of glance which usually denotes the sleeper surprised. The eyes were of a clear blue, and Mr. Turner looked five years younger with them open than with them shut. But he was immensely stout. “Well, my friend,” he said, soothingly; for the Minister's attendant had a truculent ministerial manner. “Why so much noise?” “The Minister will see you.” John Turner yawned and reached for his hat. “The Minister is pressed for time.” “So was I,” replied the Englishman, who spoke perfect French, “when I first sat down here, half an hour ago. But even haste will pass in time.” He rose, and followed the servant into the inner room, where he returned the bow of a little white-bearded gentleman seated at a huge desk. “Well, sir,” said this gentleman, with the abrupt manner which has come to be considered Napoleonic on the stage or in the political world to-day. “Your business?” The servant had withdrawn, closing the door behind him with an emphasis of the self-accusatory sort. “I am a banker,” replied John Turner, looking with an obese deliberation toward one of the deep windows, where, half-concealed by the heavy curtain, a third person stood gazing down into the street. The Minister smiled involuntarily, forgetting his dignity of a two-years' growth. “Oh, you may speak before Monsieur,” he said. “But I am behind him,” was the immediate reply. The gentleman leaning against the window-breast did not accept this somewhat obvious invitation to show his face. He must have heard it, however, despite an absorption which was probably chronic; for he made a movement to follow with his glance the passage of some object of interest in the street below. And the movement seemed to supply John Turner with the information he desired. “Yes, I am a banker,” he said, more genially. The Minister gave a short laugh. “Monsieur,” he said, “every one in Europe knows that. Proceed.” “And I only meddle in politics when I see the possibility of making an honest penny.” “Already made--that honest penny--if one may believe the gossip--of Europe,” said the Minister. “So many pence that it is whispered that you do not know what to do with them.” “It is unfortunate,” admitted Turner, “that one can only dine once a day.” The little gentleman in office had more than once invited his visitor to be seated, indicating by a gesture the chair placed ready for him. After a slow inspection of its legs, Mr. John Turner now seated himself. It would seem that he, at the same time, tacitly accepted the invitation to ignore the presence of a third person. “Since you seem to know all about me,” he said, “I will not waste any more of your time, or mine, by trying to make you believe that I am eminently respectable. The business that brought me here, however, is of a political nature. A plain man, like myself, only touches politics when he sees his gain clearly. There are others who enter that field from purer motives, I am told. I have not met them.” The Minister smiled on one side of his face, and all of it went white. He glanced uncomfortably at that third person, whom he had suggested ignoring. “And yet,” went on John Turner, very dense or greatly daring, “I have lived many years in France, Monsieur le Ministre.” The Minister frowned at him, and made a quick gesture of one hand toward the window. “So long,” pursued the Englishman, placidly, “as the trains start punctually, and there is not actually grape-shot in the streets, and one may count upon one's dinner at the hour, one form of government in this country seems to me to be as good as another, Monsieur le Ministre. A Bourbon Monarchy or an Orleans Monarchy, or a Republic, or--well, an Empire, Monsieur le Ministre.” “Mon Dieu! have you come here to tell me this?” cried the Minister, impatiently, glancing over his shoulder toward the window, and with one hand already stretched out toward the little bell standing on his desk. “Yes,” answered Turner, leaning forward to draw the bell out of reach. He nodded his head with a friendly smile, and his fat cheeks shook. “Yes, and other things as well. Some of those other matters are perhaps even more worthy of your earnest attention. It is worth your while to listen. More especially, as you are paid for it--by the hour.” He laughed inside himself, with a hollow sound, and placidly crossed his legs. “Yes; I came to tell you, firstly, that the present form of government, and, er--any other form which may evolve from it--” “Oh! --proceed, monsieur!” exclaimed the Minister, hastily, while the man in the recess of the window turned and looked over his shoulder at John Turner's profile with a smile, not unkind, on his sphinx-like face. “--has the inestimable advantage of my passive approval. That is why I am here, in fact. I should be sorry to see it upset.” He broke off, and turned laboriously in his chair to look toward the window, as if the gaze of the expressionless eyes there had tickled the back of his neck like a fly. But by the time the heavy banker had got round, the curtain had fallen again in its original folds. “--by a serious Royalist plot,” concluded Turner, in his thick, deliberate way. “So, assuredly, would any patriot or any true friend of France,” said the Minister, in his best declamatory manner. “Um--m. That is out of my depth,” returned the Englishman, bluntly. “I paddle about in the shallow water at the edge and pick up what I can, you understand. I am too fat for a voyant bathing-costume, and the deep waters beyond, Monsieur le Ministre.” The Minister drummed impatiently on his desk with his five fingers, and looked at Turner sideways beneath his brows. “Royalist plots are common enough,” he said, tentatively, after a pause. “Not a Royalist plot with money in it,” was the retort. “I dare say an honest politician, like yourself, is aware that in France it is always safe to ignore the conspirator who has no money, and always dangerous to treat with contempt him who jingles a purse. There is only a certain amount of money in the world, Monsieur le Ministre, and we bankers usually know where it is. I do not mean the money that the world pours into its own stomach. That is always afloat--changing hands daily. I mean the Great Reserves. We watch those, you understand. And if one of the Great Reserves, or even one of the smaller reserves, moves, we wonder why it is being moved and we nearly always find out.” “One supposes,” said the Minister, hazarding an opinion for the first time, and he gave it with a sidelong glance toward the window, “that it is passing from the hands of a financier possessing money into those of one who has none.” “Precisely. And if a financier possessing money is persuaded to part with it in such a quarter as you suggest, one may conclude that he has good reason to anticipate a substantial return for the loan. You, who are a brilliant collaborateur in the present government, should know that, if any one does, Monsieur le Ministre.” The Minister glanced toward the window, and then gave a good-natured and encouraging laugh, quite unexpectedly, just as if he had been told to do so by the silent man looking down into the street, who may, indeed, have had time to make a gesture. “And,” pursued the banker, “if a financier possessing money parts with it--or, to state the case more particularly, if a financier possessing no money, to my certain knowledge, suddenly raises it from nowhere definite, for the purposes of a Royalist conspiracy, the natural conclusion is that the Royalists have got hold of something good.” John Turner leant back in his chair and suppressed a yawn. “This room is very warm,” he said, producing a pocket-handkerchief. Which was tantamount to a refusal to say more. The Minister twisted the end of his moustache in reflection. It was at this time the fashion in France to wear the moustache waxed. Indeed, men displayed thus their political bias to all whom it might concern. “There remains nothing,” said the official at length, with a gracious smile, “but to ask your terms.” For he who was afterward Napoleon the Third had introduced into French political and social life a plain-spoken cynicism which characterises both to this day. “Easy,” replied Turner. “You will find them easy. Firstly, I would ask that your stupid secret police keeps its fingers out; secondly, that leniency be assured to one person, a client of mine--the woman who supplies the money--who is under the influence--well, that influence which makes women do nobler and more foolish things, monsieur, than men are capable of.” He rose as he spoke, collected his hat and stick, and walked slowly to the door. With his hand on the handle, he paused. “You can think about it,” he said, “and let me know at your leisure. By the way, there is one more point, Monsieur le Ministre. I would ask you to let this matter remain a secret, known only to our two selves and--the Prince President.” And John Turner went out, without so much as a glance toward the window.

17

ON THE PONT ROYAL

It would appear that John Turner had business south of the Seine, though his clients were few in the Faubourg St. Germain. For this placid British banker was known to be a good hater. His father before him, it was said, had had dealings with the Bourbons, while many a great family of the Emigration would have lost more than the esteem of their fellows in their panic-stricken flight, had it not been that one cool-headed and calm man of business stayed at his post through the topsy-turvy days of the Terror, and did his duty by the clients whom he despised. On quitting the Louvre, by the door facing the Palais Royal, Turner moved to the left. To say that he walked would be to overstate the action of his little stout legs, which took so short a stride that his progress suggested wheels and some one pushing behind. He turned to the left again, and ambled under the great arch, to take the path passing behind the Tuileries. His stoutness was, in a sense, a safeguard in streets where the travelling Englishman, easily recognised, has not always found a welcome. His clothes and his walk were studiously French. Indeed, no one, passing by with a casual glance, would have turned to look a second time at a figure so typical of the Paris streets. Mr. Turner quitted the enclosure of the Tuileries gardens and crossed the quay toward the Pont Royal. But he stopped short under the trees by the river wall, with a low whistle of surprise. Crossing the bridge, toward him, and carrying a carpet-bag of early Victorian design, was Mr. Septimus Marvin, rector of Farlingford, in Suffolk. After a moment's thought, John Turner went toward the bridge, and stationed himself on the pavement at the corner. The pavement is narrow, and Turner was wide. In order to pass him, Septimus Marvin would need to step into the road. This he did, without resentment; with, indeed, a courtly and vague inclination of the head toward the human obstruction. “Look here, Sep,” said Turner, “you are not going to pass an old schoolfellow like that.” Septimus Marvin lurched onward one or two steps, with long loose strides. Then he clutched his carpet-bag with both hands and looked back at his interlocutor, with the scared eyes of a detected criminal. This gave place to the habitual gentle smile when, at last, the recognition was complete. “What have you got there?” asked Turner, pointing with his stick at the carpet-bag. “A kitten?” “No--no,” replied Marvin, looking this way and that, to make sure that none could overhear. “A Nanteuil--engraved from his own drawing, Jack--a real Nanteuil. I have just been to a man I know--the print-shop opposite the statue on the Quai Voltaire--to have my own opinion verified. I was sure of it. He says that I am undoubtedly right. It is a genuine Nanteuil--a proof before letters.” “Ah! And you have just picked it up cheap? Picked it up, eh?” “No, no, quite the contrary,” Marvin replied, in a confidential whisper. “Stolen--dear, dear! I am sorry to hear that, Septimus.” And Septimus Marvin broke into the jerky, spasmodic laugh of one who has not laughed for long--perhaps for years. “Ah, Jack,” he said; “you are still up to a joke.” “Well, I should hope so. We are quite close to my club. Come, and have luncheon, and tell me all about it.” So the Social and Sporting Club, renowned at that day for its matchless cuisine and for nothing else of good repute at all, entertained an angel unawares, and was much amused at Septimus Marvin's appearance, although the amusement was not apparent. The members, it would appear, were gentlemen of that good school of old France which, like many good things both French and English, is fast disappearing. And with all those faults, which we are so ready to perceive in any Frenchman, there is none on earth who will conceal from you so effectually the fact that in his heart he is vastly amused. It was with some difficulty that Septimus was persuaded to consign his carpet-bag to the custody of the hall-porter. “If it wasn't a Nanteuil,” he explained in a whisper to his friend, “I should have no hesitation; for I am sure the man is honest and in every way to be relied upon. But a Nanteuil--ad vivum--Jack. There are none like him. It is priceless.” “You used not to be a miser,” said Turner, panting on the stairs, when at last the bag was concealed in a safe place. “What matter what the value may be, so long as you like it?” “Oh! but the value is of great importance,” answered Septimus, rather sheepishly. “Then you have changed a good deal since you and I were at Ipswich school together. There, sit down at this table. I suppose you are hungry. I hope you are. Try and think--there's a good fellow--and remember that they have the best cook in Paris here. Their morals ain't of the first water, but their cook is without match. Yes, you have changed a good deal, if you think of money.” Septimus Marvin had changed colour, at all events, in the last few minutes. “I have to, Jack, I have to. That is the truth of it. I have come to Paris to sell that Nanteuil. To realise, I suppose you would call it in the financial world. Pro aris et focis, old friend. I want money for the altar and the hearth. It has come to that. I cannot ask them in Farlingford for more money, for I know they have none. And the church is falling about our ears. The house wants painting. It is going the way of the church, indeed.” “Ah!” said Turner, glancing at him over the bill of fare. “So you have to sell an engraving. It goes to the heart, I suppose?” Marvin laughed and rubbed his spare hands together, with an assumption of cheerfulness in which some one less stout and well-to-do than his companion might have perceived that dim minor note of pathos, which always rings somewhere in a forced laugh. “One has to face it,” he replied. “Ne cedas malis, you know. I suddenly found it was necessary. It was forced upon me, in fact. I found that my niece was secretly helping to make both ends meet. A generous action, made doubly generous by the manner in which it was performed.” “Miriam?” put in John Turner, who appeared to be absorbed in the all-important document before him. “Yes, Miriam. Do you know her? Ah! I forgot. You are her guardian and trustee. I sometimes think my memory is failing. I found her out quite by accident. It must have been going on for quite a long time. Heaven will reward her, Turner! One cannot doubt it.” He absent-mindedly seized two pieces of bread from the basket offered to him by a waiter, and began to eat as if famished. “Steady, man, steady,” exclaimed Turner, leaning forward with a horror-stricken face to restrain him. “Don't spoil a grand appetite on bread. Gad! I wish I could fall on my food like that. You seem to be starving.” “I think I forgot to have any breakfast,” said Marvin, apologetically. “I dare say you did!” was the angry retort. “You always were a bit of an ass, you know, Sep. But I have ordered a tiptop luncheon, and I'll trouble you not to wolf like that.” “Well--well, I'm sorry,” said the other, who, even in the far-off days at Ipswich school, had always been in the clouds, while John Turner moved essentially on the earth. “And do not sell that Nanteuil to the first bidder,” went on Turner, with a glance, of which the keenness was entirely disarmed by the good-natured roundness of his huge cheeks. “I know a man who will buy it--at a good price, too. Where did you get it?” “Ah! that is a long story,” replied Marvin, looking dreamily out of the window. “I bought it, years ago, at Farlingford. But it is a long story.” “Then tell it, slowly. While I eat this sole a la Normande. I see you've nearly finished yours, and I have scarcely begun.” It was a vague and disjointed enough story, as related by Septimus Marvin. And it was the story of Loo Barebone's father. As it progressed John Turner grew redder and redder in the face, while he drank glass after glass of Burgundy. “A queer story,” he ejaculated, breathlessly. “Go on. And you bought this engraving from the man himself, before he died? Did he tell you where he got it? It is the portrait of a woman, you say.” “Portrait of a woman--yes, yes. But he did not know who she was. And I do not know whether I gave him enough for it. Do you think I did, Jack?” “I do not know how much you gave him, but I have no doubt that it was too much. Where did he get it?” “He thinks it was brought from France by his mother, or the woman who was supposed in Farlingford to be his mother--together with other papers, which he burnt, I believe.” “And then he died?” “Yes--yes. He died--but he left a son.” “The devil he did! Why did you not mention that before? Where is the son? Tell me all about him, while I see how they've served this langue fourree, which should be eaten slowly; though it is too late to remind you of that now. Go on. Tell me all about the son.” And before the story of Loo Barebone was half told, John Turner laid aside his knife and fork and turned his attention to the dissection of this ill-told tale. As the story neared its end, he glanced round the room, to make sure that none was listening to their conversation. “Dormer Colville,” he repeated. “Does he come into it?” “He came to Farlingford with the Marquis de Gemosac, out of pure good-nature--because the Marquis could speak but little English. He is a charming man. So unselfish and disinterested.” “Who? The Marquis?” “No; Dormer Colville.” “Oh yes!” said John Turner, returning to the cold tongue. “Yes; a charming fellow.” And he glanced again at his friend, with a queer smile. When luncheon was finished, Turner led the way to a small smoking-room, where they would be alone, and sent a messenger to fetch Septimus Marvin's bag from downstairs. “We will have a look at your precious engraving,” he said, “while we smoke a cigar. It is, I suppose, a relic of the Great Monarchy, and I may tell you that there is rather a small demand just now for relics of that period. It would be wiser not to take it into the open market. I think my client would give you as good a price as any; and I suppose you want to get as much as you can for it now that you have made up your mind to the sacrifice?” Marvin suppressed a sigh, and rubbed his hands together with that forced jocularity which had made his companion turn grave once before. “Oh, I mean to drive a hard bargain, I can tell you!” was the reply, with an assumption of worldly wisdom on a countenance little calculated to wear that expression naturally. “What did your friend in the print-shop on the Quai Voltaire mention as a probable price?” asked Turner, carelessly. “Well, he said he might be able to sell it for me at four thousand francs. I would not hear of his running any risk in the matter, however. Such a good fellow, he is. So honest.” “Yes, he is likely to be that,” said Turner, with his broad smile. He was a little sleepy after a heavy luncheon, and sipped his coffee with a feeling of charity toward his fellow-men. “You would find lots of honest men in the Quai Voltaire, Sep. I will tell you what I will do. Give me the print, and I will do my best for you. Would ten thousand francs help you out of your difficulties?” “I do not remember saying that I was in difficulties,” objected the Reverend Septimus, with heightened colour. “Don't you? Memory IS bad, is it not? Would ten thousand francs paint the rectory, then?” “It would ease my mind and sweeten my sleep at night to have half that sum, my friend. With two hundred pounds I could face the world aequo animo.” “I will see what I can do. This is the print, is it? I don't know much about such things myself, but I should put the price down at ten thousand francs.” “But the man in the Quai Voltaire?” “Precisely. I know little about prints, but a lot about the Quai Voltaire. Who is the lady? I presume it is a portrait?” “It is a portrait, but I cannot identify the original. To an expert of that period it should not be impossible, however.” Septimus Marvin was all awake now, with flushed cheeks and eyes brightened by enthusiasm. “Do you know why? Because her hair is dressed in a peculiar way--poufs de sentiment, these curls are called. They were only worn for a brief period. In those days the writings of Jean Jacques Rousseau had a certain vogue among the idle classes. The women showed their sentiments in the dressing of their hair. Very curious--very curious. And here, in the hair, half-concealed, is an imitation dove's nest.” “The deuce there is!” ejaculated Turner, pulling at his cigar. “A fashion which ruled for a still briefer period.” “I should hope so. Well, roll the thing up, and I will do my best for you. I'm less likely to be taken in than you are, perhaps. If I sell it, I will send you a cheque this evening. It is a beautiful face.” “Yes,” agreed Septimus Marvin, with a sharp sigh. “It is a beautiful face.” And he slowly rolled up his most treasured possession, which John Turner tucked under his arm. On the Pont Royal they parted company. “By the way,” said John Turner, after they had shaken hands, “you never told me what sort of a man this young fellow is--this Loo Barebone?” “The dearest fellow in the world,” answered Marvin, with eyes aglow behind his spectacles. “To me he has been as a son--an elder brother, as it were, to little Sep. I was already an elderly man, you know, when Sep was born. Too old, perhaps. Who knows? Heaven's way is not always marked very clearly.” He nodded vaguely and went away a few paces. Then he remembered something and came back. “I don't know if I ought to speak of such a thing. But I quite hoped, at one time, that Miriam might one day recognise his goodness of heart.” “What?” interrupted Turner. “The mate of a coasting schooner!” “He is more than that, my friend,” answered Septimus Marvin, nodding his head slowly, so that the sun flashed on his spectacles in such a manner as to make Turner blink. Then he turned away again and crossed the bridge, leaving the English banker at the corner of it, still blinking.

18

THE CITY THAT SOON FORGETS

There are in humble life some families which settle their domestic differences on the doorstep, while the neighbours, gathered hastily by the commotion, tiptoe behind each other to watch the fun. In the European congerie France represents this loud-voiced household, and Paris--Paris, the city that soon forgets--is the doorstep whereon they wrangle. The bones of contention may be pitched far and wide by the chances and changes of exile, but the contending dogs bark and yap in Paris. At this time there lived, sometimes in Italy, sometimes at Frohsdorf, a jovial young gentleman, fond of sport and society, cultivating the tastes and enjoying the easy existence of a country-gentleman of princely rank--the Comte de Chambord. Son of that Duchesse de Berri who tried to play a great part and failed, he was married to an Italian princess and had no children. He was, therefore, the last of the Bourbons, and passed in Europe as such. But he did not care. Perhaps his was the philosophy of the indolent which saith that some one must be last and why not I? Nevertheless, there ran in his veins some energetic blood. On his father's side he was descended from sixty-six kings of France. From his mother he inherited a relationship to many makers of history. For the Duchesse de Berri's grandmother was the sister of Marie Antoinette. Her mother was aunt to that Empress of the French, Marie Louise, who was a notable exception to the rule that “Bon sang ne peut mentir.” Her father was a king of Sicily and Naples. She was a Bourbon married to a Bourbon. When she was nineteen she gave birth to a daughter, who died next day. In a year she had a son who died in twenty hours. Two years later her husband died in her arms, assassinated, in a back room of the Opera House in Paris. Seven months after her husband's death she gave birth to the Comte de Chambord, the last of the old Bourbons. She was active, energetic and of boundless courage. She made a famous journey through La Vendee on horseback to rally the Royalists. She urged her father-in-law, Charles X., to resist the revolution. She was the best Royalist of them all. And her son was the Comte de Chambord, who could have been a king if he had not been a philosopher, or a coward. He was waiting till France called him with one voice. As if France had ever called for anything with one voice! Amid the babel there rang out not a few voices for the younger branch of the Royal line--the Orleans. Louis Philippe--king for eighteen years--was still alive, living in exile at Claremont. Two years earlier, in the rush of the revolution of 1848, he had effected his escape to Newhaven. The Orleans always seek a refuge in England, and always turn and abuse that country when they can go elsewhere in safety. And England is not one penny the worse for their abuse, and no man or country was ever yet one penny the better for their friendship. Louis Philippe had been called to the throne by the people of France. His reign of eighteen years was marked by one great deed. He threw open the Palace of Versailles--which was not his--to the public. And then the people who called him in, hooted him out. His life had been attempted many times. All the other kings hated him and refused to let their daughters marry his sons. He and his sons were waiting at Claremont while the talkers in Paris talked their loudest. There was a third bone of contention--the Imperial line. At this time the champions of this morsel were at the summit; for a Bonaparte was riding on the top of the revolutionary scrimmage. By the death of the great Napoleon's only child, the second son of his third brother became the recognised claimant to the Imperial crown. For France has long ceased to look to the eldest son as the rightful heir. There is, in fact, a curse on the first-born of France. Napoleon's son, the King of Rome, died in exile, an Austrian. The Duc de Bordeaux, born eight years after him, never wore the crown, and died in exile, childless. The Comte de Paris, born also at the Tuileries, was exiled when he was ten years old, and died in England. All these, of one generation. And of the next, the Prince Imperial, hurried out of France in 1870, perished on the Veldt. The King of Rome lies in his tomb at Vienna, the Duc de Bordeaux at Goritz, the Comte de Paris at Weybridge, the Prince Imperial at Farnborough. These are the heirs of France, born in the palace of the Tuileries. How are they cast upon the waters of the world! And where the palace of the Tuileries once stood the pigeons now call to each other beneath the trees, while, near at hand, lolls on the public seat he whom France has always with her, the vaurien--the worth-nothing. So passes the glory of the world. It is not a good thing to be born in a palace, nor to live in one. It was in the Rue Lafayette that John Turner had his office, and when he emerged from it into that long street on the evening of the 25th of August, 1850, he ran against, or he was rather run against by, the newsboy who shrieked as he pattered along in lamentable boots and waved a sheet in the face of the passer: “The King is dead! The King is dead!” And Paris--the city that soon forgets--smiled and asked what King? Louis Philippe was dead in England, at the age of seventy-seven, the bad son of a bad father, another of those adventurers whose happy hunting-ground always has been, always will be, France. John Turner, like many who are slow in movement, was quick in thought. He perceived at once that the death of Louis Philippe left the field open to the next adventurer; for he left behind him no son of his own mettle. Turner went back to his office, where the pen with which he had signed a cheque for four hundred pounds, payable to the Reverend Septimus Marvin, was still wet; where, at the bottom of the largest safe, the portrait of an unknown lady of the period of Louis XVI. lay concealed. He wrote out a telegram to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, addressed to her at her villa near Royan, and then proceeded to his dinner with the grave face of the careful critic. The next morning he received the answer, at his breakfast-table, in the apartment he had long occupied in the Avenue d'Antin. But he did not open the envelope. He had telegraphed to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, asking if it would be convenient for her to put him up for a few days. And he suspected that it would not. “When I am gone,” he said to his well-trained servant, “put that into an envelope and send it after me to the Villa Cordouan, Royan. Pack my portmanteau for a week.” Thus John Turner set out southward to join a party of those Royalists whom his father before him had learnt to despise. And in a manner he was pre-armed; for he knew that he would not be welcome. It was in those days a long journey, for the railway was laid no farther than Tours, from whence the traveller must needs post to La Rochelle, and there take a boat to Royan--that shallow harbour at the mouth of the Gironde. “Must have a change--of cooking,” he explained to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. “Doctor says I am getting too stout.” He shook her deliberately by the hand without appearing to notice her blank looks. “So I came south and shall finish up at Biarritz, which they say is going to be fashionable. I hope it is not inconvenient for you to give me a bed--a solid one--for a night or two.” “Oh no!” answered Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, who had charming manners, and was one of those fortunate persons who are never at a loss. “Did you not receive my telegram?” “Telling me you were counting the hours till my arrival?” “Well,” admitted Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, wisely reflecting that he would ultimately see the telegram, “hardly so fervent as that--” “Good Lord!” interrupted Turner, looking behind her toward the veranda, which was cool and shady, where two men were seated near a table bearing coffee-cups. “Who is that?” “Which?” asked Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, without turning to follow the direction of his glance. “Oh! one is Dormer Colville, I see that. But the other--gad!” “Why do you say gad?” asked the lady, with surprise. “Where did he get that face from?” was the reply. Turner took off his hat and mopped his brow; for it was very hot and the August sun was setting over a copper sea. “Where we all get our faces from, I suppose!” answered Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, with her easy laugh. She was always mistress of the situation. “The heavenly warehouse, one supposes. His name is Barebone. He is a friend of Dormer's.” “Any friend of Dormer Colville's commands my interest.” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence glanced quickly at her companion beneath the shade of her lace-trimmed parasol. “What do you mean by that?” she asked, in a voice suddenly hard and resentful. “That he chooses his friends well,” returned the banker, with his guileless smile. His face was bovine, and in the heat of summer apt to be shiny. No one would attribute an inner meaning to a stout person thus outwardly brilliant. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence appeared to be mollified, and turned toward the house with a gesture inviting him to walk with her. “I will be frank with you,” she said. “I telegraphed to tell you that the Villa Cordouan is for the moment unfortunately filled with guests.” “What matter? I will go to the hotel. In fact, I told the driver of my carriage to wait for further orders. I half feared that at this time of year, you know, house would be full. I'll just shake hands with Colville and then be off. You will let me come in after dinner, perhaps. You and I must have a talk about money, you will remember.” There was no time to answer; for Dormer Colville, perceiving their approach, was already hurrying down the steps of the veranda to meet them. He laughed as he came, for John Turner's bulk made him a laughing matter in the eyes of most men, and his good humour seemed to invite them to frank amusement. The greeting was, therefore, jovial enough on both sides, and after being introduced to Loo Barebone, Mr. Turner took his leave without farther defining his intentions for the evening. “I do not think it matters much,” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence said to her two guests, when he had left. “And he may not come, after all.” Her self-confidence sufficiently convinced Loo, who was always ready to leave something to chance. But Colville shook his head. It thus came about that sundry persons of title and importance who had been invited to come to the Villa Cordouan after dinner for a little music found the English banker complacently installed in the largest chair, with a shirt-front evading the constraint of an abnormal waistcoat, and a sleepy chin drooping surreptitiously toward it. “He is my banker from Paris,” whispered Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence to one and another. “He knows nothing, and so far as I am aware, is no politician--merely a banker, you understand. Leave him alone and he will go to sleep.” During the three weeks which Loo Barebone had spent very pleasantly at the Villa Cordouan, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had provided music and light refreshment for her friends on several occasions. And each evening the drawing-room, which was not a small one, had been filled to overflowing. Friends brought their friends and introduced them to the hostess, who in turn presented them to Barebone. Some came from a distance, driving from Saintes or La Rochelle or Pons. Others had taken houses for the bathing-season at Royan itself. “He never makes a mistake,” said the hostess to Dormer Colville, behind her fan, a hundred times, following with her shrewd eyes the gay and easy movements of Loo, who seemed to be taught by some instinct to suit his manner to his interlocutor. To-night there was more music and less conversation. “Play him to sleep,” Dormer Colville had said to his cousin. And at length Turner succumbed to the soft effect of a sonata. He even snored in the shade of a palm, and the gaiety of the proceedings in no way suffered. It was only Colville who seemed uneasy and always urged any who were talking earnestly to keep out of earshot of the sleeping Englishman. Once or twice he took Barebone by the arm and led him to the other end of the room, for he was always the centre of the liveliest group and led the laughter there. “Oh! but he is charming, my dear,” more than one guest whispered to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, as they took their departure. “He will do--he will do,” the men said with a new light of hope in their grave faces. Nearly all had gone when John Turner at length woke up. Indeed, Colville threw a book upon the floor to disturb his placid sleep. “I will come round to-morrow,” he said, bidding his hostess good night. “I have some papers for you to sign since you are determined to sell your rentes and leave the money idle at your bank.” “Yes. I am quite determined,” she answered, gaily, for she was before her time inasmuch as she was what is known in these days of degenerate speech as cock-sure. And when John Turner, carrying a bundle of papers, presented himself at the Villa Cordouan next morning he found Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence sitting alone in the veranda. “Dormer and his friend have left me to my own devices. They have gone away,” she mentioned, casually, in the course of conversation. “Suddenly?” “Oh no,” she answered, carelessly, and wrote her name in a clear firm hand on the document before her. And John Turner looked dense.

19

IN THE BREACH

The Marquis de Gemosac was sitting at the open window of the little drawing-room in the only habitable part of the chateau. From his position he looked across the courtyard toward the garden where stiff cypress-trees stood sentry among the mignonette and the roses, now in the full glory of their autumn bloom. Beyond the garden, the rough outline of the walls cut a straight line across the distant plains, which melted away into the haze of the marsh-lands by the banks of the Gironde far to the westward. The Marquis had dined. They dined early in those days in France, and coffee was still served after the evening meal. The sun was declining toward the sea in a clear copper-coloured sky, but a fresh breeze was blowing in from the estuary to temper the heat of the later rays. The Marquis was beating time with one finger, and within the room, to an impromptu accompaniment invented by Juliette, Barebone was singing: C'est le Hasard, Qui, tot ou tard, Ici-bas nous seconde; Car, D'un bout du monde A l'autre bout, Le Hasard seul fait tout. He broke off with a laugh in which Juliette's low voice joined. “That is splendid, mademoiselle,” he cried, and the Marquis clapped his thin hands together. Un tel qu'on vantait Par hasard etait D'origine assez mince; Par hasard il plut, Par hasard il fut Baron, ministre et prince: C'est le Hasard, Qui, tot ou tard, Ici bas nous seconde; Car, D'un bout du monde A l'autre bout, Le Hasard seul fait tout. “There--that is all I know. It is the only song I sing.” “But there are other verses,” said Juliette, resting her hands on the keys of the wheezy spinet which must have been a hundred years old. “What are they about?” “I do not know, mademoiselle,” he answered, looking down at her. “I think it is a love-song.” She had pinned some mignonette, strong scented as autumn mignonette is, in the front of her muslin dress, and the heavy heads had dragged the stems to one side. She put the flowers in order, slowly, and then bent her head to enjoy the scent of them. “It scarcely sounds like one,” she said, in a low and inquiring voice. The Marquis was a little deaf. “Is it all chance then?” “Oh yes,” he answered, and as he spoke without lowering his voice she played softly on the old piano the simple melody of his song. “It is all chance, mademoiselle. Did they not teach you that at the school at Saintes?” But she was not in a humour to join in his ready laughter. The room was rosy with the glow of the setting sun, she breathed the scent of the mignonette at every breath, the air which she had picked out on the spinet in unison with his clear and sympathetic voice had those minor tones and slow slurring from note to note which are characteristic of the gay and tearful songs of southern France and all Spain. None of which things are conducive to gaiety when one is young. She glanced at him with one quick turn of the head and made no answer. But she played the air over again--the girls sing it to this day over their household work at Farlingford to other words--with her foot on the soft pedal. The Marquis hummed it between his teeth at the other end of the room. “This room is hot,” she exclaimed, suddenly, and rose from her seat without troubling to finish the melody. “And that window will not open, mademoiselle; for I have tried it,” added Barebone, watching her impatient movements. “Then I am going into the garden,” she said, with a sharp sigh and a wilful toss of the head. It was not his fault that the setting sun, against which, as many have discovered, men shut their doors, should happen to be burning hot or that the window would not open. But Juliette seemed to blame him for it or for something else, perhaps. One never knows. Barebone did not follow her at once, but stood by the window talking to the Marquis, who was in a reminiscent humour. The old man interrupted his own narrative, however. “There,” he cried, “is Juliette on that wall overhanging the river. It is where the English effected a breach long ago, my friend--you need not smile, for you are no Englishman--and the chateau has only been taken twice through all the centuries of fighting. There! She ventures still farther. I have told her a hundred times that the wall is unsafe.” “Shall I go and warn her the hundred-and-first time?” asked Loo, willing enough. “Yes, my friend, do. And speak to her severely. She is only a child, remember.” “Yes--I will remember that.” Juliette did not seem to hear his approach across the turf where the goats fed now, but stood with her back toward him, a few feet below him, actually in that breach effected long ago by those pestilential English. They must have prized out the great stones with crowbars and torn them down with their bare hands. Juliette was looking over the vineyards toward the river, which gleamed across the horizon. She was humming to herself the last lines of the song: D'un bout du monde A l'autre bout, Le Hasard seul fait tout. She turned with a pretty swing of her skirts to gather them in her hand. “You must go no farther, mademoiselle,” said Loo. She stopped, half bending to take her skirt, but did not look back. Then she took two steps downward from stone to stone. The blocks were half embedded in the turf and looked ready to fall under the smallest additional weight. “It is not I who say so, but your father who sent me,” explained the admonisher from above. “Since it is all chance--” she said, looking downward. She turned suddenly and looked up at him with that impatience which gives way in later life to a philosophy infinitely to be dreaded when it comes; for its real name is Indifference. Her movements were spasmodic and quick as if something angered her, she knew not what; as if she wanted something, she knew not what. “I suppose,” she said, “that it was chance that saved our lives that night two months ago, out there.” And she stood with one hand stretched out behind her pointing toward the estuary, which was quiet enough now, looking up at him with that strange anger or new disquietude--it was hard to tell which--glowing in her eyes. The wind fluttered her hair, which was tied low down with a ribbon in the mode named “a la diable” by some French wit with a sore heart in an old man's breast. For none other could have so aptly described it. “All chance, mademoiselle,” he answered, looking over her head toward the river. “And it would have been the same had it been only Marie or Marie and Jean in the boat with you?” “The boat would have been as solid and the ropes as strong.” “And you?” asked the girl, with a glance from her persistent eyes. “Oh no!” he answered, with a laugh. “I should not have been the same. But you must not continue to stand there, mademoiselle; the wall is unsafe.” She shrugged her shoulders and stood with half-averted face, looking down at the vineyards which stretched away to the dunes by the river. Her cheeks were oddly flushed. “Your father sent me to say so,” continued Loo, “and if he sees that you take no heed he will come himself to learn why.” Juliette gave a curt laugh and climbed the declivity toward him. The argument was, it seemed, a sound one. When she reached his level he made a step or two along the path that ran round the enceinte--not toward the house, however--but away from it. She accepted the tacit suggestion, not tacitly, however. “Shall we not go and tell papa we have returned without mishap?” she amended, with a light laugh. “No, mademoiselle,” he answered. It was his turn to be grave now and she glanced at him with a gleam of satisfaction beneath her lids. She was not content with that, however, but wished to make him angry. So she laughed again and they would have quarrelled if he had not kept his lips firmly closed and looked straight in front of him. They passed between the unfinished ruin known as the Italian house and the rampart. The Italian house screened them from the windows of that portion of the ancient stabling which the Marquis had made habitable when he bought back the chateau of Gemosac from the descendant of an adventurous republican to whom the estate had been awarded in the days of the Terror. A walk of lime-trees bordered that part of the garden which lies to the west of the Italian house, and no other part was visible from where Juliette paused to watch the sun sink below the distant horizon. Loo was walking a few paces behind her, and when she stopped he stopped also. She sat down on the low wall, but he remained standing. Her profile, clear-cut and delicate with its short chin and beautifully curved lips, its slightly aquiline nose and crisp hair rising in a bold curve from her forehead, was outlined against the sky. He could see the gleam of the western light in her eyes, which were half averted. While she watched the sunset, he watched her with a puzzled expression about his lips. He remembered perhaps the Marquis's last words, that Juliette was only a child. He knew that she could in all human calculation know nothing of the world; that at least she could have learned nothing of it in the convent where she had been educated. So, if she knew anything, she must have known it before she went there, which was impossible. She knew nothing, therefore, and yet she was not a child. As a matter of fact, she was the most beautiful woman Loo Barebone had ever seen. He was thinking that as she sat on the low wall, swinging one slipper half falling from her foot, watching the sunset, while he watched her and noted the anger slowly dying from her eyes as the light faded from the sky. That strange anger went down, it would appear, with the sun. After the long silence--when the low bars of red cloud lying across the western sky were fading from pink to grey--she spoke at last in a voice which he had never heard before, gentle and confidential. “When are you going away?” she asked. “To-night.” And he knew that the very hour of his departure was known to her already. “And when will you come back?” “As soon as I can,” he answered, half-involuntarily. There was a turn of the head half toward him, something expectant in the tilt at the corner of her parted lips, which made it practically impossible to make any other answer. “Why?” she asked, in little more than a whisper--then she broke into a gay laugh and leapt off the wall. She walked quickly past him. “Why?” she repeated over her shoulder as she passed him. And he was too quick for her, for he caught her hand and touched it with his lips before she jerked it away from him. “Because you are here,” he answered, with a laugh. But she was grave again and looked at him with a queer searching glance before she turned away and left him standing in the half-light--thinking of Miriam Liston.

20

“NINETEEN”

As Juliette returned to the Gate House she encountered her father, walking arm-in-arm with Dormer Colville. The presence of the Englishman within the enceinte of the chateau was probably no surprise to her, for she must have heard the clang of the bell just within the gate, which could not be opened from outside; by which alone access was gained to any part of the chateau. Colville was in riding costume. It was, indeed, his habitual dress when living in France, for he made no concealment of his partnership in a well-known business house in Bordeaux. “I am a sleeping partner,” he would say, with that easy flow of egotistic confidence which is the surest way of learning somewhat of your neighbour's private affairs. “I am a sleeping partner at all times except the vintage, when I awake and ride round among the growers, to test their growth.” It was too early yet for these journeys, for the grapes were hardly ripe. But any one who wished to move from place to place must needs do so in the saddle in a country where land is so valuable that the width of a road is grudged, and bridle-ways are deemed good enough for the passage of the long and narrow carts that carry wine. Ever since their somewhat precipitate departure from the Villa Cordouan at Royan, Dormer Colville and Barebone had been in company. They had stayed together, in one friend's house or another. Sometimes they enjoyed the hospitality of a chateau, and at others put up with the scanty accommodation of a priest's house or the apartment of a retired military officer, in one of those little towns of provincial France at which the cheap journalists of Paris are pleased to sneer without ceasing. They avoided the large towns with extraordinary care. “Why should we go to towns,” asked Colville, jovially, “when we have business in the country and the sun is still high in the sky?” “Yes,” he would reply to the questions of an indiscreet fellow-traveller, at table or on the road. “Yes; I am a buyer of wine. We are buyers of wine. We are travelling from place to place to watch the growth. For the wine is hidden in the grape, and the grape is ripening.” And, as often as not, the chance acquaintance of an inn dejeuner would catch the phrase and repeat it thoughtfully. “Ah! is that so?” he would ask, with a sudden glance at Dormer Colville's companion, who had hitherto passed unobserved as the silent subordinate of a large buyer; learning his trade, no doubt. “The grape is ripening. Good!” And as sure as he seemed to be struck with this statement of a self-evident fact, he would, in the next few minutes, bring the numeral “nineteen”--tant bien que mal--into his conversation. “With nineteen days of sun, the vintage will be upon us,” he would say; or, “I have but nineteen kilometres more of road before me to-day.” Indeed, it frequently happened that the word came in very inappropriately, as if tugged heroically to the front by a clumsy conversationalist. There is no hazard of life so certain to discover sympathy or antagonism as travel--a fact which points to the wisdom of beginning married life with a journey. The majority of people like to know the worst at once. To travel, however, with Dormer Colville was a liberal education in the virtues. No man could be less selfish or less easily fatigued; which are the two bases upon which rest all the stumbling-blocks of travel. Up to a certain point, Barebone and Dormer Colville became fast friends during the month that elapsed between their departure from Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's house and their arrival at the inn at Gemosac. The “White Horse,” at Gemosac, was no better and no worse than any other “White Horse” in any other small town of France. It was, however, better than the principal inn of a town of the same size in any other habitable part of the globe. There were many reasons why the Marquis de Gemosac had yielded to Colville's contention--that the time had not yet come for Loo Barebone to be his guest at the chateau. “He is inclined to be indolent,” Colville had whispered. “One recognises, in many traits of character, the source from whence his blood is drawn. He will not exert himself so long as there is some one else at hand who is prepared to take trouble. He must learn that it is necessary to act for himself. He needs rousing. Let him travel through France, and see for himself that of which he has as yet only learnt at second-hand. That will rouse him.” And the journey through the valleys of the Garonne and the Dordogne had been undertaken. Another, greater journey, was now afoot, to end at no less a centre of political life than Paris. A start was to be made this evening, and Dormer Colville now came to report that all was ready and the horses at the gate. “If there were scenes such as this for all of us to linger in, mademoiselle,” he said, lifting his face to the western sky and inhaling the scent of the flowers growing knee-deep all around him, “men would accomplish little in their brief lifetime.” His eyes, dreamy and reflective, wandered over the scene and paused, just for a moment in passing, on Juliette's face. She continued her way, with no other answer than a smile. “She grows, my dear Marquis--she grows every minute of the day and wakes up a new woman every morning,” said Colville, in a confidential aside, and he went forward to meet Loo with his accustomed laugh of good-fellowship. He whom the world calls a good fellow is never a wise man. Barebone walked toward the gate without joining in the talk of his companions. He was thoughtful and uneasy. He had come to say good-bye and nothing else. He was wondering if he had really meant what he had said. “Come,” interrupted Colville's smooth voice. “We must get into the saddle and begone. I was just telling Monsieur and Mademoiselle Juliette, that any man might be tempted to linger at Gemosac until the active years of a lifetime rolled by.” The Marquis made the needful reply; hoping that he might yet live to see Gemosac--and not only Gemosac, but a hundred chateaux like it--reawakened to their ancient glory, and thrown open to welcome the restorer of their fallen fortunes. Colville looked from one to the other, and then, with his foot in the stirrup, turned to look at Juliette, who had followed them to the gate. “And mademoiselle,” he said; “will she wish us good luck, also? Alas! those times are gone when we could have asked for her ribbon to wear, and to fight for between ourselves when we are tired and cross at the end of a journey. Come, Barebone--into the saddle.” They waited, both looking at Juliette; for she had not spoken. “I wish you good luck,” she said, at length, patting the neck of Colville's horse, her face wearing a little mystic smile. Thus they departed, at sunset, on a journey of which old men will still talk in certain parts of France. Here and there, in the Angoumois, in Guienne, in the Vendee, and in the western parts of Brittany, the student of forgotten history may find an old priest who will still persist in dividing France into the ancient provinces, and will tell how Hope rode through the Royalist country when he himself was busy at his first cure. The journey lasted nearly two months, and before they passed north of the Loire at Nantes and quitted the wine country, the vintage was over. “We must say that we are cider merchants, that is all,” observed Dormer Colville, when they crossed the river, which has always been the great divider of France. “He is sobering down. I believe he will become serious,” wrote he to the Marquis de Gemosac. But he took care to leave Loo Barebone as free as possible. “I am, in a way, a compulsory pilot,” he explained, airily, to his companion. “The ship is yours, and you probably know more about the shoals than I do. You must have felt that a hundred times when you were at sea with that solemn old sailor, Captain Clubbe. And yet, before you could get into port, you found yourself forced to take the compulsory pilot on board and make him welcome with such grace as you could command, feeling all the while that he did not want to come and you could have done as well without him. So you must put up with my company as gracefully as you can, remembering that you can drop me as soon as you are in port.” And surely, none other could have occupied an uncomfortable position so gracefully. Barebone found that he had not much to do. He soon accommodated himself to a position which required nothing more active than a ready ear and a gracious patience. For, day by day--almost hour by hour--it was his lot to listen to protestations of loyalty to a cause which smouldered none the less hotly because it was hidden from the sight of the Prince President's spies. And, as Colville had predicted, Barebone sobered down. He would ride now, hour after hour, in silence, whereas at the beginning of the journey he had talked gaily enough, seeing a hundred humorous incidents in the passing events of the day; laughing at the recollection of an interview with some provincial notable who had fallen behind the times, or jesting readily enough with such as showed a turn for joking on the road. But now the unreality of his singular change of fortune was vanishing. Every village priest who came after dark to take a glass of wine with them at their inn sent it farther into the past, every provincial noble greeting him on the step of his remote and quiet house added a note to the drumming reality which dominated his waking moments and disturbed his sleep at night. Day by day they rode on, passing through two or three villages between such halts as were needed by the horses. At every hamlet, in the large villages, where they rested and had their food, at the remote little town where they passed a night, there was always some one expecting them, who came and talked of the weather and more or less skilfully brought in the numeral nineteen. “Nineteen! Nineteen!” It was a watchword all over France. Long before, on the banks of the Dordogne, Loo had asked his companion why that word had been selected--what it meant. “It means Louis XIX.,” replied Dormer Colville, gravely. And now, as they rode through a country so rural, so thinly populated and remote that nothing like it may be found in these crowded islands, the number seemed to follow them; or, rather, to pass on before them and await their coming. Often Colville would point silently with his whip to the numerals, scrawled on a gate-post or written across a wall. At this time France was mysteriously flooded with cheap portraits of the great Napoleon. It was before the days of pictorial advertisement, and young ladies who wished to make an advantageous marriage had no means of advertising the fact and themselves in supplements to illustrated papers. The walls of inns and shops and diligence offices were therefore barer than they are to-day. And from these bare walls stared out at this time the well-known face of the great Napoleon. It was an innovation, and as such readily enough accepted. At every fair, at the great fete of St. Jean, at St. Jean d'Angely and a hundred other fetes of purely local notoriety, at least one hawker of cheap lithographs was to be found. And if the buyer haggled, he could get the portrait of the great Emperor for almost nothing. “One cannot print it at such a cost,” the seller assured his purchasers, which was no less than the truth. The fairs were, and are to this day, the link between the remoter villages and the world; and the peasants carried home with them a picture, for the first time, to hang on their walls. Thus the Prince President fostered the Napoleonic legend. Dormer Colville would walk up to these pictures, and, as often as not, would turn and look over his shoulder at Barebone, with a short laugh. For as often as not, the numerals were scrawled across the face in pencil. But Barebone had ceased to laugh at the constant repetition now. Soon Colville ceased to point out the silent witness, for he perceived that Loo was looking for it himself, detecting its absence with a gleam of determination in his eyes or noting its recurrence with a sharp sigh, as of the consciousness of a great responsibility. Thus the reality was gradually forced upon him that that into which he had entered half in jest was no jest at all; that he was moving forward on a road which seemed easy enough, but of which the end was not perceptible; neither was there any turning to one side or the other. All men who have made a mark--whether it be a guiding or warning sign to those that follow--must at one moment of their career have perceived their road before them, thus. Each must have realised that once set out upon that easy path there is no turning aside and no turning back. And many have chosen to turn back while there was yet time, leaving the mark unmade. For most men are cowards and shun responsibility. Most men unconsciously steer their way by proverb or catchword; and all the wise saws of all the nations preach cowardice. Barebone saw his road now, and Dormer Colville knew that he saw it. When they crossed the Loire they passed the crisis, and Colville breathed again like one who had held his breath for long. Those colder, sterner men of Brittany, who, in later times, compared notes with the nobles of Guienne and the Vendee, seemed to talk of a different man; for they spoke of one who rarely laughed, and never turned aside from a chosen path which was in no wise bordered by flowers.

21

NO. 8 RUELLE ST. JACOB

Between the Rue de Lille and the Boulevard St. Germain, in the narrow streets which to this day have survived the sweeping influence of Baron Haussmann, once Prefect of the Seine, there are many houses which scarcely seem to have opened door or window since the great Revolution. One of these, to be precise, is situated in the Ruelle St. Jacob, hardly wider than a lane--a short street with a blind end against high walls--into which any vehicle that enters must needs do so with the knowledge of having to back out again. For there is no room to turn. Which is an allegory. All the windows, in fact, that look forlornly at the blank walls or peep over the high gateways into the Ruelle St. Jacob are Royalist windows looking into a street which is blinded by a high wall and is too narrow to allow of turning. Many of the windows would appear to have gathered dust since those days more than a hundred years ago when white faces peeped from them and trembling hands unbarred the sash to listen to the roar of voices in the Rue du Bac, in the open space by the church of St. Germain des Pres, in the Cite, all over Paris, where the people were making history. To this house in the Ruelle St. Jacob, Dormer Colville and Loo Barebone made their way on foot, on their arrival in Paris at the termination of their long journey. It was nearly dark, for Colville had arranged to approach the city and leave their horses at a stable at Meudon after dusk. “It is foolish,” he said, gaily, to his companion, “to flaunt a face like yours in Paris by daylight.” They had driven from Meudon in a hired carriage to the corner of the Champ de Mars, in those days still innocent of glass houses and exhibition buildings, for Paris was not yet the toy-shop of the world; and from the Champ de Mars they came on foot through the ill-paved, feebly lighted streets. In the Ruelle St. Jacob itself there was only one lamp, burning oil, swinging at the corner. The remainder of the lane depended for its illumination on the windows of two small shops retailing firewood and pickled gherkins and balls of string grey with age, as do all the shops in the narrow streets on the wrong side of the Seine. Dormer Colville led the way, picking his steps from side to side of the gutter which meandered odoriferously down the middle of the street toward the river. He stopped in front of the great gateway and looked up at the arch of it, where the stone carving had been carefully obliterated by some enthusiastic citizen armed with a hatchet. “Ichabod,” he said, with a short laugh; and cautiously laid hold of the dangling bell-handle which had summoned the porter to open to a Queen in those gay days when Marie Antoinette light-heartedly pushed a falling monarchy down the incline. The great gate was not opened in response, but a small side door, deep-sunken in the thickness of the wall. On either jamb of the door was affixed in the metal letters ordained by the municipality the number eight. Number Eight Ruelle St. Jacob had once been known to kings as the Hotel Gemosac. The man who opened carried a lantern and held the door ajar with a grudging hand while he peered out. One could almost imagine that he had survived the downfall and the Restoration, and a couple of republics, behind the high walls. The court-yard was paved with round cobble-stones no bigger than an apple, and, even by the flickering light of the lantern, it was perceptible that no weed had been allowed to grow between the stones or in the seams of the wide, low steps that led to an open door. The house appeared to be dark and deserted. “Yes, Monsieur le Marquis--Monsieur le Marquis is at home,” muttered the man with a bronchial chuckle, and led the way across the yard. He wore a sort of livery, which must have been put away for years. A young man had been measured for the coat which now displayed three deep creases across a bent back. “Attention--attention!” he said, in a warning voice, while he scraped a sulphur match in the hall. “There are holes in the carpets. It is easy to trip and fall.” He lighted the candle, and after having carefully shut and bolted the door, he led the way upstairs. At their approach, easily audible in the empty house by reason of the hollow creaking of the oak floor, a door was opened at the head of the stairs and a flood of light met the new-comers. In the doorway, which was ten feet high, the little bent form of the Marquis de Gemosac stood waiting. “Ah! ah!” he said, with that pleasant manner of his generation, which was refined and spirituelle and sometimes dramatic, and yet ever failed to touch aught but the surface of life. “Ah! ah! Safely accomplished--the great journey. Safely accomplished. You permit--” And he embraced Barebone after the custom of his day. “From all sides,” he said, when the door was closed, “I hear that you have done great things. From every quarter one hears your praise.” He held him at arm's length. “Yes,” he said. “Your face is graver and--more striking in resemblance than ever. So now you know--now you have seen.” “Yes,” answered Barebone, gravely. “I have seen and I know.” The Marquis rubbed his white hands together and gave a little crackling laugh of delight as he drew forward a chair to the fire, which was of logs as long as a barrel. The room was a huge one, and it was lighted from end to end with lamps, as if for a reception or a ball. The air was damp and mouldly. There were patches of grey on the walls, which had once been painted with garlands of roses and Cupids and pastoral scenes by a noted artist of the Great Age. The ceiling had fallen in places, and the woodwork of the carved furniture gave forth a subtle scent of dry rot. But everything was in an exquisite taste which vulgarer generations have never yet succeeded in imitating. Nothing was concealed, but rather displayed with a half-cynical pride. All was moth-ridden, worm-eaten, fallen to decay--but it was of the Monarchy. Not half a dozen houses in Paris, where already the wealth, which has to-day culminated in a ridiculous luxury of outward show, was beginning to build new palaces, could show room after room furnished in the days of the Great Louis. The very air, faintly scented it would seem by some forgotten perfume, breathed of a bygone splendour. And the last of the de Gemosacs scorned to screen his poverty from the eyes of his equals, nor sought to hide from them a desolation which was only symbolic of that which crushed their hearts and bade them steal back from time to time like criminals to the capital. “You see,” he said to Colville and Barebone, “I have kept my promise, I have thrown open this old house once more for to-night's meeting. You will find that many friends have made the journey to Paris for the occasion--Madame de Chantonnay and Albert, Madame de Rathe and many from the Vendee and the West whom you have met on your journey. And to-night one may speak without fear, for none will be present who are not vouched for by the Almanac de Gotha. There are no Royalists pour rire or pour vivre to-night. You have but time to change your clothes and dine. Your luggage arrived yesterday. You will forgive the stupidity of old servants who have forgotten their business. Come, I will lead the way and show you your rooms.” He took a candle and did the honours of the deserted dust-ridden house in the manner of the high calling which had been his twenty years ago when Charles X. was king. For some there lingers a certain pathos in the sight of a belated survival, while the majority of men and women are ready to smile at it instead. And yet the Monarchy lasted eight centuries and the Revolution eight years. Perhaps Fate may yet exact payment for the excesses of those eight years from a nation for which the watching world already prepares a secondary place in the councils of empire. The larger room had been assigned to Loo. There was a subtle difference in the Marquis's manner toward him. He made an odd bow as he quitted the room. “There,” said Colville, whose room communicated with this great apartment by a dressing-room and two doors. He spoke in English, as they always did when they were alone together. “There--you are launched. You are lance, my friend. I may say you are through the shoals now and out on the high seas--” He paused, candle in hand, and looked round the room with a reflective smile. It was obviously the best room in the house, with a fireplace as wide as a gate, where logs of pine burnt briskly on high iron dogs. The bed loomed mysteriously in one corner with its baldachin of Gobelin tapestry. Here, too, the dim scent of fallen monarchy lingered in the atmosphere. A portrait of Louis XVI. in a faded frame hung over the mantelpiece. “And the time will come,” pursued Colville, with his melancholy, sympathetic smile, “when you will find it necessary to drop the pilot--to turn your face seaward and your back upon old recollections and old associations. You cannot make an omelette without breaking eggs, my friend.” “Oh yes,” replied Barebone, with a brisk movement of the head, “I shall have to forget Farlingford.” Colville had moved toward the door that led to his own room. He paused, examining the wick of the candle he carried in his hand. Then, though glib of speech, he decided in favour of silence, and went away without making reply. Loo sat down in a grey old arm-chair in front of the fire. The house was astoundingly noiseless, though situated in what had once been the heart of Paris. It was one of the few houses left in this quarter with a large garden. And the traffic passing in and out of the Ruelle St. Jacob went slipshod on its own feet. The busy crackle of the wood was the only sound to break a silence which seemed part of this vast palace of memories. Loo had ridden far and was tired. He smiled grimly at the fire. It is to be supposed that he was sitting down to the task he had set himself--to forget Farlingford. There was a great reception at the Hotel Gemosac that night, and after twenty years of brooding silence the rooms, hastily set in order, were lighted up. There was, as the Marquis had promised, no man or woman present who was not vouched for by a noble name or by history. As the old man presented them, their names were oddly familiar to the ear, while each face looking at Loo seemed to be the face of a ghost looking out of a past which the world will never forget so long as history lives. And here, again, was the subtle difference. They no longer talked to Loo, but stood apart and spoke among themselves in a hushed voice. Men made their bow to him and met his smile with grave and measuring eyes. Some made a little set speech, which might mean much or nothing. Others embarked on such a speech and paused--faltered, and passed on gulping something down in their throats. Women made a deep reverence to him and glanced at him with parted lips and white faces--no coquetry in their eyes. They saw that he was young and good-looking; but they forgot that he might think the same of them. Then they passed on and grouped themselves together, as women do in moments of danger or emotion, their souls instinctively seeking the company of other souls tuned to catch a hundred passing vibrations of the heart-strings of which men remain in ignorance. They spoke together in lowered voices without daring, or desiring perhaps, to turn and look at him again. “It only remains,” some one said, “for the Duchesse d'Angouleme to recognise his claim. A messenger has departed for Frohsdorf.” And Barebone, looking at them, knew that there was a barrier between him and them which none could cast aside: a barrier erected in the past and based on the sure foundations of history. “She is an old woman,” said Monsieur de Gemosac to any who spoke to him on this subject. “She is seventy-two, and fifty-eight of those years have been marked by greater misfortunes than ever fell to the lot of a woman. When she came out of prison she had no tears left, my friends. We cannot expect her to turn back willingly to the past now. But we know that in her heart she has never been sure that her brother died in the Temple. You know how many disappointments she has had. We must not awake her sleeping sorrow until all is ready. I shall make the journey to Frohsdorf--that I promise you. But to-night we have another task before us.” “Yes--yes,” answered his listeners. “You are to open the locket. Where is it? --show it to us.” And the locket which Captain Clubbe's wife had given to Dormer Colville was handed from one to another. It was not of great value, but it was of gold with stones, long since discoloured, set in silver around it. It was crushed and misshapen. “It has never been opened for twenty years,” they told each other. “It has been mislaid in an obscure village in England for nearly half a century.” “The Vicomte de Castel Aunet--who is so clever a mechanician--has promised to bring his tools,” said Monsieur de Gemosac. “He will open it for us--even if he find it necessary to break the locket.” So the thing went round the room until it came to Loo Barebone. “I have seen it before,” he said. “I think I remember seeing it long ago--when I was a little child.” And he handed it to the old Vicomte de Castel Aunet, whose shaking fingers closed round it in a breathless silence. He carried it to the table, and some one brought candles. The Vicomte was very old. He had learnt clock-making, they said, in prison during the Terror. “Il n'y a moyen,” he whispered to himself. “I must break it.” With one effort he prised up the cover, but the hinge snapped, and the lid rolled across the table into Barebone's hand. “Ah!” he cried, in that breathless silence, “now I remember it. I remember the red silk lining of the cover, and in the other side there is the portrait of a lady with--” The Vicomte paused, with his palm covering the other half of the locket and looked across at Loo. And the eyes of all Royalist France were fixed on the same face. “Silence!” whispered Dormer Colville in English, crushing Barebone's foot under the table.

22

DROPPING THE PILOT

“The portrait of a lady,” repeated Loo, slowly. “Young and beautiful. That much I remember.” The old nobleman had never removed his covering hand from the locket. He had never glanced at it himself. He looked slowly round the peering faces, two and three deep round the table. He was the oldest man present--one of the oldest in Paris--one of the few now living who had known Marie Antoinette. Without uncovering the locket, he handed it to Barebone across the table with a bow worthy of the old regime and his own historic name. “It is right that you should be the first to see it,” he said. “Since there is no longer any doubt that the lady was your father's mother.” Loo took the locket, looked at it with strangely glittering eyes and steady lips. He gave a sort of gasp, which all in the room heard. He was handing it back to the Vicomte de Castel Aunet without a word of comment, when a crashing fall on the bare floor startled every one. A lady had fainted. “Thank God!” muttered Dormer Colville almost in Barebone's ear and swayed against him. Barebone turned and looked into a face grey and haggard, and shining with perspiration. Instinctively he grasped him by the arm and supported him. In the confusion of the moment no one noticed Colville; for all were pressing round the prostrate lady. And in a moment Colville was himself again, though the ready smile sat oddly on such white lips. “For God's sake be careful,” he said, and turned away, handkerchief in hand. For the moment the portrait was forgotten until the lady was on her feet again, smiling reassurances and rubbing her elbow. “It is nothing,” she said, “nothing. My heart--that is all.” And she staggered to a chair with the reassuring smile frozen on her face. Then the portrait was passed from hand to hand in silence. It was a miniature of Marie Antoinette, painted on ivory, which had turned yellow. The colours were almost lost, but the face stood clearly enough. It was the face of a young girl, long and narrow, with the hair drawn straight up and dressed high and simply on the head without ornament. “It is she,” said one and another. “C'est bien elle.” “It was painted when she was newly a queen,” commented the Vicomte de Castel Aunet. “I have seen others like it, but not that one before.” Barebone stood apart and no one offered to approach him. Dormer Colville had gone toward the great fireplace, and was standing by himself there with his back toward the room. He was surreptitiously wiping from his face the perspiration which had suddenly run down it, as one may see the rain running down the face of a statue. Things had taken an unexpected turn. The Marquis de Gemosac, himself always on the surface, had stirred others more deeply than he had anticipated or could now understand. France has always been the victim of her own emotions; aroused in the first instance half in idleness, allowed to swell with a semi-restraining laugh, and then suddenly sweeping and overwhelming. History tells of a hundred such crises in the pilgrimage of the French people. A few more--and historians shall write “Ichabod” across the most favoured land in Europe. It is customary to relate that, after a crisis, those most concerned in it know not how they faced it or what events succeeded it. “He never knew,” we are informed, “how he got through the rest of the evening.” Loo Barebone knew and remembered every incident, every glance. He was in full possession of every faculty, and never had each been so keenly alive to the necessity of the moment. Never had his quick brain been so alert as it was during the rest of the evening. And those who had come to the Hotel Gemosac to confirm their adoption of a figure-head went away with the startling knowledge in their hearts that they had never in the course of an artificial life met a man less suited to play that undignified part. And all the while, in the back of his mind, there lingered with a deadly patience the desire for the moment which must inevitably come when he should at last find himself alone, face to face, with Dormer Colville. It was nearly midnight before this moment came. At last the latest guest had taken his leave, quitting the house by the garden door and making his way across that forlorn and weedy desert by the dim light reflected from the clouds above. At last the Marquis de Gemosac had bidden them good night, and they were left alone in the vast bedroom which a dozen candles, in candelabras of silver blackened by damp and neglect, only served to render more gloomy and mysterious. In the confusion consequent on the departure of so many guests the locket had been lost sight of, and Monsieur de Gemosac forgot to make inquiry for it. It was in Barebone's pocket. Colville put together with the toe of his boot the logs which were smouldering in a glow of incandescent heat. He turned and glanced over his shoulder toward his companion. Barebone was taking the locket from his waistcoat pocket and approaching the table where the candles burnt low in their sockets. “You never really supposed you were the man, did you?” asked Colville, with a ready smile. He was brave, at all events, for he took the only course left to him with a sublime assurance. Barebone looked across the candles at the face which smiled, and smiled. “That is what I thought,” he answered, with a queer laugh. “Do not jump to any hasty decisions,” urged Colville instantly, as if warned by the laugh. “No! I want to sift the matter carefully to the bottom. It will be interesting to learn who are the deceived and who the deceivers.” Barebone had had time to think out a course of action. His face seemed to puzzle Colville, who was rarely at fault in such judgments of character as came within his understanding. But he seemed for an instant to be on the threshold of something beyond his understanding; and yet he had lived, almost day and night, for some months with Barebone. Since the beginning--that far-off beginning at Farlingford--their respective positions had been quite clearly defined. Colville, the elder by nearly twenty years, had always been the guide and mentor and friend--the compulsory pilot he had gaily called himself. He had a vast experience of the world. He had always moved in the best French society. All that he knew, all the influence he could command, and the experience upon which he could draw were unreservedly at Barebone's service. The difference in years had only affected their friendship in so far as it defined their respective positions and prohibited any thought of rivalry. Colville had been the unquestioned leader, Barebone the ready disciple. And now in the twinkling of an eye the positions were reversed. Colville stood watching Barebone's face with eyes rendered almost servile by a great suspense. He waited breathless for the next words. “This portrait,” said Barebone, “of the Queen was placed in the locket by you?” Colville nodded with a laugh of conscious cleverness rewarded by complete success. There was nothing in his companion's voice to suggest suppressed anger. It was all right after all. “I had great difficulty in finding just what I wanted,” he added, modestly. “What I remember--though the memory is necessarily vague--was a portrait of a woman older than this. Her style of dress was more elaborate. Her hair was dressed differently, with sort of curls at the side, and on the top, half buried in the hair, was the imitation of a nest--a dove's nest. Such a thing would naturally stick in a child's memory. It stuck in mine.” “Yes--and nearly gave the game away to-night,” said Colville, gulping down the memory of those tense moments. “That portrait--the original--you have not destroyed it?” “Oh no. It is of some value,” replied Colville, almost naively. He felt in his pocket and produced a silver cigar case. The miniature was wrapped in a piece of thin paper, which he unfolded. Barebone took the painting and examined it with a little nod of recognition. His memory had not failed after twenty years. “Who is this lady?” he asked. Dormer Colville hesitated. “Do you know the history of that period?” he inquired, after a moment's reflection. For the last hour he had been trying to decide on a course of conduct. During the last few minutes he had been forced to change it half a dozen times. “Septimus Marvin, of Farlingford, is one of the greatest living authorities on those reigns. I learnt a good deal from him,” was the answer. “That lady is, I think, the Duchesse de Guiche.” “You think--” “Even Marvin could not tell you for certain,” replied Colville, mildly. He did not seem to perceive a difference in Barebone's manner toward himself. The quickest intelligence cannot follow another's mind beyond its own depth. “Then the inference is that my father was the illegitimate son of the Comte d'Artois.” “Afterward Charles X., of France,” supplemented Colville, significantly. “Is that the inference?” persisted Barebone. “I should like to know your opinion. You must have studied the question very carefully. Your opinion should be of some interest, though--” “Though--” echoed Colville, interrogatively, and regretted it immediately. “Though it is impossible to say when you speak the truth and when you lie.” And any who doubted that there was royal blood in Loo Barebone's veins would assuredly have been satisfied by a glance at his face at that moment; by the sound of his quiet, judicial voice; by the sudden and almost terrifying sense of power in his measuring eyes. Colville turned away with an awkward laugh and gave his attention to the logs on the hearth. Then suddenly he regained his readiness of speech. “Look here, Barebone,” he cried. “We must not quarrel; we cannot afford to do that. And after all, what does it matter? You are only giving yourself the benefit of the doubt--that is all. For there is a doubt. You may be what you--what we say you are, after all. It is certain enough that Marie Antoinette and Fersen were in daily correspondence. They were both clever--two of the cleverest people in France--and they were both desperate. Remember that. Do you think that they would have failed in a matter of such intense interest to her, and therefore to him? All these pretenders, Naundorff and the others, have proved that quite clearly, but none has succeeded in proving that he was the man.” “And do you think that I shall be able to prove that I am the man--when I am not?” By way of reply Dormer Colville turned again to the fireplace and took down the print of Louis XVI. engraved from a portrait painted when he was still Dauphin. A mirror stood near, and Colville came to the table carrying the portrait in one hand, the looking-glass in the other. “Here,” he said, eagerly. “Look at one and then at the other. Look in the mirror and then at the portrait. Prove it! Why, God has proved it for you.” “I do not think we had better bring Him into the question,” was the retort: an odd reflex of Captain Clubbe's solid East Anglian piety. “No. If we go on with the thing at all, let us be honest enough to admit to ourselves that we are dishonest. The portrait in that locket points clearly enough to the Truth.” “The portrait in that locket is of Marie Antoinette,” replied Colville, half sullenly. “And no one can ever prove anything contrary to that. No one except myself knows of--of this doubt which you have stumbled upon. De Gemosac, Parson Marvin, Clubbe--all of them are convinced that your father was the Dauphin.” “And Miss Liston?” “Miriam Liston--she also, of course. And I believe she knew it long before I told her.” Barebone turned and looked at him squarely in the eyes. Colville wondered a second time why Loo Barebone reminded him of Captain Clubbe to-night. “What makes you believe that?” he asked. “Oh, I don't know. But that isn't the question. The question is about the future. You see how things are in France. It is a question of Louis Napoleon or a monarchy--you see that. Unless you stop him he will be Emperor before a year is out, and he will drag France in the gutter. He is less a Bonaparte than you are a Bourbon. You remember that Louis Bonaparte himself was the first to say so. He wrote a letter to the Pope, saying so quite clearly. You will go on with it, of course, Barebone. Say you will go on with it! To turn back now would be death. We could not do it if we wanted to. I have been trying to think about it, and I cannot. That is the truth. It takes one's breath away. At the mere thought of it I feel as if I were getting out of my depth.” “We have been out of our depths the last month,” admitted Barebone, curtly. And he stood reflecting, while Colville watched him. “If I go on,” he said, at length, “I go on alone.” “Better not,” urged Colville, with a laugh of great relief. “For you would always have me and my knowledge hanging over you. If you succeeded, you would have me dunning you for hush-money.” Which seemed true enough. Few men knew more of one side of human nature than Dormer Colville, it would appear. “I am not afraid of that.” “You can never tell,” laughed Colville, but his laugh rather paled under Barebone's glance. “You can never tell.” “Wise men do not attempt to blackmail--kings.” And Colville caught his breath. “Perhaps you are right,” he admitted, after a pause. “You seem to be taking to the position very kindly, Barebone. But I do not mind, you know. It does not matter what we say to each other, eh? We have been good friends so long. You must do as you like. And if you succeed, I must be content to leave my share of the matter to your consideration. You certainly seem to know the business already, and some day perhaps you will remember who taught you to be a King.” “It was an old North Sea skipper who taught me that,” replied Barebone. “That is one of the things I learnt at sea.” “Yes--yes,” agreed Colville, almost nervously. “And you will go on with the thing, will you not? Like a good fellow, eh? Think about it till to-morrow morning. I will go now. Which is my candle? Yes. You will think about it. Do not jump to any hasty decision.” He hurried to the door as he spoke. He could not understand Barebone at all. “If I do go on with it,” was the reply, “it will not be in response to any of your arguments. It will be only and solely for the sake of France.” “Yes--of course,” agreed Colville, and closed the door behind him. In his own room he turned and looked toward the door leading through to that from which he had hurriedly escaped. He passed his hand across his face, which was white and moist. “For the sake of France!” he echoed in bewilderment. “For the sake of France! Gad! I believe he IS the man after all.”

23

A SIMPLE BANKER

Mr. John Turner had none of the outward signs of the discreet adviser in his person or surroundings. He had, it was currently whispered, inherited from his father an enormous clientele of noble names. And to such as have studied the history of Paris during the whole of the nineteenth century, it will appear readily comprehensible that the careful or the penniless should give preference to an English banker. Mr. Turner's appearance suggested solidity, and the carpet of his private room was a good one. The room smelt of cigar smoke, while the office, through which the client must pass to reach it, was odoriferous of ancient ledgers. Half a dozen clerks were seated in the office, which was simply furnished and innocent of iron safes. If a client entered, one of the six, whose business it was, looked up, while the other five continued to give their attention to the books before them. One cold morning, toward the end of the year, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence was admitted by the concierge. She noted that only one clerk gave heed to her entry, and, it is to be presumed, the quiet perfection of her furs. “Of the six young men in your office,” she observed, when she was seated in the bare wooden chair placed invitingly by the side of John Turner's writing-table, “only one appears to be in full possession of his senses.” Turner, sitting--if the expression be allowed--in a heap in an armchair before a table provided with pens, ink, and a blotting-pad, but otherwise bare, looked at his client with a bovine smile. “I don't pay them to admire my clients,” he replied. “If Mademoiselle de Montijo came in, I suppose the other five would not look up.” John Turner settled himself a little lower into his chair, so that he appeared to be in some danger of slipping under the table. “If the Archangel Gabriel came in, they would still attend to their business,” he replied, in his thick, slow voice. “But he won't. He is not one of my clients. Quite the contrary.” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence smoothed the fur that bordered her neat jacket and glanced sideways at her banker. Then she looked round the room. It was bare enough. A single picture hung on the wall--a portrait of an old lady. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence raised her eyebrows, and continued her scrutiny. Here, again, was no iron safe. There were no ledgers, no diaries, no note-books, no paraphernalia of business. Nothing but a bare table and John Turner seated at it, in a much more comfortable chair than that provided for the client, staring apathetically at a date-case which stood on a bare mantelpiece. The lady's eyes returned to the portrait on the wall. “You used to have a portrait of Louis Philippe there,” she said. “When Louis Philippe was on the throne,” admitted the banker. “And now?” inquired this daughter of Eve, looking at the portrait. “My maternal aunt,” replied Turner, making a gesture with two fingers, as if introducing his client to the portrait. “You keep her, one may suppose, as a stop-gap--between the dynasties. It is so safe--a maternal aunt!” “One cannot hang a republic on the wall, however much one may want to.” “Then you are a Royalist?” inquired Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. “No; I am only a banker,” replied Turner, with his chin sinking lower on his bulging waistcoat and his eyes scarcely visible beneath the heavy lids. The remark, coupled with a thought that Turner was going to sleep, seemed to remind the client of her business. “Will you kindly ask one of your clerks to let me know how much money I have?” she said, casting a glance not wholly innocent of scornful reproach at the table, so glaringly devoid of the bare necessities of a banking business. “Only eleven thousand francs and fourteen sous,” replied Turner, with a promptness which seemed to suggest that he kept no diary or note-book on the table before him because he had need of neither. “I feel sure I must have more than that,” said Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, with some spirit. “I quite thought I had.” But John Turner only moistened his lips and sat patiently gazing at the date. His attitude dimly suggested--quite in a nice way--that the chair upon which Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence sat was polished bright by the garments of persons who had found themselves labouring under the same error. “Well, I must have a hundred thousand francs to-morrow; that is all. Simply must. And in notes, too. I told you I should want it when you came to see me at Royan. You must remember. I told you at luncheon.” “When we were eating a sweetbread aux champignons. I remember perfectly. We do not get sweetbreads like that in Paris.” And John Turner shook his head sadly. “Well, will you let me have the money to-morrow morning--in notes?” “I remember I advised you not to sell just now; after we had finished the sweetbread and had gone on to a creme renversee--very good one, too. Yes, it is a bad time to sell. Things are uncertain in France just now. One cannot even get one's meals properly served. Cook's head is full of politics, I suppose.” “To-morrow morning--in notes,” repeated Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. “Now, your man at Royan was excellent--kept his head all through--and a light hand, too. Got him with you in Paris?” “No, I have not. To-morrow morning, about ten o'clock--in notes.” And Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence tapped a neat gloved finger on the corner of the table with some determination. “I remember--at dessert--you told me you wanted to realise a considerable sum of money at the beginning of the year, to put into some business venture. Is this part of that sum?” “Yes,” returned the lady, arranging her veil. “A venture of Dormer Colville's, I think you told me--while we were having coffee. One never gets coffee hot enough in a private house, but yours was all right.” “Yes,” mumbled Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, behind her quick finger, busy with the veil. Beneath the sleepy lids John Turner's eyes, which were small and deep-sunken in the flesh, like the eyes of a pig, noted in passing that his client's cheeks were momentarily pink. “I hope you don't mean to suggest that there is anything unsafe in Mr. Colville as a business man?” “Heaven forbid!” ejaculated Turner. “On the contrary, he is most enterprising. And I know no one who smokes a better cigar than Colville--when he can get it. And the young fellow seemed nice enough.” “Which young fellow?” inquired the lady, sharply. “His young friend--the man who was with him. I think you told me, after luncheon, that Colville required the money to start his young friend in business.” “Never!” laughed Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, who, if she felt momentarily uneasy, was quickly reassured. For this was one of those fortunate ladies who go through life with the comforting sense of being always cleverer than their neighbour. If the neighbour happen to be a man, and a stout one, the conviction is the stronger for those facts. “Never! I never told you that. You must have dreamt it.” “Perhaps I did,” admitted the banker, placidly. “I am afraid I often feel sleepy after luncheon. Perhaps I dreamt it. But I could not hand such a sum in notes to an unprotected lady, even if I can effect a sale of your securities so quickly as to have the money ready by to-morrow morning. Perhaps Colville will call for it himself.” “If he is in Paris.” “Every one is in Paris now,” was Mr. Turner's opinion. “And if he likes to bring his young friend with him, all the better. In these uncertain times it is not fair on a man to hand to him a large sum of money in notes.” He paused and jerked his thumb toward the window, which was a double one, looking down into the Rue Lafayette. “There are always people in the streets watching those who pass in and out of a bank. If a man comes out smiling, with his hand on his pocket, he is followed, and if an opportunity occurs, he is robbed. Better not have it in notes.” “I know,” replied Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, not troubling further to deceive one so lethargic and simple, “I know that Dormer wants it in notes.” “Then let him come and fetch it.” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence rose from her chair and shook her dress into straighter folds, with the air of having accomplished a task which she had known to be difficult, but not impossible to one equipped with wit and self-confidence. “You will sell the securities, and have it all ready by ten o'clock to-morrow morning,” she repeated, with a feminine insistence. “You shall have the money to-morrow morning, whether I succeed in selling for cash or not,” was the reply, and John Turner concealed a yawn with imperfect success. “A loan?” “No banker lends--except to kings,” replied Turner, stolidly. “Call it an accommodation.” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence glanced at him sharply over the fur collar which she was clasping round her neck. Here was a banker, reputed wealthy, who sat in a bare room, without so much as a fireproof safe to suggest riches; a business man of world-wide affairs, who drummed indolent fingers on a bare table; a philosopher with a maxim ever ready to teach, as all maxims do, cowardice in the guise of prudence, selfishness masquerading as worldly wisdom, hard-heartedness passing for foresight. Here was one who seemed to see, and was yet too sleepy to perceive. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence was not always sure of her banker, but now, as ever before, one glance at his round, heavy face reassured her. She laughed and went away, well satisfied with the knowledge, only given to women, of having once more carried out her object with the completeness which is known as twisting round the little finger. She nodded to Turner, who had ponderously risen from the chair which was more comfortable than the client's seat, and held the door open for her to pass. He glanced at the clock as he did so. And she knew that he was thinking that it was nearly the luncheon hour, so transparent to the feminine perception are the thoughts of men. When he had closed the door he returned to his writing-table. Like many stout people, he moved noiselessly, and quickly enough when the occasion demanded haste. He wrote three letters in a very few minutes, and, when they were addressed, he tapped on the table with the end of his pen-holder, which brought, in the twinkling of an eye, that clerk whose business it was to abandon his books when called. “I shall not go out to luncheon until I have the written receipt for each one of those letters,” said the banker, knowing that until he went out to luncheon his six clerks must needs go hungry. “Not an answer,” he explained, “but a receipt in the addressee's writing.” And while the clerk hurried from the room and down the stone stairs at a break-neck speed, Turner sank back into his chair, with lustreless eyes fixed on space. “No one can wait,” he was in the habit of saying, “better than I can.”

24

THE LANE OF MANY TURNINGS

If John Turner expected Colville to bring Loo Barebone with him to the Rue Lafayette he was, in part, disappointed. Colville arrived in a hired carriage, of which the blinds were partially lowered. The driver had been instructed to drive into the roomy court-yard of the house of which Turner's office occupied the first floor. Carriages frequently waited there, by the side of a little fountain which splashed all day and all night into a circular basin. Colville descended from the carriage and turned to speak to Loo, who was left sitting within it. Since the unfortunate night at the Hotel Gemosac, when they had been on the verge of a quarrel, a certain restraint had characterised their intercourse. Colville was shy of approaching the subject upon which they had differed. His easy laugh had not laughed away the grim fact that he had deceived Loo in such a manner that complicity was practically forced upon an innocent man. Loo had not given his decision yet. He had waited a week, during which time Colville had not dared to ask him whether his mind was made up. There was a sort of recklessness in Loo's manner which at once puzzled and alarmed his mentor. At times he was gay, as he always had been, and in the midst of his gaiety he would turn away with a gloomy face and go to his own room. To press the question would be to precipitate a catastrophe. Dormer Colville decided to go on as if nothing had happened. It is a compromise with the inconveniences of untruth to which we must all resort at some crisis or another in life. “I will not be long,” he assured Barebone, with a gay laugh. The prospect of handling one hundred thousand francs in notes was perhaps exhilarating; though the actual possession of great wealth would seem to be of the contrary tendency. There is a profound melancholy peculiar to the face of the millionaire. “I shall not be long; for he is a man of his word, and the money will be ready.” John Turner was awaiting his visitor, and gave a large soft hand inertly into Colville's warm grasp. “I always wish I saw more of you,” said the new-comer. “Is there not enough of me already?” inquired the banker, pointing to the vacant chair, upon which fell the full light of the double window. A smaller window opposite to it afforded a view of the court-yard. And it was at this smaller window that Colville glanced as he sat down, with a pause indicative of reluctance. Turner saw the glance and noted the reluctance. He concluded, perhaps, in the slow, sure mind that worked behind his little peeping eyes, that Loo Barebone was in the carriage in the court-yard, and that Colville was anxious to return to him as soon as possible. “It is very kind of you to say that, I am sure,” pursued Turner, rousing himself to be pleasant and conversational. “But, although the loss is mine, my dear Colville, the fault is mostly yours. You always know where to find me when you want my society. I am anchored in this chair, whereas one never knows where one has a butterfly like yourself.” “A butterfly that is getting a bit heavy on the wing,” answered Colville, with his wan and sympathetic smile. He sat forward in the chair in an attitude antipathetic to digression from the subject in hand. “I do not see any evidence of that. One hears of you here and there in France. I suppose, for instance, you know more than any man in Paris at the present moment of the--” he paused and suppressed a yawn, “the--er--vintage. Anything in it--eh?” “So far as I could judge, the rains came too late; but I shall be glad to tell you all about it another time. This morning--” “Yes; I know. You want your money. I have it all ready for you. But I must make out some sort of receipt, you know.” Turner felt vaguely in his pocket, and at last found a letter, from which he tore the blank sheet, while his companion, glancing from time to time at the window, watched him impatiently. “Seems to me,” said Turner, opening his inkstand, “that the vintage of 1850 will not be drunk by a Republic.” “Ah! indeed.” “What do you think?” “Well, to tell you the truth, my mind was more occupied in the quality of the vintage than in its ultimate fate. If you make out a receipt on behalf of Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, I will sign it,” answered Colville, fingering the blotting-paper. “Received on behalf of, and for, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, the sum of one hundred thousand francs,” muttered the banker, as he wrote. “She is only a client, you understand, my dear Colville,” he went on, holding out his hand for the blotting-paper, “or I would not part with the money so easily. It is against my advice that Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence realises this sum.” “If a woman sets her heart on a thing, my dear fellow--” began Colville, carelessly. “Yes, I know--reason goes to the wall. Sign there, will you?” Turner handed him pen and receipt, but Colville was looking toward the window sunk deep in the wall on the inner side of the room. This was not a double window, and the sound of carriage wheels rose above the gentle, continuous plash of the little fountain in the court-yard. Colville rose from his seat, but to reach the window he had to pass behind Turner's chair. Turner rose at the same moment, and pushed his chair back against the wall in doing so. This passage toward the window being completely closed by the bulk of John Turner, Colville hurried round the writing-table. But Turner was again in front of him, and, without appearing to notice that his companion was literally at his heels, he opened a large cupboard sunk in the panelling of the wall. The door of it folded back over the little window, completely hiding it. Turning on his heel, with an agility which was quite startling in one so stout, he found Colville's colourless face two feet from his own. In fact, Colville almost stumbled against him. For a moment they looked each other in the eyes in silence. With his right hand, John Turner held the cupboard-door over the window. “I have the money here,” he said, “in this cupboard.” And as he spoke, a hollow rumble, echoing in the court-yard, marked the exit of a carriage under the archway into the Rue Lafayette. There had been only one carriage in attendance in the court-yard--that in which Colville had left Barebone. “Here, in this cupboard,” repeated Turner to unheeding ears. For Dormer Colville was already hurrying across the room toward the other window that looked out into the Rue Lafayette. The house was a lofty one, with a high entresol, and from the windows of the first floor it was not possible to see the street immediately below without opening the sashes. Turner closed the cupboard and locked it, without ceasing to watch Colville, who was struggling with the stiff fastening of the outer sash. “Anything the matter?” inquired the banker, placidly. “Lost a dog?” But Colville had at length wrenched open the window and was leaning out. The roar of the traffic drowned any answer he may have made. It was manifest that the loss of three precious minutes had made him too late. After a glance down into the street, he came back into the centre of the room and snatched up his hat from Turner's bare writing-table. He hurried to the door, but turned again, with his back against it, to face his companion, with the eyes usually so affable and sympathetic, ablaze for once with rage. “Damn you!” he cried. “Damn you!” And the door banged on his heels as he hurried through the outer office. Turner was left standing, a massive incarnation of bewilderment, in the middle of the room. He heard the outer door close with considerable emphasis. Then he sat down again, his eyebrows raised high on his round forehead, and gazed sadly at the date-card. * * * Colville had left Loo Barebone seated in the hired carriage in a frame of mind far from satisfactory. A sea-faring life, more than any other, teaches a man quickness in action. A hundred times a day the sailor needs to execute, with a rapidity impossible to the landsman, that which knowledge tells him to be the imminent necessity of the moment. At sea, life is so far simpler than in towns that there are only two ways: the right and the wrong. In the devious paths of a pavement-ridden man there are a hundred byways: there is the long, long lane of many turnings called Compromise. Loo Barebone had turned into this lane one night at the Hotel Gemosac, in the Ruelle St. Jacob, and had wandered there ever since. Captain Clubbe had taught him the two ways of seamanship effectively enough. But the education fell short of the necessities of this crisis. Moreover, Barebone had in his veins blood of a race which had fallen to low estate through Compromise and Delay. Let those throw the first stone at him who have seen the right way gaping before their feet with a hundred pitfalls and barriers, apparently insurmountable, and have resolutely taken that road. For the devious path of Compromise has this merit--that the obstacles are round the corner. Barebone, absorbed in thought, hardly noticed that the driver of his carriage descended from the box and lounged toward the archway, where the hum of traffic and the passage of many people would serve to beguile a long wait. After a minute's delay, a driver returned and climbed to the seat--but it was not the same driver. He wore the same coat and hat, but a different face looked out from the sheepskin collar turned up to the ears. There was no one in the court-yard to notice this trifling change. Barebone was not even looking out of the window. He had never glanced at the cabman's face, whose vehicle had happened to be lingering at the corner of the Ruelle St. Jacob when Colville and his companion had emerged from the high doorway of the Hotel Gemosac. Barebone was so far obeying instructions that he was leaning back in the carriage, his face half hidden by the collar of his coat. For it was a cold morning in mid-winter. He hardly looked up when the handle of the door was turned. Colville had shut this door five minutes earlier, promising to return immediately. It was undoubtedly his hand that opened the door. But suddenly Barebone sat up. Both doors were open. Before he could make another movement, two men stepped quietly into the carriage, each closing the door by which he had entered quickly and noiselessly. One seated himself beside Barebone, the other opposite to him, and each drew down a blind. They seemed to have rehearsed the actions over and over again, so that there was no hitch or noise or bungling. The whole was executed as if by clock-work, and the carriage moved away the instant the doors were closed. In the twilight, within the carriage, the two men grasped Loo Barebone, each by one arm, and held him firmly against the back of the carriage. “Quietly, mon bon monsieur; quietly, and you will come to no harm.” Barebone made no resistance, and only laughed. “You have come too soon,” he said, without attempting to free his arms, which were held, as if by a vice, at the elbow and shoulder. “You have come too soon, gentlemen! There is no money in the carriage. Not so much as a sou.” “It is not for money that we have come,” replied the man who had first spoken--and the absolute silence of his companion was obviously the silence of a subordinate. “Though, for a larger sum than monsieur is likely to offer, one might make a mistake, and allow of escape--who knows?” The remark was made with the cynical honesty of dishonesty which had so lately been introduced into France by him who was now Dictator of that facile people. “Oh! I offer nothing,” replied Barebone. “For a good reason. I have nothing to offer. If you are not thieves, what are you?” The carriage was rattling along the Rue Lafayette, over the cobble-stones, and the inmates, though their faces were close together, had to shout in order to be heard. “Of the police,” was the reply. “Of the high police. I fancy that monsieur's affair is political?” “Why should you fancy that?” “Because my comrade and I are not engaged on other cases. The criminal receives very different treatment. Permit me to assure you of that. And no consideration whatever. The common police is so unmannerly. There! --one may well release the arms--since we understand each other.” “I shall not try to escape--if that is what you mean,” replied Barebone, with a laugh. “Nothing else--nothing else,” his affable captor assured him. And for the remainder of a long drive through the noisy streets the three men sat upright in the dim and musty cab in silence.

25

SANS RANCUNE

A large French fishing-lugger was drifting northward on the ebb tide with its sails flapping idly against the spars. It had been a fine morning, and the Captain, a man from Fecamp, where every boy that is born is born a sailor, had been fortunate in working his way in clear weather across the banks that lie northward of the Thames. He had predicted all along in a voice rendered husky by much shouting in dirty weather that the fog-banks would be drifting in from the sea before nightfall. And now he had that mournful satisfaction which is the special privilege of the pessimistic. These fog-banks, the pest of the east coast, are the materials that form the light fleecy clouds which drift westward in sunny weather like a gauze veil across the face of the sky. They roll across the North Sea from their home in the marshes of Holland on the face of the waters, and the mariner, groping his way with dripping eyelashes and a rosy face through them, can look up and see the blue sky through the rifts overhead. When the fog-bank touches land it rises, slowly lifted by the warm breath of the field. On the coast-line it lies low; a mile inland it begins to break into rifts, so that any one working his way down one of the tidal rivers, sails in the counting of twenty seconds from sunshine into a pearly shadow. Five miles inland there is a transparent veil across the blue sky slowly sweeping toward the west, and rising all the while, until those who dwell on the higher lands of Essex and Suffolk perceive nothing but a few fleecy clouds high in the heavens. The lugger was hardly moving, for the tide had only turned half an hour ago. “Provided,” the Captain had muttered within the folds of his woollen scarf rolled round and round his neck until it looked like a dusky life-belt--“provided that they are ringing their bell on the Shipwash, we shall find our way into the open. Always sea-sick, this traveller, always seasick!” And he turned with a kindly laugh to Loo Barebone, who was lying on a heap of old sails by the stern rail, concealing as well as he could the pangs of a consuming hunger. “One sees that you will never be a sailor,” added the man from Fecamp, with that rough humour which sailors use. “Perhaps I do not want to be one,” replied Barebone, with a ready gaiety which had already made him several friends on this tarry vessel, although the voyage had lasted but four days. “Listen,” interrupted the Captain, holding up a mittened hand. “Listen! I hear a bell, or else it is my conscience.” Barebone had heard it for some time. It was the bell-buoy at the mouth of Harwich River. But he did not deem it necessary for one who was a prisoner on board, and no sailor, to interfere in the navigation of a vessel now making its way to the Faroe fisheries for the twentieth time. “My conscience,” he observed, “rings louder than that.” The Captain took a turn round the tiller with a rope made fast to the rail for the purpose, and went to the side of the ship, lifting his nose toward the west. “It is the land,” he said. “I can smell it. But it is only the Blessed Virgin who knows where we are.” He turned and gave a gruff order to a man half hidden in the mist in the waist of the boat to try a heave of the lead. The sound of the bell could be heard clearly enough now--the uncertain, hesitating clang of a bell-buoy rocked in the tideway--with its melancholy note of warning. Indeed, there are few sounds on sea or land more fraught with lonesomeness and fear. Behind it and beyond it a faint “tap-tap” was now audible. Barebone knew it to be the sound of a caulker's hammer in the Government repairing yard on the south side. They were drifting past the mouth of the Harwich River. The leadsman called out a depth which Loo could have told without the help of line or lead. For he had served a long apprenticeship on these coasts under a captain second to none in the North Sea. He turned a little on his bed of sails under repair, at which the Captain had been plying his needle while the weather remained clear, and glanced over his shoulder toward the ship's dinghy towing astern. The rope that held it was made fast round the rail a few feet away from him. The boat itself was clumsy, shaped like a walnut, of a preposterous strength and weight. It was fitted with a short, stiff mast and a balance lug-sail. It floated more lightly on the water than the bigger vessel, which was laden with coal and provender and salt for the North Atlantic fishery, and the painter hung loose, while the dinghy, tide-borne, sidled up to stern of its big companion like a kitten following its mother with the uncertain steps of infancy. The face of the water was glassy and of a yellow green. Although the scud swept in toward the land at a fair speed, there was not enough wind to fill the sails. Moreover, the bounty of Holland seemed inexhaustible. There was more to come. This fog-bank lay on the water halfway across the North Sea, and the brief winter sun having failed to disperse it, was now sinking to the west, cold and pale. “The water seems shallow,” said Barebone to the Captain. “What would you do if the ship went aground?” “We should stay there, mon bon monsieur, until some one came to help us at the flood tide. We should shout until they heard us.” “You might fire a gun,” suggested Barebone. “We have no gun on board, mon bon monsieur,” replied the Captain, who had long ago explained to his prisoner that there was no ill-feeling. “It is the fortune of war,” he had explained before the white cliffs of St. Valerie had faded from sight. “I am a poor man who cannot afford to refuse a good offer. It is a Government job, as you no doubt know without my telling you. You would seem to have incurred the displeasure or the distrust of some one high placed in the Government. 'Treat him well,' they said to me. 'Give him your best, and see that he comes to no harm unless he tries to escape. And be careful that he does not return to France before the mackerel fishing begins.' And when we do return to Fecamp, I have to lie to off Notre Dame de la Garde and signal to the Douane that I have you safe. They want you out of the way. You are a dangerous man, it seems. Salut!” And the Captain raised his glass to one so distinguished by Government. He laughed as he set his glass down on the little cabin table. “No ill-feeling on either side,” he added. “C'est entendu.” He made a half-movement as if to shake hands across the table and thought better of it, remembering, perhaps, that his own palm was not innocent of blood-money. For the rest they had been friendly enough on the voyage. And had the “Petite Jeanne” been in danger, it is probable that Barebone would have warned his jailer, if only in obedience to a seaman's instinct against throwing away a good ship. He had noted every detail, however, of the dinghy while he lay on the deck of the “Petite Jeanne”; how the runner fitted to the mast; whether the halliards were likely to run sweetly through the sheaves or were knotted and would jamb. He knew the weight of the gaff and the great tan-soddened sail to a nicety. Some dark night, he had thought, on the Dogger, he would slip overboard and take his chance. He had never looked for thick weather at this time of year off the Banks, so near home, within a few hours' sail of the mouth of Farlingford River. If a breeze would only come up from the south-east, as it almost always does in these waters toward the evening of a still, fine day! Without lifting his head he scanned the weather, noting that the scud was blowing more northward now. It might only be what is known as a slant. On the other hand, it might prove to be a true breeze, coming from the usual quarter. The “tap-tap” of the caulker's hammer on the slip-way in Harwich River was silent now. There must be a breeze in-shore that carried the sound away. The topsail of the “Petite Jeanne” filled with a jerk, and the Captain, standing at the tiller, looked up at it. The lower sails soon took their cue, and suddenly the slack sheets hummed taut in the breeze. The “Petite Jeanne” answered to it at once, and the waves gurgled and laughed beneath her counter as she moved through the water. She could sail quicker than her dinghy: Barebone knew that. But he also knew that he could handle an open boat as few even on the Cotes-du-Nord knew how. If the breeze came strong, it would blow the fog-bank away, and Barebone had need of its covert. Though there must be many English boats within sight should the fog lift--indeed, the guardship in Harwich harbour would be almost visible across the spit of land where Landguard Fort lies hidden--Barebone had no intention of asking help so compromising. He had but a queer story to tell to any in authority, and on the face of it he must perforce appear to have run away with the dinghy of the “Petite Jeanne.” He desired to get ashore as unobtrusively as possible. For he was not going to stay in England. The die was cast now. Where Dormer Colville's persuasions had failed, where the memory of that journey through Royalist France had yet left him doubting, the incidents of the last few days had clinched the matter once for all. Barebone was going back to France. He moved as if to stretch his limbs and lay down once more, with his shoulders against the rail and his elbow covering the stanchion round which the dinghy's painter was made fast. The proper place for the dinghy was on deck should the breeze freshen. Barebone knew that as well as the French Captain of the “Petite Jeanne.” For seamanship is like music--it is independent of language or race. There is only one right way and one wrong way at sea, all the world over. The dinghy was only towing behind while the fog continued to be impenetrable. At any moment the Captain might give the order to bring it inboard. At any moment Barebone might have to make a dash for the boat. He watched the Captain, who continued to steer in silence. To drift on the tide in a fog is a very different thing to sailing through it at ten miles an hour on a strong breeze, and the steersman had no thought to spare for anything but his sails. Two men were keeping the look-out in the bows. Another--the leadsman--was standing amidships peering over the side into the mist. Still Barebone waited. Captain Clubbe had taught him that most difficult art--to select with patience and a perfect judgment the right moment. The “Petite Jeanne” was rustling through the glassy water northward toward Farlingford. At a word from the Captain the man who had been heaving the lead came aft to the ship's bell and struck ten quick strokes. He waited and repeated the warning, but no one answered. They were alone in these shallow channels. Fortunately the man faced forward, as sailors always do by instinct, turning his back upon the Captain and Barebone. The painter was cast off now and, under his elbow, Barebone was slowly hauling in. The dinghy was heavy and the “Petite Jeanne” was moving quickly through the water. Suddenly Barebone rose to his feet, hauled in hand over hand, and when the dinghy was near enough, leaped across two yards of water to her gunwale. The Captain heard the thud of his feet on the thwart, and looking back over his shoulder saw and understood in a flash of thought. But even then he did not understand that Loo was aught else but a landsman half-recovered from seasickness. He understood it a minute later, however, when the brown sail ran up the mast and, holding the tiller between his knees, Barebone hauled in the sheet hand over hand and steered a course out to sea. He looked back over the foot of the sail and waved his hand. “Sans rancune!” he shouted. “C'est entendu!” The Captain's own words. The “Petite Jeanne” was already round to the wind, and the Captain was bellowing to his crew to trim the sails. It could scarcely be a chase, for the huge deep-sea fishing-boat could sail half as fast again as her own dinghy. The Captain gave his instructions with all the quickness of his race, and the men were not slow to carry them out. The safe-keeping of the prisoner had been made of personal advantage to each member of the crew. The Captain hailed Barebone with winged words which need not be set down here, and explained to him the impossibility of escape. “How can you--a landsman,” he shouted, “hope to get away from us? Come back and it shall be as you say, 'sans rancune.' Name of God! I bear you no ill-will for making the attempt.” They were so close together that all on board the “Petite Jeanne” could see Barebone laugh and shake his head. He knew that there was no gun on board the fishing-boat. The lugger rushed on, sailing quicker, lying up closer to the wind. She was within twenty yards of the little boat now--would overhaul her in a minute. But in an instant Barebone was round on the other tack, and the Captain swore aloud, for he knew now that he was not dealing with a landsman. The “Petite Jeanne” spun round almost as quickly, but not quite. Every time that Barebone put about, the “Petite Jeanne” must perforce do the same, and every time she lost a little in the manoeuvre. On a long tack or running before the wind the bigger boat was immeasurably superior. Barebone had but one chance--to make short tacks--and he knew it. The Captain knew it also, and no landsman would have possessed the knowledge. He was trying to run the boat down now. Barebone might succeed in getting far enough away to be lost in the fog. But in tacking so frequently he was liable to make a mistake. The bigger boat was not so likely to miss stays. He passed so close to her that he could read the figures cut on her stern-post indicating her draught of water. There was another chance. The “Petite Jeanne” was drawing six feet; the dinghy could sail across a shoal covered by eighteen inches of water. But such a shoal would be clearly visible on the surface of the water. Besides, there was no shallow like that nearer than the Goodwins. Barebone pressed out seaward. He knew every channel and every bank between the Thames and Thorpeness. He kept on pressing out to sea by short tacks. All the while he was peeping over the gunwale out of the corner of his eye. He was near, he must be near, a bank covered by five feet of water at low tide. A shoal of five feet is rarely visible on the surface. Suddenly he rose from his seat on the gunwale, and stood with the tiller in one hand and the sheet in the other, half turning back to look at “Petite Jeanne” towering almost over him. And as he looked, her bluff black bows rose upward with an odd climbing movement like a horse stepping up a bank. With a rattle of ropes and blocks she stood still. Barebone went about again and sailed past her. “Sans rancune!” he shouted. But no one heeded him, for they had other matters to attend to. And the dinghy sailed into the veil of the mist toward the land.

26

RETURNED EMPTY

The breeze freshened, and, as was to be expected, blew the fog-bank away before sunset. Sep Marvin had been an unwilling student all day. Like many of his cloth and generation, Parson Marvin pinned all his faith on education. “Give a boy a good education,” he said, a hundred times. “Make a gentleman of him, and you have done your duty by him.” “Make a gentleman of him--and the world will be glad to feed and clothe him,” was the real thought in his mind, as it was in the mind of nearly all his contemporaries. The wildest dreamer of those days never anticipated that, in the passage of one brief generation, social advancement should be for the shrewdly ignorant rather than for the scholar: that it would be better for a man that his mind be stored with knowledge of the world than the wisdom of the classics: that the successful grocer might find a kinder welcome in a palace than the scholar: that the manufacturer of kitchen utensils might feed with kings and speak to them, without aspirates, between the courses. Parson Marvin knew none of these things, however; nor suspected that the advance of civilisation is not always progressive, but that she may take hands with vulgarity and dance down-hill, as she does to-day. His one scheme of life for Sep was that he should be sent to the ancient school where field-sports are cultivated to-day and English gentlemen turned upon the world more ignorant than any other gentlemen in the universe. Then, of course, Sep must go to that College with which his father's life had been so closely allied. And if it please God to call him to the Church, and the College should remember that it had given his father a living, and do the same by him--for that reason and no other--then, of course, Sep would be a made man. And the making of Sep had been in progress during the winter day that a fog-bank came in from the North Sea and clung tenaciously to the low, surfless coast. In the afternoon the sun broke through at last, wintry and pale. Sep, who, by some instinct--the instinct, it is to be supposed, of young animals--knew that he was destined to be of a generation that should cultivate ignorance out of doors, rather than learning by the fireside, threw aside his books and cried out that he could no longer breathe in his father's study. So Paid Marvin went off, alone, to visit a distant parishioner--one who was dying by himself out on the marsh, in a cottage cut off from all the world in a spring tide. “Don't forget that it is high tide at five o'clock, and that there is no moon, and that the dykes will be full. You will never find your way across the marsh after dark,” said Sep--the learned in tides and those practical affairs of nature, which were as a closed book to the scholar. Parson Marvin vaguely acknowledged the warning and went away, leaving Sep to accompany Miriam on her daily errand to the simple shops in Farlingford, which would awake to life and business now that the sea-fog was gone. For the men of Farlingford, like nearly all seafarers, are timorous of bad weather on shore and sit indoors during its passage, while they treat storm and rain with a calm contempt at sea. “Sail a-coming up the river, master,” River Andrew said to Sep, who was awaiting Miriam in the village street, and he walked on, without further comment, spade on shoulder, toward the church-yard, where he spent a portion of his day, without apparent effect. So, when Miriam had done her shopping, it was only natural that they should turn their footsteps toward the quay and the river-wall. Or was it fate? So often is the natural nothing but the inevitable in holiday garb. “That is no Farlingford boat,” said Sep, versed in riverside knowledge, so soon as he saw the balance-lug moving along the line of the river-wall, half a mile below the village. They stood watching. Few coasters were at sea in these months of wild weather, and there was nothing moving on the quay. The moss-grown slip-way, where “The Last Hope” had been drawn up for repair, stood gaunt and empty, half submerged by the flowing tide. Many Farlingford men were engaged in the winter fisheries on the Dogger, and farther north, in Lowestoft boats. In winter, Farlingford--thrust out into the North Sea, surrounded by marsh--is forgotten by the world. The solitary boat came round the corner into the wider sheet of water, locally known as Quay Reach. “A foreigner!” cried Sep, jumping, as was his wont, from one foot to the other with excitement. “It is like the boat that was brought up by the tide, with a dead man in it, long ago. And that was a Belgian boat.” Miriam was looking at the boat with a sudden brightness in her eyes, a rush of colour to her cheeks, which were round and healthy and of that soft clear pink which marks a face swept constantly by mist and a salty air. In flat countries, where men may see each other, unimpeded by hedge or tree or hillock, across a space measured only by miles, the eye is soon trained--like the sailor's eye--to see and recognise at a great distance. There was no mistaking the attitude of the solitary steersman of this foreign boat stealing quietly up to Farlingford on the flood tide. It was Loo Barebone sitting on the gunwale as he always sat, with one knee raised on the thwart, to support his elbow, and his chin in the palm of his hand, so that he could glance up the head of the sail or ahead, without needing to change his position. Sep turned and looked up at her. “I thought you said he was never coming back,” he said, reproachfully. “So I did. I thought he was never coming back.” Sep looked at her again, and then at the boat. One never knows how much children, and dogs--who live daily with human beings--understand. “Your face is very red,” he observed. “That comes from telling untruths.” “It comes from the cold wind,” replied Miriam, with an odd, breathless laugh. “If we do not go home, he will be there before us,” said Sep, gravely. “He will make one tack across to the other side, and then make the mouth of the creek.” They turned and walked, side by side, on the top of the sea-wall toward the rectory. Their figures must have been outlined against the sky, for any watching from the river. The girl, tall and strong, walking with the ease that comes from health and a steadfast mind; the eager, restless boy running and jumping by her side. Barebone must have seen them as soon as they saw him. They were part of Farlingford, these two. He had a sudden feeling of having been away for years, with this difference--that he came back and found nothing changed. Whereas, in reality, he who returns after a long absence usually finds no one awaiting him. He did as Sep had foretold--crossing to the far side of the river, and then gaining the mouth of the creek in one tack. Miriam and Sep had reached the rectory garden first, and now stood waiting for him. He came on in silence. Last time--on “The Last Hope”--he had come up the river singing. Sep waved his hand, and, in response, Barebone nodded his head, with one eye peering ahead, for the breeze was fresh. The old chain was still there, imperfectly fastened round a tottering post at the foot of the tide-washed steps. It clinked as he made fast the boat. Miriam had not heard the sound of it since that night, long ago, when Loo had gone down the steps in the dark and cast off. “I was given a passage home in a French fishing-boat, and borrowed their dinghy to come ashore in,” said Loo, as he came up the steps. He knew that Farlingford would want some explanation, and that Sep would be proud to give it. An explanation is never the worse for a spice of truth. “Miriam told me you were never coming home again,” answered Sep, still nourishing that grievance. “Well, she was wrong, and here I am!” was Loo's reply, with his old, ready laugh. “And here is Farlingford--unchanged, and no harm done.” “Why should there be any harm done?” was Sep's prompt question. Barebone was shaking hands with Miriam. “Oh, I don't know,” he answered. “Because there always is harm done, I suppose.” Miriam was thinking that he had changed; that the man who had unmoored his boat at these steps six months ago had departed for ever, and that another had come back in his place. A minute later, as he turned to close the gate that shut off the rectory garden from the river-wall, chance ruled it that their eyes should meet for an instant, and she knew that he had not changed; that he might, perhaps, never change so long as he lived. She turned abruptly and led the way to the house. Sep had a hundred questions to ask, but only a few of them were personal. Children live in a world of their own, and are not slow to invite those whom they like to come to it, while to the others, they shut the door with a greater frankness than is permissible later in life. “Father,” he explained, “has gone to see old Doy, who is dying.” “Is he still dying? He will never die, I am sure; for he has been trying to do it ever since I remember,” laughed Barebone; who was interested, it seemed, in Sep's affairs, and never noticed that Miriam was walking more quickly than they were. “And I am rather anxious about him,” continued Sep, with the gravity that comes of a realised responsibility. “He moons along, you know, with his mind far away, and he doesn't know the path across the marsh a bit. He is bound to lose his way, and it is getting dark. Suppose I shall have to go and look for him.” “With a lantern,” suggested Loo, darkly, without looking toward Miriam. “Oh, yes!” replied Sep, with delight. “With a lantern, of course. Nobody but a fool would go out on to the marshes after dark without a lantern. The weed on the water makes it the same as the grass, and that old woman who was nearly drowned last winter, you know, she walked straight in, and thought it was dry land.” And Loo heard no more, for they were at the door; and Miriam, in the lighted hall, was waiting for them, with all the colour gone from her face. “He is sure to be in in a few minutes,” she said; for she had heard the end of their talk. She could scarcely have helped hearing Loo's weighty suggestion of a lantern, which had had the effect he must have anticipated. Sep was already hurriedly searching for matches. It would be difficult to dissuade him from his purpose. What boy would willingly give up the prospect of an adventure on the marsh alone, with a bull's-eye? Miriam tried, and tried in vain. She gained time, however, and was listening for Marvin's footstep on the gravel all the while. Sep found the matches--and it chanced that there was a sufficiency of oil in his lantern. He lighted up and went away, leaving an abominable smell of untrimmed wick behind him. It was tea-time, and, half a century ago, that meal was a matter of greater importance than it is to-day. A fire burned in the dining-room, glowing warmly on the mellow walls and gleaming furniture; but there was no lamp, nor need of one, in a room with large windows facing the sunset sky. Miriam led the way into this room, and lifted the shining, old-fashioned kettle to the hob. She took a chair that stood near, and sat, with her shoulder turned toward him, looking into the fire. “We will have tea as soon as they come in,” she said, in that voice of camaraderie which speaks of a life-long friendship between a man and a woman--if such a friendship be possible. Is it? --who knows? “They will not be long, I am sure. You will like tea, after having been so long abroad. It is one of the charms of coming home, or one of the alleviations. I don't know which. And now, tell me all that has happened since you went away--if you care to.”

27

OUT OF THE MOUTHS OF BABES

Miriam's manner toward him was the same as it had always been so long as he could remember. He had once thought--indeed, he had made to her the accusation--that she was always conscious of the social gulf existing between them; that she always remembered that she was by birth and breeding a lady, whereas he was the son of an obscure Frenchman who was nothing but a clockmaker whose name could be read (and can to this day be deciphered) on a hundred timepieces in remote East Anglian farms. Since his change of fortune he had, as all men who rise to a great height or sink to the depths will tell, noted a corresponding change in his friends. Even Captain Clubbe had altered, and the affection which peeped out at times almost against his puritanical will seemed to have suffered a chill. The men of Farlingford, and even those who had sailed in “The Last Hope” with him, seemed to hold him at a distance. They nodded to him with a brief, friendly smile, but were shy of shaking hands. The hand which they would have held out readily enough, had he needed assistance in misfortune, slunk hastily into a pocket. For he who climbs will lose more friends than the ne'er-do-well. Some may account this to human nature for righteousness and others quite the contrary: for jealousy, like love, lies hidden in unsuspected corners. Juliette de Gemosac had been quite different to Loo since learning his story. Miriam alone remained unchanged. He had accused her of failing to rise superior to arbitrary social distinctions, and now, standing behind her in the fire-lit dining-room of the rectory, he retracted that accusation once and for all time in his own heart, though her justification came from a contrary direction to that from which it might have been expected. Miriam alone remained a friend--and nothing else, he added, bitterly, in his own heart. And she seemed to assume that their friendship, begun in face of social distinctions, should never have to suffer from that burthen. “I should like to hear,” she repeated, seeing that he was silent, “all that has happened since you went away; all that you may care to tell me.” “My heritage, you mean?” She moved in her seat but did not look round. She had laid aside her hat on coming into the house, and as she sat, leaning forward with her hands clasped together in her lap, gazing thoughtfully at the fire which glowed blue and white for the salt water that was in the drift-wood, her hair, loosened by the wind, half concealed her face. “Yes,” she answered, slowly. “Do you know what it is--my heritage?” lapsing, as he often did when hurried by some pressing thought, into a colloquialism half French. She shook her head, but made no audible reply. “Do you suspect what it is?” he insisted. “I may have suspected, perhaps,” she admitted, after a pause. “When? How long?” She paused again. Quick and clever as he was, she was no less so. She weighed the question. Perhaps she found no answer to it, for she turned toward the door that stood open and looked out into the hall. The light of the lamp there fell for a moment across her face. “I think I hear them returning,” she said. “No,” he retorted, “for I should hear them before you did. I was brought up at sea. Do not answer the question, however, if you would rather not. You ask what has happened since I went away. A great many things have happened which are of no importance. Such things always happen, do they not? But one night, when we were quarrelling, Dormer Colville mentioned your name. He was very much alarmed and very angry, so he perhaps spoke the truth--by accident. He said that you had always known that I might be the King of France. Many things happened, as I tell you, which are of no importance, and which I have already forgotten, but that I remember and always shall.” “I have always known,” replied Miriam, “that Mr. Dormer Colville is a liar. It is written on his face, for those who care to read.” A woman at bay is rarely merciful. “And I thought for an instant,” pursued Loo, “that such a knowledge might have been in your mind that night, the last I was here, last summer, on the river-wall. I had a vague idea that it might have influenced in some way the reply you gave me then.” He had come a step nearer and was standing over her. She could hear his hurried breathing. “Oh, no,” she replied, in a calm voice full of friendliness. “You are quite wrong. The reason I gave you still holds good, and--and always will.” In the brief silence that followed this clear statement of affairs, they both heard the rattle of the iron gate by the seawall. Sep and his father were coming. Loo turned to look toward the hall and the front door, dimly visible in the shadow of the porch. While he did so Miriam passed her hand quickly across her face. When Loo turned again and glanced down at her, her attitude was unchanged. “Will you look at me and say that again?” he asked, slowly. “Certainly,” she replied. And she rose from her chair. She turned and faced him with the light of the hall-lamp upon her. She was smiling and self-confident. “I thought,” he said, looking at her closely, “as I stood behind you, that there were tears in your eyes.” She went past him into the hall to meet Sep and his father, who were already on the threshold. “It must have been the firelight,” she said to Barebone as she passed him. A minute later Septimus Marvin was shaking him by the hand with a vague and uncertain but kindly grasp. “Sep came running to tell me that you were home again,” he said, struggling out of his overcoat. “Yes--yes. Home again to the old place. And little changed, I can see. Little changed, my boy. Tempora mutantur, eh? and we mutamur in illis. But you are the same.” “Of course. Why should I change? It is too late to change for the better now.” “Never! Never say that. But we do not want you to change. We looked for you to come in a coach-and-four--did we not, Miriam? For I suppose you have secured your heritage, since you are here again. It is a great thing to possess riches--and a great responsibility. Come, let us have tea and not think of such things. Yes--yes. Let us forget that such a thing as a heritage ever came between us--eh, Miriam?” And with a gesture of old-world politeness he stood aside for his niece to pass first into the dining-room, whither a servant had preceded them with a lamp. “It will not be hard to do that,” replied Miriam, steadily, “because he tells me that he has not yet secured it.” “All in good time--all in good time,” said Marvin, with that faith in some occult power, seemingly the Government and Providence working in conjunction, to which parsons and many women confide their worldly affairs and sit with folded hands. He asked many questions which were easy enough to answer; for he had no worldly wisdom himself, and did not look for it in other people. And then he related his own adventure--the great incident of his life--his visit to Paris. “A matter of business,” he explained. “Some duplicates--one or two of my prints which I had decided to part with. Miriam also wished me to see into some small money matters of her own. Her guardian, John Turner, you may remember, resides in Paris. A schoolfellow of my own, by the way. But our ways diverged later in life. I found him unchanged--a kind heart--always a kind heart. He attempts to conceal it, as many do, under a flippant, almost a profane, manner of speech. Brutum fulmen. But I saw through it--I saw through it.” And the rector beamed on Loo through his spectacles with an innocent delight in a Christian charity which he mistook for cunning. “You see,” he went on, “we have spent a little money on the rectory. To-morrow you will see that we have made good the roof of the church. One could not ask the villagers to contribute, knowing that the children want boots and scarcely know the taste of jam. Yes, John Turner was very kind to me. He found me a buyer for one of my prints.” The rector broke off with a sharp sigh and drank his tea. “We shall never miss it,” he added, with the hopefulness of those who can blind themselves to facts. “Come, tell me your impressions of France.” “I have been there before,” replied Loo, with a curtness so unusual as to make Miriam glance at him. “I have been there before, you know. It would be more interesting to hear your own impressions, which must be fresher.” Miriam knew that he did not want to speak of France, and wondered why. But Marvin, eager to talk of his favourite study, seized the suggestion in all innocence. He had gone to Paris as he had wandered through life, with the mind of a child, eager, receptive, open to impression. Such minds pass by much that is of value, but to one or two conclusions they bring a perceptive comprehension which is photographic in its accuracy. “I have followed her history with unflagging interest since boyhood,” he said, “but never until now have I understood France. I walked through the streets of Paris and I looked into the faces of the people, and I realised that the astonishing history of France is true. One can see it in those faces. The city is brilliant, beautiful, unreal. The reality is in the faces of the people. Do you remember what Wellington said of them half a century ago? 'They are ripe,' he said, 'for another Napoleon.' But he could not see that Napoleon on the political horizon. And that is what I saw in their faces. They are ripe for something--they know not what.” “Did John Turner tell you that?” asked Loo, in an eager voice. “He who has lived in Paris all his life?” And Miriam caught the thrill of excitement in the voice that put this question. She glanced at Loo. His eyes were bright and his cheeks colourless. She knew that she was in the presence of some feeling that she did not understand. It was odd that an old scholar, knowing nothing but history, could thus stir a listener whose touch had hitherto only skimmed the surface of life. “No,” answered Marvin, with assurance. “I saw it myself in their faces. Ah! if another such as Napoleon could only arise--such as he, but different. Not an adventurer, but a King and the descendant of Kings--not allied, as Napoleon was, with a hundred other adventurers.” “Yes,” said Loo, in a muffled voice, looking away toward the fire. “A King whose wife should be a Queen,” pursued the dreamer. “Yes,” said Loo again, encouragingly. “They could save France,” concluded Marvin, taking off his spectacles and polishing them with a silk handkerchief. Loo turned and looked at him, for the action so characteristic of a mere onlooker indicated that the momentary concentration of a mind so stored with knowledge that confusion reigned there was passing away. “From what?” asked Loo. “Save France from what?” “From inevitable disaster, my boy,” replied Marvin, gravely. “That is what I saw in those gay streets.” Loo glanced at him sharply. He had himself seen the same all through those provinces which must take their cue from Paris whether they will or no. “What a career!” murmured Marvin. “What a mission for a man to have in life--to save France! One does not like to think of the world without a France to lead it in nearly everything, or with a France, a mere ghost of her former self, exploited, depleted by another Bonaparte. And we must look in vain for that man as did the good Duke years ago.” “I should like to have a shot at it,” put in Sep, who had just despatched a large piece of cake. “Heaven forbid!” exclaimed his father, only half in jest. “Better sit all day under the lee of a boat and make nets, like Sea Andrew,” advised Loo, with a laugh. “Do you think so?” said Miriam, without looking up. “All the same, I'd like to have a shot at it,” persisted Sep. “Pass the cake, please.” Loo had risen and was looking at the clock. His face was drawn and tired and his eyes grave. “You will come in and see us as often as you can while you are here?” said the kindly rector, as if vaguely conscious of a change in this visitor. “You will always find a welcome whether you come in a coach-and-four or on foot--you know that.” “Thank you--yes. I know that.” The rector peered at him through his spectacles. “I hope,” he said, “that you will soon be successful in getting your own. You are worried about it, I fear. The responsibilities of wealth, perhaps. And yet many rich people are able to do good in the world, and must therefore be happy.” “I do not suppose I shall ever be rich,” said Loo, with a careless laugh. “No, perhaps not. But let us hope that all will be for the best. You must not attach too much importance to what I said about France, you know. I may be wrong. Let us hope I am. For I understand that your heritage is there.” “Yes,” answered Loo, who was shaking hands with Sep and Miriam, “my heritage is there.” “And you will go back to France?” inquired Marvin, holding out his hand. “Yes,” was the reply, with a side glance in the direction of Miriam. “I shall go back to France.”

28

BAREBONE'S PRICE

At Farlingford, forgotten of the world, events move slowly and men's minds assimilate change without shock. Old people look for death long before it arrives, so that when at last the great change comes it is effected quite calmly. There is no indecent haste, no scrambling to put a semblance of finish to the incomplete, as there is in the hurried death of cities. Young faces grow softly mellow without those lines and anxious crow's-feet that mar the features of the middle-aged, who, to earn their daily bread or to kill the tedium of their lives, find it necessary to dwell in streets. “Loo's home again,” men told each other at “The Black Sailor”; and the women, who discussed the matter in the village street, had little to add to this bare piece of news. There was nothing unusual about it. Indeed, it was customary for Farlingford men to come home again. They always returned, at last, from wide wanderings, which a limited conversational capacity seemed to deprive of all interest. Those that stayed at home learnt a few names, and that was all. “Where are ye now from, Willum?” the newly returned sailor would be kindly asked, with the sideward jerk of the head. “A'm now from Valparaiso.” And that was all that there was to be said about Valparaiso and the experiences of this circumnavigator. Perhaps it was not considered good form to inquire further into that which was, after all, his own business. If you ask an East Anglian questions he will tell you nothing; if you do not inquire he will tell you less. No one, therefore, asked Barebone any questions. More especially is it considered, in seafaring communities, impolite to make inquiry into your neighbour's misfortune. If a man have the ill luck to lose his ship, he may well go through the rest of his life without hearing the mention of her name. It was understood in Farlingford that Loo Barebone had resigned his post on “The Last Hope” in order to claim a heritage in France. He had returned home, and was living quietly at Maidens Grave Farm with Mrs. Clubbe. It was, therefore, to be presumed that he had failed in his quest. This was hardly a matter for surprise to such as had inherited from their forefathers a profound distrust in Frenchmen. The brief February days followed each other with that monotony, marked by small events, that quickly lays the years aside. Loo lingered on, with a vague indecision in his mind which increased as the weeks passed by and the spell of the wide marsh-lands closed round his soul. He took up again those studies which the necessity of earning a living had interrupted years before, and Septimus Marvin, who had never left off seeking, opened new historical gardens to him and bade him come in and dig. Nearly every morning Loo went to the rectory to look up an obscure reference or elucidate an uncertain period. Nearly every evening, after the rectory dinner, he returned the books he had borrowed, and lingered until past Sep's bedtime to discuss the day's reading. Septimus Marvin, with an enthusiasm which is the reward of the simple-hearted, led the way down the paths of history while Loo and Miriam followed--the man with the quick perception of his race, the woman with that instinctive and untiring search for the human motive which can put heart into a printed page of history. Many a whole lifetime has slipped away in such occupations; for history, already inexhaustible, grows in bulk day by day. Marvin was happier than he had ever been, for a great absorption is one of Heaven's kindest gifts. For Barebone, France and his quest there, the Marquis de Gemosac, Dormer Colville, Juliette, lapsed into a sort of dream, while Farlingford remained a quiet reality. Loo had not written to Dormer Colville. Captain Clubbe was trading between Alexandria and Bristol. “The Last Hope” was not to be expected in England before April. To communicate with Colville would be to turn that past dream, not wholly pleasant, into a grim reality. Loo therefore put off from day to day the evil moment. By nature and by training he was a man of action. He tried to persuade himself that he was made for a scholar and would be happy to pass the rest of his days in the study of that history which had occupied Septimus Marvin's thoughts during a whole lifetime. Perhaps he was right. He might have been happy enough to pass his days thus if life were unchanging; if Septimus Marvin should never age and never die; if Miriam should be always there, with her light touch on the deeper thoughts, her half-French way of understanding the unspoken, with her steady friendship which might change, some day, into something else. This was, of course, inconsistent. Love itself is the most inconsistent of all human dreams; for it would have some things change and others remain ever as they are. Whereas nothing stays unchanged for a single day: love, least of all. For it must go forward or back. “See!” cried Septimus Marvin, one evening, laying his hand on the open book before him. “See how strong are racial things. Here are the Bourbons for ever shutting their eyes to the obvious, for ever putting off the evil moment, for ever temporising--from father to son, father to son; generation after generation. Finally we come to Louis XVI. Read his letters to the Comte d'Artois. They are the letters of a man who knows the truth in his own heart and will not admit it even to himself.” “Yes,” admitted Loo. “Yes--you are right. It is racial, one must suppose.” And he glanced at Miriam, who did not meet his eyes but looked at the open page, with a smile on her lips half sad, wholly tolerant. Next morning, Loo thought, he would write to Dormer Colville. But the following evening came, and he had not done so. He went, as usual, to the rectory, where the same kind welcome awaited him. Miriam knew that he had not written. Like him, she knew that an end of some sort must soon come. And the end came an hour later. Some day, Barebone knew, Dormer Colville would arrive. Every morning he half looked for him on the seawall, between “The Black Sailor” and the rectory garden. Any evening, he was well aware, the smiling face might greet him in the lamp-lit drawing-room. Sep had gone to bed earlier that night. The rector was reading aloud an endless collection of letters, from which the careful student could scarcely fail to gather side-lights on history. Both Miriam and Loo heard the clang of the iron gate on the sea-wall. A minute or two later the old dog, who lived mysteriously in the back premises, barked, and presently the servant announced that a gentleman was desirous of speaking to the rector. There were not many gentlemen within a day's walk of the rectory. Some one must have put up at “The Black Sailor.” Theoretically, the rector was at the call of any of his parishioners at all moments; but in practice the people of Farlingford never sought his help. “A gentleman,” said Marvin, vaguely; “well, let him come in, Sarah.” Miriam and Barebone sat silently looking at the door. But the man who appeared there was not Dormer Colville. It was John Turner. He evinced no surprise on seeing Barebone, but shook hands with him with a little nod of the head, which somehow indicated that they had business together. He accepted the chair brought forward by Marvin and warmed his hands at the fire, in no hurry, it would appear, to state the reason for this unceremonious call. After all, Marvin was his oldest friend and Miriam his ward. Between old friends, explanations are often better omitted. “It is many years,” he said, at length, “since I heard their talk. They speak with their tongues and their teeth, but not their lips.” “And their throats,” put in Marvin, eagerly. “That is because they are of Teuton descent. So different from the French, eh, Turner?” Turner nodded a placid acquiescence. Then he turned, as far, it would appear, as the thickness of his neck allowed, toward Barebone. “Saw in a French paper,” he said, “that the 'Petite Jeanne' had put in to Lowestoft, to replace a dinghy lost at sea. So I put two and two together. It is my business putting two and two together, and making five of them when I can, but they generally make four. I thought I should find you here.” Loo made no answer. He had only seen John Turner once in his life--for a short hour, in a room full of people, at Royan. The banker stared straight in front of him for a few moments. Then he raised his sleepy little eyes directly to Miriam's face. He heaved a sigh, and fell to studying the burning logs again. And the colour slowly rose to Miriam's cheeks. The banker, it seemed, was about his business again, in one of those simple addition sums, which he sometimes solved correctly. “To you,” he said, after a moment's pause, with a glance in Loo's direction, “to you, it must appear that I am interfering in what is not my own business. You are wrong there.” He had clasped his hands across his abnormal waistcoat, and he half closed his eyes as he blinked at the fire. “I am a sort of intermediary angel,” he went on, “between private persons in France and their friends in England. Nothing to do with state affairs, you understand; at least, very little. Many persons in England have relations or property in France. French persons fall in love with people on this side of the Channel, and vice versa. And, sooner or later, all these persons, who are in trouble with their property or their affections, come to me, because money is invariably at the bottom of the trouble. Money is invariably at the bottom of all trouble. And I represent money.” He pursed up his lips and gazed somnolently at the fire. “Ask anybody,” he went on, dreamily, after a pause, “if that is not the bare truth. Ask Colville, ask Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, ask Miriam Liston, sitting here beside us, if I exaggerate the importance of--of myself.” “Every one,” admitted Barebone, cheerfully, “knows that you occupy a great position in Paris.” Turner glanced at him and gave a thick chuckle in his throat. “Thank you,” he said. “Very decent of you. And that point being established, I will explain further, that I am not here of my own free will. I am only an agent. No man in his senses would come to Farlingford in mid-winter unless--” he broke off, with a sharp sigh, and glanced down at Miriam's slipper resting on the fender, “unless he was much younger than I am. I came because I was paid to do it. Came to make you a proposition.” “To make me a proposition?” inquired Loo, as the identity of Turner's hearers had become involved. “Yes. And I should recommend you to give it your gravest consideration. It is one of the most foolish propositions, from the proposer's point of view, that I have ever had to make: I should blush to make it, if it were any use blushing, but no one sees blushes on my cheeks now. Do not decide in a hurry--sleep on it. I always sleep on a question.” He closed his eyes, and seemed about to compose himself to slumber then and there. “I am no longer young,” he admitted, after a pause, “and therefore propose to take one of the few alleviations allowed to advancing years and an increasing avoirdupois. I am going to give you some advice. There is only one thing worth having in this life, and that is happiness. Even the possibility of it is worth all other possibilities put together. If a man have a chance of grasping happiness--I mean a home and the wife he wants.... and all that--he is wise to throw all other chances to the wind. Such, for instance, as the chance of greatness, of fame or wealth, of gratified vanity or satisfied ambition.” He had spoken slowly, and at last he ceased speaking, as if overcome by a growing drowsiness. A queer silence followed this singular man's words. Barebone had not resumed his seat. He was standing by the mantelpiece, as he often did, being quick and eager when interested, and not content to sit still and express himself calmly in words, but must needs emphasise his meaning by gestures and a hundred quick movements of the head. “Go on,” he said. “Let us have the proposition.” “And no more advice?” Loo glanced at Miriam. He could see all three faces where he stood, but only by the light of the fire. Miriam was nearest to the hearth. He could see that her eyes were aglow--possibly with anger. Barebone shrugged his shoulders. “You are not an agent--you are an advocate,” he said. Turner raised his eyes with the patience of a slumbering animal that has been prodded. “Yes,” he said--“your advocate. There is one more chance I should advise any man to shun--to cast to the four winds, and hold on only to that tangible possibility of happiness in the present--it is the chance of enjoying, in some dim and distant future, the satisfaction of having, in a half-forgotten past, done one's duty. One's first duty is to secure, by all legitimate means, one's own happiness.” “What is the proposition?” interrupted Barebone, quickly; and Turner, beneath his heavy lids, had caught in the passing the glance from Miriam's eyes, for which possibly both he and Loo Barebone had been waiting. “Fifty thousand pounds,” replied the banker, bluntly, “in first-class English securities, in return for a written undertaking on your part to relinquish all claim to any heritage to which you may think yourself entitled in France. You will need to give your word of honour never to set foot on French soil--and that is all.” “I never, until this moment,” replied Barebone, “knew the value of my own pretensions.” “Yes,” said Turner, quietly; “that is the obvious retort. And having made it, you can now give a few minutes' calm reflection to my proposition--say five minutes, until that clock strikes half-past nine--and then I am ready to answer any questions you may wish to ask.” Barebone laughed good-humouredly, and so far fell in with the suggestion that he leant his elbow on the corner of the mantelpiece, and looked at the clock.

29

IN THE DARK

Had John Turner been able to see round the curve of his own vast cheeks he might have perceived the answer to his proposition lurking in a little contemptuous smile at the corner of Miriam's closed lips. Loo saw it there, and turned again to the contemplation of the clock on the mantelpiece which had already given a preliminary click. Thus they waited until the minutes should elapse, and Turner, with a smile of simple pleasure at their ready acquiescence in his suggestion, probably reflected behind his vacuous face that silence rarely implies indecision. When at last the clock struck, Loo turned to him with a laugh and a shake of the head as if the refusal were so self-evident that to put it into words were a work of supererogation. “Who makes the offer?” he asked. Turner smiled on him with visible approbation as upon a quick and worthy foe who fought a capable fight with weapons above the board. “No matter--since you are disposed to refuse. The money is in my hands, as is the offer. Both are good. Both will hold good till to-morrow morning.” Septimus Marvin gave a little exclamation of approval. He had been sitting by the table looking from one to the other over his spectacles with the eager smile of the listener who understands very little, and while wishing that he understood more, is eager to put in a word of approval or disapprobation on safe and general lines. It was quite obvious to John Turner, who had entered the room in ignorance on this point, that Marvin knew nothing of Barebone's heritage in France while Miriam knew all. “There is one point,” he said, “which is perhaps scarcely worth mentioning. The man who makes the offer is not only the most unscrupulous, but is likely to become one of the most powerful men in Eur--men I know. There is a reverse side to the medal. There always is a reverse side to the good things of this world. Should you refuse his ridiculously generous offer you will make an enemy for life--one who is nearing that point where men stop at nothing.” Turner glanced at Miriam again. Her clean-cut features had a stony stillness and her eyes looked obstinately at the clock. The banker moved in his chair as if suddenly conscious that it was time to go. “Do not,” he said to Barebone, “be misled or mislead yourself into a false estimate of the strength of your own case. The offer I make you does not in any way indicate that you are in a strong position. It merely shows the indolence of a man naturally open-handed, who would always rather pay than fight.” “Especially if the money is not his own.” “Yes,” admitted Turner, stolidly, “that is so. Especially if the money is not his own. I dare say you know the weakness of your own case: others know it too. A portrait is not much to go on. Portraits are so easily copied; so easily changed.” He rose as he spoke and shook hands with Marvin. Then he turned to Miriam, but he did not meet her glance. Last of all he shook hands with Barebone. “Sleep on it,” he said. “Nothing like sleeping on a question. I am staying at 'The Black Sailor.' See you to-morrow.” He had come, had transacted his business and gone, all in less than an hour, with an extraordinary leisureliness almost amounting to indolence. He had lounged into the house, and now he departed without haste or explanation. Never hurry, never explain, was the text upon which John Turner seemed to base the sleepy discourse of his life. For each of us is a living sermon to his fellows, and, it is to be feared, the majority are warnings. Turner had dragged on his thick overcoat, not without Loo's assistance, and, with the collar turned up about his ears, he went out into the night, leaving the three persons whom he had found in the drawing-room standing in the hall looking at the door which he closed decisively behind him. “Seize your happiness while you can,” he had urged. “If not--” and the decisive closing of a door on his departing heel said the rest. The clocks struck ten. It was not worth while going back to the drawing-room. All Farlingford was abed in those days by nine o'clock. Barebone took his coat and prepared to follow Turner. Miriam was already lighting her bedroom candle. She bade the two men good night and went slowly upstairs. As she reached her own room she heard the front door closed behind Loo and the rattle of the chain under the uncertain fingers of Septimus Marvin. The sound of it was like the clink of that other chain by which Barebone had made fast his boat to the tottering post on the river-wall. Miriam's room was at the front of the house, and its square Georgian windows faced eastward across the river to the narrow spit of marsh-land and the open sea beyond it. A crescent of moon far gone on the wane, yellow and forlorn, was rising from the sea. An uncertain path of light lay across the face of the far-off tide-way--broken by a narrow strip of darkness and renewed again close at hand across the wide river almost to the sea-wall beneath the window. From this window no house could be seen by day--nothing but a vast expanse of water and land hardly less level and unbroken. No light was visible on sea or land now, nothing but the waning moon in a cold clear sky. Miriam threw herself, all dressed, on her bed with the abandonment of one who is worn out by some great effort, and buried her face in the pillow. Barebone's way lay to the left along the river-wall by the side of the creek. Turner had gone to the right, taking the path that led down the river to the old quay and the village. Whereas Barebone must turn his back on Farlingford to reach the farm which still crouches behind a shelter of twisted oaks and still bears the name of Maiden's Grave; though the name is now nothing but a word. For no one knows who the maiden was, or where her grave, or what brought her to it. The crescent moon gave little light, but Loo knew his way beneath the stunted cedars and through the barricade of ilex drawn round the rectory on the northern side. His eyes, trained to darkness, saw the shadowy form of a man awaiting him beneath the cedars almost as soon as the door was closed. He went toward him, perceiving with a sudden misgiving that it was not John Turner. A momentary silhouette against the northern sky showed that it was Colville, come at last. “Quick--this way!” he whispered, and taking Barebone's arm he led him through the bushes. He halted in a little open space between the ilex and the river-wall, which is fifteen feet high at the meeting of the creek and the larger stream. “There are three men, who are not Farlingford men, on the outer side of the sea-wall below the rectory landing. Turner must have placed them there. I'll be even with him yet. There is a large fishing-smack lying at anchor inside the Ness--just across the marsh. It is the 'Petite Jeanne.' I found this out while you were in there. I could hear your voices.” “Could you hear what he said?” “No,” answered Colville, with a sudden return to his old manner, easy and sympathetic. “No--this is no time for joking, I can tell you that. You have had a narrow escape, I assure you, Barebone. That man, the Captain of the 'Petite Jeanne,' is well known. There are plenty of people in France who want to get quietly rid of some family encumbrance--a man in the way, you understand, a son too many, a husband too much, a stepson who will inherit--the world is full of superfluities. Well, the Captain of the 'Petite Jeanne' will take them a voyage for their health to the Iceland fisheries. They are so far and so remote--the Iceland fisheries. The climate is bad and accidents happen. And if the 'Petite Jeanne' returns short-handed, as she often does, the other boats do the same. It is only a question of a few entries in the custom-house books at Fecamp. Do you see?” “Yes,” admitted Barebone, thoughtfully. “I see.” “I suppose it suggested itself to you when you were on board, and that is why you took the first chance of escape.” “Well, hardly; but I escaped, so it does not matter.” “No,” acquiesced Colville. “It doesn't matter. But how are we to get out of this? They are waiting for us under the sea-wall. Is there a way across the marsh?” “Yes--I know a way. But where do you want to go to-night?” “Out of this,” whispered Colville, eagerly. “Out of Farlingford and Suffolk before the morning if we can. I tell you there is a French gunboat at Harwich, and another in the North Sea. It may be chance and it may not. But I suspect there is a warrant out against you. And, failing that, there is the 'Petite Jeanne' hanging about waiting to kidnap you a second time. And Turner's at the bottom of it, damn him!” Again Dormer Colville allowed a glimpse to appear of another man quite different from the easy, indolent man-of-the-world, the well-dressed adventurer of a day when adventure was mostly sought in drawing-rooms, when scented and curled dandies were made or marred by women. For a moment Colville was roused to anger and seemed capable of manly action. But in an instant the humour passed and he shrugged his shoulders and gave a short, indifferent laugh beneath his breath. “Come,” he said, “lead the way and I will follow. I have been out here since eight o'clock and it is deucedly cold. I followed Turner from Paris, for I knew he was on your scent. Once across the marsh we can talk without fear as we go along.” Barebone obeyed mechanically, leading the way through the bushes to the kitchen-garden and over an iron fencing on to the open marsh. This stretched inland for two miles without a hedge or other fence but the sunken dykes which intersected it across and across. Any knowing his way could save two miles on the longer way by the only road connecting Farlingford with the mainland and tapping the great road that runs north and south a few miles inland. There was no path, for few ever passed this way. By day, a solitary shepherd watched his flocks here. By night the marsh was deserted. Across some of the dykes a plank is thrown, the whereabouts of which is indicated by a post, waist-high, driven into the ground, easily enough seen by day, but hard to find after dark. Not all the dykes have a plank, and for the most part the marsh is divided into squares, each only connected at one point with its neighbour. Barebone knew the way as well as any in Farlingford, and he struck out across the thick grass which crunched briskly under the foot, for it was coated with rime, and the icy wind blew in from the sea a freezing mist. Once or twice Barebone, having made a bee-line across from dyke to dyke, failed to strike the exact spot where the low post indicated a plank, and had to pause and stoop down so as to find its silhouette against the sky. When they reached a plank he tried its strength with one foot and then led the way across it, turning and waiting at the far end for Colville to follow. It was unnecessary to warn him against a slip, for the plank was no more than nine inches wide and shone white with rime. Each foot must be secure before its fellow was lifted. Colville, always ready to fall in with a companion's humour, ever quick to understand the thoughts of others, respected his silence. Perhaps he was not far from guessing the cause of it. Loo was surprised to find that Dormer Colville was less antipathetic than he had anticipated. For the last month, night and day, he had dreaded Colville's arrival, and now that he was here he was almost glad to see him; almost glad to quit Farlingford. And his heart was hot with anger against Miriam. Turner's offer had at all events been worth considering. Had he been alone when it was made he would certainly have considered it; he would have turned it this way and that. He would have liked to play with it as a cat plays with a mouse, knowing all the while that he must refuse in the end. Perhaps Turner had made the offer in Miriam's presence, expecting to find in her a powerful ally. It was only natural for him to think this. Ever since the beginning, men have assigned to women the role of the dissuader, the drag, the hinderer. It is always the woman, tradition tells us, who persuades the man to be a coward, to stay at home, to shirk a difficult or a dangerous duty. As a matter of fact, Turner had made this mistake. He had always wondered why Miriam Liston elected to live at Farlingford when with her wealth and connections, both in England and France, she might live a gayer life elsewhere. There must, he reflected, be some reason for it. When whosoever does anything slightly unconventional or leaves undone what custom and gossip make almost obligatory, a relation or a mere interfering neighbour is always at hand to wag her head and say there must be some reason for it. Which means, of course, one specific reason. And the worst of it is that she is nearly always right. John Turner, laboriously putting two small numerals together, after his manner, had concluded that Loo Barebone was the reason. Even banking may, it seems, be carried on without the loss of all human weakness, especially if the banker be of middle age, unmarried, and deprived by an unromantic superfluity of adipose tissue of the possibility of living through a romance of his own. Turner had consented to countenance, if not actually to take part in, a nefarious scheme, to rid France and the present government of one who might easily bring about its downfall, on certain conditions. Knowing quite well that Loo Barebone could take care of himself at sea, and was quite capable of effecting an escape if he desired it, he had put no obstacle in the way of the usual voyage to the Iceland fisheries. Since those days many governments in France have invented many new methods of disposing of a political foe. Dormer Colville was only anticipating events when he took away the character of the Captain of the “Petite Jeanne.” Turner had himself proposed this alternative method of securing Barebone's silence. He had even named the sum. He had seized the excellent opportunity of laying it before Barebone in the quiet intimacy of the rectory drawing-room with Miriam in the soft lamp-light beside him, with the scent of the violets at her breast mingling with the warm smell of the wood fire. And Barebone had laughed at the offer.

30

IN THE FURROW AGAIN

Turner, stumbling along the road to “The Black Sailor,” probably wondered why he had failed. It is to be presumed that he knew that the ally he had looked to for powerful aid had played him false at the crucial moment. His misfortune is common to all men who presume to take anything for granted from a woman. Barebone, stumbling along in the dark in another direction, was as angry with Miriam as she in her turn was angry with Turner. She was, Barebone reflected, so uncompromising. She saw her course so clearly, so unmistakably--as birds that fly in the night--and from that course nothing, it seemed, would move her. It was a question of temperament and not of principle. For, even half a century ago, high principles were beginning to go out of fashion in the upper strata of a society which in these days tolerates anything except cheating at games. Barebone himself was of a different temperament. He liked to blind himself to the inevitable end, to temporise with the truth, whereas Miriam, with a sort of dogged courage essentially English, perceived the hard truth at once and clung to it, though it hurt. And all the while Barebone knew at the back of his heart that his life was not his own to shape. At the end, says an Italian motto, stands Destiny. Barebone wanted to make believe; he wanted to pretend that his path lay down a flowery way, knowing all the while that he had a hill to climb and Destiny stood at the top. Colville had come at the right time. It is the fate of some men to come at the right moment, just as it is the lot of others never to be there when they are wanted and their place is filled by a bystander and an opportunity is gone for ever. Which is always a serious matter, for God only gives one or two opportunities to each of us. Colville had come with his ready sympathy, not expressed as the world expresses its sympathy, in words, but by a hundred little self-abnegations. He was always ready to act up to the principles of his companion for the moment or to act up to no principles at all should that companion be deficient. Moreover, he never took it upon himself to judge others, but extended to his neighbour a large tolerance, in return for which he seemed to ask nothing. “I have a carriage,” he said, when on a broader cart-track they could walk side by side, “waiting for me at the roadside inn at the junction of the two roads. The man brought me from Ipswich to the outskirts of Farlingford, and I sent him back to the high road to wait for me there, to put up and stay all night, if necessary.” Barebone was beginning to feel tired. The wind was abominably cold. He heard with satisfaction that Colville had as usual foreseen his wishes. “I dogged Turner all the way from Paris, hardly letting him out of my sight,” Colville explained, cheerily, when they at length reached the road. “It is easy enough to keep in touch with one so remarkably stout, for every one remembers him. What did he come to Farlingford for?” “Apparently to try and buy me off.” “For Louis Bonaparte?” “He did not say so.” “No,” said Colville. “He would not say so. But it is pretty generally suspected that he is in that galley, and pulls an important oar in it, too. What did he offer you?” “Fifty thousand pounds.” “Whew!” whistled Colville. He stopped short in the middle of the road. “Whew!” he repeated, thoughtfully, “fifty thousand pounds! Gad! They must be afraid of you. They must think that we are in a strong position. And what did you say, Barebone?” “I refused.” “Why?” Barebone paused, and after a moment's thought made no answer at all. He could not explain to Dormer Colville his reason for refusing. “Outright?” inquired Colville, deep in thought. “Yes.” Colville turned and glanced at him sideways, though it was too dark to see his face. “I should have thought,” he said, tentatively, after a while, “that it would have been wise to accept. A bird in the hand, you know--a damned big bird! And then afterwards you could see what turned up.” “You mean I could break my word later on,” inquired Barebone, with that odd downrightness which at times surprised Colville and made him think of Captain Clubbe. “Well, you know,” he explained, with a tolerant laugh, “in politics it often turns out that a man's duty is to break his word--duty toward his party, and his country, and that sort of thing.” Which was plausible enough, as many eminent politicians seem to have found in these later times. “I dare say it may be so,” answered Barebone, “but I refused outright, and there is an end to it.” For now that he was brought face to face with the situation, shorn of side issues and set squarely before him, he envisaged it clearly enough. He did not want fifty thousand pounds. He had only wanted the money for a moment because the thought leapt into his mind that fifty thousand pounds meant Miriam. Then he saw that little contemptuous smile tilting the corner of her lips, and he had no use for a million. If he could not have Miriam, he would be King of France. It is thus that history is made, for those who make it are only men. And Clio, that greatest of the daughters of Zeus, about whose feet cluster all the famous names of the makers of this world's story, has, after all, only had the reversion of the earth's great men. She has taken them after some forgotten woman of their own choosing has had the first refusal. Thus it came about that the friendship so nearly severed one evening at the Hotel Gemosac, in Paris, was renewed after a few months; and Barebone felt assured once more that no one was so well disposed toward him as Dormer Colville. There was no formal reconciliation, and neither deemed it necessary to refer to the past. Colville, it will be remembered, was an adept at that graceful tactfulness which is somewhat clumsily described by this tolerant generation as going on as if nothing had happened. By the time that the waning moon was high enough in the eastern sky to shed an appreciable light upon their path, they reached the junction of the two roads and set off at a brisk pace southward toward Ipswich. So far as the eye could reach, the wide heath was deserted, and they talked at their ease. “There is nothing for it but to wake up my driver and make him take us back to Ipswich to-night. To-morrow morning we can take train to London and be there almost as soon as John Turner realises that you have given him the slip,” said Colville, cheerily. “And then?” “And then back to France--where the sun shines, my friend, and the spring is already in the air. Think of that! It is so, at least, at Gemosac, for I heard from the Marquis before I quitted Paris. Your disappearance has nearly broken a heart or two down there, I can tell you. The old Marquis was in a great state of anxiety. I have never seen him so upset about anything, and Juliette did not seem to be able to offer him any consolation.” “Back to France?” echoed Barebone, not without a tone of relief, almost of exultation, in his voice. “Will it be possible to go back there, since we have to run away from Farlingford?” “Safer there than here,” replied Colville. “It may sound odd, but it is true. De Gemosac is one of the most powerful men in France--not intellectually, perhaps, but by reason of his great name--and they would not dare to touch a protege or a guest of his. If you go back there now you must stay at Gemosac; they have put the chateau into a more habitable condition, and are ready to receive you.” He turned and glanced at Loo's face in the moonlight. “There will be a difference, you understand. You will be a different person from what you were when last there,” he went on, in a muffled voice. “Yes, I understand,” replied Barebone, gravely. Already the dream was taking shape--Colville's persuasive voice had awakened him to find that it was no dream, but a reality--and Farlingford was fading back into the land of shadows. It was only France, after all, that was real. “That journey of ours,” explained Colville, vaguely, “has made an extraordinary difference. The whole party is aroused and in deadly earnest now.” Barebone made no answer, and they walked on in meditative silence toward the roadside inn, which stood up against the southern sky a few hundred yards ahead. “In fact,” Colville added, after a silence, “the ball is at your feet, Barebone. There can be no looking back now.” And again Barebone made no answer. It was a tacit understanding, then. For greater secrecy, Barebone walked on toward Ipswich alone, while Colville went into the inn to arouse his driver, whom he found slumbering in the wide chimney corner before a log fire. From Ipswich to London, and thus on to Newhaven, they journeyed pleasantly enough in company, for they were old companions of the road, and Colville's unruffled good humour made him an easy comrade for travel even in days when the idea of comfort reconciled with speed had not suggested itself to the mind of man. Such, indeed, was his foresight that he had brought with him to London, and there left awaiting further need of it, that personal baggage which Loo had perforce left behind him at the Hotel Gemosac in Paris. They made but a brief halt in London, where Colville admitted gaily that he had no desire to be seen. “I might meet my tailor in Piccadilly,” he said. “And there are others who may perhaps consider themselves aggrieved.” At Colville's club, where they dined, he met more than one friend. “Hallo!” said one who had the ruddy countenance and bluff manners of a retired major. “Hallo! Who'd have expected to see you here? I didn't know--I--thought--eh! dammy!” And a hundred facetious questions gleamed from the major's eye. “All right, my boy,” answered Colville, cheerfully. “I am off to France to-morrow morning.” The Major shook his head wisely as if in approval of a course of conduct savouring of that prudence which is the better part of valour, glanced at Loo Barebone, and waited in vain for an invitation to take a vacant chair near at hand. “Still in the south of France, I suppose?” “Still in the south of France,” replied Colville, turning to Barebone in a final way, which had the effect of dismissing this inquisitive idler. While they were at dinner another came. He was a raw-boned Scotchman, who spoke in broken English when the waiter was absent and in perfect French when that servitor hovered near. “I wish I could show my face in Paris,” he said, frankly, “but I can't. Too much mixed up with Louis Philippe to find favour in the eyes of the Prince President.” “Why?” asked Colville. “What could you gain by showing in Paris a face which I am sure has the stamp of innocence all over it?” The Scotchman laughed curtly. “Gain?” he answered. “Gain? I don't say I would, but I think I might be able to turn an honest penny out of the approaching events.” “What events?” “The Lord alone knows,” replied the Scotchman, who had never set foot in his country, but had acquired elsewhere the prudent habit of never answering a question. “France doesn't, I am sure of that. I am thinking there will be events, though, before long, Colville. Will there not, now?” Colville looked at him with an open smile. “You mean,” he said, slowly, “the Prince President.” “That is what he calls himself at present. I'm wondering how long. Eh! man. He is just pouring money into the country from here, from America, from Austria--from wherever he can get it.” “Why is he doing that?” “You must ask somebody who knows him better than I do. They say you knew him yourself once well enough, eh?” “He is not a man I have much faith in,” said Colville, vaguely. “And France has no faith in him at all.” “So I'm told. But France--well, does France know what she wants? She mostly wants something without knowing what it is. She is like a woman. It's excitement she wants, perhaps. And she will buy it at any cost, and then find afterward she has paid too dear for it. That is like a woman, too. But it isn't another Bonaparte she wants, I am sure of that.” “So am I,” answered Colville, with a side glance toward Barebone, a mere flicker of the eyelids. “Not unless it is a Napoleon of that ilk.” “And he is not,” completed Colville. . “But--” the Scotchman paused, for a waiter came at this moment to tell him that his dinner was ready at a table nearer to the fire. “But,” he went on, in French, for the waiter lingered, “but he might be able to persuade France that it is himself she wants--might he not, now? With money at the back of it, eh?” “He might,” admitted Colville, doubtfully. The Scotchman moved away, but came back again. “I am thinking,” he said, with a grim smile, “that like all intelligent people who know France, you are aware that it is a King she wants.” “But not an Orleans King,” replied Colville, with his friendly and indifferent laugh. The Scotchman smiled more grimly still and went away. He was seated too near for Colville and Loo to talk of him. But Colville took an opportunity to mention his name in an undertone. It was a name known all over Europe then, and forgotten now.

31

THE THURSDAY OF MADAME DE CHANTONNAY

“It is,” Madame de Chantonnay had maintained throughout the months of January and February--“it is an affair of the heart.” She continued to hold this opinion with, however, a shade less conviction, well into a cold March. “It is an affair of the heart, Abbe,” she said. “Allez! I know what I talk of. It is an affair of the heart and nothing more. There is some one in England: some blonde English girl. They are always washing, I am told. And certainly they have that air--like a garment that has been too often to the blanchisseuse and has lost its substance. A beautiful skin, I allow you. But so thin--so thin.” “The skin, madame?” inquired the Abbe Touvent, with that gentle and cackling humour in which the ordained of any Church may indulge after a good dinner. The Abbe Touvent had, as a matter of fact, been Madame de Chantonnay's most patient listener through the months of suspense that followed Loo Barebone's sudden disappearance. Needless to say he agreed ardently with whatever explanation she put forward. Old ladies who give good dinners to a Low Church British curate, or an abbe of the Roman confession, or, indeed, to the needy celibate exponents of any creed whatsoever, may always count upon the active conversational support of their spiritual adviser. And it is not only within the fold of Papacy that careful Christians find the road to heaven made smooth by the arts of an efficient cook. “You know well enough what I mean, malicious one,” retorted the lady, arranging her shawl upon her fat shoulders. “I always think,” murmured the Abbe, sipping his digestive glass of eau-de-vie d'Armagnac, which is better than any cognac of Charente--“I always think that to be thin shows a mean mind, lacking generosity.” “Take my word for it,” pursued Madame de Chantonnay, warming to her subject, “that is the explanation of the young man's disappearance. They say the government has taken some underhand way of putting him aside. One does not give credence to such rumours in these orderly times. No: it is simply that he prefers the pale eyes of some Mees to glory and France. Has it not happened before, Abbe?” “Ah! Madame--” another sip of Armagnac. “And will it not happen again? It is the heart that has the first word and the last. I know--I who address you, I know!” And she touched her breast where, very deeply seated it is to be presumed, she kept her own heart. “Ah! Madame. Who better?” murmured the Abbe. “Na, na!” exclaimed Madame de Chantonnay, holding up one hand, heavy with rings, while with the other she gathered her shawl closer about her as if for protection. “Now you tread on dangerous ground, wicked one--WICKED! And you so demure in your soutane!” But the Abbe only laughed and held up his small glass after the manner of any abandoned layman drinking a toast. “Madame,” he said, “I drink to the hearts you have broken. And now I go to arrange the card tables, for your guests will soon be coming.” It was, in fact, Madame de Chantonnay's Thursday evening to which were bidden such friends as enjoyed for the moment her fickle good graces. The Abbe Touvent was, so to speak, a permanent subscriber to these favours. The task was easy enough, and any endowed with a patience to listen, a readiness to admire that excellent young nobleman, Albert de Chantonnay, and the credulity necessary to listen to the record (more hinted at than clearly spoken) of Madame's own charms in her youth, could make sure of a game of dominoes on the evening of the third Thursday in the month. The Abbe bustled about, drawing cards and tables nearer to the lamps, away from the draught of the door, not too near the open wood fire. His movements were dainty, like those of an old maid of the last generation. He hissed through his teeth as if he were working very hard. It served to stimulate a healthy excitement in the Thursday evening of Madame de Chantonnay. “Oh, I am not uneasy,” said that lady, as she watched him. She had dined well and her digestion had outlived those charms to which she made such frequent reference. “I am not uneasy. He will return, more or less sheepish. He will make some excuse more or less inadequate. He will tell us a story more or less creditable. Allez! Oh, you men. If you intend that chair for Monsieur de Gemosac, it is the wrong one. Monsieur de Gemosac sits high, but his legs are short; give him the little chair that creaks. If he sits too high he is apt to see over the top of one's cards. And he is so eager to win--the good Marquis.” “Then he will come to-night despite the cold? You think he will come, Madame?” “I am sure of it. He has come more frequently since Juliette came to live at the chateau. It is Juliette who makes him come, perhaps. Who knows?” The Abbe stopped midway across the floor and set down the chair he carried with great caution. “Madame is incorrigible,” he said, spreading out his hands. “Madame would perceive a romance in a cradle.” “Well, one must begin somewhere, Materialist. Once it was for me that the guests crowded to my poor Thursdays. But now it is because Albert is near. Ah! I know it. I say it without jealousy. Have you noticed, my dear Abbe, that he has cut his whiskers a little shorter--a shade nearer to the ear? It is effective, eh?” “It gives an air of hardihood,” assented the Abbe. “It lends to that intellectual face something martial. I would almost say that to the timorous it might appear terrible and overbearing.” Thus they talked until the guests began to arrive, and for Madame de Chantonnay the time no doubt seemed short enough. For no one appreciated Albert with such a delicacy of touch as the Abbe Touvent. The Marquis de Gemosac and Juliette were the last to arrive. The Marquis looked worn and considerably aged. He excused himself with a hundred gestures of despair for being late. “I have so much to do,” he whispered. “So much to think of. We are leaving no stone unturned, and at last we have a clue.” The other guests gathered round. “But speak, my dear friend, speak,” cried Madame de Chantonnay. “You keep us in suspense. Look around you. We are among friends, as you see. It is only ourselves.” “Well,” replied the Marquis, standing upright and fingering the snuff-box which had been given to his grandfather by the Great Louis. “Well, my friends, our invaluable ally, Dormer Colville, has gone to England. There is a ray of hope. That is all I can tell you.” He looked round, smiled on his audience, and then proceeded to tell them more, after the manner of any Frenchman. “What,” he whispered, “if an unscrupulous republican government had got scent of our glorious discovery! What if, panic-stricken, they threw all vestige of honour to the wind and decided to kidnap an innocent man and send him to the Iceland fisheries, where so many lives are lost every winter; with what hopes in their republican hearts, I leave to your imagination. What if--let us say it for once--Monsieur de Bourbon should prove a match for them? Alert, hardy, full of resource, a skilled sailor, he takes his life in his hand with the daring audacity of royal blood and effects his escape to England. I tell you nothing--” He held up his hands as if to stay their clamouring voices, and nodded his head triumphantly toward Albert de Chantonnay, who stood near a lamp fingering his martial whisker of the left side with the air of one who would pause at naught. “I tell you nothing. But such a theory has been pieced together upon excellent material. It may be true. It may be a dream. And, as I tell you, our dear friend Dormer Colville, who has nothing at stake, who loses or gains little by the restoration of France, has journeyed to England for us. None could execute the commission so capably, or without danger of arousing suspicion. There! I have told you all I know. We must wait, my compatriots. We must wait.” “And in the mean time,” purred the voice of the Abbe Touvent, “for the digestion, Monsieur le Marquis--for the digestion.” For it was one of the features of Madame de Chantonnay's Thursdays that no servants were allowed in the room; but the guests waited on each other. If the servants, as is to be presumed, listened outside the door, they were particular not to introduce each succeeding guest without first knocking, which caused a momentary silence and added considerably to the sense of political importance of those assembled. The Abbe Touvent made it his special care to preside over the table where small glasses of eau-de-vie d'Armagnac and other aids to digestion were set out in a careful profusion. “It is a theory, my dear Marquis,” admitted Madame de Chantonnay. “But it is nothing more. It has no heart in it, your theory. Now I have a theory of my own.” “Full of heart, one may assure oneself, Madame; full of heart,” murmured the Marquis. “For you yourself are full of heart--is it not so?” “I hope not,” Juliette whispered to her fan, with a little smile of malicious amusement. For she had a youthful contempt for persons old and stout, who talk ignorantly of matters only understood by such as are young and slim and pretty. She looked at her fan with a gleam of ill-concealed irony and glanced over it toward Albert de Chantonnay, who, with a consideration which must have been hereditary, was uneasy about the alteration he had made in his whiskers. It was perhaps unfair, he felt, to harrow young and tender hearts. It was at this moment that a loud knock commanded a breathless silence, for no more guests were expected. Indeed the whole neighbourhood was present. The servant, in his faded gold lace, came in and announced with a dramatic assurance: “Monsieur de Borbone--Monsieur Colville.” And that difference which Dormer Colville had predicted was manifested with an astounding promptness; for all who were seated rose to their feet. It was Colville who had given the names to the servant in the order in which they had been announced, and at the last minute, on the threshold, he had stepped on one side and with his hand on Barebone's shoulder had forced him to take precedence. The first person Barebone saw on entering the room was Juliette, standing under the spreading arms of a chandelier, half turned to look at him--Juliette, in all the freshness of her girlhood and her first evening dress, flushing pink and white like a wild rose, her eyes, bright with a sudden excitement, seeking his. Behind her, the Marquis de Gemosac, Albert de Chantonnay, his mother, and all the Royalists of the province, gathered in a semicircle, by accident or some tacit instinct, leaving only the girl standing out in front, beneath the chandelier. They bowed with that grave self-possession which falls like a cloak over the shoulders of such as are of ancient and historic lineage. “We reached the chateau of Gemosac only a few minutes after Monsieur le Marquis and Mademoiselle had quitted it to come here,” Barebone explained to Madame de Chantonnay; “and trusting to the good-nature--so widely famed--of Madame la Comtesse, we hurriedly removed the dust of travel, and took the liberty of following them hither.” “You have not taken me by surprise,” replied Madame de Chantonnay. “I expected you. Ask the Abbe Touvent. He will tell you, gentlemen, that I expected you.” As Barebone turned away to speak to the Marquis and others, who were pressing forward to greet him, it became apparent that that mantle of imperturbability, which millions made in trade can never buy, had fallen upon his shoulders, too. For most men are, in the end, forced to play the part the world assigns to them. We are not allowed to remain what we know ourselves to be, but must, at last, be that which the world thinks us. Madame de Chantonnay, murmuring to a neighbour a mystic reference to her heart and its voluminous premonitions, watched him depart with a vague surprise. “Mon Dieu! mon Dieu!” she whispered, breathlessly. “It is not a resemblance. It is the dead come to life again.”

32

PRIMROSES

“If I go on, I go alone,” Barebone had once said to Dormer Colville. The words, spoken in the heat of a quarrel, stuck in the memory of both, as such are wont to do. Perhaps, in moments of anger or disillusionment--when we find that neither self nor friend is what we thought--the heart tears itself away from the grip of the cooler, calmer brain and speaks untrammelled. And such speeches are apt to linger in the mind long after the most brilliant jeu d'esprit has been forgotten. What occupies the thoughts of the old man, sitting out the grey remainder of the day, over the embers of a hearth which he will only quit when he quits the world? Does he remember the brilliant sallies of wit, the greatest triumphs of the noblest minds with which he has consorted; or does his memory cling to some scene--simple, pastoral, without incident--which passed before his eyes at a moment when his heart was sore or glad? When his mind is resting from its labours and the sound of the grinding is low, he will scarce remember the neat saying or the lofty thought clothed in perfect language; but he will never forget a hasty word spoken in an unguarded moment by one who was not clever at all, nor even possessed the worldly wisdom to shield the heart behind the buckler of the brain. “You will find things changed,” Colville had said, as they walked across the marsh from Farlingford, toward the Ipswich road. And the words came back to the minds of both, on that Thursday of Madame de Chantonnay, which many remember to this day. Not only did they find things changed, but themselves they found no longer the same. Both remembered the quarrel, and the outcome of it. Colville, ever tolerant, always leaning toward the compromise that eases a doubting conscience, had, it would almost seem unconsciously, prepared the way for a reconciliation before there was any question of a difference. On their way back to France, without directly referring to that fatal portrait and the revelation caused by Barebone's unaccountable feat of memory, he had smoothed away any possible scruple. “France must always be deceived,” he had said, a hundred times. “Better that she should be deceived for an honest than a dishonest purpose--if it is deception, after all, which is very doubtful. The best patriot is he who is ready to save his country at the cost of his own ease, whether of body or of mind. It does not matter who or what you are; it is what or who the world thinks you to be, that is of importance.” Which of us has not listened to a score of such arguments, not always from the lips of a friend, but most often in that still, small voice which rarely has the courage to stand out against the tendency of the age? There is nothing so contagious as laxity of conscience. Barebone listened to the good-natured, sympathetic voice with a make-believe conviction which was part of his readiness to put off an evil moment. Colville was a difficult man to quarrel with. It seemed bearish and ill-natured to take amiss any word or action which could only be the outcome of a singularly tender consideration for the feelings of others. But when they entered Madame de Chantonnay's drawing-room--when Dormer, impelled by some instinct of the fitness of things, stepped aside and motioned to his companion to pass in first--the secret they had in common yawned suddenly like a gulf between them. For the possession of a secret either estranges or draws together. More commonly, it estranges. For which of us is careful of a secret that redounds to our credit? Nearly every secret is a hidden disgrace; and such a possession, held in common with another, is not likely to insure affection. Colville lingered on the threshold, watching Loo make the first steps of that progress which must henceforth be pursued alone. He looked round for a friendly face, but no one had eyes for him. They were all looking at Loo Barebone. Colville sought Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, usually in full evidence, even in a room full of beautiful women and distinguished men. But she was not there. For a minute or two no one noticed him; and then Albert de Chantonnay, remembering his role, came forward to greet the Englishman. “It was,” explained Colville, in a lowered voice, “as we thought. An attempt was made to get him out of the way, but he effected his escape. He knew, however, the danger of attempting to communicate with any of us by post, and was awaiting some opportunity of transmitting a letter by a safe hand, when I discovered his hiding-place.” And this was the story that went half round France, from lip to lip, among those who were faithful to the traditions of a glorious past. “Madame St. Pierre Lawrence,” Albert de Chantonnay told Colville, in reply, “is not here to-night. She is, however, at her villa, at Royan. She has not, perhaps, displayed such interest in our meetings as she did before you departed on your long journey through France. But her generosity is unchanged. The money, which, in the hurry of the moment, you did not withdraw from her bank--” “I doubt whether it was ever there,” interrupted Colville. “She informs me,” concluded Albert, “is still at our service. We have many other promises, which must now be recalled to the minds of those who made them. But from no one have we received such generous support as from your kinswoman.” They were standing apart, and in a few minutes the Marquis de Gemosac joined them. “How daring! how audacious!” he whispered, “and yet how opportune--this return. It is all to be recommenced, my friends, with a firmer grasp, a new courage.” “But my task is accomplished,” returned Colville. “You have no further use for a mere Englishman, like myself. I was fortunate in being able to lend some slight assistance in the original discovery of our friend; I have again been lucky enough to restore him to you. And now, with your permission, I will return to Royan, where I have my little apartment, as you know.” He looked from one to the other, with his melancholy and self-deprecating smile. “Voila,” he added; “it remains for me to pay my respects to Madame de Chantonnay. We have travelled far, and I am tired. I shall ask her to excuse me.” “And Monsieur de Bourbon comes to Gemosac. That is understood. He will be safe there. His apartments have been in readiness for him these last two months. Hidden there, or in other dwellings--grander and better served, perhaps, than my poor ruin, but no safer--he can continue the great work he began so well last winter. As for you, my dear Colville,” continued the Marquis, taking the Englishman's two hands in his, “I envy you from the bottom of my heart. It is not given to many to serve France as you have served her--to serve a King as you have served one. It will be my business to see that both remember you. For France, I allow, sometimes forgets. Go to Royan, since you wish--but it is only for a time. You will be called to Paris some day, that I promise you.” The Marquis would have embraced him then and there, had the cool-blooded Englishman shown the smallest desire for that honour. But Dormer Colville's sad and doubting smile held at arms' length one who was always at the mercy of his own eloquence. The card tables had lost their attraction; and, although many parties were formed, and the cards were dealt, the players fell to talking across the ungathered tricks, and even the Abbe Touvent was caught tripping in the matter of a point. “Never,” exclaimed Madame de Chantonnay, as her guests took leave at their wonted hour, and some of them even later--“never have I had a Thursday so dull and yet so full of incident.” “And never, madame,” replied the Marquis, still on tiptoe, as it were, with delight and excitement, “shall we see another like it.” Loo went back to Gemosac with the fluttering old man and Juliette. Juliette, indeed, was in no flutter, but had carried herself through the excitement of her first evening party with a demure little air of self-possession. She had scarce spoken to Loo during the evening. Indeed, it had been his duty to attend on Madame de Chantonnay and on the older members of these quiet Royalist families biding their time in the remote country villages of Guienne and the Vendee. On the journey home, the Marquis had so much to tell his companion, and told it so hurriedly, that his was the only voice heard above the rattle of the heavy, old-fashioned carriage. But Barebone was aware of Juliette's presence in a dark corner of the roomy vehicle, and his eyes, seeking to penetrate the gloom, could just distinguish hers, which seemed to be turned in his direction. Many changes had been effected at the chateau, and a suite of rooms had been prepared for Barebone in the detached building known as the Italian house, which stands in the midst of the garden within the enceinte of the chateau walls. “I have been able,” explained the Marquis, frankly, “to obtain a small advance on the results of last autumn's vintage. My notary in the village found, indeed, that facilities were greater than he had anticipated. With this sum, I have been enabled to effect some necessary repairs to the buildings and the internal decorations. I had fallen behind the times, perhaps. But now that Juliette is installed as chatelaine, many changes have been effected. You will see, my dear friend; you will see for yourself. Yes, for the moment, I am no longer a pauper. As you yourself will have noticed, in your journey through the west, rural France is enjoying a sudden return of prosperity. It is unaccountable. No one can make me believe that it is to be ascribed to this scandalous Government, under which we agonise. But there it is--and we must thank Heaven for it.” Which was only the truth. For France was at this time entering upon a period of plenty. The air was full of rumours of new railways, new roads, and new commercial enterprise. Banks were being opened in the provincial towns, and loans made on easy terms to agriculturists for the improvement of their land. Barebone found that there were indeed changes in the old chateau. The apartments above that which had once been the stabling, hitherto occupied by the Marquis, had been added to and a slight attempt at redecoration had been made. There was no lack of rooms, and Juliette now had her own suite, while the Marquis lived, as hitherto, in three small apartments over the rooms occupied by Marie and her husband. An elderly relation--one of those old ladies habited in black, who are ready to efface themselves all day and occupy a garret all night in return for bed and board, had been added to the family. She contributed a silent and mysterious presence, some worldly wisdom, and a profound respect for her noble kinsman. “She is quite harmless,” Juliette explained, gaily, to Barebone, on the first occasion when they were alone together. This did not present itself until Loo had been quartered in the Italian house for some days, with his own servant. Although he took luncheon and dinner with the family in the old building near to the gate-house, and spent his evenings in Juliette's drawing-room, the Marquis or Madame Maugiron was always present, and as often as not, they played a game of chess together. “She is quite harmless,” said Juliette, tying, with a thread, the primroses she had been picking in that shady corner of the garden which lay at the other side of the Italian house. The windows of Barebone's apartment, by the way, looked down upon this garden, and he, having perceived her, had not wasted time in joining her in the morning sunshine. “I wonder if I shall be as harmless when I am her age.” And, indeed, danger lurked beneath her lashes as she glanced at him, asking this question with her lips and a hundred others with her eyes, with her gay air of youth and happiness--with her very attitude of coquetry, as she stood in the spring sunshine, with the scent of the primroses about her. “I think that any one who approaches you will always do so at his peril, Mademoiselle.” “Then why do it?” she asked, drawing back and busying herself with the flowers, which she laid against her breast, as if to judge the effect of their colour against the delicate white of her dress. “Why run into danger? Why come downstairs at all?” “Why breathe?” he retorted, with a laugh. “Why eat, or drink, or sleep? Why live? Mon Dieu! because there is no choice. And when I see you in the garden, there is no choice for me, Mademoiselle. I must come down and run into danger, because I cannot help it any more that I can help--” “But you need not stay,” she interrupted, cleverly. “A brave man may always retire from danger into safety.” “But he may not always want to, Mademoiselle.” “Ah!” And, with a shrug of the shoulders, she inserted the primroses within a very small waistband and turned away. “Will you give me those primroses, Mademoiselle?” asked Loo, without moving; for, although she had turned to go, she had not gone. She turned on her heel and looked at him, with demure surprise, and then bent her head to look at the flowers at her own waist. “They are mine,” she answered, standing in that pretty attitude, her hair half concealing her face. “I picked them myself.” “Two reasons why I want them.” “Ah! but,” she said, with a suggestion of thoughtfulness, “one does not always get what one wants. You ask a great deal, Monsieur.” “There is no limit to what I would ask, Mademoiselle.” She laughed gaily. “If--” she inquired, with raised eyebrows. “If I dared.” Again she looked at him with that little air of surprise. “But I thought you were so brave?” she said. “So reckless of danger? A brave man assuredly does not ask. He takes that which he would have.” It happened that she had clasped her hands behind her back, leaving the primroses at her waist uncovered and half falling from the ribbon. In a moment he had reached out his hand and taken them. She leapt back, as if she feared that he might take more, and ran back toward the house, placing a rough tangle of brier between herself and this robber. Her laughing face looked at him through the brier. “You have your primroses,” she said, “but I did not give them to you. You want too much, I think.” “I want what that ribbon binds,” he answered. But she turned away and ran toward the house, without waiting to hear.

33

DORMER COLVILLE IS BLIND

It was late when Dormer Colville reached the quiet sea-coast village of Royan on the evening of his return to the west. He did not seek Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence until the luncheon hour next morning, when he was informed that she was away from home. “Madame has gone to Paris,” the man said, who, with his wife, was left in charge of the empty house. “It was a sudden resolution, one must conclude,” he added, darkly, “but Madame took no one into her confidence. She received news by post, which must have brought about this sudden decision.” Colville was intimately acquainted with his cousin's affairs; many hazarded an opinion that, without the help of Madame St. Pierre Lawrence, this rolling stone would have been bare enough. She had gone to Paris for one of two reasons, he concluded. Either she had expected him to return thither from London, and had gone to meet him with the intention of coming to some arrangement as to the disposal of the vast sum of money now in Turner's hands awaiting further developments, or some hitch had occurred with respect to John Turner himself. Dormer Colville returned, thoughtfully, to his lodging, and in the evening set out for Paris. He himself had not seen Turner since that morning in the banker's office in the Rue Lafayette, when they had parted so unceremoniously, in a somewhat heated spirit. But, on reflection, Colville, who had sought to reassure himself with regard to one whose name stood for the incarnation of gastronomy and mental density in the Anglo-French clubs of Paris, had come to the conclusion that nothing was to be gained by forcing a quarrel upon Turner. It was impossible to bring home to him an accusation of complicity in an outrage which had been carried through with remarkable skill. And when it is impossible to force home an accusation, a wise man will hold his tongue. Colville could not prove that Turner had known Barebone to be in the carriage waiting in the courtyard, and his own action in the matter had been limited to the interposition of his own clumsy person between Colville and the window; which might, after all, have been due to stupidity. This, as a matter of fact, was Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's theory on the subject. For that lady, resting cheerfully on the firm basis of a self-confidence which the possession of money nearly always confers on women, had laughed at Turner all her life, and now proposed to continue that course of treatment. “Take my word,” she had assured Colville, “he was only acting in his usual dense way, and probably thinks now that you are subject to brief fits of mental aberration. I am not afraid of him or anything that he can do. Leave him to me, and devote all your attention to finding Loo Barebone again.” Upon which advice Colville had been content to act. He had a faith in Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's wit which was almost as great as her own; and thought, perhaps rightly enough, that if any one were a match for John Turner it was his sprightly and capable client. For there are two ways of getting on in this world: one is to get credit for being cleverer than you are, and the other to be cleverer than your neighbour suspects. But the latter plan is seldom followed, for the satisfaction it provides must necessarily be shared with no confidant. Colville knew where to look for Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence in Paris, where she always took an apartment in a quiet and old-fashioned hotel rejoicing in a select Royalist clientele on the Place Vendome. On arriving at the capital, he hurried thither, and was told that the lady he sought had gone out a few minutes earlier. “But Madame's maid,” the porter added, “is no doubt within.” Colville was conducted to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's room, and was hardly there before the lady's French maid came hurrying in with upraised hands. “A just Heaven has assuredly sent Monsieur at this moment!” she exclaimed. “Madame only quitted this room ten minutes ago, and she was agitated--she, who is usually so calm. She would tell me nothing; but I know--I, who have done Madame's hair these ten years! And there is only one thing that could cause her anxiety--except, of course, any mishap to Monsieur; that would touch the heart--yes!” “You are very kind, Catherine,” said Colville, with a laugh, “to think me so important. Is that letter for me?” And he pointed to a note in the woman's hand. “But--yes!” was the reply, and she gave up the letter, somewhat reluctantly. “There is only one thing, and that is money,” she concluded, watching him tear open the envelope. “I am going to John Turner's office,” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence wrote. “If, by some lucky chance, you should pass through Paris, and happen to call this morning, follow me to the Rue Lafayette. M. St. P. L.” It was plain enough. Colville reflected that Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had heard of the success of his mission to England and the safe return to Gemosac of Loo Barebone. For the moment, he could not think how the news could have reached her. She might have heard it from Miriam Liston; for their journey back to Gemosac had occupied nearly a week. On learning the good news, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had promptly grasped the situation; for she was very quick in thought and deed. The money would be wanted at once. She had gone to Turner's office to withdraw it in person. Dormer Colville bought a flower in a shop in the Rue de la Paix, and had it affixed to his buttonhole by the handmaid of Flora, who made it her business to linger over the office with a gentle familiarity no doubt pleasing enough to the majority of her clients. Colville was absent-minded as he drove, in a hired carriage, to the Rue Lafayette. He was wondering whether Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's maid had any grounds for stating that a mishap to him would touch her mistress's heart. He was a man of unbounded enterprise; but, like many who are gamblers at heart, he was superstitious. He had never dared to try his luck with Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. She was so hard, so worldly, so infinitely capable of managing her own affairs and regulating her own life, that to offer her his hand and heart in exchange for her fortune had hitherto been dismissed from his mind as a last expedient, only to be faced when ruin awaited him. She had only been a widow three years. She had never been a sentimental woman, and now her liberty and her wealth were obviously so dear to her that, in common sense, he could scarcely, with any prospect of success, ask her outright to part with them. Moreover, Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence knew all about Dormer Colville, as men say. Which is only a saying; for no human being knows all about another human being, nor one-half, nor one-tenth of what there is to know. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence knew enough, at all events, Colville reflected, rather ruefully, to disillusionise a schoolgirl, much more a woman of the world, knowing good and evil. He had not lived forty years in the world, and twenty years in that world of French culture which digs and digs into human nature, without having heard philosophers opine that, in matters of the heart, women have no illusions at all, and that it is only men who go blindfold into the tortuous ways of love. But he was too practical a man to build up a false hope on so frail a basis as a theory applied to a woman's heart. He bought a flower for his buttonhole then, and squared his shoulders, without any definite design. It was a mere habit--the habit acquired by twenty years of unsuccessful enterprise, and renewed effort and deferred hope--of leaving no stone unturned. His cab wheeled into the Rue Lafayette, and the man drove more slowly, reading the numbers on the houses. Then he stopped altogether, and turned round in his seat. “Citizen,” he said, “there is a great crowd at the house you named. It extends half across the street. I will go no further. It is not I who care about publicity.” Colville stood up and looked in the direction indicated by his driver's whip. The man had scarcely exaggerated. A number of people were waiting their turn on the pavement and out into the roadway, while two gendarmes held the door. Dormer Colville paid his cabman and walked into that crowd, with a sinking heart. “It is the great English banker,” explained an on-looker, even before he was asked, “who has failed.” Colville had never found any difficulty in making his way through a crowd--a useful accomplishment in Paris at all times, where government is conducted, thrones are raised and toppled over, provinces are won and lost again, by the mob. He had that air of distinction which, if wielded good-naturedly, is the surest passport in any concourse. Some, no doubt, recognised him as an Englishman. One after another made way for him. Persons unknown to him commanded others to step aside and let him pass; for the busybody we have always with us. In a few minutes he was at the top of the stairs, and there elbowed his way into the office, where the five clerks sat bent up over their ledgers. The space on the hither side of the counter was crammed with men, who whispered impatiently together. If any one raised his voice, the clerk whose business it was lifted his head and looked at the speaker with a mute surprise. One after another these white-faced applicants leant over the counter. “Voyons, Monsieur!” they urged; “tell me this or inform me of that.” But the clerk only smiled and shook his head. “Patience, Monsieur,” he answered. “I cannot tell you yet. We are awaiting advices from London.” “But when will you receive them?” inquired several, at once. “It may be to-morrow. It may not be for several days.” “But can one see Mr. Turner?” inquired one, more daring than the rest. “He is engaged.” Colville caught the eye of the clerk, and by a gesture made it known that he must be allowed to pass on into the inner room. Once more his air of the great world, his good clothes, his flower in the buttonhole, gave him the advantage over others; and the clerk got down from his stool. “Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence is with him, I know,” whispered Colville. “I come by appointment to meet her here.” He was shown in without further trouble, and found Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence sitting, white-faced and voluble, in the visitors' chair. John Turner had his usual air of dense placidity, but the narrow black tie he always tied in a bow was inclined slightly to one side; his hair was ruffled, and, although the weather was not warm, his face wore a shiny look. Any banker, with his clients clamouring on the stairs and out into the street, might look as John Turner looked. “You have heard the news?” asked Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, turning sharply in her chair and looking at Colville with an expression of sudden relief. She carried a handkerchief in her hand, but her eyes were dry. She was, after all, only a forerunner of those who now propose to manage human affairs. And even in these later days of their great advance, they have not left their pocket-handkerchiefs behind them. “I was told by one of the crowd,” replied Colville, with a side smile full of sympathy for Turner, “that the--er--bank had come to grief.” “Was just telling Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence,” said Turner, imperturbably, “that it is too early in the day to throw up the sponge and cry out that all is lost.” “All!” echoed Colville, angrily. “But do you mean to say--Why, surely, there is generally something left.” Turner shrugged his shoulders and sat in silence, gnawing the middle joint of his thumb. “But I must have the money!” cried Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. “It is most important, and I must have it at once. I withdraw it all. See, I brought my cheque-book with me. And I know that there are over a hundred thousand pounds in my account. As well as that, you hold securities for two hundred and fifty thousand more--my whole fortune. The money is not yours: it is mine. I draw it all out, and I insist on having it.” Turner continued to bite his thumb, and glanced at her without speaking. “Now, damn it all, Turner!” said Colville, in a voice suddenly hoarse; “hand it over, man.” “I tell you it is gone,” was the answer. “What? Three hundred and fifty thousand pounds? Then you are a rogue! You are a fraudulent trustee! I always thought you were a damned scoundrel, Turner, and now I know it. I'll get you to the galleys for the rest of your life, I promise you that.” “You will gain nothing by that,” returned the banker, staring at the date-card in front of him. “And you will lose any chance there is of recovering something from the wreck. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had better take the advice of her lawyer--in preference to yours.” “Then I am ruined!” said that lady, rising, with an air of resolution. She was brave, at all events. “At the present moment, it looks like it,” admitted Turner, without meeting her eye. “What am I to do?” murmured Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, looking helplessly round the room and finally at the banker's stolid face. “Like the rest of us, I suppose,” he admitted. “Begin the world afresh. Perhaps your friends will come forward.” And he looked calmly toward Colville. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's face suddenly flushed, and she turned away toward the door. Turner rose, laboriously, and opened it. “There is another staircase through this side door,” he said, opening a second door, which had the appearance of a cupboard. “You can avoid the crowd.” They passed out together, and Turner, having closed the door behind them, crossed the room to where a small mirror was suspended. He set his tie straight and smoothed his hair, and then returned to his chair, with a vague smile on his face. Colville took the vacant seat in Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's brougham. She still held a handkerchief in her hand. “I do not mind for myself,” she exclaimed, suddenly, when the carriage moved out of the court-yard. “It is only for your sake, Dormer.” She turned and glanced at him with eyes that shone, but not with tears. “Oh! Don't you understand?” she asked, in a whisper. “Don't you see, Dormer?” “A way out of it?” he answered, hurriedly, almost interrupting her. He withdrew his hand, upon which she had laid her own; withdrew it sympathetically, almost tenderly. “See a way out of it?” he repeated, in a reflective and business-like voice. “No, I am afraid, for the moment, I don't.” He sat stroking his moustache, looking out of the window, while she looked out of the other, resolutely blinking back her tears. They drove back to her hotel without speaking.

34

A SORDID MATTER

“Bon Dieu! my old friend, what do you expect?” replied Madame de Chantonnay to a rather incoherent statement made to her one May afternoon by the Marquis de Gemosac. “It is the month of May,” she further explained, indicating with a gesture of her dimpled hand the roses abloom all around them. For the Marquis had found her in a chair beneath the mulberry-tree in the old garden of that house near Gemosac which looks across the river toward the sea. “It is the month of May. One is young. Such things have happened since the world began. They will happen until it ends, Marquis. It happened in our own time, if I remember correctly.” And Madame de Chantonnay heaved a prodigious sigh, in memory of the days that were no more. “Given a young man of enterprise and not bad looking, I allow. He has the grand air and his face is not without distinction. Given a young girl, fresh as a flower, young, innocent, not without feeling. Ah! I know, for I was like that myself. Place them in a garden, in the springtime. What will they talk of--politics? Ah--bah! Let them have long evenings together while their elders play chess or a hand at bezique. What game will they play? A much older game than chess or bezique, I fancy.” “But the circumstances were so exceptional,” protested the Marquis, who had a pleased air, as if his anger were not without an antidote. “Circumstances may be exceptional, my friend, but Love is a Rule. You allow him to stay six weeks in the chateau, seeing Juliette daily, and then you are surprised that one fine morning Monsieur de Bourbon comes to you and tells you brusquely, as you report it, that he wants to marry your daughter.” “Yes,” admitted the Marquis. “He was what you may describe as brusque. It is the English way, perhaps, of treating such matters. Now, for myself I should have been warmer, I think. I should have allowed myself a little play, as it were. One says a few pretty things--is it not so? One suggests that the lady is an angel and oneself entirely unworthy of a happiness which is only to be compared with the happiness that is promised to us in the hereafter. It is an occasion upon which to be eloquent.” “Not for the English,” corrected Madame de Chantonnay, holding up a hand to emphasise her opinion. “And you must remember, that although our friend is French, he has been brought up in that cold country--by a minister of their frozen religion, I understand. I, who speak to you, know what they are, for once I had an Englishman in love with me. It was in Paris, when Louis XVIII. was King. And did this Englishman tell me that he was heart-broken, I ask you? Never! On the contrary, he appeared to be of an indifference only to be compared with the indifference of a tree. He seemed to avoid me rather than seek my society. Once, he made believe to forget that he had been presented to me. A ruse--a mere ruse to conceal his passion. But I knew, I knew always.” “And what was the poor man's fate? What was his name, Comtesse?” “I forget, my friend. For the moment I have forgotten it. But tell me more about Monsieur de Bourbon and Juliette. He is passionately in love with her, of course; he is so miserable.” The Marquis reflected for a few moments. “Well,” he said, at last, “he may be so; he may be so, Comtesse.” “And you--what did you say?” The Marquis looked carefully round before replying. Then he leant forward with his forefinger raised delicately to the tip of his nose. “I temporised, Comtesse,” he said, in a low voice. “I explained as gracefully as one could that it was too early to think of such a development--that I was taken by surprise.” “Which could hardly have been true,” put in Madame de Chantonnay in an audible aside to the mulberry-tree, “for neither Guienne nor la Vendee will be taken by surprise.” “I said, in other words--a good many words, the more the better, for one must be polite--'Secure your throne, Monsieur, and you shall marry Juliette.' But it is not a position into which one hurries the last of the house of Gemosac--to be the wife of an unsuccessful claimant, eh?” Madame de Chantonnay approved in one gesture of her stout hand of these principles and of the Marquis de Gemosac's masterly demonstration of them. “And Monsieur de Bourbon--did he accept these conditions?” “He seemed to, Madame. He seemed content to do so,” replied the Marquis, tapping his snuff-box and avoiding the lady's eye. “And Juliette?” inquired Madame, with a sidelong glance. “Oh, Juliette is sensible,” replied the fond father. “My daughter is, I hope, sensible, Comtesse.” “Give yourself no uneasiness, my old friend,” said Madame de Chantonnay, heartily. “She is charming.” Madame sat back in her chair and fanned herself thoughtfully. It was the fashion of that day to carry a fan and wield it with grace and effect. To fan oneself did not mean that the heat was oppressive, any more than the use of incorrect English signifies to-day ill-breeding or a lack of education. Both are an indication of a laudable desire to be unmistakably in the movement of one's day. Over her fan Madame cast a sidelong glance at the Marquis, whom she, like many of his friends, suspected of being much less simple and spontaneous than he appeared. “Then they are not formally affianced?” she suggested. “Mon Dieu! no. I clearly indicated that there were other things to be thought of at the present time. A very arduous task lies before him, but he is equal to it, I am certain. My conviction as to that grows as one knows him better.” “But you are not prepared to allow the young people to force you to take a leap in the dark,” suggested Madame de Chantonnay. “And that poor Juliette must consume her soul in patience; but she is sensible, as you justly say. Yes, my dear Marquis, she is charming.” They were thus engaged in facile talk when Albert de Chantonnay emerged from the long window of his study, a room opening on to a moss-grown terrace, where this plotter walked to and fro like another Richelieu and brooded over nation-shaking schemes. He carried a letter in his hand and wore an air of genuine perturbment. But even in his agitation he looked carefully round before he spoke. “Here,” he said to the Marquis and his fond mother, who watched him with complacency--“here I have a letter from Dormer Colville. It is necessarily couched in very cautious language. He probably knows, as I know, that any letter addressed to me is liable to be opened. I have reason to believe that some of my letters have not only been opened, but that copies of them are actually in the possession of that man--the head of that which is called the Government.” He turned and looked darkly into a neighbouring clump of rhododendrons, as if Louis Napoleon were perhaps lurking there. But he was nevertheless quite right in his suspicions, which were verified twenty years later, along with much duplicity which none had suspected. “Nevertheless,” he went on, “I know what Colville seeks to convey to us, and is now hurrying away from Paris to confirm to us by word of mouth. The bank of John Turner in the Rue Lafayette has failed, and with it goes all the fortune of Madame St. Pierre Lawrence.” Both his hearers exclaimed aloud, and Madame de Chantonnay showed signs of a desire to swoon; but as no one took any notice, she changed her mind. “It is a ruse to gain time,” explained Albert, brushing the thin end of his moustache upward with a gesture of resolution. “Just as the other was a ruse to gain time. It is at present a race between two resolute parties. The party which is ready first and declares itself will be the victor. For to-day our poor France is in the gutter: she is in the hands of the canaille, and the canaille will accept the first who places himself upon an elevation and scatters gold. What care they--King or Emperor, Emperor or King! It is the same to them so long as they have a change of some sort and see, or think they see, gain to themselves to be snatched from it.” From which it will be seen that Albert de Chantonnay knew his countrymen. “But,” protested Madame de Chantonnay, who had a Frenchwoman's inimitable quickness to grasp a situation--“but the Government could scarcely cause a bank to fail--such an old-established bank as Turner's, which has existed since the day of Louis XIV. --in order to gain time.” “An unscrupulous Government can do anything in France,” replied the lady's son. “Their existence depends upon delay, and they are aware of it. They would ruin France rather than forego their own aggrandisement. And this is part of their scheme. They seek to delay us at all costs. To kidnap de Bourbon was the first move. It failed. This is their second move. What must be our countermove?” He clasped his hands behind his willowy back and paced slowly backward and forward. By a gesture, Madame de Chantonnay bade the Marquis keep silence while she drew his attention to the attitude of her son. When he paused and fingered his whisker she gasped excitedly. “I have it,” said Albert, with an upward glance of inspiration. “Yes, my son?” “The Beauvoir estate,” replied Albert, “left to me by my uncle. It is worth three hundred thousand francs. That is enough for the moment. That must be our counter-move.” Madame de Chantonnay protested volubly. For if Frenchmen are ready to sacrifice, or, at all events, to risk all for a sentiment--and history says nothing to the contrary--Frenchwomen are eminently practical and far-sighted. Madame had a hundred reasons why the Beauvoir estate should not be sold. Many of them contradicted each other. She was not what may be called a close reasoner, but she was roughly effective. Many a general has won a victory not by the accuracy, but by the volume of his fire. “What will become of France,” she cried to Albert's retreating back as he walked to and fro, “if none of the old families has a son to bless itself with? And Heaven knows that there are few enough remaining now. Besides, you will want to marry some day, and what will your bride say when you have no money? There are no dots growing in the hedgerows now. Not that I am a stickler for a dot. Give me heart, I always say, and keep the money yourself. And some day you will find a loving heart, but no dot. And there is a tragedy at once--ready made. Is it not so, my old friend?” She turned to the Marquis de Gemosac for confirmation of this forecast. “It is a danger, Madame,” was the reply. “It is a danger which it would be well to foresee.” They had discussed a hundred times the possibility of a romantic marriage between their two houses. Juliette and Albert--the two last representatives of an old nobility long-famed in the annals of the west--might well fall in love with each other. It would be charming, Madame thought; but, alas! Albert would be wise to look for a dot. The Marquis paused. Again he temporised. For he could not all in an instant decide which side of this question to take. He looked at Albert, frail, romantic; an ideal representative of that old nobility of France which was never practical, and elected to go to the guillotine rather than seek to cultivate that modern virtue. “At the same time, Madame, it is well to remember that a loan offered now may reasonably be expected to bring such a return in the future as will provide dots for the de Chantonnays to the end of time.” Madame was about to make a spirited reply; she might even have suggested that the Beauvoir estate would be better apportioned to Albert's wife than to Juliette as the wife of another, but Albert himself stopped in front of them and swept away all argument by a passionate gesture of his small, white hand. “It is concluded,” he said. “I sell the Beauvoir estate! Have not the Chantonnays proved a hundred times that they are equal to any sacrifice for the sake of France?”

35

A SQUARE MAN

All through the summer of 1851--a year to be marked for all time in the minds of historians, not in red, but in black letters--the war of politics tossed France hither and thither. There were, at this time, five parties contending for mastery. Should one of these appear for the moment to be about to make itself secure in power, the other four would at once unite to tear the common adversary from his unstable position. Of these parties, only two were of real cohesion: the Legitimists and the Bonapartists. The Socialists, the Moderate Republicans, and the Orleanists were too closely allied in the past to be friendly in the present. Socialists are noisy, but rarely clever. A man who in France describes himself as Moderate must not expect to be popular for any length of time. The Orleanists were only just out of office. It was scarcely a year since Louis Philippe had died in exile at Claremont--only three years since he signed his abdication and hurried across to Newhaven. It was not the turn of the Orleanists. There is no quarrel so deadly as a family quarrel; no fall so sudden as that of a house divided against itself. All through the spring and summer of 1851 France exhibited herself in the eyes of the world a laughing-stock to her enemies, a thing of pity to those who loved that great country. The Republic of 1848 was already a house divided against itself. Its President, Louis Bonaparte, had been elected for four years. He was, as the law then stood, not eligible again until after the lapse of another four years. His party tried to abrogate this law, and failed. “No matter,” they said, “we shall elect him again, and President he shall be, despite the law.” This was only one of a hundred such clouds, no bigger than a man's hand, arising at this time on the political horizon. For France was beginning to wander down that primrose path where a law is only a law so long as it is convenient. There was one man, Louis Bonaparte, who kept his head when others lost that invaluable adjunct; who pushed on doggedly to a set purpose; whose task was hard even in France, and would have been impossible in any other country. For it is only in France that ridicule does not kill. And twice within the last fifteen years--once at Strasbourg, once at Boulogne--he had made the world hold its sides at the mention of his name, greeting with the laughter which is imbittered by scorn, a failure damned by ridicule. It has been said that Louis Bonaparte never gave serious thought to the Legitimist party. He had inherited, it would seem, that invaluable knowledge of men by which his uncle had risen to the greatest throne of modern times. He knew that a party is never for a moment equal to a Man. And the Legitimists had no man. They had only the Comte de Chambord. At Frohsdorff they still clung to their hopes, with that old-world belief in the ultimate revival of a dead regime which was eminently characteristic. And at Frohsdorff there died, in the October of this year, the Duchess of Angouleme, Marie Therese Charlotte, daughter of Marie Antoinette, who had despised her two uncles, Louis XVIII. and Charles X., for the concessions they had made--who was more Royalist than the King. She was the last of her generation, the last of her family, and with her died a part of the greatness of France, almost all the dignity of royalty, and the last master-mind of the Bourbon race. If, as Albert de Chantonnay stated, the failure of Turner's bank was nothing but a ruse to gain time, it had the desired effect. For a space, nothing could be undertaken, and the Marquis de Gemosac and his friends were hindered from continuing the work they had so successfully begun. All through the summer Loo Barebone remained in France, at Gemosac as much as anywhere. The Marquis de Gemosac himself went to Frohsdorff. “If she had been ten years younger,” he said, on his return, “I could have persuaded her to receive you. She has money. All the influence is hers. It is she who has had the last word in all our affairs since the death of the Duc de Berri. But she is old--she is broken. I think she is dying, my friend.” It was the time of the vintage again. Barebone remembered the last vintage, and his journey through those provinces that supply all the world with wine, with Dormer Colville for a companion. Since then he had journeyed alone. He had made a hundred new friends, had been welcomed in a hundred historic houses. Wherever he had passed, he had left enthusiasm behind him--and he knew it. He had grown accustomed to his own power, and yet its renewed evidence was a surprise to him every day. There was something unreal in it. There is always something unreal in fame, and great men know in their own hearts that they are not great. It is only the world that thinks them so. When they are alone--in a room by themselves--they feel for a moment their own smallness. But the door opens, and in an instant they arise and play their part mechanically. This had come to be Barebone's daily task. It was so easy to make his way in this world, which threw its doors open to him, greeted him with outstretched hands, and only asked him to charm them by being himself. He had not even to make an effort to appear to be that which he was not. He had only to be himself, and they were satisfied. Part of his role was Juliette de Gemosac. He found it quite easy to make love to her; and she, it seemed, desired nothing better. Nothing definite had been said by the Marquis de Gemosac. They were not formally affianced. They were not forbidden to see each other. But the irregularity of these proceedings lent a certain spice of surreptitiousness to their intercourse which was not without its charm. They did not see so much of each other after Loo had spoken to the Marquis de Gemosac on this subject; for Barebone had to make visits to other parts of France. Once or twice Juliette herself went to stay with relatives. During these absences they did not write to each other. It was, in fact, impossible for Barebone to keep up any correspondence whatever. He heard that Dormer Colville was still in Paris, seeking to snatch something from the wreck of Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence's fortune. The Marquis de Gemosac had been told that affairs might yet be arranged. He was no financier, however, he admitted; he did not understand such matters, and all that he knew was that the promised help from the Englishwoman was not forthcoming. “It is,” he concluded, “a question of looking elsewhere. It is not only that we want money. It is that we must have it at once.” It was not, strictly speaking, Loo's part to think of or to administer the money. His was the part to be played by Kings--so easy, if the gift is there, so impossible to acquire if it be lacking--to know many people and to charm them all. Thus the summer ripened into autumn. It had been another great vintage in the south, and Bordeaux was more than usually busy when Barebone arrived there, at daybreak, one morning in November, having posted from Toulouse. He was more daring in winter, and went fearlessly through the streets. In cold weather it is so much easier for a man to conceal his identity; for a woman to hide her beauty, if she wish to--which is a large If. Barebone could wear a fur collar and turn it up round that tell-tale chin, which made the passer-by pause and turn to look at him again if it was visible. He breakfasted at the old-fashioned inn in the heart of the town, where to this day the diligences deposit their passengers, and then he made his way to the quay, from whence he would take passage down the river. It was a cold morning, and there are few colder cities, south of Paris, than Bordeaux. Barebone hurried, his breath frozen on the fur of his collar. Suddenly he stopped. His new self--that phantom second-nature bred of custom--vanished in the twinkling of an eye, and left him plain Loo Barebone, of Farlingford, staring across the green water toward “The Last Hope,” deep-laden, anchored in mid-stream. Seeing him stop, a boatman ran toward him from a neighbouring flight of steps. “An English ship, monsieur,” he said; “just come in. Her anchors are hardly home. Does monsieur wish to go on board?” “Of course I do, comrade--as quick as you like,” he answered, with a gay laugh. It was odd that the sight of this structure, made of human hands, should change him in a flash of thought, should make his heart leap in his breast. In a few minutes he was seated in the wherry, half way out across the stream. Already a face was looking over the bulwarks. The hands were on the forecastle, still busy clearing decks after the confusion of letting go anchor and hauling in the jib-boom. Barebone could see them leave off work and turn to look at him. One or two raised a hand in salutation and then turned again to their task. Already the mate--a Farlingford man, who had succeeded Loo--was standing on the rail fingering a coil of rope. “Old man is down below,” he said, giving Barebone a hand. From the forecastle came sundry grunts, and half a dozen heads were jerked sideways at him. Captain Clubbe was in the cabin, where the remains of breakfast had been pushed to one end of the table to make room for pens and ink. The Captain was laboriously filling in the countless documents required by the French custom-house. He looked up, pen in hand, and all the wrinkles, graven by years of hardship and trouble, were swept away like writing from a slate. He laid aside his pen and held his hand out across the table. “Had your breakfast?” he asked, curtly, with a glance at the empty coffee-pot. Loo laughed as he sat down. It was all so familiar--the disorder of the cabin; the smell of lamp-oil; the low song of the wind through the rigging, that came humming in at the doorway, which was never closed, night or day, unless the seas were washing to and fro on the main deck. He knew everything so well; the very pen and the rarely used ink-pot; the Captain's attitude, and the British care that he took not to speak with his lips that which was in his heart. “Well,” said Captain Clubbe, taking up his pen again, “how are you getting on?” “With what?” “With the business that brought you to this country,” answered Clubbe, with a sudden gruffness; for he was, like the majority of big men, shy. Barebone looked at him across the table. “Do you know what the business is that brought me to this country?” he asked. And Captain Clubbe looked thoughtfully at the point of his pen. “Did the Marquis de Gemosac and Dormer Colville tell you everything, or only a little?” “I don't suppose they told me everything,” was the reply. “Why should they? I am only a seafaring man.” “But they told you enough,” persisted Barebone, “for you to draw your own conclusions as to my business over here.” “Yes,” answered Clubbe, with a glance across the table. “Is it going badly?” “No. On the contrary, it is going splendidly,” answered Barebone, gaily; and Captain Clubbe ducked his head down again over the papers of the French custom-house. “It is going splendidly, but--” He paused. Half an hour ago he had no thought in his mind of Captain Clubbe or of Farlingford. He had come on board merely to greet his old friends, to hear some news of home, to take up for a moment that old self of bygone days and drop it again. And now, in half a dozen questions and answers, whither was he drifting? Captain Clubbe filled in a word, slowly and very legibly. “But I am not the man, you know,” said Barebone, slowly. It was as if the sight of that just man had bidden him cry out the truth. “I am not the man they think me. My father was not the son of Louis XVI., I know that now. I did not know it at first, but I know it now. And I have been going on with the thing, all the same.” Clubbe sat back in his chair. He was large and ponderous in body. And the habit of the body at length becomes the nature of the mind. “Who has been telling you that?” he asked. “Dormer Colville. He told me one thing first and then the other. Only he and you and I know of it.” “Then he must have told one lie,” said Clubbe, reflectively. “One that we know of. And what he says is of no value either way; for he doesn't know. No one knows. Your father was a friend of mine, man and boy, and he didn't know. He was not the same as other men; I know that--but nothing more.” “Then, if you were me, you would give yourself the benefit of the doubt?” asked Barebone, with a rather reckless laugh. “For the sake of others--for the sake of France?” “Not I,” replied Clubbe, bluntly. “But it is practically impossible to go back now,” explained Loo. “It would be the ruin of all my friends, the downfall of France. In my position, what would you do?” “I don't understand your position,” replied Clubbe. “I don't understand politics; I am only a seafaring man. But there is only one thing to do--the square thing.” “But,” protested Dormer Colville's pupil, “I cannot throw over my friends. I cannot abandon France now.” “The square thing,” repeated the sailor, stubbornly. “The square thing; and damn your friends--damn France!” He rose as he spoke, for they had both heard the customs officers come on board; and these functionaries were now bowing at the cabin-door.

36

MRS. ST. PIERRE LAWRENCE DOES NOT UNDERSTAND

It was early in November that the report took wing in Paris that John Turner's bank was, after all, going to weather the storm. Dormer Colville was among the first to hear this news, and strangely enough he did not at once impart it to Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence. All through the year, John Turner had kept his client supplied with ready money. He had, moreover, made no change in his own mode of living. Which things are a mystery to all who have no money of their own nor the good fortune to handle other people's. There is no doubt some explanation of the fact that bankers and other financiers seem to fail, and even become bankrupt, without tangible effect upon their daily comfort, but the unfinancial cannot expect to understand it. There had, as a matter of fact, been no question of discomfort for Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence either. “Can I spend as much as I like?” she had asked Turner, and his reply had been in the affirmative. “No use in saving?” “None whatever,” he replied. To which Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence made answer that she did not understand things at all. “It is no use collecting straws against a flood,” the banker answered, sleepily. There was, of course, no question now of supplying the necessary funds to the Marquis de Gemosac and Albert de Chantonnay, who, it was understood, were raising the money, not without difficulty, elsewhere. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence had indeed heard little or nothing of her Royalist friends in the west. Human nature is the same, it would appear, all the world over, but the upper crust is always the hardest. When Colville was informed of the rumour, he remembered that he had never quarrelled with John Turner. He had, of course, said some hard things in the heat of the moment, but Turner had not retorted. There was no quarrel. Colville, therefore, took an early opportunity of lunching at the club then reputed to have the best chef in Paris. He went late and found that the majority of members had finished dejeuner and were taking coffee in one or other of the smoking-rooms. After a quick and simple meal, Colville lighted a cigarette and went upstairs. There were two or three small rooms where members smoked or played cards or read the newspapers, and in the quietest of these John Turner was alone, asleep. Colville walked backward into the room, talking loudly as he did so with a friend in the passage. When well over the threshold he turned: John Turner, whose slumbers had been rudely disturbed, was sitting up rubbing his eyes. The surprise was of course mutual, and for a moment there was an awkward pause; then, with a smile of frank good-fellowship, Colville advanced, holding out his hand. “I hope we have known each other too many years, old fellow,” he said, “to bear any lasting ill-will for words spoken in the heat of anger or disappointment, eh?” He stood in front of the banker frankly holding out the hand of forgiveness, his head a little on one side, that melancholy smile of toleration for poor human weakness in his eyes. “Well,” admitted Turner, “we've certainly known each other a good many years.” He somewhat laboriously hoisted himself up, his head emerging from his tumbled collar like the head of a tortoise aroused from sleep, and gave into Colville's affectionate grasp a limp and nerveless hand. “No one could feel for you more sincerely than I do,” Colville assured him, drawing forward a chair,--“more than I have done all through these trying months.” “Very kind, I'm sure,” murmured Turner, looking drowsily at his friend's necktie. One must look somewhere, and Turner always gazed at the necktie of any one who sat straight in front of him, which usually induced an uneasy fingering of that ornament and an early consultation of the nearest mirror. “Have a cigar.” There was the faint suggestion of a twinkle beneath the banker's heavy lids as Colville accepted this peace-offering. It was barely twenty-four hours since he had himself launched in Colville's direction the rumour which had brought about this reconciliation. “And I'm sure,” continued the other, turning to cut the end of the cigar, “that no one would be better pleased to hear that better times are coming--eh? What did you say?” “Nothing. Didn't speak,” was the reply to this vague interrogation. Then they talked of other things. There was no lack of topics for conversation at this time in France; indeed, the whole country was in a buzz of talk. But Turner was not, it seemed, in a talkative mood. Only once did he rouse himself to take more than a passing interest in the subject touched upon by his easy-going companion. “Yes,” he admitted, “he may be the best cook in Paris, but he is not what he was. It is this Revision of the Constitution which is upsetting the whole country, especially the lower classes. The man's hand is shaky. I can see it from his way of pouring the mayonnaise over a salad.” After touching upon each fresh topic, Colville seemed to return unconsciously to that which must of necessity be foremost in his companion's thoughts--the possibility of saving Turner's bank from failure. And each time he learnt a little more. At last, with that sympathetic spontaneity which was his chief charm, Dormer Colville laid his hand confidentially on Turner's sleeve. “Frankly, old fellow,” he said, “are you going to pull it through?” “Frankly, old fellow, I am,” was the reply, which made Colville glance hastily at the clock. “Gad!” he exclaimed, “look at the time. You have kept me gossiping the whole afternoon. Must be off. Nobody will be better pleased than I am to hear the good news. But of course I am mum. Not a word will they hear from me. I AM glad. Good-bye.” “I dare say you are,” murmured Turner to the closed door. Dormer Colville was that which is known as an opportunist. It was a dull grey afternoon. He would be sure to find Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence at home. She had taken an apartment in the Rue de Lille in the St. Germain quarter. His way was past the flower-shop, where he sometimes bestowed a fickle custom. He went in and bought a carnation for his buttonhole. It is to be presumed that John Turner devoted the afternoon to his affairs. It was at all events evening before he also bent his steps toward the Rue de Lille. Yes, the servant told him, Madame was at home and would assuredly see him. Madame was not alone. No. It was, however, only Monsieur Colville, who was so frequent a visitor. Turner followed the servant along the corridor. The stairs had rather tried one who had to elevate such a weight at each step; he breathed hard, but placidly. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence received him with an unusual empressement. Dormer Colville, who was discovered sitting as far from her as the size of the room allowed, was less eager, but he brought forward a chair for the banker and glanced sharply at his face as he sat down. “So glad to see you,” the hostess explained. “It is really kind of you to come and cheer one up on such a dull afternoon. Dormer and I--won't you take off your coat? No, let ME put it aside for you. Dormer and I were just--just saying how dull it was. Weren't we?” She looked from one to the other with a rather unnatural laugh. One would have thought that she was engaged in carrying off a difficult situation and, for so practised a woman of the world, not doing it very well. Her cheeks were flushed, which made her look younger, and a subtle uncertainty in her voice and manner added to this illusion charmingly. For a young girl's most precious possession is her inexperience. Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, for the first time in her life, was not sure of herself. “Now I hope you have not come on business,” she added, drawing forward her own chair and passing a quick hand over her hair. “Bother business! Do not let us think about it.” “Not exactly,” replied Turner, recovering his breath. “Quite agree with you. Let us say, 'Bother business,' and not think of it. Though, for an old man who is getting stout, there is nothing much left but business and his dinner, eh?” “No. Do not say that,” cried the lady. “Never say that. It is time enough to think that years hence when we are all white-haired. But I used to think that myself once, you know. When I first had my money. Do you remember? I was so pleased to have all that wealth that I determined to learn all about cheque-books and things and manage it myself. So you taught me, and at last you admitted that I was an excellent man of business. I know I thought I was myself. And I suppose I lapsed into a regular business woman and only thought of money and how to increase it. How horrid you must have thought me!” “Never did that,” protested Turner, stoutly. “But I know I learnt to think much too much about it,” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence went on eagerly. “And now that it is all gone, I do not care THAT for it.” She snapped her finger and thumb and laughed gaily. “Not that,” she repeated. She turned and glanced at Dormer Colville, raising her eyebrows in some mute interrogation only comprehensible to him. “Shall I tell him?” she asked, with a laugh of happiness not very far removed from tears. Then she turned to the banker again. “Listen,” she said. “I am going to tell you something which no one else in the world can tell you. Dormer and I are going to be married. I dare say lots of people will say that they have expected it for a long time. They can say what they like. We don't care. And I am glad that you are the first person to hear it. We have only just settled it, so you are the very first to be told. And I am glad to tell you before anybody else because you have been so kind to me always. You have been my best friend, I think. And the kindest thing you ever did for me was to lose my money, for if you had not lost it, Dormer never would have asked me to marry him. He has just said so himself. And I suppose all men feel that. All the nice ones, I mean. It is one of the drawbacks of being rich, is it not?” “I suppose it is,” answered Turner, stolidly, without turning an eyelash in the direction of Colville. “Perhaps that is why no one has ever asked me to marry them.” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence laughed jerkily at this witticism. She laughed again when John Turner rose from his chair to congratulate her, but the laugh suddenly ceased when he raised her hand to his lips with a courtesy which was even in those days dying out of the world, and turned away from him hastily. She stood with her back toward them for a minute or two looking at some flowers on a side table. Then she came back into the middle of the room, all smiles, replacing her handkerchief in her pocket. “So that is the news I have to tell you,” she said. John Turner had placidly resumed his chair after shaking hands with Dormer Colville for the second time since luncheon. “Yes,” he answered, “it is news indeed. And I have a little news to give you. I do not say that it is quite free from the taint of business, but at all events it is news. Like yours, it has the merit of being at first hand, and you are the first to hear it. No one else could tell it to you.” He broke off and rubbed his chin while he looked apathetically at Colville's necktie. “It has another merit, rare enough,” he went on. “It is good news. I think, in fact I may say I am sure, that we shall pull through now and your money will be safely returned to you.” “I am so glad,” said Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, with a glance at Dormer Colville. “I cannot tell you how glad I am.” She looked at the banker with bright eyes and the flush still in her cheeks that made her look younger and less sure of herself. “Not only for my own sake, you know. For yours, because I am sure you must be relieved, and for--well, for everybody's sake. Tell me all about it, please.” And she pushed her chair sideways nearer to Colville's. John Turner bit the first joint of his thumb reflectively. It is so rare that one can tell any one all about anything. “Tell me first,” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence suggested, “whether Miriam Liston's money is all safe as well.” “Miriam's money never was in danger,” he replied. “Miriam is my ward; you are only my client. There is no chance of Miriam being able to make ducks and drakes of her money.” “That sounds as if I had been trying to do that with mine.” “Well,” admitted the banker, with a placid laugh, “if it had not been for my failure--” “Don't call it hard names,” put in Dormer Colville, generously. “It was not a failure.” “Call it a temporary suspension of payment, then,” agreed the banker, imperturbably. “If it had not been for that, half your fortune would have been goodness knows where by now. You wanted to put it into some big speculation in this country, if I remember aright. And big speculations in France are the very devil just now. Whereas, now, you see, it is all safe and you can invest it in the beginning of next year in some good English securities. It seems providential, does it not?” He rose as he spoke and held out his hand to say goodbye. He asked the question of Colville's necktie, apparently, for he smiled stupidly at it. “Well, I do not understand business after all, I admit that,” Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence called out gaily to him as he went toward the door. “I do not understand things at all.” “No, and I don't suppose you ever will,” Turner replied as he followed the servant into the corridor.

37

AN UNDERSTANDING

Loo Barebone went back to the Chateau de Gemosac after those travels in Provence which terminated so oddly on board “The Last Hope,” at anchor in the Garonne River. The Marquis received him with enthusiasm and a spirit of optimism which age could not dim. “Everything is going a merveille!” he cried. “In three months we shall be ready to strike our blow--to make our great coup for France. The failure of Turner's bank was a severe check, I admit, and for a moment I was in despair. But now we are sure that we shall have the money for Albert de Chantonnay's Beauvoir estate by the middle of January. The death of Madame la Duchesse was a misfortune. If we could have persuaded her to receive you--your face would have done the rest, mon ami--we should have been invincible. But she was broken, that poor lady. Think of her life! Few women would have survived half of the troubles that she carried on those proud shoulders from childhood.” They were sitting in the little salon in the building that adjoined the gate-house of Gemosac, of which the stone stairs must have rung beneath the red spurs of fighting men; of which the walls were dented still with the mark of arms. Barebone had given an account of his journey, which had been carried through without difficulty. Everywhere success had waited upon him--enthusiasm had marked his passage. In returning to France, he had stolen a march on his enemies, for nothing seemed to indicate that his presence in the country was known to them. “I tell you,” the Marquis explained, “that he has his hands full--that man in Paris. It is only a month since he changed his ministry. Who is this St. Arnaud, his Minister of War? Who is Maupas, his Prefect of Police? Does Monsieur Maupas know that we are nearly ready for our coup? Bah! Tell me nothing of that sort, gentlemen.” And this was the universally accepted opinion at this time, of Louis Bonaparte the President of a tottering Republic, divided against itself; a dull man, at his wits' end. For months, all Europe had been turning an inquiring and watchful eye on France. Socialism was rampant. Secret societies honeycombed the community. There was some danger in the air--men knew not what. Catastrophe was imminent, and none knew where to look for its approach. But all thought that it must come at the end of the year. A sort of panic took hold of all classes. They dreaded the end of 1851. The Marquis de Gemosac spoke openly of these things before Juliette. She had been present when Loo and he talked together of this last journey, so happily accomplished, so fruitful of result. And Loo did not tell the Marquis that he had seen his old ship, “The Last Hope,” in the river at Bordeaux, and had gone on board of her. Juliette listened, as she worked, beneath the lamp at the table in the middle of the room. The lace-work she had brought from the convent-school was not finished yet. It was exquisitely fine and delicate, and Juliette executed the most difficult patterns with a sort of careless ease. Sometimes, when the Marquis was more than usually extravagant in his anticipations of success, or showed a superlative contempt for his foes, Juliette glanced at Barebone over her lace-work, but she rarely took part in the talk when politics were under discussion. In domestic matters, however, this new chatelaine showed considerable shrewdness. She was not ignorant of the price of hay, and knew to a cask how much wine was stored in the vault beneath the old chapel. On these subjects the Marquis good-humouredly followed her advice sometimes. His word had always been law in the whole neighbourhood. Was he not the head of one of the oldest families in France? “But, pardieu, she shows a wisdom quite phenomenal, that little one,” the Marquis would tell his friends, with a hearty laugh. It was only natural that he should consider amusing the idea of uniting wisdom and youth and beauty in one person. It is still a universally accepted law that old people must be wise and young persons only charming. Some may think that they could point to a wise child born of foolish parents; to a daughter who is well-educated and shrewd, possessing a sense of logic, and a mother who is ignorant and foolish; to a son who has more sense than his father: but of course such observers must be mistaken. Old theories must be the right ones. The Marquis had no doubt of this, at all events, and thought it most amusing that Juliette should establish order in the chaos of domestic affairs at Gemosac. “You are grave,” said Juliette to Barebone, one evening soon after his return, when they happened to be alone in the little drawing-room. Barebone was, in fact, not a lively companion; for he had sat staring at the log-fire for quite three minutes when his eyes might assuredly have been better employed. “You are grave. Are you thinking of your sins?” “When I think of those, Mademoiselle, I laugh. It is when I think of you that I am grave.” “Thank you.” “So I am always grave, you understand.” She glanced quickly, not at him but toward him, and then continued her lace-making, with the ghost of a smile tilting the corners of her lips. “It is because I have something to tell you.” “A secret?” she inquired, and she continued to smile, but differently, and her eyes hardened almost to resentment. “Yes; a secret. It is a secret only known to two other people in the world besides myself. And they will never let you know even that they share it with you, Mademoiselle.” “Then they are not women,” she said, with a sudden laugh. “Tell it to me, then--your secret.” There had been an odd suggestion of foreknowledge in her manner, as if she were humouring him by pretending to accept as a secret of vast importance some news which she had long known--that little air of patronage which even schoolgirls bestow, at times, upon white-haired men. It is part of the maternal instinct. But this vanished when she heard that she was to share the secret with two men, and she repeated, impatiently, “Tell me, please.” “It is a secret which will make a difference to us all our lives, Mademoiselle,” he said, warningly. “It will not leave us the same as it found us. It has made a difference to all who know it. Therefore, I have only decided to tell you after long consideration. It is, in fact, a point of honour. It is necessary for you to know, whatever the result may be. Of that I have no doubt whatever.” He laughed reassuringly, which made her glance at him gravely, almost anxiously. “And are you going on telling it to other people, afterward,” she inquired; “to my father, for instance?” “No, Mademoiselle. It comes to you, and it stops at you. I do not mind withholding it from your father, and from all the friends who have been so kind to me in France. I do not mind deceiving kings and emperors, Mademoiselle, and even the People, which is now always spelt in capital letters, and must be spoken of with bated breath.” She gave a scornful little laugh, as at the sound of an old jest--the note of a deathless disdain which was in the air she breathed. “Not even the newspapers, which are trying to govern France. All that is a question of politics. But when it comes to you, Mademoiselle, that is a different matter.” “Ah!” “Yes. It is then a question of love.” Juliette slowly changed colour, but she gave a little gay laugh of incredulity and bent her head away from the light of the lamp. “That is a different code of honour altogether,” he said, gravely. “A code one does not wish to tamper with.” “No?” she inquired, with the odd little smile of foreknowledge again. “No. And, therefore, before I go any farther, I think it best to tell you that I am not what I am pretending to be. I am pretending to be the son of the little Dauphin, who escaped from the Temple. He may have escaped from the Temple; that I don't know. But I know, or at least I think I know, that he is not buried in Farlingford churchyard and he was not my father. I can pass as the grandson of Louis XVI.; I know that. I can deceive all the world. I can even climb to the throne of France, perhaps. There are many, as you know, who think I shall do it without difficulty. But I do not propose to deceive YOU, Mademoiselle.” There was a short silence, while Loo watched her face. Juliette had not even changed colour. When she was satisfied that he had nothing more to add, she looked at him, her needle poised in the air. “Do you think it matters?” she asked, in a little cool, even voice. It was so different from what he had expected that, for a moment, he was taken aback. Captain Clubbe's bluff, uncompromising reception of the same news had haunted his thoughts. “The square thing,” that sailor had said, “and damn your friends; damn France.” Loo looked at Juliette in doubt; then, suddenly, he understood her point of view; he understood her. He had learnt to understand a number of people and a number of points of view during the last twelve months. “So long as I succeed?” he suggested. “Yes,” she answered, simply. “So long as you succeed, I do not see that it can matter who you are.” “And if I succeed,” pursued Loo, gravely, “will you marry me, Mademoiselle?” “Oh! I never said that,” in a voice that was ready to yield to a really good argument. “And if I fail--” Barebone paused for an instant. He still doubted his own perception. “And if I fail, you would not marry me under any circumstances?” “I do not think my father would let me,” she answered, with her eyes cast down upon her lace-frame. Barebone leant forward to put together the logs, which burnt with a white incandescence that told of a frosty night. The Marquis had business in the town, and would soon return from the notary's, in time to dress for dinner. “Well,” said Loo, over his shoulder, “it is as well to understand each other, is it not?” “Yes,” she answered, significantly. She ignored the implied sarcasm altogether. There was so much meaning in her reply that Loo turned to look at her. She was smiling as she worked. “Yes,” she went on; “you have told me your secret--a secret. But I have the other, too; the secret you have not told me, mon ami. I have had it always.” “Ah?” “The secret that you do not love me,” said Juliette, in her little wise, even voice; “that you have never loved me. Ah! You think we do not know. You think that I am too young. But we are never too young to know that, to know all about it. I think we know it in our cradles.” She spoke with a strange philosophy, far beyond her years. It might have been Madame de Chantonnay who spoke, with all that lady's vast experience of life and without any of her folly. “You think I am pretty. Perhaps I am. Just pretty enough to enable you to pretend, and you have pretended very well at times. You are good at pretending, one must conclude. Oh! I bear no ill-will....” She broke off and looked at him, with a gay laugh, in which there was certainly no note of ill-will to be detected. “But it is as well,” she went on, “as you say, that we should understand each other. Thank you for telling me your secret--the one you have told me. I am flattered at that mark of your confidence. A woman is always glad to be told a secret, and immediately begins to anticipate the pleasure she will take in telling it to others, in confidence.” She looked up for a moment from her work; for Loo had given a short laugh. She looked, to satisfy herself that it was not the ungenerous laugh that nine men out of ten would have cast at her; and it was not. For Loo was looking at her with frank amusement. “Oh, yes,” she said; “I know that, too. It is one of the items not included in a convent education. It is unnecessary to teach us such things as that. We know them before we go in. Your secret is safe enough with me, however--the one you have told me. That is the least I can promise in return for your confidence. As to the other secret, bon Dieu! we will pretend I do not know it, if you like. At all events, you can vow that you never told me, if--if ever you are called upon to do so.” She paused for a moment to finish off a thread. Then, when she reached out her hand for the reel, she glanced at him with a smile, not unkind. “So you need not pretend any more, monsieur,” she said, seeing that Barebone was wise enough to keep silence. “I do not know who you are, mon ami,” she went on, in a little burst of confidence; “and, as I told you just now, I do not care. And, as to that other matter, there is no ill-will. I only permit myself to wonder, sometimes, if she is pretty. That is feminine, I suppose. One can be feminine quite young, you understand.” She looked at him with unfathomable eyes and a little smile, such as men never forget once they have seen it. “But you were inclined to be ironical just now, when I said I would marry you if you were successful. So I mention that other secret just to show that the understanding you wish to arrive at may be mutual--there may be two sides to it. I hear my father coming. That is his voice at the gate. We will leave things as they stand: n'est ce pas?” She rose as she spoke and went toward the door. The Marquis's voice was raised, and there seemed to be some unusual clamour at the gate.

38

A COUP-D'ETAT

As the Marquis de Gemosac's step was already on the stairs, Barebone was spared the necessity of agreeing in words to the inevitable. A moment later the old man hurried into the room. He had not even waited to remove his coat and gloves. A few snow-flakes powdered his shoulders. “Ah!” he cried, on perceiving Barebone. “Good--you are safe!” He turned to speak to some one who was following him up the stairs with the slower steps of one who knew not his way. “All is well!” he cried. “He is here. Give yourself no anxiety.” And the second comer crossed the threshold, coming suddenly out of the shadow of the staircase. It was Dormer Colville, white with snow, his face grey and worn. He shook hands with Barebone and bowed to Juliette, but the Marquis gave him no time to speak. “I go down into the town,” he explained, breathlessly. “The streets are full. There is a crowd on the market-place, more especially round the tobacconist's, where the newspapers are to be bought. No newspapers, if you please. The Paris journals of last Sunday, and this is Friday evening. Nothing since that. No Bordeaux journal. No news at all from Paris: absolute silence from Toulouse and Limoges. 'It is another revolution,' they tell each other. Something has happened and no one knows what. A man comes up to me and tugs at my sleeve. 'Inside your walls, Monsieur le Marquis, waste no time,' he whispers, and is gone. He is some stable-boy. I have seen him somewhere. I! inside my walls! Here in Gemosac, where I see nothing but bare heads as I walk through the streets. Name of God! I should laugh at such a precaution. And while I am still trying to gather information the man comes back to me. 'It is not the people you have to fear,' he whispers in my ear, 'it is the Government. The order for your arrest is at the Gendarmerie, for it was I who took it there. Monsieur Albert was arrested yesterday, and is now in La Rochelle. Madame de Chantonnay's house is guarded. It is from Madame I come.' And again he goes. While I am hesitating, I hear the step of a horse, tired and yet urged to its utmost. It is Dormer Colville, this faithful friend, who is from Paris in thirty-six hours to warn us. He shall tell his story himself.” “There is not much to tell,” said Colville, in a hollow voice. He looked round for a chair and sat down rather abruptly. “Louis Bonaparte is absolute master of France; that is all. He must be so by this time. When I escaped from Paris yesterday morning nearly all the streets were barricaded. But the troops were pouring into the city as I rode out--and artillery. I saw one barricade carried by artillery. Thousands must have been killed in the streets of Paris yesterday--” “--And, bon Dieu! it is called a coup-d'etat,” interrupted the Marquis. “That was on Tuesday,” explained Colville, in his tired voice--“at six o'clock on Tuesday morning. Yesterday and Wednesday were days of massacre.” “But, my friend,” exclaimed the Marquis, impatiently, “tell us how it happened. You laugh! It is no time to laugh.” “I do not know,” replied Colville, with an odd smile. “I think there is nothing else to be done--it is all so complete. We are all so utterly fooled by this man whom all the world took to be a dolt. On Tuesday morning he arrested seventy-eight of the Representatives. When Paris awoke, the streets had been placarded in the night with the decree of the President of the Republic. The National Assembly was dissolved. The Council of State was dissolved. Martial law was declared. And why? He does not even trouble to give a reason. He has the army at his back. The soldiers cried 'Vive l'Empereur' as they charged the crowd on Wednesday. He has got rid of his opponents by putting them in prison. Many, it is said, are already on their way to exile in Cayenne; the prisons are full. There is a warrant out against myself; against you, Barebone; against you, of course, Monsieur le Marquis. Albert de Chantonnay was arrested at Tours, and is now in La Rochelle. We may escape--we may get away to-night--” He paused and looked hurriedly toward the door, for some one was coming up the stairs--some one who wore sabots. It was the servant, Marie, who came unceremoniously into the room with the exaggerated calm of one who realises the gravity of the situation and means to master it. “The town is on fire,” she explained, curtly; “they have begun on the Gendarmerie. Doubtless they have heard that these gentlemen are to be arrested, and it is to give other employment to the gendarmes. But the cavalry has arrived from Saintes, and I come upstairs to ask Monsieur to come down and help. It is my husband who is a fool. Holy Virgin! how many times have I regretted having married such a blockhead as that. He says he cannot raise the drawbridge. To raise it three feet would be to gain three hours. So I came to get Monsieur,” she pointed at Barebone with a steady finger, “who has his wits on the top always and two hands at the end of his arms.” “But it is little use to raise the drawbridge,” objected the Marquis. “They will soon get a ladder and place it against the breach in the wall and climb in.” “Not if I am on the wall who amuse myself with a hayfork, Monsieur le Marquis,” replied Marie, with that exaggerated respect which implies a knowledge of mental superiority. She beckoned curtly to Loo and clattered down the stairs, followed by Barebone. The others did not attempt to go to their assistance, and the Marquis de Gemosac had a hundred questions to ask Colville. The Englishman had little to tell of his own escape. There were so many more important arrests to be made that the overworked police of Monsieur de Maupas had only been able to apportion to him a bungler whom Colville had easily outwitted. “And Madame St. Pierre Lawrence?” inquired the Marquis. “Madame quitted Paris on Tuesday for England under the care of John Turner, who had business in London. He kindly offered to escort her across the Channel.” “Then she, at all events, is safe,” said the Marquis, with a little wave of the hand indicating his satisfaction. “He is not brilliant, Monsieur Turner--so few English are--but he is solid, I think.” “I think he is the cleverest man I know,” said Dormer Colville, thoughtfully. And before they had spoken again Loo Barebone returned. He, like Marie, had grasped at once the serious aspect of the situation, whereas the Marquis succeeded only in reaching it with a superficial touch. He prattled of the political crisis in Paris and bade his friends rest assured that law and order must ultimately prevail. He even seemed to cherish the comforting assurance that Providence must in the end interfere on behalf of a Legitimate Succession. For this old noble was the true son of a father who had believed to the end in that King who talked grandiloquently of the works of Seneca and Tacitus while driving from the Temple to his trial, with the mob hooting and yelling imprecations into the carriage windows. The Marquis de Gemosac found time to give a polite opinion on John Turner while the streets of Gemosac were being cleared by the cavalry from Saintes, and the Gendarmerie, burning briskly, lighted up a scene of bloodshed. “We have raised the drawbridge a few feet,” said Barebone; “but the chains are rusted and may easily be broken by a blacksmith. It will serve to delay them a few minutes; but it is not the mob we seek to keep out, and any organised attempt to break in would succeed in half an hour. We must go, of course.” He turned to Colville, with whom he had met and faced difficulties in the past. Colville might easily have escaped to England with Mrs. St. Pierre Lawrence, but he had chosen the better part. He had undertaken a long journey through disturbed France only to throw in his lot at the end of it with two pre-condemned men. Loo turned to him as to one who had proved himself capable enough in an emergency, brave in face of danger. “We cannot stay here,” he said; “the gates will serve to give us an hour's start, but no more. I suppose there is another way out of the chateau.” “There are two ways,” answered the Marquis. “One leads to a house in the town and the other emerges at the mill down below the walls. But, alas! both are lost sight of. My ancestors--” “I know the shorter one,” put in Juliette, “the passage that leads to the mill. I can show you the entrance to that, which is in the crypt of the chapel, hidden behind the casks of wine.” She spoke to Barebone, only half-concealing, as Marie had done, the fact that the great respect with which the Marquis de Gemosac was treated was artificial, and would fall to pieces under the strain of an emergency--a faint echo of the old regime. “When you are gone,” the girl continued, still addressing Barebone, “Marie and I can keep them out at least an hour--probably more. We may be able to keep them outside the walls all night, and when at last they come in it will take them hours to satisfy themselves that you are not concealed within the enceinte.” She was quite cool, and even smiled at him with a white face. “You are always right, Mademoiselle, and have a clear head,” said Barebone. “But no heart?” she answered in an undertone, under cover of her father's endless talk to Colville and with a glance which Barebone could not understand. In a few minutes Dormer Colville pronounced himself ready to go, and refused to waste further precious minutes in response to Monsieur de Gemosac's offers of hospitality. No dinner had been prepared, for Marie had sterner business in hand and could be heard beneath the windows urging her husband to display a courage superior to that of a rabbit. Juliette hurried to the kitchen and there prepared a parcel of cold meat and bread for the fugitives to eat as they fled. “We might remain hidden in a remote cottage,” Barebone had suggested to Colville, “awaiting the development of events, but our best chance is 'The Last Hope.' She is at Bordeaux, and must be nearly ready for sea.” So it was hurriedly arranged that they should make their way on foot to a cottage on the marsh while Jean was despatched to Bordeaux with a letter for Captain Clubbe. “It is a pity,” said Marie, when informed of this plan, “that it is not I who wear the breeches. But I will make it clear to Jean that if he fails to carry out his task he need not show his face at the gate again.” The Marquis ran hither and thither, making a hundred suggestions, which were accepted in the soothing manner adopted toward children. He assured Juliette that their absence would be of short duration; that there was indeed no danger, but that he was acceding to the urgent persuasions of Barebone and Colville, who were perhaps unnecessarily alarmed--who did not understand how affairs were conducted in France. He felt assured that law and order must prevail. “But if they have put Albert de Chantonnay in prison, why should you be safe?” asked Juliette. To which the Marquis replied with a meaning cackle that she had a kind heart, and that it was only natural that it should be occupied at that moment with thoughts of that excellent young man who, in his turn, was doubtless thinking of her in his cell at La Rochelle. Which playful allusion to Albert de Chantonnay's pretensions was received by their object with a calm indifference. “When Jean returns,” she said, practically, “I will send him to you at the Bremonts' cottage with food and clothing. But you must not attempt to communicate with us. You would only betray your whereabouts and do no good to us. We shall be quite safe in the chateau. Marie and I and Madame Maugiron are not afraid.” At which the Marquis laughed heartily. It was so amusing to think that one should be young and pretty and not afraid. In the mean time Barebone was sealing his letter to Captain Clubbe. He had written it in the Suffolk dialect, spelling all the words as they are pronounced on that coast and employing when he could the Danish and Dutch expressions in daily use on the foreshore, which no French official seeking to translate could find in any dictionary. Lao gave his instructions to Jean himself, who received them in a silence not devoid of intelligence. The man had been round the walls and reported that nothing stirred beneath them; that there was more than one fire in the town, and that the streets appeared to be given over to disorder and riot. “It is assuredly a change in the Government,” he explained, simply. “And there will be many for Monsieur l'Abbe to bury on Sunday.” Jean was to accompany them to the cottage of an old man who had once lived by ferrying the rare passenger across the Gironde. Having left them here, he could reach Blaye before daylight, from whence a passage up the river to Bordeaux would be easily procurable. The boatman's cottage stood on the bank of a creek running into the Gironde. It was a lone building hidden among the low dunes that lie between the river and the marsh. Any one approaching it by daylight would be discernible half an hour in advance, and the man's boat, though old, was seaworthy. None would care to cross the lowlands at night except under the guidance of one or two, who, like Jean, knew their way even in the dark. Colville and Barebone had to help Jean to move the great casks stored in the crypt of the old chapel by which the entrance to the passage was masked. “It is, I recollect having been told, more than a passage--it is a ramp,” explained the Marquis, who stood by. “It was intended for the passage of horses, so that a man might mount here and ride out into the mill-stream, actually beneath the mill-wheel which conceals the exit.” Juliette, a cloak thrown over her evening dress, had accompanied them and stood near, holding a lantern above her head to give them light. It was an odd scene--a strange occupation for the last of the de Gemosacs. Through the gaps in the toppling walls they could hear the roar of voices and the occasional report of a firearm in the streets of the town below. The door opened easily enough, and Jean, lighting a candle, led the way. Barebone was the last to follow. Within the doorway he turned to say good-bye. The light of the lantern flickered uncertainly on Juliette's fair hair. “We may be back sooner than you expect, mademoiselle,” said Barebone. “Or you may go--to England,” she answered.

39

“JOHN DARBY”

Although it was snowing hard, it was not a dark night. There was a half moon hidden behind those thin, fleecy clouds, which carry the snow across the North Sea and cast it noiselessly upon the low-lying coast, from Thanet to the Wash, which knows less rain and more snow than any in England. A gale of wind was blowing from the north-east; not in itself a wild gale, but at short intervals a fresh burst of wind brought with it a thicker fall of snow, and during these squalls the force of the storm was terrific. A man, who had waited on the far shore of the river for a quiet interval, had at last made his way to the Farlingford side. He moored his boat and stumbled heavily up the steps. There was no one on the quay. The street was deserted, but the lights within the cottages glowed warmly through red blinds here and there. The majority of windows were, however, secured with a shutter, screwed tight from within. The man trotted steadily up the street. He had an unmistakable air of discipline. It was only six o'clock, but night had closed in three hours ago. The coast-guard looked neither to one side nor the other, but ran on at the pace of one who had run far and knows that he cannot afford to lose his breath; for his night's work was only begun. The coast-guard station stands on the left-hand side of the street, a long, low house in a bare garden. In answer to the loud summons, a red-faced little man opened the door and let out into the night a smell of bloaters and tea--the smell that pervades all Farlingford at six o'clock in the evening. “Something on the Inner Curlo Bank,” shouted the coast-guard in his face, and turning on his heel, he ran with the same slow, organised haste, leaving the red-faced man finishing a mouthful on the mat. The next place of call was at River Andrew's, the little low cottage with rounded corners, below the church. “Come out o' that,” said the coast-guard, with a contemptuous glance of snow-rimmed eyes at River Andrew's comfortable tea-table. “Ring yer bell. Something on the Inner Curlo Bank.” River Andrew had never hurried in his life, and like all his fellows, he looked upon coast-guards as amateurs mindful, as all amateurs are, of their clothes. “A'm now going,” he answered, rising laboriously from his chair. The coast-guard glanced at his feet clad in the bright green carpet-slippers, dear to seafaring men. Then he turned to the side of the mantelpiece and took the church keys from the nail. For everybody knows where everybody else keeps his keys in Farlingford. He forgot to shut the door behind him, and River Andrew, pessimistically getting into his sea-boots, swore at his retreating back. “Likely as not, he'll getten howld o' the wrong roup,” he muttered; though he knew that every boy in the village could point out the rope of “John Darby,” as that which had a piece of faded scarlet flannel twisted through the strands. In a few minutes the man, who hastened slowly, gave the call, which every man in Farlingford answered with an emotionless, mechanical promptitude. From each fireside some tired worker reached out his hand toward his most precious possession, his sea-boots, as his forefathers had done before him for two hundred years at the sound of “John Darby.” The women crammed into the pockets of the men's stiff oilskins a piece of bread, a half-filled bottle--knowing that, as often as not, their husbands must pass the night and half the next day on the beach, or out at sea, should the weather permit a launch through the surf. There was no need of excitement, or even of comment. Did not “John Darby” call them from their firesides or their beds a dozen times every winter, to scramble out across the shingle? As often as not, there was nothing to be done but drag the dead bodies from the surf; but sometimes the dead revived--some fair-haired, mystic foreigner from the northern seas, who came to and said, “T'ank you,” and nothing else. And next day, rigged out in dry clothes and despatched toward Ipswich on the carrier's cart, he would shake hands awkwardly with any standing near and bob his head and say “T'ank you” again, and go away, monosyllabic, mystic, never to be heard of more. But the ocean, as it is called at Farlingford, seemed to have an inexhaustible supply of such Titans to throw up on the rattling shingle winter after winter. And, after all, they were seafaring men, and therefore brothers. Farlingford turned out to a man, each seeking to be first across the river every time “John Darby” called them, as if he had never called them before. To-night none paused to finish the meal, and many a cup raised half-way was set down again untasted. It is so easy to be too late. Already the flicker of lanterns on the sea-wall showed that the rectory was astir. For Septimus Marvin, vaguely recalling some schoolboy instinct of fair-play, knew the place of the gentleman and the man of education among humbler men in moments of danger and hardship, which should, assuredly, never be at the back. “Yonder's parson,” some one muttered. “His head is clear enow, I'll warrant, when he hears 'John Darby.'” “'Tis only on Sundays, when 'John' rings slow, 'tis misty,” answered a sharp-voiced woman, with a laugh. For half of Farlingford was already at the quay, and three or four boats were bumping and splashing against the steps. The tide was racing out, and the wind, whizzing slantwise across it, pushed it against the wooden piles of the quay, making them throb and tremble. “Not less'n four to the oars!” shouted a gruff voice, at the foot of the steps, where the salt water, splashing on the snow, had laid bare the green and slimy moss. Two or three volunteers stumbled down the steps, and the first boat got away, swinging down-stream at once, only to be brought slowly back, head to wind. She hung motionless a few yards from the quay, each dip of the oars stirring the water into a whirl of phosphorescence, and then forged slowly ahead. Septimus Marvin was not alone, but was accompanied by a bulky man, not unknown in Farlingford--John Turner, of Ipswich, understood to live “foreign,” but to return, after the manner of East Anglians, when occasion offered. The rector was in oilskins and sou'wester, like any one else, and the gleam of his spectacles under the snowy brim of his headgear seemed to strike no one as incongruous. His pockets bulged with bottles and bandages. Under his arm he carried a couple of blanket horse-cloths, useful for carrying the injured or the dead. “The Curlo--the Inner Curlo--yes, yes!” he shouted in response to information volunteered on all sides. “Poor fellows! The Inner Curlo, dear, dear!” And he groped his way down the steps, into the first boat he saw, with a simple haste. John Turner followed him. He had tied a silk handkerchief over his soft felt hat and under his chin. “No, no!” he said, as Septimus Marvin made room for him on the after-thwart. “I'm too heavy for a passenger. Put my weight on an oar,” and he clambered forward to a vacant thwart. “Mind you come back for us, River Andrew!” cried little Sep's thin voice, as the boat swirled down stream. His wavering bull's-eye lantern followed it, and showed River Andrew and another pulling stroke to John Turner's bow, for the banker had been a famous oar on the Orwell in his boyhood. Then, with a smack like a box on the ear, another snow-squall swept in from the sea, and forced all on the quay to turn their backs and crouch. Many went back to their homes, knowing that nothing could be known for some hours. Others crouched on the landward side of an old coal-shed, peeping round the corner. Miriam and Sep, and a few others, waited on the quay until River Andrew or another should return. It was an understood thing that the helpers, such as could man a boat or carry a drowned man, should go first. In a few minutes the squall was past, and by the light of the moon, now thinly covered by clouds, the black forms of the first to reach the other shore could be seen straggling across the marsh toward the great shingle-bank that lies between the river and the sea. Two boats were moored at the far side, another was just making the jetty, while a fourth was returning toward the quay. It was River Andrew, faithful to his own element, who preferred to be first here, rather than obey orders on the open beach. There were several ready to lend a helping hand against tide and wind, and Miriam and Sep were soon struggling across the shingle, in the footsteps of those who had gone before. The north-east wind seared their faces like a hot iron, but the snow had ceased falling. As they reached the summit of the shingle-bank, they could see in front of them the black line of the sea, and on the beach, where the white of the snow and the white of the roaring surf merged together, a group of men. One or two stragglers had left this group to search the beach, north or south; but it was known, from a long and grim experience, that anything floating in from the tail of the Inner Curlo Bank must reach the shore at one particular point. A few lanterns twinkled here and there, but near the group of watchers a bonfire of wreckage and tarry fragments and old rope, brought hither for the purpose, had been kindled. Two boats, hauled out of reach of a spring tide, were being leisurely prepared for launching. There was no hurry; for it had been decided by the older men that no boat could be put to sea through the surf then rolling in. At the turn of the tide, in two hours' time, something might be done. “Us cannot see anything,” a bystander said to Miriam. “It is just there, where I am pointing. Sea Andrew saw something a while back--says it looked like a schooner.” The man stood pointing out to sea to the southward. He carried an unlighted torch--a flare, roughly made, of tarred rope, bound round a stick. At times, one or another would ignite his flare, and go down the beach holding it above his head, while he stood knee deep in the churning foam to peer out to sea. He would presently return, without comment, to beat out his flare against his foot and take his place among the silent watchers. No one spoke; but if any turned his head sharply to one side or other, all the rest wheeled, like one man, in the same direction and after staring at the tumbled sea would turn reproachful glances on the false alarmist. Suddenly, after a long wait, four men rushed without a word into the surf; their silent fury suggesting oddly the rush of hounds upon a fox. They had simultaneously caught sight of something dark, half sunk in the shallow water. In a moment they were struggling up the shingle slope toward the fire, carrying a heavy weight. They laid their burden by the fire, where the snow had melted away, and it was a man. He was in oilskins, and some one cut the tape that tied his sou'wester. His face was covered with blood. “'Tis warm,” said the man who had cut away the oilskin cap, and with his hand he wiped the blood away from the eyes and mouth. Some one in the background drew a cork, with his teeth, and a bottle was handed down to those kneeling on the ground. Suddenly the man sat up--and coughed. “Shipmets,” he said, with a splutter, and lay down again. Some one held the bottle to his lips and wiped the blood away from his face again. “My God!” shouted a bystander, gruffly. “'Tis William Brooke, of the Cottages.” “Yes. 'Tis me,” said the man, sitting up again. “Not that arm, mate; don't ye touch it. 'Tis bruk. Yes; 'tis me. And 'The Last Hope' is on the tail of the Inner Curlo--and the spar that knocked me overboard fell on the old man, and must have half killed him. But Loo Barebone's aboard.” He rose to his knees, with one arm hanging straight and piteous from his shoulder, then slowly to his feet. He stood wavering for a moment, and wiped his mouth with the back of his hand and spluttered. Then, looking straight in front of him, with that strange air of a whipped dog which humble men wear when the hand of Heaven is upon them, he staggered up the beach toward the river and Farlingford. “Where are ye goin'?” some one asked. “Over to mine,” was the reply. “A'm going to my old woman, shipmets.” And he staggered away in the darkness.

40

FARLINGFORD ONCE MORE

After a hurried consultation, Septimus Marvin was deputed to follow the injured man and take him home, seeing that he had as yet but half recovered his senses. This good Samaritan had scarcely disappeared when a shout from the beach drew the attention of all in another direction. One of the outposts was running toward the fire, waving his lantern and shouting incoherently. It was a coastguard. “Comin' ashore in their own boat,” he cried. “They're coming in in their own boat!” “There she rides--there she rides!” added Sea Andrew, almost immediately, and he pointed to the south. Quite close in, just outside the line of breakers, a black shadow was rising and falling on the water. It seemed to make scarcely any way at all, and each sea that curled underneath the boat and roared toward the beach was a new danger. “They're going to run her in here,” said Sea Andrew. “There's more left on board; that's what that means, and they're goin' back for 'em. If 'twasn't so they'd run in anywheres and let her break.” For one sailor will always tell what another is about, however great the distance intervening. Slowly the boat came on, rolling tremendously on the curve of the breakers, between the broken water of the tideway and the spume of the surf. “That's Loo at the hellum,” said Sea Andrew--the keenest eyes in Farlingford. And suddenly Miriam swayed sideways against John Turner, who was perhaps watching her, for he gripped her arm and stood firm. No one spoke. The watchers on the beach stared open-mouthed, making unconscious grimaces as the boat rose and fell. All had been ready for some minutes; every preparation made according to the time-honoured use of these coasts: four men with life-lines round them standing knee-deep waiting to dash in deeper, others behind them grouped in two files, some holding the slack of the life-lines, forming a double rank from the shore to the fire, giving the steersman his course. There was no need to wave a torch or shout an order. They were Farlingford men on the shore and Farlingford men in the boat. At last, after breathless moments of suspense, the boat turned, and came spinning in on the top of a breaker, with the useless oars sticking out like the legs of some huge insect. For a few seconds it was impossible to distinguish anything. The moment the boat touched ground, the waves beating on it enveloped all near it in a whirl of spray, and the black forms seemed to be tumbling over each other in confusion. “You see,” said Turner to Miriam, “he has come back to you after all.” She did not answer but stood, her two hands clasped together on her breast, seeking to disentangle the confused group, half in half out of the water. Then they heard Loo Barebone's voice, cheerful and energetic, almost laughing. Before they could understand what was taking place his voice was audible again, giving a sharp, clear order, and all the black forms rushed together down into the surf. A moment later the boat danced out over the crest of a breaker, splashing into the next and throwing up a fan of spray. “She's through, she's through!” cried some one. And the boat rode for a brief minute head to wind before she turned southward. There were only three on the thwarts--Loo Barebone and two others. The group now broke up and straggled up toward the fire. One man was being supported, and could scarcely walk. It was Captain Clubbe, hatless, his grey hair plastered across his head by salt water. He did not heed any one, but sat down heavily on the shingle and felt his leg with one hand, the other arm hung limply. “Leave me here,” he said, gruffly, to two or three who were spreading out a horse-cloth and preparing to carry him. “Here I stay till all are ashore.” Behind him were several new-comers, one of them a little man talking excitedly to his companion. “But it is a folly,” he was saying in French, “to go back in such a sea as that.” It was the Marquis de Gemosac, and no one was taking any notice of him. Dormer Colville, stumbling over the shingle beside him, recognised Miriam in the firelight and turned again to look at her companion as if scarcely believing the evidence of his own eyes. “Is that you, Turner?” he said. “We are all here,--the Marquis, Barebone, and I. Clubbe took us on board one dark night in the Gironde and brought us home.” “Are you hurt?” asked Turner, curtly. “Oh, no. But Clubbe's collar-bone is broken and his leg is crushed. We had to leave four on board; not room for them in the boat. That fool Barebone has gone back for them. He promised them he would. The sea out there is awful!” He knelt down and held his shaking hands to the flames. Some one handed him a bottle, but he turned first and gave it the Marquis de Gemosac, who was shaking all over like one far gone in a palsy. Sea Andrew and the coast-guard captain were persuading Captain Clubbe to quit the beach, but he only answered them roughly in monosyllables. “My place is here till all are safe,” he said. “Let me lie.” And with a groan of pain he lay back on the beach. Miriam folded a blanket and placed it under his head. He looked round, recognised her and nodded. “No place for you, miss,” he said, and closed his eyes. After a moment he raised himself on his elbow and looked into the faces peering down at him. “Loo will beach her anywhere he can. Keep a bright lookout for him,” he said. Then he was silent, and all turned their faces toward the sea. Another snow-squall swept in with a rush from the eastward, and half of the fire was blown away--a trail of sparks hissing on the snow. They built up the fire again and waited, crouching low over the embers. They could see nothing out to sea. There was nothing to be done but to wait. Some had gone along the shore to the south, keeping pace with the supposed progress of the boat, ready to help should she be thrown ashore. Suddenly the Marquis de Gemosac, shivering over the fire, raised his voice querulously. His emotions always found vent in speech. “It is a folly,” he repeated, “that he has committed. I do not understand, gentlemen, how he was permitted to do such a thing--he whose life is of value to millions.” He turned his head to glance sharply at Captain Clubbe, at Colville, at Turner, who listened with that half-contemptuous silence which Englishmen oppose to unnecessary or inopportune speech. “Ah!” he said, “you do not understand--you Englishmen--or you do not believe, perhaps, that he is the King. You would demand proofs which you know cannot be produced. I demand no proofs, for I know. I know without any proof at all but his face, his manner, his whole being. I knew at once when I saw him step out of his boat here in this sad village, and I have lived with him almost daily ever since--only to be more sure than at first.” His hearers made no answer. They listened tolerantly enough, as one listens to a child or to any other incapable of keeping to the business in hand. “Oh, I know more than you suspect,” said the Marquis, suddenly. “There are some even in our own party who have doubts, who are not quite sure. I know that there was a doubt as to that portrait of the Queen,” he half glanced toward Dormer Colville. “Some say one thing, some another. I have been told that, when the child--Monsieur de Bourbon's father--landed here, there were two portraits among his few possessions--the miniature and a larger print, an engraving. Where is that engraving, one would ask?” “I have it in my safe in Paris,” said a thick voice in the darkness. “Thought it was better in my possession than anywhere else.” “Indeed! And now, Monsieur Turner--” the Marquis raised himself on his knees and pointed in his eager way a thin finger in the direction of the banker--“tell me this. Those portraits to which some would attach importance--they are of the Duchess de Guiche. Admitted? Good! If you yourself--who have the reputation of being a man of wit--desired to secure the escape of a child and his nurse, would you content yourself with the mere precaution of concealing the child's identity? Would you not go farther and provide the nurse with a subterfuge, a blind, something for the woman to produce and say, 'This is not the little Dauphin. This is so-and-so. See, here is the portrait of his mother?' What so effective, I ask you? What so likely to be believed as a scandal directed against the hated aristocrats? Can you advance anything against that theory?” “No, Monsieur,” replied Turner. “But Monsieur de Bourbon knows of these doubts,” went on the Marquis. “They have even touched his own mind, I know that. But he has continued to fight undaunted. He has made sacrifices--any looking at his face can see that. It was not in France that he looked for happiness, but elsewhere. He was not heart-whole--I who have seen him with the most beautiful women in France paying court to him know that. But this sacrifice, also, he made for the sake of France. Or perhaps some woman of whom we know nothing stepped back and bade him go forward alone, for the sake of his own greatness--who can tell?” Again no one answered him. He had not perceived Miriam, and John Turner, with that light step which sometimes goes with a vast bulk, had placed himself between her and the firelight. Monsieur de Gemosac rose to his feet and stood looking seaward. The snow-clouds were rolling away to the west, and the moon, breaking through, was beginning to illumine the wild sky. “Gentlemen,” said the Marquis, “they have been gone a long time?” Captain Clubbe moved restlessly, but he made no answer. The Marquis had, of course, spoken in French, and the Captain had no use for that language. The group round the fire had dwindled until only half a dozen remained. One after another the watchers had moved away uneasily toward the beach. The Marquis was right--the boat had been gone too long. At last the moon broke through, and the snowy scene was almost as light as day. John Turner was looking along the beach to the south, and one after another the watchers by the fire turned their anxious eyes in the same direction. The sea, whipped white, was bare of any wreck. “The Last Hope” of Farlingford was gone. She had broken up or rolled into deep water. A number of men were coming up the shingle in silence. Sea Andrew, dragging his feet wearily, approached in advance of them. “Boat's thrown up on the beach,” he said to Captain Clubbe. “Stove in by a sea. We've found them.” He stood back and the others, coming slowly into the light, deposited their burdens side by side near the fire. The Marquis, who had understood nothing, took a torch from the hand of a bystander and held it down toward the face of the man they had brought last. It was Loo Barebone, and the clean-cut, royal features seemed to wear a reflective smile. Miriam had come forward toward the fire, and by chance or by some vague instinct the bearers had laid their burden at her feet. After all, as John Turner had said, Loo Barebone had come back to her. She had denied him twice, and the third time he would take no denial. The taciturn sailors laid him there and stepped back--as if he was hers and this was the inevitable end of his short and stormy voyage. She looked down at him with tired eyes. She had done the right, and this was the end. There are some who may say that she had done what she thought was right, and this only seemed to be the end. It may be so. The Marquis de Gemosac was dumb for once. He looked round him with a half-defiant question in his eyes. Then he pointed a lean finger down toward the dead man's face. “Others may question,” he said, “but I know--I KNOW.”

1

PILGRIMS AND PATIENTS

THE pilgrims and patients, closely packed on the hard seats of a third-class carriage, were just finishing the "Ave maris Stella," which they had begun to chant on leaving the terminus of the Orleans line, when Marie, slightly raised on her couch of misery and restless with feverish impatience, caught sight of the Paris fortifications through the window of the moving train. "Ah, the fortifications!" she exclaimed, in a tone which was joyous despite her suffering. "Here we are, out of Paris; we are off at last!" Her delight drew a smile from her father, M. de Guersaint, who sat in front of her, whilst Abbe Pierre Froment, who was looking at her with fraternal affection, was so carried away by his compassionate anxiety as to say aloud: "And now we are in for it till to-morrow morning. We shall only reach Lourdes at three-forty. We have more than two-and-twenty hours' journey before us." It was half-past five, the sun had risen, radiant in the pure sky of a delightful morning. It was a Friday, the 19th of August. On the horizon, however, some small, heavy clouds already presaged a terrible day of stormy heat. And the oblique sunrays were enfilading the compartments of the railway carriage, filling them with dancing, golden dust. "Yes, two-and-twenty hours," murmured Marie, relapsing into a state of anguish. " /Mon Dieu/! what a long time we must still wait!" Then her father helped her to lie down again in the narrow box, a kind of wooden gutter, in which she had been living for seven years past. Making an exception in her favour, the railway officials had consented to take as luggage the two pairs of wheels which could be removed from the box, or fitted to it whenever it became necessary to transport her from place to place. Packed between the sides of this movable coffin, she occupied the room of three passengers on the carriage seat; and for a moment she lay there with eyes closed. Although she was three-and-twenty; her ashen, emaciated face was still delicately infantile, charming despite everything, in the midst of her marvellous fair hair, the hair of a queen, which illness had respected. Clad with the utmost simplicity in a gown of thin woollen stuff, she wore, hanging from her neck, the card bearing her name and number, which entitled her to /hospitalisation/, or free treatment. She herself had insisted on making the journey in this humble fashion, not wishing to be a source of expense to her relatives, who little by little had fallen into very straitened circumstances. And thus it was that she found herself in a third-class carriage of the "white train," the train which carried the greatest sufferers, the most woeful of the fourteen trains going to Lourdes that day, the one in which, in addition to five hundred healthy pilgrims, nearly three hundred unfortunate wretches, weak to the point of exhaustion, racked by suffering, were heaped together, and borne at express speed from one to the other end of France. Sorry that he had saddened her, Pierre continued to gaze at her with the air of a compassionate elder brother. He had just completed his thirtieth year, and was pale and slight, with a broad forehead. After busying himself with all the arrangements for the journey, he had been desirous of accompanying her, and, having obtained admission among the Hospitallers of Our Lady of Salvation as an auxiliary member, wore on his cassock the red, orange-tipped cross of a bearer. M. de Guersaint on his side had simply pinned the little scarlet cross of the pilgrimage on his grey cloth jacket. The idea of travelling appeared to delight him; although he was over fifty he still looked young, and, with his eyes ever wandering over the landscape, he seemed unable to keep his head still--a bird-like head it was, with an expression of good nature and absent-mindedness. However, in spite of the violent shaking of the train, which constantly drew sighs from Marie, Sister Hyacinthe had risen to her feet in the adjoining compartment. She noticed that the sun's rays were streaming in the girl's face. "Pull down the blind, Monsieur l'Abbe," she said to Pierre. "Come, come, we must install ourselves properly, and set our little household in order." Clad in the black robe of a Sister of the Assumption, enlivened by a white coif, a white wimple, and a large white apron, Sister Hyacinthe smiled, the picture of courageous activity. Her youth bloomed upon her small, fresh lips, and in the depths of her beautiful blue eyes, whose expression was ever gentle. She was not pretty, perhaps, still she was charming, slender, and tall, the bib of her apron covering her flat chest like that of a young man; one of good heart, displaying a snowy complexion, and overflowing with health, gaiety, and innocence. "But this sun is already roasting us," said she; "pray pull down your blind as well, madame." Seated in the corner, near the Sister, was Madame de Jonquiere, who had kept her little bag on her lap. She slowly pulled down the blind. Dark, and well built, she was still nice-looking, although she had a daughter, Raymonde, who was four-and-twenty, and whom for motives of propriety she had placed in the charge of two lady-hospitallers, Madame Desagneaux and Madame Volmar, in a first-class carriage. For her part, directress as she was of a ward of the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours at Lourdes, she did not quit her patients; and outside, swinging against the door of her compartment, was the regulation placard bearing under her own name those of the two Sisters of the Assumption who accompanied her. The widow of a ruined man, she lived with her daughter on the scanty income of four or five thousand francs a year, at the rear of a courtyard in the Rue Vanneau. But her charity was inexhaustible, and she gave all her time to the work of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation, an institution whose red cross she wore on her gown of carmelite poplin, and whose aims she furthered with the most active zeal. Of a somewhat proud disposition, fond of being flattered and loved, she took great delight in this annual journey, from which both her heart and her passion derived contentment. "You are right, Sister," she said, "we will organise matters. I really don't know why I am encumbering myself with this bag." And thereupon she placed it under the seat, near her. "Wait a moment," resumed Sister Hyacinthe; "you have the water-can between your legs--it is in your way." "No, no, it isn't, I assure you. Let it be. It must always be somewhere." Then they both set their house in order as they expressed it, so that for a day and a night they might live with their patients as comfortably as possible. The worry was that they had not been able to take Marie into their compartment, as she wished to have Pierre and her father near her; however neighbourly intercourse was easy enough over the low partition. Moreover the whole carriage, with its five compartments of ten seats each, formed but one moving chamber, a common room as it were which the eye took in at a glance from end to end. Between its wooden walls, bare and yellow, under its white-painted panelled roof, it showed like a hospital ward, with all the disorder and promiscuous jumbling together of an improvised ambulance. Basins, brooms, and sponges lay about, half-hidden by the seats. Then, as the train only carried such luggage as the pilgrims could take with them, there were valises, deal boxes, bonnet boxes, and bags, a wretched pile of poor worn-out things mended with bits of string, heaped up a little bit everywhere; and overhead the litter began again, what with articles of clothing, parcels, and baskets hanging from brass pegs and swinging to and fro without a pause. Amidst all this frippery the more afflicted patients, stretched on their narrow mattresses, which took up the room of several passengers, were shaken, carried along by the rumbling gyrations of the wheels; whilst those who were able to remain seated, leaned against the partitions, their faces pale, their heads resting upon pillows. According to the regulations there should have been one lady-hospitaller to each compartment. However, at the other end of the carriage there was but a second Sister of the Assumption, Sister Claire des Anges. Some of the pilgrims who were in good health were already getting up, eating and drinking. One compartment was entirely occupied by women, ten pilgrims closely pressed together, young ones and old ones, all sadly, pitifully ugly. And as nobody dared to open the windows on account of the consumptives in the carriage, the heat was soon felt and an unbearable odour arose, set free as it were by the jolting of the train as it went its way at express speed. They had said their chaplets at Juvisy; and six o'clock was striking, and they were rushing like a hurricane past the station of Bretigny, when Sister Hyacinthe stood up. It was she who directed the pious exercises, which most of the pilgrims followed from small, blue-covered books. "The Angelus, my children," said she with a pleasant smile, a maternal air which her great youth rendered very charming and sweet. Then the "Aves" again followed one another, and were drawing to an end when Pierre and Marie began to feel interested in two women who occupied the other corner seats of their compartment. One of them, she who sat at Marie's feet, was a blonde of slender build and /bourgeoise/ appearance, some thirty and odd years of age, and faded before she had grown old. She shrank back, scarcely occupying any room, wearing a dark dress, and showing colourless hair, and a long grief-stricken face which expressed unlimited self-abandonment, infinite sadness. The woman in front of her, she who sat on the same seat as Pierre, was of the same age, but belonged to the working classes. She wore a black cap and displayed a face ravaged by wretchedness and anxiety, whilst on her lap she held a little girl of seven, who was so pale, so wasted by illness, that she scarcely seemed four. With her nose contracted, her eyelids lowered and showing blue in her waxen face, the child was unable to speak, unable to give utterance to more than a low plaint, a gentle moan, which rent the heart of her mother, leaning over her, each time that she heard it. "Would she eat a few grapes?" timidly asked the lady, who had hitherto preserved silence. "I have some in my basket." "Thank you, madame," replied the woman, "she only takes milk, and sometimes not even that willingly. I took care to bring a bottleful with me." Then, giving way to the desire which possesses the wretched to confide their woes to others, she began to relate her story. Her name was Vincent, and her husband, a gilder by trade, had been carried off by consumption. Left alone with her little Rose, who was the passion of her heart, she had worked by day and night at her calling as a dressmaker in order to bring the child up. But disease had come, and for fourteen months now she had had her in her arms like that, growing more and more woeful and wasted until reduced almost to nothingness. She, the mother, who never went to mass, entered a church, impelled by despair to pray for her daughter's cure; and there she had heard a voice which had told her to take the little one to Lourdes, where the Blessed Virgin would have pity on her. Acquainted with nobody, not knowing even how the pilgrimages were organised, she had had but one idea--to work, save up the money necessary for the journey, take a ticket, and start off with the thirty sous remaining to her, destitute of all supplies save a bottle of milk for the child, not having even thought of purchasing a crust of bread for herself. "What is the poor little thing suffering from?" resumed the lady. "Oh, it must be consumption of the bowels, madame! But the doctors have names they give it. At first she only had slight pains in the stomach. Then her stomach began to swell and she suffered, oh, so dreadfully! it made one cry to see her. Her stomach has gone down now, only she's worn out; she has got so thin that she has no legs left her, and she's wasting away with continual sweating." Then, as Rose, raising her eyelids, began to moan, her mother leant over her, distracted and turning pale. "What is the matter, my jewel, my treasure?" she asked. "Are you thirsty?" But the little girl was already closing her dim eyes of a hazy sky-blue hue, and did not even answer, but relapsed into her torpor, quite white in the white frock she wore--a last coquetry on the part of her mother, who had gone to this useless expense in the hope that the Virgin would be more compassionate and gentle to a little sufferer who was well dressed, so immaculately white. There was an interval of silence, and then Madame Vincent inquired: "And you, madame, it's for yourself no doubt that you are going to Lourdes? One can see very well that you are ill." But the lady, with a frightened look, shrank woefully into her corner, murmuring: "No, no, I am not ill. Would to God that I were! I should suffer less." Her name was Madame Maze, and her heart was full of an incurable grief. After a love marriage to a big, gay fellow with ripe, red lips, she had found herself deserted at the end of a twelvemonth's honeymoon. Ever travelling, following the profession of a jeweller's bagman, her husband, who earned a deal of money, would disappear for six months at a stretch, deceive her from one frontier to the other of France, at times even carrying creatures about with him. And she worshipped him; she suffered so frightfully from it all that she had sought a remedy in religion, and had at last made up her mind to repair to Lourdes, in order to pray the Virgin to restore her husband to her and make him amend his ways. Although Madame Vincent did not understand the other's words, she realised that she was a prey to great mental affliction, and they continued looking at one another, the mother, whom the sight of her dying daughter was killing, and the abandoned wife, whom her passion cast into throes of death-like agony. However, Pierre, who, like Marie, had been listening to the conversation, now intervened. He was astonished that the dressmaker had not sought free treatment for her little patient. The Association of Our Lady of Salvation had been founded by the Augustine Fathers of the Assumption after the Franco-German war, with the object of contributing to the salvation of France and the defence of the Church by prayer in common and the practice of charity; and it was this association which had promoted the great pilgrimage movement, in particular initiating and unremittingly extending the national pilgrimage which every year, towards the close of August, set out for Lourdes. An elaborate organisation had been gradually perfected, donations of considerable amounts were collected in all parts of the world, sufferers were enrolled in every parish, and agreements were signed with the railway companies, to say nothing of the active help of the Little Sisters of the Assumption and the establishment of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation, a widespread brotherhood of the benevolent, in which one beheld men and women, mostly belonging to society, who, under the orders of the pilgrimage managers, nursed the sick, helped to transport them, and watched over the observance of good discipline. A written request was needed for the sufferers to obtain hospitalisation, which dispensed them from making the smallest payment in respect either of their journey or their sojourn; they were fetched from their homes and conveyed back thither; and they simply had to provide a few provisions for the road. By far the greater number were recommended by priests or benevolent persons, who superintended the inquiries concerning them and obtained the needful papers, such as doctors' certificates and certificates of birth. And, these matters being settled, the sick ones had nothing further to trouble about, they became but so much suffering flesh, food for miracles, in the hands of the hospitallers of either sex. "But you need only have applied to your parish priest, madame," Pierre explained. "This poor child is deserving of all sympathy. She would have been immediately admitted." "I did not know it, monsieur l'Abbe." "Then how did you manage?" "Why, Monsieur l'Abbe, I went to take a ticket at a place which one of my neighbours, who reads the newspapers, told me about." She was referring to the tickets, at greatly reduced rates, which were issued to the pilgrims possessed of means. And Marie, listening to her, felt great pity for her, and also some shame; for she who was not entirely destitute of resources had succeeded in obtaining /hospitalisation/, thanks to Pierre, whereas that mother and her sorry child, after exhausting their scanty savings, remained without a copper. However, a more violent jolt of the carriage drew a cry of pain from the girl. "Oh, father," she said, "pray raise me a little! I can't stay on my back any longer." When M. de Guersaint had helped her into a sitting posture, she gave a deep sigh of relief. They were now at Etampes, after a run of an hour and a half from Paris, and what with the increased warmth of the sun, the dust, and the noise, weariness was becoming apparent already. Madame de Jonquiere had got up to speak a few words of kindly encouragement to Marie over the partition; and Sister Hyacinthe moreover again rose, and gaily clapped her hands that she might be heard and obeyed from one to the other end of the carriage. "Come, come!" said she, "we mustn't think of our little troubles. Let us pray and sing, and the Blessed Virgin will be with us." She herself then began the rosary according to the rite of Our Lady of Lourdes, and all the patients and pilgrims followed her. This was the first chaplet--the five joyful mysteries, the Annunciation, the Visitation, the Nativity, the Purification, and Jesus found in the Temple. Then they all began to chant the canticle: "Let us contemplate the heavenly Archangel!" Their voices were lost amid the loud rumbling of the wheels; you heard but the muffled surging of that human wave, stifling within the closed carriage which rolled on and on without a pause. Although M. de Guersaint was a worshipper, he could never follow a hymn to the end. He got up, sat down again, and finished by resting his elbow on the partition and conversing in an undertone with a patient who sat against this same partition in the next compartment. The patient in question was a thick-set man of fifty, with a good-natured face and a large head, completely bald. His name was Sabathier, and for fifteen years he had been stricken with ataxia. He only suffered pain by fits and starts, but he had quite lost the use of his legs, which his wife, who accompanied him, moved for him as though they had been dead legs, whenever they became too heavy, weighty like bars of lead. "Yes, monsieur," he said, "such as you see me, I was formerly fifth-class professor at the Lycee Charlemagne. At first I thought that it was mere sciatica, but afterwards I was seized with sharp, lightning-like pains, red-hot sword thrusts, you know, in the muscles. For nearly ten years the disease kept on mastering me more and more. I consulted all the doctors, tried every imaginable mineral spring, and now I suffer less, but I can no longer move from my seat. And then, after long living without a thought of religion, I was led back to God by the idea that I was too wretched, and that Our Lady of Lourdes could not do otherwise than take pity on me." Feeling interested, Pierre in his turn had leant over the partition and was listening. "Is it not so, Monsieur l'Abbe?" continued M. Sabathier. "Is not suffering the best awakener of souls? This is the seventh year that I am going to Lourdes without despairing of cure. This year the Blessed Virgin will cure me, I feel sure of it. Yes, I expect to be able to walk about again; I now live solely in that hope." M. Sabathier paused, he wished his wife to push his legs a little more to the left; and Pierre looked at him, astonished to find such obstinate faith in a man of intellect, in one of those university professors who, as a rule, are such Voltairians. How could the belief in miracles have germinated and taken root in this man's brain? As he himself said, great suffering alone explained this need of illusion, this blossoming of eternal and consolatory hope. "And my wife and I," resumed the ex-professor, "are dressed, you see, as poor folks, for I wished to go as a mere pauper this year, and applied for /hospitalisation/ in a spirit of humility in order that the Blessed Virgin might include me among the wretched, her children--only, as I did not wish to take the place of a real pauper, I gave fifty francs to the Hospitalite, and this, as you are aware, gives one the right to have a patient of one's own in the pilgrimage. I even know my patient. He was introduced to me at the railway station. He is suffering from tuberculosis, it appears, and seemed to me very low, very low." A fresh interval of silence ensued. "Well," said M. Sabathier at last, "may the Blessed Virgin save him also, she who can do everything. I shall be so happy; she will have loaded me with favours." Then the three men, isolating themselves from the others, went on conversing together, at first on medical subjects, and at last diverging into a discussion on romanesque architecture, /a propos/ of a steeple which they had perceived on a hillside, and which every pilgrim had saluted with a sign of the cross. Swayed once more by the habits of cultivated intellect, the young priest and his two companions forgot themselves together in the midst of their fellow-passengers, all those poor, suffering, simple-minded folk, whom wretchedness stupefied. Another hour went by, two more canticles had just been sung, and the stations of Toury and Les Aubrais had been left behind, when, at Beaugency, they at last ceased their chat, on hearing Sister Hyacinthe clap her hands and intonate in her fresh, sonorous voice: "/Parce, Domine, parce populo tuo/." And then the chant went on; all voices became mingled in that ever-surging wave of prayer which stilled pain, excited hope, and little by little penetrated the entire being, harassed by the haunting thought of the grace and cure which one and all were going to seek so far away. However, as Pierre sat down again, he saw that Marie was very pale, and had her eyes closed. By the painful contraction of her features he could tell that she was not asleep. "Are you in great suffering?" he asked. "Yes, yes, I suffer dreadfully. I shall never last to the end. It is this incessant jolting." She moaned, raised her eyelids, and, half-fainting, remained in a sitting posture, her eyes turned on the other sufferers. In the adjoining compartment, La Grivotte, hitherto stretched out, scarce breathing, like a corpse, had just raised herself up in front of M. Sabathier. She was a tall, slip-shod, singular-looking creature of over thirty, with a round, ravaged face, which her frizzy hair and flaming eyes rendered almost pretty. She had reached the third stage of phthisis. "Eh, mademoiselle," she said, addressing herself in a hoarse, indistinct voice to Marie, "how nice it would be if we could only doze off a little. But it can't be managed; all these wheels keep on whirling round and round in one's head." Then, although it fatigued her to speak, she obstinately went on talking, volunteering particulars about herself. She was a mattress-maker, and with one of her aunts had long gone from yard to yard at Bercy to comb and sew up mattresses. And, indeed, it was to the pestilential wool which she had combed in her youth that she ascribed her malady. For five years she had been making the round of the hospitals of Paris, and she spoke familiarly of all the great doctors. It was the Sisters of Charity, at the Lariboisiere hospital, who, finding that she had a passion for religious ceremonies, had completed her conversion, and convinced her that the Virgin awaited her at Lourdes to cure her. "I certainly need it," said she. "The doctors say that I have one lung done for, and that the other one is scarcely any better. There are great big holes you know. At first I only felt bad between the shoulders and spat up some froth. But then I got thin, and became a dreadful sight. And now I'm always in a sweat, and cough till I think I'm going to bring my heart up. And I can no longer spit. And I haven't the strength to stand, you see. I can't eat." A stifling sensation made her pause, and she became livid. "All the same I prefer being in my skin instead of in that of the Brother in the compartment behind you. He has the same complaint as I have, but he is in a worse state that I am." She was mistaken. In the farther compartment, beyond Marie, there was indeed a young missionary, Brother Isidore, who was lying on a mattress and could not be seen, since he was unable to raise even a finger. But he was not suffering from phthisis. He was dying of inflammation of the liver, contracted in Senegal. Very long and lank, he had a yellow face, with skin as dry and lifeless as parchment. The abscess which had formed in his liver had ended by breaking out externally, and amidst the continuous shivering of fever, vomiting, and delirium, suppuration was exhausting him. His eyes alone were still alive, eyes full of unextinguishable love, whose flame lighted up his expiring face, a peasant face such as painters have given to the crucified Christ, common, but rendered sublime at moments by its expression of faith and passion. He was a Breton, the last puny child of an over-numerous family, and had left his little share of land to his elder brothers. One of his sisters, Marthe, older than himself by a couple of years, accompanied him. She had been in service in Paris, an insignificant maid-of-all-work, but withal so devoted to her brother that she had left her situation to follow him, subsisting scantily on her petty savings. "I was lying on the platform," resumed La Grivotte, "when he was put in the carriage. There were four men carrying him--" But she was unable to speak any further, for just then an attack of coughing shook her and threw her back upon the seat. She was suffocating, and the red flush on her cheek-bones turned blue. Sister Hyacinthe, however, immediately raised her head and wiped her lips with a linen cloth, which became spotted with blood. At the same time Madame de Jonquiere gave her attention to a patient in front of her, who had just fainted. She was called Madame Vetu, and was the wife of a petty clockmaker of the Mouffetard district, who had not been able to shut up his shop in order to accompany her to Lourdes. And to make sure that she would be cared for she had sought and obtained /hospitalisation/. The fear of death was bringing her back to religion, although she had not set foot in church since her first communion. She knew that she was lost, that a cancer in the chest was eating into her; and she already had the haggard, orange-hued mark of the cancerous patient. Since the beginning of the journey she had not spoken a word, but, suffering terribly, had remained with her lips tightly closed. Then all at once, she had swooned away after an attack of vomiting. "It is unbearable!" murmured Madame de Jonquiere, who herself felt faint; "we must let in a little fresh air." Sister Hyacinthe was just then laying La Grivotte to rest on her pillows, "Certainly," said she, "we will open the window for a few moments. But not on this side, for I am afraid we might have a fresh fit of coughing. Open the window on your side, madame." The heat was still increasing, and the occupants of the carriage were stifling in that heavy evil-smelling atmosphere. The pure air which came in when the window was opened brought relief however. For a moment there were other duties to be attended to, a clearance and cleansing. The Sister emptied the basins out of the window, whilst the lady-hospitaller wiped the shaking floor with a sponge. Next, things had to be set in order; and then came a fresh anxiety, for the fourth patient, a slender girl whose face was entirely covered by a black fichu, and who had not yet moved, was saying that she felt hungry. With quiet devotion Madame de Jonquiere immediately tendered her services. "Don't you trouble, Sister," she said, "I will cut her bread into little bits for her." Marie, with the need she felt of diverting her mind from her own sufferings, had already begun to take an interest in that motionless sufferer whose countenance was so thickly veiled, for she not unnaturally suspected that it was a case of some distressing facial sore. She had merely been told that the patient was a servant, which was true, but it happened that the poor creature, a native of Picardy, named Elise Rouquet, had been obliged to leave her situation, and seek a home with a sister who ill-treated her, for no hospital would take her in. Extremely devout, she had for many months been possessed by an ardent desire to go to Lourdes. While Marie, with dread in her heart, waited for the fichu to be moved aside, Madame de Jonquiere, having cut some bread into small pieces, inquired maternally: "Are they small enough? Can you put them into your mouth?" Thereupon a hoarse voice growled confused words under the black fichu: "Yes, yes, madame." And at last the veil fell and Marie shuddered with horror. It was a case of lupus which had preyed upon the unhappy woman's nose and mouth. Ulceration had spread, and was hourly spreading--in short, all the hideous peculiarities of this terrible disease were in full process of development, almost obliterating the traces of what once were pleasing womanly lineaments. "Oh, look, Pierre!" Marie murmured, trembling. The priest in his turn shuddered as he beheld Elise Rouquet cautiously slipping the tiny pieces of bread into her poor shapeless mouth. Everyone in the carriage had turned pale at sight of the awful apparition. And the same thought ascended from all those hope-inflated souls. Ah! Blessed Virgin, Powerful Virgin, what a miracle indeed if such an ill were cured! "We must not think of ourselves, my children, if we wish to get well," resumed Sister Hyacinthe, who still retained her encouraging smile. And then she made them say the second chaplet, the five sorrowful mysteries: Jesus in the Garden of Olives, Jesus scourged, Jesus crowned with thorns, Jesus carrying the cross, and Jesus crucified. Afterwards came the canticle: "In thy help, Virgin, do I put my trust." They had just passed through Blois; for three long hours they had been rolling onward; and Marie, who had averted her eyes from Elise Rouquet, now turned them upon a man who occupied a corner seat in the compartment on her left, that in which Brother Isidore was lying. She had noticed this man several times already. Poorly clad in an old black frock-coat, he looked still young, although his sparse beard was already turning grey; and, short and emaciated, he seemed to experience great suffering, his fleshless, livid face being covered with sweat. However, he remained motionless, ensconced in his corner, speaking to nobody, but staring straight before him with dilated eyes. And all at once Marie noticed that his eyelids were falling, and that he was fainting away. She thereupon drew Sister's Hyacinthe's attention to him: "Look, Sister! One would think that that gentleman is dangerously ill." "Which one, my dear child?" "That one, over there, with his head thrown back." General excitement followed, all the healthy pilgrims rose up to look, and it occurred to Madame de Jonquiere to call to Marthe, Brother Isidore's sister, and tell her to tap the man's hands. "Question him," she added; "ask what ails him." Marthe drew near, shook the man, and questioned him. But instead of an answer only a rattle came from his throat, and his eyes remained closed. Then a frightened voice was heard saying, "I think he is going to die." The dread increased, words flew about, advice was tendered from one to the other end of the carriage. Nobody knew the man. He had certainly not obtained /hospitalisation/, for no white card was hanging from his neck. Somebody related, however, that he had seen him arrive, dragging himself along, but three minutes or so before the train started; and that he had remained quite motionless, scarce breathing, ever since he had flung himself with an air of intense weariness into that corner, where he was now apparently dying. His ticket was at last seen protruding from under the band of an old silk hat which was hung from a peg near him. "Ah, he is breathing again now!" Sister Hyacinthe suddenly exclaimed. "Ask him his name." However, on being again questioned by Marthe, the man merely gave vent to a low plaint, an exclamation scarcely articulated, "Oh, how I suffer!" And thenceforward that was the only answer that could be obtained from him. With reference to everything that they wished to know, who he was, whence he came, what his illness was, what could be done for him, he gave no information, but still and ever continued moaning, "Oh, how I suffer--how I suffer!" Sister Hyacinthe grew restless with impatience. Ah, if she had only been in the same compartment with him! And she resolved that she would change her seat at the first station they should stop at. Only there would be no stoppage for a long time. The position was becoming terrible, the more so as the man's head again fell back. "He is dying, he is dying!" repeated the frightened voice. What was to be done, /mon Dieu/? The Sister was aware that one of the Fathers of the Assumption, Father Massias, was in the train with the Holy Oils, ready to administer extreme unction to the dying; for every year some of the patients passed away during the journey. But she did not dare to have recourse to the alarm signal. Moreover, in the /cantine/ van where Sister Saint Francois officiated, there was a doctor with a little medicine chest. If the sufferer should survive until they reached Poitiers, where there would be half an hour's stoppage, all possible help might be given to him. But on the other hand he might suddenly expire. However, they ended by becoming somewhat calmer. The man, though still unconscious, began to breathe in a more regular manner, and seemed to fall asleep. "To think of it, to die before getting there," murmured Marie with a shudder, "to die in sight of the promised land!" And as her father sought to reassure her she added: "I am suffering--I am suffering dreadfully myself." "Have confidence," said Pierre; "the Blessed Virgin is watching over you." She could no longer remain seated, and it became necessary to replace her in a recumbent position in her narrow coffin. Her father and the priest had to take every precaution in doing so, for the slightest hurt drew a moan from her. And she lay there breathless, like one dead, her face contracted by suffering, and surrounded by her regal fair hair. They had now been rolling on, ever rolling on for nearly four hours. And if the carriage was so greatly shaken, with an unbearable spreading tendency, it was from its position at the rear part of the train. The coupling irons shrieked, the wheels growled furiously; and as it was necessary to leave the windows partially open, the dust came in, acrid and burning; but it was especially the heat which grew terrible, a devouring, stormy heat falling from a tawny sky which large hanging clouds had slowly covered. The hot carriages, those rolling boxes where the pilgrims ate and drank, where the sick lay in a vitiated atmosphere, amid dizzying moans, prayers, and hymns, became like so many furnaces. And Marie was not the only one whose condition had been aggravated; others also were suffering from the journey. Resting in the lap of her despairing mother, who gazed at her with large, tear-blurred eyes, little Rose had ceased to stir, and had grown so pale that Madame Maze had twice leant forward to feel her hands, fearful lest she should find them cold. At each moment also Madame Sabathier had to move her husband's legs, for their weight was so great, said he, that it seemed as if his hips were being torn from him. Brother Isidore too had just begun to cry out, emerging from his wonted torpor; and his sister had only been able to assuage his sufferings by raising him, and clasping him in her arms. La Grivotte seemed to be asleep, but a continuous hiccoughing shook her, and a tiny streamlet of blood dribbled from her mouth. Madame Vetu had again vomited, Elise Rouquet no longer thought of hiding the frightful sore open on her face. And from the man yonder, breathing hard, there still came a lugubrious rattle, as though he were at every moment on the point of expiring. In vain did Madame de Jonquiere and Sister Hyacinthe lavish their attentions on the patients, they could but slightly assuage so much suffering. At times it all seemed like an evil dream--that carriage of wretchedness and pain, hurried along at express speed, with a continuous shaking and jolting which made everything hanging from the pegs--the old clothes, the worn-out baskets mended with bits of string--swing to and fro incessantly. And in the compartment at the far end, the ten female pilgrims, some old, some young, and all pitifully ugly, sang on without a pause in cracked voices, shrill and dreary. Then Pierre began to think of the other carriages of the train, that white train which conveyed most, if not all, of the more seriously afflicted patients; these carriages were rolling along, all displaying similar scenes of suffering among the three hundred sick and five hundred healthy pilgrims crowded within them. And afterwards he thought of the other trains which were leaving Paris that day, the grey train and the blue train* which had preceded the white one, the green train, the yellow train, the pink train, the orange train which were following it. From hour to hour trains set out from one to the other end of France. And he thought, too, of those which that same morning had started from Orleans, Le Mans, Poitiers, Bordeaux, Marseilles, and Carcassonne. Coming from all parts, trains were rushing across that land of France at the same hour, all directing their course yonder towards the holy Grotto, bringing thirty thousand patients and pilgrims to the Virgin's feet. And he reflected that other days of the year witnessed a like rush of human beings, that not a week went by without Lourdes beholding the arrival of some pilgrimage; that it was not merely France which set out on the march, but all Europe, the whole world; that in certain years of great religious fervour there had been three hundred thousand, and even five hundred thousand, pilgrims and patients streaming to the spot. * Different-coloured tickets are issued for these trains; it is for this reason that they are called the white, blue, and grey trains, etc.--Trans. Pierre fancied that he could hear those flying trains, those trains from everywhere, all converging towards the same rocky cavity where the tapers were blazing. They all rumbled loudly amid the cries of pain and snatches of hymns wafted from their carriages. They were the rolling hospitals of disease at its last stage, of human suffering rushing to the hope of cure, furiously seeking consolation between attacks of increased severity, with the ever-present threat of death--death hastened, supervening under awful conditions, amidst the mob-like scramble. They rolled on, they rolled on again and again, they rolled on without a pause, carrying the wretchedness of the world on its way to the divine illusion, the health of the infirm, the consolation of the afflicted. And immense pity overflowed from Pierre's heart, human compassion for all the suffering and all the tears that consumed weak and naked men. He was sad unto death and ardent charity burnt within him, the unextinguishable flame as it were of his fraternal feelings towards all things and beings. When they left the station of Saint Pierre des Corps at half-past ten, Sister Hyacinthe gave the signal, and they recited the third chaplet, the five glorious mysteries, the Resurrection of Our Lord, the Ascension of Our Lord, the Mission of the Holy Ghost, the Assumption of the Most Blessed Virgin, the Crowning of the Most Blessed Virgin. And afterwards they sang the canticle of Bernadette, that long, long chant, composed of six times ten couplets, to which the ever recurring Angelic Salutation serves as a refrain--a prolonged lullaby slowly besetting one until it ends by penetrating one's entire being, transporting one into ecstatic sleep, in delicious expectancy of a miracle.

2

PIERRE AND MARIE

THE green landscapes of Poitou were now defiling before them, and Abbe Pierre Froment, gazing out of the window, watched the trees fly away till, little by little, he ceased to distinguish them. A steeple appeared and then vanished, and all the pilgrims crossed themselves. They would not reach Poitiers until twelve-thirty-five, and the train was still rolling on amid the growing weariness of that oppressive, stormy day. Falling into a deep reverie, the young priest no longer heard the words of the canticle, which sounded in his ears merely like a slow, wavy lullaby. Forgetfulness of the present had come upon him, an awakening of the past filled his whole being. He was reascending the stream of memory, reascending it to its source. He again beheld the house at Neuilly, where he had been born and where he still lived, that home of peace and toil, with its garden planted with a few fine trees, and parted by a quickset hedge and palisade from the garden of the neighbouring house, which was similar to his own. He was again three, perhaps four, years old, and round a table, shaded by the big horse-chestnut tree he once more beheld his father, his mother, and his elder brother at /dejeuner/. To his father, Michel Froment, he could give no distinct lineaments; he pictured him but faintly, vaguely, renowned as an illustrious chemist, bearing the title of Member of the Institute, and leading a cloistered life in the laboratory which he had installed in that secluded, deserted suburb. However he could plainly see his first brother Guillaume, then fourteen years of age, whom some holiday had brought from college that morning, and then and even more vividly his mother, so gentle and so quiet, with eyes so full of active kindliness. Later on he learnt what anguish had racked that religious soul, that believing woman who, from esteem and gratitude, had resignedly accepted marriage with an unbeliever, her senior by fifteen years, to whom her relatives were indebted for great services. He, Pierre, the tardy offspring of this union, born when his father was already near his fiftieth year, had only known his mother as a respectful, conquered woman in the presence of her husband, whom she had learnt to love passionately, with the frightful torment of knowing, however, that he was doomed to perdition. And, all at once, another memory flashed upon the young priest, the terrible memory of the day when his father had died, killed in his laboratory by an accident, the explosion of a retort. He, Pierre, had then been five years old, and he remembered the slightest incidents--his mother's cry when she had found the shattered body among the remnants of the chemical appliances, then her terror, her sobs, her prayers at the idea that God had slain the unbeliever, damned him for evermore. Not daring to burn his books and papers, she had contented herself with locking up the laboratory, which henceforth nobody entered. And from that moment, haunted by a vision of hell, she had had but one idea, to possess herself of her second son, who was still so young, to give him a strictly religious training, and through him to ransom her husband--secure his forgiveness from God. Guillaume, her elder boy, had already ceased to belong to her, having grown up at college, where he had been won over by the ideas of the century; but she resolved that the other, the younger one, should not leave the house, but should have a priest as tutor; and her secret dream, her consuming hope, was that she might some day see him a priest himself, saying his first mass and solacing souls whom the thought of eternity tortured. Then between green, leafy boughs, flecked with sunlight, another figure rose vividly before Pierre's eyes. He suddenly beheld Marie de Guersaint as he had seen her one morning through a gap in the hedge dividing the two gardens. M. de Guersaint, who belonged to the petty Norman /noblesse/, was a combination of architect and inventor; and he was at that time busy with a scheme of model dwellings for the poor, to which churches and schools were to be attached; an affair of considerable magnitude, planned none too well, however, and in which, with his customary impetuosity, the lack of foresight of an imperfect artist, he was risking the three hundred thousand francs that he possessed. A similarity of religious faith had drawn Madame de Guersaint and Madame Froment together; but the former was altogether a superior woman, perspicuous and rigid, with an iron hand which alone prevented her household from gliding to a catastrophe; and she was bringing up her two daughters, Blanche and Marie, in principles of narrow piety, the elder one already being as grave as herself, whilst the younger, albeit very devout, was still fond of play, with an intensity of life within her which found vent in gay peals of sonorous laughter. From their early childhood Pierre and Marie played together, the hedge was ever being crossed, the two families constantly mingled. And on that clear sunshiny morning, when he pictured her parting the leafy branches she was already ten years old. He, who was sixteen, was to enter the seminary on the following Tuesday. Never had she seemed to him so pretty. Her hair, of a pure golden hue, was so long that when it was let down it sufficed to clothe her. Well did he remember her face as it had been, with round cheeks, blue eyes, red mouth, and skin of dazzling, snowy whiteness. She was indeed as gay and brilliant as the sun itself, a transplendency. Yet there were tears at the corners of her eyes, for she was aware of his coming departure. They sat down together at the far end of the garden, in the shadow cast by the hedge. Their hands mingled, and their hearts were very heavy. They had, however, never exchanged any vows amid their pastimes, for their innocence was absolute. But now, on the eve of separation, their mutual tenderness rose to their lips, and they spoke without knowing, swore that they would ever think of one another, and find one another again, some day, even as one meets in heaven to be very, very happy. Then, without understanding how it happened, they clasped each other tightly, to the point of suffocation, and kissed each other's face, weeping, the while, hot tears. And it was that delightful memory which Pierre had ever carried with him, which he felt alive within him still, after so many years, and after so many painful renunciations. Just then a more violent shock roused him from his reverie. He turned his eyes upon the carriage and vaguely espied the suffering beings it contained--Madame Maze motionless, overwhelmed with grief; little Rose gently moaning in her mother's lap; La Grivotte, whom a hoarse cough was choking. For a moment Sister Hyacinthe's gay face shone out amidst the whiteness of her coif and wimple, dominating all the others. The painful journey was continuing, with a ray of divine hope still and ever shining yonder. Then everything slowly vanished from Pierre's eyes as a fresh wave of memory brought the past back from afar; and nothing of the present remained save the lulling hymn, the indistinct voices of dreamland, emerging from the invisible. Henceforth he was at the seminary. The classrooms, the recreation ground with its trees, rose up clearly before him. But all at once he only beheld, as in a mirror, the youthful face which had then been his, and he contemplated it and scrutinised it, as though it had been the face of a stranger. Tall and slender, he had an elongated visage, with an unusually developed forehead, lofty and straight like a tower; whilst his jaws tapered, ending in a small refined chin. He seemed, in fact, to be all brains; his mouth, rather large, alone retained an expression of tenderness. Indeed, when his usually serious face relaxed, his mouth and eyes acquired an exceedingly soft expression, betokening an unsatisfied, hungry desire to love, devote oneself, and live. But immediately afterwards, the look of intellectual passion would come back again, that intellectuality which had ever consumed him with an anxiety to understand and know. And it was with surprise that he now recalled those years of seminary life. How was it that he had so long been able to accept the rude discipline of blind faith, of obedient belief in everything without the slightest examination? It had been required of him that he should absolutely surrender his reasoning faculties, and he had striven to do so, had succeeded indeed in stifling his torturing need of truth. Doubtless he had been softened, weakened by his mother's tears, had been possessed by the sole desire to afford her the great happiness she dreamt of. Yet now he remembered certain quiverings of revolt; he found in the depths of his mind the memory of nights which he had spent in weeping without knowing why, nights peopled with vague images, nights through which galloped the free, virile life of the world, when Marie's face incessantly returned to him, such as he had seen it one morning, dazzling and bathed in tears, while she embraced him with her whole soul. And that alone now remained; his years of religious study with their monotonous lessons, their ever similar exercises and ceremonies, had flown away into the same haze, into a vague half-light, full of mortal silence. Then, just as the train had passed though a station at full speed, with the sudden uproar of its rush there arose within him a succession of confused visions. He had noticed a large deserted enclosure, and fancied that he could see himself within it at twenty years of age. His reverie was wandering. An indisposition of rather long duration had, however, at one time interrupted his studies, and led to his being sent into the country. He had remained for a long time without seeing Marie; during his vacations spent at Neuilly he had twice failed to meet her, for she was almost always travelling. He knew that she was very ill, in consequence of a fall from a horse when she was thirteen, a critical moment in a girl's life; and her despairing mother, perplexed by the contradictory advice of medical men, was taking her each year to a different watering-place. Then he learnt the startling news of the sudden tragical death of that mother, who was so severe and yet so useful to her kin. She had been carried off in five days by inflammation of the lungs, which she had contracted one evening whilst she was out walking at La Bourboule, through having taken off her mantle to place it round the shoulders of Marie, who had been conveyed thither for treatment. It had been necessary that the father should at once start off to fetch his daughter, who was mad with grief, and the corpse of his wife, who had been so suddenly torn from him. And unhappily, after losing her, the affairs of the family went from bad to worse in the hands of this architect, who, without counting, flung his fortune into the yawning gulf of his unsuccessful enterprises. Marie no longer stirred from her couch; only Blanche remained to manage the household, and she had matters of her own to attend to, being busy with the last examinations which she had to pass, the diplomas which she was obstinately intent on securing, foreseeing as she did that she would someday have to earn her bread. All at once, from amidst this mass of confused, half-forgotten incidents, Pierre was conscious of the rise of a vivid vision. Ill-health, he remembered, had again compelled him to take a holiday. He had just completed his twenty-fourth year, he was greatly behindhand, having so far only secured the four minor orders; but on his return a sub-deaconship would be conferred on him, and an inviolable vow would bind him for evermore. And the Guersaints' little garden at Neuilly, whither he had formerly so often gone to play, again distinctly appeared before him. Marie's couch had been rolled under the tall trees at the far end of the garden near the hedge, they were alone together in the sad peacefulness of an autumnal afternoon, and he saw Marie, clad in deep mourning for her mother and reclining there with legs inert; whilst he, also clad in black, in a cassock already, sat near her on an iron garden chair. For five years she had been suffering. She was now eighteen, paler and thinner than formerly, but still adorable with her regal golden hair, which illness respected. He believed from what he had heard that she was destined to remain infirm, condemned never to become a woman, stricken even in her sex. The doctors, who failed to agree respecting her case, had abandoned her. Doubtless it was she who told him these things that dreary afternoon, whilst the yellow withered leaves rained upon them. However, he could not remember the words that they had spoken; her pale smile, her young face, still so charming though already dimmed by regretfulness for life, alone remained present with him. But he realised that she had evoked the far-off day of their parting, on that same spot, behind the hedge flecked with sunlight; and all that was already as though dead--their tears, their embrace, their promise to find one another some day with a certainty of happiness. For although they had found one another again, what availed it, since she was but a corpse, and he was about to bid farewell to the life of the world? As the doctors condemned her, as she would never be woman, nor wife, nor mother, he, on his side, might well renounce manhood, and annihilate himself, dedicate himself to God, to whom his mother gave him. And he still felt within him the soft bitterness of that last interview: Marie smiling painfully at memory of their childish play and prattle, and speaking to him of the happiness which he would assuredly find in the service of God; so penetrated indeed with emotion at this thought, that she had made him promise that he would let her hear him say his first mass. But the train was passing the station of Sainte-Maure, and just then a sudden uproar momentarily brought Pierre's attention back to the carriage and its occupants. He fancied that there had been some fresh seizure or swooning, but the suffering faces that he beheld were still the same, ever contracted by the same expression of anxious waiting for the divine succour which was so slow in coming. M. Sabathier was vainly striving to get his legs into a comfortable position, whilst Brother Isidore raised a feeble continuous moan like a dying child, and Madame Vetu, a prey to terrible agony, devoured by her disease, sat motionless, and kept her lips tightly closed, her face distorted, haggard, and almost black. The noise which Pierre had heard had been occasioned by Madame de Jonquiere, who whilst cleansing a basin had dropped the large zinc water-can. And, despite their torment, this had made the patients laugh, like the simple souls they were, rendered puerile by suffering. However, Sister Hyacinthe, who rightly called them her children, children whom she governed with a word, at once set them saying the chaplet again, pending the Angelus, which would only be said at Chatellerault, in accordance with the predetermined programme. And thereupon the "Aves" followed one after the other, spreading into a confused murmuring and mumbling amidst the rattling of the coupling irons and noisy growling of the wheels. Pierre had meantime relapsed into his reverie, and beheld himself as he had been at six-and-twenty, when ordained a priest. Tardy scruples had come to him a few days before his ordination, a semi-consciousness that he was binding himself without having clearly questioned his heart and mind. But he had avoided doing so, living in the dizzy bewilderment of his decision, fancying that he had lopped off all human ties and feelings with a voluntary hatchet-stroke. His flesh had surely died with his childhood's innocent romance, that white-skinned girl with golden hair, whom now he never beheld otherwise than stretched upon her couch of suffering, her flesh as lifeless as his own. And he had afterwards made the sacrifice of his mind, which he then fancied even an easier one, hoping as he did that determination would suffice to prevent him from thinking. Besides, it was too late, he could not recoil at the last moment, and if when he pronounced the last solemn vow he felt a secret terror, an indeterminate but immense regret agitating him, he forgot everything, saving a divine reward for his efforts on the day when he afforded his mother the great and long-expected joy of hearing him say his first mass. He could still see the poor woman in the little church of Neuilly, which she herself had selected, the church where the funeral service for his father had been celebrated; he saw her on that cold November morning, kneeling almost alone in the dark little chapel, her hands hiding her face as she continued weeping whilst he raised the Host. It was there that she had tasted her last happiness, for she led a sad and lonely life, no longer seeing her elder son, who had gone away, swayed by other ideas than her own, bent on breaking off all family intercourse since his brother intended to enter the Church. It was said that Guillaume, a chemist of great talent, like his father, but at the same time a Bohemian, addicted to revolutionary dreams, was living in a little house in the suburbs, where he devoted himself to the dangerous study of explosive substances; and folks added that he was living with a woman who had come no one knew whence. This it was which had severed the last tie between himself and his mother, all piety and propriety. For three years Pierre had not once seen Guillaume, whom in his childhood he had worshipped as a kind, merry, and fatherly big brother. But there came an awful pang to his heart--he once more beheld his mother lying dead. This again was a thunderbolt, an illness of scarce three days' duration, a sudden passing away, as in the case of Madame de Guersaint. One evening, after a wild hunt for the doctor, he had found her motionless and quite white. She had died during his absence; and his lips had ever retained the icy thrill of the last kiss that he had given her. Of everything else--the vigil, the preparations, the funeral--he remembered nothing. All that had become lost in the black night of his stupor and grief, grief so extreme that he had almost died of it--seized with shivering on his return from the cemetery, struck down by a fever which during three weeks had kept him delirious, hovering between life and death. His brother had come and nursed him and had then attended to pecuniary matters, dividing the little inheritance, leaving him the house and a modest income and taking his own share in money. And as soon as Guillaume had found him out of danger he had gone off again, once more vanishing into the unknown. But then through what a long convalescence he, Pierre, had passed, buried as it were in that deserted house. He had done nothing to detain Guillaume, for he realised that there was an abyss between them. At first the solitude had brought him suffering, but afterwards it had grown very pleasant, whether in the deep silence of the rooms which the rare noises of the street did not disturb, or under the screening, shady foliage of the little garden, where he could spend whole days without seeing a soul. His favourite place of refuge, however, was the old laboratory, his father's cabinet, which his mother for twenty years had kept carefully locked up, as though to immure within it all the incredulity and damnation of the past. And despite the gentleness, the respectful submissiveness which she had shown in former times, she would perhaps have some day ended by destroying all her husband's books and papers, had not death so suddenly surprised her. Pierre, however, had once more had the windows opened, the writing-table and the bookcase dusted; and, installed in the large leather arm-chair, he now spent delicious hours there, regenerated as it were by his illness, brought back to his youthful days again, deriving a wondrous intellectual delight from the perusal of the books which he came upon. The only person whom he remembered having received during those two months of slow recovery was Doctor Chassaigne, an old friend of his father, a medical man of real merit, who, with the one ambition of curing disease, modestly confined himself to the /role/ of the practitioner. It was in vain that the doctor had sought to save Madame Froment, but he flattered himself that he had extricated the young priest from grievous danger; and he came to see him from time to time, to chat with him and cheer him, talking with him of his father, the great chemist, of whom he recounted many a charming anecdote, many a particular, still glowing with the flame of ardent friendship. Little by little, amidst the weak languor of convalescence, the son had thus beheld an embodiment of charming simplicity, affection, and good nature rising up before him. It was his father such as he had really been, not the man of stern science whom he had pictured whilst listening to his mother. Certainly she had never taught him aught but respect for that dear memory; but had not her husband been the unbeliever, the man who denied, and made the angels weep, the artisan of impiety who sought to change the world that God had made? And so he had long remained a gloomy vision, a spectre of damnation prowling about the house, whereas now he became the house's very light, clear and gay, a worker consumed by a longing for truth, who had never desired anything but the love and happiness of all. For his part, Doctor Chassaigne, a Pyrenean by birth, born in a far-off secluded village where folks still believed in sorceresses, inclined rather towards religion, although he had not set his foot inside a church during the forty years he had been living in Paris. However, his conviction was absolute: if there were a heaven somewhere, Michel Froment was assuredly there, and not merely there, but seated upon a throne on the Divinity's right hand. Then Pierre, in a few minutes, again lived through the frightful torment which, during two long months, had ravaged him. It was not that he had found controversial works of an anti-religious character in the bookcase, or that his father, whose papers he sorted, had ever gone beyond his technical studies as a /savant/. But little by little, despite himself, the light of science dawned upon him, an /ensemble/ of proven phenomena, which demolished dogmas and left within him nothing of the things which as a priest he should have believed. It seemed, in fact, as though illness had renewed him, as though he were again beginning to live and learn amidst the physical pleasantness of convalescence, that still subsisting weakness which lent penetrating lucidity to his brain. At the seminary, by the advice of his masters, he had always kept the spirit of inquiry, his thirst for knowledge, in check. Much of that which was taught him there had surprised him; however, he had succeeded in making the sacrifice of his mind required of his piety. But now, all the laboriously raised scaffolding of dogmas was swept away in a revolt of that sovereign mind which clamoured for its rights, and which he could no longer silence. Truth was bubbling up and overflowing in such an irresistible stream that he realised he would never succeed in lodging error in his brain again. It was indeed the total and irreparable ruin of faith. Although he had been able to kill his flesh by renouncing the romance of his youth, although he felt that he had altogether mastered carnal passion, he now knew that it would be impossible for him to make the sacrifice of his intelligence. And he was not mistaken; it was indeed his father again springing to life in the depths of his being, and at last obtaining the mastery in that dual heredity in which, during so many years, his mother had dominated. The upper part of his face, his straight, towering brow, seemed to have risen yet higher, whilst the lower part, the small chin, the affectionate mouth, were becoming less distinct. However, he suffered; at certain twilight hours when his kindliness, his need of love awoke, he felt distracted with grief at no longer believing, distracted with desire to believe again; and it was necessary that the lighted lamp should be brought in, that he should see clearly around him and within him, before he could recover the energy and calmness of reason, the strength of martyrdom, the determination to sacrifice everything to the peace of his conscience. Then came the crisis. He was a priest and he no longer believed. This had suddenly dawned before him like a bottomless abyss. It was the end of his life, the collapse of everything. What should he do? Did not simple rectitude require that he should throw off the cassock and return to the world? But he had seen some renegade priests and had despised them. A married priest with whom he was acquainted filled him with disgust. All this, no doubt, was but a survival of his long religious training. He retained the notion that a priest cannot, must not, weaken; the idea that when one has dedicated oneself to God one cannot take possession of oneself again. Possibly, also, he felt that he was too plainly branded, too different from other men already, to prove otherwise than awkward and unwelcome among them. Since he had been cut off from them he would remain apart in his grievous pride; And, after days of anguish, days of struggle incessantly renewed, in which his thirst for happiness warred with the energies of his returning health, he took the heroic resolution to remain a priest, and an honest one. He would find the strength necessary for such abnegation. Since he had conquered the flesh, albeit unable to conquer the brain, he felt sure of keeping his vow of chastity, and that would be unshakable; therein lay the pure, upright life which he was absolutely certain of living. What mattered the rest if he alone suffered, if nobody in the world suspected that his heart was reduced to ashes, that nothing remained of his faith, that he was agonising amidst fearful falsehood? His rectitude would prove a firm prop; he would follow his priestly calling like an honest man, without breaking any of the vows he had taken; he would, in due accordance with the rites, discharge his duties as a minister of the Divinity, whom he would praise and glorify at the altar, and distribute as the Bread of Life to the faithful. Who, then, would dare to impute his loss of faith to him as a crime, even if this great misfortune should some day become known? And what more could be asked of him than lifelong devotion to his vow, regard for his ministry, and the practice of every charity without the hope of any future reward? In this wise he ended by calming himself, still upright, still bearing his head erect, with the desolate grandeur of the priest who himself no longer believes, but continues watching over the faith of others. And he certainly was not alone; he felt that he had many brothers, priests with ravaged minds, who had sunk into incredulity, and who yet, like soldiers without a fatherland, remained at the altar, and, despite, everything, found the courage to make the divine illusion shine forth above the kneeling crowds. On recovering his health Pierre had immediately resumed his service at the little church of Neuilly. He said his mass there every morning. But he had resolved to refuse any appointment, any preferment. Months and years went by, and he obstinately insisted on remaining the least known and the most humble of those priests who are tolerated in a parish, who appear and disappear after discharging their duty. The acceptance of any appointment would have seemed to him an aggravation of his falsehood, a theft from those who were more deserving than himself. And he had to resist frequent offers, for it was impossible for his merits to remain unnoticed. Indeed, his obstinate modesty provoked astonishment at the archbishop's palace, where there was a desire to utilise the power which could be divined in him. Now and again, it is true, he bitterly regretted that he was not useful, that he did not co-operate in some great work, in furthering the purification of the world, the salvation and happiness of all, in accordance with his own ardent, torturing desire. Fortunately his time was nearly all his own, and to console himself he gave rein to his passion for work by devouring every volume in his father's bookcase, and then again resuming and considering his studies, feverishly preoccupied with regard to the history of nations, full of a desire to explore the depths of the social and religious crisis so that he might ascertain whether it were really beyond remedy. It was at this time, whilst rummaging one morning in one of the large drawers in the lower part of the bookcase, that he discovered quite a collection of papers respecting the apparitions of Lourdes. It was a very complete set of documents, comprising detailed notes of the interrogatories to which Bernadette had been subjected, copies of numerous official documents, and police and medical reports, in addition to many private and confidential letters of the greatest interest. This discovery had surprised Pierre, and he had questioned, Doctor Chassaigne concerning it. The latter thereupon remembered that his friend, Michel Froment, had at one time passionately devoted himself to the study of Bernadette's case; and he himself, a native of the village near Lourdes, had procured for the chemist a portion of the documents in the collection. Pierre, in his turn, then became impassioned, and for a whole month continued studying the affair, powerfully attracted by the visionary's pure, upright nature, but indignant with all that had subsequently sprouted up--the barbarous fetishism, the painful superstitions, and the triumphant simony. In the access of unbelief which had come upon him, this story of Lourdes was certainly of a nature to complete the collapse of his faith. However, it had also excited his curiosity, and he would have liked to investigate it, to establish beyond dispute what scientific truth might be in it, and render pure Christianity the service of ridding it of this scoria, this fairy tale, all touching and childish as it was. But he had been obliged to relinquish his studies, shrinking from the necessity of making a journey to the Grotto, and finding that it would be extremely difficult to obtain the information which he still needed; and of it all there at last only remained within him a tender feeling for Bernadette, of whom he could not think without a sensation of delightful charm and infinite pity. The days went by, and Pierre led a more and more lonely life. Doctor Chassaigne had just left for the Pyrenees in a state of mortal anxiety. Abandoning his patients, he had set out for Cauterets with his ailing wife, who was sinking more and more each day, to the infinite distress of both his charming daughter and himself. From that moment the little house at Neuilly fell into deathlike silence and emptiness. Pierre had no other distraction than that of occasionally going to see the Guersaints, who had long since left the neighbouring house, but whom he had found again in a small lodging in a wretched tenement of the district. And the memory of his first visit to them there was yet so fresh within him, that he felt a pang at his heart as he recalled his emotion at sight of the hapless Marie. That pang roused him from his reverie, and on looking round he perceived Marie stretched on the seat, even as he had found her on the day which he recalled, already imprisoned in that gutter-like box, that coffin to which wheels were adapted when she was taken out-of-doors for an airing. She, formerly so brimful of life, ever astir and laughing, was dying of inaction and immobility in that box. Of her old-time beauty she had retained nothing save her hair, which clad her as with a royal mantle, and she was so emaciated that she seemed to have grown smaller again, to have become once more a child. And what was most distressing was the expression on her pale face, the blank, frigid stare of her eyes which did not see, the ever haunting absent look, as of one whom suffering overwhelmed. However, she noticed that Pierre was gazing at her, and at once desired to smile at him; but irresistible moans escaped her, and when she did at last smile, it was like a poor smitten creature who is convinced that she will expire before the miracle takes place. He was overcome by it, and, amidst all the sufferings with which the carriage abounded, hers were now the only ones that he beheld and heard, as though one and all were summed up in her, in the long and terrible agony of her beauty, gaiety, and youth. Then by degrees, without taking his eyes from Marie, he again reverted to former days, again lived those hours, fraught with a mournful and bitter charm, which he had often spent beside her, when he called at the sorry lodging to keep her company. M. de Guersaint had finally ruined himself by trying to improve the artistic quality of the religious prints so widely sold in France, the faulty execution of which quite irritated him. His last resources had been swallowed up in the failure of a colour-printing firm; and, heedless as he was, deficient in foresight, ever trusting in Providence, his childish mind continually swayed by illusions, he did not notice the awful pecuniary embarrassment of the household; but applied himself to the study of aerial navigation, without even realising what prodigious activity his elder daughter, Blanche, was forced to display, in order to earn the living of her two children, as she was wont to call her father and her sister. It was Blanche who, by running about Paris in the dust or the mud from morning to evening in order to give French or music lessons, contrived to provide the money necessary for the unremitting attentions which Marie required. And Marie often experienced attacks of despair--bursting into tears and accusing herself of being the primary cause of their ruin, as for years and years now it had been necessary to pay for medical attendance and for taking her to almost every imaginable spring--La Bourboule, Aix, Lamalou, Amelie-les-Bains, and others. And the outcome of ten years of varied diagnosis and treatment was that the doctors had now abandoned her. Some thought her illness to be due to the rupture of certain ligaments, others believed in the presence of a tumour, others again to paralysis due to injury to the spinal cord, and as she, with maidenly revolt, refused to undergo any examination, and they did not even dare to address precise questions to her, they each contented themselves with their several opinions and declared that she was beyond cure. Moreover, she now solely relied upon the divine help, having grown rigidly pious since she had been suffering, and finding her only relief in her ardent faith. Every morning she herself read the holy offices, for to her great sorrow she was unable to go to church. Her inert limbs indeed seemed quite lifeless, and she had sunk into a condition of extreme weakness, to such a point, in fact, that on certain days it became necessary for her sister to place her food in her mouth. Pierre was thinking of this when all at once he recalled an evening he had spent with her. The lamp had not yet been lighted, he was seated beside her in the growing obscurity, and she suddenly told him that she wished to go to Lourdes, feeling certain that she would return cured. He had experienced an uncomfortable sensation on hearing her speak in this fashion, and quite forgetting himself had exclaimed that it was folly to believe in such childishness. He had hitherto made it a rule never to converse with her on religious matters, having not only refused to be her confessor, but even to advise her with regard to the petty uncertainties of her pietism. In this respect he was influenced by feelings of mingled shame and compassion; to lie to her of all people would have made him suffer, and, moreover, he would have deemed himself a criminal had he even by a breath sullied that fervent pure faith which lent her such strength against pain. And so, regretting that he had not been able to restrain his exclamation, he remained sorely embarrassed, when all at once he felt the girl's cold hand take hold of his own. And then, emboldened by the darkness, she ventured in a gentle, faltering voice, to tell him that she already knew his secret, his misfortune, that wretchedness, so fearful for a priest, of being unable to believe. Despite himself he had revealed everything during their chats together, and she, with the delicate intuition of a friend, had been able to read his conscience. She felt terribly distressed on his account; she deemed him, with that mortal moral malady, to be more deserving of pity than herself. And then as he, thunderstruck, was still unable to find an answer, acknowledging the truth of her words by his very silence, she again began to speak to him of Lourdes, adding in a low whisper that she wished to confide him as well as herself to the protection of the Blessed Virgin, whom she entreated to restore him to faith. And from that evening forward she did not cease speaking on the subject, repeating again and again, that if she went to Lourdes she would be surely cured. But she was prevented from making the journey by lack of means and she did not even dare to speak to her sister of the pecuniary question. So two months went by, and day by day she grew weaker, exhausted by her longing dreams, her eyes ever turned towards the flashing light of the miraculous Grotto far away. Pierre then experienced many painful days. He had at first told Marie that he would not accompany her. But his decision was somewhat shaken by the thought that if he made up his mind to go, he might profit by the journey to continue his inquiries with regard to Bernadette, whose charming image lingered in his heart. And at last he even felt penetrated by a delightful feeling, an unacknowledged hope, the hope that Marie was perhaps right, that the Virgin might take pity on him and restore to him his former blind faith, the faith of the child who loves and does not question. Oh! to believe, to believe with his whole soul, to plunge into faith for ever! Doubtless there was no other possible happiness. He longed for faith with all the joyousness of his youth, with all the love that he had felt for his mother, with all his burning desire to escape from the torment of understanding and knowing, and to slumber forever in the depths of divine ignorance. It was cowardly, and yet so delightful; to exist no more, to become a mere thing in the hands of the Divinity. And thus he was at last possessed by a desire to make the supreme experiment. A week later the journey to Lourdes was decided upon. Pierre, however, had insisted on a final consultation of medical men in order to ascertain if it were really possible for Marie to travel; and this again was a scene which rose up before him, with certain incidents which he ever beheld whilst others were already fading from his mind. Two of the doctors who had formerly attended the patient, and one of whom believed in the rupture of certain ligaments, whilst the other asserted the case to be one of medullary paralysis, had ended by agreeing that this paralysis existed, and that there was also, possibly, some ligamentary injury. In their opinion all the symptoms pointed to this diagnosis, and the nature of the case seemed to them so evident that they did not hesitate to give certificates, each his own, agreeing almost word for word with one another, and so positive in character as to leave no room for doubt. Moreover, they thought that the journey was practicable, though it would certainly prove an exceedingly painful one. Pierre thereupon resolved to risk it, for he had found the doctors very prudent, and very desirous to arrive at the truth; and he retained but a confused recollection of the third medical man who had been called in, a distant cousin of his named De Beauclair, who was young, extremely intelligent, but little known as yet, and said by some to be rather strange in his theories. This doctor, after looking at Marie for a long time, had asked somewhat anxiously about her parents, and had seemed greatly interested by what was told him of M. de Guersaint, this architect and inventor with a weak and exuberant mind. Then he had desired to measure the sufferer's visual field, and by a slight discreet touch had ascertained the locality of the pain, which, under certain pressure, seemed to ascend like a heavy shifting mass towards the breast. He did not appear to attach importance to the paralysis of the legs; but on a direct question being put to him he exclaimed that the girl ought to be taken to Lourdes and that she would assuredly be cured there, if she herself were convinced of it. Faith sufficed, said he, with a smile; two pious lady patients of his, whom he had sent thither during the preceding year, had returned in radiant health. He even predicted how the miracle would come about; it would be like a lightning stroke, an awakening, an exaltation of the entire being, whilst the evil, that horrid, diabolical weight which stifled the poor girl would once more ascend and fly away as though emerging by her mouth. But at the same time he flatly declined to give a certificate. He had failed to agree with his two /confreres/, who treated him coldly, as though they considered him a wild, adventurous young fellow. Pierre confusedly remembered some shreds of the discussion which had begun again in his presence, some little part of the diagnosis framed by Beauclair. First, a dislocation of the organ, with a slight laceration of the ligaments, resulting from the patient's fall from her horse; then a slow healing, everything returning to its place, followed by consecutive nervous symptoms, so that the sufferer was now simply beset by her original fright, her attention fixed on the injured part, arrested there amidst increasing pain, incapable of acquiring fresh notions unless it were under the lash of some violent emotion. Moreover, he also admitted the probability of accidents due to nutrition, as yet unexplained, and on the course and importance of which he himself would not venture to give an opinion. However, the idea that Marie /dreamt/ her disease, that the fearful sufferings torturing her came from an injury long since healed, appeared such a paradox to Pierre when he gazed at her and saw her in such agony, her limbs already stretched out lifeless on her bed of misery, that he did not even pause to consider it; but at that moment felt simply happy in the thought that all three doctors agreed in authorising the journey to Lourdes. To him it was sufficient that she /might/ be cured, and to attain that result he would have followed her to the end of the world. Ah! those last days of Paris, amid what a scramble they were spent! The national pilgrimage was about to start, and in order to avoid heavy expenses, it had occurred to him to obtain /hospitalisation/ for Marie. Then he had been obliged to run about in order to obtain his own admission, as a helper, into the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation. M. de Guersaint was delighted with the prospect of the journey, for he was fond of nature, and ardently desired to become acquainted with the Pyrenees. Moreover, he did not allow anything to worry him, but was perfectly willing that the young priest should pay his railway fare, and provide for him at the hotel yonder as for a child; and his daughter Blanche, having slipped a twenty-franc piece into his hand at the last moment, he had even thought himself rich again. That poor brave Blanche had a little hidden store of her own, savings to the amount of fifty francs, which it had been absolutely necessary to accept, for she became quite angry in her determination to contribute towards her sister's cure, unable as she was to form one of the party, owing to the lessons which she had to give in Paris, whose hard pavements she must continue pacing, whilst her dear ones were kneeling yonder, amidst the enchantments of the Grotto. And so the others had started on, and were now rolling, ever rolling along. As they passed the station of Chatellerault a sudden burst of voices made Pierre start, and drove away the torpor into which his reverie had plunged him. What was the matter? Were they reaching Poitiers? But it was only half-past twelve o'clock, and it was simply Sister Hyacinthe who had roused him, by making her patients and pilgrims say the Angelus, the three "Aves" thrice repeated. Then the voices burst forth, and the sound of a fresh canticle arose, and continued like a lamentation. Fully five and twenty minutes must elapse before they would reach Poitiers, where it seemed as if the half-hour's stoppage would bring relief to every suffering! They were all so uncomfortable, so roughly shaken in that malodorous, burning carriage! Such wretchedness was beyond endurance. Big tears coursed down the cheeks of Madame Vincent, a muttered oath escaped M. Sabathier usually so resigned, and Brother Isidore, La Grivotte, and Madame Vetu seemed to have become inanimate, mere waifs carried along by a torrent. Moreover, Marie no longer answered, but had closed her eyes and would not open them, pursued as she was by the horrible vision of Elise Rouquet's face, that face with its gaping cavities which seemed to her to be the image of death. And whilst the train increased its speed, bearing all this human despair onward, under the heavy sky, athwart the burning plains, there was yet another scare in the carriage. The strange man had apparently ceased to breathe, and a voice cried out that he was expiring.

3

POITIERS

AS soon as the train arrived at Poitiers, Sister Hyacinthe alighted in all haste, amidst the crowd of porters opening the carriage doors, and of pilgrims darting forward to reach the platform. "Wait a moment, wait a moment," she repeated, "let me pass first. I wish to see if all is over." Then, having entered the other compartment, she raised the strange man's head, and seeing him so pale, with such blank eyes, she did at first think him already dead. At last, however, she detected a faint breathing. "No, no," she then exclaimed, "he still breathes. Quick! there is no time to be lost." And, perceiving the other Sister, she added: "Sister Claire des Anges, will you go and fetch Father Massias, who must be in the third or fourth carriage of the train? Tell him that we have a patient in very great danger here, and ask him to bring the Holy Oils at once." Without answering, the other Sister at once plunged into the midst of the scramble. She was small, slender, and gentle, with a meditative air and mysterious eyes, but withal extremely active. Pierre, who was standing in the other compartment watching the scene, now ventured to make a suggestion: "And would it not be as well to fetch the doctor?" said he. "Yes, I was thinking of it," replied Sister Hyacinthe, "and, Monsieur l'Abbe, it would be very kind of you to go for him yourself." It so happened that Pierre intended going to the cantine carriage to fetch some broth for Marie. Now that she was no longer being jolted she felt somewhat relieved, and had opened her eyes, and caused her father to raise her to a sitting posture. Keenly thirsting for fresh air, she would have much liked them to carry her out on to the platform for a moment, but she felt that it would be asking too much, that it would be too troublesome a task to place her inside the carriage again. So M. de Guersaint remained by himself on the platform, near the open door, smoking a cigarette, whilst Pierre hastened to the cantine van, where he knew he would find the doctor on duty, with his travelling pharmacy. Some other patients, whom one could not think of removing, also remained in the carriage. Amongst them was La Grivotte, who was stifling and almost delirious, in such a state indeed as to detain Madame de Jonquiere, who had arranged to meet her daughter Raymonde, with Madame Volmar and Madame Desagneaux, in the refreshment-room, in order that they might all four lunch together. But that unfortunate creature seemed on the point of expiring, so how could she leave her all alone, on the hard seat of that carriage? On his side, M. Sabathier, likewise riveted to his seat, was waiting for his wife, who had gone to fetch a bunch of grapes for him; whilst Marthe had remained with her brother the missionary, whose faint moan never ceased. The others, those who were able to walk, had hustled one another in their haste to alight, all eager as they were to escape for a moment from that cage of wretchedness where their limbs had been quite numbed by the seven hours' journey which they had so far gone. Madame Maze had at once drawn apart, straying with melancholy face to the far end of the platform, where she found herself all alone; Madame Vetu, stupefied by her sufferings, had found sufficient strength to take a few steps, and sit down on a bench, in the full sunlight, where she did not even feel the burning heat; whilst Elise Rouquet, who had had the decency to cover her face with a black wrap, and was consumed by a desire for fresh water, went hither and thither in search of a drinking fountain. And meantime Madame Vincent, walking slowly, carried her little Rose about in her arms, trying to smile at her, and to cheer her by showing her some gaudily coloured picture bills, which the child gravely gazed at, but did not see. Pierre had the greatest possible difficulty in making his way through the crowd inundating the platform. No effort of imagination could enable one to picture the living torrent of ailing and healthy beings which the train had here set down--a mob of more than a thousand persons just emerging from suffocation, and bustling, hurrying hither and thither. Each carriage had contributed its share of wretchedness, like some hospital ward suddenly evacuated; and it was now possible to form an idea of the frightful amount of suffering which this terrible white train carried along with it, this train which disseminated a legend of horror wheresoever it passed. Some infirm sufferers were dragging themselves about, others were being carried, and many remained in a heap on the platform. There were sudden pushes, violent calls, innumerable displays of distracted eagerness to reach the refreshment-room and the /buvette/. Each and all made haste, going wheresoever their wants called them. This stoppage of half an hour's duration, the only stoppage there would be before reaching Lourdes, was, after all, such a short one. And the only gay note, amidst all the black cassocks and the threadbare garments of the poor, never of any precise shade of colour, was supplied by the smiling whiteness of the Little Sisters of the Assumption, all bright and active in their snowy coifs, wimples, and aprons. When Pierre at last reached the cantine van near the middle of the train, he found it already besieged. There was here a petroleum stove, with a small supply of cooking utensils. The broth prepared from concentrated meat-extract was being warmed in wrought-iron pans, whilst the preserved milk in tins was diluted and supplied as occasion required. There were some other provisions, such as biscuits, fruit, and chocolate, on a few shelves. But Sister Saint-Francois, to whom the service was entrusted, a short, stout woman of five-and-forty, with a good-natured fresh-coloured face, was somewhat losing her head in the presence of all the hands so eagerly stretched towards her. Whilst continuing her distribution, she lent ear to Pierre, as he called the doctor, who with his travelling pharmacy occupied another corner of the van. Then, when the young priest began to explain matters, speaking of the poor unknown man who was dying, a sudden desire came to her to go and see him, and she summoned another Sister to take her place. "Oh! I wished to ask you, Sister, for some broth for a passenger who is ill," said Pierre, at that moment turning towards her. "Very well, Monsieur l'Abbe, I will bring some. Go on in front." The doctor and the abbe went off in all haste, rapidly questioning and answering one another, whilst behind them followed Sister Saint-Francois, carrying the bowl of broth with all possible caution amidst the jostling of the crowd. The doctor was a dark-complexioned man of eight-and-twenty, robust and extremely handsome, with the head of a young Roman emperor, such as may still be occasionally met with in the sunburnt land of Provence. As soon as Sister Hyacinthe caught sight of him, she raised an exclamation of surprise: "What! Monsieur Ferrand, is it you?" Indeed, they both seemed amazed at meeting in this manner. It is, however, the courageous mission of the Sisters of the Assumption to tend the ailing poor, those who lie in agony in their humble garrets, and cannot pay for nursing; and thus these good women spend their lives among the wretched, installing themselves beside the sufferer's pallet in his tiny lodging, and ministering to every want, attending alike to cooking and cleaning, and living there as servants and relatives, until either cure or death supervenes. And it was in this wise that Sister Hyacinthe, young as she was, with her milky face, and her blue eyes which ever laughed, had installed herself one day in the abode of this young fellow, Ferrand, then a medical student, prostrated by typhoid fever, and so desperately poor that he lived in a kind of loft reached by a ladder, in the Rue du Four. And from that moment she had not stirred from his side, but had remained with him until she cured him, with the passion of one who lived only for others, one who when an infant had been found in a church porch, and who had no other family than that of those who suffered, to whom she devoted herself with all her ardently affectionate nature. And what a delightful month, what exquisite comradeship, fraught with the pure fraternity of suffering, had followed! When he called her "Sister," it was really to a sister that he was speaking. And she was a mother also, a mother who helped him to rise, and who put him to bed as though he were her child, without aught springing up between them save supreme pity, the divine, gentle compassion of charity. She ever showed herself gay, sexless, devoid of any instinct excepting that which prompted her to assuage and to console. And he worshipped her, venerated her, and had retained of her the most chaste and passionate of recollections. "O Sister Hyacinthe!" he murmured in delight. Chance alone had brought them face to face again, for Ferrand was not a believer, and if he found himself in that train it was simply because he had at the last moment consented to take the place of a friend who was suddenly prevented from coming. For nearly a twelvemonth he had been a house-surgeon at the Hospital of La Pitie. However, this journey to Lourdes, in such peculiar circumstances, greatly interested him. The joy of the meeting was making them forget the ailing stranger. And so the Sister resumed: "You see, Monsieur Ferrand, it is for this man that we want you. At one moment we thought him dead. Ever since we passed Amboise he has been filling us with fear, and I have just sent for the Holy Oils. Do you find him so very low? Could you not revive him a little?" The doctor was already examining the man, and thereupon the sufferers who had remained in the carriage became greatly interested and began to look. Marie, to whom Sister Saint-Francois had given the bowl of broth, was holding it with such an unsteady hand that Pierre had to take it from her, and endeavour to make her drink; but she could not swallow, and she left the broth scarce tasted, fixing her eyes upon the man waiting to see what would happen like one whose own existence is at stake. "Tell me," again asked Sister Hyacinthe, "how do you find him? What is his illness?" "What is his illness!" muttered Ferrand; "he has every illness." Then, drawing a little phial from his pocket, he endeavoured to introduce a few drops of the contents between the sufferer's clenched teeth. The man heaved a sigh, raised his eyelids and let them fall again; that was all, he gave no other sign of life. Sister Hyacinthe, usually so calm and composed, so little accustomed to despair, became impatient. "But it is terrible," said she, "and Sister Claire des Anges does not come back! Yet I told her plainly enough where she would find Father Massias's carriage. /Mon Dieu! / what will become of us?" Sister Saint-Francois, seeing that she could render no help, was now about to return to the cantine van. Before doing so, however, she inquired if the man were not simply dying of hunger; for such cases presented themselves, and indeed she had only come to the compartment with the view of offering some of her provisions. At last, as she went off, she promised that she would make Sister Claire des Anges hasten her return should she happen to meet her; and she had not gone twenty yards when she turned round and waved her arm to call attention to her colleague, who with discreet short steps was coming back alone. Leaning out of the window, Sister Hyacinthe kept on calling to her, "Make haste, make haste! Well, and where is Father Massias?" "He isn't there." "What! not there?" "No. I went as fast as I could, but with all these people about it was not possible to get there quickly. When I reached the carriage Father Massias had already alighted, and gone out of the station, no doubt." She thereupon explained, that according to what she had heard, Father Massias and the priest of Sainte-Radegonde had some appointment together. In other years the national pilgrimage halted at Poitiers for four-and-twenty hours, and after those who were ill had been placed in the town hospital the others went in procession to Sainte-Radegonde. * That year, however, there was some obstacle to this course being followed, so the train was going straight on to Lourdes; and Father Massias was certainly with his friend the priest, talking with him on some matter of importance. * The church of Sainte-Radegonde, built by the saint of that name in the sixth century, is famous throughout Poitou. In the crypt between the tombs of Ste. Agnes and St. Disciole is that of Ste. Radegonde herself, but it now only contains some particles of her remains, as the greater portion was burnt by the Huguenots in 1562. On a previous occasion (1412) the tomb had been violated by Jean, Duc de Berry, who wished to remove both the saint's head and her two rings. Whilst he was making the attempt, however, the skeleton is said to have withdrawn its hand so that he might not possess himself of the rings. A greater curiosity which the church contains is a footprint on a stone slab, said to have been left by Christ when He appeared to Ste. Radegonde in her cell. This attracts pilgrims from many parts. --Trans. "They promised to tell him and send him here with the Holy Oils as soon as they found him," added Sister Claire. However, this was quite a disaster for Sister Hyacinthe. Since Science was powerless, perhaps the Holy Oils would have brought the sufferer some relief. She had often seen that happen. "O Sister, Sister, how worried I am!" she said to her companion. "Do you know, I wish you would go back and watch for Father Massias and bring him to me as soon as you see him. It would be so kind of you to do so!" "Yes, Sister," compliantly answered Sister Claire des Anges, and off she went again with that grave, mysterious air of hers, wending her way through the crowd like a gliding shadow. Ferrand, meantime, was still looking at the man, sorely distressed at his inability to please Sister Hyacinthe by reviving him. And as he made a gesture expressive of his powerlessness she again raised her voice entreatingly: "Stay with me, Monsieur Ferrand, pray stay," she said. "Wait till Father Massias comes--I shall be a little more at ease with you here." He remained and helped her to raise the man, who was slipping down upon the seat. Then, taking a linen cloth, she wiped the poor fellow's face which a dense perspiration was continually covering. And the spell of waiting continued amid the uneasiness of the patients who had remained in the carriage, and the curiosity of the folks who had begun to assemble on the platform in front of the compartment. All at once however a girl hastily pushed the crowd aside, and, mounting on the footboard, addressed herself to Madame de Jonquiere: "What is the matter, mamma?" she said. "They are waiting for you in the refreshment-room." It was Raymonde de Jonquiere, who, already somewhat ripe for her four-and-twenty years, was remarkably like her mother, being very dark, with a pronounced nose, large mouth, and full, pleasant-looking face. "But, my dear, you can see for yourself. I can't leave this poor woman," replied the lady-hospitaller; and thereupon she pointed to La Grivotte, who had been attacked by a fit of coughing which shook her frightfully. "Oh, how annoying, mamma!" retorted Raymonde, "Madame Desagneaux and Madame Volmar were looking forward with so much pleasure to this little lunch together." "Well, it can't be helped, my dear. At all events, you can begin without waiting for me. Tell the ladies that I will come and join them as soon as I can." Then, an idea occurring to her, Madame de Jonquiere added: "Wait a moment, the doctor is here. I will try to get him to take charge of my patient. Go back, I will follow you. As you can guess, I am dying of hunger." Raymonde briskly returned to the refreshment-room whilst her mother begged Ferrand to come into her compartment to see if he could do something to relieve La Grivotte. At Marthe's request he had already examined Brother Isidore, whose moaning never ceased; and with a sorrowful gesture he had again confessed his powerlessness. However, he hastened to comply with Madame de Jonquiere's appeal, and raised the consumptive woman to a sitting posture in the hope of thus stopping her cough, which indeed gradually ceased. And then he helped the lady-hospitaller to make her swallow a spoonful of some soothing draught. The doctor's presence in the carriage was still causing a stir among the ailing ones. M. Sabathier, who was slowly eating the grapes which his wife had been to fetch him, did not, however, question Ferrand, for he knew full well what his answer would be, and was weary, as he expressed it, of consulting all the princes of science; nevertheless he felt comforted as it were at seeing him set that poor consumptive woman on her feet again. And even Marie watched all that the doctor did with increasing interest, though not daring to call him herself, certain as she also was that he could do nothing for her. Meantime, the crush on the platform was increasing. Only a quarter of an hour now remained to the pilgrims. Madame Vetu, whose eyes were open but who saw nothing, sat like an insensible being in the broad sunlight, in the hope possibly that the scorching heat would deaden her pains; whilst up and down, in front of her, went Madame Vincent ever with the same sleep-inducing step and ever carrying her little Rose, her poor ailing birdie, whose weight was so trifling that she scarcely felt her in her arms. Many people meantime were hastening to the water tap in order to fill their pitchers, cans, and bottles. Madame Maze, who was of refined tastes and careful of her person, thought of going to wash her hands there; but just as she arrived she found Elise Rouquet drinking, and she recoiled at sight of that disease-smitten face, so terribly disfigured and robbed of nearly all semblance of humanity. And all the others likewise shuddered, likewise hesitated to fill their bottles, pitchers, and cans at the tap from which she had drunk. A large number of pilgrims had now begun to eat whilst pacing the platform. You could hear the rhythmical taps of the crutches carried by a woman who incessantly wended her way through the groups. On the ground, a legless cripple was painfully dragging herself about in search of nobody knew what. Others, seated there in heaps, no longer stirred. All these sufferers, momentarily unpacked as it were, these patients of a travelling hospital emptied for a brief half-hour, were taking the air amidst the bewilderment and agitation of the healthy passengers; and the whole throng had a frightfully woeful, poverty-stricken appearance in the broad noontide light. Pierre no longer stirred from the side of Marie, for M. de Guersaint had disappeared, attracted by a verdant patch of landscape which could be seen at the far end of the station. And, feeling anxious about her, since she had not been able to finish her broth, the young priest with a smiling air tried to tempt her palate by offering to go and buy her a peach; but she refused it; she was suffering too much, she cared for nothing. She was gazing at him with her large, woeful eyes, on the one hand impatient at this stoppage which delayed her chance of cure, and on the other terrified at the thought of again being jolted along that hard and endless railroad. Just then a stout gentleman whose full beard was turning grey, and who had a broad, fatherly kind of face, drew near and touched Pierre's arm: "Excuse me, Monsieur l'Abbe," said he, "but is it not in this carriage that there is a poor man dying?" And on the priest returning an affirmative answer, the gentleman became quite affable and familiar. "My name is Vigneron," he said; "I am the head clerk at the Ministry of Finances, and applied for leave in order that I might help my wife to take our son Gustave to Lourdes. The dear lad places all his hope in the Blessed Virgin, to whom we pray morning and evening on his behalf. We are in a second-class compartment of the carriage just in front of yours." Then, turning round, he summoned his party with a wave of the hand. "Come, come!" said he, "it is here. The unfortunate man is indeed in the last throes." Madame Vigneron was a little woman with the correct bearing of a respectable /bourgeoise/, but her long, livid face denoted impoverished blood, terrible evidence of which was furnished by her son Gustave. The latter, who was fifteen years of age, looked scarcely ten. Twisted out of shape, he was a mere skeleton, with his right leg so wasted, so reduced, that he had to walk with a crutch. He had a small, thin face, somewhat awry, in which one saw little excepting his eyes, clear eyes, sparkling with intelligence, sharpened as it were by suffering, and doubtless well able to dive into the human soul. An old puffy-faced lady followed the others, dragging her legs along with difficulty; and M. Vigneron, remembering that he had forgotten her, stepped back towards Pierre so that he might complete the introduction. "That lady," said he, "is Madame Chaise, my wife's eldest sister. She also wished to accompany Gustave, whom she is very fond of." And then, leaning forward, he added in a whisper, with a confidential air: "She is the widow of Chaise, the silk merchant, you know, who left such an immense fortune. She is suffering from a heart complaint which causes her much anxiety." The whole family, grouped together, then gazed with lively curiosity at what was taking place in the railway carriage. People were incessantly flocking to the spot; and so that the lad might be the better able to see, his father took him up in his arms for a moment whilst his aunt held the crutch, and his mother on her side raised herself on tip-toe. The scene in the carriage was still the same; the strange man was still stiffly seated in his corner, his head resting against the hard wood. He was livid, his eyes were closed, and his mouth was twisted by suffering; and every now and then Sister Hyacinthe with her linen cloth wiped away the cold sweat which was constantly covering his face. She no longer spoke, no longer evinced any impatience, but had recovered her serenity and relied on Heaven. From time to time she would simply glance towards the platform to see if Father Massias were coming. "Look at him, Gustave," said M. Vigneron to his son; "he must be consumptive." The lad, whom scrofula was eating away, whose hip was attacked by an abscess, and in whom there were already signs of necrosis of the vertebrae, seemed to take a passionate interest in the agony he thus beheld. It did not frighten him, he smiled at it with a smile of infinite sadness. "Oh! how dreadful!" muttered Madame Chaise, who, living in continual terror of a sudden attack which would carry her off, turned pale with the fear of death. "Ah! well," replied M. Vigneron, philosophically, "it will come to each of us in turn. We are all mortal." Thereupon, a painful, mocking expression came over Gustave's smile, as though he had heard other words than those--perchance an unconscious wish, the hope that the old aunt might die before he himself did, that he would inherit the promised half-million of francs, and then not long encumber his family. "Put the boy down now," said Madame Vigneron to her husband. "You are tiring him, holding him by the legs like that." Then both she and Madame Chaise bestirred themselves in order that the lad might not be shaken. The poor darling was so much in need of care and attention. At each moment they feared that they might lose him. Even his father was of opinion that they had better put him in the train again at once. And as the two women went off with the child, the old gentleman once more turned towards Pierre, and with evident emotion exclaimed: "Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe, if God should take him from us, the light of our life would be extinguished--I don't speak of his aunt's fortune, which would go to other nephews. But it would be unnatural, would it not, that he should go off before her, especially as she is so ill? However, we are all in the hands of Providence, and place our reliance in the Blessed Virgin, who will assuredly perform a miracle." Just then Madame de Jonquiere, having been reassured by Doctor Ferrand, was able to leave La Grivotte. Before going off, however, she took care to say to Pierre: "I am dying of hunger and am going to the refreshment-room for a moment. But if my patient should begin coughing again, pray come and fetch me." When, after great difficulty, she had managed to cross the platform and reach the refreshment-room, she found herself in the midst of another scramble. The better-circumstanced pilgrims had taken the tables by assault, and a great many priests were to be seen hastily lunching amidst all the clatter of knives, forks, and crockery. The three or four waiters were not able to attend to all the requirements, especially as they were hampered in their movements by the crowd purchasing fruit, bread, and cold meat at the counter. It was at a little table at the far end of the room that Raymonde was lunching with Madame Desagneaux and Madame Volmar. "Ah! here you are at last, mamma!" the girl exclaimed, as Madame de Jonquiere approached. "I was just going back to fetch you. You certainly ought to be allowed time to eat!" She was laughing, with a very animated expression on her face, quite delighted as she was with the adventures of the journey and this indifferent scrambling meal. "There," said she, "I have kept you some trout with green sauce, and there's a cutlet also waiting for you. We have already got to the artichokes." Then everything became charming. The gaiety prevailing in that little corner rejoiced the sight. Young Madame Desagneaux was particularly adorable. A delicate blonde, with wild, wavy, yellow hair, a round, dimpled, milky face, a gay, laughing disposition, and a remarkably good heart, she had made a rich marriage, and for three years past had been wont to leave her husband at Trouville in the fine August weather, in order to accompany the national pilgrimage as a lady-hospitaller. This was her great passion, an access of quivering pity, a longing desire to place herself unreservedly at the disposal of the sick for five days, a real debauch of devotion from which she returned tired to death but full of intense delight. Her only regret was that she as yet had no children, and with comical passion, she occasionally expressed a regret that she had missed her true vocation, that of a sister of charity. "Ah! my dear," she hastily said to Raymonde, "don't pity your mother for being so much taken up with her patients. She, at all events, has something to occupy her." And addressing herself to Madame de Jonquiere, she added: "If you only knew how long we find the time in our fine first-class carriage. We cannot even occupy ourselves with a little needlework, as it is forbidden. I asked for a place with the patients, but all were already distributed, so that my only resource will be to try to sleep tonight." She began to laugh, and then resumed: "Yes, Madame Volmar, we will try to sleep, won't we, since talking seems to tire you?" Madame Volmar, who looked over thirty, was very dark, with a long face and delicate but drawn features. Her magnificent eyes shone out like brasiers, though every now and then a cloud seemed to veil and extinguish them. At the first glance she did not appear beautiful, but as you gazed at her she became more and more perturbing, till she conquered you and inspired you with passionate admiration. It should be said though that she shrank from all self-assertion, comporting herself with much modesty, ever keeping in the background, striving to hide her lustre, invariably clad in black and unadorned by a single jewel, although she was the wife of a Parisian diamond-merchant. "Oh! for my part," she murmured, "as long as I am not hustled too much I am well pleased." She had been to Lourdes as an auxiliary lady-helper already on two occasions, though but little had been seen of her there--at the hospital of Our Lady of Dolours--as, on arriving, she had been overcome by such great fatigue that she had been forced, she said, to keep her room. However, Madame de Jonquiere, who managed the ward, treated her with good-natured tolerance. "Ah! my poor friends," said she, "there will be plenty of time for you to exert yourselves. Get to sleep if you can, and your turn will come when I can no longer keep up." Then addressing her daughter, she resumed: "And you would do well, darling, not to excite yourself too much if you wish to keep your head clear." Raymonde smiled and gave her mother a reproachful glance: "Mamma, mamma, why do you say that? Am I not sensible?" she asked. Doubtless she was not boasting, for, despite her youthful, thoughtless air, the air of one who simply feels happy in living, there appeared in her grey eyes an expression of firm resolution, a resolution to shape her life for herself. "It is true," the mother confessed with a little confusion, "this little girl is at times more sensible than I am myself. Come, pass me the cutlet--it is welcome, I assure you. Lord! how hungry I was!" The meal continued, enlivened by the constant laughter of Madame Desagneaux and Raymonde. The latter was very animated, and her face, which was already growing somewhat yellow through long pining for a suitor, again assumed the rosy bloom of twenty. They had to eat very fast, for only ten minutes now remained to them. On all sides one heard the growing tumult of customers who feared that they would not have time to take their coffee. All at once, however, Pierre made his appearance; a fit of stifling had again come over La Grivotte; and Madame de Jonquiere hastily finished her artichoke and returned to her compartment, after kissing her daughter, who wished her "good-night" in a facetious way. The priest, however, had made a movement of surprise on perceiving Madame Volmar with the red cross of the lady-hospitallers on her black bodice. He knew her, for he still called at long intervals on old Madame Volmar, the diamond-merchant's mother, who had been one of his own mother's friends. She was the most terrible woman in the world, religious beyond all reason, so harsh and stern, moreover, as to close the very window shutters in order to prevent her daughter-in-law from looking into the street. And he knew the young woman's story, how she had been imprisoned on the very morrow of her marriage, shut up between her mother-in-law, who tyrannised over her, and her husband, a repulsively ugly monster who went so far as to beat her, mad as he was with jealousy, although he himself kept mistresses. The unhappy woman was not allowed out of the house excepting it were to go to mass. And one day, at La Trinite, Pierre had surprised her secret, on seeing her behind the church exchanging a few hasty words with a well-groomed, distinguished-looking man. The priest's sudden appearance in the refreshment-room had somewhat disconcerted Madame Volmar. "What an unexpected meeting, Monsieur l'Abbe!" she said, offering him her long, warm hand. "What a long time it is since I last saw you!" And thereupon she explained that this was the third year she had gone to Lourdes, her mother-in-law having required her to join the Association of Our Lady of Salvation. "It is surprising that you did not see her at the station when we started," she added. "She sees me into the train and comes to meet me on my return." This was said in an apparently simple way, but with such a subtle touch of irony that Pierre fancied he could guess the truth. He knew that she really had no religious principles at all, and that she merely followed the rites and ceremonies of the Church in order that she might now and again obtain an hour's freedom; and all at once he intuitively realised that someone must be waiting for her yonder, that it was for the purpose of meeting him that she was thus hastening to Lourdes with her shrinking yet ardent air and flaming eyes, which she so prudently shrouded with a veil of lifeless indifference. "For my part," he answered, "I am accompanying a friend of my childhood, a poor girl who is very ill indeed. I must ask your help for her; you shall nurse her." Thereupon she faintly blushed, and he no longer doubted the truth of his surmise. However, Raymonde was just then settling the bill with the easy assurance of a girl who is expert in figures; and immediately afterwards Madame Desagneaux led Madame Volmar away. The waiters were now growing more distracted and the tables were fast being vacated; for, on hearing a bell ring, everybody had begun to rush towards the door. Pierre, on his side, was hastening back to his carriage, when he was stopped by an old priest. "Ah! Monsieur le Cure," he said, "I saw you just before we started, but I was unable to get near enough to shake hands with you." Thereupon he offered his hand to his brother ecclesiastic, who was looking and smiling at him in a kindly way. The Abbe Judaine was the parish priest of Saligny, a little village in the department of the Oise. Tall and sturdy, he had a broad pink face, around which clustered a mass of white, curly hair, and it could be divined by his appearance that he was a worthy man whom neither the flesh nor the spirit had ever tormented. He believed indeed firmly and absolutely, with a tranquil godliness, never having known a struggle, endowed as he was with the ready faith of a child who is unacquainted with human passions. And ever since the Virgin at Lourdes had cured him of a disease of the eyes, by a famous miracle which folks still talked about, his belief had become yet more absolute and tender, as though impregnated with divine gratitude. "I am pleased that you are with us, my friend," he gently said; "for there is much in these pilgrimages for young priests to profit by. I am told that some of them at times experience a feeling of rebellion. Well, you will see all these poor people praying,--it is a sight which will make you weep. How can one do otherwise than place oneself in God's hands, on seeing so much suffering cured or consoled?" The old priest himself was accompanying a patient; and he pointed to a first-class compartment, at the door of which hung a placard bearing the inscription: "M. l'Abbe Judaine, Reserved." Then lowering his voice, he said: "It is Madame Dieulafay, you know, the great banker's wife. Their chateau, a royal domain, is in my parish, and when they learned that the Blessed Virgin had vouchsafed me such an undeserved favour, they begged me to intercede for their poor sufferer. I have already said several masses, and most sincerely pray for her. There, you see her yonder on the ground. She insisted on being taken out of the carriage, in spite of all the trouble which one will have to place her in it again." On a shady part of the platform, in a kind of long box, there was, as the old priest said, a woman whose beautiful, perfectly oval face, lighted up by splendid eyes, denoted no greater age than six-and-twenty. She was suffering from a frightful disease. The disappearance from her system of the calcareous salts had led to a softening of the osseous framework, the slow destruction of her bones. Three years previously, after the advent of a stillborn child, she had felt vague pains in the spinal column. And then, little by little, her bones had rarefied and lost shape, the vertebrae had sunk, the bones of the pelvis had flattened, and those of the arms and legs had contracted. Thus shrunken, melting away as it were, she had become a mere human remnant, a nameless, fluid thing, which could not be set erect, but had to be carried hither and thither with infinite care, for fear lest she should vanish between one's fingers. Her face, a motionless face, on which sat a stupefied imbecile expression, still retained its beauty of outline, and yet it was impossible to gaze at this wretched shred of a woman without feeling a heart-pang, the keener on account of all the luxury surrounding her; for not only was the box in which she lay lined with blue quilted silk, but she was covered with valuable lace, and a cap of rare valenciennes was set upon her head, her wealth thus being proclaimed, displayed, in the midst of her awful agony. "Ah! how pitiable it is," resumed the Abbe Judaine in an undertone. "To think that she is so young, so pretty, possessed of millions of money! And if you knew how dearly loved she was, with what adoration she is still surrounded. That tall gentleman near her is her husband, that elegantly dressed lady is her sister, Madame Jousseur." Pierre remembered having often noticed in the newspapers the name of Madame Jousseur, wife of a diplomatist, and a conspicuous member of the higher spheres of Catholic society in Paris. People had even circulated a story of some great passion which she had fought against and vanquished. She also was very prettily dressed, with marvellously tasteful simplicity, and she ministered to the wants of her sorry sister with an air of perfect devotion. As for the unhappy woman's husband, who at the age of five-and-thirty had inherited his father's colossal business, he was a clear-complexioned, well-groomed, handsome man, clad in a closely buttoned frock-coat. His eyes, however, were full of tears, for he adored his wife, and had left his business in order to take her to Lourdes, placing his last hope in this appeal to the mercy of Heaven. Ever since the morning, Pierre had beheld many frightful sufferings in that woeful white train. But none had so distressed his soul as did that wretched female skeleton, slowly liquefying in the midst of its lace and its millions. "The unhappy woman!" he murmured with a shudder. The Abbe Judaine, however, made a gesture of serene hope. "The Blessed Virgin will cure her," said he; "I have prayed to her so much." Just then a bell again pealed, and this time it was really the signal for starting. Only two minutes remained. There was a last rush, and folks hurried back towards the train carrying eatables wrapped in paper, and bottles and cans which they had filled with water. Several of them quite lost their heads, and in their inability to find their carriages, ran distractedly from one to the other end of the train; whilst some of the infirm ones dragged themselves about amidst the precipitate tapping of crutches, and others, only able to walk with difficulty, strove to hasten their steps whilst leaning on the arms of some of the lady-hospitallers. It was only with infinite difficulty that four men managed to replace Madame Dieulafay in her first-class compartment. The Vignerons, who were content with second-class accommodation, had already reinstalled themselves in their quarters amidst an extraordinary heap of baskets, boxes, and valises which scarcely allowed little Gustave enough room to stretch his poor puny limbs--the limbs as it were of a deformed insect. And then all the women appeared again: Madame Maze gliding along in silence; Madame Vincent raising her dear little girl in her outstretched arms and dreading lest she should hear her cry out; Madame Vetu, whom it had been necessary to push into the train, after rousing her from her stupefying torment; and Elise Rouquet, who was quite drenched through her obstinacy in endeavouring to drink from the tap, and was still wiping her monstrous face. Whilst each returned to her place and the carriage filled once more, Marie listened to her father, who had come back delighted with his stroll to a pointsman's little house beyond the station, whence a really pleasant stretch of landscape could be discerned. "Shall we lay you down again at once?" asked Pierre, sorely distressed by the pained expression on Marie's face. "Oh no, no, by-and-by!" she replied. "I shall have plenty of time to hear those wheels roaring in my head as though they were grinding my bones." Then, as Ferrand seemed on the point of returning to the cantine van, Sister Hyacinthe begged him to take another look at the strange man before he went off. She was still waiting for Father Massias, astonished at the inexplicable delay in his arrival, but not yet without hope, as Sister Claire des Anges had not returned. "Pray, Monsieur Ferrand," said she, "tell me if this unfortunate man is in any immediate danger." The young doctor again looked at the sufferer, felt him, and listened to his breathing. Then with a gesture of discouragement he answered in a low voice, "I feel convinced that you will not get him to Lourdes alive." Every head was still anxiously stretched forward. If they had only known the man's name, the place he had come from, who he was! But it was impossible to extract a word from this unhappy stranger, who was about to die there, in that carriage, without anybody being able to give his face a name! It suddenly occurred to Sister Hyacinthe to have him searched. Under the circumstances there could certainly be no harm in such a course. "Feel in his pockets, Monsieur Ferrand," she said. The doctor thereupon searched the man in a gentle, cautious way, but the only things that he found in his pockets were a chaplet, a knife, and three sous. And nothing more was ever learnt of the man. At that moment, however, a voice announced that Sister Claire des Anges was at last coming back with Father Massias. All this while the latter had simply been chatting with the priest of Sainte-Radegonde in one of the waiting-rooms. Keen emotion attended his arrival; for a moment all seemed saved. But the train was about to start, the porters were already closing the carriage doors, and it was necessary that extreme unction should be administered in all haste in order to avoid too long a delay. "This way, reverend Father!" exclaimed Sister Hyacinthe; "yes, yes, pray come in; our unfortunate patient is here." Father Massias, who was five years older than Pierre, whose fellow-student however he had been at the seminary, had a tall, spare figure with an ascetic countenance, framed round with a light-coloured beard and vividly lighted up by burning eyes, He was neither the priest harassed by doubt, nor the priest with childlike faith, but an apostle carried away by his passion, ever ready to fight and vanquish for the pure glory of the Blessed Virgin. In his black cloak with its large hood, and his broad-brimmed flossy hat, he shone resplendently with the perpetual ardour of battle. He immediately took from his pocket the silver case containing the Holy Oils, and the ceremony began whilst the last carriage doors were being slammed and belated pilgrims were rushing back to the train; the station-master, meantime, anxiously glancing at the clock, and realising that it would be necessary for him to grant a few minutes' grace. " /Credo in unum Deum/," hastily murmured the Father. " /Amen/," replied Sister Hyacinthe and the other occupants of the carriage. Those who had been able to do so, had knelt upon the seats, whilst the others joined their hands, or repeatedly made the sign of the cross; and when the murmured prayers were followed by the Litanies of the ritual, every voice rose, an ardent desire for the remission of the man's sins and for his physical and spiritual cure winging its flight heavenward with each successive /Kyrie eleison/. Might his whole life, of which they knew nought, be forgiven him; might he enter, stranger though he was, in triumph into the Kingdom of God! " /Christe, exaudi nos/." " /Ora pro nobis, sancta Dei Genitrix/." Father Massias had pulled out the silver needle from which hung a drop of Holy Oil. In the midst of such a scramble, with the whole train waiting--many people now thrusting their heads out of the carriage windows in surprise at the delay in starting--he could not think of following the usual practice, of anointing in turn all the organs of the senses, those portals of the soul which give admittance to evil. He must content himself, as the rules authorised him to do in pressing cases, with one anointment; and this he made upon the man's lips, those livid parted lips from between which only a faint breath escaped, whilst the rest of his face, with its lowered eyelids, already seemed indistinct, again merged into the dust of the earth. " /Per istam sanctam unctionem/," said the Father, "/et suam piissimam misericordiam indulgeat tibi Dominus quidquid per visum, auditum, odoratum, gustum, tactum, deliquisti." * * Through this holy unction and His most tender mercy may the Lord pardon thee whatever sins thou hast committed by thy sight, hearing, etc. The remainder of the ceremony was lost amid the hurry and scramble of the departure. Father Massias scarcely had time to wipe off the oil with the little piece of cotton-wool which Sister Hyacinthe held in readiness, before he had to leave the compartment and get into his own as fast as possible, setting the case containing the Holy Oils in order as he did so, whilst the pilgrims finished repeating the final prayer. "We cannot wait any longer! It is impossible!" repeated the station-master as he bustled about. "Come, come, make haste everybody!" At last then they were about to resume their journey. Everybody sat down, returned to his or her corner again. Madame de Jonquiere, however, had changed her place, in order to be nearer La Grivotte, whose condition still worried her, and she was now seated in front of M. Sabathier, who remained waiting with silent resignation. Moreover, Sister Hyacinthe had not returned to her compartment, having decided to remain near the unknown man so that she might watch over him and help him. By following this course, too, she was able to minister to Brother Isidore, whose sufferings his sister Marthe was at a loss to assuage. And Marie, turning pale, felt the jolting of the train in her ailing flesh, even before it had resumed its journey under the heavy sun, rolling onward once more with its load of sufferers stifling in the pestilential atmosphere of the over-heated carriages. At last a loud whistle resounded, the engine puffed, and Sister Hyacinthe rose up to say: The /Magnificat/, my children!

4

MIRACLES

JUST as the train was beginning to move, the door of the compartment in which Pierre and Marie found themselves was opened and a porter pushed a girl of fourteen inside, saying: "There's a seat here--make haste!" The others were already pulling long faces and were about to protest, when Sister Hyacinthe exclaimed: "What, is it you, Sophie? So you are going back to see the Blessed Virgin who cured you last year!" And at the same time Madame de Jonquiere remarked: "Ah! Sophie, my little friend, I am very pleased to see that you are grateful." "Why, yes, Sister; why, yes, madame," answered the girl, in a pretty way. The carriage door had already been closed again, so that it was necessary that they should accept the presence of this new pilgrim who had fallen from heaven as it were at the very moment when the train, which she had almost missed, was starting off again. She was a slender damsel and would not take up much room. Moreover these ladies knew her, and all the patients had turned their eyes upon her on hearing that the Blessed Virgin had been pleased to cure her. They had now got beyond the station, the engine was still puffing, whilst the wheels increased their speed, and Sister Hyacinthe, clapping her hands, repeated: "Come, come, my children, the /Magnificat/." Whilst the joyful chant arose amidst the jolting of the train, Pierre gazed at Sophie. She was evidently a young peasant girl, the daughter of some poor husbandman of the vicinity of Poitiers, petted by her parents, treated in fact like a young lady since she had become the subject of a miracle, one of the elect, whom the priests of the district flocked to see. She wore a straw hat with pink ribbons, and a grey woollen dress trimmed with a flounce. Her round face although not pretty was a very pleasant one, with a beautifully fresh complexion and clear, intelligent eyes which lent her a smiling, modest air. When the /Magnificat/ had been sung, Pierre was unable to resist his desire to question Sophie. A child of her age, with so candid an air, so utterly unlike a liar, greatly interested him. "And so you nearly missed the train, my child?" he said. "I should have been much ashamed if I had, Monsieur l'Abbe," she replied. "I had been at the station since twelve o'clock. And all at once I saw his reverence, the priest of Sainte-Radegonde, who knows me well and who called me to him, to kiss me and tell me that it was very good of me to go back to Lourdes. But it seems the train was starting and I only just had time to run on to the platform. Oh! I ran so fast!" She paused, laughing, still slightly out of breath, but already repenting that she had been so giddy. "And what is your name, my child?" asked Pierre. "Sophie Couteau, Monsieur l'Abbe." "You do not belong to the town of Poitiers?" "Oh no! certainly not. We belong to Vivonne, which is seven kilometres away. My father and mother have a little land there, and things would not be so bad if there were not eight children at home--I am the fifth,--fortunately the four older ones are beginning to work." "And you, my child, what do you do?" "I, Monsieur l'Abbe! Oh! I am no great help. Since last year, when I came home cured, I have not been left quiet a single day, for, as you can understand, so many people have come to see me, and then too I have been taken to Monseigneur's,* and to the convents and all manner of other places. And before all that I was a long time ill. I could not walk without a stick, and each step I took made me cry out, so dreadfully did my foot hurt me." * The Bishop's residence. "So it was of some injury to the foot that the Blessed Virgin cured you?" Sophie did not have time to reply, for Sister Hyacinthe, who was listening, intervened: "Of caries of the bones of the left heel, which had been going on for three years," said she. "The foot was swollen and quite deformed, and there were fistulas giving egress to continual suppuration." On hearing this, all the sufferers in the carriage became intensely interested. They no longer took their eyes off this little girl on whom a miracle had been performed, but scanned her from head to foot as though seeking for some sign of the prodigy. Those who were able to stand rose up in order that they might the better see her, and the others, the infirm ones, stretched on their mattresses, strove to raise themselves and turn their heads. Amidst the suffering which had again come upon them on leaving Poitiers, the terror which filled them at the thought that they must continue rolling onward for another fifteen hours, the sudden advent of this child, favoured by Heaven, was like a divine relief, a ray of hope whence they would derive sufficient strength to accomplish the remainder of their terrible journey. The moaning had abated somewhat already, and every face was turned towards the girl with an ardent desire to believe. This was especially the case with Marie, who, already reviving, joined her trembling hands, and in a gentle supplicating voice said to Pierre, "Question her, pray question her, ask her to tell us everything--cured, O God! cured of such a terrible complaint!" Madame de Jonquiere, who was quite affected, had leant over the partition to kiss the girl. "Certainly," said she, "our little friend will tell you all about it. Won't you, my darling? You will tell us what the Blessed Virgin did for you?" "Oh, certainly! madame-as much as you like," answered Sophie with her smiling, modest air, her eyes gleaming with intelligence. Indeed, she wished to begin at once, and raised her right hand with a pretty gesture, as a sign to everybody to be attentive. Plainly enough, she had already acquired the habit of speaking in public. She could not be seen, however, from some parts of the carriage, and an idea came to Sister Hyacinthe, who said: "Get up on the seat, Sophie, and speak loudly, on account of the noise which the train makes." This amused the girl, and before beginning she needed time to become serious again. "Well, it was like this," said she; "my foot was past cure, I couldn't even go to church any more, and it had to be kept bandaged, because there was always a lot of nasty matter coming from it. Monsieur Rivoire, the doctor, who had made a cut in it, so as to see inside it, said that he should be obliged to take out a piece of the bone; and that, sure enough, would have made me lame for life. But when I got to Lourdes and had prayed a great deal to the Blessed Virgin, I went to dip my foot in the water, wishing so much that I might be cured that I did not even take the time to pull the bandage off. And everything remained in the water, there was no longer anything the matter with my foot when I took it out." A murmur of mingled surprise, wonder, and desire arose and spread among those who heard this marvellous tale, so sweet and soothing to all who were in despair. But the little one had not yet finished. She had simply paused. And now, making a fresh gesture, holding her arms somewhat apart, she concluded: "When I got back to Vivonne and Monsieur Rivoire saw my foot again, he said: 'Whether it be God or the Devil who has cured this child, it is all the same to me; but in all truth she /is/ cured.'" This time a burst of laughter rang out. The girl spoke in too recitative a way, having repeated her story so many times already that she knew it by heart. The doctor's remark was sure to produce an effect, and she herself laughed at it in advance, certain as she was that the others would laugh also. However, she still retained her candid, touching air. But she had evidently forgotten some particular, for Sister Hyacinthe, a glance from whom had foreshadowed the doctor's jest, now softly prompted her "And what was it you said to Madame la Comtesse, the superintendent of your ward, Sophie?" "Ah! yes. I hadn't brought many bandages for my foot with me, and I said to her, 'It was very kind of the Blessed Virgin to cure me the first day, as I should have run out of linen on the morrow.'" This provoked a fresh outburst of delight. They all thought her so nice, to have been cured like that! And in reply to a question from Madame de Jonquiere, she also had to tell the story of her boots, a pair of beautiful new boots which Madame la Comtesse had given her, and in which she had run, jumped, and danced about, full of childish delight. Boots! think of it, she who for three years had not even been able to wear a slipper. Pierre, who had become grave, waxing pale with the secret uneasiness which was penetrating him, continued to look at her. And he also asked her other questions. She was certainly not lying, and he merely suspected a slow distortion of the actual truth, an easily explained embellishment of the real facts amidst all the joy she felt at being cured and becoming an important little personage. Who now knew if the cicatrisation of her injuries, effected, so it was asserted, completely, instantaneously, in a few seconds, had not in reality been the work of days? Where were the witnesses? Just then Madame de Jonquiere began to relate that she had been at the hospital at the time referred to. "Sophie was not in my ward," said she, "but I had met her walking lame that very morning--" Pierre hastily interrupted the lady-hospitaller. "Ah! you saw her foot before and after the immersion?" "No, no! I don't think that anybody was able to see it, for it was bound round with bandages. She told you that the bandages had fallen into the piscina." And, turning towards the child, Madame de Jonquiere added, "But she will show you her foot--won't you, Sophie? Undo your shoe." The girl took off her shoe, and pulled down her stocking, with a promptness and ease of manner which showed how thoroughly accustomed she had become to it all. And she not only stretched out her foot, which was very clean and very white, carefully tended indeed, with well-cut, pink nails, but complacently turned it so that the young priest might examine it at his ease. Just below the ankle there was a long scar, whose whity seam, plainly defined, testified to the gravity of the complaint from which the girl had suffered. "Oh! take hold of the heel, Monsieur l'Abbe," said she. "Press it as hard as you like. I no longer feel any pain at all." Pierre made a gesture from which it might have been thought that he was delighted with the power exercised by the Blessed Virgin. But he was still tortured by doubt. What unknown force had acted in this case? Or rather what faulty medical diagnosis, what assemblage of errors and exaggerations, had ended in this fine tale? All the patients, however, wished to see the miraculous foot, that outward and visible sign of the divine cure which each of them was going in search of. And it was Marie, sitting up in her box, and already feeling less pain, who touched it first. Then Madame Maze, quite roused from her melancholy, passed it on to Madame Vincent, who would have kissed it for the hope which it restored to her. M. Sabathier had listened to all the explanations with a beatific air; Madame Vetu, La Grivotte, and even Brother Isidore opened their eyes, and evinced signs of interest; whilst the face of Elise Rouquet had assumed an extraordinary expression, transfigured by faith, almost beatified. If a sore had thus disappeared, might not her own sore close and disappear, her face retaining no trace of it save a slight scar, and again becoming such a face as other people had? Sophie, who was still standing, had to hold on to one of the iron rails, and place her foot on the partition, now on the right, now on the left. And she did not weary of it all, but felt exceedingly happy and proud at the many exclamations which were raised, the quivering admiration and religious respect which were bestowed on that little piece of her person, that little foot which had now, so to say, become sacred. "One must possess great faith, no doubt," said Marie, thinking aloud. "One must have a pure unspotted soul." And, addressing herself to M. de Guersaint, she added: "Father, I feel that I should get well if I were ten years old, if I had the unspotted soul of a little girl." "But you are ten years old, my darling! Is it not so, Pierre? A little girl of ten years old could not have a more spotless soul." Possessed of a mind prone to chimeras, M. de Guersaint was fond of hearing tales of miracles. As for the young priest, profoundly affected by the ardent purity which the young girl evinced, he no longer sought to discuss the question, but let her surrender herself to the consoling illusions which Sophie's tale had wafted through the carriage. The temperature had become yet more oppressive since their departure from Poitiers, a storm was rising in the coppery sky, and it seemed as though the train were rushing through a furnace. The villages passed, mournful and solitary under the burning sun. At Couhe-Verac they had again said their chaplets, and sung another canticle. At present, however, there was some slight abatement of the religious exercises. Sister Hyacinthe, who had not yet been able to lunch, ventured to eat a roll and some fruit in all haste, whilst still ministering to the strange man whose faint, painful breathing seemed to have become more regular. And it was only on passing Ruffec at three o'clock that they said the vespers of the Blessed Virgin. " /Ora pro nobis, sancta Dei Genitrix/." " /Ut digni efficiamur promissionibus Christi/." * * "Pray for us, O holy Mother of God, That we may be made worthy of the promises of Christ." As they were finishing, M. Sabathier, who had watched little Sophie while she put on her shoe and stocking, turned towards M. de Guersaint. "This child's case is interesting, no doubt," he remarked. "But it is a mere nothing, monsieur, for there have been far more marvellous cures than that. Do you know the story of Pierre de Rudder, a Belgian working-man?" Everybody had again begun to listen. "This man," continued M. Sabathier, "had his leg broken by the fall of a tree. Eight years afterwards the two fragments of the bone had not yet joined together again--the two ends could be seen in the depths of a sore which was continually suppurating; and the leg hung down quite limp, swaying in all directions. Well, it was sufficient for this man to drink a glassful of the miraculous water, and his leg was made whole again. He was able to walk without crutches, and the doctor said to him: 'Your leg is like that of a new-born child.' Yes, indeed, a perfectly new leg." Nobody spoke, but the listeners exchanged glances of ecstasy. "And, by the way," resumed M. Sabathier, "it is like the story of Louis Bouriette, a quarryman, one of the first of the Lourdes miracles. Do you know it? Bouriette had been injured by an explosion during some blasting operations. The sight of his right eye was altogether destroyed, and he was even threatened with the loss of the left one. Well, one day he sent his daughter to fetch a bottleful of the muddy water of the source, which then scarcely bubbled up to the surface. He washed his eye with this muddy liquid, and prayed fervently. And, all at once, he raised a cry, for he could see, monsieur, see as well as you and I. The doctor who was attending him drew up a detailed narrative of the case, and there cannot be the slightest doubt about its truth." "It is marvellous," murmured M. de Guersaint in his delight. "Would you like another example, monsieur? I can give you a famous one, that of Francois Macary, the carpenter of Lavaur. During eighteen years he had suffered from a deep varicose ulcer, with considerable enlargement of the tissues in the mesial part of the left leg. He had reached such a point that he could no longer move, and science decreed that he would forever remain infirm. Well, one evening he shuts himself up with a bottle of Lourdes water. He takes off his bandages, washes both his legs, and drinks what little water then remains in the bottle. Then he goes to bed and falls asleep; and when he awakes, he feels his legs and looks at them. There is nothing left; the varicose enlargement, the ulcers, have all disappeared. The skin of his knee, monsieur, had become as smooth, as fresh as it had been when he was twenty." This time there was an explosion of surprise and admiration. The patients and the pilgrims were entering into the enchanted land of miracles, where impossibilities are accomplished at each bend of the pathways, where one marches on at ease from prodigy to prodigy. And each had his or her story to tell, burning with a desire to contribute a fresh proof, to fortify faith and hope by yet another example. That silent creature, Madame Maze, was so transported that she spoke the first. "I have a friend," said she, "who knew the Widow Rizan, that lady whose cure also created so great a stir. For four-and-twenty years her left side had been entirely paralysed. Her stomach was unable to retain any solid food, and she had become an inert bag of bones which had to be turned over in bed, The friction of the sheets, too, had ended by rubbing her skin away in parts. Well, she was so low one evening that the doctor announced that she would die during the night. An hour later, however, she emerged from her torpor and asked her daughter in a faint voice to go and fetch her a glass of Lourdes water from a neighbour's. But she was only able to obtain this glass of water on the following morning; and she cried out to her daughter: 'Oh! it is life that I am drinking--rub my face with it, rub my arm and my leg, rub my whole body with it!' And when her daughter obeyed her, she gradually saw the huge swelling subside, and the paralysed, tumefied limbs recover their natural suppleness and appearance. Nor was that all, for Madame Rizan cried out that she was cured and felt hungry, and wanted bread and meat--she who had eaten none for four-and-twenty years! And she got out of bed and dressed herself, whilst her daughter, who was so overpowered that the neighbours thought she had become an orphan, replied to them: 'No, no, mamma isn't dead, she has come to life again!'" This narrative had brought tears to Madame Vincent's eyes. Ah! if she had only been able to see her little Rose recover like that, eat with a good appetite, and run about again! At the same time, another case, which she had been told of in Paris and which had greatly influenced her in deciding to take her ailing child to Lourdes, returned to her memory. "And I, too," said she, "know the story of a girl who was paralysed. Her name was Lucie Druon, and she was an inmate of an orphan asylum. She was quite young and could not even kneel down. Her limbs were bent like hoops. Her right leg, the shorter of the two, had ended by becoming twisted round the left one; and when any of the other girls carried her about you saw her feet hanging down quite limp, like dead ones. Please notice that she did not even go to Lourdes. She simply performed a novena; but she fasted during the nine days, and her desire to be cured was so great that she spent her nights in prayer. At last, on the ninth day, whilst she was drinking a little Lourdes water, she felt a violent commotion in her legs. She picked herself up, fell down, picked herself up again and walked. All her little companions, who were astonished, almost frightened at the sight, began to cry out 'Lucie can walk! Lucie can walk!' It was quite true. In a few seconds her legs had become straight and strong and healthy. She crossed the courtyard and was able to climb up the steps of the chapel, where the whole sisterhood, transported with gratitude, chanted the /Magnificat/. Ah! the dear child, how happy, how happy she must have been!" As Madame Vincent finished, two tears fell from her cheeks on to the pale face of her little girl, whom she kissed distractedly. The general interest was still increasing, becoming quite impassioned. The rapturous joy born of these beautiful stories, in which Heaven invariably triumphed over human reality, transported these childlike souls to such a point that those who were suffering the most grievously sat up in their turn, and recovered the power of speech. And with the narratives of one and all was blended a thought of the sufferer's own ailment, a belief that he or she would also be cured, since a malady of the same description had vanished like an evil dream beneath the breath of the Divinity. "Ah!" stammered Madame Vetu, her articulation hindered by her sufferings, "there was another one, Antoinette Thardivail, whose stomach was being eaten away like mine. You would have said that dogs were devouring it, and sometimes there was a swelling in it as big as a child's head. Tumours indeed were ever forming in it, like fowl's eggs, so that for eight months she brought up blood. And she also was at the point of death, with nothing but her skin left on her bones, and dying of hunger, when she drank some water of Lourdes and had the pit of her stomach washed with it. Three minutes afterwards, her doctor, who on the previous day had left her almost in the last throes, scarce breathing, found her up and sitting by the fireside, eating a tender chicken's wing with a good appetite. She had no more tumours, she laughed as she had laughed when she was twenty, and her face had regained the brilliancy of youth. Ah! to be able to eat what one likes, to become young again, to cease suffering!" "And the cure of Sister Julienne!" then exclaimed La Grivotte, raising herself on one of her elbows, her eyes glittering with fever. "In her case it commenced with a bad cold as it did with me, and then she began to spit blood. And every six months she fell ill again and had to take to her bed. The last time everybody said that she wouldn't leave it alive. The doctors had vainly tried every remedy, iodine, blistering, and cauterising. In fact, hers was a real case of phthisis, certified by half a dozen medical men. Well, she comes to Lourdes, and Heaven alone knows amidst what awful suffering--she was so bad, indeed, that at Toulouse they thought for a moment that she was about to die! The Sisters had to carry her in their arms, and on reaching the piscina the lady-hospitallers wouldn't bathe her. She was dead, they said. No matter! she was undressed at last, and plunged into the water, quite unconscious and covered with perspiration. And when they took her out she was so pale that they laid her on the ground, thinking that it was certainly all over with her at last. But, all at once, colour came back to her cheeks, her eyes opened, and she drew a long breath. She was cured; she dressed herself without any help and made a good meal after she had been to the Grotto to thank the Blessed Virgin. There! there's no gainsaying it, that was a real case of phthisis, completely cured as though by medicine!" Thereupon Brother Isidore in his turn wished to speak; but he was unable to do so at any length, and could only with difficulty manage to say to his sister: "Marthe, tell them the story of Sister Dorothee which the priest of Saint-Sauveur related to us." "Sister Dorothee," began the peasant girl in an awkward way, "felt her leg quite numbed when she got up one morning, and from that time she lost the use of it, for it got as cold and as heavy as a stone. Besides which she felt a great pain in the back. The doctors couldn't understand it. She saw half a dozen of them, who pricked her with pins and burnt her skin with a lot of drugs. But it was just as if they had sung to her. Sister Dorothee had well understood that only the Blessed Virgin could find the right remedy for her, and so she went off to Lourdes, and had herself dipped in the piscina. She thought at first that the water was going to kill her, for it was so bitterly cold. But by-and-by it became so soft that she fancied it was warm, as nice as milk. She had never felt so nice before, it seemed to her as if her veins were opening and the water were flowing into them. As you will understand, life was returning into her body since the Blessed Virgin was concerning herself in the case. She no longer had anything the matter with her when she came out, but walked about, ate the whole of a pigeon for her dinner, and slept all night long like the happy woman she was. Glory to the Blessed Virgin, eternal gratitude to the most Powerful Mother and her Divine Son!" Elise Rouquet would also have liked to bring forward a miracle which she was acquainted with. Only she spoke with so much difficulty owing to the deformity of her mouth, that she had not yet been able to secure a turn. Just then, however, there was a pause, and drawing the wrap, which concealed the horror of her sore, slightly on one side, she profited by the opportunity to begin. "For my part, I wasn't told anything about a great illness, but it was a very funny case at all events," she said. "It was about a woman, Celestine Dubois, as she was called, who had run a needle right into her hand while she was washing. It stopped there for seven years, for no doctor was able to take it out. Her hand shrivelled up, and she could no longer open it. Well, she got to Lourdes, and dipped her hand into the piscina. But as soon as she did so she began to shriek, and took it out again. Then they caught hold of her and put her hand into the water by force, and kept it there while she continued sobbing, with her face covered with sweat. Three times did they plunge her hand into the piscina, and each time they saw the needle moving along, till it came out by the tip of the thumb. She shrieked, of course, because the needle was moving though her flesh just as though somebody had been pushing it to drive it out. And after that Celestine never suffered again, and only a little scar could be seen on her hand as a mark of what the Blessed Virgin had done." This anecdote produced a greater effect than even the miraculous cures of the most fearful illnesses. A needle which moved as though somebody were pushing it! This peopled the Invisible, showed each sufferer his Guardian Angel standing behind him, only awaiting the orders of Heaven in order to render him assistance. And besides, how pretty and childlike the story was--this needle which came out in the miraculous water after obstinately refusing to stir during seven long years. Exclamations of delight resounded from all the pleased listeners; they smiled and laughed with satisfaction, radiant at finding that nothing was beyond the power of Heaven, and that if it were Heaven's pleasure they themselves would all become healthy, young, and superb. It was sufficient that one should fervently believe and pray in order that nature might be confounded and that the Incredible might come to pass. Apart from that there was merely a question of good luck, since Heaven seemed to make a selection of those sufferers who should be cured. "Oh! how beautiful it is, father," murmured Marie, who, revived by the passionate interest which she took in the momentous subject, had so far contented herself with listening, dumb with amazement as it were. "Do you remember," she continued, "what you yourself told me of that poor woman, Joachine Dehaut, who came from Belgium and made her way right across France with her twisted leg eaten away by an ulcer, the awful smell of which drove everybody away from her? First of all the ulcer was healed; you could press her knee and she felt nothing, only a slight redness remained to mark where it had been. And then came the turn of the dislocation. She shrieked while she was in the water, it seemed to her as if somebody were breaking her bones, pulling her leg away from her; and, at the same time, she and the woman who was bathing her, saw her deformed foot rise and extend into its natural shape with the regular movement of a clock hand. Her leg also straightened itself, the muscles extended, the knee replaced itself in its proper position, all amidst such acute pain that Joachine ended by fainting. But as soon as she recovered consciousness, she darted off, erect and agile, to carry her crutches to the Grotto." M. de Guersaint in his turn was laughing with wonderment, waving his hand to confirm this story, which had been told him by a Father of the Assumption. He could have related a score of similar instances, said he, each more touching, more extraordinary than the other. He even invoked Pierre's testimony, and the young priest, who was unable to believe, contented himself with nodding his head. At first, unwilling as he was to afflict Marie, he had striven to divert his thoughts by gazing though the carriage window at the fields, trees, and houses which defiled before his eyes. They had just passed Angouleme, and meadows stretched out, and lines of poplar trees fled away amidst the continuous fanning of the air, which the velocity of the train occasioned. They were late, no doubt, for they were hastening onward at full speed, thundering along under the stormy sky, through the fiery atmosphere, devouring kilometre after kilometre in swift succession. However, despite himself, Pierre heard snatches of the various narratives, and grew interested in these extravagant stories, which the rough jolting of the wheels accompanied like a lullaby, as though the engine had been turned loose and were wildly bearing them away to the divine land of dreams, They were rolling, still rolling along, and Pierre at last ceased to gaze at the landscape, and surrendered himself to the heavy, sleep-inviting atmosphere of the carriage, where ecstasy was growing and spreading, carrying everyone far from the world of reality across which they were so rapidly rushing, The sight of Marie's face with its brightened look filled the young priest with sincere joy, and he let her retain his hand, which she had taken in order to acquaint him, by the pressure of her fingers, with all the confidence which was reviving in her soul. And why should he have saddened her by his doubts, since he was so desirous of her cure? So he continued clasping her small, moist hand, feeling infinite affection for her, a dolorous brotherly love which distracted him, and made him anxious to believe in the pity of the spheres, in a superior kindness which tempered suffering to those who were plunged in despair, "Oh!" she repeated, "how beautiful it is, Pierre! How beautiful it is! And what glory it will be if the Blessed Virgin deigns to disturb herself for me! Do you really think me worthy of such a favour?" "Assuredly I do," he exclaimed; "you are the best and the purest, with a spotless soul as your father said; there are not enough good angels in Paradise to form your escort." But the narratives were not yet finished. Sister Hyacinthe and Madame de Jonquiere were now enumerating all the miracles with which they were acquainted, the long, long series of miracles which for more than thirty years had been flowering at Lourdes, like the uninterrupted budding of the roses on the Mystical Rose-tree. They could be counted by thousands, they put forth fresh shoots every year with prodigious verdancy of sap, becoming brighter and brighter each successive season. And the sufferers who listened to these marvellous stories with increasing feverishness were like little children who, after hearing one fine fairy tale, ask for another, and another, and yet another. Oh! that they might have more and more of those stories in which evil reality was flouted, in which unjust nature was cuffed and slapped, in which the Divinity intervened as the supreme healer, He who laughs at science and distributes happiness according to His own good pleasure. First of all there were the deaf and the dumb who suddenly heard and spoke; such as Aurelie Bruneau, who was incurably deaf, with the drums of both ears broken, and yet was suddenly enraptured by the celestial music of a harmonium; such also as Louise Pourchet, who on her side had been dumb for five-and-twenty years, and yet, whilst praying in the Grotto, suddenly exclaimed, "Hail, Mary, full of grace!" And there were others and yet others who were completely cured by merely letting a few drops of water fall into their ears or upon their tongues. Then came the procession of the blind: Father Hermann, who felt the Blessed Virgin's gentle hand removing the veil which covered his eyes; Mademoiselle de Pontbriant, who was threatened with a total loss of sight, but after a simple prayer was enabled to see better than she had ever seen before; then a child twelve years old whose corneas resembled marbles, but who, in three seconds, became possessed of clear, deep eyes, bright with an angelic smile. However, there was especially an abundance of paralytics, of lame people suddenly enabled to walk upright, of sufferers for long years powerless to stir from their beds of misery and to whom the voice said: "Arise and walk!" Delannoy,* afflicted with ataxia, vainly cauterised and burnt, fifteen times an inmate of the Paris hospitals, whence he had emerged with the concurring diagnosis of twelve doctors, feels a strange force raising him up as the Blessed Sacrament goes by, and he begins to follow it, his legs strong and healthy once more. Marie Louise Delpon, a girl of fourteen, suffering from paralysis which had stiffened her legs, drawn back her hands, and twisted her mouth on one side, sees her limbs loosen and the distortion of her mouth disappear as though an invisible hand were severing the fearful bonds which had deformed her. Marie Vachier, riveted to her arm-chair during seventeen years by paraplegia, not only runs and flies on emerging from the piscina, but finds no trace even of the sores with which her long-enforced immobility had covered her body. And Georges Hanquet, attacked by softening of the spinal marrow, passes without transition from agony to perfect health; while Leonie Charton, likewise afflicted with softening of the medulla, and whose vertebrae bulge out to a considerable extent, feels her hump melting away as though by enchantment, and her legs rise and straighten, renovated and vigorous. * This was one of the most notorious of the recorded cases and had a very strange sequel subsequent to the first publication of this work. Pierre Delannoy had been employed as a ward-assistant in one of the large Paris hospitals from 1877 to 1881, when he came to the conclusion that the life of an in-patient was far preferable to the one he was leading. He, therefore, resolved to pass the rest of his days inside different hospitals in the capacity of invalid. He started by feigning locomotor ataxia, and for six years deceived the highest medical experts in Paris, so curiously did he appear to suffer. He stayed in turn in all the hospitals in the city, being treated with every care and consideration, until at last he met with a doctor who insisted on cauterisation and other disagreeable remedies. Delannoy thereupon opined that the time to be cured had arrived, and cured he became, and was discharged. He next appeared at Lourdes, supported by crutches, and presenting every symptom of being hopelessly crippled. With other infirm and decrepid people he was dipped in the piscina and so efficacious did this treatment prove that he came out another man, threw his crutches to the ground and walked, as an onlooker expressed it, "like a rural postman." All Lourdes rang with the fame of the miracle, and the Church, after starring Delannoy round the country as a specimen of what could be done at the holy spring, placed him in charge of a home for invalids. But this was too much like hard work, and he soon decamped with all the money he could lay his hands on. Returning to Paris he was admitted to the Hospital of Ste. Anne as suffering from mental debility, but this did not prevent him from running off one night with about $300 belonging to a dispenser. The police were put on his track and arrested him in May, 1895, when he tried to pass himself off as a lunatic; but he had become by this time too well known, and was indicted in due course. At his trial he energetically denied that he had ever shammed, but the Court would not believe him, and sentenced him to four years' imprisonment with hard labour. --Trans. Then came all sorts of ailments. First those brought about by scrofula--a great many more legs long incapable of service and made anew. There was Margaret Gehier, who had suffered from coxalgia for seven-and-twenty years, whose hip was devoured by the disease, whose left knee was anchylosed, and who yet was suddenly able to fall upon her knees to thank the Blessed Virgin for healing her. There was also Philomene Simonneau, the young Vendeenne, whose left leg was perforated by three horrible sores in the depths of which her carious bones were visible, and whose bones, whose flesh, and whose skin were all formed afresh. Next came the dropsical ones: Madame Ancelin, the swelling of whose feet, hands, and entire body subsided without anyone being able to tell whither all the water had gone; Mademoiselle Montagnon, from whom, on various occasions, nearly twenty quarts of water had been drawn, and who, on again swelling, was entirely rid of the fluid by the application of a bandage which had been dipped in the miraculous source. And, in her case also, none of the water could be found, either in her bed or on the floor. In the same way, not a complaint of the stomach resisted, all disappeared with the first glass of water. There was Marie Souchet, who vomited black blood, who had wasted to a skeleton, and who devoured her food and recovered her flesh in two days' time! There was Marie Jarlaud, who had burnt herself internally through drinking a glass of a metallic solution used for cleansing and brightening kitchen utensils, and who felt the tumour which had resulted from her injuries melt rapidly away. Moreover, every tumour disappeared in this fashion, in the piscina, without leaving the slightest trace behind. But that which caused yet greater wonderment was the manner in which ulcers, cancers, all sorts of horrible, visible sores were cicatrised as by a breath from on high. A Jew, an actor, whose hand was devoured by an ulcer, merely had to dip it in the water and he was cured. A very wealthy young foreigner, who had a wen as large as a hen's egg, on his right wrist, /beheld/ it dissolve. Rose Duval, who, as a result of a white tumour, had a hole in her left elbow, large enough to accommodate a walnut, was able to watch and follow the prompt action of the new flesh in filling up this cavity! The Widow Fromond, with a lip half decoyed by a cancerous formation, merely had to apply the miraculous water to it as a lotion, and not even a red mark remained. Marie Moreau, who experienced fearful sufferings from a cancer in the breast, fell asleep, after laying on it a linen cloth soaked in some water of Lourdes, and when she awoke, two hours later, the pain had disappeared, and her flesh was once more smooth and pink and fresh. At last Sister Hyacinthe began to speak of the immediate and complete cures of phthisis, and this was the triumph, the healing of that terrible disease which ravages humanity, which unbelievers defied the Blessed Virgin to cure, but which she did cure, it was said, by merely raising her little finger. A hundred instances, more extraordinary one than the other, pressed forward for citation. Marguerite Coupel, who had suffered from phthisis for three years, and the upper part of whose lungs is destroyed by tuberculosis, rises up and goes off, radiant with health. Madame de la Riviere, who spits blood, who is ever covered with a cold perspiration, whose nails have already acquired a violet tinge, who is indeed on the point of drawing her last breath, requires but a spoonful of the water to be administered to her between her teeth, and lo! the rattles cease, she sits up, makes the responses to the litanies, and asks for some broth. Julie Jadot requires four spoonfuls; but then she could no longer hold up her head, she was of such a delicate constitution that disease had reduced her to nothing; and yet, in a few days, she becomes quite fat. Anna Catry, who is in the most advanced stage of the malady, with her left lung half destroyed by a cavity, is plunged five times into the cold water, contrary to all the dictates of prudence, and she is cured, her lung is healthy once more. Another consumptive girl, condemned by fifteen doctors, has asked nothing, has simply fallen on her knees in the Grotto, by chance as it were, and is afterwards quite surprised at having been cured /au passage/, through the lucky circumstance of having been there, no doubt, at the hour when the Blessed Virgin, moved to pity, allows miracles to fall from her invisible hands. Miracles and yet more miracles! They rained down like the flowers of dreams from a clear and balmy sky. Some of them were touching, some of them were childish. An old woman, who, having her hand anchylosed, had been incapable of moving it for thirty years, washes it in the water and is at once able to make the sign of the Cross. Sister Sophie, who barked like a dog, plunges into the piscina and emerges from it with a clear, pure voice, chanting a canticle. Mustapha, a Turk, invokes the White Lady and recovers the use of his right eye by applying a compress to it. An officer of Turcos was protected at Sedan; a cuirassier of Reichsoffen would have died, pierced in the heart by a bullet, if this bullet after passing though his pocket-book had not stayed its flight on reaching a little picture of Our Lady of Lourdes! And, as with the men and women, so did the children, the poor, suffering little ones, find mercy; a paralytic boy of five rose and walked after being held for five minutes under the icy jet of the spring; another one, fifteen years of age, who, lying in bed, could only raise an inarticulate cry, sprang out of the piscina, shouting that he was cured; another one, but two years old, a poor tiny fellow who had never been able to walk, remained for a quarter of an hour in the cold water and then, invigorated and smiling, took his first steps like a little man! And for all of them, the little ones as well as the adults, the pain was acute whilst the miracle was being accomplished; for the work of repair could not be effected without causing an extraordinary shock to the whole human organism; the bones grew again, new flesh was formed, and the disease, driven away, made its escape in a final convulsion. But how great was the feeling of comfort which followed! The doctors could not believe their eyes, their astonishment burst forth at each fresh cure, when they saw the patients whom they had despaired of run and jump and eat with ravenous appetites. All these chosen ones, these women cured of their ailments, walked a couple of miles, sat down to roast fowl, and slept the soundest of sleeps for a dozen hours. Moreover, there was no convalescence, it was a sudden leap from the death throes to complete health. Limbs were renovated, sores were filled up, organs were reformed in their entirety, plumpness returned to the emaciated, all with the velocity of a lightning flash! Science was completely baffled. Not even the most simple precautions were taken, women were bathed at all times and seasons, perspiring consumptives were plunged into the icy water, sores were left to their putrefaction without any thought of employing antiseptics. And then what canticles of joy, what shouts of gratitude and love arose at each fresh miracle! The favoured one falls upon her knees, all who are present weep, conversions are effected, Protestants and Jews alike embrace Catholicism--other miracles these, miracles of faith, at which Heaven triumphs. And when the favoured one, chosen for the miracle, returns to her village, all the inhabitants crowd to meet her, whilst the bells peal merrily; and when she is seen springing lightly from the vehicle which has brought her home, shouts and sobs of joy burst forth and all intonate the /Magnificat/: Glory to the Blessed Virgin! Gratitude and love for ever! Indeed, that which was more particularly evolved from the realisation of all these hopes, from the celebration of all these ardent thanksgivings, was gratitude--gratitude to the Mother most pure and most admirable. She was the great passion of every soul, she, the Virgin most powerful, the Virgin most merciful, the Mirror of Justice, the Seat of Wisdom. * All hands were stretched towards her, Mystical Rose in the dim light of the chapels, Tower of Ivory on the horizon of dreamland, Gate of Heaven leading into the Infinite. Each day at early dawn she shone forth, bright Morning Star, gay with juvenescent hope. And was she not also the Health of the weak, the Refuge of sinners, the Comforter of the afflicted? France had ever been her well-loved country, she was adored there with an ardent worship, the worship of her womanhood and her motherhood, the soaring of a divine affection; and it was particularly in France that it pleased her to show herself to little shepherdesses. She was so good to the little and the humble; she continually occupied herself with them; and if she was appealed to so willingly it was because she was known to be the intermediary of love betwixt Earth and Heaven. Every evening she wept tears of gold at the feet of her divine Son to obtain favours from Him, and these favours were the miracles which He permitted her to work,--these beautiful, flower-like miracles, as sweet-scented as the roses of Paradise, so prodigiously splendid and fragrant. * For the information of Protestant and other non-Catholic readers it may be mentioned that all the titles enumerated in this passage are taken from the Litany of the Blessed Virgin. --Trans. But the train was still rolling, rolling onward. They had just passed Contras, it was six o'clock, and Sister Hyacinthe, rising to her, feet, clapped her hands together and once again repeated: "The Angelus, my children!" Never had "Aves" impregnated with greater faith, inflamed with a more fervent desire to be heard by Heaven, winged their flight on high. And Pierre suddenly understood everything, clearly realised the meaning of all these pilgrimages, of all these trains rolling along through every country of the civilised world, of all these eager crowds, hastening towards Lourdes, which blazed over yonder like the abode of salvation for body and for mind. Ah! the poor wretches whom, ever since morning, he had heard groaning with pain, the poor wretches who exposed their sorry carcasses to the fatigues of such a journey! They were all condemned, abandoned by science, weary of consulting doctors, of having tried the torturing effects of futile remedies. And how well one could understand that, burning with a desire to preserve their lives, unable to resign themselves to the injustice and indifference of Nature, they should dream of a superhuman power, of an almighty Divinity who, in their favour, would perchance annul the established laws, alter the course of the planets, and reconsider His creation! For if the world failed them, did not the Divinity remain to them? In their cases reality was too abominable, and an immense need of illusion and falsehood sprang up within them. Oh! to believe that there is a supreme Justiciar somewhere, one who rights the apparent wrongs of things and beings; to believe that there is a Redeemer, a consoler who is the real master, who can carry the torrents back to their source, who can restore youth to the aged, and life to the dead! And when you are covered with sores, when your limbs are twisted, when your stomach is swollen by tumours, when your lungs are destroyed by disease, to be able to say that all this is of no consequence, that everything may disappear and be renewed at a sign from the Blessed Virgin, that it is sufficient that you should pray to her, touch her heart, and obtain the favour of being chosen by her. And then what a heavenly fount of hope appeared with the prodigious flow of those beautiful stories of cure, those adorable fairy tales which lulled and intoxicated the feverish imaginations of the sick and the infirm. Since little Sophie Couteau, with her white, sound foot, had climbed into that carriage, opening to the gaze of those within it the limitless heavens of the Divine and the Supernatural, how well one could understand the breath of resurrection that was passing over the world, slowly raising those who despaired the most from their beds of misery, and making their eyes shine since life was itself a possibility for them, and they were, perhaps, about to begin it afresh. Yes, 't was indeed that. If that woeful train was rolling, rolling on, if that carriage was full, if the other carriages were full also, if France and the world, from the uttermost limits of the earth, were crossed by similar trains, if crowds of three hundred thousand believers, bringing thousands of sick along with them, were ever setting out, from one end of the year to the other, it was because the Grotto yonder was shining forth in its glory like a beacon of hope and illusion, like a sign of the revolt and triumph of the Impossible over inexorable materiality. Never had a more impassionating romance been devised to exalt the souls of men above the stern laws of life. To dream that dream, this was the great, the ineffable happiness. If the Fathers of the Assumption had seen the success of their pilgrimages increase and spread from year to year, it was because they sold to all the flocking peoples the bread of consolation and illusion, the delicious bread of hope, for which suffering humanity ever hungers with a hunger that nothing will ever appease. And it was not merely the physical sores which cried aloud for cure, the whole of man's moral and intellectual being likewise shrieked forth its wretchedness, with an insatiable yearning for happiness. To be happy, to place the certainty of life in faith, to lean till death should come upon that one strong staff of travel--such was the desire exhaled by every breast, the desire which made every moral grief bend the knee, imploring a continuance of grace, the conversion of dear ones, the spiritual salvation of self and those one loved. The mighty cry spread from pole to pole, ascended and filled all the regions of space: To be happy, happy for evermore, both in life and in death! And Pierre saw the suffering beings around him lose all perception of the jolting and recover their strength as league by league they drew nearer to the miracle. Even Madame Maze grew talkative, certain as she felt that the Blessed Virgin would restore her husband to her. With a smile on her face Madame Vincent gently rocked her little Rose in her arms, thinking that she was not nearly so ill as those all but lifeless children who, after being plunged in the icy water, sprang out and played. M. Sabathier jested with M. de Guersaint, and explained to him that, next October, when he had recovered the use of his legs, he should go on a trip to Rome--a journey which he had been postponing for fifteen years and more. Madame Vetu, quite calmed, feeling nothing but a slight twinge in the stomach, imagined that she was hungry, and asked Madame de Jonquiere to let her dip some strips of bread in a glass of milk; whilst Elise Rouquet, forgetting her sores, ate some grapes, with face uncovered. And in La Grivotte who was sitting up and Brother Isidore who had ceased moaning, all those fine stories had left a pleasant fever, to such a point that, impatient to be cured, they grew anxious to know the time. For a minute also the man, the strange man, resuscitated. Whilst Sister Hyacinthe was again wiping the cold sweat from his brow, he raised his eyelids, and a smile momentarily brightened his pallid countenance. Yet once again he, also, had hoped. Marie was still holding Pierre's fingers in her own small, warm hand. It was seven o'clock, they were not due at Bordeaux till half-past seven; and the belated train was quickening its pace yet more and more, rushing along with wild speed in order to make up for the minutes it had lost. The storm had ended by coming down, and now a gentle light of infinite purity fell from the vast clear heavens. "Oh! how beautiful it is, Pierre--how beautiful it is!" Marie again repeated, pressing his hand with tender affection. And leaning towards him, she added in an undertone: "I beheld the Blessed Virgin a little while ago, Pierre, and it was your cure that I implored and shall obtain." The priest, who understood her meaning, was thrown into confusion by the divine light which gleamed in her eyes as she fixed them on his own. She had forgotten her own sufferings; that which she had asked for was his conversion; and that prayer of faith, emanating, pure and candid, from that dear, suffering creature, upset his soul. Yet why should he not believe some day? He himself had been distracted by all those extraordinary narratives. The stifling heat of the carriage had made him dizzy, the sight of all the woe heaped up there caused his heart to bleed with pity. And contagion was doing its work; he no longer knew where the real and the possible ceased, he lacked the power to disentangle such a mass of stupefying facts, to explain such as admitted of explanation and reject the others. At one moment, indeed, as a hymn once more resounded and carried him off with its stubborn importunate rhythm, he ceased to be master of himself, and imagined that he was at last beginning to believe amidst the hallucinatory vertigo which reigned in that travelling hospital, rolling, ever rolling onward at full speed.

5

BERNADETTE

THE train left Bordeaux after a stoppage of a few minutes, during which those who had not dined hastened to purchase some provisions. Moreover, the ailing ones were constantly drinking milk, and asking for biscuits, like little children. And, as soon as they were off again, Sister Hyacinthe clapped her hands, and exclaimed: "Come, let us make haste; the evening prayer." Thereupon, during a quarter of an hour came a confused murmuring, made up of "Paters" and "Aves," self-examinations, acts of contrition, and vows of trustful reliance in God, the Blessed Virgin, and the Saints, with thanksgiving for protection and preservation that day, and, at last, a prayer for the living and for the faithful departed. "In the name of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Ghost. Amen." It was ten minutes past eight o'clock, the shades of night were already bedimming the landscape--a vast plain which the evening mist seemed to prolong into the infinite, and where, far away, bright dots of light shone out from the windows of lonely, scattered houses. In the carriage, the lights of the lamps were flickering, casting a subdued yellow glow on the luggage and the pilgrims, who were sorely shaken by the spreading tendency of the train's motion. "You know, my children," resumed Sister Hyacinthe, who had remained standing, "I shall order silence when we get to Lamothe, in about an hour's time. So you have an hour to amuse yourselves, but you must be reasonable and not excite yourselves too much. And when we have passed Lamothe, you hear me, there must not be another word, another sound, you must all go to sleep." This made them laugh. "Oh! but it is the rule, you know," added the Sister, "and surely you have too much sense not to obey me." Since the morning they had punctually fulfilled the programme of religious exercises specified for each successive hour. And now that all the prayers had been said, the beads told, the hymns chanted, the day's duties were over, and a brief interval for recreation was allowed before sleeping. They were, however, at a loss as to what they should do. "Sister," suddenly said Marie, "if you would allow Monsieur l'Abbe to read to us--he reads extremely well,--and as it happens I have a little book with me--a history of Bernadette which is so interesting--" The others did nor let her finish, but with the suddenly awakened desire of children to whom a beautiful story has been promised, loudly exclaimed: "Oh! yes, Sister. Oh! yes, Sister--" "Of course I will allow it," replied Sister Hyacinthe, "since it is a question of reading something instructive and edifying." Pierre was obliged to consent. But to be able to read the book he wished to be under the lamp, and it was necessary that he should change seats with M. de Guersaint, whom the promise of a story had delighted as much as it did the ailing ones. And when the young priest, after changing seats and declaring that he would be able to see well enough, at last opened the little book, a quiver of curiosity sped from one end of the carriage to the other, and every head was stretched out, lending ear with rapt attention. Fortunately, Pierre had a clear, powerful voice and made himself distinctly heard above the wheels, which, now that the train travelled across a vast level plain, gave out but a subdued, rumbling sound. Before beginning, however, the young priest had examined the book. It was one of those little works of propaganda issued from the Catholic printing-presses and circulated in profusion throughout all Christendom. Badly printed, on wretched paper, it was adorned on its blue cover with a little wood-cut of Our Lady of Lourdes, a naive design alike stiff and awkward. The book itself was short, and half an hour would certainly suffice to read it from cover to cover without hurrying. Accordingly, in his fine, clear voice, with its penetrating, musical tones, he began his perusal as follows:-- "It happened at Lourdes, a little town near the Pyrenees, on a Thursday, February 11, 1858. The weather was cold, and somewhat cloudy, and in the humble home of a poor but honest miller named Francois Soubirous there was no wood to cook the dinner. The miller's wife, Louise, said to her younger daughter Marie, 'Go and gather some wood on the bank of the Gave or on the common-land.' The Gave is a torrent which passes through Lourdes. "Marie had an elder sister, named Bernadette, who had lately arrived from the country, where some worthy villagers had employed her as a shepherdess. She was a slender, delicate, extremely innocent child, and knew nothing except her rosary. Louise Soubirous hesitated to send her out with her sister, on account of the cold, but at last, yielding to the entreaties of Marie and a young girl of the neighbourhood called Jeanne Abadie, she consented to let her go. "Following the bank of the torrent and gathering stray fragments of dead wood, the three maidens at last found themselves in front of the Grotto, hollowed out in a huge mass of rock which the people of the district called Massabielle." Pierre had reached this point and was turning the page when he suddenly paused and let the little book fall on his knees. The childish character of the narrative, its ready-made, empty phraseology, filled him with impatience. He himself possessed quite a collection of documents concerning this extraordinary story, had passionately studied even its most trifling details, and in the depths of his heart retained a feeling of tender affection and infinite pity for Bernadette. He had just reflected, too, that on the very next day he would be able to begin that decisive inquiry which he had formerly dreamt of making at Lourdes. In fact, this was one of the reasons which had induced him to accompany Marie on her journey. And he was now conscious of an awakening of all his curiosity respecting the Visionary, whom he loved because he felt that she had been a girl of candid soul, truthful and ill-fated, though at the same time he would much have liked to analyse and explain her case. Assuredly, she had not lied, she had indeed beheld a vision and heard voices, like Joan of Arc; and like Joan of Arc also, she was now, in the opinion of the devout, accomplishing the deliverance of France--from sin if not from invaders. Pierre wondered what force could have produced her--her and her work. How was it that the visionary faculty had become developed in that lowly girl, so distracting believing souls as to bring about a renewal of the miracles of primitive times, as to found almost a new religion in the midst of a Holy City, built at an outlay of millions, and ever invaded by crowds of worshippers more numerous and more exalted in mind than had ever been known since the days of the Crusades? And so, ceasing to read the book, Pierre began to tell his companions all that he knew, all that he had divined and reconstructed of that story which is yet so obscure despite the vast rivers of ink which it has already caused to flow. He knew the country and its manners and customs, through his long conversations with his friend Doctor Chassaigne. And he was endowed with charming fluency of language, an emotional power of exquisite purity, many remarkable gifts well fitting him to be a pulpit orator, which he never made use of, although he had known them to be within him ever since his seminary days. When the occupants of the carriage perceived that he knew the story, far better and in far greater detail than it appeared in Marie's little book, and that he related it also in such a gentle yet passionate way, there came an increase of attention, and all those afflicted souls hungering for happiness went forth towards him. First came the story of Bernadette's childhood at Bartres, where she had grown up in the abode of her foster-mother, Madame Lagues, who, having lost an infant of her own, had rendered those poor folks, the Soubirouses, the service of suckling and keeping their child for them. Bartres, a village of four hundred souls, at a league or so from Lourdes, lay as it were in a desert oasis, sequestered amidst greenery, and far from any frequented highway. The road dips down, the few houses are scattered over grassland, divided by hedges and planted with walnut and chestnut trees, whilst the clear rivulets, which are never silent, follow the sloping banks beside the pathways, and nothing rises on high save the small ancient romanesque church, which is perched on a hillock, covered with graves. Wooded slopes undulate upon all sides. Bartres lies in a hollow amidst grass of delicious freshness, grass of intense greenness, which is ever moist at the roots, thanks to the eternal subterraneous expanse of water which is fed by the mountain torrents. And Bernadette, who, since becoming a big girl, had paid for her keep by tending lambs, was wont to take them with her, season after season, through all the greenery where she never met a soul. It was only now and then, from the summit of some slope, that she saw the far-away mountains, the Pic du Midi, the Pic de Viscos, those masses which rose up, bright or gloomy, according to the weather, and which stretched away to other peaks, lightly and faintly coloured, vaguely and confusedly outlined, like apparitions seen in dreams. Then came the home of the Lagueses, where her cradle was still preserved, a solitary, silent house, the last of the village. A meadow planted with pear and apple trees, and only separated from the open country by a narrow stream which one could jump across, stretched out in front of the house. Inside the latter, a low and damp abode, there were, on either side of the wooden stairway leading to the loft, but two spacious rooms, flagged with stones, and each containing four or five beds. The girls, who slept together, fell asleep at even, gazing at the fine pictures affixed to the walls, whilst the big clock in its pinewood case gravely struck the hours in the midst of the deep silence. Ah! those years at Bartres; in what sweet peacefulness did Bernadette live them! Yet she grew up very thin, always in bad health, suffering from a nervous asthma which stifled her in the least veering of the wind; and on attaining her twelfth year she could neither read nor write, nor speak otherwise than in dialect, having remained quite infantile, behindhand in mind as in body. She was a very good little girl, very gentle and well behaved, and but little different from other children, except that instead of talking she preferred to listen. Limited as was her intelligence, she often evinced much natural common-sense, and at times was prompt in her /reparties/, with a kind of simple gaiety which made one smile. It was only with infinite trouble that she was taught her rosary, and when she knew it she seemed bent on carrying her knowledge no further, but repeated it all day long, so that whenever you met her with her lambs, she invariably had her chaplet between her fingers, diligently telling each successive "Pater" and "Ave." For long, long hours she lived like this on the grassy slopes of the hills, hidden away and haunted as it were amidst the mysteries of the foliage, seeing nought of the world save the crests of the distant mountains, which, for an instant, every now and then, would soar aloft in the radiant light, as ethereal as the peaks of dreamland. Days followed days, and Bernadette roamed, dreaming her one narrow dream, repeating the sole prayer she knew, which gave her amidst her solitude, so fresh and naively infantile, no other companion and friend than the Blessed Virgin. But what pleasant evenings she spent in the winter-time in the room on the left, where a fire was kept burning! Her foster-mother had a brother, a priest, who occasionally read some marvellous stories to them--stories of saints, prodigious adventures of a kind to make one tremble with mingled fear and joy, in which Paradise appeared upon earth, whilst the heavens opened and a glimpse was caught of the splendour of the angels. The books he brought with him were often full of pictures--God the Father enthroned amidst His glory; Jesus, so gentle and so handsome with His beaming face; the Blessed Virgin, who recurred again and again, radiant with splendour, clad now in white, now in azure, now in gold, and ever so amiable that Bernadette would see her again in her dreams. But the book which was read more than all others was the Bible, an old Bible which had been in the family for more than a hundred years, and which time and usage had turned yellow. Each winter evening Bernadette's foster-father, the only member of the household who had learnt to read, would take a pin, pass it at random between the leaves of the book, open the latter, and then start reading from the top of the right-hand page, amidst the deep attention of both the women and the children, who ended by knowing the book by heart, and could have continued reciting it without a single mistake. However, Bernadette, for her part, preferred the religious works in which the Blessed Virgin constantly appeared with her engaging smile. True, one reading of a different character amused her, that of the marvellous story of the Four Brothers Aymon. On the yellow paper cover of the little book, which had doubtless fallen from the bale of some peddler who had lost his way in that remote region, there was a naive cut showing the four doughty knights, Renaud and his brothers, all mounted on Bayard, their famous battle charger, that princely present made to them by the fairy Orlanda. And inside were narratives of bloody fights, of the building and besieging of fortresses, of the terrible swordthrusts exchanged by Roland and Renaud, who was at last about to free the Holy Land, without mentioning the tales of Maugis the Magician and his marvellous enchantments, and the Princess Clarisse, the King of Aquitaine's sister, who was more lovely than sunlight. Her imagination fired by such stories as these, Bernadette often found it difficult to get to sleep; and this was especially the case on the evenings when the books were left aside, and some person of the company related a tale of witchcraft. The girl was very superstitious, and after sundown could never be prevailed upon to pass near a tower in the vicinity, which was said to be haunted by the fiend. For that matter, all the folks of the region were superstitious, devout, and simple-minded, the whole countryside being peopled, so to say, with mysteries--trees which sang, stones from which blood flowed, cross-roads where it was necessary to say three "Paters" and three "Aves," if you did not wish to meet the seven-horned beast who carried maidens off to perdition. And what a wealth of terrifying stories there was! Hundreds of stories, so that there was no finishing on the evenings when somebody started them. First came the wehrwolf adventures, the tales of the unhappy men whom the demon forced to enter into the bodies of dogs, the great white dogs of the mountains. If you fire a gun at the dog and a single shot should strike him, the man will be delivered; but if the shot should fall on the dog's shadow, the man will immediately die. Then came the endless procession of sorcerers and sorceresses. In one of these tales Bernadette evinced a passionate interest; it was the story of a clerk of the tribunal of Lourdes who, wishing to see the devil, was conducted by a witch into an untilled field at midnight on Good Friday. The devil arrived clad in magnificent scarlet garments, and at once proposed to the clerk that he should buy his soul, an offer which the clerk pretended to accept. It so happened that the devil was carrying under his arm a register in which different persons of the town, who had already sold themselves, had signed their names. However, the clerk, who was a cunning fellow, pulled out of his pocket a pretended bottle of ink, which in reality contained holy water, and with this he sprinkled the devil, who raised frightful shrieks, whilst the clerk took to flight, carrying the register off with him. Then began a wild, mad race, which might last throughout the night, over the mountains, through the valleys, across the forests and the torrents. "Give me back my register!" shouted the fiend. "No, you sha'n't have it!" replied the clerk. And again and again it began afresh: "Give me back my register!" --"No, you sha'n't have it'!" And at last, finding himself out of breath, near the point of succumbing, the clerk, who had his plan, threw himself into the cemetery, which was consecrated ground, and was there able to deride the devil at his ease, waving the register which he had purloined so as to save the souls of all the unhappy people who had signed their names in it. On the evening when this story was told, Bernadette, before surrendering herself to sleep, would mentally repeat her rosary, delighted with the thought that hell should have been baffled, though she trembled at the idea that it would surely return to prowl around her, as soon as the lamp should have been put out. Throughout one winter, the long evenings were spent in the church. Abbe Ader, the village priest, had authorised it, and many families came, in order to economise oil and candles. Moreover, they felt less cold when gathered together in this fashion. The Bible was read, and prayers were repeated, whilst the children ended by falling asleep. Bernadette alone struggled on to the finish, so pleased she was at being there, in that narrow nave whose slender nervures were coloured blue and red. At the farther end was the altar, also painted and gilded, with its twisted columns and its screens on which appeared the Virgin and Ste. Anne, and the beheading of St. John the Baptist--the whole of a gaudy and somewhat barbaric splendour. And as sleepiness grew upon her, the child must have often seen a mystical vision as it were of those crudely coloured designs rising before her--have seen the blood flowing from St. John's severed head, have seen the aureolas shining, the Virgin ever returning and gazing at her with her blue, living eyes, and looking as though she were on the point of opening her vermilion lips in order to speak to her. For some months Bernadette spent her evenings in this wise, half asleep in front of that sumptuous, vaguely defined altar, in the incipiency of a divine dream which she carried away with her, and finished in bed, slumbering peacefully under the watchful care of her guardian angel. And it was also in that old church, so humble yet so impregnated with ardent faith, that Bernadette began to learn her catechism. She would soon be fourteen now, and must think of her first communion. Her foster-mother, who had the reputation of being avaricious, did not send her to school, but employed her in or about the house from morning till evening. M. Barbet, the schoolmaster, never saw her at his classes, though one day, when he gave the catechism lesson, in the place of Abbe Ader who was indisposed, he remarked her on account of her piety and modesty. The village priest was very fond of Bernadette and often spoke of her to the schoolmaster, saying that he could never look at her without thinking of the children of La Salette, since they must have been good, candid, and pious as she was, for the Blessed Virgin to have appeared to them. * On another occasion whilst the two men were walking one morning near the village, and saw Bernadette disappear with her little flock under some spreading trees in the distance, the Abbe repeatedly turned round to look for her, and again remarked "I cannot account for it, but every time I meet that child it seems to me as if I saw Melanie, the young shepherdess, little Maximin's companion." He was certainly beset by this singular idea, which became, so to say, a prediction. Moreover, had he not one day after catechism, or one evening, when the villagers were gathered in the church, related that marvellous story which was already twelve years old, that story of the Lady in the dazzling robes who walked upon the grass without even making it bend, the Blessed Virgin who showed herself to Melanie and Maximin on the banks of a stream in the mountains, and confided to them a great secret and announced the anger of her Son? Ever since that day a source had sprung up from the tears which she had shed, a source which cured all ailments, whilst the secret, inscribed on parchment fastened with three seals, slumbered at Rome! And Bernadette, no doubt, with her dreamy, silent air, had listened passionately to that wonderful tale and carried it off with her into the desert of foliage where she spent her days, so that she might live it over again as she walked along behind her lambs with her rosary, slipping bead by bead between her slender fingers. * It was on September 19, 1846, that the Virgin is said to have appeared in the ravine of La Sezia, adjacent to the valley of La Salette, between Corps and Eutraigues, in the department of the Isere. The visionaries were Melanie Mathieu, a girl of fourteen, and Maximin Giraud, a boy of twelve. The local clergy speedily endorsed the story of the miracle, and thousands of people still go every year in pilgrimage to a church overlooking the valley, and bathe and drink at a so-called miraculous source. Two priests of Grenoble, however, Abbe Deleon and Abbe Cartellier, accused a Mlle. de Lamerliere of having concocted the miracle, and when she took proceedings against them for libel she lost her case. --Trans. Thus her childhood ran its course at Bartres. That which delighted one in this Bernadette, so poor-blooded, so slight of build, was her ecstatic eyes, beautiful visionary eyes, from which dreams soared aloft like birds winging their flight in a pure limpid sky. Her mouth was large, with lips somewhat thick, expressive of kindliness; her square-shaped head had a straight brow, and was covered with thick black hair, whilst her face would have seemed rather common but for its charming expression of gentle obstinacy. Those who did not gaze into her eyes, however, gave her no thought. To them she was but an ordinary child, a poor thing of the roads, a girl of reluctant growth, timidly humble in her ways. Assuredly it was in her glance that Abbe Ader had with agitation detected the stifling ailment which filled her puny, girlish form with suffering--that ailment born of the greeny solitude in which she had grown up, the gentleness of her bleating lambs, the Angelic Salutation which she had carried with her, hither and thither, under the sky, repeating and repeating it to the point of hallucination, the prodigious stories, too, which she had heard folks tell at her foster-mother's, the long evenings spent before the living altar-screens in the church, and all the atmosphere of primitive faith which she had breathed in that far-away rural region, hemmed in by mountains. At last, on one seventh of January, Bernadette had just reached her fourteenth birthday, when her parents, finding that she learnt nothing at Bartres, resolved to bring her back to Lourdes for good, in order that she might diligently study her catechism, and in this wise seriously prepare herself for her first communion. And so it happened that she had already been at Lourdes some fifteen or twenty days, when on February 11, a Thursday, cold and somewhat cloudy-- But Pierre could carry his narrative no further, for Sister Hyacinthe had risen to her feet and was vigorously clapping her hands. "My children," she exclaimed, "it is past nine o'clock. Silence! silence!" The train had indeed just passed Lamothe, and was rolling with a dull rumble across a sea of darkness--the endless plains of the Landes which the night submerged. For ten minutes already not a sound ought to have been heard in the carriage, one and all ought to have been sleeping or suffering uncomplainingly. However, a mutiny broke out. "Oh! Sister!" exclaimed Marie, whose eyes were sparkling, "allow us just another short quarter of an hour! We have got to the most interesting part." Ten, twenty voices took up the cry: "Oh yes, Sister, please do let us have another short quarter of an hour!" They all wished to hear the continuation, burning with as much curiosity as though they had not known the story, so captivated were they by the touches of compassionate human feeling which Pierre introduced into his narrative. Their glances never left him, all their heads were stretched towards him, fantastically illumined by the flickering light of the lamps. And it was not only the sick who displayed this interest; the ten women occupying the compartment at the far end of the carriage had also become impassioned, and, happy at not missing a single word, turned their poor ugly faces now beautified by naive faith. "No, I cannot!" Sister Hyacinthe at first declared; "the rules are very strict--you must be silent." However, she weakened, she herself feeling so interested in the tale that she could detect her heart beating under her stomacher. Then Marie again repeated her request in an entreating tone; whilst her father, M. de Guersaint, who had listened like one hugely amused, declared that they would all fall ill if the story were not continued. And thereupon, seeing Madame de Jonquiere smile with an indulgent air, Sister Hyacinthe ended by consenting. "Well, then," said she, "I will allow you another short quarter of an hour; but only a short quarter of an hour, mind. That is understood, is it not? For I should otherwise be in fault." Pierre had waited quietly without attempting to intervene. And he resumed his narrative in the same penetrating voice as before, a voice in which his own doubts were softened by pity for those who suffer and who hope. The scene of the story was now transferred to Lourdes, to the Rue des Petits Fosses, a narrow, tortuous, mournful street taking a downward course between humble houses and roughly plastered dead walls. The Soubirous family occupied a single room on the ground floor of one of these sorry habitations, a room at the end of a dark passage, in which seven persons were huddled together, the father, the mother, and five children. You could scarcely see in the chamber; from the tiny, damp inner courtyard of the house there came but a greenish light. And in that room they slept, all of a heap; and there also they ate, when they had bread. For some time past, the father, a miller by trade, could only with difficulty obtain work as a journeyman. And it was from that dark hole, that lowly wretchedness, that Bernadette, the elder girl, with Marie, her sister, and Jeanne, a little friend of the neighbourhood, went out to pick up dead wood, on the cold February Thursday already spoken of. Then the beautiful tale was unfolded at length; how the three girls followed the bank of the Gave from the other side of the castle, and how they ended by finding themselves on the Ile du Chalet in front of the rock of Massabielle, from which they were only separated by the narrow stream diverted from the Gave, and used for working the mill of Savy. It was a wild spot, whither the common herdsman often brought the pigs of the neighbourhood, which, when showers suddenly came on, would take shelter under this rock of Massabielle, at whose base there was a kind of grotto of no great depth, blocked at the entrance by eglantine and brambles. The girls found dead wood very scarce that day, but at last on seeing on the other side of the stream quite a gleaning of branches deposited there by the torrent, Marie and Jeanne crossed over through the water; whilst Bernadette, more delicate than they were, a trifle young-ladyfied, perhaps, remained on the bank lamenting, and not daring to wet her feet. She was suffering slightly from humour in the head, and her mother had expressly bidden her to wrap herself in her /capulet/,* a large white /capulet/ which contrasted vividly with her old black woollen dress. When she found that her companions would not help her, she resignedly made up her mind to take off her /sabots/, and pull down her stockings. It was then about noon, the three strokes of the Angelus rang out from the parish church, rising into the broad calm winter sky, which was somewhat veiled by fine fleecy clouds. And it was then that a great agitation arose within her, resounding in her ears with such a tempestuous roar that she fancied a hurricane had descended from the mountains, and was passing over her. But she looked at the trees and was stupefied, for not a leaf was stirring. Then she thought that she had been mistaken, and was about to pick up her /sabots/, when again the great gust swept through her; but, this time, the disturbance in her ears reached her eyes, she no longer saw the trees, but was dazzled by a whiteness, a kind of bright light which seemed to her to settle itself against the rock, in a narrow, lofty slit above the Grotto, not unlike an ogival window of a cathedral. In her fright she fell upon her knees. What could it be, /mon Dieu/? Sometimes, during bad weather, when her asthma oppressed her more than usual, she spent very bad nights, incessantly dreaming dreams which were often painful, and whose stifling effect she retained on awaking, even when she had ceased to remember anything. Flames would surround her, the sun would flash before her face. Had she dreamt in that fashion during the previous night? Was this the continuation of some forgotten dream? However, little by little a form became outlined, she believed that she could distinguish a figure which the vivid light rendered intensely white. In her fear lest it should be the devil, for her mind was haunted by tales of witchcraft, she began to tell her beads. And when the light had slowly faded away, and she had crossed the canal and joined Marie and Jeanne, she was surprised to find that neither of them had seen anything whilst they were picking up the wood in front of the Grotto. On their way back to Lourdes the three girls talked together. So she, Bernadette, had seen something then? What was it? At first, feeling uneasy, and somewhat ashamed, she would not answer; but at last she said that she had seen something white. * This is a kind of hood, more generally known among the Bearnese peasantry as a /sarot/. Whilst forming a coif it also completely covers the back and shoulders. --Trans. From this the rumours started and grew. The Soubirouses, on being made acquainted with the circumstance, evinced much displeasure at such childish nonsense, and told their daughter that she was not to return to the rock of Massabielle. All the children of the neighbourhood, however, were already repeating the tale, and when Sunday came the parents had to give way, and allow Bernadette to betake herself to the Grotto with a bottle of holy water to ascertain if it were really the devil whom one had to deal with. She then again beheld the light, the figure became more clearly defined, and smiled upon her, evincing no fear whatever of the holy water. And, on the ensuing Thursday, she once more returned to the spot accompanied by several persons, and then for the first time the radiant lady assumed sufficient corporality to speak, and say to her: "Do me the kindness to come here for fifteen days." Thus, little by little, the lady had assumed a precise appearance. The something clad in white had become indeed a lady more beautiful than a queen, of a kind such as is only seen in pictures. At first, in presence of the questions with which all the neighbours plied her from morning till evening, Bernadette had hesitated, disturbed, perhaps, by scruples of conscience. But then, as though prompted by the very interrogatories to which she was subjected, she seemed to perceive the figure which she had beheld, more plainly, so that it definitely assumed life, with lines and hues from which the child, in her after-descriptions, never departed. The lady's eyes were blue and very mild, her mouth was rosy and smiling, the oval of her face expressed both the grace of youth and of maternity. Below the veil covering her head and falling to her heels, only a glimpse was caught of her admirable fair hair, which was slightly curled. Her robe, which was of dazzling whiteness, must have been of some material unknown on earth, some material woven of the sun's rays. Her sash, of the same hue as the heavens, was fastened loosely about her, its long ends streaming downwards, with the light airiness of morning. Her chaplet, wound about her right arm, had beads of a milky whiteness, whilst the links and the cross were of gold. And on her bare feet, on her adorable feet of virgin snow, flowered two golden roses, the mystic roses of this divine mother's immaculate flesh. Where was it that Bernadette had seen this Blessed Virgin, of such traditionally simple composition, unadorned by a single jewel, having but the primitive grace imagined by the painters of a people in its childhood? In which illustrated book belonging to her foster-mother's brother, the good priest, who read such attractive stories, had she beheld this Virgin? Or in what picture, or what statuette, or what stained-glass window of the painted and gilded church where she had spent so many evenings whilst growing up? And whence, above all things, had come those golden roses poised on the Virgin's feet, that piously imagined florescence of woman's flesh--from what romance of chivalry, from what story told after catechism by the Abbe Ader, from what unconscious dream indulged in under the shady foliage of Bartres, whilst ever and ever repeating that haunting Angelic Salutation? Pierre's voice had acquired a yet more feeling tone, for if he did not say all these things to the simple-minded folks who were listening to him, still the human explanation of all these prodigies which the feeling of doubt in the depths of his being strove to supply, imparted to his narrative a quiver of sympathetic, fraternal love. He loved Bernadette the better for the great charm of her hallucination--that lady of such gracious access, such perfect amiability, such politeness in appearing and disappearing so appropriately. At first the great light would show itself, then the vision took form, came and went, leant forward, moved about, floating imperceptibly, with ethereal lightness; and when it vanished the glow lingered for yet another moment, and then disappeared like a star fading away. No lady in this world could have such a white and rosy face, with a beauty so akin to that of the Virgins on the picture-cards given to children at their first communions. And it was strange that the eglantine of the Grotto did not even hurt her adorable bare feet blooming with golden flowers. Pierre, however, at once proceeded to recount the other apparitions. The fourth and fifth occurred on the Friday and the Saturday; but the Lady, who shone so brightly and who had not yet told her name, contented herself on these occasions with smiling and saluting without pronouncing a word. On the Sunday, however, she wept, and said to Bernadette, "Pray for sinners." On the Monday, to the child's great grief, she did not appear, wishing, no doubt, to try her. But on the Tuesday she confided to her a secret which concerned her (the girl) alone, a secret which she was never to divulge*; and then she at last told her what mission it was that she entrusted to her: "Go and tell the priests," she said, "that they must build a chapel here." On the Wednesday she frequently murmured the word "Penitence! penitence! penitence!" which the child repeated, afterwards kissing the earth. On the Thursday the Lady said to her: "Go, and drink, and wash at the spring, and eat of the grass that is beside it," words which the Visionary ended by understanding, when in the depths of the Grotto a source suddenly sprang up beneath her fingers. And this was the miracle of the enchanted fountain. * In a like way, it will be remembered, the apparition at La Salette confided a secret to Melanie and Maximin (see /ante/, note). There can be little doubt that Bernadette was acquainted with the story of the miracle of La Salette. --Trans. Then the second week ran its course. The lady did not appear on the Friday, but was punctual on the five following days, repeating her commands and gazing with a smile at the humble girl whom she had chosen to do her bidding, and who, on her side, duly told her beads at each apparition, kissed the earth, and repaired on her knees to the source, there to drink and wash. At last, on Thursday, March 4, the last day of these mystical assignations, the Lady requested more pressingly than before that a chapel might be erected in order that the nations might come thither in procession from all parts of the earth. So far, however, in reply to all Bernadette's appeals, she had refused to say who she was; and it was only three weeks later, on Thursday, March 25, that, joining her hands together, and raising her eyes to Heaven, she said: "I am the Immaculate Conception." On two other occasions, at somewhat long intervals, April 7 and July l6, she again appeared: the first time to perform the miracle of the lighted taper, that taper above which the child, plunged in ecstasy, for a long time unconsciously left her hand, without burning it; and the second time to bid Bernadette farewell, to favour her with a last smile, and a last inclination of the head full of charming politeness. This made eighteen apparitions all told; and never again did the Lady show herself. Whilst Pierre went on with his beautiful, marvellous story, so soothing to the wretched, he evoked for himself a vision of that pitiable, lovable Bernadette, whose sufferings had flowered so wonderfully. As a doctor had roughly expressed it, this girl of fourteen, at a critical period of her life, already ravaged, too, by asthma, was, after all, simply an exceptional victim of hysteria, afflicted with a degenerate heredity and lapsing into infancy. If there were no violent crises in her case, if there were no stiffening of the muscles during her attacks, if she retained a precise recollection of her dreams, the reason was that her case was peculiar to herself, and she added, so to say, a new and very curious form to all the forms of hysteria known at the time. Miracles only begin when things cannot be explained; and science, so far, knows and can explain so little, so infinitely do the phenomena of disease vary according to the nature of the patient! But how many shepherdesses there had been before Bernadette who had seen the Virgin in a similar way, amidst all the same childish nonsense! Was it not always the same story, the Lady clad in light, the secret confided, the spring bursting forth, the mission which had to be fulfilled, the miracles whose enchantments would convert the masses? And was not the personal appearance of the Virgin always in accordance with a poor child's dreams--akin to some coloured figure in a missal, an ideal compounded of traditional beauty, gentleness, and politeness. And the same dreams showed themselves in the naivete of the means which were to be employed and of the object which was to be attained--the deliverance of nations, the building of churches, the processional pilgrimages of the faithful! Then, too, all the words which fell from Heaven resembled one another, calls for penitence, promises of help; and in this respect, in Bernadette's case the only new feature was that most extraordinary declaration: "I am the Immaculate Conception," which burst forth--very usefully--as the recognition by the Blessed Virgin herself of the dogma promulgated by the Court of Rome but three years previously! It was not the Immaculate Virgin who appeared: no, it was the Immaculate Conception, the abstraction itself, the thing, the dogma, so that one might well ask oneself if really the Virgin had spoken in such a fashion. As for the other words, it was possible that Bernadette had heard them somewhere and stored them up in some unconscious nook of her memory. But these--"I am the Immaculate Conception"--whence had they come as though expressly to fortify a dogma--still bitterly discussed--with such prodigious support as the direct testimony of the Mother conceived without sin? At this thought, Pierre, who was convinced of Bernadette's absolute good faith, who refused to believe that she had been the instrument of a fraud, began to waver, deeply agitated, feeling his belief in truth totter within him. The apparitions, however, had caused intense emotion at Lourdes; crowds flocked to the spot, miracles began, and those inevitable persecutions broke out which ensure the triumph of new religions. Abbe Peyramale, the parish priest of Lourdes, an extremely honest man, with an upright, vigorous mind, was able in all truth to declare that he did not know this child, that she had not yet been seen at catechism. Where was the pressure, then, where the lesson learnt by heart? There was nothing but those years of childhood spent at Bartres, the first teachings of Abbe Ader, conversations possibly, religious ceremonies in honour of the recently proclaimed dogma, or simply the gift of one of those commemorative medals which had been scattered in profusion. Never did Abbe Ader reappear upon the scene, he who had predicted the mission of the future Visionary. He was destined to remain apart from Bernadette and her future career, he who, the first, had seen her little soul blossom in his pious hands. And yet all the unknown forces that had sprung from that sequestered village, from that nook of greenery where superstition and poverty of intelligence prevailed, were still making themselves felt, disturbing the brains of men, disseminating the contagion of the mysterious. It was remembered that a shepherd of Argeles, speaking of the rock of Massabielle, had prophesied that great things would take place there. Other children, moreover, now fell in ecstasy with their eyes dilated and their limbs quivering with convulsions, but these only saw the devil. A whirlwind of madness seemed to be passing over the region. An old lady of Lourdes declared that Bernadette was simply a witch and that she had herself seen the toad's foot in her eye. But for the others, for the thousands of pilgrims who hastened to the spot, she was a saint, and they kissed her garments. Sobs burst forth and frenzy seemed to seize upon the souls of the beholders, when she fell upon her knees before the Grotto, a lighted taper in her right hand, whilst with the left she told the beads of her rosary. She became very pale and quite beautiful, transfigured, so to say. Her features gently ascended in her face, lengthened into an expression of extraordinary beatitude, whilst her eyes filled with light, and her lips parted as though she were speaking words which could not be heard. And it was quite certain that she had no will of her own left her, penetrated as she was by a dream, possessed by it to such a point in the confined, exclusive sphere in which she lived, that she continued dreaming it even when awake, and thus accepted it as the only indisputable reality, prepared to testify to it even at the cost of her blood, repeating it over and over again, obstinately, stubbornly clinging to it, and never varying in the details she gave. She did not lie, for she did not know, could not and would not desire anything apart from it. Forgetful of the flight of time, Pierre was now sketching a charming picture of old Lourdes, that pious little town, slumbering at the foot of the Pyrenees. The castle, perched on a rock at the point of intersection of the seven valleys of Lavedan, had formerly been the key of the mountain districts. But, in Bernadette's time, it had become a mere dismantled, ruined pile, at the entrance of a road leading nowhere. Modern life found its march stayed by a formidable rampart of lofty, snow-capped peaks, and only the trans-Pyrenean railway--had it been constructed--could have established an active circulation of social life in that sequestered nook where human existence stagnated like dead water. Forgotten, therefore, Lourdes remained slumbering, happy and sluggish amidst its old-time peacefulness, with its narrow, pebble-paved streets and its bleak houses with dressings of marble. The old roofs were still all massed on the eastern side of the castle; the Rue de la Grotte, then called the Rue du Bois, was but a deserted and often impassable road; no houses stretched down to the Gave as now, and the scum-laden waters rolled through a perfect solitude of pollard willows and tall grass. On week-days but few people passed across the Place du Marcadal, such as housewives hastening on errands, and petty cits airing their leisure hours; and you had to wait till Sundays or fair days to find the inhabitants rigged out in their best clothes and assembled on the Champ Commun, in company with the crowd of graziers who had come down from the distant tablelands with their cattle. During the season when people resort to the Pyrenean-waters, the passage of the visitors to Cauterets and Bagneres also brought some animation; /diligences/ passed through the town twice a day, but they came from Pau by a wretched road, and had to ford the Lapaca, which often overflowed its banks. Then climbing the steep ascent of the Rue Basse, they skirted the terrace of the church, which was shaded by large elms. And what soft peacefulness prevailed in and around that old semi-Spanish church, full of ancient carvings, columns, screens, and statues, peopled with visionary patches of gilding and painted flesh, which time had mellowed and which you faintly discerned as by the light of mystical lamps! The whole population came there to worship, to fill their eyes with the dream of the mysterious. There were no unbelievers, the inhabitants of Lourdes were a people of primitive faith; each corporation marched behind the banner of its saint, brotherhoods of all kinds united the entire town, on festival mornings, in one large Christian family. And, as with some exquisite flower that has grown in the soil of its choice, great purity of life reigned there. There was not even a resort of debauchery for young men to wreck their lives, and the girls, one and all, grew up with the perfume and beauty of innocence, under the eyes of the Blessed Virgin, Tower of Ivory and Seat of Wisdom. And how well one could understand that Bernadette, born in that holy soil, should flower in it, like one of nature's roses budding in the wayside bushes! She was indeed the very florescence of that region of ancient belief and rectitude; she would certainly not have sprouted elsewhere; she could only appear and develop there, amidst that belated race, amidst the slumberous peacefulness of a childlike people, under the moral discipline of religion. And what intense love at once burst forth all around her! What blind confidence was displayed in her mission, what immense consolation and hope came to human hearts on the very morrow of the first miracles! A long cry of relief had greeted the cure of old Bourriette recovering his sight, and of little Justin Bouhohorts coming to life again in the icy water of the spring. At last, then, the Blessed Virgin was intervening in favour of those who despaired, forcing that unkind mother, Nature, to be just and charitable. This was divine omnipotence returning to reign on earth, sweeping the laws of the world aside in order to work the happiness of the suffering and the poor. The miracles multiplied, blazed forth, from day to day more and more extraordinary, like unimpeachable proof of Bernadette's veracity. And she was, indeed, the rose of the divine garden, whose deeds shed perfume, the rose who beholds all the other flowers of grace and salvation spring into being around her. Pierre had reached this point of his story, and was again enumerating the miracles, on the point of recounting the prodigious triumph of the Grotto, when Sister Hyacinthe, awaking with a start from the ecstasy into which the narrative had plunged her, hastily rose to her feet. "Really, really," said she, "there is no sense in it. It will soon be eleven o'clock." This was true. They had left Morceux behind them, and would now soon be at Mont de Marsan. So Sister Hyacinthe clapped her hands once more, and added: "Silence, my children, silence!" This time they did not dare to rebel, for they felt she was in the right; they were unreasonable. But how greatly they regretted not hearing the continuation, how vexed they were that the story should cease when only half told! The ten women in the farther compartment even let a murmur of disappointment escape them; whilst the sick, their faces still outstretched, their dilated eyes gazing upon the light of hope, seemed to be yet listening. Those miracles which ever and ever returned to their minds and filled them with unlimited, haunting, supernatural joy. "And don't let me hear anyone breathe, even," added Sister Hyacinthe gaily, "or otherwise I shall impose penance on you." Madame de Jonquiere laughed good-naturedly. "You must obey, my children," she said; "be good and get to sleep, so that you may have strength to pray at the Grotto to-morrow with all your hearts." Then silence fell, nobody spoke any further; and the only sounds were those of the rumbling of the wheels and the jolting of the train as it was carried along at full speed through the black night. Pierre, however, was unable to sleep. Beside him, M. de Guersaint was already snoring lightly, looking very happy despite the hardness of his seat. For a time the young priest saw Marie's eyes wide open, still full of all the radiance of the marvels that he had related. For a long while she kept them ardently fixed upon his own, but at last closed them, and then he knew not whether she was sleeping, or with eyelids simply closed was living the everlasting miracle over again. Some of the sufferers were dreaming aloud, giving vent to bursts of laughter which unconscious moans interrupted. Perhaps they beheld the Archangels opening their flesh to wrest their diseases from them. Others, restless with insomnia, turned over and over, stifling their sobs and gazing fixedly into the darkness. And, with a shudder born of all the mystery he had evoked, Pierre, distracted, no longer master of himself in that delirious sphere of fraternal suffering, ended by hating his very mind, and, drawn into close communion with all those humble folks, sought to believe like them. What could be the use of that physiological inquiry into Bernadette's case, so full of gaps and intricacies? Why should he not accept her as a messenger from the spheres beyond, as one of the elect chosen for the divine mystery? Doctors were but ignorant men with rough and brutal hands, and it would be so delightful to fall asleep in childlike faith, in the enchanted gardens of the impossible. And for a moment indeed he surrendered himself, experiencing a delightful feeling of comfort, no longer seeking to explain anything, but accepting the Visionary with her sumptuous /cortege/ of miracles, and relying on God to think and determine for him. Then he looked out through the window, which they did not dare to open on account of the consumptive patients, and beheld the immeasurable night which enwrapped the country across which the train was fleeing. The storm must have burst forth there; the sky was now of an admirable nocturnal purity, as though cleansed by the masses of fallen water. Large stars shone out in the dark velvet, alone illumining, with their mysterious gleams, the silent, refreshed fields, which incessantly displayed only the black solitude of slumber. And across the Landes, through the valleys, between the hills, that carriage of wretchedness and suffering rolled on and on, over-heated, pestilential, rueful, and wailing, amidst the serenity of the august night, so lovely and so mild. They had passed Riscle at one in the morning. Between the jolting, the painful, the hallucinatory silence still continued. At two o'clock, as they reached Vic-de-Bigorre, low moans were heard; the bad state of the line, with the unbearable spreading tendency of the train's motion, was sorely shaking the patients. It was only at Tarbes, at half-past two, that silence was at length broken, and that morning prayers were said, though black night still reigned around them. There came first the "Pater," and then the "Ave," the "Credo," and the supplication to God to grant them the happiness of a glorious day. "O God, vouchsafe me sufficient strength that I may avoid all that is evil, do all that is good, and suffer uncomplainingly every pain." And now there was to be no further stoppage until they reached Lourdes. Barely three more quarters of an hour, and Lourdes, with all its vast hopes, would blaze forth in the midst of that night, so long and cruel. Their painful awakening was enfevered by the thought; a final agitation arose amidst the morning discomfort, as the abominable sufferings began afresh. Sister Hyacinthe, however, was especially anxious about the strange man, whose sweat-covered face she had been continually wiping. He had so far managed to keep alive, she watching him without a pause, never having once closed her eyes, but unremittingly listening to his faint breathing with the stubborn desire to take him to the holy Grotto before he died. All at once, however, she felt frightened; and addressing Madame de Jonquiere, she hastily exclaimed, "Pray pass me the vinegar bottle at once--I can no longer hear him breathe." For an instant, indeed, the man's faint breathing had ceased. His eyes were still closed, his lips parted; he could not have been paler, he had an ashen hue, and was cold. And the carriage was rolling along with its ceaseless rattle of coupling-irons; the speed of the train seemed even to have increased. "I will rub his temples," resumed Sister Hyacinthe. "Help me, do!" But, at a more violent jolt of the train, the man suddenly fell from the seat, face downward. "Ah! /mon Dieu/, help me, pick him up!" They picked him up, and found him dead. And they had to seat him in his corner again, with his back resting against the woodwork. He remained there erect, his torso stiffened, and his head wagging slightly at each successive jolt. Thus the train continued carrying him along, with the same thundering noise of wheels, while the engine, well pleased, no doubt, to be reaching its destination, began whistling shrilly, giving vent to quite a flourish of delirious joy as it sped through the calm night. And then came the last and seemingly endless half-hour of the journey, in company with that wretched corpse. Two big tears had rolled down Sister Hyacinthe's cheeks, and with her hands joined she had begun to pray. The whole carriage shuddered with terror at sight of that terrible companion who was being taken, too late alas! to the Blessed Virgin. Hope, however, proved stronger than sorrow or pain, and although all the sufferings there assembled awoke and grew again, irritated by overwhelming weariness, a song of joy nevertheless proclaimed the sufferers' triumphal entry into the Land of Miracles. Amidst the tears which their pains drew from them, the exasperated and howling sick began to chant the "Ave maris Stella" with a growing clamour in which lamentation finally turned into cries of hope. Marie had again taken Pierre's hand between her little feverish fingers. "Oh, /mon Dieu! /" said she, "to think that poor man is dead, and I feared so much that it was I who would die before arriving. And we are there--there at last!" The priest was trembling with intense emotion. "It means that you are to be cured, Marie," he replied, "and that I myself shall be cured if you pray for me--" The engine was now whistling in a yet louder key in the depths of the bluish darkness. They were nearing their destination. The lights of Lourdes already shone out on the horizon. Then the whole train again sang a canticle--the rhymed story of Bernadette, that endless ballad of six times ten couplets, in which the Angelic Salutation ever returns as a refrain, all besetting and distracting, opening to the human mind the portals of the heaven of ecstasy:-- "It was the hour for ev'ning pray'r; Soft bells chimed on the chilly air. Ave, ave, ave Maria! "The maid stood on the torrent's bank, A breeze arose, then swiftly sank. Ave, ave, ave Maria! "And she beheld, e'en as it fell, The Virgin on Massabielle. Ave, ave, ave Maria! "All white appeared the Lady chaste, A zone of Heaven round her waist. Ave, ave, ave Maria! "Two golden roses, pure and sweet, Bloomed brightly on her naked feet. Ave, ave, ave Maria! "Upon her arm, so white and round, Her chaplet's milky pearls were wound. Ave, ave, ave Maria! "The maiden prayed till, from her eyes, The vision sped to Paradise. Ave, ave, ave Maria!"

1

THE TRAIN ARRIVES

IT was twenty minutes past three by the clock of the Lourdes railway station, the dial of which was illumined by a reflector. Under the slanting roof sheltering the platform, a hundred yards or so in length, some shadowy forms went to and fro, resignedly waiting. Only a red signal light peeped out of the black countryside, far away. Two of the promenaders suddenly halted. The taller of them, a Father of the Assumption, none other indeed than the Reverend Father Fourcade, director of the national pilgrimage, who had reached Lourdes on the previous day, was a man of sixty, looking superb in his black cloak with its large hood. His fine head, with its clear, domineering eyes and thick grizzly beard, was the head of a general whom an intelligent determination to conquer inflames. In consequence, however, of a sudden attack of gout he slightly dragged one of his legs, and was leaning on the shoulder of his companion, Dr. Bonamy, the practitioner attached to the Miracle Verification Office, a short, thick-set man, with a square-shaped, clean-shaven face, which had dull, blurred eyes and a tranquil cast of features. Father Fourcade had stopped to question the station-master whom he perceived running out of his office. "Will the white train be very late, monsieur?" he asked. "No, your reverence. It hasn't lost more than ten minutes; it will be here at the half-hour. It's the Bayonne train which worries me; it ought to have passed through already." So saying, he ran off to give an order; but soon came back again, his slim, nervous figure displaying marked signs of agitation. He lived, indeed, in a state of high fever throughout the period of the great pilgrimages. Apart from the usual service, he that day expected eighteen trains, containing more than fifteen thousand passengers. The grey and the blue trains which had started from Paris the first had already arrived at the regulation hour. But the delay in the arrival of the white train was very troublesome, the more so as the Bayonne express--which passed over the same rails--had not yet been signalled. It was easy to understand, therefore, what incessant watchfulness was necessary, not a second passing without the entire staff of the station being called upon to exercise its vigilance. "In ten minutes, then?" repeated Father Fourcade. "Yes, in ten minutes, unless I'm obliged to close the line!" cried the station-master as he hastened into the telegraph office. Father Fourcade and the doctor slowly resumed their promenade. The thing which astonished them was that no serious accident had ever happened in the midst of such a fearful scramble. In past times, especially, the most terrible disorder had prevailed. Father Fourcade complacently recalled the first pilgrimage which he had organised and led, in 1875; the terrible endless journey without pillows or mattresses, the patients exhausted, half dead, with no means of reviving them at hand; and then the arrival at Lourdes, the train evacuated in confusion, no /materiel/ in readiness, no straps, nor stretchers, nor carts. But now there was a powerful organisation; a hospital awaited the sick, who were no longer reduced to lying upon straw in sheds. What a shock for those unhappy ones! What force of will in the man of faith who led them to the scene of miracles! The reverend Father smiled gently at the thought of the work which he had accomplished. Then, still leaning on the doctor's shoulder, he began to question him: "How many pilgrims did you have last year?" he asked. "About two hundred thousand. That is still the average. In the year of the Coronation of the Virgin the figure rose to five hundred thousand. But to bring that about an exceptional occasion was needed with a great effort of propaganda. Such vast masses cannot be collected together every day." A pause followed, and then Father Fourcade murmured: "No doubt. Still the blessing of Heaven attends our endeavours; our work thrives more and more. We have collected more than two hundred thousand francs in donations for this journey, and God will be with us, there will be many cures for you to proclaim to-morrow, I am sure of it." Then, breaking off, he inquired: "Has not Father Dargeles come here?" Dr. Bonamy waved his hand as though to say that he did not know. Father Dargeles was the editor of the "Journal de la Grotte." He belonged to the Order of the Fathers of the Immaculate Conception whom the Bishop had installed at Lourdes and who were the absolute masters there; though, when the Fathers of the Assumption came to the town with the national pilgrimage from Paris, which crowds of faithful Catholics from Cambrai, Arras, Chartres, Troyes, Rheims, Sens, Orleans, Blois, and Poitiers joined, they evinced a kind of affectation in disappearing from the scene. Their omnipotence was no longer felt either at the Grotto or at the Basilica; they seemed to surrender every key together with every responsibility. Their superior, Father Capdebarthe, a tall, peasant-like man, with a knotty frame, a big head which looked as if it had been fashioned with a bill-hook, and a worn face which retained a ruddy mournful reflection of the soil, did not even show himself. Of the whole community you only saw little, insinuating Father Dargeles; but he was met everywhere, incessantly on the look-out for paragraphs for his newspaper. At the same time, however, although the Fathers of the Immaculate Conception disappeared in this fashion, it could be divined that they were behind the vast stage, like a hidden sovereign power, coining money and toiling without a pause to increase the triumphant prosperity of their business. Indeed, they turned even their humility to account. "It's true that we have had to get up early--two in the morning," resumed Father Fourcade gaily. "But I wished to be here. What would my poor children have said, indeed, if I had not come?" He was alluding to the sick pilgrims, those who were so much flesh for miracle-working; and it was a fact that he had never missed coming to the station, no matter what the hour, to meet that woeful white train, that train which brought such grievous suffering with it. "Five-and-twenty minutes past three--only another five minutes now," exclaimed Dr. Bonamy repressing a yawn as he glanced at the clock; for, despite his obsequious air, he was at bottom very much annoyed at having had to get out of bed so early. However, he continued his slow promenade with Father Fourcade along that platform which resembled a covered walk, pacing up and down in the dense night which the gas jets here and there illumined with patches of yellow light. Little parties, dimly outlined, composed of priests and gentlemen in frock-coats, with a solitary officer of dragoons, went to and fro incessantly, talking together the while in discreet murmuring tones. Other people, seated on benches, ranged along the station wall, were also chatting or putting their patience to proof with their glances wandering away into the black stretch of country before them. The doorways of the offices and waiting-rooms, which were brilliantly lighted, looked like great holes in the darkness, and all was flaring in the refreshment-room, where you could see the marble tables and the counter laden with bottles and glasses and baskets of bread and fruit. On the right hand, beyond the roofing of the platform, there was a confused swarming of people. There was here a goods gate, by which the sick were taken out of the station, and a mass of stretchers, litters, and hand-carts, with piles of pillows and mattresses, obstructed the broad walk. Three parties of bearers were also assembled here, persons of well-nigh every class, but more particularly young men of good society, all wearing red, orange-tipped crosses and straps of yellow leather. Many of them, too, had adopted the Bearnese cap, the convenient head-gear of the region; and a few, clad as though they were bound on some distant expedition, displayed wonderful gaiters reaching to their knees. Some were smoking, whilst others, installed in their little vehicles, slept or read newspapers by the light of the neighbouring gas jets. One group, standing apart, were discussing some service question. Suddenly, however, one and all began to salute. A paternal-looking man, with a heavy but good-natured face, lighted by large blue eyes, like those of a credulous child, was approaching. It was Baron Suire, the President of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation. He possessed a great fortune and occupied a high position at Toulouse. "Where is Berthaud?" he inquired of one bearer after another, with a busy air. "Where is Berthaud? I must speak to him." The others answered, volunteering contradictory information. Berthaud was their superintendent, and whilst some said that they had seen him with the Reverend Father Fourcade, others affirmed that he must be in the courtyard of the station inspecting the ambulance vehicles. And they thereupon offered to go and fetch him. "No, no, thank you," replied the Baron. "I shall manage to find him myself." Whilst this was happening, Berthaud, who had just seated himself on a bench at the other end of the station, was talking with his young friend, Gerard de Peyrelongue, by way of occupation pending the arrival of the train. The superintendent of the bearers was a man of forty, with a broad, regular-featured, handsome face and carefully trimmed whiskers of a lawyer-like pattern. Belonging to a militant Legitimist family and holding extremely reactionary opinions, he had been Procureur de la Republique (public prosecutor) in a town of the south of France from the time of the parliamentary revolution of the twenty-fourth of May* until that of the decree of the Religious Communities,** when he had resigned his post in a blusterous fashion, by addressing an insulting letter to the Minister of Justice. And he had never since laid down his arms, but had joined the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation as a sort of protest, repairing year after year to Lourdes in order to "demonstrate"; convinced as he was that the pilgrimages were both disagreeable and hurtful to the Republic, and that God alone could re-establish the Monarchy by one of those miracles which He worked so lavishly at the Grotto. Despite all this, however, Berthaud possessed no small amount of good sense, and being of a gay disposition, displayed a kind of jovial charity towards the poor sufferers whose transport he had to provide for during the three days that the national pilgrimage remained at Lourdes. * The parliamentary revolution of May, 1873, by which M. Thiers was overthrown and Marshal MacMahon installed in his place with the object of restoring the Monarchy in France. --Trans. ** M. Grevy's decree by which the Jesuits were expelled. --Trans. "And so, my dear Gerard," he said to the young man seated beside him, "your marriage is really to come off this year?" "Why yes, if I can find such a wife as I want," replied the other. "Come, cousin, give me some good advice." Gerard de Peyrelongue, a short, thin, carroty young man, with a pronounced nose and prominent cheek-bones, belonged to Tarbes, where his father and mother had lately died, leaving him at the utmost some seven or eight thousand francs a year. Extremely ambitious, he had been unable to find such a wife as he desired in his native province--a well-connected young woman capable of helping him to push both forward and upward in the world; and so he had joined the Hospitality, and betook himself every summer to Lourdes, in the vague hope that amidst the mass of believers, the torrent of devout mammas and daughters which flowed thither, he might find the family whose help he needed to enable him to make his way in this terrestrial sphere. However, he remained in perplexity, for if, on the one hand, he already had several young ladies in view, on the other, none of them completely satisfied him. "Eh, cousin? You will advise me, won't you?" he said to Berthaud. "You are a man of experience. There is Mademoiselle Lemercier who comes here with her aunt. She is very rich; according to what is said she has over a million francs. But she doesn't belong to our set, and besides I think her a bit of a madcap." Berthaud nodded. "I told you so; if I were you I should choose little Raymonde, Mademoiselle de Jonquiere." "But she hasn't a copper!" "That's true--she has barely enough to pay for her board. But she is fairly good-looking, she has been well brought up, and she has no extravagant tastes. That is the really important point, for what is the use of marrying a rich girl if she squanders the dowry she brings you? Besides, I know Madame and Mademoiselle de Jonquiere very well, I meet them all through the winter in the most influential drawing-rooms of Paris. And, finally, don't forget the girl's uncle, the diplomatist, who has had the painful courage to remain in the service of the Republic. He will be able to do whatever he pleases for his niece's husband." For a moment Gerard seemed shaken, and then he relapsed into perplexity. "But she hasn't a copper," he said, "no, not a copper. It's too stiff. I am quite willing to think it over, but it really frightens me too much." This time Berthaud burst into a frank laugh. "Come, you are ambitious, so you must be daring. I tell you that it means the secretaryship of an embassy before two years are over. By the way, Madame and Mademoiselle de Jonquiere are in the white train which we are waiting for. Make up your mind and pay your court at once." "No, no! Later on. I want to think it over." At this moment they were interrupted, for Baron Suire, who had already once gone by without perceiving them, so completely did the darkness enshroud them in that retired corner, had just recognised the ex-public prosecutor's good-natured laugh. And, thereupon, with the volubility of a man whose head is easily unhinged, he gave him several orders respecting the vehicles and the transport service, deploring the circumstance that it would be impossible to conduct the patients to the Grotto immediately on their arrival, as it was yet so extremely early. It had therefore been decided that they should in the first instance be taken to the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours, where they would be able to rest awhile after their trying journey. Whilst the Baron and the superintendent were thus settling what measures should be adopted, Gerard shook hands with a priest who had sat down beside him. This was the Abbe des Hermoises, who was barely eight-and-thirty years of age and had a superb head--such a head as one might expect to find on the shoulders of a worldly priest. With his hair well combed, and his person perfumed, he was not unnaturally a great favourite among women. Very amiable and distinguished in his manners, he did not come to Lourdes in any official capacity, but simply for his pleasure, as so many other people did; and the bright, sparkling smile of a sceptic above all idolatry gleamed in the depths of his fine eyes. He certainly believed, and bowed to superior decisions; but the Church--the Holy See--had not pronounced itself with regard to the miracles; and he seemed quite ready to dispute their authenticity. Having lived at Tarbes he was already acquainted with Gerard. "Ah!" he said to him, "how impressive it is--isn't it? --this waiting for the trains in the middle of the night! I have come to meet a lady--one of my former Paris penitents--but I don't know what train she will come by. Still, as you see, I stop on, for it all interests me so much." Then another priest, an old country priest, having come to sit down on the same bench, the Abbe considerately began talking to him, speaking of the beauty of the Lourdes district and of the theatrical effect which would take place by-and-by when the sun rose and the mountains appeared. However, there was again a sudden alert, and the station-master ran along shouting orders. Removing his hand from Dr. Bonamy's shoulder, Father Fourcade, despite his gouty leg, hastily drew near. "Oh! it's that Bayonne express which is so late," answered the station-master in reply to the questions addressed to him. "I should like some information about it; I'm not at ease." At this moment the telegraph bells rang out and a porter rushed away into the darkness swinging a lantern, whilst a distant signal began to work. Thereupon the station-master resumed: "Ah! this time it's the white train. Let us hope we shall have time to get the sick people out before the express passes." He started off once more and disappeared. Berthaud meanwhile called to Gerard, who was at the head of a squad of bearers, and they both made haste to join their men, into whom Baron Suire was already instilling activity. The bearers flocked to the spot from all sides, and setting themselves in motion began dragging their little vehicles across the lines to the platform at which the white train would come in--an unroofed platform plunged in darkness. A mass of pillows, mattresses, stretchers, and litters was soon waiting there, whilst Father Fourcade, Dr. Bonamy, the priests, the gentlemen, and the officer of dragoons in their turn crossed over in order to witness the removal of the ailing pilgrims. All that they could as yet see, far away in the depths of the black country, was the lantern in front of the engine, looking like a red star which grew larger and larger. Strident whistles pierced the night, then suddenly ceased, and you only heard the panting of the steam and the dull roar of the wheels gradually slackening their speed. Then the canticle became distinctly audible, the song of Bernadette with the ever-recurring "Aves" of its refrain, which the whole train was chanting in chorus. And at last this train of suffering and faith, this moaning, singing train, thus making its entry into Lourdes, drew up in the station. The carriage doors were at once opened, the whole throng of healthy pilgrims, and of ailing ones able to walk, alighted, and streamed over the platform. The few gas lamps cast but a feeble light on the crowd of poverty-stricken beings clad in faded garments, and encumbered with all sorts of parcels, baskets, valises, and boxes. And amidst all the jostling of this scared flock, which did not know in which direction to turn to find its way out of the station, loud exclamations were heard, the shouts of people calling relatives whom they had lost, mingled with the embraces of others whom relatives or friends had come to meet. One woman declared with beatifical satisfaction, "I have slept well." A priest went off carrying his travelling-bag, after wishing a crippled lady "good luck!" Most of them had the bewildered, weary, yet joyous appearance of people whom an excursion train sets down at some unknown station. And such became the scramble and the confusion in the darkness, that they did not hear the railway /employes/ who grew quite hoarse through shouting, "This way! this way!" in their eagerness to clear the platform as soon as possible. Sister Hyacinthe had nimbly alighted from her compartment, leaving the dead man in the charge of Sister Claire des Anges; and, losing her head somewhat, she ran off to the cantine van in the idea that Ferrand would be able to help her. Fortunately she found Father Fourcade in front of the van and acquainted him with the fatality in a low voice. Repressing a gesture of annoyance, he thereupon called Baron Suire, who was passing, and began whispering in his ear. The muttering lasted for a few seconds, and then the Baron rushed off, and clove his way through the crowd with two bearers carrying a covered litter. In this the man was removed from the carriage as though he were a patient who had simply fainted, the mob of pilgrims paying no further attention to him amidst all the emotion of their arrival. Preceded by the Baron, the bearers carried the corpse into a goods office, where they provisionally lodged it behind some barrels; one of them, a fair-haired little fellow, a general's son, remaining to watch over it. Meanwhile, after begging Ferrand and Sister Saint-Francois to go and wait for her in the courtyard of the station, near the reserved vehicle which was to take them to the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours, Sister Hyacinthe returned to the railway carriage and talked of helping her patients to alight before going away. But Marie would not let her touch her. "No, no!" said the girl, "do not trouble about me, Sister. I shall remain here the last. My father and Abbe Froment have gone to the van to fetch the wheels; I am waiting for their return; they know how to fix them, and they will take me away all right, you may be sure of it." In the same way M. Sabathier and Brother Isidore did not desire to be moved until the crowd had decreased. Madame de Jonquiere, who had taken charge of La Grivotte, also promised to see to Madame Vetu's removal in an ambulance vehicle. And thereupon Sister Hyacinthe decided that she would go off at once so as to get everything ready at the hospital. Moreover, she took with her both little Sophie Couteau and Elise Rouquet, whose face she very carefully wrapped up. Madame Maze preceded them, while Madame Vincent, carrying her little girl, who was unconscious and quite white, struggled through the crowd, possessed by the fixed idea of running off as soon as possible and depositing the child in the Grotto at the feet of the Blessed Virgin. The mob was now pressing towards the doorway by which passengers left the station, and to facilitate the egress of all these people it at last became necessary to open the luggage gates. The /employes/, at a loss how to take the tickets, held out their caps, which a downpour of the little cards speedily filled. And in the courtyard, a large square courtyard, skirted on three sides by the low buildings of the station, the most extraordinary uproar prevailed amongst all the vehicles of divers kinds which were there jumbled together. The hotel omnibuses, backed against the curb of the footway, displayed the most sacred names on their large boards--Jesus and Mary, St. Michel, the Rosary, and the Sacred Heart. Then there were ambulance vehicles, landaus, cabriolets, brakes, and little donkey carts, all entangled together, with their drivers shouting, swearing, and cracking their whips--the tumult being apparently increased by the obscurity in which the lanterns set brilliant patches of light. Rain had fallen heavily a few hours previously. Liquid mud splashed up under the hoofs of the horses; the foot passengers sank into it to their ankles. M. Vigneron, whom Madame Vigneron and Madame Chaise were following in a state of distraction, raised Gustave, in order to place him in the omnibus from the Hotel of the Apparitions, after which he himself and the ladies climbed into the vehicle. Madame Maze, shuddering slightly, like a delicate tabby who fears to dirty the tips of her paws, made a sign to the driver of an old brougham, got into it, and quickly drove away, after giving as address the Convent of the Blue Sisters. And at last Sister Hyacinthe was able to install herself with Elise Rouquet and Sophie Couteau in a large /char-a-bancs/, in which Ferrand and Sisters Saint-Francois and Claire des Anges were already seated. The drivers whipped up their spirited little horses, and the vehicles went off at a breakneck pace, amidst the shouts of those left behind, and the splashing of the mire. In presence of that rushing torrent, Madame Vincent, with her dear little burden in her arms, hesitated to cross over. Bursts of laughter rang out around her every now and then. Oh! what a filthy mess! And at sight of all the mud, the women caught up their skirts before attempting to pass through it. At last, when the courtyard had somewhat emptied, Madame Vincent herself ventured on her way, all terror lest the mire should make her fall in that black darkness. Then, on reaching a downhill road, she noticed there a number of women of the locality who were on the watch, offering furnished rooms, bed and board, according to the state of the pilgrim's purse. "Which is the way to the Grotto, madame, if you please?" asked Madame Vincent, addressing one old woman of the party. Instead of answering the question, however, the other offered her a cheap room. "You won't find anything in the hotels," said she, "for they are all full. Perhaps you will be able to eat there, but you certainly won't find a closet even to sleep in." Eat, sleep, indeed! Had Madame Vincent any thought of such things; she who had left Paris with thirty sous in her pocket, all that remained to her after the expenses she had been put to! "The way to the Grotto, if you please, madame?" she repeated. Among the women who were thus touting for lodgers, there was a tall, well-built girl, dressed like a superior servant, and looking very clean, with carefully tended hands. She glanced at Madame Vincent and slightly shrugged her shoulders. And then, seeing a broad-chested priest with a red face go by, she rushed after him, offered him a furnished room, and continued following him, whispering in his ear. Another girl, however, at last took pity on Madame Vincent and said to her: "Here, go down this road, and when you get to the bottom, turn to the right and you will reach the Grotto." Meanwhile, the confusion inside the station continued. The healthy pilgrims, and those of the sick who retained the use of their legs could go off, thus, in some measure, clearing the platform; but the others, the more grievously stricken sufferers whom it was difficult to get out of the carriages and remove to the hospital, remained waiting. The bearers seemed to become quite bewildered, rushing madly hither and thither with their litters and vehicles, not knowing at what end to set about the profusion of work which lay before them. As Berthaud, followed by Gerard, went along the platform, gesticulating, he noticed two ladies and a girl who were standing under a gas jet and to all appearance waiting. In the girl he recognised Raymonde, and with a sign of the hand he at once stopped his companion. "Ah! mademoiselle," said he, "how pleased I am to see you! Is Madame de Jonquiere quite well? You have made a good journey, I hope?" Then, without a pause, he added: "This is my friend, Monsieur Gerard de Peyrelongue." Raymonde gazed fixedly at the young man with her clear, smiling eyes. "Oh! I already have the pleasure of being slightly acquainted with this gentleman," she said. "We have previously met one another at Lourdes." Thereupon Gerard, who thought that his cousin Berthaud was conducting matters too quickly, and was quite resolved that he would not enter into any hasty engagement, contented himself with bowing in a ceremonious way. "We are waiting for mamma," resumed Raymonde. "She is extremely busy; she has to see after some pilgrims who are very ill." At this, little Madame Desagneaux, with her pretty, light wavy-haired head, began to say that it served Madame de Jonquiere right for refusing her services. She herself was stamping with impatience, eager to join in the work and make herself useful, whilst Madame Volmar, silent, shrinking back as though taking no interest in it at all, seemed simply desirous of penetrating the darkness, as though, indeed, she were seeking somebody with those magnificent eyes of hers, usually bedimmed, but now shining out like brasiers. Just then, however, they were all pushed back. Madame Dieulafay was being removed from her first-class compartment, and Madame Desagneaux could not restrain an exclamation of pity. "Ah! the poor woman!" There could in fact be no more distressing sight than this young woman, encompassed by luxury, covered with lace in her species of coffin, so wasted that she seemed to be a mere human shred, deposited on that platform till it could be taken away. Her husband and her sister, both very elegant and very sad, remained standing near her, whilst a man-servant and maid ran off with the valises to ascertain if the carriage which had been ordered by telegram was in the courtyard. Abbe Judaine also helped the sufferer; and when two men at last took her up he bent over her and wished her /au revoir/, adding some kind words which she did not seem to hear. Then as he watched her removal, he resumed, addressing himself to Berthaud, whom he knew: "Ah! the poor people, if they could only purchase their dear sufferer's cure. I told them that prayer was the most precious thing in the Blessed Virgin's eyes, and I hope that I have myself prayed fervently enough to obtain the compassion of Heaven. Nevertheless, they have brought a magnificent gift, a golden lantern for the Basilica, a perfect marvel, adorned with precious stones. May the Immaculate Virgin deign to smile upon it!" In this way a great many offerings were brought by the pilgrims. Some huge bouquets of flowers had just gone by, together with a kind of triple crown of roses, mounted on a wooden stand. And the old priest explained that before leaving the station he wished to secure a banner, the gift of the beautiful Madame Jousseur, Madame Dieulafay's sister. Madame de Jonquiere was at last approaching, however, and on perceiving Berthaud and Gerard she exclaimed: "Pray do go to that carriage, gentlemen--that one, there! We want some men very badly. There are three or four sick persons to be taken out. I am in despair; I can do nothing myself." Gerard ran off after bowing to Raymonde, whilst Berthaud advised Madame de Jonquiere to leave the station with her daughter and those ladies instead of remaining on the platform. Her presence was in nowise necessary, he said; he would undertake everything, and within three quarters of an hour she would find her patients in her ward at the hospital. She ended by giving way, and took a conveyance in company with Raymonde and Madame Desagneaux. As for Madame Volmar, she had at the last moment disappeared, as though seized with a sudden fit of impatience. The others fancied that they had seen her approach a strange gentleman, with the object no doubt of making some inquiry of him. However, they would of course find her at the hospital. Berthaud joined Gerard again just as the young man, assisted by two fellow-bearers, was endeavouring to remove M. Sabathier from the carriage. It was a difficult task, for he was very stout and very heavy, and they began to think that he would never pass through the doorway of the compartment. However, as he had been got in they ought to be able to get him out; and indeed when two other bearers had entered the carriage from the other side, they were at last able to deposit him on the platform. The dawn was now appearing, a faint pale dawn; and the platform presented the woeful appearance of an improvised hospital. La Grivotte, who had lost consciousness, lay there on a mattress pending her removal in a litter; whilst Madame Vetu had been seated against a lamp-post, suffering so severely from another attack of her ailment that they scarcely dared to touch her. Some hospitallers, whose hands were gloved, were with difficulty wheeling their little vehicles in which were poor, sordid-looking women with old baskets at their feet. Others, with stretchers on which lay the stiffened, woeful bodies of silent sufferers, whose eyes gleamed with anguish, found themselves unable to pass; but some of the infirm pilgrims, some unfortunate cripples, contrived to slip through the ranks, among them a young priest who was lame, and a little humpbacked boy, one of whose legs had been amputated, and who, looking like a gnome, managed to drag himself with his crutches from group to group. Then there was quite a block around a man who was bent in half, twisted by paralysis to such a point that he had to be carried on a chair with his head and feet hanging downward. It seemed as though hours would be required to clear the platform. The dismay therefore reached a climax when the station-master suddenly rushed up shouting: "The Bayonne express is signalled. Make haste! make haste! You have only three minutes left!" Father Fourcade, who had remained in the midst of the throng, leaning on Doctor Bonamy's arm, and gaily encouraging the more stricken of the sufferers, beckoned to Berthaud and said to him: "Finish taking them out of the train; you will be able to clear the platform afterwards!" The advice was very sensible, and in accordance with it they finished placing the sufferers on the platform. In Madame de Jonquiere's carriage Marie now alone remained, waiting patiently. M. de Guersaint and Pierre had at last returned to her, bringing the two pairs of wheels by means of which the box in which she lay was rolled about. And with Gerard's assistance Pierre in all haste removed the girl from the train. She was as light as a poor shivering bird, and it was only the box that gave them any trouble. However, they soon placed it on the wheels and made the latter fast, and then Pierre might have rolled Marie away had it not been for the crowd which hampered him. "Make haste! make haste!" furiously repeated the station-master. He himself lent a hand, taking hold of a sick man by the feet in order to remove him from the compartment more speedily. And he also pushed the little hand-carts back, so as to clear the edge of the platform. In a second-class carriage, however, there still remained one woman who had just been overpowered by a terrible nervous attack. She was howling and struggling, and it was impossible to think of touching her at that moment. But on the other hand the express, signalled by the incessant tinkling of the electric bells, was now fast approaching, and they had to close the door and in all haste shunt the train to the siding where it would remain for three days, until in fact it was required to convey its load of sick and healthy passengers back to Paris. As it went off to the siding the crowd still heard the cries of the suffering woman, whom it had been necessary to leave in it, in charge of a Sister, cries which grew weaker and weaker, like those of a strengthless child whom one at last succeeds in consoling. "Good Lord!" muttered the station-master; "it was high time!" In fact the Bayonne express was now coming along at full speed, and the next moment it rushed like a crash of thunder past that woeful platform littered with all the grievous wretchedness of a hospital hastily evacuated. The litters and little handcarts were shaken, but there was no accident, for the porters were on the watch, and pushed back the bewildered flock which was still jostling and struggling in its eagerness to get away. As soon as the express had passed, however, circulation was re-established, and the bearers were at last able to complete the removal of the sick with prudent deliberation. Little by little the daylight was increasing--a clear dawn it was, whitening the heavens whose reflection illumined the earth, which was still black. One began to distinguish things and people clearly. "Oh, by-and-by!" Marie repeated to Pierre, as he endeavoured to roll her away. "Let us wait till some part of the crowd has gone." Then, looking around, she began to feel interested in a man of military bearing, apparently some sixty years of age, who was walking about among the sick pilgrims. With a square-shaped head and white bushy hair, he would still have looked sturdy if he had not dragged his left foot, throwing it inward at each step he took. With the left hand, too, he leant heavily on a thick walking-stick. When M. Sabathier, who had visited Lourdes for six years past, perceived him, he became quite gay. "Ah!" said he, "it is you, Commander!" Commander was perhaps the old man's name. But as he was decorated with a broad red riband, he was possibly called Commander on account of his decoration, albeit the latter was that of a mere chevalier. Nobody exactly knew his story. No doubt he had relatives and children of his own somewhere, but these matters remained vague and mysterious. For the last three years he had been employed at the railway station as a superintendent in the goods department, a simple occupation, a little berth which had been given him by favour and which enabled him to live in perfect happiness. A first stroke of apoplexy at fifty-five years of age had been followed by a second one three years later, which had left him slightly paralysed in the left side. And now he was awaiting the third stroke with an air of perfect tranquillity. As he himself put it, he was at the disposal of death, which might come for him that night, the next day, or possibly that very moment. All Lourdes knew him on account of the habit, the mania he had, at pilgrimage time, of coming to witness the arrival of the trains, dragging his foot along and leaning upon his stick, whilst expressing his astonishment and reproaching the ailing ones for their intense desire to be made whole and sound again. This was the third year that he had seen M. Sabathier arrive, and all his anger fell upon him. "What! you have come back /again/!" he exclaimed. "Well, you /must/ be desirous of living this hateful life! But /sacrebleu/! go and die quietly in your bed at home. Isn't that the best thing that can happen to anyone?" M. Sabathier evinced no anger, but laughed, exhausted though he was by the handling to which he had been subjected during his removal from the carriage. "No, no," said he, "I prefer to be cured." "To be cured, to be cured! That's what they all ask for. They travel hundreds of leagues and arrive in fragments, howling with pain, and all this to be cured--to go through every worry and every suffering again. Come, monsieur, you would be nicely caught if, at your age and with your dilapidated old body, your Blessed Virgin should be pleased to restore the use of your legs to you. What would you do with them, /mon Dieu? / What pleasure would you find in prolonging the abomination of old age for a few years more? It's much better to die at once, while you are like that! Death is happiness!" He spoke in this fashion, not as a believer who aspires to the delicious reward of eternal life, but as a weary man who expects to fall into nihility, to enjoy the great everlasting peace of being no more. Whilst M. Sabathier was gaily shrugging his shoulders as though he had a child to deal with, Abbe Judaine, who had at last secured his banner, came by and stopped for a moment in order that he might gently scold the Commander, with whom he also was well acquainted. "Don't blaspheme, my dear friend," he said. "It is an offence against God to refuse life and to treat health with contempt. If you yourself had listened to me, you would have asked the Blessed Virgin to cure your leg before now." At this the Commander became angry. "My leg! The Virgin can do nothing to it! I'm quite at my ease. May death come and may it all be over forever! When the time comes to die you turn your face to the wall and you die--it's simple enough." The old priest interrupted him, however. Pointing to Marie, who was lying on her box listening to them, he exclaimed: "You tell all our sick to go home and die--even mademoiselle, eh? She who is full of youth and wishes to live." Marie's eyes were wide open, burning with the ardent desire which she felt to /be/, to enjoy her share of the vast world; and the Commander, who had drawn near, gazed upon her, suddenly seized with deep emotion which made his voice tremble. "If mademoiselle gets well," he said, "I will wish her another miracle, that she be happy." Then he went off, dragging his foot and tapping the flagstones with the ferrule of his stout stick as he continued wending his way, like an angry philosopher among the suffering pilgrims. Little by little, the platform was at last cleared. Madame Vetu and La Grivotte were carried away, and Gerard removed M. Sabathier in a little cart, whilst Baron Suire and Berthaud already began giving orders for the green train, which would be the next one to arrive. Of all the ailing pilgrims the only one now remaining at the station was Marie, of whom Pierre jealously took charge. He had already dragged her into the courtyard when he noticed that M. de Guersaint had disappeared; but a moment later he perceived him conversing with the Abbe des Hermoises, whose acquaintance he had just made. Their admiration of the beauties of nature had brought them together. The daylight had now appeared, and the surrounding mountains displayed themselves in all their majesty. "What a lovely country, monsieur!" exclaimed M. de Guersaint. "I have been wishing to see the Cirque de Gavarnie for thirty years past. But it is some distance away and the trip must be an expensive one, so that I fear I shall not be able to make it." "You are mistaken, monsieur," said the Abbe; "nothing is more easily managed. By making up a party the expense becomes very slight. And as it happens, I wish to return there this year, so that if you would like to join us--" "Oh, certainly, monsieur. We will speak of it again. A thousand thanks," replied M. de Guersaint. His daughter was now calling him, however, and he joined her after taking leave of the Abbe in a very cordial manner. Pierre had decided that he would drag Marie to the hospital so as to spare her the pain of transference to another vehicle. But as the omnibuses, landaus, and other conveyances were already coming back, again filling the courtyard in readiness for the arrival of the next train, the young priest had some difficulty in reaching the road with the little chariot whose low wheels sank deeply in the mud. Some police agents charged with maintaining order were cursing that fearful mire which splashed their boots; and indeed it was only the touts, the young and old women who had rooms to let, who laughed at the puddles, which they crossed and crossed again in every direction, pursuing the last pilgrims that emerged from the station. When the little car had begun to roll more easily over the sloping road Marie suddenly inquired of M. de Guersaint, who was walking near her: "What day of the week is it, father?" "Saturday, my darling." "Ah! yes, Saturday, the day of the Blessed Virgin. Is it to-day that she will cure me?" Then she began thinking again; while, at some distance behind her, two bearers came furtively down the road, with a covered stretcher in which lay the corpse of the man who had died in the train. They had gone to take it from behind the barrels in the goods office, and were now conveying it to a secret spot of which Father Fourcade had told them.

2

HOSPITAL AND GROTTO

BUILT, so far as it extends, by a charitable Canon, and left unfinished through lack of money, the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours is a vast pile, four storeys high, and consequently far too lofty, since it is difficult to carry the sufferers to the topmost wards. As a rule the building is occupied by a hundred infirm and aged paupers; but at the season of the national pilgrimage these old folks are for three days sheltered elsewhere, and the hospital is let to the Fathers of the Assumption, who at times lodge in it as many as five and six hundred patients. Still, however closely packed they may be, the accommodation never suffices, so that the three or four hundred remaining sufferers have to be distributed between the Hospital of Salvation and the town hospital, the men being sent to the former and the women to the latter institution. That morning at sunrise great confusion prevailed in the sand-covered courtyard of Our Lady of Dolours, at the door of which a couple of priests were mounting guard. The temporary staff, with its formidable supply of registers, cards, and printed formulas, had installed itself in one of the ground-floor rooms on the previous day. The managers were desirous of greatly improving upon the organisation of the preceding year. The lower wards were this time to be reserved to the most helpless sufferers; and in order to prevent a repetition of the cases of mistaken identity which had occurred in the past, very great care was to be taken in filling in and distributing the admission cards, each of which bore the name of a ward and the number of a bed. It became difficult, however, to act in accordance with these good intentions in presence of the torrent of ailing beings which the white train had brought to Lourdes, and the new formalities so complicated matters that the patients had to be deposited in the courtyard as they arrived, to wait there until it became possible to admit them in something like an orderly manner. It was the scene witnessed at the railway station all over again, the same woeful camping in the open, whilst the bearers and the young seminarists who acted as the secretary's assistants ran hither and thither in bewilderment. "We have been over-ambitious, we wanted to do things too well!" exclaimed Baron Suire in despair. There was much truth in his remark, for never had a greater number of useless precautions been taken, and they now discovered that, by some inexplicable error, they had allotted not the lower--but the higher-placed wards to the patients whom it was most difficult to move. It was impossible to begin the classification afresh, however, and so as in former years things must be allowed to take their course, in a haphazard way. The distribution of the cards began, a young priest at the same time entering each patient's name and address in a register. Moreover, all the /hospitalisation/ cards bearing the patients' names and numbers had to be produced, so that the names of the wards and the numbers of the beds might be added to them; and all these formalities greatly protracted the /defile/. Then there was an endless coming and going from the top to the bottom of the building, and from one to the other end of each of its four floors. M. Sabathier was one of the first to secure admittance, being placed in a ground-floor room which was known as the Family Ward. Sick men were there allowed to have their wives with them; but to the other wards of the hospital only women were admitted. Brother Isidore, it is true, was accompanied by his sister; however, by a special favour it was agreed that they should be considered as conjoints, and the missionary was accordingly placed in the bed next to that allotted to M. Sabathier. The chapel, still littered with plaster and with its unfinished windows boarded up, was close at hand. There were also various wards in an unfinished state; still these were filled with mattresses, on which sufferers were rapidly placed. All those who could walk, however, were already besieging the refectory, a long gallery whose broad windows looked into an inner courtyard; and the Saint-Frai Sisters, who managed the hospital at other times, and had remained to attend to the cooking, began to distribute bowls of coffee and chocolate among the poor women whom the terrible journey had exhausted. "Rest yourselves and try to gain a little strength," repeated Baron Suire, who was ever on the move, showing himself here, there, and everywhere in rapid succession. "You have three good hours before you, it is not yet five, and their reverences have given orders that you are not to be taken to the Grotto until eight o'clock, so as to avoid any excessive fatigue." Meanwhile, up above on the second floor, Madame de Jonquiere had been one of the first to take possession of the Sainte-Honorine Ward of which she was the superintendent. She had been obliged to leave her daughter Raymonde downstairs, for the regulations did not allow young girls to enter the wards, where they might have witnessed sights that were scarcely proper or else too horrible for such eyes as theirs. Raymonde had therefore remained in the refectory as a helper; however, little Madame Desagneaux, being a lady-hospitaller, had not left the superintendent, and was already asking her for orders, in her delight that she should at last be able to render some assistance. "Are all these beds properly made, madame?" she inquired; "perhaps I had better make them afresh with Sister Hyacinthe." The ward, whose walls were painted a light yellow, and whose few windows admitted but little light from an inner yard, contained fifteen beds, standing in two rows against the walls. "We will see by-and-by," replied Madame de Jonquiere with an absorbed air. She was busy counting the beds and examining the long narrow apartment. And this accomplished she added in an undertone: "I shall never have room enough. They say that I must accommodate twenty-three patients. We shall have to put some mattresses down." Sister Hyacinthe, who had followed the ladies after leaving Sister Saint-Francois and Sister Claire des Anges in a small adjoining apartment which was being transformed into a linen-room, then began to lift up the coverlets and examine the bedding. And she promptly reassured Madame Desagneaux with regard to her surmises. "Oh! the beds are properly made," she said; "everything is very clean too. One can see that the Saint-Frai Sisters have attended to things themselves. The reserve mattresses are in the next room, however, and if madame will lend me a hand we can place some of them between the beds at once. "Oh, certainly!" exclaimed young Madame Desagneaux, quite excited by the idea of carrying mattresses about with her weak slender arms. It became necessary for Madame de Jonquiere to calm her. "By-and-by," said the lady-superintendent; "there is no hurry. Let us wait till our patients arrive. I don't much like this ward, it is so difficult to air. Last year I had the Sainte-Rosalie Ward on the first floor. However, we will organise matters, all the same." Some other lady-hospitallers were now arriving, quite a hiveful of busy bees, all eager to start on their work. The confusion which so often arose was, in fact, increased by the excessive number of nurses, women of the aristocracy and upper-middle class, with whose fervent zeal some little vanity was blended. There were more than two hundred of them, and as each had to make a donation on joining the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation, the managers did not dare to refuse any applicants, for fear lest they might check the flow of alms-giving. Thus the number of lady-hospitallers increased year by year. Fortunately there were among them some who cared for nothing beyond the privilege of wearing the red cloth cross, and who started off on excursions as soon as they reached Lourdes. Still it must be acknowledged that those who devoted themselves were really deserving, for they underwent five days of awful fatigue, sleeping scarcely a couple of hours each night, and living in the midst of the most terrible and repulsive spectacles. They witnessed the death agonies, dressed the pestilential sores, cleaned up, changed linen, turned the sufferers over in their beds, went through a sickening and overwhelming labour to which they were in no wise accustomed. And thus they emerged from it aching all over, tired to death, with feverish eyes flaming with the joy of the charity which so excited them. "And Madame Volmar?" suddenly asked Madame Desagneaux. "I thought we should find her here." This was apparently a subject which Madame de Jonquiere did not care to have discussed; for, as though she were aware of the truth and wished to bury it in silence, with the indulgence of a woman who compassionates human wretchedness, she promptly retorted: "Madame Volmar isn't strong, she must have gone to the hotel to rest. We must let her sleep." Then she apportioned the beds among the ladies present, allotting two to each of them; and this done they all finished taking possession of the place, hastening up and down and backwards and forwards in order to ascertain where the offices, the linen-room, and the kitchens were situated. "And the dispensary?" then asked one of the ladies. But there was no dispensary. There was no medical staff even. What would have been the use of any? --since the patients were those whom science had given up, despairing creatures who had come to beg of God the cure which powerless men were unable to promise them. Logically enough, all treatment was suspended during the pilgrimage. If a patient seemed likely to die, extreme unction was administered. The only medical man about the place was the young doctor who had come by the white train with his little medicine chest; and his intervention was limited to an endeavour to assuage the sufferings of those patients who chanced to ask for him during an attack. As it happened, Sister Hyacinthe was just bringing Ferrand, whom Sister Saint-Francois had kept with her in a closet near the linen-room which he proposed to make his quarters. "Madame," said he to Madame de Jonquiere, "I am entirely at your disposal. In case of need you will only have to ring for me." She barely listened to him, however, engaged as she was in a quarrel with a young priest belonging to the management with reference to a deficiency of certain utensils. "Certainly, monsieur, if we should need a soothing draught," she answered, and then, reverting to her discussion, she went on: "Well, Monsieur l'Abbe, you must certainly get me four or five more. How can we possibly manage with so few? Things are bad enough as it is." Ferrand looked and listened, quite bewildered by the extraordinary behaviour of the people amongst whom he had been thrown by chance since the previous day. He who did not believe, who was only present out of friendship and charity, was amazed at this extraordinary scramble of wretchedness and suffering rushing towards the hope of happiness. And, as a medical man of the new school, he was altogether upset by the careless neglect of precautions, the contempt which was shown for the most simple teachings of science, in the certainty which was apparently felt that, if Heaven should so will it, cure would supervene, sudden and resounding, like a lie given to the very laws of nature. But if this were the case, what was the use of that last concession to human prejudices--why engage a doctor for the journey if none were wanted? At this thought the young man returned to his little room, experiencing a vague feeling of shame as he realised that his presence was useless, and even a trifle ridiculous. "Get some opium pills ready all the same," said Sister Hyacinthe, as she went back with him as far as the linen-room. "You will be asked for some, for I feel anxious about some of the patients." While speaking she looked at him with her large blue eyes, so gentle and so kind, and ever lighted by a divine smile. The constant exercise which she gave herself brought the rosy flush of her quick blood to her skin all dazzling with youthfulness. And like a good friend who was willing that he should share the work to which she gave her heart, she added: "Besides, if I should need somebody to get a patient in or out of bed, you will help me, won't you?" Thereupon, at the idea that he might be of use to her, he was pleased that he had come and was there. In his mind's eye, he again beheld her at his bedside, at the time when he had so narrowly escaped death, nursing him with fraternal hands, with the smiling, compassionate grace of a sexless angel, in whom there was something more than a comrade, something of a woman left. However, the thought never occurred to him that there was religion, belief, behind her. "Oh! I will help you as much as you like, Sister," he replied. "I belong to you, I shall be so happy to serve you. You know very well what a debt of gratitude I have to pay you." In a pretty way she raised her finger to her lips so as to silence him. Nobody owed her anything. She was merely the servant of the ailing and the poor. At this moment a first patient was making her entry into the Sainte-Honorine Ward. It was Marie, lying in her wooden box, which Pierre, with Gerard's assistance, had just brought up-stairs. The last to start from the railway station, she had secured admission before the others, thanks to the endless complications which, after keeping them all in suspense, now freed them according to the chance distribution of the admission cards. M. de Guersaint had quitted his daughter at the hospital door by her own desire; for, fearing the hotels would be very full, she had wished him to secure two rooms for himself and Pierre at once. Then, on reaching the ward, she felt so weary that, after venting her chagrin at not being immediately taken to the Grotto, she consented to be laid on a bed for a short time. "Come, my child," repeated Madame de Jonquiere, "you have three hours before you. We will put you to bed. It will ease you to take you out of that case." Thereupon the lady-superintendent raised her by the shoulders, whilst Sister Hyacinthe held her feet. The bed was in the central part of the ward, near a window. For a moment the poor girl remained on it with her eyes closed, as though exhausted by being moved about so much. Then it became necessary that Pierre should be readmitted, for she grew very fidgety, saying that there were things which she must explain to him. "Pray don't go away, my friend," she exclaimed when he approached her. "Take the case out on to the landing, but stay there, because I want to be taken down as soon as I can get permission." "Do you feel more comfortable now?" asked the young priest. "Yes, no doubt--but I really don't know. I so much want to be taken yonder to the Blessed Virgin's feet." However, when Pierre had removed the case, the successive arrivals of the other patients supplied her with some little diversion. Madame Vetu, whom two bearers had brought up-stairs, holding her under the arms, was laid, fully dressed, on the next bed, where she remained motionless, scarce breathing, with her heavy, yellow, cancerous mask. None of the patients, it should be mentioned, were divested of their clothes, they were simply stretched out on the beds, and advised to go to sleep if they could manage to do so. Those whose complaints were less grievous contented themselves with sitting down on their mattresses, chatting together, and putting the things they had brought with them in order. For instance, Elise Rouquet, who was also near Marie, on the other side of the latter's bed, opened her basket to take a clean fichu out of it, and seemed sorely annoyed at having no hand-glass with her. In less than ten minutes all the beds were occupied, so that when La Grivotte appeared, half carried by Sister Hyacinthe and Sister Claire des Anges, it became necessary to place some mattresses on the floor. "Here! here is one," exclaimed Madame Desagneaux; "she will be very well here, out of the draught from the door." Seven other mattresses were soon added in a line, occupying the space between the rows of beds, so that it became difficult to move about. One had to be very careful, and follow narrow pathways which had been left between the beds and the mattresses. Each of the patients had retained possession of her parcel, or box, or bag, and round about the improvised shakedowns were piles of poor old things, sorry remnants of garments, straying among the sheets and the coverlets. You might have thought yourself in some woeful infirmary, hastily organised after some great catastrophe, some conflagration or earthquake which had thrown hundreds of wounded and penniless beings into the streets. Madame de Jonquiere made her way from one to the other end of the ward, ever and ever repeating, "Come, my children, don't excite yourselves; try to sleep a little." However, she did not succeed in calming them, and indeed, she herself, like the other lady-hospitallers under her orders, increased the general fever by her own bewilderment. The linen of several patients had to be changed, and there were other needs to be attended to. One woman, suffering from an ulcer in the leg, began moaning so dreadfully that Madame Desagneaux undertook to dress her sore afresh; but she was not skilful, and despite all her passionate courage she almost fainted, so greatly was she distressed by the unbearable odour. Those patients who were in better health asked for broth, bowlfuls of which began to circulate amidst the calls, the answers, and the contradictory orders which nobody executed. And meanwhile, let loose amidst this frightful scramble, little Sophie Couteau, who remained with the Sisters, and was very gay, imagined that it was playtime, and ran, and jumped, and hopped in turn, called and petted first by one and then by another, dear as she was to all alike for the miraculous hope which she brought them. However, amidst this agitation, the hours went by. Seven o'clock had just struck when Abbe Judaine came in. He was the chaplain of the Sainte-Honorine Ward, and only the difficulty of finding an unoccupied altar at which he might say his mass had delayed his arrival. As soon as he appeared, a cry of impatience arose from every bed. "Oh! Monsieur le Cure, let us start, let us start at once!" An ardent desire, which each passing minute heightened and irritated, was upbuoying them, like a more and more devouring thirst, which only the waters of the miraculous fountain could appease. And more fervently than any of the others, La Grivotte, sitting up on her mattress, and joining her hands, begged and begged that she might be taken to the Grotto. Was there not a beginning of the miracle in this--in this awakening of her will power, this feverish desire for cure which enabled her to set herself erect? Inert and fainting on her arrival, she was now seated, turning her dark glances in all directions, waiting and watching for the happy moment when she would be removed. And colour also was returning to her livid face. She was already resuscitating. "Oh! Monsieur le Cure, pray do tell them to take me--I feel that I shall be cured," she exclaimed. With a loving, fatherly smile on his good-natured face, Abbe Judaine listened to them all, and allayed their impatience with kind words. They would soon set out; but they must be reasonable, and allow sufficient time for things to be organised; and besides, the Blessed Virgin did not like to have violence done her; she bided her time, and distributed her divine favours among those who behaved themselves the best. As he paused before Marie's bed and beheld her, stammering entreaties with joined hands, he again paused. "And you, too, my daughter, you are in a hurry?" he said. "Be easy, there is grace enough in heaven for you all." "I am dying of love, Father," she murmured in reply. "My heart is so swollen with prayers, it stifles me--" He was greatly touched by the passion of this poor emaciated child, so harshly stricken in her youth and beauty, and wishing to appease her, he called her attention to Madame Vetu, who did not move, though with her eyes wide open she stared at all who passed. "Look at madame, how quiet she is!" he said. "She is meditating, and she does right to place herself in God's hands, like a little child." However, in a scarcely audible voice, a mere breath, Madame Vetu stammered: "Oh! I am suffering, I am suffering." At last, at a quarter to eight o'clock, Madame de Jonquiere warned her charges that they would do well to prepare themselves. She herself, assisted by Sister Hyacinthe and Madame Desagneaux, buttoned several dresses, and put shoes on impotent feet. It was a real toilette, for they all desired to appear to the greatest advantage before the Blessed Virgin. A large number had sufficient sense of delicacy to wash their hands. Others unpacked their parcels, and put on clean linen. On her side, Elise Rouquet had ended by discovering a little pocket-glass in the hands of a woman near her, a huge, dropsical creature, who was very coquettish; and having borrowed it, she leant it against the bolster, and then, with infinite care, began to fasten her fichu as elegantly as possible about her head, in order to hide her distorted features. Meanwhile, erect in front of her, little Sophie watched her with an air of profound interest. It was Abbe Judaine who gave the signal for starting on the journey to the Grotto. He wished, he said, to accompany his dear suffering daughters thither, whilst the lady-hospitallers and the Sisters remained in the ward, so as to put things in some little order again. Then the ward was at once emptied, the patients being carried down-stairs amidst renewed tumult. And Pierre, having replaced Marie's box upon its wheels, took the first place in the /cortege/, which was formed of a score of little handcarts, bath-chairs, and litters. The other wards, however, were also emptying, the courtyard became crowded, and the /defile/ was organised in haphazard fashion. There was soon an interminable train descending the rather steep slope of the Avenue de la Grotte, so that Pierre was already reaching the Plateau de la Merlasse when the last stretchers were barely leaving the precincts of the hospital. It was eight o'clock, and the sun, already high, a triumphant August sun, was flaming in the great sky, which was beautifully clear. It seemed as if the blue of the atmosphere, cleansed by the storm of the previous night, were quite new, fresh with youth. And the frightful /defile/, a perfect "Cour des Miracles" of human woe, rolled along the sloping pavement amid all the brilliancy of that radiant morning. There was no end to the train of abominations; it appeared to grow longer and longer. No order was observed, ailments of all kinds were jumbled together; it seemed like the clearing of some inferno where the most monstrous maladies, the rare and awful cases which provoke a shudder, had been gathered together. Eczema, roseola, elephantiasis, presented a long array of doleful victims. Well-nigh vanished diseases reappeared; one old woman was affected with leprosy, another was, covered with impetiginous lichen like a tree which has rotted in the shade. Then came the dropsical ones, inflated like wine-skins; and beside some stretchers there dangled hands twisted by rheumatism, while from others protruded feet swollen by oedema beyond all recognition, looking, in fact, like bags full of rags. One woman, suffering from hydrocephalus, sat in a little cart, the dolorous motions of her head bespeaking her grievous malady. A tall girl afflicted with chorea--St. Vitus's dance--was dancing with every limb, without a pause, the left side of her face being continually distorted by sudden, convulsive grimaces. A younger one, who followed, gave vent to a bark, a kind of plaintive animal cry, each time that the tic douloureux which was torturing her twisted her mouth and her right cheek, which she seemed to throw forward. Next came the consumptives, trembling with fever, exhausted by dysentery, wasted to skeletons, with livid skins, recalling the colour of that earth in which they would soon be laid to rest; and there was one among them who was quite white, with flaming eyes, who looked indeed like a death's head in which a torch had been lighted. Then every deformity of the contractions followed in succession--twisted trunks, twisted arms, necks askew, all the distortions of poor creatures whom nature had warped and broken; and among these was one whose right hand was thrust back behind her ribs whilst her head fell to the left resting fixedly upon her shoulder. Afterwards came poor rachitic girls displaying waxen complexions and slender necks eaten away by sores, and yellow-faced women in the painful stupor which falls on those whose bosoms are devoured by cancers; whilst others, lying down with their mournful eyes gazing heavenwards, seemed to be listening to the throbs of the tumours which obstructed their organs. And still more and more went by; there was always something more frightful to come; this woman following that other one increased the general shudder of horror. From the neck of a girl of twenty who had a crushed, flattened head like a toad's, there hung so large a goitre that it fell even to her waist like the bib of an apron. A blind woman walked along, her head erect, her face pale like marble, displaying the acute inflammation of her poor, ulcerated eyes. An aged woman stricken with imbecility, afflicted with dreadful facial disfigurements, laughed aloud with a terrifying laugh. And all at once an epileptic was seized with convulsions, and began foaming on her stretcher, without, however, causing any stoppage of the procession, which never slackened its march, lashed onward as it was by the blizzard of feverish passion which impelled it towards the Grotto. The bearers, the priests, and the ailing ones themselves had just intonated a canticle, the song of Bernadette, and all rolled along amid the besetting "Aves," so that the little carts, the litters, and the pedestrians descended the sloping road like a swollen and overflowing torrent of roaring water. At the corner of the Rue Saint-Joseph, near the Plateau de la Merlasse, a family of excursionists, who had come from Cauterets or Bagneres, stood at the edge of the footway, overcome with profound astonishment. These people were evidently well-to-do /bourgeois/, the father and mother very correct in appearance and demeanour, while their two big girls, attired in light-coloured dresses, had the smiling faces of happy creatures who are amusing themselves. But their first feeling of surprise was soon followed by terror, a growing terror, as if they beheld the opening of some pesthouse of ancient times, some hospital of the legendary ages, evacuated after a great epidemic. The two girls became quite pale, while the father and the mother felt icy cold in presence of that endless /defile/ of so many horrors, the pestilential emanations of which were blown full in their faces. O God! to think that such hideousness, such filth, such suffering, should exist! Was it possible--under that magnificently radiant sun, under those broad heavens so full of light and joy whither the freshness of the Gave's waters ascended, and the breeze of morning wafted the pure perfumes of the mountains! When Pierre, at the head of the /cortege/, reached the Plateau de la Merlasse, he found himself immersed in that clear sunlight, that fresh and balmy air. He turned round and smiled affectionately at Marie; and as they came out on the Place du Rosaire in the morning splendour, they were both enchanted with the lovely panorama which spread around them. In front, on the east, was Old Lourdes, lying in a broad fold of the ground beyond a rock. The sun was rising behind the distant mountains, and its oblique rays clearly outlined the dark lilac mass of that solitary rock, which was crowned by the tower and crumbling walls of the ancient castle, once the redoubtable key of the seven valleys. Through the dancing, golden dust you discerned little of the ruined pile except some stately outlines, some huge blocks of building which looked as though reared by Cyclopean hands; and beyond the rock you but vaguely distinguished the discoloured, intermingled house-roofs of the old town. Nearer in than the castle, however, the new town--the rich and noisy city which had sprung up in a few years as though by miracle--spread out on either hand, displaying its hotels, its stylish shops, its lodging-houses all with white fronts smiling amidst patches of greenery. Then there was the Gave flowing along at the base of the rock, rolling clamorous, clear waters, now blue and now green, now deep as they passed under the old bridge, and now leaping as they careered under the new one, which the Fathers of the Immaculate Conception had built in order to connect the Grotto with the railway station and the recently opened Boulevard. And as a background to this delightful picture, this fresh water, this greenery, this gay, scattered, rejuvenated town, the little and the big Gers arose, two huge ridges of bare rock and low herbage, which, in the projected shade that bathed them, assumed delicate tints of pale mauve and green, fading softly into pink. Then, upon the north, on the right bank of the Gave, beyond the hills followed by the railway line, the heights of La Buala ascended, their wooded slopes radiant in the morning light. On that side lay Bartres. More to the left arose the Serre de Julos, dominated by the Miramont. Other crests, far off, faded away into the ether. And in the foreground, rising in tiers among the grassy valleys beyond the Gave, a number of convents, which seemed to have sprung up in this region of prodigies like early vegetation, imparted some measure of life to the landscape. First, there was an Orphan Asylum founded by the Sisters of Nevers, whose vast buildings shone brightly in the sunlight. Next came the Carmelite convent, on the highway to Pau, just in front of the Grotto; and then that of the Assumptionists higher up, skirting the road to Poueyferre; whilst the Dominicans showed but a corner of their roofs, sequestered in the far-away solitude. And at last appeared the establishment of the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, those who were called the Blue Sisters, and who had founded at the far end of the valley a home where they received well-to-do lady pilgrims, desirous of solitude, as boarders. At that early hour all the bells of these convents were pealing joyfully in the crystalline atmosphere, whilst the bells of other convents, on the other, the southern horizon, answered them with the same silvery strains of joy. The bell of the nunnery of Sainte Clarissa, near the old bridge, rang a scale of gay, clear notes, which one might have fancied to be the chirruping of a bird. And on this side of the town, also, there were valleys that dipped down between the ridges, and mountains that upreared their bare sides, a commingling of smiling and of agitated nature, an endless surging of heights amongst which you noticed those of Visens, whose slopes the sunlight tinged ornately with soft blue and carmine of a rippling, moire-like effect. However, when Marie and Pierre turned their eyes to the west, they were quite dazzled. The sun rays were here streaming on the large and the little Beout with their cupolas of unequal height. And on this side the background was one of gold and purple, a dazzling mountain on whose sides one could only discern the road which snaked between the trees on its way to the Calvary above. And here, too, against the sunlit background, radiant like an aureola, stood out the three superposed churches which at the voice of Bernadette had sprung from the rock to the glory of the Blessed Virgin. First of all, down below, came the church of the Rosary, squat, circular, and half cut out of the rock, at the farther end of an esplanade on either side of which, like two huge arms, were colossal gradient ways ascending gently to the Crypt church. Vast labour had been expended here, a quarryful of stones had been cut and set in position, there were arches as lofty as naves supporting the gigantic terraced avenues which had been constructed so that the processions might roll along in all their pomp, and the little conveyances containing sick children might ascend without hindrance to the divine presence. Then came the Crypt, the subterranean church within the rock, with only its low door visible above the church of the Rosary, whose paved roof, with its vast promenade, formed a continuation of the terraced inclines. And at last, from the summit sprang the Basilica, somewhat slender and frail, recalling some finely chased jewel of the Renascence, and looking very new and very white--like a prayer, a spotless dove, soaring aloft from the rocks of Massabielle. The spire, which appeared the more delicate and slight when compared with the gigantic inclines below, seemed like the little vertical flame of a taper set in the midst of the vast landscape, those endless waves of valleys and mountains. By the side, too, of the dense greenery of the Calvary hill, it looked fragile and candid, like childish faith; and at sight of it you instinctively thought of the little white arm, the little thin hand of the puny girl, who had here pointed to Heaven in the crisis of her human sufferings. You could not see the Grotto, the entrance of which was on the left, at the base of the rock. Beyond the Basilica, the only buildings which caught the eye were the heavy square pile where the Fathers of the Immaculate Conception had their abode, and the episcopal palace, standing much farther away, in a spreading, wooded valley. And the three churches were flaming in the morning glow, and the rain of gold scattered by the sun rays was sweeping the whole countryside, whilst the flying peals of the bells seemed to be the very vibration of the light, the musical awakening of the lovely day that was now beginning. Whilst crossing the Place du Rosaire, Pierre and Marie glanced at the Esplanade, the public walk with its long central lawn skirted by broad parallel paths and extending as far as the new bridge. Here, with face turned towards the Basilica, was the great crowned statue of the Virgin. All the sufferers crossed themselves as they went by. And still passionately chanting its canticle, the fearful /cortege/ rolled on, through nature in festive array. Under the dazzling sky, past the mountains of gold and purple, amidst the centenarian trees, symbolical of health, the running waters whose freshness was eternal, that /cortege/ still and ever marched on with its sufferers, whom nature, if not God, had condemned, those who were afflicted with skin diseases, those whose flesh was eaten away, those who were dropsical and inflated like wine-skins, and those whom rheumatism and paralysis had twisted into postures of agony. And the victims of hydrocephalus followed, with the dancers of St. Vitus, the consumptives, the rickety, the epileptic, the cancerous, the goitrous, the blind, the mad, and the idiotic. "Ave, ave, ave, Maria!" they sang; and the stubborn plaint acquired increased volume, as nearer and nearer to the Grotto it bore that abominable torrent of human wretchedness and pain, amidst all the fright and horror of the passers-by, who stopped short, unable to stir, their hearts frozen as this nightmare swept before their eyes. Pierre and Marie were the first to pass under the lofty arcade of one of the terraced inclines. And then, as they followed the quay of the Gave, they all at once came upon the Grotto. And Marie, whom Pierre wheeled as near to the railing as possible, was only able to raise herself in her little conveyance, and murmur: "O most Blessed Virgin, Virgin most loved!" She had seen neither the entrances to the piscinas nor the twelve-piped fountain, which she had just passed; nor did she distinguish any better the shop on her left hand where crucifixes, chaplets, statuettes, pictures, and other religious articles were sold, or the stone pulpit on her right which Father Massias already occupied. Her eyes were dazzled by the splendour of the Grotto; it seemed to her as if a hundred thousand tapers were burning there behind the railing, filling the low entrance with the glow of a furnace and illuminating, as with star rays, the statue of the Virgin, which stood, higher up, at the edge of a narrow ogive-like cavity. And for her, apart from that glorious apparition, nothing existed there, neither the crutches with which a part of the vault had been covered, nor the piles of bouquets fading away amidst the ivy and the eglantine, nor even the altar placed in the centre near a little portable organ over which a cover had been thrown. However, as she raised her eyes above the rock, she once more beheld the slender white Basilica profiled against the sky, its slight, tapering spire soaring into the azure of the Infinite like a prayer. "O Virgin most powerful--Queen of the Virgins--Holy Virgin of Virgins!" Pierre had now succeeded in wheeling Marie's box to the front rank, beyond the numerous oak benches which were set out here in the open air as in the nave of a church. Nearly all these benches were already occupied by those sufferers who could sit down, while the vacant spaces were soon filled with litters and little vehicles whose wheels became entangled together, and on whose close-packed mattresses and pillows all sorts of diseases were gathered pell-mell. Immediately on arriving, the young priest had recognised the Vignerons seated with their sorry child Gustave in the middle of a bench, and now, on the flagstones, he caught sight of the lace-trimmed bed of Madame Dieulafay, beside whom her husband and sister knelt in prayer. Moreover, all the patients of Madame de Jonquiere's carriage took up position here--M. Sabathier and Brother Isidore side by side, Madame Vetu reclining hopelessly in a conveyance, Elise Rouquet seated, La Grivotte excited and raising herself on her clenched hands. Pierre also again perceived Madame Maze, standing somewhat apart from the others, and humbling herself in prayer; whilst Madame Vincent, who had fallen on her knees, still holding her little Rose in her arms, presented the child to the Virgin with ardent entreaty, the distracted gesture of a mother soliciting compassion from the mother of divine grace. And around this reserved space was the ever-growing throng of pilgrims, the pressing, jostling mob which gradually stretched to the parapet overlooking the Gave. "O Virgin most merciful," continued Marie in an undertone, "Virgin most faithful, Virgin conceived without sin!" Then, almost fainting, she spoke no more, but with her lips still moving, as though in silent prayer, gazed distractedly at Pierre. He thought that she wished to speak to him and leant forward: "Shall I remain here at your disposal to take you to the piscina by-and-by?" he asked. But as soon as she understood him she shook her head. And then in a feverish way she said: "No, no, I don't want to be bathed this morning. It seems to me that one must be truly worthy, truly pure, truly holy before seeking the miracle! I want to spend the whole morning in imploring it with joined hands; I want to pray, to pray with all my strength and all my soul--" She was stifling, and paused. Then she added: "Don't come to take me back to the hospital till eleven o'clock. I will not let them take me from here till then." However, Pierre did not go away, but remained near her. For a moment, he even fell upon his knees; he also would have liked to pray with the same burning faith, to beg of God the cure of that poor sick child, whom he loved with such fraternal affection. But since he had reached the Grotto he had felt a singular sensation invading him, a covert revolt, as it were, which hampered the pious flight of his prayer. He wished to believe; he had spent the whole night hoping that belief would once more blossom in his soul, like some lovely flower of innocence and candour, as soon as he should have knelt upon the soil of that land of miracle. And yet he only experienced discomfort and anxiety in presence of the theatrical scene before him, that pale stiff statue in the false light of the tapers, with the chaplet shop full of jostling customers on the one hand, and the large stone pulpit whence a Father of the Assumption was shouting "Aves" on the other. Had his soul become utterly withered then? Could no divine dew again impregnate it with innocence, render it like the souls of little children, who at the slightest caressing touch of the sacred legend give themselves to it entirely? Then, while his thoughts were still wandering, he recognised Father Massias in the ecclesiastic who occupied the pulpit. He had formerly known him, and was quite stirred by his sombre ardour, by the sight of his thin face and sparkling eyes, by the eloquence which poured from his large mouth as he offered violence to Heaven to compel it to descend upon earth. And whilst he thus examined Father Massias, astonished at feeling himself so unlike the preacher, he caught sight of Father Fourcade, who, at the foot of the pulpit, was deep in conference with Baron Suire. The latter seemed much perplexed by something which Father Fourcade said to him; however he ended by approving it with a complaisant nod. Then, as Abbe Judaine was also standing there, Father Fourcade likewise spoke to him for a moment, and a scared expression came over the Abbe's broad, fatherly face while he listened; nevertheless, like the Baron, he at last bowed assent. Then, all at once, Father Fourcade appeared in the pulpit, erect, drawing up his lofty figure which his attack of gout had slightly bent; and he had not wished that Father Massias, his well-loved brother, whom he preferred above all others, should altogether go down the narrow stairway, for he had kept him upon one of the steps, and was leaning on his shoulder. And in a full, grave voice, with an air of sovereign authority which caused perfect silence to reign around, he spoke as follows: "My dear brethren, my dear sisters, I ask your forgiveness for interrupting your prayers, but I have a communication to make to you, and I have to ask the help of all your faithful souls. We had a very sad accident to deplore this morning, one of our brethren died in one of the trains by which you came to Lourdes, died just as he was about to set foot in the promised land." A brief pause followed and Father Fourcade seemed to become yet taller, his handsome face beaming with fervour, amidst his long, streaming, royal beard. "Well, my dear brethren, my dear sisters," he resumed, "in spite of everything, the idea has come to me that we ought not to despair. Who knows if God Almighty did not will that death in order that He might prove His Omnipotence to the world? It is as though a voice were speaking to me, urging me to ascend this pulpit and ask your prayers for this man, this man who is no more, but whose life is nevertheless in the hands of the most Blessed Virgin who can still implore her Divine Son in his favour. Yes, the man is here, I have caused his body to be brought hither, and it depends on you, perhaps, whether a brilliant miracle shall dazzle the universe, if you pray with sufficient ardour to touch the compassion of Heaven. We will plunge the man's body into the piscina and we will entreat the Lord, the master of the world, to resuscitate him, to give unto us this extraordinary sign of His sovereign beneficence!" An icy thrill, wafted from the Invisible, passed through the listeners. They had all become pale, and though the lips of none of them had opened, it seemed as if a murmur sped through their ranks amidst a shudder. "But with what ardour must we not pray!" violently resumed Father Fourcade, exalted by genuine faith. "It is your souls, your whole souls, that I ask of you, my dear brothers, my dear sisters, it is a prayer in which you must put your hearts, your blood, your very life with whatever may be most noble and loving in it! Pray with all your strength, pray till you no longer know who you are, or where you are; pray as one loves, pray as one dies, for that which we are about to ask is so precious, so rare, so astounding a grace that only the energy of our worship can induce God to answer us. And in order that our prayers may be the more efficacious, in order that they may have time to spread and ascend to the feet of the Eternal Father, we will not lower the body into the piscina until four o'clock this afternoon. And now my dear brethren, now my dear sisters, pray, pray to the most Blessed Virgin, the Queen of the Angels, the Comforter of the Afflicted!" Then he himself, distracted by emotion, resumed the recital of the rosary, whilst near him Father Massias burst into sobs. And thereupon the great anxious silence was broken, contagion seized upon the throng, it was transported and gave vent to shouts, tears, and confused stammered entreaties. It was as though a breath of delirium were sweeping by, reducing men's wills to naught, and turning all these beings into one being, exasperated with love and seized with a mad desire for the impossible prodigy. And for a moment Pierre had thought that the ground was giving way beneath him, that he was about to fall and faint. But with difficulty he managed to rise from his knees and slowly walked away.

3

FOUNTAIN AND PISCINA

As Pierre went off, ill at ease, mastered by invincible repugnance, unwilling to remain there any longer, he caught sight of M. de Guersaint, kneeling near the Grotto, with the absorbed air of one who is praying with his whole soul. The young priest had not seen him since the morning, and did not know whether he had managed to secure a couple of rooms in one or other of the hotels, so that his first impulse was to go and join him. Then, however, he hesitated, unwilling to disturb his meditations, for he was doubtless praying for his daughter, whom he fondly loved, in spite of the constant absent-mindedness of his volatile brain. Accordingly, the young priest passed on, and took his way under the trees. Nine o'clock was now striking, he had a couple of hours before him. By dint of money, the wild bank where swine had formerly pastured had been transformed into a superb avenue skirting the Gave. It had been necessary to put back the river's bed in order to gain ground, and lay out a monumental quay bordered by a broad footway, and protected by a parapet. Some two or three hundred yards farther on, a hill brought the avenue to an end, and it thus resembled an enclosed promenade, provided with benches, and shaded by magnificent trees. Nobody passed along, however; merely the overflow of the crowd had settled there, and solitary spots still abounded between the grassy wall limiting the promenade on the south, and the extensive fields spreading out northward beyond the Gave, as far as the wooded slopes which the white-walled convents brightened. Under the foliage, on the margin of the running water, one could enjoy delightful freshness, even during the burning days of August. Thus Pierre, like a man at last awakening from a painful dream, soon found rest of mind again. He had questioned himself in the acute anxiety which he felt with regard to his sensations. Had he not reached Lourdes that morning possessed by a genuine desire to believe, an idea that he was indeed again beginning to believe even as he had done in the docile days of childhood when his mother had made him join his hands, and taught him to fear God? Yet as soon as he had found himself at the Grotto, the idolatry of the worship, the violence of the display of faith, the onslaught upon human reason which he witnessed, had so disturbed him that he had almost fainted. What would become of him then? Could he not even try to contend against his doubts by examining things and convincing himself of their truth, thus turning his journey to profit? At all events, he had made a bad beginning, which left him sorely agitated, and he indeed needed the environment of those fine trees, that limpid, rushing water, that calm, cool avenue, to recover from the shock. Still pondering, he was approaching the end of the pathway, when he most unexpectedly met a forgotten friend. He had, for a few seconds, been looking at a tall old gentleman who was coming towards him, dressed in a tightly buttoned frock-coat and broad-brimmed hat; and he had tried to remember where it was that he had previously beheld that pale face, with eagle nose, and black and penetrating eyes. These he had seen before, he felt sure of it; but the promenader's long white beard and long curly white hair perplexed him. However, the other halted, also looking extremely astonished, though he promptly exclaimed, "What, Pierre? Is it you, at Lourdes?" Then all at once the young priest recognised Doctor Chassaigne, his father's old friend, his own friend, the man who had cured and consoled him in the terrible physical and mental crisis which had come upon him after his mother's death. "Ah! my dear doctor, how pleased I am to see you!" he replied. They embraced with deep emotion. And now, in presence of that snowy hair and snowy beard, that slow walk, that sorrowful demeanour, Pierre remembered with what unrelenting ferocity misfortune had fallen on that unhappy man and aged him. But a few years had gone by, and now, when they met again, he was bowed down by destiny. "You did not know, I suppose, that I had remained at Lourdes?" said the doctor. "It's true that I no longer write to anybody; in fact, I am no longer among the living. I live in the land of the dead." Tears were gathering in his eyes, and emotion made his voice falter as he resumed: "There! come and sit down on that bench yonder; it will please me to live the old days afresh with you, just for a moment." In his turn the young priest felt his sobs choking him. He could only murmur: "Ah! my dear doctor, my old friend, I can truly tell you that I pitied you with my whole heart, my whole soul." Doctor Chassaigne's story was one of disaster, the shipwreck of a life. He and his daughter Marguerite, a tall and lovable girl of twenty, had gone to Cauterets with Madame Chassaigne, the model wife and mother, whose state of health had made them somewhat anxious. A fortnight had elapsed and she seemed much better, and was already planning several pleasure trips, when one morning she was found dead in her bed. Her husband and daughter were overwhelmed, stupefied by this sudden blow, this cruel treachery of death. The doctor, who belonged to Bartres, had a family vault in the Lourdes cemetery, a vault constructed at his own expense, and in which his father and mother already rested. He desired, therefore, that his wife should be interred there, in a compartment adjoining that in which he expected soon to lie himself. And after the burial he had lingered for a week at Lourdes, when Marguerite, who was with him, was seized with a great shivering, and, taking to her bed one evening, died two days afterwards without her distracted father being able to form any exact notion of the illness which had carried her off. And thus it was not himself, but his daughter, lately radiant with beauty and health, in the very flower of her youth, who was laid in the vacant compartment by the mother's side. The man who had been so happy, so worshipped by his two helpmates, whose heart had been kept so warm by the love of two dear creatures all his own, was now nothing more than an old, miserable, stammering, lost being, who shivered in his icy solitude. All the joy of his life had departed; he envied the men who broke stones upon the highways when he saw their barefooted wives and daughters bring them their dinners at noontide. And he had refused to leave Lourdes, he had relinquished everything, his studies, his practice in Paris, in order that he might live near the tomb in which his wife and his daughter slept the eternal sleep. "Ah, my old friend," repeated Pierre, "how I pitied you! How frightful must have been your grief! But why did you not rely a little on those who love you? Why did you shut yourself up here with your sorrow?" The doctor made a gesture which embraced the horizon. "I could not go away, they are here and keep me with them. It is all over, I am merely waiting till my time comes to join them again." Then silence fell. Birds were fluttering among the shrubs on the bank behind them, and in front they heard the loud murmur of the Gave. The sun rays were falling more heavily in a slow, golden dust, upon the hillsides; but on that retired bench under the beautiful trees, the coolness was still delightful. And although the crowd was but a couple of hundred yards distant, they were, so to say, in a desert, for nobody tore himself away from the Grotto to stray as far as the spot which they had chosen. They talked together for a long time, and Pierre related under what circumstances he had reached Lourdes that morning with M. de Guersaint and his daughter, all three forming part of the national pilgrimage. Then all at once he gave a start of astonishment and exclaimed: "What! doctor, so you now believe that miracles are possible? You, good heavens! whom I knew as an unbeliever, or at least as one altogether indifferent to these matters?" He was gazing at M. Chassaigne quite stupefied by something which he had just heard him say of the Grotto and Bernadette. It was amazing, coming from a man with so strong a mind, a /savant/ of such intelligence, whose powerful analytical faculties he had formerly so much admired! How was it that a lofty, clear mind, nourished by experience and method, had become so changed as to acknowledge the miraculous cures effected by that divine fountain which the Blessed Virgin had caused to spurt forth under the pressure of a child's fingers? "But just think a little, my dear doctor," he resumed. "It was you yourself who supplied my father with memoranda about Bernadette, your little fellow-villager as you used to call her; and it was you, too, who spoke to me at such length about her, when, later on, I took a momentary interest in her story. In your eyes she was simply an ailing child, prone to hallucinations, infantile, but self-conscious of her acts, deficient of will-power. Recollect our chats together, my doubts, and the healthy reason which you again enabled me, to acquire!" Pierre was feeling very moved, for was not this the strangest of adventures? He a priest, who in a spirit of resignation had formerly endeavoured to believe, had ended by completely losing all faith through intercourse with this same doctor, who was then an unbeliever, but whom he now found converted, conquered by the supernatural, whilst he himself was racked by the torture of no longer believing. "You who would only rely on accurate facts," he said, "you who based everything on observation! Do you renounce science then?" Chassaigne, hitherto quiet, with a sorrowful smile playing on his lips, now made a violent gesture expressive of sovereign contempt. "Science indeed!" he exclaimed. "Do I know anything? Can I accomplish anything? You asked me just now what malady it was that killed my poor Marguerite. But I do not know! I, whom people think so learned, so well armed against death, I understood nothing of it, and I could do nothing--not even prolong my daughter's life for a single hour! And my wife, whom I found in bed already cold, when on the previous evening she had lain down in much better health and quite gay--was I even capable of foreseeing what ought to have been done in her case? No, no! for me at all events, science has become bankrupt. I wish to know nothing; I am but a fool and a poor old man!" He spoke like this in a furious revolt against all his past life of pride and happiness. Then, having become calm again, he added: "And now I only feel a frightful remorse. Yes, a remorse which haunts me, which ever brings me here, prowling around the people who are praying. It is remorse for not having in the first instance come and humbled myself at that Grotto, bringing my two dear ones with me. They would have knelt there like those women whom you see, I should have knelt beside them, and perhaps the Blessed Virgin would have cured and preserved them. But, fool that I was, I only knew how to lose them! It is my fault." Tears were now streaming from his eyes. "I remember," he continued, "that in my childhood at Bartres, my mother, a peasant woman, made me join my hands and implore God's help each morning. The prayer she taught me came back to my mind, word for word, when I again found myself alone, as weak, as lost, as a little child. What would you have, my friend? I joined my hands as in my younger days, I felt too wretched, too forsaken, I had too keen a need of a superhuman help, of a divine power which should think and determine for me, which should lull me and carry me on with its eternal prescience. How great at first was the confusion, the aberration of my poor brain, under the frightful, heavy blow which fell upon it! I spent a score of nights without being able to sleep, thinking that I should surely go mad. All sorts of ideas warred within me; I passed through periods of revolt when I shook my fist at Heaven, and then I lapsed into humility, entreating God to take me in my turn. And it was at last a conviction that there must be justice, a conviction that there must be love, which calmed me by restoring me my faith. You knew my daughter, so tall and strong, so beautiful, so brimful of life. Would it not be the most monstrous injustice if for her, who did not know life, there should be nothing beyond the tomb? She will live again, I am absolutely convinced of it, for I still hear her at times, she tells me that we shall meet, that we shall see one another again. Oh! the dear beings whom one has lost, my dear daughter, my dear wife, to see them once more, to live with them elsewhere, that is the one hope, the one consolation for all the sorrows of this world! I have given myself to God, since God alone can restore them to me!" He was shaking with a slight tremor, like the weak old man he had become; and Pierre was at last able to understand and explain the conversion of this /savant/, this man of intellect who, growing old, had reverted to belief under the influence of sentiment. First of all, and this he had previously suspected, he discovered a kind of atavism of faith in this Pyrenean, this son of peasant mountaineers, who had been brought up in belief of the legend, and whom the legend had again mastered even when fifty years, of positive study had rolled over it. Then, too, there was human weariness; this man, to whom science had not brought happiness, revolted against science on the day when it seemed to him shallow, powerless to prevent him from shedding tears. And finally there was discouragement, a doubt of all things, ending in a need of certainty on the part of one whom age had softened, and who felt happy at being able to fall asleep in credulity. Pierre did not protest, however; he did not jeer, for his heart was rent at sight of this tall, stricken old man, with his woeful senility. Is it not indeed pitiful to see the strongest, the clearest-minded become mere children again under such blows of fate? "Ah!" he faintly sighed, "if I could only suffer enough to be able to silence my reason, and kneel yonder and believe in all those fine stories." The pale smile, which at times still passed over Doctor Chassaigne's lips, reappeared on them. "You mean the miracles?" said he. "You are a priest, my child, and I know what your misfortune is. The miracles seem impossible to you. But what do you know of them? Admit that you know nothing, and that what to our senses seems impossible is every minute taking place. And now we have been talking together for a long time, and eleven o'clock will soon strike, so that you must return to the Grotto. However, I shall expect you, at half-past three, when I will take you to the Medical Verification Office, where I hope I shall be able to show you some surprising things. Don't forget, at half-past three." Thereupon he sent him off, and remained on the bench alone. The heat had yet increased, and the distant hills were burning in the furnace-like glow of the sun. However, he lingered there forgetfully, dreaming in the greeny half-light amidst the foliage, and listening to the continuous murmur of the Gave, as if a voice, a dear voice from the realms beyond, were speaking to him. Pierre meantime hastened back to Marie. He was able to join her without much difficulty, for the crowd was thinning, a good many people having already gone off to /dejeuner/. And on arriving he perceived the girl's father, who was quietly seated beside her, and who at once wished to explain to him the reason of his long absence. For more than a couple of hours that morning he had scoured Lourdes in all directions, applying at twenty hotels in turn without being able to find the smallest closet where they might sleep. Even the servants' rooms were let and you could not have even secured a mattress on which to stretch yourself in some passage. However, all at once, just as he was despairing, he had discovered two rooms, small ones, it is true, and just under the roof, but in a very good hotel, that of the Apparitions, one of the best patronised in the town. The persons who had retained these rooms had just telegraphed that the patient whom they had meant to bring with them was dead. Briefly, it was a piece of rare good luck, and seemed to make M. de Guersaint quite gay. Eleven o'clock was now striking and the woeful procession of sufferers started off again through the sunlit streets and squares. When it reached the hospital Marie begged her father and Pierre to go to the hotel, lunch and rest there awhile, and return to fetch her at two o'clock, when the patients would again be conducted to the Grotto. But when, after lunching, the two men went up to the rooms which they were to occupy at the Hotel of the Apparitions, M. de Guersaint, overcome by fatigue, fell so soundly asleep that Pierre had not the heart to awaken him. What would have been the use of it? His presence was not indispensable. And so the young priest returned to the hospital alone. Then the /cortege/ again descended the Avenue de la Grotte, again wended its way over the Plateau de la Merlasse, again crossed the Place du Rosaire, past an ever-growing crowd which shuddered and crossed itself amid all the joyousness of that splendid August day. It was now the most glorious hour of a lovely afternoon. When Marie was again installed in front of the Grotto she inquired if her father were coming. "Yes," answered Pierre; "he is only taking a little rest." She waved her hand as though to say that he was acting rightly, and then in a sorely troubled voice she added: "Listen, Pierre; don't take me to the piscina for another hour. I am not yet in a state to find favour from Heaven, I wish to pray, to keep on praying." After evincing such an ardent desire to come to Lourdes, terror was agitating her now that the moment for attempting the miracle was at hand. In fact, she began to relate that she had been unable to eat anything, and a girl who overheard her at once approached saying: "If you feel too weak, my dear young lady, remember we have some broth here." Marie looked at her and recognised Raymonde. Several young girls were in this wise employed at the Grotto to distribute cups of broth and milk among the sufferers. Some of them, indeed, in previous years had displayed so much coquetry in the matter of silk, aprons trimmed with lace, that a uniform apron, of modest linen, with a small check pattern, blue and white, had been imposed on them. Nevertheless, in spite of this enforced simplicity, Raymonde, thanks to her freshness and her active, good-natured, housewifely air, had succeeded in making herself look quite charming. "You will remember, won't you?" she added; "you have only to make me a sign and I will serve you." Marie thanked her, saying, however, that she felt sure she would not be able to take anything; and then, turning towards the young priest, she resumed: "One hour--you must allow me one more hour, my friend." Pierre wished at any rate to remain near her, but the entire space was reserved to the sufferers, the bearers not being allowed there. So he had to retire, and, caught in the rolling waves of the crowd, he found himself carried towards the piscinas, where he came upon an extraordinary spectacle which stayed his steps. In front of the low buildings where the baths were, three by three, six for the women and three for the men, he perceived under the trees a long stretch of ground enclosed by a rope fastened to the tree-trunks; and here, various sufferers, some sitting in their bath-chairs and others lying on the mattresses of their litters, were drawn up in line, waiting to be bathed, whilst outside the rope, a huge, excited throng was ever pressing and surging. A Capuchin, erect in the centre of the reserved space, was at that moment conducting the prayers. "Aves" followed one after the other, repeated by the crowd in a loud confused murmur. Then, all at once, as Madame Vincent, who, pale with agony, had long been waiting, was admitted to the baths, carrying her dear burden, her little girl who looked like a waxen image of the child Christ, the Capuchin let himself fall upon his knees with his arms extended, and cried aloud: "Lord, heal our sick!" He raised this cry a dozen, twenty times, with a growing fury, and each time the crowd repeated it, growing more and more excited at each shout, till it sobbed and kissed the ground in a state of frenzy. It was like a hurricane of delirium rushing by and laying every head in the dust. Pierre was utterly distracted by the sob of suffering which arose from the very bowels of these poor folks--at first a prayer, growing louder and louder, then bursting forth like a demand in impatient, angry, deafening, obstinate accents, as though to compel the help of Heaven. "Lord, heal our sick!" --"Lord, heal our sick!" The shout soared on high incessantly. An incident occurred, however; La Grivotte was weeping hot tears because they would not bathe her. "They say that I'm a consumptive," she plaintively exclaimed, "and that they can't dip consumptives in cold water. Yet they dipped one this morning; I saw her. So why won't they dip me? I've been wearing myself out for the last half-hour in telling them that they are only grieving the Blessed Virgin, for I am going to be cured, I feel it, I am going to be cured!" As she was beginning to cause a scandal, one of the chaplains of the piscinas approached and endeavoured to calm her. They would see what they could do for her, by-and-by, said he; they would consult the reverend Fathers, and, if she were very good, perhaps they would bathe her all the same. Meantime the cry continued: "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" And Pierre, who had just perceived Madame Vetu, also waiting at the piscina entry, could no longer turn his eyes away from her hope-tortured face, whose eyes were fixed upon the doorway by which the happy ones, the elect, emerged from the divine presence, cured of all their ailments. However, a sudden increase of the crowd's frenzy, a perfect rage of entreaties, gave him such a shock as to draw tears from his eyes. Madame Vincent was now coming out again, still carrying her little girl in her arms, her wretched, her fondly loved little girl, who had been dipped in a fainting state in the icy water, and whose little face, but imperfectly wiped, was as pale as ever, and indeed even more woeful and lifeless. The mother was sobbing, crucified by this long agony, reduced to despair by the refusal of the Blessed Virgin, who had remained insensible to her child's sufferings. And yet when Madame Vetu in her turn entered, with the eager passion of a dying woman about to drink the water of life, the haunting, obstinate cry burst out again, without sign of discouragement or lassitude: "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" The Capuchin had now fallen with his face to the ground, and the howling crowd, with arms outstretched, devoured the soil with its kisses. Pierre wished to join Madame Vincent to soothe her with a few kind, encouraging words; however, a fresh string of pilgrims not only prevented him from passing, but threw him towards the fountain which another throng besieged. There was here quite a range of low buildings, a long stone wall with carved coping, and it had been necessary for the people to form in procession, although there were twelve taps from which the water fell into a narrow basin. Many came hither to fill bottles, metal cans, and stoneware pitchers. To prevent too great a waste of water, the tap only acted when a knob was pressed with the hand. And thus many weak-handed women lingered there a long time, the water dripping on their feet. Those who had no cans to fill at least came to drink and wash their faces. Pierre noticed one young man who drank seven small glassfuls of water, and washed his eyes seven times without wiping them. Others were drinking out of shells, tin goblets, and leather cups. And he was particularly interested by the sight of Elise Rouquet, who, thinking it useless to go to the piscinas to bathe the frightful sore which was eating away her face, had contented herself with employing the water of the fountain as a lotion, every two hours since her arrival that morning. She knelt down, threw back her fichu, and for a long time applied a handkerchief to her face--a handkerchief which she had soaked with the miraculous fluid like a sponge; and the crowd around rushed upon the fountain in such fury that folks no longer noticed her diseased face, but washed themselves and drank from the same pipe at which she constantly moistened her handkerchief. Just then, however, Gerard, who passed by dragging M. Sabathier to the piscinas, called to Pierre, whom he saw unoccupied, and asked him to come and help him, for it would not be an easy task to move and bathe this helpless victim of ataxia. And thus Pierre lingered with the sufferer in the men's piscina for nearly half an hour, whilst Gerard returned to the Grotto to fetch another patient. These piscinas seemed to the young priest to be very well arranged. They were divided into three compartments, three baths separated by partitions, with steps leading into them. In order that one might isolate the patient, a linen curtain hug before each entry, which was reached through a kind of waiting-room having a paved floor, and furnished with a bench and a couple of chairs. Here the patients undressed and dressed themselves with an awkward haste, a nervous kind of shame. One man, whom Pierre found there when he entered, was still naked, and wrapped himself in the curtain before putting on a bandage with trembling hands. Another one, a consumptive who was frightfully emaciated, sat shivering and groaning, his livid skin mottled with violet marks. However, Pierre became more interested in Brother Isidore, who was just being removed from one of the baths. He had fainted away, and for a moment, indeed, it was thought that he was dead. But at last he began moaning again, and one's heart filled with pity at sight of his long, lank frame, which suffering had withered, and which, with his diseased hip, looked a human remnant on exhibition. The two hospitallers who had been bathing him had the greatest difficulty to put on his shirt, fearful as they were that if he were suddenly shaken he might expire in their arms. "You will help me, Monsieur l'Abbe, won't you?" asked another hospitaller as he began to undress M. Sabathier. Pierre hastened to give his services, and found that the attendant, discharging such humble duties, was none other than the Marquis de Salmon-Roquebert whom M. de Guersaint had pointed out to him on the way from the station to the hospital that morning. A man of forty, with a large, aquiline, knightly nose set in a long face, the Marquis was the last representative of one of the most ancient and illustrious families of France. Possessing a large fortune, a regal mansion in the Rue de Lille at Paris, and vast estates in Normandy, he came to Lourdes each year, for the three days of the national pilgrimage, influenced solely by his benevolent feelings, for he had no religious zeal and simply observed the rites of the Church because it was customary for noblemen to do so. And he obstinately declined any high functions. Resolved to remain a hospitaller, he had that year assumed the duty of bathing the patients, exhausting the strength of his arms, employing his fingers from morning till night in handling rags and re-applying dressings to sores. "Be careful," he said to Pierre; "take off the stockings very slowly. Just now, some flesh came away when they were taking off the things of that poor fellow who is being dressed again, over yonder." Then, leaving M. Sabathier for a moment in order to put on the shoes of the unhappy sufferer whom he alluded to, the Marquis found the left shoe wet inside. Some matter had flowed into the fore part of it, and he had to take the usual medical precautions before putting it on the patient's foot, a task which he performed with extreme care; and so as not to touch the man's leg, into which an ulcer was eating. "And now," he said to Pierre, as he returned to M. Sabathier, "pull down the drawers at the same time I do, so that we may get them off at one pull." In addition to the patients and the hospitallers selected for duty at the piscinas, the only person in the little dressing-room was a chaplain who kept on repeating "Paters" and "Aves," for not even a momentary pause was allowed in the prayers. Merely a loose curtain hung before the doorway leading to the open space which the rope enclosed; and the ardent clamorous entreaties of the throng were incessantly wafted into the room, with the piercing shouts of the Capuchin, who ever repeated "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" A cold light fell from the high windows of the building and constant dampness reigned there, with the mouldy smell like that of a cellar dripping with water. At last M. Sabathier was stripped, divested of all garments save a little apron which had been fastened about his loins for decency's sake. "Pray don't plunge me," said he; "let me down into the water by degrees." In point of fact that cold water quite terrified him. He was still wont to relate that he had experienced such a frightful chilling sensation on the first occasion that he had sworn never to go in again. According to his account, there could be no worse torture than that icy cold. And then too, as he put it, the water was scarcely inviting; for, through fear lest the output of the source should not suffice, the Fathers of the Grotto only allowed the water of the baths to be changed twice a day. And nearly a hundred patients being dipped in the same water, it can be imagined what a terrible soup the latter at last became. All manner of things were found in it, so that it was like a frightful /consomme/ of all ailments, a field of cultivation for every kind of poisonous germ, a quintessence of the most dreaded contagious diseases; the miraculous feature of it all being that men should emerge alive from their immersion in such filth. "Gently, gently," repeated M. Sabathier to Pierre and the Marquis, who had taken hold of him under the hips in order to carry him to the bath. And he gazed with childlike terror at that thick, livid water on which floated so many greasy, nauseating patches of scum. However, his dread of the cold was so great that he preferred the polluted baths of the afternoon, since all the bodies that were dipped in the water during the early part of the day ended by slightly warming it. "We will let you slide down the steps," exclaimed the Marquis in an undertone; and then he instructed Pierre to hold the patient with all his strength under the arm-pits. "Have no fear," replied the priest; "I will not let go." M. Sabathier was then slowly lowered. You could now only see his back, his poor painful back which swayed and swelled, mottled by the rippling of a shiver. And when they dipped him his head fell back in a spasm, a sound like the cracking of bones was heard, and breathing hard, he almost stifled. The chaplain, standing beside the bath, had begun calling with renewed fervour: "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" M. de Salmon-Roquebert repeated the cry, which the regulations required the hospitallers to raise at each fresh immersion. Pierre, therefore, had to imitate his companion, and his pitiful feelings at the sight of so much suffering were so intense that he regained some little of his faith. It was long indeed since he had prayed like this, devoutly wishing that there might be a God in heaven, whose omnipotence could assuage the wretchedness of humanity. At the end of three or four minutes, however, when with great difficulty they drew M. Sabathier, livid and shivering, out of the bath, the young priest fell into deeper, more despairing sorrow than ever at beholding how downcast, how overwhelmed the sufferer was at having experienced no relief. Again had he made a futile attempt; for the seventh time the Blessed Virgin had not deigned to listen to his prayers. He closed his eyes, from between the lids of which big tears began to roll while they were dressing him again. Then Pierre recognised little Gustave Vigneron coming in, on his crutch, to take his first bath. His relatives, his father, his mother, and his aunt, Madame Chaise, all three of substantial appearance and exemplary piety, had just fallen on their knees at the door. Whispers ran through the crowd; it was said that the gentleman was a functionary of the Ministry of Finances. However, while the child was beginning to undress, a tumult arose, and Father Fourcade and Father Massias, suddenly arriving, gave orders to suspend the immersions. The great miracle was about to be attempted, the extraordinary favour which had been so ardently prayed for since the morning--the restoration of the dead man to life. The prayers were continuing outside, rising in a furious appeal which died away in the sky of that warm summer afternoon. Two bearers came in with a covered stretcher, which they deposited in the middle of the dressing-room. Baron Suire, President of the Association, followed, accompanied by Berthaud, one of its principal officers, for the affair was causing a great stir among the whole staff, and before anything was done a few words were exchanged in low voices between the gentlemen and the two Fathers of the Assumption. Then the latter fell upon their knees, with arms extended, and began to pray, their faces illumined, transfigured by their burning desire to see God's omnipotence displayed. "Lord, hear us! Lord, grant our prayer!" M. Sabathier had just been taken away, and the only patient now present was little Gustave, who had remained on a chair, half-undressed and forgotten. The curtains of the stretcher were raised, and the man's corpse appeared, already stiff, and seemingly reduced and shrunken, with large eyes which had obstinately remained wide open. It was necessary, however, to undress the body, which was still fully clad, and this terrible duty made the bearers momentarily hesitate. Pierre noticed that the Marquis de Salmon-Roquebert, who showed such devotion to the living, such freedom from all repugnance whenever they were in question, had now drawn aside and fallen on his knees, as though to avoid the necessity of touching that lifeless corpse. And the young priest thereupon followed his example, and knelt near him in order to keep countenance. Father Massias meanwhile was gradually becoming excited, praying in so loud a voice that it drowned that of his superior, Father Fourcade: "Lord, restore our brother to us!" he cried. "Lord, do it for Thy glory!" One of the hospitallers had already begun to pull at the man's trousers, but his legs were so stiff that the garment would not come off. In fact the corpse ought to have been raised up; and the other hospitaller, who was unbuttoning the dead man's old frock coat, remarked in an undertone that it would be best to cut everything away with a pair of scissors. Otherwise there would be no end of the job. Berthaud, however, rushed up to them, after rapidly consulting Baron Suire. As a politician he secretly disapproved of Father Fourcade's action in making such an attempt, only they could not now do otherwise than carry matters to an issue; for the crowd was waiting and had been entreating God on the dead man's behalf ever since the morning. The wisest course, therefore, was to finish with the affair at once, showing as much respect as possible for the remains of the deceased. In lieu, therefore, of pulling the corpse about in order to strip it bare, Berthaud was of opinion that it would be better to dip it in the piscina clad as it was. Should the man resuscitate, it would be easy to procure fresh clothes for him; and in the contrary event, no harm would have been done. This is what he hastily said to the bearers; and forthwith he helped them to pass some straps under the man's hips and arms. Father Fourcade had nodded his approval of this course, whilst Father Massias prayed with increased fervour: "Breathe upon him, O Lord, and he shall be born anew! Restore his soul to him, O, Lord, that he may glorify Thee!" Making an effort, the two hospitallers now raised the man by means of the straps, carried him to the bath, and slowly lowered him into the water, at each moment fearing that he would slip away from their hold. Pierre, although overcome by horror, could not do otherwise than look at them, and thus he distinctly beheld the immersion of this corpse in its sorry garments, which on being wetted clung to the bones, outlining the skeleton-like figure of the deceased, who floated like a man who has been drowned. But the repulsive part of it all was, that in spite of the /rigor mortis/, the head fell backward into the water, and was submerged by it. In vain did the hospitallers try to raise it by pulling the shoulder straps; as they made the attempt, the man almost sank to the bottom of the bath. And how could he have recovered his breath when his mouth was full of water, his staring eyes seemingly dying afresh, beneath that watery veil? Then, during the three long minutes allowed for the immersion, the two Fathers of the Assumption and the chaplain, in a paroxysm of desire and faith, strove to compel the intervention of Heaven, praying in such loud voices that they seemed to choke. "Do Thou but look on him, O Lord, and he will live again! Lord! may he rise at Thy voice to convert the earth! Lord! Thou hast but one word to say and all Thy people will acclaim Thee!" At last, as though some vessel had broken in his throat, Father Massias fell groaning and choking on his elbows, with only enough strength left him to kiss the flagstones. And from without came the clamour of the crowd, the ever-repeated cry, which the Capuchin was still leading: "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" This appeal seemed so singular at that moment, that Pierre's sufferings were increased. He could feel, too, that the Marquis was shuddering beside him. And so the relief was general when Berthaud, thoroughly annoyed with the whole business, curtly shouted to the hospitallers: "Take him out! Take him out at once!" The body was removed from the bath and laid on the stretcher, looking like the corpse of a drowned man with its sorry garments clinging to its limbs. The water was trickling from the hair, and rivulets began falling on either side, spreading out in pools on the floor. And naturally, dead as the man had been, dead he remained. The others had all risen and stood looking at him amidst a distressing silence. Then, as he was covered up and carried away, Father Fourcade followed the bier leaning on the shoulder of Father Massias and dragging his gouty leg, the painful weight of which he had momentarily forgotten. But he was already recovering his strong serenity, and as a hush fell upon the crowd outside, he could be heard saying: "My dear brothers, my dear sisters, God has not been willing to restore him to us, doubtless because in His infinite goodness He has desired to retain him among His elect." And that was all; there was no further question of the dead man. Patients were again being brought into the dressing-room, the two other baths were already occupied. And now little Gustave, who had watched that terrible scene with his keen inquisitive eyes, evincing no sign of terror, finished undressing himself. His wretched body, the body of a scrofulous child, appeared with its prominent ribs and projecting spine, its limbs so thin that they looked like mere walking-sticks. Especially was this the case as regards the left one, which was withered, wasted to the bone; and he also had two sores, one on the hip, and the other in the loins, the last a terrible one, the skin being eaten away so that you distinctly saw the raw flesh. Yet he smiled, rendered so precocious by his sufferings that, although but fifteen years old and looking no more than ten, he seemed to be endowed with the reason and philosophy of a grown man. The Marquis de Salmon-Roquebert, who had taken him gently in his arms, refused Pierre's offer of service: "Thanks, but he weighs no more than a bird. And don't be frightened, my dear little fellow. I will do it gently." "Oh, I am not afraid of cold water, monsieur," replied the boy; "you may duck me." Then he was lowered into the bath in which the dead man had been dipped. Madame Vigneron and Madame Chaise, who were not allowed to enter, had remained at the door on their knees, whilst the father, M. Vigneron, who was admitted into the dressing-room, went on making the sign of the cross. Finding that his services were no longer required, Pierre now departed. The sudden idea that three o'clock must have long since struck and that Marie must be waiting for him made him hasten his steps. However, whilst he was endeavouring to pierce the crowd, he saw the girl arrive in her little conveyance, dragged along by Gerard, who had not ceased transporting sufferers to the piscina. She had become impatient, suddenly filled with a conviction that she was at last in a frame of mind to find grace. And at sight of Pierre she reproached him, saying, "What, my friend, did you forget me?" He could find no answer, but watched her as she was taken into the piscina reserved for women, and then, in mortal sorrow, fell upon his knees. It was there that he would wait for her, humbly kneeling, in order that he might take her back to the Grotto, cured without doubt and singing a hymn of praise. Since she was certain of it, would she not assuredly be cured? However, it was in vain that he sought for words of prayer in the depths of his distracted being. He was still under the blow of all the terrible things that he had beheld, worn out with physical fatigue, his brain depressed, no longer knowing what he saw or what he believed. His desperate affection for Marie alone remained, making him long to humble himself and supplicate, in the thought that when little ones really love and entreat the powerful they end by obtaining favours. And at last he caught himself repeating the prayers of the crowd, in a distressful voice that came from the depths of his being "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" Ten minutes, a quarter of an hour perhaps, went by. Then Marie reappeared in her little conveyance. Her face was very pale and wore an expression of despair. Her beautiful hair was fastened above her head in a heavy golden coil which the water had not touched. And she was not cured. The stupor of infinite discouragement hollowed and lengthened her face, and she averted her eyes as though to avoid meeting those of the priest who thunderstruck, chilled to the heart, at last made up his mind to grasp the handle of the little vehicle, so as to take the girl back to the Grotto. And meantime the cry of the faithful, who with open arms were kneeling there and kissing the earth, again rose with a growing fury, excited by the Capuchin's shrill voice: "Lord, heal our sick! Heal our sick, O Lord!" As Pierre was placing Marie in position again in front of the Grotto, an attack of weakness came over her and she almost fainted. Gerard, who was there, saw Raymonde quickly hurry to the spot with a cup of broth, and at once they began zealously rivalling each other in their attentions to the ailing girl. Raymonde, holding out the cup in a pretty way, and assuming the coaxing airs of an expert nurse, especially insisted that Marie should accept the bouillon; and Gerard, glancing at this portionless girl, could not help finding her charming, already expert in the business of life, and quite ready to manage a household with a firm hand without ceasing to be amiable. Berthaud was no doubt right, this was the wife that he, Gerard, needed. "Mademoiselle," said he to Raymonde, "shall I raise the young lady a little?" "Thank you, monsieur, I am quite strong enough. And besides I will give it to her in spoonfuls; that will be the better way." Marie, however, obstinately preserving her fierce silence as she recovered consciousness, refused the broth with a gesture. She wished to be left in quietness, she did not want anybody to question her. And it was only when the others had gone off smiling at one another, that she said to Pierre in a husky voice: "Has not my father come then?" After hesitating for a moment the priest was obliged to confess the truth. "I left him sleeping and he cannot have woke up." Then Marie relapsed into her state of languid stupor and dismissed him in his turn, with the gesture with which she declined all succour. She no longer prayed, but remained quite motionless, gazing fixedly with her large eyes at the marble Virgin, the white statue amidst the radiance of the Grotto. And as four o'clock was now striking, Pierre with his heart sore went off to the Verification Office, having suddenly remembered the appointment given him by Doctor Chassaigne.

4

VERIFICATION

THE doctor was waiting for the young priest outside the Verification Office, in front of which a compact and feverish crowd of pilgrims was assembled, waylaying and questioning the patients who went in, and acclaiming them as they came out whenever the news spread of any miracle, such as the restoration of some blind man's sight, some deaf woman's hearing, or some paralytic's power of motion. Pierre had no little difficulty in making his way through the throng, but at last he reached his friend. "Well," he asked, "are we going to have a miracle--a real, incontestable one I mean?" The doctor smiled, indulgent despite his new faith. "Ah, well," said he, "a miracle is not worked to order. God intervenes when He pleases." Some hospitallers were mounting guard at the door, but they all knew M. Chassaigne, and respectfully drew aside to let him enter with his companion. The office where the cures were verified was very badly installed in a wretched wooden shanty divided into two apartments, first a narrow ante-chamber, and then a general meeting room which was by no means so large as it should have been. However, there was a question of providing the department with better accommodation the following year; with which view some large premises, under one of the inclined ways of the Rosary, were already being fitted up. The only article of furniture in the antechamber was a wooden bench on which Pierre perceived two female patients awaiting their turn in the charge of a young hospitaller. But on entering the meeting room the number of persons packed inside it quite surprised him, whilst the suffocating heat within those wooden walls on which the sun was so fiercely playing, almost scorched his face. It was a square bare room, painted a light yellow, with the panes of its single window covered with whitening, so that the pressing throng outside might see nothing of what went on within. One dared not even open this window to admit a little fresh air, for it was no sooner set ajar than a crowd of inquisitive heads peeped in. The furniture was of a very rudimentary kind, consisting simply of two deal tables of unequal height placed end to end and not even covered with a cloth; together with a kind of big "canterbury" littered with untidy papers, sets of documents, registers and pamphlets, and finally some thirty rush-seated chairs placed here and there over the floor and a couple of ragged arm-chairs usually reserved for the patients. Doctor Bonamy at once hastened forward to greet Doctor Chassaigne, who was one of the latest and most glorious conquests of the Grotto. He found a chair for him and, bowing to Pierre's cassock, also made the young priest sit down. Then, in the tone of extreme politeness which was customary with him, he exclaimed: "/Mon cher confrere/, you will kindly allow me to continue. We were just examining mademoiselle." He referred to a deaf peasant girl of twenty, who was seated in one of the arm-chairs. Instead of listening, however, Pierre, who was very weary, still with a buzzing in his head, contented himself with gazing at the scene, endeavouring to form some notion of the people assembled in the room. There were some fifty altogether, many of them standing and leaning against the walls. Half a dozen, however, were seated at the two tables, a central position being occupied by the superintendent of the piscinas, who was constantly consulting a thick register; whilst around him were a Father of the Assumption and three young seminarists who acted as secretaries, writing, searching for documents, passing them and classifying them again after each examination. Pierre, however, took most interest in a Father of the Immaculate Conception, Father Dargeles, who had been pointed out to him that morning as being the editor of the "Journal de la Grotte." This ecclesiastic, whose thin little face, with its blinking eyes, pointed nose, and delicate mouth was ever smiling, had modestly seated himself at the end of the lower table where he occasionally took notes for his newspaper. He alone, of the community to which he belonged, showed himself during the three days of the national pilgrimage. Behind him, however, one could divine the presence of all the others, the slowly developed hidden power which organised everything and raked in all the proceeds. The onlookers consisted almost entirely of inquisitive people and witnesses, including a score of doctors and a few priests. The medical men, who had come from all parts, mostly preserved silence, only a few of them occasionally venturing to ask a question; and every now and then they would exchange oblique glances, more occupied apparently in watching one another than in verifying the facts submitted to their examination. Who could they be? Some names were mentioned, but they were quite unknown. Only one had caused any stir, that of a celebrated doctor, professor at a Catholic university. That afternoon, however, Doctor Bonamy, who never sat down, busy as he was conducting the proceedings and questioning the patients, reserved most of his attentions for a short, fair-haired man, a writer of some talent who contributed to one of the most widely read Paris newspapers, and who, in the course of a holiday tour, had by chance reached Lourdes that morning. Was not this an unbeliever whom it might be possible to convert, whose influence it would be desirable to gain for advertisement's sake? Such at all events appeared to be M. Bonamy's opinion, for he had compelled the journalist to take the second arm-chair, and with an affectation of smiling good-nature was treating him to a full performance, again and again repeating that he and his patrons had nothing to hide, and that everything took place in the most open manner. "We only desire light," he exclaimed. "We never cease to call for the investigations of all willing men." Then, as the alleged cure of the deaf girl did not seem at all a promising case, he addressed her somewhat roughly: "Come, come, my girl, this is only a beginning. You must come back when there are more distinct signs of improvement." And turning to the journalist he added in an undertone: "If we were to believe them they would all be healed. But the only cures we accept are those which are thoroughly proven, which are as apparent as the sun itself. Pray notice moreover that I say cures and not miracles; for we doctors do not take upon ourselves to interpret and explain. We are simply here to see if the patients, who submit themselves to our examination, have really lost all symptoms of their ailments." Thereupon he struck an attitude. Doubtless he spoke like this in order that his rectitude might not be called in question. Believing without believing, he knew that science was yet so obscure, so full of surprises, that what seemed impossible might always come to pass; and thus, in the declining years of his life, he had contrived to secure an exceptional position at the Grotto, a position which had both its inconveniences and its advantages, but which, taken for all in all, was very comfortable and pleasant. And now, in reply to a question from the Paris journalist, he began to explain his mode of proceeding. Each patient who accompanied the pilgrimage arrived provided with papers, amongst which there was almost always a certificate of the doctor who had been attending the case. At times even there were certificates given by several doctors, hospital bulletins and so forth--quite a record of the illness in its various stages. And thus if a cure took place and the cured person came forward, it was only necessary to consult his or her set of documents in order to ascertain the nature of the ailment, and then examination would show if that ailment had really disappeared. Pierre was now listening. Since he had been there, seated and resting himself, he had grown calmer, and his mind was clear once more. It was only the heat which at present caused him any inconvenience. And thus, interested as he was by Doctor Bonamy's explanations, and desirous of forming an opinion, he would have spoken out and questioned, had it not been for his cloth which condemned him to remain in the background. He was delighted, therefore, when the little fair-haired gentleman, the influential writer, began to bring forward the objections which at once occurred to him. * Was it not most unfortunate that one doctor should diagnose the illness and that another one should verify the cure? In this mode of proceeding there was certainly a source of frequent error. The better plan would have been for a medical commission to examine all the patients as soon as they arrived at Lourdes and draw up reports on every case, to which reports the same commission would have referred whenever an alleged cure was brought before it. Doctor Bonamy, however, did not fall in with this suggestion. He replied, with some reason, that a commission would never suffice for such gigantic labour. Just think of it! A thousand patients to examine in a single morning! And how many different theories there would be, how many contrary diagnoses, how many endless discussions, all of a nature to increase the general uncertainty! The preliminary examination of the patients, which was almost always impossible, would, even if attempted, leave the door open for as many errors as the present system. In practice, it was necessary to remain content with the certificates delivered by the medical men who had been in attendance on the patients, and these certificates accordingly acquired capital, decisive importance. Doctor Bonamy ran through the documents lying on one of the tables and gave the Paris journalist some of these certificates to read. A great many of them unfortunately were very brief. Others, more skilfully drawn up, clearly specified the nature of the complaint; and some of the doctors' signatures were even certified by the mayors of the localities where they resided. Nevertheless doubts remained, innumerable and not to be surmounted. Who were these doctors? Who could tell if they possessed sufficient scientific authority to write as they did? With all respect to the medical profession, were there not innumerable doctors whose attainments were very limited? And, besides, might not these have been influenced by circumstances that one knew nothing of, in some cases by considerations of a personal character? One was tempted to ask for an inquiry respecting each of these medical men. Since everything was based on the documents supplied by the patients, these documents ought to have been most carefully controlled; for there could be no proof of any miracle if the absolute certainty of the alleged ailments had not been demonstrated by stringent examination. * The reader will doubtless have understood that the Parisian journalist is none other than M. Zola himself--Trans. Very red and covered with perspiration, Doctor Bonamy waved his arms. "But that is the course we follow, that is the course we follow!" said he. "As soon as it seems to us that a case of cure cannot be explained by natural means, we institute a minute inquiry, we request the person who has been cured to return here for further examination. And as you can see, we surround ourselves with all means of enlightenment. These gentlemen here, who are listening to us, are nearly every one of them doctors who have come from all parts of France. We always entreat them to express their doubts if they feel any, to discuss the cases with us, and a very detailed report of each discussion is drawn up. You hear me, gentlemen; by all means protest if anything occurs here of a nature to offend your sense of truth." Not one of the onlookers spoke. Most of the doctors present were undoubtedly Catholics, and naturally enough they merely bowed. As for the others, the unbelievers, the /savants/ pure and simple, they looked on and evinced some interest in certain phenomena, but considerations of courtesy deterred them from entering into discussions which they knew would have been useless. When as men of sense their discomfort became too great, and they felt themselves growing angry, they simply left the room. As nobody breathed a word, Doctor Bonamy became quite triumphant, and on the journalist asking him if he were all alone to accomplish so much work, he replied: "Yes, all alone; but my functions as doctor of the Grotto are not so complicated as you may think, for, I repeat it, they simply consist in verifying cures whenever any take place." However, he corrected himself, and added with a smile: "All! I was forgetting, I am not quite alone, I have Raboin, who helps me to keep things a little bit in order here." So saying, he pointed to a stout, grey-haired man of forty, with a heavy face and bull-dog jaw. Raboin was an ardent believer, one of those excited beings who did not allow the miracles to be called in question. And thus he often suffered from his duties at the Verification Office, where he was ever ready to growl with anger when anybody disputed a prodigy. The appeal to the doctors had made him quite lose his temper, and his superior had to calm him. "Come, Raboin, my friend, be quiet!" said Doctor Bonamy. "All sincere opinions are entitled to a hearing." However, the /defile/ of patients was resumed. A man was now brought in whose trunk was so covered with eczema that when he took off his shirt a kind of grey flour fell from his skin. He was not cured, but simply declared that he came to Lourdes every year, and always went away feeling relieved. Then came a lady, a countess, who was fearfully emaciated, and whose story was an extraordinary one. Cured of tuberculosis by the Blessed Virgin, a first time, seven years previously, she had subsequently given birth to four children, and had then again fallen into consumption. At present she was a morphinomaniac, but her first bath had already relieved her so much, that she proposed taking part in the torchlight procession that same evening with the twenty-seven members of her family whom she had brought with her to Lourdes. Then there was a woman afflicted with nervous aphonia, who after months of absolute dumbness had just recovered her voice at the moment when the Blessed Sacrament went by at the head of the four o'clock procession. "Gentlemen," declared Doctor Bonamy, affecting the graciousness of a /savant/ of extremely liberal views, "as you are aware, we do not draw any conclusions when a nervous affection is in question. Still you will kindly observe that this woman was treated at the Salpetriere for six months, and that she had to come here to find her tongue suddenly loosened." Despite all these fine words he displayed some little impatience, for he would have greatly liked to show the gentleman from Paris one of those remarkable instances of cure which occasionally presented themselves during the four o'clock procession--that being the moment of grace and exaltation when the Blessed Virgin interceded for those whom she had chosen. But on this particular afternoon there had apparently been none. The cures which had so far passed before them were doubtful ones, deficient in interest. Meanwhile, out-of-doors, you could hear the stamping and roaring of the crowd, goaded into a frenzy by repeated hymns, enfevered by its earnest desire for the Divine interposition, and growing more and more enervated by the delay. All at once, however, a smiling, modest-looking young girl, whose clear eyes sparkled with intelligence, entered the office. "Ah!" exclaimed Doctor Bonamy joyously, "here is our little friend Sophie. A remarkable cure, gentlemen, which took place at the same season last year, and the results of which I will ask permission to show you." Pierre had immediately recognized Sophie Couteau, the /miraculee/ who had got into the train at Poitiers. And he now witnessed a repetition of the scene which had already been enacted in his presence. Doctor Bonamy began giving detailed explanations to the little fair-haired gentleman, who displayed great attention. The case, said the doctor, had been one of caries of the bones of the left heel, with a commencement of necrosis necessitating excision; and yet the frightful, suppurating sore had been healed in a minute at the first immersion in the piscina. "Tell the gentlemen how it happened, Sophie," he added. The little girl made her usual pretty gesture as a sign to everybody to be attentive. And then she began: "Well, it was like this; my foot was past cure, I couldn't even go to church any more, and it had to be kept bandaged because there was always a lot of matter coming from it. Monsieur Rivoire, the doctor, who had made a cut in it so as to see inside it, said that he should be obliged to take out a piece of the bone; and that, sure enough, would have made me lame for life. But when I got to Lourdes, and had prayed a great deal to the Blessed Virgin, I went to dip my foot in the water, wishing so much that I might be cured, that I did not even take the time to pull the bandages off. And everything remained in the water; there was no longer anything the matter with my foot when I took it out." Doctor Bonamy listened, and punctuated each word with an approving nod. "And what did your doctor say, Sophie?" he asked. "When I got back to Vivonne, and Monsieur Rivoire saw my foot again, he said: 'Whether it be God or the Devil who has cured this child, it is all the same to me; but in all truth, she is cured.'" A burst of laughter rang out. The doctor's remark was sure to produce an effect. "And what was it, Sophie, that you said to Madame la Comtesse, the superintendent of your ward?" "Ah, yes! I hadn't brought many bandages for my foot with me, and I said to her, 'It was very kind of the Blessed Virgin to cure me the first day, as I should have run out of linen on the morrow.'" Then there was fresh laughter, a general display of satisfaction at seeing her look so pretty, telling her story, which she now knew by heart, in too recitative a manner, but, nevertheless, remaining very touching and truthful in appearance. "Take off your shoe, Sophie," now said Doctor Bonamy; "show your foot to these gentlemen. Let them feel it. Nobody must retain any doubt." The little foot promptly appeared, very white, very clean, carefully tended indeed, with its scar just below the ankle, a long scar, whose whity seam testified to the gravity of the complaint. Some of the medical men had drawn near, and looked on in silence. Others, whose opinions, no doubt, were already formed, did not disturb themselves, though one of them, with an air of extreme politeness, inquired why the Blessed Virgin had not made a new foot while she was about it, for this would assuredly have given her no more trouble. Doctor Bonamy, however, quickly replied, that if the Blessed Virgin had left a scar, it was certainly in order that a trace, a proof of the miracle, might remain. Then he entered into technical particulars, demonstrating that a fragment of bone and flesh must have been instantly formed, and this, of course, could not be explained in any natural way. " /Mon Dieu/!" interrupted the little fair-haired gentleman, "there is no need of any such complicated affair. Let me merely see a finger cut with a penknife, let me see it dipped in the water, and let it come out with the cut cicatrised. The miracle will be quite as great, and I shall bow to it respectfully." Then he added: "If I possessed a source which could thus close up sores and wounds, I would turn the world topsy-turvy. I do not know exactly how I should manage it, but at all events I would summon the nations, and the nations would come. I should cause the miracles to be verified in such an indisputable manner, that I should be the master of the earth. Just think what an extraordinary power it would be--a divine power. But it would be necessary that not a doubt should remain, the truth would have to be as patent, as apparent as the sun itself. The whole world would behold it and believe!" Then he began discussing various methods of control with the doctor. He had admitted that, owing to the great number of patients, it would be difficult, if not impossible, to examine them all on their arrival. Only, why didn't they organise a special ward at the hospital, a ward which would be reserved for cases of visible sores? They would have thirty such cases all told, which might be subjected to the preliminary examination of a committee. Authentic reports would be drawn up, and the sores might even be photographed. Then, if a case of cure should present itself, the commission would merely have to authenticate it by a fresh report. And in all this there would be no question of any internal complaint, the diagnostication of which is difficult, and liable to be controverted. There would be visible evidence of the ailment, and cure could be proved. Somewhat embarrassed, Doctor Bonamy replied: "No doubt, no doubt; all we ask for is enlightenment. The difficulty would be in forming the committee you speak of. If you only knew how little medical men agree! However, there is certainly an idea in what you say." Fortunately a fresh patient now came to his assistance. Whilst little Sophie Couteau, already forgotten, was putting on, her shoes again, Elise Rouquet appeared, and, removing her wrap, displayed her diseased face to view. She related that she had been bathing it with her handkerchief ever since the morning, and it seemed to her that her sore, previously so fresh and raw, was already beginning to dry and grow paler in colour. This was true; Pierre noticed, with great surprise, that the aspect of the sore was now less horrible. This supplied fresh food for the discussion on visible sores, for the little fair-haired gentleman clung obstinately to his idea of organising a special ward. Indeed, said he, if the condition of this girl had been verified that morning, and she should be cured, what a triumph it would have been for the Grotto, which could have claimed to have healed a lupus! It would then have no longer been possible to deny that miracles were worked. Doctor Chassaigne had so far kept in the background, motionless and silent, as though he desired that the facts alone should exercise their influence on Pierre. But he now leant forward and said to him in an undertone: "Visible sores, visible sores indeed! That gentleman can have no idea that our most learned medical men suspect many of these sores to be of nervous origin. Yes, we are discovering that complaints of this kind are often simply due to bad nutrition of the skin. These questions of nutrition are still so imperfectly studied and understood! And some medical men are also beginning to prove that the faith which heals can even cure sores, certain forms of lupus among others. And so I would ask what certainty that gentleman would obtain with his ward for visible sores? There would simply be a little more confusion and passion in arguing the eternal question. No, no! Science is vain, it is a sea of uncertainty." He smiled sorrowfully whilst Doctor Bonamy, after advising Elise Rouquet to continue using the water as lotion and to return each day for further examination, repeated with his prudent, affable air: "At all events, gentlemen, there are signs of improvement in this case--that is beyond doubt." But all at once the office was fairly turned topsy-turvy by the arrival of La Grivotte, who swept in like a whirlwind, almost dancing with delight and shouting in a full voice: "I am cured! I am cured!" And forthwith she began to relate that they had first of all refused to bathe her, and that she had been obliged to insist and beg and sob in order to prevail upon them to do so, after receiving Father Fourcade's express permission. And then it had all happened as she had previously said it would. She had not been immersed in the icy water for three minutes--all perspiring as she was with her consumptive rattle--before she had felt strength returning to her like a whipstroke lashing her whole body. And now a flaming excitement possessed her; radiant, stamping her feet, she was unable to keep still. "I am cured, my good gentlemen, I am cured!" Pierre looked at her, this time quite stupefied. Was this the same girl whom, on the previous night, he had seen lying on the carriage seat, annihilated, coughing and spitting blood, with her face of ashen hue? He could not recognise her as she now stood there, erect and slender, her cheeks rosy, her eyes sparkling, upbuoyed by a determination to live, a joy in living already. "Gentlemen," declared Doctor Bonamy, "the case appears to me to be a very interesting one. We will see." Then he asked for the documents concerning La Grivotte. But they could not be found among all the papers heaped together on the tables. The young seminarists who acted as secretaries began turning everything over; and the superintendent of the piscinas who sat in their midst himself had to get up to see if these documents were in the "canterbury." At last, when he had sat down again, he found them under the register which lay open before him. Among them were three medical certificates which he read aloud. All three of them agreed in stating that the case was one of advanced phthisis, complicated by nervous incidents which invested it with a peculiar character. Doctor Bonamy wagged his head as though to say that such an /ensemble/ of testimony could leave no room for doubt. Forthwith, he subjected the patient to a prolonged auscultation. And he murmured: "I hear nothing--I hear nothing." Then, correcting himself, he added: "At least I hear scarcely anything." Finally he turned towards the five-and-twenty or thirty doctors who were assembled there in silence. "Will some of you gentlemen," he asked, "kindly lend me the help of your science? We are here to study and discuss these questions." At first nobody stirred. Then there was one who ventured to come forward and, in his turn subject the patient to auscultation. But instead of declaring himself, he continued reflecting, shaking his head anxiously. At last he stammered that in his opinion one must await further developments. Another doctor, however, at once took his place, and this one expressed a decided opinion. He could hear nothing at all, that woman could never have suffered from phthisis. Then others followed him; in fact, with the exception of five or six whose smiling faces remained impenetrable, they all joined the /defile/. And the confusion now attained its apogee; for each gave an opinion sensibly differing from that of his colleagues, so that a general uproar arose and one could no longer hear oneself speak. Father Dargeles alone retained the calmness of perfect serenity, for he had scented one of those cases which impassion people and redound to the glory of Our Lady of Lourdes. He was already taking notes on a corner of the table. Thanks to all the noise of the discussion, Pierre and Doctor Chassaigne, seated at some distance from the others, were now able to talk together without being heard. "Oh! those piscinas!" said the young priest, "I have just seen them. To think that the water should be so seldom changed! What filth it is, what a soup of microbes! What a terrible blow for the present-day mania, that rage for antiseptic precautions! How is it that some pestilence does not carry off all these poor people? The opponents of the microbe theory must be having a good laugh--" M. Chassaigne stopped him. "No, no, my child," said he. "The baths may be scarcely clean, but they offer no danger. Please notice that the temperature of the water never rises above fifty degrees, and that seventy-seven are necessary for the cultivation of germs. * Besides, scarcely any contagious diseases come to Lourdes, neither cholera, nor typhus, nor variola, nor measles, nor scarlatina. We only see certain organic affections here, paralysis, scrofula, tumours, ulcers and abscesses, cancers and phthisis; and the latter cannot be transmitted by the water of the baths. The old sores which are bathed have nothing to fear, and offer no risk of contagion. I can assure you that on this point there is even no necessity for the Blessed Virgin to intervene." * The above are Fahrenheit degrees. --Trans. "Then, in that case, doctor," rejoined Pierre, "when you were practising, you would have dipped all your patients in icy water--women at no matter what season, rheumatic patients, people suffering from diseases of the heart, consumptives, and so on? For instance, that unhappy girl, half dead, and covered with sweat--would you have bathed her?" "Certainly not! There are heroic methods of treatment to which, in practice, one does not dare to have recourse. An icy bath may undoubtedly kill a consumptive; but do we know, whether, in certain circumstances, it might not save her? I, who have ended by admitting that a supernatural power is at work here, I willingly admit that some cures must take place under natural conditions, thanks to that immersion in cold water which seems to us idiotic and barbarous. Ah! the things we don't know, the things we don't know!" He was relapsing into his anger, his hatred of science, which he scorned since it had left him scared and powerless beside the deathbed of his wife and his daughter. "You ask for certainties," he resumed, "but assuredly it is not medicine which will give you them. Listen for a moment to those gentlemen and you will be edified. Is it not beautiful, all that confusion in which so many opinions clash together? Certainly there are ailments with which one is thoroughly acquainted, even to the most minute details of their evolution; there are remedies also, the effects of which have been studied with the most scrupulous care; but the thing that one does not know, that one cannot know, is the relation of the remedy to the ailment, for there are as many cases as there may be patients, each liable to variation, so that experimentation begins afresh every time. This is why the practice of medicine remains an art, for there can be no experimental finality in it. Cure always depends on chance, on some fortunate circumstance, on some bright idea of the doctor's. And so you will understand that all the people who come and discuss here make me laugh when they talk about the absolute laws of science. Where are those laws in medicine? I should like to have them shown to me." He did not wish to say any more, but his passion carried him away, so he went on: "I told you that I had become a believer--nevertheless, to speak the truth, I understand very well why this worthy Doctor Bonamy is so little affected, and why he continues calling upon doctors in all parts of the world to come and study his miracles. The more doctors that might come, the less likelihood there would be of the truth being established in the inevitable battle between contradictory diagnoses and methods of treatment. If men cannot agree about a visible sore, they surely cannot do so about an internal lesion the existence of which will be admitted by some, and denied by others. And why then should not everything become a miracle? For, after all, whether the action comes from nature or from some unknown power, medical men are, as a rule, none the less astonished when an illness terminates in a manner which they have not foreseen. No doubt, too, things are very badly organised here. Those certificates from doctors whom nobody knows have no real value. All documents ought to be stringently inquired into. But even admitting any absolute scientific strictness, you must be very simple, my dear child, if you imagine that a positive conviction would be arrived at, absolute for one and all. Error is implanted in man, and there is no more difficult task than that of demonstrating to universal satisfaction the most insignificant truth." Pierre had now begun to understand what was taking place at Lourdes, the extraordinary spectacle which the world had been witnessing for years, amidst the reverent admiration of some and the insulting laughter of others. Forces as yet but imperfectly studied, of which one was even ignorant, were certainly at work--auto-suggestion, long prepared disturbance of the nerves; inspiriting influence of the journey, the prayers, and the hymns; and especially the healing breath, the unknown force which was evolved from the multitude, in the acute crisis of faith. Thus it seemed to him anything but intelligent to believe in trickery. The facts were both of a much more lofty and much more simple nature. There was no occasion for the Fathers of the Grotto to descend to falsehood; it was sufficient that they should help in creating confusion, that they should utilise the universal ignorance. It might even be admitted that everybody acted in good faith--the doctors void of genius who delivered the certificates, the consoled patients who believed themselves cured, and the impassioned witnesses who swore that they had beheld what they described. And from all this was evolved the obvious impossibility of proving whether there was a miracle or not. And such being the case, did not the miracle naturally become a reality for the greater number, for all those who suffered and who had need of hope? Then, as Doctor Bonamy, who had noticed that they were chatting apart, came up to them, Pierre ventured to inquire: "What is about the proportion of the cures to the number of cases?" "About ten per cent.," answered the doctor; and reading in the young priest's eyes the words that he could not utter, he added in a very cordial way: "Oh! there would be many more, they would all be cured if we chose to listen to them. But it is as well to say it, I am only here to keep an eye on the miracles, like a policeman as it were. My only functions are to check excessive zeal, and to prevent holy things from being made ridiculous. In one word, this office is simply an office where a /visa/ is given when the cures have been verified and seem real ones." He was interrupted, however, by a low growl. Raboin was growing angry: "The cures verified, the cures verified," he muttered. "What is the use of that? There is no pause in the working of the miracles. What is the use of verifying them so far as believers are concerned? /They/ merely have to bow down and believe. And what is the use, too, as regards the unbelievers? /They/ will never be convinced. The work we do here is so much foolishness." Doctor Bonamy severely ordered him to hold his tongue. "You are a rebel, Raboin," said he; "I shall tell Father Capdebarthe that I won't have you here any longer since you pass your time in sowing disobedience." Nevertheless, there was truth in what had just been said by this man, who so promptly showed his teeth, eager to bite whenever his faith was assailed; and Pierre looked at him with sympathy. All the work of the Verification Office--work anything but well performed--was indeed useless, for it wounded the feelings of the pious, and failed to satisfy the incredulous. Besides, can a miracle be proved? No, you must believe in it! When God is pleased to intervene, it is not for man to try to understand. In the ages of real belief, Science did not make any meddlesome attempt to explain the nature of the Divinity. And why should it come and interfere here? By doing so, it simply hampered faith and diminished its own prestige. No, no, there must be no Science, you must throw yourself upon the ground, kiss it, and believe. Or else you must take yourself off. No compromise was possible. If examination once began it must go on, and must, fatally, conduct to doubt. Pierre's greatest sufferings, however, came from the extraordinary conversations which he heard around him. There were some believers present who spoke of the miracles with the most amazing ease and tranquillity. The most stupefying stories left their serenity entire. Another miracle, and yet another! And with smiles on their faces, their reason never protesting, they went on relating such imaginings as could only have come from diseased brains. They were evidently living in such a state of visionary fever that nothing henceforth could astonish them. And not only did Pierre notice this among folks of simple, childish minds, illiterate, hallucinated creatures like Raboin, but also among the men of intellect, the men with cultivated brains, the /savants/ like Doctor Bonamy and others. It was incredible. And thus Pierre felt a growing discomfort arising within him, a covert anger which would doubtless end by bursting forth. His reason was struggling, like that of some poor wretch who after being flung into a river, feels the waters seize him from all sides and stifle him; and he reflected that the minds which, like Doctor Chassaigne's, sink at last into blind belief, must pass though this same discomfort and struggle before the final shipwreck. He glanced at his old friend and saw how sorrowful he looked, struck down by destiny, as weak as a crying child, and henceforth quite alone in life. Nevertheless, he was unable to check the cry of protest which rose to his lips: "No, no, if we do not know everything, even if we shall never know everything, there is no reason why we should leave off learning. It is wrong that the Unknown should profit by man's debility and ignorance. On the contrary, the eternal hope should be that the things which now seem inexplicable will some day be explained; and we cannot, under healthy conditions, have any other ideal than this march towards the discovery of the Unknown, this victory slowly achieved by reason amidst all the miseries both of the flesh and of the mind. Ah! reason--it is my reason which makes me suffer, and it is from my reason too that I await all my strength. When reason dies, the whole being perishes. And I feel but an ardent thirst to satisfy my reason more and more, even though I may lose all happiness in doing so." Tears were appearing in Doctor Chassaigne's eyes; doubtless the memory of his dear dead ones had again flashed upon him. And, in his turn, he murmured: "Reason, reason, yes, certainly it is a thing to be very proud of; it embodies the very dignity of life. But there is love, which is life's omnipotence, the one blessing to be won again when you have lost it." His voice sank in a stifled sob; and as in a mechanical way he began to finger the sets of documents lying on the table, he espied among them one whose cover bore the name of Marie de Guersaint in large letters. He opened it and read the certificates of the two doctors who had inferred that the case was one of paralysis of the marrow. "Come, my child," he then resumed, "I know that you feel warm affection for Mademoiselle de Guersaint. What should you say if she were cured here? There are here some certificates, bearing honourable names, and you know that paralysis of this nature is virtually incurable. Well, if this young person should all at once run and jump about as I have seen so many others do, would you not feel very happy, would you not at last acknowledge the intervention of a supernatural power?" Pierre was about to reply, when he suddenly remembered his cousin Beauclair's expression of opinion, the prediction that the miracle would come about like a lightning stroke, an awakening, an exaltation of the whole being; and he felt his discomfort increase and contented himself with replying: "Yes, indeed, I should be very happy. And you are right; there is doubtless only a determination to secure happiness in all the agitation one beholds here." However, he could remain in that office no longer. The heat was becoming so great that perspiration streamed down the faces of those present. Doctor Bonamy had begun to dictate a report of the examination of La Grivotte to one of the seminarists, while Father Dargeles, watchful with regard to the phraseology employed, occasionally rose and whispered some verbal alteration in the writer's ear. Meantime, the tumult around them was continuing; the discussion among the medical men had taken another turn and now bore on certain technical points of no significance with regard to the case in question. You could no longer breathe within those wooden walls, nausea was upsetting every heart and every head. The little fair-haired gentleman, the influential writer from Paris, had already gone away, quite vexed at not having seen a real miracle. Pierre thereupon said to Doctor Chassaigne, "Let us go; I shall be taken ill if I stay here any longer." They left the office at the same time as La Grivotte, who was at last being dismissed. And as soon as they reached the door they found themselves caught in a torrential, surging, jostling crowd, which was eager to behold the girl so miraculously healed; for the report of the miracle must have already spread, and one and all were struggling to see the chosen one, question her, and touch her. And she, with her empurpled cheeks, her flaming eyes, her dancing gait, could do nothing but repeat, "I am cured, I am cured!" Shouts drowned her voice, she herself was submerged, carried off amidst the eddies of the throng. For a moment one lost sight of her as though she had sunk in those tumultuous waters; then she suddenly reappeared close to Pierre and the doctor, who endeavoured to extricate her from the crush. They had just perceived the Commander, one of whose manias was to come down to the piscinas and the Grotto in order to vent his anger there. With his frock-coat tightly girding him in military fashion, he was, as usual, leaning on his silver-knobbed walking-stick, slightly dragging his left leg, which his second attack of paralysis had stiffened. And his face reddened and his eyes flashed with anger when La Grivotte, pushing him aside in order that she might pass, repeated amidst the wild enthusiasm of the crowd, "I am cured, I am cured!" "Well!" he cried, seized with sudden fury, "so much the worse for you, my girl!" Exclamations arose, folks began to laugh, for he was well known, and his maniacal passion for death was forgiven him. However, when he began stammering confused words, saying that it was pitiful to desire life when one was possessed of neither beauty nor fortune, and that this girl ought to have preferred to die at once rather than suffer again, people began to growl around him, and Abbe Judaine, who was passing, had to extricate him from his trouble. The priest drew him away. "Be quiet, my friend, be quiet," he said. "It is scandalous. Why do you rebel like this against the goodness of God who occasionally shows His compassion for our sufferings by alleviating them? I tell you again that you yourself ought to fall on your knees and beg Him to restore to you the use of your leg and let you live another ten years." The Commander almost choked with anger. "What!" he replied, "ask to live for another ten years, when my finest day will be the day I die! Show myself as spiritless, as cowardly as the thousands of patients whom I see pass along here, full of a base terror of death, shrieking aloud their weakness, their passion to remain alive! Ah! no, I should feel too much contempt for myself. I want to die! --to die at once! It will be so delightful to be no more." He was at last out of the scramble of the pilgrims, and again found himself near Doctor Chassaigne and Pierre on the bank of the Gave. And he addressed himself to the doctor, whom he often met: "Didn't they try to restore a dead man to life just now?" he asked; "I was told of it--it almost suffocated me. Eh, doctor? You understand? That man was happy enough to be dead, and they dared to dip him in their water in the criminal hope to make him alive again! But suppose they had succeeded, suppose their water had animated that poor devil once more--for one never knows what may happen in this funny world--don't you think that the man would have had a perfect right to spit his anger in the face of those corpse-menders? Had he asked them to awaken him? How did they know if he were not well pleased at being dead? Folks ought to be consulted at any rate. Just picture them playing the same vile trick on me when I at last fall into the great deep sleep. Ah! I would give them a nice reception. 'Meddle with what concerns you,' I should say, and you may be sure I should make all haste to die again!" He looked so singular in the fit of rage which had come over him that Abbe Judaine and the doctor could not help smiling. Pierre, however, remained grave, chilled by the great quiver which swept by. Were not those words he had just heard the despairing imprecations of Lazarus? He had often imagined Lazarus emerging from the tomb and crying aloud: "Why hast Thou again awakened me to this abominable life, O Lord? I was sleeping the eternal, dreamless sleep so deeply; I was at last enjoying such sweet repose amidst the delights of nihility! I had known every wretchedness and every dolour, treachery, vain hope, defeat, sickness; as one of the living I had paid my frightful debt to suffering, for I was born without knowing why, and I lived without knowing how; and now, behold, O Lord, Thou requirest me to pay my debt yet again; Thou condemnest me to serve my term of punishment afresh! Have I then been guilty of some inexpiable transgression that thou shouldst inflict such cruel chastisement upon me? Alas! to live again, to feel oneself die a little in one's flesh each day, to have no intelligence save such as is required in order to doubt; no will, save such as one must have to be unable; no tenderness, save such as is needed to weep over one's own sorrows. Yet it was passed, I had crossed the terrifying threshold of death, I had known that second which is so horrible that it sufficeth to poison the whole of life. I had felt the sweat of agony cover me with moisture, the blood flow back from my limbs, my breath forsake me, flee away in a last gasp. And Thou ordainest that I should know this distress a second time, that I should die twice, that my human misery should exceed that of all mankind. Then may it be even now, O Lord! Yes, I entreat Thee, do also this great miracle; may I once more lay myself down in this grave, and again fall asleep without suffering from the interruption of my eternal slumber. Have mercy upon me, and forbear from inflicting on me the torture of living yet again; that torture which is so frightful that Thou hast never inflicted it on any being. I have always loved Thee and served Thee; and I beseech Thee do not make of me the greatest example of Thy wrath, a cause of terror unto all generations. But show unto me Thy gentleness and loving kindness, O Lord! restore unto me the slumber I have earned, and let me sleep once more amid the delights of Thy nihility." While Pierre was pondering in this wise, Abbe Judaine had led the Commander away, at last managing to calm him; and now the young priest shook hands with Doctor Chassaigne, recollecting that it was past five o'clock, and that Marie must be waiting for him. On his way back to the Grotto, however, he encountered the Abbe des Hermoises deep in conversation with M. de Guersaint, who had only just left his room at the hotel, and was quite enlivened by his good nap. He and his companion were admiring the extraordinary beauty which the fervour of faith imparted to some women's countenances, and they also spoke of their projected trip to the Cirque de Gavarnie. On learning, however, that Marie had taken a first bath with no effect, M. de Guersaint at once followed Pierre. They found the poor girl still in the same painful stupor, with her eyes still fixed on the Blessed Virgin who had not deigned to hear her. She did not answer the loving words which her father addressed to her, but simply glanced at him with her large distressful eyes, and then again turned them upon the marble statue which looked so white amid the radiance of the tapers. And whilst Pierre stood waiting to take her back to the hospital, M. de Guersaint devoutly fell upon his knees. At first he prayed with passionate ardour for his daughter's cure, and then he solicited, on his own behalf, the favour of finding some wealthy person who would provide him with the million francs that he needed for his studies on aerial navigation.

5

BERNADETTE'S TRIALS

ABOUT eleven o'clock that night, leaving M. de Guersaint in his room at the Hotel of the Apparitions, it occurred to Pierre to return for a moment to the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours before going to bed himself. He had left Marie in such a despairing state, so fiercely silent, that he was full of anxiety about her. And when he had asked for Madame de Jonquiere at the door of the Sainte-Honorine Ward he became yet more anxious, for the news was by no means good. The young girl, said the superintendent, had not even opened her mouth. She would answer nobody, and had even refused to eat. Madame de Jonquiere, insisted therefore that Pierre should come in. True, the presence of men was forbidden in the women's wards at night-time, but then a priest is not a man. "She only cares for you and will only listen to you," said the worthy lady. "Pray come in and sit down near her till Abbe Judaine arrives. He will come at about one in the morning to administer the communion to our more afflicted sufferers, those who cannot move and who have to eat at daybreak. You will be able to assist him." Pierre thereupon followed Madame de Jonquiere, who installed him at the head of Marie's bed. "My dear child," she said to the girl, "I have brought you somebody who is very fond of you. You will be able to chat with him, and you will be reasonable now, won't you?" Marie, however, on recognising Pierre, gazed at him with an air of exasperated suffering, a black, stern expression of revolt. "Would you like him to read something to you," resumed Madame de Jonquiere, "something that would ease and console you as he did in the train? No? It wouldn't interest you, you don't care for it? Well, we will see by-and-by. I will leave him with you, and I am sure you will be quite reasonable again in a few minutes." Pierre then began speaking to her in a low voice, saying all the kind consoling things that his heart could think of, and entreating her not to allow herself to sink into such despair. If the Blessed Virgin had not cured her on the first day, it was because she reserved her for some conspicuous miracle. But he spoke in vain. Marie had turned her head away, and did not even seem to listen as she lay there with a bitter expression on her mouth and a gleam of irritation in her eyes, which wandered away into space. Accordingly he ceased speaking and began to gaze at the ward around him. The spectacle was a frightful one. Never before had such a nausea of pity and terror affected his heart. They had long since dined, nevertheless plates of food which had been brought up from the kitchens still lay about the beds; and all through the night there were some who ate whilst others continued restlessly moaning, asking to be turned over or helped out of bed. As the hours went by a kind of vague delirium seemed to come upon almost all of them. Very few were able to sleep quietly. Some had been undressed and were lying between the sheets, but the greater number were simply stretched out on the beds, it being so difficult to get their clothes off that they did not even change their linen during the five days of the pilgrimage. In the semi-obscurity, moreover, the obstruction of the ward seemed to have increased. To the fifteen beds ranged along the walls and the seven mattresses filling the central space, some fresh pallets had been added, and on all sides there was a confused litter of ragged garments, old baskets, boxes, and valises. Indeed, you no longer knew where to step. Two smoky lanterns shed but a dim light upon this encampment of dying women, in which a sickly smell prevailed; for, instead of any freshness, merely the heavy heat of the August night came in through the two windows which had been left ajar. Nightmare-like shadows and cries sped to and fro, peopling the inferno, amidst the nocturnal agony of so much accumulated suffering. However, Pierre recognised Raymonde, who, her duties over, had come to kiss her mother, before going to sleep in one of the garrets reserved to the Sisters of the hospital. For her own part, Madame de Jonquiere, taking her functions to heart, did not close her eyes during the three nights spent at Lourdes. She certainly had an arm-chair in which to rest herself, but she never sat down in it for a moment with out being disturbed. It must be admitted that she was bravely seconded by little Madame Desagneaux, who displayed such enthusiastic zeal that Sister Hyacinthe asked her, with a smile: "Why don't you take the vows?" whereupon she responded, with an air of scared surprise: "Oh! I can't, I'm married, you know, and I'm very fond of my husband." As for Madame Volmar, she had not even shown herself; but it was alleged that Madame de Jonquiere had sent her to bed on hearing her complain of a frightful headache. And this had put Madame Desagneaux in quite a temper; for, as she sensibly enough remarked, a person had no business to offer to nurse the sick when the slightest exertion exhausted her. She herself, however, at last began to feel her legs and arms aching, though she would not admit it, but hastened to every patient whom she heard calling, ever ready as she was to lend a helping hand. In Paris she would have rung for a servant rather than have moved a candlestick herself; but here she was ever coming and going, bringing and emptying basins, and passing her arms around patients to hold them up, whilst Madame de Jonquiere slipped pillows behind them. However, shortly after eleven o'clock, she was all at once overpowered. Having imprudently stretched herself in the armchair for a moment's rest, she there fell soundly asleep, her pretty head sinking on one of her shoulders amidst her lovely, wavy fair hair, which was all in disorder. And from that moment neither moan nor call, indeed no sound whatever, could waken her. Madame de Jonquiere, however, had softly approached the young priest again. "I had an idea," said she in a low voice, "of sending for Monsieur Ferrand, the house-surgeon, you know, who accompanies us. He would have given the poor girl something to calm her. Only he is busy downstairs trying to relieve Brother Isidore, in the Family Ward. Besides, as you know, we are not supposed to give medical attendance here; our work consists in placing our dear sick ones in the hands of the Blessed Virgin." Sister Hyacinthe, who had made up her mind to spend the night with the superintendent, now drew, near. "I have just come from the Family Ward," she said; "I went to take Monsieur Sabathier some oranges which I had promised him, and I saw Monsieur Ferrand, who had just succeeded in reviving Brother Isidore. Would you like me to go down and fetch him?" But Pierre declined the offer. "No, no," he replied, "Marie will be sensible. I will read her a few consoling pages by-and-by, and then she will rest." For the moment, however, the girl still remained obstinately silent. One of the two lanterns was hanging from the wall close by, and Pierre could distinctly see her thin face, rigid and motionless like stone. Then, farther away, in the adjoining bed, he perceived Elise Rouquet, who was sound asleep and no longer wore her fichu, but openly displayed her face, the ulcerations of which still continued to grow paler. And on the young priest's left hand was Madame Vetu, now greatly weakened, in a hopeless state, unable to doze off for a moment, shaken as she was by a continuous rattle. He said a few kind words to her, for which she thanked him with a nod; and, gathering her remaining strength together, she was at last able to say: "There were several cures to-day; I was very pleased to hear of them." On a mattress at the foot of her bed was La Grivotte, who in a fever of extraordinary activity kept on sitting up to repeat her favourite phrase: "I am cured, I am cured!" And she went on to relate that she had eaten half a fowl for dinner, she who had been unable to eat for long months past. Then, too, she had followed the torchlight procession on foot during nearly a couple of hours, and she would certainly have danced till daybreak had the Blessed Virgin only been pleased to give a ball. And once more she repeated: "I am cured, yes, cured, quite cured!" Thereupon Madame Vetu found enough strength to say with childlike serenity and perfect, gladsome abnegation: "The Blessed Virgin did well to cure her since she is poor. I am better pleased than if it had been myself, for I have my little shop to depend upon and can wait. We each have our turn, each our turn." One and all displayed a like charity, a like pleasure that others should have been cured. Seldom, indeed, was any jealousy shown; they surrendered themselves to a kind of epidemical beatitude, to a contagious hope that they would all be cured whenever it should so please the Blessed Virgin. And it was necessary that she should not be offended by any undue impatience; for assuredly she had her reasons and knew right well why she began by healing some rather than others. Thus with the fraternity born of common suffering and hope, the most grievously afflicted patients prayed for the cure of their neighbours. None of them ever despaired, each fresh miracle was the promise of another one, of the one which would be worked on themselves. Their faith remained unshakable. A story was told of a paralytic woman, some farm servant, who with extraordinary strength of will had contrived to take a few steps at the Grotto, and who while being conveyed back to the hospital had asked to be set down that she might return to the Grotto on foot. But she had gone only half the distance when she had staggered, panting and livid; and on being brought to the hospital on a stretcher, she had died there, cured, however, said her neighbours in the ward. Each, indeed, had her turn; the Blessed Virgin forgot none of her dear daughters unless it were her design to grant some chosen one immediate admission into Paradise. All at once, at the moment when Pierre was leaning towards her, again offering to read to her, Marie burst into furious sobs. Letting her head fall upon her friend's shoulder, she vented all her rebellion in a low, terrible voice, amidst the vague shadows of that awful room. She had experienced what seldom happened to her, a collapse of faith, a sudden loss of courage, all the rage of the suffering being who can no longer wait. Such was her despair, indeed, that she even became sacrilegious. "No, no," she stammered, "the Virgin is cruel; she is unjust, for she did not cure me just now. Yet I felt so certain that she would grant my prayer, I had prayed to her so fervently. I shall never be cured, now that the first day is past. It was a Saturday, and I was convinced that I should be cured on a Saturday. I did not want to speak--and oh! prevent me, for my heart is too full, and I might say more than I ought to do." With fraternal hands he had quickly taken hold of her head, and he was endeavouring to stifle the cry of her rebellion. "Be quiet, Marie, I entreat you! It would never do for anyone to hear you--you so pious! Do you want to scandalise every soul?" But in spite of her efforts she was unable to keep silence. "I should stifle, I must speak out," she said. "I no longer love her, no longer believe in her. The tales which are related here are all falsehoods; there is /nothing/, she does not even exist, since she does not hear when one speaks to her, and sobs. If you only knew all that I said to her! Oh! I want to go away at once. Take me away, carry me away in your arms, so that I may go and die in the street, where the passers-by, at least, will take pity on my sufferings!" She was growing weak again, and had once more fallen on her back, stammering, talking childishly. "Besides, nobody loves me," she said. "My father was not even there. And you, my friend, forsook me. When I saw that it was another who was taking me to the piscinas, I began to feel a chill. Yes, that chill of doubt which I often felt in Paris. And that is at least certain, I doubted--perhaps, indeed, that is why she did not cure me. I cannot have prayed well enough, I am not pious enough, no doubt." She was no longer blaspheming, but seeking for excuses to explain the non-intervention of Heaven. However, her face retained an angry expression amidst this struggle which she was waging with the Supreme Power, that Power which she had loved so well and entreated so fervently, but which had not obeyed her. When, on rare occasions, a fit of rage of this description broke out in the ward, and the sufferers, lying on their beds, rebelled against their fate, sobbing and lamenting, and at times even swearing, the lady-hospitallers and the Sisters, somewhat shocked, would content themselves with simply closing the bed-curtains. Grace had departed, one must await its return. And at last, sometimes after long hours, the rebellious complaints would die away, and peace would reign again amidst the deep, woeful silence. "Calm yourself, calm yourself, I implore you," Pierre gently repeated to Marie, seeing that a fresh attack was coming upon her, an attack of doubt in herself, of fear that she was unworthy of the divine assistance. Sister Hyacinthe, moreover, had again drawn near. "You will not be able to take the sacrament by-and-by, my dear child," said she, "if you continue in such a state. Come, since we have given Monsieur l'Abbe permission to read to you, why don't you let him do so?" Marie made a feeble gesture as though to say that she consented, and Pierre at once took out of the valise at the foot of her bed, the little blue-covered book in which the story of Bernadette was so naively related. As on the previous night, however, when the train was rolling on, he did not confine himself to the bald phraseology of the book, but began improvising, relating all manner of details in his own fashion, in order to charm the simple folks who listened to him. Nevertheless, with his reasoning, analytical proclivities, he could not prevent himself from secretly re-establishing the real facts, imparting, for himself alone, a human character to this legend, whose wealth of prodigies contributed so greatly to the cure of those that suffered. Women were soon sitting up on all the surrounding beds. They wished to hear the continuation of the story, for the thought of the sacrament which they were passionately awaiting had prevented almost all of them from getting to sleep. And seated there, in the pale light of the lantern hanging from the wall above him, Pierre little by little raised his voice, so that he might be heard by the whole ward. "The persecutions began with the very first miracles. Called a liar and a lunatic, Bernadette was threatened with imprisonment. Abbe Peyramale, the parish priest of Lourdes, and Monseigneur Laurence, Bishop of Tarbes, like the rest of the clergy, refrained from all intervention, waiting the course of events with the greatest prudence; whilst the civil authorities, the Prefect, the Public Prosecutor, the Mayor, and the Commissary of Police, indulged in excessive anti-religious zeal." Continuing his perusal in this fashion, Pierre saw the real story rise up before him with invincible force. His mind travelled a short distance backward and he beheld Bernadette at the time of the first apparitions, so candid, so charming in her ignorance and good faith, amidst all her sufferings. And she was truly the visionary, the saint, her face assuming an expression of superhuman beauty during her crises of ecstasy. Her brow beamed, her features seemed to ascend, her eyes were bathed with light, whilst her parted lips burnt with divine love. And then her whole person became majestic; it was in a slow, stately way that she made the sign of the cross, with gestures which seemed to embrace the whole horizon. The neighbouring valleys, the villages, the towns, spoke of Bernadette alone. Although the Lady had not yet told her name, she was recognised, and people said, "It is she, the Blessed Virgin." On the first market-day, so many people flocked into Lourdes that the town quite overflowed. All wished to see the blessed child whom the Queen of the Angels had chosen, and who became so beautiful when the heavens opened to her enraptured gaze. The crowd on the banks of the Gave grew larger each morning, and thousands of people ended by installing themselves there, jostling one another that they might lose nothing of the spectacle! As soon as Bernadette appeared, a murmur of fervour spread: "Here is the saint, the saint, the saint!" Folks rushed forward to kiss her garments. She was a Messiah, the eternal Messiah whom the nations await, and the need of whom is ever arising from generation to generation. And, moreover, it was ever the same adventure beginning afresh: an apparition of the Virgin to a shepherdess; a voice exhorting the world to penitence; a spring gushing forth; and miracles astonishing and enrapturing the crowds that hastened to the spot in larger and larger numbers. Ah! those first miracles of Lourdes, what a spring-tide flowering of consolation and hope they brought to the hearts of the wretched, upon whom poverty and sickness were preying! Old Bourriette's restored eyesight, little Bouhohort's resuscitation in the icy water, the deaf recovering their hearing, the lame suddenly enabled to walk, and so many other cases, Blaise Maumus, Bernade Soubies,* Auguste Bordes, Blaisette Soupenne, Benoite Cazeaux, in turn cured of the most dreadful ailments, became the subject of endless conversations, and fanned the illusions of all those who suffered either in their hearts or their flesh. On Thursday, March 4th, the last day of the fifteen visits solicited by the Virgin, there were more than twenty thousand persons assembled before the Grotto. Everybody, indeed, had come down from the mountains. And this immense throng found at the Grotto the divine food that it hungered for, a feast of the Marvellous, a sufficient meed of the Impossible to content its belief in a superior Power, which deigned to bestow some attention upon poor folks, and to intervene in the wretched affairs of this lower world, in order to re-establish some measure of justice and kindness. It was indeed the cry of heavenly charity bursting forth, the invisible helping hand stretched out at last to dress the eternal sores of humanity. Ah! that dream in which each successive generation sought refuge, with what indestructible energy did it not arise among the disinherited ones of this world as soon as it found a favourable spot, prepared by circumstances! And for centuries, perhaps, circumstances had never so combined to kindle the mystical fire of faith as they did at Lourdes. * I give this name as written by M. Zola; but in other works on Lourdes I find it given as "Bernarde Loubie--a bed-ridden old woman, cured of a paralytic affection by drinking the water of the Grotto." --Trans. A new religion was about to be founded, and persecutions at once began, for religions only spring up amidst vexations and rebellions. And even as it was long ago at Jerusalem, when the tidings of miracles spread, the civil authorities--the Public Prosecutor, the Justice of the Peace, the Mayor, and particularly the Prefect of Tarbes--were all roused and began to bestir themselves. The Prefect was a sincere Catholic, a worshipper, a man of perfect honour, but he also had the firm mind of a public functionary, was a passionate defender of order, and a declared adversary of fanaticism which gives birth to disorder and religious perversion. Under his orders at Lourdes there was a Commissary of Police, a man of great intelligence and shrewdness, who had hitherto discharged his functions in a very proper way, and who, legitimately enough, beheld in this affair of the apparitions an opportunity to put his gift of sagacious skill to the proof. So the struggle began, and it was this Commissary who, on the first Sunday in Lent, at the time of the first apparitions, summoned Bernadette to his office in order that he might question her. He showed himself affectionate, then angry, then threatening, but all in vain; the answers which the girl gave him were ever the same. The story which she related, with its slowly accumulated details, had little by little irrevocably implanted itself in her infantile mind. And it was no lie on the part of this poor suffering creature, this exceptional victim of hysteria, but an unconscious haunting, a radical lack of will-power to free herself from her original hallucination. She knew not how to exert any such will, she could not, she would not exert it. Ah! the poor child, the dear child, so amiable and so gentle, so incapable of any evil thought, from that time forward lost to life, crucified by her fixed idea, whence one could only have extricated her by changing her environment, by restoring her to the open air, in some land of daylight and human affection. But she was the chosen one, she had beheld the Virgin, she would suffer from it her whole life long and die from it at last! Pierre, who knew Bernadette so well, and who felt a fraternal pity for her memory, the fervent compassion with which one regards a human saint, a simple, upright, charming creature tortured by her faith, allowed his emotion to appear in his moist eyes and trembling voice. And a pause in his narrative ensued. Marie, who had hitherto been lying there quite stiff, with a hard expression of revolt still upon her face, opened her clenched hands and made a vague gesture of pity. "Ah," she murmured, "the poor child, all alone to contend against those magistrates, and so innocent, so proud, so unshakable in her championship of the truth!" The same compassionate sympathy was arising from all the beds in the ward. That hospital inferno with its nocturnal wretchedness, its pestilential atmosphere, its pallets of anguish heaped together, its weary lady-hospitallers and Sisters flitting phantom-like hither and thither, now seemed to be illumined by a ray of divine charity. Was not the eternal illusion of happiness rising once more amidst tears and unconscious falsehoods? Poor, poor Bernadette! All waxed indignant at the thought of the persecutions which she had endured in defence of her faith. Then Pierre, resuming his story, related all that the child had had to suffer. After being questioned by the Commissary she had to appear before the judges of the local tribunal. The entire magistracy pursued her, and endeavoured to wring a retractation from her. But the obstinacy of her dream was stronger than the common sense of all the civil authorities put together. Two doctors who were sent by the Prefect to make a careful examination of the girl came, as all doctors would have done, to the honest opinion that it was a case of nervous trouble, of which the asthma was a sure sign, and which, in certain circumstances, might have induced visions. This nearly led to her removal and confinement in a hospital at Tarbes. But public exasperation was feared. A bishop had fallen on his knees before her. Some ladies had sought to buy favours from her for gold. Moreover she had found a refuge with the Sisters of Nevers, who tended the aged in the town asylum, and there she made her first communion, and was with difficulty taught to read and write. As the Blessed Virgin seemed to have chosen her solely to work the happiness of others, and she herself had not been cured, it was very sensibly decided to take her to the baths of Cauterets, which were so near at hand. However, they did her no good. And no sooner had she returned to Lourdes than the torture of being questioned and adored by a whole people began afresh, became aggravated, and filled her more and more with horror of the world. Her life was over already; she would be a playful child no more; she could never be a young girl dreaming of a husband, a young wife kissing the cheeks of sturdy children. She had beheld the Virgin, she was the chosen one, the martyr. If the Virgin, said believers, had confided three secrets to her, investing her with a triple armour as it were, it was simply in order to sustain her in her appointed course. The clergy had for a long time remained aloof, on its own side full of doubt and anxiety. Abby Peyramale, the parish priest of Lourdes, was a man of somewhat blunt ways, but full of infinite kindness, rectitude, and energy whenever he found himself in what he thought the right path. On the first occasion when Bernadette visited him, he received this child who had been brought up at Bartres and had not yet been seen at Catechism, almost as sternly as the Commissary of Police had done; in fact, he refused to believe her story, and with some irony told her to entreat the Lady to begin by making the briars blossom beneath her feet, which, by the way, the Lady never did. And if the Abbe ended by taking the child under his protection like a good pastor who defends his flock, it was simply through the advent of persecution and the talk of imprisoning this puny child, whose clear eyes shone so frankly, and who clung with such modest, gentle stubbornness to her original tale. Besides, why should he have continued denying the miracle after merely doubting it like a prudent priest who had no desire to see religion mixed up in any suspicious affair? Holy Writ is full of prodigies, all dogma is based on the mysterious; and that being so, there was nothing to prevent him, a priest, from believing that the Virgin had really entrusted Bernadette with a pious message for him, an injunction to build a church whither the faithful would repair in procession. Thus it was that he began loving and defending Bernadette for her charm's sake, whilst still refraining from active interference, awaiting as he did the decision of his Bishop. This Bishop, Monseigneur Laurence, seemed to have shut himself up in his episcopal residence at Tarbes, locking himself within it and preserving absolute silence as though there were nothing occurring at Lourdes of a nature to interest him. He had given strict instructions to his clergy, and so far not a priest had appeared among the vast crowds of people who spent their days before the Grotto. He waited, and even allowed the Prefect to state in his administrative circulars that the civil and the religious authorities were acting in concert. In reality, he cannot have believed in the apparitions of the Grotto of Massabielle, which he doubtless considered to be the mere hallucinations of a sick child. This affair, which was revolutionising the region, was of sufficient importance for him to have studied it day by day, and the manner in which he disregarded it for so long a time shows how little inclined he was to admit the truth of the alleged miracles, and how greatly he desired to avoid compromising the Church in a matter which seemed destined to end badly. With all his piety, Monseigneur Laurence had a cool, practical intellect, which enabled him to govern his diocese with great good sense. Impatient and ardent people nicknamed him Saint Thomas at the time, on account of the manner in which his doubts persisted until events at last forced his hand. Indeed, he turned a deaf ear to all the stories that were being related, firmly resolved as he was that he would only listen to them if it should appear certain that religion had nothing to lose. However, the persecutions were about to become more pronounced. The Minister of Worship in Paris, who had been informed of what was going on, required that a stop should be put to all disorders, and so the Prefect caused the approaches to the Grotto to be occupied by the military. The Grotto had already been decorated with vases of flowers offered by the zeal of the faithful and the gratitude of sufferers who had been healed. Money, moreover, was thrown into it; gifts to the Blessed Virgin abounded. Rudimentary improvements, too, were carried out in a spontaneous way; some quarrymen cut a kind of reservoir to receive the miraculous water, and others removed the large blocks of stone, and traced a path in the hillside. However, in presence of the swelling torrents of people, the Prefect, after renouncing his idea of arresting Bernadette, took the serious resolution of preventing all access to the Grotto by placing a strong palisade in front of it. Some regrettable incidents had lately occurred; various children pretended that they had seen the devil, some of them being guilty of simulation in this respect, whilst others had given way to real attacks of hysteria, in the contagious nervous unhinging which was so prevalent. But what a terrible business did the removal of the offerings from the Grotto prove! It was only towards evening that the Commissary was able to find a girl willing to let him have a cart on hire, and two hours later this girl fell from a loft and broke one of her ribs. Likewise, a man who had lent an axe had one of his feet crushed on the morrow by the fall of a block of stone. * It was in the midst of jeers and hisses that the Commissary carried off the pots of flowers, the tapers which he found burning, the coppers and the silver hearts which lay upon the sand. People clenched their fists, and covertly called him "thief" and "murderer." Then the posts for the palisades were planted in the ground, and the rails were nailed to the crossbars, no little labour being performed to shut off the Mystery, in order to bar access to the Unknown, and put the miracles in prison. And the civil authorities were simple enough to imagine that it was all over, that those few bits of boarding would suffice to stay the poor people who hungered for illusion and hope. * Both of these accidents were interpreted as miracles. --Trans. But as soon as the new religion was proscribed, forbidden by the law as an offence, it began to burn with an inextinguishable flame in the depths of every soul. Believers came to the river bank in far greater numbers, fell upon their knees at a short distance from the Grotto, and sobbed aloud as they gazed at the forbidden heaven. And the sick, the poor ailing folks, who were forbidden to seek cure, rushed on the Grotto despite all prohibitions, slipped in whenever they could find an aperture or climbed over the palings when their strength enabled them to do so, in the one ardent desire to steal a little of the water. What! there was a prodigious water in that Grotto, which restored the sight to the blind, which set the infirm erect upon their legs again, which instantaneously healed all ailments; and there were officials cruel enough to put that water under lock and key so that it might not cure any more poor people! Why, it was monstrous! And a cry of hatred arose from all the humble ones, all the disinherited ones who had as much need of the Marvellous as of bread to live! In accordance with a municipal decree, the names of all delinquents were to be taken by the police, and thus one soon beheld a woeful /defile/ of old women and lame men summoned before the Justice of the Peace for the sole offence of taking a little water from the fount of life! They stammered and entreated, at their wit's end when a fine was imposed upon them. And, outside, the crowd was growling; rageful unpopularity was gathering around those magistrates who treated human wretchedness so harshly, those pitiless masters who after taking all the wealth of the world, would not even leave to the poor their dream of the realms beyond, their belief that a beneficent superior power took a maternal interest in them, and was ready to endow them with peace of soul and health of body. One day a whole band of poverty-stricken and ailing folks went to the Mayor, knelt down in his courtyard, and implored him with sobs to allow the Grotto to be reopened; and the words they spoke were so pitiful that all who heard them wept. A mother showed her child who was half-dead; would they let the little one die like that in her arms when there was a source yonder which had saved the children of other mothers? A blind man called attention to his dim eyes; a pale, scrofulous youth displayed the sores on his legs; a paralytic woman sought to join her woeful twisted hands: did the authorities wish to see them all perish, did they refuse them the last divine chance of life, condemned and abandoned as they were by the science of man? And equally great was the distress of the believers, of those who were convinced that a corner of heaven had opened amidst the night of their mournful existences, and who were indignant that they should be deprived of the chimerical delight, the supreme relief for their human and social sufferings, which they found in the belief that the Blessed Virgin had indeed come down from heaven to bring them the priceless balm of her intervention. However, the Mayor was unable to promise anything, and the crowd withdrew weeping, ready for rebellion, as though under the blow of some great act of injustice, an act of idiotic cruelty towards the humble and the simple for which Heaven would assuredly take vengeance. The struggle went on for several months; and it was an extraordinary spectacle which those sensible men--the Minister, the Prefect, and the Commissary of Police--presented, all animated with the best intentions and contending against the ever-swelling crowd of despairing ones, who would not allow the doors of dreamland to be closed upon them, who would not be shut off from the mystic glimpse of future happiness in which they found consolation for their present wretchedness. The authorities required order, the respect of a discreet religion, the triumph of reason; whereas the need of happiness carried the people off into an enthusiastic desire for cure both in this world and in the next. Oh! to cease suffering, to secure equality in the comforts of life; to march on under the protection of a just and beneficent Mother, to die only to awaken in heaven! And necessarily the burning desire of the multitude, the holy madness of the universal joy, was destined to sweep aside the rigid, morose conceptions of a well-regulated society in which the ever-recurring epidemical attacks of religious hallucination are condemned as prejudicial to good order and healthiness of mind. The Sainte-Honorine Ward, on hearing the story, likewise revolted. Pierre again had to pause, for many were the stifled exclamations in which the Commissary of Police was likened to Satan and Herod. La Grivotte had sat up on her mattress, stammering: "Ah! the monsters! To behave like that to the Blessed Virgin who has cured me!" And even Madame Vetu--once more penetrated by a ray of hope amidst the covert certainty she felt that she was going to die--grew angry at the idea that the Grotto would not have existed had the Prefect won the day. "There would have been no pilgrimages," she said, "we should not be here, hundreds of us would not be cured every year." A fit of stifling came over her, however, and Sister Hyacinthe had to raise her to a sitting posture. Madame de Jonquiere was profiting by the interruption to attend to a young woman afflicted with a spinal complaint, whilst two other women, unable to remain on their beds, so unbearable was the heat, prowled about with short, silent steps, looking quite white in the misty darkness. And from the far end of the ward, where all was black, there resounded a noise of painful breathing, which had been going on without a pause, accompanying Pierre's narrative like a rattle. Elise Rouquet alone was sleeping peacefully, still stretched upon her back, and displaying her disfigured countenance, which was slowly drying. Midnight had struck a quarter of an hour previously, and Abbe Judaine might arrive at any moment for the communion. Grace was now again descending into Marie's heart, and she was convinced that if the Blessed Virgin had refused to cure her it was, indeed, her own fault in having doubted when she entered the piscina. And she, therefore, repented of her rebellion as of a crime. Could she ever be forgiven? Her pale face sank down among her beautiful fair hair, her eyes filled with tears, and she looked at Pierre with an expression of anguish. "Oh! how wicked I was, my friend," she said. "It was through hearing you relate how that Prefect and those magistrates sinned through pride, that I understood my transgression. One must believe, my friend; there is no happiness outside faith and love." Then, as Pierre wished to break off at the point which he had reached, they all began protesting and calling for the continuation of his narrative, so that he had to promise to go on to the triumph of the Grotto. Its entrance remained barred by the palisade, and you had to come secretly at night if you wished to pray and carry off a stolen bottle of water. Still, the fear of rioting increased, for it was rumoured that whole villages intended to come down from the hills in order to deliver God, as they naively expressed it. It was a /levee en masse/ of the humble, a rush of those who hungered for the miraculous, so irresistible in its impetuosity that mere common sense, mere considerations of public order were to be swept away like chaff. And it was Monseigneur Laurence, in his episcopal residence at Tarbes, who was first forced to surrender. All his prudence, all his doubts were outflanked by the popular outburst. For five long months he had been able to remain aloof, preventing his clergy from following the faithful to the Grotto, and defending the Church against the tornado of superstition which had been let loose. But what was the use of struggling any longer? He felt the wretchedness of the suffering people committed to his care to be so great that he resigned himself to granting them the idolatrous religion for which he realised them to be eager. Some prudence remaining to him, however, he contented himself in the first instance with drawing up an /ordonnance/, appointing a commission of inquiry, which was to investigate the question; this implied the acceptance of the miracles after a period of longer or shorter duration. If Monseigneur Laurence was the man of healthy culture and cool reason that he is pictured to have been, how great must have been his anguish on the morning when he signed that /ordonnance/! He must have knelt in his oratory, and have begged the Sovereign Master of the world to dictate his conduct to him. He did not believe in the apparitions; he had a loftier, more intellectual idea of the manifestations of the Divinity. Only would he not be showing true pity and mercy in silencing the scruples of his reason, the noble prejudices of his faith, in presence of the necessity of granting that bread of falsehood which poor humanity requires in order to be happy? Doubtless, he begged the pardon of Heaven for allowing it to be mixed up in what he regarded as childish pastime, for exposing it to ridicule in connection with an affair in which there was only sickliness and dementia. But his flock suffered so much, hungered so ravenously for the marvellous, for fairy stories with which to lull the pains of life. And thus, in tears, the Bishop at last sacrificed his respect for the dignity of Providence to his sensitive pastoral charity for the woeful human flock. Then the Emperor in his turn gave way. He was at Biarritz at the time, and was kept regularly informed of everything connected with this affair of the apparitions, with which the entire Parisian press was also occupying itself, for the persecutions would not have been complete if the pens of Voltairean newspaper-men had not meddled in them. And whilst his Minister, his Prefect, and his Commissary of Police were fighting for common sense and public order, the Emperor preserved his wonted silence--the deep silence of a day-dreamer which nobody ever penetrated. Petitions arrived day by day, yet he held his tongue. Bishops came, great personages, great ladies of his circle watched and drew him on one side, and still he held his tongue. A truceless warfare was being waged around him: on one side the believers and the men of fanciful minds whom the Mysterious strongly interested; on the other the unbelievers and the statesmen who distrusted the disturbances of the imagination;--and still and ever he held his tongue. Then, all at once, with the sudden decision of a naturally timid man, he spoke out. The rumour spread that he had yielded to the entreaties of his wife Eugenie. No doubt she did intervene, but the Emperor was more deeply influenced by a revival of his old humanitarian dreams, his genuine compassion for the disinherited. * Like the Bishop, he did not wish to close the portals of illusion to the wretched by upholding the unpopular decree which forbade despairing sufferers to go and drink life at the holy source. So he sent a telegram, a curt order to remove the palisade, so as to allow everybody free access to the Grotto. * I think this view of the matter the right one, for, as all who know the history of the Second Empire are aware, it was about this time that the Emperor began taking great interest in the erection of model dwellings for the working classes, and the plantation and transformation of the sandy wastes of the Landes. --Trans. Then came a shout of joy and triumph. The decree annulling the previous one was read at Lourdes to the sound of drum and trumpet. The Commissary of Police had to come in person to superintend the removal of the palisade. He was afterwards transferred elsewhere like the Prefect. * People flocked to Lourdes from all parts, the new /cultus/ was organised at the Grotto, and a cry of joy ascended: God had won the victory! God? --alas, no! It was human wretchedness which had won the battle, human wretchedness with its eternal need of falsehood, its hunger for the marvellous, its everlasting hope akin to that of some condemned man who, for salvation's sake, surrenders himself into the hands of an invisible Omnipotence, mightier than nature, and alone capable, should it be willing, of annulling nature's laws. And that which had also conquered was the sovereign compassion of those pastors, the merciful Bishop and merciful Emperor who allowed those big sick children to retain the fetich which consoled some of them and at times even cured others. * The Prefect was transferred to Grenoble, and curiously enough his new jurisdiction extended over the hills and valleys of La Salette, whither pilgrims likewise flocked to drink, pray, and wash themselves at a miraculous fountain. Warned by experience, however, Baron Massy (such was the Prefect's name) was careful to avoid any further interference in religious matters. --Trans. In the middle of November the episcopal commission came to Lourdes to prosecute the inquiry which had been entrusted to it. It questioned Bernadette yet once again, and studied a large number of miracles. However, in order that the evidence might be absolute, it only registered some thirty cases of cure. And Monseigneur Laurence declared himself convinced. Nevertheless, he gave a final proof of his prudence, by continuing to wait another three years before declaring in a pastoral letter that the Blessed Virgin had in truth appeared at the Grotto of Massabielle and that numerous miracles had subsequently taken place there. Meantime, he had purchased the Grotto itself, with all the land around it, from the municipality of Lourdes, on behalf of his see. Work was then begun, modestly at first, but soon on a larger and larger scale as money began to flow in from all parts of Christendom. The Grotto was cleared and enclosed with an iron railing. The Gave was thrown back into a new bed, so as to allow of spacious approaches to the shrine, with lawns, paths, and walks. At last, too, the church which the Virgin had asked for, the Basilica, began to rise on the summit of the rock itself. From the very first stroke of the pick, Abbe Peyramale, the parish priest of Lourdes, went on directing everything with even excessive zeal, for the struggle had made him the most ardent and most sincere of all believers in the work that was to be accomplished. With his somewhat rough but truly fatherly nature, he had begun to adore Bernadette, making her mission his own, and devoting himself, soul and body, to realising the orders which he had received from Heaven through her innocent mouth. And he exhausted himself in mighty efforts; he wished everything to be very beautiful and very grand, worthy of the Queen of the Angels who had deigned to visit this mountain nook. The first religious ceremony did not take place till six years after the apparitions. A marble statue of the Virgin was installed with great pomp on the very spot where she had appeared. It was a magnificent day, all Lourdes was gay with flags, and every bell rang joyously. Five years later, in 1869, the first mass was celebrated in the crypt of the Basilica, whose spire was not yet finished. Meantime, gifts flowed in without a pause, a river of gold was streaming towards the Grotto, a whole town was about to spring up from the soil. It was the new religion completing its foundations. The desire to be healed did heal; the thirst for a miracle worked the miracle. A Deity of pity and hope was evolved from man's sufferings, from that longing for falsehood and relief which, in every age of humanity, has created the marvellous palaces of the realms beyond, where an almighty Power renders justice and distributes eternal happiness. And thus the ailing ones of the Sainte-Honorine Ward only beheld in the victory of the Grotto the triumph of their hopes of cure. Along the rows of beds there was a quiver of joy when, with his heart stirred by all those poor faces turned towards him, eager for certainty, Pierre repeated: "God had conquered. Since that day the miracles have never ceased, and it is the most humble who are the most frequently relieved." Then he laid down the little book. Abbe Judaine was coming in, and the Sacrament was about to be administered. Marie, however, again penetrated by the fever of faith, her hands burning, leant towards Pierre. "Oh, my friend!" said she, "I pray you hear me confess my fault and absolve me. I have blasphemed, and have been guilty of mortal sin. If you do not succour me, I shall be unable to receive the Blessed Sacrament, and yet I so greatly need to be consoled and strengthened." The young priest refused her request with a wave of the hand. He had never been willing to act as confessor to this friend, the only woman he had loved in the healthy, smiling days of youth. However, she insisted. "I beg you to do so," said she; "you will help to work the miracle of my cure." Then he gave way and received the avowal of her fault, that impious rebellion induced by suffering, that rebellion against the Virgin who had remained deaf to her prayers. And afterwards he granted her absolution in the sacramental form. Meanwhile Abbe Judaine had already deposited the ciborium on a little table, between two lighted tapers, which looked like woeful stars in the semi-obscurity of the ward. Madame de Jonquiere had just decided to open one of the windows quite wide, for the odour emanating from all the suffering bodies and heaped-up rags had become unbearable. But no air came in from the narrow courtyard into which the window opened; though black with night, it seemed like a well of fire. Having offered to act as server, Pierre repeated the "Confiteor." Then, after responding with the "Misereatur" and the "Indulgentiam," the chaplain, who wore his alb, raised the pyx, saying, "Behold the Lamb of God, who taketh away the sins of the world." All the women who, writhing in agony, were impatiently awaiting the communion, like dying creatures who await life from some fresh medicine which is a long time coming, thereupon thrice repeated, in all humility, and with lips almost closed: "Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof; but only say the word and my soul shall be healed." Abbe Judaine had begun to make the round of those woeful beds, accompanied by Pierre, and followed by Madame de Jonquiere and Sister Hyacinthe, each of whom carried one of the lighted tapers. The Sister designated those who were to communicate; and, murmuring the customary Latin words, the priest leant forward and placed the Host somewhat at random on the sufferer's tongue. Almost all were waiting for him with widely opened, glittering eyes, amidst the disorder of that hastily pitched camp. Two were found to be sound asleep, however, and had to be awakened. Several were moaning without being conscious of it, and continued moaning even after they had received the sacrament. At the far end of the ward, the rattle of the poor creature who could not be seen still resounded. And nothing could have been more mournful than the appearance of that little /cortege/ in the semi-darkness, amidst which the yellow flames of the tapers gleamed like stars. But Marie's face, to which an expression of ecstasy had returned, was like a divine apparition. Although La Grivotte was hungering for the bread of life, they had refused her the sacrament on this occasion, as it was to be administered to her in the morning at the Rosary; Madame Vetu, however, had received the Host on her black tongue in a hiccough. And now Marie was lying there under the pale light of the tapers, looking so beautiful amidst her fair hair, with her eyes dilated and her features transfigured by faith, that everyone admired her. She received the sacrament with rapture; Heaven visibly descended into her poor, youthful frame, reduced to such physical wretchedness. And, clasping Pierre's hand, she detained him for a moment, saying: "Oh! she will heal me, my friend, she has just promised me that she will do so. Go and take some rest. I shall sleep so soundly now!" As he withdrew in company with Abbe Judaine, Pierre caught sight of little Madame Desagneaux stretched out in the arm-chair in which weariness had overpowered her. Nothing could awaken her. It was now half-past one in the morning; and Madame de Jonquiere and her assistant, Sister Hyacinthe, were still going backwards and forwards, turning the patients over, cleansing them, and dressing their sores. However, the ward was becoming more peaceful, its heavy darkness had grown less oppressive since Bernadette with her charm had passed through it. The visionary's little shadow was now flitting in triumph from bed to bed, completing its work, bringing a little of heaven to each of the despairing ones, each of the disinherited ones of this world; and as they all at last sank to sleep they could see the little shepherdess, so young, so ill herself, leaning over them and kissing them with a kindly smile.

1

BED AND BOARD

AT seven o'clock on the morning of that fine, bright, warm August Sunday, M. de Guersaint was already up and dressed in one of the two little rooms which he had fortunately been able to secure on the third floor of the Hotel of the Apparitions. He had gone to bed at eleven o'clock the night before and had awoke feeling quite fresh and gay. As soon as he was dressed he entered the adjoining room which Pierre occupied; but the young priest, who had not returned to the hotel until past one in the morning, with his blood heated by insomnia, had been unable to doze off until daybreak and was now still slumbering. His cassock flung across a chair, his other garments scattered here and there, testified to his great weariness and agitation of mind. "Come, come, you lazybones!" cried M. de Guersaint gaily; "can't you hear the bells ringing?" Pierre awoke with a start, quite surprised to find himself in that little hotel room into which the sunlight was streaming. All the joyous peals of the bells, the music of the chiming, happy town, moreover, came in through the window which he had left open. "We shall never have time to get to the hospital before eight o'clock to fetch Marie," resumed M. de Guersaint, "for we must have some breakfast, eh?" "Of course, make haste and order two cups of chocolate. I will get up at once, I sha'n't be long," replied Pierre. In spite of the fatigue which had already stiffened his joints, he sprang out of bed as soon as he was alone, and made all haste with his toilet. However, he still had his head in the washing basin, ducking it in the fresh, cool water, when M. de Guersaint, who was unable to remain alone, came back again. "I've given the order," said he; "they will bring it up. Ah! what a curious place this hotel is! You have of course seen the landlord, Master Majeste, clad in white from head to foot and looking so dignified in his office. The place is crammed, it appears; they have never had so many people before. So it is no wonder that there should be such a fearful noise. I was wakened up three times during the night. People kept on talking in the room next to mine. And you, did you sleep well?" "No, indeed," answered Pierre; "I was tired to death, but I couldn't close my eyes. No doubt it was the uproar you speak of that prevented me." In his turn he then began to talk of the thin partitions, and the manner in which the house had been crammed with people until it seemed as though the floors and the walls would collapse with the strain. The place had been shaking all night long; every now and then people suddenly rushed along the passages, heavy footfalls resounded, gruff voices ascended nobody knew whence; without speaking of all the moaning and coughing, the frightful coughing which seemed to re-echo from every wall. Throughout the night people evidently came in and went out, got up and lay down again, paying no attention to time in the disorder in which they lived, amid shocks of passion which made them hurry to their devotional exercises as to pleasure parties. "And Marie, how was she when you left her last night?" M. de Guersaint suddenly inquired. "A great deal better," replied Pierre; "she had an attack of extreme discouragement, but all her courage and faith returned to her at last." A pause followed; and then the girl's father resumed with his tranquil optimism: "Oh! I am not anxious. Things will go on all right, you'll see. For my own part, I am delighted. I had asked the Virgin to grant me her protection in my affairs--you know, my great invention of navigable balloons. Well, suppose I told you that she has already shown me her favour? Yes, indeed yesterday evening while I was talking with Abbe des Hermoises, he told me that at Toulouse he would no doubt be able to find a person to finance me--one of his friends, in fact, who is extremely wealthy and takes great interest in mechanics! And in this I at once saw the hand of God!" M. de Guersaint began laughing with his childish laugh, and then he added: "That Abbe des Hermoises is a charming man. I shall see this afternoon if there is any means of my accompanying him on an excursion to the Cirque de Gavarnie at small cost." Pierre, who wished to pay everything, the hotel bill and all the rest, at once encouraged him in this idea. "Of course," said he, "you ought not to miss this opportunity to visit the mountains, since you have so great a wish to do so. Your daughter will be very happy to know that you are pleased." Their talk, however, was now interrupted by a servant girl bringing the two cups of chocolate with a couple of rolls on a metal tray covered with a napkin. She left the door open as she entered the room, so that a glimpse was obtained of some portion of the passage. "Ah! they are already doing my neighbour's room!" exclaimed M. de Guersaint. "He is a married man, isn't he? His wife is with him?" The servant looked astonished. "Oh, no," she replied, "he is quite alone!" "Quite alone? Why, I heard people talking in his room this morning." "You must be mistaken, monsieur," said the servant; "he has just gone out after giving orders that his room was to be tidied up at once." And then, while taking the cups of chocolate off the tray and placing them on the table, she continued: "Oh! he is a very respectable gentleman. Last year he was able to have one of the pavilions which Monsieur Majeste lets out to visitors, in the lane by the side of the hotel; but this year he applied too late and had to content himself with that room, which greatly worried him, for it isn't a large one, though there is a big cupboard in it. As he doesn't care to eat with everybody, he takes his meals there, and he orders good wine and the best of everything, I can tell you." "That explains it all!" replied M. de Guersaint gaily; "he dined too well last night, and I must have heard him talking in his sleep." Pierre had been listening somewhat inquisitively to all this chatter. "And on this side, my side," said he, "isn't there a gentleman with two ladies, and a little boy who walks about with a crutch?" "Yes, Monsieur l'Abbe, I know them. The aunt, Madame Chaise, took one of the two rooms for herself; and Monsieur and Madame Vigneron with their son Gustave have had to content themselves with the other one. This is the second year they have come to Lourdes. They are very respectable people too." Pierre nodded. During the night he had fancied he could recognise the voice of M. Vigneron, whom the heat doubtless had incommoded. However, the servant was now thoroughly started, and she began to enumerate the other persons whose rooms were reached by the same passage; on the left hand there was a priest, then a mother with three daughters, and then an old married couple; whilst on the right lodged another gentleman who was all alone, a young lady, too, who was unaccompanied, and then a family party which included five young children. The hotel was crowded to its garrets. The servants had had to give up their rooms the previous evening and lie in a heap in the washhouse. During the night, also, some camp bedsteads had even been set up on the landings; and one honourable ecclesiastic, for lack of other accommodation, had been obliged to sleep on a billiard-table. When the girl had retired and the two men had drunk their chocolate, M. de Guersaint went back into his own room to wash his hands again, for he was very careful of his person; and Pierre, who remained alone, felt attracted by the gay sunlight, and stepped for a moment on to the narrow balcony outside his window. Each of the third-floor rooms on this side of the hotel was provided with a similar balcony, having a carved-wood balustrade. However, the young priest's surprise was very great, for he had scarcely stepped outside when he suddenly saw a woman protrude her head over the balcony next to him--that of the room occupied by the gentleman whom M. de Guersaint and the servant had been speaking of. And this woman he had recognised: it was Madame Volmar. There was no mistaking her long face with its delicate drawn features, its magnificent large eyes, those brasiers over which a veil, a dimming /moire/, seemed to pass at times. She gave a start of terror on perceiving him. And he, extremely ill at ease, grieved that he should have frightened her, made all haste to withdraw into his apartment. A sudden light had dawned upon him, and he now understood and could picture everything. So this was why she had not been seen at the hospital, where little Madame Desagneaux was always asking for her. Standing motionless, his heart upset, Pierre fell into a deep reverie, reflecting on the life led by this woman whom he knew, that torturing conjugal life in Paris between a fierce mother-in-law and an unworthy husband, and then those three days of complete liberty spent at Lourdes, that brief bonfire of passion to which she had hastened under the sacrilegious pretext of serving the divinity. Tears whose cause he could not even explain, tears that ascended from the very depths of his being, from his own voluntary chastity, welled into his eyes amidst the feeling of intense sorrow which came over him. "Well, are you ready?" joyously called M. de Guersaint as he came back, with his grey jacket buttoned up and his hands gloved. "Yes, yes, let us go," replied Pierre, turning aside and pretending to look for his hat so that he might wipe his eyes. Then they went out, and on crossing the threshold heard on their left hand an unctuous voice which they recognised; it was that of M. Vigneron, who was loudly repeating the morning prayers. A moment afterwards came a meeting which interested them. They were walking down the passage when they were passed by a middle-aged, thick-set, sturdy-looking gentleman, wearing carefully trimmed whiskers. He bent his back and passed so rapidly that they were unable to distinguish his features, but they noticed that he was carrying a carefully made parcel. And immediately afterwards he slipped a key into the lock of the room adjoining M. de Guersaint's, and opening the door disappeared noiselessly, like a shadow. M. de Guersaint had glanced round: "Ah! my neighbour," said he; "he has been to market and has brought back some delicacies, no doubt!" Pierre pretended not to hear, for his companion was so light-minded that he did not care to trust him with a secret which was not his own. Besides, a feeling of uneasiness was returning to him, a kind of chaste terror at the thought that the world and the flesh were there taking their revenge, amidst all the mystical enthusiasm which he could feel around him. They reached the hospital just as the patients were being brought out to be carried to the Grotto; and they found that Marie had slept well and was very gay. She kissed her father and scolded him when she learnt that he had not yet decided on his trip to Gavarnie. She should really be displeased with him, she said, if he did not go. Still with the same restful, smiling expression, she added that she did not expect to be cured that day; and then, assuming an air of mystery, she begged Pierre to obtain permission for her to spend the following night before the Grotto. This was a favour which all the sufferers ardently coveted, but which only a few favoured ones with difficulty secured. After protesting, anxious as he felt with regard to the effect which a night spent in the open air might have upon her health, the young priest, seeing how unhappy she had suddenly become, at last promised that he would make the application. Doubtless she imagined that she would only obtain a hearing from the Virgin when they were alone together in the slumbering peacefulness of the night. That morning, indeed, she felt so lost among the innumerable patients who were heaped together in front of the Grotto, that already at ten o'clock she asked to be taken back to the hospital, complaining that the bright light tired her eyes. And when her father and the priest had again installed her in the Sainte-Honorine Ward, she gave them their liberty for the remainder of the day. "No, don't come to fetch me," she said, "I shall not go back to the Grotto this afternoon--it would be useless. But you will come for me this evening at nine o'clock, won't you, Pierre? It is agreed, you have given me your word." He repeated that he would endeavour to secure the requisite permission, and that, if necessary, he would apply to Father Fourcade in person. "Then, till this evening, darling," said M. de Guersaint, kissing his daughter. And he and Pierre went off together, leaving her lying on her bed, with an absorbed expression on her features, as her large, smiling eyes wandered away into space. It was barely half-past ten when they got back to the Hotel of the Apparitions; but M. de Guersaint, whom the fine weather delighted, talked of having /dejeuner/ at once, so that he might the sooner start upon a ramble through Lourdes. First of all, however, he wished to go up to his room, and Pierre following him, they encountered quite a drama on their way. The door of the room occupied by the Vignerons was wide open, and little Gustave could be seen lying on the sofa which served as his bed. He was livid; a moment previously he had suddenly fainted, and this had made the father and mother imagine that the end had come. Madame Vigneron was crouching on a chair, still stupefied by her fright, whilst M. Vigneron rushed about the room, thrusting everything aside in order that he might prepare a glass of sugared-water, to which he added a few drops of some elixir. This draught, he exclaimed, would set the lad right again. But all the same, it was incomprehensible. The boy was still strong, and to think that he should have fainted like that, and have turned as white as a chicken! Speaking in this wise, M. Vigneron glanced at Madame Chaise, the aunt, who was standing in front of the sofa, looking in good health that morning; and his hands shook yet more violently at the covert idea that if that stupid attack had carried off his son, they would no longer have inherited the aunt's fortune. He was quite beside himself at this thought, and eagerly opening the boy's mouth he compelled him to swallow the entire contents of the glass. Then, however, when he heard Gustave sigh, and saw him open his eyes again, his fatherly good-nature reappeared, and he shed tears, and called the lad his dear little fellow. But on Madame Chaise drawing near to offer some assistance, Gustave repulsed her with a sudden gesture of hatred, as though he understood how this woman's money unconsciously perverted his parents, who, after all, were worthy folks. Greatly offended, the old lady turned on her heel, and seated herself in a corner, whilst the father and mother, at last freed from their anxiety, returned thanks to the Blessed Virgin for having preserved their darling, who smiled at them with his intelligent and infinitely sorrowful smile, knowing and understanding everything as he did, and no longer having any taste for life, although he was not fifteen. "Can we be of any help to you?" asked Pierre in an obliging way. "No, no, I thank you, gentlemen," replied M. Vigneron, coming for a moment into the passage. "But oh! we did have a fright! Think of it, an only son, who is so dear to us too." All around them the approach of the /dejeuner/ hour was now throwing the house into commotion. Every door was banging, and the passages and the staircase resounded with the constant pitter-patter of feet. Three big girls passed by, raising a current of air with the sweep of their skirts. Some little children were crying in a neighbouring room. Then there were old people who seemed quite scared, and distracted priests who, forgetting their calling, caught up their cassocks with both hands, so that they might run the faster to the dining-room. From the top to the bottom of the house one could feel the floors shaking under the excessive weight of all the people who were packed inside the hotel. "Oh, I hope that it is all over now, and that the Blessed Virgin will cure him," repeated M. Vigneron, before allowing his neighbours to retire. "We are going down-stairs, for I must confess that all this has made me feel faint. I need something to eat, I am terribly hungry." When Pierre and M. de Guersaint at last left their rooms, and went down-stairs, they found to their annoyance that there was not the smallest table-corner vacant in the large dining-room. A most extraordinary mob had assembled there, and the few seats that were still unoccupied were reserved. A waiter informed them that the room never emptied between ten and one o'clock, such was the rush of appetite, sharpened by the keen mountain air. So they had to resign themselves to wait, requesting the waiter to warn them as soon as there should be a couple of vacant places. Then, scarcely knowing what to do with themselves, they went to walk about the hotel porch, whence there was a view of the street, along which the townsfolk, in their Sunday best, streamed without a pause. All at once, however, the landlord of the Hotel of the Apparitions, Master Majeste in person, appeared before them, clad in white from head to foot; and with a great show of politeness he inquired if the gentlemen would like to wait in the drawing-room. He was a stout man of five-and-forty, and strove to bear the burden of his name in a right royal fashion. Bald and clean-shaven, with round blue eyes in a waxy face, displaying three superposed chins, he always deported himself with much dignity. He had come from Nevers with the Sisters who managed the orphan asylum, and was married to a dusky little woman, a native of Lourdes. In less than fifteen years they had made their hotel one of the most substantial and best patronised establishments in the town. Of recent times, moreover, they had started a business in religious articles, installed in a large shop on the left of the hotel porch and managed by a young niece under Madame Majeste's Supervision. "You can wait in the drawing-room, gentlemen," again suggested the hotel-keeper whom Pierre's cassock rendered very attentive. They replied, however, that they preferred to walk about and wait in the open air. And thereupon Majeste would not leave them, but deigned to chat with them for a moment as he was wont to do with those of his customers whom he desired to honour. The conversation turned at first on the procession which would take place that night and which promised to be a superb spectacle as the weather was so fine. There were more than fifty thousand strangers gathered together in Lourdes that day, for visitors had come in from all the neighbouring bathing stations. This explained the crush at the /table d'hote/. Possibly the town would run short of bread as had been the case the previous year. "You saw what a scramble there is," concluded Majeste, "we really don't know how to manage. It isn't my fault, I assure you, if you are kept waiting for a short time." At this moment, however, a postman arrived with a large batch of newspapers and letters which he deposited on a table in the office. He had kept one letter in his hand and inquired of the landlord, "Have you a Madame Maze here?" "Madame Maze, Madame Maze," repeated the hotel-keeper. "No, no, certainly not." Pierre had heard both question and answer, and drawing near he exclaimed, "I know of a Madame Maze who must be lodging with the Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, the Blue Sisters as people call them here, I think." The postman thanked him for the information and went off, but a somewhat bitter smile had risen to Majeste's lips. "The Blue Sisters," he muttered, "ah! the Blue Sisters." Then, darting a side glance at Pierre's cassock, he stopped short, as though he feared that he might say too much. Yet his heart was overflowing; he would have greatly liked to ease his feelings, and this young priest from Paris, who looked so liberal-minded, could not be one of the "band" as he called all those who discharged functions at the Grotto and coined money out of Our Lady of Lourdes. Accordingly, little by little, he ventured to speak out. "I am a good Christian, I assure you, Monsieur l'Abbe," said he. "In fact we are all good Christians here. And I am a regular worshipper and take the sacrament every Easter. But, really, I must say that members of a religious community ought not to keep hotels. No, no, it isn't right!" And thereupon he vented all the spite of a tradesman in presence of what he considered to be disloyal competition. Ought not those Blue Sisters, those Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, to have confined themselves to their real functions, the manufacture of wafers for sacramental purposes, and the repairing and washing of church linen? Instead of that, however, they had transformed their convent into a vast hostelry, where ladies who came to Lourdes unaccompanied found separate rooms, and were able to take their meals either in privacy or in a general dining-room. Everything was certainly very clean, very well organised and very inexpensive, thanks to the thousand advantages which the Sisters enjoyed; in fact, no hotel at Lourdes did so much business. "But all the same," continued Majeste, "I ask you if it is proper. To think of nuns selling victuals! Besides, I must tell you that the lady superior is really a clever woman, and as soon as she saw the stream of fortune rolling in, she wanted to keep it all for her own community and resolutely parted with the Fathers of the Grotto who wanted to lay their hands on it. Yes, Monsieur l'Abbe, she even went to Rome and gained her cause there, so that now she pockets all the money that her bills bring in. Think of it, nuns, yes nuns, /mon Dieu/! letting furnished rooms and keeping a /table d'hote/!" He raised his arms to heaven, he was stifling with envy and vexation. "But as your house is crammed," Pierre gently objected, "as you no longer have either a bed or a plate at anybody's disposal, where would you put any additional visitors who might arrive here?" Majeste at once began protesting. "Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe!" said he, "one can see very well that you don't know the place. It's quite true that there is work for all of us, and that nobody has reason to complain during the national pilgrimage. But that only lasts four or five days, and in ordinary times the custom we secure isn't nearly so great. For myself, thank Heaven, I am always satisfied. My house is well known, it occupies the same rank as the Hotel of the Grotto, where two landlords have already made their fortunes. But no matter, it is vexing to see those Blue Sisters taking all the cream of the custom, for instance the ladies of the /bourgeoisie/ who spend a fortnight and three weeks here at a stretch; and that, too, just in the quiet season, when there are not many people here. You understand, don't you? There are people of position who dislike uproar; they go by themselves to the Grotto, and pray there all day long, for days together, and pay good prices for their accommodation without any higgling." Madame Majeste, whom Pierre and M. de Guersaint had not noticed leaning over an account-book in which she was adding up some figures, thereupon intervened in a shrill voice: "We had a customer like that, gentlemen, who stayed here for two months last year. She went to the Grotto, came back, went there again, took her meals, and went to bed. And never did we have a word of complaint from her; she was always smiling, as though to say that she found everything very nice. She paid her bill, too, without even looking at it. Ah! one regrets people of that kind." Short, thin, very dark, and dressed in black, with a little white collar, Madame Majeste had risen to her feet; and she now began to solicit custom: "If you would like to buy a few little souvenirs of Lourdes before you leave, gentlemen, I hope that you will not forget us. We have a shop close by, where you will find an assortment of all the articles that are most in request. As a rule, the persons who stay here are kind enough not to deal elsewhere." However, Majeste was again wagging his head, with the air of a good Christian saddened by the scandals of the time. "Certainly," said he, "I don't want to show any disrespect to the reverend Fathers, but it must in all truth be admitted that they are too greedy. You must have seen the shop which they have set up near the Grotto, that shop which is always crowded, and where tapers and articles of piety are sold. A bishop declared that it was shameful, and that the buyers and sellers ought to be driven out of the temple afresh. It is said, too, that the Fathers run that big shop yonder, just across the street, which supplies all the petty dealers in the town. And, according to the reports which circulate, they have a finger in all the trade in religious articles, and levy a percentage on the millions of chaplets, statuettes, and medals which are sold every year at Lourdes." Majeste had now lowered his voice, for his accusations were becoming precise, and he ended by trembling somewhat at his imprudence in talking so confidentially to strangers. However, the expression of Pierre's gentle, attentive face reassured him; and so he continued with the passion of a wounded rival, resolved to go on to the very end: "I am willing to admit that there is some exaggeration in all this. But all the same, it does religion no good for people to see the reverend Fathers keeping shops like us tradesmen. For my part, of course, I don't go and ask for a share of the money which they make by their masses, or a percentage on the presents which they receive, so why should they start selling what I sell? Our business was a poor one last year owing to them. There are already too many of us; nowadays everyone at Lourdes sells 'religious articles,' to such an extent, in fact, that there will soon be no butchers or wine merchants left--nothing but bread to eat and water to drink. Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe, it is no doubt nice to have the Blessed Virgin with us, but things are none the less very bad at times." A person staying at the hotel at that moment disturbed him, but he returned just as a young girl came in search of Madame Majeste. The damsel, who evidently belonged to Lourdes, was very pretty, small but plump, with beautiful black hair, and a round face full of bright gaiety. "That is our niece Apolline," resumed Majeste. "She has been keeping our shop for two years past. She is the daughter of one of my wife's brothers, who is in poor circumstances. She was keeping sheep at Ossun, in the neighbourhood of Bartres, when we were struck by her intelligence and nice looks and decided to bring her here; and we don't repent having done so, for she has a great deal of merit, and has become a very good saleswoman." A point to which he omitted to refer, was that there were rumours current of somewhat flighty conduct on Mademoiselle Apolline's part. But she undoubtedly had her value: she attracted customers by the power, possibly, of her large black eyes, which smiled so readily. During his sojourn at Lourdes the previous year, Gerard de Peyrelongue had scarcely stirred from the shop she managed, and doubtless it was only the matrimonial ideas now flitting through his head that prevented him from returning thither. It seemed as though the Abbe des Hermoises had taken his place, for this gallant ecclesiastic brought a great many ladies to make purchases at the repository. "Ah! you are speaking of Apolline," said Madame Majeste, at that moment coming back from the shop. "Have you noticed one thing about her, gentlemen--her extraordinary likeness to Bernadette? There, on the wall yonder, is a photograph of Bernadette when she was eighteen years old." Pierre and M. de Guersaint drew near to examine the portrait, whilst Majeste exclaimed: "Bernadette, yes, certainly--she was rather like Apolline, but not nearly so nice; she looked so sad and poor." He would doubtless have gone on chattering, but just then the waiter appeared and announced that there was at last a little table vacant. M. de Guersaint had twice gone to glance inside the dining-room, for he was eager to have his /dejeuner/ and spend the remainder of that fine Sunday out-of-doors. So he now hastened away, without paying any further attention to Majeste, who remarked, with an amiable smile, that the gentlemen had not had so very long to wait after all. To reach the table mentioned by the waiter, the architect and Pierre had to cross the dining-room from end to end. It was a long apartment, painted a light oak colour, an oily yellow, which was already peeling away in places and soiled with stains in others. You realised that rapid wear and tear went on here amidst the continual scramble of the big eaters who sat down at table. The only ornaments were a gilt zinc clock and a couple of meagre candelabra on the mantelpiece. Guipure curtains, moreover, hung at the five large windows looking on to the street, which was flooded with sunshine; some of the fierce arrow-like rays penetrating into the room although the blinds had been lowered. And, in the middle of the apartment, some forty persons were packed together at the /table d'hote/, which was scarcely eleven yards in length and did not supply proper accommodation for more than thirty people; whilst at the little tables standing against the walls upon either side another forty persons sat close together, hustled by the three waiters each time that they went by. You had scarcely reached the threshold before you were deafened by the extraordinary uproar, the noise of voices and the clatter of forks and plates; and it seemed, too, as if you were entering a damp oven, for a warm, steamy mist, laden with a suffocating smell of victuals, assailed the face. Pierre at first failed to distinguish anything, but, when he was installed at the little table--a garden-table which had been brought indoors for the occasion, and on which there was scarcely room for two covers--he felt quite upset, almost sick, in fact, at the sight presented by the /table d'hote/, which his glance now enfiladed from end to end. People had been eating at it for an hour already, two sets of customers had followed one upon the other, and the covers were strewn about in higgledy-piggledy fashion. On the cloth were numerous stains of wine and sauce, while there was no symmetry even in the arrangement of the glass fruit-stands, which formed the only decorations of the table. And one's astonishment increased at sight of the motley mob which was collected there--huge priests, scraggy girls, mothers overflowing with superfluous fat, gentlemen with red faces, and families ranged in rows and displaying all the pitiable, increasing ugliness of successive generations. All these people were perspiring, greedily swallowing, seated slantwise, lacking room to move their arms, and unable even to use their hands deftly. And amidst this display of appetite, increased tenfold by fatigue, and of eager haste to fill one's stomach in order to return to the Grotto more quickly, there was a corpulent ecclesiastic who in no wise hurried, but ate of every dish with prudent slowness, crunching his food with a ceaseless, dignified movement of the jaws. " /Fichtre/!" exclaimed M. de Guersaint, "it is by no means cool in here. All the same, I shall be glad of something to eat, for I've felt a sinking in the stomach ever since I have been at Lourdes. And you--are you hungry?" "Yes, yes, I shall eat," replied Pierre, though, truth to tell, he felt quite upset. The /menu/ was a copious one. There was salmon, an omelet, mutton cutlets with mashed potatoes, stewed kidneys, cauliflowers, cold meats, and apricot tarts--everything cooked too much, and swimming in sauce which, but for its grittiness, would have been flavourless. However, there was some fairly fine fruit on the glass stands, particularly some peaches. And, besides, the people did not seem at all difficult to please; they apparently had no palates, for there was no sign of nausea. Hemmed in between an old priest and a dirty, full-bearded man, a girl of delicate build, who looked very pretty with her soft eyes and silken skin, was eating some kidneys with an expression of absolute beatitude, although the so-called "sauce" in which they swam was simply greyish water. "Hum!" resumed even M. de Guersaint, "this salmon is not so bad. Add a little salt to it and you will find it all right." Pierre made up his mind to eat, for after all he must take sustenance for strength's sake. At a little table close by, however, he had just caught sight of Madame Vigneron and Madame Chaise, who sat face to face, apparently waiting. And indeed, M. Vigneron and his son Gustave soon appeared, the latter still pale, and leaning more heavily than usual on his crutch. "Sit down next to your aunt," said his father; "I will take the chair beside your mother." But just then he perceived his two neighbours, and stepping up to them, he added: "Oh! he is now all right again. I have been rubbing him with some eau-de-Cologne, and by-and-by he will be able to take his bath at the piscina." Thereupon M. Vigneron sat down and began to devour. But what an awful fright he had had! He again began talking of it aloud, despite himself, so intense had been his terror at the thought that the lad might go off before his aunt. The latter related that whilst she was kneeling at the Grotto the day before, she had experienced a sudden feeling of relief; in fact, she flattered herself that she was cured of her heart complaint, and began giving precise particulars, to which her brother-in-law listened with dilated eyes, full of involuntary anxiety. Most certainly he was a good-natured man, he had never desired anybody's death; only he felt indignant at the idea that the Virgin might cure this old woman, and forget his son, who was so young. Talking and eating, he had got to the cutlets, and was swallowing the mashed potatoes by the forkful, when he fancied he could detect that Madame Chaise was sulking with her nephew. "Gustave," he suddenly inquired, "have you asked your aunt's forgiveness?" The lad, quite astonished, began staring at his father with his large clear eyes. "Yes," added M. Vigneron, "you behaved very badly, you pushed her back just now when she wanted to help you to sit up." Madame Chaise said nothing, but waited with a dignified air, whilst Gustave, who, without any show of appetite, was finishing the /noix/ of his cutlet, which had been cut into small pieces, remained with his eyes lowered on his plate, this time obstinately refusing to make the sorry show of affection which was demanded of him. "Come, Gustave," resumed his father, "be a good boy. You know how kind your aunt is, and all that she intends to do for you." But no, he would not yield. At that moment, indeed, he really hated that woman, who did not die quickly enough, who polluted the affection of his parents, to such a point that when he saw them surround him with attentions he no longer knew whether it were himself or the inheritance which his life represented that they wished to save. However, Madame Vigneron, so dignified in her demeanour, came to her husband's help. "You really grieve me, Gustave," said she; "ask your aunt's forgiveness, or you will make me quite angry with you." Thereupon he gave way. What was the use of resisting? Was it not better that his parents should obtain that money? Would he not himself die later on, so as to suit the family convenience? He was aware of all that; he understood everything, even when not a word was spoken. So keen was the sense of hearing with which suffering had endowed him, that he even heard the others' thoughts. "I beg your pardon, aunt," he said, "for not having behaved well to you just now." Then two big tears rolled from his eyes, whilst he smiled with the air of a tender-hearted man who has seen too much of life and can no longer be deceived by anything. Madame Chaise at once kissed him and told him that she was not at all angry. And the Vignerons' delight in living was displayed in all candour. "If the kidneys are not up to much," M. de Guersaint now said to Pierre, "here at all events are some cauliflowers with a good flavour." The formidable mastication was still going on around them. Pierre had never seen such an amount of eating, amidst such perspiration, in an atmosphere as stifling as that of a washhouse full of hot steam. The odour of the victuals seemed to thicken into a kind of smoke. You had to shout to make yourself heard, for everybody was talking in loud tones, and the scared waiters raised a fearful clatter in changing the plates and forks; not to mention the noise of all the jaw-crunching, a mill-like grinding which was distinctly audible. What most hurt the feelings of the young priest, however, was the extraordinary promiscuity of the /table d'hote/, at which men and women, young girls and ecclesiastics, were packed together in chance order, and satisfied their hunger like a pack of hounds snapping at offal in all haste. Baskets of bread went round and were promptly emptied. And there was a perfect massacre of cold meats, all the remnants of the victuals of the day before, leg of mutton, veal, and ham, encompassed by a fallen mass of transparent jelly which quivered like soft glue. They had all eaten too much already, but these viands seemed to whet their appetites afresh, as though the idea had come to them that nothing whatever ought to be left. The fat priest in the middle of the table, who had shown himself such a capital knife-and-fork, was now lingering over the fruit, having just got to his third peach, a huge one, which he slowly peeled and swallowed in slices with an air of compunction. All at once, however, the whole room was thrown into agitation. A waiter had come in and begun distributing the letters which Madame Majeste had finished sorting. "Hallo!" exclaimed M. Vigneron; "a letter for me! This is surprising--I did not give my address to anybody." Then, at a sudden recollection, he added, "Yes I did, though; this must have come from Sauvageot, who is filling my place at the Ministry." He opened the letter, his hands began to tremble, and suddenly he raised a cry: "The chief clerk is dead!" Deeply agitated, Madame Vigneron was also unable to bridle her tongue: "Then you will have the appointment!" This was the secret dream in which they had so long and so fondly indulged: the chief clerk's death, in order that he, Vigneron, assistant chief clerk for ten years past, might at last rise to the supreme post, the bureaucratic marshalship. And so great was his delight that he cast aside all restraint. "Ah! the Blessed Virgin is certainly protecting me, my dear. Only this morning I again prayed to her for a rise, and, you see, she grants my prayer!" However, finding Madame Chaise's eyes fixed upon his own, and seeing Gustave smile, he realised that he ought not to exult in this fashion. Each member of the family no doubt thought of his or her interests and prayed to the Blessed Virgin for such personal favours as might be desired. And so, again putting on his good-natured air, he resumed: "I mean that the Blessed Virgin takes an interest in every one of us and will send us all home well satisfied. Ah! the poor chief, I'm sorry for him. I shall have to send my card to his widow." In spite of all his efforts he could not restrain his exultation, and no longer doubted that his most secret desires, those which he did not even confess to himself, would soon be gratified. And so all honour was done to the apricot tarts, even Gustave being allowed to eat a portion of one. "It is surprising," now remarked M. de Guersaint, who had just ordered a cup of coffee; "it is surprising that one doesn't see more sick people here. All these folks seem to me to have first-rate appetites." After a close inspection, however, in addition to Gustave, who ate no more than a little chicken, he ended by finding a man with a goitre seated at the /table d'hote/ between two women, one of whom certainly suffered from cancer. Farther on, too, there was a girl so thin and pale that she must surely be a consumptive. And still farther away there was a female idiot who had made her entry leaning on two relatives, and with expressionless eyes and lifeless features was now carrying her food to her mouth with a spoon, and slobbering over her napkin. Perhaps there were yet other ailing ones present who could not be distinguished among all those noisy appetites, ailing ones whom the journey had braced, and who were eating as they had not eaten for a long time past. The apricot tarts, the cheese, the fruits were all engulfed amidst the increasing disorder of the table, where at last there only remained the stains of all the wine and sauce which had been spilt upon the cloth. It was nearly noon. "We will go back to the Grotto at once, eh?" said M. Vigneron. Indeed, "To the Grotto! To the Grotto!" were well-nigh the only words you now heard. The full mouths were eagerly masticating and swallowing, in order that they might repeat prayers and hymns again with all speed. "Well, as we have the whole afternoon before us," declared M. de Guersaint, "I suggest that we should visit the town a little. I want to see also if I can get a conveyance for my excursion, as my daughter so particularly wishes me to make it." Pierre, who was stifling, was glad indeed to leave the dining-room. In the porch he was able to breathe again, though even there he found a torrent of customers, new arrivals who were waiting for places. No sooner did one of the little tables become vacant than its possession was eagerly contested, whilst the smallest gap at the /table d'hote/ was instantly filled up. In this wise the assault would continue for more than another hour, and again would the different courses of the /menu/ appear in procession, to be engulfed amidst the crunching of jaws, the stifling heat, and the growing nausea.

2

THE "ORDINARY."

WHEN Pierre and M. de Guersaint got outside they began walking slowly amidst the ever-growing stream of the Sundayfied crowd. The sky was a bright blue, the sun warmed the whole town, and there was a festive gaiety in the atmosphere, the keen delight that attends those great fairs which bring entire communities into the open air. When they had descended the crowded footway of the Avenue de la Grotte, and had reached the corner of the Plateau de la Merlasse, they found their way barred by a throng which was flowing backward amidst a block of vehicles and stamping of horses. "There is no hurry, however," remarked M. de Guersaint. "My idea is to go as far as the Place du Marcadal in the old town; for the servant girl at the hotel told me of a hairdresser there whose brother lets out conveyances cheaply. Do you mind going so far?" "I?" replied Pierre. "Go wherever you like, I'll follow you." "All right--and I'll profit by the opportunity to have a shave." They were nearing the Place du Rosaire, and found themselves in front of the lawns stretching to the Gave, when an encounter again stopped them. Mesdames Desagneaux and Raymonde de Jonquiere were here, chatting gaily with Gerard de Peyrelongue. Both women wore light-coloured gowns, seaside dresses as it were, and their white silk parasols shone in the bright sunlight. They imparted, so to say, a pretty note to the scene--a touch of society chatter blended with the fresh laughter of youth. "No, no," Madame Desagneaux was saying, "we certainly can't go and visit your 'ordinary' like that--at the very moment when all your comrades are eating." Gerard, however, with a very gallant air, insisted on their accompanying him, turning more particularly towards Raymonde, whose somewhat massive face was that day brightened by the radiant charm of health. "But it is a very curious sight, I assure you," said the young man, "and you would be very respectfully received. Trust yourself to me, mademoiselle. Besides, we should certainly find M. Berthaud there, and he would be delighted to do you the honours." Raymonde smiled, her clear eyes plainly saying that she was quite agreeable. And just then, as Pierre and M. de Guersaint drew near in order to present their respects to the ladies, they were made acquainted with the question under discussion. The "ordinary" was a kind of restaurant or /table d'hote/ which the members of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation--the bearers, the hospitallers of the Grotto, the piscinas, and the hospitals--had established among themselves with the view of taking their meals together at small cost. Many of them were not rich, for they were recruited among all classes; however, they had contrived to secure three good meals for the daily payment of three francs apiece. And in fact they soon had provisions to spare and distributed them among the poor. Everything was in their own management; they purchased their own supplies, recruited a cook and a few waiters, and did not disdain to lend a hand themselves, in order that everything might be comfortable and orderly. "It must be very interesting," said M, de Guersaint, when these explanations had been given him. "Let us go and see it, if we are not in the way." Little Madame Desagneaux thereupon gave her consent. "Well, if we are going in a party," said she, "I am quite willing. But when this gentleman first proposed to take Raymonde and me, I was afraid that it might not be quite proper." Then, as she began to laugh, the others followed her example. She had accepted M. de Guersaint's arm, and Pierre walked beside her on the other hand, experiencing a sudden feeling of sympathy for this gay little woman, who was so full of life and so charming with her fair frizzy hair and creamy complexion. Behind them came Raymonde, leaning upon Gerard's arm and talking to him in the calm, staid voice of a young lady who holds the best principles despite her air of heedless youth. And since here was the husband whom she had so often dreamt of, she resolved that she would this time secure him, make him beyond all question her own. She intoxicated him with the perfume of health and youth which she diffused, and at the same time astonished him by her knowledge of housewifely duties and of the manner in which money may be economised even in the most trifling matters; for having questioned him with regard to the purchases which he and his comrades made for their "ordinary," she proceeded to show him that they might have reduced their expenditure still further. Meantime M. de Guersaint and Madame Desagneaux were also chatting together: "You must be fearfully tired, madame," said the architect. But with a gesture of revolt, and an exclamation of genuine anger, she replied: "Oh no, indeed! Last night, it is true, fatigue quite overcame me at the hospital; I sat down and dozed off, and Madame de Jonquiere and the other ladies were good enough to let me sleep on." At this the others again began to laugh; but still with the same angry air she continued: "And so I slept like a log until this morning. It was disgraceful, especially as I had sworn that I would remain up all night." Then, merriment gaining upon her in her turn, she suddenly burst into a sonorous laugh, displaying her beautiful white teeth. "Ah! a pretty nurse I am, and no mistake! It was poor Madame de Jonquiere who had to remain on her legs all the time. I tried to coax her to come out with us just now. But she preferred to take a little rest." Raymonde, who overheard these words, thereupon raised her voice to say: "Yes, indeed, my poor mamma could no longer keep on her feet. It was I who compelled her to lie down, telling her that she could go to sleep without any uneasiness, for we should get on all right without her--" So saying, the girl gave Gerard a laughing glance. He even fancied that he could detect a faint squeeze of the fresh round arm which was resting on his own, as though, indeed, she had wished to express her happiness at being alone with him so that they might settle their own affairs without any interference. This quite delighted him; and he began to explain that if he had not had /dejeuner/ with his comrades that day, it was because some friends had invited him to join them at the railway-station refreshment-room at ten o'clock, and had not given him his liberty until after the departure of the eleven-thirty train. "Ah! the rascals!" he suddenly resumed. "Do you hear them, mademoiselle?" The little party was now nearing its destination, and the uproarious laughter and chatter of youth rang out from a clump of trees which concealed the old zinc and plaster building in which the "ordinary" was installed. Gerard began by taking the visitors into the kitchen, a very spacious apartment, well fitted up, and containing a huge range and an immense table, to say nothing of numerous gigantic cauldrons. Here, moreover, the young man called the attention of his companions to the circumstance that the cook, a fat, jovial-looking man, had the red cross pinned on his white jacket, being himself a member of the pilgrimage. Then, pushing open a door, Gerard invited his friends to enter the common room. It was a long apartment containing two rows of plain deal tables; and the only other articles of furniture were numerous rush-seated tavern chairs, with an additional table which served as a sideboard. The whitewashed walls and the flooring of shiny, red tiles looked, however, extremely clean amidst this intentional bareness, which was similar to that of a monkish refectory. But, the feature of the place which more particularly struck you, as you crossed the threshold, was the childish gaiety which reigned there; for, packed together at the tables, were a hundred and fifty hospitallers of all ages, eating with splendid appetites, laughing, applauding, and singing, with their mouths full. A wondrous fraternity united these men, who had flocked to Lourdes from every province of France, and who belonged to all classes, and represented every degree of fortune. Many of them knew nothing of one another, save that they met here and elbowed one another during three days every year, living together like brothers, and then going off and remaining in absolute ignorance of each other during the rest of the twelvemonth. Nothing could be more charming, however, than to meet again at the next pilgrimage, united in the same charitable work, and to spend a few days of hard labour and boyish delight in common once more; for it all became, as it were, an "outing" of a number of big fellows, let loose under a lovely sky, and well pleased to be able to enjoy themselves and laugh together. And even the frugality of the table, with the pride of managing things themselves, of eating the provisions which they had purchased and cooked, added to the general good humour. "You see," explained Gerard, "we are not at all inclined to be sad, although we have so much hard work to get through. The Hospitality numbers more than three hundred members, but there are only about one hundred and fifty here at a time, for we have had to organise two successive services, so that there may always be some of us on duty at the Grotto and the hospitals." The sight of the little party of visitors assembled on the threshold of the room seemed to have increased the general delight; and Berthaud, the superintendent of the bearers, who was lunching at the head of one of the tables, gallantly rose up to receive the ladies. "But it smells very nice," exclaimed Madame Desagneaux in her giddy way. "Won't you invite us to come and taste your cookery to-morrow?" "Oh! we can't ask ladies," replied Berthaud, laughing. "But if you gentlemen would like to join us to-morrow we should be extremely pleased to entertain you." He had at once noticed the good understanding which prevailed between Gerard and Raymonde, and seemed delighted at it, for he greatly wished his cousin to make this match. He laughed pleasantly, at the enthusiastic gaiety which the young girl displayed as she began to question him. "Is not that the Marquis de Salmon-Roquebert," she asked, "who is sitting over yonder between those two young men who look like shop assistants?" "They are, in fact, the sons of a small stationer at Tarbes," replied Berthaud; "and that is really the Marquis, your neighbour of the Rue de Lille, the owner of that magnificent mansion, one of the richest and most noble men of title in France. You see how he is enjoying our mutton stew!" It was true, the millionaire Marquis seemed delighted to be able to board himself for his three francs a day, and to sit down at table in genuine democratic fashion by the side of petty /bourgeois/ and workmen who would not have dared to accost him in the street. Was not that chance table symbolical of social communion, effected by the joint practice of charity? For his part, the Marquis was the more hungry that day, as he had bathed over sixty patients, sufferers from all the most abominable diseases of unhappy humanity, at the piscinas that morning. And the scene around him seemed like a realisation of the evangelical commonalty; but doubtless it was so charming and so gay simply because its duration was limited to three days. Although M. de Guersaint had but lately risen from table, his curiosity prompted him to taste the mutton stew, and he pronounced it perfect. Meantime, Pierre caught sight of Baron Suire, the director of the Hospitality, walking about between the rows of tables with an air of some importance, as though he had allotted himself the task of keeping an eye on everything, even on the manner in which his staff fed itself. The young priest thereupon remembered the ardent desire which Marie had expressed to spend the night in front of the Grotto, and it occurred to him that the Baron might be willing to give the necessary authorisation. "Certainly," replied the director, who had become quite grave whilst listening to Pierre, "we do sometimes allow it; but it is always a very delicate matter! You assure me at all events that this young person is not consumptive? Well, well, since you say that she so much desires it I will mention the matter to Father Fourcade and warn Madame de Jonquiere, so that she may let you take the young lady away." He was in reality a very good-natured fellow, albeit so fond of assuming the air of an indispensable man weighed down by the heaviest responsibilities. In his turn he now detained the visitors, and gave them full particulars concerning the organisation of the Hospitality. Its members said prayers together every morning. Two board meetings were held each day, and were attended by all the heads of departments, as well as by the reverend Fathers and some of the chaplains. All the hospitallers took the Sacrament as frequently as possible. And, moreover, there were many complicated tasks to be attended to, a prodigious rotation of duties, quite a little world to be governed with a firm hand. The Baron spoke like a general who each year gains a great victory over the spirit of the age; and, sending Berthaud back to finish his /dejeuner/, he insisted on escorting the ladies into the little sanded courtyard, which was shaded by some fine trees. "It is very interesting, very interesting," repeated Madame Desagneaux. "We are greatly obliged to you for your kindness, monsieur." "Don't mention it, don't mention it, madame," answered the Baron. "It is I who am pleased at having had an opportunity to show you my little army." So far Gerard had not quitted Raymonde's side; but M. de Guersaint and Pierre were already exchanging glances suggestive of leave-taking, in order that they might repair by themselves to the Place du Marcadal, when Madame Desagneaux suddenly remembered that a friend had requested her to send her a bottle of Lourdes water. And she thereupon asked Gerard how she was to execute this commission. The young man began to laugh. "Will you again accept me as a guide?" said he. "And by the way, if these gentlemen like to come as well, I will show you the place where the bottles are filled, corked, packed in cases, and then sent off. It is a curious sight." M. de Guersaint immediately consented; and all five of them set out again, Madame Desagneaux still between the architect and the priest, whilst Raymonde and Gerard brought up the rear. The crowd in the burning sunlight was increasing; the Place du Rosaire was now overflowing with an idle sauntering mob resembling some concourse of sight-seers on a day of public rejoicing. The bottling and packing shops were situated under one of the arches on the left-hand side of the Place. They formed a suite of three apartments of very simple aspect. In the first one the bottles were filled in the most ordinary of fashions. A little green-painted zinc barrel, not unlike a watering-cask, was dragged by a man from the Grotto, and the light-coloured bottles were then simply filled at its tap, one by one; the blouse-clad workman entrusted with the duty exercising no particular watchfulness to prevent the water from overflowing. In fact there was quite a puddle of it upon the ground. There were no labels on the bottles; the little leaden capsules placed over the corks alone bore an inscription, and they were coated with a kind of ceruse, doubtless to ensure preservation. Then came two other rooms which formed regular packing shops, with carpenters' benches, tools, and heaps of shavings. The boxes, most frequently made for one bottle or for two, were put together with great care, and the bottles were deposited inside them, on beds of fine wood parings. The scene reminded one in some degree of the packing halls for flowers at Nice and for preserved fruits at Grasse. Gerard went on giving explanations with a quiet, satisfied air. "The water," he said, "really comes from the Grotto, as you can yourselves see, so that all the foolish jokes which one hears really have no basis. And everything is perfectly simple, natural, and goes on in the broad daylight. I would also point out to you that the Fathers don't sell the water as they are accused of doing. For instance, a bottle of water here costs twenty centimes,* which is only the price of the bottle itself. If you wish to have it sent to anybody you naturally have to pay for the packing and the carriage, and then it costs you one franc and seventy centimes. ** However, you are perfectly at liberty to go to the source and fill the flasks and cans and other receptacles that you may choose to bring with you." * Four cents, U.S.A. ** About 32 cents, U.S.A. Pierre reflected that the profits of the reverend Fathers in this respect could not be very large ones, for their gains were limited to what they made by manufacturing the boxes and supplying the bottles, which latter, purchased by the thousand, certainly did not cost them so much as twenty centimes apiece. However, Raymonde and Madame Desagneaux, as well as M. de Guersaint, who had such a lively imagination, experienced deep disappointment at sight of the little green barrel, the capsules, sticky with ceruse, and the piles of shavings lying around the benches. They had doubtless imagined all sorts of ceremonies, the observance of certain rites in bottling the miraculous water, priests in vestments pronouncing blessings, and choir-boys singing hymns of praise in pure crystalline voices. For his part, Pierre, in presence of all this vulgar bottling and packing, ended by thinking of the active power of faith. When one of those bottles reaches some far-away sick-room, and is unpacked there, and the sufferer falls upon his knees, and so excites himself by contemplating and drinking the pure water that he actually brings about the cure of his ailment, there must truly be a most extraordinary plunge into all-powerful illusion. "Ah!" exclaimed Gerard as they came out, "would you like to see the storehouse where the tapers are kept, before going to the offices? It is only a couple of steps away." And then, not even waiting for their answer, he led them to the opposite side of the Place du Rosaire. His one desire was to amuse Raymonde, but, in point of fact, the aspect of the place where the tapers were stored was even less entertaining than that of the packing-rooms which they had just left. This storehouse, a kind of deep vault under one of the right-hand arches of the Place, was divided by timber into a number of spacious compartments, in which lay an extraordinary collection of tapers, classified according to size. The overplus of all the tapers offered to the Grotto was deposited here; and such was the number of these superfluous candles that the little conveyances stationed near the Grotto railing, ready to receive the pilgrims' offerings, had to be brought to the storehouse several times a day in order to be emptied there, after which they were returned to the Grotto, and were promptly filled again. In theory, each taper that was offered ought to have been burnt at the feet of the Virgin's statue; but so great was the number of these offerings, that, although a couple of hundred tapers of all sizes were kept burning by day and night, it was impossible to exhaust the supply, which went on increasing and increasing. There was a rumour that the Fathers could not even find room to store all this wax, but had to sell it over and over again; and, indeed, certain friends of the Grotto confessed, with a touch of pride, that the profit on the tapers alone would have sufficed to defray all the expenses of the business. The quantity of these votive candles quite stupefied Raymonde and Madame Desagneaux. How many, how many there were! The smaller ones, costing from fifty centimes to a franc apiece, were piled up in fabulous numbers. M. de Guersaint, desirous of getting at the exact figures, quite lost himself in the puzzling calculation he attempted. As for Pierre, it was in silence that he gazed upon this mass of wax, destined to be burnt in open daylight to the glory of God; and although he was by no means a rigid utilitarian, and could well understand that some apparent acts of extravagance yield an illusive enjoyment and satisfaction which provide humanity with as much sustenance as bread, he could not, on the other hand, refrain from reflecting on the many benefits which might have been conferred on the poor and the ailing with the money represented by all that wax, which would fly away in smoke. "But come, what about that bottle which I am to send off?" abruptly asked Madame Desagneaux. "We will go to the office," replied Gerard. "In five minutes everything will be settled." They had to cross the Place du Rosaire once more and ascend the stone stairway leading to the Basilica. The office was up above, on the left hand, at the corner of the path leading to the Calvary. The building was a paltry one, a hut of lath and plaster which the wind and the rain had reduced to a state of ruin. On a board outside was the inscription: "Apply here with reference to Masses, Offerings, and Brotherhoods. Forwarding office for Lourdes water. Subscriptions to the 'Annals of O. L. of Lourdes.'" How many millions of people must have already passed through this wretched shanty, which seemed to date from the innocent days when the foundations of the adjacent Basilica had scarcely been laid! The whole party went in, eager to see what might be inside. But they simply found a wicket at which Madame Desagneaux had to stop in order to give her friend's name and address; and when she had paid one franc and seventy centimes, a small printed receipt was handed her, such as you receive on registering luggage at a railway station. As soon as they were outside again Gerard pointed to a large building standing two or three hundred yards away, and resumed: "There, that is where the Fathers reside." "But we see nothing of them," remarked Pierre. This observation so astonished the young man that he remained for a moment without replying. "It's true," he at last said, "we do not see them, but then they give up the custody of everything--the Grotto and all the rest--to the Fathers of the Assumption during the national pilgrimage." Pierre looked at the building which had been pointed out to him, and noticed that it was a massive stone pile resembling a fortress. The windows were closed, and the whole edifice looked lifeless. Yet everything at Lourdes came from it, and to it also everything returned. It seemed, in fact, to the young priest that he could hear the silent, formidable rake-stroke which extended over the entire valley, which caught hold of all who had come to the spot, and placed both the gold and the blood of the throng in the clutches of those reverend Fathers! However, Gerard just then resumed in a low voice "But come, they do show themselves, for here is the reverend superior, Father Capdebarthe himself." An ecclesiastic was indeed just passing, a man with the appearance of a peasant, a knotty frame, and a large head which looked as though carved with a billhook. His opaque eyes were quite expressionless, and his face, with its worn features, had retained a loamy tint, a gloomy, russet reflection of the earth. Monseigneur Laurence had really made a politic selection in confiding the organisation and management of the Grotto to those Garaison missionaries, who were so tenacious and covetous, for the most part sons of mountain peasants and passionately attached to the soil. However, the little party now slowly retraced its steps by way of the Plateau de la Merlasse, the broad boulevard which skirts the inclined way on the left hand and leads to the Avenue de la Grotte. It was already past one o'clock, but people were still eating their /dejeuners/ from one to the other end of the overflowing town. Many of the fifty thousand pilgrims and sight-seers collected within it had not yet been able to sit down and eat; and Pierre, who had left the /table d'hote/ still crowded, who had just seen the hospitallers squeezing together so gaily at the "ordinary," found more and more tables at each step he took. On all sides people were eating, eating without a pause. Hereabouts, however, in the open air, on either side of the broad road, the hungry ones were humble folk who had rushed upon the tables set up on either footway--tables formed of a couple of long boards, flanked by two forms, and shaded from the sun by narrow linen awnings. Broth and coffee were sold at these places at a penny a cup. The little loaves heaped up in high baskets also cost a penny apiece. Hanging from the poles which upheld the awnings were sausages, chitterlings, and hams. Some of the open-air /restaurateurs/ were frying potatoes, and others were concocting more or less savoury messes of inferior meat and onions. A pungent smoke, a violent odour, arose into the sunlight, mingling with the dust which was raised by the continuous tramp of the promenaders. Rows of people, moreover, were waiting at each cantine, so that each time a party rose from table fresh customers took possession of the benches ranged beside the oilcloth-covered planks, which were so narrow that there was scarcely room for two bowls of soup to be placed side by side. And one and all made haste, and devoured with the ravenous hunger born of their fatigue, that insatiable appetite which so often follows upon great moral shocks. In fact, when the mind had exhausted itself in prayer, when everything physical had been forgotten amidst the mental flight into the legendary heavens, the human animal suddenly appeared, again asserted itself, and began to gorge. Moreover, under that dazzling Sunday sky, the scene was like that of a fair-field with all the gluttony of a merrymaking community, a display of the delight which they felt in living, despite the multiplicity of their abominable ailments and the dearth of the miracles they hoped for. "They eat, they amuse themselves; what else can one expect?" remarked Gerard, guessing the thoughts of his amiable companions. "Ah! poor people!" murmured Pierre, "they have a perfect right to do so." He was greatly touched to see human nature reassert itself in this fashion. However, when they had got to the lower part of the boulevard near the Grotto, his feelings were hurt at sight of the desperate eagerness displayed by the female vendors of tapers and bouquets, who with the rough fierceness of conquerors assailed the passers-by in bands. They were mostly young women, with bare heads, or with kerchiefs tied over their hair, and they displayed extraordinary effrontery. Even the old ones were scarcely more discreet. With parcels of tapers under their arms, they brandished the one which they offered for sale and even thrust it into the hand of the promenader. "Monsieur," "madame," they called, "buy a taper, buy a taper, it will bring you luck!" One gentleman, who was surrounded and shaken by three of the youngest of these harpies, almost lost the skirts of his frock-coat in attempting to escape their clutches. Then the scene began afresh with the bouquets--large round bouquets they were, carelessly fastened together and looking like cabbages. "A bouquet, madame!" was the cry. "A bouquet for the Blessed Virgin!" If the lady escaped, she heard muttered insults behind her. Trafficking, impudent trafficking, pursued the pilgrims to the very outskirts of the Grotto. Trade was not merely triumphantly installed in every one of the shops, standing close together and transforming each street into a bazaar, but it overran the footways and barred the road with hand-carts full of chaplets, medals, statuettes, and religious prints. On all sides people were buying almost to the same extent as they ate, in order that they might take away with them some souvenir of this holy Kermesse. And the bright gay note of this commercial eagerness, this scramble of hawkers, was supplied by the urchins who rushed about through the crowd, crying the "Journal de la Grotte." Their sharp, shrill voices pierced the ear: "The 'Journal de la Grotte,' this morning's number, two sous, the 'Journal de la Grotte.'" Amidst the continual pushing which accompanied the eddying of the ever-moving crowd, Gerard's little party became separated. He and Raymonde remained behind the others. They had begun talking together in low tones, with an air of smiling intimacy, lost and isolated as they were in the dense crowd. And Madame Desagneaux at last had to stop, look back, and call to them: "Come on, or we shall lose one another!" As they drew near, Pierre heard the girl exclaim: "Mamma is so very busy; speak to her before we leave." And Gerard thereupon replied: "It is understood. You have made me very happy, mademoiselle." Thus the husband had been secured, the marriage decided upon, during this charming promenade among the sights of Lourdes. Raymonde had completed her conquest, and Gerard had at last taken a resolution, realising how gay and sensible she was, as she walked beside him leaning on his arm. M. de Guersaint, however, had raised his eyes, and was heard inquiring: "Are not those people up there, on that balcony, the rich folk who made the journey in the same train as ourselves? --You know whom I mean, that lady who is so very ill, and whose husband and sister accompany her?" He was alluding to the Dieulafays; and they indeed were the persons whom he now saw on the balcony of a suite of rooms which they had rented in a new house overlooking the lawns of the Rosary. They here occupied a first-floor, furnished with all the luxury that Lourdes could provide, carpets, hangings, mirrors, and many other things, without mentioning a staff of servants despatched beforehand from Paris. As the weather was so fine that afternoon, the large armchair on which lay the poor ailing woman had been rolled on to the balcony. You could see her there, clad in a lace /peignoir/. Her husband, always correctly attired in a black frock-coat, stood beside her on her right hand, whilst her sister, in a delightful pale mauve gown, sat on her left smiling and leaning over every now and then so as to speak to her, but apparently receiving no reply. "Oh!" declared little Madame Desagneaux, "I have often heard people speak of Madame Jousseur, that lady in mauve. She is the wife of a diplomatist who neglects her, it seems, in spite of her great beauty; and last year there was a deal of talk about her fancy for a young colonel who is well known in Parisian society. It is said, however, in Catholic /salons/ that her religious principles enabled her to conquer it." They all five remained there, looking up at the balcony. "To think," resumed Madame Desagneaux, "that her sister, poor woman, was once her living portrait." And, indeed, there was an expression of greater kindliness and more gentle gaiety on Madame Dieulafay's face. And now you see her--no different from a dead woman except that she is above instead of under ground--with her flesh wasted away, reduced to a livid, boneless thing which they scarcely dare to move. Ah! the unhappy woman! Raymonde thereupon assured the others that Madame Dieulafay, who had been married scarcely two years previously, had brought all the jewellery given her on the occasion of her wedding to offer it as a gift to Our Lady of Lourdes; and Gerard confirmed this assertion, saying that the jewellery had been handed over to the treasurer of the Basilica that very morning with a golden lantern studded with gems and a large sum of money destined for the relief of the poor. However, the Blessed Virgin could not have been touched as yet, for the sufferer's condition seemed, if anything, to be worse. From that moment Pierre no longer beheld aught save that young woman on that handsome balcony, that woeful, wealthy creature lying there high above the merrymaking throng, the Lourdes mob which was feasting and laughing in the Sunday sunshine. The two dear ones who were so tenderly watching over her--her sister who had forsaken her society triumphs, her husband who had forgotten his financial business, his millions dispersed throughout the world--increased, by their irreproachable demeanour, the woefulness of the group which they thus formed high above all other heads, and face to face with the lovely valley. For Pierre they alone remained; and they were exceedingly wealthy and exceedingly wretched. However, lingering in this wise on the footway with their eyes upturned, the five promenaders narrowly escaped being knocked down and run over, for at every moment fresh vehicles were coming up, for the most part landaus drawn by four horses, which were driven at a fast trot, and whose bells jingled merrily. The occupants of these carriages were tourists, visitors to the waters of Pau, Bareges, and Cauterets, whom curiosity had attracted to Lourdes, and who were delighted with the fine weather and quite inspirited by their rapid drive across the mountains. They would remain at Lourdes only a few hours; after hastening to the Grotto and the Basilica in seaside costumes, they would start off again, laughing, and well pleased at having seen it all. In this wise families in light attire, bands of young women with bright parasols, darted hither and thither among the grey, neutral-tinted crowd of pilgrims, imparting to it, in a yet more pronounced manner, the aspect of a fair-day mob, amidst which folks of good society deign to come and amuse themselves. All at once Madame Desagneaux raised a cry "What, is it you, Berthe?" And thereupon she embraced a tall, charming brunette who had just alighted from a landau with three other young women, the whole party smiling and animated. Everyone began talking at once, and all sorts of merry exclamations rang out, in the delight they felt at meeting in this fashion. "Oh! we are at Cauterets, my dear," said the tall brunette. "And as everybody comes here, we decided to come all four together. And your husband, is he here with you?" Madame Desagneaux began protesting: "Of course not," said she. "He is at Trouville, as you ought to know. I shall start to join him on Thursday." "Yes, yes, of course," resumed the tall brunette, who, like her friend, seemed to be an amiable, giddy creature, "I was forgetting; you are here with the pilgrimage." Then Madame Desagneaux offered to guide her friends, promising to show them everything of interest in less than a couple of hours; and turning to Raymonde, who stood by, smiling, she added "Come with us, my dear; your mother won't be anxious." The ladies and Pierre and M. de Guersaint thereupon exchanged bows: and Gerard also took leave, tenderly pressing Raymonde's hand, with his eyes fixed on hers, as though to pledge himself definitively. The women swiftly departed, directing their steps towards the Grotto, and when Gerard also had gone off, returning to his duties, M. de Guersaint said to Pierre: "And the hairdresser on the Place du Marcadal, I really must go and see him. You will come with me, won't you?" "Of course I will go wherever you like. I am quite at your disposal as Marie does not need us." Following the pathways between the large lawns which stretch out in front of the Rosary, they reached the new bridge, where they had another encounter, this time with Abbe des Hermoises, who was acting as guide to two young married ladies who had arrived that morning from Tarbes. Walking between them with the gallant air of a society priest, he was showing them Lourdes and explaining it to them, keeping them well away, however, from its more repugnant features, its poor and its ailing folk, its odour of low misery, which, it must be admitted, had well-nigh disappeared that fine, sunshiny day. At the first word which M. de Guersaint addressed to him with respect to the hiring of a vehicle for the trip to Gavarnie, the Abbe was seized with a dread lest he should be obliged to leave his pretty lady-visitors: "As you please, my dear sir," he replied. "Kindly attend to the matter, and--you are quite right, make the cheapest arrangements possible, for I shall have two ecclesiastics of small means with me. There will be four of us. Let me know at the hotel this evening at what hour we shall start." Thereupon he again joined his lady-friends, and led them towards the Grotto, following the shady path which skirts the Gave, a cool, sequestered path well suited for lovers' walks. Feeling somewhat tired, Pierre had remained apart from the others, leaning against the parapet of the new bridge. And now for the first time he was struck by the prodigious number of priests among the crowd. He saw all varieties of them swarming across the bridge: priests of correct mien who had come with the pilgrimage and who could be recognised by their air of assurance and their clean cassocks; poor village priests who were far more timid and badly clothed, and who, after making sacrifices in order that they might indulge in the journey, would return home quite scared and, finally, there was the whole crowd of unattached ecclesiastics who had come nobody knew whence, and who enjoyed such absolute liberty that it was difficult to be sure whether they had even said their mass that morning. They doubtless found this liberty very agreeable; and thus the greater number of them, like Abbe des Hermoises, had simply come on a holiday excursion, free from all duties, and happy at being able to live like ordinary men, lost, unnoticed as they were in the multitude around them. And from the young, carefully groomed and perfumed priest, to the old one in a dirty cassock and shoes down at heel, the entire species had its representative in the throng--there were corpulent ones, others but moderately fat, thin ones, tall ones and short ones, some whom faith had brought and whom ardour was consuming, some also who simply plied their calling like worthy men, and some, moreover, who were fond of intriguing, and who were only present in order that they might help the good cause. However, Pierre was quite surprised to see such a stream of priests pass before him, each with his special passion, and one and all hurrying to the Grotto as one hurries to a duty, a belief, a pleasure, or a task. He noticed one among the number, a very short, slim, dark man with a pronounced Italian accent, whose glittering eyes seemed to be taking a plan of Lourdes, who looked, indeed, like one of those spies who come and peer around with a view to conquest; and then he observed another one, an enormous fellow with a paternal air, who was breathing hard through inordinate eating, and who paused in front of a poor sick woman, and ended by slipping a five-franc piece into her hand. Just then, however, M. de Guersaint returned: "We merely have to go down the boulevard and the Rue Basse," said he. Pierre followed him without answering. He had just felt his cassock on his shoulders for the first time that afternoon, for never had it seemed so light to him as whilst he was walking about amidst the scramble of the pilgrimage. The young fellow was now living in a state of mingled unconsciousness and dizziness, ever hoping that faith would fall upon him like a lightning flash, in spite of all the vague uneasiness which was growing within him at sight of the things which he beheld. However, the spectacle of that ever-swelling stream of priests no longer wounded his heart; fraternal feelings towards these unknown colleagues had returned to him; how many of them there must be who believed no more than he did himself, and yet, like himself, honestly fulfilled their mission as guides and consolers! "This boulevard is a new one, you know," said M. de Guersaint, all at once raising his voice. "The number of houses built during the last twenty years is almost beyond belief. There is quite a new town here." The Lapaca flowed along behind the buildings on their right and, their curiosity inducing them to turn into a narrow lane, they came upon some strange old structures on the margin of the narrow stream. Several ancient mills here displayed their wheels; among them one which Monseigneur Laurence had given to Bernadette's parents after the apparitions. Tourists, moreover, were here shown the pretended abode of Bernadette, a hovel whither the Soubirous family had removed on leaving the Rue des Petits Fosses, and in which the young girl, as she was already boarding with the Sisters of Nevers, can have but seldom slept. At last, by way of the Rue Basse, Pierre and his companion reached the Place du Marcadal. This was a long, triangular, open space, the most animated and luxurious of the squares of the old town, the one where the cafes, the chemists, all the finest shops were situated. And, among the latter, one showed conspicuously, coloured as it was a lively green, adorned with lofty mirrors, and surmounted by a broad board bearing in gilt letters the inscription: "Cazaban, Hairdresser". M. de Guersaint and Pierre went in, but there was nobody in the salon and they had to wait. A terrible clatter of forks resounded from the adjoining room, an ordinary dining-room transformed into a /table d'hote/, in which some twenty people were having /dejeuner/ although it was already two o'clock. The afternoon was progressing, and yet people were still eating from one to the other end of Lourdes. Like every other householder in the town, whatever his religious convictions might be, Cazaban, in the pilgrimage season, let his bedrooms, surrendered his dining-room, end sought refuge in his cellar, where, heaped up with his family, he ate and slept, although this unventilated hole was no more than three yards square. However, the passion for trading and moneymaking carried all before it; at pilgrimage time the whole population disappeared like that of a conquered city, surrendering even the beds of its women and its children to the pilgrims, seating them at its tables, and supplying them with food. "Is there nobody here?" called M. de Guersaint after waiting a moment. At last a little man made his appearance, Cazaban himself, a type of the knotty but active Pyrenean, with a long face, prominent cheek-bones, and a sunburned complexion spotted here and there with red. His big, glittering eyes never remained still; and the whole of his spare little figure quivered with incessant exuberance of speech and gesture. "For you, monsieur--a shave, eh?" said he. "I must beg your pardon for keeping you waiting; but my assistant has gone out, and I was in there with my boarders. If you will kindly sit down, I will attend to you at once." Thereupon, deigning to operate in person, Cazaban began to stir up the lather and strop the razor. He had glanced rather nervously, however, at the cassock worn by Pierre, who without a word had seated himself in a corner and taken up a newspaper in the perusal of which he appeared to be absorbed. A short interval of silence followed; but it was fraught with suffering for Cazaban, and whilst lathering his customer's chin he began to chatter: "My boarders lingered this morning such a long time at the Grotto, monsieur, that they have scarcely sat down to /dejeuner/. You can hear them, eh? I was staying with them out of politeness. However, I owe myself to my customers as well, do I not? One must try to please everybody." M. de Guersaint, who also was fond of a chat, thereupon began to question him: "You lodge some of the pilgrims, I suppose?" "Oh! we all lodge some of them, monsieur; it is necessary for the town," replied the barber. "And you accompany them to the Grotto?" At this, however, Cazaban revolted, and, holding up his razor, he answered with an air of dignity "Never, monsieur, never! For five years past I have not been in that new town which they are building." He was still seeking to restrain himself, and again glanced at Pierre, whose face was hidden by the newspaper. The sight of the red cross pinned on M. de Guersaint's jacket was also calculated to render him prudent; nevertheless his tongue won the victory. "Well, monsieur, opinions are free, are they not?" said he. "I respect yours, but for my part I don't believe in all that phantasmagoria! Oh I've never concealed it! I was already a republican and a freethinker in the days of the Empire. There were barely four men of those views in the whole town at that time. Oh! I'm proud of it." He had begun to shave M. de Guersaint's left cheek and was quite triumphant. From that moment a stream of words poured forth from his mouth, a stream which seemed to be inexhaustible. To begin with, he brought the same charges as Majeste against the Fathers of the Grotto. He reproached them for their dealings in tapers, chaplets, prints, and crucifixes, for the disloyal manner in which they competed with those who sold those articles as well as with the hotel and lodging-house keepers. And he was also wrathful with the Blue Sisters of the Immaculate Conception, for had they not robbed him of two tenants, two old ladies, who spent three weeks at Lourdes each year? Moreover you could divine within him all the slowly accumulated, overflowing spite with which the old town regarded the new town--that town which had sprung up so quickly on the other side of the castle, that rich city with houses as big as palaces, whither flowed all the life, all the luxury, all the money of Lourdes, so that it was incessantly growing larger and wealthier, whilst its elder sister, the poor, antique town of the mountains, with its narrow, grass-grown, deserted streets, seemed near the point of death. Nevertheless the struggle still continued; the old town seemed determined not to die, and, by lodging pilgrims and opening shops on her side, endeavoured to compel her ungrateful junior to grant her a share of the spoils. But custom only flowed to the shops which were near the Grotto, and only the poorer pilgrims were willing to lodge so far away; so that the unequal conditions of the struggle intensified the rupture and turned the high town and the low town into two irreconcilable enemies, who preyed upon one another amidst continual intrigues. "Ah, no! They certainly won't see me at their Grotto," resumed Cazaban, with his rageful air. "What an abusive use they make of that Grotto of theirs! They serve it up in every fashion! To think of such idolatry, such gross superstition in the nineteenth century! Just ask them if they have cured a single sufferer belonging to the town during the last twenty years! Yet there are plenty of infirm people crawling about our streets. It was our folk that benefited by the first miracles; but it would seem that the miraculous water has long lost all its power, so far as we are concerned. We are too near it; people have to come from a long distance if they want it to act on them. It's really all too stupid; why, I wouldn't go there even if I were offered a hundred francs!" Pierre's immobility was doubtless irritating the barber. He had now begun to shave M. de Guersaint's right cheek; and was inveighing against the Fathers of the Immaculate Conception, whose greed for gain was the one cause of all the misunderstanding. These Fathers who were at home there, since they had purchased from the Municipality the land on which they desired to build, did not even carry out the stipulations of the contract they had signed, for there were two clauses in it forbidding all trading, such as the sale of the water and of religious articles. Innumerable actions might have been brought against them. But they snapped their fingers, and felt themselves so powerful that they no longer allowed a single offering to go to the parish, but arranged matters so that the whole harvest of money should be garnered by the Grotto and the Basilica. And, all at once, Cazaban candidly exclaimed: "If they were only reasonable, if they would only share with us!" Then, when M. de Guersaint had washed his face, and reseated himself, the hairdresser resumed: "And if I were to tell you, monsieur, what they have done with our poor town! Forty years ago all the young girls here conducted themselves properly, I assure you. I remember that in my young days when a young man was wicked he generally had to go elsewhere. But times have changed, our manners are no longer the same. Nowadays nearly all the girls content themselves with selling candles and nosegays; and you must have seen them catching hold of the passers-by and thrusting their goods into their hands! It is really shameful to see so many bold girls about! They make a lot of money, acquire lazy habits, and, instead of working during the winter, simply wait for the return of the pilgrimage season. And I assure you that the young men don't need to go elsewhere nowadays. No, indeed! And add to all this the suspicious floating element which swells the population as soon as the first fine weather sets in--the coachmen, the hawkers, the cantine keepers, all the low-class, wandering folk reeking with grossness and vice--and you can form an idea of the honest new town which they have given us with the crowds that come to their Grotto and their Basilica!" Greatly struck by these remarks, Pierre had let his newspaper fall and begun to listen. It was now, for the first time, that he fully realised the difference between the two Lourdes--old Lourdes so honest and so pious in its tranquil solitude, and new Lourdes corrupted, demoralised by the circulation of so much money, by such a great enforced increase of wealth, by the ever-growing torrent of strangers sweeping through it, by the fatal rotting influence of the conflux of thousands of people, the contagion of evil examples. And what a terrible result it seemed when one thought of Bernadette, the pure, candid girl kneeling before the wild primitive grotto, when one thought of all the naive faith, all the fervent purity of those who had first begun the work! Had they desired that the whole countryside should be poisoned in this wise by lucre and human filth? Yet it had sufficed that the nations should flock there for a pestilence to break out. Seeing that Pierre was listening, Cazaban made a final threatening gesture as though to sweep away all this poisonous superstition. Then, relapsing into silence, he finished cutting M. de Guersaint's hair. "There you are, monsieur!" The architect rose, and it was only now that he began to speak of the conveyance which he wished to hire. At first the hairdresser declined to enter into the matter, pretending that they must apply to his brother at the Champ Commun; but at last he consented to take the order. A pair-horse landau for Gavarnie was priced at fifty francs. However, he was so pleased at having talked so much, and so flattered at hearing himself called an honest man, that he eventually agreed to charge only forty francs. There were four persons in the party, so this would make ten francs apiece. And it was agreed that they should start off at about two in the morning, so that they might get back to Lourdes at a tolerably early hour on the Monday evening. "The landau will be outside the Hotel of the Apparitions at the appointed time," repeated Cazaban in his emphatic way. "You may rely on me, monsieur." Then he began to listen. The clatter of crockery did not cease in the adjoining room. People were still eating there with that impulsive voracity which had spread from one to the other end of Lourdes. And all at once a voice was heard calling for more bread. "Excuse me," hastily resumed Cazaban, "my boarders want me." And thereupon he rushed away, his hands still greasy through fingering the comb. The door remained open for a second, and on the walls of the dining-room Pierre espied various religious prints, and notably a view of the Grotto, which surprised him; in all probability, however, the hairdresser only hung these engravings there during the pilgrimage season by way of pleasing his boarders. It was now nearly three o'clock. When the young priest and M. de Guersaint got outside they were astonished at the loud pealing of bells which was flying through the air. The parish church had responded to the first stroke of vespers chiming at the Basilica; and now all the convents, one after another, were contributing to the swelling peals. The crystalline notes of the bell of the Carmelites mingled with the grave notes of the bell of the Immaculate Conception; and all the joyous bells of the Sisters of Nevers and the Dominicans were jingling together. In this wise, from morning till evening on fine days of festivity, the chimes winged their flight above the house-roofs of Lourdes. And nothing could have been gayer than that sonorous melody resounding in the broad blue heavens above the gluttonous town, which had at last lunched, and was now comfortably digesting as it strolled about in the sunlight.

3

THE NIGHT PROCESSION

AS soon as night had fallen Marie, still lying on her bed at the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours, became extremely impatient, for she had learnt from Madame de Jonquiere that Baron Suire had obtained from Father Fourcade the necessary permission for her to spend the night in front of the Grotto. Thus she kept on questioning Sister Hyacinthe, asking her: "Pray, Sister, is it not yet nine o'clock?" "No, my child, it is scarcely half-past eight," was the reply. "Here is a nice woollen shawl for you to wrap round you at daybreak, for the Gave is close by, and the mornings are very fresh, you know, in these mountainous parts." "Oh! but the nights are so lovely, Sister, and besides, I sleep so little here!" replied Marie; "I cannot be worse off out-of-doors. /Mon Dieu/, how happy I am; how delightful it will be to spend the whole night with the Blessed Virgin!" The entire ward was jealous of her; for to remain in prayer before the Grotto all night long was the most ineffable of joys, the supreme beatitude. It was said that in the deep peacefulness of night the chosen ones undoubtedly beheld the Virgin, but powerful protection was needed to obtain such a favour as had been granted to Marie; for nowadays the reverend Fathers scarcely liked to grant it, as several sufferers had died during the long vigil, falling asleep, as it were, in the midst of their ecstasy. "You will take the Sacrament at the Grotto tomorrow morning, before you are brought back here, won't you, my child?" resumed Sister Hyacinthe. However, nine o'clock at last struck, and, Pierre not arriving, the girl wondered whether he, usually so punctual, could have forgotten her? The others were now talking to her of the night procession, which she would see from beginning to end if she only started at once. The ceremonies concluded with a procession every night, but the Sunday one was always the finest, and that evening, it was said, would be remarkably splendid, such, indeed, as was seldom seen. Nearly thirty thousand pilgrims would take part in it, each carrying a lighted taper: the nocturnal marvels of the sky would be revealed; the stars would descend upon earth. At this thought the sufferers began to bewail their fate; what a wretched lot was theirs, to be tied to their beds, unable to see any of those wonders. At last Madame de Jonquiere approached Marie's bed. "My dear girl," said she, "here is your father with Monsieur l'Abbe." Radiant with delight, the girl at once forgot her weary waiting. "Oh! pray let us make haste, Pierre," she exclaimed; "pray let us make haste!" They carried her down the stairs, and the young priest harnessed himself to the little car, which gently rolled along, under the star-studded heavens, whilst M. de Guersaint walked beside it. The night was moonless, but extremely beautiful; the vault above looked like deep blue velvet, spangled with diamonds, and the atmosphere was exquisitely mild and pure, fragrant with the perfumes from the mountains. Many pilgrims were hurrying along the street, all bending their steps towards the Grotto, but they formed a discreet, pensive crowd, with naught of the fair-field, lounging character of the daytime throng. And, as soon as the Plateau de la Merlasse was reached, the darkness spread out, you entered into a great lake of shadows formed by the stretching lawns and lofty trees, and saw nothing rising on high save the black, tapering spire of the Basilica. Pierre grew rather anxious on finding that the crowd became more and more compact as he advanced. Already on reaching the Place du Rosaire it was difficult to take another forward step. "There is no hope of getting to the Grotto yet awhile," he said. "The best course would be to turn into one of the pathways behind the pilgrims' shelter-house and wait there." Marie, however, greatly desired to see the procession start. "Oh! pray try to go as far as the Gave," said she. "I shall then see everything from a distance; I don't want to go near." M. de Guersaint, who was equally inquisitive, seconded this proposal. "Don't be uneasy," he said to Pierre. "I am here behind, and will take care to let nobody jostle her." Pierre had to begin pulling the little vehicle again. It took him a quarter of an hour to pass under one of the arches of the inclined way on the left hand, so great was the crush of pilgrims at that point. Then, taking a somewhat oblique course, he ended by reaching the quay beside the Gave, where there were only some spectators standing on the sidewalk, so that he was able to advance another fifty yards. At last he halted, and backed the little car against the quay parapet, in full view of the Grotto. "Will you be all right here?" he asked. "Oh yes, thank you. Only you must sit me up; I shall then be able to see much better." M. de Guersaint raised her into a sitting posture, and then for his part climbed upon the stonework running from one to the other end of the quay. A mob of inquisitive people had already scaled it in part, like sight-seers waiting for a display of fireworks; and they were all raising themselves on tiptoe, and craning their necks to get a better view. Pierre himself at last grew interested, although there was, so far, little to see. Some thirty thousand people were assembled, and, every moment there were fresh arrivals. All carried candles, the lower parts of which were wrapped in white paper, on which a picture of Our Lady of Lourdes was printed in blue ink. However, these candles were not yet lighted, and the only illumination that you perceived above the billowy sea of heads was the bright, forge-like glow of the taper-lighted Grotto. A great buzzing arose, whiffs of human breath blew hither and thither, and these alone enabled you to realise that thousands of serried, stifling creatures were gathered together in the black depths, like a living sea that was ever eddying and spreading. There were even people hidden away under the trees beyond the Grotto, in distant recesses of the darkness of which one had no suspicion. At last a few tapers began to shine forth here and there, like sudden sparks of light spangling the obscurity at random. Their number rapidly increased, eyots of stars were formed, whilst at other points there were meteoric trails, milky ways, so to say, flowing midst the constellations. The thirty thousand tapers were being lighted one by one, their beams gradually increasing in number till they obscured the bright glow of the Grotto and spread, from one to the other end of the promenade, the small yellow flames of a gigantic brasier. "Oh! how beautiful it is, Pierre!" murmured Marie; "it is like the resurrection of the humble, the bright awakening of the souls of the poor." "It is superb, superb!" repeated M. de Guersaint, with impassioned artistic satisfaction. "Do you see those two trails of light yonder, which intersect one another and form a cross?" Pierre's feelings, however, had been touched by what Marie had just said. He was reflecting upon her words. There was truth in them. Taken singly, those slender flames, those mere specks of light, were modest and unobtrusive, like the lowly; it was only their great number that supplied the effulgence, the sun-like resplendency. Fresh ones were continually appearing, farther and farther away, like waifs and strays. "Ah!" murmured the young priest, "do you see that one which has just begun to flicker, all by itself, far away--do you see it, Marie? Do you see how it floats and slowly approaches until it is merged in the great lake of light?" In the vicinity of the Grotto one could see now as clearly as in the daytime. The trees, illumined from below, were intensely green, like the painted trees in stage scenery. Above the moving brasier were some motionless banners, whose embroidered saints and silken cords showed with vivid distinctness. And the great reflection ascended to the rock, even to the Basilica, whose spire now shone out, quite white, against the black sky; whilst the hillsides across the Gave were likewise brightened, and displayed the pale fronts of their convents amidst their sombre foliage. There came yet another moment of uncertainty. The flaming lake, in which each burning wick was like a little wave, rolled its starry sparkling as though it were about to burst from its bed and flow away in a river. Then the banners began to oscillate, and soon a regular motion set in. "Oh! so they won't pass this way!" exclaimed M. de Guersaint in a tone of disappointment. Pierre, who had informed himself on the matter, thereupon explained that the procession would first of all ascend the serpentine road--constructed at great cost up the hillside--and that it would afterwards pass behind the Basilica, descend by the inclined way on the right hand, and then spread out through the gardens. "Look!" said he; "you can see the foremost tapers ascending amidst the greenery." Then came an enchanting spectacle. Little flickering lights detached themselves from the great bed of fire, and began gently rising, without it being possible for one to tell at that distance what connected them with the earth. They moved upward, looking in the darkness like golden particles of the sun. And soon they formed an oblique streak, a streak which suddenly twisted, then extended again until it curved once more. At last the whole hillside was streaked by a flaming zigzag, resembling those lightning flashes which you see falling from black skies in cheap engravings. But, unlike the lightning, the luminous trail did not fade away; the little lights still went onward in the same slow, gentle, gliding manner. Only for a moment, at rare intervals, was there a sudden eclipse; the procession, no doubt, was then passing behind some clump of trees. But, farther on, the tapers beamed forth afresh, rising heavenward by an intricate path, which incessantly diverged and then started upward again. At last, however, the time came when the lights no longer ascended, for they had reached the summit of the hill and had begun to disappear at the last turn of the road. Exclamations were rising from the crowd. "They are passing behind the Basilica," said one. "Oh! it will take them twenty minutes before they begin coming down on the other side," remarked another. "Yes, madame," said a third, "there are thirty thousand of them, and an hour will go by before the last of them leaves the Grotto." Ever since the start a sound of chanting had risen above the low rumbling of the crowd. The hymn of Bernadette was being sung, those sixty couplets between which the Angelic Salutation, with its all-besetting rhythm, was ever returning as a refrain. When the sixty couplets were finished they were sung again; and that lullaby of "Ave, ave, ave Maria!" came back incessantly, stupefying the mind, and gradually transporting those thousands of beings into a kind of wide-awake dream, with a vision of Paradise before their eyes. And, indeed, at night-time when they were asleep, their beds would rock to the eternal tune, which they still and ever continued singing. "Are we going to stop here?" asked M. de Guersaint, who speedily got tired of remaining in any one spot. "We see nothing but the same thing over and over again." Marie, who had informed herself by listening to what was said in the crowd, thereupon exclaimed: "You were quite right, Pierre; it would be much better to go back yonder under the trees. I so much wish to see everything." "Yes, certainly; we will seek a spot whence you may see it all," replied the priest. "The only difficulty lies in getting away from here." Indeed, they were now inclosed within the mob of sight-seers; and, in order to secure a passage, Pierre with stubborn perseverance had to keep on begging a little room for a suffering girl. M. de Guersaint meantime brought up the rear, screening the little conveyance so that it might not be upset by the jostling; whilst Marie turned her head, still endeavouring to see the sheet of flame spread out before the Grotto, that lake of little sparkling waves which never seemed to diminish, although the procession continued to flow from it without a pause. At last they all three found themselves out of the crowd, near one of the arches, on a deserted spot where they were able to breathe for a moment. They now heard nothing but the distant canticle with its besetting refrain, and they only saw the reflection of the tapers, hovering like a luminous cloud in the neighbourhood of the Basilica. "The best plan would be to climb to the Calvary," said M. de Guersaint. "The servant at the hotel told me so this morning. From up there, it seems, the scene is fairy-like." But they could not think of making the ascent. Pierre at once enumerated the difficulties. "How could we hoist ourselves to such a height with Marie's conveyance?" he asked. "Besides, we should have to come down again, and that would be dangerous work in the darkness amidst all the scrambling." Marie herself preferred to remain under the trees in the gardens, where it was very mild. So they started off, and reached the esplanade in front of the great crowned statue of the Virgin. It was illuminated by means of blue and yellow globes which encompassed it with a gaudy splendour; and despite all his piety M. de Guersaint could not help finding these decorations in execrable taste. "There!" exclaimed Marie, "a good place would be near those shrubs yonder." She was pointing to a shrubbery near the pilgrims' shelter-house; and the spot was indeed an excellent one for their purpose, as it enabled them to see the procession come down by the gradient way on the left, and watch it as it passed between the lawns to the new bridge and back again. Moreover, a delightful freshness prevailed there by reason of the vicinity of the Gave. There was nobody there as yet, and one could enjoy deep peacefulness in the dense shade which fell from the big plane-trees bordering the path. In his impatience to see the first tapers reappear as soon as they should have passed behind the Basilica, M. de Guersaint had risen on tiptoe. "I see nothing as yet," he muttered, "so whatever the regulations may be I shall sit on the grass for a moment. I've no strength left in my legs." Then, growing anxious about his daughter, he inquired: "Shall I cover you up? It is very cool here." "Oh, no! I'm not cold, father!" answered Marie; "I feel so happy. It is long since I breathed such sweet air. There must be some roses about--can't you smell that delicious perfume?" And turning to Pierre she asked: "Where are the roses, my friend? Can you see them?" When M. de Guersaint had seated himself on the grass near the little vehicle, it occurred to Pierre to see if there was not some bed of roses near at hand. But is was in vain that he explored the dark lawns; he could only distinguish sundry clumps of evergreens. And, as he passed in front of the pilgrims' shelter-house on his way back, curiosity prompted him to enter it. This building formed a long and lofty hall, lighted by large windows upon two sides. With bare walls and a stone pavement, it contained no other furniture than a number of benches, which stood here and there in haphazard fashion. There was neither table nor shelf, so that the homeless pilgrims who had sought refuge there had piled up their baskets, parcels, and valises in the window embrasures. Moreover, the place was apparently empty; the poor folk that it sheltered had no doubt joined the procession. Nevertheless, although the door stood wide open, an almost unbearable smell reigned inside. The very walls seemed impregnated with an odour of poverty, and in spite of the bright sunshine which had prevailed during the day, the flagstones were quite damp, soiled and soaked with expectorations, spilt wine, and grease. This mess had been made by the poorer pilgrims, who with their dirty skins and wretched rags lived in the hall, eating and sleeping in heaps on the benches. Pierre speedily came to the conclusion that the pleasant smell of roses must emanate from some other spot; still, he was making the round of the hall, which was lighted by four smoky lanterns, and which he believed to be altogether unoccupied, when, against the left-hand wall, he was surprised to espy the vague figure of a woman in black, with what seemed to be a white parcel lying on her lap. She was all alone in that solitude, and did not stir; however, her eyes were wide open. He drew near and recognised Madame Vincent. She addressed him in a deep, broken voice: "Rose has suffered so dreadfully to-day! Since daybreak she has not ceased moaning. And so, as she fell asleep a couple of hours ago, I haven't dared to stir for fear lest she should awake and suffer again." Thus the poor woman remained motionless, martyr-mother that she was, having for long months held her daughter in her arms in this fashion, in the stubborn hope of curing her. In her arms, too, she had brought her to Lourdes; in her arms she had carried her to the Grotto; in her arms she had rocked her to sleep, having neither a room of her own, nor even a hospital bed at her disposal. "Isn't the poor little thing any better?" asked Pierre, whose heart ached at the sight. "No, Monsieur l'Abbe; no, I think not." "But you are very badly off here on this bench. You should have made an application to the pilgrimage managers instead of remaining like this, in the street, as it were. Some accommodation would have been found for your little girl, at any rate; that's certain." "Oh! what would have been the use of it, Monsieur l'Abbe? She is all right on my lap. And besides, should I have been allowed to stay with her? No, no, I prefer to have her on my knees; it seems to me that it will end by curing her." Two big tears rolled down the poor woman's motionless cheeks, and in her stifled voice she continued: "I am not penniless. I had thirty sous when I left Paris, and I still have ten left. All I need is a little bread, and she, poor darling, can no longer drink any milk even. I have enough to last me till we go back, and if she gets well again, oh! we shall be rich, rich, rich!" She had leant forward while speaking, and by the flickering light of a lantern near by, gazed at Rose, who was breathing faintly, with parted lips. "You see how soundly she is sleeping," resumed the unhappy mother. "Surely the Blessed Virgin will take pity on her and cure her, won't she, Monsieur l'Abbe? We only have one day left; still, I don't despair; and I shall again pray all night long without moving from here. She will be cured to-morrow; we must live till then." Infinite pity was filling the heart of Pierre, who, fearing that he also might weep, now went away. "Yes, yes, my poor woman, we must hope, still hope," said he, as he left her there among the scattered benches, in that deserted, malodorous hall, so motionless in her painful maternal passion as to hold her own breath, fearful lest the heaving of her bosom should awaken the poor little sufferer. And in deepest grief, with closed lips, she prayed ardently. On Pierre returning to Marie's side, the girl inquired of him: "Well, and those roses? Are there any near here?" He did not wish to sadden her by telling her what he had seen, so he simply answered: "No, I have searched the lawns; there are none." "How singular!" she rejoined, in a thoughtful way. "The perfume is both so sweet and penetrating. You can smell it, can't you? At this moment it is wonderfully strong, as though all the roses of Paradise were flowering around us in the darkness." A low exclamation from her father interrupted her. M. de Guersaint had risen to his feet again on seeing some specks of light shine out above the gradient ways on the left side of the Basilica. "At last! Here they come!" said he. It was indeed the head of the procession again appearing; and at once the specks of light began to swarm and extend in long, wavering double files. The darkness submerged everything except these luminous points, which seemed to be at a great elevation, and to emerge, as it were, from the black depths of the Unknown. And at the same time the everlasting canticle was again heard, but so lightly, for the procession was far away, that it seemed as yet merely like the rustle of a coming storm, stirring the leaves of the trees. "Ah! I said so," muttered M. de Guersaint; "one ought to be at the Calvary to see everything." With the obstinacy of a child he kept on returning to his first idea, again and again complaining that they had chosen "the worst possible place." "But why don't you go up to the Calvary, papa?" at last said Marie. "There is still time. Pierre will stay here with me." And with a mournful laugh she added: "Go; you know very well that nobody will run away with me." He at first refused to act upon the suggestion, but, unable to resist his desire, he all at once fell in with it. And he had to hasten his steps, crossing the lawns at a run. "Don't move," he called; "wait for me under the trees. I will tell you of all that I may see up there." Then Pierre and Marie remained alone in that dim, solitary nook, whence came such a perfume of roses, albeit no roses could be found. And they did not speak, but in silence watched the procession, which was now coming down from the hill with a gentle, continuous, gliding motion. A double file of quivering stars leapt into view on the left-hand side of the Basilica, and then followed the monumental, gradient way, whose curve is gradually described. At that distance you were still unable to see the pilgrims themselves, and you beheld simply those well-disciplined travelling lights tracing geometrical lines amidst the darkness. Under the deep blue heavens, even the buildings at first remained vague, forming but blacker patches against the sky. Little by little, however, as the number of candles increased, the principal architectural lines--the tapering spire of the Basilica, the cyclopean arches of the gradient ways, the heavy, squat facade of the Rosary--became more distinctly visible. And with that ceaseless torrent of bright sparks, flowing slowly downward with the stubborn persistence of a stream which has overflowed its banks and can be stopped by nothing, there came as it were an aurora, a growing, invading mass of light, which would at last spread its glory over the whole horizon. "Look, look, Pierre!" cried Marie, in an access of childish joy. "There is no end of them; fresh ones are ever shining out." Indeed, the sudden appearances of the little lights continued with mechanical regularity, as though some inexhaustible celestial source were pouring forth all those solar specks. The head of the procession had just reached the gardens, near the crowned statue of the Virgin, so that as yet the double file of flames merely outlined the curves of the Rosary and the broad inclined way. However, the approach of the multitude was foretokened by the perturbation of the atmosphere, by the gusts of human breath coming from afar; and particularly did the voices swell, the canticle of Bernadette surging with the clamour of a rising tide, through which, with rhythmical persistence, the refrain of "Ave, ave, ave Maria!" rolled ever in a louder key. "Ah, that refrain!" muttered Pierre; "it penetrates one's very skin. It seems to me as though my whole body were at last singing it." Again did Marie give vent to that childish laugh of hers. "It is true," said she; "it follows me about everywhere. I heard it the other night whilst I was asleep. And now it is again taking possession of me, rocking me, wafting me above the ground." Then she broke off to say: "Here they come, just across the lawn, in front of us." The procession had entered one of the long, straight paths; and then, turning round the lawn by way of the Breton's Cross, it came back by a parallel path. It took more than a quarter of an hour to execute this movement, during which the double file of tapers resembled two long parallel streams of flame. That which ever excited one's admiration was the ceaseless march of this serpent of fire, whose golden coils crept so gently over the black earth, winding, stretching into the far distance, without the immense body ever seeming to end. There must have been some jostling and scrambling every now and then, for some of the luminous lines shook and bent as though they were about to break; but order was soon re-established, and then the slow, regular, gliding movement set in afresh. There now seemed to be fewer stars in the heavens; it was as though a milky way had fallen from on high, rolling its glittering dust of worlds, and transferring the revolutions of the planets from the empyrean to earth. A bluish light streamed all around; there was naught but heaven left; the buildings and the trees assumed a visionary aspect in the mysterious glow of those thousands of tapers, whose number still and ever increased. A faint sigh of admiration came from Marie. She was at a loss for words, and could only repeat "How beautiful it is! /Mon Dieu/! how beautiful it is! Look, Pierre, is it not beautiful?" However, since the procession had been going by at so short a distance from them it had ceased to be a rhythmic march of stars which no human hand appeared to guide, for amidst the stream of light they could distinguish the figures of the pilgrims carrying the tapers, and at times even recognise them as they passed. First they espied La Grivotte, who, exaggerating her cure, and repeating that she had never felt in better health, had insisted upon taking part in the ceremony despite the lateness of the hour; and she still retained her excited demeanour, her dancing gait in that cool night air, which often made her shiver. Then the Vignerons appeared; the father at the head of the party, raising his taper on high, and followed by Madame Vigneron and Madame Chaise, who dragged their weary legs; whilst little Gustave, quite worn out, kept on tapping the sanded path with his crutch, his right hand covered meantime with all the wax that had dripped upon it. Every sufferer who could walk was there, among others Elise Rouquet, who, with her bare red face, passed by like some apparition from among the damned. Others were laughing; Sophie Couteau, the little girl who had been miraculously healed the previous year, was quite forgetting herself, playing with her taper as though it were a switch. Heads followed heads without a pause, heads of women especially, more often with sordid, common features, but at times wearing an exalted expression, which you saw for a second ere it vanished amidst the fantastic illumination. And there was no end to that terrible march past; fresh pilgrims were ever appearing. Among them Pierre and Marie noticed yet another little black shadowy figure, gliding along in a discreet, humble way; it was Madame Maze, whom they would not have recognised if she had not for a moment raised her pale face, down which the tears were streaming. "Look!" exclaimed Pierre; "the first tapers in the procession are reaching the Place du Rosaire, and I am sure that half of the pilgrims are still in front of the Grotto." Marie had raised her eyes. Up yonder, on the left-hand side of the Basilica, she could see other lights incessantly appearing with that mechanical kind of movement which seemed as though it would never cease. "Ah!" she said, "how many, how many distressed souls there are! For each of those little flames is a suffering soul seeking deliverance, is it not?" Pierre had to lean over in order to hear her, for since the procession had been streaming by, so near to them, they had been deafened by the sound of the endless canticle, the hymn of Bernadette. The voices of the pilgrims rang out more loudly than ever amidst the increasing vertigo; the couplets became jumbled together--each batch of processionists chanted a different one with the ecstatic voices of beings possessed, who can no longer hear themselves. There was a huge indistinct clamour, the distracted clamour of a multitude intoxicated by its ardent faith. And meantime the refrain of "Ave, ave, ave Maria!" was ever returning, rising, with its frantic, importunate rhythm, above everything else. All at once Pierre and Marie, to their great surprise, saw M. de Guersaint before them again. "Ah! my children," he said, "I did not want to linger too long up there, I cut through the procession twice in order to get back to you. But what a sight, what a sight it is! It is certainly the first beautiful thing that I have seen since I have been here!" Thereupon he began to describe the procession as he had beheld it from the Calvary height. "Imagine," said he, "another heaven, a heaven down below reflecting that above, a heaven entirely filled by a single immense constellation. The swarming stars seem to be lost, to lie in dim faraway depths; and the trail of fire is in form like a monstrance--yes, a real monstrance, the base of which is outlined by the inclined ways, the stem by the two parallel paths, and the Host by the round lawn which crowns them. It is a monstrance of burning gold, shining out in the depths of the darkness with a perpetual sparkle of moving stars. Nothing else seems to exist; it is gigantic, paramount. I really never saw anything so extraordinary before!" He was waving his arms, beside himself, overflowing with the emotion of an artist. "Father dear," said Marie, tenderly, "since you have come back you ought to go to bed. It is nearly eleven o'clock, and you know that you have to start at two in the morning." Then, to render him compliant, she added: "I am so pleased that you are going to make that excursion! Only, come back early to-morrow evening, because you'll see, you'll see--" She stopped short, not daring to express her conviction that she would be cured. "You are right; I will go to bed," replied M. de Guersaint, quite calmed. "Since Pierre will be with you I sha'n't feel anxious." "But I don't wish Pierre to pass the night out here. He will join you by-and-by after he has taken me to the Grotto. I sha'n't have any further need of anybody; the first bearer who passes can take me back to the hospital to-morrow morning." Pierre had not interrupted her, and now he simply said: "No, no, Marie, I shall stay. Like you, I shall spend the night at the Grotto." She opened her mouth to insist and express her displeasure. But he had spoken those words so gently, and she had detected in them such a dolorous thirst for happiness, that, stirred to the depths of her soul, she stayed her tongue. "Well, well, my children," replied her father, "settle the matter between you. I know that you are both very sensible. And now good-night, and don't be at all uneasy about me." He gave his daughter a long, loving kiss, pressed the young priest's hands, and then went off, disappearing among the serried ranks of the procession, which he once more had to cross. Then they remained alone in their dark, solitary nook under the spreading trees, she still sitting up in her box, and he kneeling on the grass, with his elbow resting on one of the wheels. And it was truly sweet to linger there while the tapers continued marching past, and, after a turning movement, assembled on the Place du Rosaire. What delighted Pierre was that nothing of all the daytime junketing remained. It seemed as though a purifying breeze had come down from the mountains, sweeping away all the odour of strong meats, the greedy Sunday delights, the scorching, pestilential, fair-field dust which, at an earlier hour, had hovered above the town. Overhead there was now only the vast sky, studded with pure stars, and the freshness of the Gave was delicious, whilst the wandering breezes were laden with the perfumes of wild flowers. The mysterious Infinite spread far around in the sovereign peacefulness of night, and nothing of materiality remained save those little candle-flames which the young priest's companion had compared to suffering souls seeking deliverance. All was now exquisitely restful, instinct with unlimited hope. Since Pierre had been there all the heart-rending memories of the afternoon, of the voracious appetites, the impudent simony, and the poisoning of the old town, had gradually left him, allowing him to savour the divine refreshment of that beautiful night, in which his whole being was steeped as in some revivifying water. A feeling of infinite sweetness had likewise come over Marie, who murmured: "Ah! how happy Blanche would be to see all these marvels." She was thinking of her sister, who had been left in Paris to all the worries of her hard profession as a teacher forced to run hither and thither giving lessons. And that simple mention of her sister, of whom Marie had not spoken since her arrival at Lourdes, but whose figure now unexpectedly arose in her mind's eye, sufficed to evoke a vision of all the past. Then, without exchanging a word, Marie and Pierre lived their childhood's days afresh, playing together once more in the neighbouring gardens parted by the quickset hedge. But separation came on the day when he entered the seminary and when she kissed him on the cheeks, vowing that she would never forget him. Years went by, and they found themselves forever parted: he a priest, she prostrated by illness, no longer with any hope of ever being a woman. That was their whole story--an ardent affection of which they had long been ignorant, then absolute severance, as though they were dead, albeit they lived side by side. They again beheld the sorry lodging whence they had started to come to Lourdes after so much battling, so much discussion--his doubts and her passionate faith, which last had conquered. And it seemed to them truly delightful to find themselves once more quite alone together, in that dark nook on that lovely night, when there were as many stars upon earth as there were in heaven. Marie had hitherto retained the soul of a child, a spotless soul, as her father said, good and pure among the purest. Stricken low in her thirteenth year, she had grown no older in mind. Although she was now three-and-twenty, she was still a child, a child of thirteen, who had retired within herself, absorbed in the bitter catastrophe which had annihilated her. You could tell this by the frigidity of her glance, by her absent expression, by the haunted air she ever wore, unable as she was to bestow a thought on anything but her calamity. And never was woman's soul more pure and candid, arrested as it had been in its development. She had had no other romance in life save that tearful farewell to her friend, which for ten long years had sufficed to fill her heart. During the endless days which she had spent on her couch of wretchedness, she had never gone beyond this dream--that if she had grown up in health, he doubtless would not have become a priest, in order to live near her. She never read any novels. The pious works which she was allowed to peruse maintained her in the excitement of a superhuman love. Even the rumours of everyday life died away at the door of the room where she lived in seclusion; and, in past years, when she had been taken from one to the other end of France, from one inland spa to another, she had passed through the crowds like a somnambulist who neither sees nor hears anything, possessed, as she was, by the idea of the calamity that had befallen her, the bond which made her a sexless thing. Hence her purity and childishness; hence she was but an adorable daughter of suffering, who, despite the growth of her sorry flesh, harboured nothing in her heart save that distant awakening of passion, the unconscious love of her thirteenth year. Her hand sought Pierre's in the darkness, and when she found it, coming to meet her own, she, for a long time, continued pressing it. Ah! how sweet it was! Never before, indeed, had they tasted such pure and perfect joy in being together, far from the world, amidst the sovereign enchantment of darkness and mystery. Around them nothing subsisted, save the revolving stars. The lulling hymns were like the very vertigo that bore them away. And she knew right well that after spending a night of rapture at the Grotto, she would, on the morrow, be cured. Of this she was, indeed, absolutely convinced; she would prevail upon the Blessed Virgin to listen to her; she would soften her, as soon as she should be alone, imploring her face to face. And she well understood what Pierre had wished to say a short time previously, when expressing his desire to spend the whole night outside the Grotto, like herself. Was it not that he intended to make a supreme effort to believe, that he meant to fall upon his knees like a little child, and beg the all-powerful Mother to restore his lost faith? Without need of any further exchange of words, their clasped hands repeated all those things. They mutually promised that they would pray for each other, and so absorbed in each other did they become that they forgot themselves, with such an ardent desire for one another's cure and happiness, that for a moment they attained to the depths of the love which offers itself in sacrifice. It was divine enjoyment. "Ah!" murmured Pierre, "how beautiful is this blue night, this infinite darkness, which has swept away all the hideousness of things and beings, this deep, fresh peacefulness, in which I myself should like to bury my doubts!" His voice died away, and Marie, in her turn, said in a very low voice: "And the roses, the perfume of the roses? Can't you smell them, my friend? Where can they be since you could not see them?" "Yes, yes, I smell them, but there are none," he replied. "I should certainly have seen them, for I hunted everywhere." "How can you say that there are no roses when they perfume the air around us, when we are steeped in their aroma? Why, there are moments when the scent is so powerful that I almost faint with delight in inhaling it! They must certainly be here, innumerable, under our very feet." "No, no," said Pierre, "I swear to you I hunted everywhere, and there are no roses. They must be invisible, or they may be the very grass we tread and the spreading trees that are around us; their perfume may come from the soil itself, from the torrent which flows along close by, from the woods and the mountains that rise yonder." For a moment they remained silent. Then, in an undertone, she resumed: "How sweet they smell, Pierre! And it seems to me that even our clasped hands form a bouquet." "Yes, they smell delightfully sweet; but it is from you, Marie, that the perfume now ascends, as though the roses were budding from your hair." Then they ceased speaking. The procession was still gliding along, and at the corner of the Basilica bright sparks were still appearing, flashing suddenly from out of the obscurity, as though spurting from some invisible source. The vast train of little flames, marching in double file, threw a riband of light across the darkness. But the great sight was now on the Place du Rosaire, where the head of the procession, still continuing its measured evolutions, was revolving and revolving in a circle which ever grew smaller, with a stubborn whirl which increased the dizziness of the weary pilgrims and the violence of their chants. And soon the circle formed a nucleus, the nucleus of a nebula, so to say, around which the endless riband of fire began to coil itself. And the brasier grew larger and larger--there was first a pool, then a lake of light. The whole vast Place du Rosaire changed at last into a burning ocean, rolling its little sparkling wavelets with the dizzy motion of a whirlpool that never rested. A reflection like that of dawn whitened the Basilica; while the rest of the horizon faded into deep obscurity, amidst which you only saw a few stray tapers journeying alone, like glowworms seeking their way with the help of their little lights. However, a straggling rear-guard of the procession must have climbed the Calvary height, for up there, against the sky, some moving stars could also be seen. Eventually the moment came when the last tapers appeared down below, marched round the lawns, flowed away, and were merged in the sea of flame. Thirty thousand tapers were burning there, still and ever revolving, quickening their sparkles under the vast calm heavens where the planets had grown pale. A luminous glow ascended in company with the strains of the canticle which never ceased. And the roar of voices incessantly repeating the refrain of "Ave, ave, ave Maria!" was like the very crackling of those hearts of fire which were burning away in prayers in order that souls might be saved. The candles had just been extinguished, one by one, and the night was falling again, paramount, densely black, and extremely mild, when Pierre and Marie perceived that they were still there, hand in hand, hidden away among the trees. In the dim streets of Lourdes, far off, there were now only some stray, lost pilgrims inquiring their way, in order that they might get to bed. Through the darkness there swept a rustling sound--the rustling of those who prowl and fall asleep when days of festivity draw to a close. But the young priest and the girl lingered in their nook forgetfully, never stirring, but tasting delicious happiness amidst the perfume of the invisible roses.

4

THE VIGIL

WHEN Pierre dragged Marie in her box to the front of the Grotto, and placed her as near as possible to the railing, it was past midnight, and about a hundred persons were still there, some seated on the benches, but the greater number kneeling as though prostrated in prayer. The Grotto shone from afar, with its multitude of lighted tapers, similar to the illumination round a coffin, though all that you could distinguish was a star-like blaze, from the midst of which, with visionary whiteness, emerged the statue of the Virgin in its niche. The hanging foliage assumed an emerald sheen, the hundreds of crutches covering the vault resembled an inextricable network of dead wood on the point of reflowering. And the darkness was rendered more dense by so great a brightness, the surroundings became lost in a deep shadow in which nothing, neither walls nor trees, remained; whilst all alone ascended the angry and continuous murmur of the Gave, rolling along beneath the gloomy, boundless sky, now heavy with a gathering storm. "Are you comfortable, Marie?" gently inquired Pierre. "Don't you feel chilly?" She had just shivered. But it was only at a breath from the other world, which had seemed to her to come from the Grotto. "No, no, I am so comfortable! Only place the shawl over my knees. And--thank you, Pierre--don't be anxious about me. I no longer require anyone now that I am with her." Her voice died away, she was already falling into an ecstasy, her hands clasped, her eyes raised towards the white statue, in a beatific transfiguration of the whole of her poor suffering face. Yet Pierre remained a few minutes longer beside her. He would have liked to wrap her in the shawl, for he perceived the trembling of her little wasted hands. But he feared to annoy her, so confined himself to tucking her in like a child; whilst she, slightly raised, with her elbows on the edges of her box, and her eyes fixed on the Grotto, no longer beheld him. A bench stood near, and he had just seated himself upon it, intending to collect his thoughts, when his glance fell upon a woman kneeling in the gloom. Dressed in black, she was so slim, so discreet, so unobtrusive, so wrapt in darkness, that at first he had not noticed her. After a while, however, he recognised her as Madame Maze. The thought of the letter which she had received during the day then recurred to him. And the sight of her filled him with pity; he could feel for the forlornness of this solitary woman, who had no physical sore to heal, but only implored the Blessed Virgin to relieve her heart-pain by converting her inconstant husband. The letter had no doubt been some harsh reply, for, with bowed head, she seemed almost annihilated, filled with the humility of some poor beaten creature. It was only at night-time that she readily forgot herself there, happy at disappearing, at being able to weep, suffer martyrdom, and implore the return of the lost caresses, for hours together, without anyone suspecting her grievous secret. Her lips did not even move; it was her wounded heart which prayed, which desperately begged for its share of love and happiness. Ah! that inextinguishable thirst for happiness which brought them all there, wounded either in body or in spirit; Pierre also felt it parching his throat, in an ardent desire to be quenched. He longed to cast himself upon his knees, to beg the divine aid with the same humble faith as that woman. But his limbs were as though tied; he could not find the words he wanted, and it was a relief when he at last felt someone touch him on the arm. "Come with me, Monsieur l'Abbe, if you do not know the Grotto," said a voice. "I will find you a place. It is so pleasant there at this time!" He raised his head, and recognised Baron Suire, the director of the Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation. This benevolent and simple man no doubt felt some affection for him. He therefore accepted his offer, and followed him into the Grotto, which was quite empty. The Baron had a key, with which he locked the railing behind them. "You see, Monsieur l'Abbe," said he, "this is the time when one can really be comfortable here. For my part, whenever I come to spend a few days at Lourdes, I seldom retire to rest before daybreak, as I have fallen into the habit of finishing my night here. The place is deserted, one is quite alone, and is it not pleasant? How well one feels oneself to be in the abode of the Blessed Virgin!" He smiled with a kindly air, doing the honours of the Grotto like an old frequenter of the place, somewhat enfeebled by age, but full of genuine affection for this delightful nook. Moreover, in spite of his great piety, he was in no way ill at ease there, but talked on and explained matters with the familiarity of a man who felt himself to be the friend of Heaven. "Ah! you are looking at the tapers," he said. "There are about two hundred of them which burn together night and day; and they end by making the place warm. It is even warm here in winter." Indeed, Pierre was beginning to feel incommoded by the warm odour of the wax. Dazzled by the brilliant light into which he was penetrating, he gazed at the large, central, pyramidal holder, all bristling with little tapers, and resembling a luminous clipped yew glistening with stars. In the background, a straight holder, on a level with the ground, upheld the large tapers, which, like the pipes of an organ, formed a row of uneven height, some of them being as large as a man's thigh. And yet other holders, resembling massive candelabra, stood here and there on the jutting parts of the rock. The vault of the Grotto sank towards the left, where the stone seemed baked and blackened by the eternal flames which had been heating it for years. And the wax was perpetually dripping like fine snow; the trays of the holders were smothered with it, whitened by its ever-thickening dust. In fact, it coated the whole rock, which had become quite greasy to the touch; and to such a degree did it cover the ground that accidents had occurred, and it had been necessary to spread some mats about to prevent persons from slipping. "You see those large ones there," obligingly continued Baron Suire. "They are the most expensive and cost sixty francs apiece; they will continue burning for a month. The smallest ones, which cost but five sous each, only last three hours. Oh! we don't husband them; we never run short. Look here! Here are two more hampers full, which there has not yet been time to remove to the storehouse." Then he pointed to the furniture, which comprised a harmonium covered with a cloth, a substantial dresser with several large drawers in which the sacred vestments were kept, some benches and chairs reserved for the privileged few who were admitted during the ceremonies, and finally a very handsome movable altar, which was adorned with engraved silver plates, the gift of a great lady, and--for fear of injury from dampness--was only brought out on the occasions of remunerative pilgrimages. Pierre was disturbed by all this well-meant chatter. His religious emotion lost some of its charm. In spite of his lack of faith, he had, on entering, experienced a feeling of agitation, a heaving of the soul, as though the mystery were about to be revealed to him. It was at the same time both an anxious and a delicious feeling. And he beheld things which deeply stirred him: bunches of flowers, lying in a heap at the Virgin's feet, with the votive offerings of children--little faded shoes, a tiny iron corselet, and a doll-like crutch which almost seemed to be a toy. Beneath the natural ogival cavity in which the apparition had appeared, at the spot where the pilgrims rubbed the chaplets and medals they wished to consecrate, the rock was quite worn away and polished. Millions of ardent lips had pressed kisses on the wall with such intensity of love that the stone was as though calcined, streaked with black veins, shining like marble. However, he stopped short at last opposite a cavity in which lay a considerable pile of letters and papers of every description. "Ah! I was forgetting," hastily resumed Baron Suire; "this is the most interesting part of it. These are the letters which the faithful throw into the Grotto through the railing every day. We gather them up and place them there; and in the winter I amuse myself by glancing through them. You see, we cannot burn them without opening them, for they often contain money--francs, half-francs, and especially postage-stamps." He stirred up the letters, and, selecting a few at random, showed the addresses, and opened them to read. Nearly all of them were letters from illiterate persons, with the superscription, "To Our Lady of Lourdes," scrawled on the envelopes in big, irregular handwriting. Many of them contained requests or thanks, incorrectly worded and wondrously spelt; and nothing was more affecting than the nature of some of the petitions: a little brother to be saved, a lawsuit to be gained, a lover to be preserved, a marriage to be effected. Other letters, however, were angry ones, taking the Blessed Virgin to task for not having had the politeness to acknowledge a former communication by granting the writer's prayers. Then there were still others, written in a finer hand, with carefully worded phrases containing confessions and fervent entreaties; and these were from women who confided to the Queen of Heaven things which they dared not even say to a priest in the shadow of the confessional. Finally, one envelope, selected at random, merely contained a photograph; a young girl had sent her portrait to Our Lady of Lourdes, with this dedication: "To my good Mother." In short, they every day received the correspondence of a most powerful Queen, to whom both prayers and secrets were addressed, and who was expected to reply with favours and kindnesses of every kind. The franc and half-franc pieces were simple tokens of love to propitiate her; while, as for the postage-stamps, these could only be sent for convenience' sake, in lieu of coined money; unless, indeed, they were sent guilelessly, as in the case of a peasant woman who had added a postscript to her letter to say that she enclosed a stamp for the reply. "I can assure you," concluded the Baron, "that there are some very nice ones among them, much less foolish than you might imagine. During a period of three years I constantly found some very interesting letters from a lady who did nothing without relating it to the Blessed Virgin. She was a married woman, and entertained a most dangerous passion for a friend of her husband's. Well, Monsieur l'Abbe, she overcame it; the Blessed Virgin answered her by sending her an armour for her chastity, an all-divine power to resist the promptings of her heart." Then he broke off to say: "But come and seat yourself here, Monsieur l'Abbe. You will see how comfortable you will be." Pierre went and placed himself beside him on a bench on the left hand, at the spot where the rock sloped down. This was a deliciously reposeful corner, and neither the one nor the other spoke; a profound silence had ensued, when, behind him, Pierre heard an indistinct murmur, a light crystalline voice, which seemed to come from the Invisible. He gave a start, which Baron Suire understood. "That is the spring which you hear," said he; "it is there, underground, below this grating. Would you like to see it?" And without waiting for Pierre's reply, he at once bent down to open one of the iron plates protecting the spring, mentioning that it was thus closed up in order to prevent freethinkers from throwing poison into it. For a moment this extraordinary idea quite amazed the priest; but he ended by attributing it entirely to the Baron, who was, indeed, very childish. The latter, meantime, was vainly struggling with the padlock, which opened by a combination of letters, and refused to yield to his endeavours. "It is singular," he muttered; "the word is /Rome/, and I am positive that it hasn't been changed. The damp destroys everything. Every two years or so we are obliged to replace those crutches up there, otherwise they would all rot away. Be good enough to bring me a taper." By the light of the candle which Pierre then took from one of the holders, he at last succeeded in unfastening the brass padlock, which was covered with /vert-de-gris/. Then, the plate having been raised, the spring appeared to view. Upon a bed of muddy gravel, in a fissure of the rock, there was a limpid stream, quite tranquil, but seemingly spreading over a rather large surface. The Baron explained that it had been necessary to conduct it to the fountains through pipes coated with cement; and he even admitted that, behind the piscinas, a large cistern had been dug in which the water was collected during the night, as otherwise the small output of the source would not suffice for the daily requirements. "Will you taste it?" he suddenly asked. "It is much better here, fresh from the earth." Pierre did not answer; he was gazing at that tranquil, innocent water, which assumed a moire-like golden sheen in the dancing light of the taper. The falling drops of wax now and again ruffled its surface. And, as he gazed at it, the young priest pondered upon all the mystery it brought with it from the distant mountain slopes. "Come, drink some!" said the Baron, who had already dipped and filled a glass which was kept there handy. The priest had no choice but to empty it; it was good pure, water, fresh and transparent, like that which flows from all the lofty uplands of the Pyrenees. After refastening the padlock, they both returned to the bench. Now and again Pierre could still hear the spring flowing behind him, with a music resembling the gentle warble of some unseen bird. And now the Baron again raised his voice, giving him the history of the Grotto at all times and seasons, in a pathetic babble, replete with puerile details. The summer was the roughest season, for then came the great itinerant pilgrimage crowds, with the uproarious fervour of thousands of eager beings, all praying and vociferating together. But with the autumn came the rain, those diluvial rains which beat against the Grotto entrance for days together; and with them arrived the pilgrims from remote countries, small, silent, and ecstatic bands of Indians, Malays, and even Chinese, who fell upon their knees in the mud at the sign from the missionaries accompanying them. Of all the old provinces of France, it was Brittany that sent the most devout pilgrims, whole parishes arriving together, the men as numerous as the women, and all displaying a pious deportment, a simple and unostentatious faith, such as might edify the world. Then came the winter, December with its terrible cold, its dense snow-drifts blocking the mountain ways. But even then families put up at the hotels, and, despite everything, faithful worshippers--all those who, fleeing the noise of the world, wished to speak to the Virgin in the tender intimacy of solitude--still came every morning to the Grotto. Among them were some whom no one knew, who appeared directly they felt certain they would be alone there to kneel and love like jealous lovers; and who departed, frightened away by the first suspicion of a crowd. And how warm and pleasant the place was throughout the foul winter weather! In spite of rain and wind and snow, the Grotto still continued flaring. Even during nights of howling tempest, when not a soul was there, it lighted up the empty darkness, blazing like a brasier of love that nothing could extinguish. The Baron related that, at the time of the heavy snowfall of the previous winter, he had spent whole afternoons there, on the bench where they were then seated. A gentle warmth prevailed, although the spot faced the north and was never reached by a ray of sunshine. No doubt the circumstance of the burning tapers continually heating the rock explained this generous warmth; but might one not also believe in some charming kindness on the part of the Virgin, who endowed the spot with perpetual springtide? And the little birds were well aware of it; when the snow on the ground froze their feet, all the finches of the neighbourhood sought shelter there, fluttering about in the ivy around the holy statue. At length came the awakening of the real spring: the Gave, swollen with melted snow, and rolling on with a voice of thunder: the trees, under the action of their sap, arraying themselves in a mantle of greenery, whilst the crowds, once more returning, noisily invaded the sparkling Grotto, whence they drove the little birds of heaven. "Yes, yes," repeated Baron Suire, in a declining voice, "I spent some most delightful winter days here all alone. I saw no one but a woman, who leant against the railing to avoid kneeling in the snow. She was quite young, twenty-five perhaps, and very pretty--dark, with magnificent blue eyes. She never spoke, and did not even seem to pray, but remained there for hours together, looking intensely sad. I do not know who she was, nor have I ever seen her since." He ceased speaking; and when, a couple of minutes later, Pierre, surprised at his silence, looked at him, he perceived that he had fallen asleep. With his hands clasped upon his belly, his chin resting on his chest, he slept as peacefully as a child, a smile hovering the while about his mouth. Doubtless, when he said that he spent the night there, he meant that he came thither to indulge in the early nap of a happy old man, whose dreams are of the angels. And now Pierre tasted all the charms of the solitude. It was indeed true that a feeling of peacefulness and comfort permeated the soul in this rocky nook. It was occasioned by the somewhat stifling fumes of the burning wax, by the transplendent ecstasy into which one sank amidst the glare of the tapers. The young priest could no longer distinctly see the crutches on the roof, the votive offerings hanging from the sides, the altar of engraved silver, and the harmonium in its wrapper, for a slow intoxication seemed to be stealing over him, a gradual prostration of his whole being. And he particularly experienced the divine sensation of having left the living world, of having attained to the far realms of the marvellous and the superhuman, as though that simple iron railing yonder had become the very barrier of the Infinite. However, a slight noise on his left again disturbed him. It was the spring flowing, ever flowing on, with its bird-like warble. Ah! how he would have liked to fall upon his knees and believe in the miracle, to acquire a certain conviction that that divine water had gushed from the rock solely for the healing of suffering humanity. Had he not come there to prostrate himself and implore the Virgin to restore the faith of his childhood? Why, then, did he not pray, why did he not beseech her to bring him back to grace? His feeling of suffocation increased, the burning tapers dazzled him almost to the point of giddiness. And, all at once, the recollection came to him that for two days past, amidst the great freedom which priests enjoyed at Lourdes, he had neglected to say his mass. He was in a state of sin, and perhaps it was the weight of this transgression which was oppressing his heart. He suffered so much that he was at last compelled to rise from his seat and walk away. He gently closed the gate behind him, leaving Baron Suire still asleep do the bench. Marie, he found, had not stirred, but was still raised on her elbows, with her ecstatic eyes uplifted towards the figure of the Virgin. "How are you, Marie?" asked Pierre. "Don't you feel cold?" She did not reply. He felt her hands and found them warm and soft, albeit slightly trembling. "It is not the cold which makes you tremble, is it, Marie?" he asked. In a voice as gentle as a zephyr she replied: "No, no! let me be; I am so happy! I shall see her, I feel it. Ah! what joy!" So, after slightly pulling up her shawl, he went forth into the night, a prey to indescribable agitation. Beyond the bright glow of the Grotto was a night as black as ink, a region of darkness, into which he plunged at random. Then, as his eyes became accustomed to this gloom, he found himself near the Gave, and skirted it, following a path shaded by tall trees, where he again came upon a refreshing obscurity. This shade and coolness, both so soothing, now brought him relief. And his only surprise was that he had not fallen on his knees in the Grotto, and prayed, even as Marie was praying, with all the power of his soul. What could be the obstacle within him? Whence came the irresistible revolt which prevented him from surrendering himself to faith even when his overtaxed, tortured being longed to yield? He understood well enough that it was his reason alone which protested, and the time had come when he would gladly have killed that voracious reason, which was devouring his life and preventing him from enjoying the happiness allowed to the ignorant and the simple. Perhaps, had he beheld a miracle, he might have acquired enough strength of will to believe. For instance, would he not have bowed himself down, vanquished at last, if Marie had suddenly risen up and walked before him. The scene which he conjured up of Marie saved, Marie cured, affected him so deeply that he stopped short, his trembling arms uplifted towards the star-spangled vault of heaven. What a lovely night it was! --so deep and mysterious, so airy and fragrant; and what joy rained down at the hope that eternal health might be restored, that eternal love might ever revive, even as spring returns! Then he continued his walk, following the path to the end. But his doubts were again coming back to him; when you need a miracle to gain belief, it means that you are incapable of believing. There is no need for the Almighty to prove His existence. Pierre also felt uneasy at the thought that, so long as he had not discharged his priestly duties by saying his mass, his prayers would not be answered. Why did he not go at once to the church of the Rosary, whose altars, from midnight till noon, are placed at the disposal of the priests who come from a distance? Thus thinking, he descended by another path, again finding himself beneath the trees, near the leafy spot whence he and Marie had watched the procession of tapers. Not a light now remained, there was but a boundless expanse of gloom. Here Pierre experienced a fresh attack of faintness, and as though to gain time, he turned mechanically into the pilgrims' shelter-house. Its door had remained wide open; still this failed to sufficiently ventilate the spacious hall, which was now full of people. On the very threshold Pierre felt oppressed by the stifling heat emanating from the multitude of bodies, the dense pestilential smell of human breath and perspiration. The smoking lanterns gave out so bad a light that he had to pick his way with extreme care in order to avoid treading upon outstretched limbs; for the overcrowding was extraordinary, and many persons, unable to find room on the benches, had stretched themselves on the pavement, on the damp stone slabs fouled by all the refuse of the day. And on all sides indescribable promiscuousness prevailed: prostrated by overpowering weariness, men, women, and priests were lying there, pell-mell, at random, open-mouthed and utterly exhausted. A large number were snoring, seated on the slabs, with their backs against the walls and their heads drooping on their chests. Others had slipped down, with limbs intermingled, and one young girl lay prostrate across an old country priest, who in his calm, childlike slumber was smiling at the angels. It was like a cattle-shed sheltering poor wanderers of the roads, all those who were homeless on that beautiful holiday night, and who had dropped in there and fallen fraternally asleep. Still, there were some who found no repose in their feverish excitement, but turned and twisted, or rose up to finish eating the food which remained in their baskets. Others could be seen lying perfectly motionless, their eyes wide open and fixed upon the gloom. The cries of dreamers, the wailing of sufferers, arose amidst general snoring. And pity came to the heart, a pity full of anguish, at sight of this flock of wretches lying there in heaps in loathsome rags, whilst their poor spotless souls no doubt were far away in the blue realm of some mystical dream. Pierre was on the point of withdrawing, feeling sick at heart, when a low continuous moan attracted his attention. He looked, and recognised Madame Vincent, on the same spot and in the same position as before, still nursing little Rose upon her lap. "Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe," the poor woman murmured, "you hear her; she woke up nearly an hour ago, and has been sobbing ever since. Yet I assure you I have not moved even a finger, I felt so happy at seeing her sleep." The priest bent down, examining the little one, who had not even the strength to raise her eyelids. A plaintive cry no stronger than a breath was coming from her lips; and she was so white that he shuddered, for he felt that death was hovering near. "Dear me! what shall I do?" continued the poor mother, utterly worn out. "This cannot last; I can no longer bear to hear her cry. And if you knew all that I have been saying to her: 'My jewel, my treasure, my angel, I beseech you cry no more. Be good; the Blessed Virgin will cure you!' And yet she still cries on." With these words the poor creature burst out sobbing, her big tears falling on the face of the child, whose rattle still continued. "Had it been daylight," she resumed, "I would long ago have left this hall, the more especially as she disturbs the others. There is an old lady yonder who has already complained. But I fear it may be chilly outside; and besides, where could I go in the middle of the night? Ah! Blessed Virgin, Blessed Virgin, take pity upon us!" Overcome by emotion, Pierre kissed the child's fair head, and then hastened away to avoid bursting into tears like the sorrowing mother. And he went straight to the Rosary, as though he were determined to conquer death. He had already beheld the Rosary in broad daylight, and had been displeased by the aspect of this church, which the architect, fettered by the rockbound site, had been obliged to make circular and low, so that it seemed crushed beneath its great cupola, which square pillars supported. The worst was that, despite its archaic Byzantine style, it altogether lacked any religious appearance, and suggested neither mystery nor meditation. Indeed, with the glaring light admitted by the cupola and the broad glazed doors it was more like some brand-new corn-market. And then, too, it was not yet completed: the decorations were lacking, the bare walls against which the altars stood had no other embellishment than some artificial roses of coloured paper and a few insignificant votive offerings; and this bareness heightened the resemblance to some vast public hall. Moreover, in time of rain the paved floor became as muddy as that of a general waiting-room at a railway station. The high altar was a temporary structure of painted wood. Innumerable rows of benches filled the central rotunda, benches free to the public, on which people could come and rest at all hours, for night and day alike the Rosary remained open to the swarming pilgrims. Like the shelter-house, it was a cow-shed in which the Almighty received the poor ones of the earth. On entering, Pierre felt himself to be in some common hall trod by the footsteps of an ever-changing crowd. But the brilliant sunlight no longer streamed on the pallid walls, the tapers burning at every altar simply gleamed like stars amidst the uncertain gloom which filled the building. A solemn high mass had been celebrated at midnight with extraordinary pomp, amidst all the splendour of candles, chants, golden vestments, and swinging, steaming censers; but of all this glorious display there now remained only the regulation number of tapers necessary for the celebration of the masses at each of the fifteen altars ranged around the edifice. These masses began at midnight and did not cease till noon. Nearly four hundred were said during those twelve hours at the Rosary alone. Taking the whole of Lourdes, where there were altogether some fifty altars, more than two thousand masses were celebrated daily. And so great was the abundance of priests, that many had extreme difficulty in fulfilling their duties, having to wait for hours together before they could find an altar unoccupied. What particularly struck Pierre that evening, was the sight of all the altars besieged by rows of priests patiently awaiting their turn in the dim light at the foot of the steps; whilst the officiating minister galloped through the Latin phrases, hastily punctuating them with the prescribed signs of the cross. And the weariness of all the waiting ones was so great, that most of them were seated on the flagstones, some even dozing on the altar steps in heaps, quite overpowered, relying on the beadle to come and rouse them. For a moment Pierre walked about undecided. Was he going to wait like the others? However, the scene determined him against doing so. At every altar, at every mass, a crowd of pilgrims was gathered, communicating in all haste with a sort of voracious fervour. Each pyx was filled and emptied incessantly; the priests' hands grew tired in thus distributing the bread of life; and Pierre's surprise increased at the sight. Never before had he beheld a corner of this earth so watered by the divine blood, whence faith took wing in such a flight of souls. It was like a return to the heroic days of the Church, when all nations prostrated themselves beneath the same blast of credulity in their terrified ignorance which led them to place their hope of eternal happiness in an Almighty God. He could fancy himself carried back some eight or nine centuries, to the time of great public piety, when people believed in the approaching end of the world; and this he could fancy the more readily as the crowd of simple folk, the whole host that had attended high mass, was still seated on the benches, as much at ease in God's house as at home. Many had no place of refuge. Was not the church their home, the asylum where consolation awaited them both by day and by night? Those who knew not where to sleep, who had not found room even at the shelter place, came to the Rosary, where sometimes they succeeded in finding a vacant seat on a bench, at others sufficient space to lie down on the flagstones. And others who had beds awaiting them lingered there for the joy of passing a whole night in that divine abode, so full of beautiful dreams. Until daylight the concourse and promiscuity were extraordinary; every row of benches was occupied, sleeping persons were scattered in every corner and behind every pillar; men, women, children were leaning against each other, their heads on one another's shoulders, their breath mingling in calm unconsciousness. It was the break-up of a religious gathering overwhelmed by sleep, a church transformed into a chance hospital, its doors wide open to the lovely August night, giving access to all who were wandering in the darkness, the good and the bad, the weary and the lost. And all over the place, from each of the fifteen altars, the bells announcing the elevation of the Host incessantly sounded, whilst from among the mob of sleepers bands of believers now and again arose, went and received the sacrament, and then returned to mingle once more with the nameless, shepherdless flock which the semi-obscurity enveloped like a veil. With an air of restless indecision, Pierre was still wandering through the shadowy groups, when an old priest, seated on the step of an altar, beckoned to him. For two hours he had been waiting there, and now that his turn was at length arriving he felt so faint that he feared he might not have strength to say the whole of his mass, and preferred, therefore, to surrender his place to another. No doubt the sight of Pierre, wandering so distressfully in the gloom, had moved him. He pointed the vestry out to him, waited until he returned with chasuble and chalice, and then went off and fell into a sound sleep on one of the neighbouring benches. Pierre thereupon said his mass in the same way as he said it at Paris, like a worthy man fulfilling a professional duty. He outwardly maintained an air of sincere faith. But, contrary to what he had expected from the two feverish days through which he had just gone, from the extraordinary and agitating surroundings amidst which he had spent the last few hours, nothing moved him nor touched his heart. He had hoped that a great commotion would overpower him at the moment of the communion, when the divine mystery is accomplished; that he would find himself in view of Paradise, steeped in grace, in the very presence of the Almighty; but there was no manifestation, his chilled heart did not even throb, he went on to the end pronouncing the usual words, making the regulation gestures, with the mechanical accuracy of the profession. In spite of his effort to be fervent, one single idea kept obstinately returning to his mind--that the vestry was far too small, since such an enormous number of masses had to be said. How could the sacristans manage to distribute the holy vestments and the cloths? It puzzled him, and engaged his thoughts with absurd persistency. At length, to his surprise, he once more found himself outside. Again he wandered through the night, a night which seemed to him utterly void, darker and stiller than before. The town was lifeless, not a light was gleaming. There only remained the growl of the Gave, which his accustomed ears no longer heard. And suddenly, similar to a miraculous apparition, the Grotto blazed before him, illumining the darkness with its everlasting brasier, which burnt with a flame of inextinguishable love. He had returned thither unconsciously, attracted no doubt by thoughts of Marie. Three o'clock was about to strike, the benches before the Grotto were emptying, and only some twenty persons remained there, dark, indistinct forms, kneeling in slumberous ecstasy, wrapped in divine torpor. It seemed as though the night in progressing had increased the gloom, and imparted a remote visionary aspect to the Grotto. All faded away amidst delicious lassitude, sleep reigned supreme over the dim, far-spreading country side; whilst the voice of the invisible waters seemed to be merely the breathing of this pure slumber, upon which the Blessed Virgin, all white with her aureola of tapers, was smiling. And among the few unconscious women was Madame Maze, still kneeling, with clasped hands and bowed head, but so indistinct that she seemed to have melted away amidst her ardent prayer. Pierre, however, had immediately gone up to Marie. He was shivering, and fancied that she must be chilled by the early morning air. "I beseech you, Marie, cover yourself up," said he. "Do you want to suffer still more?" And thereupon he drew up the shawl which had slipped off her, and endeavoured to fasten it about her neck. "You are cold, Marie," he added; "your hands are like ice." She did not answer, she was still in the same attitude as when he had left her a couple of hours previously. With her elbows resting on the edges of her box, she kept herself raised, her soul still lifted towards the Blessed Virgin and her face transfigured, beaming with a celestial joy. Her lips moved, though no sound came from them. Perhaps she was still carrying on some mysterious conversation in the world of enchantments, dreaming wide awake, as she had been doing ever since he had placed her there. He spoke to her again, but still she answered not. At last, however, of her own accord, she murmured in a far-away voice: "Oh! I am so happy, Pierre! I have seen her; I prayed to her for you, and she smiled at me, slightly nodding her head to let me know that she heard me and would grant my prayers. And though she did not speak to me, Pierre, I understood what she wished me to know. 'Tis to-day, at four o'clock in the afternoon, when the Blessed Sacrament passes by, that I shall be cured!" He listened to her in deep agitation. Had she been sleeping with her eyes wide open? Was it in a dream that she had seen the marble figure of the Blessed Virgin bend its head and smile? A great tremor passed through him at the thought that this poor child had prayed for him. And he walked up to the railing, and dropped upon his knees, stammering: "O Marie! O Marie!" without knowing whether this heart-cry were intended for the Virgin or for the beloved friend of his childhood. And he remained there, utterly overwhelmed, waiting for grace to come to him. Endless minutes went by. This was indeed the superhuman effort, the waiting for the miracle which he had come to seek for himself, the sudden revelation, the thunderclap which was to sweep away his unbelief and restore him, rejuvenated and triumphant, to the faith of the simple-minded. He surrendered himself, he wished that some mighty power might ravage his being and transform it. But, even as before whilst saying his mass, he heard naught within him but an endless silence, felt nothing but a boundless vacuum. There was no divine intervention, his despairing heart almost seemed to cease beating. And although he strove to pray, to fix his mind wholly upon that powerful Virgin, so compassionate to poor humanity, his thoughts none the less wandered, won back by the outside world, and again turning to puerile trifles. Within the Grotto, on the other side of the railing, he had once more caught sight of Baron Suire, still asleep, still continuing his pleasant nap with his hands clasped in front of him. Other things also attracted his attention: the flowers deposited at the feet of the Virgin, the letters cast there as though into a heavenly letter-box, the delicate lace-like work of wax which remained erect around the flames of the larger tapers, looking like some rich silver ornamentation. Then, without any apparent reason, his thoughts flew away to the days of his childhood, and his brother Guillaume's face rose before him with extreme distinctness. He had not seen him since their mother's death. He merely knew that he led a very secluded life, occupying himself with scientific matters, in a little house in which he had buried himself with a mistress and two big dogs; and he would have known nothing more about him, but for having recently read his name in a newspaper in connection with some revolutionary attempt. It was stated that he was passionately devoting himself to the study of explosives, and in constant intercourse with the leaders of the most advanced parties. Why, however, should Guillaume appear to him in this wise, in this ecstatic spot, amidst the mystical light of the tapers,--appear to him, moreover, such as he had formerly known him, so good, affectionate, and brotherly, overflowing with charity for every affliction! The thought haunted him for a moment, and filled him with painful regret for that brotherliness now dead and gone. Then, with hardly a moment's pause, his mind reverted to himself, and he realised that he might stubbornly remain there for hours without regaining faith. Nevertheless, he felt a sort of tremor pass through him, a final hope, a feeling that if the Blessed Virgin should perform the great miracle of curing Marie, he would at last believe. It was like a final delay which he allowed himself, an appointment with Faith for that very day, at four o'clock in the afternoon, when, according to what the girl had told him, the Blessed Sacrament would pass by. And at this thought his anguish at once ceased, he remained kneeling, worn out with fatigue and overcome by invincible drowsiness. The hours passed by, the resplendent illumination of the Grotto was still projected into the night, its reflection stretching to the neighbouring hillsides and whitening the walls of the convents there. However, Pierre noticed it grow paler and paler, which surprised him, and he roused himself, feeling thoroughly chilled; it was the day breaking, beneath a leaden sky overcast with clouds. He perceived that one of those storms, so sudden in mountainous regions, was rapidly rising from the south. The thunder could already be heard rumbling in the distance, whilst gusts of wind swept along the roads. Perhaps he also had been sleeping, for he no longer beheld Baron Suire, whose departure he did not remember having witnessed. There were scarcely ten persons left before the Grotto, though among them he again recognised Madame Maze with her face hidden in her hands. However, when she noticed that it was daylight and that she could be seen, she rose up, and vanished at a turn of the narrow path leading to the convent of the Blue Sisters. Feeling anxious, Pierre went up to Marie to tell her she must not remain there any longer, unless she wished to get wet through. "I will take you back to the hospital," said he. She refused and then entreated: "No, no! I am waiting for mass; I promised to communicate here. Don't trouble about me, return to the hotel at once, and go to bed, I implore you. You know very well that covered vehicles are sent here for the sick whenever it rains." And she persisted in refusing to leave, whilst on his side he kept on repeating that he did not wish to go to bed. A mass, it should be mentioned, was said at the Grotto early every morning, and it was a divine joy for the pilgrims to be able to communicate, amidst the glory of the rising sun, after a long night of ecstasy. And now, just as some large drops of rain were beginning to fall, there came the priest, wearing a chasuble and accompanied by two acolytes, one of whom, in order to protect the chalice, held a large white silk umbrella, embroidered with gold, over him. Pierre, after pushing Marie's little conveyance close to the railing, so that the girl might be sheltered by the overhanging rock, under which the few other worshippers had also sought refuge, had just seen her receive the sacrament with ardent fervour, when his attention was attracted by a pitiful spectacle which quite wrung his heart. Beneath a dense, heavy deluge of rain, he caught sight of Madame Vincent, still with that precious, woeful burden, her little Rose, whom with outstretched arms she was offering to the Blessed Virgin. Unable to stay any longer at the shelter-house owing to the complaints caused by the child's constant moaning, she had carried her off into the night, and during two hours had roamed about in the darkness, lost, distracted, bearing this poor flesh of her flesh, which she pressed to her bosom, unable to give it any relief. She knew not what road she had taken, beneath what trees she had strayed, so absorbed had she been in her revolt against the unjust sufferings which had so sorely stricken this poor little being, so feeble and so pure, and as yet quite incapable of sin. Was it not abominable that the grip of disease should for weeks have been incessantly torturing her child, whose cry she knew not how to quiet? She carried her about, rocking her in her arms as she went wildly along the paths, obstinately hoping that she would at last get her to sleep, and so hush that wail which was rending her heart. And suddenly, utterly worn-out, sharing each of her daughter's death pangs, she found herself opposite the Grotto, at the feet of the miracle-working Virgin, she who forgave and who healed. "O Virgin, Mother most admirable, heal her! O Virgin, Mother of Divine Grace, heal her!" She had fallen on her knees, and with quivering, outstretched arms was still offering her expiring daughter, in a paroxysm of hope and desire which seemed to raise her from the ground. And the rain, which she never noticed, beat down behind her with the fury of an escaped torrent, whilst violent claps of thunder shook the mountains. For one moment she thought her prayer was granted, for Rose had slightly shivered as though visited by the archangel, her face becoming quite white, her eyes and mouth opening wide; and with one last little gasp she ceased to cry. "O Virgin, Mother of Our Redeemer, heal her! O Virgin, All-powerful Mother, heal her!" But the poor woman felt her child become even lighter in her extended arms. And now she became afraid at no longer hearing her moan, at seeing her so white, with staring eyes and open mouth, without a sign of life. How was it that she did not smile if she were cured? Suddenly a loud heart-rending cry rang out, the cry of the mother, surpassing even the din of the thunder in the storm, whose violence was increasing. Her child was dead. And she rose up erect, turned her back on that deaf Virgin who let little children die, and started off like a madwoman beneath the lashing downpour, going straight before her without knowing whither, and still and ever carrying and nursing that poor little body which she had held in her arms during so many days and nights. A thunderbolt fell, shivering one of the neighbouring trees, as though with the stroke of a giant axe, amidst a great crash of twisted and broken branches. Pierre had rushed after Madame Vincent, eager to guide and help her. But he was unable to follow her, for he at once lost sight of her behind the blurring curtain of rain. When he returned, the mass was drawing to an end, and, as soon as the rain fell less violently, the officiating priest went off under the white silk umbrella embroidered with gold. Meantime a kind of omnibus awaited the few patients to take them back to the hospital. Marie pressed Pierre's hands. "Oh! how happy I am!" she said. "Do not come for me before three o'clock this afternoon." On being left amidst the rain, which had now become an obstinate fine drizzle, Pierre re-entered the Grotto and seated himself on the bench near the spring. He would not go to bed, for in spite of his weariness he dreaded sleep in the state of nervous excitement in which he had been plunged ever since the day before. Little Rose's death had increased his fever; he could not banish from his mind the thought of that heart-broken mother, wandering along the muddy paths with the dead body of her child. What could be the reasons which influenced the Virgin? He was amazed that she could make a choice. Divine Mother as she was, he wondered how her heart could decide upon healing only ten out of a hundred sufferers--that ten per cent. of miracles which Doctor Bonamy had proved by statistics. He, Pierre, had already asked himself the day before which ones he would have chosen had he possessed the power of saving ten. A terrible power in all truth, a formidable selection, which he would never have had the courage to make. Why this one, and not that other? Where was the justice, where the compassion? To be all-powerful and heal every one of them, was not that the desire which rose from each heart? And the Virgin seemed to him to be cruel, badly informed, as harsh and indifferent as even impassible nature, distributing life and death at random, or in accordance with laws which mankind knew nothing of. The rain was at last leaving off, and Pierre had been there a couple of hours when he felt that his feet were damp. He looked down, and was greatly surprised, for the spring was overflowing through the gratings. The soil of the Grotto was already covered; whilst outside a sheet of water was flowing under the benches, as far as the parapet against the Gave. The late storms had swollen the waters in the neighbourhood. Pierre thereupon reflected that this spring, in spite of its miraculous origin, was subject to the laws that governed other springs, for it certainly communicated with some natural reservoirs, wherein the rain penetrated and accumulated. And then, to keep his ankles dry, he left the place.

5

THE TWO VICTIMS

PIERRE walked along thirsting for fresh air, his head so heavy that he took off his hat to relieve his burning brow. Despite all the fatigue of that terrible night of vigil, he did not think of sleeping. He was kept erect by that rebellion of his whole being which he could not quiet. Eight o'clock was striking, and he walked at random under the glorious morning sun, now shining forth in a spotless sky, which the storm seemed to have cleansed of all the Sunday dust. All at once, however, he raised his head, anxious to know where he was; and he was quite astonished, for he found that he had already covered a deal of ground, and was now below the station, near the municipal hospital. He was hesitating at a point where the road forked, not knowing which direction to take, when a friendly hand was laid on his shoulder, and a voice inquired: "Where are you going at this early hour?" It was Doctor Chassaigne who addressed him, drawing up his lofty figure, clad in black from head to foot. "Have you lost yourself?" he added; "do you want to know your way?" "No, thanks, no," replied Pierre, somewhat disturbed. "I spent the night at the Grotto with that young patient to whom I am so much attached, and my heart was so upset that I have been walking about in the hope it would do me good, before returning to the hotel to take a little sleep." The doctor continued looking at him, clearly detecting the frightful struggle which was raging within him, the despair which he felt at being unable to sink asleep in faith, the suffering which the futility of all his efforts brought him. "Ah, my poor child!" murmured M. Chassaigne; and in a fatherly way he added: "Well, since you are walking, suppose we take a walk together? I was just going down yonder, to the bank of the Gave. Come along, and on our way back you will see what a lovely view we shall have." For his part, the doctor took a walk of a couple of hours' duration each morning, ever alone, seeking, as it were, to tire and exhaust his grief. First of all, as soon as he had risen, he repaired to the cemetery, and knelt on the tomb of his wife and daughter, which, at all seasons, he decked with flowers. And afterwards he would roam along the roads, with tearful eyes, never returning home until fatigue compelled him. With a wave of the hand, Pierre accepted his proposal, and in perfect silence they went, side by side, down the sloping road. They remained for a long time without speaking; the doctor seemed more overcome than was his wont that morning; it was as though his chat with his dear lost ones had made his heart bleed yet more copiously. He walked along with his head bowed; his face, round which his white hair streamed, was very pale, and tears still blurred his eyes. And yet it was so pleasant, so warm in the sunlight on that lovely morning. The road now followed the Gave on its right bank, on the other side of the new town; and you could see the gardens, the inclined ways, and the Basilica. And, all at once, the Grotto appeared, with the everlasting flare of its tapers, now paling in the broad light. Doctor Chassaigne, who had turned his head, made the sign of the cross, which Pierre did not at first understand. And when, in his turn, he had perceived the Grotto, he glanced in surprise at his old friend, and once more relapsed into the astonishment which had come over him a couple of days previously on finding this man of science, this whilom atheist and materialist, so overwhelmed by grief that he was now a believer, longing for the one delight of meeting his dear ones in another life. His heart had swept his reason away; old and lonely as he was, it was only the illusion that he would live once more in Paradise, where loving souls meet again, that prolonged his life on earth. This thought increased the young priest's discomfort. Must he also wait until he had grown old and endured equal sufferings in order to find a refuge in faith? Still walking beside the Gave, leaving the town farther and farther behind them, they were lulled as it were by the noise of those clear waters rolling over the pebbles between banks shaded by trees. And they still remained silent, walking on with an equal step, each, on his own side, absorbed in his sorrows. "And Bernadette," Pierre suddenly inquired; "did you know her?" The doctor raised his head. "Bernadette? Yes, yes," said he. "I saw her once--afterwards." He relapsed into silence for a moment, and then began chatting: "In 1858, you know, at the time of the apparitions, I was thirty years of age. I was in Paris, still young in my profession, and opposed to all supernatural notions, so that I had no idea of returning to my native mountains to see a girl suffering from hallucinations. Five or six years later, however, some time about 1864, I passed through Lourdes, and was inquisitive enough to pay Bernadette a visit. She was then still at the asylum with the Sisters of Nevers." Pierre remembered that one of the reasons of his journey had been his desire to complete his inquiry respecting Bernadette. And who could tell if grace might not come to him from that humble, lovable girl, on the day when he should be convinced that she had indeed fulfilled a mission of divine love and forgiveness? For this consummation to ensue it would perhaps suffice that he should know her better and learn to feel that she was really the saint, the chosen one, as others believed her to have been. "Tell me about her, I pray you," he said; "tell me all you know of her." A faint smile curved the doctor's lips. He understood, and would have greatly liked to calm and comfort the young priest whose soul was so grievously tortured by doubt. "Oh! willingly, my poor child!" he answered. "I should be so happy to help you on the path to light. You do well to love Bernadette--that may save you; for since all those old-time things I have deeply reflected on her case, and I declare to you that I never met a more charming creature, or one with a better heart." Then, to the slow rhythm of their footsteps along the well-kept, sunlit road, in the delightful freshness of morning, the doctor began to relate his visit to Bernadette in 1864. She had then just attained her twentieth birthday, the apparitions had taken place six years previously, and she had astonished him by her candid and sensible air, her perfect modesty. The Sisters of Nevers, who had taught her to read, kept her with them at the asylum in order to shield her from public inquisitiveness. She found an occupation there, helping them in sundry petty duties; but she was very often taken ill, and would spend weeks at a time in her bed. The doctor had been particularly struck by her beautiful eyes, pure, candid, and frank, like those of a child. The rest of her face, said he, had become somewhat spoilt; her complexion was losing its clearness, her features had grown less delicate, and her general appearance was that of an ordinary servant-girl, short, puny, and unobtrusive. Her piety was still keen, but she had not seemed to him to be the ecstatical, excitable creature that many might have supposed; indeed, she appeared to have a rather positive mind which did not indulge in flights of fancy; and she invariably had some little piece of needlework, some knitting, some embroidery in her hand. In a word, she appeared to have entered the common path, and in nowise resembled the intensely passionate female worshippers of the Christ. She had no further visions, and never of her own accord spoke of the eighteen apparitions which had decided her life. To learn anything it was necessary to interrogate her, to address precise questions to her. These she would briefly answer, and then seek to change the conversation, as though she did not like to talk of such mysterious things. If wishing to probe the matter further, you asked her the nature of the three secrets which the Virgin had confided to her, she would remain silent, simply averting her eyes. And it was impossible to make her contradict herself; the particulars she gave invariably agreed with her original narrative, and, indeed, she always seemed to repeat the same words, with the same inflections of the voice. "I had her in hand during the whole of one afternoon," continued Doctor Chassaigne, "and there was not the variation of a syllable in her story. It was disconcerting. Still, I am prepared to swear that she was not lying, that she never lied, that she was altogether incapable of falsehood." Pierre boldly ventured to discuss this point. "But won't you admit, doctor, the possibility of some disorder of the will?" he asked. "Has it not been proved, is it not admitted nowadays, that when certain degenerate creatures with childish minds fall into an hallucination, a fancy of some kind or other, they are often unable to free themselves from it, especially when they remain in the same environment in which the phenomenon occurred? Cloistered, living alone with her fixed idea, Bernadette, naturally enough, obstinately clung to it." The doctor's faint smile returned to his lips, and vaguely waving his arm, he replied: "Ah! my child, you ask me too much. You know very well that I am now only a poor old man, who prides himself but little on his science, and no longer claims to be able to explain anything. However, I do of course know of that famous medical-school example of the young girl who allowed herself to waste away with hunger at home, because she imagined that she was suffering from a serious complaint of the digestive organs, but who nevertheless began to eat when she was taken elsewhere. However, that is but one circumstance, and there are so many contradictory cases." For a moment they became silent, and only the rhythmical sound of their steps was heard along the road. Then the doctor resumed: "Moreover, it is quite true that Bernadette shunned the world, and was only happy in her solitary corner. She was never known to have a single intimate female friend, any particular human love for anybody. She was kind and gentle towards all, but it was only for children that she showed any lively affection. And as, after all, the medical man is not quite dead within me, I will confess to you that I have sometimes wondered if she remained as pure in mind, as, most undoubtedly, she did remain in body. However, I think it quite possible, given her sluggish, poor-blooded temperament, not to speak of the innocent sphere in which she grew up, first Bartres, and then the convent. Still, a doubt came to me when I heard of the tender interest which she took in the orphan asylum built by the Sisters of Nevers, farther along this very road. Poor little girls are received into it, and shielded from the perils of the highways. And if Bernadette wished it to be extremely large, so as to lodge all the little lambs in danger, was it not because she herself remembered having roamed the roads with bare feet, and still trembled at the idea of what might have become of her but for the help of the Blessed Virgin?" Then, resuming his narrative, he went on telling Pierre of the crowds that flocked to see Bernadette and pay her reverence in her asylum at Lourdes. This had proved a source of considerable fatigue to her. Not a day went by without a stream of visitors appearing before her. They came from all parts of France, some even from abroad; and it soon proved necessary to refuse the applications of those who were actuated by mere inquisitiveness, and to grant admittance only to the genuine believers, the members of the clergy, and the people of mark on whom the doors could not well have been shut. A Sister was always present to protect Bernadette against the excessive indiscretion of some of her visitors, for questions literally rained upon her, and she often grew faint through having to repeat her story so many times. Ladies of high position fell on their knees, kissed her gown, and would have liked to carry a piece of it away as a relic. She also had to defend her chaplet, which in their excitement they all begged her to sell to them for a fabulous amount. One day a certain marchioness endeavoured to secure it by giving her another one which she had brought with her--a chaplet with a golden cross and beads of real pearls. Many hoped that she would consent to work a miracle in their presence; children were brought to her in order that she might lay her hands upon them; she was also consulted in cases of illness, and attempts were made to purchase her influence with the Virgin. Large sums were offered to her. At the slightest sign, the slightest expression of a desire to be a queen, decked with jewels and crowned with gold, she would have been overwhelmed with regal presents. And while the humble remained on their knees on her threshold, the great ones of the earth pressed round her, and would have counted it a glory to act as her escort. It was even related that one among them, the handsomest and wealthiest of princes, came one clear sunny April day to ask her hand in marriage. "But what always struck and displeased me," said Pierre, "was her departure from Lourdes when she was two-and-twenty, her sudden disappearance and sequestration in the convent of Saint Gildard at Nevers, whence she never emerged. Didn't that give a semblance of truth to those spurious rumours of insanity which were circulated? Didn't it help people to suppose that she was being shut up, whisked away for fear of some indiscretion on her part, some naive remark or other which might have revealed the secret of a prolonged fraud? Indeed, to speak plainly, I will confess to you that for my own part I still believe that she was spirited away." Doctor Chassaigne gently shook his head. "No, no," said he, "there was no story prepared in advance in this affair, no big melodrama secretly staged and afterwards performed by more or less unconscious actors. The developments came of themselves, by the sole force of circumstances; and they were always very intricate, very difficult to analyse. Moreover, it is certain that it was Bernadette herself who wished to leave Lourdes. Those incessant visits wearied her, she felt ill at ease amidst all that noisy worship. All that /she/ desired was a dim nook where she might live in peace, and so fierce was she at times in her disinterestedness, that when money was handed to her, even with the pious intent of having a mass said or a taper burnt, she would fling it upon the floor. She never accepted anything for herself or for her family, which remained in poverty. And with such pride as she possessed, such natural simplicity, such a desire to remain in the background, one can very well understand that she should have wished to disappear and cloister herself in some lonely spot so as to prepare herself to make a good death. Her work was accomplished; she had initiated this great movement scarcely knowing how or why; and she could really be of no further utility. Others were about to conduct matters to an issue and insure the triumph of the Grotto." "Let us admit, then, that she went off of her own accord," said Pierre; "still, what a relief it must have been for the people you speak of, who thenceforth became the real masters, whilst millions of money were raining down on Lourdes from the whole world." "Oh! certainly; I don't pretend that any attempt was made to detain her here!" exclaimed the doctor. "Frankly, I even believe that she was in some degree urged into the course she took. She ended by becoming somewhat of an incumbrance. It was not that any annoying revelations were feared from her; but remember that with her extreme timidity and frequent illnesses she was scarcely ornamental. Besides, however small the room which she took up at Lourdes, however obedient she showed herself, she was none the less a power, and attracted the multitude, which made her, so to say, a competitor of the Grotto. For the Grotto to remain alone, resplendent in its glory, it was advisable that Bernadette should withdraw into the background, become as it were a simple legend. Such, indeed, must have been the reasons which induced Monseigneur Laurence, the Bishop of Tarbes, to hasten her departure. The only mistake that was made was in saying that it was a question of screening her from the enterprises of the world, as though it were feared that she might fall into the sin of pride, by growing vain of the saintly fame with which the whole of Christendom re-echoed. And this was doing her a grave injury, for she was as incapable of pride as she was of falsehood. Never, indeed, was there a more candid or more modest child." The doctor was growing impassioned, excited. But all at once he became calm again, and a pale smile returned to his lips. " 'Tis true," said he, "I love her; the more I have thought of her, the more have I learned to love her. But you must not think, Pierre, that I am completely brutified by belief. If I nowadays acknowledge the existence of an unseen power, if I feel a need of believing in another, better, and more just life, I nevertheless know right well that there are men remaining in this world of ours; and at times, even when they wear the cowl or the cassock, the work they do is vile." There came another interval of silence. Each was continuing his dream apart from the other. Then the doctor resumed: "I will tell you of a fancy which has often haunted me. Suppose we admit that Bernadette was not the shy, simple child we knew her to be; let us endow her with a spirit of intrigue and domination, transform her into a conqueress, a leader of nations, and try to picture what, in that case, would have happened. It is evident that the Grotto would be hers, the Basilica also. We should see her lording it at all the ceremonies, under a dais, with a gold mitre on her head. She would distribute the miracles; with a sovereign gesture her little hand would lead the multitudes to heaven. All the lustre and glory would come from her, she being the saint, the chosen one, the only one that had been privileged to see the Divinity face to face. And indeed nothing would seem more just, for she would triumph after toiling, enjoy the fruit of her labour in all glory. But you see, as it happens, she is defrauded, robbed. The marvellous harvests sown by her are reaped by others. During the twelve years which she lived at Saint Gildard, kneeling in the gloom, Lourdes was full of victors, priests in golden vestments chanting thanksgivings, and blessing churches and monuments erected at a cost of millions. She alone did not behold the triumph of the new faith, whose author she had been. You say that she dreamt it all. Well, at all events, what a beautiful dream it was, a dream which has stirred the whole world, and from which she, dear girl, never awakened!" They halted and sat down for a moment on a rock beside the road, before returning to the town. In front of them the Gave, deep at this point of its course, was rolling blue waters tinged with dark moire-like reflections, whilst, farther on, rushing hurriedly over a bed of large stones, the stream became so much foam, a white froth, light like snow. Amidst the gold raining from the sun, a fresh breeze came down from the mountains. Whilst listening to that story of how Bernadette had been exploited and suppressed, Pierre had simply found in it all a fresh motive for revolt; and, with his eyes fixed on the ground, he began to think of the injustice of nature, of that law which wills that the strong should devour the weak. Then, all at once raising his head, he inquired: "And did you also know Abbe Peyramale?" The doctor's eyes brightened once more, and he eagerly replied: "Certainly I did! He was an upright, energetic man, a saint, an apostle. He and Bernadette were the great makers of Our Lady of Lourdes. Like her, he endured frightful sufferings, and, like her, he died from them. Those who do not know his story can know nothing, understand nothing, of the drama enacted here." Thereupon he related that story at length. Abbe Peyramale was the parish priest of Lourdes at the time of the apparitions. A native of the region, tall, broad-shouldered, with a powerful leonine head, he was extremely intelligent, very honest and goodhearted, though at times violent and domineering. He seemed built for combat. An enemy of all pious exaggerations, discharging the duties of his ministry in a broad, liberal spirit, he regarded the apparitions with distrust when he first heard of them, refused to believe in Bernadette's stories, questioned her, and demanded proofs. It was only at a later stage, when the blast of faith became irresistible, upsetting the most rebellious minds and mastering the multitude, that he ended, in his turn, by bowing his head; and when he was finally conquered, it was more particularly by his love for the humble and the oppressed which he could not restrain when he beheld Bernadette threatened with imprisonment. The civil authorities were persecuting one of his flock; at this his shepherd's heart awoke, and, in her defence, he gave full reign to his ardent passion for justice. Moreover, the charm which the child diffused had worked upon him; he felt her to be so candid, so truthful, that he began to place a blind faith in her and love her even as everybody else loved her. Moreover, why should he have curtly dismissed all questions of miracles, when miracles abound in the pages of Holy Writ? It was not for a minister of religion, whatever his prudence, to set himself up as a sceptic when entire populations were falling on their knees and the Church seemed to be on the eve of another great triumph. Then, too, he had the nature of one who leads men, who stirs up crowds, who builds, and in this affair he had really found his vocation, the vast field in which he might exercise his energy, the great cause to which he might wholly devote himself with all his passionate ardour and determination to succeed. From that moment, then, Abbe Peyramale had but one thought, to execute the orders which the Virgin had commissioned Bernadette to transmit to him. He caused improvements to be carried out at the Grotto. A railing was placed in front of it; pipes were laid for the conveyance of the water from the source, and a variety of work was accomplished in order to clear the approaches. However, the Virgin had particularly requested that a chapel might be built; and he wished to have a church, quite a triumphal Basilica. He pictured everything on a grand scale, and, full of confidence in the enthusiastic help of Christendom, he worried the architects, requiring them to design real palaces worthy of the Queen of Heaven. As a matter of fact, offerings already abounded, gold poured from the most distant dioceses, a rain of gold destined to increase and never end. Then came his happy years: he was to be met among the workmen at all hours, instilling activity into them like the jovial, good-natured fellow he was, constantly on the point of taking a pick or trowel in hand himself, such was his eagerness to behold the realisation of his dream. But days of trial were in store for him: he fell ill, and lay in danger of death on the fourth of April, 1864, when the first procession started from his parish church to the Grotto, a procession of sixty thousand pilgrims, which wound along the streets amidst an immense concourse of spectators. On the day when Abbe Peyramale rose from his bed, saved, a first time, from death, he found himself despoiled. To second him in his heavy task, Monseigneur Laurence, the Bishop, had already given him as assistant a former episcopal secretary, Father Sempe, whom he had appointed warden of the Missionaries of Geraison, a community founded by himself. Father Sempe was a sly, spare little man, to all appearance most disinterested and humble, but in reality consumed by all the thirst of ambition. At the outset he kept in his place, serving the parish priest of Lourdes like a faithful subordinate, attending to matters of all kinds in order to lighten the other's work, and acquiring information on every possible subject in his desire to render himself indispensable. He must soon have realised what a rich farm the Grotto was destined to become, and what a colossal revenue might be derived from it, if only a little skill were exercised. And thenceforth he no longer stirred from the episcopal residence, but ended by acquiring great influence over the calm, practical Bishop, who was in great need of money for the charities of his diocese. And thus it was that during Abbe Peyramale's illness Father Sempe succeeded in effecting a separation between the parish of Lourdes and the domain of the Grotto, which last he was commissioned to manage at the head of a few Fathers of the Immaculate Conception, over whom the Bishop placed him as Father Superior. The struggle soon began, one of those covert, desperate, mortal struggles which are waged under the cloak of ecclesiastical discipline. There was a pretext for rupture all ready, a field of battle on which the longer purse would necessarily end by conquering. It was proposed to build a new parish church, larger and more worthy of Lourdes than the old one already in existence, which was admitted to have become too small since the faithful had been flocking into the town in larger and larger numbers. Moreover, it was an old idea of Abbe Peyramale, who desired to carry out the Virgin's orders with all possible precision. Speaking of the Grotto, she had said that people would go "thither in procession"; and the Abbe had always seen the pilgrims start in procession from the town, whither they were expected to return in the same fashion, as indeed had been the practice on the first occasions after the apparitions. A central point, a rallying spot, was therefore required, and the Abbe's dream was to erect a magnificent church, a cathedral of gigantic proportions, which would accommodate a vast multitude. Builder as he was by temperament, impassioned artisan working for the glory of Heaven, he already pictured this cathedral springing from the soil, and rearing its clanging belfry in the sunlight. And it was also his own house that he wished to build, the edifice which would be his act of faith and adoration, the temple where he would be the pontiff, and triumph in company with the sweet memory of Bernadette, in full view of the spot of which both he and she had been so cruelly dispossessed. Naturally enough, bitterly as he felt that act of spoliation, the building of this new parish church was in some degree his revenge, his share of all the glory, besides being a task which would enable him to utilise both his militant activity and the fever that had been consuming him ever since he had ceased going to the Grotto, by reason of his soreness of heart. At the outset of the new enterprise there was again a flash of enthusiasm. At the prospect of seeing all the life and all the money flow into the new city which was springing from the ground around the Basilica, the old town, which felt itself thrust upon one side, espoused the cause of its priest. The municipal council voted a sum of one hundred thousand francs, which, unfortunately, was not to be paid until the new church should be roofed in. Abbe Peyramale had already accepted the plans of his architect--plans which, he had insisted, should be on a grand scale--and had also treated with a contractor of Chartres, who engaged to complete the church in three or four years if the promised supplies of funds should be regularly forthcoming. The Abbe believed that offerings would assuredly continue raining down from all parts, and so he launched into this big enterprise without any anxiety, overflowing with a careless bravery, and fully expecting that Heaven would not abandon him on the road. He even fancied that he could rely upon the support of Monseigneur Jourdan, who had now succeeded Monseigneur Laurence as Bishop of Tarbes, for this prelate, after blessing the foundation-stone of the new church, had delivered an address in which he admitted that the enterprise was necessary and meritorious. And it seemed, too, as though Father Sempe, with his customary humility, had bowed to the inevitable and accepted this vexatious competition, which would compel him to relinquish a share of the plunder; for he now pretended to devote himself entirely to the management of the Grotto, and even allowed a collection-box for contributions to the building of the new parish church to be placed inside the Basilica. Then, however, the secret, rageful struggle began afresh. Abbe Peyramale, who was a wretched manager, exulted on seeing his new church so rapidly take shape. The work was being carried on at a fast pace, and he troubled about nothing else, being still under the delusion that the Blessed Virgin would find whatever money might be needed. Thus he was quite stupefied when he at last perceived that the offerings were falling off, that the money of the faithful no longer reached him, as though, indeed, someone had secretly diverted its flow. And eventually the day came when he was unable to make the stipulated payments. In all this there had been so much skilfully combined strangulation, of which he only became aware later on. Father Sempe, however, had once more prevailed on the Bishop to grant his favour exclusively to the Grotto. There was even a talk of some confidential circulars distributed through the various dioceses, so that the many sums of money offered by the faithful should no longer be sent to the parish. The voracious, insatiable Grotto was bent upon securing everything, and to such a point were things carried that five hundred franc notes slipped into the collection-box at the Basilica were kept back; the box was rifled and the parish robbed. Abbe Peyramale, however, in his passion for the rising church, his child, continued fighting most desperately, ready if need were to give his blood. He had at first treated with the contractor in the name of the vestry; then, when he was at a loss how to pay, he treated in his own name. His life was bound up in the enterprise, he wore himself out in the heroic efforts which he made. Of the four hundred thousand francs that he had promised, he had only been able to pay two hundred thousand; and the municipal council still obstinately refused to hand over the hundred thousand francs which it had voted, until the new church should be covered in. This was acting against the town's real interests. However, it was said that Father Sempe was trying to bring influence to bear on the contractor. And, all at once, the work was stopped. From that moment the death agony began. Wounded in the heart, the Abbe Peyramale, the broad-shouldered mountaineer with the leonine face, staggered and fell like an oak struck down by a thunderbolt. He took to his bed, and never left it alive. Strange stories circulated: it was said that Father Sempe had sought to secure admission to the parsonage under some pious pretext, but in reality to see if his much-dreaded adversary were really mortally stricken; and it was added, that it had been necessary to drive him from the sick-room, where his presence was an outrageous scandal. Then, when the unhappy priest, vanquished and steeped in bitterness, was dead, Father Sempe was seen triumphing at the funeral, from which the others had not dared to keep him away. It was affirmed that he openly displayed his abominable delight, that his face was radiant that day with the joy of victory. He was at last rid of the only man who had been an obstacle to his designs, whose legitimate authority he had feared. He would no longer be forced to share anything with anybody now that both the founders of Our Lady of Lourdes had been suppressed--Bernadette placed in a convent, and Abbe Peyramale lowered into the ground. The Grotto was now his own property, the alms would come to him alone, and he could do what he pleased with the eight hundred thousand francs* or so which were at his disposal every year. He would complete the gigantic works destined to make the Basilica a self-supporting centre, and assist in embellishing the new town in order to increase the isolation of the old one and seclude it behind its rock, like an insignificant parish submerged beneath the splendour of its all-powerful neighbour. All the money, all the sovereignty, would be his; he henceforth would reign. * About 145,000 dollars. However, although the works had been stopped, and the new parish church was slumbering inside its wooden fence, it was none the less more than half built. The vaulted aisles were already erected. And the imperfect pile remained there like a threat, for the town might some day attempt to finish it. Like Abbe Peyramale, therefore, it must be killed for good, turned into an irreparable ruin. The secret labour therefore continued, a work of refined cruelty and slow destruction. To begin with, the new parish priest, a simple-minded creature, was cowed to such a point that he no longer opened the envelopes containing remittances for the parish; all the registered letters were at once taken to the Fathers. Then the site selected for the new parish church was criticised, and the diocesan architect was induced to draw up a report stating that the old church was still in good condition and of ample size for the requirements of the community. Moreover, influence was brought to bear on the Bishop, and representations were made to him respecting the annoying features of the pecuniary difficulties which had arisen with the contractor. With a little imagination poor Peyramale was transformed into a violent, obstinate madman, through whose undisciplined zeal the Church had almost been compromised. And, at last, the Bishop, forgetting that he himself had blessed the foundation-stone, issued a pastoral letter laying the unfinished church under interdict, and prohibiting all religious services in it. This was the supreme blow. Endless lawsuits had already begun; the contractor, who had only received two hundred thousand francs for the five hundred thousand francs' worth of work which had been executed, had taken proceedings against Abbe Peyramale's heir-at-law, the vestry, and the town, for the last still refused to pay over the amount which it had voted. At first the Prefect's Council declared itself incompetent to deal with the case, and when it was sent back to it by the Council of State, it rendered a judgment by which the town was condemned to pay the hundred thousand francs and the heir-at-law to finish the church. At the same time the vestry was put out of court. However, there was a fresh appeal to the Council of State, which quashed this judgment, and condemned the vestry, and, in default, the heir-at-law, to pay the contractor. Neither party being solvent, matters remained in this position. The lawsuits had lasted fifteen years. The town had now resignedly paid over the hundred thousand francs, and only two hundred thousand remained owing to the contractor. However, the costs and the accumulated interest had so increased the amount of indebtedness that it had risen to six hundred thousand francs; and as, on the other hand, it was estimated that four hundred thousand francs would be required to finish the church, a million was needed to save this young ruin from certain destruction. The Fathers of the Grotto were thenceforth able to sleep in peace; they had assassinated the poor church; it was as dead as Abbe Peyramale himself. The bells of the Basilica rang out triumphantly, and Father Sempe reigned as a victor at the conclusion of that great struggle, that dagger warfare in which not only a man but stones also had been done to death in the shrouding gloom of intriguing sacristies. And old Lourdes, obstinate and unintelligent, paid a hard penalty for its mistake in not giving more support to its minister, who had died struggling, killed by his love for his parish, for now the new town did not cease to grow and prosper at the expense of the old one. All the wealth flowed to the former: the Fathers of the Grotto coined money, financed hotels and candle shops, and sold the water of the source, although a clause of their agreement with the municipality expressly prohibited them from carrying on any commercial pursuits. The whole region began to rot and fester; the triumph of the Grotto had brought about such a passion for lucre, such a burning, feverish desire to possess and enjoy, that extraordinary perversion set in, growing worse and worse each day, and changing Bernadette's peaceful Bethlehem into a perfect Sodom or Gomorrah. Father Sempe had ensured the triumph of his Divinity by spreading human abominations all around and wrecking thousands of souls. Gigantic buildings rose from the ground, five or six millions of francs had already been expended, everything being sacrificed to the stern determination to leave the poor parish out in the cold and keep the entire plunder for self and friends. Those costly, colossal gradient ways had only been erected in order to avoid compliance with the Virgin's express desire that the faithful should come to the Grotto in procession. For to go down from the Basilica by the incline on the left, and climb up to it again by the incline on the right, could certainly not be called going to the Grotto in procession: it was simply so much revolving in a circle. However, the Fathers cared little about that; they had succeeded in compelling people to start from their premises and return to them, in order that they might be the sole proprietors of the affair, the opulent farmers who garnered the whole harvest. Abbe Peyramale lay buried in the crypt of his unfinished, ruined church, and Bernadette, who had long since dragged out her life of suffering in the depths of a convent far away, was now likewise sleeping the eternal sleep under a flagstone in a chapel. Deep silence fell when Doctor Chassaigne had finished this long narrative. Then, with a painful effort, he rose to his feet again: "It will soon be ten o'clock, my dear child," said he, "and I want you to take a little rest. Let us go back." Pierre followed him without speaking; and they retraced their steps toward the town at a more rapid pace. "Ah! yes," resumed the doctor, "there were great iniquities and great sufferings in it all. But what else could you expect? Man spoils and corrupts the most beautiful things. And you cannot yet understand all the woeful sadness of the things of which I have been talking to you. You must see them, lay your hand on them. Would you like me to show you Bernadette's room and Abbe Peyramale's unfinished church this evening?" "Yes, I should indeed," replied Pierre. "Well, I will meet you in front of the Basilica after the four-o'clock procession, and you can come with me." Then they spoke no further, each becoming absorbed in his reverie once more. The Gave, now upon their right hand, was flowing through a deep gorge, a kind of cleft into which it plunged, vanishing from sight among the bushes. But at intervals a clear stretch of it, looking like unburnished silver, would appear to view; and, farther on, after a sudden turn in the road, they found it flowing in increased volume across a plain, where it spread at times into glassy sheets which must often have changed their beds, for the gravelly soil was ravined on all sides. The sun was now becoming very hot, and was already high in the heavens, whose limpid azure assumed a deeper tinge above the vast circle of mountains. And it was at this turn of the road that Lourdes, still some distance away, reappeared to the eyes of Pierre and Doctor Chassaigne. In the splendid morning atmosphere, amid a flying dust of gold and purple rays, the town shone whitely on the horizon, its houses and monuments becoming more and more distinct at each step which brought them nearer. And the doctor, still silent, at last waved his arm with a broad, mournful gesture in order to call his companion's attention to this growing town, as though to a proof of all that he had been telling him. There, indeed, rising up in the dazzling daylight, was the evidence which confirmed his words. The flare of the Grotto, fainter now that the sun was shining, could already be espied amidst the greenery. And soon afterwards the gigantic monumental works spread out: the quay with its freestone parapet skirting the Gave, whose course had been diverted; the new bridge connecting the new gardens with the recently opened boulevard; the colossal gradient ways, the massive church of the Rosary, and, finally, the slim, tapering Basilica, rising above all else with graceful pride. Of the new town spread all around the monuments, the wealthy city which had sprung, as though by enchantment, from the ancient impoverished soil, the great convents and the great hotels, you could, at this distance, merely distinguish a swarming of white facades and a scintillation of new slates; whilst, in confusion, far away, beyond the rocky mass on which the crumbling castle walls were profiled against the sky, appeared the humble roofs of the old town, a jumble of little time-worn roofs, pressing timorously against one another. And as a background to this vision of the life of yesterday and to-day, the little and the big Gers rose up beneath the splendour of the everlasting sun, and barred the horizon with their bare slopes, which the oblique rays were tingeing with streaks of pink and yellow. Doctor Chassaigne insisted on accompanying Pierre to the Hotel of the Apparitions, and only parted from him at its door, after reminding him of their appointment for the afternoon. It was not yet eleven o'clock. Pierre, whom fatigue had suddenly mastered, forced himself to eat before going to bed, for he realised that want of food was one of the chief causes of the weakness which had come over him. He fortunately found a vacant seat at the /table d'hote/, and made some kind of a /dejeuner/, half asleep all the time, and scarcely knowing what was served to him. Then he went up-stairs and flung himself on his bed, after taking care to tell the servant to awake him at three o'clock. However, on lying down, the fever that consumed him at first prevented him from closing his eyes. A pair of gloves, forgotten in the next room, had reminded him of M. de Guersaint, who had left for Gavarnie before daybreak, and would only return in the evening. What a delightful gift was thoughtlessness, thought Pierre. For his own part, with his limbs worn out by weariness and his mind distracted, he was sad unto death. Everything seemed to conspire against his willing desire to regain the faith of his childhood. The tale of Abbe Peyramale's tragic adventures had simply aggravated the feeling of revolt which the story of Bernadette, chosen and martyred, had implanted in his breast. And thus he asked himself whether his search after the truth, instead of restoring his faith, would not rather lead him to yet greater hatred of ignorance and credulity, and to the bitter conviction that man is indeed all alone in the world, with naught to guide him save his reason. At last he fell asleep, but visions continued hovering around him in his painful slumber. He beheld Lourdes, contaminated by Mammon, turned into a spot of abomination and perdition, transformed into a huge bazaar, where everything was sold, masses and souls alike! He beheld also Abbe Peyramale, dead and slumbering under the ruins of his church, among the nettles which ingratitude had sown there. And he only grew calm again, only tasted the delights of forgetfulness when a last pale, woeful vision had faded from his gaze--a vision of Bernadette upon her knees in a gloomy corner at Nevers, dreaming of her far-away work, which she was never, never to behold.

1

THE BITTERNESS OP DEATH

AT the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours, that morning, Marie remained seated on her bed, propped up by pillows. Having spent the whole night at the Grotto, she had refused to let them take her back there. And, as Madame de Jonquiere approached her, to raise one of the pillows which was slipping from its place, she asked: "What day is it, madame?" "Monday, my dear child." "Ah! true. One so soon loses count of time. And, besides, I am so happy! It is to-day that the Blessed Virgin will cure me!" She smiled divinely, with the air of a day-dreamer, her eyes gazing into vacancy, her thoughts so far away, so absorbed in her one fixed idea, that she beheld nothing save the certainty of her hope. Round about her, the Sainte-Honorine Ward was now quite deserted, all the patients, excepting Madame Vetu, who lay at the last extremity in the next bed, having already started for the Grotto. But Marie did not even notice her neighbour; she was delighted with the sudden stillness which had fallen. One of the windows overlooking the courtyard had been opened, and the glorious morning sunshine entered in one broad beam, whose golden dust was dancing over her bed and streaming upon her pale hands. It was indeed pleasant to find this room, so dismal at nighttime with its many beds of sickness, its unhealthy atmosphere, and its nightmare groans, thus suddenly filled with sunlight, purified by the morning air, and wrapped in such delicious silence! "Why don't you try to sleep a little?" maternally inquired Madame de Jonquiere. "You must be quite worn out by your vigil." Marie, who felt so light and cheerful that she no longer experienced any pain, seemed surprised. "But I am not at all tired, and I don't feel a bit sleepy. Go to sleep? Oh! no, that would be too sad. I should no longer know that I was going to be cured!" At this the superintendent laughed. "Then why didn't you let them take you to the Grotto?" she asked. "You won't know what to do with yourself all alone here." "I am not alone, madame, I am with her," replied Marie; and thereupon, her vision returning to her, she clasped her hands in ecstasy. "Last night, you know, I saw her bend her head towards me and smile. I quite understood her, I could hear her voice, although she never opened her lips. When the Blessed Sacrament passes at four o'clock I shall be cured." Madame de Jonquiere tried to calm her, feeling rather anxious at the species of somnambulism in which she beheld her. However, the sick girl went on: "No, no, I am no worse, I am waiting. Only, you must surely see, madame, that there is no need for me to go to the Grotto this morning, since the appointment which she gave me is for four o'clock." And then the girl added in a lower tone: "Pierre will come for me at half-past three. At four o'clock I shall be cured." The sunbeam slowly made its way up her bare arms, which were now almost transparent, so wasted had they become through illness; whilst her glorious fair hair, which had fallen over her shoulders, seemed like the very effulgence of the great luminary enveloping her. The trill of a bird came in from the courtyard, and quite enlivened the tremulous silence of the ward. Some child who could not be seen must also have been playing close by, for now and again a soft laugh could be heard ascending in the warm air which was so delightfully calm. "Well," said Madame de Jonquiere by way of conclusion, "don't sleep then, as you don't wish to. But keep quite quiet, and it will rest you all the same." Meantime Madame Vetu was expiring in the adjoining bed. They had not dared to take her to the Grotto, for fear they should see her die on the way. For some little time she had lain there with her eyes closed; and Sister Hyacinthe, who was watching, had beckoned to Madame Desagneaux in order to acquaint her with the bad opinion she had formed of the case. Both of them were now leaning over the dying woman, observing her with increasing anxiety. The mask upon her face had turned more yellow than ever, and now looked like a coating of mud; her eyes too had become more sunken, her lips seemed to have grown thinner, and the death rattle had begun, a slow, pestilential wheezing, polluted by the cancer which was finishing its destructive work. All at once she raised her eyelids, and was seized with fear on beholding those two faces bent over her own. Could her death be near, that they should thus be gazing at her? Immense sadness showed itself in her eyes, a despairing regret of life. It was not a vehement revolt, for she no longer had the strength to struggle; but what a frightful fate it was to have left her shop, her surroundings, and her husband, merely to come and die so far away; to have braved the abominable torture of such a journey, to have prayed both day and night, and then, instead of having her prayer granted, to die when others recovered! However, she could do no more than murmur "Oh! how I suffer; oh! how I suffer. Do something, anything, to relieve this pain, I beseech you." Little Madame Desagneaux, with her pretty milk-white face showing amidst her mass of fair, frizzy hair, was quite upset. She was not used to deathbed scenes, she would have given half her heart, as she expressed it, to see that poor woman recover. And she rose up and began to question Sister Hyacinthe, who was also in tears but already resigned, knowing as she did that salvation was assured when one died well. Could nothing really be done, however? Could not something be tried to ease the dying woman? Abbe Judaine had come and administered the last sacrament to her a couple of hours earlier that very morning. She now only had Heaven to look to; it was her only hope, for she had long since given up expecting aid from the skill of man. "No, no! we must do something," exclaimed Madame Desagneaux. And thereupon she went and fetched Madame de Jonquiere from beside Marie's bed. "Look how this poor creature is suffering, madame!" she exclaimed. "Sister Hyacinthe says that she can only last a few hours longer. But we cannot leave her moaning like this. There are things which give relief. Why not call that young doctor who is here?" "Of course we will," replied the superintendent. "We will send for him at once." They seldom thought of the doctor in the wards. It only occurred to the ladies to send for him when a case was at its very worst, when one of their patients was howling with pain. Sister Hyacinthe, who herself felt surprised at not having thought of Ferrand, whom she believed to be in an adjoining room, inquired if she should fetch him. "Certainly," was the reply. "Bring him as quickly as possible." When the Sister had gone off, Madame de Jonquiere made Madame Desagneaux help her in slightly raising the dying woman's head, thinking that this might relieve her. The two ladies happened to be alone there that morning, all the other lady-hospitallers having gone to their devotions or their private affairs. However, from the end of the large deserted ward, where, amidst the warm quiver of the sunlight such sweet tranquillity prevailed, there still came at intervals the light laughter of the unseen child. "Can it be Sophie who is making such a noise?" suddenly asked the lady-superintendent, whose nerves were somewhat upset by all the worry of the death which she foresaw. Then quickly walking to the end of the ward, she found that it was indeed Sophie Couteau--the young girl so miraculously healed the previous year--who, seated on the floor behind a bed, had been amusing herself, despite her fourteen years, in making a doll out of a few rags. She was now talking to it, so happy, so absorbed in her play, that she laughed quite heartily. "Hold yourself up, mademoiselle," said she. "Dance the polka, that I may see how you can do it! One! two! dance, turn, kiss the one you like best!" Madame de Jonquiere, however, was now coming up. "Little girl," she said, "we have one of our patients here in great pain, and not expected to recover. You must not laugh so loud." "Ah! madame, I didn't know," replied Sophie, rising up, and becoming quite serious, although still holding the doll in her hand. "Is she going to die, madame?" "I fear so, my poor child." Thereupon Sophie became quite silent. She followed the superintendent, and seated herself on an adjoining bed; whence, without the slightest sign of fear, but with her large eyes burning with curiosity, she began to watch Madame Vetu's death agony. In her nervous state, Madame Desagneaux was growing impatient at the delay in the doctor's arrival; whilst Marie, still enraptured, and resplendent in the sunlight, seemed unconscious of what was taking place about her, wrapt as she was in delightful expectancy of the miracle. Not having found Ferrand in the small apartment near the linen-room which he usually occupied, Sister Hyacinthe was now searching for him all over the building. During the past two days the young doctor had become more bewildered than ever in that extraordinary hospital, where his assistance was only sought for the relief of death pangs. The small medicine-chest which he had brought with him proved quite useless; for there could be no thought of trying any course of treatment, as the sick were not there to be doctored, but simply to be cured by the lightning stroke of a miracle. And so he mainly confined himself to administering a few opium pills, in order to deaden the severer sufferings. He had been fairly amazed when accompanying Doctor Bonamy on a round through the wards. It had resolved itself into a mere stroll, the doctor, who had only come out of curiosity, taking no interest in the patients, whom he neither questioned nor examined. He solely concerned himself with the pretended cases of cure, stopping opposite those women whom he recognised from having seen them at his office where the miracles were verified. One of them had suffered from three complaints, only one of which the Blessed Virgin had so far deigned to cure; but great hopes were entertained respecting the other two. Sometimes, when a wretched woman, who the day before had claimed to be cured, was questioned with reference to her health, she would reply that her pains had returned to her. However, this never disturbed the doctor's serenity; ever conciliatory, the good man declared that Heaven would surely complete what Heaven had begun. Whenever there was an improvement in health, he would ask if it were not something to be thankful for. And, indeed, his constant saying was: "There's an improvement already; be patient!" What he most dreaded were the importunities of the lady-superintendents, who all wished to detain him to show him sundry extraordinary cases. Each prided herself on having the most serious illnesses, the most frightful, exceptional cases in her ward; so that she was eager to have them medically authenticated, in order that she might share in the triumph should cure supervene. One caught the doctor by the arm and assured him that she felt confident she had a leper in her charge; another entreated him to come and look at a young girl whose back, she said, was covered with fish's scales; whilst a third, whispering in his ear, gave him some terrible details about a married lady of the best society. He hastened away, however, refusing to see even one of them, or else simply promising to come back later on when he was not so busy. As he himself said, if he listened to all those ladies, the day would pass in useless consultations. However, he at last suddenly stopped opposite one of the miraculously cured inmates, and, beckoning Ferrand to his side, exclaimed: "Ah! now here is an interesting cure!" and Ferrand, utterly bewildered, had to listen to him whilst he described all the features of the illness, which had totally disappeared at the first immersion in the piscina. At last Sister Hyacinthe, still wandering about, encountered Abbe Judaine, who informed her that the young doctor had just been summoned to the Family Ward. It was the fourth time he had gone thither to attend to Brother Isidore, whose sufferings were as acute as ever, and whom he could only fill with opium. In his agony, the Brother merely asked to be soothed a little, in order that he might gather together sufficient strength to return to the Grotto in the afternoon, as he had not been able to do so in the morning. However, his pains increased, and at last he swooned away. When the Sister entered the ward she found the doctor seated at the missionary's bedside. "Monsieur Ferrand," she said, "come up-stairs with me to the Sainte-Honorine Ward at once. We have a patient there at the point of death." He smiled at her; indeed, he never beheld her without feeling brighter and comforted. "I will come with you, Sister," he replied. "But you'll wait a minute, won't you? I must try to restore this poor man." She waited patiently and made herself useful. The Family Ward, situated on the ground-floor, was also full of sunshine and fresh air which entered through three large windows opening on to a narrow strip of garden. In addition to Brother Isidore, only Monsieur Sabathier had remained in bed that morning, with the view of obtaining a little rest; whilst Madame Sabathier, taking advantage of the opportunity, had gone to purchase a few medals and pictures, which she intended for presents. Comfortably seated on his bed, his back supported by some pillows, the ex-professor was rolling the beads of a chaplet between his fingers. He was no longer praying, however, but merely continuing the operation in a mechanical manner, his eyes, meantime, fixed upon his neighbour, whose attack he was following with painful interest. "Ah! Sister," said he to Sister Hyacinthe, who had drawn near, "that poor Brother fills me with admiration. Yesterday I doubted the Blessed Virgin for a moment, seeing that she did not deign to hear me, though I have been coming here for seven years past; but the example set me by that poor martyr, so resigned amidst his torments, has quite shamed me for my want of faith. You can have no idea how grievously he suffers, and you should see him at the Grotto, with his eyes glowing with divine hope! It is really sublime! I only know of one picture at the Louvre--a picture by some unknown Italian master--in which there is the head of a monk beatified by a similar faith." The man of intellect, the ex-university-professor, reared on literature and art, was reappearing in this poor old fellow, whose life had been blasted, and who had desired to become a free patient, one of the poor of the earth, in order to move the pity of Heaven. He again began thinking of his own case, and with tenacious hopefulness, which the futility of seven journeys to Lourdes had failed to destroy, he added: "Well, I still have this afternoon, since we sha'n't leave till to-morrow. The water is certainly very cold, but I shall let them dip me a last time; and all the morning I have been praying and asking pardon for my revolt of yesterday. When the Blessed Virgin chooses to cure one of her children, it only takes her a second to do so; is that not so, Sister? May her will be done, and blessed be her name!" Passing the beads of the chaplet more slowly between his fingers, he again began saying his "Aves" and "Paters," whilst his eyelids drooped on his flabby face, to which a childish expression had been returning during the many years that he had been virtually cut off from the world. Meantime Ferrand had signalled to Brother Isidore's sister, Marthe, to come to him. She had been standing at the foot of the bed with her arms hanging down beside her, showing the tearless resignation of a poor, narrow-minded girl whilst she watched that dying man whom she worshipped. She was no more than a faithful dog; she had accompanied her brother and spent her scanty savings, without being of any use save to watch him suffer. Accordingly, when the doctor told her to take the invalid in her arms and raise him up a little, she felt quite happy at being of some service at last. Her heavy, freckled, mournful face actually grew bright. "Hold him," said the doctor, "whilst I try to give him this." When she had raised him, Ferrand, with the aid of a small spoon, succeeded in introducing a few drops of liquid between his set teeth. Almost immediately the sick man opened his eyes and heaved a deep sigh. He was calmer already; the opium was taking effect and dulling the pain which he felt burning his right side, as though a red-hot iron were being applied to it. However, he remained so weak that, when he wished to speak, it became necessary to place one's ear close to his mouth in order to catch what he said. With a slight sign he had begged Ferrand to bend over him. "You are the doctor, monsieur, are you not?" he faltered. "Give me sufficient strength that I may go once more to the Grotto, this afternoon. I am certain that, if I am able to go, the Blessed Virgin will cure me." "Why, of course you shall go," replied the young man. "Don't you feel ever so much better?" "Oh! ever so much better--no! I know very well what my condition is, because I saw many of our Brothers die, out there in Senegal. When the liver is attacked and the abscess has worked its way outside, it means the end. Sweating, fever, and delirium follow. But the Blessed Virgin will touch the sore with her little finger and it will be healed. Oh! I implore you all, take me to the Grotto, even if I should be unconscious!" Sister Hyacinthe had also approached, and leant over him. "Be easy, dear Brother," said she. "You shall go to the Grotto after /dejeuner/, and we will all pray for you." At length, in despair at these delays and extremely anxious about Madame Vetu, she was able to get Ferrand away. Still, the Brother's state filled her with pity; and, as they ascended the stairs, she questioned the doctor, asking him if there were really no more hope. The other made a gesture expressive of absolute hopelessness. It was madness to come to Lourdes when one was in such a condition. However, he hastened to add, with a smile: "I beg your pardon, Sister. You know that I am unfortunate enough not to be a believer." But she smiled in her turn, like an indulgent friend who tolerates the shortcomings of those she loves. "Oh! that doesn't matter," she replied. "I know you; you're all the same a good fellow. Besides, we see so many people, we go amongst such pagans that it would be difficult to shock us." Up above, in the Sainte-Honorine Ward, they found Madame Vetu still moaning, a prey to most intolerable suffering. Madame de Jonquiere and Madame Desagneaux had remained beside the bed, their faces turning pale, their hearts distracted by that death-cry, which never ceased. And when they consulted Ferrand in a whisper, he merely replied, with a slight shrug of the shoulders, that she was a lost woman, that it was only a question of hours, perhaps merely of minutes. All he could do was to stupefy her also, in order to ease the atrocious death agony which he foresaw. She was watching him, still conscious, and also very obedient, never refusing the medicine offered her. Like the others, she now had but one ardent desire--to go back to the Grotto--and she gave expression to it in the stammering accents of a child who fears that its prayer may not be granted: "To the Grotto--will you? To the Grotto!" "You shall be taken there by-and-by, I promise you," said Sister Hyacinthe. "But you must be good. Try to sleep a little to gain some strength." The sick woman appeared to sink into a doze, and Madame de Jonquiere then thought that she might take Madame Desagneaux with her to the other end of the ward to count the linen, a troublesome business, in which they became quite bewildered, as some of the articles were missing. Meantime Sophie, seated on the bed opposite Madame Vetu, had not stirred. She had laid her doll on her lap, and was waiting for the lady's death, since they had told her that she was about to die. Sister Hyacinthe, moreover, had remained beside the dying woman, and, unwilling to waste her time, had taken a needle and cotton to mend some patient's bodice which had a hole in the sleeve. "You'll stay a little while with us, won't you?" she asked Ferrand. The latter, who was still watching Madame Vetu, replied: "Yes, yes. She may go off at any moment. I fear hemorrhage." Then, catching sight of Marie on the neighbouring bed, he added in a lower voice: "How is she? Has she experienced any relief?" "No, not yet. Ah, dear child! we all pray for her very sincerely. She is so young, so sweet, and so sorely afflicted. Just look at her now! Isn't she pretty? One might think her a saint amid all this sunshine, with her large, ecstatic eyes, and her golden hair shining like an aureola!" Ferrand watched Marie for a moment with interest. Her absent air, her indifference to all about her, the ardent faith, the internal joy which so completely absorbed her, surprised him. "She will recover," he murmured, as though giving utterance to a prognostic. "She will recover." Then he rejoined Sister Hyacinthe, who had seated herself in the embrasure of the lofty window, which stood wide open, admitting the warm air of the courtyard. The sun was now creeping round, and only a narrow golden ray fell upon her white coif and wimple. Ferrand stood opposite to her, leaning against the window bar and watching her while she sewed. "Do you know, Sister," said he, "this journey to Lourdes, which I undertook to oblige a friend, will be one of the few delights of my life." She did not understand him, but innocently asked: "Why so?" "Because I have found you again, because I am here with you, assisting you in your admirable work. And if you only knew how grateful I am to you, what sincere affection and reverence I feel for you!" She raised her head to look him straight in the face, and began jesting without the least constraint. She was really delicious, with her pure lily-white complexion, her small laughing mouth, and adorable blue eyes which ever smiled. And you could realise that she had grown up in all innocence and devotion, slender and supple, with all the appearance of a girl hardly in her teens. "What! You are so fond of me as all that!" she exclaimed. "Why?" "Why I'm fond of you? Because you are the best, the most consoling, the most sisterly of beings. You are the sweetest memory in my life, the memory I evoke whenever I need to be encouraged and sustained. Do you no longer remember the month we spent together, in my poor room, when I was so ill and you so affectionately nursed me?" "Of course, of course I remember it! Why, I never had so good a patient as you. You took all I offered you; and when I tucked you in, after changing your linen, you remained as still as a little child." So speaking, she continued looking at him, smiling ingenuously the while. He was very handsome and robust, in the very prime of youth, with a rather pronounced nose, superb eyes, and red lips showing under his black moustache. But she seemed to be simply pleased at seeing him there before her moved almost to tears. "Ah! Sister, I should have died if it hadn't been for you," he said. "It was through having you that I was cured." Then, as they gazed at one another, with tender gaiety of heart, the memory of that adorable month recurred to them. They no longer heard Madame Vetu's death moans, nor beheld the ward littered with beds, and, with all its disorder, resembling some infirmary improvised after a public catastrophe. They once more found themselves in a small attic at the top of a dingy house in old Paris, where air and light only reached them through a tiny window opening on to a sea of roofs. And how charming it was to be alone there together--he who had been prostrated by fever, she who had appeared there like a good angel, who had quietly come from her convent like a comrade who fears nothing! It was thus that she nursed women, children, and men, as chance ordained, feeling perfectly happy so long as she had something to do, some sufferer to relieve. She never displayed any consciousness of her sex; and he, on his side, never seemed to have suspected that she might be a woman, except it were for the extreme softness of her hands, the caressing accents of her voice, the beneficent gentleness of her manner; and yet all the tender love of a mother, all the affection of a sister, radiated from her person. During three weeks, as she had said, she had nursed him like a child, helping him in and out of bed, and rendering him every necessary attention, without the slightest embarrassment or repugnance, the holy purity born of suffering and charity shielding them both the while. They were indeed far removed from the frailties of life. And when he became convalescent, what a happy existence began, how joyously they laughed, like two old friends! She still watched over him, scolding him and gently slapping his arms when he persisted in keeping them uncovered. He would watch her standing at the basin, washing him a shirt in order to save him the trifling expense of employing a laundress. No one ever came up there; they were quite alone, thousands of miles away from the world, delighted with this solitude, in which their youth displayed such fraternal gaiety. "Do you remember, Sister, the morning when I was first able to walk about?" asked Ferrand. "You helped me to get up, and supported me whilst I awkwardly stumbled about, no longer knowing how to use my legs. We did laugh so." "Yes, yes, you were saved, and I was very pleased." "And the day when you brought me some cherries--I can see it all again: myself reclining on my pillows, and you seated at the edge of the bed, with the cherries lying between us in a large piece of white paper. I refused to touch them unless you ate some with me. And then we took them in turn, one at a time, until the paper was emptied; and they were very nice." "Yes, yes, very nice. It was the same with the currant syrup: you would only drink it when I took some also." Thereupon they laughed yet louder; these recollections quite delighted them. But a painful sigh from Madame Vetu brought them back to the present. Ferrand leant over and cast a glance at the sick woman, who had not stirred. The ward was still full of a quivering peacefulness, which was only broken by the clear voice of Madame Desagneaux counting the linen. Stifling with emotion, the young man resumed in a lower tone: "Ah! Sister, were I to live a hundred years, to know every joy, every pleasure, I should never love another woman as I love you!" Then Sister Hyacinthe, without, however, showing any confusion, bowed her head and resumed her sewing. An almost imperceptible blush tinged her lily-white skin with pink. "I also love you well, Monsieur Ferrand," she said, "but you must not make me vain. I only did for you what I do for so many others. It is my business, you see. And there was really only one pleasant thing about it all, that the Almighty cured you." They were now again interrupted. La Grivotte and Elise Rouquet had returned from the Grotto before the others. La Grivotte at once squatted down on her mattress on the floor, at the foot of Madame Vetu's bed, and, taking a piece of bread from her pocket, proceeded to devour it. Ferrand, since the day before, had felt some interest in this consumptive patient, who was traversing such a curious phase of agitation, a prey to an inordinate appetite and a feverish need of motion. For the moment, however, Elise Rouquet's case interested him still more; for it had now become evident that the lupus, the sore which was eating away her face, was showing signs of cure. She had continued bathing her face at the miraculous fountain, and had just come from the Verification Office, where Doctor Bonamy had triumphed. Ferrand, quite surprised, went and examined the sore, which, although still far from healed, was already paler in colour and slightly desiccated, displaying all the symptoms of gradual cure. And the case seemed to him so curious, that he resolved to make some notes upon it for one of his old masters at the medical college, who was studying the nervous origin of certain skin diseases due to faulty nutrition. "Have you felt any pricking sensation?" he asked. "Not at all, monsieur," she replied. "I bathe my face and tell my beads with my whole soul, and that is all." La Grivotte, who was vain and jealous, and ever since the day before had been going in triumph among the crowds, thereupon called to the doctor. "I say, monsieur, I am cured, cured, cured completely!" He waved his hand to her in a friendly way, but refused to examine her. "I know, my girl. There is nothing more the matter with you." Just then Sister Hyacinthe called to him. She had put her sewing down on seeing Madame Vetu raise herself in a frightful fit of nausea. In spite of her haste, however, she was too late with the basin; the sick woman had brought up another discharge of black matter, similar to soot; but, this time, some blood was mixed with it, little specks of violet-coloured blood. It was the hemorrhage coming, the near end which Ferrand had been dreading. "Send for the superintendent," he said in a low voice, seating himself at the bedside. Sister Hyacinthe ran for Madame de Jonquiere. The linen having been counted, she found her deep in conversation with her daughter Raymonde, at some distance from Madame Desagneaux, who was washing her hands. Raymonde had just escaped for a few minutes from the refectory, where she was on duty. This was the roughest of her labours. The long narrow room, with its double row of greasy tables, its sickening smell of food and misery, quite disgusted her. And taking advantage of the half-hour still remaining before the return of the patients, she had hurried up-stairs, where, out of breath, with a rosy face and shining eyes, she had thrown her arms around her mother's neck. "Ah! mamma," she cried, "what happiness! It's settled!" Amazed, her head buzzing, busy with the superintendence of her ward, Madame de Jonquiere did not understand. "What's settled, my child?" she asked. Then Raymonde lowered her voice, and, with a faint blush, replied: "My marriage!" It was now the mother's turn to rejoice. Lively satisfaction appeared upon her face, the fat face of a ripe, handsome, and still agreeable woman. She at once beheld in her mind's eye their little lodging in the Rue Vaneau, where, since her husband's death, she had reared her daughter with great difficulty upon the few thousand francs he had left her. This marriage, however, meant a return to life, to society, the good old times come back once more. "Ah! my child, how happy you make me!" she exclaimed. But a feeling of uneasiness suddenly restrained her. God was her witness that for three years past she had been coming to Lourdes through pure motives of charity, for the one great joy of nursing His beloved invalids. Perhaps, had she closely examined her conscience, she might, behind her devotion, have found some trace of her fondness for authority, which rendered her present managerial duties extremely pleasant to her. However, the hope of finding a husband for her daughter among the suitable young men who swarmed at the Grotto was certainly her last thought. It was a thought which came to her, of course, but merely as something that was possible, though she never mentioned it. However, her happiness, wrung an avowal from her: "Ah! my child, your success doesn't surprise me. I prayed to the Blessed Virgin for it this morning." Then she wished to be quite sure, and asked for further information. Raymonde had not yet told her of her long walk leaning on Gerard's arm the day before, for she did not wish to speak of such things until she was triumphant, certain of having at last secured a husband. And now it was indeed settled, as she had exclaimed so gaily: that very morning she had again seen the young man at the Grotto, and he had formally become engaged to her. M. Berthaud would undoubtedly ask for her hand on his cousin's behalf before they took their departure from Lourdes. "Well," declared Madame de Jonquiere, who was now convinced, smiling, and delighted at heart, "I hope you will be happy, since you are so sensible and do not need my aid to bring your affairs to a successful issue. Kiss me." It was at this moment that Sister Hyacinthe arrived to announce Madame Vetu's imminent death. Raymonde at once ran off. And Madame Desagneaux, who was wiping her hands, began to complain of the lady-assistants, who had all disappeared precisely on the morning when they were most wanted. "For instance," said she, "there's Madame Volmar. I should like to know where she can have got to. She has not been seen, even for an hour, ever since our arrival." "Pray leave Madame Volmar alone!" replied Madame de Jonquiere with some asperity. "I have already told you that she is ill." They both hastened to Madame Vetu. Ferrand stood there waiting; and Sister Hyacinthe having asked him if there were indeed nothing to be done, he shook his head. The dying woman, relieved by her first emesis, now lay inert, with closed eyes. But, a second time, the frightful nausea returned to her, and she brought up another discharge of black matter mingled with violet-coloured blood. Then she had another short interval of calm, during which she noticed La Grivotte, who was greedily devouring her hunk of bread on the mattress on the floor. "She is cured, isn't she?" the poor woman asked, feeling that she herself was dying. La Grivotte heard her, and exclaimed triumphantly: "Oh, yes, madame, cured, cured, cured completely!" For a moment Madame Vetu seemed overcome by a miserable feeling of grief, the revolt of one who will not succumb while others continue to live. But almost immediately she became resigned, and they heard her add very faintly, "It is the young ones who ought to remain." Then her eyes, which remained wide open, looked round, as though bidding farewell to all those persons, whom she seemed surprised to see about her. She attempted to smile as she encountered the eager gaze of curiosity which little Sophie Couteau still fixed upon her: the charming child had come to kiss her that very morning, in her bed. Elise Rouquet, who troubled herself about nobody, was meantime holding her hand-glass, absorbed in the contemplation of her face, which seemed to her to be growing beautiful, now that the sore was healing. But what especially charmed the dying woman was the sight of Marie, so lovely in her ecstasy. She watched her for a long time, constantly attracted towards her, as towards a vision of light and joy. Perhaps she fancied that she already beheld one of the saints of Paradise amid the glory of the sun. Suddenly, however, the fits of vomiting returned, and now she solely brought up blood, vitiated blood, the colour of claret. The rush was so great that it bespattered the sheet, and ran all over the bed. In vain did Madame de Jonquiere and Madame Desagneaux bring cloths; they were both very pale and scarce able to remain standing. Ferrand, knowing how powerless he was, had withdrawn to the window, to the very spot where he had so lately experienced such delicious emotion; and with an instinctive movement, of which she was surely unconscious, Sister Hyacinthe had likewise returned to that happy window, as though to be near him. "Really, can you do nothing?" she inquired. "No, nothing! She will go off like that, in the same way as a lamp that has burnt out." Madame Vetu, who was now utterly exhausted, with a thin red stream still flowing from her mouth, looked fixedly at Madame de Jonquiere whilst faintly moving her lips. The lady-superintendent thereupon bent over her and heard these slowly uttered words: "About my husband, madame--the shop is in the Rue Mouffetard--oh! it's quite a tiny one, not far from the Gobelins. --He's a clockmaker, he is; he couldn't come with me, of course, having to attend to the business; and he will be very much put out when he finds I don't come back. --Yes, I cleaned the jewelry and did the errands--" Then her voice grew fainter, her words disjointed by the death rattle, which began. "Therefore, madame, I beg you will write to him, because I haven't done so, and now here's the end. --Tell him my body had better remain here at Lourdes, on account of the expense. --And he must marry again; it's necessary for one in trade--his cousin--tell him his cousin--" The rest became a confused murmur. Her weakness was too great, her breath was halting. Yet her eyes continued open and full of life, amid her pale, yellow, waxy mask. And those eyes seemed to fix themselves despairingly on the past, on all that which soon would be no more: the little clockmaker's shop hidden away in a populous neighbourhood; the gentle humdrum existence, with a toiling husband who was ever bending over his watches; the great pleasures of Sunday, such as watching children fly their kites upon the fortifications. And at last these staring eyes gazed vainly into the frightful night which was gathering. A last time did Madame de Jonquiere lean over her, seeing that her lips were again moving. There came but a faint breath, a voice from far away, which distantly murmured in an accent of intense grief: "She did not cure me." And then Madame Vetu expired, very gently. As though this were all that she had been waiting for, little Sophie Couteau jumped from the bed quite satisfied, and went off to play with her doll again at the far end of the ward. Neither La Grivotte, who was finishing her bread, nor Elise Rouquet, busy with her mirror, noticed the catastrophe. However, amidst the cold breath which seemingly swept by, while Madame de Jonquiere and Madame Desagneaux--the latter of whom was unaccustomed to the sight of death--were whispering together in agitation, Marie emerged from the expectant rapture in which the continuous, unspoken prayer of her whole being had plunged her so long. And when she understood what had happened, a feeling of sisterly compassion--the compassion of a suffering companion, on her side certain of cure--brought tears to her eyes. "Ah! the poor woman!" she murmured; "to think that she has died so far from home, in such loneliness, at the hour when others are being born anew!" Ferrand, who, in spite of professional indifference, had also been stirred by the scene, stepped forward to verify the death; and it was on a sign from him that Sister Hyacinthe turned up the sheet, and threw it over the dead woman's face, for there could be no question of removing the corpse at that moment. The patients were now returning from the Grotto in bands, and the ward, hitherto so calm, so full of sunshine, was again filling with the tumult of wretchedness and pain--deep coughing and feeble shuffling, mingled with a noisome smell--a pitiful display, in fact, of well-nigh every human infirmity.

2

THE SERVICE AT THE GROTTO

ON that day, Monday, the crowd at the Grotto, was enormous. It was the last day that the national pilgrimage would spend at Lourdes, and Father Fourcade, in his morning address, had said that it would be necessary to make a supreme effort of fervour and faith to obtain from Heaven all that it might be willing to grant in the way of grace and prodigious cure. So, from two o'clock in the afternoon, twenty thousand pilgrims were assembled there, feverish, and agitated by the most ardent hopes. From minute to minute the throng continued increasing, to such a point, indeed, that Baron Suire became alarmed, and came out of the Grotto to say to Berthaud: "My friend, we shall be overwhelmed, that's certain. Double your squads, bring your men closer together." The Hospitality of Our Lady of Salvation was alone entrusted with the task of keeping order, for there were neither guardians nor policemen, of any sort present; and it was for this reason that the President of the Association was so alarmed. However, Berthaud, under grave circumstances, was a leader whose words commanded attention, and who was endowed with energy that could be relied on. "Be easy," said he; "I will be answerable for everything. I shall not move from here until the four-o'clock procession has passed by." Nevertheless, he signalled to Gerard to approach. "Give your men the strictest instructions," he said to him. "Only those persons who have cards should be allowed to pass. And place your men nearer each other; tell them to hold the cord tight." Yonder, beneath the ivy which draped the rock, the Grotto opened, with the eternal flaring of its candles. From a distance it looked rather squat and misshapen, a very narrow and modest aperture for the breath of the Infinite which issued from it, turning all faces pale and bowing every head. The statue of the Virgin had become a mere white spot, which seemed to move amid the quiver of the atmosphere, heated by the small yellow flames. To see everything it was necessary to raise oneself; for the silver altar, the harmonium divested of its housing, the heap of bouquets flung there, and the votive offerings streaking the smoky walls were scarcely distinguishable from behind the railing. And the day was lovely; never yet had a purer sky expanded above the immense crowd; the softness of the breeze in particular seemed delicious after the storm of the night, which had brought down the over-oppressive heat of the two first days. Gerard had to fight his way with his elbows in order to repeat the orders to his men. The crowd had already begun pushing. "Two more men here!" he called. "Come, four together, if necessary, and hold the rope well!" The general impulse was instinctive and invincible; the twenty thousand persons assembled there were drawn towards the Grotto by an irresistible attraction, in which burning curiosity mingled with the thirst for mystery. All eyes converged, every mouth, hand, and body was borne towards the pale glitter of the candles and the white moving speck of the marble Virgin. And, in order that the large space reserved to the sick, in front of the railings, might not be invaded by the swelling mob, it had been necessary to inclose it with a stout rope which the bearers at intervals of two or three yards grasped with both hands. Their orders were to let nobody pass excepting the sick provided with hospital cards and the few persons to whom special authorisations had been granted. They limited themselves, therefore, to raising the cords and then letting them fall behind the chosen ones, without heeding the supplications of the others. In fact they even showed themselves somewhat rough, taking a certain pleasure in exercising the authority with which they were invested for a day. In truth, however, they were very much pushed about, and had to support each other and resist with all the strength of their loins to avoid being swept away. While the benches before the Grotto and the vast reserved space were filling with sick people, handcarts, and stretchers, the crowd, the immense crowd, swayed about on the outskirts. Starting from the Place du Rosaire, it extended to the bottom of the promenade along the Gave, where the pavement throughout its entire length was black with people, so dense a human sea that all circulation was prevented. On the parapet was an interminable line of women--most of them seated, but some few standing so as to see the better--and almost all carrying silk parasols, which, with holiday-like gaiety, shimmered in the sunlight. The managers had wished to keep a path open in order that the sick might be brought along; but it was ever being invaded and obstructed, so that the carts and stretchers remained on the road, submerged and lost until a bearer freed them. Nevertheless, the great tramping was that of a docile flock, an innocent, lamb-like crowd; and it was only the involuntary pushing, the blind rolling towards the light of the candles that had to be contended against. No accident had ever happened there, notwithstanding the excitement, which gradually increased and threw the people into the unruly delirium of faith. However, Baron Suire again forced his way through the throng. "Berthaud! Berthaud!" he called, "see that the /defile/ is conducted less rapidly. There are women and children stifling." This time Berthaud gave a sign of impatience. "Ah! hang it, I can't be everywhere! Close the gate for a moment if it's necessary." It was a question of the march through the Grotto which went on throughout the afternoon. The faithful were permitted to enter by the door on the left, and made their exit by that on the right. "Close the gate!" exclaimed the Baron. "But that would be worse; they would all get crushed against it!" As it happened Gerard was there, thoughtlessly talking for an instant with Raymonde, who was standing on the other side of the cord, holding a bowl of milk which she was about to carry to a paralysed old woman; and Berthaud ordered the young fellow to post two men at the entrance gate of the iron railing, with instructions only to allow the pilgrims to enter by tens. When Gerard had executed this order, and returned, he found Berthaud laughing and joking with Raymonde. She went off on her errand, however, and the two men stood watching her while she made the paralysed woman drink. "She is charming, and it's settled, eh?" said Berthaud. "You are going to marry her, aren't you?" "I shall ask her mother to-night. I rely upon you to accompany me." "Why, certainly. You know what I told you. Nothing could be more sensible. The uncle will find you a berth before six months are over." A push of the crowd separated them, and Berthaud went off to make sure whether the march through the Grotto was now being accomplished in a methodical manner, without any crushing. For hours the same unbroken tide rolled in--women, men, and children from all parts of the world, all who chose, all who passed that way. As a result, the crowd was singularly mixed: there were beggars in rags beside neat /bourgeois/, peasants of either sex, well dressed ladies, servants with bare hair, young girls with bare feet, and others with pomatumed hair and foreheads bound with ribbons. Admission was free; the mystery was open to all, to unbelievers as well as to the faithful, to those who were solely influenced by curiosity as well as to those who entered with their hearts faint with love. And it was a sight to see them, all almost equally affected by the tepid odour of the wax, half stifling in the heavy tabernacle air which gathered beneath the rocky vault, and lowering their eyes for fear of slipping on the gratings. Many stood there bewildered, not even bowing, examining the things around with the covert uneasiness of indifferent folks astray amidst the redoubtable mysteries of a sanctuary. But the devout crossed themselves, threw letters, deposited candles and bouquets, kissed the rock below the Virgin's statue, or else rubbed their chaplets, medals, and other small objects of piety against it, as the contact sufficed to bless them. And the /defile/ continued, continued without end during days and months as it had done for years; and it seemed as if the whole world, all the miseries and sufferings of humanity, came in turn and passed in the same hypnotic, contagious kind of round, through that rocky nook, ever in search of happiness. When Berthaud had satisfied himself that everything was working well, he walked about like a mere spectator, superintending his men. Only one matter remained to trouble him: the procession of the Blessed Sacrament, during which such frenzy burst forth that accidents were always to be feared. This last day seemed likely to be a very fervent one, for he already felt a tremor of exalted faith rising among the crowd. The treatment needed for miraculous care was drawing to an end; there had been the fever of the journey, the besetting influence of the same endlessly repeated hymns, and the stubborn continuation of the same religious exercises; and ever and ever the conversation had been turned on miracles, and the mind fixed on the divine illumination of the Grotto. Many, not having slept for three nights, had reached a state of hallucination, and walked about in a rageful dream. No repose was granted them, the continual prayers were like whips lashing their souls. The appeals to the Blessed Virgin never ceased; priest followed priest in the pulpit, proclaiming the universal dolour and directing the despairing supplications of the throng, during the whole time that the sick remained with hands clasped and eyes raised to heaven before the pale, smiling, marble statue. At that moment the white stone pulpit against the rock on the right of the Grotto was occupied by a priest from Toulouse, whom Berthaud knew, and to whom he listened for a moment with an air of approval. He was a stout man with an unctuous diction, famous for his rhetorical successes. However, all eloquence here consisted in displaying the strength of one's lungs in a violent delivery of the phrase or cry which the whole crowd had to repeat; for the addresses were nothing more than so much vociferation interspersed with "Ayes" and "Paters." The priest, who had just finished the Rosary, strove to increase his stature by stretching his short legs, whilst shouting the first appeal of the litanies which he improvised, and led in his own way, according to the inspiration which possessed him. "Mary, we love thee!" he called. And thereupon the crowd repeated in a lower, confused, and broken tone: "Mary, we love thee!" From that moment there was no stopping. The voice of the priest rang out at full swing, and the voices of the crowd responded in a dolorous murmur: "Mary, thou art our only hope!" "Mary, thou art our only hope!" "Pure Virgin, make us purer, among the pure!" "Pure Virgin, make us purer, among the pure!" "Powerful Virgin, save our sick!" "Powerful Virgin, save our sick!" Often, when the priest's imagination failed him, or he wished to thrust a cry home with greater force, he would repeat it thrice; while the docile crowd would do the same, quivering under the enervating effect of the persistent lamentation, which increased the fever. The litanies continued, and Berthaud went back towards the Grotto. Those who defiled through it beheld an extraordinary sight when they turned and faced the sick. The whole of the large space between the cords was occupied by the thousand or twelve hundred patients whom the national pilgrimage had brought with it; and beneath the vast, spotless sky on that radiant day there was the most heart-rending jumble of sufferers that one could behold. The three hospitals of Lourdes had emptied their chambers of horror. To begin with, those who were still able to remain seated had been piled upon the benches. Many of them, however, were propped up with cushions, whilst others kept shoulder to shoulder, the strong ones supporting the weak. Then, in front of the benches, before the Grotto itself, were the more grievously afflicted sufferers lying at full length; the flagstones disappearing from view beneath this woeful assemblage, which was like a large, stagnant pool of horror. There was an indescribable block of vehicles, stretchers, and mattresses. Some of the invalids in little boxes not unlike coffins had raised themselves up and showed above the others, but the majority lay almost on a level with the ground. There were some lying fully dressed on the check-patterned ticks of mattresses; whilst others had been brought with their bedding, so that only their heads and pale hands were seen outside the sheets. Few of these pallets were clean. Some pillows of dazzling whiteness, which by a last feeling of coquetry had been trimmed with embroidery, alone shone out among all the filthy wretchedness of all the rest--a fearful collection of rags, worn-out blankets, and linen splashed with stains. And all were pushed, squeezed, piled up by chance as they came, women, men, children, and priests, people in nightgowns beside people who were fully attired being jumbled together in the blinding light of day. And all forms of disease were there, the whole frightful procession which, twice a day, left the hospitals to wend its way through horrified Lourdes. There were the heads eaten away by eczema, the foreheads crowned with roseola, and the noses and mouths which elephantiasis had transformed into shapeless snouts. Next, the dropsical ones, swollen out like leathern bottles; the rheumatic ones with twisted hands and swollen feet, like bags stuffed full of rags; and a sufferer from hydrocephalus, whose huge and weighty skull fell backwards. Then the consumptive ones, with livid skins, trembling with fever, exhausted by dysentery, wasted to skeletons. Then the deformities, the contractions, the twisted trunks, the twisted arms, the necks all awry; all the poor broken, pounded creatures, motionless in their tragic, marionette-like postures. Then the poor rachitic girls displaying their waxen complexions and slender necks eaten into by sores; the yellow-faced, besotted-looking women in the painful stupor which falls on unfortunate creatures devoured by cancer; and the others who turned pale, and dared not move, fearing as they did the shock of the tumours whose weighty pain was stifling them. On the benches sat bewildered deaf women, who heard nothing, but sang on all the same, and blind ones with heads erect, who remained for hours turned toward the statue of the Virgin which they could not see. And there was also the woman stricken with imbecility, whose nose was eaten away, and who laughed with a terrifying laugh, displaying the black, empty cavern of her mouth; and then the epileptic woman, whom a recent attack had left as pale as death, with froth still at the corners of her lips. But sickness and suffering were no longer of consequence, since they were all there, seated or stretched with their eyes upon the Grotto. The poor, fleshless, earthy-looking faces became transfigured, and began to glow with hope. Anchylosed hands were joined, heavy eyelids found the strength to rise, exhausted voices revived as the priest shouted the appeals. At first there was nothing but indistinct stuttering, similar to slight puffs of air rising, here and there above the multitude. Then the cry ascended and spread through the crowd itself from one to the other end of the immense square. "Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us!" cried the priest in his thundering voice. And the sick and the pilgrims repeated louder and louder: "Mary, conceived without sin, pray for us!" Then the flow of the litany set in, and continued with increasing speed: "Most pure Mother, most chaste Mother, thy children are at thy feet!" "Most pure Mother, most chaste Mother, thy children are at thy feet!" "Queen of the Angels, say but a word, and our sick shall be healed!" "Queen of the Angels, say but a word, and our sick shall be healed!" In the second row of sufferers, near the pulpit, was M. Sabathier, who had asked to be brought there early, wishing to choose his place like an old /habitue/ who knew the cosy corners. Moreover, it seemed to him that it was of paramount importance that he should be as near as possible, under the very eyes of the Virgin, as though she required to see her faithful in order not to forget them. However, for the seven years that he had been coming there he had nursed this one hope of being some day noticed by her, of touching her, and of obtaining his cure, if not by selection, at least by seniority. This merely needed patience on his part without the firmness of his faith being in the least shaken by his way of thinking. Only, like a poor, resigned man just a little weary of being always put off, he sometimes allowed himself diversions. For instance, he had obtained permission to keep his wife near him, seated on a camp-stool, and he liked to talk to her, and acquaint her with his reflections. "Raise me a little, my dear," said he. "I am slipping. I am very uncomfortable." Attired in trousers and a coarse woollen jacket, he was sitting upon his mattress, with his back leaning against a tilted chair. "Are you better?" asked his wife, when she had raised him. "Yes, yes," he answered; and then began to take an interest in Brother Isidore, whom they had succeeded in bringing in spite of everything, and who was lying upon a neighbouring mattress, with a sheet drawn up to his chin, and nothing protruding but his wasted hands, which lay clasped upon the blanket. "Ah! the poor man," said M. Sabathier. "It's very imprudent, but the Blessed Virgin is so powerful when she chooses!" He took up his chaplet again, but once more broke off from his devotions on perceiving Madame Maze, who had just glided into the reserved space--so slender and unobtrusive that she had doubtless slipped under the ropes without being noticed. She had seated herself at the end of a bench and, very quiet and motionless, did not occupy more room there than a child. And her long face, with its weary features, the face of a woman of two-and-thirty faded before her time, wore an expression of unlimited sadness, infinite abandonment. "And so," resumed M. Sabathier in a low voice, again addressing his wife after attracting her attention by a slight movement of the chin, "it's for the conversion of her husband that this lady prays. You came across her this morning in a shop, didn't you?" "Yes, yes," replied Madame Sabathier. "And, besides, I had some talk about her with another lady who knows her. Her husband is a commercial-traveller. He leaves her for six months at a time, and goes about with other people. Oh! he's a very gay fellow, it seems, very nice, and he doesn't let her want for money; only she adores him, she cannot accustom herself to his neglect, and comes to pray the Blessed Virgin to give him back to her. At this moment, it appears, he is close by, at Luchon, with two ladies--two sisters." M. Sabathier signed to his wife to stop. He was now looking at the Grotto, again becoming a man of intellect, a professor whom questions of art had formerly impassioned. "You see, my dear," he said, "they have spoilt the Grotto by endeavouring to make it too beautiful. I am certain it looked much better in its original wildness. It has lost its characteristic features--and what a frightful shop they have stuck there, on the left!" However, he now experienced sudden remorse for his thoughtlessness. Whilst he was chatting away, might not the Blessed Virgin be noticing one of his neighbours, more fervent, more sedate than himself? Feeling anxious on the point, he reverted to his customary modesty and patience, and with dull, expressionless eyes again began waiting for the good pleasure of Heaven. Moreover, the sound of a fresh voice helped to bring him back to this annihilation, in which nothing was left of the cultured reasoner that he had formerly been. It was another preacher who had just entered the pulpit, a Capuchin this time, whose guttural call, persistently repeated, sent a tremor through the crowd. "Holy Virgin of virgins, be blessed!" "Holy Virgin of virgins, be blessed!" "Holy Virgin of virgins, turn not thy face from thy children!" "Holy Virgin of virgins, turn not thy face from thy children!" "Holy Virgin of virgins, breathe upon our sores, and our sores shall heal!" "Holy Virgin of virgins, breathe upon our sores, and our sores shall heal!" At the end of the first bench, skirting the central path, which was becoming crowded, the Vigneron family had succeeded in finding room for themselves. They were all there: little Gustave, seated in a sinking posture, with his crutch between his legs; his mother, beside him, following the prayers like a punctilious /bourgeoise/; his aunt, Madame Chaise, on the other side, so inconvenienced by the crowd that she was stifling; and M. Vigneron, who remained silent and, for a moment, had been examining Madame Chaise attentively. "What is the matter with you, my dear?" he inquired. "Do you feel unwell?" She was breathing with difficulty. "Well, I don't know," she answered; "but I can't feel my limbs, and my breath fails me." At that very moment the thought had occurred to him that all the agitation, fever, and scramble of a pilgrimage could not be very good for heart-disease. Of course he did not desire anybody's death, he had never asked the Blessed Virgin for any such thing. If his prayer for advancement had already been granted through the sudden death of his chief, it must certainly be because Heaven had already ordained the latter's death. And, in the same way, if Madame Chaise should die first, leaving her fortune to Gustave, he would only have to bow before the will of God, which generally requires that the aged should go off before the young. Nevertheless, his hope unconsciously became so keen that he could not help exchanging a glance with his wife, to whom had come the same involuntary thought. "Gustave, draw back," he exclaimed; "you are inconveniencing your aunt." And then, as Raymonde passed, he asked; "Do you happen to have a glass of water, mademoiselle? One of our relatives here is losing consciousness." But Madame Chaise refused the offer with a gesture. She was getting better, recovering her breath with an effort. "No, I want nothing, thank you," she gasped. "There, I'm better--still, I really thought this time that I should stifle!" Her fright left her trembling, with haggard eyes in her pale face. She again joined her hands, and begged the Blessed Virgin to save her from other attacks and cure her; while the Vignerons, man and wife, honest folk both of them, reverted to the covert prayer for happiness that they had come to offer up at Lourdes: a pleasant old age, deservedly gained by twenty years of honesty, with a respectable fortune which in later years they would go and enjoy in the country, cultivating flowers. On the other hand, little Gustave, who had seen and noted everything with his bright eyes and intelligence sharpened by suffering, was not praying, but smiling at space, with his vague enigmatical smile. What could be the use of his praying? He knew that the Blessed Virgin would not cure him, and that he would die. However, M. Vigneron could not remain long without busying himself about his neighbours. Madame Dieulafay, who had come late, had been deposited in the crowded central pathway; and he marvelled at the luxury about the young woman, that sort of coffin quilted with white silk, in which she was lying, attired in a pink dressing-gown trimmed with Valenciennes lace. The husband in a frock-coat, and the sister in a black gown of simple but marvellous elegance, were standing by; while Abbe Judaine, kneeling near the sufferer, finished offering up a fervent prayer. When the priest had risen, M. Vigneron made him a little room on the bench beside him; and he then took the liberty of questioning him. "Well, Monsieur le Cure, does that poor young woman feel a little better?" Abbe Judaine made a gesture of infinite sadness. "Alas! no. I was full of so much hope! It was I who persuaded the family to come. Two years ago the Blessed Virgin showed me such extraordinary grace by curing my poor lost eyes, that I hoped to obtain another favour from her. However, I will not despair. We still have until to-morrow." M. Vigneron again looked towards Madame Dieulafay and examined her face, still of a perfect oval and with admirable eyes; but it was expressionless, with ashen hue, similar to a mask of death, amidst the lace. "It's really very sad," he murmured. "And if you had seen her last summer!" resumed the priest. "They have their country seat at Saligny, my parish, and I often dined with them. I cannot help feeling sad when I look at her elder sister, Madame Jousseur, that lady in black who stands there, for she bears a strong resemblance to her; and the poor sufferer was even prettier, one of the beauties of Paris. And now compare them together--observe that brilliancy, that sovereign grace, beside that poor, pitiful creature--it oppresses one's heart--ah! what a frightful lesson!" He became silent for an instant. Saintly man that he was naturally, altogether devoid of passions, with no keen intelligence to disturb him in his faith, he displayed a naive admiration for beauty, wealth, and power, which he had never envied. Nevertheless, he ventured to express a doubt, a scruple, which troubled his usual serenity. "For my part, I should have liked her to come here with more simplicity, without all that surrounding of luxury, because the Blessed Virgin prefers the humble-- But I understand very well that there are certain social exigencies. And, then, her husband and sister love her so! Remember that he has forsaken his business and she her pleasures in order to come here with her; and so overcome are they at the idea of losing her that their eyes are never dry, they always have that bewildered look which you can notice. So they must be excused for trying to procure her the comfort of looking beautiful until the last hour." M. Vigneron nodded his head approvingly. Ah! it was certainly not the wealthy who had the most luck at the Grotto! Servants, country folk, poor beggars, were cured, while ladies returned home with their ailments unrelieved, notwithstanding their gifts and the big candles they had burnt. And, in spite of himself, Vigneron then looked at Madame Chaise, who, having recovered from her attack, was now reposing with a comfortable air. But a tremor passed through the crowd and Abbe Judaine spoke again: "Here is Father Massias coming towards the pulpit. He is a saint; listen to him." They knew him, and were aware that he could not make his appearance without every soul being stirred by sudden hope, for it was reported that the miracles were often brought to pass by his great fervour. His voice, full of tenderness and strength, was said to be appreciated by the Virgin. All heads were therefore uplifted and the emotion yet further increased when Father Fourcade was seen coming to the foot of the pulpit, leaning on the shoulder of his well-beloved brother, the preferred of all; and he stayed there, so that he also might hear him. His gouty foot had been paining him more acutely since the morning, so that it required great courage on his part to remain thus standing and smiling. The increasing exaltation of the crowd made him happy, however; he foresaw prodigies and dazzling cures which would redound to the glory of Mary and Jesus. Having ascended the pulpit, Father Massias did not at once speak. He seemed, very tall, thin, and pale, with an ascetic face, elongated the more by his discoloured beard. His eyes sparkled, and his large eloquent mouth protruded passionately. "Lord, save us, for we perish!" he suddenly cried; and in a fever, which increased minute by minute, the transported crowd repeated: "Lord, save us, for we perish!" Then he opened his arms and again launched forth his flaming cry, as if he had torn it from his glowing heart: "Lord, if it be Thy will, Thou canst heal me!" "Lord, if it be Thy will, Thou canst heal me!" "Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof, but only say the word, and I shall be healed!" "Lord, I am not worthy that Thou shouldst enter under my roof, but only say the word, and I shall be healed!" Marthe, Brother Isidore's sister, had now begun to talk in a whisper to Madame Sabathier, near whom she had at last seated herself. They had formed an acquaintance at the hospital; and, drawn together by so much suffering, the servant had familiarly confided to the /bourgeoise/ how anxious she felt about her brother; for she could plainly see that he had very little breath left in him. The Blessed Virgin must be quick indeed if she desired to save him. It was already a miracle that they had been able to bring him alive as far as the Grotto. In her resignation, poor, simple creature that she was, she did not weep; but her heart was so swollen that her infrequent words came faintly from her lips. Then a flood of past memories suddenly returned to her; and with her utterance thickened by prolonged silence, she began to relieve her heart: "We were fourteen at home, at Saint Jacut, near Vannes. He, big as he was, has always been delicate, and that was why he remained with our priest, who ended by placing him among the Christian Brothers. The elder ones took over the property, and, for my part, I preferred going out to service. Yes, it was a lady who took me with her to Paris, five years ago already. Ah! what a lot of trouble there is in life! Everyone has so much trouble!" "You are quite right, my girl," replied Madame Sabathier, looking the while at her husband, who was devoutly repeating each of Father Massias's appeals. "And then," continued Marthe, "there I learned last month that Isidore, who had returned from a hot climate where he had been on a mission, had brought a bad sickness back with him. And, when I ran to see him, he told me he should die if he did not leave for Lourdes, but that he couldn't make the journey, because he had nobody to accompany him. Then, as I had eighty francs saved up, I gave up my place, and we set out together. You see, madame, if I am so fond of him, it's because he used to bring me gooseberries from the parsonage, whereas all the others beat me." She relapsed into silence for a moment, her countenance swollen by grief, and her poor eyes so scorched by watching that no tears could come from them. Then she began to stutter disjointed words: "Look at him, madame. It fills one with pity. Ah! my God, his poor cheeks, his poor chin, his poor face--" It was, in fact, a lamentable spectacle. Madame Sabathier's heart was quite upset when she observed Brother Isidore so yellow, cadaverous, steeped in a cold sweat of agony. Above the sheet he still only showed his clasped hands and his face encircled with long scanty hair; but if those wax-like hands seemed lifeless, if there was not a feature of that long-suffering face that stirred, its eyes were still alive, inextinguishable eyes of love, whose flame sufficed to illumine the whole of his expiring visage--the visage of a Christ upon the cross. And never had the contrast been so clearly marked between his low forehead and unintelligent, loutish, peasant air, and the divine splendour which came from his poor human mask, ravaged and sanctified by suffering, sublime at this last hour in the passionate radiance of his faith. His flesh had melted, as it were; he was no longer a breath, nothing but a look, a light. Since he had been set down there his eyes had not strayed from the statue of the Virgin. Nothing else existed around him. He did not see the enormous multitude, he did not even hear the wild cries of the priests, the incessant cries which shook this quivering crowd. His eyes alone remained to him, his eyes burning with infinite tenderness, and they were fixed upon the Virgin, never more to turn from her. They drank her in, even unto death; they made a last effort of will to disappear, die out in her. For an instant, however, his mouth half opened and his drawn visage relaxed as an expression of celestial beatitude came over it. Then nothing more stirred, his eyes remained wide open, still obstinately fixed upon the white statue. A few seconds elapsed. Marthe had felt a cold breath, chilling the roots of her hair. "I say, madame, look!" she stammered. Madame Sabathier, who felt anxious, pretended that she did not understand. "What is it, my girl?" "My brother! look! He no longer moves. He opened his mouth, and has not stirred since." Then they both shuddered, feeling certain he was dead. He had, indeed, just passed away, without a rattle, without a breath, as if life had escaped in his glance, through his large, loving eyes, ravenous with passion. He had expired gazing upon the Virgin, and nothing could have been so sweet; and he still continued to gaze upon her with his dead eyes, as though with ineffable delight. "Try to close his eyes," murmured Madame Sabathier. "We shall soon know then." Marthe had already risen, and, leaning forward, so as not to be observed, she endeavoured to close the eyes with a trembling finger. But each time they reopened, and again looked at the Virgin with invincible obstinacy. He was dead, and Marthe had to leave his eyes wide open, steeped in unbounded ecstasy. "Ah! it's finished, it's quite finished, madame!" she stuttered. Two tears then burst from her heavy eyelids and ran down her cheeks; while Madame Sabathier caught hold of her hand to keep her quiet. There had been whisperings, and uneasiness was already spreading. But what course could be adopted? It was impossible to carry off the corpse amidst such a mob, during the prayers, without incurring the risk of creating a disastrous effect. The best plan would be to leave it there, pending a favourable moment. The poor fellow scandalised no one, he did not seem any more dead now than he had seemed ten minutes previously, and everybody would think that his flaming eyes were still alive, ardently appealing to the divine compassion of the Blessed Virgin. Only a few persons among those around knew the truth. M. Sabathier, quite scared, had made a questioning sign to his wife, and on being answered by a prolonged affirmative nod, he had returned to his prayers without any rebellion, though he could not help turning pale at the thought of the mysterious almighty power which sent death when life was asked for. The Vignerons, who were very much interested, leaned forward, and whispered as though in presence of some street accident, one of those petty incidents which in Paris the father sometimes related on returning home from the Ministry, and which sufficed to occupy them all, throughout the evening. Madame Jousseur, for her part, had simply turned round and whispered a word or two in M. Dieulafay's ear, and then they had both reverted to the heart-rending contemplation of their own dear invalid; whilst Abbe Judaine, informed by M. Vigneron, knelt down, and in a low, agitated voice recited the prayers for the dead. Was he not a Saint, that missionary who had returned from a deadly climate, with a mortal wound in his side, to die there, beneath the smiling gaze of the Blessed Virgin? And Madame Maze, who also knew what had happened, suddenly felt a taste for death, and resolved that she would implore Heaven to suppress her also, in unobtrusive fashion, if it would not listen to her prayer and give her back her husband. But the cry of Father Massias rose into a still higher key, burst forth with a strength of terrible despair, with a rending like that of a sob: "Jesus, son of David, I am perishing, save me!" And the crowd sobbed after him in unison "Jesus, son of David, I am perishing, save me!" Then, in quick succession, and in higher and higher keys, the appeals went on proclaiming the intolerable misery of the world: "Jesus, son of David, take pity on Thy sick children!" "Jesus, son of David, take pity on Thy sick children!" "Jesus, son of David, come, heal them, that they may live!" "Jesus, son of David, come, heal them, that they may live!" It was delirium. At the foot of the pulpit Father Fourcade, succumbing to the extraordinary passion which overflowed from all hearts, had likewise raised his arms, and was shouting the appeals in his thundering voice as though to compel the intervention of Heaven. And the exaltation was still increasing beneath this blast of desire, whose powerful breath bowed every head in turn, spreading even to the young women who, in a spirit of mere curiosity, sat watching the scene from the parapet of the Gave; for these also turned pale under their sunshades. Miserable humanity was clamouring from the depths of its abyss of suffering, and the clamour swept along, sending a shudder down every spine, for one and all were plunged in agony, refusing to die, longing to compel God to grant them eternal life. Ah! life, life! that was what all those unfortunates, who had come so far, amid so many obstacles, wanted--that was the one boon they asked for in their wild desire to live it over again, to live it always! O Lord, whatever our misery, whatever the torment of our life may be, cure us, grant that we may begin to live again and suffer once more what we have suffered already. However unhappy we may be, to be is what we wish. It is not heaven that we ask Thee for, it is earth; and grant that we may leave it at the latest possible moment, never leave it, indeed, if such be Thy good pleasure. And even when we no longer implore a physical cure, but a moral favour, it is still happiness that we ask Thee for; happiness, the thirst for which alone consumes us. O Lord, grant that we may be happy and healthy; let us live, ay, let us live forever! This wild cry, the cry of man's furious desire for life, came in broken accents, mingled with tears, from every breast. "O Lord, son of David, heal our sick!" "O Lord, son of David, heal our sick!" Berthaud had twice been obliged to dash forward to prevent the cords from giving way under the unconscious pressure of the crowd. Baron Suire, in despair, kept on making signs, begging someone to come to his assistance; for the Grotto was now invaded, and the march past had become the mere trampling of a flock rushing to its passion. In vain did Gerard again leave Raymonde and post himself at the entrance gate of the iron railing, so as to carry out the orders, which were to admit the pilgrims by tens. He was hustled and swept aside, while with feverish excitement everybody rushed in, passing like a torrent between the flaring candles, throwing bouquets and letters to the Virgin, and kissing the rock, which the pressure of millions of inflamed lips had polished. It was faith run wild, the great power that nothing henceforth could stop. And now, whilst Gerard stood there, hemmed in against the iron railing, he heard two countrywomen, whom the advance was bearing onward, raise loud exclamations at sight of the sufferers lying on the stretchers before them. One of them was so greatly impressed by the pallid face of Brother Isidore, whose large dilated eyes were still fixed on the statue of the Virgin, that she crossed herself, and, overcome by devout admiration, murmured: "Oh! look at that one; see how he is praying with his whole heart, and how he gazes on Our Lady of Lourdes!" The other peasant woman thereupon replied "Oh! she will certainly cure him, he is so beautiful!" Indeed, as the dead man lay there, his eyes still fixedly staring whilst he continued his prayer of love and faith, his appearance touched every heart. No one in that endless, streaming throng could behold him without feeling edified.

3

MARIE'S CURE

IT was good Abbe Judaine who was to carry the Blessed Sacrament in the four-o'clock procession. Since the Blessed Virgin had cured him of a disease of the eyes, a miracle with which the Catholic press still resounded, he had become one of the glories of Lourdes, was given the first place, and honoured with all sorts of attentions. At half-past three he rose, wishing to leave the Grotto, but the extraordinary concourse of people quite frightened him, and he feared he would be late if he did not succeed in getting out of it. Fortunately help came to him in the person of Berthaud. "Monsieur le Cure," exclaimed the superintendent of the bearers, "don't attempt to pass out by way of the Rosary; you would never arrive in time. The best course is to ascend by the winding paths--and come! follow me; I will go before you." By means of his elbows, he thereupon parted the dense throng and opened a path for the priest, who overwhelmed him with thanks. "You are too kind. It's my fault; I had forgotten myself. But, good heavens! how shall we manage to pass with the procession presently?" This procession was Berthaud's remaining anxiety. Even on ordinary days it provoked wild excitement, which forced him to take special measures; and what would now happen, as it wended its way through this dense multitude of thirty thousand persons, consumed by such a fever of faith, already on the verge of divine frenzy? Accordingly, in a sensible way, he took advantage of this opportunity to give Abbe Judaine the best advice. "Ah! Monsieur le Cure, pray impress upon your colleagues of the clergy that they must not leave any space between their ranks; they should come on slowly, one close behind the other. And, above all, the banners should be firmly grasped, so that they may not be overthrown. As for yourself, Monsieur le Cure, see that the canopy-bearers are strong, tighten the cloth around the monstrance, and don't be afraid to carry it in both hands with all your strength." A little frightened by this advice, the priest went on expressing his thanks. "Of course, of course; you are very good," said he. "Ah! monsieur, how much I am indebted to you for having helped me to escape from all those people!" Then, free at last, he hastened towards the Basilica by the narrow serpentine path which climbs the hill; while his companion again plunged into the mob, to return to his post of inspection. At that same moment Pierre, who was bringing Marie to the Grotto in her little cart, encountered on the other side, that of the Place du Rosaire, the impenetrable wall formed by the crowd. The servant at the hotel had awakened him at three o'clock, so that he might go and fetch the young girl at the hospital. There seemed to be no hurry; they apparently had plenty of time to reach the Grotto before the procession. However, that immense throng, that resisting, living wall, through which he did not know how to break, began to cause him some uneasiness. He would never succeed in passing with the little car if the people did not evince some obligingness. "Come, ladies, come!" he appealed. "I beg of you! You see, it's for a patient!" The ladies, hypnotised as they were by the spectacle of the Grotto sparkling in the distance, and standing on tiptoe so as to lose nothing of the sight, did not move, however. Besides, the clamour of the litanies was so loud at this moment that they did not even hear the young priest's entreaties. Then Pierre began again: "Pray stand on one side, gentlemen; allow me to pass. A little room for a sick person. Come, please, listen to what I am saying!" But the men, beside themselves, in a blind, deaf rapture, would stir no more than the women. Marie, however, smiled serenely, as if ignorant of the impediments, and convinced that nothing in the world could prevent her from going to her cure. However, when Pierre had found an aperture, and begun to work his way through the moving mass, the situation became more serious. From all parts the swelling human waves beat against the frail chariot, and at times threatened to submerge it. At each step it became necessary to stop, wait, and again entreat the people. Pierre had never before felt such an anxious sensation in a crowd. True, it was not a threatening mob, it was as innocent as a flock of sheep; but he found a troubling thrill in its midst, a peculiar atmosphere that upset him. And, in spite of his affection for the humble, the ugliness of the features around him, the common, sweating faces, the evil breath, and the old clothes, smelling of poverty, made him suffer even to nausea. "Now, ladies, now, gentlemen, it's for a patient," he repeated. "A little room, I beg of you!" Buffeted about in this vast ocean, the little vehicle continued to advance by fits and starts, taking long minutes to get over a few yards of ground. At one moment you might have thought it swamped, for no sign of it could be detected. Then, however, it reappeared near the piscinas. Tender sympathy had at length been awakened for this sick girl, so wasted by suffering, but still so beautiful. When people had been compelled to give way before the priest's stubborn pushing, they turned round, but did not dare to get angry, for pity penetrated them at sight of that thin, suffering face, shining out amidst a halo of fair hair. Words of compassion and admiration were heard on all sides: "Ah, the poor child!" --"Was it not cruel to be infirm at her age?" --"Might the Blessed Virgin be merciful to her!" Others, however, expressed surprise, struck as they were by the ecstasy in which they saw her, with her clear eyes open to the spheres beyond, where she had placed her hope. She beheld Heaven, she would assuredly be cured. And thus the little car left, as it were, a feeling of wonder and fraternal charity behind it, as it made its way with so much difficulty through that human ocean. Pierre, however, was in despair and at the end of his strength, when some of the stretcher-bearers came to his aid by forming a path for the passage of the procession--a path which Berthaud had ordered them to keep clear by means of cords, which they were to hold at intervals of a couple of yards. From that moment the young priest was able to drag Marie along in a fairly easy manner, and at last place her within the reserved space, where he halted, facing the Grotto on the left side. You could no longer move in this reserved space, where the crowd seemed to increase every minute. And, quite exhausted by the painful journey he had just accomplished, Pierre reflected what a prodigious concourse of people there was; it had seemed to him as if he were in the midst of an ocean, whose waves he had heard heaving around him without a pause. Since leaving the hospital Marie had not opened her lips. He now realised, however, that she wished to speak to him, and accordingly bent over her. "And my father," she inquired, "is he here? Hasn't he returned from his excursion?" Pierre had to answer that M. de Guersaint had not returned, and that he had doubtless been delayed against his will. And thereupon she merely added with a smile: "Ah I poor father, won't he be pleased when he finds me cured!" Pierre looked at her with tender admiration. He did not remember having ever seen her looking so adorable since the slow wasting of sickness had begun. Her hair, which alone disease had respected, clothed her in gold. Her thin, delicate face had assumed a dreamy expression, her eyes wandering away to the haunting thought of her sufferings, her features motionless, as if she had fallen asleep in a fixed thought until the expected shock of happiness should waken her. She was absent from herself, ready, however, to return to consciousness whenever God might will it. And, indeed, this delicious infantile creature, this little girl of three-and-twenty, still a child as when an accident had struck her, delaying her growth, preventing her from becoming a woman, was at last ready to receive the visit of the angel, the miraculous shock which would draw her out of her torpor and set her upright once more. Her morning ecstasy continued; she had clasped her hands, and a leap of her whole being had ravished her from earth as soon as she had perceived the image of the Blessed Virgin yonder. And now she prayed and offered herself divinely. It was an hour of great mental trouble for Pierre. He felt that the drama of his priestly life was about to be enacted, and that if he did not recover faith in this crisis, it would never return to him. And he was without bad thoughts, without resistance, hoping with fervour, he also, that they might both be healed! Oh! that he might be convinced by her cure, that he might believe like her, that they might be saved together! He wished to pray, ardently, as she herself did. But in spite of himself he was preoccupied by the crowd, that limitless crowd, among which he found it so difficult to drown himself, disappear, become nothing more than a leaf in the forest, lost amidst the rustle of all the leaves. He could not prevent himself from analysing and judging it. He knew that for four days past it had been undergoing all the training of suggestion; there had been the fever of the long journey, the excitement of the new landscapes, the days spent before the splendour of the Grotto, the sleepless nights, and all the exasperating suffering, ravenous for illusion. Then, again, there had been the all-besetting prayers, those hymns, those litanies, which agitated it without a pause. Another priest had followed Father Massias in the pulpit, a little thin, dark Abbe, whom Pierre heard hurling appeals to the Virgin and Jesus in a lashing voice which resounded like a whip. Father Massias and Father Fourcade had remained at the foot of the pulpit, and were now directing the cries of the crowd, whose lamentations rose in louder and louder tones beneath the limpid sunlight. The general exaltation had yet increased; it was the hour when the violence done to Heaven at last produced the miracles. All at once a paralytic rose up and walked towards the Grotto, holding his crutch in the air; and this crutch, waving like a flag above the swaying heads, wrung loud applause from the faithful. They were all on the look-out for prodigies, they awaited them with the certainty that they would take place, innumerable and wonderful. Some eyes seemed to behold them, and feverish voices pointed them out. Another woman had been cured! Another! Yet another! A deaf person had heard, a mute had spoken, a consumptive had revived! What, a consumptive? Certainly, that was a daily occurrence! Surprise was no longer possible; you might have certified that an amputated leg was growing again without astonishing anyone. Miracle-working became the actual state of nature, the usual thing, quite commonplace, such was its abundance. The most incredible stories seemed quite simple to those overheated imaginations, given what they expected from the Blessed Virgin. And you should have heard the tales that went about, the quiet affirmations, the expressions of absolute certainty which were exchanged whenever a delirious patient cried out that she was cured. Another! Yet another! However, a piteous voice would at times exclaim: "Ah! she's cured; that one; she's lucky, she is!" Already, at the Verification Office, Pierre had suffered from this credulity of the folk among whom he lived. But here it surpassed everything he could have imagined; and he was exasperated by the extravagant things he heard people say in such a placid fashion, with the open smiles of children. Accordingly he tried to absorb himself in his thoughts and listen to nothing. "O God!" he prayed, "grant that my reason may be annihilated, that I may no longer desire to understand, that I may accept the unreal and impossible." For a moment he thought the spirit of inquiry dead within him, and allowed the cry of supplication to carry him away: "Lord, heal our sick! Lord, heal our sick!" He repeated this appeal with all his charity, clasped his hands, and gazed fixedly at the statue of the Virgin, until he became quite giddy, and imagined that the figure moved. Why should he not return to a state of childhood like the others, since happiness lay in ignorance and falsehood? Contagion would surely end by acting; he would become nothing more than a grain of sand among innumerable other grains, one of the humblest among the humble ones under the millstone, who trouble not about the power that crushes them. But just at that second, when he hoped that he had killed the old man in him, that he had annihilated himself along with his will and intelligence, the stubborn work of thought, incessant and invincible, began afresh in the depths of his brain. Little by little, notwithstanding his efforts to the contrary, he returned to his inquiries, doubted, and sought the truth. What was the unknown force thrown off by this crowd, the vital fluid powerful enough to work the few cures that really occurred? There was here a phenomenon that no physiologist had yet studied. Ought one to believe that a multitude became a single being, as it were, able to increase the power of auto-suggestion tenfold upon itself? Might one admit that, under certain circumstances of extreme exaltation, a multitude became an agent of sovereign will compelling the obedience of matter? That would have explained how sudden cure fell at times upon the most sincerely excited of the throng. The breaths of all of them united in one breath, and the power that acted was a power of consolation, hope, and life. This thought, the outcome of his human charity, filled Pierre with emotion. For another moment he was able to regain possession of himself, and prayed for the cure of all, deeply touched by the belief that he himself might in some degree contribute towards the cure of Marie. But all at once, without knowing what transition of ideas led to it, a recollection returned to him of the medical consultation which he had insisted upon prior to the young girl's departure for Lourdes. The scene rose before him with extraordinary clearness and precision; he saw the room with its grey, blue-flowered wall-paper, and he heard the three doctors discuss and decide. The two who had given certificates diagnosticating paralysis of the marrow spoke discreetly, slowly, like esteemed, well-known, perfectly honourable practitioners; but Pierre still heard the warm, vivacious voice of his cousin Beauclair, the third doctor, a young man of vast and daring intelligence, who was treated coldly by his colleagues as being of an adventurous turn of mind. And at this supreme moment Pierre was surprised to find in his memory things which he did not know were there; but it was only an instance of that singular phenomenon by which it sometimes happens that words scarce listened to, words but imperfectly heard, words stored away in the brain almost in spite of self, will awaken, burst forth, and impose themselves on the mind after they have long been forgotten. And thus it now seemed to him that the very approach of the miracle was bringing him a vision of the conditions under which--according to Beauclair's predictions--the miracle would be accomplished. In vain did Pierre endeavour to drive away this recollection by praying with an increase of fervour. The scene again appeared to him, and the old words rang out, filling his ears like a trumpet-blast. He was now again in the dining-room, where Beauclair and he had shut themselves up after the departure of the two others, and Beauclair recapitulated the history of the malady: the fall from a horse at the age of fourteen; the dislocation and displacement of the organ, with doubtless a slight laceration of the ligaments, whence the weight which the sufferer had felt, and the weakness of the legs leading to paralysis. Then, a slow healing of the disorder, everything returning to its place of itself, but without the pain ceasing. In fact this big, nervous child, whose mind had been so grievously impressed by her accident, was unable to forget it; her attention remained fixed on the part where she suffered, and she could not divert it, so that, even after cure, her sufferings had continued--a neuropathic state, a consecutive nervous exhaustion, doubtless aggravated by accidents due to faulty nutrition as yet imperfectly understood. And further, Beauclair easily explained the contrary and erroneous diagnosis of the numerous doctors who had attended her, and who, as she would not submit to examination, had groped in the dark, some believing in a tumour, and the others, the more numerous, convinced of some lesion of the marrow. He alone, after inquiring into the girl's parentage, had just begun to suspect a simple state of auto-suggestion, in which she had obstinately remained ever since the first violent shock of pain; and among the reasons which he gave for this belief were the contraction of her visual field, the fixity of her eyes, the absorbed, inattentive expression of her face, and above all the nature of the pain she felt, which, leaving the organ, had borne to the left, where it continued in the form of a crushing, intolerable weight, which sometimes rose to the breast in frightful fits of stifling. A sudden determination to throw off the false notion she had formed of her complaint, the will to rise, breathe freely, and suffer no more, could alone place her on her feet again, cured, transfigured, beneath the lash of some intense emotion. A last time did Pierre endeavour to see and hear no more, for he felt that the irreparable ruin of all belief in the miraculous was in him. And, in spite of his efforts, in spite of the ardour with which he began to cry, "Jesus, son of David, heal our sick!" he still saw, he still heard Beauclair telling him, in his calm, smiling manner how the miracle would take place, like a lightning flash, at the moment of extreme emotion, under the decisive circumstance which would complete the loosening of the muscles. The patient would rise and walk in a wild transport of joy, her legs would all at once be light again, relieved of the weight which had so long made them like lead, as though this weight had melted, fallen to the ground. But above all, the weight which bore upon the lower part of the trunk, which rose, ravaged the breast, and strangled the throat, would this time depart in a prodigious soaring flight, a tempest blast bearing all the evil away with it. And was it not thus that, in the Middle Ages, possessed women had by the mouth cast up the Devil, by whom their flesh had so long been tortured? And Beauclair had added that Marie would at last become a woman, that in that moment of supreme joy she would cease to be a child, that although seemingly worn out by her prolonged dream of suffering, she would all at once be restored to resplendent health, with beaming face, and eyes full of life. Pierre looked at her, and his trouble increased still more on seeing her so wretched in her little cart, so distractedly imploring health, her whole being soaring towards Our Lady of Lourdes, who gave life. Ah! might she be saved, at the cost even of his own damnation! But she was too ill; science lied like faith; he could not believe that this child, whose limbs had been dead for so many years, would indeed return to life. And, in the bewildered doubt into which he again relapsed, his bleeding heart clamoured yet more loudly, ever and ever repeating with the delirious crowd: "Lord, son of David, heal our sick! --Lord, son of David, heal our sick!" At that moment a tumult arose agitating one and all. People shuddered, faces were turned and raised. It was the cross of the four-o'clock procession, a little behind time that day, appearing from beneath one of the arches of the monumental gradient way. There was such applause and such violent, instinctive pushing that Berthaud, waving his arms, commanded the bearers to thrust the crowd back by pulling strongly on the cords. Overpowered for a moment, the bearers had to throw themselves backward with sore hands; however, they ended by somewhat enlarging the reserved path, along which the procession was then able to slowly wend its way. At the head came a superb beadle, all blue and gold, followed by the processional cross, a tall cross shining like a star. Then followed the delegations of the different pilgrimages with their banners, standards of velvet and satin, embroidered with metal and bright silk, adorned with painted figures, and bearing the names of towns: Versailles, Rheims, Orleans, Poitiers, and Toulouse. One, which was quite white, magnificently rich, displayed in red letters the inscription "Association of Catholic Working Men's Clubs." Then came the clergy, two or three hundred priests in simple cassocks, about a hundred in surplices, and some fifty clothed in golden chasubles, effulgent like stars. They all carried lighted candles, and sang the "Laudate Sion Salvatorem" in full voices. And then the canopy appeared in royal pomp, a canopy of purple silk, braided with gold, and upheld by four ecclesiastics, who, it could be seen, had been selected from among the most robust. Beneath it, between two other priests who assisted him, was Abbe Judaine, vigorously clasping the Blessed Sacrament with both hands, as Berthaud had recommended him to do; and the somewhat uneasy glances that he cast on the encroaching crowd right and left showed how anxious he was that no injury should befall the heavy divine monstrance, whose weight was already straining his wrists. When the slanting sun fell upon him in front, the monstrance itself looked like another sun. Choir-boys meantime were swinging censers in the blinding glow which gave splendour to the entire procession; and, finally, in the rear, there was a confused mass of pilgrims, a flock-like tramping of believers and sightseers all aflame, hurrying along, and blocking the track with their ever-rolling waves. Father Massias had returned to the pulpit a moment previously; and this time he had devised another pious exercise. After the burning cries of faith, hope, and love that he threw forth, he all at once commanded absolute silence, in order that one and all might, with closed lips, speak to God in secret for a few minutes. These sudden spells of silence falling upon the vast crowd, these minutes of mute prayer, in which all souls unbosomed their secrets, were deeply, wonderfully impressive. Their solemnity became formidable; you heard desire, the immense desire for life, winging its flight on high. Then Father Massias invited the sick alone to speak, to implore God to grant them what they asked of His almighty power. And, in response, came a pitiful lamentation, hundreds of tremulous, broken voices rising amidst a concert of sobs. "Lord Jesus, if it please Thee, Thou canst cure me!" --"Lord Jesus take pity on Thy child, who is dying of love!" --"Lord Jesus, grant that I may see, grant that I may hear, grant that I may walk!" And, all at once, the shrill voice of a little girl, light and vivacious as the notes of a flute, rose above the universal sob, repeating in the distance: "Save the others, save the others, Lord Jesus!" Tears streamed from every eye; these supplications upset all hearts, threw the hardest into the frenzy of charity, into a sublime disorder which would have impelled them to open their breasts with both hands, if by doing so they could have given their neighbours their health and youth. And then Father Massias, not letting this enthusiasm abate, resumed his cries, and again lashed the delirious crowd with them; while Father Fourcade himself sobbed on one of the steps of the pulpit, raising his streaming face to heaven as though to command God to descend on earth. But the procession had arrived; the delegations, the priests, had ranged themselves on the right and left; and, when the canopy entered the space reserved to the sick in front of the Grotto, when the sufferers perceived Jesus the Host, the Blessed Sacrament, shining like a sun, in the hands of Abbe Judaine, it became impossible to direct the prayers, all voices mingled together, and all will was borne away by vertigo. The cries, calls, entreaties broke, lapsing into groans. Human forms rose from pallets of suffering; trembling arms were stretched forth; clenched hands seemingly desired to clutch at the miracle on the way. "Lord Jesus, save us, for we perish!" --"Lord Jesus, we worship Thee; heal us!" --"Lord Jesus, Thou art the Christ, the Son of the living God; heal us!" Thrice did the despairing, exasperated voices give vent to the supreme lamentation in a clamour which rushed up to Heaven; and the tears redoubled, flooding all the burning faces which desire transformed. At one moment, the delirium became so great, the instinctive leap toward the Blessed Sacrament seemed so irresistible, that Berthaud placed the bearers who were there in a chain about it. This was the extreme protective manoeuvre, a hedge of bearers drawn up on either side of the canopy, each placing an arm firmly round his neighbour's neck, so as to establish a sort of living wall. Not the smallest aperture was left in it; nothing whatever could pass. Still, these human barriers staggered under the pressure of the unfortunate creatures who hungered for life, who wished to touch, to kiss Jesus; and, oscillating and recoiling, the bearers were at last thrust against the canopy they were defending, and the canopy itself began swaying among the crowd, ever in danger of being swept away like some holy bark in peril of being wrecked. Then, at the very climax of this holy frenzy, the miracles began amidst supplications and sobs, as when the heavens open during a storm, and a thunderbolt falls on earth. A paralytic woman rose and cast aside her crutches. There was a piercing yell, and another woman appeared erect on her mattress, wrapped in a white blanket as in a winding sheet; and people said it was a half-dead consumptive who had thus been resuscitated. Then grace fell upon two others in quick succession: a blind woman suddenly perceived the Grotto in a flame; a dumb woman fell on both her knees, thanking the Blessed Virgin in a loud, clear voice. And all in a like way prostrated themselves at the feet of Our Lady of Lourdes, distracted with joy and gratitude. But Pierre had not taken his eyes off Marie, and he was overcome with tender emotion at what he saw. The sufferer's eyes were still expressionless, but they had dilated, while her poor, pale face, with its heavy mask, was contracted as if she were suffering frightfully. She did not speak in her despair; she undoubtedly thought that she was again in the clutches of her ailment. But all at once, when the Blessed Sacrament passed by, and she saw the star-like monstrance sparkling in the sun, a sensation of dizziness came over her. She imagined herself struck by lightning. Her eyes caught fire from the glare which flashed upon her, and at last regained their flame of life, shining out like stars. And under the influence of a wave of blood her face became animated, suffused with colour, beaming with a smile of joy and health. And, suddenly, Pierre saw her rise, stand upright in her little car, staggering, stuttering, and finding in her mind only these caressing words: "Oh, my friend! Oh, my friend!" He hurriedly drew near in order to support her. But she drove him back with a gesture. She was regaining strength, looking so touching, so beautiful, in the little black woollen gown and slippers which she always wore; tall and slender, too, and crowned as with a halo of gold by her beautiful flaxen hair, which was covered with a simple piece of lace. The whole of her virgin form was quivering as if some powerful fermentation had regenerated her. First of all, it was her legs that were relieved of the chains that bound them; and then, while she felt the spirit of life--the life of woman, wife, and mother--within her, there came a final agony, an enormous weight that rose to her very throat. Only, this time, it did not linger there, did not stifle her, but burst from her open mouth, and flew away in a cry of sublime joy. "I am cured! --I am cured!" Then there was an extraordinary sight. The blanket lay at her feet, she was triumphant, she had a superb, glowing face. And her cry of cure had resounded with such rapturous delight that the entire crowd was distracted by it. She had become the sole point of interest, the others saw none but her, erect, grown so radiant and so divine. "I am cured! --I am cured!" Pierre, at the violent shock his heart had received, had begun to weep. Indeed, tears glistened again in every eye. Amidst exclamations of gratitude and praise, frantic enthusiasm passed from one to another, throwing the thousands of pilgrims who pressed forward to see into a state of violent emotion. Applause broke out, a fury of applause, whose thunder rolled from one to the other end of the valley. However, Father Fourcade began waving his arms, and Father Massias was at last able to make himself heard from the pulpit: "God has visited us, my dear brothers, my dear sisters!" said he. " /Magnificat anima mea Dominum/, My soul doth magnify the Lord, and my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour." And then all the voices, the thousands of voices, began the chant of adoration and gratitude. The procession found itself at a stand-still. Abbe Judaine had been able to reach the Grotto with the monstrance, but he patiently remained there before giving the Benediction. The canopy was awaiting him outside the railings, surrounded by priests in surplices and chasubles, all a glitter of white and gold in the rays of the setting sun. Marie, however, had knelt down, sobbing; and, whilst the canticle lasted, a burning prayer of faith and love ascended from her whole being. But the crowd wanted to see her walk, delighted women called to her, a group surrounded her, and swept her towards the Verification Office, so that the miracle might be proved true, as patent as the very light of the sun. Her box was forgotten, Pierre followed her, while she, stammering and hesitating, she who for seven years had not used her legs, advanced with adorable awkwardness, the uneasy, charming gait of a little child making its first steps; and it was so affecting, so delicious, that the young priest thought of nothing but the immense happiness of seeing her thus return to her childhood. Ah! the dear friend of infancy, the dear tenderness of long ago, so she would at last be the beautiful and charming woman that she had promised to be as a young girl when, in the little garden at Neuilly, she had looked so gay and pretty beneath the tall trees flecked with sunlight! The crowd continued to applaud her furiously, a huge wave of people accompanied her; and all remained awaiting her egress, swarming in a fever before the door, when she had entered the office, whither Pierre only was admitted with her. That particular afternoon there were few people at the Verification Office. The small square room, with its hot wooden walls and rudimentary furniture, its rush-bottomed chairs, and its two tables of unequal height, contained, apart from the usual staff only some five or six doctors, seated and silent. At the tables were the inspector of the piscinas and two young Abbes making entries in the registers, and consulting the sets of documents; while Father Dargeles, at one end, wrote a paragraph for his newspaper. And, as it happened, Doctor Bonamy was just then examining Elise Rouquet, who, for the third time, had come to have the increasing cicatrisation of her sore certified. "Anyhow, gentlemen," exclaimed the doctor, "have you ever seen a lupus heal in this way so rapidly? I am aware that a new work has appeared on faith healing in which it is stated that certain sores may have a nervous origin. Only that is by no means proved in the case of lupus, and I defy a committee of doctors to assemble and explain mademoiselle's cure by ordinary means." He paused, and turning towards Father Dargeles, inquired: "Have you noted, Father, that the suppuration has completely disappeared, and that the skin is resuming its natural colour?" However, he did not wait for the reply, for just then Marie entered, followed by Pierre; and by her beaming radiance he immediately guessed what good-fortune was befalling him. She looked superb, admirably fitted to transport and convert the multitude. He therefore promptly dismissed Elise Rouquet, inquired the new arrival's name, and asked one of the young priests to look for her papers. Then, as she slightly staggered, he wished to seat her in the arm-chair. "Oh no! oh no!" she exclaimed. "I am so happy to be able to use my legs!" Pierre, with a glance, had sought for Doctor Chassaigne, whom he was sorry not to see there. He remained on one side, waiting while they rummaged in the untidy drawers without being able to place their hands on the required papers. "Let's see," repeated Dr. Bonamy; "Marie de Guersaint, Marie de Guersaint. I have certainly seen that name before." At last Raboin discovered the documents classified under a wrong letter; and when the doctor had perused the two medical certificates he became quite enthusiastic. "Here is something very interesting, gentlemen," said he. "I beg you to listen attentively. This young lady, whom you see standing here, was afflicted with a very serious lesion of the marrow. And, if one had the least doubt of it, these two certificates would suffice to convince the most incredulous, for they are signed by two doctors of the Paris faculty, whose names are well known to us all." Then he passed the certificates to the doctors present, who read them, wagging their heads the while. It was beyond dispute; the medical men who had drawn up these documents enjoyed the reputation of being honest and clever practitioners. "Well, gentlemen, if the diagnosis is not disputed--and it cannot be when a patient brings us documents of this value--we will now see what change has taken place in the young lady's condition." However, before questioning her he turned towards Pierre. "Monsieur l'Abbe," said he, "you came from Paris with Mademoiselle de Guersaint, I think. Did you converse with the doctors before your departure?" The priest shuddered amidst all his great delight. "I was present at the consultation, monsieur," he replied. And again the scene rose up before him. He once more saw the two doctors, so serious and rational, and he once more saw Beauclair smiling, while his colleagues drew up their certificates, which were identical. And was he, Pierre, to reduce these certificates to nothing, reveal the other diagnosis, the one that allowed of the cure being explained scientifically? The miracle had been predicted, shattered beforehand. "You will observe, gentlemen," now resumed Dr. Bonamy, "that the presence of the Abbe gives these proofs additional weight. However, mademoiselle will now tell us exactly what she felt." He had leant over Father Dargeles's shoulder to impress upon him that he must not forget to make Pierre play the part of a witness in the narrative. " /Mon Dieu/! gentlemen, how can I tell you?" exclaimed Marie in a halting voice, broken by her surging happiness. "Since yesterday I had felt certain that I should be cured. And yet, a little while ago, when the pins and needles seized me in the legs again, I was afraid it might only be another attack. For an instant I doubted. Then the feeling stopped. But it began again as soon as I recommenced praying. Oh! I prayed, I prayed with all my soul! I ended by surrendering myself like a child. 'Blessed Virgin, Our Lady of Lourdes, do with me as thou wilt,' I said. But the feeling did not cease, it seemed as if my blood were boiling; a voice cried to me: 'Rise! Rise!' And I felt the miracle fall on me in a cracking of all my bones, of all my flesh, as if I had been struck by lightning." Pierre, very pale, listened to her. Beauclair had positively told him that the cure would come like a lightning flash, that under the influence of extreme excitement a sudden awakening of will so long somnolent would take place within her. "It was my legs which the Holy Virgin first of all delivered," she continued. "I could well feel that the iron bands which bound them were gliding along my skin like broken chains. Then the weight which still suffocated me, there, in the left side, began to ascend; and I thought I was going to die, it hurt me so. But it passed my chest, it passed my throat, and I felt it there in my mouth, and spat it out violently. It was all over, I no longer had any pain, it had flown away!" She had made a gesture expressive of the motion of a night bird beating its wings, and, lapsing into silence, stood smiling at Pierre, who was bewildered. Beauclair had told him all that beforehand, using almost the same words and the same imagery. Point by point, his prognostics were realised, there was nothing more in the case than natural phenomena, which had been foreseen. Raboin, however, had followed Marie's narrative with dilated eyes and the passion of a pietist of limited intelligence, ever haunted by the idea of hell. "It was the devil," he cried; "it was the devil that she spat out!" Doctor Bonamy, who was more wary, made him hold his tongue. And turning towards the doctors he said: "Gentlemen, you know that we always avoid pronouncing the big word of miracle here. Only here is a fact, and I am curious to know how any of you can explain it by natural means. Seven years ago this young lady was struck with serious paralysis, evidently due to a lesion of the marrow. And that cannot be denied; the certificates are there, irrefutable. She could no longer walk, she could no longer make a movement without a cry of pain, she had reached that extreme state of exhaustion which precedes but by little an unfortunate issue. All at once, however, here she rises, walks, laughs, and beams on us. The paralysis has completely disappeared, no pain remains, she is as well as you and I. Come, gentlemen, approach, examine her, and tell me what has happened." He triumphed. Not one of the doctors spoke. Two, who were doubtless true Catholics, had shown their approval of his speech by their vigorous nods, while the others remained motionless, with a constrained air, not caring to mix themselves up in the business. However, a little thin man, whose eyes shone behind the glasses he was wearing, ended by rising to take a closer look at Marie. He caught hold of her hand, examined the pupils of her eyes, and merely seemed preoccupied by the air of transfiguration which she wore. Then, in a very courteous manner, without even showing a desire to discuss the matter, he came back and sat down again. "The case is beyond science, that is all I can assume," concluded Doctor Bonamy, victoriously. "I will add that we have no convalescence here; health is at once restored, full, entire. Observe the young lady. Her eyes are bright, her colour is rosy, her physiognomy has recovered its lively gaiety. Without doubt, the healing of the tissues will proceed somewhat slowly, but one can already say that mademoiselle has been born again. Is it not so, Monsieur l'Abbe, you who have seen her so frequently; you no longer recognise her, eh?" "That's true, that's true," stammered Pierre. And, in fact, she already appeared strong to him, her cheeks full and fresh, gaily blooming. But Beauclair had also foreseen this sudden joyful change, this straightening and resplendency of her invalid frame, when life should re-enter it, with the will to be cured and be happy. Once again, however, had Doctor Bonamy leant over Father Dargeles, who was finishing his note, a brief but fairly complete account of the affair. They exchanged a few words in low tones, consulting together, and the doctor ended by saying: "You have witnessed these marvels, Monsieur l'Abbe, so you will not refuse to sign the careful report which the reverend Father has drawn up for publication in the 'Journal de la Grotte.'" He--Pierre--sign that page of error and falsehood! A revolt roused him, and he was on the point of shouting out the truth. But he felt the weight of his cassock on his shoulders; and, above all, Marie's divine joy filled his heart. He was penetrated with deep happiness at seeing her saved. Since they had ceased questioning her she had come and leant on his arm, and remained smiling at him with eyes full of enthusiasm. "Oh, my, friend, thank the Blessed Virgin!" she murmured in a low voice. "She has been so good to me; I am now so well, so beautiful, so young! And how pleased my father, my poor father, will be!" Then Pierre signed. Everything was collapsing within him, but it was enough that she should be saved; he would have thought it sacrilegious to interfere with the faith of that child, the great pure faith which had healed her. When Marie reappeared outside the office, the applause began afresh, the crowd clapped their hands. It now seemed that the miracle was official. However, certain charitable persons, fearing that she might again fatigue herself and again require her little car, which she had abandoned before the Grotto, had brought it to the office, and when she found it there she felt deeply moved. Ah! that box in which she had lived so many years, that rolling coffin in which she had sometimes imagined herself buried alive, how many tears, how much despair, how many bad days it had witnessed! And, all at once, the idea occurred to her that it had so long been linked with her sufferings, it ought also to share her triumph. It was a sudden inspiration, a kind of holy folly, that made her seize the handle. At that moment the procession passed by, returning from the Grotto, where Abbe Judaine had pronounced the Benediction. And thereupon Marie, dragging the little car, placed herself behind the canopy. And, in her slippers, her head covered with a strip of lace, her bosom heaving, her face erect, glowing, and superb, she walked on behind the clergy, dragging after her that car of misery, that rolling coffin, in which she had endured so much agony. And the crowd which acclaimed her, the frantic crowd, followed in her wake.

4

TRIUMPH--DESPAIR

PIERRE also had followed Marie, and like her was behind the canopy, carried along as it were by the blast of glory which made her drag her little car along in triumph. Every moment, however, there was so much tempestuous pushing that the young priest would assuredly have fallen if a rough hand had not upheld him. "Don't be alarmed," said a voice; "give me your arm, otherwise you won't be able to remain on your feet." Pierre turned round, and was surprised to recognise Father Massias, who had left Father Fourcade in the pulpit in order to accompany the procession. An extraordinary fever was sustaining him, throwing him forward, as solid as a rock, with eyes glowing like live coals, and an excited face covered with perspiration. "Take care, then!" he again exclaimed; "give me your arm." A fresh human wave had almost swept them away. And Pierre now yielded to the support of this terrible enthusiast, whom he remembered as a fellow-student at the seminary. What a singular meeting it was, and how greatly he would have liked to possess that violent faith, that mad faith, which was making Massias pant, with his throat full of sobs, whilst he continued giving vent to the ardent entreaty "Lord Jesus, heal our sick! Lord Jesus, heal our sick!" There was no cessation of this cry behind the canopy, where there was always a crier whose duty it was to accord no respite to the slow clemency of Heaven. At times a thick voice full of anguish, and at others a shrill and piercing voice, would arise. The Father's, which was an imperious one, was now at last breaking through sheer emotion. "Lord Jesus, heal our sick! Lord Jesus, heal our sick!" The rumour of Marie's wondrous cure, of the miracle whose fame would speedily fill all Christendom, had already spread from one to the other end of Lourdes; and from this had come the increased vertigo of the multitude, the attack of contagious delirium which now caused it to whirl and rush toward the Blessed Sacrament like the resistless flux of a rising tide. One and all yielded to the desire of beholding the Sacrament and touching it, of being cured and becoming happy. The Divinity was passing; and now it was not merely a question of ailing beings glowing with a desire for life, but a longing for happiness which consumed all present and raised them up with bleeding, open hearts and eager hands. Berthaud, who feared the excesses of this religious adoration, had decided to accompany his men. He commanded them, carefully watching over the double chain of bearers beside the canopy in order that it might not be broken. "Close your ranks--closer--closer!" he called, "and keep your arms firmly linked!" These young men, chosen from among the most vigorous of the bearers, had an extremely difficult duty to discharge. The wall which they formed, shoulder to shoulder, with arms linked at the waist and the neck, kept on giving way under the involuntary assaults of the throng. Nobody, certainly, fancied that he was pushing, but there was constant eddying, and deep waves of people rolled towards the procession from afar and threatened to submerge it. When the canopy had reached the middle of the Place du Rosaire, Abbe Judaine really thought that he would be unable to go any farther. Numerous conflicting currents had set in over the vast expanse, and were whirling, assailing him from all sides, so that he had to halt under the swaying canopy, which shook like a sail in a sudden squall on the open sea. He held the Blessed Sacrament aloft with his numbed hands, each moment fearing that a final push would throw him over; for he fully realised that the golden monstrance, radiant like a sun, was the one passion of all that multitude, the Divinity they demanded to kiss, in order that they might lose themselves in it, even though they should annihilate it in doing so. Accordingly, while standing there, the priest anxiously turned his eyes on Berthaud. "Let nobody pass!" called the latter to the bearers--"nobody! The orders are precise; you hear me?" Voices, however, were rising in supplication on all sides, wretched beings were sobbing with arms outstretched and lips protruding, in the wild desire that they might be allowed to approach and kneel at the priest's feet. What divine grace it would be to be thrown upon the ground and trampled under foot by the whole procession! * An infirm old man displayed his withered hand in the conviction that it would be made sound again were he only allowed to touch the monstrance. A dumb woman wildly pushed her way through the throng with her broad shoulders, in order that she might loosen her tongue by a kiss. Others were shouting, imploring, and even clenching their fists in their rage with those cruel men who denied cure to their bodily sufferings and their mental wretchedness. The orders to keep them back were rigidly enforced, however, for the most serious accidents were feared. * One is here irresistibly reminded of the car of Juggernaut, and of the Hindoo fanatics throwing themselves beneath its wheels in the belief that they would thus obtain an entrance into Paradise. --Trans. "Nobody, nobody!" repeated Berthaud; "let nobody whatever pass!" There was a woman there, however, who touched every heart with compassion. Clad in wretched garments, bareheaded, her face wet with tears, she was holding in her arms a little boy of ten years or so, whose limp, paralysed legs hung down inertly. The lad's weight was too great for one so weak as herself, still she did not seem to feel it. She had brought the boy there, and was now entreating the bearers with an invincible obstinacy which neither words nor hustling could conquer. At last, as Abbe Judaine, who felt deeply moved, beckoned to her to approach, two of the bearers, in deference to his compassion, drew apart, despite all the danger of opening a breach, and the woman then rushed forward with her burden, and fell in a heap before the priest. For a moment he rested the foot of the monstrance on the child's head, and the mother herself pressed her eager, longing lips to it; and, as they started off again, she wished to remain behind the canopy, and followed the procession, with streaming hair and panting breast, staggering the while under the heavy burden, which was fast exhausting her strength. They managed, with great difficulty, to cross the remainder of the Place du Rosaire, and then the ascent began, the glorious ascent by way of the monumental incline; whilst upon high, on the fringe of heaven, the Basilica reared its slim spire, whence pealing bells were winging their flight, sounding the triumphs of Our Lady of Lourdes. And now it was towards an apotheosis that the canopy slowly climbed, towards the lofty portal of the high-perched sanctuary which stood open, face to face with the Infinite, high above the huge multitude whose waves continued soaring across the valley's squares and avenues. Preceding the processional cross, the magnificent beadle, all blue and silver, was already rearing the level of the Rosary cupola, the spacious esplanade formed by the roof of the lower church, across which the pilgrimage deputations began to wind, with their bright-coloured silk and velvet banners waving in the ruddy glow of the sunset. Then came the clergy, the priests in snowy surplices, and the priests in golden chasubles, likewise shining out like a procession of stars. And the censers swung, and the canopy continued climbing, without anything of its bearers being seen, so that it seemed as though a mysterious power, some troop of invisible angels, were carrying it off in this glorious ascension towards the open portal of heaven. A sound of chanting had burst forth; the voices in the procession no longer called for the healing of the sick, now that the /cortege/ had extricated itself from amidst the crowd. The miracle had been worked, and they were celebrating it with the full power of their lungs, amidst the pealing of the bells and the quivering gaiety of the atmosphere. " /Magnificat anima mea Dominum/"--they began. "My soul doth magnify the Lord." 'Twas the song of gratitude, already chanted at the Grotto, and again springing from every heart: "/Et exsultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo/." "And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour." Meantime it was with increasing, overflowing joy that Marie took part in that radiant ascent, by the colossal gradient way, towards the glowing Basilica. It seemed to her, as she continued climbing, that she was growing stronger and stronger, that her legs, so long lifeless, became firmer at each step. The little car which she victoriously dragged behind her was like the earthly tenement of her illness, the /inferno/ whence the Blessed Virgin had extricated her, and although its handle was making her hands sore, she nevertheless wished to pull it up yonder with her, in order that she might cast it at last at the feet of the Almighty. No obstacle could stay her course, she laughed through the big tears which were falling on her cheeks, her bosom was swelling, her demeanour becoming warlike. One of her slippers had become unfastened, and the strip of lace had fallen from her head to her shoulders. Nevertheless, with her lovely fair hair crowning her like a helmet and her face beaming brightly, she still marched on and on with such an awakening of will and strength that, behind her, you could hear her car leap and rattle over the rough slope of the flagstones, as though it had been a mere toy. Near Marie was Pierre, still leaning on the arm of Father Massias, who had not relinquished his hold. Lost amidst the far-spreading emotion, the young priest was unable to reflect. Moreover his companion's sonorous voice quite deafened him. " /Deposuit potentes de sede et exaltavit humiles/." "He hath put down the mighty from their seat, and hath exalted the humble." On Pierre's other side, the right, Berthaud, who no longer had any cause for anxiety, was now also following the canopy. He had given his bearers orders to break their chain, and was gazing with an expression of delight on the human sea through which the procession had lately passed. The higher they the incline, the more did the Place du Rosaire and the avenues and paths of the gardens expand below them, black with the swarming multitude. It was a bird's-eye view of a whole nation, an ant-hill which ever increased in size, spreading farther and farther away. "Look!" Berthaud at last exclaimed to Pierre. "How vast and how beautiful it is! Ah! well, the year won't have been a bad one after all." Looking upon Lourdes as a centre of propaganda, where his political rancour found satisfaction, he always rejoiced when there was a numerous pilgrimage, as in his mind it was bound to prove unpleasant to the Government. Ah! thought he, if they had only been able to bring the working classes of the towns thither, and create a Catholic democracy. "Last year we scarcely reached the figure of two hundred thousand pilgrims," he continued, "but we shall exceed it this year, I hope." And then, with the gay air of the jolly fellow that he was, despite his sectarian passions, he added: "Well, 'pon my word, I was really pleased just now when there was such a crush. Things are looking up, I thought, things are looking up." Pierre, however, was not listening to him; his mind had been struck by the grandeur of the spectacle. That multitude, which spread out more and more as the procession rose higher and higher above it, that magnificent valley which was hollowed out below and ever became more and more extensive, displaying afar off its gorgeous horizon of mountains, filled him with quivering admiration. His mental trouble was increased by it all, and seeking Marie's glance, he waved his arm to draw her attention to the vast circular expanse of country. And his gesture deceived her, for in the purely spiritual excitement that possessed her she did not behold the material spectacle he pointed at, but thought that he was calling earth to witness the prodigious favours which the Blessed Virgin had heaped upon them both; for she imagined that he had had his share of the miracle, and that in the stroke of grace which had set her erect with her flesh healed, he, so near to her that their hearts mingled, had felt himself enveloped and raised by the same divine power, his soul saved from doubt, conquered by faith once more. How could he have witnessed her wondrous cure, indeed, without being convinced? Moreover, she had prayed so fervently for him outside the Grotto on the previous night. And now, therefore, to her excessive delight, she espied him transfigured like herself, weeping and laughing, restored to God again. And this lent increased force to her blissful fever; she dragged her little car along with unwearying hands, and--as though it were their double cross, her own redemption and her friend's redemption which she was carrying up that incline with its resounding flagstones--she would have liked to drag it yet farther, for leagues and leagues, ever higher and higher, to the most inaccessible summits, to the transplendent threshold of Paradise itself. "O Pierre, Pierre!" she stammered, "how sweet it is that this great happiness should have fallen on us together--yes, together! I prayed for it so fervently, and she granted my prayer, and saved you even in saving me. Yes, I felt your soul mingling with my own. Tell me that our mutual prayers have been granted, tell me that I have won your salvation even as you have won mine!" He understood her mistake and shuddered. "If you only knew," she continued, "how great would have been my grief had I thus ascended into light alone. Oh! to be chosen without you, to soar yonder without you! But with you, Pierre, it is rapturous delight! We have been saved together, we shall be happy forever! I feel all needful strength for happiness, yes, strength enough to raise the world!" And in spite of everything, he was obliged to answer her and lie, revolting at the idea of spoiling, dimming that great and pure felicity. "Yes, yes, be happy, Marie," he said, "for I am very happy myself, and all our sufferings are redeemed." But even while he spoke he felt a deep rending within him, as though a brutal hatchet-stroke were parting them forever. Amidst their common sufferings, she had hitherto remained the little friend of childhood's days, the first artlessly loved woman, whom he knew to be still his own, since she could belong to none. But now she was cured, and he remained alone in his hell, repeating to himself that she would never more be his! This sudden thought so upset him that he averted his eyes, in despair at reaping such suffering from the prodigious felicity with which she exulted. However the chant went on, and Father Massias, hearing nothing and seeing nothing, absorbed as he was in his glowing gratitude to God, shouted the final verse in a thundering voice: "/Sicut locutus est ad patres nostros, Abraham, et semini ejus in saecula/." "As He spake to our fathers, to Abraham, and to his seed for ever!" Yet another incline had to be climbed, yet another effort had to be made up that rough acclivity, with its large slippery flagstones. And the procession rose yet higher, and the ascent still went on in the full, bright light. There came a last turn, and the wheels of Marie's car grated against a granite curb. Then, still higher, still and ever higher, did it roll until it finally reached what seemed to be the very fringe of heaven. And all at once the canopy appeared on the summit of the gigantic inclined ways, on the stone balcony overlooking the stretch of country outside the portal of the Basilica. Abbe Judaine stepped forward holding the Blessed Sacrament aloft with both hands. Marie, who had pulled her car up the balcony steps, was near him, her heart beating from her exertion, her face all aglow amidst the gold of her loosened hair. Then all the clergy, the snowy surplices, and the dazzling chasubles ranged themselves behind, whilst the banners waved like bunting decking the white balustrades. And a solemn minute followed. From on high there could have been no grander spectacle. First, immediately below, there was the multitude, the human sea with its dark waves, its heaving billows, now for a moment stilled, amidst which you only distinguished the small pale specks of the faces uplifted towards the Basilica, in expectation of the Benediction; and as far as the eye could reach, from the place du Rosaire to the Gave, along the paths and avenues and across the open spaces, even to the old town in the distance; those little pale faces multiplied and multiplied, all with lips parted, and eyes fixed upon the august heaven was about to open to their gaze. Then the vast amphitheatre of slopes and hills and mountains surged aloft, ascended upon all sides, crests following crests, until they faded away in the far blue atmosphere. The numerous convents among the trees on the first of the northern slopes, beyond the torrent--those of the Carmelites, the Dominicans, the Assumptionists, and the Sisters of Nevers--were coloured by a rosy reflection from the fire-like glow of the sunset. Then wooded masses rose one above the other, until they reached the heights of Le Buala, which were surmounted by the Serre de Julos, in its turn capped by the Miramont. Deep valleys opened on the south, narrow gorges between piles of gigantic rocks whose bases were already steeped in lakes of bluish shadow, whilst the summits sparkled with the smiling farewell of the sun. The hills of Visens upon this side were empurpled, and shewed like a promontory of coral, in front of the stagnant lake of the ether, which was bright with a sapphire-like transparency. But, on the east, in front of you, the horizon again spread out to the very point of intersection of the seven valleys. The castle which had formerly guarded them still stood with its keep, its lofty walls, its black outlines--the outlines of a fierce fortress of feudal time,--upon the rock whose base was watered by the Gave; and upon this side of the stern old pile was the new town, looking quite gay amidst its gardens, with its swarm of white house-fronts, its large hotels, its lodging-houses, and its fine shops, whose windows were glowing like live embers; whilst, behind the castle, the discoloured roofs of old Lourdes spread out in confusion, in a ruddy light which hovered over them like a cloud of dust. At this late hour, when the declining luminary was sinking in royal splendour behind the little Gers and the big Gers, those two huge ridges of bare rock, spotted with patches of short herbage, formed nothing but a neutral, somewhat violet, background, as though, indeed, they were two curtains of sober hue drawn across the margin of the horizon. And higher and still higher, in front of this immensity, did Abbe Judaine with both hands raise the Blessed Sacrament. He moved it slowly from one to the other horizon, causing it to describe a huge sign of the cross against the vault of heaven. He saluted the convents, the heights of Le Buala, the Serre de Julos, and the Miramont, upon his left; he saluted the huge fallen rocks of the dim valleys, and the empurpled hills of Visens, on his right; he saluted the new and the old town, the castle bathed by the Gave, the big and the little Gers, already drowsy, in front of him; and he saluted the woods, the torrents, the mountains, the faint chains linking the distant peaks, the whole earth, even beyond the visible horizon: Peace upon earth, hope and consolation to mankind! The multitude below had quivered beneath that great sign of the cross which enveloped it. It seemed as though a divine breath were passing, rolling those billows of little pale faces which were as numerous as the waves of an ocean. A loud murmur of adoration ascended; all those parted lips proclaimed the glory of God when, in the rays of the setting sun, the illumined monstrance again shone forth like another sun, a sun of pure gold, describing the sign of the cross in streaks of flame upon the threshold of the Infinite. The banners, the clergy, with Abbe Judaine under the canopy, were already returning to the Basilica, when Marie, who was also entering it, still dragging her car by the handle, was stopped by two ladies, who kissed her, weeping. They were Madame de Jonquiere and her daughter Raymonde, who had come thither to witness the Benediction, and had been told of the miracle. "Ah! my dear child, what happiness!" repeated the lady-hospitaller; "and how proud I am to have you in my ward! It is so precious a favour for all of us that the Blessed Virgin should have been pleased to select you." Raymonde, meanwhile, had kept one of the young girl's hands in her own. "Will you allow me to call you my friend, mademoiselle?" said she. "I felt so much pity for you, and I am now so pleased to see you walking, so strong and beautiful already. Let me kiss you again. It will bring me happiness." "Thank you, thank you with all my heart," Marie stammered amidst her rapture. "I am so happy, so very happy!" "Oh! we will not leave you," resumed Madame de Jonquiere. "You hear me, Raymonde? We must follow her, and kneel beside her, and we will take her back after the ceremony." Thereupon the two ladies joined the /cortege/, and, following the canopy, walked beside Pierre and Father Massias, between the rows of chairs which the deputations already occupied, to the very centre of the choir. The banners alone were allowed on either side of the high altar; but Marie advanced to its steps, still dragging her car, whose wheels resounded over the flagstones. She had at last brought it to the spot whither the sacred madness of her desire had longingly impelled her to drag it. She had brought it, indeed, woeful, wretched-looking as it was, into the splendour of God's house, so that it might there testify to the truth of the miracle. The threshold had scarcely been crossed when the organs burst into a hymn of triumph, the sonorous acclamation of a happy people, from amidst which there soon arose a celestial, angelic voice, of joyful shrillness and crystalline purity. Abbe Judaine had placed the Blessed Sacrament upon the altar, and the crowd was streaming into the nave, each taking a seat, installing him or herself in a corner, pending the commencement of the ceremony. Marie had at once fallen on her knees between Madame de Jonquiere and Raymonde, whose eyes were moist with tender emotion; whilst Father Massias, exhausted by the extraordinary tension of the nerves which had been sustaining him ever since his departure from the Grotto, had sunk upon the ground, sobbing, with his head between his hands. Behind him Pierre and Berthaud remained standing, the latter still busy with his superintendence, his eyes ever on the watch, seeing that good order was preserved even during the most violent outbursts of emotion. Then, amidst all his mental confusion, increased by the deafening strains of the organ, Pierre raised his head and examined the interior of the Basilica. The nave was narrow and lofty, and streaked with bright colours, which numerous windows flooded with light. There were scarcely any aisles; they were reduced to the proportions of a mere passage running between the side-chapels and the clustering columns, and this circumstance seemed to increase the slim loftiness of the nave, the soaring of the stonework in perpendicular lines of infantile, graceful slenderness. A gilded railing, as transparent as lace, closed the choir, where the high altar, of white marble richly sculptured, arose in all its lavish chasteness. But the feature of the building which astonished you was the mass of extraordinary ornamentation which transformed the whole of it into an overflowing exhibition of embroidery and jewellery. What with all the banners and votive offerings, the perfect river of gifts which had flowed into it and remained clinging to its walls in a stream of gold and silver, velvet and silk, covering it from top to bottom, it was, so to say, the ever-glowing sanctuary of gratitude, whose thousand rich adornments seemed to be chanting a perpetual canticle of faith and thankfulness. The banners, in particular, abounded, as innumerable as the leaves of trees. Some thirty hung from the vaulted roof, whilst others were suspended, like pictures, between the little columns around the triforium. And others, again, displayed themselves on the walls, waved in the depths of the side-chapels, and encompassed the choir with a heaven of silk, satin, and velvet. You could count them by hundreds, and your eyes grew weary of admiring them. Many of them were quite celebrated, so renowned for their skilful workmanship that talented embroideresses took the trouble to come to Lourdes on purpose to examine them. Among these were the banner of our Lady of Fourvieres, bearing the arms of the city of Lyons; the banner of Alsace, of black velvet embroidered with gold; the banner of Lorraine, on which you beheld the Virgin casting her cloak around two children; and the white and blue banner of Brittany, on which bled the sacred heart of Jesus in the midst of a halo. All empires and kingdoms of the earth were represented; the most distant lands--Canada, Brazil, Chili, Haiti--here had their flags, which, in all piety, were being offered as a tribute of homage to the Queen of Heaven. Then, after the banners, there were other marvels, the thousands and thousands of gold and silver hearts which were hanging everywhere, glittering on the walls like stars in the heavens. Some were grouped together in the form of mystical roses, others described festoons and garlands, others, again, climbed up the pillars, surrounded the windows, and constellated the deep, dim chapels. Below the triforium somebody had had the ingenious idea of employing these hearts to trace in tall letters the various words which the Blessed Virgin had addressed to Bernadette; and thus, around the nave, there extended a long frieze of words, the delight of the infantile minds which busied themselves with spelling them. It was a swarming, a prodigious resplendency of hearts, whose infinite number deeply impressed you when you thought of all the hands, trembling with gratitude, which had offered them. Moreover, the adornments comprised many other votive offerings, and some of quite an unexpected description. There were bridal wreaths and crosses of honour, jewels and photographs, chaplets, and even spurs, in glass cases or frames. There were also the epaulets and swords of officers, together with a superb sabre, left there in memory of a miraculous conversion. But all this was not sufficient; other riches, riches of every kind, shone out on all sides--marble statues, diadems enriched with brilliants, a marvellous carpet designed at Blois and embroidered by ladies of all parts of France, and a golden palm with ornaments of enamel, the gift of the sovereign pontiff. The lamps suspended from the vaulted roof, some of them of massive gold and the most delicate workmanship, were also gifts. They were too numerous to be counted, they studded the nave with stars of great price. Immediately in front of the tabernacle there was one, a masterpiece of chasing, offered by Ireland. Others--one from Lille, one from Valence, one from Macao in far-off China--were veritable jewels, sparkling with precious stones. And how great was the resplendency when the choir's score of chandeliers was illumined, when the hundreds of lamps and the hundreds of candles burned all together, at the great evening ceremonies! The whole church then became a conflagration, the thousands of gold and silver hearts reflecting all the little flames with thousands of fiery scintillations. It was like a huge and wondrous brasier; the walls streamed with live flakes of light; you seemed to be entering into the blinding glory of Paradise itself; whilst on all sides the innumerable banners spread out their silk, their satin, and their velvet, embroidered with sanguifluous sacred hearts, victorious saints, and Virgins whose kindly smiles engendered miracles. Ah! how many ceremonies had already displayed their pomp in that Basilica! Worship, prayer, chanting, never ceased there. From one end of the year to the other incense smoked, organs roared, and kneeling multitudes prayed there with their whole souls. Masses, vespers, sermons, were continually following one upon another; day by day the religious exercises began afresh, and each festival of the Church was celebrated with unparalleled magnificence. The least noteworthy anniversary supplied a pretext for pompous solemnities. Each pilgrimage was granted its share of the dazzling resplendency. It was necessary that those suffering ones and those humble ones who had come from such long distances should be sent home consoled and enraptured, carrying with them a vision of Paradise espied through its opening portals. They beheld the luxurious surroundings of the Divinity, and would forever remain enraptured by the sight. In the depths of bare, wretched rooms, indeed, by the side of humble pallets of suffering throughout all Christendom, a vision of the Basilica with its blazing riches continually arose like a vision of fortune itself, like a vision of the wealth of that life to be, into which the poor would surely some day enter after their long, long misery in this terrestrial sphere. Pierre, however, felt no delight; no consolation, no hope, came to him as he gazed upon all the splendour. His frightful feeling of discomfort was increasing, all was becoming black within him, with that blackness of the tempest which gathers when men's thoughts and feelings pant and shriek. He had felt immense desolation rising in his soul ever since Marie, crying that she was healed, had risen from her little car and walked along with such strength and fulness of life. Yet he loved her like a passionately attached brother, and had experienced unlimited happiness on seeing that she no longer suffered. Why, therefore, should her felicity bring him such agony? He could now no longer gaze at her, kneeling there, radiant amidst her tears, with beauty recovered and increased, without his poor heart bleeding as from some mortal wound. Still he wished to remain there, and so, averting his eyes, he tried to interest himself in Father Massias, who was still shaking with violent sobbing on the flagstones, and whose prostration and annihilation, amidst the consuming illusion of divine love, he sorely envied. For a moment, moreover, he questioned Berthaud, feigning to admire some banner and requesting information respecting it. "Which one?" asked the superintendent of the bearers; "that lace banner over there?" "Yes, that one on the left." "Oh! it is a banner offered by Le Puy. The arms are those of Le Puy and Lourdes linked together by the Rosary. The lace is so fine that if you crumpled the banner up, you could hold it in the hollow of your hand." However, Abbe Judaine was now stepping forward; the ceremony was about to begin. Again did the organs resound, and again was a canticle chanted, whilst, on the altar, the Blessed Sacrament looked like the sovereign planet amidst the scintillations of the gold and silver hearts, as innumerable as stars. And then Pierre lacked the strength to remain there any longer. Since Marie had Madame de Jonquiere and Raymonde with her, and they would accompany her back, he might surely go off by himself, vanish into some shadowy corner, and there, at last, vent his grief. In a few words he excused himself, giving his appointment with Doctor Chassaigne as a pretext for his departure. However, another fear suddenly came to him, that of being unable to leave the building, so densely did the serried throng of believers bar the open doorway. But immediately afterwards he had an inspiration, and, crossing the sacristy, descended into the crypt by the narrow interior stairway. Deep silence and sepulchral gloom suddenly succeeded to the joyous chants and prodigious radiance of the Basilica above. Cut in the rock, the crypt formed two narrow passages, parted by a massive block of stone which upheld the nave, and conducting to a subterranean chapel under the apse, where some little lamps remained burning both day and night. A dim forest of pillars rose up there, a mystic terror reigned in that semi-obscurity where the mystery ever quivered. The chapel walls remained bare, like the very stones of the tomb, in which all men must some day sleep the last sleep. And along the passages, against their sides, covered from top to bottom with marble votive offerings, you only saw a double row of confessionals; for it was here, in the lifeless tranquillity of the bowels of the earth, that sins were confessed; and there were priests, speaking all languages, to absolve the sinners who came thither from the four corners of the world. At that hour, however, when the multitude was thronging the Basilica above, the crypt had become quite deserted. Not a soul, save Pierre's, throbbed there ever so faintly; and he, amidst that deep silence, that darkness, that coolness of the grave, fell upon his knees. It was not, however, through any need of prayer and worship, but because his whole being was giving way beneath his crushing mental torment. He felt a torturing longing to be able to see clearly within himself. Ah! why could he not plunge even more deeply into the heart of things, reflect, understand, and at last calm himself. And it was a fearful agony that he experienced. He tried to remember all the minutes that had gone by since Marie, suddenly springing from her pallet of wretchedness, had raised her cry of resurrection. Why had he even then, despite his fraternal joy in seeing her erect, felt such an awful sensation of discomfort, as though, indeed, the greatest of all possible misfortunes had fallen upon him? Was he jealous of the divine grace? Did he suffer because the Virgin, whilst healing her, had forgotten him, whose soul was so afflicted? He remembered how he had granted himself a last delay, fixed a supreme appointment with Faith for the moment when the Blessed Sacrament should pass by, were Marie only cured; and she was cured, and still he did not believe, and henceforth there was no hope, for never, never would he be able to believe. Therein lay the bare, bleeding sore. The truth burst upon him with blinding cruelty and certainty--she was saved, he was lost. That pretended miracle which had restored her to life had, in him, completed the ruin of all belief in the supernatural. That which he had, for a moment, dreamed of seeking, and perhaps finding, at Lourdes,--naive faith, the happy faith of a little child,--was no longer possible, would never bloom again after that collapse of the miraculous, that cure which Beauclair had foretold, and which had afterwards come to pass, exactly as had been predicted. Jealous! No--he was not jealous; but he was ravaged, full of mortal sadness at thus remaining all alone in the icy desert of his intelligence, regretting the illusion, the lie, the divine love of the simpleminded, for which henceforth there was no room in his heart. A flood of bitterness stifled him, and tears started from his eyes. He had slipped on to the flagstones, prostrated by his anguish. And, by degrees, he remembered the whole delightful story, from the day when Marie, guessing how he was tortured by doubt, had become so passionately eager for his conversion, taking hold of his hand in the gloom, retaining it in her own, and stammering that she would pray for him--oh! pray for him with her whole soul. She forgot herself, she entreated the Blessed Virgin to save her friend rather than herself if there were but one grace that she could obtain from her Divine Son. Then came another memory, the memory of the delightful hours which they had spent together amid the dense darkness of the trees during the night procession. There, again, they had prayed for one another, mingled one in the other with so ardent a desire for mutual happiness that, for a moment, they had attained to the very depths of the love which gives and immolates itself. And now their long, tear-drenched tenderness, their pure idyl of suffering, was ending in this brutal separation; she on her side saved, radiant amidst the hosannas of the triumphant Basilica; and he lost, sobbing with wretchedness, bowed down in the depths of the dark crypt in an icy, grave-like solitude. It was as though he had just lost her again, and this time forever and forever. All at once Pierre felt the sharp stab which this thought dealt his heart. He at last understood his pain--a sudden light illumined the terrible crisis of woe amidst which he was struggling. He had lost Marie for the first time on the day when he had become a priest, saying to himself that he might well renounce his manhood since she, stricken in her sex by incurable illness, would never be a woman. But behold! she /was/ cured. Behold! she /had/ become a woman. She had all at once appeared to him very strong, very beautiful, living, and desirable. He, who was dead, however, could not become a man again. Never more would he be able to raise the tombstone which crushed and imprisoned his flesh. She fled away alone, leaving him in the cold grave. The whole wide world was opening before her with smiling happiness, with the love which laughs in the sunlit paths, with the husband, with children, no doubt. Whereas he, buried, as it were to his shoulders, had naught of his body free, save his brain, and that remained free, no doubt, in order that he might suffer the more. She had still been his so long as she had not belonged to another; and if he had been enduring such agony during the past hour, it was only through this final rending which, this time, parted her from him forever and forever. Then rage shook Pierre from head to foot. He was tempted to return to the Basilica, and cry the truth aloud to Marie. The miracle was a lie! The helpful beneficence of an all-powerful Divinity was but so much illusion! Nature alone had acted, life had conquered once again. And he would have given proofs: he would have shown how life, the only sovereign, worked for health amid all the sufferings of this terrestrial sphere. And then they would have gone off together; they would have fled far, far away, that they might be happy. But a sudden terror took possession of him. What! lay hands upon that little spotless soul, kill all belief in it, fill it with the ruins which worked such havoc in his own soul? It all at once occurred to him that this would be odious sacrilege. He would afterwards become horrified with himself, he would look upon himself as her murderer were he some day to realise that he was unable to give her a happiness equal to that which she would have lost. Perhaps, too, she would not believe him. And, moreover, would she ever consent to marry a priest who had broken his vows? She who would always retain the sweet and never-to be-forgotten memory of how she had been healed in ecstasy! His design then appeared to him insane, monstrous, polluting. And his revolt rapidly subsided, until he only retained a feeling of infinite weariness, a sensation of a burning, incurable wound--the wound of his poor, bruised, lacerated heart. Then, however, amidst his abandonment, the void in which he was whirling, a supreme struggle began, filling him again with agony. What should he do? His sufferings made a coward of him, and he would have liked to flee, so that he might never see Marie again. For he understood very well that he would now have to lie to her, since she thought that he was saved like herself, converted, healed in soul, even as she had been healed in body. She had told him of her joy while dragging her car up the colossal gradient way. Oh! to have had that great happiness together, together; to have felt their hearts melt and mingle one in the other! And even then he had already lied, as he would always be obliged to lie in order that he might not spoil her pure and blissful illusion. He let the last throbbings of his veins subside, and vowed that he would find sufficient strength for the sublime charity of feigning peacefulness of soul, the rapture of one who is redeemed. For he wished her to be wholly happy--without a regret, without a doubt--in the full serenity of faith, convinced that the blessed Virgin had indeed given her consent to their purely mystical union. What did his torments matter? Later on, perhaps, he might recover possession of himself. Amidst his desolate solitude of mind would there not always be a little joy to sustain him, all that joy whose consoling falsity he would leave to her? Several minutes again elapsed, and Pierre, still overwhelmed, remained on the flagstones, seeking to calm his fever. He no longer thought, he no longer lived; he was a prey to that prostration of the entire being which follows upon great crises. But, all at once, he fancied he could hear a sound of footsteps, and thereupon he painfully rose to his feet, and feigned to be reading the inscriptions graven in the marble votive slabs along the walls. He had been mistaken--nobody was there; nevertheless, seeking to divert his mind, he continued perusing the inscriptions, at first in a mechanical kind of way, and then, little by little, feeling a fresh emotion steal over him. The sight was almost beyond imagination. Faith, love, and gratitude displayed themselves in a hundred, a thousand ways on these marble slabs with gilded lettering. Some of the inscriptions were so artless as to provoke a smile. A colonel had sent a sculptured representation of his foot with the words: "Thou hast preserved it; grant that it may serve Thee." Farther on you read the line: "May Her protection extend to the glass trade." And then, by the frankness of certain expressions of thanks, you realised of what a strange character the appeals had been. "To Mary the Immaculate," ran one inscription, "from a father of a family, in recognition of health restored, a lawsuit won, and advancement gained." However, the memory of these instances faded away amidst the chorus of soaring, fervent cries. There was the cry of the lovers: "Paul and Anna entreat Our Lady of Lourdes to bless their union." There was the cry of the mothers in various forms: "Gratitude to Mary, who has thrice healed my child." --"Gratitude to Mary for the birth of Antoinette, whom I dedicate, like myself and all my kin, to Her." --"P. D., three years old, has been preserved to the love of his parents." And then came the cry of the wives, the cry, too, of the sick restored to health, and of the souls restored to happiness: "Protect my husband; grant that my husband may enjoy good health." --"I was crippled in both legs, and now I am healed." --"We came, and now we hope." --"I prayed, I wept, and She heard me." And there were yet other cries, cries whose veiled glow conjured up thoughts of long romances: "Thou didst join us together; protect us, we pray Thee." --"To Mary, for the greatest of all blessings." And the same cries, the same words--gratitude, thankfulness, homage, acknowledgment,--occurred again and again, ever with the same passionate fervour. All! those hundreds, those thousands of cries which were forever graven on that marble, and from the depths of the crypt rose clamorously to the Virgin, proclaiming the everlasting devotion of the unhappy beings whom she had succoured. Pierre did not weary of reading them, albeit his mouth was bitter and increasing desolation was filling him. So it was only he who had no succour to hope for! When so many sufferers were listened to, he alone had been unable to make himself heard! And he now began to think of the extraordinary number of prayers which must be said at Lourdes from one end of the year to the other. He tried to cast them up; those said during the days spent at the Grotto and during the nights spent at the Rosary, those said at the ceremonies at the Basilica, and those said at the sunlight and the starlight processions. But this continual entreaty of every second was beyond computation. It seemed as if the faithful were determined to weary the ears of the Divinity, determined to extort favours and forgiveness by the very multitude, the vast multitude of their prayers. The priests said that it was necessary to offer to God the acts of expiation which the sins of France required, and that when the number of these acts of expiation should be large enough, God would smite France no more. What a harsh belief in the necessity of chastisement! What a ferocious idea born of the gloomiest pessimism! How evil life must be if it were indeed necessary that such imploring cries, such cries of physical and moral wretchedness, should ever and ever ascend to Heaven! In the midst of all his sadness, Pierre felt deep compassion penetrate his heart. He was upset by the thought that mankind should be so wretched, reduced to such a state of woe, so bare, so weak, so utterly forsaken, that it renounced its own reason to place the one sole possibility of happiness in the hallucinatory intoxication of dreams. Tears once more filled his eyes; he wept for himself and for others, for all the poor tortured beings who feel a need of stupefying and numbing their pains in order to escape from the realities of the world. He again seemed to hear the swarming, kneeling crowd of the Grotto, raising the glowing entreaty of its prayer to Heaven, the multitude of twenty and thirty thousand souls from whose midst ascended such a fervour of desire that you seemed to see it smoking in the sunlight like incense. Then another form of the exaltation of faith glowed, beneath the crypt, in the Church of the Rosary, where nights were spent in a paradise of rapture, amidst the silent delights of the communion, the mute appeals in which the whole being pines, burns, and soars aloft. And as though the cries raised before the Grotto and the perpetual adoration of the Rosary were not sufficient, that clamour of ardent entreaty burst forth afresh on the walls of the crypt around him; and here it was eternised in marble, here it would continue shrieking the sufferings of humanity even into the far-away ages. It was the marble, it was the walls themselves praying, seized by that shudder of universal woe which penetrated even the world's stones. And, at last, the prayers ascended yet higher, still higher, soared aloft from the radiant Basilica, which was humming and buzzing above him, full as it now was of a frantic multitude, whose mighty voice, bursting into a canticle of hope, he fancied he could hear through the flagstones of the nave. And it finally seemed to him that he was being whirled away, transported, as though he were indeed amidst the very vibrations of that huge wave of prayer, which, starting from the dust of the earth, ascended the tier of superposed churches, spreading from tabernacle to tabernacle, and filling even the walls with such pity that they sobbed aloud, and that the supreme cry of wretchedness pierced its way into heaven with the white spire, the lofty golden cross, above the steeple. O Almighty God, O Divinity, Helpful Power, whoever, whatever Thou mayst be, take pity upon poor mankind and make human suffering cease! All at once Pierre was dazzled. He had followed the left-hand passage, and was coming out into broad daylight, above the inclined ways, and two affectionate arms at once caught hold of him and clasped him. It was Doctor Chassaigne, whose appointment he had forgotten, and who had been waiting there to take him to visit Bernadette's room and Abbe Peyramale's church. "Oh! what joy must be yours, my child!" exclaimed the good old man. "I have just learnt the great news, the extraordinary favour which Our Lady of Lourdes has granted to your young friend. Recollect what I told you the day before yesterday. I am now at ease--you are saved!" A last bitterness came to the young priest who was very pale. However, he was able to smile, and he gently answered: "Yes, we are saved, we are very happy." It was the lie beginning; the divine illusion which in a spirit of charity he wished to give to others. And then one more spectacle met Pierre's eyes. The principal door of the Basilica stood wide open, and a red sheet of light from the setting sun was enfilading the nave from one to the other end. Everything was flaring with the splendour of a conflagration--the gilt railings of the choir, the votive offerings of gold and silver, the lamps enriched with precious stones, the banners with their bright embroideries, and the swinging censers, which seemed like flying jewels. And yonder, in the depths of this burning splendour, amidst the snowy surplices and the golden chasubles, he recognised Marie, with hair unbound, hair of gold like all else, enveloping her in a golden mantle. And the organs burst into a hymn of triumph; and the delirious people acclaimed God; and Abbe Judaine, who had again just taken the Blessed Sacrament from off the altar, raised it aloft and presented it to their gaze for the last time; and radiantly magnificent it shone out like a glory amidst the streaming gold of the Basilica, whose prodigious triumph all the bells proclaimed in clanging, flying peals.

5

CRADLE AND GRAVE

IMMEDIATELY afterwards, as they descended the steps, Doctor Chassaigne said to Pierre: "You have just seen the triumph; I will now show you two great injustices." And he conducted him into the Rue des Petits-Fosses to visit Bernadette's room, that low, dark chamber whence she set out on the day the Blessed Virgin appeared to her. The Rue des Petits-Fosses starts from the former Rue des Bois, now the Rue de la Grotte, and crosses the Rue du Tribunal. It is a winding lane, slightly sloping and very gloomy. The passers-by are few; it is skirted by long walls, wretched-looking houses, with mournful facades in which never a window opens. All its gaiety consists in an occasional tree in a courtyard. "Here we are," at last said the doctor. At the part where he had halted, the street contracted, becoming very narrow, and the house faced the high, grey wall of a barn. Raising their heads, both men looked up at the little dwelling, which seemed quite lifeless, with its narrow casements and its coarse, violet pargeting, displaying the shameful ugliness of poverty. The entrance passage down below was quite black; an old light iron gate was all that closed it; and there was a step to mount, which in rainy weather was immersed in the water of the gutter. "Go in, my friend, go in," said the doctor. "You have only to push the gate." The passage was long, and Pierre kept on feeling the damp wall with his hand, for fear of making a false step. It seemed to him as if he were descending into a cellar, in deep obscurity, and he could feel a slippery soil impregnated with water beneath his feet. Then at the end, in obedience to the doctor's direction, he turned to the right. "Stoop, or you may hurt yourself," said M. Chassaigne; "the door is very low. There, here we are." The door of the room, like the gate in the street, stood wide open, as if the place had been carelessly abandoned; and Pierre, who had stopped in the middle of the chamber, hesitating, his eyes still full of the bright daylight outside, could distinguish absolutely nothing. He had fallen into complete darkness, and felt an icy chill about the shoulders similar to the sensation that might be caused by a wet towel. But, little by little, his eyes became accustomed to the dimness. Two windows of unequal size opened on to a narrow, interior courtyard, where only a greenish light descended, as at the bottom of a well; and to read there, in the middle of the day, it would be necessary to have a candle. Measuring about fifteen feet by twelve, the room was flagged with large uneven stones; while the principal beam and the rafters of the roof, which were visible, had darkened with time and assumed a dirty, sooty hue. Opposite the door was the chimney, a miserable plaster chimney, with a mantelpiece formed of a rotten old plank. There was a sink between this chimney and one of the windows. The walls, with their decaying, damp-stained plaster falling off by bits, were full of cracks, and turning a dirty black like the ceiling. There was no longer any furniture there; the room seemed abandoned; you could only catch a glimpse of some confused, strange objects, unrecognisable in the heavy obscurity that hung about the corners. After a spell of silence, the doctor exclaimed "Yes, this is the room; all came from here. Nothing has been changed, with the exception that the furniture has gone. I have tried to picture how it was placed: the beds certainly stood against this wall, opposite the windows; there must have been three of them at least, for the Soubirouses were seven--the father, mother, two boys, and three girls. Think of that! Three beds filling this room! Seven persons living in this small space! All of them buried alive, without air, without light, almost without bread! What frightful misery! What lowly, pity-awaking poverty!" But he was interrupted. A shadowy form, which Pierre at first took for an old woman, entered. It was a priest, however, the curate of the parish, who now occupied the house. He was acquainted with the doctor. "I heard your voice, Monsieur Chassaigne, and came down," said he. "So there you are, showing the room again?" "Just so, Monsieur l' Abbe; I took the liberty. It does not inconvenience you?" "Oh! not at all, not at all! Come as often as you please, and bring other people." He laughed in an engaging manner, and bowed to Pierre, who, astonished by this quiet carelessness, observed: "The people who come, however, must sometimes plague you?" The curate in his turn seemed surprised. "Indeed, no! Nobody comes. You see the place is scarcely known. Every one remains over there at the Grotto. I leave the door open so as not to be worried. But days and days often pass without my hearing even the sound of a mouse." Pierre's eyes were becoming more and more accustomed to the obscurity; and among the vague, perplexing objects which filled the corners, he ended by distinguishing some old barrels, remnants of fowl cages, and broken tools, a lot of rubbish such as is swept away and thrown to the bottom of cellars. Hanging from the rafters, moreover, were some provisions, a salad basket full of eggs, and several bunches of big pink onions. "And, from what I see," resumed Pierre, with a slight shudder, "you have thought that you might make use of the room?" The curate was beginning to feel uncomfortable. "Of course, that's it," said he. "What can one do? The house is so small, I have so little space. And then you can't imagine how damp it is here; it is altogether impossible to occupy the room. And so, /mon Dieu/, little by little all this has accumulated here by itself, contrary to one's own desire." "It has become a lumber-room," concluded Pierre. "Oh no! hardly that. An unoccupied room, and yet in truth, if you insist on it, it is a lumber-room!" His uneasiness was increasing, mingled with a little shame. Doctor Chassaigne remained silent and did not interfere; but he smiled, and was visibly delighted at his companion's revolt against human ingratitude. Pierre, unable to restrain himself, now continued: "You must excuse me, Monsieur l'Abbe, if I insist. But just reflect that you owe everything to Bernadette; but for her Lourdes would still be one of the least known towns of France. And really it seems to me that out of mere gratitude the parish ought to have transformed this wretched room into a chapel." "Oh! a chapel!" interrupted the curate. "It is only a question of a human creature: the Church could not make her an object of worship." "Well, we won't say a chapel, then; but at all events there ought to be some lights and flowers--bouquets of roses constantly renewed by the piety of the inhabitants and the pilgrims. In a word, I should like some little show of affection--a touching souvenir, a picture of Bernadette--something that would delicately indicate that she deserves to have a place in all hearts. This forgetfulness and desertion are shocking. It is monstrous that so much dirt should have been allowed to accumulate!" The curate, a poor, thoughtless, nervous man, at once adopted Pierre's views: "In reality, you are a thousand times right," said he; "but I myself have no power, I can do nothing. Whenever they ask me for the room, to set it to rights, I will give it up and remove my barrels, although I really don't know where else to put them. Only, I repeat, it does not depend on me. I can do nothing, nothing at all!" Then, under the pretext that he had to go out, he hastened to take leave and run away again, saying to Doctor Chassaigne: "Remain, remain as long as you please; you are never in my way." When the doctor once more found himself alone with Pierre he caught hold of both his hands with effusive delight. "Ah, my dear child," said he, "how pleased you have made me! How admirably you expressed to him all that has been boiling in my own heart so long! Like you, I thought of bringing some roses here every morning. I should have simply had the room cleaned, and would have contented myself with placing two large bunches of roses on the mantelpiece; for you know that I have long felt deep affection for Bernadette, and it seemed to me that those roses would be like the very flowering and perfume of her memory. Only--only--" and so saying he made a despairing gesture, "only courage failed me. Yes, I say courage, no one having yet dared to declare himself openly against the Fathers of the Grotto. One hesitates and recoils in the fear of stirring up a religious scandal. Fancy what a deplorable racket all this would create. And so those who are as indignant as I am are reduced to the necessity of holding their tongues--preferring a continuance of silence to anything else." Then, by way of conclusion, he added: "The ingratitude and rapacity of man, my dear child, are sad things to see. Each time I come into this dim wretchedness, my heart swells and I cannot restrain my tears." He ceased speaking, and neither of them said another word, both being overcome by the extreme melancholy which the surroundings fostered. They were steeped in gloom. The dampness made them shudder as they stood there amidst the dilapidated walls and the dust of the old rubbish piled upon either side. And the idea returned to them that without Bernadette none of the prodigies which had made Lourdes a town unique in the world would have existed. It was at her voice that the miraculous spring had gushed forth, that the Grotto, bright with candles, had opened. Immense works were executed, new churches rose from the ground, giant-like causeways led up to God. An entire new city was built, as if by enchantment, with gardens, walks, quays, bridges, shops, and hotels. And people from the uttermost parts of the earth flocked thither in crowds, and the rain of millions fell with such force and so abundantly that the young city seemed likely to increase indefinitely--to fill the whole valley, from one to the other end of the mountains. If Bernadette had been suppressed none of those things would have existed, the extraordinary story would have relapsed into nothingness, old unknown Lourdes would still have been plunged in the sleep of ages at the foot of its castle. Bernadette was the sole labourer and creatress; and yet this room, whence she had set out on the day she beheld the Virgin, this cradle, indeed, of the miracle and of all the marvellous fortune of the town, was disdained, left a prey to vermin, good only for a lumber-room, where onions and empty barrels were put away. Then the other side of the question vividly appeared in Pierre's mind, and he again seemed to see the triumph which he had just witnessed, the exaltation of the Grotto and Basilica, while Marie, dragging her little car, ascended behind the Blessed Sacrament, amidst the clamour of the multitude. But the Grotto especially shone out before him. It was no longer the wild, rocky cavity before which the child had formerly knelt on the deserted bank of the torrent; it was a chapel, transformed and enriched, a chapel illumined by a vast number of candles, where nations marched past in procession. All the noise, all the brightness, all the adoration, all the money, burst forth there in a splendour of constant victory. Here, at the cradle, in this dark, icy hole, there was not a soul, not a taper, not a hymn, not a flower. Of the infrequent visitors who came thither, none knelt or prayed. All that a few tender-hearted pilgrims had done in their desire to carry away a souvenir had been to reduce to dust, between their fingers, the half-rotten plank serving as a mantelshelf. The clergy ignored the existence of this spot of misery, which the processions ought to have visited as they might visit a station of glory. It was there that the poor child had begun her dream, one cold night, lying in bed between her two sisters, and seized with a fit of her ailment while the whole family was fast asleep. It was thence, too, that she had set out, unconsciously carrying along with her that dream, which was again to be born within her in the broad daylight and to flower so prettily in a vision such as those of the legends. And no one now followed in her footsteps. The manger was forgotten, and left in darkness--that manger where had germed the little humble seed which over yonder was now yielding such prodigious harvests, reaped by the workmen of the last hour amidst the sovereign pomp of ceremonies. Pierre, whom the great human emotion of the story moved to tears, at last summed up his thoughts in three words, saying in a low voice, "It is Bethlehem." "Yes," remarked Doctor Chassaigne, in his turn, "it is the wretched lodging, the chance refuge, where new religions are born of suffering and pity. And at times I ask myself if all is not better thus: if it is not better that this room should remain in its actual state of wretchedness and abandonment. It seems to me that Bernadette has nothing to lose by it, for I love her all the more when I come to spend an hour here." He again became silent, and then made a gesture of revolt: "But no, no! I cannot forgive it--this ingratitude sets me beside myself. I told you I was convinced that Bernadette had freely gone to cloister herself at Nevers. But although no one smuggled her away, what a relief it was for those whom she had begun to inconvenience here! And they are the same men, so anxious to be the absolute masters, who at the present time endeavour by all possible means to wrap her memory in silence. Ah! my dear child, if I were to tell you all!" Little by little he spoke out and relieved himself. Those Fathers of the Grotto, who showed such greed in trading on the work of Bernadette, dreaded her still more now that she was dead than they had done whilst she was alive. So long as she had lived, their great terror had assuredly been that she might return to Lourdes to claim a portion of the spoil; and her humility alone reassured them, for she was in nowise of a domineering disposition, and had herself chosen the dim abode of renunciation where she was destined to pass away. But at present their fears had increased at the idea that a will other than theirs might bring the relics of the visionary back to Lourdes; that, thought had, indeed, occurred to the municipal council immediately after her death; the town had wished to raise a tomb, and there had been talk of opening a subscription. The Sisters of Nevers, however, formally refused to give up the body, which they said belonged to them. Everyone felt that the Sisters were acting under the influence of the Fathers, who were very uneasy, and energetically bestirred themselves to prevent by all means in their power the return of those venerated ashes, in whose presence at Lourdes they foresaw a possible competition with the Grotto itself. Could they have imagined some such threatening occurrence as this--a monumental tomb in the cemetery, pilgrims proceeding thither in procession, the sick feverishly kissing the marble, and miracles being worked there amidst a holy fervour? This would have been disastrous rivalry, a certain displacement of all the present devotion and prodigies. And the great, the sole fear, still and ever returned to them, that of having to divide the spoils, of seeing the money go elsewhere should the town, now taught by experience, know how to turn the tomb to account. The Fathers were even credited with a scheme of profound craftiness. They were supposed to have the secret idea of reserving Bernadette's remains for themselves; the Sisters of Nevers having simply undertaken to keep it for them within the peaceful precincts of their chapel. Only, they were waiting, and would not bring it back until the affluence of the pilgrims should decrease. What was the use of a solemn return at present, when crowds flocked to the place without interruption and in increasing numbers? Whereas, when the extraordinary success of Our Lady of Lourdes should decline, like everything else in this world, one could imagine what a reawakening of faith would attend the solemn, resounding ceremony at which Christendom would behold the relics of the chosen one take possession of the soil whence she had made so many marvels spring. And the miracles would then begin again on the marble of her tomb before the Grotto or in the choir of the Basilica. "You may search," continued Doctor Chassaigne, "but you won't find a single official picture of Bernadette at Lourdes. Her portrait is sold, but it is hung no where, in no sanctuary. It is systematic forgetfulness, the same sentiment of covert uneasiness as that which has wrought silence and abandonment in this sad chamber where we are. In the same way as they are afraid of worship at her tomb, so are they afraid of crowds coming and kneeling here, should two candles burn or a couple of bouquets of roses bloom upon this chimney. And if a paralytic woman were to rise shouting that she was cured, what a scandal would arise, how disturbed would be those good traders of the Grotto on seeing their monopoly seriously threatened! They are the masters, and the masters they intend to remain; they will not part with any portion of the magnificent farm that they have acquired and are working. Nevertheless they tremble--yes, they tremble at the memory of the workers of the first hour, of that little girl who is still so great in death, and for whose huge inheritance they burn with such greed that after having sent her to live at Nevers, they dare not even bring back her corpse, but leave it imprisoned beneath the flagstones of a convent!" Ah! how wretched was the fate of that poor creature, who had been cut off from among the living, and whose corpse in its turn was condemned to exile! And how Pierre pitied her, that daughter of misery, who seemed to have been chosen only that she might suffer in her life and in her death! Even admitting that an unique, persistent will had not compelled her to disappear, still guarding her even in her tomb, what a strange succession of circumstances there had been--how it seemed as if someone, uneasy at the idea of the immense power she might grasp, had jealously sought to keep her out of the way! In Pierre's eyes she remained the chosen one, the martyr; and if he could no longer believe, if the history of this unfortunate girl sufficed to complete within him the ruin of his faith, it none the less upset him in all his brotherly love for mankind by revealing a new religion to him, the only one which might still fill his heart, the religion of life, of human sorrow. Just then, before leaving the room, Doctor Chassaigne exclaimed: "And it's here that one must believe, my dear child. Do you see this obscure hole, do you think of the resplendent Grotto, of the triumphant Basilica, of the town built, of the world created, the crowds that flock to Lourdes! And if Bernadette was only hallucinated, only an idiot, would not the outcome be more astonishing, more inexplicable still? What! An idiot's dream would have sufficed to stir up nations like this! No! no! The Divine breath which alone can explain prodigies passed here." Pierre was on the point of hastily replying "Yes!" It was true, a breath had passed there, the sob of sorrow, the inextinguishable yearning towards the Infinite of hope. If the dream of a suffering child had sufficed to attract multitudes, to bring about a rain of millions and raise a new city from the soil, was it not because this dream in a measure appeased the hunger of poor mankind, its insatiable need of being deceived and consoled? She had once more opened the Unknown, doubtless at a favourable moment both socially and historically; and the crowds had rushed towards it. Oh! to take refuge in mystery, when reality is so hard, to abandon oneself to the miraculous, since cruel nature seems merely one long injustice! But although you may organise the Unknown, reduce it to dogmas, make revealed religions of it, there is never anything at the bottom of it beyond the appeal of suffering, the cry of life, demanding health, joy, and fraternal happiness, and ready to accept them in another world if they cannot be obtained on earth. What use is it to believe in dogmas? Does it not suffice to weep and love? Pierre, however, did not discuss the question. He withheld the answer that was on his lips, convinced, moreover, that the eternal need of the supernatural would cause eternal faith to abide among sorrowing mankind. The miraculous, which could not be verified, must be a food necessary to human despair. Besides, had he not vowed in all charity that he would not wound anyone with his doubts? "What a prodigy, isn't it?" repeated the doctor. "Certainly," Pierre ended by answering. "The whole human drama has been played, all the unknown forces have acted in this poor room, so damp and dark." They remained there a few minutes more in silence; they walked round the walls, raised their eyes toward the smoky ceiling, and cast a final glance at the narrow, greenish yard. Truly it was a heart-rending sight, this poverty of the cobweb level, with its dirty old barrels, its worn-out tools, its refuse of all kinds rotting in the corners in heaps. And without adding a word they at last slowly retired, feeling extremely sad. It was only in the street that Doctor Chassaigne seemed to awaken. He gave a slight shudder and hastened his steps, saying: "It is not finished, my dear child; follow me. We are now going to look at the other great iniquity." He referred to Abbe Peyramale and his church. They crossed the Place du Porche and turned into the Rue Saint Pierre; a few minutes would suffice them. But their conversation had again fallen on the Fathers of the Grotto, on the terrible, merciless war waged by Father Sempe against the former Cure of Lourdes. The latter had been vanquished, and had died in consequence, overcome by feelings of frightful bitterness; and, after thus killing him by grief, they had completed the destruction of his church, which he had left unfinished, without a roof, open to the wind and to the rain. With what a glorious dream had that monumental edifice filled the last year of the Cure's life! Since he had been dispossessed of the Grotto, driven from the work of Our Lady of Lourdes, of which he, with Bernadette, had been the first artisan, his church had become his revenge, his protestation, his own share of the glory, the House of the Lord where he would triumph in his sacred vestments, and whence he would conduct endless processions in compliance with the formal desire of the Blessed Virgin. Man of authority and domination as he was at bottom, a pastor of the multitude, a builder of temples, he experienced a restless delight in hurrying on the work, with the lack of foresight of an eager man who did not allow indebtedness to trouble him, but was perfectly contented so long as he always had a swarm of workmen busy on the scaffoldings. And thus he saw his church rise up, and pictured it finished, one bright summer morning, all new in the rising sun. Ah! that vision constantly evoked gave him courage for the struggle, amidst the underhand, murderous designs by which he felt himself to be enveloped. His church, towering above the vast square, at last rose in all its colossal majesty. He had decided that it should be in the Romanesque style, very large, very simple, its nave nearly three hundred feet long, its steeple four hundred and sixty feet high. It shone out resplendently in the clear sunlight, freed on the previous day of the last scaffolding, and looking quite smart in its newness, with its broad courses of stone disposed with perfect regularity. And, in thought, he sauntered around it, charmed with its nudity, its stupendous candour, its chasteness recalling that of a virgin child, for there was not a piece of sculpture, not an ornament that would have uselessly loaded it. The roofs of the nave, transept, and apse were of equal height above the entablature, which was decorated with simple mouldings. In the same way the apertures in the aisles and nave had no other adornments than archivaults with mouldings, rising above the piers. He stopped in thought before the great coloured glass windows of the transept, whose roses were sparkling; and passing round the building he skirted the semicircular apse against which stood the vestry building with its two rows of little windows; and then he returned, never tiring of his contemplation of that regal ordonnance, those great lines standing out against the blue sky, those superposed roofs, that enormous mass of stone, whose solidity promised to defy centuries. But, when he closed his eyes he, above all else, conjured up, with rapturous pride, a vision of the facade and steeple; down below, the three portals, the roofs of the two lateral ones forming terraces, while from the central one, in the very middle of the facade, the steeple boldly sprang. Here again columns resting on piers supported archivaults with simple mouldings. Against the gable, at a point where there was a pinnacle, and between the two lofty windows lighting the nave, was a statue of Our Lady of Lourdes under a canopy. Up above, were other bays with freshly painted luffer-boards. Buttresses started from the ground at the four corners of the steeple-base, becoming less and less massive from storey to storey, till they reached the spire, a bold, tapering spire in stone, flanked by four turrets and adorned with pinnacles, and soaring upward till it vanished in the sky. And to the parish priest of Lourdes it seemed as if it were his own fervent soul which had grown and flown aloft with this spire, to testify to his faith throughout the ages, there on high, quite close to God. At other times another vision delighted him still more. He thought he could see the inside of his church on the day of the first solemn mass he would perform there. The coloured windows threw flashes of fire brilliant like precious stones; the twelve chapels, the aisles, were beaming with lighted candles. And he was at the high altar of marble and gold; and the fourteen columns of the nave in single blocks of Pyrenean marble, magnificent marble purchased with money that had come from the four corners of Christendom, rose up supporting the vaulted roof, while the sonorous voices of the organs filled the whole building with a hymn of joy. A multitude of the faithful was gathered there, kneeling on the flags in front of the choir, which was screened by ironwork as delicate as lace, and covered with admirably carved wood. The pulpit, the regal present of a great lady, was a marvel of art cut in massive oak. The baptismal fonts had been hewn out of hard stone by an artist of great talent. Pictures by masters ornamented the walls. Crosses, pyxes, precious monstrances, sacred vestments, similar to suns, were piled up in the vestry cupboards. And what a dream it was to be the pontiff of such a temple, to reign there after having erected it with passion, to bless the crowds who hastened to it from the entire earth, while the flying peals from the steeple told the Grotto and Basilica that they had over there, in old Lourdes, a rival, a victorious sister, in whose great nave God triumphed also! After following the Rue Saint Pierre for a moment, Doctor Chassaigne and his companion turned into the little Rue de Langelle. "We are coming to it," said the doctor. But though Pierre looked around him he could see no church. There were merely some wretched hovels, a whole district of poverty, littered with foul buildings. At length, however, at the bottom of a blind alley, he perceived a remnant of the half-rotten palings which still surrounded the vast square site bordered by the Rue Saint Pierre, the Rue de Bagneres, the Rue de Langelle, and the Rue des Jardins. "We must turn to the left," continued the doctor, who had entered a narrow passage among the rubbish. "Here we are!" And the ruin suddenly appeared amidst the ugliness and wretchedness that masked it. The whole great carcase of the nave and the aisles, the transept and the apse was standing. The walls rose on all sides to the point where the vaulting would have begun. You entered as into a real church, you could walk about at ease, identifying all the usual parts of an edifice of this description. Only when you raised your eyes you saw the sky; the roofs were wanting, the rain could fall and the wind blow there freely. Some fifteen years previously the works had been abandoned, and things had remained in the same state as the last workman had left them. What struck you first of all were the ten pillars of the nave and the four pillars of the choir, those magnificent columns of Pyrenean marble, each of a single block, which had been covered with a casing of planks in order to protect them from damage. The bases and capitals were still in the rough, awaiting the sculptors. And these isolated columns, thus cased in wood, had a mournful aspect indeed. Moreover, a dismal sensation filled you at sight of the whole gaping enclosure, where grass had sprung up all over the ravaged, bumpy soil of the aisles and the nave, a thick cemetery grass, through which the women of the neighbourhood had ended by making paths. They came in to spread out their washing there. And even now a collection of poor people's washing--thick sheets, shirts in shreds, and babies' swaddling clothes--was fast drying in the last rays of the sun, which glided in through the broad, empty bays. Slowly, without speaking, Pierre and Doctor Chassaigne walked round the inside of the church. The ten chapels of the aisles formed a species of compartments full of rubbish and remnants. The ground of the choir had been cemented, doubtless to protect the crypt below against infiltrations; but unfortunately the vaults must be sinking; there was a hollow there which the storm of the previous night had transformed into a little lake. However, it was these portions of the transept and the apse which had the least suffered. Not a stone had moved; the great central rose windows above the triforium seemed to be awaiting their coloured glass, while some thick planks, forgotten atop of the walls of the apse, might have made anyone think that the workmen would begin covering it the next day. But, when Pierre and the doctor had retraced their steps, and went out to look at the facade, the lamentable woefulness of the young ruin was displayed to their gaze. On this side, indeed, the works had not been carried forward to anything like the same extent: the porch with its three portals alone was built, and fifteen years of abandonment had sufficed for the winter weather to eat into the sculptures, the small columns and the archivaults, with a really singular destructive effect, as though the stones, deeply penetrated, destroyed, had melted away beneath tears. The heart grieved at the sight of the decay which had attacked the work before it was even finished. Not yet to be, and nevertheless to crumble away in this fashion under the sky! To be arrested in one's colossal growth, and simply strew the weeds with ruins! They returned to the nave, and were overcome by the frightful sadness which this assassination of a monument provoked. The spacious plot of waste ground inside was littered with the remains of scaffoldings, which had been pulled down when half rotten, in fear lest their fall might crush people; and everywhere amidst the tall grass were boards, put-logs, moulds for arches, mingled with bundles of old cord eaten away by damp. There was also the long narrow carcase of a crane rising up like a gibbet. Spade-handles, pieces of broken wheelbarrows, and heaps of greenish bricks, speckled with moss and wild convolvuli in bloom, were still lying among the forgotten materials. In the beds of nettles you here and there distinguished the rails of a little railway laid down for the trucks, one of which was lying overturned in a corner. But the saddest sight in all this death of things was certainly the portable engine which had remained in the shed that sheltered it. For fifteen years it had been standing there cold and lifeless. A part of the roof of the shed had ended by falling in upon it, and now the rain drenched it at every shower. A bit of the leather harness by which the crane was worked hung down, and seemed to bind the engine like a thread of some gigantic spider's web. And its metal-work, its steel and copper, was also decaying, as if rusted by lichens, covered with the vegetation of old age, whose yellowish patches made it look like a very ancient, grass-grown machine which the winters had preyed upon. This lifeless engine, this cold engine with its empty firebox and its silent boiler, was like the very soul of the departed labour vainly awaiting the advent of some great charitable heart, whose coming through the eglantine and the brambles would awaken this sleeping church in the wood from its heavy slumber of ruin. At last Doctor Chassaigne spoke: "Ah!" he said, "when one thinks that fifty thousand francs would have sufficed to prevent such a disaster! With fifty thousand francs the roof could have been put on, the heavy work would have been saved, and one could have waited patiently. But they wanted to kill the work just as they had killed the man." With a gesture he designated the Fathers of the Grotto, whom he avoided naming. "And to think," he continued, "that their annual receipts are eight hundred thousand francs. However, they prefer to send presents to Rome to propitiate powerful friends there." In spite of himself, he was again opening hostilities against the adversaries of Cure Peyramale. The whole story caused a holy anger of justice to haunt him. Face to face with those lamentable ruins, he returned to the facts--the enthusiastic Cure starting on the building of his beloved church, and getting deeper and deeper into debt, whilst Father Sempe, ever on the lookout, took advantage of each of his mistakes, discrediting him with the Bishop, arresting the flow of offerings, and finally stopping the works. Then, after the conquered man was dead, had come interminable lawsuits, lawsuits lasting fifteen years, which gave the winters time to devour the building. And now it was in such a woeful state, and the debt had risen to such an enormous figure, that all seemed over. The slow death, the death of the stones, was becoming irrevocable. The portable engine beneath its tumbling shed would fall to pieces, pounded by the rain and eaten away by the moss. "I know very well that they chant victory," resumed the doctor; "that they alone remain. It is just what they wanted--to be the absolute masters, to have all the power, all the money for themselves alone. I may tell you that their terror of competition has even made them intrigue against the religious Orders that have attempted to come to Lourdes. Jesuits, Dominicans, Benedictines, Capuchins, and Carmelites have made applications at various times, and the Fathers of the Grotto have always succeeded in keeping them away. They only tolerate the female Orders, and will only have one flock. And the town belongs to them; they have opened shop there, and sell God there wholesale and retail!" Walking slowly, he had while speaking returned to the middle of the nave, amidst the ruins, and with a sweeping wave of the arm he pointed to all the devastation surrounding him. "Look at this sadness, this frightful wretchedness! Over yonder the Rosary and Basilica cost them three millions of francs." * * About 580,000 dollars. Then, as in Bernadette's cold, dark room, Pierre saw the Basilica rise before him, radiant in its triumph. It was not here that you found the realisation of the dream of Cure Peyramale, officiating and blessing kneeling multitudes while the organs resounded joyfully. The Basilica, over yonder, appeared, vibrating with the pealing of its bells, clamorous with the superhuman joy of an accomplished miracle, all sparkling with its countless lights, its banners, its lamps, its hearts of silver and gold, its clergy attired in gold, and its monstrance akin to a golden star. It flamed in the setting sun, it touched the heavens with its spire, amidst the soaring of the milliards of prayers which caused its walls to quiver. Here, however, was the church that had died before being born, the church placed under interdict by a mandamus of the Bishop, the church falling into dust, and open to the four winds of heaven. Each storm carried away a little more of the stones, big flies buzzed all alone among the nettles which had invaded the nave; and there were no other devotees than the poor women of the neighbourhood, who came thither to turn their sorry linen, spread upon the grass. It seemed amidst the mournful silence as though a low voice were sobbing, perhaps the voice of the marble columns weeping over their useless beauty under their wooden shirts. At times birds would fly across the deserted apse uttering a shrill cry. Bands of enormous rats which had taken refuge under bits of the lowered scaffoldings would fight, and bite, and bound out of their holes in a gallop of terror. And nothing could have been more heart-rending than the sight of this pre-determined ruin, face to face with its triumphant rival, the Basilica, which beamed with gold. Again Doctor Chassaigne curtly said, "Come." They left the church, and following the left aisle, reached a door, roughly fashioned out of a few planks nailed together; and, when they had passed down a half-demolished wooden staircase, the steps of which shook beneath their feet, they found themselves in the crypt. It was a low vault, with squat arches, on exactly the same plan as the choir. The thick, stunted columns, left in the rough, also awaited their sculptors. Materials were lying about, pieces of wood were rotting on the beaten ground, the whole vast hall was white with plaster in the abandonment in which unfinished buildings are left. At the far end, three bays, formerly glazed, but in which not a pane of glass remained, threw a clear, cold light upon the desolate bareness of the walls. And there, in the middle, lay Cure Peyramale's corpse. Some pious friends had conceived the touching idea of thus burying him in the crypt of his unfinished church. The tomb stood on a broad step and was all marble. The inscriptions, in letters of gold, expressed the feelings of the subscribers, the cry of truth and reparation that came from the monument itself. You read on the face: "This tomb has been erected by the aid of pious offerings from the entire universe to the blessed memory of the great servant of Our Lady of Lourdes." On the right side were these words from a Brief of Pope Pius IX.: "You have entirely devoted yourself to erecting a temple to the Mother of God." And on the left were these words from the New Testament: "Happy are they who suffer persecution for justice' sake." Did not these inscriptions embody the true plaint, the legitimate hope of the vanquished man who had fought so long in the sole desire of strictly executing the commands of the Virgin as transmitted to him by Bernadette? She, Our Lady of Lourdes, was there personified by a slender statuette, standing above the commemorative inscription, against the naked wall whose only decorations were a few bead wreaths hanging from nails. And before the tomb, as before the Grotto, were five or six benches in rows, for the faithful who desired to sit down. But with another gesture of sorrowful compassion, Doctor Chassaigne had silently pointed out to Pierre a huge damp spot which was turning the wall at the far end quite green. Pierre remembered the little lake which he had noticed up above on the cracked cement flooring of the choir--quite a quantity of water left by the storm of the previous night. Infiltration had evidently commenced, a perfect stream ran down, invading the crypt, whenever there was heavy rain. And they both felt a pang at their hearts when they perceived that the water was trickling along the vaulted roof in narrow threads, and thence falling in large, regular rhythmical drops upon the tomb. The doctor could not restrain a groan. "Now it rains," he said; "it rains on him!" Pierre remained motionless, in a kind of awe. In the presence of that falling water, at the thought of the blasts which must rush at winter time through the glassless windows, that corpse appeared to him both woeful and tragic. It acquired a fierce grandeur, lying there alone in its splendid marble tomb, amidst all the rubbish, at the bottom of the crumbling ruins of its own church. It was the solitary guardian, the dead sleeper and dreamer watching over the empty spaces, open to all the birds of night. It was the mute, obstinate, eternal protest, and it was expectation also. Cure Peyramale, stretched in his coffin, having all eternity before him to acquire patience, there, without weariness, awaited the workmen who would perhaps return thither some fine April morning. If they should take ten years to do so, he would be there, and if it should take them a century, he would be there still. He was waiting for the rotten scaffoldings up above, among the grass of the nave, to be resuscitated like the dead, and by the force of some miracle to stand upright once more, along the walls. He was waiting, too, for the moss-covered engine to become all at once burning hot, recover its breath, and raise the timbers for the roof. His beloved enterprise, his gigantic building, was crumbling about his head, and yet with joined hands and closed eyes he was watching over its ruins, watching and waiting too. In a low voice, the doctor finished the cruel story, telling how, after persecuting Cure Peyramale and his work, they persecuted his tomb. There had formerly been a bust of the Cure there, and pious hands had kept a little lamp burning before it. But a woman had one day fallen with her face to the earth, saying that she had perceived the soul of the deceased, and thereupon the Fathers of the Grotto were in a flutter. Were miracles about to take place there? The sick already passed entire days there, seated on the benches before the tomb. Others knelt down, kissed the marble, and prayed to be cured. And at this a feeling of terror arose: supposing they should be cured, supposing the Grotto should find a competitor in this martyr, lying all alone, amidst the old tools left there by the masons! The Bishop of Tarbes, informed and influenced, thereupon published the mandamus which placed the church under interdict, forbidding all worship there and all pilgrimages and processions to the tomb of the former priest of Lourdes. As in the case of Bernadette, his memory was proscribed, his portrait could be found, officially, nowhere. In the same manner as they had shown themselves merciless against the living man, so did the Fathers prove merciless to his memory. They pursued him even in his tomb. They alone, again nowadays, prevented the works of the church from being proceeded with, by raising continual obstacles, and absolutely refusing to share their rich harvest of alms. And they seemed to be waiting for the winter rains to fall and complete the work of destruction, for the vaulted roof of the crypt, the walls, the whole gigantic pile to crumble down upon the tomb of the martyr, upon the body of the defeated man, so that he might be buried beneath them and at last pounded to dust! "Ah!" murmured the doctor, "I, who knew him so valiant, so enthusiastic in all noble labour! Now, you see it, it rains, it rains on him!" Painfully, he set himself on his knees and found relief in a long prayer. Pierre, who could not pray, remained standing. Compassionate sorrow was overflowing from his heart. He listened to the heavy drops from the roof as one by one they broke on the tomb with a slow rhythmical pit-a-pat, which seemed to be numbering the seconds of eternity, amidst the profound silence. And he reflected on the eternal misery of this world, on the choice which suffering makes in always falling on the best. The two great makers of Our Lady of Lourdes, Bernadette and Cure Peyramale, rose up in the flesh again before him, like woeful victims, tortured during their lives and exiled after their deaths. That alone, indeed, would have completed within him the destruction of his faith; for the Bernadette, whom he had just found at the end of his researches, was but a human sister, loaded with every dolour. But none the less he preserved a tender brotherly veneration for her, and two tears slowly trickled down his cheeks.

1

EGOTISM AND LOVE

AGAIN that night Pierre, at the Hotel of the Apparitions, was unable to obtain a wink of sleep. After calling at the hospital to inquire after Marie, who, since her return from the procession, had been soundly enjoying the delicious, restoring sleep of a child, he had gone to bed himself feeling anxious at the prolonged absence of M. de Guersaint. He had expected him at latest at dinner-time, but probably some mischance had detained him at Gavarnie; and he thought how disappointed Marie would be if her father were not there to embrace her the first thing in the morning. With a man like M. de Guersaint, so pleasantly heedless and so hare-brained, everything was possible, every fear might be realised. Perhaps this anxiety had at first sufficed to keep Pierre awake in spite of his great fatigue; but afterwards the nocturnal noises of the hotel had really assumed unbearable proportions. The morrow, Tuesday, was the day of departure, the last day which the national pilgrimage would spend at Lourdes, and the pilgrims no doubt were making the most of their time, coming from the Grotto and returning thither in the middle of the night, endeavouring as it were to force the grace of Heaven by their commotion, and apparently never feeling the slightest need of repose. The doors slammed, the floors shook, the entire building vibrated beneath the disorderly gallop of a crowd. Never before had the walls reverberated with such obstinate coughs, such thick, husky voices. Thus Pierre, a prey to insomnia, tossed about on his bed and continually rose up, beset with the idea that the noise he heard must have been made by M. de Guersaint who had returned. For some minutes he would listen feverishly; but he could only hear the extraordinary sounds of the passage, amid which he could distinguish nothing precisely. Was it the priest, the mother and her three daughters, or the old married couple on his left, who were fighting with the furniture? or was it rather the larger family, or the single gentleman, or the young single woman on his right, whom some incomprehensible occurrences were leading into adventures? At one moment he jumped from his bed, wishing to explore his absent friend's empty room, as he felt certain that some deeds of violence were taking place in it. But although he listened very attentively when he got there, the only sound he could distinguish was the tender caressing murmur of two voices. Then a sudden recollection of Madame Volmar came to him, and he returned shuddering to bed. At length, when it was broad daylight and Pierre had just fallen asleep, a loud knocking at his door awoke him with a start. This time there could be no mistake, a loud voice broken by sobs was calling "Monsieur l'Abbe! Monsieur l'Abbe! for Heaven's sake wake up!" Surely it must be M. de Guersaint who had been brought back dead, at least. Quite scared, Pierre ran and opened the door, in his night-shirt, and found himself in the presence of his neighbour, M. Vigneron. "Oh! for Heaven's sake, Monsieur l'Abbe, dress yourself at once!" exclaimed the, assistant head-clerk. "Your holy ministry is required." And he began to relate that he had just got up to see the time by his watch on the mantelpiece, when he had heard some most frightful sighs issuing from the adjoining room, where Madame Chaise slept. She had left the communicating door open in order to be more with them, as she pleasantly expressed it. Accordingly he had hastened in, and flung the shutters open so as to admit both light and air. "And what a sight, Monsieur l'Abbe!" he continued. "Our poor aunt lying on her bed, nearly purple in the face already, her mouth wide open in a vain effort to breathe, and her hands fumbling with the sheet. It's her heart complaint, you know. Come, come at once, Monsieur l'Abbe, and help her, I implore you!" Pierre, utterly bewildered, could find neither his breeches nor his cassock. "Of course, of course I'll come with you," said he. "But I have not what is necessary for administering the last sacraments." M. Vigneron had assisted him to dress, and was now stooping down looking for his slippers. "Never mind," he said, "the mere sight of you will assist her in her last moments, if Heaven has this affliction in store for us. Here! put these on your feet, and follow me at once--oh! at once!" He went off like a gust of wind and plunged into the adjoining room. All the doors remained wide open. The young priest, who followed him, noticed nothing in the first room, which was in an incredible state of disorder, beyond the half-naked figure of little Gustave, who sat on the sofa serving him as a bed, motionless, very pale, forgotten, and shivering amid this drama of inexorable death. Open bags littered the floor, the greasy remains of supper soiled the table, the parents' bed seemed devastated by the catastrophe, its coverlets torn off and lying on the floor. And almost immediately afterwards he caught sight of the mother, who had hastily enveloped herself in an old yellow dressing-gown, standing with a terrified look in the inner room. "Well, my love, well, my love?" repeated M. Vigneron, in stammering accents. With a wave of her hand and without uttering a word Madame Vigneron drew their attention to Madame Chaise, who lay motionless, with her head sunk in the pillow and her hands stiffened and twisted. She was blue in the face, and her mouth gaped, as though with the last great gasp that had come from her. Pierre bent over her. Then in a low voice he said: "She is dead!" Dead! The word rang through the room where a heavy silence reigned, and the husband and wife looked at each other in amazement, bewilderment. So it was over? The aunt had died before Gustave, and the youngster inherited her five hundred thousand francs. How many times had they dwelt on that dream; whose sudden realisation dumfounded them? How many times had despair overcome them when they feared that the poor child might depart before her? Dead! Good heavens! was it their fault? Had they really prayed to the Blessed Virgin for this? She had shown herself so good to them that they trembled at the thought that they had not been able to express a wish without its being granted. In the death of the chief clerk, so suddenly carried off so that they might have his place, they had already recognised the powerful hand of Our Lady of Lourdes. Had she again loaded them with favours, listening even to the unconscious dreams of their desire? Yet they had never desired anyone's death; they were worthy people incapable of any bad action, loving their relations, fulfilling their religious duties, going to confession, partaking of the communion like other people without any ostentation. Whenever they thought of those five hundred thousand francs, of their son who might be the first to go, and of the annoyance it would be to them to see another and far less worthy nephew inherit that fortune, it was merely in the innermost recesses of their hearts, in short, quite innocently and naturally. Certainly they /had/ thought of it when they were at the Grotto, but was not the Blessed Virgin wisdom itself? Did she not know far better than ourselves what she ought to do for the happiness of both the living and the dead? Then Madame Vigneron in all sincerity burst into tears and wept for the sister whom she loved so much. "Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe," she said, "I saw her expire; she passed away before my eyes. What a misfortune that you were not here sooner to receive her soul! She died without a priest; your presence would have consoled her so much." A prey also to emotion, his eyes full of tears, Vigneron sought to console his wife. "Your sister was a saint," said he; "she communicated again yesterday morning, and you need have no anxiety concerning her; her soul has gone straight to heaven. No doubt, if Monsieur l'Abbe had been here in time she would have been glad to see him. But what would you? Death was quicker. I went at once, and really there is nothing for us to reproach ourselves with." Then, turning towards the priest, he added "Monsieur l'Abbe, it was her excessive piety which certainly hastened her end. Yesterday, at the Grotto, she had a bad attack, which was a warning. And in spite of her fatigue she obstinately followed the procession afterwards. I thought then that she could not last long. Yet, out of delicacy, one did not like to say anything to her, for fear of frightening her." Pierre gently knelt down and said the customary prayers, with that human emotion which was his nearest approach to faith in the presence of eternal life and eternal death, both so pitiful. Then, as he remained kneeling a little longer, he overheard snatches of the conversation around him. Little Gustave, forgotten on his couch amid the disorder of the other room, must have lost patience, for he had begun to cry and call out, "Mamma! mamma! mamma!" At length Madame Vigneron went to quiet him, and it occurred to her to carry him in her arms to kiss his poor aunt for the last time. But at first he struggled and refused, crying so much that M. Vigneron was obliged to interfere and try to make him ashamed of himself. What! he who was never frightened of anything! who bore suffering with the courage of a grown-up man! And to think it was a question of kissing his poor aunt, who had always been so kind, whose last thought must most certainly have been for him! "Give him to me," said he to his wife; "he's going to be good." Gustave ended by clinging to his father's neck. He came shivering in his night-shirt, displaying his wretched little body devoured by scrofula. It seemed indeed as though the miraculous water of the piscinas, far from curing him, had freshened the sore on his back; whilst his scraggy leg hung down inertly like a dry stick. "Kiss her," resumed M. Vigneron. The child leant forward and kissed his aunt on the forehead. It was not death which upset him and caused him to struggle. Since he had been in the room he had been looking at the dead woman with an air of quiet curiosity. He did not love her, he had suffered on her account so long. He had the ideas and feelings of a man, and the weight of them was stifling him as, like his complaint, they developed and became more acute. He felt full well that he was too little, that children ought not to understand what only concerns their elders. However, his father, seating himself out of the way, kept him on his knee, whilst his mother closed the window and lit the two candles on the mantelpiece. "Ah! my poor dear," murmured M. Vigneron, feeling that he must say something, "it's a cruel loss for all of us. Our trip is now completely spoilt; this is our last day, for we start this afternoon. And the Blessed Virgin, too, was showing herself so kind to us." However, seeing his son's surprised look, a look of infinite sadness and reproach, he hastened to add: "Yes, of course, I know that she hasn't yet quite cured you. But we must not despair of her kindness. She loves us so well, she shows us so many favours that she will certainly end by curing you, since that is now the only favour that remains for her to grant us." Madame Vigneron, who was listening, drew near and said: "How happy we should have been to have returned to Paris all three hale and hearty! Nothing is ever perfect!" "I say!" suddenly observed Monsieur Vigneron, "I sha'n't be able to leave with you this afternoon, on account of the formalities which have to be gone through. I hope that my return ticket will still be available to-morrow!" They were both getting over the frightful shock, feeling a sense of relief in spite of their affection for Madame Chaise; and, in fact, they were already forgetting her, anxious above all things to leave Lourdes as soon as possible, as though the principal object of their journey had been attained. A decorous, unavowed delight was slowly penetrating them. "When I get back to Paris there will be so much for me to do," continued M. Vigneron. "I, who now only long for repose! All the same I shall remain my three years at the Ministry, until I can retire, especially now that I am certain of the retiring pension of chief clerk. But afterwards--oh! afterwards I certainly hope to enjoy life a bit. Since this money has come to us I shall purchase the estate of Les Billottes, that superb property down at my native place which I have always been dreaming of. And I promise you that I sha'n't find time hanging heavy on my hands in the midst of my horses, my dogs, and my flowers!" Little Gustave was still on his father's knee, his night-shirt tucked up, his whole wretched misshapen body shivering, and displaying the scragginess of a slowly dying child. When he perceived that his father, now full of his dream of an opulent life, no longer seemed to notice that he was there, he gave one of his enigmatical smiles, in which melancholy was tinged with malice. "But what about me, father?" he asked. M. Vigneron started, like one aroused from sleep, and did not at first seem to understand. "You, little one? You'll be with us, of course!" But Gustave gave him a long, straight look, without ceasing to smile with his artful, though woeful lips. "Oh! do you think so?" he asked. "Of course I think so! You'll be with us, and it will be very nice to be with us." Uneasy, stammering, unable to find the proper words, M. Vigneron felt a chill come over him when his son shrugged his skinny shoulders with an air of philosophical disdain and answered: "Oh, no! I shall be dead." And then the terrified father was suddenly able to detect in the child's deep glance the glance of a man who was very aged, very knowing in all things, acquainted with all the abominations of life through having gone through them. What especially alarmed him was the abrupt conviction that this child had always seen into the innermost recesses of his heart, even farther than the things he dared to acknowledge to himself. He could recall that when the little sufferer had been but a baby in his cradle his eyes would frequently be fixed upon his own--and even then those eyes had been rendered so sharp by suffering, endowed, too, with such an extraordinary power of divination, that they had seemed able to dive into the unconscious thoughts buried in the depths of his brain. And by a singular counter-effect all the things that he had never owned to himself he now found in his child's eyes--he beheld them, read them there, against his will. The story of his cupidity lay unfolded before him, his anger at having such a sorry son, his anguish at the idea that Madame Chaise's fortune depended upon such a fragile existence, his eager desire that she might make haste and die whilst the youngster was still there, in order that he might finger the legacy. It was simply a question of days, this duel as to which should go off first. And then, at the end, it still meant death--the youngster must in his turn disappear, whilst he, the father, alone pocketed the cash, and lived joyfully to a good old age. And these frightful things shone forth so clearly from the keen, melancholy, smiling eyes of the poor condemned child, passed from son to father with such evident distinctness, that for a moment it seemed to them that they were shouting them aloud. However, M. Vigneron struggled against it all, and, averting his head, began energetically protesting: "How! You'll be dead? What an idea! It's absurd to have such ideas as that!" Meantime, Madame Vigneron was sobbing. "You wicked child," she gasped; "how can you make us so unhappy, when we already have such a cruel loss to deplore?" Gustave had to kiss them, and to promise them that he would live for their sakes. Yet he did not cease smiling, conscious as he was that a lie is necessary when one does not wish to be too miserable, and quite prepared, moreover, to leave his parents happy behind him, since even the Blessed Virgin herself was powerless to grant him in this world the little happy lot to which each creature should be born. His mother took him back to bed, and Pierre at length rose up, just as M. Vigneron had finished arranging the chamber of death in a suitable manner. "You'll excuse me, won't you, Monsieur l'Abbe?" said he, accompanying the young priest to the door. "I'm not quite myself. Well, it's an unpleasant time to go through. I must get over it somehow, however." When Pierre got into the passage he stopped for a moment, listening to a sound of voices which was ascending the stairs. He had just been thinking of M. de Guersaint again, and imagined that he could recognise his voice. However, whilst he stood there waiting, an incident occurred which caused him intense discomfort. The door of the room next to M. de Guersaint's softly opened and a woman, clad in black, slipped into the passage. As she turned, she found herself face to face with Pierre, in such a fashion that it was impossible for them to pretend not to recognise each other. The woman was Madame Volmar. Six o'clock had not yet struck, and she was going off, hoping that nobody would notice her, with the intention of showing herself at the hospital, and there spending this last morning, in order, in some measure, to justify her journey to Lourdes. When she perceived Pierre, she began to tremble, and, at first, could only stammer: "Oh, Monsieur l'Abbe, Monsieur l'Abbe!" Then, noticing that the priest had left his door wide open, she seemed to give way to the fever consuming her, to a need of speaking out, explaining things and justifying herself. With her face suffused by a rush of blood she entered the young man's room, whither he had to follow her, greatly disturbed by this strange adventure. And, as he still left the door open, it was she who, in her desire to confide her sorrow and her sin to him, begged that he would close it. "Oh! I pray you, Monsieur l'Abbe," said she, "do not judge me too harshly." He made a gesture as though to reply that he did not allow himself the right to pass judgment upon her. "But yes, but yes," she responded; "I know very well that you are acquainted with my misfortune. You saw me once in Paris behind the church of La Trinite, and the other day you recognised me on the balcony here! You were aware that I was there--in that room. But if you only knew--ah, if you only knew!" Her lips were quivering, and tears were welling into her eyes. As he looked at her he was surprised by the extraordinary beauty transfiguring her face. This woman, invariably clad in black, extremely simple, with never a jewel, now appeared to him in all the brilliancy of her passion; no longer drawing back into the gloom, no longer seeking to bedim the lustre of her eyes, as was her wont. She, who at first sight did not seem pretty, but too dark and slender, with drawn features, a large mouth and long nose, assumed, as he now examined her, a troubling charm, a powerful, irresistible beauty. Her eyes especially--her large, magnificent eyes, whose brasiers she usually sought to cover with a veil of indifference--were flaring like torches; and he understood that she should be loved, adored, to madness. "If you only knew, Monsieur l'Abbe," she continued. "If I were only to tell you all that I have suffered. Doubtless you have suspected something of it, since you are acquainted with my mother-in-law and my husband. On the few occasions when you have called on us you cannot but have understood some of the abominable things which go on in my home, though I have always striven to appear happy in my silent little corner. But to live like that for ten years, to have no existence--never to love, never to be loved--no, no, it was beyond my power!" And then she related the whole painful story: her marriage with the diamond merchant, a disastrous, though it seemed an advantageous one; her mother-in-law, with the stern soul of a jailer or an executioner, and her husband, a monster of physical ugliness and mental villainy. They imprisoned her, they did not even allow her to look out of a window. They had beaten her, they had pitilessly assailed her in her tastes, her inclinations, in all her feminine weaknesses. She knew that her husband wandered in his affections, and yet if she smiled to a relative, if she had a flower in her corsage on some rare day of gaiety, he would tear it from her, enter into the most jealous rage, and seize and bruise her wrists whilst shouting the most fearful threats. For years and years she had lived in that hell, hoping, hoping still, having within her such a power of life, such an ardent need of affection, that she continued waiting for happiness, ever thinking, at the faintest breath, that it was about to enter. "I swear to you, Monsieur l'Abbe," said she, "that I could not do otherwise than I have done. I was too unhappy: my whole being longed for someone who would care for me. And when my friend the first time told me that he loved me it was all over--I was his forever. Ah! to be loved, to be spoken to gently, to have someone near you who is always solicitous and amiable; to know that in absence he thinks of you, that there is a heart somewhere in which you live . . . Ah! if it be a crime, Monsieur l'Abbe, I cannot, cannot feel remorse for it. I will not even say that I was urged to it; I simply say that it came to me as naturally as my breath, because it was as necessary to my life!" She had carried her hand to her lips as though to throw a kiss to the world, and Pierre felt deeply disturbed in presence of this lovely woman, who personified all the ardour of human passion, and at the same time a feeling of deep pity began to arise within him. "Poor woman!" he murmured. "It is not to the priest that I am confessing," she resumed; "it is to the man that I am speaking, to a man by whom I should greatly like to be understood. No, I am not a believer: religion has not sufficed me. It is said that some women find contentment in it, a firm protection even against all transgressions. But I have ever felt cold in church, weary unto death. Oh! I know very well that it is wrong to feign piety, to mingle religion with my heart affairs. But what would you? I am forced to it. If you saw me in Paris behind La Trinite it was because that church is the only place to which I am allowed to go alone; and if you find me here at Lourdes it is because, in the whole long year, I have but these three days of happiness and freedom." Again she began to tremble. Hot tears were coursing down her cheeks. A vision of it all arose in Pierre's mind, and, distracted by the thought of the ardent earthly love which possessed this unhappy creature, he again murmured: "Poor woman!" "And, Monsieur l'Abbe," she continued, "think of the hell to which I am about to return! For weeks and months I live my life of martyrdom without complaint. Another year, another year must go by without a day, an hour of happiness! Ah! I am indeed very unhappy, Monsieur l'Abbe, yet do you not think all the same that I am a good woman?" He had been deeply moved by her sincere display of mingled grief and passion. He felt in her the breath of universal desire--a sovereign flame. And his compassion overflowed from his heart, and his words were words of pardon. "Madame," he said, "I pity you and respect you infinitely." Then she spoke no further, but looked at him with her large tear-blurred eyes. And suddenly catching hold of both his hands, she grasped them tightly with her burning fingers. And then she went off, vanishing down the passage as light, as ethereal, as a shadow. However, Pierre suffered from her presence in that room even more acutely after she had departed. He opened the window wide that the fresh air might carry off the breath of passion which she had left there. Already on the Sunday when he had seen her on the balcony he had been seized with terror at the thought that she personified the revenge of the world and the flesh amidst all the mystical exaltation of immaculate Lourdes. And now his terror was returning to him. Love seemed stronger than faith, and perhaps it was only love that was divine. To love, to belong to one another, to create and continue life--was not that the one sole object of nature outside of all social and religious policies? For a moment he was conscious of the abyss before him: his chastity was his last prop, the very dignity of his spoilt life; and he realised that, if after yielding to his reason he also yielded to his flesh, he would be utterly lost. All his pride of purity, all his strength which he had placed in professional rectitude, thereupon returned to him, and he again vowed that he would never be a man, since he had voluntarily cut himself off from among men. Seven o'clock was striking, and Pierre did not go back to bed, but began to wash himself, thoroughly enjoying the cool water, which ended by calming his fever. As he finished dressing, the anxious thought of M. de Guersaint recurred to him on hearing a sound of footsteps in the passage. These steps stopped outside his room and someone knocked. With a feeling of relief he went to open the door, but on doing so exclaimed in great surprise "What, it's you! How is it that you're already up, running about to see people?" Marie stood on the threshold smiling, whilst behind her was Sister Hyacinthe, who had come with her, and who also was smiling, with her lovely, candid eyes. "Ah! my friend," said the girl, "I could not remain in bed. I sprang out directly I saw the sunshine. I had such a longing to walk, to run and jump about like a child, and I begged and implored so much that Sister was good enough to come with me. I think I should have got out through the window if the door had been closed against me." Pierre ushered them in, and an indescribable emotion oppressed him as he heard her jest so gaily and saw her move about so freely with such grace and liveliness. She, good heavens! she whom he had seen for years with lifeless legs and colourless face! Since he had left her the day before at the Basilica she had blossomed into full youth and beauty. One night had sufficed for him to find again, developed it is true, the sweet creature whom he had loved so tenderly, the superb, radiant child whom he had embraced so wildly in the by-gone days behind the flowering hedge, beneath the sun-flecked trees. "How tall and lovely you are, Marie!" said he, in spite of himself. Then Sister Hyacinthe interposed: "Hasn't the Blessed Virgin done things well, Monsieur l'Abbe? When she takes us in hand, you see, she turns us out as fresh as roses and smelling quite as sweet." "Ah!" resumed Marie, "I'm so happy; I feel quite strong and well and spotless, as though I had just been born!" All this was very delicious to Pierre. It seemed to him that the atmosphere was now truly purified of Madame Volmar's presence. Marie filled the room with her candour, with the perfume and brightness of her innocent youth. And yet the joy he felt at the sight of pure beauty and life reflowering was not exempt from sadness. For, after all, the revolt which he had felt in the crypt, the wound of his wrecked life, must forever leave him a bleeding heart. As he gazed upon all that resuscitated grace, as the woman he loved thus reappeared before him in the flower of her youth, he could not but remember that she would never be his, that he belonged no longer to the world, but to the grave. However, he no longer lamented; he experienced a boundless melancholy--a sensation of utter nothingness as he told himself that he was dead, that this dawn of beauty was rising on the tomb in which his manhood slept. It was renunciation, accepted, resolved upon amidst all the desolate grandeur attaching to those lives which are led contrary to nature's law. Then, like the other woman, the impassioned one, Marie took hold of Pierre's hands. But hers were so soft, so fresh, so soothing! She looked at him with so little confusion and a great longing which she dared not express. After a while, however, she summoned up her courage and said: "Will you kiss me, Pierre? It would please me so much." He shuddered, his heart crushed by this last torture. Ah! the kisses of other days--those kisses which had ever lingered on his lips! Never since had he kissed her, and to-day she was like a sister flinging her arms around his neck. She kissed him with a loud smack on both his cheeks, and offering her own, insisted on his doing likewise to her. So twice, in his turn, he embraced her. "I, too, Marie," said he, "am pleased, very pleased, I assure you." And then, overcome by emotion, his courage exhausted, whilst at the same time filled with delight and bitterness, he burst into sobs, weeping with his face buried in his hands, like a child seeking to hide its tears. "Come, come, we must not give way," said Sister Hyacinthe, gaily. "Monsieur l'Abbe would feel too proud if he fancied that we had merely come on his account. M. de Guersaint is about, isn't he?" Marie raised a cry of deep affection. "Ah! my dear father! After all, it's he who'll be most pleased!" Thereupon Pierre had to relate that M. de Guersaint had not returned from his excursion to Gavarnie. His increasing anxiety showed itself while he spoke, although he sought to explain his friend's absence, surmising all sorts of obstacles and unforeseen complications. Marie, however, did not seem afraid, but again laughed, saying that her father never could be punctual. Still she was extremely eager for him to see her walking, to find her on her legs again, resuscitated, in the fresh blossoming of her youth. All at once Sister Hyacinthe, who had gone to lean over the balcony, returned to the room, saying "Here he comes! He's down below, just alighting from his carriage." "Ah!" cried Marie, with the eager playfulness of a school-girl, "let's give him a surprise. Yes, we must hide, and when he's here we'll show ourselves all of a sudden." With these words, she hastily dragged Sister Hyacinthe into the adjoining room. Almost immediately afterwards, M. de Guersaint entered like a whirlwind from the passage, the door communicating with which had been quickly opened by Pierre, and, shaking the young priest's hand, the belated excursionist exclaimed: "Here I am at last! Ah! my friend, you can't have known what to think since four o'clock yesterday, when you expected me back, eh? But you have no idea of the adventures we have had. To begin with, one of the wheels of our landau came off just as we reached Gavarnie; then, yesterday evening--though we managed to start off again--a frightful storm detained us all night long at Saint-Sauveur. I wasn't able to sleep a wink." Then, breaking off, he inquired, "And you, are you all right?" "I wasn't able to sleep either," said the priest; "they made such a noise in the hotel." But M. de Guersaint had already started off again: "All the same, it was delightful. I must tell you; you can't imagine it. I was with three delightful churchmen. Abbe des Hermoises is certainly the most charming man I know. Oh! we did laugh--we did laugh!" Then he again stopped, to inquire, "And how's my daughter?" Thereupon a clear laugh behind him caused him to turn round, and he remained with his mouth wide open. Marie was there, and was walking, with a look of rapturous delight upon her face, which was beaming with health. He had never for a moment doubted the miracle, and was not in the least surprised that it had taken place, for he had returned with the conviction that everything would end well, and that he would surely find her cured. But what so utterly astounded him was the prodigious spectacle which he had not foreseen: his daughter, looking so beautiful, so divine, in her little black gown! --his daughter, who had not even brought a hat with her, and merely had a piece of lace tied over her lovely fair hair! --his daughter, full of life, blooming, triumphant, similar to all the daughters of all the fathers whom he had envied for so many years! "O my child! O my child!" he exclaimed. And, as she had flown into his arms, he pressed her to his heart, and then they fell upon their knees together. Everything disappeared from before them in a radiant effusion of faith and love. This heedless, hare-brained man, who fell asleep instead of accompanying his daughter to the Grotto, who went off to Gavarnie on the day the Blessed Virgin was to cure her, overflowed with such paternal affection, with such Christian faith so exalted by thankfulness, that for a moment he appeared sublime. "O Jesus! O Mary! let me thank you for having restored my child to me! O my child, we shall never have breath enough, soul enough, to render thanks to Mary and Jesus for the great happiness they have vouchsafed us! O my child, whom they have resuscitated, O my child, whom they have made so beautiful again, take my heart to offer it to them with your own! I am yours, I am theirs eternally, O my beloved child, my adored child!" Kneeling before the open window they both, with uplifted eyes, gazed ardently on heaven. The daughter had rested her head on her father's shoulder; whilst he had passed an arm round her waist. They had become one. Tears slowly trickled down their enraptured faces, which were smiling with superhuman felicity, whilst they stammered together disconnected expressions of gratitude. "O Jesus, we give Thee thanks! O Holy Mother of Jesus, we give thee thanks! We love you, we adore you both. You have rejuvenated the best blood in our veins; it is yours, it circulates only for you. O All-powerful Mother, O Divine and Well-beloved Son, behold a daughter and a father who bless you, who prostrate themselves with joy at your feet." So affecting was this mingling of two beings, happy at last after so many dark days, this happiness, which could but stammer as though still tinged with suffering, that Pierre was again moved to tears. But this time they were soothing tears which relieved his heart. Ah! poor pitiable humanity! how pleasant it was to see it somewhat consoled and enraptured! and what did it matter, after all, if its great joys of a few seconds' duration sprang from the eternal illusion! Was not the whole of humanity, pitiable humanity, saved by love, personified by that poor childish man who suddenly became sublime because he found his daughter resuscitated? Standing a little aside, Sister Hyacinthe was also weeping, her heart very full, full of human emotion which she had never before experienced, she who had known no other parents than the Almighty and the Blessed Virgin. Silence had now fallen in this room full of so much tearful fraternity. And it was she who spoke the first, when the father and the daughter, overcome with emotion, at length rose up. "Now, mademoiselle," she said, "we must be quick and get back to the hospital." But they all protested. M. de Guersaint wished to keep his daughter with him, and Marie's eyes expressed an eager desire, a longing to enjoy life, to walk and ramble through the whole vast world. "Oh! no, no!" said the father, "I won't give her back to you. We'll each have a cup of milk, for I'm dying of thirst; then we'll go out and walk about. Yes, yes, both of us! She shall take my arm, like a little woman!" Sister Hyacinthe laughed again. "Very well!" said she, "I'll leave her with you, and tell the ladies that you've stolen her from me. But for my own part I must be off. You've no idea what an amount of work we have to get through at the hospital if we are to be ready in time to leave: there are all the patients and things to be seen to; and all is in the greatest confusion!" "So to-day's really Tuesday, and we leave this afternoon?" asked Monsieur de Guersaint, already absent-minded again. "Of course we do, and don't forget! The white train starts at 3.40. And if you're sensible you'll bring your daughter back early so that she may have a little rest." Marie walked with the Sister to the door, saying "Be easy, I will be very good. Besides, I want to go back to the Grotto, to thank the Blessed Virgin once more." When they found themselves all three alone in the little room full of sunshine, it was delicious. Pierre called the servant and told her to bring them some milk, some chocolate, and cakes, in fact the nicest things he could think of. And although Marie had already broken her fast, she ate again, so great an appetite had come upon her since the night before. They drew the table to the window and made quite a feast amidst the keen air from the mountains, whilst the hundred bells of Lourdes, proclaimed with flying peals the glory of that radiant day. They chattered and laughed, and the young woman told her father the story of the miracle, with all the oft-repeated details. She related, too, how she had left her box at the Basilica, and how she had slept twelve hours without stirring. Then M. de Guersaint on his side wished to relate his excursion, but got mixed and kept coming back to the miracle. Finally, it appeared that the Cirque de Gavarnie was something colossal. Only, when you looked at it from a distance it seemed small, for you lost all sense of proportion. The gigantic snow-covered tiers of cliffs, the topmost ridge standing out against the sky with the outlines of some cyclopean fortress with razed keep and jagged ramparts, the great cascade, whose ceaseless jet seemed so slow when in reality it must have rushed down with a noise like thunder, the whole immensity, the forests on right and left, the torrents and the landslips, looked as though they might have been held in the palm of one's hand, when one gazed upon them from the village market-place. And what had impressed him most, what he repeatedly alluded to, were the strange figures described by the snow, which had remained up there amongst the rocks. Amongst others was a huge crucifix, a white cross, several thousand yards in length, which you might have thought had been thrown across the amphitheatre from one end to the other. However, all at once M. de Guersaint broke off to inquire: "By the way, what's happening at our neighbour's? As I came up-stairs a little while ago I met Monsieur Vigneron running about like a madman; and, through the open doorway of their room, I fancied I saw Madame Vigneron looking very red. Has their son Gustave had another attack?" Pierre had quite forgotten Madame Chaise lying dead on the other side of the partition. He seemed to feel a cold breath pass over him. "No, no," he answered, "the child is all right." And he said no more, preferring to remain silent. Why spoil this happy hour of new life and reconquered youth by mingling with it the image of death? However, from that moment he himself could not cease thinking of the proximity of nothingness. And he thought, too, of that other room where Madame Volmar's friend was now alone, stifling his sobs with his lips pressed upon a pair of gloves which he had stolen from her. All the sounds of the hotel were now becoming audible again--the coughs, the sighs, the indistinct voices, the continual slamming of doors, the creaking of the floors beneath the great accumulation of travellers, and all the stir in the passages, along which flying skirts were sweeping, and families galloping distractedly amidst the hurry-scurry of departure. "On my word! you'll do yourself an injury," all at once cried Monsieur de Guersaint, on seeing his daughter take up another cake. Marie was quite merry too. But at a sudden thought tears came into her eyes, and she exclaimed: "Ah! how glad I am! but also how sorry when I think that everybody is not as pleased as myself."

2

PLEASANT HOURS

IT was eight o'clock, and Marie was so impatient that she could not keep still, but continued going to the window, as if she wished to inhale all the air of the vast, expanse and the immense sky. Ah! what a pleasure to be able to run about the streets, across the squares, to go everywhere as far as she might wish. And to show how strong she was, to have the pride of walking leagues in the presence of everyone, now that the Blessed Virgin had cured her! It was an irresistible impulsion, a flight of her entire being, her blood, and her heart. However, just as she was setting out she made up her mind that her first visit with her father ought to be to the Grotto, where both of them had to thank Our Lady of Lourdes. Then they would be free; they would have two long hours before them, and might walk wherever they chose, before she returned to lunch and pack up her few things at the hospital. "Well, is everyone ready?" repeated M. de Guersaint. "Shall we make a move?" Pierre took his hat, and all three went down-stairs, talking very loud and laughing on the staircase, like boisterous school-boys going for their holidays. They had almost reached the street, when at the doorway Madame Majeste rushed forward. She had evidently been waiting for them to go out. "Ah! mademoiselle; ah! gentlemen, allow me to congratulate you," she said. "We have heard of the extraordinary favour that has been granted you; we are so happy, so much flattered, when the Blessed Virgin is pleased to select one of our customers!" Her dry, harsh face was melting with amiability, and she observed the miraculously healed girl with the fondest of eyes. Then she impulsively called her husband, who was passing: "Look, my dear! It's mademoiselle; it's mademoiselle." Majeste's clean-shaven face, puffed out with yellow fat, assumed a happy and grateful expression. "Really, mademoiselle, I cannot tell you how honoured we feel," said he. "We shall never forget that your papa put up at our place. It has already excited the envy of many people." While he spoke Madame Majeste stopped the other travellers who were going out, and with a sign summoned the families already seated in the dining-room; indeed, she would have called in the whole street if they had given her time, to show that she had in her house the miracle at which all Lourdes had been marvelling since the previous day. People ended by collecting there, a crowd gathered little by little, while she whispered in the ear of each "Look! that's she; the young party, you know, the young party who--" But all at once she exclaimed: "I'll go and fetch Apolline from the shop; I must show mademoiselle to Apolline." Thereupon, however, Majeste, in a very dignified way, restrained her. "No," he said, "leave Apolline; she has three ladies to serve already. Mademoiselle and these gentlemen will certainly not leave Lourdes without making a few purchases. The little souvenirs that one carries away with one are so pleasant to look at later on! And our customers make a point of never buying elsewhere than here, in the shop which we have annexed to the hotel." "I have already offered my services," added Madame Majeste, "and I renew them. Apolline will be so happy to show mademoiselle all our prettiest articles, at prices, too, which are incredibly low! Oh! there are some delightful things, delightful!" Marie was becoming impatient at being detained in this manner, and Pierre was suffering from the increasing curiosity which they were arousing. As for M. de Guersaint, he enjoyed this popularity and triumph of his daughter immensely, and promised to return. "Certainly," said he, "we will purchase a few little knick-knacks. Some souvenirs for ourselves, and some presents that we shall have to make, but later on, when we come back." At last they escaped and descended the Avenue de la Grotte. The weather was again superb after the storms of the two preceding nights. Cooled by the rain, the morning air was delicious amidst the gaiety which the bright sun shed around. A busy crowd, well pleased with life, was already hurrying along the pavements. And what pleasure it all was for Marie, to whom everything seemed new, charming, inappreciable! In the morning she had had to allow Raymonde to lend her a pair of boots, for she had taken good care not to put any in her portmanteau, superstitiously fearing that they might bring her bad luck. However, Raymonde's boots fitted her admirably, and she listened with childish delight to the little heels tapping merrily on the flagstones. And she did not remember having ever seen houses so white, trees so green, and passers-by so happy. All her senses seemed holiday-making, endowed with a marvellously delicate sensibility; she heard music, smelt distant perfumes, savoured the air greedily, as though it were some delicious fruit. But what she considered, above all, so nice, so charming, was to walk along in this wise on her father's arm. She had never done so before, although she had felt the desire for years, as for one of those impossible pleasures with which people occupy their minds when invalided. And now her dream was realised and her heart beat with joy. She pressed against her father, and strove to walk very upright and look very handsome, so as to do him honour. And he was quite proud, as happy as she was, showing, exhibiting her, overcome with joy at the thought that she belonged to him, that she was his blood, his flesh, his daughter, henceforth beaming with youth and health. As they were all three crossing the Plateau de la Merlasse, already obstructed by a band of candle and bouquet sellers running after the pilgrims, M. de Guersaint exclaimed, "We are surely not going to the Grotto empty-handed!" Pierre, who was walking on the other side of Marie, himself brightened by her merry humour, thereupon stopped, and they were at once surrounded by a crowd of female hawkers, who with eager fingers thrust their goods into their faces. "My beautiful young lady! My good gentleman! Buy of me, of me, of me!" Such was the onslaught that it became necessary to struggle in order to extricate oneself. M. de Guersaint ended by purchasing the largest nosegay he could see--a bouquet of white marguerites, as round and hard as a cabbage--from a handsome, fair-haired, well developed girl of twenty, who was extremely bold both in look and manner. It only cost twenty sons, and he insisted on paying for it out of his own little purse, somewhat abashed meantime by the girl's unblushing effrontery. Then Pierre in his turn settled for the three candles which Marie had taken from an old woman, candles at two francs each, a very reasonable price, as she repeatedly said. And on being paid, the old creature, who had an angular face, covetous eyes, and a nose like the beak of a bird of prey, returned profuse and mellifluous thanks: "May Our Lady of Lourdes bless you, my beautiful young lady! May she cure you of your complaints, you and yours!" This enlivened them again, and they set out once more, all three laughing, amused like children at the idea that the good woman's wish had already been accomplished. At the Grotto Marie wished to file off at once, in order to offer the bouquet and candles herself before even kneeling down. There were not many people there as yet, and having gone to the end of the line their turn came after waiting some three or four minutes. And with what enraptured glances did she then examine everything--the altar of engraved silver, the harmonium-organ, the votive offerings, the candle-holders, streaming with wax blazing in broad daylight. She was now inside that Grotto which she had hitherto only seen from her box of misery; she breathed there as in Paradise itself, steeped rapturously in a pleasant warmth and odour, which slightly oppressed her. When she had placed the tapers at the bottom of the large basket, and had raised herself on tiptoe to fix the bouquet on one of the spears of the iron railing, she imprinted a long kiss upon the rock, below the statue of the Blessed Virgin, at the very spot, indeed, which millions of lips had already polished. And the stone received a kiss of love in which she put forth all the strength of her gratitude, a kiss with which her heart melted. When she was once more outside, Marie prostrated and humbled herself in an almost endless act of thanksgiving. Her father also had knelt down near her, and mingled the fervour of his gratitude with hers. But he could not remain doing the same thing for long. Little by little he became uneasy, and ended by bending down to his daughter's ear to tell her that he had a call to make which he had previously forgotten. Assuredly the best course would be for her to remain where she was, praying, and waiting for him. While she completed her devotions he would hurry along and get his troublesome errand over; and then they might walk about at ease wheresoever they liked. She did not understand him, did not even hear him, but simply nodded her head, promising that she would not move, and then such tender faith again took possession of her that her eyes, fixed on the white statue of the Virgin, filled with tears. When M. de Guersaint had joined Pierre, who had remained a short distance off, he gave him the following explanation. "My dear fellow," he said, "it's a matter of conscience; I formally promised the coachman who drove us to Gavarnie that I would see his master and tell him the real cause of our delay. You know whom I mean--the hairdresser on the Place du Marcadal. And, besides, I want to get shaved." Pierre, who felt uneasy at this proposal, had to give way in face of the promise that they would be back within a quarter of an hour. Only, as the distance seemed long, he on his side insisted on taking a trap which was standing at the bottom of the Plateau de la Merlasse. It was a sort of greenish cabriolet, and its driver, a fat fellow of about thirty, with the usual Basque cap on his head, was smoking a cigarette whilst waiting to be hired. Perched sideways on the seat with his knees wide apart, he drove them on with the tranquil indifference of a well-fed man who considers himself the master of the street. "We will keep you," said Pierre as he alighted, when they had reached the Place du Marcadal. "Very well, very well, Monsieur l'Abbe! I'll wait for you!" And then, leaving his lean horse in the hot sun, the driver went to chat and laugh with a strong, dishevelled servant-girl who was washing a dog in the basin of the neighbouring fountain. Cazaban, as it happened, was just then on the threshold of his shop, the lofty windows and pale green painting of which enlivened the dull Place, which was so deserted on week-days. When he was not pressed with work he delighted to parade in this manner, standing between his two windows, which pots of pomatum and bottles of perfumery decorated with bright shades of colour. He at once recognised the gentlemen. "Very flattered, very much honoured. Pray walk in, I beg of you," he said. Then, at the first words which M. de Guersaint said to him to excuse the man who had driven him to Gavarnie, he showed himself well disposed. Of course it was not the man's fault; he could not prevent wheels coming to pieces, or storms falling. So long as the travellers did not complain all was well. "Oh!" thereupon exclaimed M. de Guersaint, "it's a magnificent country, never to be forgotten." "Well, monsieur, as our neighbourhood pleases you, you must come and see us again; we don't ask anything better," said Cazaban; and, on the architect seating himself in one of the arm-chairs and asking to be shaved, he began to bustle about. His assistant was still absent, running errands for the pilgrims whom he lodged, a whole family, who were taking a case of chaplets, plaster Virgins, and framed engravings away with them. You heard a confused tramping of feet and violent bursts of conversation coming from the first floor, all the helter-skelter of people whom the approaching departure and the packing of purchases lying hither and thither drove almost crazy. In the adjoining dining-room, the door of which had remained open, two children were draining the dregs of some cups of chocolate which stood about amidst the disorder of the breakfast service. The whole of the house had been let, entirely given over, and now had come the last hours of this invasion which compelled the hairdresser and his wife to seek refuge in the narrow cellar, where they slept on a small camp-bed. While Cazaban was rubbing M. de Guersaint's cheeks with soap-suds, the architect questioned him. "Well, are you satisfied with the season?" "Certainly, monsieur, I can't complain. As you hear, my travellers are leaving to-day, but I am expecting others to-morrow morning; barely sufficient time for a sweep out. It will be the same up to October." Then, as Pierre remained standing, walking about the shop and looking at the walls with an air of impatience, he turned round politely and said: "Pray be seated, Monsieur l'Abbe; take a newspaper. It will not be long." The priest having thanked him with a nod, and refusing to sit down, the hairdresser, whose tongue was ever itching to talk, continued: "Oh! as for myself, I am always busy, my house is renowned for the cleanliness of the beds and the excellence of the fare. Only the town is not satisfied. Ah, no! I may even say that I have never known so much discontent here." He became silent for a moment, and shaved his customer's left cheek; then again pausing in his work he suddenly declared with a cry, wrung from him by conviction, "The Fathers of the Grotto are playing with fire, monsieur, that is all I have to say." From that moment, however, the vent-plug was withdrawn, and he talked and talked and talked again. His big eyes rolled in his long face with prominent cheek-bones and sunburnt complexion sprinkled with red, while the whole of his nervous little body continued on the jump, agitated by his growing exuberance of speech and gesture. He returned to his former indictment, and enumerated all the many grievances that the old town had against the Fathers. The hotel-keepers complained; the dealers in religious fancy articles did not take half the amount they ought to have realised; and, finally, the new town monopolised both the pilgrims and the cash; there was now no possibility for anyone but the keepers of the lodging-houses, hotels, and shops open in the neighbourhood of the Grotto to make any money whatever. It was a merciless struggle, a deadly hostility increasing from day to day, the old city losing a little of its life each season, and assuredly destined to disappear,--to be choked, assassinated, by the young town. Ah! their dirty Grotto! He would rather have his feet cut off than tread there. Wasn't it heart-rending, that knick-knack shop which they had stuck beside it? A shameful thing, at which a bishop had shown himself so indignant that it was said he had written to the Pope! He, Cazaban, who flattered himself with being a freethinker and a Republican of the old days, who already under the Empire had voted for the Opposition candidates, assuredly had the right to declare that he did not believe in their dirty Grotto, and that he did not care a fig for it! "Look here, monsieur," he continued; "I am going to tell you a fact. My brother belongs to the municipal council, and it's through him that I know it. I must tell you first of all that we now have a Republican municipal council, which is much worried by the demoralisation of the town. You can no longer go out at night without meeting girls in the streets--you know, those candle hawkers! They gad about with the drivers who come here when the season commences, and swell the suspicious floating population which comes no one knows whence. And I must also explain to you the position of the Fathers towards the town. When they purchased the land at the Grotto they signed an agreement by which they undertook not to engage in any business there. Well, they have opened a shop in spite of their signature. Is not that an unfair rivalry, unworthy of honest people? So the new council decided on sending them a deputation to insist on the agreement being respected, and enjoining them to close their shop at once. What do you think they answered, monsieur? Oh! what they have replied twenty times before, what they will always answer, when they are reminded of their engagements: 'Very well, we consent to keep them, but we are masters at our own place, and we'll close the Grotto!'" He raised himself up, his razor in the air, and, repeating his words, his eyes dilated by the enormity of the thing, he said, "'We'll close the Grotto.'" Pierre, who was continuing his slow walk, suddenly stopped and said in his face, "Well! the municipal council had only to answer, 'Close it.'" At this Cazaban almost choked; the blood rushed to his face, he was beside himself, and stammered out "Close the Grotto? --Close the Grotto?" "Certainly! As the Grotto irritates you and rends your heart; as it's a cause of continual warfare, injustice, and corruption. Everything would be over, we should hear no more about it. That would really be a capital solution, and if the council had the power it would render you a service by forcing the Fathers to carry out their threat." As Pierre went on speaking, Cazaban's anger subsided. He became very calm and somewhat pale, and in the depths of his big eyes the priest detected an expression of increasing uneasiness. Had he not gone too far in his passion against the Fathers? Many ecclesiastics did not like them; perhaps this young priest was simply at Lourdes for the purpose of stirring-up an agitation against them. Then who knows? --it might possibly result in the Grotto being closed later on. But it was by the Grotto that they all lived. If the old city screeched with rage at only picking up the crumbs, it was well pleased to secure even that windfall; and the freethinkers themselves, who coined money with the pilgrims, like everyone else, held their tongues, ill at ease, and even frightened, when they found people too much of their opinion with regard to the objectionable features of new Lourdes. It was necessary to be prudent. Cazaban thereupon returned to M. de Guersaint, whose other cheek he began shaving, murmuring the while in an off-hand manner: "Oh! what I say about the Grotto is not because it troubles me much in reality, and, besides, everyone must live." In the dining-room, the children, amidst deafening shouts, had just broken one of the bowls, and Pierre, glancing through the open doorway, again noticed the engravings of religious subjects and the plaster Virgin with which the hairdresser had ornamented the apartment in order to please his lodgers. And just then, too, a voice shouted from the first floor that the trunk was ready, and that they would be much obliged if the assistant would cord it as soon as he returned. However, Cazaban, in the presence of these two gentlemen whom, as a matter of fact, he did not know, remained suspicious and uneasy, his brain haunted by all sorts of disquieting suppositions. He was in despair at the idea of having to let them go away without learning anything about them, especially after having exposed himself. If he had only been able to withdraw the more rabid of his biting remarks about the Fathers. Accordingly, when M. de Guersaint rose to wash his chin, he yielded to a desire to renew the conversation. "Have you heard talk of yesterday's miracle? The town is quite upside down with it; more than twenty people have already given me an account of what occurred. Yes, it seems they obtained an extraordinary miracle, a paralytic young lady got up and dragged her invalid carriage as far as the choir of the Basilica." M. de Guersaint, who was about to sit down after wiping himself, gave a complacent laugh. "That young lady is my daughter," he said. Thereupon, under this sudden and fortunate flash of enlightenment, Cazaban became all smiles. He felt reassured, and combed M. de Guersaint's hair with a masterly touch, amid a returning exuberance of speech and gesture. "Ah! monsieur, I congratulate you, I am flattered at having you in my hands. Since the young lady your daughter is cured, your father's heart is at ease. Am I not right?" And he also found a few pleasant words for Pierre. Then, when he had decided to let them go, he looked at the priest with an air of conviction, and remarked, like a sensible man, desirous of coming to a conclusion on the subject of miracles: "There are some, Monsieur l'Abbe, which are good fortunes for everybody. From time to time we require one of that description." Outside, M. de Guersaint had to go and fetch the coachman, who was still laughing with the servant-girl, while her dog, dripping with water, was shaking itself in the sun. In five minutes the trap brought them back to the bottom of the Plateau de la Merlasse. The trip had taken a good half-hour. Pierre wanted to keep the conveyance, with the idea of showing Marie the town without giving her too much fatigue. So, while the father ran to the Grotto to fetch his daughter, he waited there beneath the trees. The coachman at once engaged in conversation with the priest. He had lit another cigarette and showed himself very familiar. He came from a village in the environs of Toulouse, and did not complain, for he earned good round sums each day at Lourdes. You fed well there, said he, you amused yourself, it was what you might call a good neighbourhood. He said these things with the /abandon/ of a man who was not troubled with religious scruples, but yet did not forget the respect which he owed to an ecclesiastic. At last, from the top of his box, where he remained half lying down, dangling one of his legs, he allowed this remark to fall slowly from his lips: "Ah! yes, Monsieur l'Abbe, Lourdes has caught on well, but the question is whether it will all last long!" Pierre, who was very much struck by the remark, was pondering on its involuntary profundity, when M. de Guersaint reappeared, bringing Marie with him. He had found her kneeling on the same spot, in the same act of faith and thankfulness, at the feet of the Blessed Virgin; and it seemed as if she had brought all the brilliant light of the Grotto away in her eyes, so vividly did they sparkle with divine joy at her cure. She would not entertain a proposal to keep the trap. No, no! she preferred to go on foot; she did not care about seeing the town, so long as she might for another hour continue walking on her father's arm through the gardens, the streets, the squares, anywhere they pleased! And, when Pierre had paid the driver, it was she who turned into a path of the Esplanade garden, delighted at being able to saunter in this wise beside the turf and the flower beds, under the great trees. The grass, the leaves, the shady solitary walks where you heard the everlasting rippling of the Gave, were so sweet and fresh! But afterwards she wished to return by way of the streets, among the crowd, that she might find the agitation, noise, and life, the need of which possessed her whole being. In the Rue St. Joseph, on perceiving the panorama, where the former Grotto was depicted, with Bernadette kneeling down before it on the day of the miracle of the candle, the idea occurred to Pierre to go in. Marie became as happy as a child; and even M. de Guersaint was full of innocent delight, especially when he noticed that among the batch of pilgrims who dived at the same time as themselves into the depths of the obscure corridor, several recognised in his daughter the girl so miraculously healed the day before, who was already famous, and whose name flew from mouth to mouth. Up above, on the circular platform, when they came out into the diffuse light, filtering through a vellum, there was a sort of ovation around Marie; soft whispers, beatifical glances, a rapture of delight in seeing, following, and touching her. Now glory had come, she would be loved in that way wherever she went, and it was not until the showman who gave the explanations had placed himself at the head of the little party of visitors, and begun to walk round, relating the incident depicted on the huge circular canvas, nearly five hundred feet in length, that she was in some measure forgotten. The painting represented the seventeenth apparition of the Blessed Virgin to Bernadette, on the day when, kneeling before the Grotto during her vision, she had heedlessly left her hand on the flame of the candle without burning it. The whole of the old primitive landscape of the Grotto was shown, the whole scene was set out with all its historical personages: the doctor verifying the miracle watch in hand, the Mayor, the Commissary of Police, and the Public Prosecutor, whose names the showman gave out, amidst the amazement of the public following him. Then, by an unconscious transition of ideas, Pierre recalled the remark which the driver of the cabriolet had made a short time previously: "Lourdes has caught on well, but the question is whether it will all last long." That, in fact, was the question. How many venerated sanctuaries had thus been built already, at the bidding of innocent chosen children, to whom the Blessed Virgin had shown herself! It was always the same story beginning afresh: an apparition; a persecuted shepherdess, who was called a liar; next the covert propulsion of human misery hungering after illusion; then propaganda, and the triumph of the sanctuary shining like a star; and afterwards decline, and oblivion, when the ecstatic dream of another visionary gave birth to another sanctuary elsewhere. It seemed as if the power of illusion wore away; that it was necessary in the course of centuries to displace it, set it amidst new scenery, under fresh circumstances, in order to renew its force. La Salette had dethroned the old wooden and stone Virgins that had healed; Lourdes had just dethroned La Salette, pending the time when it would be dethroned itself by Our Lady of to-morrow, she who will show her sweet, consoling features to some pure child as yet unborn. Only, if Lourdes had met with such rapid, such prodigious fortune, it assuredly owed it to the little sincere soul, the delightful charm of Bernadette. Here there was no deceit, no falsehood, merely the blossoming of suffering, a delicate sick child who brought to the afflicted multitude her dream of justice and equality in the miraculous. She was merely eternal hope, eternal consolation. Besides, all historical and social circumstances seem to have combined to increase the need of this mystical flight at the close of a terrible century of positivist inquiry; and that was perhaps the reason why Lourdes would still long endure in its triumph, before becoming a mere legend, one of those dead religions whose powerful perfume has evaporated. Ah! that ancient Lourdes, that city of peace and belief, the only possible cradle where the legend could come into being, how easily Pierre conjured it up before him, whilst walking round the vast canvas of the Panorama! That canvas said everything; it was the best lesson of things that could be seen. The monotonous explanations of the showman were not heard; the landscape spoke for itself. First of all there was the Grotto, the rocky hollow beside the Gave, a savage spot suitable for reverie--bushy slopes and heaps of fallen stone, without a path among them; and nothing yet in the way of ornamentation--no monumental quay, no garden paths winding among trimly cut shrubs; no Grotto set in order, deformed, enclosed with iron railings; above all, no shop for the sale of religious articles, that simony shop which was the scandal of all pious souls. The Virgin could not have selected a more solitary and charming nook wherein to show herself to the chosen one of her heart, the poor young girl who came thither still possessed by the dream of her painful nights, even whilst gathering dead wood. And on the opposite side of the Gave, behind the rock of the castle, was old Lourdes, confident and asleep. Another age was then conjured up; a small town, with narrow pebble-paved streets, black houses with marble dressings, and an antique, semi-Spanish church, full of old carvings, and peopled with visions of gold and painted flesh. Communication with other places was only kept up by the Bagneres and Cauterets /diligences/, which twice a day forded the Lapaca to climb the steep causeway of the Rue Basse. The spirit of the century had not breathed on those peaceful roofs sheltering a belated population which had remained childish, enclosed within the narrow limits of strict religious discipline. There was no debauchery; a slow antique commerce sufficed for daily life, a poor life whose hardships were the safeguards of morality. And Pierre had never better understood how Bernadette, born in that land of faith and honesty, had flowered like a natural rose, budding on the briars of the road. "It's all the same very curious," observed M. de Guersaint when they found themselves in the street again. "I'm not at all sorry I saw it." Marie was also laughing with pleasure. "One would almost think oneself there. Isn't it so, father? At times it seems as if the people were going to move. And how charming Bernadette looks on her knees, in ecstasy, while the candle flame licks her fingers without burning them." "Let us see," said the architect; "we have only an hour left, so we must think of making our purchases, if we wish to buy anything. Shall we take a look at the shops? We certainly promised Majeste to give him the preference; but that does not prevent us from making a few inquiries. Eh! Pierre, what do you say?" "Oh! certainly, as you like," answered the priest. "Besides, it will give us a walk." And he thereupon followed the young girl and her father, who returned to the Plateau de la Merlasse. Since he had quitted the Panorama he felt as though he no longer knew where he was. It seemed to him as if he had all at once been transported from one to another town, parted by centuries. He had left the solitude, the slumbering peacefulness of old Lourdes, which the dead light of the vellum had increased, to fall at last into new Lourdes, sparkling with brightness and noisy with the crowd. Ten o'clock had just struck, and extraordinary animation reigned on the footways, where before breakfast an entire people was hastening to complete its purchases, so that it might have nothing but its departure to think of afterwards. The thousands of pilgrims of the national pilgrimage streamed along the thoroughfares and besieged the shops in a final scramble. You would have taken the cries, the jostling, and the sudden rushes for those at some fair just breaking up amidst a ceaseless roll of vehicles. Many, providing themselves with provisions for the journey, cleared the open-air stalls where bread and slices of sausages and ham were sold. Others purchased fruit and wine; baskets were filled with bottles and greasy parcels until they almost burst. A hawker who was wheeling some cheeses about on a small truck saw his goods carried off as if swept away by the wind. But what the crowd more particularly purchased were religious articles, and those hawkers whose barrows were loaded with statuettes and sacred engravings were reaping golden gains. The customers at the shops stood in strings on the pavement; the women were belted with immense chaplets, had Blessed Virgins tucked under their arms, and were provided with cans which they meant to fill at the miraculous spring. Carried in the hand or slung from the shoulder, some of them quite plain and others daubed over with a Lady of Lourdes in blue paint, these cans held from one to ten quarts apiece; and, shining with all the brightness of new tin, clashing, too, at times with the sharp jingle of stew-pans, they added a gay note to the aspect of the noisy multitude. And the fever of dealing, the pleasure of spending one's money, of returning home with one's pockets crammed with photographs and medals, lit up all faces with a holiday expression, transforming the radiant gathering into a fair-field crowd with appetites either beyond control or satisfied. On the Plateau de la Merlasse, M. de Guersaint for a moment felt tempted to enter one of the finest and most patronised shops, on the board over which were these words in large letters: "Soubirous, Brother of Bernadette." "Eh! what if we were to make our purchases there? It would be more appropriate, more interesting to remember." However, he passed on, repeating that they must see everything first of all. Pierre had looked at the shop kept by Bernadette's brother with a heavy heart. It grieved him to find the brother selling the Blessed Virgin whom the sister had beheld. However, it was necessary to live, and he had reason to believe that, beside the triumphant Basilica resplendent with gold, the visionary's relatives were not making a fortune, the competition being so terrible. If on the one hand the pilgrims left millions behind them at Lourdes, on the other there were more than two hundred dealers in religious articles, to say nothing of the hotel and lodging-house keepers, to whom the largest part of the spoils fell; and thus the gain, so eagerly disputed, ended by being moderate enough after all. Along the Plateau on the right and left of the repository kept by Bernadette's brother, other shops appeared, an uninterrupted row of them, pressing one against the other, each occupying a division of a long wooden structure, a sort of gallery erected by the town, which derived from it some sixty thousand francs a year. It formed a regular bazaar of open stalls, encroaching on the pavements so as to tempt people to stop as they passed along. For more than three hundred yards no other trade was plied: a river of chaplets, medals, and statuettes streamed without end behind the windows; and in enormous letters on the boards above appeared the venerated names of Saint Roch, Saint Joseph, Jerusalem, The Immaculate Virgin, The Sacred Heart of Mary, all the names in Paradise that were most likely to touch and attract customers. "Really," said M. de Guersaint, "I think it's the same thing all over the place. Let us go anywhere." He himself had had enough of it, this interminable display was quite exhausting him. "But as you promised to make the purchases at Majeste's," said Marie, who was not, in the least tired, "the best thing will be to go back." "That's it; let's return to Majeste's place." But the rows of shops began again in the Avenue de la Grotte. They swarmed on both sides; and among them here were jewellers, drapers, and umbrella-makers, who also dealt in religious articles. There was even a confectioner who sold boxes of pastilles /a l'eau de Lourdes/, with a figure of the Virgin on the cover. A photographer's windows were crammed with views of the Grotto and the Basilica, and portraits of Bishops and reverend Fathers of all Orders, mixed up with views of famous sites in the neighbouring mountains. A bookseller displayed the last Catholic publications, volumes bearing devout titles, and among them the innumerable works published on Lourdes during the last twenty years, some of which had had a wonderful success, which was still fresh in memory. In this broad, populous thoroughfare the crowd streamed along in more open order; their cans jingled, everyone was in high spirits, amid the bright sunrays which enfiladed the road from one end to the other. And it seemed as if there would never be a finish to the statuettes, the medals, and the chaplets; one display followed another; and, indeed, there were miles of them running through the streets of the entire town, which was ever the same bazaar selling the same articles. In front of the Hotel of the Apparitions M. de Guersaint again hesitated. "Then it's decided, we are going to make our purchases there?" he asked. "Certainly," said Marie. "See what a beautiful shop it is!" And she was the first to enter the establishment, which was, in fact, one of the largest in the street, occupying the ground-floor of the hotel on the left hand. M. de Guersaint and Pierre followed her. Apolline, the niece of the Majestes, who was in charge of the place, was standing on a stool, taking some holy-water vases from a top shelf to show them to a young man, an elegant bearer, wearing beautiful yellow gaiters. She was laughing with the cooing sound of a dove, and looked charming with her thick black hair and her superb eyes, set in a somewhat square face, which had a straight forehead, chubby cheeks, and full red lips. Jumping lightly to the ground, she exclaimed: "Then you don't think that this pattern would please madame, your aunt?" "No, no," answered the bearer, as he went off. "Obtain the other pattern. I shall not leave until to-morrow, and will come back." When Apolline learnt that Marie was the young person visited by the miracle of whom Madame Majeste had been talking ever since the previous day, she became extremely attentive. She looked at her with her merry smile, in which there was a dash of surprise and covert incredulity. However, like the clever saleswoman that she was, she was profuse in complimentary remarks. "Ah, mademoiselle, I shall be so happy to sell to you! Your miracle is so beautiful! Look, the whole shop is at your disposal. We have the largest choice." Marie was ill at ease. "Thank you," she replied, "you are very good. But we have only come to buy a few small things." "If you will allow us," said M. de Guersaint, "we will choose ourselves." "Very well. That's it, monsieur. Afterwards we will see!" And as some other customers now came in, Apolline forgot them, returned to her duties as a pretty saleswoman, with caressing words and seductive glances, especially for the gentlemen, whom she never allowed to leave until they had their pockets full of purchases. M. de Guersaint had only two francs left of the louis which Blanche, his eldest daughter, had slipped into his hand when he was leaving, as pocket-money; and so he did not dare to make any large selection. But Pierre declared that they would cause him great pain if they did not allow him to offer them the few things which they would like to take away with them from Lourdes. It was therefore understood that they would first of all choose a present for Blanche, and then Marie and her father should select the souvenirs that pleased them best. "Don't let us hurry," repeated M. de Guersaint, who had become very gay. "Come, Marie, have a good look. What would be most likely to please Blanche?" All three looked, searched, and rummaged. But their indecision increased as they went from one object to another. With its counters, show-cases, and nests of drawers, furnishing it from top to bottom, the spacious shop was a sea of endless billows, overflowing with all the religious knick-knacks imaginable. There were the chaplets: skeins of chaplets hanging along the walls, and heaps of chaplets lying in the drawers, from humble ones costing twenty sons a dozen, to those of sweet-scented wood, agate, and lapis-lazuli, with chains of gold or silver; and some of them, of immense length, made to go twice round the neck or waist, had carved beads, as large as walnuts, separated by death's-heads. Then there were the medals: a shower of medals, boxes full of medals, of all sizes, of all metals, the cheapest and the most precious. They bore different inscriptions, they represented the Basilica, the Grotto, or the Immaculate Conception; they were engraved, /repoussees/, or enamelled, executed with care, or made by the gross, according to the price. And next there were the Blessed Virgins, great and small, in zinc, wood, ivory, and especially plaster; some entirely white, others tinted in bright colours, in accordance with the description given by Bernadette; the amiable and smiling face, the extremely long veil, the blue sash, and the golden roses on the feet, there being, however, some slight modification in each model so as to guarantee the copyright. And there was another flood of other religious objects: a hundred varieties of scapularies, a thousand different sorts of sacred pictures: fine engravings, large chromo-lithographs in glaring colours, submerged beneath a mass of smaller pictures, which were coloured, gilded, varnished, decorated with bouquets of flowers, and bordered with lace paper. And there was also jewellery: rings, brooches, and bracelets, loaded with stars and crosses, and ornamented with saintly figures. Finally, there was the Paris article, which rose above and submerged all the rest: pencil-holders, purses, cigar-holders, paperweights, paper-knives, even snuff-boxes; and innumerable other objects on which the Basilica, Grotto, and Blessed Virgin ever and ever appeared, reproduced in every way, by every process that is known. Heaped together pell-mell in one of the cases reserved to articles at fifty centimes apiece were napkin-rings, egg-cups, and wooden pipes, on which was carved the beaming apparition of Our Lady of Lourdes. Little by little, M. de Guersaint, with the annoyance of a man who prides himself on being an artist, became disgusted and quite sad. "But all this is frightful, frightful!" he repeated at every new article he took up to look at. Then he relieved himself by reminding Pierre of the ruinous attempt which he had made to improve the artistic quality of religious prints. The remains of his fortune had been lost in that attempt, and the thought made him all the more angry, in presence of the wretched productions with which the shop was crammed. Had anyone ever seen things of such idiotic, pretentious, and complicated ugliness! The vulgarity of the ideas and the silliness of the expressions portrayed rivalled the commonplace character of the composition. You were reminded of fashion-plates, the covers of boxes of sweets, and the wax dolls' heads that revolve in hairdressers' windows; it was an art abounding in false prettiness, painfully childish, with no really human touch in it, no tone, and no sincerity. And the architect, who was wound up, could not stop, but went on to express his disgust with the buildings of new Lourdes, the pitiable disfigurement of the Grotto, the colossal monstrosity of the inclined ways, the disastrous lack of symmetry in the church of the Rosary and the Basilica, the former looking too heavy, like a corn market, whilst the latter had an anaemical structural leanness with no kind of style but the mongrel. "Ah! one must really be very fond of God," he at last concluded, "to have courage enough to come and adore Him amidst such horrors! They have failed in everything, spoilt everything, as though out of pleasure. Not one of them has experienced that moment of true feeling, of real naturalness and sincere faith, which gives birth to masterpieces. They are all clever people, but all plagiarists; not one has given his mind and being to the undertaking. And what must they not require to inspire them, since they have failed to produce anything grand even in this land of miracles?" Pierre did not reply, but he was very much struck by these reflections, which at last gave him an explanation of a feeling of discomfort that he had experienced ever since his arrival at Lourdes. This discomfort arose from the difference between the modern surroundings and the faith of past ages which it sought to resuscitate. He thought of the old cathedrals where quivered that faith of nations; he pictured the former attributes of worship--the images, the goldsmith's work, the saints in wood and stone--all of admirable power and beauty of expression. The fact was that in those ancient times the workmen had been true believers, had given their whole souls and bodies and all the candour of their feelings to their productions, just as M. de Guersaint said. But nowadays architects built churches with the same practical tranquillity that they erected five-storey houses, just as the religious articles, the chaplets, the medals, and the statuettes were manufactured by the gross in the populous quarters of Paris by merrymaking workmen who did not even follow their religion. And thus what slopwork, what toymakers', ironmongers' stuff it all was! of a prettiness fit to make you cry, a silly sentimentality fit to make your heart turn with disgust! Lourdes was inundated, devastated, disfigured by it all to such a point as to quite upset persons with any delicacy of taste who happened to stray through its streets. It clashed jarringly with the attempted resuscitation of the legends, ceremonies, and processions of dead ages; and all at once it occurred to Pierre that the social and historical condemnation of Lourdes lay in this, that faith is forever dead among a people when it no longer introduces it into the churches it builds or the chaplets it manufactures. However, Marie had continued examining the shelves with the impatience of a child, hesitating, and finding nothing which seemed to her worthy of the great dream of ecstasy which she would ever keep within her. "Father," she said, "it is getting late; you must take me back to the hospital; and to make up my mind, look, I will give Blanche this medal with the silver chain. After all it's the most simple and prettiest thing here. She will wear it; it will make her a little piece of jewellery. As for myself, I will take this statuette of Our Lady of Lourdes, this small one, which is rather prettily painted. I shall place it in my room and surround it with fresh flowers. It will be very nice, will it not?" M. de Guersaint approved of her idea, and then busied himself with his own choice. "O dear! oh dear! how embarrassed I am!" said he. He was examining some ivory-handled penholders capped with pea-like balls, in which were microscopic photographs, and while bringing one of the little holes to his eye to look in it he raised an exclamation of mingled surprise and pleasure. "Hallo! here's the Cirque de Gavarnie! Ah! it's prodigious; everything is there; how can that colossal panorama have been got into so small a space? Come, I'll take this penholder; it's curious, and will remind me of my excursion." Pierre had simply chosen a portrait of Bernadette, the large photograph which represents her on her knees in a black gown, with a handkerchief tied over her hair, and which is said to be the only one in existence taken from life. He hastened to pay, and they were all three on the point of leaving when Madame Majeste entered, protested, and positively insisted on making Marie a little present, saying that it would bring her establishment good-fortune. "I beg of you, mademoiselle, take a scapulary," said she. "Look among those there. The Blessed Virgin who chose you will repay me in good luck." She raised her voice and made so much fuss that the purchasers filling the shop were interested, and began gazing at the girl with envious eyes. It was popularity bursting out again around her, a popularity which ended even by reaching the street when the landlady went to the threshold of the shop, making signs to the tradespeople opposite and putting all the neighbourhood in a flutter. "Let us go," repeated Marie, feeling more and more uncomfortable. But her father, on noticing a priest come in, detained her. "Ah! Monsieur l'Abbe des Hermoises!" It was in fact the handsome Abbe, clad in a cassock of fine cloth emitting a pleasant odour, and with an expression of soft gaiety on his fresh-coloured face. He had not noticed his companion of the previous day, but had gone straight to Apolline and taken her on one side. And Pierre overheard him saying in a subdued tone: "Why didn't you bring me my three-dozen chaplets this morning?" Apolline again began laughing with the cooing notes of a dove, and looked at him sideways, roguishly, without answering. "They are for my little penitents at Toulouse. I wanted to place them at the bottom of my trunk; and you offered to help me pack my linen." She continued laughing, and her pretty eyes sparkled. "However, I shall not leave before to-morrow. Bring them me to-night, will you not? When you are at liberty. It's at the end of the street, at Duchene's." Thereupon, with a slight movement of her red lips, and in a somewhat bantering way, which left him in doubt as to whether she would keep her promise, she replied: "Certainly, Monsieur l'Abbe, I will go." They were now interrupted by M. de Guersaint, who came forward to shake the priest's hand. And the two men at once began talking again of the Cirque de Gavarnie: they had had a delightful trip, a most pleasant time, which they would never forget. Then they enjoyed a laugh at the expense of their two companions, ecclesiastics of slender means, good-natured fellows, who had much amused them. And the architect ended by reminding his new friend that he had kindly promised to induce a personage at Toulouse, who was ten times a millionaire, to interest himself in his studies on navigable balloons. "A first advance of a hundred thousand francs would be sufficient," he said. "You can rely on me," answered Abbe des Hermoises. "You will not have prayed to the Blessed Virgin in vain." However, Pierre, who had kept Bernadette's portrait in his hand, had just then been struck by the extraordinary likeness between Apolline and the visionary. It was the same rather massive face, the same full thick mouth, and the same magnificent eyes; and he recollected that Madame Majeste had already pointed out to him this striking resemblance, which was all the more peculiar as Apolline had passed through a similar poverty-stricken childhood at Bartres before her aunt had taken her with her to assist in keeping the shop. Bernadette! Apolline! What a strange association, what an unexpected reincarnation at thirty years' distance! And, all at once, with this Apolline, who was so flightily merry and careless, and in regard to whom there were so many odd rumours, new Lourdes rose before his eyes: the coachmen, the candle-girls, the persons who let rooms and waylaid tenants at the railway station, the hundreds of furnished houses with discreet little lodgings, the crowd of free priests, the lady hospitallers, and the simple passers-by, who came there to satisfy their appetites. Then, too, there was the trading mania excited by the shower of millions, the entire town given up to lucre, the shops transforming the streets into bazaars which devoured one another, the hotels living gluttonously on the pilgrims, even to the Blue Sisters who kept a /table d'hote/, and the Fathers of the Grotto who coined money with their God! What a sad and frightful course of events, the vision of pure Bernadette inflaming multitudes, making them rush to the illusion of happiness, bringing a river of gold to the town, and from that moment rotting everything. The breath of superstition had sufficed to make humanity flock thither, to attract abundance of money, and to corrupt this honest corner of the earth forever. Where the candid lily had formerly bloomed there now grew the carnal rose, in the new loam of cupidity and enjoyment. Bethlehem had become Sodom since an innocent child had seen the Virgin. "Eh? What did I tell you?" exclaimed Madame Majeste, perceiving that Pierre was comparing her niece with the portrait. "Apolline is Bernadette all over!" The young girl approached with her amiable smile, flattered at first by the comparison. "Let's see, let's see!" said Abbe des Hermoises, with an air of lively interest. He took the photograph in his turn, compared it with the girl, and then exclaimed in amazement: "It's wonderful; the same features. I had not noticed it before. Really I'm delighted--" "Still I fancy she had a larger nose," Apolline ended by remarking. The Abbe then raised an exclamation of irresistible admiration: "Oh! you are prettier, much prettier, that's evident. But that does not matter, anyone would take you for two sisters." Pierre could not refrain from laughing, he thought the remark so peculiar. Ah! poor Bernadette was absolutely dead, and she had no sister. She could not have been born again; it would have been impossible for her to exist in the region of crowded life and passion which she had made. At length Marie went off leaning on her father's arm, and it was agreed that they would both call and fetch her at the hospital to go to the station together. More than fifty people were awaiting her in the street in a state of ecstasy. They bowed to her and followed her; and one woman even made her infirm child, whom she was bringing back from the Grotto, touch her gown.

3

DEPARTURE

At half-past two o'clock the white train, which was to leave Lourdes at three-forty, was already in the station, alongside the second platform. For three days it had been waiting on a siding, in the same state as when it had come from Paris, and since it had been run into the station again white flags had been waving from the foremost and hindmost of its carriages, by way of preventing any mistakes on the part of the pilgrims, whose entraining was usually a very long and troublesome affair. Moreover, all the fourteen trains of the pilgrimage were timed to leave that day. The green train had started off at ten o'clock, followed by the pink and the yellow trains, and the others--the orange, the grey, and the blue--would start in turn after the white train had taken its departure. It was, indeed, another terrible day's work for the station staff, amidst a tumult and a scramble which altogether distracted them. However, the departure of the white train was always the event of the day which provoked most interest and emotion, for it took away with it all the more afflicted patients, amongst whom were naturally those loved by the Virgin and chosen by her for the miraculous cures. Accordingly, a large, serried crowd was collected under the roofing of the spacious platform, a hundred yards in length, where all the benches were already covered with waiting pilgrims and their parcels. In the refreshment-room, at one end of the buildings, men were drinking beer and women ordering lemonade at the little tables which had been taken by assault, whilst at the other end bearers stood on guard at the goods entrance so as to keep the way clear for the speedy passage of the patients, who would soon be arriving. And all along the broad platform there was incessant coming and going, poor people rushing hither and thither in bewilderment, priests trotting along to render assistance, gentlemen in frock-coats looking on with quiet inquisitiveness: indeed, all the jumbling and jostling of the most mixed, most variegated throng ever elbowed in a railway station. At three o'clock, however, the sick had not yet reached the station, and Baron Suire was in despair, his anxiety arising from the dearth of horses, for a number of unexpected tourists had arrived at Lourdes that morning and hired conveyances for Bareges, Cauterets, and Gavarnie. At last, however, the Baron espied Berthaud and Gerard arriving in all haste, after scouring the town; and when he had rushed up to them they soon pacified him by announcing that things were going splendidly. They had been able to procure the needful animals, and the removal of the patients from the hospital was now being carried out under the most favorable circumstances. Squads of bearers with their stretchers and little carts were already in the station yard, watching for the arrival of the vans, breaks, and other vehicles which had been recruited. A reserve supply of mattresses and cushions was, moreover, heaped up beside a lamp-post. Nevertheless, just as the first patients arrived, Baron Suire again lost his head, whilst Berthaud and Gerard hastened to the platform from which the train would start. There they began to superintend matters, and gave orders amidst an increasing scramble. Father Fourcade was on this platform, walking up and down alongside the train, on Father Massias's arm. Seeing Doctor Bonamy approach, he stopped short to speak to him: "Ah, doctor," said he, "I am pleased to see you. Father Massias, who is about to leave us, was again telling me just now of the extraordinary favor granted by the Blessed Virgin to that interesting young person, Mademoiselle Marie de Guersaint. There has not been such a brilliant miracle for years! It is signal good-fortune for us--a blessing which should render our labours fruitful. All Christendom will be illumined, comforted, enriched by it." He was radiant with pleasure, and forthwith the doctor with his clean-shaven face, heavy, peaceful features, and usually tired eyes, also began to exult: "Yes, your reverence, it is prodigious, prodigious! I shall write a pamphlet about it. Never was cure produced by supernatural means in a more authentic manner. Ah! what a stir it will create!" Then, as they had begun walking to and fro again, all three together, he noticed that Father Fourcade was dragging his leg with increased difficulty, leaning heavily the while on his companion's arm. "Is your attack of gout worse, your reverence?" he inquired. "You seem to be suffering a great deal." "Oh! don't speak of it; I wasn't able to close my eyes all night! It is very annoying that this attack should have come on me the very day of my arrival here! It might as well have waited. But there is nothing to be done, so don't let us talk of it any more. I am, at all events, very pleased with this year's result." "Ah! yes, yes indeed," in his turn said Father Massias, in a voice which quivered with fervour; "we may all feel proud, and go away with our hearts full of enthusiasm and gratitude. How many prodigies there have been, in addition to the healing of that young woman you spoke of! There is no counting all the miracles: deaf women and dumb women have recovered their faculties, faces disfigured by sores have become as smooth as the hand, moribund consumptives have come to life again and eaten and danced! It is not a train of sufferers, but a train of resurrection, a train of glory, that I am about to take back to Paris!" He had ceased to see the ailing creatures around him, and in the blindness of his faith was soaring triumphantly. Then, alongside the carriages, whose compartments were beginning to fill, they all three continued their slow saunter, smiling at the pilgrims who bowed to them, and at times again stopping to address a kind word to some mournful woman who, pale and shivering, passed by upon a stretcher. They boldly declared that she was looking much better, and would assuredly soon get well. However, the station-master, who was incessantly bustling about, passed by, calling in a shrill voice: "Don't block up the platform, please; don't block up the platform!" And on Berthaud pointing out to him that it was, at all events, necessary to deposit the stretchers on the platform before hoisting the patients into the carriages, he became quite angry: "But, come, come; is it reasonable?" he asked. "Look at that little hand-cart which has been left on the rails over yonder. I expect the train to Toulouse in a few minutes. Do you want your people to be crushed to death?" Then he went off at a run to instruct some porters to keep the bewildered flock of pilgrims away from the rails. Many of them, old and simple people, did not even recognise the colour of their train, and this was the reason why one and all wore cards of some particular hue hanging from their necks, so that they might be led and entrained like marked cattle. And what a constant state of excitement it was, with the starting of these fourteen special trains, in addition to all the ordinary traffic, in which no change had been made. Pierre arrived, valise in hand, and found some difficulty in reaching the platform. He was alone, for Marie had expressed an ardent desire to kneel once more at the Grotto, so that her soul might burn with gratitude before the Blessed Virgin until the last moment; and so he had left M. de Guersaint to conduct her thither whilst he himself settled the hotel bill. Moreover, he had made them promise that they would take a fly to the station, and they would certainly arrive within a quarter of an hour. Meantime, his idea was to seek their carriage, and there rid himself of his valise. This, however, was not an easy task, and he only recognised the carriage eventually by the placard which had been swinging from it in the sunlight and the storms during the last three days--a square of pasteboard bearing the names of Madame de Jonquiere and Sisters Hyacinthe and Claire des Anges. There could be no mistake, and Pierre again pictured the compartments full of his travelling companions. Some cushions already marked M. Sabathier's corner, and on the seat where Marie had experienced such suffering he still found some scratches caused by the ironwork of her box. Then, having deposited his valise in his own place, he remained on the platform waiting and looking around him, with a slight feeling of surprise at not perceiving Doctor Chassaigne, who had promised to come and embrace him before the train started. Now that Marie was well again, Pierre had laid his bearer straps aside, and merely wore the red cross of the pilgrimage on his cassock. The station, of which he had caught but a glimpse, in the livid dawn amidst the anguish of the terrible morning of their arrival, now surprised him by its spacious platforms, its broad exits, and its clear gaiety. He could not see the mountains, but some verdant slopes rose up on the other side, in front of the waiting-rooms; and that afternoon the weather was delightfully mild, the sky of a milky whiteness, with light fleecy clouds veiling the sun, whence there fell a broad diffuse light, like a nacreous, pearly dust: "maiden's weather," as country folk are wont to say. The big clock had just struck three, and Pierre was looking at it when he saw Madame Desagneaux and Madame Volmar arrive, followed by Madame de Jonquiere and her daughter. These ladies, who had driven from the hospital in a landau, at once began looking for their carriage, and it was Raymonde who first recognised the first-class compartment in which she had travelled from Paris. "Mamma, mamma, here; here it is!" she called. "Stay a little while with us; you have plenty of time to install yourself among your patients, since they haven't yet arrived." Pierre now again found himself face to face with Madame Volmar, and their glances met. However, he gave no sign of recognition, and on her side there was but a slight sudden drooping of the eyelids. She had again assumed the air of a languid, indolent, black-robed woman, who modestly shrinks back, well pleased to escape notice. Her brasier-like eyes no longer glowed; it was only at long intervals that they kindled into a spark beneath the veil of indifference, the moire-like shade, which dimmed them. "Oh! it was a fearful sick headache!" she was repeating to Madame Desagneaux. "And, you can see, I've hardly recovered the use of my poor head yet. It's the journey which brings it on. It's the same thing every year." However, Berthaud and Gerard, who had just perceived the ladies, were hurrying up to them. That morning they had presented themselves at the Hospital of Our Lady of Dolours, and Madame de Jonquiere had received them in a little office near the linen-room. Thereupon, apologising with smiling affability for making his request amidst such a hurly-burly, Berthaud had solicited the hand of Mademoiselle Raymonde for his cousin, Gerard. They at once felt themselves at ease, the mother, with some show of emotion, saying that Lourdes would bring the young couple good luck. And so the marriage was arranged in a few words, amidst general satisfaction. A meeting was even appointed for the fifteenth of September at the Chateau of Berneville, near Caen, an estate belonging to Raymonde's uncle, the diplomatist, whom Berthaud knew, and to whom he promised to introduce Gerard. Then Raymonde was summoned, and blushed with pleasure as she placed her little hand in those of her betrothed. Binding her now upon the platform, the latter began paying her every attention, and asking, "Would you like some pillows for the night? Don't make any ceremony about it; I can give you plenty, both for yourself and for these ladies who are accompanying you." However, Raymonde gaily refused the offer, "No, no," said she, "we are not so delicate. Keep them for the poor sufferers." All the ladies were now talking together. Madame de Jonquiere declared that she was so tired, so tired that she no longer felt alive; and yet she displayed great happiness, her eyes smiling as she glanced at her daughter and the young man she was engaged to. But neither Berthaud nor Gerard could remain there; they had their duties to perform, and accordingly took their leave, after reminding Madame de Jonquiere and Raymonde of the appointed meeting. It was understood, was it not, on September 15th, at the Chateau of Berneville? Yes, yes, it was understood! And then came fresh smiles and handshakes, whilst the eyes of the newly engaged couple--caressing, delighted eyes--added all that they dared not say aloud in the midst of such a throng. "What!" exclaimed little Madame Desagneaux, "you will go to Berneville on the 15th? But if we stay at Trouville till the 10th, as my husband wishes to do, we will go to see you!" And then, turning towards Madame Volmar, who stood there silent, she added, "You ought to come as well, my dear. It would be so nice to meet there all together." But, with a slow wave of the hand and an air of weary indifference, Madame Volmar answered, "Oh! my holiday is all over; I am going home." Just then her eyes again met those of Pierre, who had remained standing near the party, and he fancied that she became confused, whilst an expression of indescribable suffering passed over her lifeless face. The Sisters of the Assumption were now arriving, and the ladies joined them in front of the cantine van. Ferrand, who had come with the Sisters from the hospital, got into the van, and then helped Sister Saint-Francois to mount upon the somewhat high footboard. Then he remained standing on the threshold of the van--transformed into a kitchen and containing all sorts of supplies for the journey, such as bread, broth, milk, and chocolate,--whilst Sister Hyacinthe and Sister Claire des Anges, who were still on the platform, passed him his little medicine-chest and some small articles of luggage. "You are sure you have everything?" Sister Hyacinthe asked him. "All right. Well, now you only have to go and lie down in your corner and get to sleep, since you complain that your services are not utilised." Ferrand began to laugh softly. "I shall help Sister Saint-Francois," said he. "I shall light the oil-stove, wash the crockery, carry the cups of broth and milk to the patients whenever we stop, according to the time-table hanging yonder; and if, all the same, you /should/ require a doctor, you will please come to fetch me." Sister Hyacinthe had also begun to laugh. "But we no longer require a doctor since all our patients are cured," she replied; and, fixing her eyes on his, with her calm, sisterly air, she added, "Good-bye, Monsieur Ferrand." He smiled again, whilst a feeling of deep emotion brought moisture to his eyes. The tremulous accents of his voice expressed his conviction that he would never be able to forget this journey, his joy at having seen her again, and the souvenir of divine and eternal affection which he was taking away with him. "Good-bye, Sister," said he. Then Madame de Jonquiere talked of going to her carriage with Sister Claire des Anges and Sister Hyacinthe; but the latter assured her that there was no hurry, since the sick pilgrims were as yet scarcely arriving. She left her, therefore, taking the other Sister with her, and promising to see to everything. Moreover, she even insisted on ridding the superintendent of her little bag, saying that she would find it on her seat when it was time for her to come. Thus the ladies continued walking and chatting gaily on the broad platform, where the atmosphere was so pleasant. Pierre, however, his eyes fixed upon the big clock, watched the minutes hasten by on the dial, and began to feel surprised at not seeing Marie arrive with her father. It was to be hoped that M. de Guersaint would not lose himself on the road! The young priest was still watching, when, to his surprise, he caught sight of M. Vigneron, in a state of perfect exasperation, pushing his wife and little Gustave furiously before him. "Oh, Monsieur l'Abbe," he exclaimed, "tell me where our carriage is! Help me to put our luggage and this child in it. I am at my wit's end! They have made me altogether lose my temper." Then, on reaching the second-class compartment, he caught hold of Pierre's hands, just as the young man was about to place little Gustave inside, and quite an outburst followed. "Could you believe it? They insist on my starting. They tell me that my return-ticket will not be available if I wait here till to-morrow. It was of no use my telling them about the accident. As it is, it's by no means pleasant to have to stay with that corpse, watch over it, see it put in a coffin, and remove it to-morrow within the regulation time. But they pretend that it doesn't concern them, that they already make large enough reductions on the pilgrimage tickets, and that they can't enter into any questions of people dying." Madame Vigneron stood all of a tremble listening to him, whilst Gustave, forgotten, staggering on his crutch with fatigue, raised his poor, inquisitive, suffering face. "But at all events," continued the irate father, "as I told them, it's a case of compulsion. What do they expect me to do with that corpse? I can't take it under my arm, and bring it them to-day, like an article of luggage! I am therefore absolutely obliged to remain behind. But no! ah! how many stupid and wicked people there are!" "Have you spoken to the station-master?" asked Pierre. "The station-master! Oh! he's somewhere about, in the midst of the scramble. They were never able to find him. How could you have anything done properly in such a bear-garden? Still, I mean to rout him out, and give him a bit of my mind!" Then, perceiving his wife standing beside him motionless, glued as it were to the platform, he cried: "What are you doing there? Get in, so that we may pass you the youngster and the parcels!" With these words he pushed her in, and threw the parcels after her, whilst the young priest took Gustave in his arms. The poor little fellow, who was as light as a bird, seemingly thinner than before, consumed by sores, and so full of pain, raised a faint cry. "Oh, my dear child, have I hurt you?" asked Pierre. "No, no, Monsieur l'Abbe, but I've been moved about so much to-day, and I'm very tired this afternoon." As he spoke, he smiled with his usual intelligent and mournful expression, and then, sinking back into his corner, closed his eyes, exhausted, indeed done for, by this fearful trip to Lourdes. "As you can very well understand," now resumed M. Vigneron, "it by no means amuses me to stay here, kicking my heels, while my wife and my son go back to Paris without me. They have to go, however, for life at the hotel is no longer bearable; and besides, if I kept them with me, and the railway people won't listen to reason, I should have to pay three extra fares. And to make matters worse, my wife hasn't got much brains. I'm afraid she won't be able to manage things properly." Then, almost breathless, he overwhelmed Madame Vigneron with the most minute instructions--what she was to do during the journey, how she was to get back home on arriving in Paris, and what steps she was to take if Gustave was to have another attack. Somewhat scared, she responded, in all docility, to each recommendation: "Yes, yes, dear--of course, dear, of course." But all at once her husband's rage came back to him. "After all," he shouted, "what I want to know is whether my return ticket be good or not! I must know for certain! They must find that station-master for me!" He was already on the point of rushing away through the crowd, when he noticed Gustave's crutch lying on the platform. This was disastrous, and he raised his eyes to heaven as though to call Providence to witness that he would never be able to extricate himself from such awful complications. And, throwing the crutch to his wife, he hurried off, distracted and shouting, "There, take it! You forget everything!" The sick pilgrims were now flocking into the station, and, as on the occasion of their arrival, there was plenty of disorderly carting along the platform and across the lines. All the abominable ailments, all the sores, all the deformities, went past once more, neither their gravity nor their number seeming to have decreased; for the few cures which had been effected were but a faint inappreciable gleam of light amidst the general mourning. They were taken back as they had come. The little carts, laden with helpless old women with their bags at their feet, grated over the rails. The stretchers on which you saw inflated bodies and pale faces with glittering eyes, swayed amidst the jostling of the throng. There was wild and senseless haste, indescribable confusion, questions, calls, sudden running, all the whirling of a flock which cannot find the entrance to the pen. And the bearers ended by losing their heads, no longer knowing which direction to take amidst the warning cries of the porters, who at each moment were frightening people, distracting them with anguish. "Take care, take care over there! Make haste! No, no, don't cross! The Toulouse train, the Toulouse train!" Retracing his steps, Pierre again perceived the ladies, Madame de Jonquiere and the others, still gaily chatting together. Lingering near them, he listened to Berthaud, whom Father Fourcade had stopped, to congratulate him on the good order which had been maintained throughout the pilgrimage. The ex-public prosecutor was now bowing his thanks, feeling quite flattered by this praise. "Is it not a lesson for their Republic, your reverence?" he asked. "People get killed in Paris when such crowds as these celebrate some bloody anniversary of their hateful history. They ought to come and take a lesson here." He was delighted with the thought of being disagreeable to the Government which had compelled him to resign. He was never so happy as when women were just saved from being knocked over amidst the great concourse of believers at Lourdes. However, he did not seem to be satisfied with the results of the political propaganda which he came to further there, during three days, every year. Fits of impatience came over him, things did not move fast enough. When did Our Lady of Lourdes mean to bring back the monarchy? "You see, your reverence," said he, "the only means, the real triumph, would be to bring the working classes of the towns here /en masse/. I shall cease dreaming, I shall devote myself to that entirely. Ah! if one could only create a Catholic democracy!" Father Fourcade had become very grave. His fine, intelligent eyes filled with a dreamy expression, and wandered far away. How many times already had he himself made the creation of that new people the object of his efforts! But was not the breath of a new Messiah needed for the accomplishment of such a task? "Yes, yes," he murmured, "a Catholic democracy; ah! the history of humanity would begin afresh!" But Father Massias interrupted him in a passionate voice, saying that all the nations of the earth would end by coming; whilst Doctor Bonamy, who already detected a slight subsidence of fervour among the pilgrims, wagged his head and expressed the opinion that the faithful ones of the Grotto ought to increase their zeal. To his mind, success especially depended on the greatest possible measure of publicity being given to the miracles. And he assumed a radiant air and laughed complacently whilst pointing to the tumultuous /defile/ of the sick. "Look at them!" said he. "Don't they go off looking better? There are a great many who, although they don't appear to be cured, are nevertheless carrying the germs of cure away with them; of that you may be certain! Ah! the good people; they do far more than we do all together for the glory of Our Lady of Lourdes!" However, he had to check himself, for Madame Dieulafay was passing before them, in her box lined with quilted silk. She was deposited in front of the door of the first-class carriage, in which a maid was already placing the luggage. Pity came to all who beheld the unhappy woman, for she did not seem to have awakened from her prostration during her three days' sojourn at Lourdes. What she had been when they had removed her from the carriage on the morning of her arrival, that she also was now when the bearers were about to place her inside it again--clad in lace, covered with jewels, still with the lifeless, imbecile face of a mummy slowly liquefying; and, indeed, one might have thought that she had become yet more wasted, that she was being taken back diminished, shrunken more and more to the proportions of a child, by the march of that horrible disease which, after destroying her bones, was now dissolving the softened fibres of her muscles. Inconsolable, bowed down by the loss of their last hope, her husband and sister, their eyes red, were following her with Abbe Judaine, even as one follows a corpse to the grave. "No, no! not yet!" said the old priest to the bearers, in order to prevent them from placing the box in the carriage. "She will have time enough to roll along in there. Let her have the warmth of that lovely sky above her till the last possible moment." Then, seeing Pierre near him, he drew him a few steps aside, and, in a voice broken by grief, resumed: "Ah! I am indeed distressed. Again this morning I had a hope. I had her taken to the Grotto, I said my mass for her, and came back to pray till eleven o'clock. But nothing came of it; the Blessed Virgin did not listen to me. Although she cured me, a poor, useless old man like me, I could not obtain from her the cure of this beautiful, young, and wealthy woman, whose life ought to be a continual /fete/. Undoubtedly the Blessed Virgin knows what she ought to do better than ourselves, and I bow and bless her name. Nevertheless, my soul is full of frightful sadness." He did not tell everything; he did not confess the thought which was upsetting him, simple, childish, worthy man that he was, whose life had never been troubled by either passion or doubt. But his thought was that those poor weeping people, the husband and the sister, had too many millions, that the presents they had brought were too costly, that they had given far too much money to the Basilica. A miracle is not to be bought. The wealth of the world is a hindrance rather than an advantage when you address yourself to God. Assuredly, if the Blessed Virgin had turned a deaf ear to their entreaties, had shown them but a stern, cold countenance, it was in order that she might the more attentively listen to the weak voices of the lowly ones who had come to her with empty hands, with no other wealth than their love, and these she had loaded with grace, flooded with the glowing affection of her Divine Motherhood. And those poor wealthy ones, who had not been heard, that sister and that husband, both so wretched beside the sorry body they were taking away with them, they themselves felt like pariahs among the throng of the humble who had been consoled or healed; they seemed embarrassed by their very luxury, and recoiled, awkward and ill at ease, covered with shame at the thought that Our Lady of Lourdes had relieved beggars whilst never casting a glance upon that beautiful and powerful lady agonising unto death amidst all her lace! All at once it occurred to Pierre that he might have missed seeing M. de Guersaint and Marie arrive, and that they were perhaps already in the carriage. He returned thither, but there was still only his valise on the seat. Sister Hyacinthe and Sister Claire des Anges, however, had begun to install themselves, pending the arrival of their charges, and as Gerard just then brought up M. Sabathier in a little handcart, Pierre helped to place him in the carriage, a laborious task which put both the young priest and Gerard into a perspiration. The ex-professor, who looked disconsolate though very calm, at once settled himself in his corner. "Thank you, gentlemen," said he. "That's over, thank goodness. And now they'll only have to take me out at Paris." After wrapping a rug round his legs, Madame Sabathier, who was also there, got out of the carriage and remained standing near the open door. She was talking to Pierre when all at once she broke off to say: "Ah! here's Madame Maze coming to take her seat. She confided in me the other day, you know. She's a very unhappy little woman." Then, in an obliging spirit, she called to her and offered to watch over her things. But Madame Maze shook her head, laughed, and gesticulated as though she were out of her senses. "No, no, I am not going," said she. "What! you are not going back?" "No, no, I am not going--that is, I am, but not with you, not with you!" She wore such an extraordinary air, she looked so bright, that Pierre and Madame Sabathier found it difficult to recognise her. Her fair, prematurely faded face was radiant, she seemed to be ten years younger, suddenly aroused from the infinite sadness into which desertion had plunged her. And, at last, her joy overflowing, she raised a cry: "I am going off with him! Yes, he has come to fetch me, he is taking me with him. Yes, yes, we are going to Luchon together, together!" Then, with a rapturous glance, she pointed out a dark, sturdy-looking young man, with gay eyes and bright red lips, who was purchasing some newspapers. "There! that's my husband," said she, "that handsome man who's laughing over there with the newspaper-girl. He turned up here early this morning, and he's carrying me off. We shall take the Toulouse train in a couple of minutes. Ah! dear madame, I told you of all my worries, and you can understand my happiness, can't you?" However, she could not remain silent, but again spoke of the frightful letter which she had received on Sunday, a letter in which he had declared to her that if she should take advantage of her sojourn at Lourdes to come to Luchon after him, he would not open the door to her. And, think of it, theirs had been a love match! But for ten years he had neglected her, profiting by his continual journeys as a commercial traveller to take friends about with him from one to the other end of France. Ah! that time she had thought it all over, she had asked the Blessed Virgin to let her die, for she knew that the faithless one was at that very moment at Luchon with two friends. What was it then that had happened? A thunderbolt must certainly have fallen from heaven. Those two friends must have received a warning from on high--perhaps they had dreamt that they were already condemned to everlasting punishment. At all events they had fled one evening without a word of explanation, and he, unable to live alone, had suddenly been seized with a desire to fetch his wife and keep her with him for a week. Grace must have certainly fallen on him, though he did not say it, for he was so kind and pleasant that she could not do otherwise than believe in a real beginning of conversion. "Ah! how grateful I am to the Blessed Virgin," she continued; "she alone can have acted, and I well understood her last evening. It seemed to me that she made me a little sign just at the very moment when my husband was making up his mind to come here to fetch me. I asked him at what time it was that the idea occurred to him, and the hours fit in exactly. Ah! there has been no greater miracle. The others make me smile with their mended legs and their vanished sores. Blessed be Our Lady of Lourdes, who has healed my heart!" Just then the sturdy young man turned round, and she darted away to join him, so full of delight that she forgot to bid the others good-bye. And it was at this moment, amidst the growing crowd of patients whom the bearers were bringing, that the Toulouse train at last came in. The tumult increased, the confusion became extraordinary. Bells rang and signals worked, whilst the station-master was seen rushing up, shouting with all the strength of his lungs: "Be careful there! Clear the line at once!" A railway /employe/ had to rush from the platform to push a little vehicle, which had been forgotten on the line, with an old woman in it, out of harm's way; however, yet another scared band of pilgrims ran across when the steaming, growling engine was only thirty yards distant. Others, losing their heads, would have been crushed by the wheels if porters had not roughly caught them by the shoulders. Then, without having pounded anybody, the train at last stopped alongside the mattresses, pillows, and cushions lying hither and thither, and the bewildered, whirling groups of people. The carriage doors opened and a torrent of travellers alighted, whilst another torrent climbed in, these two obstinately contending currents bringing the tumult to a climax. Faces, first wearing an inquisitive expression, and then overcome by stupefaction at the astonishing sight, showed themselves at the windows of the doors which remained closed; and, among them, one especially noticed the faces of two remarkably pretty girls, whose large candid eyes ended by expressing the most dolorous compassion. Followed by her husband, however, Madame Maze had climbed into one of the carriages, feeling as happy and buoyant as if she were in her twentieth year again, as on the already distant evening of her honeymoon journey. And the doors having been slammed, the engine gave a loud whistle and began to move, going off slowly and heavily between the throng, which, in the rear of the train, flowed on to the lines again like an invading torrent whose flood-gates have been swept away. "Bar the platform!" shouted the station-master to his men. "Keep watch when the engine comes up!" The belated patients and pilgrims had arrived during this alert. La Grivotte passed by with her feverish eyes and excited, dancing gait, followed by Elise Rouquet and Sophie Couteau, who were very gay, and quite out of breath through running. All three hastened to their carriage, where Sister Hyacinthe scolded them. They had almost been left behind at the Grotto, where, at times, the pilgrims lingered forgetfully, unable to tear themselves away, still imploring and entreating the Blessed Virgin, when the train was waiting for them at the railway-station. All at once Pierre, who likewise was anxious, no longer knowing what to think, perceived M. de Guersaint and Marie quietly talking with Abbe Judaine on the covered platform. He hastened to join them, and told them of his impatience. "What have you been doing?" he asked. "I was losing all hope." "What have we been doing?" responded M. de Guersaint, with quiet astonishment. "We were at the Grotto, as you know very well. There was a priest there, preaching in a most remarkable manner, and we should still be there if I hadn't remembered that we had to leave. And we took a fly here, as we promised you we would do." He broke off to look at the clock. "But hang it all!" he added, "there's no hurry. The train won't start for another quarter of an hour." This was true. Then Marie, smiling with divine joy, exclaimed: "Oh! if you only knew, Pierre, what happiness I have brought away from that last visit to the Blessed Virgin. I saw her smile at me, I felt her giving me strength to live. Really, that farewell was delightful, and you must not scold us, Pierre." He himself had begun to smile, somewhat ill at ease, however, as he thought of his nervous fidgeting. Had he, then, experienced so keen a desire to get far away from Lourdes? Had he feared that the Grotto might keep Marie, that she might never come away from it again? Now that she was there beside him, he was astonished at having indulged such thoughts, and felt himself to be very calm. However, whilst he was advising them to go and take their seats in the carriage, he recognised Doctor Chassaigne hastily approaching. "Ah! my dear doctor," he said, "I was waiting for you. I should have been sorry indeed to have gone away without embracing you." But the old doctor, who was trembling with emotion, interrupted him. "Yes, yes, I am late. But ten minutes ago, just as I arrived, I caught sight of that eccentric fellow, the Commander, and had a talk with him over yonder. He was sneering at the sight of your people taking the train again to go and die at home, when, said he, they ought to have done so before coming to Lourdes. Well, all at once, while he was talking like this, he fell on the ground before me. It was his third attack of paralysis; the one he had long been expecting." "Oh! /mon Dieu/," murmured Abbe Judaine, who heard the doctor, "he was blaspheming. Heaven has punished him." M. de Guersaint and Marie were listening, greatly interested and deeply moved. "I had him carried yonder, into that shed," continued the doctor. "It is all over; I can do nothing. He will doubtless be dead before a quarter of an hour has gone by. But I thought of a priest, and hastened up to you." Then, turning towards Abbe Judaine, M. Chassaigne added: "Come with me, Monsieur le Cure; you know him. We cannot let a Christian depart unsuccoured. Perhaps he will be moved, recognise his error, and become reconciled with God." Abbe Judaine quickly followed the doctor, and in the rear went M. de Guersaint, leading Marie and Pierre, whom the thought of this tragedy impassioned. All five entered the goods shed, at twenty paces from the crowd which was still bustling and buzzing, without a soul in it expecting that there was a man dying so near by. In a solitary corner of the shed, between two piles of sacks filled with oats, lay the Commander, on a mattress borrowed from the Hospitality reserve supply. He wore his everlasting frock-coat, with its buttonhole decked with a broad red riband, and somebody who had taken the precaution to pick up his silver-knobbed walking-stick had carefully placed it on the ground beside the mattress. Abbe Judaine at once leant over him. "You recognise us, you can hear us, my poor friend, can't you?" asked the priest. Only the Commander's eyes now appeared to be alive; but they /were/ alive, still glittering brightly with a stubborn flame of energy. The attack had this time fallen on his right side, almost entirely depriving him of the power of speech. He could only stammer a few words, by which he succeeded in making them understand that he wished to die there, without being moved or worried any further. He had no relative at Lourdes, where nobody knew anything either of his former life or his family. For three years he had lived there happily on the salary attached to his little post at the station, and now he at last beheld his ardent, his only desire, approaching fulfilment--the desire that he might depart and fall into the eternal sleep. His eyes expressed the great joy he felt at being so near his end. "Have you any wish to make known to us?" resumed Abbe Judaine. "Cannot we be useful to you in any way?" No, no; his eyes replied that he was all right, well pleased. For three years past he had never got up in the morning without hoping that by night time he would be sleeping in the cemetery. Whenever he saw the sun shine he was wont to say in an envious tone: "What a beautiful day for departure!" And now that death was at last at hand, ready to deliver him from his hateful existence, it was indeed welcome. "I can do nothing, science is powerless. He is condemned," said Doctor Chassaigne in a low, bitter tone to the old priest, who begged him to attempt some effort. However, at that same moment it chanced that an aged woman, a pilgrim of fourscore years, who had lost her way and knew not whither she was going, entered the shed. Lame and humpbacked, reduced to the stature of childhood's days, afflicted with all the ailments of extreme old age, she was dragging herself along with the assistance of a stick, and at her side was slung a can full of Lourdes water, which she was taking away with her, in the hope of yet prolonging her old age, in spite of all its frightful decay. For a moment her senile, imbecile mind was quite scared. She stood looking at that outstretched, stiffened man, who was dying. Then a gleam of grandmotherly kindliness appeared in the depths of her dim, vague eyes; and with the sisterly feelings of one who was very aged and suffered very grievously she drew nearer, and, taking hold of her can with her hands, which never ceased shaking, she offered it to the man. To Abbe Judaine this seemed like a sudden flash of light, an inspiration from on high. He, who had prayed so fervently and so often for the cure of Madame Dieulafay without being heard by the Blessed Virgin, now glowed with fresh faith in the conviction that if the Commander would only drink that water he would be cured. The old priest fell upon his knees beside the mattress. "O brother!" he said, "it is God who has sent you this woman. Reconcile yourself with God, drink and pray, whilst we ourselves implore the divine mercy with our whole souls. God will prove His power to you; God will work the great miracle of setting you erect once more, so that you may yet spend many years upon this earth, loving Him and glorifying Him." No, no! the Commander's sparkling eyes cried no! He, indeed, show himself as cowardly as those flocks of pilgrims who came from afar, through so many fatigues, in order to drag themselves on the ground and sob and beg Heaven to let them live a month, a year, ten years longer! It was so pleasant, so simple to die quietly in your bed. You turned your face to the wall and you died. "Drink, O my brother, I implore you!" continued the old priest. "It is life that you will drink, it is strength and health, the very joy of living. Drink that you may become young again, that you may begin a new and pious life; drink that you may sing the praises of the Divine Mother, who will have saved both your body and your soul. She is speaking to me, your resurrection is certain." But no! but no! The eyes refused, repelled the offer of life with growing obstinacy, and in their expression now appeared a covert fear of the miraculous. The Commander did not believe; for three years he had been shrugging his shoulders at the pretended cases of cure. But could one ever tell in this strange world of ours? Such extraordinary things did sometimes happen. And if by chance their water should really have a supernatural power, and if by force they should make him drink some of it, it would be terrible to have to live again--to endure once more the punishment of a galley-slave existence, that abomination which Lazarus--the pitiable object of the great miracle--had suffered twice. No, no, he would not drink; he would not incur the fearful risk of resurrection. "Drink, drink, my brother," repeated Abbe Judaine, who was now in tears; "do not harden your heart to refuse the favours of Heaven." And then a terrible thing was seen; this man, already half dead, raised himself, shaking off the stifling bonds of paralysis, loosening for a second his tied tongue, and stammering, growling in a hoarse voice: "No, no, NO!" Pierre had to lead the stupefied old woman away and put her in the right direction again. She had failed to understand that refusal of the water which she herself was taking home with her like an inestimable treasure, the very gift of God's eternity to the poor who did not wish to die. Lame of one leg, humpbacked, dragging the sorry remnants of her fourscore years along by the assistance of her stick, she disappeared among the tramping crowd, consumed by the passion of being, eager for space, air, sunshine, and noise. Marie and her father had shuddered in presence of that appetite for death, that greedy hungering for the end which the Commander showed. Ah! to sleep, to sleep without a dream, in the infinite darkness forever and ever--nothing in the world could have seemed so sweet to him. He did not hope in a better life; he had no desire to become happy, at last, in Paradise where equality and justice would reign. His sole longing was for black night and endless sleep, the joy of being no more, of never, never being again. And Doctor Chassaigne also had shuddered, for he also nourished but one thought, the thought of the happy moment when he would depart. But, in his case, on the other side of this earthly existence he would find his dear lost ones awaiting him, at the spot where eternal life began; and how icy cold all would have seemed had he but for a single moment thought that he might not meet them there. Abbe Judaine painfully rose up. It had seemed to him that the Commander was now fixing his bright eyes upon Marie. Deeply grieved that his entreaties should have been of no avail, the priest wished to show the dying man an example of that goodness of God which he repulsed. "You recognise her, do you not?" he asked. "Yes, it is the young lady who arrived here on Saturday so ill, with both legs paralysed. And you see her now, so full of health, so strong, so beautiful. Heaven has taken pity on her, and now she is reviving to youth, to the long life she was born to live. Do you feel no regret in seeing her? Would you also like her to be dead? would you have advised her not to drink the water?" The Commander could not answer; but his eyes no longer strayed from Marie's young face, on which one read such great happiness at having resuscitated, such vast hopes in countless morrows; and tears appeared in those fixed eyes of his, gathered under their lids, and rolled down his cheeks, which were already cold. He was certainly weeping for her; he must have been thinking of that other miracle which he had wished her--that if she should be cured, she might be happy. It was the tenderness of an old man, who knows the miseries of this world, stirred to pity by the thought of all the sorrows which awaited this young creature. Ah! poor woman, how many times; perhaps, might she regret that she had not died in her twentieth year! Then the Commander's eyes grew very dim, as though those last pitiful tears had dissolved them. It was the end; coma was coming; the mind was departing with the breath. He slightly turned, and died. Doctor Chassaigne at once drew Marie aside. "The train's starting," he said; "make haste, make haste!" Indeed, the loud ringing of a bell was clearly resounding above the growing tumult of the crowd. And the doctor, having requested two bearers to watch the body, which would be removed later on when the train had gone, desired to accompany his friends to their carriage. They hastened their steps. Abbe Judaine, who was in despair, joined them after saying a short prayer for the repose of that rebellious soul. However, while Marie, followed by Pierre and M. de Guersaint, was running along the platform, she was stopped once more, and this time by Doctor Bonamy, who triumphantly presented her to Father Fourcade. "Here is Mademoiselle de Guersaint, your reverence, the young lady who was healed so marvellously yesterday." The radiant smile of a general who is reminded of his most decisive victory appeared on Father Fourcade's face. "I know, I know; I was there," he replied. "God has blessed you among all women, my dear daughter; go, and cause His name to be worshipped." Then he congratulated M. de Guersaint, whose paternal pride savoured divine enjoyment. It was the ovation beginning afresh--the concert of loving words and enraptured glances which had followed the girl through the streets of Lourdes that morning, and which again surrounded her at the moment of departure. The bell might go on ringing; a circle of delighted pilgrims still lingered around her; it seemed as if she were carrying away in her person all the glory of the pilgrimage, the triumph of religion, which would echo and echo to the four corners of the earth. And Pierre was moved as he noticed the dolorous group which Madame Jousseur and M. Dieulafay formed near by. Their eyes were fixed upon Marie; like the others, they were astonished by the resurrection of this beautiful girl, whom they had seen lying inert, emaciated, with ashen face. Why should that child have been healed? Why not the young woman, the dear woman, whom they were taking home in a dying state? Their confusion, their sense of shame, seemed to increase; they drew back, uneasy, like pariahs burdened with too much wealth; and it was a great relief for them when, three bearers having with difficulty placed Madame Dieulafay in the first-class compartment, they themselves were able to vanish into it in company with Abbe Judaine. The /employes/ were already shouting, "Take your seats! take your seats," and Father Massias, the spiritual director of the train, had returned to his compartment, leaving Father Fourcade on the platform leaning on Doctor Bonamy's shoulder. In all haste Gerard and Berthaud again saluted the ladies, while Raymonde got in to join Madame Desagneaux and Madame Volmar in their corner; and Madame de Jonquiere at last ran off to her carriage, which she reached at the same time as the Guersaints. There was hustling, and shouting, and wild running from one to the other end of the long train, to which the engine, a copper engine, glittering like a star, had just been coupled. Pierre was helping Marie into the carriage, when M. Vigneron, coming back at a gallop, shouted to him: "It'll be good to-morrow, it'll be good tomorrow!" Very red in the face, he showed and waved his ticket, and then galloped off again to the compartment where his wife and son had their seats, in order to announce the good news to them. When Marie and her father were installed in their places, Pierre lingered for another moment on the platform with Doctor Chassaigne, who embraced him paternally. The young man wished to induce the doctor to return to Paris and take some little interest in life again. But M. Chassaigne shook his head. "No, no, my dear child," he replied. "I shall remain here. They are here, they keep me here." He was speaking of his dear lost ones. Then, very gently and lovingly, he said, "Farewell." "Not farewell, my dear doctor; till we meet again." "Yes, yes, farewell. The Commander was right, you know; nothing can be so sweet as to die, but to die in order to live again." Baron Suire was now giving orders for the removal of the white flags on the foremost and hindmost carriages of the train; the shouts of the railway /employes/ were ringing out in more and more imperious tones, "Take your seats! take your seats!" and now came the supreme scramble, the torrent of belated pilgrims rushing up distracted, breathless, and covered with perspiration. Madame de Jonquiere and Sister Hyacinthe were counting their party in the carriage. La Grivotte, Elise Rouquet, and Sophie Couteau were all three there. Madame Sabathier, too, had taken her seat in front of her husband, who, with his eyes half closed, was patiently awaiting the departure. However, a voice inquired, "And Madame Vincent, isn't she going back with us?" Thereupon Sister Hyacinthe, who was leaning out of the window exchanging a last smile with Ferrand, who stood at the door of the cantine van, exclaimed: "Here she comes!" Madame Vincent crossed the lines, rushed up, the last of all, breathless and haggard. And at once, by an involuntary impulse, Pierre glanced at her arms. They carried nothing now. All the doors were being closed, slammed one after the other; the carriages were full, and only the signal for departure was awaited. Panting and smoking, the engine gave vent to a first loud whistle, shrill and joyous; and at that moment the sun, hitherto veiled from sight, dissipated the light cloudlets and made the whole train resplendent, gilding the engine, which seemed on the point of starting for the legendary Paradise. No bitterness, but a divine, infantile gaiety attended the departure. All the sick appeared to be healed. Though most of them were being taken away in the same condition as they had been brought, they went off relieved and happy, at all events, for an hour. And not the slightest jealousy tainted their brotherly and sisterly feelings; those who were not cured waxed quite gay, triumphant at the cure of the others. Their own turns would surely come; yesterday's miracle was the formal promise of to-morrow's. Even after those three days of burning entreaty their fever of desire remained within them; the faith of the forgotten ones continued as keen as ever in the conviction that the Blessed Virgin had simply deferred a cure for their souls' benefit. Inextinguishable love, invincible hope glowed within all those wretched ones thirsting for life. And so a last outburst of joy, a turbulent display of happiness, laughter and shouts, overflowed from all the crowded carriages. "Till next year! We'll come back, we'll come back again!" was the cry; and then the gay little Sisters of the Assumption clapped their hands, and the hymn of gratitude, the "Magnificat," began, sung by all the eight hundred pilgrims: "/Magnificat anima mea Dominum/." "My soul doth magnify the Lord." Thereupon the station-master, his mind at last at ease, his arms hanging beside him, caused the signal to be given. The engine whistled once again and then set out, rolling along in the dazzling sunlight as amidst a glory. Although his leg was causing him great suffering, Father Fourcade had remained on the platform, leaning upon Doctor Bonamy's shoulder, and, in spite of everything, saluting the departure of his dear children with a smile. Berthaud, Gerard, and Baron Suire formed another group, and near them were Doctor Chassaigne and M. Vigneron waving their handkerchiefs. Heads were looking joyously out of the windows of the fleeing carriages, whence other handkerchiefs were streaming in the current of air produced by the motion of the train. Madame Vigneron compelled Gustave to show his pale little face, and for a long time Raymonde's small hand could be seen waving good wishes; but Marie remained the last, looking back on Lourdes as it grew smaller and smaller amidst the trees. Across the bright countryside the train triumphantly disappeared, resplendent, growling, chanting at the full pitch of its eight hundred voices: "/Et exsultavit spiritus meus in Deo salutari meo/." "And my spirit hath rejoiced in God my Saviour!"

4

MARIE'S VOW

ONCE more was the white train rolling, rolling towards Paris on its way home; and the third-class carriage, where the shrill voices singing the "Magnificat" at full pitch rose above the growling of the wheels, had again become a common room, a travelling hospital ward, full of disorder, littered like an improvised ambulance. Basins and brooms and sponges lay about under the seats, which half concealed them. Articles of luggage, all the wretched mass of poor worn-out things, were heaped together, a little bit everywhere; and up above, the litter began again, what with the parcels, the baskets, and the bags hanging from the brass pegs and swinging to and fro without a moment's rest. The same Sisters of the Assumption and the same lady-hospitallers were there with their patients, amidst the contingent of healthy pilgrims, who were already suffering from the overpowering heat and unbearable odour. And at the far end there was again the compartment full of women, the ten close-packed female pilgrims, some young, some old, and all looking pitifully ugly as they violently chanted the canticle in cracked and woeful voices. "At what time shall we reach Paris?" M. de Guersaint inquired of Pierre. "To-morrow at about two in the afternoon, I think," the priest replied. Since starting, Marie had been looking at the latter with an air of anxious preoccupation, as though haunted by a sudden sorrow which she could not reveal. However, she found her gay, healthful smile again to say: "Twenty-two hours' journey! Ah! it won't be so long and trying as it was coming." "Besides," resumed her father, "we have left some of our people behind. We have plenty of room now." In fact Madame Maze's absence left a corner free at the end of the seat which Marie, now sitting up like any other passenger, no longer encumbered with her box. Moreover, little Sophie had this time been placed in the next compartment, where there was neither Brother Isidore nor his sister Marthe. The latter, it was said, had remained at Lourdes in service with a pious lady. On the other side, Madame de Jonquiere and Sister Hyacinthe also had the benefit of a vacant seat, that of Madame Vetu; and it had further occurred to them to get rid of Elise Rouquet by placing her with Sophie, so that only La Grivotte and the Sabathier couple were with them in their compartment. Thanks to these new arrangements, they were better able to breathe, and perhaps they might manage to sleep a little. The last verse of the "Magnificat" having been sung, the ladies finished installing themselves as comfortably as possible by setting their little household in order. One of the most important matters was to put the zinc water-can, which interfered with their legs, out of the way. All the blinds of the left-hand windows had been pulled down, for the oblique sunrays were falling on the train, and had poured into it in sheets of fire. The last storms, however, must have laid the dust, and the night would certainly be cool. Moreover, there was less suffering: death had carried off the most afflicted ones, and only stupefied ailments, numbed by fatigue and lapsing into a slow torpor, remained. The overpowering reaction which always follows great moral shocks was about to declare itself. The souls had made the efforts required of them, the miracles had been worked, and now the relaxing was beginning amidst a hebetude tinged with profound relief. Until they got to Tarbes they were all very much occupied in setting things in order and making themselves comfortable. But as they left that station Sister Hyacinthe rose up and clapped her hands. "My children," said she, "we must not forget the Blessed Virgin who has been so kind to us. Let us begin the Rosary." Then the whole carriage repeated the first chaplet--the five joyful mysteries, the Annunciation, the Visitation, the Nativity, the Purification, and the Finding of Jesus in the Temple. And afterwards they intoned the canticle, "Let us contemplate the heavenly Archangel," in such loud voices that the peasants working in the fields raised their heads to look at this singing train as it rushed past them at full speed. Marie was at the window, gazing with admiration at the vast landscape and the immense stretch of sky, which had gradually freed itself of its mist and was now of a dazzling blue. It was the delicious close of a fine day. However, she at last looked back into the carriage, and her eyes were fixing themselves on Pierre with that mute sadness which had previously dimmed them, when all at once a sound of furious sobbing burst forth in front of her. The canticle was finished, and it was Madame Vincent who was crying, stammering confused words, half-choked by her tears: "Ah, my poor little one!" she gasped. "Ah, my jewel, my treasure, my life!" She had previously remained in her corner, shrinking back into it as though anxious to disappear. With a fierce face, her lips tightly set, and her eyes closed, as though to isolate herself in the depths of her cruel grief, she had hitherto not said a word. But, chancing to open her eyes, she had espied the leathern window-strap hanging down beside the door, and the sight of that strap, which her daughter had touched, almost played with at one moment during the previous journey, had overwhelmed her with a frantic despair which swept away her resolution to remain silent. "Ah! my poor little Rose," she continued. "Her little hand touched that strap, she turned it, and looked at it--ah, it was her last plaything! And we were there both together then; she was still alive, I still had her on my lap, in my arms. It was still so nice, so nice! But now I no longer have her; I shall never, never have her again, my poor little Rose, my poor little Rose!" Distracted, sobbing bitterly, she looked at her knees and her arms, on which nothing now rested, and which she was at a loss how to employ. She had so long rocked her daughter on her knees, so long carried her in her arms, that it now seemed to her as if some portion of her being had been amputated, as if her body had been deprived of one of its functions, leaving her diminished, unoccupied, distracted at being unable to fulfil that function any more. Those useless arms and knees of hers quite embarrassed her. Pierre and Marie, who were deeply moved, had drawn near, uttering kind words and striving to console the unhappy mother. And, little by little, from the disconnected sentences which mingled with her sobs, they learned what a Calvary she had ascended since her daughter's death. On the morning of the previous day, when she had carried the body off in her arms amidst the storm, she must have long continued walking, blind and deaf to everything, whilst the torrential rain beat down upon her. She no longer remembered what squares she had crossed, what streets she had traversed, as she roamed through that infamous Lourdes, that Lourdes which killed little children, that Lourdes which she cursed. "Ah! I can't remember, I can't remember," she faltered. "But some people took me in, had pity upon me, some people whom I don't know, but who live somewhere. Ah! I can't remember where, but it was somewhere high up, far away, at the other end of the town. And they were certainly very poor folk, for I can still see myself in a poor-looking room with my dear little one who was quite cold, and whom they laid upon their bed." At this recollection a fresh attack of sobbing shook her, in fact almost stifled her. "No, no," she at last resumed, "I would not part with her dear little body by leaving it in that abominable town. And I can't tell exactly how it happened, but it must have been those poor people who took me with them. We did a great deal of walking, oh! a great deal of walking; we saw all those gentlemen of the pilgrimage and the railway. 'What can it matter to you?' I repeated to them. 'Let me take her back to Paris in my arms. I brought her here like that when she was alive, I may surely take her back dead? Nobody will notice anything, people will think that she is asleep.'" "And all of them, all those officials, began shouting and driving me away as though I were asking them to let me do something wicked. Then I ended by telling them my mind. When people make so much fuss, and bring so many agonising sick to a place like that, they surely ought to send the dead ones home again, ought they not? And do you know how much money they ended by asking of me at the station? Three hundred francs! Yes, it appears it is the price! Three hundred francs, good Lord! of me, who came here with thirty sous in my pocket and have only five left. Why, I don't earn that amount of money by six months' sewing. They ought to have asked me for my life; I would have given it so willingly. Three hundred francs! three hundred francs for that poor little bird-like body, which it would have consoled me so much to have brought away on my knees!" Then she began stammering and complaining in a confused, husky voice: "Ah, if you only knew how sensibly those poor people talked to me to induce me to go back. A work-woman like myself, with work waiting, ought to return to Paris, they said; and, besides, I couldn't afford to sacrifice my return ticket; I must take the three-forty train. And they told me, too, that people are compelled to put up with things when they are not rich. Only the rich can keep their dead, do what they like with them, eh? And I can't remember--no, again I can't remember! I didn't even know the time; I should never have been able to find my way back to the station. After the funeral over there, at a place where there were two trees, it must have been those poor people who led me away, half out of my senses, and brought me to the station, and pushed me into the carriage just at the moment when the train was starting. But what a rending it was--as if my heart had remained there underground, and it is frightful, that it is, frightful, my God!" "Poor woman!" murmured Marie. "Take courage, and pray to the Blessed Virgin for the succour which she never refuses to the afflicted." But at this Madame Vincent shook with rage. "It isn't true!" she cried. "The Blessed Virgin doesn't care a rap about me. She doesn't tell the truth! Why did she deceive me? I should never have gone to Lourdes if I hadn't heard that voice in a church. My little girl would still be alive, and perhaps the doctors would have saved her. I, who would never set my foot among the priests formerly! Ah! I was right! I was right! There's no Blessed Virgin at all!" And in this wise, without resignation, without illusion, without hope, she continued blaspheming with the coarse fury of a woman of the people, shrieking the sufferings of her heart aloud in such rough fashion that Sister Hyacinthe had to intervene: "Be quiet, you unhappy woman! It is God who is making you suffer, to punish you." The scene had already lasted a long time, and as they passed Riscle at full speed the Sister again clapped her hands and gave the signal for the chanting of the "Laudate Mariam." "Come, come, my children," she exclaimed, "all together, and with all your hearts: "In heav'n, on earth, All voices raise, In concert sing My Mother's praise: /Laudate, laudate, laudate Mariam/!" Madame Vincent, whose voice was drowned by this canticle of love, now only sobbed, with her hands pressed to her face. Her revolt was over, she was again strengthless, weak like a suffering woman whom grief and weariness have stupefied. After the canticle, fatigue fell more or less heavily upon all the occupants of the carriage. Only Sister Hyacinthe, so quick and active, and Sister Claire des Anges, so gentle, serious, and slight, retained, as on their departure from Paris and during their sojourn at Lourdes, the professional serenity of women accustomed to everything, amidst the bright gaiety of their white coifs and wimples. Madame de Jonquiere, who had scarcely slept for five days past, had to make an effort to keep her poor eyes open; and yet she was delighted with the journey, for her heart was full of joy at having arranged her daughter's marriage, and at bringing back with her the greatest of all the miracles, a /miraculee/ whom everybody was talking of. She decided in her own mind that she would get to sleep that night, however bad the jolting might be; though on the other hand she could not shake off a covert fear with regard to La Grivotte, who looked very strange, excited, and haggard, with dull eyes, and cheeks glowing with patches of violet colour. Madame de Jonquiere had tried a dozen times to keep her from fidgeting, but had not been able to induce her to remain still, with joined hands and closed eyes. Fortunately, the other patients gave her no anxiety; most of them were either so relieved or so weary that they were already dozing off. Elise Rouquet, however, had bought herself a pocket mirror, a large round one, in which she did not weary of contemplating herself, finding herself quite pretty, and verifying from minute to minute the progress of her cure with a coquetry which, now that her monstrous face was becoming human again, made her purse her lips and try a variety of smiles. As for Sophie Couteau, she was playing very prettily; for finding that nobody now asked to examine her foot, she had taken off her shoe and stocking of her own accord, repeating that she must surely have a pebble in one or the other of them; and as her companions still paid no attention to that little foot which the Blessed Virgin had been pleased to visit, she kept it in her hands, caressing it, seemingly delighted to touch it and turn it into a plaything. M. de Guersaint had meantime risen from his seat, and, leaning on the low partition between the compartments, he was glancing at M. Sabathier, when all of a sudden Marie called: "Oh! father, father, look at this notch in the seat; it was the ironwork of my box that made it!" The discovery of this trace rendered her so happy that for a moment she forgot the secret sorrow which she seemed anxious to keep to herself. And in the same way as Madame Vincent had burst out sobbing on perceiving the leather strap which her little girl had touched, so she burst into joy at the sight of this scratch, which reminded her of her long martyrdom in this same carriage, all the abomination which had now disappeared, vanished like a nightmare. "To think that four days have scarcely gone by," she said; "I was lying there, I could not stir, and now, now I come and go, and feel so comfortable!" Pierre and M. de Guersaint were smiling at her; and M. Sabathier, who had heard her, slowly said: "It is quite true. We leave a little of ourselves in things, a little of our sufferings and our hopes, and when we find them again they speak to us, and once more tell us the things which sadden us or make us gay." He had remained in his corner silent, with an air of resignation, ever since their departure from Lourdes. Even his wife whilst wrapping up his legs had only been able to obtain sundry shakes of the head from him in response to her inquiries whether he was suffering. In point of fact he was not suffering, but extreme dejection was overcoming him. "Thus for my own part," he continued, "during our long journey from Paris I tried to divert my thoughts by counting the bands in the roofing up there. There were thirteen from the lamp to the door. Well, I have just been counting them again, and naturally enough there are still thirteen. It's like that brass knob beside me. You can't imagine what dreams I had whilst I watched it shining at night-time when Monsieur l'Abbe was reading the story of Bernadette to us. Yes, I saw myself cured; I was making that journey to Rome which I have been talking of for twenty years past; I walked and travelled the world--briefly, I had all manner of wild and delightful dreams. And now here we are on our way back to Paris, and there are thirteen bands across the roofing there, and the knob is still shining--all of which tells me that I am again on the same seat, with my legs lifeless. Well, well, it's understood, I'm a poor, old, used-up animal, and such I shall remain." Two big tears appeared in his eyes; he must have been passing through an hour of frightful bitterness. However, he raised his big square head, with its jaw typical of patient obstinacy, and added: "This is the seventh year that I have been to Lourdes, and the Blessed Virgin has not listened to me. No matter! It won't prevent me from going back next year. Perhaps she will at last deign to hear me." For his part he did not revolt. And Pierre, whilst chatting with him, was stupefied to find persistent, tenacious credulity springing up once more, in spite of everything, in the cultivated brain of this man of intellect. What ardent desire of cure and life was it that had led to this refusal to accept evidence, this determination to remain blind? He stubbornly clung to the resolution to be saved when all human probabilities were against him, when the experiment of the miracle itself had failed so many times already; and he had reached such a point that he wished to explain his fresh rebuff, urging moments of inattention at the Grotto, a lack of sufficient contrition, and all sorts of little transgressions which must have displeased the Blessed Virgin. Moreover, he was already deciding in his mind that he would perform a novena somewhere next year, before again repairing to Lourdes. "Ah! by the way," he resumed, "do you know of the good-luck which my substitute has had? Yes, you must remember my telling you about that poor fellow suffering from tuberculosis, for whom I paid fifty francs when I obtained /hospitalisation/ for myself. Well, he has been thoroughly cured." "Really! And he was suffering from tuberculosis!" exclaimed M. de Guersaint. "Certainly, monsieur, perfectly cured I had seen him looking so low, so yellow, so emaciated, when we started; but when he came to pay me a visit at the hospital he was quite a new man; and, dear me, I gave him five francs." Pierre had to restrain a smile, for be had heard the story from Doctor Chassaigne. This miraculously healed individual was a feigner, who had eventually been recognised at the Medical Verification Office. It was, apparently, the third year that he had presented himself there, the first time alleging paralysis and the second time a tumour, both of which had been as completely healed as his pretended tuberculosis. On each occasion he obtained an outing, lodging and food, and returned home loaded with alms. It appeared that he had formerly been a hospital nurse, and that he transformed himself, "made-up" a face suited to his pretended ailment, in such an extremely artistic manner that it was only by chance that Doctor Bonamy had detected the imposition. Moreover, the Fathers had immediately required that the incident should be kept secret. What was the use of stirring up a scandal which would only have led to jocular remarks in the newspapers? Whenever any fraudulent miracles of this kind were discovered, the Fathers contented themselves with forcing the guilty parties to go away. Moreover, these feigners were far from numerous, despite all that was related of them in the amusing stories concocted by Voltairean humourists. Apart from faith, human stupidity and ignorance, alas! were quite sufficient to account for the miracles. M. Sabathier, however, was greatly stirred by the idea that Heaven had healed this man who had gone to Lourdes at his expense, whereas he himself was returning home still helpless, still in the same woeful state. He sighed, and, despite all his resignation, could not help saying, with a touch of envy: "What would you, however? The Blessed Virgin must know very well what she's about. Neither you nor I can call her to account to us for her actions. Whenever it may please her to cast her eyes on me she will find me at her feet." After the "Angelus" when they got to Mont-de-Marsan, Sister Hyacinthe made them repeat the second chaplet, the five sorrowful mysteries, Jesus in the Garden of Olives, Jesus scourged, Jesus crowned with thorns, Jesus carrying the cross, and Jesus crucified. Then they took dinner in the carriage, for there would be no stopping until they reached Bordeaux, where they would only arrive at eleven o'clock at night. All the pilgrims' baskets were crammed with provisions, to say nothing of the milk, broth, chocolate, and fruit which Sister Saint-Francois had sent from the cantine. Then, too, there was fraternal sharing: they sat with their food on their laps and drew close together, every compartment becoming, as it were, the scene of a picnic, to which each contributed his share. And they had finished their meal and were packing up the remaining bread again when the train passed Morceux. "My children," now said Sister Hyacinthe, rising up, "the evening prayer!" Thereupon came a confused murmuring made up of "Paters" and "Aves," self-examinations, acts of contrition and vows of trustful reliance in God, the Blessed Virgin, and the Saints, with thanksgivings for that happy day, and, at last, a prayer for the living and for the faithful departed. "I warn you," then resumed the Sister, "that when we get to Lamothe, at ten o'clock, I shall order silence. However, I think you will all be very good and won't require any rocking to get to sleep." This made them laugh. It was now half-past eight o'clock, and the night had slowly covered the country-side. The hills alone retained a vague trace of the twilight's farewell, whilst a dense sheet of darkness blotted out all the low ground. Rushing on at full speed, the train entered an immense plain, and then there was nothing but a sea of darkness, through which they ever and ever rolled under a blackish sky, studded with stars. For a moment or so Pierre had been astonished by the demeanour of La Grivotte. While the other pilgrims and patients were already dozing off, sinking down amidst the luggage, which the constant jolting shook, she had risen to her feet and was clinging to the partition in a sudden spasm of agony. And under the pale, yellow, dancing gleam of the lamp she once more looked emaciated, with a livid, tortured face. "Take care, madame, she will fall!" the priest called to Madame de Jonquiere, who, with eyelids lowered, was at last giving way to sleep. She made all haste to intervene, but Sister Hyacinthe had turned more quickly and caught La Grivotte in her arms. A frightful fit of coughing, however, prostrated the unhappy creature upon the seat, and for five minutes she continued stifling, shaken by such an attack that her poor body seemed to be actually cracking and rending. Then a red thread oozed from between her lips, and at last she spat up blood by the throatful. "Good heavens! good heavens! it's coming on her again!" repeated Madame de Jonquiere in despair. "I had a fear of it; I was not at ease, seeing her looking so strange. Wait a moment; I will sit down beside her." But the Sister would not consent: "No, no, madame, sleep a little. I'll watch over her. You are not accustomed to it: you would end by making yourself ill as well." Then she settled herself beside La Grivotte, made her rest her head against her shoulder, and wiped the blood from her lips. The attack subsided, but weakness was coming back, so extreme that the wretched woman was scarcely able to stammer: "Oh, it is nothing, nothing at all; I am cured, I am cured, completely cured!" Pierre was thoroughly upset: This sudden, overwhelming relapse had sent an icy chill through the whole carriage. Many of the passengers raised themselves up and looked at La Grivotte with terror in their eyes. Then they dived down into their corners again, and nobody spoke, nobody stirred any further. Pierre, for his part, reflected on the curious medical aspect of this girl's case. Her strength had come back to her over yonder. She had displayed a ravenous appetite, she had walked long distances with a dancing gait, her face quite radiant the while; and now she had spat blood, her cough had broken out afresh, she again had the heavy ashen face of one in the last agony. Her ailment had returned to her with brutal force, victorious over everything. Was this, then, some special case of phthisis complicated by neurosis? Or was it some other malady, some unknown disease, quietly continuing its work in the midst of contradictory diagnosis? The sea of error and ignorance, the darkness amidst which human science is still struggling, again appeared to Pierre. And he once more saw Doctor Chassaigne shrugging his shoulders with disdain, whilst Doctor Bonamy, full of serenity, quietly continued his verification work, absolutely convinced that nobody would be able to prove to him the impossibility of his miracles any more than he himself could have proved their possibility. "Oh! I am not frightened," La Grivotte continued, stammering. "I am cured, completely cured; they all told me so, over yonder." Meantime the carriage was rolling, rolling along, through the black night. Each of its occupants was making preparations, stretching himself out in order to sleep more comfortably. They compelled Madame Vincent to lie down on the seat, and gave her a pillow on which to rest her poor pain-racked head; and then, as docile as a child, quite stupefied, she fell asleep in a nightmare-like torpor, with big, silent tears still flowing from her closed eyes. Elise Rouquet, who had a whole seat to herself, was also getting ready to lie down, but first of all she made quite an elaborate toilet, tying the black wrap which had served to hide her sore about her head, and then again peering into her glass to see if this headgear became her, now that the swelling of her lip had subsided. And again did Pierre feel astonished at sight of that sore, which was certainly healing, if not already healed--that face, so lately a monster's face, which one could now look at without feeling horrified. The sea of incertitude stretched before him once more. Was it even a real lupus? Might it not rather be some unknown form of ulcer of hysterical origin? Or ought one to admit that certain forms of lupus, as yet but imperfectly studied and arising from faulty nutrition of the skin, might be benefited by a great moral shock? At all events there here seemed to be a miracle, unless, indeed, the sore should reappear again in three weeks', three months', or three years' time, like La Grivotte's phthisis. It was ten o'clock, and the people in the carriage were falling asleep when they left Lamothe. Sister Hyacinthe, upon whose knees La Grivotte was now drowsily resting her head, was unable to rise, and, for form's sake, merely said, "Silence, silence, my children!" in a low voice, which died away amidst the growling rumble of the wheels. However, something continued stirring in an adjoining compartment; she heard a noise which irritated her nerves, and the cause of which she at last fancied she could understand. "Why do you keep on kicking the seat, Sophie?" she asked. "You must get to sleep, my child." "I'm not kicking, Sister. It's a key that was rolling about under my foot." "A key! --how is that? Pass it to me." Then she examined it. A very old, poor-looking key it was--blackened, worn away, and polished by long use, its ring bearing the mark of where it had been broken and resoldered. However, they all searched their pockets, and none of them, it seemed, had lost a key. "I found it in the corner," now resumed Sophie; "it must have belonged to the man." "What man?" asked Sister Hyacinthe. "The man who died there." They had already forgotten him. But it had surely been his, for Sister Hyacinthe recollected that she had heard something fall while she was wiping his forehead. And she turned the key over and continued looking at it, as it lay in her hand, poor, ugly, wretched key that it was, no longer of any use, never again to open the lock it belonged to--some unknown lock, hidden far away in the depths of the world. For a moment she was minded to put it in her pocket, as though by a kind of compassion for this little bit of iron, so humble and so mysterious, since it was all that remained of that unknown man. But then the pious thought came to her that it is wrong to show attachment to any earthly thing; and, the window being half-lowered, she threw out the key, which fell into the black night. "You must not play any more, Sophie," she resumed. "Come, come, my children, silence!" It was only after the brief stay at Bordeaux, however, at about half-past eleven o'clock, that sleep came back again and overpowered all in the carriage. Madame de Jonquiere had been unable to contend against it any longer, and her head was now resting against the partition, her face wearing an expression of happiness amidst all her fatigue. The Sabathiers were, in a like fashion, calmly sleeping; and not a sound now came from the compartment which Sophie Couteau and Elise Rouquet occupied, stretched in front of each other, on the seats. From time to time a low plaint would rise, a strangled cry of grief or fright, escaping from the lips of Madame Vincent, who, amidst her prostration, was being tortured by evil dreams. Sister Hyacinthe was one of the very few who still had their eyes open, anxious as she was respecting La Grivotte, who now lay quite motionless, like a felled animal, breathing painfully, with a continuous wheezing sound. From one to the other end of this travelling dormitory, shaken by the rumbling of the train rolling on at full speed, the pilgrims and the sick surrendered themselves to sleep, and limbs dangled and heads swayed under the pale, dancing gleams from the lamps. At the far end, in the compartment occupied by the ten female pilgrims, there was a woeful jumbling of poor, ugly faces, old and young, and all open-mouthed, as though sleep had suddenly fallen upon them at the moment they were finishing some hymn. Great pity came to the heart at the sight of all those mournful, weary beings, prostrated by five days of wild hope and infinite ecstasy, and destined to awaken, on the very morrow, to the stern realities of life. And now Pierre once more felt himself to be alone with Marie. She had not consented to stretch herself on the seat--she had been lying down too long, she said, for seven years, alas! And in order that M. de Guersaint, who on leaving Bordeaux had again fallen into his childlike slumber, might be more at ease, Pierre came and sat down beside the girl. As the light of the lamp annoyed her he drew the little screen, and they thus found themselves in the shade, a soft and transparent shade. The train must now have been crossing a plain, for it glided through the night as in an endless flight, with a sound like the regular flapping of huge wings. Through the window, which they had opened, a delicious coolness came from the black fields, the fathomless fields, where not even any lonely little village lights could be seen gleaming. For a moment Pierre had turned towards Marie and had noticed that her eyes were closed. But he could divine that she was not sleeping, that she was savouring the deep peacefulness which prevailed around them amidst the thundering roar of their rush through the darkness, and, like her, he closed his eyelids and began dreaming. Yet once again did the past arise before him: the little house at Neuilly, the embrace which they had exchanged near the flowering hedge under the trees flecked with sunlight. How far away all that already was, and with what perfume had it not filled his life! Then bitter thoughts returned to him at the memory of the day when he had become a priest. Since she would never be a woman, he had consented to be a man no more; and that was to prove their eternal misfortune, for ironical Nature was to make her a wife and a mother after all. Had he only been able to retain his faith he might have found eternal consolation in it. But all his attempts to regain it had been in vain. He had gone to Lourdes, he had striven his utmost at the Grotto, he had hoped for a moment that he would end by believing should Marie be miraculously healed; but total and irremediable ruin had come when the predicted cure had taken place even as science had foretold. And their idyl, so pure and so painful, the long story of their affection bathed in tears, likewise spread out before him. She, having penetrated his sad secret, had come to Lourdes to pray to Heaven for the miracle of his conversion. When they had remained alone under the trees amidst the perfume of the invisible roses, during the night procession, they had prayed one for the other, mingling one in the other, with an ardent desire for their mutual happiness. Before the Grotto, too, she had entreated the Blessed Virgin to forget her and to save him, if she could obtain but one favour from her Divine Son. Then, healed, beside herself, transported with love and gratitude, whirled with her little car up the inclined ways to the Basilica, she had thought her prayers granted, and had cried aloud the joy she felt that they should have both been saved, together, together! Ah! that lie which he, prompted by affection and charity, had told, that error in which he had from that moment suffered her to remain, with what a weight did it oppress his heart! It was the heavy slab which walled him in his voluntarily chosen sepulchre. He remembered the frightful attack of grief which had almost killed him in the gloom of the crypt, his sobs, his brutal revolt, his longing to keep her for himself alone, to possess her since he knew her to be his own--all that rising passion of his awakened manhood, which little by little had fallen asleep again, drowned by the rushing river of his tears; and in order that he might not destroy the divine illusion which possessed her, yielding to brotherly compassion, he had taken that heroic vow to lie to her, that vow which now filled him with such anguish. Pierre shuddered amidst his reverie. Would he have the strength to keep that vow forever? Had he not detected a feeling of impatience in his heart even whilst he was waiting for her at the railway station, a jealous longing to leave that Lourdes which she loved too well, in the vague hope that she might again become his own, somewhere far away? If he had not been a priest he would have married her. And what rapture, what felicity would then have been his! He would have given himself wholly unto her, she would have been wholly his own, and he and she would have lived again in the dear child that would doubtless have been born to them. Ah! surely that alone was divine, the life which is complete, the life which creates life! And then his reverie strayed: he pictured himself married, and the thought filled him with such delight that he asked why such a dream should be unrealisable? She knew no more than a child of ten; he would educate her, form her mind. She would then understand that this cure for which she thought herself indebted to the Blessed Virgin, had in reality come to her from the Only Mother, serene and impassive Nature. But even whilst he was thus settling things in his mind, a kind of terror, born of his religious education, arose within him. Could he tell if that human happiness with which he desired to endow her would ever be worth as much as the holy ignorance, the infantile candour in which she now lived? How bitterly he would reproach himself afterwards if she should not be happy. Then, too, what a drama it would all be; he to throw off the cassock, and marry this girl healed by an alleged miracle--ravage her faith sufficiently to induce her to consent to such sacrilege? Yet therein lay the brave course; there lay reason, life, real manhood, real womanhood. Why, then, did he not dare? Horrible sadness was breaking upon his reverie, he became conscious of nothing beyond the sufferings of his poor heart. The train was still rolling along with its great noise of flapping wings. Beside Pierre and Marie, only Sister Hyacinthe was still awake amidst the weary slumber of the carriage; and just then, Marie leant towards Pierre, and softly said to him: "It's strange, my friend; I am so sleepy, and yet I can't sleep." Then, with alight laugh, she added: "I've got Paris in my head!" "How is that--Paris?" "Yes, yes. I'm thinking that it's waiting for me, that I am about to return to it--that Paris which I know nothing of, and where I shall have to live!" These words brought fresh anguish to Pierre's heart. He had well foreseen it; she could no longer belong to him, she would belong to others. If Lourdes had restored her to him, Paris was about to take her from him again. And he pictured this ignorant little being fatally acquiring all the education of woman. That little spotless soul which had remained so candid in the frame of a big girl of three-and-twenty, that soul which illness had kept apart from others, far from life, far even from novels, would soon ripen, now that it could fly freely once more. He beheld her, a gay, healthy young girl, running everywhere, looking and learning, and, some day, meeting the husband who would finish her education. "And so," said he, "you propose to amuse yourself in Paris?" "Oh! what are you saying, my friend? Are we rich enough to amuse ourselves?" she replied. "No, I was thinking of my poor sister Blanche, and wondering what I should be able to do in Paris to help her a little. She is so good, she works so hard; I don't wish that she should have to continue earning all the money." And, after a fresh pause, as he, deeply moved, remained silent, she added: "Formerly, before I suffered so dreadfully, I painted miniatures rather nicely. You remember, don't you, that I painted a portrait of papa which was very like him, and which everybody praised. You will help me, won't you? You will find me customers?" Then she began talking of the new life which she was about to live. She wanted to arrange her room and hang it with cretonne, something pretty, with a pattern of little blue flowers. She would buy it out of the first money she could save. Blanche had spoken to her of the big shops where things could be bought so cheaply. To go out with Blanche and run about a little would be so amusing for her, who, confined to her bed since childhood, had never seen anything. Then Pierre, who for a moment had been calmer, again began to suffer, for he could divine all her glowing desire to live, her ardour to see everything, know everything, and taste everything. It was at last the awakening of the woman whom she was destined to be, whom he had divined in childhood's days--a dear creature of gaiety and passion, with blooming lips, starry eyes, a milky complexion, golden hair, all resplendent with the joy of being. "Oh! I shall work, I shall work," she resumed; "but you are right, Pierre, I shall also amuse myself, because it cannot be a sin to be gay, can it?" "No, surely not, Marie." "On Sundays we will go into the country, oh very far away, into the woods where there are beautiful trees. And we will sometimes go to the theatre, too, if papa will take us. I have been told that there are many plays that one may see. But, after all, it's not all that. Provided I can go out and walk in the streets and see things, I shall be so happy; I shall come home so gay. It is so nice to live, is it not, Pierre?" "Yes, yes, Marie, it is very nice." A chill like that of death was coming over him; his regret that he was no longer a man was filling him with agony. But since she tempted him like this with her irritating candour, why should he not confess to her the truth which was ravaging his being? He would have won her, have conquered her. Never had a more frightful struggle arisen between his heart and his will. For a moment he was on the point of uttering irrevocable words. But with the voice of a joyous child she was already resuming: "Oh! look at poor papa; how pleased he must be to sleep so soundly!" On the seat in front of them M. de Guersaint was indeed slumbering with a comfortable expression on his face, as though he were in his bed, and had no consciousness of the continual jolting of the train. This monotonous rolling and heaving seemed, in fact, a lullaby rocking the whole carriage to sleep. All surrendered themselves to it, sinking powerless on to the piles of bags and parcels, many of which had also fallen; and the rhythmical growling of the wheels never ceased in the unknown darkness through which the train was still rolling. Now and again, as they passed through a station or under a bridge, there would be a loud rush of wind, a tempest would suddenly sweep by; and then the lulling, growling sound would begin again, ever the same for hours together. Marie gently took hold of Pierre's hands; he and she were so lost, so completely alone among all those prostrated beings, in the deep, rumbling peacefulness of the train flying across the black night. And sadness, the sadness which she had hitherto hidden, had again come back to her, casting a shadow over her large blue eyes. "You will often come with us, my good Pierre, won't you?" she asked. He had started on feeling her little hand pressing his own. His heart was on his lips, he was making up his mind to speak. However, he once again restrained himself and stammered: "I am not always at liberty, Marie; a priest cannot go everywhere." "A priest?" she repeated. "Yes, yes, a priest. I understand." Then it was she who spoke, who confessed the mortal secret which had been oppressing her heart ever since they had started. She leant nearer, and in a lower voice resumed: "Listen, my good Pierre; I am fearfully sad. I may look pleased, but there is death in my soul. You did not tell me the truth yesterday." He became quite scared, but did not at first understand her. "I did not tell you the truth--About what?" he asked. A kind of shame restrained her, and she again hesitated at the moment of descending into the depths of another conscience than her own. Then, like a friend, a sister, she continued: "No, you let me believe that you had been saved with me, and it was not true, Pierre, you have not found your lost faith again." Good Lord! she knew. For him this was desolation, such a catastrophe that he forgot his torments. And, at first, he obstinately clung to the falsehood born of his fraternal charity. "But I assure you, Marie. How can you have formed such a wicked idea?" "Oh! be quiet, my friend, for pity's sake. It would grieve me too deeply if you were to speak to me falsely again. It was yonder, at the station, at the moment when we were starting, and that unhappy man had died. Good Abbe Judaine had knelt down to pray for the repose of that rebellious soul. And I divined everything, I understood everything when I saw that you did not kneel as well, that prayer did not rise to your lips as to his." "But, really, I assure you, Marie--" "No, no, you did not pray for the dead; you no longer believe. And besides, there is something else; something I can guess, something which comes to me from you, a despair which you can't hide from me, a melancholy look which comes into your poor eyes directly they meet mine. The Blessed Virgin did not grant my prayer, she did not restore your faith, and I am very, very wretched." She was weeping, a hot tear fell upon the priest's hand, which she was still holding. It quite upset him, and he ceased struggling, confessing, in his turn letting his tears flow, whilst, in a very low voice, he stammered: "Ah! Marie, I am very wretched also. Oh! so very wretched." For a moment they remained silent, in their cruel grief at feeling that the abyss which parts different beliefs was yawning between them. They would never belong to one another again, and they were in despair at being so utterly unable to bring themselves nearer to one another; but the severance was henceforth definitive, since Heaven itself had been unable to reconnect the bond. And thus, side by side, they wept over their separation. "I who prayed so fervently for your conversion," she said in a dolorous voice, "I who was so happy. It had seemed to me that your soul was mingling with mine; and it was so delightful to have been saved together, together. I felt such strength for life; oh, strength enough to raise the world!" He did not answer; his tears were still flowing, flowing without end. "And to think," she resumed, "that I was saved all alone; that this great happiness fell upon me without you having any share in it. And to see you so forsaken, so desolate, when I am loaded with grace and joy, rends my heart. Ah! how severe the Blessed Virgin has been! Why did she not heal your soul at the same time that she healed my body?" The last opportunity was presenting itself; he ought to have illumined this innocent creature's mind with the light of reason, have explained the miracle to her, in order that life, after accomplishing its healthful work in her body, might complete its triumph by throwing them into one another's arms. He also was healed, his mind was healthy now, and it was not for the loss of faith, but for the loss of herself, that he was weeping. However, invincible compassion was taking possession of him amidst all his grief. No, no, he would not trouble that dear soul; he would not rob her of her belief, which some day might prove her only stay amidst the sorrows of this world. One cannot yet require of children and women the bitter heroism of reason. He had not the strength to do it; he even thought that he had not the right. It would have seemed to him violation, abominable murder. And he did not speak out, but his tears flowed, hotter and hotter, in this immolation of his love, this despairing sacrifice of his own happiness in order that she might remain candid and ignorant and gay at heart. "Oh, Marie, how wretched I am! Nowhere on the roads, nowhere at the galleys even, is there a man more wretched than myself! Oh, Marie, if you only knew; if you only knew how wretched I am!" She was distracted, and caught him in her trembling arms, wishing to console him with a sisterly embrace. And at that moment the woman awaking within her understood everything, and she herself sobbed with sorrow that both human and divine will should thus part them. She had never yet reflected on such things, but suddenly she caught a glimpse of life, with its passions, its struggles, and its sufferings; and then, seeking for what she might say to soothe in some degree that broken heart, she stammered very faintly, distressed that she could find nothing sweet enough, "I know, I know--" Then the words it was needful she should speak came to her; and as though that which she had to say ought only to be heard by the angels, she became anxious and looked around her. But the slumber which reigned in the carriage seemed more heavy even than before. Her father was still sleeping, with the innocent look of a big child. Not one of the pilgrims, not one of the ailing ones, had stirred amidst the rough rocking which bore them onward. Even Sister Hyacinthe, giving way to her overpowering weariness, had just closed her eyes, after drawing the lamp-screen in her own compartment. And now there were only vague shadows there, ill-defined bodies amidst nameless things, ghostly forms scarce visible, which a tempest blast, a furious rush, was carrying on and on through the darkness. And she likewise distrusted that black country-side whose unknown depths went by on either side of the train without one even being able to tell what forests, what rivers, what hills one was crossing. A short time back some bright sparks of light had appeared, possibly the lights of some distant forges, or the woeful lamps of workers or sufferers. Now, however, the night again streamed deeply all around, the obscure, infinite, nameless sea, farther and farther through which they ever went, not knowing where they were. Then, with a chaste confusion, blushing amidst her tears, Marie placed her lips near Pierre's ear. "Listen, my friend; there is a great secret between the Blessed Virgin and myself. I had sworn that I would never tell it to anybody. But you are too unhappy, you are suffering too bitterly; she will forgive me; I will confide it to you." And in a faint breath she went on: "During that night of love, you know, that night of burning ecstasy which I spent before the Grotto, I engaged myself by a vow: I promised the Blessed Virgin the gift of my chastity if she would but heal me. . . . She has healed me, and never--you hear me, Pierre, never will I marry anybody." Ah! what unhoped-for sweetness! He thought that a balmy dew was falling on his poor wounded heart. It was a divine enchantment, a delicious relief. If she belonged to none other she would always be a little bit his own. And how well she had known his torment and what it was needful she should say in order that life might yet be possible for him. In his turn he wished to find happy words and promise that he also would ever be hers, ever love her as he had loved her since childhood, like the dear creature she was, whose one kiss, long, long ago, had sufficed to perfume his entire life. But she made him stop, already anxious, fearing to spoil that pure moment. "No, no, my friend," she murmured, "let us say nothing more; it would be wrong, perhaps. I am very weary; I shall sleep quietly now." And, with her head against his shoulder, she fell asleep at once, like a sister who is all confidence. He for a moment kept himself awake in that painful happiness of renunciation which they had just tasted together. It was all over, quite over now; the sacrifice was consummated. He would live a solitary life, apart from the life of other men. Never would he know woman, never would any child be born to him. And there remained to him only the consoling pride of that accepted and desired suicide, with the desolate grandeur that attaches to lives which are beyond the pale of nature. But fatigue overpowered him also; his eyes closed, and in his turn he fell asleep. And afterwards his head slipped down, and his cheek touched the cheek of his dear friend, who was sleeping very gently with her brow against his shoulder. Then their hair mingled. She had her golden hair, her royal hair, half unbound, and it streamed over his face, and he dreamed amidst its perfume. Doubtless the same blissful dream fell upon them both, for their loving faces assumed the same expression of rapture; they both seemed to be smiling to the angels. It was chaste and passionate abandon, the innocence of chance slumber placing them in one another's arms, with warm, close lips so that their breath mingled, like the breath of two babes lying in the same cradle. And such was their bridal night, the consummation of the spiritual marriage in which they were to live, a delicious annihilation born of extreme fatigue, with scarcely a fleeting dream of mystical possession, amidst that carriage of wretchedness and suffering, which still and ever rolled along through the dense night. Hours and hours slipped by, the wheels growled, the bags and baskets swung from the brass hooks, whilst from the piled-up, crushed bodies there only arose a sense of terrible fatigue, the great physical exhaustion brought back from the land of miracles when the overworked souls returned home. At last, at five o'clock, whilst the sun was rising, there was a sudden awakening, a resounding entry into a large station, with porters calling, doors opening, and people scrambling together. They were at Poitiers, and at once the whole carriage was on foot, amidst a chorus of laughter and exclamations. Little Sophie Couteau alighted here, and was bidding everybody farewell. She embraced all the ladies, even passing over the partition to take leave of Sister Claire des Anges, whom nobody had seen since the previous evening, for, silent and slight of build, with eyes full of mystery, she had vanished into her corner. Then the child came back again, took her little parcel, and showed herself particularly amiable towards Sister Hyacinthe and Madame de Jonquiere. " /Au revoir/, Sister! /Au revoir/, madame! I thank you for all your kindness." "You must come back again next year, my child." "Oh, I sha'n't fail, Sister; it's my duty." "And be good, my dear child, and take care of your health, so that the Blessed Virgin may be proud of you." "To be sure, madame, she was so good to me, and it amuses me so much to go to see her." When she was on the platform, all the pilgrims in the carriage leaned out, and with happy faces watched her go off. "Till next year!" they called to her; "till next year!" "Yes, yes, thank you kindly. Till next year." The morning prayer was only to be said at Chatelherault. After the stoppage at Poitiers, when the train was once more rolling on in the fresh breeze of morning, M. de Guersaint gaily declared that he had slept delightfully, in spite of the hardness of the seat. Madame de Jonquiere also congratulated herself on the good rest which she had had, and of which she had been in so much need; though, at the same time, she was somewhat annoyed at having left Sister Hyacinthe all alone to watch over La Grivotte, who was now shivering with intense fever, again attacked by her horrible cough. Meanwhile the other female pilgrims were tidying themselves. The ten women at the far end were fastening their /fichus/ and tying their cap strings, with a kind of modest nervousness displayed on their mournfully ugly faces. And Elise Rouquet, all attention, with her face close to her pocket glass, did not cease examining her nose, mouth, and cheeks, admiring herself with the thought that she was really and truly becoming nice-looking. And it was then that Pierre and Marie again experienced a feeling of deep compassion on glancing at Madame Vincent, whom nothing had been able to rouse from a state of torpor, neither the tumultuous stoppage at Poitiers, nor the noise of voices which had continued ever since they had started off again. Prostrate on the seat, she had not opened her eyes, but still and ever slumbered, tortured by atrocious dreams. And, with big tears still streaming from her closed eyes, she had caught hold of the pillow which had been forced upon her, and was closely pressing it to her breast in some nightmare born of her suffering. Her poor arms, which had so long carried her dying daughter, her arms now unoccupied, forever empty, had found this cushion whilst she slept, and had coiled around them, as around a phantom, with a blind and frantic embrace. On the other hand, M. Sabathier had woke up feeling quite joyous. Whilst his wife was pulling up his rug, carefully wrapping it round his lifeless legs; he began to chat with sparkling eyes, once more basking in illusion. He had dreamt of Lourdes, said he, and had seen the Blessed Virgin leaning towards him with a smile of kindly promise. And then, although he had before him both Madame Vincent, that mother whose daughter the Virgin had allowed to die, and La Grivotte, the wretched woman whom she had healed and who had so cruelly relapsed into her mortal disease, he nevertheless rejoiced and made merry, repeating to M. de Guersaint, with an air of perfect conviction: "Oh! I shall return home quite easy in mind, monsieur--I shall be cured next year. Yes, yes, as that dear little girl said just now: 'Till next year, till next year!'" It was indestructible illusion, victorious even over certainty, eternal hope determined not to die, but shooting up with more life than ever, after each defeat, upon the ruins of everything. At Chatelherault, Sister Hyacinthe made them say the morning prayer, the "Pater," the "Ave," the "Credo," and an appeal to God begging Him for the happiness of a glorious day: "O God, grant me sufficient strength that I may avoid all that is evil, do all that is good, and suffer without complaint every pain."

5

THE DEATH OP BERNADETTE--THE NEW RELIGION

AND the journey continued; the train rolled, still rolled along. At Sainte-Maure the prayers of the mass were said, and at Sainte-Pierre-des- Corps the "Credo" was chanted. However, the religious exercises no longer proved so welcome; the pilgrims' zeal was flagging somewhat in the increasing fatigue of their return journey, after such prolonged mental excitement. It occurred to Sister Hyacinthe that the happiest way of entertaining these poor worn-out folks would be for someone to read aloud; and she promised that she would allow Monsieur l'Abbe to read them the finish of Bernadette's life, some of the marvellous episodes of which he had already on two occasions related to them. However, they must wait until they arrived at Les Aubrais; there would be nearly two hours between Les Aubrais and Etampes, ample time to finish the story without being disturbed. Then the various religious exercises followed one after the other, in a monotonous repetition of the order which had been observed whilst they crossed the same plains on their way to Lourdes. They again began the Rosary at Amboise, where they said the first chaplet, the five joyful mysteries; then, after singing the canticle, "O loving Mother, bless," at Blois, they recited the second chaplet, the five sorrowful mysteries, at Beaugency. Some little fleecy clouds had veiled the sun since morning, and the landscapes, very sweet and somewhat sad, flew by with a continuous fan-like motion. The trees and houses on either side of the line disappeared in the grey light with the fleetness of vague visions, whilst the distant hills, enveloped in mist, vanished more slowly, with the gentle rise and fall of a swelling sea. Between Beaugency and Les Aubrais the train seemed to slacken speed, though it still kept up its rhythmical, persistent rumbling, which the deafened pilgrims no longer even heard. At length, when Les Aubrais had been left behind, they began to lunch in the carriage. It was then a quarter to twelve, and when they had said the "Angelus," and the three "Aves" had been thrice repeated, Pierre took from Marie's bag the little book whose blue cover was ornamented with an artless picture of Our Lady of Lourdes. Sister Hyacinthe clapped her hands as a signal for silence, and amidst general wakefulness and ardent curiosity like that of big children impassioned by the marvellous story, the priest was able to begin reading in his fine, penetrating voice. Now came the narrative of Bernadette's sojourn at Nevers, and then her death there. Pierre, however, as on the two previous occasions, soon ceased following the exact text of the little book, and added charming anecdotes of his own, both what he knew and what he could divine; and, for himself alone, he again evolved the true story, the human, pitiful story, that which none had ever told, but which he felt so deeply. It was on the 8th July, 1866, that Bernadette left Lourdes. She went to take the veil at Nevers, in the convent of Saint-Gildard, the chief habitation of the Sisters on duty at the Asylum where she had learnt to read and had been living for eight years. She was then twenty-two years of age, and it was eight years since the Blessed Virgin had appeared to her. And her farewells to the Grotto, to the Basilica, to the whole town which she loved, were watered with tears. But she could no longer remain there, owing to the continuous persecution of public curiosity, the visits, the homage, and the adoration paid to her, from which, on account of her delicate health, she suffered cruelly. Her sincere humility, her timid love of shade and silence, had at last produced in her an ardent desire to disappear, to hide her resounding glory--the glory of one whom heaven had chosen and whom the world would not leave in peace--in the depth of some unknown darkness; and she longed only for simple-mindedness, for a quiet humdrum life devoted to prayer and petty daily occupations. Her departure was therefore a relief both to her and to the Grotto, which she was beginning to embarrass with her excessive innocence and burdensome complaints. At Nevers, Saint-Gildard ought to have proved a paradise. She there found fresh air, sunshine, spacious apartments, and an extensive garden planted with fine trees. Yet she did not enjoy peace,--that utter forgetfulness of the world for which one flees to the far-away desert. Scarcely twenty days after her arrival, she donned the garb of the Order and assumed the name of Sister Marie-Bernard, for the time simply engaging herself by partial vows. However, the world still flocked around her, the persecution of the multitude began afresh. She was pursued even into the cloister through an irresistible desire to obtain favours from her saintly person. Ah! to see her, touch her, become lucky by gazing on her or surreptitiously rubbing some medal against her dress. It was the credulous passion of fetishism, a rush of believers pursuing this poor beatified being in the desire which each felt to secure a share of hope and divine illusion. She wept at it with very weariness, with impatient revolt, and often repeated: "Why do they torment me like this? What more is there in me than in others?" And at last she felt real grief at thus becoming "the raree-show," as she ended by calling herself with a sad, suffering smile. She defended herself as far as she could, refusing to see anyone. Her companions defended her also, and sometimes very sternly, showing her only to such visitors as were authorised by the Bishop. The doors of the Convent remained closed, and ecclesiastics almost alone succeeded in effecting an entrance. Still, even this was too much for her desire for solitude, and she often had to be obstinate, to request that the priests who had called might be sent away, weary as she was of always telling the same story, of ever answering the same questions. She was incensed, wounded, on behalf of the Blessed Virgin herself. Still, she sometimes had to yield, for the Bishop in person would bring great personages, dignitaries, and prelates; and she would then appear with her grave air, answering politely and as briefly as possible; only feeling at ease when she was allowed to return to her shadowy corner. Never, indeed, had distinction weighed more heavily on a mortal. One day, when she was asked if she was not proud of the continual visits paid her by the Bishop, she answered simply: "Monseigneur does not come to see me, he comes to show me." On another occasion some princes of the Church, great militant Catholics, who wished to see her, were overcome with emotion and sobbed before her; but, in her horror of being shown, in the vexation they caused her simple mind, she left them without comprehending, merely feeling very weary and very sad. At length, however, she grew accustomed to Saint-Gildard, and spent a peaceful existence there, engaged in avocations of which she became very fond. She was so delicate, so frequently ill, that she was employed in the infirmary. In addition to the little assistance she rendered there, she worked with her needle, with which she became rather skilful, embroidering albs and altar-cloths in a delicate manner. But at times she, would lose all strength, and be unable to do even this light work. When she was not confined to her bed she spent long days in an easy-chair, her only diversion being to recite her rosary or to read some pious work. Now that she had learnt to read, books interested her, especially the beautiful stories of conversion, the delightful legends in which saints of both sexes appear, and the splendid and terrible dramas in which the devil is baffled and cast back into hell. But her great favourite, the book at which she continually marvelled, was the Bible, that wonderful New Testament of whose perpetual miracle she never wearied. She remembered the Bible at Bartres, that old book which had been in the family a hundred years, and whose pages had turned yellow; she could again see her foster-father slip a pin between the leaves to open the book at random, and then read aloud from the top of the right-hand page; and even at that time she had already known those beautiful stories so well that she could have continued repeating the narrative by heart, whatever might be the passage at which the perusal had ceased. And now that she read the book herself, she found in it a constant source of surprise, an ever-increasing delight. The story of the Passion particularly upset her, as though it were some extraordinary tragical event that had happened only the day before. She sobbed with pity; it made her poor suffering body quiver for hours. Mingled with her tears, perhaps, there was the unconscious dolour of her own passion, the desolate Calvary which she also had been ascending ever since her childhood. When Bernadette was well and able to perform her duties in the infirmary, she bustled about, filling the building with childish liveliness. Until her death she remained an innocent, infantile being, fond of laughing, romping, and play. She was very little, the smallest Sister of the community, so that her companions always treated her somewhat like a child. Her face grew long and hollow, and lost its bloom of youth; but she retained the pure divine brightness of her eyes, the beautiful eyes of a visionary, in which, as in a limpid sky, you detected the flight of her dreams. As she grew older and her sufferings increased, she became somewhat sour-tempered and violent, cross-grained, anxious, and at times rough; little imperfections which after each attack filled her with remorse. She would humble herself, think herself damned, and beg pardon of everyone. But, more frequently, what a good little daughter of Providence she was! She became lively, alert, quick at repartee, full of mirth-provoking remarks, with a grace quite her own, which made her beloved. In spite of her great devotion, although she spent days in prayer, she was not at all bigoted or over-exacting with regard to others, but tolerant and compassionate. In fact, no nun was ever so much a woman, with distinct features, a decided personality, charming even in its puerility. And this gift of childishness which she had retained, the simple innocence of the child she still was, also made children love her, as though they recognised in her one of themselves. They all ran to her, jumped upon her lap, and passed their tiny arms round her neck, and the garden would then fill with the noise of joyous games, races, and cries; and it was not she who ran or cried the least, so happy was she at once more feeling herself a poor unknown little girl as in the far-away days of Bartres! Later on it was related that a mother had one day brought her paralysed child to the convent for the saint to touch and cure it. The woman sobbed so much that the Superior ended by consenting to make the attempt. However, as Bernadette indignantly protested whenever she was asked to perform a miracle, she was not forewarned, but simply called to take the sick child to the infirmary. And she did so, and when she stood the child on the ground it walked. It was cured. Ah! how many times must Bartres and her free childhood spent watching her lambs--the years passed among the hills, in the long grass, in the leafy woods--have returned to her during the hours she gave to her dreams when weary of praying for sinners! No one then fathomed her soul, no one could say if involuntary regrets did not rend her wounded heart. One day she spoke some words, which her historians have preserved, with the view of making her passion more touching. Cloistered far away from her mountains, confined to a bed of sickness, she exclaimed: "It seems to me that I was made to live, to act, to be ever on the move, and yet the Lord will have me remain motionless." What a revelation, full of terrible testimony and immense sadness! Why should the Lord wish that dear being, all grace and gaiety, to remain motionless? Could she not have honoured Him equally well by living the free, healthy life that she had been born to live? And would she not have done more to increase the world's happiness and her own if, instead of praying for sinners, her constant occupation, she had given her love to the husband who might have been united to her and to the children who might have been born to her? She, so gay and so active, would, on certain evenings, become extremely depressed. She turned gloomy and remained wrapped in herself, as though overcome by excess of pain. No doubt the cup was becoming too bitter. The thought of her life's perpetual renunciation was killing her. Did Bernadette often think of Lourdes whilst she was at Saint-Gildard? What knew she of the triumph of the Grotto, of the prodigies which were daily transforming the land of miracles? These questions were never thoroughly elucidated. Her companions were forbidden to talk to her of such matters, which remained enveloped in absolute, continual silence. She herself did not care to speak of them; she kept silent with regard to the mysterious past, and evinced no desire to know the present, however triumphant it might be. But all the same did not her heart, in imagination, fly away to the enchanted country of her childhood, where lived her kith and kin, where all her life-ties had been formed, where she had left the most extraordinary dream that ever human being dreamt? Surely she must have sometimes travelled the beautiful journey of memory, she must have known the main features of the great events that had taken place at Lourdes. What she most dreaded was to go there herself, and, she always refused to do so, knowing full well that she could not remain unrecognised, and fearful of meeting the crowds whose adoration awaited her. What glory would have been hers had she been headstrong, ambitious, domineering! She would have returned to the holy spot of her visions, have worked miracles there, have become a priestess, a female pope, with the infallibility and sovereignty of one of the elect, a friend of the Blessed Virgin. But the Fathers never really feared this, although express orders had been given to withdraw her from the world for her salvation's sake. In reality they were easy, for they knew her, so gentle and so humble in her fear of becoming divine, in her ignorance of the colossal machine which she had put in motion, and the working of which would have made her recoil with affright had she understood it. No, no! that was no longer her land, that place of crowds, of violence and trafficking. She would have suffered too much there, she would have been out of her element, bewildered, ashamed. And so, when pilgrims bound thither asked her with a smile, "Will you come with us?" she shivered slightly, and then hastily replied, "No, no! but how I should like to, were I a little bird!" Her reverie alone was that little travelling bird, with rapid flight and noiseless wings, which continually went on pilgrimage to the Grotto. In her dreams, indeed, she must have continually lived at Lourdes, though in the flesh she had not even gone there for either her father's or her mother's funeral. Yet she loved her kin; she was anxious to procure work for her relations who had remained poor, and she had insisted on seeing her eldest brother, who, coming to Nevers to complain, had been refused admission to the convent. However, he found her weary and resigned, and she did not ask him a single question about New Lourdes, as though that rising town were no longer her own. The year of the crowning of the Virgin, a priest whom she had deputed to pray for her before the Grotto came back and told her of the never-to-be forgotten wonders of the ceremony, the hundred thousand pilgrims who had flocked to it, and the five-and-thirty bishops in golden vestments who had assembled in the resplendent Basilica. Whilst listening, she trembled with her customary little quiver of desire and anxiety. And when the priest exclaimed, "Ah! if you had only seen that pomp!" she answered: "Me! I was much better here in my little corner in the infirmary." They had robbed her of her glory; her work shone forth resplendently amidst a continuous hosanna, and she only tasted joy in forgetfulness, in the gloom of the cloister, where the opulent farmers of the Grotto forgot her. It was never the re-echoing solemnities that prompted her mysterious journeys; the little bird of her soul only winged its lonesome flight to Lourdes on days of solitude, in the peaceful hours when no one could there disturb its devotions. It was before the wild primitive Grotto that she returned to kneel, amongst the bushy eglantine, as in the days when the Gave was not walled in by a monumental quay. And it was the old town that she visited at twilight, when the cool, perfumed breezes came down from the mountains, the old painted and gilded semi-Spanish church where she had made her first communion, the old Asylum so full of suffering where during eight years she had grown accustomed to solitude--all that poor, innocent old town, whose every paving-stone awoke old affections in her memory's depths. And did Bernadette ever extend the pilgrimage of her dreams as far as Bartres? Probably, at times when she sat in her invalid-chair and let some pious book slip from her tired hands, and closed her eyes, Bartres did appear to her, lighting up the darkness of her view. The little antique Romanesque church with sky-blue nave and blood-red altar screens stood there amidst the tombs of the narrow cemetery. Then she would find herself once more in the house of the Lagues, in the large room on the left, where the fire was burning, and where, in winter-time, such wonderful stories were told whilst the big clock gravely ticked the hours away. At times the whole countryside spread out before her, meadows without end, giant chestnut-trees beneath which you lost yourself, deserted table-lands whence you descried the distant mountains, the Pic du Midi and the Pic de Viscos soaring aloft as airy and as rose-coloured as dreams, in a paradise such as the legends have depicted. And afterwards, afterwards came her free childhood, when she scampered off whither she listed in the open air, her lonely, dreamy thirteenth year, when with all the joy of living she wandered through the immensity of nature. And now, too, perhaps, she again beheld herself roaming in the tall grass among the hawthorn bushes beside the streams on a warm sunny day in June. Did she not picture herself grown, with a lover of her own age, whom she would have loved with all the simplicity and affection of her heart? Ah! to be a child again, to be free, unknown, happy once more, to love afresh, and to love differently! The vision must have passed confusedly before her--a husband who worshipped her, children gaily growing up around her, the life that everybody led, the joys and sorrows that her own parents had known, and which her children would have had to know in their turn. But little by little all vanished, and she again found herself in her chair of suffering, imprisoned between four cold walls, with no other desire than a longing one for a speedy death, since she had been denied a share of the poor common happiness of this world. Bernadette's ailments increased each year. It was, in fact, the commencement of her passion, the passion of this new child-Messiah, who had come to bring relief to the unhappy, to announce to mankind the religion of divine justice and equality in the face of miracles which flouted the laws of impassible nature. If she now rose it was only to drag herself from chair to chair for a few days at a time, and then she would have a relapse and be again forced to take to her bed. Her sufferings became terrible. Her hereditary nervousness, her asthma, aggravated by cloister life, had probably turned into phthisis. She coughed frightfully, each fit rending her burning chest and leaving her half dead. To complete her misery, caries of the right knee-cap supervened, a gnawing disease, the shooting pains of which caused her to cry aloud. Her poor body, to which dressings were continually being applied, became one great sore, which was irritated by the warmth of her bed, by her prolonged sojourn between sheets whose friction ended by breaking her skin. One and all pitied her; those who beheld her martyrdom said that it was impossible to suffer more, or with greater fortitude. She tried some of the Lourdes water, but it brought her no relief. Lord, Almighty King, why cure others and not cure her? To save her soul? Then dost Thou not save the souls of the others? What an inexplicable selection! How absurd that in the eternal evolution of worlds it should be necessary for this poor being to be tortured! She sobbed, and again and again said in order to keep up her courage: "Heaven is at the end, but how long the end is in coming!" There was ever the idea that suffering is the test, that it is necessary to suffer upon earth if one would triumph elsewhere, that suffering is indispensable, enviable, and blessed. But is this not blasphemous, O Lord? Hast Thou not created youth and joy? Is it Thy wish that Thy creatures should enjoy neither the sun, nor the smiling Nature which Thou hast created, nor the human affections with which Thou hast endowed their flesh? She dreaded the feeling of revolt which maddened her at times, and wished also to strengthen herself against the disease which made her groan, and she crucified herself in thought, extending her arms so as to form a cross and unite herself to Jesus, her limbs against His limbs, her mouth against His mouth, streaming the while with blood like Him, and steeped like Him in bitterness! Jesus died in three hours, but a longer agony fell to her, who again brought redemption by pain, who died to give others life. When her bones ached with agony she would sometimes utter complaints, but she reproached herself immediately. "Oh! how I suffer, oh! how I suffer! but what happiness it is to bear this pain!" There can be no more frightful words, words pregnant with a blacker pessimism. Happy to suffer, O Lord! but why, and to what unknown and senseless end? Where is the reason in this useless cruelty, in this revolting glorification of suffering, when from the whole of humanity there ascends but one desperate longing for health and happiness? In the midst of her frightful sufferings, however, Sister Marie-Bernard took the final vows on September 22, 1878. Twenty years had gone by since the Blessed Virgin had appeared to her, visiting her as the Angel had visited the Virgin, choosing her as the Virgin had been chosen, amongst the most lowly and the most candid, that she might hide within her the secret of King Jesus. Such was the mystical explanation of that election of suffering, the /raison d'etre/ of that being who was so harshly separated from her fellows, weighed down by disease, transformed into the pitiable field of every human affliction. She was the "garden inclosed"* that brings such pleasure to the gaze of the Spouse. He had chosen her, then buried her in the death of her hidden life. And even when the unhappy creature staggered beneath the weight of her cross, her companions would say to her: "Do you forget that the Blessed Virgin promised you that you should be happy, not in this world, but in the next?" And with renewed strength, and striking her forehead, she would answer: "Forget? no, no! it is here!" She only recovered temporary energy by means of this illusion of a paradise of glory, into which she would enter escorted by seraphims, to be forever and ever happy. The three personal secrets which the Blessed Virgin had confided to her, to arm her against evil, must have been promises of beauty, felicity, and immortality in heaven. What monstrous dupery if there were only the darkness of the earth beyond the grave, if the Blessed Virgin of her dream were not there to meet her with the prodigious guerdons she had promised! But Bernadette had not a doubt; she willingly undertook all the little commissions with which her companions naively entrusted her for Heaven: "Sister Marie-Bernard, you'll say this, you'll say that, to the Almighty." "Sister Marie-Bernard, you'll kiss my brother if you meet him in Paradise." "Sister Marie-Bernard, give me a little place beside you when I die." And she obligingly answered each one: "Have no fear, I will do it!" Ah! all-powerful illusion, delicious repose, power ever reviving and consolatory! * Song of Solomon iv. 12. And then came the last agony, then came death. On Friday, March 28, 1879, it was thought that she would not last the night. She had a despairing longing for the tomb, in order that she might suffer no more, and live again in heaven. And thus she obstinately refused to receive extreme unction, saying that twice already it had cured her. She wished, in short, that God would let her die, for it was more than she could bear; it would have been unreasonable to require that she should suffer longer. Yet she ended by consenting to receive the sacraments, and her last agony was thereby prolonged for nearly three weeks. The priest who attended her frequently said: "My daughter, you must make the sacrifice of your life"; and one day, quite out of patience, she sharply answered him: "But, Father, it is no sacrifice." A terrible saying, that also, for it implied disgust at /being/, furious contempt for existence, and an immediate ending of her humanity, had she had the power to suppress herself by a gesture. It is true that the poor girl had nothing to regret, that she had been compelled to banish everything from her life, health, joy, and love, so that she might leave it as one casts off a soiled, worn, tattered garment. And she was right; she condemned her useless, cruel life when she said: "My passion will finish only at my death; it will not cease until I enter into eternity." And this idea of her passion pursued her, attaching her more closely to the cross with her Divine Master. She had induced them to give her a large crucifix; she pressed it vehemently against her poor maidenly breast, exclaiming that she would like to thrust it into her bosom and leave it there. Towards the end, her strength completely forsook her, and she could no longer grasp the crucifix with her trembling hands. "Let it be tightly tied to me," she prayed, "that I may feel it until my last breath!" The Redeemer upon that crucifix was the only spouse that she was destined to know; His bleeding kiss was to be the only one bestowed upon her womanhood, diverted from nature's course. The nuns took cords, passed them under her aching back, and fastened the crucifix so roughly to her bosom that it did indeed penetrate it. At last death took pity upon her. On Easter Monday she was seized with a great fit of shivering. Hallucinations perturbed her, she trembled with fright, she beheld the devil jeering and prowling around her. "Be off, be off, Satan!" she gasped; "do not touch me, do not carry me away!" And amidst her delirium she related that the fiend had sought to throw himself upon her, that she had felt his mouth scorching her with all the flames of hell. The devil in a life so pure, in a soul without sin! what for, O Lord! and again I ask it, why this relentless suffering, intense to the very last, why this nightmare-like ending, this death troubled with such frightful fancies, after so beautiful a life of candour, purity, and innocence? Could she not fall asleep serenely in the peacefulness of her chaste soul? But doubtless so long as breath remained in her body it was necessary to leave her the hatred and dread of life, which is the devil. It was life which menaced her, and it was life which she cast out, in the same way that she denied life when she reserved to the Celestial Bridegroom her tortured, crucified womanhood. That dogma of the Immaculate Conception, which her dream had come to strengthen, was a blow dealt by the Church to woman, both wife and mother. To decree that woman is only worthy of worship on condition that she be a virgin, to imagine that virgin to be herself born without sin, is not this an insult to Nature, the condemnation of life, the denial of womanhood, whose true greatness consists in perpetuating life? "Be off, be off, Satan! let me die without fulfilling Nature's law." And she drove the sunshine from the room and the free air that entered by the window, the air that was sweet with the scent of flowers, laden with all the floating germs which transmit love throughout the whole vast world. On the Wednesday after Easter (April 16th), the death agony commenced. It is related that on the morning of that day one of Bernadette's companions, a nun attacked with a mortal illness and lying in the infirmary in an adjoining bed, was suddenly healed upon drinking a glass of Lourdes water. But she, the privileged one, had drunk of it in vain. God at last granted her the signal favour which she desired by sending her into the good sound sleep of the earth, in which there is no more suffering. She asked pardon of everyone. Her passion was consummated; like the Saviour, she had the nails and the crown of thorns, the scourged limbs, the pierced side. Like Him she raised her eyes to heaven, extended her arms in the form of a cross, and uttered a loud cry: "My God!" And, like Him, she said, towards three o'clock: "I thirst." She moistened her lips in the glass, then bowed her head and expired. Thus, very glorious and very holy, died the Visionary of Lourdes, Bernadette Soubirous, Sister Marie-Bernard, one of the Sisters of Charity of Nevers. During three days her body remained exposed to view, and vast crowds passed before it; a whole people hastened to the convent, an interminable procession of devotees hungering after hope, who rubbed medals, chaplets, pictures, and missals against the dead woman's dress, to obtain from her one more favour, a fetish bringing happiness. Even in death her dream of solitude was denied her: a mob of the wretched ones of this world rushed to the spot, drinking in illusion around her coffin. And it was noticed that her left eye, the eye which at the time of the apparitions had been nearest to the Blessed Virgin, remained obstinately open. Then a last miracle amazed the convent: the body underwent no change, but was interred on the third day, still supple, warm, with red lips, and a very white skin, rejuvenated as it were, and smelling sweet. And to-day Bernadette Soubirous, exiled from Lourdes, obscurely sleeps her last sleep at Saint Gildard, beneath a stone slab in a little chapel, amidst the shade and silence of the old trees of the garden, whilst yonder the Grotto shines resplendently in all its triumph. Pierre ceased speaking; the beautiful, marvellous story was ended. And yet the whole carriage was still listening, deeply impressed by that death, at once so tragic and so touching. Compassionate tears fell from Marie's eyes, while the others, Elise Rouquet, La Grivotte herself, now calmer, clasped their hands and prayed to her who was in heaven to intercede with the Divinity to complete their cure. M. Sabathier made a big sign of the cross, and then ate a cake which his wife had bought him at Poitiers. M. de Guersaint, whom sad things always upset, had fallen asleep again in the middle of the story. And there was only Madame Vincent, with her face buried in her pillow, who had not stirred, like a deaf and blind creature, determined to see and hear nothing more. Meanwhile the train rolled, still rolled along. Madame de Jonquiere, after putting her head out of the window, informed them that they were approaching Etampes. And, when they had left that station behind them, Sister Hyacinthe gave the signal, and they recited the third chaplet of the Rosary, the five glorious mysteries--the Resurrection of Our Lord, the Ascension of Our Lord, the Mission of the Holy Ghost, the Assumption of the Most Blessed Virgin, and the Crowning of the Most Blessed Virgin. And afterwards they sang the canticle: "O Virgin, in thy help I put my trust." Then Pierre fell into a deep reverie. His glance had turned towards the now sunlit landscape, the continual flight of which seemed to lull his thoughts. The noise of the wheels was making him dizzy, and he ended by no longer recognising the familiar horizon of this vast suburban expanse with which he had once been acquainted. They still had to pass Bretigny and Juvisy, and then, in an hour and a half at the utmost, they would at last be at Paris. So the great journey was finished! the inquiry, which he had so much desired to make, the experiment which he had attempted with so much passion, were over! He had wished to acquire certainty, to study Bernadette's case on the spot, and see if grace would not come back to him in a lightning flash, restoring him his faith. And now he had settled the point--Bernadette had dreamed through the continual torments of her flesh, and he himself would never believe again. And this forced itself upon his mind like a brutal fact: the simple faith of the child who kneels and prays, the primitive faith of young people, bowed down by an awe born of their ignorance, was dead. Though thousands of pilgrims might each year go to Lourdes, the nations were no longer with them; this attempt to bring about the resurrection of absolute faith, the faith of dead-and-gone centuries, without revolt or examination, was fatally doomed to fail. History never retraces its steps, humanity cannot return to childhood, times have too much changed, too many new inspirations have sown new harvests for the men of to-day to become once more like the men of olden time. It was decisive; Lourdes was only an explainable accident, whose reactionary violence was even a proof of the extreme agony in which belief under the antique form of Catholicism was struggling. Never again, as in the cathedrals of the twelfth century, would the entire nation kneel like a docile flock in the hands of the Master. To blindly, obstinately cling to the attempt to bring that to pass would mean to dash oneself against the impossible, to rush, perhaps, towards great moral catastrophes. And of his journey there already only remained to Pierre an immense feeling of compassion. Ah! his heart was overflowing with pity; his poor heart was returning wrung by all that he had seen. He recalled the words of worthy Abbe Judaine; and he had seen those thousands of unhappy beings praying, weeping, and imploring God to take pity on their suffering; and he had wept with them, and felt within himself, like an open wound, a sorrowful fraternal feeling for all their ailments. He could not think of those poor people without burning with a desire to relieve them. If it were true that the faith of the simple-minded no longer sufficed; if one ran the risk of going astray in wishing to turn back, would it become necessary to close the Grotto, to preach other efforts, other sufferings? However, his compassion revolted at that thought. No, no! it would be a crime to snatch their dream of Heaven from those poor creatures who suffered either in body or in mind, and who only found relief in kneeling yonder amidst the splendour of tapers and the soothing repetition of hymns. He had not taken the murderous course of undeceiving Marie, but had sacrificed himself in order to leave her the joy of her fancy, the divine consolation of having been healed by the Virgin. Where was the man hard enough, cruel enough, to prevent the lowly from believing, to rob them of the consolation of the supernatural, the hope that God troubled Himself about them, that He held a better life in His paradise in reserve for them? All humanity was weeping, desperate with anguish, like some despairing invalid, irrevocably condemned, and whom only a miracle could save. He felt mankind to be unhappy indeed, and he shuddered with fraternal affection in the presence of such pitiable humility, ignorance, poverty in its rags, disease with its sores and evil odour, all the lowly sufferers, in hospital, convent, and slums, amidst vermin and dirt, with ugliness and imbecility written on their faces, an immense protest against health, life, and Nature, in the triumphal name of justice, equality, and benevolence. No, no! it would never do to drive the wretched to despair. Lourdes must be tolerated, in the same way that you tolerate a falsehood which makes life possible. And, as he had already said in Bernadette's chamber, she remained the martyr, she it was who revealed to him the only religion which still filled his heart, the religion of human suffering. Ah! to be good and kindly, to alleviate all ills, to lull pain, to sleep in a dream, to lie even, so that no one might suffer any more! The train passed at full speed through a village, and Pierre vaguely caught sight of a church nestling amidst some large apple trees. All the pilgrims in the carriage crossed themselves. But he was now becoming uneasy, scruples were tingeing his reverie with anxiety. This religion of human suffering, this redemption by pain, was not this yet another lure, a continual aggravation of pain and misery? It is cowardly and dangerous to allow superstition to live. To tolerate and accept it is to revive the dark evil ages afresh. It weakens and stupefies; the sanctimoniousness bequeathed by heredity produces humiliated, timorous generations, decadent and docile nations, who are an easy prey to the powerful of the earth. Whole nations are imposed upon, robbed, devoured, when they have devoted the whole effort of their will to the mere conquest of a future existence. Would it not, therefore, be better to cure humanity at once by boldly closing the miraculous Grottos whither it goes to weep, and thus restore to it the courage to live the real life, even in the midst of tears? And it was the same prayer, that incessant flood of prayer which ascended from Lourdes, the endless supplication in which he had been immersed and softened: was it not after all but puerile lullaby, a debasement of all one's energies? It benumbed the will, one's very being became dissolved in it and acquired disgust for life and action. Of what use could it be to will anything, do anything, when you totally resigned yourself to the caprices of an unknown almighty power? And, in another respect, what a strange thing was this mad desire for prodigies, this anxiety to drive the Divinity to transgress the laws of Nature established by Himself in His infinite wisdom! Therein evidently lay peril and unreasonableness; at the risk even of losing illusion, that divine comforter, only the habit of personal effort and the courage of truth should have been developed in man, and especially in the child. Then a great brightness arose in Pierre's mind and dazzled him. It was Reason, protesting against the glorification of the absurd and the deposition of common-sense. Ah! reason, it was through her that he had suffered, through her alone that he was happy. As he had told Doctor Chassaigne, his one consuming longing was to satisfy reason ever more and more, although it might cost him happiness to do so. It was reason, he now well understood it, whose continual revolt at the Grotto, at the Basilica, throughout entire Lourdes, had prevented him from believing. Unlike his old friend--that stricken old man, who was afflicted with such dolorous senility, who had fallen into second childhood since the shipwreck of his affections,--he had been unable to kill reason and humiliate and annihilate himself. Reason remained his sovereign mistress, and she it was who buoyed him up even amidst the obscurities and failures of science. Whenever he met with a thing which he could not understand, it was she who whispered to him, "There is certainly a natural explanation which escapes me." He repeated that there could be no healthy ideal outside the march towards the discovery of the unknown, the slow victory of reason amidst all the wretchedness of body and mind. In the clashing of the twofold heredity which he had derived from his father, all brain, and his mother, all faith, he, a priest, found it possible to ravage his life in order that he might keep his vows. He had acquired strength enough to master his flesh, but he felt that his paternal heredity had now definitely gained the upper hand, for henceforth the sacrifice of his reason had become an impossibility; this he would not renounce and would not master. No, no, even human suffering, the hallowed suffering of the poor, ought not to prove an obstacle, enjoining the necessity of ignorance and folly. Reason before all; in her alone lay salvation. If at Lourdes, whilst bathed in tears, softened by the sight of so much affliction, he had said that it was sufficient to weep and love, he had made a dangerous mistake. Pity was but a convenient expedient. One must live, one must act; reason must combat suffering, unless it be desired that the latter should last forever. However, as the train rolled on and the landscape flew by, a church once more appeared, this time on the fringe of heaven, some votive chapel perched upon a hill and surmounted by a lofty statue of the Virgin. And once more all the pilgrims made the sign of the cross, and once more Pierre's reverie strayed, a fresh stream of reflections bringing his anguish back to him. What was this imperious need of the things beyond, which tortured suffering humanity? Whence came it? Why should equality and justice be desired when they did not seem to exist in impassive nature? Man had set them in the unknown spheres of the Mysterious, in the supernatural realms of religious paradises, and there contented his ardent thirst for them. That unquenchable thirst for happiness had ever consumed, and would consume him always. If the Fathers of the Grotto drove such a glorious trade, it was simply because they made motley out of what was divine. That thirst for the Divine, which nothing had quenched through the long, long ages, seemed to have returned with increased violence at the close of our century of science. Lourdes was a resounding and undeniable proof that man could never live without the dream of a Sovereign Divinity, re-establishing equality and re-creating happiness by dint of miracles. When man has reached the depths of life's misfortunes, he returns to the divine illusion, and the origin of all religions lies there. Man, weak and bare, lacks the strength to live through his terrestrial misery without the everlasting lie of a paradise. To-day, thought Pierre, the experiment had been made; it seemed that science alone could not suffice, and that one would be obliged to leave a door open on the Mysterious. All at once in the depths of his deeply absorbed mind the words rang out, A new religion! The door which must be left open on the Mysterious was indeed a new religion. To subject mankind to brutal amputation, lop off its dream, and forcibly deprive it of the Marvellous, which it needed to live as much as it needed bread, would possibly kill it. Would it ever have the philosophical courage to take life as it is, and live it for its own sake, without any idea of future rewards and penalties? It certainly seemed that centuries must elapse before the advent of a society wise enough to lead a life of rectitude without the moral control of some cultus and the consolation of superhuman equality and justice. Yes, a new religion! The call burst forth, resounded within Pierre's brain like the call of the nations, the eager, despairing desire of the modern soul. The consolation and hope which Catholicism had brought the world seemed exhausted after eighteen hundred years full of so many tears, so much blood, so much vain and barbarous agitation. It was an illusion departing, and it was at least necessary that the illusion should be changed. If mankind had long ago darted for refuge into the Christian paradise, it was because that paradise then opened before it like a fresh hope. But now a new religion, a new hope, a new paradise, yes, that was what the world thirsted for, in the discomfort in which it was struggling. And Father Fourcade, for his part, fully felt such to be the case; he had not meant to imply anything else when he had given rein to his anxiety, entreating that the people of the great towns, the dense mass of the humble which forms the nation, might be brought to Lourdes. One hundred thousand, two hundred thousand pilgrims at Lourdes each year, that was, after all, but a grain of sand. It was the people, the whole people, that was required. But the people has forever deserted the churches, it no longer puts any soul in the Blessed Virgins which it manufactures, and nothing nowadays could restore its lost faith. A Catholic democracy--yes, history would then begin afresh; only were it possible to create a new Christian people, would not the advent of a new Saviour, the mighty breath of a new Messiah, have been needed for such a task? However, the words still sounded, still rang out in Pierre's mind with the growing clamour of pealing bells. A new religion; a new religion. Doubtless it must be a religion nearer to life, giving a larger place to the things of the world, and taking the acquired truths into due account. And, above all, it must be a religion which was not an appetite for death--Bernadette living solely in order that she might die, Doctor Chassaigne aspiring to the tomb as to the only happiness--for all that spiritualistic abandonment was so much continuous disorganisation of the will to live. At bottom of it was hatred to life, disgust with and cessation of action. Every religion, it is true, is but a promise of immortality, an embellishment of the spheres beyond, an enchanted garden to be entered on the morrow of death. Could a new religion ever place such a garden of eternal happiness on earth? Where was the formula, the dogma, that would satisfy the hopes of the mankind of to-day? What belief should be sown to blossom forth in a harvest of strength and peace? How could one fecundate the universal doubt so that it should give birth to a new faith? and what sort of illusion, what divine falsehood of any kind could be made to germinate in the contemporary world, ravaged as it had been upon all sides, broken up by a century of science? At that moment, without any apparent transition, Pierre saw the face of his brother Guillaume arise in the troublous depths of his mind. Still, he was not surprised; some secret link must have brought that vision there. Ah! how fond they had been of one another long ago, and what a good brother that elder brother, so upright and gentle, had been! Henceforth, also, the rupture was complete; Pierre no longer saw Guillaume, since the latter had cloistered himself in his chemical studies, living like a savage in a little suburban house, with a mistress and two big dogs. Then Pierre's reverie again diverged, and he thought of that trial in which Guillaume had been mentioned, like one suspected of having compromising friendships amongst the most violent revolutionaries. It was related, too, that the young man had, after long researches, discovered the formula of a terrible explosive, one pound of which would suffice to blow up a cathedral. And Pierre then thought of those Anarchists who wished to renew and save the world by destroying it. They were but dreamers, horrible dreamers; yet dreamers in the same way as those innocent pilgrims whom he had seen kneeling at the Grotto in an enraptured flock. If the Anarchists, if the extreme Socialists, demanded with violence the equality of wealth, the sharing of all the enjoyments of the world, the pilgrims on their side demanded with tears equality of health and an equitable sharing of moral and physical peace. The latter relied on miracles, the former appealed to brute force. At bottom, however, it was but the same exasperated dream of fraternity and justice, the eternal desire for happiness--neither poor nor sick left, but bliss for one and all. And, in fact, had not the primitive Christians been terrible revolutionaries for the pagan world, which they threatened, and did, indeed, destroy? They who were persecuted, whom the others sought to exterminate, are to-day inoffensive, because they have become the Past. The frightful Future is ever the man who dreams of a future society; even as to-day it is the madman so wildly bent on social renovation that he harbours the great black dream of purifying everything by the flame of conflagrations. This seemed monstrous to Pierre. Yet, who could tell? Therein, perchance, lay the rejuvenated world of to-morrow. Astray, full of doubts, he nevertheless, in his horror of violence, made common cause with old society now reduced to defend itself, unable though he was to say whence would come the new Messiah of Gentleness, in whose hands he would have liked to place poor ailing mankind. A new religion, yes, a new religion. But it is not easy to invent one, and he knew not to what conclusion to come between the ancient faith, which was dead, and the young faith of to-morrow, as yet unborn. For his part, in his desolation, he was only sure of keeping his vow, like an unbelieving priest watching over the belief of others, chastely and honestly discharging his duties, with the proud sadness that he had been unable to renounce his reason as he had renounced his flesh. And for the rest, he would wait. However, the train rolled on between large parks, and the engine gave a prolonged whistle, a joyful flourish, which drew Pierre from his reflections. The others were stirring, displaying emotion around him. The train had just left Juvisy, and Paris was at last near at hand, within a short half-hour's journey. One and all were getting their things together: the Sabathiers were remaking their little parcels, Elise Rouquet was giving a last glance at her mirror. For a moment Madame de Jonquiere again became anxious concerning La Grivotte, and decided that as the girl was in such a pitiful condition she would have her taken straight to a hospital on arriving; whilst Marie endeavoured to rouse Madame Vincent from the torpor in which she seemed determined to remain. M. de Guersaint, who had been indulging in a little siesta, also had to be awakened. And at last, when Sister Hyacinthe had clapped her hands, the whole carriage intonated the "Te Deum," the hymn of praise and thanksgiving. " /Te Deum, laudamus, te Dominum confitemur/." The voices rose amidst a last burst of fervour. All those glowing souls returned thanks to God for the beautiful journey, the marvellous favours that He had already bestowed on them, and would bestow on them yet again. At last came the fortifications. The two o'clock sun was slowly descending the vast, pure heavens, so serenely warm. Distant smoke, a ruddy smoke, was rising in light clouds above the immensity of Paris like the scattered, flying breath of that toiling colossus. It was Paris in her forge, Paris with her passions, her battles, her ever-growling thunder, her ardent life ever engendering the life of to-morrow. And the white train, the woeful train of every misery and every dolour, was returning into it all at full speed, sounding in higher and higher strains the piercing flourishes of its whistle-calls. The five hundred pilgrims, the three hundred patients, were about to disappear in the vast city, fall again upon the hard pavement of life after the prodigious dream in which they had just indulged, until the day should come when their need of the consolation of a fresh dream would irresistibly impel them to start once more on the everlasting pilgrimage to mystery and forgetfulness. Ah! unhappy mankind, poor ailing humanity, hungering for illusion, and in the weariness of this waning century distracted and sore from having too greedily acquired science; it fancies itself abandoned by the physicians of both the mind and the body, and, in great danger of succumbing to incurable disease, retraces its steps and asks the miracle of its cure of the mystical Lourdes of a past forever dead! Yonder, however, Bernadette, the new Messiah of suffering, so touching in her human reality, constitutes the terrible lesson, the sacrifice cut off from the world, the victim condemned to abandonment, solitude, and death, smitten with the penalty of being neither woman, nor wife, nor mother, because she beheld the Blessed Virgin. THE END

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When the time drew near for Samuel the Beadle to let his son begin his term of military service, he betook himself to the market, purchased a regulation shirt, a knapsack, and a few other things needed by a soldier--and he did not forget the main item: he ran and fetched a bottle of liquor. Then he went home. And there, in the presence of his neighbors, of whom I had the privilege of being one, he drank a glassful to "long life," and offered another to Rebekah, his good wife. "Drink, madam," said he, merrily. At this Rebekah turned up her nose, as if ready to blurt out with "How often have you seen me drink liquor?" Indeed, it was an affront which she would not have passed over in silence at any other time, but she had no heart for an open quarrel just then, when about to part with her son, and was satisfied with a silent refusal. "Woman," said Samuel, angrily, "take it, and do as you are told!" But Rebekah was not impressed by his angry tone, for in fact Samuel was an easy "lord and master." As to his loudness, it was but part of an old habit of his, dating from the days of his own military service, to bully his inferiors and to let those above him in authority bully him. "So are they all of his kind," she would often explain to her neighbors. "They just fuss, to blow off their tempers, and then--one may sit on them." Rebekah persisted in her refusal, and Samuel began in a softer tone: "But why does it worry you so much? Woman, woman, it is not to Shemad, God forbid, that he is going!" At the mention of conversion, Rebekah burst into tears, for Samuel had unintentionally touched her sore spot: there were rumors in the town that her family was not without blemish. "Now that you are crying," exclaimed Samuel, thoroughly angry, "you are not only hard-headed, but also silly, simply silly! 'Long of hair but short of sense.' To cry and cry, and not know wherefore!" With this Samuel turned towards us, and began to plead his case. "Have you ever seen such a cry-baby? Five times in her life she filled the world with a hue and cry, when she bore me a child, and every time it was but an empty bubble: five girls she brought me! Then, beginning with the sixth birth, she was fortunate enough to get boys, the real thing. Three sons she gave me as my old age was approaching. And now, when she ought to thank Heaven for having been found worthy of raising a soldier for the army, she cries! Think of it--your son enters the army a free man; but I, in my time,--well, well, I was taken by force when a mere youngster!" Here the old man settled his account with the bottle, and took leave of his crying wife and his good neighbors, and in the company of his son mounted the coach waiting outside, ready to go to H., the capital of the district, where the recruits had to report. By special good fortune I was going to H. by the same coach, and so I came to hear the story of old Samuel's life from the beginning till that day. It was the rainy season; the roads were muddy, and the horses moved with difficulty. The driver made frequent stops, and whenever the road showed the slightest inclination to go uphill he would intimate that it might be well for us to dismount and walk beside the coach a little. The cold drizzle penetrated to our very skin and made our flesh creep. The warmth we had brought with us from the house was evaporating, and with it went the merry humor of the old man. He began to contemplate his son, who sat opposite to him, looking him over up and down. The wise "lord and master," who had tried to instruct his wife at home and celebrate the fact of her having reared a soldier for the army, he failed himself to stand the trial: he began to feel the pangs of longing and lonesomeness. The imminent parting with his son, to take place on the morrow, seemed to depress him greatly. Bent and silent he sat, and one could see that he was lost in a maze of thoughts and emotions, which came crowding in upon him in spite of himself. I took a seat opposite to him, so that I might enter into a conversation with him. "Do you remember all that happened to you in those days?" I asked by way of starting the conversation. He seemed to welcome my question. In that hour of trial the old man was eager to unload his bosom, to share his thoughts with some one, and return mentally to all the landmarks of his own life, till he reached the period corresponding to that into which he was introducing his son. The old man took out his well-beloved short pipe. According to his story it had been a present from his superior officer, and it had served him ever since. He filled the pipe, struck a match, and was enveloped in smoke.

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You ask me whether I remember everything--he began from behind the smoke. Why, I see it all as if it had happened yesterday. I do not know exactly how old I was then. I remember only that my brother Solomon became a Bar-Mitzwah at that time. Then there was Dovidl, another brother, younger than Solomon, but older than myself; but he had died before that time. I must have been about eleven years old. Just then the mothers fell a-worrying: a Catcher was coming to town. According to some he had already arrived. At the Heder the boys were telling one another that the Catcher was a monster, who caught boys, made soldiers out of them, and turned them over to the Government, in place of the Jewish grown-ups that were unwilling and unable to serve. And the boys were divided in their opinions: some said that the Catcher was a demon, one of those who had been created at twilight on the eve of the Sabbath. Others said that he was simply a "heathen," and some others, that he was an "apostate." Then, there were some who asserted that he was merely a bad Jew, though a learned one nevertheless;--that he wore the regular Jewish costume, the long coat and the broad waistband, and had the Tallis-Koton on his breast, so that the curse of the righteous could not hurt him. According to rumor, he was in the habit of distributing nuts and candy among Jewish boys; and if any one tasted of them, he could not move from the spot, until the Catcher put his hand on him and "caught" him. I happened to overhear a conversation between father and mother, and I gathered from it that I need not fear the Catcher. It was a Saturday night, soon after the death of my elder brother Dovidl, within the period of the thirty days' mourning for him. Mother would not be consoled, for Dovidl had been her "very best." Three brothers had I. The first-born, Simhah, may he rest in peace, had been married long before; he was the junior Shohet in town, and a candidate for the Rabbinate. Solomon was more learned in the Torah, young though he was, peace be unto him. . . . Well, they are now in the world-of-truth, in the world-to-come, both of them. But Dovidl, had he lived, would have excelled them both. That is the way of the Angel of Death, he chooses the very best. As to myself--why deny it? --I was a dullard. Somehow my soul was not attuned to the Torah. As I said, mother was uttering complaints against Heaven, always crying. Yes, in the matter of tears they are experts. I have pondered over it, and have found it out: fish were created out of the mud-puddle, and woman out of tears. Father used to scold her mightily, but she did not mind it; and she never ceased bemoaning Dovidl and crying unto Heaven, "who gave the Angel of Death power over him." On the night after Sabbath, when father had extinguished the taper in the dregs of the Havdolah cup, he turned to mother, and said: "Now man born of woman is unwise all his life long. He knows not how to thank for the sorrows that have been sweetened by His mercy, blessed be He!" Mother did not understand, and looked at father questioningly. "The Catcher is in town," explained father. "The Catcher!" shuddered mother. "But he takes only Fourths and upwards," said father, reassuringly. Fourths, Fifths, etc., those households were called which had four, or five, or more sons. "And our household has only three sons at present," continued father. "Do you understand, woman? Three sons were left to us, and our household is exempt from military duty. Now do you see the mercy of the Lord, blessed be He? Do you still murmur against Him, blessed be He?" -- So it was in those days. Every Jewish community had to deliver a certain fixed number of recruits to the Government annually. This number was apportioned among the families, and every family taxed the households composing it. But not every household had to supply a recruit. A household with a large number of sons secured the exemption of a household with fewer sons. For instance, a household with four sons in it was exempted, if there was a household with five sons to levy from in the same family. And a household of three sons was spared when there was, in the same family, a household of four sons. And so forth. -- And as father was speaking--the old man continued--mother contemplated us, as one that escapes from a fire contemplates the saved remnants; and her eyes overflowed with silent tears. Those were the last tears shed over the grave of Dovidl, and for those tears father had no rebuke. We felt that Dovidl was a saint: he had departed this life to save us from the hand of the Catcher. It seemed to me that the soul of Dovidl was flitting about the room, listening to everything, and noticing that we were pleased that he had died; and I felt ashamed. The next day I went to the Heder, somewhat proud of myself. I boasted before my mates that I was a Third. The Fourths envied me; the Fifths envied the Fourths, and all of us envied the Seconds and the only sons. So little chaps, youngsters who knew not what their life was going to be, came to know early that brothers, sons of one father, may at times be a source of trouble to one another. That was at the beginning of the summer. The teachers decided that we remain within the walls of the Heder most of the time, and show ourselves outside as little as possible during the period of danger. But a decree like that was more than boys could stand, especially in those beautiful summer days. Meanwhile the Catcher came to town, and set his eye on the son-in-law of the rich Reb Yossel, peace be unto him. The name of the young man was Avremel Hourvitz--a fine, genteel young man. He had run away from his home in Poland and come to our town, and was spending his time at the Klaus studying the Torah. And Reb Yossel, may he rest in peace, had to spend a pile of money before he got Avremel for his daughter. From the same Polish town came the Catcher, to take Avremel as the recruit of the family Hourvitz due to the Jewish community of his city. When he laid his hand on Avremel, the town was shocked. The rabbi himself sent for the Catcher, and promised to let him have, without any contention, some one else instead of Avremel. Then they began to look for a household with the family name of Hourvitz, and they found my father's. Before that happened I had never suspected that my father had anything like a family name. For some time the deal remained a deep secret. But no secret is proof against a mother's intuition, and my mother scented the thing. She caught me by the arm--I do not know why she picked me out--rushed with me to the rabbi, and made it hot for him. "Is this justice, rabbi? Did I bear and rear children, only to give up my son for the sake of some Avremel?!" The rabbi sighed, cast down his eyes, and argued, that said Avremel was not simply "an Avremel," but a "veritable jewel," a profound Lamdan, a noble-hearted man, destined to become great in Israel. It was unjust to give him away, when there was someone else to take his place. Besides, Avremel was a married man, and the father of an infant child. "Now where is justice?" demanded the rabbi. But my mother persisted. For all she knew, her own sons might yet grow up to become ornaments to israel . . . And she, too, was observing the ordinances of the Hallah and the Sabbath candles, and the rest of the laws, no less than Avremel's mother. More arguments, more tears without arguments--till the rabbi softened: he could not resist a woman. Then mother took me and Solomon up to the garret, and ordered us not to venture outside. -- Here the old man interrupted himself by a soft sigh, and continued:-- To a great extent it was my own fault, wild boy that I was. I broke my mother's injunction. In the alley, near the house of my parents, there lived a wine-dealer, Bendet by name. Good wine was to be found in his cellar. For this reason army officers and other persons of rank frequented his place, and he was somewhat of a favorite with them. In short, though he lived in a mean little alley, those important personages were not averse to calling at his house. That Bendet had an only child, a daughter. She was considered beautiful and educated. I had not known her. In my day they spoke ill of her. Naturally, her father loved her. Is there a father who loves not his offspring? And how much more such a daughter, whom everyone loved. However that may be, one day Bendet's daughter broke away, left her father's house, and renounced her faith--may we be spared such a fate! And many years after her father's death she returned to our town, to take possession of her portion of the inheritance. That happened at a time when we were hiding in the garret. The town was all agog: people ran from every street to get a look at the renegade, who came to take possession of a Jewish inheritance. I, too, was seized with a wild desire to get a look at her, to curse her, to spit in her face . . . . And I forgot all the dangers that surrounded me. Young as I was, I considered myself as a Jew responsible for the wayward one. I lost control of myself, and ran out. But after I had been in the street for some time, I was seized with fear of the Catcher. Every stranger I met seemed to me to be a Catcher. I shrank into myself, walked unsteadily hither and thither, and did not know how to hide myself. Then a man met me. His large beard and curled side-locks made me think he was a good man. I looked at him imploringly. "What ails you, my boy?" he asked in a soft tone. "I am afraid of the Catcher," said I, tearfully. "Whose son are you?" I told him. "Then come with me, and I shall hide you, my boy. Don't be afraid. I am your uncle. Don't you recognize me?" He took me by the arm, and I went after him. Then I noticed that the children of my neighborhood were eyeing me terror-stricken. The womenfolk saw me, wrung their hands, and lamented aloud. "What are they crying about?" I wondered. "Do you want some candy? Your uncle has plenty of it," said he, bending over me, as if to protect me. "Or maybe your feet hurt you? Let your uncle take you on his arms." As soon as I heard "candy," I felt that the man was the Catcher himself, and I tried to break away. But the "uncle" held me fast. Then I began to yell. It was near our house, and the people of our alley rushed towards us, some yelling, some crying, some armed with sticks. Pretty soon I recognized my mother's voice in the mixture of voices and noises. You see, peculiar is the charm of a mother's voice: a knife may be held to one's throat, but the mere sound of mother's voice awakens new courage and begets new hope. Mother made a way for herself, and fell upon the Catcher like a wild beast. She struck, she pinched, she scratched, she pulled his hair, she bit him. But what can a woman do in the line of beating? Nothing! Her neighbors joined her, one, two, three; and all tried hard to take me out of the hands of the Catcher. What can a few women do against one able-bodied man? Nothing at all! That happened during the dinner hour. One of our neighbors got the best of the Catcher, a woman who happened rather to dislike me and my mother; they quarreled frequently. Perhaps on account of this very dislike she was not over-excited, and was able to hit upon the right course to take at the critical moment. She went to our house, took in one hand a potful of roasted groats, ready for dinner, and in the other a kettle of boiling water. Unnoticed she approached the Catcher, spilled the hot groats upon his hands, and at the same time she poured the boiling water over them. A wild yell escaped from the mouth of the Catcher--and I was free. -- There was no more tobacco in the pipe, and the old man lost his speech. That was the way of Samuel the Beadle; he could tell his story only from behind the smoke of his pipe, when he did not see his hearers, nor his hearers saw him. In that way he found it easy to put his boyhood before his mind's eye and conjure up the reminiscences of those days. Meanwhile the horses had stopped, and let us know that a high and steep hill was ahead of us, and that it was our turn to trudge through the mud. We had to submit to the will of the animals, and we dismounted.

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After tramping a while alongside the coach, the old man lit his pipe, emitted a cloud of smoke, and continued:-- I do not know what happened then. I cannot tell who caught me, nor the place I was taken to. I must have been in a trance all the while. When I awoke, I found myself surrounded by a flock of sheep, in a meadow near the woods. Near me was my brother Solomon; but I hardly recognized him. He wore peasant clothes: a linen shirt turned out over linen breeches and gathered in by a broad belt. I was eyeing my brother, and he was eyeing me, both of us equally bewildered, for I was disguised like himself. A little boy, a real peasant boy, was standing near us. He smiled at us in a good-natured, hospitable way. It was the chore-boy of the Jewish quarter. On the Sabbaths of the winter months he kept up the fires in the Jewish houses; that is why he could jabber a few words of Yiddish. During the summer he took care of the flocks of the peasants that lived in the neighborhood. When I awoke, my mother was with us too. She kissed us amid tears, gave us some bread and salt, and, departing, strictly forbade us to speak any Yiddish. "For God's sake, speak no Yiddish," said she, "you might be recognized! Hide here till the Catcher leaves town." It was easy enough to say, "Speak no Yiddish"; but did we know how to speak any other language? I saw then that I was in a sort of hiding-place--a hiding-place under the open sky! I realized that I had escaped from houses, garrets, and cellars, merely to hide in the open field between heaven and earth. I had fled from darkness, to hide in broad daylight! Indeed, it was not light that I had to fear. Nor was it the sun, the moon, or the sheep. It was only man that I had to avoid. Mother went away and left us under the protection of the little shepherd boy. And he was a good boy, indeed. He watched us to the best of his ability. As soon as he saw any one approach our place, he called out loudly: "No, no; these are not Jewish boys at all! On my life, they are not!" As a matter of facet, a stranger did happen to visit our place; but he was only a butcher, who came to buy sheep for slaughtering. Well, the sun had set, and night came. It was my first night under an open sky. I suffered greatly from fear, for there was no Mezuzah anywhere near me. I put my hand under my Shaatnez clothes, and felt my Tzitzis: they, too, seemed to be in hiding, for they shook in my hand. Over us the dark night sky was spread out, and it seemed to me that the stars were so many omens whose meaning I could not make out. But I felt certain that they meant nothing good so far as I was concerned. All kinds of whispers, sizzling sounds of the night, reached my ears, and I knew not where they came from. Looking down, I saw sparks a-twinkling. I knew they were stars reflected in the near-by stream. But soon I thought it was not the water and the stars: the sheen of the water became the broad smile of some giant stretched out flat upon the ground; and the sparks were the twinkling of his eyes. And the sheep were not sheep at all, but some strange creatures moving to and fro, spreading out, and coming together again in knotted masses. I imagined they all were giants bewitched to appear as sheep by day and to become giants again by night. Then I knew too well that the thick, dark forest was behind me; and what doesn't one find in a forest? Is there an unholy spirit that cannot be found there? Z-z-z---- a sudden sizzling whisper reached my ear, and I began to cry. "Why don't you sleep?" asked the shepherd boy in his broken Yiddish. "I am afraid!" "What are you afraid of?" "Of--of--the woods . . . ." "Ha--ha--ha--I have good dogs with the flock!" I wanted a Mezuzah, some talisman, a protection against evil spirits, and that fool offered me barking dogs! All at once he whistled loudly, and his dogs set up a barking that nearly made me deaf. The flock was panic-stricken. I thought at first that the earth had opened her mouth, and packs of dogs were breaking out from hell. The noise the dogs made broke the awful hush of the night, and my fears were somewhat dispelled. But there were other reasons why I liked to hear the dogs bark. I was myself the owner of a dog, which I had raised on the sly in my father's house. Imagine the horror of my brother Solomon, who as a real Jewish lad was very much afraid of a dog! In that way we spent a few days, hiding under the open sky, disguised in our Shaatnez clothes. Soon enough the time came when my parents _had_ to understand what they would not understand when the rabbi wanted to give me up in place of the famous Avremel. For they caught my oldest brother Simhah, may he rest in peace. And Simhah was a privileged person; he was not only the Shohet of the community and a great Lamdan, but also a married man, and the father of four children to boot. Only then, it seems, my parents understood what the rabbi had understood before: that it was not fair to deliver up my brother when I, the ignorant fellow, the lover of dogs, might take his place. A few days later mother came and took us home. As to the rest, others had seen to it. -- Here the old man stopped for a while. He was puffing and snorting, tired from the hard walk uphill. Having reached the summit, he turned around, looked downhill, straightened up, and took a deep breath. "This is an excellent way of getting rid of your tired feeling," said he. "Turn around and look downhill: then your strength will return to you." --

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We had left the coach far behind, and had to wait till it overtook us. Meanwhile I looked downhill into the valley below: it was a veritable sea of slush. The teams that followed ours sank into it, and seemed not to be moving at all. The oblique rays of the setting sun, reflected and radiating in every direction, lent a peculiar glitter to the slushy wagons and the broken sheet of mire, as if pointing out their beauty to the darkening sky. So much light wasted, I thought. But on the summit of the hill on which I was standing, the direct rays of the sun promised a good hour more of daylight. The old man drew breath, and continued his story:-- Well, I was caught, and put into prison. I was not alone. Many young boys had been brought there. Some were crying bitterly; some looked at their companions wonderingly. We were told that the next day we should be taken away to some place, and that the rabbi wished to come to see us, but was not permitted to enter our prison. Yes, a good man was the rabbi, may he rest in peace; yet he was compelled to cheat for once. And when an honest man is compelled to cheat he may outdo the cleverest crook. Do you want to know what the rabbi did? He disguised himself as a peasant, went out, and walked the streets with the rolling gait of a drunkard. The night guards stopped him, and asked him what his business was. "I am a thief," said the rabbi. Then the guards arrested him, and put him into the prison with us. In the darkness of that night the rabbi never ceased talking to us, swallowing his own tears all the while. He told us the story of Joseph the righteous. It had been decreed in Heaven, said the rabbi, that his brethren should sell Joseph into slavery. And it was the will of the Almighty that Joseph should come to Egypt, to show the Egyptians that there is only one God in Heaven, and that the Children of Israel are the chosen people. Then the rabbi examined us: Did we know our Modeh-Ani by heart? did we know our Shema? He told us that we should be taken very, very far away, that we should be away many, many years, and should become soldiers when grown up. Then he warned us never to eat of any food forbidden by the Jewish law, and never to forget the God of Israel and our own people, even if they tore our flesh with thorns. He told us also the story of the Ten Martyrs, who sacrificed their lives to sanctify the God of Israel. He told us of the mother and her seven children that were killed for having refused to bow before idols; and he told us many more such things. All those saints and martyrs, he said, are now in Paradise, enjoying the bliss of the Divine Presence. That night I really envied those saints; I longed with all my heart to be forced to bow to idols, to have to withstand all sorts of trials, so as to enjoy, after my death, the bliss of the Divine Presence in Paradise. Many more stories the rabbi told us; many more words of warning, encouragement, and praise came from his lips, till I really believed I was the one whom God had picked out from among my equals, to be put through great trials and temptations. . . . Morning came, and the guard entered the prison. Then the rabbi turned towards us, and said: "Lambs of the God of Israel, we have to part now: I am going to be lashed and imprisoned for having entered this place by a trick, and you will be taken into exile, to undergo your trials! I may hardly expect to be found worthy of surviving till you return. But there, in the world-of-truth, we shall surely meet. May it be the will of God that I may have no reason to be ashamed of you there, before Him and His angels, in Heaven!" We parted, and the words of the rabbi sank deep into my heart. Then they began dumping us into wagons. The obstreperous boys, who tried to run away, were many of them bound with ropes and thrown into the wagon. Of course, we all howled. I did not hear my own voice, nor the voice of my neighbor. It was all one great howl. A crowd of men and women followed our wagon--the parents of the boys. Very likely they cried, too; but we could not hear their voices. The town, the fields, heaven and earth, seemed to cry with us. I caught sight of my parents, and my heart was filled with something like anger and hatred. I felt that I had been sacrificed for my brother. My mother, among many other mothers, approached the wagon, looked at me, and apparently read my thoughts: she fainted away, and fell to the ground. The accident held up the crowd, which busied itself with reviving my mother, while our wagon rolled away. My heart was filled with a mixture of anger, pity, and terror. In that mood of mixed feelings I parted from my parents. We cried and cried, got tired, and finally became still from sheer exhaustion. Presently a noise reached our ears, something like the yelling of children. We thought it was another wagonload of boys like ourselves. But soon we found out our mistake: it was but a wagonload of sheep that were being taken to slaughter. . . . Of course, we ate nothing the whole of that day, though the mothers had not failed to provide us with food. Meanwhile the sun had set; it got dark, and the boys who had been bound with ropes were released by the guard: he knew they would not attempt to escape at that time. We fell asleep, but every now and then one of the boys would wake up, crying, quietly at first, then louder and louder. Then another would join him; one more, and yet one more, till we all were yelling in chorus, filling the night air with our bitter cries. Even the guard could not stand it; he scolded us, and belabored us with his whip. That crying of ours reminds me of what we read in lamentations: "Weeping she hath wept in the night. . . ." Morning came, and found us all awake: we were waiting for daylight. We believed it would bring us freedom, that angels would descend from Heaven, just as they had descended to our father Jacob, to smite our guard and set us free. At the same time, the rising sun brought us all a feeling of hunger. We began to sigh, each and every one of us separately. But the noise we made did not amount even to the barking of a few dogs or the cawing of a few crows. That is what hunger can do. And when the guard had distributed among us some of the food we had brought with us, we ate it with relish, and felt satisfied. At the same time we began to feel the discomfort we were causing one another, cooped up as we were in the wagon. I began to complain of my neighbor, who was sitting on my legs. He claimed that I was pressing against him with my shoulder. We all began to look up to the guard, as if expecting that he could or would prevent us from torturing one another. Still I had some fun even on that day of weeping. I happened to turn around, and I noticed that Barker, my dog, was running after our wagon. "Too bad, foolish Barker," said I, laughing at him in spite of my heartache. "Do you think I am going to a feast? It is into exile that I am going; and what do you run after me for?" -- This made old Samuel laugh; he laughed like a child, as if the thing had just happened before his eyes, and as if it were really comical. Meanwhile our coach had reached the top of the hill; we jumped into our seats, and proceeded to make one another uncomfortable. The old man glanced at his son, who was sitting opposite to him. It was a loving and tender look, issuing from under long shaggy eyebrows, a beautiful, gentle, almost motherly look, out of accord with the hard-set face of an irritable and stern father. The old man made his son's seat comfortable for him, and then fell silent.

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I am going to pass over a long time--resumed the old man later. There was much traveling and many stops; much tramping on foot, with legs swollen; but all that has nothing to do with the subject. Once in a while our guard would get angry at us, curse us bitterly, and strike us with his whip. "You cursed Jews," he would say, "do I owe you anything that I should suffer so much on your account, and undergo all the hardships of travel?" Indeed, there was a good deal of truth in what he said. For, willingly or unwillingly, we did give him much trouble. Had we died, say the year before, or even at that very moment, he would not have been put to the necessity of leading a crowd of half-dumb boys. He would not have had to stand the hardships of travel, and would not have been compelled to listen to the wailings of children torn from the arms of their parents. Or do you think it is agreeable to feel that little children consider you a hard and cruel man? When I grew up and served in the army myself, and had people below me in age and position under my command, I came to understand the troubles of our guard; so that now, after having gone through many experiences, after I have passed, as they say, through fire and water, I may confess that I bear no malice towards all those at whose hands I suffered. There are many ex-Cantonists who cannot forget the birch-rod, for instance. Well, so much is true: for every misstep, for every sign of disobedience a whipping was due. If one of us refused to kneel in prayer before the crucifix; if one of us refused to eat pork; if one of us was caught mumbling a Hebrew prayer or speaking Yiddish, he was sure to get a flogging. Twenty, thirty, forty, or even full fifty lashes were the punishment. But, then, is it conceivable that they could have treated us any other way? Why, hundreds of Jewish children that did not understand a word of Russian had been delivered into the hands of a Russian official that did not understand a word of Yiddish. He would say, Take off my boots, and the boy would wash his hands. He would say, Sit down, and the boy would stand up. Were we not like dumb cattle? It was only the rod that we understood well. And the rod taught us to understand our master's orders by the mere expression of his eyes. Then many of the ex-Cantonists still remember with horror the steam-bath they were compelled to take. "The chamber of hell," they called the bath. At first blush, it would really seem to have been an awful thing. They would pick out all the Cantonists that had so much as a scratch on their bodies or the smallest sign of an eruption, paint the wounds with tar, and put the boys, stripped, on the highest shelf in the steam-bath. And below was a row of attendants armed with birch-rods. The kettle was boiling fiercely, the stones were red-hot, and the attendants emptied jars of boiling water ceaselessly upon the stones. The steam would rise, penetrate every pore of the skin, and--sting! sting! --enter into the very flesh. The pain was horrible; it pricked, and pricked, and there was no air to breathe. It was simply choking. If the boy happened to roll down, those below stood ready to meet him with the rods. All this is true. At the same time, was it mere cruelty? It is very simple: we were a lot of Jewish lads snatched from the arms of our mothers. On the eve of every Sabbath our mothers would take us in hand, wash us, comb our hair, change our underwear, and dress us in our Sabbath clothes. All at once we were taken into exile. Days, weeks, nay, months, we passed in the dust of the roads, in perspiration and dirt, and sleeping on the ground. Our underwear had not been changed. No water had touched our bodies. So we became afflicted with all kinds of eruptions. That is why we had to pass through what we called "the chamber of hell." And this will give you an idea of the rest. To make a long story short: there were many of us, and we were distributed in various places. Many of the boys had taken ill; many died on the road. The survivors were distributed among peasants, to be brought up by them till they reached the age of entering the army. I was among the latter. Many months, maybe even years, I passed in knocking about from village to village, from town to town, till, at last, I came into the joint possession of a certain Peter Semionovich Khlopov and his wife Anna Petrovna. My master was neither old nor young; he was neither a plain peasant nor a nobleman. He was the clerk of the village. In those days that was considered a genteel occupation, honorable and well-paid. He had no sons, but he and one daughter, Marusya by name. She was then about fourteen years old, very good-looking, gay, and rather wild. According to the regulations, all the Cantonists in the village had to report daily for military drill and exercise on the drill grounds before the house of the sergeant. He lived in the same village. At the request of my patron Khlopov I was excused from the daily drill, and had to report but once a week. You see, Peter expected to derive some benefit from me by employing me about the house and in the field. Now it was surely through the merits of my ancestors that I happened to be placed in the household of Peter Khlopov. Peter himself spent but little of his time at home. Most of the time he was at the office, and his free moments he liked to spend at the tavern, which was owned by the only Jew in the village, "our Moshko" the Klopovs used to call him. But whenever he happened to be at home, Peter was very kind to me, especially when he was just a little tipsy. Perhaps he dreamt of adopting me as his son: he had no sons of his own. And he tried to make me like military service. "When you grow up," he sued to say, "you will become an officer, and wear a sword. Soldiers will stand at attention before you, and salute you. You will win distinction in battle, and be found worthy of being presented to the Czar." He also told me stories of Russian military life. By that time I had learned some Russian. They were really nice stories, as far as I could understand them; but they were made nicer yet by what I could not understand of them. For then I was free to add something to the stories myself, or change them according to my own fancy. If you are a lover of stories, take the advice of a plain old man like myself. Never pay any attention to stories in which everything has been prepared from the very start, and you can tell the end as soon as you begin to read them or listen to them. Such stories make one yawn and fall asleep. Stories of this kind my daughter reads to me once in a while, and I always fall asleep over them. Stories are good only when told the way Khlopov used to tell them to me. But that is all irrelevant. In short, Khlopov was kind to me. As to Anna, she was entirely different. She was close-mouthed, ill-tempered, and a great stay-at-home. She never visited her neighbors, and they, in turn, called on her very rarely. In the village she was spoken of as a snob and a hypocrite. Peter was afraid of her as of the plague, especially in his sober hours. All her power lay in her eyes. When that strong man--he who had the whole village in the palm of his hand--felt her eye fixed on him, his strength left him. It seemed as if some devil were ready to jump out of that eye and turn the house topsyturvy. You fellows are mere youngsters, you have seen nothing of the world yet; but take it from me, there are eyes that seem quite harmless when you first look into them, but just try to arouse their temper: you will see a hellish fire spring up in them. Have you ever looked into my Rebekah's eyes? Well, beware of the eyes. The look Anna gave me when I first entered her house promised me nothing good. She hated me heartily. She never called me by my own name. She called me "Zhid" all the time, in a tone of deep hatred and contempt. Among the orders the Cantonists had to obey were the following: to speak no Yiddish; to say no Jewish prayer; to recite daily a certain prayer before the image of the Virgin and before the crucifix, and not to abstain from non-kosher food. With regard to all injunctions except the last, Anna was very strict with me. But she was not very particular as to the last injunction. Out of sheer stinginess she fed me on bread and vegetables, and that in the kitchen. Once she did offer me some meat, and I refused to touch it. Then she got very angry, flew into a temper, and decided to complain to the sergeant. But Peter did not let her be so cruel. "Let him grow up, he will know better," said Peter, waving his hand at me. Then Anna made up her mind to force me to eat forbidden meat. But I was obstinate. And she decided once more to complain to the sergeant. Just at that time another Cantonist had been found guilty of some offense. He belonged to the same village; his name was Jacob. I did not know him at that time. His patron complained that Jacob had persisted in reciting Hebrew prayers, and that he abstained from meat. Jacob was condemned to twenty lashes with rods. An order was issued that all Cantonists should assemble to witness the flogging of the offender. In the course of time we got used to such sights; but the first time we were terribly shocked. Just imagine: a lad of about fifteen is stripped, put on the ground face downwards; one man sits on his head, and another on his feet. Two men are put on either side of him, each with a bundle of birch-rods in his hand. Ten times each of them has to strike him with the rods, to make up the twenty lashes. I looked at the face of the culprit; it was as white as chalk. His lips were moving. I thought he was reciting the prayer: "And He, the Merciful, will forgive sin, and will not destroy. . . ." Up went the rods, down they went: a piercing cry . . . . blood . . . . flaps of loose skin . . . . cries . . . . "one, two, three" . . . . again cries . . . . sudden silence . . . . more cries . . . . again silence . . . . "four, five" . . . . "stop!" Because the culprit fainted, the sergeant in the goodness of his heart divided the punishment into two parts. Jacob was carried off to the hospital, and it was put down in the book that he was to get ten more lashes after his recover. I went home. Had Anna given me a piece of pork to eat that evening, I do not know what I should have done. That night I saw the old rabbi in my dream. He was standing before me, with bowed head and tears dropping from his eyes. . . . . I do not remember the way Marusya treated me at first. But I do remember the look she gave me when I first entered her father's house. There are trifling matters that one remembers forever. Hers was a telltale look, wild and merry. It is hard to describe it in words--as if she wanted to say, "Welcome, friend! You did well in coming here. I need just you to pass my leisure hours with me!" And she really needed someone like myself, for she never associated with the children of the village. The beautiful lively girl used to have her fits of the blues. Then it was impossible to look at her face without pitying her. At such times her mother could not get a word out of her, and the whole expression of her face was changed to such an extent that she seemed to have aged suddenly. She would look the very image of her mother then. And a peculiar expression would steal over her face, which estranged her from other people, and perhaps brought her nearer to me. During those fits of despondency she was sure to follow me if I happened to leave the room and go outside. She would join me and spend hour after hour in childish prattle with me, and her merriment and wildness knew no limits. Little by little I got used to her, and fell, in turn, a longing for her company during my own fits of lonesomeness. The day after I had witnessed Jacob's punishment I felt miserable. I was restless and excitable, and did not know what to do with myself. I thought my heart would burst within me. I asked myself all kinds of questions: What am I doing here? What did I come here for? What are all those people to me? As if I had come there only the day before, and of my own free will. . . . Marusya looked sharply at me. Very likely she recognized that something was worrying me. I felt a desire to share my feelings with her. I got up and walked out into the garden behind the house. In a moment she followed me. I made a clean breast of it, and told her all I had to witness the day before. She listened, shivering, and asked in a tremulous voice: "And what did they beat him for?" "He said a Hebrew prayer, and refused to eat meat." "And why did he refuse to eat meat?" "It is forbidden." "Forbidden? Why?" I was silent. She also became silent; then she laid her hand on me, and said with her usual merriment: "They will not beat you." "How do you know?" "The sergeant is a good friend of ours." "But if your mother should complain about me?" "Then I shall go in your stead, if they should decide to switch you." She laughed heartily at her own suggestion. Her laughter made me laugh too; we both laughed, and laughed without knowing why. And in a mood completely changed I returned to the house. After that I felt very near to the girl. Well, time passed, months and years: I lost track of them. But I do remember that the time had come when I knew enough Russian to make myself understood, and fit for any kind of work about the house and in the field, and could give my patron entire satisfaction. One day, I remember, I tried very hard to have my work well and promptly done, so as to earn, for once, the good-will of Anna herself. I felt a longing for the friendly smile of a mother. But Anna kept going in and out, and did not pay the least attention to me. I was sitting on the bench outside the house alone. My dog was lying at my feet, looking at me very intently. His eyes seemed to be full of tears. And let me tell you by the way, his lot in the house was entirely different from mine. When he first entered Peter's courtyard, the dogs met him with howls. He tried to find shelter in the kitchen, but was chased out with sticks. "Where did that tramp come from?" wondered the people. Then my Barker saw that he could expect no charity from the people, and he put his trust in his own teeth. He stood up bravely, and fought all the dogs of the household till blood flowed. Then only did the masters of the house appreciate his doggish virtues and accomplishments. They befriended him, and allowed him his rations. So my Barker saved his skin. Yet his lot did not seem to please him. He recognized, by some peculiar dog-sense, that I, his fellow in exile, was unhappy myself and sorry for him too. He felt that somehow his own days of prosperity would not last long. Whenever I sat about lonely and moping, he would stretch himself at my feet, and look straight into my eyes, with an expression of earnestness and wonderment, as if he wanted to ask me, How is that, why don't you fight for your rights the way I did? Presently Anna came out, shot a glance at me, and said: "Well, now, there is the lazy Zhid sitting idle, and I have to work and prepare meals for him, so that he may find everything ready!" I got up, and began to look around for something to do. "Go, catch the little pig and bring it over here," ordered Anna. The day before I had overheard her say that it was time to kill the little pig. I did not relish the job by any means. I felt sorry for the porkling: mere pig though it was, it had after all grown up in our house. And it was hard on me to have a hand in the affair. But one angry word of Anna's set me a-going. In a moment my hand was on the animal, which trusted me and believed in me implicitly. Then Anna handed me a rope to bind it. I did as she wanted; the pig started to squeal and squeak horribly. To me it sounded like "Zhid, Zhid, is that the way to treat _me?" _ Then Anna handed me a knife, and showed me where to make the cut. . . . The pig began to bleed fearfully, gurgling, and choking with his own blood. Forthwith Anna ordered wood to be brought, a fire to be kindled, and the pig to be put upon it. I did all as I had been ordered. My dog was watching me intently, greatly bewildered; the pig groaned and groaned; the flames licked his body and embraced it--and my dog was barking and yelping away up into the sky. That night I dreamt that my brother the Shohet and I were on trial in Heaven before the seat of judgment, with various animals complaining against us. Only clean fowl, such as geese, pigeons, and the like were complaining against my brother, and they all pleaded in clear, good Hebrew, saying, "Was it for your own consumption that you killed us all?" . . . . But it was only the pig that complained against me, and it pleaded in screeches and grunts that nobody could understand. . . . The next morning Anna got up early, and made me stand before the ikon of the Virgin and recite a certain prayer. At dinner she seated me alongside of Peter, gave me some roast pork, and looked sharply at me. I guess, while making all those preparations, Anna had only one thing in mind: to put Peter up against me while he was drunk. I took fright, and began to chew away at the pork. But then the screeches and the grunts of the pig rang in my ears, and I thought they came right from within my insides; I wondered how they could listen to all that, and yet eat the pork in perfect comfort. Suddenly a lump in my throat began to choke me. . . . Nausea, retching . . . . and something happened to me: I vomited everything out, right on the table. Everybody jumped away from the table in disgust and anger. I met Marusya's eye, and was ashamed to look into it. Anna got up, boiling with rage, and took me by the ear, and pulled me outside: "Get out of here, you dirty Zhid; and don't you dare enter my house any more!" Well, she chased me out. Peter and Marusya kept quiet. Thoroughly miserable, I dropped down on the bench behind the house; my dog stretched himself out on the ground at my feet and looked into my eyes. Then I began to talk to my fellow in misfortune: "Do you hear, doggie, we have been chased out. . . . What does that mean? did we come here of our own free will? It is by force that we were brought here; so what sense is there in chasing us out?" And I thought my dog understood me; a sound came from the depths of his throat, and died away there. Then a thought began to haunt me: Maybe it is really time to run away. If they run after me and overtake me, I shall simply say that my patron chased me out of his house. And the thought, Home! to your parents! took possession of me, and tortured me ceaselessly. Said I to myself: "If they chase me out, I am certainly free!" But then, just see the power of the birch-rod: I knew well that much time would pass before my patron would notice my absence; and before the sergeant was informed, and people were dispatched to pursue me, more time would pass. Then I should be far away from the place. By that time I was quite hardened; I was not afraid to hide in the woods; devils and evil spirits I did not fear any more. I had learned well enough that no devil will ever trouble a man as much as one human being can trouble another. And yet, when I remembered the swish of the rods over the naked flesh, the spurting blood, the loose flaps of skin, and the futile outcries, I was paralyzed with fear. No, it was not really fear: it was a sort of submissive adoration. Had a birch-rod been lying near me, I should have kissed it with fear and respect. It is hard for me to explain to you. You youngsters are not capable of understanding. And as I was sitting there, full of gloomy thoughts, I did not notice that the sun had set, and night had come. It got so dark that I could not see my dog lying at my feet. Suddenly I felt something touch me and pass lightly over my hair. I thought it was an ant or a night moth, and I raised my hand to chase it away. Then it changed its place, and I felt it at the nape of my neck. I tried to catch the thing that was making my neck itch, and caught a hand, soft and warm. I shuddered and started back: before me was Marusya, bending over me. I wanted to get up, but she put her hands on me heavily, sat down at my side, all the while pressing my hand between hers. "Why are you sitting here?" she asked. "Didn't your mother chase me out?" "That is nothing. Don't you know her temper? That is her way." "She keeps nagging at me all the time, and calls me nothing but Zhid, Zhid." "And what of it? Aren't you a Jew? Should I feel insulted if some one were to call me Christian?!" I had nothing to say. And it dawned upon me at that moment that I was really insulting myself by objecting to being called Zhid. True, Anna meant to jeer at me and insult me; but did it depend on her alone? "And what are you going to do now?" asked Marusya. "I want to run away." "Without telling me?" She peered into my face, and I felt as if two streams of warmth had emptied themselves into me. My eyes had become somewhat accustomed to the darkness, and I could discern every movement of her body. A delicate smile was playing around her mouth, and my feeling of despondency was giving way before it. I felt that after all I had a friend in the house, a good, loving, and beautiful friend. I shuddered and broke out into tears. Then she began to play caressingly with my hair and pat me on my neck and face. She did well to let me have my cry out. By and by I felt relieved. She wanted to withdraw her hand, but then I held it fast. "So you were going to run away, and that without my knowledge?" said she. "No," I said with a deep sigh. "And if I should ever call you Zhid, will you be angry with me?" "No," answered I, thoroughly vanquished. "Well, then you are a dear boy, and I like you!" I felt the touch of soft, warm lips on my neck . . . . I closed my eyes, that the dark night sky and the shining stars might not see me. And when I recognized what had happened to me, I felt ashamed. Marusya disappeared, and soon returned with a bag in her hand. "Papa said you should go out with the horses for the night. Here is some food in the bag. Take it and go out." This she shot out quickly, and in a tone of authority, as befits the daughter of the patron, and as if what had passed between us were nothing but a dream. "Going out for the night" was a peculiar custom. You can have no idea of what it meant. The logic of it was this: The cattle that had been worked the whole of the day were, to be sure, earning their fodder for the day. And the owners felt under obligation and necessity to feed them during their working hours. But how about the night, when the animals rested, and did no work? Where should the fodder for the night time come from? So the custom developed of letting the animals browse in some neighbor's meadow during the night. That was cheaper. But that neighbor also had cattle; he, too, had horses that did not earn their feed during the night. Do you know what the neighbor did? He did the same. He, too, sent out his horses stealthily, into his neighbor's meadow. So, in the long run, every one had his cattle browse secretly in some neighbor's meadow, and all were happy. But when the trespassing shepherd happened to be caught poaching, he got a whipping. And yet, strictly speaking, it was not stealing; it was a mere usage. The land-owners seemed to have agreed beforehand: "If you happen to catch my shepherd poaching, you may whip him, provided you do not object if I give a whipping to your shepherd on a similar occasion." In spite of all this I rather liked "going out for the night." I loved those nights in the open field. When the moon gave but little light, and one could see but a few steps away, I forgot my immediate surroundings, and my imagination was free! I would peer into the open sky, would bring before my mind's eye father and mother and all who were dear to me, and would feel near to them; for the sky that spread over all of us was the very same. I could imagine my father celebrating the new moon with a prayer. I could imagine my mother watching for the same star I was looking at; I could imagine that we were really looking at the same spot. . . . Then tears would come into my eyes. My mother, I would think, was crying, too. And the night listened to me, and the stars listened to me. . . . The crickets chirped, and if I chose, I could believe they shared my sorrows with me, and were sighing over my fate. . . . Idle fancy, nonsense, you think; but when one has nothing real to look up to, dreams are very sweet. A light breeze would steal over me, refresh me, and bring me new hope; and I trusted I should not be a prisoner always, the day of my release would surely come. At such happy moments I would fall asleep gazing at the stars. And if the sudden whip of the landowner did not put an end to my dreams, I would dream away, and see things no language could describe. Well, I took the bag and led the horses out into the open field. But that time, out of sheer spite or for some other reason, I did not go into our neighbor's field, but descended right into the valley that my patron had left lying fallow, and stretched myself upon the soft grass of the hospitable turf. That night I longed to bring father and mother before my mind's eye and have an imaginary talk with them. But I did not succeed. Instead, the figure of the old rabbi hovered before my eyes. It seemed to me that he was looking at me angrily, and telling me the story of Joseph the righteous: how he lived in the house of Potiphar, and ate nothing but vegetables. But when I reminded myself of Joseph the righteous, I felt my heart sink at the thought of what Marusya had done to me. I could not deny that the good looks of the Gentile girl were endearing her to me, that out of her hands I would eat pork ten times a day, and that in fact I myself was trying to put up a defense of her. I took all the responsibility on myself. I was ready to believe that she did not seek my company, but that it was I who called her to myself. I was a sinner in my own estimation, and I could not even cry. Then it seemed to me that the sky was much darker than usual, and the stars did not shine at all. With such thought in my mind I fell asleep. I awoke at the sound of voices. Some one is crying, I thought. The sound seemed near enough. It rose and rose and filled the valley. It made me shudder. The soft, plaintive chant swelled and grew louder, as if addressed to me. It gripped my very heart. I stood up all in a shiver, and started to walk in the direction of the sound. But around me, up and down, on every side, was total darkness. The moon had set long ago. I moved away only a few steps from the horses, and could not make them out any more. By and by I could distinguish some words, and I recognized the heart-gripping chant of a Hebrew Psalm. . . . "For the Lord knoweth the path of the righteous, And the path of the wicked shall perish." . . . My fears vanished, and gave place to a feeling of surprise. "Where can that chanting come from," thought I, "and here in exile, too?" Then I began to doubt it all, thinking it was but a dream. "Why do the nations rage, And the peoples imagine a vain thing?" The voices were drawing me forward irresistibly, and I decided to join the chorus, come what might. And I continued the Psalm in a loud voice: "The kings of the earth stood up . . . ." The chanting ceased; I heard steps approaching me. "Who is there?" asked a voice in Yiddish. "It is I," answered I, "and who are you?" "It is we!" shouted many voices in chorus. "Cantonists?" "A Cantonist, too?" Thus exchanging questions, we met. They turned out to be three Cantonists, who lived in a village at some distance from Peter's house. I had never met them before. They, too, had "gone out for the night," and we had happened to use the same valley. I love to mention their names. The oldest of them was Jacob, whom you remember from the punishment he underwent. The others were Simeon and Reuben. But there in the valley they introduced themselves to me with the names they were called by at home: Yekil, Shimele, and Ruvek. I found out later that the valley was their meeting-place. It was a sort of Klaus, "Rabbi Yekil's Klaus" the boys called it. Yekil was a boy of about fifteen, who was well-equipped with knowledge of the Torah when he was taken away from his home. In the long years of our exile we had forgotten the Jewish calendar completely. But Yekil prided himself on being able to distinguish the days "by their color and smell," especially Fridays; and his friends confirmed his statements. He used to boast that he could keep track of every day of the year, and never miss a single day of the Jewish holidays. Every Jewish holiday they met in the valley on Peter's estate. According to Yekil's calendar, the eve of the Fast of the Ninth of Av fell on that very day. That is why they had gathered in the valley that night. "If so," said I, "what is the use of reciting that Psalm? Were it not more proper to recite Lamentations?" "We do not know Lamentations by heart," explained Yekil, with the authority of a rabbi, "but we do know some Psalms, and these we recite on every holiday. For, at bottom, are mere words the main thing? Your real prayer is not what you say with your lips, but what you feel with the whole of your heart. As long as the words are in the holy tongue, it all depends on the feelings you wish to put into them. As my father, may he rest in peace, used to instruct me, the second Psalm is the same as the festival hymn, 'Thou hast chosen us from among the nations,' if you feel that way; or it may be the same as Lamentations. It all depends on the feelings in our heart, and on the meaning we wish to put into the words!" Yekil's talk and the sounds of Yiddish speech, which I had not heard since I left home, impressed me in a wonderful way. Here I found myself all at once in the company of Jews like father and mother. But I felt very much below that wonderful boy who could decide questions of Jewish law like some great rabbi. Indeed, he seemed to me little short of a rabbi in our small congregation. Then I began to feel more despondent than ever. I considered myself the sinner of our little community. I knew I was guilty of eating pork and of other grave trespasses, and I felt quite unworthy of being a member of the pious congregation. Meanwhile little Reuben discovered the contents of my bag. "Boys, grub!" exclaimed he, excitedly. At the word "grub" the congregation was thrown into a flutter. That was the way of the Cantonists. They could not help getting excited at the sight of any article of food, even when they were not hungry at all. In the long run our patrons fed us well enough, and on the whole we could not complain of lack of food. But we were fed according to the calculations of our patrons, and not according to our own appetites. So it became our habit to eat whenever victuals were put before us, even on a full stomach. "Eat whenever you have something to eat, so as not to go hungry when there may be no rations." That was a standing rule among the Cantonists. They began fumbling in my bag, and I was dying with shame at the thought that soon they would discover the piece of pork, and that my sin would become known to the pious congregation. Then I broke down, and with tears began to confess my sins. "I have sinned," said I, sobbing, "it is pork. I could not withstand the temptation." At that moment it seemed to me that Yekil was the judge, and the boys who had found the pork were the witnesses against me. Yekil listened to my partial confession, and the two "witnesses" hung their heads, and hid their faces in shame, as if they were the accused. But I sobbed and cried bitterly. "Now, listen, little one," Yekil turned to me. "I do not know whether you have suffered the horrors of hell that we have suffered. Did they paint your body with tar, and put you up on the highest shelf in the steam-bath, and choke you with burning steam? Did they flog you with birch-rods for having been caught mumbling a Hebrew prayer? Did they make you kneel for hours on sharp stones for having refused to kiss the ikon and the crucifix? Did they discover you secretly kissing the Arba-Kanfos, and give you as many lashes as there are treads in the Tzitzis? If you have not passed through all that, uncover our backs, and count the welts that still mark them! And to this you must add the number of blows I have still to get, simply because my little body could not take in at once all it was expected to take in. And yet, not a day passed without our having recited our Modeh-Ani. As to eating pork, we abstained from it in spite of the rods. Then they gave up flogging us; but, instead of that punishment, they gave us nothing but pork to eat. Two days we held out; we did not touch any food. We did not get even a drink of water. Do you see little Simeon? Well, he tried to eat the grass in the courtyard. . . . On the third day of our fast I saw my father in my dream. He was dressed in his holiday clothes, and holding the Bible in his hands he quoted the passage, 'Be ye mindful of your lives.' Suddenly, the earth burst open, and the Angel of Death appeared. He had rods in one hand and a piece of swine's flesh in the other. He put the piece of pork into my mouth. I looked up, terror-stricken, to my father, but he smiled. His smile filled the place with light. He said to me, 'Eatest thou this of thy own free will?' Then he began to soar upwards, and called out to me from afar: 'Tell all thy comrades, the Cantonists: Your reward is great. Every sigh of yours is a prayer, every good thought of yours is a good action! Only beware, lest you die of hunger; then surely you will merit eternal punishment!' "I awoke. Since then we eat all kinds of forbidden food. The main thing is that we have remained Jews, and that as Jews we shall return home to our parents. It is clear to me now that the Holy One, blessed by He, will not consider all that a sin on our part!" I felt as if a heavy load had been taken off my shoulders. My eyes began to flow with tears of gladness. Then, having once started my confession, I decided to confess to my second sin also. Meanwhile Simeon had pulled the bread and the meat out of my bag. "Glutton!" exclaimed Yekil, angrily. "Have you forgotten that it is the night of the Fast of the Ninth of Av?" The boy, ashamed, returned the things to the bag, and moved away a few steps. Then I told Yekil all that had passed between me and Marusya, and tried unconsciously to defend her in every way. I think I exaggerated a good deal when I tried to show that Marusya liked the Jews very much, indeed. "And what was the end of it?" asked Yekil, with some fear. "Did she really kiss you?" The other boys echoed the question. I looked down, and said nothing. "Is she good-looking?" I still gave no answer. "I have forgotten your name. What is it?" "Samuel." "Now listen, Samuel, this is a very serious affair. It is much worse than what is told of Joseph the righteous. Do you understand? I do not really know how to make it clear to you. It is very dangerous to find good and true friends right here in exile, in the very ranks of our enemies." "Why?" wondered I. "I cannot tell you, but this is how I feel. Insulted and outraged we have been brought here; insulted and outraged we should depart from here. Ours is the right of the oppressed; and that right we must cherish till we return home." "I do not understand!" Jacob looked at me sharply, and said: "Well, I have warned you; keep away from her." His words entered into the depths of my heart. I bowed my head before Yekil, and submitted to his authority. That was the way we all felt: Yekil had only to look at us to subject us to his will. It was hard to resist him. I felt a great change in myself: I had been relieved of the weight of two sins. Of one I had been absolved completely, and the other I had confessed in public and repented of. I gladly joined the little congregation, and we returned to our Psalms, which we recited instead of Lamentations. At the conclusion I proposed that we chant the Psalm "By the rivers of Babylon," which we all knew by heart. And we, a congregation of four little Jews, stood up in the valley on the estate of Peter Khlopov, concealed by steep hills and by the darkness of the night: thieves for the benefit of our masters, and mourners of Zion on our own account. . . . And we chanted out of the depths of our hearts: "By the rivers of Babylon, there we sat and wept, remembering Zion." . . . We chanted the whole of it, sat down and wept, remembering at the same time all we had gone through ourselves, and also the position we were in at that time. -- Here old Samuel shuddered and stopped abruptly. The sun had set, and he reminded himself that he had forgotten to say his afternoon prayer. He jumped down hastily, washed his hands in a near-by pool, returned to his seat, and became absorbed in his devotion.

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By and by the streaks of light disappeared in the twilight sky, and the wintry night threw the mantle of thick and misty blackness over us. Presently I heard the old man conclude his prayer: "When the world will be reclaimed through the kingship of the Almighty; when all mortals will acknowledge Thy name. . . . on that day the Lord will be One, and His name will be One!" Out of the darkness came the devout words; they seemed to take wing, as though to pierce the shrouding mist and scatter it; but they themselves were finally dissolved in the triumph and blackness. . . . I did not have to urge the old man to continue his tale. His prayers over, he picked up the thread of his narrative, as if something were driving him to give a full account of what he had passed through. -- The day I became acquainted with Jacob--continued the old man--I consider the beginning of a new period in my life. I became accustomed to consider him my superior, whose behavior had to be taken as an example. Jacob spoke as an authority whenever he did speak, and he never wavered in his decisions. Whenever he happened to be in doubt, his father would "instruct" him in his dreams. Thus we lived according to Jacob's decisions and dreams. I got used to eating forbidden food, to breaking the Sabbath, and trespassing against all the ordinances of the ritual without compunction. And yet Jacob used to preach to us, to bear floggings and all kinds of punishments rather than turn traitor to our faith. So I got the notion that our faith is neither prayers, nor a collection of ordinances of varying importance, but something I could not name, nor point to with my finger. Jacob, I thought, certainly knows all about it; but I do not. All I could was to _feel_ it; so could Anna. Otherwise she would not have called me Zhid, and would not have hated me so much, in spite of seeing me break all the ordinances of the Jewish ritual. At times I thought that I and my comrades were captains in God's army, that all His ordinances were not meant for us, but for the plain soldiers of the line. They, the rank and file, must be subjected to discipline, must know how to submit to authority; all of which does not apply to the commanding officers. It seemed to me that this was what the Holy One, blessed be He, had deigned to reveal to us through the dreams of Jacob: there is another religion for you, the elect. _You_ will surely know what is forbidden, and what is permitted. . . . Sometimes, again, I imagined that I might best prove true to my faith if I set my heart against the temptation that Satan had put before me in the person of Marusya. If I turned away from her, I thought, I might at once gain my share in the future world. So I armed myself against Marusya's influence in every possible way. I firmly resolved to throw back at her any food she might offer me. If she laid her hand on me, I would push it away from me, and tell her plainly that I was a Jew, and she--a nobody. So I fought with her shadow, and, indeed, got the best of it as long as she herself was away. But the moment she appeared, all my weapons became useless. She made me feel like one drunk. I could not withstand the wild-fire of her eye, nor the charm of her merry talk, nor the wonderful attraction of her whole person. At the same time there was not a trace of deviltry about her: it was simply an attraction which I could not resist. And when she laid her soft hand on me, I bent under it, and gave myself up entirely. And she did what she wanted: where buttons were missing, she sewed them on; and where a patch was needed, she put it in. She was a little mother to me. She used to bring me all kinds of delicacies and order me to eat them; and I could not disobey her. In short, she made me forget Jacob and his teachings. But the moment I met Jacob I forgot Marusya's charms, and reminded myself that it was sinful to accept favors in exile. Then I would repent of my past actions from the very depths of my heart--till I again was face to face with Marusya. I was between the hammer and the anvil. My meetings with Jacob were regular and frequent. After what according to Jacob's calendar was the Ninth of Av, we met nightly in the valley on Peter's estate, till a disagreement broke out among us. I would not permit the cattle of the whole neighborhood to browse on the estate of my patron, and Simeon and Reuben would not agree to let my patron's horses be brought to the meadows of their patrons. Our congregation nearly broke up. But here Jacob intervened with his expert decision. "Boys," said he, "you must know that 'going out for the night' is really a form of stealing. True, we do not steal for our own benefit. Yet, as long as we have a hand in it, we must manage it in a fair way. So let us figure out how many horses every one of our patrons possesses. And let us arrange the nights according to the number of horses each of the patrons has. According to this calculation we shall change places. We shall spend more nights in the meadows of those who have more horses. That will make 'fair stealing.'" The plan of Jacob was accepted, not as a proposition, but as an order. Since that time we began to "steal with justice." And our patrons slept peacefully, delighted with their unpunished thievery, till a Gentile boy, one Serge Ivanovich, joined us on one of his own "nights." He was the son of the village elder, and a cousin of Peter Khlopov. He was compelled to obey Jacob, but the next morning he blabbed about it all over the village. Of course, our patrons were angry. Jacob took the whole blame on himself, and suffered punishment for all of us. Then "Jacob's Klaus" was closed, because our patrons gave up sending us out "for the night." Well, if you please, their dissatisfaction was not entirely groundless: they found themselves fooled by us, and cheated in a way. For every one of them had been thinking that his horse would bring him some profit every night, equal to the value of the horse's browsing. Seven nights, seven times that profit; thirty nights, thirty times that profit. . . . All at once these "profits" had vanished: it turned out that every horse had been browsing at the expense of his own master; so the expected profits became a total loss. Of course, stealing is stealing. But then, they argued, had the Zhid youngsters any right to meddle with their affairs? Was it their property that was being stolen? As one of my Gentile acquaintances told me once: "The trouble with the Jews is that they are always pushing themselves in where they are not wanted at all." Indeed, it was this fault of ours that Serge kept pointing out to me and berating us for. Well, Jacob's Klaus had been closed. But we managed to get together in different places. Once in a while we came to see one another at our patron's houses, and they did not object. I do not know who told Marusya what kind of a chap Jacob was, and what he thought of her; but she hated him from the moment she first saw him, when he came to visit me. "He is a real savage," she would say. "I never saw such a Jew. I am simply afraid of him. I am afraid of those wild eyes of his. I detest him, anyway." That is what she used to tell me. Whenever Jacob came to see me, and Marusya happened to be in the room, she would walk out immediately, and would not return before he was out of the house. I rather liked it. I could not be giving in to both of them at the same time. Such were the surroundings that shaped my life during those days. Peter befriended me; but Anna kept on worrying me and making me miserable. Marusya loved me as a sister loves a brother, and the fire of her eyes ate into my heart. Jacob kept preaching to me that it was wrong to accept favors from Gentiles, and that we had to fight for our faith. Serge became my bitter enemy from the time he betrayed our scheme of "honest stealing." To top it all, my sergeant tried to put me through the paces of the military drill, and succeeded. But my own self seemed to have been totally forgotten and left out of the account. By and by the summer passed, and most of the following winter; and in the Khlopov household preparations were made for some holiday, I forget which. Those days of preparation were our most miserable days in exile. When Anna was busy on the eve of a holiday, I could not help remembering our own Sabbath eves at home, the Sabbath days in the Klaus, as well as the other holidays, and all the things that are so dear to the heart of the Jewish boy. That was the time when I felt especially lonely and homesick; it was as though a fever were burning within me. Then neither tears nor even Marusya's company did me any good. I felt as if red-hot coals had been packed up right here in my breast. Did you ever feel that way? I felt like rolling on the ground and pressing my chest against something hard. I felt I was going mad. I felt like jumping, crying, singing, and fighting all at once. I felt as if even lashes would be welcome, simply to get rid of that horrible heartache. On that particular day Khlopov was late in coming home. Marusya remarked that she had seen her father enter the tavern. Then Anna began to curse "our Moshko," the tavern keeper. Marusya objected: "Tut, tut, mother, is it any of Moshko's fault? Does he compel papa to go there? Does he compel him to drink?" Then Anna few into a temper, and poured out a torrent of curses and insults on Marusya. I don't know what happened to me then. My blood was up; my fists tightened. It was a dangerous moment; I was ready to pounce upon Anna. I did not know that Marusya had been watching me all the while from behind, and understood all that was passing within me. Presently the door opened, and Khlopov entered, rather tipsy, hopping and jigging. That was his way when in his cups. When he was under the influence of liquor, his soul seemed to spread beyond its usual limits and light up his face with smiles. At such moments he would be ready to hug, to kiss, or to cry; or else to curse, to fight, and to laugh at the same time. Right here you can see the difference between the Jew and the Gentile. The finer soul of the Jew may contract and settle on the very point of his nose. But the grosser soul of the Gentile needs, as it were, more space to spread over. This, I believe, is why Khlopov never failed to get a clean shave on the eve of every holiday. As soon as Khlopov had entered the room, he began to play with me and Marusya. He gave us candy, and insisted on dancing a jig with us. Anna met him with a frown: "Drunk again?" But this time her eyes seemed to have no power over Khlopov. He could not stand it any longer, and gave tit for tat. "Zhidovka!" he shouted. I looked at Anna: she turned red. Marusya blushed. Khlopov sobered up, and his soul shrank to its usual size. Anna went to her room. The spell was broken. The word "Zhidovka" hurled at Anna made me start back. What could it mean, I wondered. I felt sorry for Khlopov, for Marusya, for Anna, and for the holiday mood that had been spoilt by a single word. And it seemed to me it was my fault to some extent. Who, I thought, had anything in common with Zhidovka if not myself? Or was it Khlopov? -- Here the old man was interrupted by the neighing of the horses. The forward horse seemed to be getting proud of the comparative freedom he enjoyed, and bit his neighbor, only to remind him of it. The latter, unable to turn around in the harness, resented the insult by kicking. But then the driver plied the whip, and there was peace again. "Would you take the trouble to dismount? Just walk up that hill: it will do you good to warm yourselves up a little after sitting so long in one place." That was the driver's suggestion; and as no one refuses obedience to drivers on the road, we dismounted.

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The next day--resumed the old man--the situation became a little clearer to me. Marusya told me that according to the gossip of the village her mother was a converted Jewess. She, Marusya, was not so sure of it. Her father would call her mother a Jewess once in a while, but that happened only when he was drunk. So she did not know whether he merely repeated the village gossip, or had his own information in the matter. And when she asked her mother, the latter would fly into a temper. "Papa himself," said Marusya, "likes Jews; but mother hates them. I like papa more than mamma; I also like Jews; I often play with Moshko's girls when mother is not around. I do not understand why mother dislikes Jews so much." Then Marusya insisted I should tell her the real truth about the Jews, as they are at home: were they like myself, or like Jacob, the wild one? But I stopped listening to her chatter, and began to think of what she had told me about her mother. For in case it was true that Anna was a convert, then--why, then Marusya herself was half a Jewess. I decided to solve the mystery. Now let me tell you that as a result of our Cantonist training we were not only as bold as eagles, as courageous as lions, as swift as the deer in doing the will of our patrons, but also as sly as foxes in finding a way out of a difficulty. And, by the way, that was also the opinion of our late commander, Colonel Pavel Akimovich. A keen-eyed commander and a kind-hearted master was he, may his lot be in Paradise among the godly men of the Gentile tribes. Yes, if he was an eagle, we were his chicks; if he was a lion, we were his whelps! This is what he used to say: "In time of need, you have no better soldier than the Jew. But then you must know how to use him. Do not give him too many instructions, and do not try to explain it all to him from beginning to end. If you instruct him too much, he will be afraid to do any scheming on his own hook, and you will be the loser. Just give him your order, and tell him what the order is for. Then you may be sure he will get it for you, even if he should have to go to hell for it!" This is what Colonel Pavel Akimovich used to say of us. Now, once I decided to find out Anna's secret, I thought it all out beforehand, as a Cantonist should; and I hit upon a plan. That was at the beginning of spring. One day Khlopov left on a journey to the neighboring villages to collect the taxes. He had to stay away some time. The whole of that day Anna kept worrying me as usual. She sent me on unnecessary errands, she wanted me to be in two places at the same time. She yelled, she cursed, she shook me, and mauled me, she pulled me by the ears. She knew well how to make one miserable. When night came, I went to sleep in the anteroom; that was my bedroom. Anna was abed, but not asleep. Marusya had long been asleep. Then Anna remembered that she had forgotten to close the door leading to the anteroom, and she ordered me to get up and close it. I made believe I was sleeping soundly, and began to snore loudly. She kept on calling me, but I kept on snoring. Suddenly I began to cry, as if from the sleep: "O mother, leave Anna alone. She too is a mother! Pity her family!" Anna became silent. I half opened my eyes and looked at her through the open door. A candle was burning on the table near her bed, and I could see that she was frightened, and was listening intently. then I continued, somewhat differently: "I beg of you, mother, is it her fault? Doesn't she feed me? Isn't she a mother too?" Then I began to cry as if in my sleep. "What?" I asked suddenly, "Anna?! Anna--a Jewess too?!" Then I noticed that Anna was watching Marusya's bed. I saw she was afraid Marusya might overhear what was not intended for her ears. She put on her night robe, came to my bed, and began in a whisper: "Are you sleeping? Get up, my boy, wake up!" I did "wake up," and put on a frightened appearance. "What did you cry about?" she asked. "I dreamt something terrible." "What did you dream about" I kept silent. "Tell me, tell me!" she insisted. "I saw my mother in a dream." "Is she alive yet?" I told a lie. I said my mother was long dead. "And what did she tell you?" "She said that . . . ." "Tell me, tell me!" "I cannot repeat that in Russian." "Then say it in Yiddish." I looked with make-believe surprise at Anna. "She said: 'I shall come to Anna at night and choke her, if she doesn't give up abusing you.'" At this Anna turned red. I continued: "And she said also, 'Anna ought to have pity on Jewish children, because she is a Jewess herself.'" . . . . My scheme worked well. Anna began to treat me in an entirely different way, and my position in the house not only improved, but became the opposite of what it had been. At times, when no one was around, she even spoke Yiddish to me. Apparently she liked to remain alone in the house with me and chat with me. You must know, her position in the village was all but agreeable. She had very few acquaintances; and she would have been better off without any. When she happened to have visitors, a mutual suspicion at once became apparent, in their behavior and their talk. There was much more flattery, much more sweetness of speech than is common among people. One could see that each spoke only to hide her innermost thoughts. Every conversation ended as it began: with gossip about women who were not zealous enough in matters of church attendance. And when it came to that, Anna invariably blushed, simply because she was afraid she might blush. Then, feeling the blood coming to her face, she would try to hide her confusion, and would chatter away ceaselessly, to show how punctual she was herself in church matters. On taking leave, Anna's friends would exchange significant glances, and Anna would have been either too stupid or else too wise not to notice the sting of those sly looks. As to Peter, he treated Anna fairly well; and when they happened to quarrel, it was mostly her own fault. One night--it was long after I had found out Anna's secret--I happened to be sleepless, and I overheard Anna talking angrily to Peter. She was scolding him for having forgotten to prepare oil for the lamp before the ikon of some saint. It was that saint's day, and Khlopov had either forgotten or neglected it. He was very careless in church matters, and Anna never got tired of taking him to task for it. This time she didn't leave off nagging him, till he lost patience, and said: "Were I really as religious as you want me to be, I should have taken to wife a woman who--well, who is a real Christian herself." Perhaps Peter never meant to insult Anna by reminding her of that which she wished to forget. Or perhaps Peter thought he had offered a valid excuse. But Anna was offended and turned around crying. The trouble with Anna was that she was very sensitive. That was a trait of hers. When she heard something said about herself, she never was satisfied with the plain meaning of what was said, but tried to give the words every other possible meaning. Every chance remark she happened to overhear she took to be meant for herself. Well, this same sensitiveness one may find in most of the Cantonists. For instance, in the regiment of General Luders, in which I served once, we had many Tatars, some Karaites, and a goodly number of Jews. To all appearances there was no trouble; but let one soldier call another "Antichrist," and every Jew in the regiment would get excited. The Tatars and the Karaites rather liked to call their comrades Antichrist, even if they happened to be Christians. But it was only the Jews whom the word set a-shivering. It is as I tell you--the Jew is painfully sensitive. Well, to cut my story short, Anna did not have a happy time of it. She was all alone, surrounded though she was by many people. She became taciturn in spite of herself. And this is a great misfortune when it happens with womenfolk. Women are naturally great talkers, and you may do them much harm, if you do not give them a chance to talk. So I became her crony as soon as I discovered her secret. Then she tried to make up for the many years of silence by chattering incessantly. In her long talks she often said things she had denied before. Once she told me that she felt a longing to see her relations and townspeople. But the next time she said that she hated them mightily. Very likely she did not hate them. We all dislike that which has caused us pain and harm. So Anna disliked her relations for having caused her remorse, homesickness, and perhaps shame. Once her tongue was loosed, she did not stop until she had poured out the proverbial nine measures given to woman as her share of the ten measures of speech in the world. She spoke Yiddish even in the presence of Marusya and of Jacob, who used to visit me once in a while. By and by Anna began to treat him in a very friendly way. Only Marusya avoided him, and never spoke a word to him. She simply hated him. Thus in time the house of Anna became something like a Jewish settlement, or rather like some sort of a Klaus, especially when Pater was away from home. We all used to gather there, and talk Yiddish, just as in a Klaus. For under Anna's roof we felt perfectly free. She became a mother to the homeless Cantonists. Even marusya took to jabbering a little Yiddish. Jacob began to feel that the leadership of our little community was passing into the hands of Anna, and he became jealous. He did not see that the very fact that he too was falling under her spell was influencing our community greatly, and that thus he was stamping it with his own character. Anna liked him more than she did any one of us. Moreover, she respected him. At times it looked as if she were somewhat afraid of him. Now you must know that at bottom Anna had never deserted her religion. Instead, she carried the burdens of both religions; to the fear of the Jewish hell she seemed to have added the fear of the Christian hell. I suspect that she was still in the habit of reciting her Hebrew prayer before going to sleep. She also believed in dreams. In this respect all women are the same. Of course, she had her dreams, and Jacob thought himself able to interpret them; he used to seek her company for that purpose. So we all began to feel very much at home in Anna's house. Once it happened that Peter entered the house at a moment when we were all so much absorbed in our Yiddish conversation that we did not notice his presence. He sat down quietly among us and took part in our talk, smiling in his usual manner. He asked us some questions, and we answered him. Then we asked him something, and he answered us in pure, good Yiddish, as if there were nothing new or surprising about it. At last Marusya awoke, and exclaimed with glad surprise: "Papa, can you speak Yiddish too?" We all shuddered, as if caught stealing. Peter's smile broadened, covering the whole of his face. "Did you imagine that I do not know it? I wish you could speak it as well as I do." That made me suspect that Peter might have been himself a convert from Judaism, and I decided to ask Anna bout it. She cleared up my doubts very soon. She told me that Peter had been brought up in an exclusively Jewish town; he had been employed there as a clerk in the Town Hall. As he always had to deal with jews, he finally learned their language. She told me at the same time that Peter rather liked Jews, and that he was a man of more than ordinary ability; otherwise, she said, it would have been very foolish on her part to leave the religion of her father for the sake of Peter. "What did you say was the name of your native town?" I asked out of sheer curiosity. She named my native town. I felt a shiver go through me. "And what was your father's name?" I asked again, trembling. "Bendet." "Was he a wine-dealer?" "Yes; and how do you know it? Are you of the same town?" I told her my father's name, and we clasped hands in surprise. -- While the old man was telling his tale, the clouds dispersed. I looked upwards: the dark sky spread vaultlike above us studded with stars, some in groups, some far apart. Then I remembered what the Lord had promised to our father Abraham: "And I shall multiply thy seed as the stars in heaven." And I thought I saw in the sky naught but so many groups of Jews: some kept in exile, some confined within the nebulae of the Milky Way. . . . But even then, it seemed to me, there was a strong attraction, a deep sympathy between them all, far apart and scattered though they were. Even so they formed aggregations of shining stars--far apart, yet near. . . .

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The wind began to grow cold; we pressed close to one another to keep warm. The old man drew his old coat tightly about him, and continued his story:-- Well, we of our little community threw off the yoke of the old Torah, yet refused to accept the yoke of the new Torah. Nevertheless our lives were far from being barren. Our longing for the things we were forbidden to practise prompted us to invent a good many new usages. For instance, long before we had the freedom of Anna's house, we managed to meet every Saturday to exchange a few words in Yiddish; two or three words were sufficient to satisfy our sense of duty. Those meetings were among the things for the sake of which we were ready to run any risk of discovery. Of course, we dared not recite our Modeh-Ani: our patrons might have overheard us, and that meant a sure flogging. But we practised repeating the prayer mentally, and we always managed to do it with our faces turned in the direction from which we thought we had come, and where our native towns were situated. Jacob had a little piece of cloth, a remnant of an Arba-Kanfos. The Tzitzis had long been torn away, to prevent discovery and avoid punishment; but what was left of it we kept secretly, and we used to kiss it at opportune moments, as if it were a scroll of the Torah. Then we made a point of abstaining from work at least one hour every Saturday and on the days that were the Jewish holidays according to Jacob's calendar. On the other hand, work was considered obligatory on Sundays and on Christian holidays. Tearing up some papers or starting a fire was thought sufficient. These and many other usages we invented, slowly, one after another. In time we got into the habit of observing them very punctiliously, even after we had made ourselves at home in Anna's house. But over and above all Jacob never gave up preaching to me that it was wrong on the part of an oppressed Jew to accept favors from a non-Jew. And this he preached without ever noticing that he was himself giving in to temptation when he accepted favors and kindnesses from Anna. As to Marusya, he always found a pretext to separate us whenever he met me in her company. I was very angry with him for that, but I could not tell him so openly. At last it came to such a pass that Marusya lost all patience, and made me the scapegoat. She stopped having anything to do with me. Now that was a real misfortune as far as I was concerned. For only then did I come to realize how much I was attached to the girl. I felt an utter emptiness in my heart; I began to feel myself a total stranger in the house. When everybody was talking merrily, I kept quiet, as if I were a mourner. I was always looking for Marusya, I was always trying to catch her eye. I hoped that our eyes would meet, that she would at least look at me. But she kept on avoiding me. No, she did not avoid me: she simply did not seem to know that I was in the house. I was exasperated; and when once I came face to face with Jacob, I lost my temper, and berated him roundly, attacking him on his weakest side: "Is it on me that you are spying? How many favors, if you please, have you accepted yourself from Anna? Perhaps your father gave you a special dispensation in your dreams?" To all of this Jacob replied very calmly: "First of all, your analogy does not hold, for you and Marusya are both youngsters. And, second, even supposing I were sinning, it is your fault then, too; for it is clearly your duty to warn me. At the same time, you can imagine how much the whole thing grieves me." Well, after all, I was ready to forgive him his sins, provided he overlooked mine. . . . . Yes, that happened on a Saturday. We were all standing in line on the drill grounds. I was in the first line, and Jacob was directly behind me in the second line. We were going through the paces of the so-called three-step exercise. It was this way: the soldier had to stretch his left leg forward on a somewhat oblique line, so that the sole of his foot touched the ground without resting on it. That was the first pace, the hardest of all, as we had to stand on one leg, with the other a dead weight. In this position we had to keep standing till the command was given for the second pace. At that moment we had to shift to our left leg, and quickly bend the right leg at the knee-joint at a right angle. Thus we had to stand till the command was given for the third pace, when we had to unbend the right leg and bring it forward. On that day we were kept at the first pace unusually long. My muscles began to twitch, and I felt as if needles were pricking me from under the skin. Suddenly I felt as if I had lost my footing, and was suspended in the air. Then I fell. This was my first mishap on that day. The sergeant made believe that he did not notice it, and I congratulated myself, hoping it would pass unremarked. The sergeant was busy with the last of our line: somehow he did not like the way he was standing. Just then, in a crazy fit of contrariness, I felt a sudden desire to fulfil my duty of talking a few words of Yiddish on Saturday. I turned my head and whispered to Jacob in Yiddish: "He is going to keep us here the whole day! When shall we have our hour's rest?" At that moment the sergeant passed between the lines, and overheard me speaking Yiddish. O yes, they have sharp ears, those drill-masters. As you know, speaking Yiddish was considered a great breach of discipline, which never passed unpunished. It always meant a whipping. So I had made myself guilty of two offenses. On that day I did not go home empty-handed: I got an order to report the next morning to receive my twenty lashes. I received my order like a soldier, saluted, and seemed cool about it--for the time being. That pleased the sergeant greatly; he was a thorough soldier himself, and heartily hated tenderfeet and cowards. He looked at me approvingly, and said: "Because you have always been a good soldier, I shall make the punishment easier for you. You have the privilege of dividing the number of lashes in two: ten you get to-morrow, and ten you may put off for some other time." That was the customary way of making the punishment easier in the cases when the Cantonist was either too weak to take in the whole number of lashes at once, or was thought to deserve consideration otherwise. A temporary relief it certainly was; but in the end the relief was worse than the punishment itself. Between the first half of the punishment and the other half, life was a burden to the culprit: he could neither eat, nor drink, nor sleep in peace. Every moment he felt as if his back were not his own, that he merely had borrowed it for a while, and sooner or later he would have to stretch himself on the ground, to bear the weight of a rider on his neck and of another on his feet, and have the rods fall on him with a swish: one, two, three. . . . And the pain was awful. It felt as if the skin were being torn away in strips. A new lash on the fresh cut, and another strip was torn out; then another strip across the two. One felt like yelling, but the throat was dry. One felt like scratching the ground, but the finger nails had long become soft. One felt like biting one's own flesh, but one had no power over himself so long as a man was sitting on his neck and pinning it tight to the ground. It was hard enough to stand the ordeal itself, as hard as hell. But it was still harder to bear in mind that such a punishment was coming. It felt as if one was being flogged every moment. So, in the stress of the moment, I found my speech. "Sir," said I, saluting, "I would rather stand twenty-five lashes at once than have the twenty lashes divided in two parts." "Why?" asked the sergeant. "Because a Russian soldier has no time to keep accounts that concern only his own back. He has no right to forget his military duties even for a single moment." Here the sergeant gave me an approving smile, and reduced the twenty lashes to ten. Then Jacob stepped forward, stood at attention, saluted, and said: "Sir, it is not his fault, but mine. It was I who spoke to him. He was silent. As to his falling during the drill, that was also my fault: I made him stumble. I am ready to stand the punishment, because I am the guilty one." The sergeant threw a quick, admiring glance at Jacob, and said: "Your intentions are certainly good, because you wish to sacrifice yourself for your friend. You might serve as a model for all the young soldiers. Boys, do you hear? Love one another as Jacob loves his guilty friend! But you must know that your sergeant is not to be fooled; his eyes are everywhere, and he certainly knows the guilty one!" When I went home, I felt neither glad nor despondent; I felt as if I did not exist at all--as if my very body did not belong to me, but had been borrowed for a few hours. That night I woke up many times; I felt as if snakes were crawling over my flesh. I got up early the next morning. Marusya was yet in bed, half awake. "Where are you going?" asked Anna, standing in my way. I kept silent for a while, then I made a clean breast of it all. Anna shook her head at me, and said with tears glistening in her eyes: "Poor fellow, and where are you going to?" "I am going to the sergeant's; if it has been decreed, let it be done quickly." "Why should you go hungry?" "That does not matter." I waved my hand, and walked away slowly. One the way I met some people, but I did not greet them; some people overtook me, but I did not even notice them pass. I had nothing in my mind except my own shoulders and the stinging rods. And for a moment I really lost heart; I acted like a tenderfoot instead of a Cantonist. I was ready to cry; my tears were choking me, as if I were mamma's only darling. It was about a two hours' walk to the sergeant's. When I arrived there, I stood outside and waited for him. Then I thought I heard the sound of some not unfamiliar voice: arguments, expostulations, again arguments. Somebody was talking earnestly behind the closed door. I could not make out what was said. Neither did I have any desire to know what it was all about. I was very impatient. I longed for the sergeant to come out and do the thing he had to do to me. I wished for all to be over and done with--that I had already been carried to the hospital and been bandaged; that the days in the hospital had gone; that I had recovered and had been dismissed. But at the same time I hoped the sergeant might be a little slow in coming out, and that my pain might be postponed for a little while. In short, I was divided against myself: I had two wishes, one excluding the other. Suddenly the door opened, and on the threshold was standing--do you know who? Marusya! Yes, dear God, it was Marusya. She was standing at the right of the sergeant. With one hand he was playing with her locks, and in the other he was holding both her hands. Then he turned to me: "Hourvitz, this young lady has interceded in your favor. And a soldier is in honor bound to respect the request of such a nice girl. So, for her sake, all is forgiven this time. Go home!" At that moment I was ready to take forty lashes, if only I might remove the sergeant's hands from off Marusya. I went home at a very slow pace, so that Marusya might overtake me on the road. I thought she might talk to me then. I meant to ask her how she had gotten ahead of me without my noticing her. The minutes seemed hours; I thought she would never come out of the house. Then a crazy idea struck me--to return to the sergeant's house and see what had happened to Marusya. After all, I thought, what can the sergeant do to me more than have me whipped? At that moment I thought little of the rods; it seemed to me just then that the rods did not hurt so much after all, and the pain they caused was only temporary; it was hardly worth while giving the matter much thought. And, I am sure, for the moment I had lost all sense of pain. Had they flogged me then, I should not have felt any pain. I turned back. Luckily I did not have to go as far as the sergeant's house; I met Marusya on the way. She passed me, looking right and left, as if I were a mere stone lying on the roadside. "Marusya!" I called after her. But she kept on walking ahead, as if she had not heard me. "Marusya," I cried again, "is that the way you are going to treat me?! Why, then, did you save me from the rods?" She stopped for a moment, as though thinking of something. Her handkerchief fell from her hand. She sighed deeply, picked up the handkerchief, and resumed her walk. I returned to the village alone. Anna met me with tears of joy in her eyes. I broke out into tears myself, without really knowing why. I caught Marusya's eye, but her look was a puzzle to me. -- Presently our horses began to trot at a lively pace; they felt the road sloping downhill. The driver, who had long been nodding in his seat, was suddenly shaken out of his slumbers. He woke up with a start, and flourished his whip; which is a habit acquired in his trade. Uphill or downhill, your coach-drive is bound to work with his whip. Let him be disturbed, no matter when,--even when he drops into a doze in his Klaus on a Yom-Kippur night--he will invariably shake his hand at the intruder as if swinging his whip. As the horses increased their speed, the baying of dogs became audible; a village was not far off. Cheering and inviting as the distant chorus sounded, it resolved itself by and by into single barks, and every bark seemed to say, "Away with you," "Stand back," "No strangers admitted," and the like. A gust of wind brought to our nostrils warmish air laden with all kinds of smells: smells of smouldering dung, of garbage, and of humanity in general. Soon lights began to twinkle from huddled shanties and from broad-faced houses, as if welcoming our arrival. It looked as if the village were priding itself on its lights, and boasting before Heaven: "See how much stronger I am: sunk in the deep slush of a dirty valley, I have my own lights, and my own stars within myself." The village seemed to have shrunk within the limits of its own nest, glad that it need not know the ills and the hardships of travel. The driver ordered an hour's rest.

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After we had warmed ourselves a little in the village inn, we returned to our seats in the coach, and the drive continued his "talk" with the horses. The old man resumed his story:-- Well, I had fallen into debt; and my two creditors were very hard to satisfy. Jacob had offered, though vainly, to sacrifice his skin for mine and suffer the lashes intended for me. Marusya took the trouble to walk all the way to the sergeant's house and talk with him, to save me from punishment. Thus I was indebted to both of them, but with a difference. While trying to belittle the good intentions of jacob, I tried at the same time to belittle my obligation to him, whose authority was fast becoming irksome. Marusya, on the other hand, refused to accept my thanks. . . . . Well, by that time I had long considered myself a good young soldier. I knew I was growing in the favor of my superiors. The sergeant had praised me repeatedly, in my presence and in my absence. I began to feel my own worth, to cherish military aspirations, and to burn with the ambition of a soldier. Many a time I dreamt I was promoted from the ranks, had become a colonel, and was promoted to a higher rank still. . . . I fought in battles, performed wonderful feats. . . . About that time they began to talk in the army about the Turks. Jacob and I had our differences with respect to them. He tried to prove to me that the Turks, being the sons of Ishmael, were our cousins. But I did not believe it. I did not wish to believe it, in spite of everything. He claimed that the children of Ishmael were heroes, brave as lions. But I used to say, "Just give me ten Turks, and I shall put them out of business with one shot!" On account of these talks Jacob and I began to avoid one another's company. He was too hard on me, with his endless contradictions, admonitions, and warnings. One day we went out target shooting. Jacob fired twelve shots in succession, at long range, and every shot was a bull's eye. He outdid all his comrades on that day. Then the sergeant put his hand on Jacob's shoulder, and said: "Bravo, Jacob! I see a coming officer in you! Have you a petition to make of me for something I can grant?" Then Jacob saluted, and asked to be permitted to recite his Hebrew prayers daily and rest on Saturdays. The sergeant smiled, and granted Jacob's request. I may just as well tell you now that long before this incident the authorities had lost all hope of getting us converted to the ruling faith. They became convinced that we did not budge so much as an inch, in spite of all the pressure and tortures we had to stand. they realized at last that only compulsion could make us say certain prayers before the crucifix every morning. So by and by they gave it up. And Jacob's request was not so hard to grant after all. From that moment Jacob became a bitter enemy of the Turks. He pictured them as midgets, and named his patron's dog "Turk." Aside from all this there was a general change in Jacob's disposition; it was something that one could only feel, but not exactly see. We had a very hard winter that year, quite different from what we have now. Nowadays the very seasons of the year seem to have softened: new generations--new people; new times--new winters. Why, only last mid-winter I saw the rabbi's daughter-in-law pass through the streets bareheaded. In the mid-summer she drank hot tea, and caught a cold in her teeth. It is all the way I am telling you: the word is turned topsyturvy. In olden times a married woman would not dare uncover her hair even in the presence of her husband; it was also thought dangerous even for a man to go out bareheaded in winter time; and nobody ever caught a cold in midsummer. Nowadays things are different: only last winter I saw soldiers shiver with cold, while in our time a soldier was ashamed to show he was afraid of the cold. Yes, new generations, new soldiers; new times, new seasons. . . . In short, that winter was a very hard one: heavy snowfalls, snow-storms, and no roads. The peasants could not go outside of the village; they had to stay home, and being idle and lonesome, they celebrated their weddings at that convenient season. Many people used to go to their weddings merely as sight-seers, I among them, for my sergeant gave me plenty of freedom. I had been excused from a large part of the drill; it was really superfluous as far as I was concerned. I had long learned all there was to learn. So I had much leisure to knock about in. Well, my sergeant rather liked us grown-up Cantonists. We were, with hardly an exception, very good soldiers indeed. And, after all, what was the hope of the sergeant, if not the praise of his superior, "Bravo, sergeant!" He liked to hear it, just as we ourselves liked to hear his "Bravo, boys, well done!" One of the weddings of that season happened to take place in the house of the richest peasant of the village, one of those peasants who try to rise above their class. It goes without saying that among the invited guests was the very cream of the village society: the few Government officials, the village elder, the clerk of the village, our sergeant, etc. Yes, as to our sergeant, he was a jolly sort of fellow. He enjoyed a good laugh himself, and liked to hear others laugh. He liked to pass jokes with his soldiers, too. But then he was always the first to laugh at his own jokes; it seemed as if he might laugh himself to death. Of course, his hearty laughter made one laugh with him, joke or no joke. Yes, he was a good fellow; may he, too, have his place among the righteous in Paradise. True, he had us switched once in a while; but that was the way of the world in those days. For he, too, grew up and had been promoted from under the birch-rods. You know what all this reminds me of? take this driver, for instance: he is used to belabor his horses with the whip; and yet he likes them, you may be sure. Of course, our sergeant would scold us once in a while, too. But then his scolding seemed to hurt him more than us: he looked as if he had gotten the scolding himself. The jokers of our company used to say of him, that he stood up every morning before his own uniform, and saluted it as it hung on the wall. . . . In short, he liked to mingle with people and to make merry; then he was always the happiest of all. Of course, he also had been invited to that wedding. Marusya, too, was there, and that was against her habit. She kept away from all kinds of public gatherings and festivities. And right she was, too, in staying away. For it was in the company of other girls that her brooding, melancholy disposition showed itself most clearly. Did I say melancholy? No it was not exactly melancholy. It was rather the feeling of total isolation, which one could not help reading on her face. And a total stranger she certainly was in that throng. When she kept quiet, her very silence betrayed her presence among the chattering girls. One could almost hear her silence. And when she did take part in the conversation, her voice somehow sounded strange and far away in the chorus of voices. Her very dress seemed different, though she was dressed just like any other of the village girls. It was in her gait, her deportment, in her very being that she differed from the rest of the girls. From the moment she entered the house she had to run the gauntlet of inquisitive looks, which seemed to pierce her very body and made her look like a sieve, as it were. I looked at Marusya, and it seemed to me that her face had become longer and her lips more compressed; her eyes seemed wider open and lying deeper in her sockets. She looked shrunken and contracted, very much like my mother on the eve of the Ninth of Av, when she read aloud the Lamentations for the benefit of her illiterate women-friends. Well, that evening the sergeant danced with Marusya, neglecting the other girls entirely. They kept on refusing the invitations of the cavaliers, in the hope that they might yet have a chance to dance with the sergeant. The result was that the cavaliers were angry with the girls; the girls, with Marusya; and I, with the sergeant. And when a recess was called, something happened: one of the bachelors, Serge Ivanovich, my old enemy, stood up behind Marusya, and shouted with all his might, "Zhidovka!" Then the envious girls broke out into a malicious giggle. Marusya turned crimson. She looked first at the sergeant: he was curling his mustache, and tried to look angry. Then Marusya turned away from him, and I caught her eye. Well, that was too much for me. I could not stand it any longer. I sprang at Serge and dragged him to Marusya. I struck him once and twice, got him by the neck, and belabored him with the hilt of my sword. "Apologize!" said I. Now, no one is obedient as your Gentile once you have him down. And Serge Ivanovich did not balk. He apologized in the very words that I dictated to him. Then I let him go. The sergeant looked at me approvingly, as if wishing to say, "Well done!" This prevented the young men from attacking me. Marusya left the house, and I followed her. Once outside, she broke into tears. She said something between sobs, but I could not make out what she meant. I thought she was complaining of someone, probably her mother. I wished very much to comfort her, but I did not know how. So we walked on in silence. The hard, crisp snow was squeaking rhythmically under our feet, as if we were trying to play a tune. And from the house snatches of music reached us, mixed with sounds of quarreling and merry-making. It seemed as if all those sounds were pursuing us: "Zhid! Zhid!" Suddenly a sense of resentment overtook me, as if I had been called upon to defend the Jews. And I blurted out: "If it is so hard to be insulted once by a youngster who cannot count his own years yet, how much harder is it to hear insults day in and day out, year in and year out?" Marusya looked at me with sparkling eyes. She thought I was angry with her and meant her. Then she wanted to soothe my feelings, and she said wonderingly: "Years? What, pray, did I do to you? I only wanted you not to listen to Jacob. He is a bad man. He hates me. He is forever on the lookout to separate us!" "He is afraid," said I, "I might yet get converted." At this Marusya gave me an irresistible look, the look of a mother, of a loving sister. "No," she said decidedly, "I shall not let you do that. You and your daughters will be unhappy forever. You know what I have decided? I have decided never to get married. For I know that my own daughters will always be called Zhidovka." At this point I became sorry for the turn our conversation had taken, and I cared no more for the defense of the Jews. After a brief silence Marusya turned to me: "Why does mother dislike Jews so much? She surely knows them better than papa does." "Very likely she fears being called Zhidovka, as they called you." "But, then, why did she get herself into that trouble?" "Ask yourself; she may tell you." . . . . Never mind what passed between us afterwards. It does not suit a man of my age to go into particulars, the way the story-writers do. Suffice it to tell you that our relations became very much complicated. Marusya attached herself to me; she became a sister to me. So, after all, Jacob's fears had been well founded from the very beginning. I felt I had gotten myself into a tangle, but I did nothing to escape from it; on the contrary, I was getting myself deeper and deeper into it. -- Here the old man's eyes flashed with a fire that fairly penetrated the darkness, and for a moment I thought it was but a youth of eighteen who was sitting opposite me. I was glad that the dark hid the whiteness of the old man's beard from my view. The white beard was entirely out of harmony with the youthful ardor of its owner's speech. There was a silence of a few minutes, and the old man continued his story:--

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Hard as Anna's lot was, Peter himself was not very happy either. I do not know how things are managed nowadays. As I told you before, new times bring new people with new ways. It never happened in our day that a Jewish maiden, no matter what class she belonged to, should throw herself at a young Gentile, and tell him, "Now, I am ready to leave my faith and my people, if you will marry me." In our day there never was a case of apostasy except after a good deal of courting. No Jewish girl ever left her faith, unless there was a proposal of marriage accompanied by much coaxing. It required a great deal of coaxing and enticing on the part of the man. Only extravagant promises and assurances, which never could be made good, could prompt a Jewish maiden to leave her faith. And such had been the case with Khlopov, as Anna told me afterwards. Anna, or, as she had been called as a Jewess, Hannah, had spent her girlhood under the rule of a stepmother. Peter was a young man earning a fair salary as a clerk at the Town Hall. He was a frequent visitor at Bendet's wine-shop. And Peter was an expert judge of the comeliness of Jewish maidens in general and of Anna's beauty in particular. So, when Pater did come, he came as a veritable angel-protector. He came to save her from the yoke of a stepmother and make her his wife. He promised her "golden castles" and a "paradise on earth." All that would be hers but for one obstacle: she had to renounce her faith. At first Anna was unwilling. But the stepmother made Anna as miserable as only human beings know how. Then Bendet's business began to go from bad to worse, so that Anna had very slim prospects of ever exchanging the yoke of a stepmother for that of a husband. At the same time Peter urged his suit, coaxing her more and more. Anna warned Peter, that in her new life she might find misery instead of happiness. She was sure she would be a stranger to the people with whom she would have to come in contact. Should she happen to be below the other women, they would despise her. Should she happen to be above them, they would envy and hate her. Here she certainly spoke like a prophetess. But Peter kept on assuring her that she was the very best of all women, and that he would be her protector in all possible troubles. Then she argued that he might not be happy himself; that he would have to fight many a battle. His parents would surely not agree with him. His relations would shun him. In short, he would be isolated. Peter laughed at her, and told her that all her fears were nothing but the imagination of an unhappy maiden who did not believe in the possibility of ever being happy. He told her also that not all the women in the world were as bad as her stepmother. Still Hannah was unwilling. Then Peter attacked her with a new weapon. He made believe he was ill, and let her know that if he should die, it would be her fault; and if he did not die, he would commit suicide, and his last thought would be that the Jews are cruel, and rejoice in the misfortune of a Christian. Then Hanna gave in, did as she was urged, and was renamed Anna. Now what Anna found in actual life far exceeded what Hannah had prophesied. The women of the village kept aloof from her, and for many reasons. The first reason was that she never visited the village tavern. She never drank any liquor herself, nor treated her visitors with it. And nothing in the world brings such people together as liquor does. Then the men hated her for the purity and chastity which she brought from her father's house. Besides, men and women alike envied the prosperity of Khlopov's household, which was due only to Anna's thrift. All those reasons, as well as many others, were included in the one word "Zhidovka." So that word may stand for anything you choose. As to Peter's brothers and relatives, they not only kept away from him but also became his open or secret enemies. By and by Peter recognized that Hannah's fears were not the result of mere imagination, but the true prophecy of a mature young woman, who had foreseen her own future, and he could not help feeling hurt. That bitter thought was possibly the only reason why he frequented the establishment of "our Moshko." He wanted to get rid of the accursed thought; but he did not succeed. He pined for the time when he lived among Jews; but Anna could not possibly return to live among them. In the meantime Peter sickened, and took to bed. Anna knew there was still some litigation pending between Khlopov and his relations, and his title to the property he held by inheritance was disputed. And she always feared the worst: should she survive Peter, his relations would start proceedings against her, dispossess her and Marusya, and let them shift for themselves. Many a time did Anna mention the matter to Peter in a casual, off-hand way; but he merely smiled his usual smile, listened, and forgot all about it the next morning. Well, that was a weakness of Peter's. Writing official papers had been his lifework, and when he had to do writing in his own behalf, he felt disgusted. He could not touch the pen when his own affairs were involved. Even the writing of a simple letter he used to put off from day to day. And when it came to clear up the title to his holding, he would have had to write papers and fill out documents enough to load two pack-donkeys. Small wonder, then, that he kept putting it off. But the time came when it was necessary that Anna should speak to him about the matter; and yet she could not muster up enough courage to do it. For at times she thought herself nothing but a stranger in the place. Who was she anyway, to inherit the property left by old Simeon Khlopov, deceased? On one occasion she asked me to call Peter's attention to the matter of his title to the property. I entered the sick-room and began to discuss the matter cautiously, in a roundabout way, so as not to excite the patient by implying that his end might be near. But my precautions were unnecessary. He spoke very cooly of the possibility of his end coming at any moment, but at the same time he insisted that there was really no need to hurry, a proper time to settle the matter would be found. Now here you see one more difference between Jews and Gentiles. To look at the Gentiles, would you ever think them all fools? Why, you may find many a shrewd man among them, many a man who could get me and you into his net, as the spider the fly. But when it comes to taking care of the next day, the future, they are rather foolish. They do not foresee things as clearly as the Jew does. For instance, do I not work hard to save up money for my daughter's dowry, even though I hardly expect her to get married for two years at least? Do I not try hard to pay off the mortgage on my house, so as to leave it to my children free and clear? Say what you will, I hold to my opinion, that Gentile-folk do not feel the "to-morrow" as keenly as we do. If you like, the whole life of a Jew is nothing but an anticipation of "to-morrow." Many a time I went without a meal simply because I forgot to eat, or thought I had eaten already. But I never forget anything that concerns the coming day. I can hardly explain it to you, but many a time I thought, dull as my brains were made by my soldier's grub, that the Jew is altogether a creature of "to-morrow." Well, Peter listened to me; he saw there was reason in what I told him; and yet he did not feel that way. He did not feel the necessity of acting immediately, and he put it off. Now, it seems to me that when things come to such a pass between a Gentile husband and his Jewish wife, the results are bound to be strange, unusual, and anything but agreeable. It is all something like--let me see--something like what is written in the Bible about the confusion of tongues, when one could not understand the speech of his fellow. Indeed, had Peter known that it was Anna who sent me to him, he would have resented it surely, and would have thought that she cared more for his inheritance than she cared for him. And Peter died, after a long illness. Then Anna had to go through an ordeal she had not yet experienced in her life of apostasy: she had to go through the ceremony of mourning according to the prescribed rules. And her fears regarding the house turned out to have been but too well founded. The village elder, in the name of the rest of the relatives, disputed Peter's title to the property. Anna was given a small sum of money, and the whole piece of property was deeded over to Serge Ivanovich. As to Anna and Marusya, they had to be satisfied with the little money they received. In the end it turned out that there was a deeper purpose at the bottom of the whole affair. That scamp, Serge Ivanovich, understood very well that in every respect Marusya was above the rest of the village girls, and he made up his mind to marry her. To be sure, he hated the Jews: they always managed to intrude where they were least wanted; and he never missed an opportunity of insulting Anna and her daughter. But that is just the way they all are: they will spit to-day, to lick it off to-morrow. At the same time he knew well enough that Marusya would not be willing to have him. Yet, in spite of it all, he sent some friends with the formal message of a proposal. As an inducement he promised to deed the whole property to Anna and Marusya. Anna seemed willing enough to accept the offer. Then Marusya turned to me. I began to side with Anna. "You are a liar!" shouted Marusya, turning to me. And she was right. Indeed, I did not wish at all to see Marusya marry Serve. But I cannot tell why I had said the opposite. Then Marusya curtly dismissed the representatives of the suitor. I decided not to part from the two unhappy women just then and leave them alone with their misfortune. But Heaven willed otherwise. The Crimean War had been decided upon, and our regiment was the first to be sent to the front. So I was taken from my dear friends just when they needed me most. --

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A mixture of light and darkness appeared in a corner of the eastern sky, something like the reflection of a distant conflagration. The light spread farther and farther, and swallowed many a star. It looked as if some half-extinguished firebrand of a world had blazed up again, and was burning brightly once more. But no! that was neither a world-catastrophe nor a conflagration: some mysterious new creation was struggling into existence. And after the noiseless storm and battle of lights, the moon appeared, angry-looking, and ragged-edged. In the light of the moon the speaker too looked strange and fantastic, like a relic of a world that is no more. The old man continued:-- Well, on that day we turned a new leaf in our lives. Till then we had been like people who live against their own will, without aim or object. We had to get up in the morning, because we had gone to bed the night before. We ate, because we were hungry. We went to our drills, because we were ordered to go. And we went to sleep at night, because we felt tired. All our existence seemed to be only for the sake of discipline; and that discipline, again, seemed a thing in itself. But the moment they told us of mobilization and war, our riddle was solved. It suddenly became clear to us why we had been caught and brought to where we were, and why we had been suffering all the time. It looked as if year in, year out, we had been walking in the darkness of some cave, and all of a sudden our path became light. And we were happy. I saw Jacob: he, too, looked happy, which had not been his way for the last few years. From the moment he had received permission to pray in Hebrew and observe the Sabbath, his mood had changed for the worse: he looked as if he were "possessed." He complained that his prayers were not so sweet to him any more as they had been before; and the Sabbath rest was a real burden upon him. Then, his father did not appear in his dreams any more. Besides, he confessed that he forgot his prayers many a time, and was not very strict as to the Sabbath. He feared his prayers were no longer acceptable in Heaven. No, said he, that was not his destiny: the Jewishness of a Cantonist lay only in suffering martyrdom. But with the news of the coming war, a change came over him. He became gay as a child. One morning, when we were assembled on the drill grounds before the house of the sergeant, I was called into the house. "Hourvitz," said my good sergeant, turning to me, "three beautiful creatures ask me not to send you to the fighting line but to appoint you to some auxiliary company. Ask, and I shall do so." "Sir," said I, "if this be your order, I have but to obey; but if my wish counts for anything, I should prefer to stay with the colors and go to the fighting line. Otherwise what was our preparation for and our training of many years?" A smile of satisfaction appeared on the face of the sergeant. "And if you fall in battle?" "I shall not fall, sir, before I make others fall." "What makes you feel so sure of it?" "I cannot tell, sir; but it is enough if I am sure of it." "Well, I agree with you. Now let us hear what your fair advocates have to say." He opened the door of an adjoining room, and Anna, Marusya, and the sergeant's wife appeared. Then a dispute began. They insisted on their opinion, and I on mine. "Let us count votes," said the sergeant. "I grant you two votes; together with my own vote it makes three against tree." Then I looked at Marusya. She thought a little, and added her vote to mine. So the majority prevailed. When I went outside, Marusya followed me, and handed me a small parcel. What I found there, among other things, was a small Hebrew prayer book, which Marusya must have gotten at Moshko's, and a small silver cross which she had always worn around her neck. We looked at each other and kept silent: was there anything to be said? After she had walked away a few steps, she turned around, as if she had forgotten something. "And if you return . . .?" "Then to you I return," was my answer. She went on, and I turned to look back in her direction: she also looked back at me. Later I turned again to look at her, and she, too, kept looking back, until we lost sight of each other. Before Anna could be dispossessed, Heaven wrought a miracle: Serge Ivanovich was drafted into the army. He was attached to our regiment, and we served in the same company. In the meantime Anna remained in possession of the house.

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So, after all, they had not been mere sport, those years of drilling, of exercising, of training to "stand up," to "lie down," to "run," etc., etc. . . . It had been all for the sake of war, and it was to war that we were going. My companion in exile, I mean my Barker, did not wish to part from me. Ashamed though I am, I must yet call him "my true friend." Human beings as a rule forget favors rendered. This is the way God has made them. In very truth, it is only your soldier, your fellow in exile, and your dog that are able to serve you and love you at the risk of their own lives. I chased Barker away, but he kept on following me. I struck him: he took the blows, and licked my hands. I struck him over the legs with the stock of my gun. He broke out in a whine, and ran after me, limping. Marusya caught him and locked him up in the stable. I thought I had gotten rid of him. But some hours later I saw him limping after me. Then I realized that the dog was fated to share all the troubles of campaign life with me. And my Barker became a highly respectable dog. The first day he eyed everybody with a look of suspicion. The bright buttons and the blue uniforms scared him; possibly because buttons and uniforms went with stocks of guns like the one that had given him the lame leg. By and by Barker picked me and Jacob out from among the soldiers, and kept near us. They used to say in our company that Barker was a particular friend of jews, and he knew a Jew when he saw one. Very likely that was so. But then they never knew how many slices of bread and meat Barker had gotten from Jewish hands before he knew the difference. Just about that time we got other new companions. One of them was a certain Pole, Vassil Stefanovich Zagrubsky, blessed be his memory, Jew-hater though he was. The beginning of our acquaintance promised no good. That particular Pole was poor but proud--a poor fellow with many wants. Then he was a smoker, too. I also enjoyed a smoke when I had an extra copper in my pocket. But Zagrubsky had a passion for smoking, and when he had no tobacco of his own, he demanded it of others. That was his way: he could not beg; he could only demand. Three of us shared one tent: Zagrubsky, Serge, and myself. Serge was a soldier in comfortable circumstances. He had taken some money with him from home, and received a monthly allowance from his parents. He always had excellent tobacco. Once, when he happened to open his tobacco pouch to roll a cigarette, Zagrubsky took notice of it, and put forth his hand to take some tobacco. That was his way: whenever he saw a tobacco pouch open, he would try to help himself to some of its contents. But Serge was one of those peasants whose ambition extends beyond their class. He was painfully proud, prouder than any of the nobles. Before entering the service he had made up his mind to "rise." He wanted to become an officer, so that the villagers would have to stand at attention before him, when he returned home. Therefore he gave Zagrubsky a supercilious look of contempt, and unceremoniously closed the pouch when the Pole wanted to take some tobacco. I was sorry for the Pole, and offered him some of my own tobacco. He did not fail to take it, but at the same time I heard him sizzle out "Zhid" from between his tightly closed lips. I looked at him in amazement: how on earth could he guess I was a Jew, when I spoke my Russian with the right accent and inflection, while his was lame, broken, and half mixed with Polish? That was a riddle to me. But I had no time to puzzle it out, and I forgot it on the spot. We had long been occupying the same position, waiting for a merry beginning. All that time seemed to us something like a preparation for a holiday; but the long tiresome wait was disgusting. In the meantime something extraordinary happened in our camp. Our camp was surrounded by a cordon of sentries. At some distance from the cordon was the camp of the purveyors, the merchants who supplied the soldiers with all kinds of necessaries. Without a special permit no purveyor could pass the line of sentries and enter the camp. It happened that one of those purveyors excited the suspicion of Jacob. Without really knowing why, Jacob came to consider him a suspicious character. Even Barker, timid dog that he was, once viciously attacked that particular man, as if to tear him to pieces. And it was with great difficulty that Jacob saved him from Barker's teeth. But from that time on Jacob began to watch the man closely. That very day we were told that General Luders was going to visit our camp. Jacob was doing sentry duty. Just then the suspicious purveyor appeared suddenly, as if he had sprung out of the ground. Jacob had his eye on him. Presently Jacob noticed that the fellow was hiding behind a bank of earth; he saw him take out a pistol from his pocket and aim it somewhere into space. That very moment General Luders appeared on the grounds. Without thinking much, Jacob aimed his gun at the purveyor and shot him dead. On investigation, it turned out that the purveyor was a Pole, who had smuggled himself into the camp in order to assassinate the General. Then they began to gossip in the regiment about Jacob's "rising." General Luders patted him on the shoulder, and said, "Bravo, officer!" A few days later I met Jacob: he looked pale and worn out. His smile was more like the frozen smile of the agony of death. I told him I had dreamt he was drowning in a river of oil. Then he told me confidentially that he had promised his superiors to renounce his faith. Well, in the long run, it appeared that there was much truth in Jacob's idea, that a Jew in exile must not accept favors from Gentiles. And the temptation to which Jacob had been exposed was certainly much harder to stand than a thousand lashes, or even, for that matter, the whole bitter life of a Cantonist. The pity of it! A few days later Zagrubsky was appointed to serve Jacob. But when Zagrubsky reported for duty, Jacob dismissed him. It was against Jacob's nature to have others do for him what he could do himself. Zagrubsky departed, hissing "Zhid" under his breath. It was the way he had treated me. My patience was gone. I put myself in his way, stopped him and asked him: "Now listen, you Pollack, how do you come to find out so quickly who is a Jew, and who is not? As far as I can see, you cannot speak Russian correctly yourself: why, then, do you spy on others? I have not yet forgotten that it was on account of my tobacco that you recognized I was a Zhid, too." "O, that is all very simple," said he. "I never saw such lickspittles as the Jews are. They are always ready to oblige others with their favors and refuse honors due to themselves. That is why the authorities favor them so much. Do you wish to know what a Jew is? A Jew is a spendthrift, a liar, a whip-kisser, a sneak. He likes to be trampled on much more than others like to trample on him. He makes a slave of himself in order to be able to enslave everybody else. I hate the Jews, especially those from whom I ever get any favors." Well, by this time I am ready almost to agree with many of the Pole's assertions. The Jew is very lavish in his dealings with Gentiles. He is subservient, and always ready to give up what is his due. All that is a puzzle to the Gentiles, and every Jew who has been brought up and educated among them knows that as well as I do. Sometimes they have a queer explanation for it. A gentile who has ever tasted of Jewish kindness and unselfishness will say to himself, "Very likely the Jew feels that he owes me much more." To be brief: Zagrubsky and I became very much attached to each other. But we never tried to disguise our feelings. I knew he was my enemy, and he knew that I was repaying him in kind, with open enmity. That was just what Zagrubsky liked. We loved our mutual cordial hatred. When one feels like giving vent to his feelings, like hating, cursing, or detesting somebody or something, one's enemy becomes dearer than a hundred friends. Then there came a certain day, and that day brought us closer together for a moment, closer than we should ever be again. It happened at night . . . . cursed be that night! swallowed up the following day! . . . . We soldiers had long become tired of our drill and our manoeuvres; we got tired of "attacking" under the feint of a "retreat," and of "retreating" under the feint of an "attack." We were disgusted with standing in line and discharging our guns into the air, without ever seeing the enemy. In our days a soldier hated feints and make-believes. "Get at your enemy and crush his head, or lie down yourself a crushed 'cadaver'"--that was our way of fighting, and that was the way we won victories. As our general used to say: "The bullet is a blind fool, but the bayonet is the real thing." At last, at last, we heard the quick, nervous notes of the bugle, and the hurried beats of the drum, the same we used to hear year in, year out. But till that moment it was all "make-believe" drill. It was like what we mean by the passage in the Passover Haggodah: "Any one who is in need may come, and partake of the Passah-lamb. . . ." Till that moment we used to attack the air with our bayonets and pierce space right and left, "as if" the enemy had been before us, ready for our steel. We were accustomed to pierce and to vanquish the air and spirits, and that is all. At the same time there was something wonderful, sweet, and terrible in those blasts of the bugle, something that was the very secret of soldiery, something that went right into our souls when we returned home from our drill. . . . But on that day it was not drill any more, and not make-believe any more, no! Before us was the real enemy, looking into our very eyes and thirsting for our blood. Then, just for a moment I thought of myself, of my own flesh, which was not made proof against the sharp steel. I remembered that I had many an account to settle in this world; that I had started many a thing and had not finished it; and that there was much more to start. I thought of my own enemies, whom I had not harmed as yet. I thought of my friends, to whom I had so far done no good. In short, I thought I was just in the middle of my lifework, and that the proper moment to die had not yet come. But all that came as a mere flash. For in the line of battle my own self was dissolved, as it were, and was lost, just like the selves of all who were there. I became a new creature with new feelings and a new consciousness. But the thing cannot be described: one has to be a soldier and stand in the line of battle to feel it. You may say, if you like, that I believe that the angel-protectors of warring nations descend from on high, and in the hour of battle enter as new souls into the soldiers of the line. Then and there an end came also to the vicissitudes of my Barker. I found him dead, stretched out at full length on a bank of earth, which was the monument over the grave of the heroes of the first day's fighting. In the morning they all went to battle in the full flowering of strength and thirsty for victory, only to be dragged down at night into that hole, to be buried there. Well, the earth knows no distinction between one race and another; its worms feed alike on Jew and Gentile. But there, in Heaven, they surely know the difference between one soul and another, and each one is sent to its appointed place. I was told that Jacob was among those buried in the common grave. Quite likely. I whispered a Kaddish over the grave, giving it the benefit of the doubt. Of course, I was not foolish enough to cry over the cadaver of a dog; and yet it was a pity. After all, it was a living creature, too; it had shared all kinds of things with me: exile, hunger, rations, blows. And it had loved me, too. . . . The next morning we were out again. In a moment line faced line, man faced man, enemy faced enemy. It was a mutual murderous attraction, a bloodthirsty love, a desire to embrace and to kill. It was very much like the pull I felt towards Marusya. . . . . Lightening. . . . shots. . . . thunder. . . . The talk of the angel-protectors it is. . . . Snakes of fire flying upward, spreading out . . . . shrapnel . . . . bombs a-bursting . . . . soldiers standing . . . . reeling . . . . falling . . . . crushed, or lapping their own blood. . . . Thinning lines . . . . breast to breast. . . . Hellish howls over the field. . . . Crashing comes the Russian music, drowning all that hellish chorus, pouring vigor, might, and hope into the hearts of men. . . . Alas, the music breaks off. . . . Where is the bugle? . . . . The trumpet is silenced. . . . The trombone breaks off in the middle of a note. . . . Only one horn is left. . . . Higher and higher rise its ringing blasts, chanting, as it were, "Yea, thought I walk through the valley of the shadow of death, I will fear no evil; for Thou art with me!" In mighty embrace men clasp one another. . . . Stabbing, being stabbed . . . . killing, being killed. . . . . I work away right and left, I expect my death-blow at every moment, but I seem to be charmed: swords and bayonets surround me, but never touch me. . . . Yes, it was a critical moment; it could not last much longer; one side had to give way. But the Russians could not retreat, because in their very midst the priest was standing, the ikon of the Virgin in one hand and the crucifix in the other. The soldiers looked at the images, got up new courage, and did wonders. Do you remember the Biblical story of the brazen serpent? That was just like it. Well, a bullet came flying, whistling, through the air, and the priest fell. Then the ikon and the crucifix began to wobble this way and that way, and fell down, too. The soldiers saw it, lost heart, and wanted to run. At that moment I felt as if I were made of three different men. Just imagine: Samuel the individual, Samuel the soldier, and Samuel the Jew. Says Samuel the individual: "You have done well enough, and it is all over for now. Run for dear life." Says Samuel the soldier: "Shame on you, where is your bravery? The regimental images are falling. Try, perhaps they may be saved yet." Says Samuel the Jew: "Of course, save; for a Jew must ever do more than is expected of him." But Samuel the individual replies: "Do you remember how many lashes you have suffered on account of these very images?" Says Samuel the Jew again: "Do you know what these images are, and to what race they belong?" Many such thoughts flashed through my brain; but it was all in a moment. And in a moment I was at the side of the priest. He was alive; he was only wounded in his hand. I raised him to his feet, put the images into his hands, lifted them up, and supported them. "This way, Russians!" I do not know who shouted these words. Perhaps I did; perhaps some one else; perhaps it was from Heaven. However, the victory was ours. But I did not remain on my feet a long time; a bullet struck me, and I fell. . . . . What happened then, I cannot tell. All I know is that I dreamt something very agreeable: I was a little boy again, hanging on to my father's coat-tails, and standing beside him in the Klaus on a Yom-Kippur even, during the most tearful prayers, and a mischievous little boy began to play with me, pricking my leg with a needle every now and then. . . . When I came to my senses, I found myself in a sea of howls, groans, and cries, which seemed to be issuing from the very depths of the earth. For a moment I thought I was in purgatory, among the sinners who undergo punishment. But pretty soon I recognized everything. I turned my head, and saw Zagrubsky lying near me, wounded and groaning. He looked at me, and there was love and hatred mixed in that look. "Zhid," said he, with his last breath, and gave up the ghost. Rest in peace, thou beloved enemy of mine! From behind I heard someone groaning and moaning; but the voice sounded full and strong. I turned my head in the direction of the voice, and I saw that Serge Ivanovich was lying on his side and moaning. He looked around, stood up for a while, and lay down again. This manoeuvre he repeated several times in succession. You see, the rascal was scheming to his own advantage. He knew very well that in the end he would have to fall down and groan for good. So he thought it was much cheaper and wiser to do it of his own free will, than to wait for something to throw him down. The scamp had seen what I had done before I fell. A thought came to him. He helped me to my feet, bandaged my wound, and said: "Now listen, Samuel: you have certainly done a very great thing; but it is worth nothing to you personally. Nay, worse: they might again try to make you renounce your faith. So it is really a danger to you. But, if you wish, just say that I have done it, and I shall repay you handsomely for it. The priest will not know the difference." Well, it is this way: I always hated get-rich-quick schemes. I never cared a rap for a penny I had not expected and was not ready to earn. Take, for instance, what I did with the priest: Did I ever expect any honors or profits out of it? Such possible honors and profits I certainly did not like, and did not look for. Besides, who could assure me that they would not try again to coax me into renouncing my faith? Why, then, should I put myself into such trouble? And I said to Serge: "You want it badly, Serge, do you? You'd like to see yourself promoted, to be an officer? Is that so? Very well, then. Make out a paper assigning the house to Marusya." "I promise faithfully." "I believe no promises." "What shall I do?" "You have paper and pencil in your pocket?" "Certainly!" I turned around, supported myself on both my arms and one knee, and made a sort of a rickety table of myself. And on my back Serge wrote out his paper, and signed it. But all that was really unnecessary. He would have kept his word anyway. For he was always afraid I might blurt out the whole story. Not I, though. May I never have anything in common with those who profit by falsehoods! As to what happened later, I cannot tell you exactly. For I was taken away, first to a temporary hospital, and then to a permanent one. I fell into a fever and lost consciousness. I do not know how many days or weeks passed by: I was in a different world all that time. How can I describe it to you? Well, it was a world of chaos. It was all jumbled together: father, mother, military service, ikons, lashes, lambs slaughtered, Peter, bullets, etc., etc. It was all in a jumble, all topsyturvy. And in the midst of that chaos I felt as if I were a thing apart from myself. My head ached, and yet it felt as if it did not belong to me. . . . Finally I thought I felt mother bathing me; a delicious feeling of moisture spread over my flesh, and my headache disappeared. Then I felt a warm, soft hand pass over my forehead, cheeks, and neck. . . . I opened my eyes, the first time since I lost consciousness, and I exclaimed: "Marusya!?" "Yes, yes," said she, with a smile, while her eyes brimmed with tears, "it is I." And behind her was another face: "Anna?!" "Rest, rest," said they, warningly. "Thanks to God, the crisis is over." I doubted, I thought it was all a dream. But it was no dream. It was all very simple: Anna and Marusya had enlisted and were serving as volunteer nurses at the military hospital, and I had known nothing of it. "Marusya," said I, "please tell me how do I happen to be here?" Then she began to tell me how they brought me there, and took me down from the wagon as insensible as a log. But she could not finish her story; she began to choke with tears, and Anna finished what Marusya wanted to tell me. I turned to Marusya: "Where are my clothes?" "What do you want them for?" "There is a paper there." I insisted, and she brought the paper. "Read the paper, Marusya," said I. She read the document in which Serge assigned the house to Marusya. The two women looked at me with glad surprise. "How did you ever get it?" But I had decided to keep the thing a secret from them, and I did. When I was discharged from the hospital, the war was long over, and a treaty of peace had been signed. Had they asked me, I should not have signed it. --

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Here the old man stopped for a while. Apparently he skipped many an incident, and omitted many a thing that he did not care to mention. I saw he was touching upon them mentally. Her resumed:-- Just so, just so. . . . Many, many a thing may take place within us, without our ever knowing it. I never suspected that I had been longing to see my parents. I never wrote to them, simply because I had never learned to write my Jewish well enough. Of course, had my brother Solomon been taken, he would surely have written regularly, for he was a great penman, may he rest in peace. As to Russian, I certainly might have written in that language; but then it would have been very much like offering salt water to a thirsty person. And that is why I did not write. I thought I had forgotten my parents. But no! Even that was merely a matter of habit. I had gotten so used to my feeling of longing that I was not aware of having it. That is the way I explain it to myself. By and by there opened in my heart a dark little corner that had been closed for many a year. That was the longing for my parents, for my home, mixed with just a trace of anger and resentment. I began to picture to myself how my folks would meet me: there would be kisses, embraces, tears, neighbors. . . . For, like a silly child, I imagined they were all alive and well yet, and that the Angel of Death would wait till I came and repaid them for all the worry I had caused them. . . . And, indeed, would they not have been greatly wronged, had they been allowed to die unconsoled, after they had rent Heaven with their prayers and lamentations? But the nearer I came to my native town, the less grew my desire to see it. A feeling of estrangement crept over me at the sight of the neighborhood. No, it was not exactly a feeling of estrangement, but some other feeling, something akin to what we feel at the recollection of the pain caused by long-forgotten troubles. I can hardly make it clear to you; it was not unlike what an old man feels after a bad dream of the days of his youth. It was about this time of the year. The roads were just as bad as now, the slush just as deep. And it was as nauseating to sit in the coach only to watch the glittering mud and count the slow steps of the horses. In a season like this it is certainly much more agreeable to dismount and walk. That was just what I did. My native town was not far away: only once uphill, once downhill, and there was the inevitable cemetery, which must be passed when one enters a Jewish village. The horses could hardly move, and I overtook them very soon, as I took a short cut, and struck into a path across the peasants' fields. I allowed myself that privilege, because at that time I was still wearing my uniform with the brass buttons shining brightly. When I descended into the valley, I decided to cross the cemetery, and so shorten my way. The coach was far behind, and I was walking very slowly, that it might reach me at the other side of the cemetery. My path lay among the gravestones, some of them gray with age, dilapidated, bent forward, as if trying to overhear the talk of the nether world: some clean and upright, as if gazing proudly heavenwards. It was a world of silence I was in; and heavy indeed is the silence I was in; it is really a speaking silence. I think there is something real in the belief that the dead talk in their graves. To me it seemed as if the gravestones were casting evil glances at me for my having disturbed the silent place with the glitter of my buttons. And it was with difficulty that I could decipher the inscriptions on the stones. I do not know why it was so: either my Hebrew had got rusty, or else graveyard inscriptions make hard reading in general. "Here lieth . . . . the righteous man . . . . modest, pious . . . . Rabbi Simhah . . . . Shohet. . . ." I read it all, and shuddered: why, under that very stone lay the remains of my own brother Simhah! I wanted to shed tears, but my tears did not obey me. I read it again and again, and when I came to the words "modest," "pious," I mumbled something to myself, something angry and envious. Then I thought I felt the tombstone move, the ground shake under me, as if a shiver were passing through the air. . . "Forgive me, forgive me!" It was not my ears that caught those words; it was my heart. I understood that it was the soul of my brother apologizing to me for the action of my parents. Tears began to flow from my eyes. I did not care to read any further, from fear of finding something I did not wish to find. I was thinking of my parents. And when I entered the house of my parents, I could hardly recognize them. Wrinkled, bent, with sunken cheeks, they had changed entirely in appearance. Father looked at my buttons, removed his cap, and stood bent before me. Mother was busying herself at the oven, and began to speak to father in a mixture of Hebrew and Yiddish: "Sure enough, some sort of taxes again. . . . Much do we need it now. . . ." Then, in a fit of spitefulness, I made believe I was a stranger. "Old people," said I, "I have brought you news from your son Samuel." As soon as father heard me speak Yiddish, he ran to the window, rubbed his hands against the moist pane, by way of washing them, and shook hands with me. "Peace be with you, young man," said he. Mother left her corner and stood up before me. Father began fumbling for his glasses, and asked me: "News from my son, you say? Where did you see him last?" "And when did you see him?" asked mother, shivering. I mentioned some imaginary place and date. "How does he feel? Was he in the war? Is he well? Does he expect to come home?" Many such questions followed one another in quick succession. Meanwhile father took me aside, and whispered into my ear: "How about . . . . how about religion?" Out of sheer spitefulness I wanted to worry the poor old folks a little; may the Lord not consider it a sin on my part. I said: "Had Rabbi Simhah the Shohet been in his place, he surely would have withstood all temptations!" . . . . "What, converted?!" I kept silent, and the old people took it as a sign of affirmation. They hung their heads despondently, and kept silent, too. Then father asked me once more: "Married a Gentile? Has children?" I still kept silent. My old mother wept silently. My heart melted within me, but I braced myself up and kept silent. I felt as if a lump in my throat was choking me, but I swallowed it. I heard mother talking to herself: "O Master of the Universe, Father who art in Heaven, Thou Merciful and Righteous!" . . . . As she said it, she shook her head, as if accepting God's verdict and complaining at the same time. The old man stood up, his beard a-quiver. His hand shook nervously, and he said in a tone of dry, cold despair: "Ett. . . . Blessed be the righteous Judge!" as though I had told him the news of his son's death. With that he took out a pocket knife, and wanted to make the "mourning cut." At that moment my ear caught the sound of the heartrending singsong of the Psalms. The voice was old and tremulous. It was an old man, evidently a lodger, who was reading his Psalter in an adjoining room: "For the Lord knoweth the path of the righteous. . . ." The memories of the long past overtook me, and I told my parents who I was. . . . . And yet--continued Samuel after some thought--and yet they were not at peace, fearing I had deceived them. And they never rested till they got me married to my Rebekah, "according to the laws of Moses and Israel." Well, two years passed after my wedding, and troubles began; I got a toothache, may you be spared the pain! That is the way of the Jew: no sooner does he wed a woman and beget children, than all kinds of ills come upon him. Some one told me, there was a nurse at the city hospital who knew how to treat aching teeth and all kinds of ills better than a full-fledged doctor. I went to the hospital, and asked for the nurse. A young woman came out. . . . "Marusya?!" "Samuel?!" We were both taken aback. "And where is your husband, Marusya?" asked I, after I had caught my breath. "And you, Samuel, are you married?" "Yes." "But I am single yet." Yes, yes, she was a good soul! She died long ago. . . . May it please the Lord to give her a goodly portion in Paradise! -- Here the old man broke off his story with a deep sigh escaping from his breast. We waved his hand at the son, who was dozing away unconcerned, lurching from side to side. The old man looked at his son, shook his head, and said: "Yes, yes, those were times, those were soldiers. . . . It is all different now: new times, new people, new soldiers. . . . "It is all make-believe nowadays! . . . ." NOTES BY THE TRANSLATOR Av. The month in the Jewish calendar corresponding to July-August. On the ninth day of Av the Temple was taken and destroyed by Titus. Arba-Kanfos. Literally "four corners." A rectangular piece of cloth about one foot wide and three feet long, with an aperture in the middle large enough to pass it over the head. The front part of the garment falls over the chest, the other part covers the shoulders. To its four corners "Tzitzis," or fringes, are attached in prescribed manner. When made of wool, the Arba-Kanfos is usually called TALLIS-KOTON (which see). Bar-Mitzwah. Literally "man of duty." A Jewish boy who has passed his thirteenth birthday, and has thus attained his religious majority. Beadle. The functions of this officer in a Jewish community were somewhat similar to those of the constable in some American villages. Candles. The Sabbath is ushered in by lighting the Sabbath candles, accompanied by a short prayer. Cantonists. A term applied to Jewish boys drafted into military service during the reign of Nicholas I of Russia (1825-1855). Every Jewish community had to supply its quota; but as parents did not surrender their children willingly, they were secured by kidnappers specially appointed by the Community for the purpose. See CATCHER. The same term was applied to the children of Russian soldiers who were educated for the army in the so-called District, or Canton, Schools. Hence the name. Catcher. An agent of the Jewish community prior to the introduction, in 1874, of general military duty in Russia. Havdolah. Ceremonial with wine, candles, and spices, accompanied by a prayer, at the end of the Sabbath. Haggodah. The ritual used at the Passover eve home service. Hallah. In commemoration of the priest's tithe at the time of the Temple. The ceremonial consists of taking a piece of the bread dough before it is baked and throwing it into the fire; a prayer is recited at the same time. Heder. Literally, "a room." Specifically, a school in which Bible and Talmud are taught. Kaddish. Literally, "sanctification." A prayer recited in commemoration of the dead. Karaites. Members of a Jewish sect that does not recognize the authority of the Talmud. Kosher. Literally, "right," "fit." Specifically applied to food prepared in accordance with the Jewish dietary laws. Klaus. A synagogue to which students of the Talmud resort for study and discussion. Lamdan. A scholar learned in the Torah. Mezuzah. Literally, "door-post." A piece of parchment, inscribed with the SHEMA (which see), together with Deut. 11:13-21, rolled up, and enclosed in an oblong box, which is attached in a prescribed way to the door-post of a dwelling. Modeh-Ani. Literally "I affirm." The opening words of a brief confession of faith. Shaatnez. Cloth or a garment made of linen and wool woven together; or a wool garment sewed with linen thread; or a linen garment sewed with wool. Shema. Literally, "listen," The opening words of Deut. 6:4-9. Shemad. Literally, "extermination." Applied figuratively to renunciation of the Jewish faith, whether forced or voluntary. Shohet. A slaughterer of cattle licensed by a rabbi. He must examine the viscera of cattle according to the rules laid down in the Talmud. Tallis-koton. Literally, "the little Tallis," or prayer shawl. Worn by some Jews. See ARBA-KANFOS. Torah. Literally, "doctrine." A term applied to the Pentateuch, and to the Talmud with its commentaries. Tzitzis. See ARBA-KANFOS. Yom-Kippur. Day of Atonement. Zhid (fem. Zhidovka: zh sounded like z in azure). Literally, "Judean." Russian equivalent of English "sheeny." __________________________ TRANSCRIBER'S DISCUSSION The book presents a softer side of Cantonist life than history records. The abducted children (as young as eight) were usually raised in barracks ('Cantonments') under brutal conditions designed to break their Jewishness. Speaking Yiddish, or any sign of Jewishness or religious practice, was punished by starvation, beatings, and if that failed outright tortures, resulting in many deaths, as well as suicides. At age 18, the lads began a 25 year term in the army. Reversion to Judaism at any time thereafter was a crime. At its height, in 1854, official records show 7,515 Cantonists conscripted into the Russian army. The Cantonist laws were ended in 1856 by Tsar Alexander II, almost as soon as he came to power. Alexander II created a general draft in 1874, affecting all Russians. One message of the book is clear; whatever worries Jewish parents may have regarding their drafted child's ability to maintain their religion, this modern draft was vastly preferable to the Cantonist system, and might even be welcomed for its fairness. In retrospect, Steinberg was really using the Cantonist topic as a backdrop for a cultural study. He presents us with several characters, each at a different place in the gray zone between Jewish and Christian cultures: two Cantonists, one clinging to the Jewish side (Jacob); one closer to the non-Jewish side (Samuel, the narrator); as well as a Jewish convert unhappy with her lot (Anna, whose abuse of Samuel we later understand as the 'self-disdain' often seen among those who had left Judaism); her daughter Marusya, who although fully Christian is ostracized as being a Jewess, and struggles unsuccessfully to find her place in life; and Peter Khlopov, a full Christian who finds Jewish culture agreeable. Steinberg's portrayal of Samuel makes it clear, even in the first few pages, that Samuel, although Jewish, thinks very much like a Russian peasant; in a very real way he straddles that fringe zone between the two distinct societies. ===================== TRANSCRIBER'S NOTES Serge Ivanovich acute accent over the a, throughout the text At such moments he would be ready to hug "be" was erroneously "he" in source text Zhidovka acute accent over the o, throughout the text nebulae ae written as a ligature Vassil Stefanovich Zagrubsky acute accent over the u, throughout the text manoeuvres oe written as a ligature

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“And I--my joy of life is fled, My spirit's power, my bosom's glow; The raven locks that grac'd my head, Wave in a wreath of snow! And where the star of youth arose, I deem'd life's lingering ray should close, And those lov'd trees my tomb o'ershade, Beneath whose arching bowers my childhood play'd.” MRS. HEMANS. I was born in a valley not very remote from the sea. My father had been a sailor in youth, and some of my earliest recollections are connected with the history of his adventures, and the recollections they excited. He had been a boy in the war of the revolution, and had seen some service in the shipping of that period. Among other scenes he witnessed, he had been on board the Trumbull, in her action with the Watt--the hardest-fought naval combat of that war--and he particularly delighted in relating its incidents. He had been wounded in the battle, and bore the marks of the injury, in a scar that slightly disfigured a face, that, without this blemish, would have been singularly handsome. My mother, after my poor father's death, always spoke of even this scar as a beauty spot. Agreeably to my own recollections, the mark scarcely deserved that commendation, as it gave one side of the face a grim and fierce appearance, particularly when its owner was displeased. My father died on the farm on which he was born, and which descended to him from his great-grandfather, an English emigrant that had purchased it of the Dutch colonist who had originally cleared it from the woods. The place was called Clawbonny, which some said was good Dutch others bad Dutch; and, now and then, a person ventured a conjecture that it might be Indian. Bonny it was, in one sense at least, for a lovelier farm there is not on the whole of the wide surface of the Empire State. What does not always happen in this wicked, world, it was as good as it was handsome. It consisted of three hundred and seventy-two acres of first-rate land, either arable, or of rich river bottom in meadows, and of more than a hundred of rocky mountain side, that was very tolerably covered with wood. The first of our family who owned the place had built a substantial one-story stone house, that bears the date of 1707 on one of its gables; and to which each of his successors had added a little, until the whole structure got to resemble a cluster of cottages thrown together without the least attention to order or regularity. There were a porch, a front door, and a lawn, however; the latter containing half a dozen acres of a soil as black as one's hat, and nourishing eight or ten elms that were scattered about, as if their seeds had been sown broad-cast. In addition to the trees, and a suitable garniture of shrubbery, this lawn was coated with a sward that, in the proper seasons, rivalled all I have read, or imagined, of the emerald and shorn slopes of the Swiss valleys. Clawbonny, while it had all the appearance of being the residence of an affluent agriculturist, had none of the pretension of these later times. The house had an air of substantial comfort without, an appearance that its interior in no manner contradicted. The ceilings, were low, it is true, nor were the rooms particularly large; but the latter were warm in winter, cool in summer and tidy, neat and respectable all the year round. Both the parlours had carpets, as had the passages and all the better bed-rooms; and there were an old-fashioned chintz settee, well stuffed and cushioned, and curtains in the “big parlour,” as we called the best apartment,--the pretending name of drawing-room not having reached our valley as far back as the year 1796, or that in which my recollections of the place, as it then existed, are the most vivid and distinct. We had orchards, meadows, and ploughed fields all around us; while the barns, granaries, styes, and other buildings of the farm, were of solid stone, like the dwelling, and all in capital condition. In addition to the place, which he inherited from my grandfather, quite without any encumbrance, well stocked and supplied with utensils of all sorts, my father had managed to bring with him from sea some fourteen or fifteen thousand dollars, which he carefully invested in mortgages in the county. He got twenty-seven hundred pounds currency with my mother, similarly bestowed; and, two or three great landed proprietors, and as many retired merchants from York, excepted, Captain Wallingford was generally supposed to be one of the stiffest men in Ulster county. I do not know exactly how true was this report; though I never saw anything but the abundance of a better sort of American farm under the paternal roof, and I know that the poor were never sent away empty-handed. It as true that our wine was made of currants; but it was delicious, and there was always a sufficient stock in the cellar to enable us to drink it three or four years old. My father, however, had a small private collection of his own, out of which he would occasionally produce a bottle; and I remember to have heard Governor George Clinton, afterwards, Vice President, who was an Ulster county man, and who sometimes stopped at Clawbonny in passing, say that it was excellent East India Madeira. As for clarets, burgundy, hock and champagne, they were wines then unknown in America, except on the tables of some of the principal merchants, and, here and there, on that of some travelled gentleman of an estate larger than common. When I say that Governor George Clinton used to stop occasionally, and taste my father's Madeira, I do not wish to boast of being classed with those who then composed the gentry of the state. To this, in that day, we could hardly aspire, though the substantial hereditary property of my family gave us a local consideration that placed us a good deal above the station of ordinary yeomen. Had we lived in one of the large towns, our association would unquestionably have been with those who are usually considered to be one or two degrees beneath the highest class. These distinctions were much more marked, immediately after the war of the revolution, than they are to-day; and they are more marked to-day, even, than all but the most lucky, or the most meritorious, whichever fortune dignifies, are willing to allow. The courtship between my parents occurred while my father was at home, to be cured of the wounds he had received in the engagement between the Trumbull and the Watt. I have always supposed this was the moving cause why my mother fancied that the grim-looking scar on the left side of my father's face was so particularly becoming. The battle was fought in June 1780, and my parents were married in the autumn of the same year. My father did not go to sea again until after my birth, which took place the very day that Cornwallis capitulated at Yorktown. These combined events set the young sailor in motion, for he felt he had a family to provide for, and he wished to make one more mark on the enemy in return for the beauty-spot his wife so gloried in. He accordingly got a commission in a privateer, made two or three fortunate cruises, and was able at the peace to purchase a prize-brig, which he sailed, as master and owner, until the year 1790, when he was recalled to the paternal roof by the death of my grandfather. Being an only son, the captain, as my father was uniformly called, inherited the land, stock, utensils and crops, as already mentioned; while the six thousand pounds currency that were “at use,” went to my two aunts, who were thought to be well married, to men in their own class of life, in adjacent counties. My father never went to sea after he inherited Clawbonny. From that time down to the day of his death, he remained on his farm, with the exception of a single winter passed in Albany as one of the representatives of the county. In his day, it was a credit to a man to represent a county, and to hold office under the State; though the abuse of the elective principle, not to say of the appointing power, has since brought about so great a change. Then, a member of congress was _somebody_; now, he is only--a member of congress. We were but two surviving children, three of the family dying infants, leaving only my sister Grace and myself to console our mother in her widowhood. The dire accident which placed her in this, the saddest of all conditions for a woman who had been a happy wife, occurred in the year 1794, when I was in my thirteenth year, and Grace was turned of eleven. It may be well to relate the particulars. There was a mill, just where the stream that runs through our valley tumbles down to a level below that on which the farm lies, and empties itself into a small tributary of the Hudson. This mill was on our property, and was a source of great convenience and of some profit to my father. There he ground all the grain that was consumed for domestic purposes, for several miles around; and the tolls enabled him to fatten his porkers and beeves, in a way to give both a sort of established character. In a word, the mill was the concentrating point for all the products of the farm, there being a little landing on the margin of the creek that put up from the Hudson, whence a sloop sailed weekly for town. My father passed half his time about the mill and landing, superintending his workmen, and particularly giving directions about the fitting of the sloop, which was his property also, and about the gear of the mill. He was clever, certainly, and had made several useful suggestions to the millwright who occasionally came to examine and repair the works; but he was by no means so accurate a mechanic as he fancied himself to be. He had invented some new mode of arresting the movement, and of setting the machinery in motion when necessary; what it was, I never knew, for it was not named at Clawbonny after the fatal accident occurred. One day, however, in order to convince the millwright of the excellence of this improvement, my father caused the machinery to be stopped, and then placed his own weight upon the large wheel, in order to manifest the sense he felt in the security of his invention. He was in the very act of laughing exultingly at the manner in which the millwright shook his head at the risk he ran, when the arresting power lost its control of the machinery, the heavy head of water burst into the buckets, and the wheel whirled round carrying my unfortunate father with it. I was an eye-witness of the whole, and saw the face of my parent, as the wheel turned it from me, still expanded in mirth. There was but one revolution made, when the wright succeeded in stopping the works. This brought the great wheel back nearly to its original position, and I fairly shouted with hysterical delight when I saw my father standing in his tracks, as it might be, seemingly unhurt. Unhurt he would have been, though he must have passed a fearful keel-hauling, but for one circumstance. He had held on to the wheel with the tenacity of a seaman, since letting go his hold would have thrown him down a cliff of near a hundred feet in depth, and he actually passed between the wheel and the planking beneath it unharmed, although there was only an inch or two to spare; but in rising from this fearful strait, his head had been driven between a projecting beam and one of the buckets, in a way to crush one temple in upon the brain. So swift and sudden had been the whole thing, that, on turning the wheel, his lifeless body was still inclining on its periphery, retained erect, I believe, in consequence of some part of his coat getting attached, to the head of a nail. This was the first serious sorrow of my life. I had always regarded my father as one of the fixtures of the world; as a part of the great system of the universe; and had never contemplated his death as a possible thing. That another revolution might occur, and carry the country back under the dominion of the British crown, would have seemed to me far more possible than that my father could die. Bitter truth now convinced me of the fallacy of such notions. It was months and months before I ceased to dream of this frightful scene. At my age, all the feelings were fresh and plastic, and grief took strong hold of my heart. Grace and I used to look at each other without speaking, long after the event, the tears starting to my eyes, and rolling down her cheeks, our emotions being the only communications between us, but communications that no uttered words could have made so plain. Even now, I allude to my mother's anguish with trembling. She was sent for to the house of the miller, where the body lay, and arrived unapprised of the extent of the evil. Never can I--never shall I forget the outbreakings of her sorrow, when she learned the whole of the dreadful truth. She was in fainting fits for hours, one succeeding another, and then her grief found tongue. There was no term of endearment that the heart of woman could dictate to her speech, that was not lavished on the lifeless clay. She called the dead “her Miles,” “her beloved Miles,” “her husband,” “her own darling husband,” and by such other endearing epithets. Once she seemed as if resolute to arouse the sleeper from his endless trance, and she said, solemnly, “_Father_--dear, _dearest_ father!” appealing as it might be to the parent of her children, the tenderest and most comprehensive of all woman's terms of endearment--“Father--dear, dearest father! open your eyes and look upon your babes--your precious girl, and noble boy! Do not thus shut out their sight for ever!” But it was in vain. There lay the lifeless corpse, as insensible as if the spirit of God had never had a dwelling within it. The principal injury had been received on that much-prized scar; and again and again did my poor mother kiss both, as if her caresses might yet restore her husband to life. All would not do. The same evening, the body was carried to the dwelling, and three days later it was laid in the church-yard, by the side of three generations of forefathers, at a distance of only a mile from Clawbonny. That funeral service, too, made a deep impression on my memory. We had some Church of England people in the valley; and old Miles Wallingford, the first of the name, a substantial English franklin, had been influenced in his choice of a purchase by the fact that one of Queen Anne's churches stood so near the farm. To that little church, a tiny edifice of stone, with a high, pointed roof, without steeple, bell, or vestry-room, had three generations of us been taken to be christened, and three, including my father, had been taken to be buried. Excellent, kind-hearted, just-minded Mr. Hardinge read the funeral service over the man whom his own father had, in the same humble edifice, christened. Our neighbourhood has much altered of late years; but, then, few higher than mere labourers dwelt among us, who had not some sort of hereditary claim to be beloved. So it was with our clergyman, whose father had been his predecessor, having actually married my grand-parents. The son had united my father and mother, and now he was called on to officiate at the funeral obsequies of the first. Grace and I sobbed as if our hearts would break, the whole time we were in the church; and my poor, sensitive, nervous little sister actually shrieked as she heard the sound of the first clod that fell upon the coffin. Our mother was spared that trying scene, finding it impossible to support it. She remained at home, on her knees, most of the day on which the funeral occurred. Time soothed our sorrows, though my mother, a woman of more than common sensibility, or, it were better to say of uncommon affections, never entirely recovered from the effects of her irreparable loss. She had loved too well, too devotedly, too engrossingly, ever to think of a second marriage, and lived only to care for the interests of Miles Wallingford's children. I firmly believe we were more beloved because we stood in this relation to the deceased, than because we were her own natural offspring. Her health became gradually undermined, and, three years after the accident of the mill, Mr. Hardinge laid her at my father's side. I was now sixteen, and can better describe what passed during the last days of her existence, than what took place at the death of her husband. Grace and I were apprised of what was so likely to occur, quite a month before the fatal moment arrived; and we were not so much overwhelmed with sudden grief as we had been on the first great occasion of family sorrow, though we both felt our loss keenly, and my sister, I think I may almost say, inextinguishably. Mr. Hardinge had us both brought to the bed-side, to listen to the parting advice of our dying parent, and to be impressed with a scene that is always healthful, if rightly improved. “You baptized these two dear children, good Mr. Hardinge,” she said, in a voice that was already enfeebled by physical decay, “and you signed them with the sign of the cross, in token of Christ's death for them; and I now ask of your friendship and pastoral care to see that they are not neglected at the most critical period of their lives--that when impressions are the deepest, and yet the most easily made. God will reward all your kindness to the orphan children of your friends.” The excellent divine, a man who lived more for others than for himself, made the required promises, and the soul of my mother took its flight in peace. Neither my sister nor myself grieved as deeply for the loss of this last of our parents, as we did for that of the first. We had both seen so many instances of her devout goodness, had been witnesses of so great a triumph of her faith as to feel an intimate, though silent, persuasion that her death was merely a passage to a better state of existence--that it seemed selfish to regret. Still, we wept and mourned, even while, in one sense, I think we rejoiced. She was relieved from, much bodily suffering, and I remember, when I went to take a last look at her beloved face, that I gazed on its calm serenity with a feeling akin to exultation, as I recollected that pain could no longer exercise dominion over her frame, and that her spirit was then dwelling in bliss. Bitter regrets came later, it is true, and these were fully shared--nay, more than shared--by Grace. After the death of my father, I had never bethought me of the manner in which he had disposed of his property. I heard something said of his will, and gleaned a little, accidentally, of the forms that had been gone through in proving the instrument, and of obtaining its probate. Shortly after my mother's death, however, Mr. Hardinge had a free conversation with both me and Grace on the subject, when we learned, for the first time, the disposition that had been made. My father had bequeathed to me the farm, mill, landing, sloop, stock, utensils, crops, &c. &c., in full property; subject, however, to my mother's use of the whole until I attained my majority; after which I was to give her complete possession of a comfortable wing of the house, which had every convenience for a small family within itself, certain privileges in the fields, dairy, styes, orchards, meadows, granaries, &c., and to pay her three hundred pounds currency, per annum, in money. Grace had four thousand pounds that were “at use,” and I had all the remainder of the personal property, which yielded about five hundred dollars a-year. As the farm, sloop, mill, landing, &c., produced a net annual income of rather more than a thousand dollars, besides all that was consumed in housekeeping, I was very well off, in the way of temporal things, for one who had been trained in habits as simple as those which reigned at Clawbonny. My father had left Mr. Hardinge the executor, and my mother an executrix of his will, with survivorship. He had also made the same provision as respected the guardians. Thus Grace and I became the wards of the clergyman alone on the death of our last remaining parent. This was grateful to us both, for we both truly loved this good man, and, what was more, we loved his children. Of these there were two of ages corresponding very nearly with our own; Rupert Hardinge being not quite a year older than I was myself, and Lucy, his sister, about six months younger than Grace. We were all four strongly attached to each other, and had been so from infancy, Mr. Hardinge having had charge of my education as soon as I was taken from a woman's school. I cannot say, however, that Rupert Hardinge was ever a boy to give his father the delight that a studious, well-conducted, considerate and industrious child, has it so much in his power to yield to his parent. Of the two, I was much the best scholar, and had been pronounced by Mr. Hardinge fit to enter college, a twelvemonth before my mother died; though she declined sending me to Yale, the institution selected by my father, until my school-fellow was similarly prepared, it having been her intention to give the clergyman's son a thorough education, in furtherance of his father's views of bringing him up to the church. This delay, so well and kindly meant, had the effect of changing the whole course of my subsequent life. My father, it seems, wished to make a lawyer of me, with the natural desire of seeing me advanced to some honourable position in the State. But I was averse to anything like serious mental labour, and was greatly delighted when my mother determined to keep me out of college a twelvemonth in order that my friend Rupert might be my classmate. It is true I learned quick, and was fond of reading; but the first I could not very well help, while the reading I liked was that which amused, rather than that which instructed me. As for Rupert, though not absolutely dull, but, on the other hand, absolutely clever in certain things, he disliked mental labour even more than myself, while he liked self-restraint of any sort far less. His father was sincerely pious, and regarded his sacred office with too much reverence to think of bringing up a “cosset-priest,” though he prayed and hoped that his son's inclinations, under the guidance of Providence, would take that direction. He seldom spoke on the subject himself, but I ascertained his wishes through my confidential dialogues with his children. Lucy seemed delighted with the idea, looking forward to the time when her brother would officiate in the same desk where her father and grandfather had now conducted the worship of God for more than half a century; a period of time that, to us young people, seemed to lead us back to the dark ages of the country. And all this the dear girl wished for her brother, in connection with his spiritual rather than his temporal interests, inasmuch as the living was worth only a badly-paid salary of one hundred and fifty pounds currency per annum, together with a small but comfortable rectory, and a glebe of five-and-twenty acres of very tolerable land, which it was thought no sin, in that day, for the clergyman to work by means of two male slaves, whom, with as many females, he had inherited as part of the chattels of his mother. I had a dozen slaves also; negroes who, as a race, had been in the family almost as long as Clawbonny. About half of these blacks were singularly laborious and useful, viz., four males and three of the females; but several of the remainder were enjoying _otium_, and not altogether without _dignitate_, as heir-looms to be fed, clothed and lodged, for the good, or evil, they had done. There were some small-fry in our kitchens, too, that used to roll about on the grass, and munch fruit in the summer, _ad libitum;_ and stand so close in the chimney-corners in cold weather, that I have often fancied they must have been, as a legal wit of New York once pronounced certain eastern coal-mines to be, incombustible. These negroes all went by the patronymic of Clawbonny, there being among them Hector Clawbonny, Venus Clawbonny, Caesar Clawbonny, Rose Clawbonny--who was as black as a crow--Romeo Clawbonny, and Julietta, commonly called Julee, Clawbonny; who were, with Pharaoh, Potiphar, Sampson and Nebuchadnezzar, all Clawbonnys in the last resort. Neb, as the namesake of the herbiferous king of Babylon was called, was about my own age, and had been a sort of humble playfellow from infancy; and even now, when it was thought proper to set him about the more serious toil which was to mark his humble career, I often interfered to call him away to be my companion with the rod, the fowling-piece, or in the boat, of which we had one that frequently descended the creek, and navigated the Hudson for miles at a time, under my command. The lad, by such means, and through an off-hand friendliness of manner that I rather think was characteristic of my habits at that day, got to love me as a brother or comrade. It is not easy to describe the affection of an attached slave, which has blended with it the pride of a partisan, the solicitude of a parent, and the blindness of a lover. I do think Neb had more gratification in believing himself particularly belonging to Master Miles, than I ever had in any quality or thing I could call my own. Neb, moreover liked a vagrant life, and greatly encouraged Rupert and myself in idleness, and a desultory manner of misspending hours that could never be recalled. The first time I ever played truant was under the patronage of Neb, who decoyed me away from my books to go nutting on the mountain stoutly maintaining that chestnuts were just as good as the spelling-book, or any primer that could be bought in York. I have forgotten to mention that the death of my mother, which occurred in the autumn, brought about an immediate change in the condition of our domestic economy. Grace was too young, being only fourteen, to preside over such a household, and I could be of little use, either in the way of directing or advising. Mr. Hardinge, who had received a letter to that effect from the dying saint, that was only put into his hand the day after the funeral, with a view to give her request the greater weight, rented the rectory, and came to Clawbonny to live, bringing with him both his children. My mother knew that his presence would be of the greatest service to the orphans she left behind her; while the money saved from his own household expenses might enable this single-minded minister of the altar to lay by a hundred or two for Lucy, who, at his demise, might otherwise be left without a penny, as it was then said, cents not having yet come much into fashion. This removal gave Grace and me much pleasure, for she was as fond of Lucy as I was of Rupert, and, to tell the truth, so was I, too. Four happier young people were not to be found in the State than we thus became, each and all of us finding in the arrangement exactly the association which was most agreeable to our feelings. Previously, we only saw each other every day; now, we saw each other all day. At night we separated at an early hour, it is true, each having his or her room; but it was to meet at a still earlier hour the next morning, and to resume our amusements in company. From study, all of us were relieved for a month or two, and we wandered through the fields; nutted, gathered fruit, or saw others gather it as well as the crops, taking as much exercise as possible in the open air, equally for the good of our bodies, and the lightening of our spirits. I do not think vanity, or any feeling connected with self-love, misleads me, when I say it would have been difficult to find four young people more likely to attract the attention of a passer-by, than we four were, in the fall of 1797. As for Rupert Hardinge, he resembled his mother, and was singularly handsome in face, as well as graceful in movements. He had a native gentility of air, of which he knew how to make the most, and a readiness of tongue and a flow of spirits that rendered him an agreeable, if not a very instructive companion. I was not ill-looking, myself, though far from possessing the striking countenance of my young associate. In manliness, strength and activity, however, I had essentially the advantage over him, few youths of my age surpassing me in masculine qualities of this nature, after I had passed my twelfth year. My hair was a dark auburn, and it was the only thing about my face, perhaps, that would cause a stranger to notice it; but this hung about my temples and down my neck in rich ringlets, until frequent applications of the scissors brought it into something like subjection. It never lost its beauty entirely, and though now white as snow, it is still admired. But Grace was the one of the party whose personal appearance would be most likely to attract attention. Her face beamed with sensibility and feeling, being one of those countenances on which nature sometimes delights to impress the mingled radiance, sweetness, truth and sentiment, that men ascribe to angels. Her hair was lighter than mine; her eyes of a heavenly blue, all softness and tenderness; her cheeks just of the tint of the palest of the coloured roses; and her smile so full of gentleness and feeling, that, again and again, it has controlled my ruder and more violent emotions, when they were fast getting the mastery. In form, some persons might have thought Grace, in a slight degree, too fragile, though her limbs would have been delicate models for the study of a sculptor. Lucy, too, had certainly great perfection, particularly in figure; though in the crowd of beauty that has been so profusely lavished on the youthful in this country, she would not have been at all remarked in a large assembly of young American girls. Her face was pleasing nevertheless; and there was a piquant contrast between the raven blackness of her hair the deep blue of her eyes, and the dazzling whiteness of her skin. Her colour, too, was high, and changeful with her emotions. As for teeth, she had a set that one might have travelled weeks to meet with their equals; and, though she seemed totally unconscious of the advantage, she had a natural manner of showing them, that would have made a far less interesting face altogether agreeable. Her voice and laugh, too, when happy and free from care, were joyousness itself. It would be saying too much, perhaps, to assert that any human being was ever totally indifferent to his or her personal appearance. Still, I do not think either of our party, Rupert alone excepted, ever thought on the subject, unless as it related to others, down to the period Of which I am now writing. I knew, and saw, and felt that my sister was far more beautiful than any of the young girls of her age and condition that I had seen in her society; and I had pleasure and pride in the fact. I knew that I resembled her in some respects, but I was never coxcomb enough to imagine I had half her good-looks, even allowing for difference of sex. My own conceit, so far as I then had any--plenty of it came, a year or two later--but my own conceit, in 1797, rather ran in the direction of my athletic properties, physical force, which was unusually great for sixteen, and stature. As for Rupert, I would not have exchanged these manly qualities for twenty times his good looks, and a thought of envy never crossed my mind on the subject. I fancied it might be well enough for a parson to be a little delicate, and a good deal handsome; but for one who intended to knock about the world as I had it already in contemplation to do, strength, health, vigour, courage and activity, were much more to be desired than beauty. Lucy I never thought of as handsome at all. I saw she was pleasing; fancied she was even more so to me than to any one else; and I never looked upon her sunny, cheerful and yet perfectly feminine face, without a feeling of security and happiness. As for her honest eyes, they invariably met my own with an open frankness that said, as plainly as eyes could say anything, there was nothing to be concealed.

2

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“Cease to persuade, my loving Proteus; Home-keeping youth have ever homely wits;-- I rather would entreat thy company To see the wonders of the world abroad.” _Two Gentlemen of--Clawbonny. _ During the year that succeeded after I was prepared for Yale, Mr. Hardinge had pursued a very judicious course with my education. Instead of pushing me into books that were to be read in the regular course of that institution, with the idea of lightening my future labours, which would only have been providing excuses for future idleness, we went back to the elementary works, until even he was satisfied that nothing more remained to be done in that direction. I had my two grammars literally by heart, notes and all. Then we revised as thoroughly as possible, reading everything anew, and leaving no passage unexplained. I learned to scan, too, a fact that was sufficient to make a reputation for a scholar, in America, half a century since. {*] After this, we turned our attention to mathematics, a science Mr. Hardinge rightly enough thought there was no danger of my acquiring too thoroughly. We mastered arithmetic, of which I had a good deal of previous knowledge, in a few weeks, and then I went through trigonometry, with some of the more useful problems in geometry. This was the point at which I had arrived when my mother's death occurred. {Footnote *: The writer's master taught him to scan Virgil in 1801. This gentleman was a graduate of Oxford. In 1803, the class to which the writer then belonged in Yale, was the first that ever attempted to scan in that institution. The quantities were in sad discredit in this country, years after this, though Columbia and Harvard were a little in advance of Yale. All that was ever done in the last college, during the writer's time, was to scan the ordinary hexameter of Homer and Virgil.] As for myself, I frankly admit a strong disinclination to be learned. The law I might be forced to study, but practising it was a thing my mind had long been made up never to do. There was a small vein of obstinacy in my disposition that would have been very likely to carry me through in such a determination, even had my mother lived, though deference to her wishes would certainly have carried me as far as the license. Even now she was no more, I was anxious to ascertain whether she had left any directions or requests on the subject, either of which would have been laws to me. I talked with Rupert on this matter, and was a little shocked with the levity with which he treated it. “What difference can it make to your parents, _now_,” he said, with an emphasis that grated on my nerves, “whether you become a lawyer, or a merchant, or a doctor, or stay here on your farm, and be a farmer, like your father?” “My father had been a sailor,” I answered, quick as lightning. “True; and a noble, manly, gentleman-like calling it is! I never see a sailor that I do not envy him his advantages. Why, Miles, neither of us has ever been in town even, while your mother's boatmen, or your own, as they are now, go there regularly once a-week. I would give the world to be a sailor.” “You, Rupert! Why, you know that your father in tends, or, rather, wishes that you should become a clergyman.” “A pretty appearance a young man of my figure would make in the pulpit, Miles, or wearing a surplice. No, no; there have been two Hardinges in the church in this century, and I have a fancy also to the sea. I suppose you know that my great-grandfather was a captain in the navy, and _he_ brought _his_ son up a parson; now, turn about is fair play, and the parson ought to give a son back to a man-of-war. I've been reading the lives of naval men, and it's surprising how many clergymen's sons, in England, go into the navy, and how many sailors' sons get to be priests.” “But there is no navy in this country now--not even a single ship-of-war, I believe.” “That is the worst of it. Congress _did_ pass a law, two or three years since, to build some frigates, but they have never been launched. Now Washington has gone out of office, I suppose we shall never have anything good in the country.” I revered the name of Washington, in common with the whole country, but I did not see the _sequitur_. Rupert, however, cared little for logical inferences, usually asserting such things as he wished, and wishing such as he asserted. After a short pause, he continued the discourse. “You are now substantially your own master,” he said, “and can do as you please. Should you go to sea and not like it, you have only to come back to this place, where you will be just as much the master as if you had remained here superintending cattle, cutting hay, and fattening pork, the whole time.” “I am not my own master, Rupert, any more than you are yourself. I am your father's ward, and must so remain for more than five years to come. I am just as much under his control as you, yourself.” Rupert laughed at this, and tried to persuade me it would be a good thing to relieve his worthy fether of all responsibility in the affair, if I had seriously determined never to go to Yale, or to be a lawyer, by going off to sea clandestinely, and returning when I was ready. If I ever was to make a sailor, no time was to be lost; for all with whom he had conversed assured him the period of life when such things were best learned, was between sixteen and twenty. This I thought probable enough, and I parted from my friend with a promise of conversing further with him on the subject at an early opportunity. I am almost ashamed to confess that Rupert's artful sophism nearly blinded my eyes to the true distinction between right and wrong. If Mr. Hardinge really felt himself bound by my father's wishes to educate me for the bar, and my own repugnance to the profession was unconquerable, why should I not relieve him from the responsibility at once by assuming the right to judge for myself, and act accordingly? So far as Mr. Hardinge was concerned, I had little difficulty in coming to a conclusion, though the profound deference I still felt for my father's wishes, and more especially for those of my sainted mother, had a hold on my heart, and an influence on my conduct, that was not so easily disposed of. I determined to have a frank conversation with Mr. Hardinge, therefore, in order to ascertain how far either of my parents had expressed anything that might be considered obligatory on me. My plan went as far as to reveal my own desire to be a sailor, and to see the world, but not to let it be known that I might go off without his knowledge, as this would not be so absolutely relieving the excellent divine “from all responsibility in the premises,” as was contemplated in the scheme of his own son. An opportunity soon occurred, when I broached the subject by asking Mr. Hardinge whether my father, in his will, had ordered that I should be sent to Yale, and there be educated for the bar. He had done nothing of the sort. Had he left any particular request, writing, or message on the subject, at all? Not that Mr. Hardinge knew. It is true, the last had heard his friend, once or twice, make some general remark which would lead one to suppose that Captain Wallingford had some vague expectations I might go to the bar, but nothing further. My mind felt vastly relieved by these admissions, for I knew my mother's tenderness too well to anticipate that she would dream of absolutely dictating in a matter that was so clearly connected with my own happiness and tastes. When questioned on this last point, Mr. Hardinge did not hesitate to say that my mother had conversed with him several times concerning her views, as related to my career in life. She wished me to go to Yale, and then to read law, even though I did not practise. As soon as this, much was said, the conscientious servant of God paused, to note the effect on me. Reading disappointment in my countenance, I presume, he immediately added, “But your mother, Miles, laid no restraint on you; for she knew it was _you_ who was to follow the career, and not herself. 'I should as soon think of commanding whom he was to marry, as to think of forcing, a profession on him,' she added. 'He is the one who is to decide this, and he only. We may try to guide and influence him, but not go beyond this. I leave you, dear sir, to do all you think best in this matter, certain that your own wisdom will be aided by the providence of a kind Master.'” I now plainly told Mr. Hardinge my desire to see the world, and to be a sailor. The divine was astounded at this declaration, and I saw that he was grieved. I believe some religious objections were connected with his reluctance to consent to my following the sea, as a calling. At any rate, it was easy to discover that these objections were lasting and profound. In that day, few Americans travelled, by way of an accomplishment, at all; and those few belonged to a class in society so much superior to mine, as to render it absurd to think of sending, me abroad with similar views. Nor would my fortune justify such an expenditure. I was well enough off to be a comfortable and free housekeeper, and as independent as a king on my own farm; living in abundance, nay, in superfluity, so far as all the ordinary wants were concerned; but men hesitated a little about setting up for gentlemen at large, in the year 1797. The country was fast getting rich, it is true, under the advantages of its neutral position; but it had not yet been long enough emancipated from its embarrassments to think of playing the nabob on eight hundred pounds currency a-year. The interview terminated with a strong exhortation from my guardian not to think of abandoning my books for any project as visionary and useless as the hope of seeing the world in the character of a common sailor. I related all this to Rupert, who, I now perceived for the first time, did not hesitate to laugh at some of his father's notions, as puritanical and exaggerated. He maintained that every one was the best judge of what he liked, and that the sea had produced quite as fair a proportion of saints as the land. He was not certain, considering the great difference there was in numbers, that more good men might not be traced in connection with the ocean, than in connection with any other pursuit. “Take the lawyers now, for instance, Miles,” he said, “and what can you make out of them, in the way of religion, I should like to know? They hire their consciences out at so much _per diem_, and talk and reason just as zealously for the wrong, as they do for the right.” “By George, that is true enough, Rupert. There is old David Dockett, I remember to have heard Mr. Hardinge say always did double duty for his fee, usually acting as witness, as well as advocate. They tell me he will talk by the hour of facts that he and his clients get up between them, and look the whole time as if he believed all he said to be true.” Rupert laughed at this sally, and pushed the advantage it gave him by giving several other examples to prove how much his father was mistaken by supposing that a man was to save his soul from perdition simply by getting admitted to the bar. After discussing the matter a little longer, to my astonishment Rupert came out with a plain proposal that he and I should elope, go to New York, and ship as foremastlads in some Indiaman, of which there were then many sailing, at the proper season, from that port. I did not dislike the idea, so far as I was myself concerned; but the thought of accompanying Rupert in such an adventure, startled me. I knew I was sufficiently secure of the future to be able to risk a little at the present moment; but such was not the case with my friend. If I made a false step at so early an age, I had only to return to Clawbonny, where I was certain to find competence and a home; but, with Rupert, it was very different. Of the moral hazards I ran, I then knew nothing, and of course they gave me no concern. Like all inexperienced persons, I supposed myself too strong in virtue to be in any danger of contamination; and this portion of the adventure was regarded with the self-complacency with which the untried are apt to regard their own powers of endurance. I thought myself morally invulnerable. But Rupert might find it difficult to retrace any serious error made at his time of life. This consideration would have put an end to the scheme, so far as my companion was concerned, had not the thought suggested itself that I should always have it in my own power to aid my friend. Letting something of this sort escape me, Rupert was not slow in enlarging on it, though this was done with great tact and discretion. He proved that, by the time we both came of age, he would be qualified to command a ship, and that, doubtless, I would naturally desire to invest some of my spare cash in a vessel. The accumulations of my estate alone would do this much, within the next five years, and then a career of wealth and prosperity would lie open before us both. “It is a good thing, Miles, no doubt,” continued this tempting sophist, “to have money at use, and a large farm, and a mill, and such things; but many a ship nets more money, in a single voyage, than your whole estate would sell for. Those that begin with nothing, too, they tell me, are the most apt to succeed; and, if we go off with our clothes only, we shall begin with nothing, too. Success may be said to be certain. I like the notion of beginning with nothing, it is so American!” It is, in truth, rather a besetting weakness of America to suppose that men who have never had any means for qualifying themselves for particular pursuits, are the most likely to succeed in them; and especially to fancy that those who “begin poor” are in a much better way for acquiring wealth than they who commence with some means; and I was disposed to lean to this latter doctrine myself, though I confess I cannot recall an instance in which any person of my acquaintance has given away his capital, however large and embarrassing it may have been, in order to start fair with his poorer competitors. Nevertheless, there was something taking, to my imagination, in the notion of being the fabricator of my own fortune. In that day, it was easy to enumerate every dwelling on the banks of the Hudson that aspired to be called a seat, and I had often heard them named by those who were familiar with the river. I liked the thought of erecting a house on the Clawbonny property that might aspire to equal claims, and to be the owner of a _seat_; though only after I had acquired the means, myself, to carry out such a project. At present, I owned only a _house_; my ambition was, to own a _seat_. In a word, Rupert and I canvassed this matter in every possible way for a month, now leaning to one scheme, and now to another, until I determined to lay the whole affair before the two girls, under a solemn pledge of secrecy. As we passed hours in company daily, opportunities were not wanting to effect this purpose. I thought my friend was a little shy on this project; but I had so much affection for Grace, and so much confidence in Lucy's sound judgment, that I was not to be turned aside from the completion of my purpose. It is now more than forty years since the interview took place in which this confidence was bestowed; but every minute occurrence connected with it is as fresh in my mind as if the whole had taken place only yesterday. We were all four of us seated on a rude bench that my mother had caused to be placed under the shade of an enormous oak that stood on the most picturesque spot, perhaps, on the whole farm, and which commanded a distant view of one of the loveliest reaches of the Hudson. Our side of the river, in general, does not possess as fine views as the eastern, for the reason that all our own broken, and in some instances magnificent back-ground of mountains, fills up the landscape for our neighbours, while we are obliged to receive the picture as it is set in a humbler frame; but there are exquisite bits to be found on the western bank, and this was one of the very best of them. The water was as placid as molten silver, and the sails of every vessel in sight were hanging in listless idleness from their several spars, representing commerce asleep. Grace had a deep feeling for natural scenery, and she had a better mode of expressing her thoughts, on such occasions, than is usual with girls of fourteen. She first drew our attention to the view by one of her strong, eloquent bursts of eulogium; and Lucy met the remark with a truthful, simple answer, that showed abundant sympathy with the sentiment, though with less of exaggeration of manner and feeling, perhaps. I seized the moment as favourable for my purpose, and spoke out. “If you admire a vessel so much, Grace,” I said, “you will probably be glad to hear that I think of becoming a sailor.” A silence of near two minutes succeeded, during which time I affected to be gazing at the distant sloops, and then I ventured to steal a glance at my companions. I found Grace's mild eyes earnestly riveted on my face; and, turning from their anxious expression with a little uneasiness, I encountered those of Lucy looking at me as intently as if she doubted whether her ears had not deceived her. “A sailor, Miles!” --my sister now slowly repeated--“I thought it settled you were to study law.” “As far from that as we are from England; I've fully made up my mind to see the world if I can, and Rupert, here--” “What of Rupert, here?” Grace asked, a sudden change again coming over her sweet countenance, though I was altogether too inexperienced to understand its meaning. “_He_ is certainly to be a clergyman--his dear father's assistant, and, a long, long, _very_ long time hence, his successor!” I could see that Rupert was whistling on a low key, and affecting to look cool; but my sister's solemn, earnest, astonished manner had more effect on us both, I believe, than either would have been willing to own. “Come, girls,” I said at length, putting the best face on the matter, “there is no use in keeping secrets from _you_--but remember that what I am about to tell you _is_ a secret, and on no account is to be betrayed.” “To no one but Mr. Hardinge,” answered Grace. “If you intend to be a sailor, he ought to know it.” “That comes from looking at our duties superficially,” I had caught this phrase from my friend, “and not distinguishing properly between their shadows and their substance.” “Duties superficially! I do not understand you, Miles. Certainly Mr. Hardinge ought to be told what profession you mean to follow. Remember, brother, he now fills the place of a parent to you.” “He is not more _my_ parent than Rupert's--I fancy you will admit that much!” “Rupert, again! What has Rupert to do with your going to sea?” “Promise me, then, to keep my secret, and you shall know all; both you and Lucy must give me your words. I know you will not break them, when once given.” “Promise him, Grace,” said Lucy, in a low tone, and a voice that, even at that age, I could perceive was tremulous. “If we promise, we shall learn everything, and then may have some effect on these headstrong boys by our advice.” “Boys! _You_ cannot mean, Lucy, that Rupert is not to be a clergyman--your father's assistant; that Rupert means to be a sailor, too?” “One never knows what boys will do. Let us promise them, dear; then we can better judge.” “I do” promise you, Miles, “said my sister, in a voice so solemn as almost to frighten me. “And I, Miles,” added Lucy; but it was so low, I had to lean forward to catch the syllables. “This is honest and right,”--it was honest, perhaps, but very wrong,--“and it convinces me that you are both reasonable, and will be of use to us. Rupert and I have both made up our minds, and intend to be sailors.” Exclamations followed from both girls, and another long silence succeeded. “As for the law, hang all law!” I continued, hemming, and determined to speak like a man. “I never heard of a Wallingford who was a lawyer.” “But you have _both_ heard of Hardinges who were clergymen,” said Grace, endeavouring to smile, though the expression of her countenance was so painful that even now I dislike to recall it. “And sailors, too,” put in Rupert, a little more stoutly than I thought possible. “My father's grandfather was an officer in the navy.” “And _my_ father was a sailor himself--in the navy, too.” “But there is no navy in this country now, Miles,” returned Lucy, in an expostulating tone. “What of that? There are plenty of ships. The ocean is just as big, and the world just as wide, as if we had a navy to cover the first. I see no great objection on that account--do you, Ru?” “Certainly not. What we want is to go to sea, and that can be done in an Indiaman, as well as in a man-of-war.” “Yes,” said I, stretching myself with a little importance. “I fancy an Indiaman, a vessel that goes all the way to Calcutta, round the Cape of Good Hope, in the track of Vasquez de Gama, isn't exactly an Albany sloop.” “Who is Vasquez de Gama?” demanded Lucy, with so much quickness as to surprise me. “Why, a _noble_ Portuguese, who discovered the Cape of Good Hope, and first sailed round it, and then went to the Indies. You see, girls, even _nobles_ are sailors, and why should not Rupert and I be sailors?” “It is not that, Miles,” my sister answered; “every honest calling is respectable. Have you and Rupert spoken to Mr. Hardinge on this subject?” “Not exactly--not spoken--hinted only--that is, blindly--not so as to be understood, perhaps.” “He will _never_ consent, boys!” and this was uttered with something very like an air of triumph. “We have no intention of asking it of him, Grace. Rupert and I intend to be off next week, without saying a word to Mr. Hardinge on the subject.” Another long, eloquent silence succeeded, during which I saw Lucy bury her face in her apron, while the tears openly ran down my sister's cheek. “You _do_ not--_cannot_ mean to do anything so cruel, Miles!” Grace at length said. “It is exactly because it will not be cruel, that we intend to do it,”--here I nudged Rupert with my elbow, as a hint that I wanted assistance; but he made no other reply than an answering nudge, which I interpreted into as much as if he had said in terms, “You've got into the scrape in your own way, and you may get out of it in the same manner.” “Yes,” I continued, finding succour hopeless, “yes, _that's_ just it.” “What is just it, Miles? You speak in a way to show that you are not satisfied with yourself--neither you nor Rupert is satisfied with himself, if the truth were known.” “I not satisfied with _myself! _ Rupert not satisfied with _himself! _ You never were more mistaken in your life, Grace. If there ever were two boys in New York State that _were_ well satisfied with themselves, they are just Rupert and I.” Here Lucy raised her face from the apron and burst into a laugh, the tears filling her eyes all the while. “Believe them, dear Grace,” she said. “They are precisely two self-satisfied, silly fellows, that have got some ridiculous notions in their heads, and then begin to talk about 'superficial views of duties,' and all such nonsense. My father will set it all right, and the boys will have had their talk.” “Not so last, Miss Lucy, if you please. Your father will not know a syllable of the matter until you tell him all about it, after we are gone. We intend 'to relieve him from all responsibility in the premises.'” This last sounded very profound, and a little magnificent, to my imagination; and I looked at the girls to note the effect. Grace was weeping, and weeping only; but Lucy looked saucy and mocking, even while the tears bedewed her smiling face, as rain sometimes falls while the sun is shining. “Yes,” I repeated, with emphasis, “'of all responsibility in the premises.' I hope that is plain English, and good English, although I know that Mr. Hardinge has been trying to make you both so simple in your language, that you turn up your noses at a profound sentiment, whenever you hear one.” In 1797, the grandiose had by no means made the deep invasion into the everyday language of the country, that it has since done. Anything of the sublime, or of the recondite, school was a good deal more apt to provoke a smile, than it is to-day--the improvement proceeding, as I have understood through better judges than myself, from the great melioration of mind and manners that is to be traced to the speeches in congress, and to the profundities of the newspapers. Rupert, however, frequently ornamented his ideas, and I may truly say everything ambitious that adorned my discourse was derived from his example. I almost thought Lucy impertinent for presuming to laugh at sentiments which came from such a source, and, by way of settling my own correctness of thought and terms, I made no bones of falling back on my great authority, by fairly pointing him out. “I thought so!” exclaimed Lucy, now laughing with all her heart, though a little hysterically; “I thought so, for this is just like Rupert, who is always talking to me about 'assuming the responsibility,' and 'conclusions in the premises,' and all such nonsense. Leave the boys to my father, Grace, and he will 'assume the responsibility' of 'concluding the premises,' and the whole of the foolish scheme along with it!” This would have provoked me, had not Grace manifested so much sisterly interest in my welfare that I was soon persuaded to tell _her_--that minx Lucy overhearing every syllable, though I had half a mind to tell her to go away--all about our project. “You see,” I continued, “if Mr. Hardinge knows anything about our plan, people will say he ought to have stopped us. 'He a clergyman, and not able to keep two lads of sixteen or seventeen from running away and going to sea!' they will say, as if it were so easy to prevent two spirited youths from seeing the world. Whereas, if he knew nothing about it, nobody can blame him. That is what I call 'relieving him from the responsibility.' Now, we intend to be off next week, or as soon as the jackets and trowsers that are making for us, under the pretence of being boat-dresses, are finished. We mean to go down the river in the sail-boat, taking Neb with us to bring the boat back. Now you know the whole story, there will be no occasion to leave a letter for Mr. Hardinge; for, three hours after we have sailed, you can tell him everything. We shall be gone a year; at the end of that time you may look for us both, and glad enough shall we all be to see each other. Rupert and I will be young men then, though you call us boys now.” This last picture a good deal consoled the girls. Rupert, too, who had unaccountably kept back, throwing the labouring-oar altogether on me, came to the rescue, and, with his subtle manner and oily tongue, began to make the wrong appear the right. I do not think he blinded his own sister in the least, but I fear he had too much influence over mine. Lucy, though all heart, was as much matter-of-fact as her brother was a sophist. He was ingenious in glozing over truths; she, nearly unerring in detecting them. I never knew a greater contrast between two human beings, than there was between these two children of the same parents, in this particular. I have heard that the son took after the mother, in this respect, and that the daughter took after the father; though Mrs. Hardinge died too early to have had any moral influence on the character of her children. We came again and again to the discussion of our subject during the next two or three days. The girls endeavoured earnestly to persuade us to ask Mr. Hardinge's permission for the step we were about to undertake; but all in vain. We lads were so thoroughly determined to “relieve the divine from all responsibility in the premises,” that they might as well have talked to stones. We knew these just-minded, sincere, upright girls would not betray us, and continued obdurate to the last. As we expected, as soon as convinced their importunities were useless, they seriously set about doing all they could to render us comfortable. They made us duck bags to hold our clothes, two each, and mended our linen, stockings, &c., and even helped to procure us some clothes more suited to the contemplated expedition than most of those we already possessed. Our “long togs,” indeed, we determined to leave behind us, retaining just one suit each, and that of the plainest quality. In the course of a week everything was ready, our bags well lined, being concealed in the storehouse at the landing. Of this building I could at any moment procure the key, my authority as heir-apparent being very considerable, already, on the farm. As for Neb, he was directed to have the boat all ready for the succeeding Tuesday evening, it being the plan to sail the day after the Wallingford of Clawbonny (this was the name of the sloop) had gone on one of her regular trips, in order to escape a pursuit. I had made all the calculations about the tide, and knew that the Wallingford would go out about nine in the morning, leaving us to follow before midnight. It was necessary to depart at night and when the wharf was clear, in order to avoid observation. Tuesday was an uneasy, nervous and sad day for us all, Mr. Hardinge excepted. As the last had not the smallest distrust, he continued calm, quiet, and cheerful as was his wont. Rupert had a conscience-stricken and furtive air about him, while the eyes of the two dear, girls were scarcely a moment without tears. Grace seemed now the most composed of the two, and I have since suspected that she had had a private conversation with my ingenious friend, whose convincing powers were of a very extraordinary quality, when he set about their use in downright earnest. As for Lucy, she seemed to me to have been weeping the entire day. At nine o'clock it was customary for the whole family to separate, after prayers. Most of us went to bed at that early hour, though Mr. Hardinge himself seldom sought his pillow until midnight. This habit compelled us to use a good deal of caution in getting out of the house, in which Rupert and myself succeeded, however, without discovery, just as the clock struck eleven. We had taken leave of the girls in a hasty manner, in a passage, shaking hands, and each of us kissing his own sister, as he affected to retire for the night. To own the truth, we were much gratified in finding how reasonably Grace and Lucy behaved, on the occasion, and not a little surprised, for we had expected a scene, particularly with the former. We walked away from the house with heavy hearts, few leaving the paternal roof for the first time, to enter upon the chances of the world, without a deep sense of the dependence in which they had hitherto lived. We walked fast and silently, and reached the wharf in less than half an hour, a distance of near two miles. I was just on the point of speaking to Neb, whose figure I could see in the boat, when I caught a glimpse of two female forms within six feet of me. There were Grace and Lucy, in tears, both waiting our arrival, with a view to see us depart! I confess I was shocked and concerned at seeing these two delicate girls so far from their home, at such an hour; and my first impulse was to see them both safely back before I would enter the boat; but to this neither would consent. All my entreaties were thrown away, and I was obliged to submit. I know not exactly how it happened, but of the fact I am certain; odd as it may seem, at a moment like that, when about to separate, instead of each youth's getting his own sister aside to make his last speeches, and say his last say to, each of us got his friend's sister aside. I do not mean that we were making love, or anything of the sort; we were a little too young, perhaps, for that; but we obeyed an impulse which, as Rupert would have said, “produced that result.” What passed between Grace and her companion, I do not know. As for Lucy and myself, it was all plain-sailing and fair dealing. The excellent creature forced on me six gold pieces, which I knew had come to her as an heirloom from her mother, and which I had often heard her declare she never meant to use, unless in the last extremity. She knew I had but five dollars on earth, and that Rupert had not one; and she offered me this gold. I told her Rupert had better take it; no, _I_ had better take it. I should use it more prudently than Rupert, and would use it for the good of both. “Besides, you are rich,” she said, smiling through her tears, “and can repay me--I _lend_ them to you; to Rupert I should have to _give_ them.” I could not refuse the generous girl, and took the money, all half-joes, with a determination to repay them with interest. Then I folded her to my heart, and kissed her six or eight times with fervour, the first time I had done such a thing in two years, and tore myself away. I do not think Rupert embraced Grace, but I confess I do not know, although we were standing within three or four yards of each other, the whole time. “Write, Miles--write, Rupert,” said the sobbing girls leaning forward from the wharf, as we shoved off. It was not so dark but we could see their dear forms for several minutes, or until a bend in the creek put a dark mass of earth between us and them. Such was the manner of my departure from Clawbonny, in the month of September, 1797. I wanted a few days of being seventeen; Rupert was six months older, and Neb was his senior, again, by near a twelvemonth. Everything was in the boat but our hearts. Mine, I can truly say, remained with the two beloved creatures we left on the wharf; while Rupert's was betwixt and between, I fancy--seldom absolutely deserting the dear tenement in which it was encased by nature.

3

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“There's a youth in this city, it were a great pity That he from our lasses should wander awa'; For he's bonny and braw, weel-favoured witha', And his hair has a natural buckle and a'. His coat is the hue of his bonnet so blue; His pocket is white as the new-driven snaw; His hose they are blue, and his shoon like the slae, And his clean siller buckles they dazzle us a'.” BURNS. We had selected our time well, as respects the hour of departure. It was young ebb, and the boat floated swiftly down the creek, though the high banks of the latter would have prevented our feeling any wind, even if there were a breeze on the river. Our boat was of some size, sloop-rigged and half-decked; but Neb's vigorous arms made her move through the water with some rapidity, and, to own the truth, the lad sprang to his work like a true runaway negro. I was a skilful oarsman myself, having received many lessons from my father in early boyhood, and being in almost daily practice for seven mouths in the year. The excitement of the adventure, its romance, or what for a short time seemed to me to be romance, and the secret apprehension of being detected, which I believe accompanies every clandestine undertaking, soon set me in motion also. I took one of the oars, and, in less than twenty minutes, the Grace & Lucy, for so the boat was called, emerged from between two, high, steep banks, and entered on the broader bosom of the Hudson. Neb gave a half-suppressed, negro-like cry of exultation, as we shot out from our cover, and ascertained that there was a pleasant and fair breeze blowing. In three minutes we had the jib and mainsail on the boat, the helm was up, the sheet was eased off, and we were gliding down-stream at the rate of something like five miles an hour. I took the helm, almost as a matter of course; Rupert being much too indolent to do anything unnecessarily, while Neb was far too humble to aspire to such an office while Master Miles was there, willing and ready. In that day, indeed, it was so much a matter of course for the skipper of a Hudson river craft to steer, that most of the people who lived on the banks of the stream imagined that Sir John Jervis, Lord Anson, and the other great English admirals of whom they had read and heard, usually amused themselves with that employment, out on the ocean. I remember the hearty laugh in which my unfortunate father indulged, when Mr. Hardinge once asked him how he could manage to get any sleep, on account of this very duty. But we were very green, up at Clawbonny, in most things that related to the world. The hour that succeeded was one of the most painful I ever passed in my life. I recalled my father, his manly frankness, his liberal bequests in my favour, and his precepts of respect and obedience; all of which, it now seemed to me, I had openly dishonoured. Then came the image of my mother, with her love and sufferings, her prayers, and her mild but earnest exhortations to be good. I thought I could see both these parents regarding me with sorrowful, though not with reproachful countenances. They appeared to be soliciting my return, with a species of silent, but not the less eloquent, warnings of the consequences. Grace and Lucy, and their sobs, and admonitions, and entreaties to abandon my scheme, and to write, and not to remain away long, and all that tender interest had induced two warm-hearted girls to utter at our parting, came fresh and vividly to my mind. The recollection proved nearly too much for me. Nor did I forget Mr. Hardinge, and the distress he would certainly feel, when he discovered that he had not only lost his ward, but his only son. Then Clawbonny itself, the house, the orchards, the meadows, the garden, the mill, and all that belonged to the farm, began to have a double value in my eyes, and to serve as so many cords attached to my heart-strings, and to remind me that the rover “Drags at each remove a lengthening chain.'” I marvelled at Rupert's tranquility. I did not then understand his character as thoroughly as I subsequently got to know it. All that he most prized was with him in the boat, in fact, and this lessened his grief at parting from less beloved objects. Where Rupert was, there was his paradise. As for Neb, I do believe his head was over his shoulder, for he affected to sit with his face down-stream, so long as the hills that lay in the rear of Clawbonny could be at all distinguished. This must have proceeded from tradition, or instinct, or some latent negro quality; for I do not think the fellow fancied _he_ was running away. He knew that his two young masters were; but he was fully aware he was my property, and no doubt thought, as long as he staid in my company, he was in the line of his legitimate duty. Then it was _my_ plan that he should return with the boat, and perhaps these backward glances were no more than the shadows of coming events, cast, in his case, _behind_. Rupert was indisposed to converse, for, to tell the truth, he had eaten a hearty supper, and began to feel drowsy; and I was too much wrapped up in my own busy thoughts to solicit any communications. I found a sort of saddened pleasure in setting a watch for the night, therefore, which had an air of seaman-like duty about it, that in a slight degree revived my old taste for the profession. It was midnight, and I took the first watch myself, bidding my two companions to crawl under the half-deck, and go to sleep. This they both did without any parley, Rupert occupying an inner place, while Neb lay with his legs exposed to the night air. The breeze freshened, and for some time I thought it might be necessary to reef, though we were running dead before the wind. I succeeded in holding on, however, and I found the Grace & Lucy was doing wonders in my watch. When I gave Rupert his call at four o'clock, the boat was just approaching two frowning mountains, where the river was narrowed to a third or fourth of its former width; and, by the appearance of the shores, and the dim glimpses I had caught of a village of no great size on the right bank, I knew we were in what is called Newburgh Bay. This was the extent of our former journeyings south, all three of us having once before, and only once, been as low as Fishkill Landing, which lies opposite to the place that gives this part of the river its name. Rupert now took the helm, and I went to sleep. The wind still continued fresh and fair, and I felt no uneasiness on account of the boat. It is true, there were two parts of the navigation before us of which I had thought a little seriously, but not sufficiently so to keep me awake. These were the Race, a passage in the Highlands, and Tappan Sea; both points on the Hudson of which the navigators of that classical stream were fond of relating the marvels. The first I knew was formidable only later in the autumn, and, as for the last, I hoped to enjoy some of its wonders in the morning. In this very justifiable expectation, I fell asleep. Neb did not call me until ten o'clock. I afterwards discovered that Rupert kept the helm for only an hour, and then, calculating that from five until nine were four hours, he thought it a pity the negro should not have his share of the glory of that night. When I was awakened, it was merely to let me know that it was time to eat something--Neb would have starved before he would precede his young master in that necessary occupation--and I found Rupert in a deep and pleasant sleep at my side. We were in the centre of Tappan, and the Highlands had been passed in safety. Neb expatiated a little on the difficulties of the navigation, the river having many windings, besides being bounded by high mountains; but, after all, he admitted that there was water enough, wind enough, and a road that was plain enough. From this moment, excitement kept us wide awake. Everything was new, and everything seemed delightful. The day was pleasant, the wind continued fair, and nothing occurred to mar our joy. I had a little map, one neither particularly accurate, nor very well engraved; and I remember the importance with which, after having ascertained the fact myself, I pointed out to my two companions the rocky precipices on the western bank, as New Jersey! Even-Rupert was struck with this important circumstance. As for Neb, he was actually in ecstasies, rolling his large black eyes, and showing his white teeth, until he suddenly closed his truly coral and plump lips, to demand what New Jersey meant? Of course I gratified this laudable desire to obtain knowledge, and Neb seemed still more pleased than ever, now he had ascertained that New Jersey was a State. Travelling was not as much of an every-day occupation, at that time, as it is now; and it was, in truth, something for three American lads, all under nineteen, to be able to say that they had seen a State, other than their own. Notwithstanding the rapid progress we had made for the first few hours of our undertaking, the voyage was far from being ended. About noon the wind came out light from the southward, and, having a flood-tide, we were compelled to anchor. This made us all uneasy, for, while we were stationary, we did not seem to be running away. The ebb came again, at length, however, and then we made sail, and began to turn down with the tide. It was near sunset before we got a view of the two or three spires that then piloted strangers to the town. New York was not the “commercial emporium” in 1796; so high-sounding a title, indeed, scarce belonging to the simple English of the period, it requiring a very great collection of half-educated men to venture on so ambitious an appellation--the only emporium that existed in America, during the last century, being a slop-shop in Water street, and on the island of Manhattan. _Commercial_ emporium was a flight of fancy, indeed, that must have required a whole board of aldermen, and an extra supply of turtle, to sanction. What is meant by a _literary_ emporium, I leave those editors who are “native and to the _manor_ born,” to explain. We first saw the State Prison, which was then new, and a most imposing edifice, according to our notions, as we drew near the town. Like the gallows first seen by a traveller in entering a strange country, it was a pledge of civilization. Neb shook his head, as he gazed at it, with a moralizing air, and said it had a “wicked look.” For myself, I own I did not regard it altogether without dread. On Rupert it made less impression than on any of the three. He was always somewhat obtuse on the subject of morals. {*] {Footnote *: It may be well to tell the European who shall happen to read this book, that in America a “State's Prison” is not for prisoners of State, but for common rogues: the term coming from the name borne by the local governments.] New York, in that day, and on the Hudson side of the town, commenced a short distance above Duane street. Between Greenwich, as the little hamlet around the State Prison was called, and the town proper, was an interval of a mile and a half of open fields, dotted here and there with country-houses. Much of this space was in broken hills, and a few piles of lumber lay along the shores. St. John's church had no existence, and most of the ground in its vicinity was in low swamp. As we glided along the wharves, we caught sight of the first market I had then ever seen--such proofs of an advanced civilization not having yet made their way into the villages of the interior. It was called “The Bear,” from the circumstance that the first meat ever exposed for sale in it was of that animal; but the appellation has disappeared before the intellectual refinement of these later times--the name of the soldier and statesman, Washington, having fairly supplanted that of the bear! Whether this great moral improvement was brought about by the Philosophical Society, or the Historical Society, or “The Merchants,” or the Aldermen of New York, I have never ascertained. If the latter, one cannot but admire their disinterested modesty in conferring this notable honour on the Father of his country, inasmuch as all can see that there never has been a period when their own board has not possessed distinguished members, every way qualified to act as god-fathers to the most illustrious markets of the republic. But Manhattan, in the way of taste, has never had justice done it. So profound is its admiration for all the higher qualities, that Franklin and Fulton have each a market to himself, in addition to this bestowed on Washington. Doubtless there would have been Newton Market, and Socrates Market, and Solomon Market, but for the patriotism of the town, which has forbidden it from going out of the hemisphere, in quest of names to illustrate. Bacon Market would doubtless have been too equivocal to be tolerated, under any circumstances. Then Bacon was a rogue, though a philosopher, and markets are always appropriated to honest people. At all events, I am rejoiced the reproach of having a market called “The Bear” has been taken away, as it was tacitly admitting our living near, if not absolutely in, the woods. We passed the Albany basin, a large receptacle for North River craft, that is now in the bosom of the town and built on, and recognized in it the mast-head of the Wallingford. Neb was shown the place, for he was to bring the boat round to it, and join the sloop, in readiness to return in her. We rounded the Battery, then a circular stripe of grass, with an earthen and wooden breastwork running along the margin of the water, leaving a narrow promenade on the exterior. This brought us to White-Hall, since so celebrated for its oarsmen, where we put in for a haven. I had obtained the address of a better sort of sailor-tavern in that vicinity, and, securing the boat, we shouldered the bags, got a boy to guide us, and were soon housed. As it was near night, Rupert and I ordered supper, and Neb was directed to pull the boat round to the sloop, and to return to us in the morning; taking care, however, not to let our lodgings be known. The next day, I own I thought but little of the girls, Clawbonny, or Mr. Hardinge. Neb was at my bed-side before I was up, and reported the Grace & Lucy safe alongside of the Wallingford, and expressed himself ready to wait on me in my progress in quest of a ship. As this was the moment of action, little was said, but we all breakfasted, and sallied forth, in good earnest, on the important business before us. Neb was permitted to follow, but at such a distance as to prevent his being suspected of belonging to our party--a gentleman, with a serving-man at his heels, not being the candidate most likely to succeed in his application for a berth in the forecastle. So eager was I to belong to some sea-going craft, that I would not stop even to look at the wonders of the town, before we took the direction of the wharves. Rupert was for pursuing a different policy, having an inherent love of the genteeler gaieties of a town, but I turned a deaf ear to his hints, and this time I was master. He followed me with some reluctance, but follow he did, after some remonstrances that bordered on warmth. Any inexperienced eye that had seen us passing, would have mistaken us for two well-looking, smart young sailor-boys, who had just returned from a profitable voyage, and who, well-clad, tidy and semi-genteel, were strolling along the wharves as _admirateurs_, not to say critics, of the craft. _Admirateurs_ we were, certainly, or _I_ was, at least; though knowledge was a point on which we Were sadly deficient. The trade of America was surprisingly active in 1797. It had been preyed upon by the two great belligerents of the period, England and France, it is true; and certain proceedings of the latter nation were about to bring the relations of the two countries into a very embarrassed state; but still the shipping interest was wonderfully active, and, as a whole, singularly successful. Almost every tide brought in or took out ships for foreign ports, and scarce a week passed that vessels did not arrive from, or sail for, all the different quarters of the world. An Indiaman, however, was our object; the voyage being longer, the ships better, and the achievement greater, than merely to cross the Atlantic and return. We accordingly proceeded towards the Fly Market, in the vicinity of which, we had been given to understand, some three or four vessels of that description were fitting out. This market has since used its wings to disappear, altogether. I kept my eyes on every ship we passed. Until the previous day, I had never seen a square-rigged vessel; and no enthusiast in the arts ever gloated on a fine picture or statue with greater avidity than my soul drank in the wonder and beauty of every ship I passed. I had a large, full-rigged model at Clawbonny; and this I had studied under my father so thoroughly, as to know the name of every rope in it, and to have some pretty distinct notions of their uses. This early schooling was now of great use to me, though I found it a little difficult, at first, to trace my old acquaintances on the large scale in which they now presented themselves, and amid the intricate mazes that were drawn against the skies. The braces, shrouds, stays and halyards, were all plain enough, and I could point to either, at a moment's notice; but when it came to the rest of the running rigging, I found it necessary to look a little, before I could speak with certainty. Eager as I was to ship, the indulgence of gazing at all I saw was so attractive, that it was noon before we reached an Indiaman. This was a pretty little ship of about four hundred tons, that was called the John. Little I say, for such she would now be thought, though a vessel of her size was then termed large. The Manhattan, much the largest ship out of the port, measured but about seven hundred tons; while few even of the Indiamen went much beyond five hundred. I can see the John at this moment, near fifty years after I first laid eyes on her, as she then appeared. She was not bright-sided, but had a narrow, cream-coloured streak, broken into ports. She was a straight, black-looking craft, with a handsome billet, low, thin bulwarks, and waistcloths secured to ridge-ropes. Her larger spars were painted the same colour as her streak, and her stern had a few ornaments of a similar tint. We went on board the John, where we found the officers just topping off with the riggers and stevedores, having stowed all the provisions and water, and the mere trifle of cargo she carried. The mate, whose name was Marble, and a well-veined bit of marble he was, his face resembling a map that had more rivers drawn on it than the land could feed, winked at the captain and nodded his head towards us as soon as we met his eye. The latter smiled, but did not speak. “Walk this way, gentlemen--walk this way, if you please,” said Mr. Marble, encouragingly, passing a ball of spun-yarn, all the while, to help a rigger serve a rope. “When did you leave the country?” This produced a general laugh, even the yellow rascal of a mulatto, who was passing into the cabin with some crockery, grinning in our faces at this salutation. I saw it was now or never, and determined not to be brow-beaten, while I was too truthful to attempt to pass for that I was not. “We left home last night, thinking to be in time to find berths in one of the Indiamen that is to sail this week.” “Not _this_ week, my son--not till _next_,” said Mr. Marble, jocularly. “Sunday is _the_ day. We run from Sunday to Sunday--the better day, the better deed, you know. How did you leave father and mother?” “I have neither,” I answered, almost choked. “My mother died a few months since, and my father, Captain Wallingford, has now been dead some years.” The master of the John was a man of about fifty, red-faced, hard-looking, pock-marked, square-rigged, and of an exterior that promised anything but sentiment. Feeling, however, he did manifest, the moment I mentioned my father's name. He ceased his employment, came close to me, gazed earnestly in my face, and even looked kind. “Are you a son of Captain Miles Wallingford?” he asked in a low voice--“of Miles Wallingford, from up the river?” “I am, sir; his only son. He left but two of us, a son and a daughter; and, though under no necessity to work at all, I wish to make this Miles Wallingford as good a seaman as the last, and, I hope, as honest a man.” This was said manfully, and with a spirit that must have pleased; for I was shaken cordially by the hand, welcomed on board, invited into the cabin, and asked to take a seat at a table on which the dinner had just been placed. Rupert, of course, shared in all these favours. Then followed the explanations. Captain Robbins, of the John, had first gone to sea with my father, for whom I believe he entertained a profound respect. He had even served with him once as mate, and talked as if he felt that he had been under obligations to him. He did not question me very closely, seeming to think it natural enough that Miles Wallingford's only son should wish to be a seaman. As we sat at the table, even, it was agreed that Rupert and I should join the ship, as green hands, the very next morning, signing the articles as soon as we went on shore. This was done accordingly, and I had the felicity of writing Miles Wallingford to the roll d'equipage, to the tune of eighteen dollars per month--seamen then actually receiving thirty and thirty-five dollars per month--wages. Rupert was taken also, though Captain Robbins cut _him_ down to thirteen dollars, saying, in a jesting way, that a parson's son could hardly be worth as much as the son of one of the best old ship-masters who ever sailed out of America. He was a shrewd observer of men and things, this new friend of mine, and I believe understood “by the cut of his jib” that Rupert was not likely to make a weather-earing man. The money, however, was not of much account in our calculations; and lucky enough did I think myself in finding so good a berth, almost as soon as looked for. We returned to the tavern and staid that night, taking a formal leave of Neb, who was to carry the good news home, as soon as the sloop should sail. In the morning a cart was loaded with our effects, the bill was discharged, and we left the tavern. I had the precaution not to go directly alongside the ship. On the contrary, we proceeded to an opposite part of the town, placing the bags on a wharf resorted to by craft from New Jersey, as if we intended to go on board one of them. The cartman took his quarter, and drove off, troubling himself very little about the future movements of two young sailors. Waiting half an hour, another cart was called, when we went to the John, and were immediately installed in her forecastle. Captain Robbins had provided us both with chests, paid for out of the three months' advance, and in them we found the slops necessary for so long a voyage. Rupert and I immediately put on suits of these new clothes, with regular little round tarpaulins, which so much altered us in appearance, even from those produced by our Ulster county fittings, that we scarce knew each other. Rupert now went on deck to lounge and smoke a segar, while I went aloft, visiting every yard, and touching all three of the trucks, before I returned from this, my exploring expedition. The captain and mates and riggers smiled at my movements, and I overheard the former telling his mate that I was “old Miles over again.” In a word, all parties seemed pleased with the arrangement that had been made; I had told the officers aft of my knowledge of the names and uses of most of the ropes; and never did I feel so proud as when Mr. Marble called out, in a loud tone-- “D'ye hear there, Miles--away aloft and unreeve them fore-top-gallant halyards, and send an end down to haul up this new rope, to reeve a fresh set.” Away I went, my head buzzing with the complicated order, and yet I had a very tolerable notion of what was to be done. The unreeving might have been achieved by any one, and I got through with that without difficulty; and, the mate himself helping me and directing me from the deck, the new rope was rove with distinguished success. This was the first duty I ever did in a ship, and I was prouder of it than of any that was subsequently performed by the same individual. The whole time I was thus occupied, Rupert stood lounging against the foot of the main-stay, smoking his segar like a burgomaster. His turn came next, however, the captain sending for him to the cabin, where he set him at work to copy some papers. Rupert wrote a beautiful hand, and he wrote rapidly. That evening I heard the chief-mate tell the dickey that the parson's son was likely to turn out a regular “barber's clerk” to the captain. “The old man,” he added, “makes so many traverses himself on a bit of paper, that he hardly knows at which end to begin to read it; and I shouldn't wonder if he just stationed this chap, with a quill behind his ear, for the v'y'ge.” For the next two or three days I was delightfully busy, passing half the time aloft. All the sails were to be bent, and I had my full share in the performance of this duty. I actually furled the mizen-royal with my own hands--the ship carrying standing royals--and it was said to be very respectably done; a little rag-baggish in the bunt, perhaps, but secured in a way that took the next fellow who touched the gasket five minutes to cast the sail loose. Then it rained, and sails were to be loosened to dry. I let everything fall forward with my own hands, and, when we came to roll up the canvass again, I actually managed all three of the royals alone; one at a time, of course. My father had taught me to make a flat-knot, a bowline, a clove-hitch, two half-hitches, and such sort of things; and I got through with both a long and a short splice tolerably well. I found all this, and the knowledge I had gained from my model-ship at home of great use to me; so much so, indeed, as to induce even that indurated bit of mortality, Marble, to say I “was the ripest piece of green stuff he had ever fallen in with.” All this time, Rupert was kept at quill-driving. Once he got leave to quit the ship--it was the day before we sailed--and I observed he went ashore in his long-togs, of which each of us had one suit. I stole away the same afternoon to find the post-office, and worked up-stream as far as Broadway, not knowing exactly which way to shape my course. In that day, everybody who was anybody, and unmarried, promenaded the west side of this street, from the Battery to St. Paul's Church, between the hours of twelve and half-past two, wind and weather permitting. There I saw Rupert, in his country guise, nothing remarkable, of a certainty, strutting about with the best of them, and looking handsome in spite of his rusticity. It was getting late, and he left the street just as I saw him. I followed, waiting until we got to a private place before I would speak to him, however, as I knew he would be mortified to be taken for the friend of a Jack-tar, in such a scene. Rupert entered a door, and then reappeared with a letter in his hand. He, too, had gone to the post-office, and I no longer hesitated about joining him. “Is it from Clawbonny?” I asked, eagerly. “If so, from Lucy, doubtless?” “From Clawbonny--but from Grace,” he answered, with a slight change of colour. “I desired the poor girl to let me know how things passed off, after we left them; and as for Lucy, her pot-hooks are so much out of the way, I never want to see them.” I felt hurt, offended, that my sister should write to any youngster but myself. It is true, the letter was to a bosom friend, a co-adventurer, one almost a child of the same family; and I had come to the office expecting to get a letter from Rupert's sister, who had promised, while weeping on the wharf, to do exactly the same thing for me; but there _is_ a difference between one's sister writing to another young man, and another young man's sister writing to oneself. I cannot even now explain it; but that there _is_ a difference I am sure. Without asking to see a line that Grace had written, I went into the office, and returned in a minute or two, with an air of injured dignity, holding Lucy's epistle in my hand. After all, there was nothing in either letter to excite much sensibility. Each was written with the simplicity, truth and feeling of a generous-minded, warm-hearted female friend, of an age not to distrust her own motives, to a lad who bad no right to view the favour other than it was, as an evidence of early and intimate friendship. Both epistles are now before me, and I copy them, as the shortest way of letting the reader know the effect our disappearance had produced at Clawbonny. That of Grace was couched in the following terms: DEAR RUPERT: Clawbonny was in commotion at nine o'clock this morning, and well it might be! When your father's anxiety got to be painful, I told him the whole, and gave him the letters. I am sorry to say, he wept. I wish never to see such a sight again. The tears of two such silly girls as Lucy and I, are of little account--but, Rupert, to behold an aged man we love and respect like him, a minister of the gospel too, in tears! It was a hard sight to bear. He did not reproach us for our silence, saying he did not see, after our promises, how we could well do otherwise. I gave your reasons about “responsibility in the premises;” but I don't think he understood them. Is it too late to return? The boat that carried you down can bring you back; and oh! how much rejoiced shall we all be to see you! Wherever you go, and whatever you do, boys, for I write as much to one as to the other, and only address to Rupert because he so earnestly desired it; but wherever you go, and whatever you do, remember the instructions you have both received in youth, and how much all of us are interested in your conduct and happiness. Affectionately, yours, GRACE WALLINGFORD. To Mr. Rupert Hardinge. Lucy had been less guarded, and possibly a little more honest. She wrote as follows: DEAR MILES: I believe I cried for one whole hour after you and Rupert left us, and, now it is all over, I am vexed at having cried so much about two such foolish fellows. Grace has told you all about my dear, dear father, who cried too. I declare, I don't know when I was so frightened! I thought it _must_ bring you back, as soon as you hear of it. What will be done, I do not know; but _something_, I am certain Whenever father is in earnest, he says but little. I know he is in earnest _now_. I believe Grace and I do nothing but think of you; that is, she of _you_, and I of Rupert; and a little the other way, too--so now you have the whole truth. Do not fail, on any account, to write before you go to sea, if you _do_ go to sea, as I hope and trust you will not. Good-bye. LUCY HARDINGE. To Mr. Miles Wallingford. P.S. Neb's mother protests, if the boy is not home by Saturday night, she will go after him. No such disgrace as a runaway ever befel her or hers, and she says she will not submit to it. But I suppose we shall see _him_ soon, and with him _letters_. Now, Neb had taken his leave, but no letter had been trusted to his care. As often happens, I regretted the mistake when it was too late; and all that day I thought how disappointed Lucy would be, when she came to see the negro empty-handed. Rupert and I parted in the street, as he did not wish to walk with a sailor, while in his own long-togs. He did not _say_ as much; but I knew him well enough to ascertain it, without his speaking. I was walking very fast in the direction of the ship, and had actually reached the wharves, when, in turning a corner, I came plump upon Mr. Hardinge. My guardian was walking slowly, his face sorrowful and dejected, and his eyes fastened on every ship he passed, as if looking for his boys. He saw me, casting a vacant glance over my person; but I was so much changed by dress, and particularly by the little tarpaulin, that he did not know me. Anxiety immediately drew his look towards the vessels, and I passed him unobserved. Mr. Hardinge was walking _from_, and I _towards_ the John, and of course all my risk terminated as soon as out of sight. That evening I had the happiness of being under-way, in a real full-rigged ship. It is true, it was under very short canvass, and merely to go into the stream. Taking advantage of a favourable wind and tide, the John left the wharf under her jib, main-top-mast staysail, and spanker, and dropped down as low as the Battery, when she sheered into the other channel and anchored. Here I was, then, fairly at anchor in the stream, Half a mile from any land but the bottom, and burning to see the ocean. That afternoon the crew came on board, a motley collection, of lately drunken seamen, of whom about half were Americans, and the rest natives of as many different countries as there were men. Mr. Marble scanned them with a knowing look, and, to my surprise, he told the captain there was good stuff among them. It seems he was a better judge than I was myself, for a more unpromising set of wretches, as to looks, I never saw grouped together. A few, it is true, appeared well enough; but most of them had the air of having been dragged through--a place I will not name, though it is that which sailors usually quote when describing themselves on such occasions. But Jack, after he has been a week at sea, and Jack coming on board to duty, after a month of excesses on shore, are very different creatures, morally and physically. I now began to regret that I had not seen a little of the town. In 1797, New York could not have had more than fifty thousand inhabitants, though it was just as much of a paragon then, in the eyes of all good Americans, as it is today. It is a sound patriotic rule to maintain that _our_ best is always _the_ best, for it never puts us in the wrong. I have seen enough of the world since to understand that we get a great many things wrong-end foremost, in this country of ours; undervaluing those advantages and excellencies of which we have great reason to be proud, and boasting of others that, to say the least, are exceedingly equivocal. But it takes time to learn all this, and I have no intention of getting ahead of my story, or of my country; the last being a most suicidal act. We received the crew of a Saturday afternoon, and half of them turned in immediately. Rupert and I had a good berth, intending to turn in and out together, during the voyage; and this made us rather indifferent to the movements of the rest of our extraordinary associates. The kid, at supper, annoyed us both a little; the notion of seeing one's food in a round _trough_, to be tumbled over and cut from by all hands, being particularly disagreeable to those who have been accustomed to plates, knives and forks, and such other superfluities. I confess I thought of Grace's and Lucy's little white hands, and of silver sugrar-toogs, and of clean plates and glasses, and table-cloths--napkins and silver forks were then unknown in America, except on the very best tables, and not always on them, unless on high days and holidays--as we were going through the unsophisticated manipulations of this first supper. Forty-seven years have elapsed, and the whole scene is as vivid to my mind at this moment, as if it occurred last night. I wished myself one of the long-snouted tribe, several times, in order to be in what is called “keeping.” I had the honour of keeping an anchor-watch in company with a grum old Swede, as we lay in the Hudson. The wind was light, and the ship had a good berth, so my associate chose a soft plank, told me to give him a call should anything happen, and lay down to sleep away his two hours in comfort. Not so with me. I strutted the deck with as much importance as if the weight of the State lay on my shoulders--paid a visit every five minutes to the bows, to see that the cable had not parted, and that the anchor did not “come home”--and then looked aloft, to ascertain that everything was in its place. Those were a happy two hours! About ten next morning, being Sunday, and, as Mr. Marble expressed it, “the better day, the better deed,” the pilot came off, and all hands were called to “up anchor.” The cook, cabin-boy, Rupert and I, were entrusted with the duty of “fleeting jig” and breaking down the coils of the cable, the handspikes requiring heavier hands than ours. The anchor was got in without any difficulty, however, when Rupert and I were sent aloft to loose the fore-top-sail. Rupert got into the top via the lubber's hole, I am sorry to say, and the loosing of the sail on both yard-arms fell to my duty. A hand was on the fore-yard, and I was next ordered up to loose the top-gallant-sail. Canvass began to fall and open all over the ship, the top-sails were mast-headed, and, as I looked down from the fore-top-mast cross-trees, where I remained to overhaul the clew-lines, I saw that the ship was falling off, and that her sails were filling with a stiff north-west breeze. Just as my whole being was entranced with the rapture of being under-way for Canton, which was then called the Indies, Rupert called out to me from the top. Ha was pointing at some object on the water, and, turning, I saw a boat within a hundred feet of the ship. In her was Mr. Hardinge, who at that moment caught sight of us. But the ship's sails were now all full, and no one on deck saw, or at least heeded, the boat. The John glided past it, and, the last I saw of my venerated guardian, he was standing erect, bare-headed, holding both arms extended, as if entreating us not to desert him! Presently the ship fell off so much, that the after-sails hid him from my view. I descended into the top, where I found Rupert had shrunk down out of sight, looking frightened and guilty. As for myself, I got behind the head of the mast, and fairly sobbed. This lasted a few minutes, when an order from the mate called us both below. When I reached the deck, the boat was already a long distance astern, and had evidently given up the idea of boarding us. I do not know whether I felt the most relieved or pained by the certainty of this fact.

4

None

“There is a tide in the affairs of men, Which, taken at the flood, leads on to fortune Omitted, all the voyage of their life Is bound in shallows, and in miseries. On such a full sea are we now afloat; And we must take the current when it serves, Or lose our ventures.” Brutus--Julius Caesar. In four hours from the time when Rupert and I last saw Mr. Hardinge, the ship was at sea. She crossed the bar, and started on her long journey, with a fresh north-wester, and with everything packed on that she would bear. We took a diagonal course out of the bight formed by the coasts of Long Island and New Jersey, and sunk the land entirely by the middle of the afternoon. I watched the highlands of Navesink, as they vanished like watery clouds in the west, and then I felt I was at last fairly out of sight of land. But a foremast hand has little opportunity for indulging in sentimen, as he quits his native shore; and few, I fancy, have the disposition. As regards the opportunity, anchors are to be got in off the bows, and stowed; cables are to be unbent and coiled down; studding-gear is to be hauled out and got ready; frequently boom-irons are to be placed upon the yards, and the hundred preparations made, that render the work of a ship as ceaseless a round of activity as that of a house. This kept us all busy until night, when the watches were told off and set. I was in the larboard, or chief-mate's watch, having actually been chosen by that hard-featured old seaman, the fourth man he named; an honour for which I was indebted to the activity I had already manifested aloft. Rupert was less distinguished, being taken by the captain for the second-mate's watch, the very last person chosen. That night Mr. Marble dropped a few hints on the subject, which let me into the secret of these two selections. “You and I will get along well together, I see that plainly, Miles,” he said, “for there's quicksilver in your body. As for your friend in t'other watch, it's all as it should be; the captain has got one hand the most, and such as he is, he is welcome to him. He'll blacken more writing paper this v'y'ge, I reckon, than he'll tar down riggin'.” I thought it odd, however, that Rupert, who had been so forward in all the preliminaries of our adventure, should fall so far astern in its first practical results. It is not my intention to dwell on all the minute incidents of this, my first voyage to sea, else would it spin out the narrative unnecessarily, and render my task as fatiguing to the reader, as it might prove to myself. One occurrence, however, which took place three days out, must be mentioned, as it will prove to be connected with important circumstances in the end. The ship was now in order, and was at least two hundred leagues from the land, having had a famous run off the coast, when the voice of the cook, who had gone below for water, was heard down among the casks, in such a clamour as none but a black can raise, with all his loquacity awakened. “There's _two_ niggers at that work!” exclaimed Mr. Marble, after listening an instant, glancing his eye round to make certain the mulatto steward was not in the discussion. “No _one_ darkey ever could make all that outcry. Bear a hand below, Miles, and see if Africa has come aboard us in the night.” I was in the act of obeying, when Cato, the cook, was seen rising through the steerage-hatch, dragging after him the dark poll of another black, whom he had gripped by the wool. In an instant both were on deck, when, to my astonishment, I discovered the agitated countenance of Nebuchadnezzar Clawbonny. Of course the secret was out, the instant the lad's glistening features were recognised. Neb, in a word, had managed to get on board the ship before she hauled out into the stream, and lay concealed among the water-casks, his pockets crammed with ginger-bread and apples, until discovered by the cook, in one of his journeys in quest of water. The food of the lad had been gone twenty-four hours, and it is not probable the fellow could have remained concealed much longer, had not this discovery taken place. The instant he was on deck, Neb looked eagerly around to ascertain how far the ship had got from the land, and, seeing nothing but water on every side of him, he fairly grinned with delight. This exasperated Mr. Marble, who thought it was adding insult to injury, and he gave the lad a cuff on the ear that would have set a white reeling. On Neb, however, this sharp blow produced no effect, falling as it did on the impregnable part of his system. “Oh! you're a nigger, be you?” exclaimed the mate, waxing warmer and warmer, as he: fancied himself baffled by the other's powers of endurance. “Take that, and let us see if you're full-blooded!” A smart rap on the shin accompanying these words, Neb gave in on the instant. He begged for mercy, and professed a readiness to tell all, protesting he was not “a runaway nigger”--a term the mate used while applying the kicks. I now interfered, by telling Mr. Marble, with all the respect due from a green hand to a chief-mate, who Neb really was, and what I supposed to be his motives for following me to the ship. This revelation cost me a good deal in the end, the idea of Jack's having a “waiting-man” on board giving rise to a great many jokes at my expense, during the rest of the voyage. Had I not been so active, and so _willing,_ a great source of favour on board a ship, it is probable these jokes would have been much broader and more frequent. As it was, they annoyed me a good deal; and it required a strong exercise of all the boyish regard I really entertained for Neb, to refrain from turning-to and giving him a sound threshing for his exploit, at the first good occasion. And yet, what was his delinquency compared to my own? He had followed his master out of deep affection, blended somewhat, it is true, with a love of adventure; while, in one sense, I had violated all the ties of the heart, merely to indulge the latter passion. The captain coming on deck, Neb's story was told, and, finding that no wages would be asked in behalf of this athletic, healthy, young negro, he had no difficulty in receiving him into favour. To Neb's great delight, he was sent forward to take his share on the yards and in the rigging, there being no vacancy for him to fill about the camboose, or in the cabin. In an hour the negro was fed, and he was regularly placed in the starboard-watch. I was rejoiced at this last arrangement, as it put the fellow in a watch different from my own, and prevented his officious efforts to do my work. Rupert, I discovered, however, profited often by his zeal, employing the willing black on every possible occasion. On questioning Neb, I ascertained that he had taken the boat round to the Wallingford, and had made use of a dollar or two I had given him at parting, to board in a house suitable to his colour, until the ship was ready for sea, when he got on board, and stowed himself among the water-casks, as mentioned. Neb's apparition soon ceased to be a subject of discourse, and his zeal quickly made him a general favourite. Hardy, strong, resolute, and accustomed to labour, he was early of great use in all the heavy drags; and aloft, even, though less quick than a white would have been, he got to be serviceable and reasonably expert. My own progress--and I say it without vanity, but simply because it was true--was the subject of general remark. One week made me familiar with the running gear; and, by that time, I could tell a rope by its size, the manner in which it led, and the place where it was belayed, in the darkest night, as well as the oldest seaman on board. It is true, my model-ship had prepared the way for much of this expertness; but, free from all seasickness, of which I never had a moment in my life, I set about learning these things in good earnest, and was fully rewarded for my pains. I passed the weather-earing of the mizen-top-sail when we had been out a fortnight, and went to those of the fore and main before we crossed the line. The mate put me forward on all occasions, giving me much instruction in private; and the captain neglected no opportunity of giving me useful hints, or practical ideas. I asked, and was allowed to take my regular trick at the wheel, before we got into the latitude of St. Helena; and from that time did my full share of seaman's duly on board, the nicer work of knotting, splicing, &c., excepted. These last required a little more time; but I am satisfied that, in all things but judgment, a clever lad, who has a taste for the business, can make himself a very useful and respectable mariner in six months of active service. China voyages seldom produce much incident. If the moment of sailing has been judiciously timed, the ship has fair winds much of the way, and generally moderate weather. To be sure, there are points on the long road that usually give one a taste of what the seas sometimes are; but, on the whole, a Canton voyage, though a long one, cannot be called a rough one. As a matter of course, we had gales, and squalls, and the usual vicissitudes of the ocean, to contend with, though our voyage to Canton might have been called quiet, rather than the reverse. We were four months under our canvass, and, when we anchored in the river, the clewing up of our sails, and getting from beneath their shadows, resembled the rising of a curtain on some novel scenic representation. John Chinaman, however, has been so often described, particularly of late, that I shall not dwell on his peculiarities. Sailors, as a class, are very philosophical, so far as the peculiarities and habits of strangers are concerned, appearing to think it beneath the dignity of those who visit all lands, to betray wonder at the novelties of any. It so happened that no man on board the John, the officers, steward and cook excepted, had ever doubled the Cape of Good Hope before this voyage; and yet our crew regarded the shorn polls, slanting eyes, long queues, clumsy dresses, high cheek-bones, and lumbering shoes, of the people they now saw for the first time, with just as much indifference as they would have encountered a new fashion at home. Most of them, indeed, had seen, or fancied they had seen, much stranger sights in the different countries they had visited; it being a standing rule, with Jack to compress everything that is wonderful into the “last voyage”--that in which he is engaged for the present time being usually set down as common-place, and unworthy of particular comment. On this principle, _my_ Canton excursion _ought_ to be full of marvels, as it was the progenitor of all that I subsequently saw and experienced as a sailor. Truth compels me to confess, notwithstanding, that it was one of the least wonderful of all the voyages I ever made, until near its close. We lay some months in the river, getting cargo, receiving teas, nankins, silks and other articles, as our supercargo could lay hands on them. In all this time, we saw just as much of the Chinese as it is usual for strangers to see, and not a jot more. I was much up at the factories, with the captain, having charge of his boat; and, as for Rupert, he passed most of his working-hours either busy with the supercargo ashore, or writing in the cabin. I got a good insight, however, into the uses of the serving-mallet, the fid, marlinspike and winch, and did something with the needle and palm. Marble was very good to me, in spite of his nor-west face, and never let slip an occasion to give a useful hint. I believe my exertions on the outward-bound passage fully equalled expectations, and the officers had a species of pride in helping to make Captain Wallingford's son worthy of his honourable descent. I had taken occasion to let it be known that Rupert's great-grandfather had been a man-of-war captain; but the suggestion was met by a flat, refusal to believe it from Mr. Kite, the second-mate, though Mr. Marble remarked it _might_ be so, as I admitted that both his father and grandfather had been, or were, in the Church. My friend seemed fated to achieve nothing but the glory of a “barber's clerk.” Our hatches were got on and battened down, and we sailed for home early in the spring of 1798. The ship had a good run across the China Sea, and reached the Indies in rather a short passage. We had cleared all the islands, and were fairly in the Indian Ocean, when an adventure occurred, which was the first really worthy of being related that we met in the whole voyage. I shall give it, in as few words as possible. We had cleared the Straits of Sunda early in the morning, and had made a pretty fair run in the course of the day, though most of the time in thick weather. Just as the sun set, however, the horizon became clear, and we got a sight of two small sail seemingly heading in towards the coast of Sumatra, proas by their rig and dimensions. They were so distant, and were so evidently steering for the land, that no one gave them much thought, or bestowed on them any particular attention. Proas in that quarter were usually distrusted by ships, it is true; but the sea is full of them, and far more are innocent than are guilty of any acts of violence. Then it became dark soon after these craft were seen, and night shut them in. An hour after the sun had set, the wind fell to a light air, that just kept steerage-way on the ship. Fortunately, the John was not only fast, but she minded her helm, as a light-footed girl turns in a lively dance. I never was in a better-steering ship, most especially in moderate weather. Mr. Marble had the middle watch that night, and of course I was on deck from midnight until four in the morning. It proved misty most of the watch, and for quite an hour we had a light drizzling rain. The ship, the whole time, was close-hauled, carrying royals. As everybody seemed to have made up his mind to a quiet night, one without any reefing or furling, most of the watch were sleeping about the decks, or wherever they could get good quarters, and be least in the way. I do not know what kept me awake, for lads of my age are apt to get all the sleep they can; but I believe I was thinking of Clawbonny, and Grace, and Lucy; for the latter, excellent girl as she was, often crossed my mind in those days of youth and comparative innocence. Awake I was, and walking in the weather-gangway, in a sailor's trot. Mr. Marble, he I do believe was fairly snoozing on the hen-coops, being, like the sails, as one might say, barely “asleep.” At that moment I heard a noise, one familiar to seamen; that of an oar falling in a boat. So completely was my mind bent on other and distant scenes, that at first I felt no surprise, as if we were in a harbour surrounded by craft of various sizes, coming and going at all hours. But a second thought destroyed this illusion, and I looked eagerly about me. Directly on our weather-bow, distant perhaps a cable's length, I saw a small sail, and I could distinguish it sufficiently well to perceive it was a proa. I sang out “Sail ho! and close aboard!” Mr. Marble was on his feet in an instant. He afterwards told me that when he opened his eyes, for he admitted this much to me in confidence, they fell directly on the stranger. He was too much of a seaman to require a second look, in order to ascertain what was to be done. “Keep the ship away--keep her broad off!” he called out to the man at the wheel. “Lay the yards square--call all hands, one of you--Captain Robbins, Mr. Kite, bear a hand up; the bloody proas are aboard us!” The last part of this call was uttered in a loud voice, with the speaker's head down the companion-way. It was heard plainly enough below, but scarcely at all on deck. In the mean time, everybody was in motion. It is amazing how soon sailors are wide awake when there is really anything to do! It appeared to me that all our people mustered on deck in less than a minute, most of them with nothing on but their shirts and trowsers. The ship was nearly before the wind, by the time I heard the captain's voice; and then Mr. Kite came bustling in among us forward, ordering most of the men to lay aft to the braces, remaining himself on the forecastle, and keeping me with him to let go the sheets. On the forecastle, the strange sail was no longer visible, being now abaft the beam; but I could hear Mr. Marble swearing there were two of them, and that they must be the very chaps we had seen to leeward, and standing in for the land, at sunset. I also heard the captain calling out to the steward to bring him a powder-horn. Immediately after, orders were given to let fly all our sheets forward, and then I perceived that they were waring ship. Nothing saved us but the prompt order of Mr. Marble to keep the ship away, by which means, instead of moving towards the proas, we instantly began to move from them. Although they went three feet to our two, this gave us a moment of breathing time. As our sheets were all flying forward, and remained so for a few minutes, it gave me leisure to look about. I soon saw both proas, and glad enough was I to perceive that they had not approached materially nearer. Mr. Kite observed this also, and remarked that our movements had been so prompt as “to take the rascals aback.” He meant, they did not exactly know what we were at, and had not kept away with us. At this instant, the captain and five or six of the oldest seamen began to cast loose all our starboard, or weather guns, four in all, and sixes. We had loaded these guns in the Straits of Banca, with grape and canister, in readiness for just such pirates as were now coming down upon us; and nothing was wanting but the priming and a hot logger-head. It seems two of the last had been ordered in the fire, when we saw the proas at sunset; and they were now in excellent condition for service, live coals being kept around them all night by command. I saw a cluster of men busy with the second gun from forward, and could distinguish the captain pointing it. “There cannot well be any mistake, Mr. Marble?” the captain observed, hesitating whether to fire or not. “Mistake, sir? Lord, Captain Robbins, you might cannonade any of the islands astarn for a week, and never hurt an honest man. Let 'em have it, sir; I'll answer for it, you do good.” This settled the matter. The loggerhead was applied, and one of our sixes spoke out in a smart report. A breathless stillness succeeded. The proas did not alter their course, but neared us fast. The captain levelled his night-glass, and I heard him tell Kite, in a low voice, that they were full of men. The word was now passed to clear away all the guns, and to open the arm-chest, to come at the muskets and pistols. I heard the rattling of the boarding-pikes, too, as they were cut adrift from the spanker-boom, and fell upon the deck. All this sounded very ominous, and I began to think we should have a desperate engagement first, and then have all our throats cut afterwards. I expected now to hear the guns discharged in quick succession, but they were got ready only, not fired. Kite went aft, and returned with three or four muskets, and as many pikes. He gave the latter to those of the people who had nothing to do with the guns. By this time the ship was on a wind, steering a good full, while the two proas were just abeam, and closing fast. The stillness that reigned on both sides was like that of death. The proas, however, fell a little more astern; the result of their own manoeuvring, out of all doubt, as they moved through the water much faster than the ship, seeming desirous of dropping into our wake, with a design of closing under our stern, and avoiding our broad-side. As this would never do, and the wind freshened so as to give us four or five knot way, a most fortunate circumstance for us, the captain determined to tack while he had room. The John behaved beautifully, and came round like a top. The proas saw there was no time to lose, and attempted to close before we could fill again; and this they would have done with ninety-nine ships in a hundred. The captain knew his vessel, however, and did not let her lose her way, making everything draw again as it might be by instinct. The proas tacked, too, and, laying up much nearer to the wind than we did, appeared as if about to close on our lee-bow. The question was, now, whether we could pass them or not before they got near enough to grapple. If the pirates got on board us, we were hopelessly gone; and everything depended on coolness and judgment. The captain behaved perfectly well in this critical instant, commanding a dead silence, and the closest attention to his orders. I was too much interested at this moment to feel the concern that I might otherwise have experienced. On the forecastle, it appeared to us all that we should be boarded in a minute, for one of the proas was actually within a hundred feet, though losing her advantage a little by getting under the lee of our sails. Kite had ordered us to muster forward of the rigging, to meet the expected leap with a discharge of muskets, and then to present our pikes, when I felt an arm thrown around my body, and was turned in-board, while another person assumed my place. This was Neb, who had thus coolly thrust himself before me, in order to meet the danger first. I felt vexed, even while touched with the fellow's attachment and self-devotion, but had no time to betray either feeling before the crews of the proas gave a yell, and discharged some fifty or sixty matchlocks at us. The air was full of bullets, but they all went over our heads. Not a soul on board the John was hurt. On our side, we gave the gentlemen the four sixes, two at the nearest and two at the sternmost proa, which was still near a cable's length distant. As often happens, the one seemingly farthest from danger, fared the worst. Our grape and canister had room to scatter, and I can at this distant day still hear the shrieks that arose from that craft! They were like the yells of fiends in anguish. The effect on that proa was instantaneous; instead of keeping on after her consort, she wore short round on her heel, and stood away in our wake, on the other tack, apparently to get out of the range of our fire. I doubt if we touched a man in the nearest proa. At any rate, no noise proceeded from her, and she came up under our bows fast. As every gun was discharged, and there was not time to load them, all now depended on repelling the boarders. Part of our people mustered in the waist, where it was expected the proa would fall alongside, and part on the forecastle. Just as this distribution was made, the pirates cast their grapnel. It was admirably thrown, but caught only by a ratlin. I saw this, and was about to jump into the rigging to try what I could do to clear it, when Neb again went ahead of me, and cut the ratlin with his knife. This was just as the pirates had abandoned sails and oars, and had risen to haul up alongside. So sudden was the release, that twenty of them fell over by their own efforts. In this state the ship passed ahead, all her canvass being full, leaving the proa motionless in her wake. In passing, however, the two vessels were so near, that those aft in the John distinctly saw the swarthy faces of their enemies. We were no sooner clear of the proas than the order was given, “ready about!” The helm was put down, and the ship came into the wind in a minute. As we came square with the two proas, all our larboard guns were given to them, and this ended the affair. I think the nearest of the rascals got it this time, for away she went, after her consort, both running off towards the islands. We made a little show of chasing, but it was only a feint; for we were too glad to get away from them, to be in earnest. In ten minutes after we tacked the last time, we ceased firing, having thrown some eight or ten round-shot after the proas, and were close-hauled again, heading to the south-west. It is not to be supposed we went to sleep again immediately. Neb was the only man on board who did, but he never missed an occasion to eat or sleep. The captain praised us, and, as a matter of course in that day, he called all hands to “splice the main-brace.” After this, the watch was told to go below, as regularly as if nothing had happened. As for the captain himself, he and Mr. Marble and Mr. Kite went prying about the ship to ascertain if anything material had been cut by what the chief-mate called “the bloody Indian matchlocks.” A little running-rigging had suffered, and we had to reeve a few new ropes in the morning; but this terminated the affair. I need hardly say, all hands of us were exceedingly proud of our exploit. Everybody was praised but Neb, who, being a “nigger,” was in some way or other overlooked. I mentioned his courage and readiness to Mr. Marble, but I could excite in no one else the same respect for the poor fellow's conduct, that I certainly felt myself. I have since lived long enough to know that as the gold of the rich attracts to itself the gold of the poor, so do the deeds of the unknown go to swell the fame of the known. This is as true of nations, and races, and families, as it is of individuals; poor Neb belonging to a proscribed colour, it was not in reason to suppose he could ever acquire exactly the same credit as a white man. “Them darkies do sometimes blunder on a lucky idee,” answered Mr. Marble to one of my earnest representations, “and I've known chaps among 'em that were almost as knowing as dullish whites; but everything out of the common way with 'em is pretty much chance. As for Neb, however, I will say this for him; that, for a nigger, he takes things quicker than any of his colour I ever sailed with. Then he has no sa'ce, and that is a good deal with a black. White sa'ce is bad enough; but that of a nigger is unbearable.” Alas! Neb. Born in slavery, accustomed to consider it arrogance to think of receiving even his food until the meanest white had satisfied his appetite, submissive, unrepining, laborious and obedient--the highest eulogium that all these patient and unobtrusive qualities could obtain, was a reluctant acknowledgment that he had “no sa'ce.” His quickness and courage saved the John, nevertheless; and I have always said it, and ever shall. A day after the affair of the proas, all hands of us began to brag. Even the captain was a little seized with this mania; and as for Marble, he was taken so badly, that, had I not known he behaved well in the emergency, I certainly should have set him down as a Bobadil. Rupert manifested this feeling, too, though I heard he did his duty that night. The result of all the talk was to convert the affair into a very heroic exploit; and it subsequently figured in the journals as one of the deeds that illustrate the American name. From the time we were rid of the proas, the ship got along famously until we were as far west as about 52°, when the wind came light from the southward and westward, with thick weather. The captain had been two or three times caught in here, and he took it into his head that the currents would prove more favourable, could he stand in closer to the coast of Madagascar than common. Accordingly, we brought the ship on a bowline, and headed up well to the northward and westward. We were a week on this tack, making from fifty to a hundred miles a day, expecting hourly to see the land. At length we made it, enormously high mountains, apparently a long distance from us, though, as we afterwards ascertained, a long distance inland; and we continued to near it. The captain had a theory of his own about the currents of this part of the ocean, and, having set one of the peaks by compass, at the time the land was seen, he soon convinced himself, and everybody else whom he tried to persuade, Marble excepted, that we were setting to windward with visible speed. Captain Robbins was a well-meaning, but somewhat dull man; and, when dull men, become theorists, they usually make sad work with the practice. All that night we stood on to the northward and westward, though Mr. Marble had ventured a remonstrance concerning a certain head-land that was just visible, a little on our weather-bow. The captain snapped his fingers at this, however; laying down a course of reasoning, which, if it were worth anything, ought to have convinced the mate that the weatherly set of the current would carry us ten leagues to the southward and westward of that cape, before morning. On this assurance, we prepared to pass a quiet and comfortable night. I had the morning watch, and when I came on deck, at four, there was no change in the weather. Mr. Marble soon appeared, and he walked into the waist, where I was leaning on the weather-rail, and fell into discourse. This he often did, sometimes so far forgetting the difference in our stations _afloat_--not _ashore_; _there_ I had considerably the advantage of him--as occasionally to call me “sir.” I always paid for this inadvertency, however, it usually putting a stop to the communications for the time being. In one instance, he took such prompt revenge for this implied admission of equality, as literally to break off short in the discourse, and to order me, in his sharpest key, to go aloft and send some studding-sails on deck, though they all had to be sent aloft again, and set, in the course of the same watch. But offended dignity is seldom considerate, and not always consistent. “A quiet night, Master Miles”--_this_ the mate _could_ call me, as it implied superiority on his part--“A quiet night, Master Miles,” commenced Mr. Marble, “and a strong westerly current, accordin' to Captain Robbins. Well, to my taste gooseberries are better than currents, and _I'd_ go about. That's my manner of _generalizing_.” “The captain, I suppose, sir, from that, is of a different opinion?” “Why, yes, somewhatish,--though I don't think he knows himself exactly what his own opinion is. This is the third v'y'ge I've sailed with the old gentleman, and he is half his time in a fog or a current. Now, it's his idee the ocean is full of Mississippi rivers, and if one could only find the head of a stream, he might go round the world in it. More particularly does he hold that there is no fear of the land when in a current, as a stream never sets on shore. For my part, I never want any better hand-lead than my nose.” “Nose, Mr. Marble?” “Yes, nose, Master Miles. Haven't you remarked how far we smelt the Injees, as we went through the islands?” “It is true, sir, the Spice Islands, and all land, they say--” “What the devil's that?” asked the mate, evidently startled at something he _heard_, though he appeared to _smell_ nothing, unless indeed it might be a rat. “It sounds like water washing on rocks, sir, as much as anything I ever heard in my life!” “Ready about!” shouted the mate. “Run down and call the captain, Miles--hard a-lee--start everybody up, forward.” A scene of confusion followed, in the midst of which the captain, second-mate, and the watch below, appeared on deck. Captain Robbins took command, of course, and was in time to haul the after-yards, the ship coming round slowly in so light a wind. Come round she did, however, and, when her head was fairly to the southward and eastward, the captain demanded an explanation. Mr. Marble did not feel disposed to trust his nose any longer, but he invited the captain to use his ears. This all hands did, and, if sounds could be trusted, we had a pretty lot of breakers seemingly all around us. “We surely can go out the way we came in, Mr. Marble?” said the captain, anxiously. “Yes, sir, if there were no _current_; but one never knows where a bloody current will carry him in the dark.” “Stand by to let go the anchor!” cried the captain. “Let run and clew up, forward and aft. Let go as soon as you're ready, Mr. Kite.” Luckily, we had kept a cable bent as we came through the Straits, and, not knowing but we might touch at the Isle of France, it was still bent, with the anchor fished. We had talked of stowing the latter in-board, but, having land in sight, it was not done. In two minutes it was a-cock-bill, and, in two more, let go. None knew whether we should find a bottom; but Kite soon sang out to “snub,” the anchor being down, with only six fathoms out. The lead corroborated this, and we had the comfortable assurance of being not only among breakers, but just near the coast. The holding-ground, however, was reported good, and we went to work and rolled up all our rags. In half an hour the ship was snug, riding by the stream, with a strong current, or tide, setting exactly north-east, or directly opposite to the captain's theory. As soon as Mr. Marble had ascertained this fact, I overheard him grumbling about something, of which I could distinctly understand nothing but the words “Bloody cape--bloody current.”

5

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“They hurried us aboard a bark; Bore us some leagues to sea; where they prepared A rotten carcass of a boat, not rigg'd, Nor tackle, sail, nor mast: the very rats Instinctively had girt us--” _Tempest. _ The hour that succeeded in the calm of expectation, was one of the most disquieting of my life. As soon as the ship was secured, and there no longer remained anything to do, the stillness of death reigned among us; the faculties of every man and boy appearing to be absorbed in the single sense of hearing--the best, and indeed the only, means we then possessed of judging of our situation. It was now apparent that we were near some place or places where the surf was breaking on land; and the hollow, not-to-be-mistaken bellowings of the element, too plainly indicated that cavities in rocks frequently received, and as often rejected, the washing waters. Nor did these portentous sounds come from one quarter only, but they seemed to surround us; now reaching our ears from the known direction of the land, now from the south, the north-east, and, in fact, from every direction. There were instances when these moanings of the ocean sounded as if close under our stern, and then again they came from some point within a fearful proximity to the bows. Happily the wind was light, and the ship rode with a moderate strain on the cable, so as to relieve us from the apprehension of immediate destruction. There was a long, heavy ground-swell rolling in from, the south-west, but, the lead giving us, eight fathoms, the sea did not break exactly where we lay; though the sullen washing that came to our ears, from time to time, gave unerring notice that it was doing so quite near us, independently of the places where it broke upon rocks. At one time the captain's impatience was so goading, that he had determined to pull round the anchorage in a boat, in order to anticipate the approach of light; but a suggestion from Mr. Marble that he might unconsciously pull into a roller, and capsize, induced him to wait for day. The dawn appeared at last, after two or three of the longest hours I remember ever to have passed. Never shall I forget the species of furious eagerness with which we gazed about us. In the first place, we got an outline of the adjacent land; then, as light diffused itself more and more into the atmosphere, we caught glimpses of its details. It was soon certain we were within a cable's length of perpendicular cliffs of several hundred feet in height, into whose caverns the sea poured at times, producing those frightful, hollow moanings, that an experienced ear can never mistake. This cliff extended for leagues in both directions, rendering drowning nearly inevitable to the shipwrecked mariner on that inhospitable coast. Ahead, astern, outside of us, and I might almost say all around us, became visible, one after another, detached ledges, breakers and ripples; so many proofs of the manner in which Providence had guided us through the hours of darkness. By the time the sun appeared, for, happily, the day proved bright and clear, we had obtained pretty tolerable notions of the critical situation in which we were placed by means of the captain's theory of currents. The very cape that we were to drift past, lay some ten leagues nearly dead to windward, as the breeze then was; while to leeward, far as the eye could reach, stretched the same inhospitable, barrier of rock as that which lay on our starboard quarter and beam. Such was my first introduction to the island of Madagascar; a portion of the world, of which, considering its position, magnitude and productions, the mariners of Christendom probably know less than of any other. At the time of which I am writing, far less had been learned of this vast country than is known to-day, though the knowledge of even our own immediate contemporaries is of an exceedingly limited character. Now that the day had returned, the sun was shining on us cheerfully, and the sea looked tranquil and assuring, the captain became more pacified. He had discretion enough to understand that time and examination were indispensable to moving the ship with safety; and he took the wise course of ordering the people to get their breakfasts, before he set us at work. The hour that was thus employed forward, was passed aft in examining the appearance of the water, and the positions of the reefs around the ship. By the time we were through, the captain had swallowed his cup of coffee and eaten his biscuit; and, calling away four of the most athletic oarsmen, he got into the jolly-boat, and set out on the all-important duty of discovering a channel sea-ward. The lead was kept moving, and I shall leave the party thus employed for an hour or more, while we turn our attention in-board. Marble beckoned me aft, as soon as Captain Robbins was in the boat, apparently with a desire to say something in private. I understood the meaning of his eye, and followed him down into the steerage, where all that was left of the ship's water was now stowed, that on deck having been already used. The mate had a certain consciousness about him that induced great caution, and he would not open his lips until he had rummaged about below some time, affecting to look for a set of blocks that might be wanted for some purpose or other, on deck. When this had lasted a little time, he turned short round to me, and let out the secret of the whole manoeuvre. “I'll tell you what, Master Miles,” he said, making a sign with a finger to be cautious, “I look upon this ship's berth as worse than that of a city scavenger. We've plenty of water all round us, and plenty of rocks, too. If we knew the way back, there is no wind to carry us through it, among these bloody currents, and there's no harm in getting ready for the worst. So do you get Neb and the gentleman”--Rupert was generally thus styled in the ship--“and clear away the launch first. Get everything out of it that don't belong there; after which, do you put these breakers in, and wait for further orders. Make no fuss, putting all upon orders, and leave the rest to me.” I complied, of course, and in a few minutes the launch was clear. While busy, however, Mr. Kite came past, and desired to know “what are you at there?” I told him 'twas Mr. Marble's orders, and the latter gave his own explanation of the matter. “The launch may be wanted,” he said, “for I've no notion that jolly-boat will do to go out as far as we shall find it necessary to sound. So I am about to ballast the launch, and get her sails ready; there's no use in mincing matters in such a berth as this.” Kite approved of the idea, and even went so far as to suggest that it might be well enough to get the launch into the water at once, by way of saving time. The proposition was too agreeable to be rejected, and, to own the truth, all hands went to work to get up the tackles with a will, as it is called. In half an hour the boat was floating alongside the ship. Some said she would certainly be wanted to carry out the stream-anchor, if for nothing else; others observed that half a dozen boats would not be enough to find all the channel we wanted; while Marble kept his eye, though always in an underhand way, on his main object. The breakers we got in and stowed, filled with _fresh_ water, by way of ballast. The masts were stepped, the oars were put on board, and a spare compass was passed dawn, lest the ship might be lost in the thick weather, of which there was so much, just in that quarter of the world. All this wars said and done so quietly, that nobody took the alarm; and when the mate called out, in a loud voice, “Miles, pass a bread-bag filled and some cold grub into that launch--the men may be hungry before they get back,” no one seemed to think more was meant than was thus openly expressed. I had my private orders, however, and managed to get quite a hundred-weight of good cabin biscuit into the launch, while the cook was directed to fill his coppers with pork. I got some of the latter _raw_ into the boat, too; _raw_ pork being food that sailors in no manner disdain. They say it eats like chestnuts. In the mean time, the captain was busy in his exploring expedition, on the return from which he appeared to think he was better rewarded than has certainly fallen to the lot of others employed on another expedition which bears the same name. He was absent near two hours, and, when he got back, it was to renew his theory of what Mr. Marble called his “bloody currents.” “I've got behind the curtain, Mr. Marble,” commenced Captain Robbins, before he was fairly alongside of the ship again, whereupon Marble muttered “ay! ay! you've got behind the rocks, too!” “It's all owing to an eddy that is made in-shore by the main current, and we have stretched a _leetle_ too far in.” Even I thought to myself, what would have become of us had we stretched a _leetle_ further in! The captain, however, seemed satisfied that he could carry the ship out, and, as this was all we wanted, no one was disposed to be very critical. A word was said about the launch, which the mate had ordered to be dropped astern, out of the way, and the explanation seemed to mystify the captain. In the meanwhile, the pork was boiling furiously in the coppers. All hands were now called to get the anchor up. Rupert and I went aloft to loosen sails, and we staid there until the royals were mast-headed. In a very few minutes the cable was up and down, and then came the critical part of the whole affair. The wind was still very light, and it was a question whether the ship could be carried past a reef of rocks that now began to show itself above water, and on which the long, heavy rollers, that came undulating from the south-western Atlantic, broke with a sullen violence that betrayed how powerful was the ocean, even in its moments of slumbering peacefulness. The rising and falling of its surface was like that of some monster's chest, as he respired heavily in sleep. Even the captain hesitated about letting go his hold of the bottom, with so strong a set of the water to leeward, and in so light a breeze. There was a sort of bight on our starboard bow, however, and Mr. Marble suggested it might be well to sound in that direction, as the water appeared smooth and deep. To him it looked as if there were really an eddy in-shore, which might hawse the ship up to windward six or eight times her length, and thus more than meet the loss that must infallibly occur in first casting her head to seaward. The captain admitted the justice of this suggestion, and I was one of those who were told to go in the jolly-boat on this occasion. We pulled in towards the cliffs, and had not gone fifty yards before we struck an eddy, sure enough, which was quite as strong as the current in which the ship lay. This was a great advantage, and so much the more, because the water was of sufficient depth, quite up to the edge of the reef which formed the bight, and thus produced the change in the direction of the set. There was plenty of room, too, to handle the ship in, and, all things considered, the discovery was extremely fortunate. In the bottom of the bight we should have gone ashore the previous night, had not our ears been so much better than our noses. As soon as certain of the facts, the captain pulled back to the ship, and gladdened the hearts of all on board with the tidings. We now manned the handspikes cheerily, and began to heave. I shall never forget the impression made on me by the rapid drift of the ship, as soon as the anchor was off the bottom, and her bows were cast in-shore, in order to fill the sails. The land was so near that I noted this drift by the rocks, and my heart was fairly in my mouth for a few seconds. But the John worked beautifully, and soon gathered way. Her bows did not not strike the eddy, however, until we got fearful evidence of the strength of the true current, which had set us down nearly as low as the reef outside, to windward of which it was indispensable for us to pass. Marble saw all this, and he whispered me to tell the cook to pass the pork into the launch at once--hot to mind whether it were particularly well done, or not. I obeyed, and had to tend the fore-sheet myself, for my pains, when the order was given to “ready about.” The eddy proved a true friend, but it did not carry us up much higher than the place where we had anchored, when it became necessary to tack. This was done in season, on account of our ignorance of all the soundings, and we had soon got the John's head off-shore again. Drawing a short distance ahead, the main-top-sail was thrown aback, and the ship allowed to drift. In proper time, it was filled, and we got round once more, looking into the bight. The manoeuvre was repeated, and this brought us up fairly under the lee of the reef, and just in the position we desired to be. It was a nervous instant, I make no doubt, when Captain Robbins determined to trust the ship in the true current, and run the gauntlet of the rocks. The passage across which we had to steer, before we could possibly weather the nearest reef was about a cable's length in width, and the wind would barely let us lay high enough to take it at right-angles. Then the air was so light, that I almost despaired of our doing anything. Captain Robbins put the ship into the current with great judgment. She was kept a rap-full until near the edge of the eddy, and then her helm was put nearly down, all at once. But for the current's acting, in one direction, on her starboard bow, and the eddy's pressing, in the other, on the larboard quarter, the vessel would have been taken aback; but these counteracting forces brought her handsomely on her course again, and that in a way to prevent her falling an inch to leeward. Now came the trial. The ship was kept a rap-full, and she went steadily across the passage, favoured, perhaps, by a little more breeze than had blown most of the morning. Still, our leeward set was fearful, and, as we approached the reef, I gave all up. Marble screwed his lips together, and his eyes never turned from the weather-leeches of the sails. Everybody appeared to me to be holding his breath, as the ship rose on the long ground-swells, sending slowly ahead the whole time. We passed the nearest point of the rocks on one of the rounded risings of the water, just touching lightly as we glided by the visible danger. The blow was light, and gave little cause for alarm. Captain Robbins now caught Mr. Marble by the hand, and was in the very act of heartily shaking it, when the ship came down very much in the manner that a man unexpectedly lights on a stone, when he has no idea of having anything within two or three yards of his feet. The blow was tremendous, throwing half the crew down; at the same instant, all three of the topmasts went to leeward. One has some difficulty in giving a reader accurate notions of the confusion of so awful a scene. The motion of the vessel was arrested suddenly, as it might be by a wall, and the whole fabric seemed to be shaken to dissolution. The very next roller that came in, which would have undulated in towards the land but for us, meeting with so large a body in its way, piled up and broke upon our decks, covering everything with water. At the same time, the hull lifted, and, aided by wind, sea and current, it set still further on the reef, thumping in a way to break strong iron bolts, like so many sticks of sealing-wax, and cracking the solid live-oak of the floor-timbers as if they were made of willow. The captain stood aghast! For one moment despair was painfully depicted in his countenance; then he recovered his self-possession and seamanship. He gave the order to stand by to carry out to windward the stream-anchor in the launch, and to send a kedge to haul out by, in the jolly-boat. Marble answered with the usual “ay, ay, sir!” but before he sent us into the boats, he ventured to suggest that the ship had bilged already. He had heard timbers crack, about which he thought there could be no mistake. The pumps were sounded, and the ship had seven feet water in her hold. This had made in about ten minutes. Still the captain would not give up. He ordered us to commence throwing the teas overboard, in order to ascertain, if possible, the extent of the injury. A place was broken out in the wake of the main-hatch, and a passage was opened down into the lower-hold, where we met the water. In the mean time, a South-Sea man we had picked up at Canton, dove down under the lee of the bilge of the ship. He soon came back and reported that a piece of sharp rock had gone quite through the planks. Everything tending to corroborate this, the captain called a council of all hands on the quarter-deck, to consult as to further measures. A merchantman has no claim on the services of her crew after she is hopelessly wrecked. The last have a lien in law, on the ship and cargo, for their wages; and it is justly determined that when this security fails, the claim for services ends. It followed, of course, that as soon as the John was given over, we were all our own masters; and hence the necessity for bringing even Neb into the consultation. With a vessel of war it would have been different. In such a case, the United States pays for the service, ship or no ship, wreck or no wreck; and the seaman serves out his term of enlistment, be this longer or shorter. Military discipline continues under all circumstances. Captain Robbins could hardly speak when we gathered round him on the forecastle, the seas breaking over the quarter-deck in a way to render that sanctuary a very uncomfortable berth. As soon as he could command himself, he told us that the ship was hopelessly lost. How it had happened, he could not very well explain himself, though he ascribed it to the fact that the currents did not run in the direction in which, according to all sound reasoning, they ought to run. This part of the speech was not perfectly lucid, though, as I understood our unfortunate captain, the laws of nature, owing to some inexplicable influence, had departed, in some way or other, from their ordinary workings, expressly to wreck the John. If this were not the meaning of what he said, I did not understand this part of the address. The captain was much more explicit after he got out of the current. He told us that the island of Bourbon was only about four hundred miles from where we then were, and he thought it possible to go that distance, find some small craft, and come back, and still save part of the cargo, the sails, anchors, &c. &c. We might make such a trip of it as would give us all a lift, in the way of salvage, that might prove some compensation for our other losses. This sounded well, and it had at least the effect to give us some present object for our exertions; it also made the danger we all ran of losing our lives, less apparent. To land on the island of Madagascar, in that day, was out of the question. The people were then believed to be far less civilized than in truth they were, and had a particularly bad character among mariners. Nothing remained, therefore, but to rig the boats, and make immediate dispositions for our departure. Now it was that we found the advantage of the preparations already made. Little remained to be done, and that which was done, was much better done than if we had waited until the wreck was half full of water, and the seas were combing in upon her. The captain took charge of the launch, putting Mr. Marble, Rupert, Neb, myself and the cook, into the jolly-boat, with orders to keep as close as possible to himself. Both boats had sails, and both were so arranged as to row in calms, or head-winds. We took in rather more than our share of provisions and water, having two skillful caterers in the chief-mate and cook; and, having obtained a compass, quadrant, and a chart, for our portion of the indispensables, all hands were ready for a start, in about two hours after the ship had struck. It was just noon when we cast off from the wreck, and stood directly off the land. According to our calculations, the wind enabled us to run, with a clean full, on our true course. As the boats drew out into the ocean, we had abundant opportunities of discovering how many dangers we had escaped; and, for my own part, I felt deeply grateful, even then, as I was going out upon the wide Atlantic in a mere shell of a boat, at the mercy we had experienced. No sooner were we fairly in deep water, than the captain and mate had a dialogue on the subject of the currents again. Notwithstanding all the difficulties his old theory had brought him into, the former remained of opinion that the true current set to windward, and that we should so find it as soon as we got a little into the offing; while the mate was frank enough to say he had been of opinion, all along, that it ran the other way. The latter added that Bourbon was rather a small spot to steer for, and it might be better to get into its longitude, and then find it by meridian observations, than to make any more speculations about matters of which we knew nothing. The captain and Mr. Marble saw things differently, and we kept away accordingly, when we ought to have luffed all we could. Fortunately the weather continued moderate, or our little boat would have had a bad time of it. We outsailed the launch with ease, and were forced to reef in order not to part company. When the sun set, we were more than twenty miles from the land, seeing no more of the coast, though the mountains inland were still looming up grandly in the distance. I confess, when night shut in upon us, and I found myself on the wide ocean, in a boat much smaller than that with which I used to navigate the Hudson, running every minute farther and farther into the watery waste, I began to think of Clawbonny, and its security, and quiet nights, and well-spread board, and comfortable beds in a way I had never thought of either before. As for food, however, we were not stinted; Mr. Marble setting us an example of using our teeth on the half boiled pork, that did credit to his philosophy. To do this man justice, he seemed to think a run of four hundred miles in a jolly-boat no great matter, but took everything as regularly as if still on the deck of the John. Each of us got as good a nap as our cramped situations would allow. The wind freshened in the morning, and the sea began to break. This made it necessary to keep still more away, to prevent filling at times, or to haul close up, which might have done equally well. But the captain preferred the latter course, on account of the current. We had ticklish work of it, in the jolly-boat, more than once that day, and were compelled to carry a whole sail in order to keep up with the launch, which beat us, now the wind had increased. Marble was a terrible fellow to carry on everything, ship or boat, and we kept our station admirably, the two boats never getting a cable's length asunder, and running most of the time within hail of each other. As night approached, however, a consultation was held on the subject of keeping in company. We had now been out thirty hours, and had made near a hundred and fifty miles, by our calculation. Luckily the wind had got to be nearly west, and we were running ahead famously, though it was as much as we could do to keep the jolly-boat from filling. One hand was kept bailing most of the time, and sometimes all four of us were busy. These matters were talked over, and the captain proposed abandoning the jolly-boat altogether, and to take us into the launch, though there was not much vacant space to receive us. But the mate resisted this, answering that he thought he could take care of our boat a while longer, at least. Accordingly, the old arrangement was maintained, the party endeavouring to keep as near together as possible. About midnight it began to blow in squalls, and two or three times we found it necessary to take in our sails, our oars, and pull the boat head to sea, in order to prevent her swamping. The consequence was, that we lost sight of the launch, and, though we always kept away to our course as soon as the puffs would allow, when the sun rose we saw nothing of our late companions. I have sometimes thought Mr. Marble parted company on purpose, though he seemed much concerned next morning when he had ascertained the launch was nowhere to be seen. After looking about for an hour, and the wind moderating, we made sail close on the wind; a direction that would soon have taken us away from the launch, had the latter been close alongside when we first took it. We made good progress all this day, and at evening, having now been out fifty-four hours, we supposed ourselves to be rather more than half-way on the road to our haven. It fell calm in the night, and the next morning we got the wind right aft. This gave us a famous shove, for we sometimes made six and seven knots in the hour. The fair wind lasted thirty hours, during which time we must have made more than a hundred and fifty miles, it falling nearly calm about an hour before dawn, on the morning of the fourth day out. Everybody was anxious to see the horizon that morning, and every eye was turned to the east, with intense expectation, as the sun rose. It was in vain; there was not the least sign of land visible. Marble looked sadly disappointed, but he endeavoured to cheer us up with the hope of seeing the island shortly. We were then heading due east, with a very light breeze from the north-west. I happened to stand up in the boat, on a thwart, and, turning my face to the southward, I caught a glimpse of something that seemed like a hummock of land in that quarter. I saw it but for an instant; but, whatever it was, I saw it plain enough. Mr. Marble now got on the thwart, and looked in vain to catch the same object. He said there was no land in that quarter--could be none--and resumed his seat to steer to the eastward, a little north. I could not be easy, however, but remained on the thwart until the boat lifted on a swell higher than common, and then I saw the brown, hazy-looking spot on the margin of the ocean again. My protestations now became so earnest, that Marble consented to stand for an hour in the direction I pointed out to him. “One hour, boy, I will grant you, to shut your mouth,” the mate said, taking out his watch, “and that you need lay nothing to my door hereafter.” To make the most of this hour, I got my companions at the oars, and we all pulled with hearty good-will. So much importance did I attach to every fathom of distance made, that we did not rise from our seats until the mate told us to stop rowing, for the hour was up. As for himself, he had not risen either, but kept looking behind him to the eastward, still hoping to see land somewhere in that quarter. My heart beat violently as I got upon the thwart, but there lay my hazy object, now never dipping at all. I shouted “land ho!” Marble jumped up on a thwart, too and no longer disputed my word. It was land, he admitted, and it must be the island of Bourbon, which we had passed to the northward, and must soon have given a hopelessly wide berth. We went to the oars again with renewed life, and soon made the boat spin. All that day we kept rowing, until about five in the afternoon, when we found ourselves within a few leagues of the island of Bourbon, where we were met by a fresh breeze from the southward, and were compelled to make sail. The wind was dead on end, and we made stretches under the lee of the island, going about as we found the sea getting to be too heavy for us, as was invariably the case whenever we got too far east or west. In a word, a lee was fast becoming necessary. By ten, we were within a mile of the shore, but saw no place where we thought it safe to attempt a landing in the dark; a long, heavy sea setting in round both sides of the island, though the water did not break much where we remained. At length the wind got to be so heavy, that we could not carry even our sail double-reefed, and we kept two oars pulling lightly in, relieving each other every hour. By daylight it blew tremendously, and glad enough were we to find a little cove where it was possible to get ashore. I had then never felt so grateful to Providence as I did when I got my feet on _terra-firma_. We remained on the island a week, hoping to see the launch and her crew; but neither appeared. Then we got a passage to the Isle of France, on arriving at which place we found the late gale was considered to have been very serious. There was no American consul in the island, at that time; and Mr. Marble, totally without credit or means, found it impossible to obtain a craft of any sort to go to the wreck in. We were without money, too, and, a homeward-bound Calcutta vessel coming in, we joined her to work our passages home, Mr. Marble as dickey, and the rest of us in the forecastle. This vessel was called the Tigris, and belonged to Philadelphia. She was considered one of the best ships out of America, and her master had a high reputation for seamanship and activity. He was a little man of the name of Digges, and was under thirty at the time I first knew him. He took us on board purely out of a national feeling, for his ship was strong-handed without us, having thirty-two souls, all told, when he received us five. We afterwards learned that letters sent after the ship had induced Captain Digges to get five additional hands in Calcutta, in order to be able to meet the picaroons that were then beginning to plunder American vessels, even on their own coast, under the pretence of their having violated certain regulations made by the two great belligerents of the day, in Europe. This was just the commencement of the _quasi_ war which broke out a few weeks later with France. Of all these hostile symptoms, however, I then knew little and cared less. Even Mr. Marble had never heard of them and we five joined the Tigris merely to get passages home, without entertaining second thoughts of running any risk, further than the ordinary dangers of the seas. The Tigris sailed the day we joined her, which was the third after we reached Mauritius, and just fifteen days after we had left the wreck. We went to sea with the wind at the southward, and had a good run off the island, making more than a hundred miles that afternoon and in the course of the night. Next morning, early, I had the watch, and an order was given to set top-gallant studding-sails. Rupert and I had got into the same watch on board this vessel, and we both went aloft to reeve the gear. I had taken up the end of the halyards, and had reeved them, and had overhauled the end down, when, in raising my head, I saw two small lug-sails on the ocean, broad on our weather-bow, which I recognised in an instant for those of the John's launch. I cannot express the feeling that came over me at that sight. I yelled, rather than shouted, “Sail ho!” and then, pushing in, I caught hold of a royal-backstay, and was on deck in an instant. I believe I made frantic gestures to windward, for Mr. Marble, who had the watch, had to shake me sharply before I could let the fact be known. As soon as Marble comprehended me, and got the bearings of the boat, he hauled down all the studding-sails, braced sharp up on a wind, set the mainsail, and then sent down a report to Captain Digges for orders. Our new commander was a humane man, and having been told our whole story, he did not hesitate about confirming all that had been done. As the people in the launch had made out the ship some time before I saw the boat, the latter was running down upon us, and, in about an hour, the tiny sails were descried from the deck. In less than an hour after this, our mainyard swung round, throwing the topsail aback, and the well-known launch of the John rounded-to close under our lee; a rope was thrown, and the boat was hauled alongside. Everybody in the Tigris was shocked when we came to get a look at the condition of the strangers. One man, a powerful negro, lay dead in the bottom of the boat; the body having been kept for a dreadful alternative, in the event of his companions falling in with no other relief. Three more of the men were nearly gone, and had to be whipped on board as so many lifeless bales of goods. Captain Robbins and Kite, both athletic, active men, resembled spectres, their eyes standing out of their heads as if thrust from their sockets by some internal foe; and when we spoke to them, they all seemed unable to answer. It was not fasting, or want of food, that had reduced them to this state, so much as want of water. It is true, they had no more bread left than would keep body and soul together for a few hours longer; but of water they had tasted not a drop for seventy odd hours! It appeared that, during the gale, they had been compelled to empty the breakers to lighten the boat, reserving only one for their immediate wants. By some mistake, the one reserved was nearly half-empty at the time; and Captain Robbins believed himself then so near Bourbon, as not to go on an allowance until it was too late. In this condition had they been searching for the island quite ten days, passing it, but never hitting it. The winds had not favoured them, and, the last few days, the weather had been such as to admit of no observation. Consequently, they had been as much out of their reckoning in their latitude, as in their longitude. A gleam of intelligence, and I thought of pleasure, shot athwart the countenance of Captain Robbins, as I helped him over the Tigris's side. He saw I was safe. He tottered as he walked, and leaned heavily on me for support. I was about to lead him aft, but his eye caught sight of a scuttlebutt, and the tin-pot on its head. Thither he went, and stretched out a trembling hand to the vessel. I gave him the pot as it was, with about a wine-glass of water in it This he swallowed at a gulp, and then tottered forward for more. By this time Captain Digges joined us, and gave the proper directions how to proceed. All the sufferers had water in small quantities given them, and it is wonderful with what expressions of delight they received the grateful beverage. As soon as they understood the necessity of keeping it as long as possible in their mouths, and on their tongues, before swallowing it, a little did them a great deal of good. After this, we gave them some coffee, the breakfast being ready, and then a little ship's biscuit soaked in wine. By such means every man was saved, though it was near a month before all were themselves again. As for Captain Robbins and Kite, they were enabled to attend to duty by the end of a week, though nothing more was exacted of them than they chose to perform.

6

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“The yesty waves Confound and swallow navigation up.” _Macbeth. _ Poor Captain Robbins! No sooner did he regain his bodily strength, than he began to endure the pain of mind that was inseparable from the loss of his ship. Marble, who, now that he had fallen to the humbler condition of a second-mate, was more than usually disposed to be communicative with me, gave me to understand that our old superior had at first sounded Captain Digges on the subject of proceeding to the wreck, in order to ascertain what could be saved; but the latter had soon convinced him that a first-rate Philadelphia Indiaman had something else to do besides turning wrecker. After a pretty broad hint to this effect, the John, and all that was in her, were abandoned to their fate. Marble, however, was of opinion that the gale in which the launch came so near being lost, must have broken the ship entirely to pieces, giving her fragments to the ocean. We never heard of her fate, or recovered a single article that belonged to her. Many were the discussions between Captain Robbins and his two mates, touching the error in reckoning that had led them so far from their course. In that day, navigation was by no means as simple a thing as it has since become. It is true, lunars were usually attempted in India and China ships; but this was not an every-day affair, like the present morning and afternoon observations to obtain the time, and, by means of the chronometer, the longitude. Then we had so recently got clear of the islands, as to have no great need of any extraordinary head-work; and the “bloody currents” had acted their pleasure with us for eight or ten days before the loss of the ship. Marble was a very good navigator, one of the best I ever sailed with, in spite of the plainness of his exterior, and his rough deportment; and, all things considered, he treated his old commander with great delicacy, promising to do all he could, when he got home, to clear the matter up. As for Kite, he knew but little, and had the discretion to say but little. This moderation rendered our passage all the more agreeable. The Tigris was a very fast ship, besides being well-found. She was a little larger than the John, and mounted twelve guns, nine-pounders. In consequence of the additions made to her crew, one way and another, she now mustered nearer fifty than forty souls on board. Captain Digges had certain martial tastes, and, long before we were up with the Cape, he had us all quartered and exercised at the guns. He, too, had had an affair with some proas, and he loved to converse of the threshing he had given the rascals. I thought he envied us our exploit, though this might have been mere imagination on my part, for he was liberal enough in his commendations. The private intelligence he had received of the relations between France and America, quickened his natural impulses; and, by the time we reached St. Helena, the ship might have been said to be in good fighting order for a merchantman. We touched at this last-mentioned island for supplies, but obtained no news of any interest. Those who supplied the ship could tell us nothing but the names of the Indiamen who had gone out and home for the last twelvemonth, and the prices of fresh meat and vegetables. Napoleon civilized them, seventeen years later. We had a good run from St. Helena to the calm latitudes, but these last proved calmer than common. We worried through them after a while, however, and then did very well until we got in the latitude of the Windward Islands. Marble one day remarked to me that Captain Digges was standing closer to the French island of Guadaloupe than was at all necessary or prudent, if he believed in his own reports of the danger there existed to American commerce, in this quarter of the ocean. I have lived long enough, and have seen too much of men and things, to fancy my country and countrymen right in all their transactions, merely because newspapers, members of congress, and fourth of July orators, are pleased to affirm the doctrine. No one can go much to sea without reading with great distrust many of the accounts, in the journals of the day, of the grievous wrongs done the commerce of America by the authorities of this or that port, the seizure of such a ship, or the imprisonment of some particular set of officers and men. As a rule, it is safer to assume that the afflicted parties deserve all that has happened to them, than to believe them immaculate; and, quite likely, much more, too. The habit of receiving such appeals to their sympathies, renders the good people of the republic peculiarly liable to impositions of this nature; and the mother who encourages those of her children who fetch and carry, will be certain to have her ears filled with complaints and tattle. Nevertheless, it is a fact beyond all dispute, that the commerce of the country was terribly depredated on by nearly all the European belligerents, between the commencement of the war of the French revolution and its close. So enormous were the robberies thus committed on the widely extended trade of this nation, under one pretence or another, as to give a colouring of retributive justice, if not of moral right, to the recent failures of certain States among us to pay their debts. Providence singularly avenges all wrongs by its unerring course; and I doubt not, if the facts could be sifted to the bottom, it would be found the devil was not permitted to do his work, in either case, without using materials supplied by the sufferers, in some direct or indirect manner, themselves. Of all the depredations on American trade just mentioned, those of the great sister republic, at the close of the last century, were among the most grievous, and were of a character so atrocious and bold, that I confess it militates somewhat against my theory to admit that France owns very little of the “suspended debt;” but I account for this last circumstance by the reparation she in part made, by the treaty of 1831. With England it is different. She drove us into a war by the effects of her orders in council and paper blockades, and compelled us to expend a hundred millions to set matters right. I should like to see the books balanced, not by the devil, who equally instigated the robberies on the high seas, and the “suspension” or “repudiation” of the State debts; but by the great Accountant who keeps a record of all our deeds of this nature, whether it be to make money by means of cruising ships, or cruising scrip. It is true, these rovers encountered very differently-looking victims, in the first place; but it is a somewhat trite remark, that the aggregate of human beings is pretty much the same in all situations. There were widows and orphans as much connected with the condemnation of prizes, as with the prices of condemned stock; and I do not see that fraud is any worse when carried on by scriveners and clerks with quills behind their ears, than when carried on by gentlemen wearing cocked hats, and carrying swords by their sides. On the whole, I am far from certain that the account-current of honesty is not slightly--honesty very _slightly_ leavens either transaction--in favour of the non-paying States, as men do sometimes borrow with good intentions, and fail, from inability, to pay; whereas, in the whole course of my experience, I never knew a captor of a ship who intended to give back any of the prize-money, if he could help it. But, to return to my adventures. We were exactly in the latitude of Guadaloupe, with the usual breeze, when, at daylight, a rakish-looking brig was seen in chase. Captain Digges took a long survey of the stranger with his best glass, one that was never exhibited but on state occasions, and then he pronounced him to be a French cruiser; most probably a privateer. That he was a Frenchman, Marble affirmed, was apparent by the height of his top-masts, and the shortness of his yards; the upper spars, in particular, being mere apologies for yards. Everybody who had any right to an opinion, was satisfied the brig was a French cruiser, either public or private. The Tigris was a fast ship, and she was under top-mast and top-gallant studding-sails at the time, going about seven knots. The brig was on an easy bowline, evidently looking up for our wake, edging off gradually as we drew ahead. She went about nine knots, and bade fair to close with us by noon. There was a good deal of doubt, aft, as to the course we ought to pursue. It was decided in the end, however, to shorten sail and let the brig come up, as being less subject to cavils, than to seem to avoid her. Captain Digges got out his last letters from home, and I saw him showing them to Captain Robbins, the two conning them over with great earnestness. I was sent to do some duty near the hencoops, where they were sitting, and overheard a part of their conversation. From the discourse, I gathered that the proceedings of these picaroons were often equivocal, and that Americans were generally left in doubt, until a favourable moment occurred for the semi-pirates to effect their purposes. The party assailed did not know when or how to defend himself, until it was too late. “These chaps come aboard you, sometimes, before you're aware of what they are about,” observed Captain Robbins. “I'll not be taken by surprise in that fashion,” returned Digges, after a moment of reflection. “Here, you Miles, go forward and tell the cook to fill his coppers with water, and to set it boiling as fast as he can; and tell Mr. Marble I want him aft. Bear a hand, now, youngster, and give them a lift yourself.” Of course I obeyed, wondering what the captain wanted with so much hot water as to let the people eat their dinners off cold grub, rather than dispense with it; for this was a consequence of his decree. But we had not got the coppers half-filled, before I saw Mr. Marble and Neb lowering a small ship's engine from the launch, and placing it near the galley, in readiness to be filled. The mate told Neb to screw on the pipe, and then half a dozen of the men, as soon as we got through with the coppers, were told to fill the engine with sea-water. Captain Digges now came forward to superintend the exercise, and Neb jumped on the engine, flourishing the pipe about with the delight of a “nigger.” The captain was diverted with the black's zeal, and he appointed him captain of the firemen on the spot. “Now, let us see what you can do at that forward dead eye, darky,” said Captain Digges, laughing. “Take it directly on the strap. Play away, boys, and let Neb try his hand.” It happened that Neb hit the dead-eye at the first jet, and he showed great readiness in turning the stream from point to point, as ordered. Neb's conduct on the night of the affair with the proas had been told to Captain Digges, who was so well pleased with the fellow's present dexterity, as to confirm him in office. He was told to stick by the engine at every hazard. Soon after, an order was given to clear for action. This had an ominous sound to my young ears, and, though I have no reason to suppose myself deficient in firmness, I confess I began to think again of Clawbonny, and Grace, and Lucy; ay, and even of the mill. This lasted but for a moment, however, and, as soon as I got at work, the feeling gave me no trouble. We were an hour getting the ship ready, and, by that time, the brig was within half a mile, luffing fairly up on our lee-quarter. As we had shortened sail, the privateer manifested no intention of throwing a shot to make us heave-to. She seemed disposed to extend courtesy for courtesy. The next order was for all hands to go to quarters. I was stationed in the main-top, and Rupert in the fore. Our duties were to do light work, in the way of repairing damages; and the captain, understanding that we were both accustomed to fire-arms, gave us a musket a-piece, with orders to blaze away as soon as they began the work below. As we had both stood fire once, we thought ourselves veterans, and proceeded to our stations, smiling and nodding to each other as we went up the rigging. Of the two, my station was the best, since I could see the approach of the brig, the mizen-top-sail offering but little obstruction to vision after she got near; whereas the main-top-sail was a perfect curtain, so far as poor Rupert was concerned. In the way of danger, there was not much difference as to any of the stations on board, the bulwarks of the ship being little more than plank that would hardly stop a musket-ball; and then the French had a reputation for firing into the rigging. As soon as all was ready, the captain sternly ordered silence. By this time the brig was near enough to hail. I could see her decks quite plainly, and they were filled with men. I counted her guns, too, and ascertained she had but ten, all of which seemed to be lighter than our own. One circumstance that I observed, however, was suspicious. Her forecastle was crowded with men, who appeared to be crouching behind the bulwarks, as if anxious to conceal their presence from the eyes of those in the Tigris. I had a mind to jump on a back-stay and slip down on deck, to let this threatening appearance be known; but I had heard some sayings touching the imperative duty of remaining at quarters in face of the enemy, and I did not like to desert my station. Tyroes have always exaggerated notions both of their rights and their duties, and I had not escaped the weakness. Still, I think some credit is due for the alternative adopted. During the whole voyage, I had kept a reckoning, and paper and pencil were always in my pocket, in readiness to catch a moment to finish a day's work. I wrote as follows on a piece of paper, therefore, as fast as possible, and dropped the billet on the quarter-deck, by enclosing a copper in the scrawl, _cents_ then being in their infancy. I had merely written--“The brig's forecastle is filled with armed men, hid behind the bulwarks!” Captain Digges heard the fall of the copper, and looking up--nothing takes an officer's eyes aloft quicker than to find anything coming out of a top! --he saw me pointing to the paper. I was rewarded for this liberty by an approving nod. Captain Digges read what I had written, and I soon observed Neb and the cook filling the engine with boiling water. This job was no sooner done than a good place was selected on the quarter-deck for this singular implement of war, and then a hail came from the brig. “Vat zat sheep is?” demanded some one from the brig. “The Tigris of Philadelphia, from Calcutta _home_. What brig is _that_?” “_La Folie--corsair Français_. From vair you come?” “From Calcutta. And where are _you_ from?” “Guadaloupe. Vair you go, eh?” “Philadelphia. Do not luff so near me; some accident may happen.” “Vat you call '_accident_?' Can nevair hear, eh? I will come _tout près_.” “Give us a wider berth, I tell you! Here is your jib boom nearly foul of my mizen-rigging.” “Vat mean zat, bert' vidair? eh! _Allons, mes enfants, c'est le moment_!” “Luff a little, and keep his spar clear,” cried our captain. “Squirt away, Neb, and let us see what you can do!” The engine made a movement, just as the French began to run out on their bowsprit, and, by the time six or eight were on the heel of the jib-boom, they were met by the hissing hot stream, which took them _en echelon_, as it might be, fairly raking the whole line. The effect was instantaneous. Physical nature cannot stand excessive heat, unless particularly well supplied with skin; and the three leading Frenchmen, finding retreat impossible, dropped incontinently into the sea, preferring cold water to hot--the chances of drowning, to the certainty of being scalded. I believe all three were saved by their companions in-board, but I will not vouch for the fact. The remainder of the intended boarders, having the bowsprit before them, scrambled back upon the brig's forecastle as well as they could, betraying, by the random way in which their hands flew about, that they had a perfect consciousness how much they left their rear exposed on the retreat. A hearty laugh was heard in all parts of the Tigris, and the brig, putting her helm hard up, wore round like a top, as if she were scalded herself. {*] {Footnote *: This incident actually occurred in the war of 1798] We all expected a broadside now; but of that there was little apprehension, as it was pretty certain we carried the heaviest battery, and had men enough to work it. But the brig did not fire, I suppose because we fell off a little ourselves, and she perceived it might prove a losing game. On the contrary, she went quite round on her heel, hauling up on the other tack far enough to bring the two vessels exactly _dos à dos_. Captain Digges ordered two of the quarter-deck nines to be run out of the stern-ports; and it was well he did, for it was not in nature for men to be treated as our friends in the brig had been served, without manifesting certain signs of ill-humour. The vessels might have been three cables' lengths asunder when we got a gun. The first I knew of the shot was to hear it plunge through the mizen-top-sail, then it came whistling through my top, between the weather-rigging and the mast-head, cutting a hole through the main-top-sail, and, proceeding onward, I heard it strike something more solid than canvass. I thought of Rupert and the fore-top in an instant, and looked anxiously down on deck to ascertain if he were injured. “Fore-top, there!” called out Captain Digges. “Where did that shot strike?” “In the mast-head,” answered Rupert, in a clear, firm voice. “It has done no damage, sir.” “Now's your time, Captain Robbing--give 'em a reminder.” Both our nines were fired, and, a few seconds after, three cheers arose from the decks of our ship. I could not see the brig, now, for the mizen-top-sail; but I afterwards learned that we had shot away her gaff. This terminated the combat, in which the glory was acquired principally by Neb. They told me, when I got down among the people again, that the black's face had been dilated with delight the whole time, though he stood fairly exposed to musketry, his mouth grinning from ear to ear. Neb was justly elated with the success that attended this exhibition of his skill, and described the retreat of our enemies with a humour and relish that raised many a laugh at the discomfited privateersman. It is certain that some of the fellows must have been nearly parboiled. I have always supposed this affair between la Folie and the Tigris to have been the actual commencement of hostilities in the _quasi_ war of 1798-9 and 1800. Other occurrences soon supplanted it in the public mind; but we of the ship never ceased to regard the adventure as one of great national interest. It did prove to be a nine days' wonder in the newspapers. From this time, nothing worthy of being noted occurred, until we reached the coast. We had got as high as the capes of Virginia, and were running in for the land, with a fair wind, when we made a ship in-shore of us. The stranger hauled up to speak us, as soon as we were seen. There was a good deal of discussion about this vessel, as she drew near, between Captain Digges and his chief-mate. The latter said he knew the vessel, and that it was an Indiaman out of Philadelphia, called the Ganges, a sort of sister craft to our own ship; while the former maintained, if it were the Ganges at all, she was so altered as scarcely to be recognised. As we got near, the stranger threw a shot under our fore-foot, and showed an American pennant and ensign. Getting a better look at her, we got so many signs of a vessel-of-war in our neighbour, as to think it wisest to heave-to, when the other vessel passed under our stern, tacked, and lay with her head-yards aback, a little on our weather-quarter. As she drew to windward, we saw her stern, which had certain national emblems, but no name on it. This settled the matter. She was a man-of-war, and she carried the American flag! Such a thing did not exist a few months before, when we left home, and Captain Digges was burning with impatience to know more. He was soon gratified. “Is not that the Tigris?” demanded a voice, through a trumpet, from the stranger. “Ay, ay! What ship is that?” “The United States' Ship Ganges, Captain Dale; from the capes of the Delaware, bound on a cruise. You're welcome home, Captain Digges; we may want some of your assistance under a cockade.” Digges gave a long whistle, and then the mystery was out. This proved to be the Ganges, as stated, an Indiaman bought into a new navy, and the first ship-of-war ever sent to sea under the government of the country, as it had existed since the adoption of the constitution, nine years before. The privateers of France had driven the republic into an armament, and ships were fitting out in considerable numbers; some being purchased, like the Ganges, and others built expressly for the new marine. Captain Digges went on board the Ganges, and, pulling an oar in his boat, I had a chance of seeing that vessel also. Captain Dale, a compact, strongly-built, seaman-like looking man, in a blue and white uniform, received our skipper with a cordial shake of the hand, for they had once sailed together, and he laughed heartily when he heard the story of the boarding-party and the hot water. This respectable officer had no braggadocia about him, but he intimated that it would not be long, as he thought, before the rovers among the islands would have their hands full. Congress was in earnest, and the whole country was fairly aroused. Whenever that happens in America, it is usually to take a new and better direction than to follow the ordinary blind impulses of popular feelings. In countries where the masses count for nothing, in the every-day working of their systems, excitement has a tendency to democracy; but, among ourselves, I think the effect of such a condition of things is to bring into action men and qualities that are commonly of little account, and to elevate, instead of depressing, public sentiment. I was extremely pleased with the manly, benevolent countenance of Captain Dale, and had half a desire to ask leave to join his ship on the spot. If that impulse had been followed, it is probable my future life would have been very different from what it subsequently proved. I should have been rated a midshipman, of course; and, serving so early, with a good deal of experience already in ships, a year or two would have made me a lieutenant, and, could I have survived the pruning of 1801, I should now have been one of the oldest officers in the service. Providence directed otherwise; and how much was lost, or how much gained, by my continuance in the Tigris, the reader will learn as we proceed. As soon as Captain Digges had taken a glass or two of wine with his old acquaintance, we returned to our own ship, and the two vessels made sail; the Ganges standing off to the northward and eastward, while we ran in for the capes of the Delaware. We got in under Cape May, or within five miles of it, the same evening, when it fell nearly calm. A pilot came off from the cape in a row-boat, and he reached us just at dark. Captain Robbins now became all impatience to land, as it was of importance to him to be the bearer of his own bad news. Accordingly, an arrangement having been made with the two men who belonged to the shore-boat, our old commander, Rupert and myself, prepared to leave the ship, late as it was. We two lads were taken for the purpose of manning two additional oars, but were to rejoin the ship in the bay, if possible; if not, up at town. One of the inducements of Captain Robbins to be off, was the signs of northerly weather. It had begun to blow a little in puffs from the north-west; and everybody knew, if it came on to blow seriously from that quarter, the ship might be a week in getting up the river, her news being certain to precede her. We hurried off accordingly, taking nothing with us but a change of linen, and a few necessary papers. We got the first real blast from the north-west in less than five minutes after we had quitted the Tigris's side, and while the ship was still visible, or, rather, while we could yet see the lights in her cabin-windows, as she fell off before the wind. Presently the lights disappeared, owing, no doubt, to the ship's luffing again. The symptoms now looked so threatening, that the pilot's men proposed making an effort, before it was too late, to find the ship; but this was far easier said than done. The vessel might be spinning away towards Cape Henlopen, at the rate of six or seven knots; and, without the means of making any signal in the dark, it was impossible to overtake her. I do believe that Captain Robbins would have acceded to the request of the men, had he seen any probability of succeeding; as it was, there remained no alternative but to pull in, and endeavour to reach the land. We had the light on the cape as our beacon, and the boat's head was kept directly for it, as the wisest course for us to pursue. Changes of wind from south-east to north-west are very common on the American coast. They are almost always sudden; sometimes so much so, as to take ships aback; and the force of the breeze usually comes so early, as to have produced the saying that a “nor'-wester comes butt-end foremost.” Such proved to be the fact in our case. In less than half an hour after it began to blow, the wind would have brought the most gallant ship that floated to double-reefed topsails, steering by, and to reasonably short-canvass, running large. We may have pulled a mile in this half hour, though it was by means of a quick stroke and great labour. The Cape May men were vigorous and experienced, and they did wonders; nor were Rupert and I idle; but, as soon as the sea got up, it was as much as all four of us could do to keep steerage-way on the boat. There were ten minutes, during which I really think the boat was kept head to sea by means of the wash of the waves that drove past, as we barely held her stationary. Of course, it was out of the question to continue exertions that were as useless as they were exhausting. We tried the expedient, however, of edging to the northward, with the hope of getting more under the lee of the land, and, consequently, into smoother water; but it did no good. The nearest we ever got to the light must have considerably exceeded a league. At length Rupert, totally exhausted, dropped his oar, and fell panting on the thwart. He was directed to steer, Captain Robbins taking his place. I can only liken our situation at that fearful moment to the danger of a man who is clinging to a cliff its summit and safety almost in reach of his hand, with the consciousness that his powers are fast failing him, and that he must shortly go down. It is true, death was not so certain by our abandoning the effort to reach the land, but the hope of being saved was faint indeed. Behind us lay the vast and angry Atlantic, without an inch of visible land between us and the Rock of Lisbon. We were totally without food of any sort, though, luckily, there was a small breaker of fresh water in the boat. The Cape May men had brought off their suppers with them, but they had made the meal; whereas the rest of us had left the Tigris fasting, intending to make comfortable suppers at the light. At length Captain Robbins consulted the boatmen, and asked them what they thought of our situation. I sat between these men, who had been remarkably silent the whole time, pulling like giants. Both were young, though, as I afterwards learned, both were married; each having a wife, at that anxious moment, waiting on the beach of the cape for the return of the boat. As Captain Robbins put the question, I turned my head, and saw that the man behind me, the oldest of the two, was in tears. I cannot describe the shock I experienced at this sight. Here was a man accustomed to hardships and dangers, who was making the stoutest and most manly efforts to save himself and all with him, at the very moment, so strongly impressed with the danger of our situation, that his feelings broke forth in a way it is always startling to witness, when the grief of man is thus exhibited in tears. The imagination of this husband was doubtless picturing to his mind the anguish of his wife at that moment, and perhaps the long days of sorrow that were to succeed. I have no idea he thought of himself, apart from his wife: for a finer, more manly resolute fellow, never existed, as he subsequently proved, to the fullest extent. It seemed to me that the two Cape May men had a sort of desperate reluctance to give up the hope of reaching the land. We were a strong boat's crew, and we had a capital, though a light boat; yet all would not do. About midnight, after pulling desperately for three hours, my strength was quite gone, and I had to give up the oar. Captain Robbins confessed himself in a very little better state, and, it being impossible for the boatmen to do more than keep the boat stationary, and that only for a little time longer, there remained no expedient but to keep off before the wind, in the hope of still falling in with the ship. We knew that the Tigris was on the starboard tack when we left her, and, as she would certainly endeavour to keep as close in with the land as possible, there was a remaining chance that she had wore ship to keep off Henlopen, and might be heading up about north-north-east, and laying athwart the mouth of the bay. This left us just a chance--a ray of hope; and it had now become absolutely necessary to endeavour to profit by it. The two Cape May men pulled the boat round, and kept her just ahead of the seas, as far as it was in their power; very light touches of the oars sufficing for this, where it could be done at all. Occasionally, however, one of those chasing waves would come after us, at a racer's speed, invariably breaking at such instants, and frequently half-filling the boat. This gave us new employment, Rupert and myself being kept quite half the time bailing. No occupation, notwithstanding the danger, could prevent me from looking about the cauldron of angry waters, in quest of the ship. Fifty times did I fancy I saw her, and as often did the delusive idea end in disappointment. The waste of dark waters, relieved by the gleaming of the combing seas, alone met the senses. The wind blew directly down the estuary, and, in crossing its mouth, we found too much swell to receive it on our beam, and were soon compelled, most reluctantly though it was, to keep dead away to prevent swamping. This painful state of expectation may have lasted half an hour, the boat sometimes seeming ready to fly out of the water, as it drifted before the gale, when Rupert unexpectedly called out that he saw the ship! There she was, sure enough, with her head to the northward and eastward, struggling along through the raging waters, under her fore and main-top-sails, close-reefed, and reefed courses, evidently clinging to the land as close as she could, both to hold her own and to make good weather. It was barely light enough to ascertain these facts, though the ship was not a cable's length from us when first discovered. Unfortunately, she was dead to leeward of us, and was drawing ahead so fast as to leave the probability she would forereach upon us, unless we took to all our oars. This was done as soon as possible, and away we went, at a rapid rate, aiming to shoot directly beneath the Tigris's lee-quarter, so as to round-to under shelter of her hull, there to receive a rope. We pulled like giants. Three several times the water slapped into us, rendering the boat more and more heavy; but Captain Bobbins told us to pull on, every moment being precious. As I did not look round--_could_ not well, indeed--I saw no more of the ship until I got a sudden glimpse of her dark hull, within a hundred feet of us, surging ahead in the manner in which vessels at sea seem to take sudden starts that carry them forward at twice their former apparent speed. Captain Robbins had begun to hail, the instant he thought himself near enough, or at the distance of a hundred yards; but what was the human voice amid the music of the winds striking the various cords, and I may add _chords_, in the mazes of a square-rigged vessel's hamper, accompanied by the base of the roaring ocean! Heavens! what a feeling of despair was that, when the novel thought suggested itself almost simultaneously to our minds, that we should not make ourselves heard! I say simultaneously, for at the same instant the whole five of us set up a common, desperate shout to alarm those who were so near us, and who might easily save us from the most dreadful of all deaths--starvation at sea. I presume the fearful manner in which we struggled at the oars diminished the effect of our voices, while the effort to raise a noise lessened our power with the oars. We were already to leeward of the ship, though nearly in her wake, and our only chance now was to over take her. The captain called out to us to pull for life or death, and pull we did. So frantic were our efforts, that I really think we should have succeeded, had not a sea come on board us, and filled us to the thwarts. There remained no alternative but to keep dead away, and to bail for our lives. I confess I felt scalding tears gush down my cheeks, as I gazed at the dark mass of the ship just before it was swallowed up in the gloom. This soon occurred, and then, I make no doubt, every man in the boat considered himself as hopelessly lost. We continued to bail, notwithstanding; and, using hats, gourds, pots and pails, soon cleared the boat, though it was done with no other seeming object than to avert immediate death. I heard one of the Cape May men pray. The name of his wife mingled with his petitions to God. As for poor Captain Robbins, who had so recently been in another scene of equal danger in a boat, he remained silent, seemingly submissive to the decrees of Providence. In this state we must have drifted a league dead before the wind, the Cape May men keeping their eyes on the light, which was just sinking below the horizon, while the rest of us were gazing seaward in ominous expectation of what awaited us in that direction, when the hail of “Boat ahoy!” sounded like the last trumpet in our ears. A schooner was passing our track, keeping a little off, and got so near as to allow us to be seen, though, owing to a remark about the light which drew all eyes to windward, not a soul of us saw her. It was too late to avert the blow, for the hail had hardly reached us, when the schooner's cut-water came down upon our little craft, and buried it in the sea as if it had been lead. At such moments men do not think, but act. I caught at a bob-stay, and missed it. As I went down into the water, my hand fell upon some object to which I clung, and, the schooner rising at the next instant, I was grasped by the hair by one of the vessel's men. I had hold of one of the Cape May men's legs. Released from my weight, this man was soon in the vessel's head, and he helped to save me. When we got in-board, and mustered our party it was found that all had been saved but Captain Robbins. The schooner wore round, and actually passed over the wreck of the boat a second time; but our old commander was never heard of more!

7

None

“Oh! forget not the hour, when through forest and vale We returned with our chief to his dear native halls! Through the woody Sierra there sigh'd not a gale, And the moonbeam was bright on his battlement walls; And nature lay sleeping in calmness and light, Round the house of the _truants_, that rose on our sight.” MRS. HEMANS. We had fallen on board an eastern coaster, called the Martha Wallis, bound from James' River to Boston, intending to cross the shoals. Her watch had seen us, because the coasters generally keep better look-outs than Indiamen; the latter, accustomed to good offings, having a trick of letting their people go to sleep in the night-watches. I made a calculation of the turns on board the Tigris, and knew it was Mr. Marble's watch when we passed the ship; and I make no question he was, at that very moment, nodding on the hencoops--a sort of trick he had. I cannot even now understand, however, why the man at the wheel did not hear the outcry we made. To me it appeared loud enough to reach the land. Sailors ordinarily receive wrecked mariners kindly. Our treatment on board the Martha Wallis was all I could have desired, and the captain promised to put us on board the first coaster she should fall in with, bound to New York. He was as good as his word, though not until more than a week had elapsed. It fell calm as soon as the north-wester blew its pipe out, and we did not get into the Vineyard Sound for nine days. Here we met a craft the skipper knew, and, being a regular Boston and New York coaster, we were put on board her, with a recommendation to good treatment The people of the Lovely Lass received us just as we had been received on board the Martha Wallis; all hands of us living aft, and eating codfish, good beef and pork, with duff (dough) and molasses, almost _ad libitum_. From this last vessel we learned all the latest news of the French war, and how things were going on in the country. The fourth day after we were put on board this craft, Rupert and I landed near Peck's Slip, New York, with nothing on earth in our possession, but just in what we stood. This, however, gave us but little concern--I had abundance at home, and Rupert was certain of being free from want, both through me and through his father. I had never parted with the gold given me by Lucy, however. When we got into the boat to land at the cape, I had put on the belt in which I kept this little treasure, and it was still round my body. I had kept it as a sort of memorial of the dear girl who had given it to me; but I now saw the means of making it useful, without disposing of it altogether. I knew that the wisest course, in all difficulties, was to go at once to head-quarters. I asked the address of the firm that owned, or rather _had_ owned the John, and proceeded to the counting-house forthwith. I told my story, but found that Kite had been before me. It seems that the Tigris got a fair wind, three days after the blow, that carried her up to the very wharves of Philadelphia, when most of the John's people had come on to New York without delay. By communications with the shore at the cape, the pilot had learned that his boat had never returned, and our loss was supposed to have inevitably occurred. The accounts of all this were in the papers, and I began to fear that the distressing tidings might have reached Clawbonny. Indeed, there were little obituary notices of Rupert and myself in the journals, inserted by some hand piously employed, I should think, by Mr. Kite. We were tenderly treated, considering our _escapade_; and _my_ fortune and prospects were dwelt on with some touches of eloquence that might have been spared. In that day, however, a newspaper was a very different thing from what it has since become. Then, journals were created merely to meet the demand, and news was given as it actually occurred; whereas, now, the competition has produced a change that any one can appreciate, when it is remembered to what a _competition in news_ must infallibly lead. In that day, our own journals had not taken to imitating the worst features of the English newspapers--talents and education are not yet cheap enough in America to enable them to imitate the best--and the citizen was supposed to have some rights, as put in opposition to the press. The public sense of right had not become blunted by familiarity with abuses, and the miserable and craven apology was never heard for not enforcing the laws, that nobody cares for what the newspapers say. Owing to these causes, I escaped a thousand lies about myself, my history, my disposition, character and acts. Still, I was in print; and I confess it half-frightened me to see my death announced in such obvious letters, although I had physical evidence of being alive and well. The owners questioned me closely about the manner in which the John was lost, and expressed themselves satisfied with my answers. I then produced my half-joes, and asked to borrow something less than their amount on their security. To the latter part of the proposition, however, these gentlemen would not listen, forcing a check for a hundred dollars on me, desiring that the money might be paid at my own convenience. Knowing I had Clawbonny, and a very comfortable income under my lee, I made no scruples about accepting the sum, and took my leave. Rupert and I had now the means of equipping ourselves neatly, though always in sailor guise. After this was done, we proceeded to the Albany basin, in order to ascertain whether the Wallingford were down or not. At the basin we learned that the sloop had gone out that very forenoon, having on board a black with his young master's effects; a lad who was said to have been out to Canton with young Mr. Wallingford, and who was now on his way home, to report all the sad occurrences to the family in Ulster. This, then, was Neb, who had got thus far back in charge of our chests, and was about to return to slavery. We had been in hopes that we might possibly reach Clawbonny before the tidings of our loss. This intelligence was likely to defeat the expectation; but, luckily, one of the fastest sloops on the river, a Hudson packet, was on the point of sailing, and, though the wind held well to the northward, her master thought he should be able to turn up with the tides, as high as our creek, in the course of the next eight-and-forty hours. This was quite as much as the Wallingford could do, I felt well persuaded; and, making a bargain to be landed on the western shore, Rupert and I put our things on board this packet, and were under way in half an hour's time. So strong was my own anxiety, I could not keep off the deck until we had anchored on account of the flood; and much did I envy Rupert, who had coolly turned in as soon as it was dark, and went to sleep. When the anchor was down, I endeavoured to imitate his example. On turning out next morning, I found the vessel in Newburgh Bay, with a fair wind. About twelve o'clock I could see the mouth of the creek, and the Wallingford fairly entering it, her sails disappearing behind the trees, just as I caught sight of them. As no other craft of her size ever went up to that landing, I could not be mistaken in the vessel. By getting ashore half a mile above the creek, there was a farm-road that would lead to the house by a cut so short, as nearly to bring us there as soon as Neb could possibly arrive with his dire, but false intelligence. The place was pointed out to the captain, who had extracted our secret from us, and who good-naturedly consented to do all we asked of him. I do think he would have gone into the creek itself, had it been required. But we were landed, with our bag of clothes--one answered very well for both--at the place I have mentioned, and, taking turn about to shoulder the wardrobe, away we went, as fast as legs could carry us. Even Rupert seemed to feel on this occasion, and I do think he had a good deal of contrition, as he must have recollected the pain he had occasioned his excellent father, and dear, good sister. Clawbonny never looked more beautiful than when I first cast eyes on it, that afternoon. There lay the house in the secure retirement of its smiling vale, the orchards just beginning to lose their blossoms; the broad, rich meadows, with the grass waving in the south wind, resembling velvet; the fields of corn of all sorts; and the cattle, as they stood ruminating, or enjoying their existence in motionless self-indulgence beneath the shade of trees, seemed to speak of abundance and considerate treatment. Everything denoted peace, plenty and happiness. Yet this place, with all its blessings and security, had I wilfully deserted to encounter pirates in the Straits of Sunda, shipwreck on the shores of Madagascar, jeopardy in an open boat off the Isle of France, and a miraculous preservation from a horrible death on my own coast! At no great distance from the house was a dense grove, in which Rupert and I had, with our own hands, constructed a rude summer-house, fit to be enjoyed on just such an afternoon as this on which we had returned. When distant from it only two hundred yards, we saw the girls enter the wood, evidently taking the direction of the seat. At the same moment I caught a glimpse of Neb moving up the road from the landing at a snail's pace, as if the poor fellow dreaded to encounter the task before him. After a moment's consultation, we determined to proceed at once to the grove, and thus anticipate the account of Neb, who must pass so near the summer-house as to be seen and recognised. We met with more obstacles than we had foreseen or remembered, and when we got to a thicket close in the rear of the bench, we found that the black was already in the presence of his two “young mistresses.” The appearance of the three, when I first caught a near view of them, was such as almost to terrify me. Even Neb, whose face was usually as shining as a black bottle, was almost of the colour of ashes. The poor fellow could not speak, and, though Lucy was actually shaking him to extract an explanation, the only answer she could get was tears. These flowed from Neb's eyes in streams, and at length the fellow threw himself on the ground, and fairly began to groan. “Can this be shame at having run away?” exclaimed Lucy, “or does it foretell evil to the boys?” “He knows nothing of _them_, not having been with them--yet, I am terrified.” “Not on my account, dearest sister,” I cried aloud; “here are Rupert and I, God be praised, both in good health, and safe.” I took care to remain hid, as I uttered this, not to alarm more than one sense at a time; but both the girls shrieked, and held out their arms. Rupert and I hesitated no longer, but sprang forward. I know not how it happened, though I found, on recovering my self-possession, that I was folding Lucy to my heart, while Rupert was doing the same to Grace. This little mistake, however, was soon rectified, each man embracing his own sister, as in duty bound, and as was most decorous. The girls shed torrents of tears, and assured us, again and again, that this was the only really happy moment they had known since the parting on the wharf, nearly a twelvemonth before. Then followed looks at each other, exclamations of surprise and pleasure at the changes that had taken place in the appearance of all parties, and kisses and tears again, in abundance. As for Neb, the poor fellow was seen in the road, whither he had fled at the sound of my voice, looking at us like one in awe and doubt. Being satisfied, in the end, of our identity, as well as of our being in the flesh, the negro again threw himself on the ground, rolling over and over, and fairly yelling with delight. After going through this process of negro excitement, he leaped up on his feel, and started for the house, shouting at the top of his voice, as if certain the good intelligence he brought would secure his own pardon--“Master Miles come home! --Master Miles come home!” In a few minutes, quiet was sufficiently restored among us four, who remained at the seat, to ask questions, and receive intelligible answers. Glad was I to ascertain that the girls had been spared the news of our loss. As for Mr. Hardinge, he was well, and busied, as usual, in discharging the duties of his holy office. He had told Grace and Lucy the name of the vessel in which we had shipped, but said nothing of the painful glimpse he had obtained of us, just as we lifted our anchor, to quit the port. Grace, in a solemn manner, then demanded an outline of our adventures. As Rupert was the spokesman on this occasion, the question having been in a manner put to him as oldest, I had an opportunity of watching the sweet countenances of the two painfully interested listeners. Rupert affected modesty in his narration, if he did not feel it, though I remarked that he dwelt a little particularly on the shot which had lodged so near him, in the head of the Tigris's foremast. He spoke of the whistling it made as it approached, and the violence of the blow when it struck. He had the impudence, too, to speak of my good-luck in being on the other side of the top, when the shot passed through my station; whereas I do believe that the shot passed nearer to me than it did to himself. It barely missed me, and by all I could learn Rupert was leaning over by the top-mast rigging when it lodged. The fellow told his story in his own way, however, and with so much unction that I observed it made Grace look pale. The effect on Lucy was different. This excellent creature perceived my uneasiness, I half suspected, for she laughed, and, interrupting her brother, told him, “There--that's enough about the cannon-ball; now let us hear of something else.” Rupert coloured, for he had frequently had such frank hints from his sister, in the course of his childhood; but he had too much address to betray the vexation I knew he felt. To own the truth, my attachment for Rupert had materially lessened with the falling off of my respect. He had manifested so much selfishness during the voyage--had shirked so much duty, most of which had fallen on poor Neb--and had been so little of the man, in practice, whom he used so well to describe with his tongue--that I could no longer shut my eyes to some of his deficiencies of character. I still liked him; but it was from habit, and perhaps because he was my guardian's son, and Lucy's brother. Then I could not conceal from myself that Rupert was not, in a rigid sense, a lad of truth. He coloured, exaggerated, glossed over and embellished, if he did not absolutely invent. I was not old enough then to understand that most of the statements that float about the world are nothing but truths distorted, and that nothing is more rare than unadulterated fact; that truths and lies travel in company, as described by Pope in his Temple of Fame, until-- “This or that unmixed, no mortal e'er shall find.” In this very narration of our voyage, Rupert had left false impressions on the minds of his listeners, in fifty things. He had made far more of both our little skirmishes, than the truth would warrant, and he had neglected to do justice to Neb in his account of each of the affairs. Then he commended Captain Robbins's conduct in connection with the loss of the John, on points that could not be sustained, and censured him for measures that deserved praise. I knew Rupert was no seaman--was pretty well satisfied, by this time, he never would make one--but I could not explain all his obliquities by referring them to ignorance. The manner, moreover, in which he represented himself as the principal actor, on all occasions, denoted so much address, that, while I felt the falsity of the impressions he left, I did not exactly see the means necessary to counteract them. So ingenious, indeed, was his manner of stringing facts and inferences together, or what _seemed_ to be facts and inferences, that I more than once caught myself actually believing that which, in sober reality, I knew to be false. I was still too young, not quite eighteen, to feel any apprehensions on the subject of Grace; and was too much accustomed to both Rupert and his sister, to regard either with any feelings very widely different from those which I entertained for Grace herself. As soon as the history of our adventures and exploits was concluded, we all had leisure to observe and comment on the alterations that time had made in our several persons. Rupert, being the oldest, was the least changed in this particular. He had got his growth early, and was only a little spread. He had cultivated a pair of whiskers at sea, which rendered his face a little more manly--an improvement, by the way--but, the effects of exposure and of the sun excepted, there was no very material change in his exterior. Perhaps, on the whole, he was improved in appearance. I think both the girls fancied this, though Grace did not say it, and Lucy only half admitted it, and that with many reservations. As for myself, I was also full-grown, standing exactly six feet in my stockings, which was pretty well for eighteen. But I had also spread; a fact that is not common for lads at that age. Grace said I had lost all delicacy of appearance; and as for Lucy, though she laughed and blushed she protested I began to look like a great bear. To confess the truth, I was well satisfied with my own appearance, did not envy Rupert a jot, and knew I could toss him over my shoulder whenever I chose. I stood the strictures on my appearance, therefore, very well; and, though no one was so much derided and laughed at as myself, in that critical discussion, no one cared less for it all. Just as I was permitted to escape, Lucy said, in an under tone-- “You should have staid at home, Miles, and then the changes would have come so gradually, no one would have noticed them, and you would have escaped being told how much you are altered, and that you are a _bear_.” I looked eagerly round at the speaker, and eyed her intently. A look of regret passed over the dear creature's face, her eyes looked as penitent as they did soft, and the flush that suffused her countenance rendered this last expression almost bewitching. At the same instant she whispered--“I did not really mean _that_.” But it was Grace's turn, and my attention was drawn to my sister. A year had made great improvements in Grace. Young as she was, she had lost much of the girlish air, in the sedateness and propriety of the young woman. Grace had always something more of these last than is common; but they had now completely removed every appearance of childish, I might almost say of girlish, frivolity. In person, her improvement was great; though an air of exceeding delicacy rather left an impression that such a being was more intended for another world, than this. There was ever an air of fragility and of pure intellectuality about my poor sister, that half disposed one to fancy that she would one day be translated to a better sphere in the body, precisely as she stood before human eyes. Lucy bore the examination well. She was all woman, there being nothing about _her_ to create any miraculous expectations, or fanciful pictures; but she was evidently fast getting to be a very lovely woman. Honest, sincere, full of heart, overflowing with the feelings of her sex, gentle yet spirited, buoyant though melting with the charities; her changeful, but natural and yet constant feelings in her, kept me incessantly in pursuit of her playful mind and varying humours. Still, a more high-principled being, a firmer or more consistent friend, or a more accurate thinker on all subjects that suited her years and became her situation, than Lucy Hardinge, never existed. Even Grace was influenced by her judgment, though I did not then know how much my sister's mind was guided by her simple and less pretending friend's capacity to foresee things, and to reason on their consequences. We were more than an hour uninterruptedly together, before we thought of repairing to the house. Lucy then reminded Rupert that he had not yet seen his father, whom she had just before observed alighting from his horse at the door of his own study. That he had been apprised of the return of the runaways, if not prodigals, was evident, she thought, by his manner; and it was disrespectful to delay seeking his forgiveness and blessing. Mr. Hardinge received us both without surprise, and totally without any show of resentment. It was about the time he expected our return, and no surprise was felt at finding this expectation realized, as a matter of course, while resentment was almost a stranger to his nature. We all shed tears, the girls sobbing aloud; and we were both solemnly blessed. Nor am I ashamed to say I knelt to receive that blessing, in an age when the cant of a pretending irreligion--there is as much cant in self-sufficiency as in hypocrisy, and they very often go together--is disposed to turn into ridicule the humbling of the person, while asking for the blessing of the Almighty through the ministers of his altars; for kneel I did, and weep I did, and, I trust, the one in humility and the other in contrition. When we had all become a little calm, and a substantial meal was placed before us adventurers, Mr. Hardinge demanded an account of all that had passed. He applied to me to give it, and I was compelled to discharge the office of an historian, somewhat against my inclination. There was no remedy, however, and I told the story in my own simple manner, and certainly in a way to leave very different impressions from many of those made by the narrative of Rupert. I thought once or twice, as I proceeded, that Lucy looked sorrowful, and Grace looked surprised. I do not think I coloured in the least, as regarded myself, and I know I did Neb no more than justice. My tale was soon told, for I felt the whole time as if I were contradicting Rupert, who, by the way, appeared perfectly unconcerned--perfectly unconscious, indeed--on the subject of the discrepancies in the two accounts. I have since met with men who did not know the truth when it was even placed very fairly before their eyes. Mr. Hardinge expressed his heartfelt happiness at having us back again, and, soon after, he ventured to ask if we were satisfied with what we had seen of the world. This was a home question, but I thought it best to meet it manfully. So far from being satisfied, I told him it was my ardent desire to get on board one of the letters-of-marque, of which so many were then fitting out in the country, and to make a voyage to Europe. Rupert, however, confessed he had mistaken his vocation, and that he thought he could do no better than to enter a lawyer's office. I was thunderstruck at this quiet admission of my friend, of his incapacity to make a sailor, for it was the first intimation I heard of his intention. I had remarked a certain want of energy, in various situations that required action, in Rupert, but no want of courage; and I had ascribed some portion of his lassitude to the change of condition, and, possibly, of food; for, after all, that godlike creature, man, is nothing but an animal, and is just as much influenced by his stomach and digestion as a sheep, or a horse. Mr. Hardinge received his son's intimation of a preference of intellectual labours to a more physical state of existence, with a gratification my own wishes did not afford him. Still, he made no particular remark to either at the time, permitting us both to enjoy our return to Clawbonny, without any of the drawbacks of advice or lectures. The evening passed delightfully, the girls beginning to laugh heartily at our own ludicrous accounts of the mode of living on board ship, and of our various scenes in China, the Isle of Bourbon, and elsewhere. Rupert had a great deal of humour, and a very dry way of exhibiting it; in short, he was almost a genius in the mere superficialities of life; and even Grace rewarded his efforts to entertain us, with laughter to tears. Neb was introduced after supper, and the fellow was both censured and commended; censured for having abandoned the household gods, and commended for not having deserted their master. His droll descriptions of the Chinese, their dress, pigtails, shoes and broken English, diverted even Mr. Hardinge, who, I believe, felt as much like a boy on this occasion, as any of the party. A happier evening than that which followed in the little _tea_-parlour, as my dear mother used to call it, was never passed in the century that the roof had covered the old walls of Clawbonny. Next day I had a private conversation with my guardian, who commenced the discourse by rendering a sort of account of the proceeds of my property during the past year. I listened respectfully, and with some interest; for I saw the first gave Mr. Hardinge great satisfaction, and I confess the last afforded some little pleasure to myself. I found that things had gone on very prosperously. Ready money was accumulating, and I saw that, by the time I came of age, sufficient cash would be on hand to give me a ship of my own, should I choose to purchase one. From that moment I was secretly determined to qualify myself to command her in the intervening time. Little was said of the future, beyond an expression of the hope, by my guardian, that I would take time to reflect before I came to a final decision on the subject of my profession. To this I said nothing beyond making a respectful inclination of the head. For the next month, Clawbonny was a scene of uninterrupted merriment and delight. We had few families to visit in our immediate neighbourhood, it is true; and Mr. Hardinge proposed an excursion to the Springs--the country was then too new, and the roads too bad, to think of Niagara--but to this I would not listen. I cared not for the Springs--knew little of, and cared less for fashion--and loved Clawbonny to its stocks and stones. We remained at home, then, living principally for each other. Rupert read a good deal to the girls, under the direction of his father; while I passed no small portion of my time in athletic exercises. The Grace & Lucy made one or two tolerably long cruises in the river, and at length I conceived the idea of taking the party down to town in the Wallingford. Neither of the girls had ever seen New York, or much of the Hudson; nor had either ever seen a ship. The sloops that passed up and down the Hudson, with an occasional schooner, were the extent of their acquaintance with vessels; and I began to feel it to be matter of reproach that those in whom I took so deep an interest, should be so ignorant. As for the girls themselves, they both admitted, now I was a sailor, that their desire to see a regular, three-masted, full-rigged ship, was increased seven-fold. Mr. Hardinge heard my proposition, at first, as a piece of pleasantry; but Grace expressing a strong desire to see a large town, or what was thought a large town in this country, in 1799, and Lucy looking wistful, though she remained silent under an apprehension her father could not afford the expense of such a journey, which her imagination rendered a great deal more formidable than it actually proved to be, the excellent divine finally acquiesced. The expense was disposed of in a very simple manner. The journey, both ways, would be made in the Wallingford; and Mr. Hardinge was not so unnecessarily scrupulous as to refuse passages for himself and children in the sloop, which never exacted passage-money from any who went to or from the farm. Food was so cheap, too, as to be a matter of no consideration; and, being entitled legally to receive that at Clawbonny, it made no great difference whether it were taken on board the vessel, or in the house. Then there was a Mrs. Bradfort in New York, a widow lady of easy fortune, who was a cousin-german of Mr. Hardinge's--his father's sister's daughter--and with her he always staid in his own annual visits to attend the convention of the Church--I beg pardon, of the Protestant Episcopal Church, as it is now _de rigueur_ to say; I wonder some ultra does not introduce the manifest improvement into the Apostles' Creed of saying, “I believe in the Holy Protestant Episcopal Catholic Church, &c.”--but, the excellent divine, in his annual attendance on the convention, was accustomed to stay with his kinswoman, who often pressed him to bring both Lucy and Grace to see her; her house in Wall street being abundantly large enough to accommodate a much more numerous party. “Yes,” said Mr. Hardinge, “that shall be the arrangement. The girls and I will stay with Mrs. Bradfort, and the young men can live at a tavern. I dare say this new City Hotel, which seems to be large enough to contain a regiment, will hold even _them_. I will write this very evening to my cousin, so as not to take her by surprise.” In less than a week after this determination, an answer was received from Mrs. Bradfort; and, the very next day, the whole party, Neb included, embarked in the Wallingford. Very different was this passage down the Hudson from that which had preceded it. Then I had the sense of error about me, while my heart yearned towards the two dear girls we had left on the wharf; but now everything was above-board sincere, and by permission. It is scarcely necessary to say that Grace and Lucy were enchanted with everything they saw. The Highlands, in particular, threw them both into ecstasies, though I have since seen so much of the world as to understand, with nearly all experienced tourists, that this is _relatively_ the worst part of the scenery of this beautiful river. When I say _relatively_, I mean as comparing the _bolder_ parts of our stream with those of others--speaking of them as _high lands_--many other portions of this good globe having a much superior _grandeur_, while very few have so much lovely river scenery compressed into so small a space as is to be found in the other parts of the Hudson. In due time we arrived in New York, and I had the supreme happiness of pointing out to the girls the State's Prison, the Bear Market, and the steeples of St. Paul's and Trinity-_old_ Trinity, as it was so lately the fashion to style a church that was built only a few years before, and which, in my youth, was considered as magnificent as it was venerable. That building has already disappeared; and another edifice, which is now termed splendid, _vast_, and I know not what, has been reared in its place. By the time this is gone, and one or two generations of buildings have succeeded, each approaching nearer to the high standard of church architecture in the old world, the Manhattanese will get to understand something of the use of the degrees of comparison on such subjects. When that day shall arrive, they will cease to be provincial, and--not till then. What a different thing was Wall street, in 1799, from what it is to-day? Then, where so many Grecian temples are now reared to Plutus, were rows of modest provincial dwellings; not a tittle more provincial, however, than the thousand meretricious houses of bricks and marble that have since started up in their neighbourhood, but far less pretending, and insomuch the more creditable. Mrs. Bradfort lived in one of these respectable abodes, and thither Mr. Hardinge led the way, with just as much confidence as one would now walk into Bleeker street, or the Fifth Avenue. Money-changers were then unknown, or, if known, were of so little account that they had not sufficient force to form a colony and a league by themselves. Even the banks did not deem it necessary to be within a stone's throw of each other--I believe there were but two--as it might be in self-defence. We have seen all sorts of expedients adopted, in this sainted street, to protect the money-bags, from the little temple that was intended to be so small as only to admit the dollars and those who were to take care of them, up to the edifice that might contain so many rogues, as to render things safe on the familiar principle of setting a thief to catch a thief. All would not do. The difficulty has been found to be unconquerable, except in those cases in which the homely and almost worn-out expedient of employing honest men, has been resorted to. But, to return from the gossipings of old age to an agreeable widow, who was still under forty. Mrs. Bradfort received Mr. Hardinge in a way to satisfy us all that she was delighted to see him. She had prepared a room for Rupert and myself, and no apologies or excuses would be received. We had to consent to accept of her hospitalities. In an hour's time, all were established, and I believe all were at home. I shall not dwell on the happiness that succeeded. We were all too young to go to parties, and, I might almost add, New York itself was too young to have any; but in the last I should have been mistaken, though there were not as many _children's_ balls in 1799, perhaps, after allowing for the difference in population, as there are to-day. If too young to be company, we were not too young to see sights. I sometimes laugh as I remember what these were at that time. There was such a museum as would now be thought lightly of in a western city of fifteen or twenty years' growth--a circus kept by a man of the name of Ricketts--the theatre in John street, a very modest Thespian edifice--and a lion, I mean literally the beast, that was kept in a cage quite out of town, that his roaring might not disturb people, somewhere near the spot where the _triangle_ that is called Franklin _Square_ now is. All these we saw, even to the theatre; good, indulgent Mr. Hardinge seeing no harm in letting us go thither under the charge of Mrs. Bradfort. I shall never forget the ecstasy of that night! The novelty was quite as great to Rupert and myself as it was to the girls; for, though we had been to China, we had never been to the play. Well was it said, “Vanity, vanity--all is vanity!” He that lives as long as I have lived, will have seen most of his opinions, and I think I may add, _all_ his tastes, change. Nothing short of revelation has a stronger tendency to convince us of the temporary character of our probationary state in this world, than to note for how short a period, and for what imperfect ends, all our hopes and success in life have been buoying us up, and occupying our minds. After fifty, the delusion begins to give way; and, though we may continue to live, and even to be happy, blind indeed must be he who does not see the end of his road, and foresee some of the great results to which it is to lead. But of all this, our quartette thought little in the year 1799.

8

None

“Thou art the same, eternal sea! The earth hath many shapes and forms Of hill and valley, flower and tree; Fields that the fervid noontide warms, Or Winter's rugged grasp deforms, Or bright with Autumn's golden store; Thou coverest up thy face with storms, Or smilest serene--but still thy roar And dashing foam go up to vex the sea-beat shore.” LUNT. I had a free conversation with my guardian, shortly after we reached town, on the subject of my going to sea again. The whole country was alive with the armament of the new marine; and cocked-hats, blue coats and white lapels, began to appear in the streets, with a parade that always marks the new officer and the new service. Now, one meets distinguished naval men at every turn, and sees nothing about their persons to denote the profession, unless in actual employment afloat, even the cockade being laid aside; whereas in 1799 the harness was put on as soon as the parchment was received, and only laid aside to turn in. Ships were building or equipping in all parts of the country; and it is matter of surprise to me that I escaped the fever, and did not apply to be made a midshipman. Had I seen another captain who interested me as much as Captain Dale, I make no doubt my career would have been quite different: but, as things were, I had imbibed the prejudice that Southey, in his very interesting, but, in a professional sense, very worthless, life of Nelson, has attributed to that hero--“aft, the more honour; forward, the better man.” Thus far, I had not got into the cabin-windows, and, like all youngsters who fairly begin on the forecastle, felt proud of my own manhood and disdain of hazards and toil. I determined, therefore, to pursue the course I had originally pointed out to myself, and follow in the footsteps of my father. Privateers were out of the question in a war with a country that had no commerce. Nor do I think I would have gone in a privateer under any circumstances. The business of carrying on a warfare merely for gain, has ever struck me as discreditable; though it must be admitted the American system of private-armed cruisers has always been more respectable and better conducted than that of most other nations. This has been owing to the circumstance that men of a higher class than is usual in Europe, have embarked in the enterprises. To a letter-of-marque, however, there could be no objection; her regular business is commerce; she arms only in self-defence, or, if she capture anything, it is merely such enemies as cross her path, and who would capture her if they could. I announced to Mr. Hardinge, therefore, my determination not to return to Clawbonny, but to look for a berth in some letter-of-marque, while then in town. Neb had received private instructions, and my sea dunnage, as well as his own, was on board the Wallingford--low enough the wreck had reduced both to be--and money obtained from Mr. Hardinge was used to purchase more. I now began to look about me for a ship, determined to please my eye as to the vessel, and my judgment as to the voyage. Neb had orders to follow the wharves on the same errand. I would sooner trust Neb than Rupert on such a duty. The latter had no taste for ships; felt no interest in them; and I have often wondered why he took a fancy to go to sea at all. With Neb it was very different. He was already an expert seaman; could hand, reef and steer, knot and splice, and was as useful as nine men in ten on board a vessel. It is true, he did not know when it became necessary to take in the last reef--had no notion of stowing a cargo so as to favour the vessel, or help her sailing; but he would break out a cask sooner than most men I ever met with. There was too much “nigger” in him for head-work of that sort, though he was ingenious and ready enough in his way. A sterling fellow was Neb, and I got in time to love him very much as I can conceive one would love a brother. One day, after I had seen all the sights, and had begun to think seriously of finding a ship, I was strolling along the wharves on the latter errand, when I heard a voice I knew cry put, “There, Captain Williams, there's just your chap; he'll make as good a third-mate as can be found in all America.” I had a sort of presentiment this applied to me, though I could not, on the instant, recall the speaker's name. Turning to look in the direction of the sounds, I saw the hard countenance of Marble, alongside the weather-beaten face of a middle-aged shipmaster, both of whom were examining me over the nettings of a very promising-looking armed merchantman. I bowed to Mr. Marble, who beckoned me to come on board, where I was regularly introduced to the master. This vessel was called the Crisis, a very capital name for a craft in a country where crisises of one sort or another occur regularly as often as once in six months. She was a tight little ship of about four hundred tons, had hoop-pole bulwarks, as I afterwards learned, with nettings for hammocks and old junk, principally the latter; and showed ten nine-pounders, carriage-guns, in her batteries. I saw she was loaded, and was soon given to understand that her shipping-articles were then open, and the serious question was of procuring a third-mate. Officers were scarce, so many young men were pressing into the navy; and Mr. Marble ventured to recommend me, from near a twelvemonth's knowledge of my character. I had not anticipated a berth aft quite so soon, and yet I had a humble confidence in my own ability to discharge the duty. Captain Williams questioned me for fifteen or twenty minutes, had a short conversation with Mr. Marble alone, and then frankly offered me the berth. The voyage was to be round the world, and it took my fancy at the very sound. The ship was to take a cargo of flour to England; there, she was to receive a small assorted cargo for the North-West Coast, and some of the sandal-wood islands; after disposing of her toys and manufactures in barter, she was to sail for Canton, exchange her furs, wood and other articles for teas, &c., and return home. To engage in this voyage, I was offered the berth I have mentioned, and thirty dollars a-month. The wages were of little moment to me, but the promotion and the voyage were of great account. The ship, too, carried out letters-of-marque and reprisal with her, and there were the chances of meeting some Frenchman in the European waters, at least. I examined the vessel, the berth I was to occupy, made a great many shy glances at the captain, to ascertain his character by that profound expedient, analyzing his looks, and finally determined to ship, on condition Neb should be taken as an ordinary seaman. As soon as Marble heard this last proposal, he explained the relation in which the black stood to me, and earnestly advised his being received as a seaman. The arrangement was made accordingly, and I went at once to the notary and signed the articles. Neb was also found, and he was shipped too; this time regularly, Mr. Hardinge attending and giving his sanction to what was done. The worthy divine was in excellent spirits, for that very day he had made an arrangement with a friend at the bar to place Rupert in his office, Mrs. Bradfort insisting on keeping her young kinsman in her house, as a regular inmate. This left on the father no more charge than to furnish Rupert with clothes, and a few dollars of pocket-money. But I knew Rupert too well to suppose he would, or could, be content with the little he might expect from the savings of Mr. Hardinge. I was not in want of money. My guardian had supplied me so amply, that not only had I paid my debt to the owners of the John, and fully equipped myself for the voyage, but I actually possessed dollars enough to supply all my probable wants during the expected absence. Many of the officers and men of the Crisis left behind them orders with their wives and families to receive their wages, in part, during their absence, as letters from time to time apprised the owners that these people were on board, and in discharge of their several duties. I determined on giving Rupert the benefit of such an arrangement. First presenting him with twenty dollars from my own little store, I took him with me to the counting-house, and succeeded, though not without some difficulty, in obtaining for my friend a credit of twenty dollars a-month, promising faithfully to repay any balance that might arise against me in consequence of the loss of the ship, or of any accident to myself. This I was enabled to do on the strength of my credit as the owner of Clawbonny; for, as is usual in these cases, I passed for being much richer than I really was, though far from being poor. I will acknowledge that, while I felt no reluctance at making this arrangement in favour of Rupert, I felt mortified he should accept it. There are certain acts we may all wish to perform, and, yet, which bring regrets when successfully performed. I was sorry that _my_ friend, Lucy's brother, Grace's admirer--for I was quick enough in perceiving that Rupert began to entertain fancies of that sort--had not pride enough to cause him to decline receiving money which must be earned by the sweat of my brow, and this, moreover, in a mode of life he had not himself sufficient resolution to encounter a second time. But he accepted the offer, and there was an end of it. As everything was alive in 1798, the Crisis was ready to sail in three days after I joined her. We hauled into the North river, as became the dignity of our voyage, and got our crew on board. On the whole, we mustered a pretty good body of men, ten of them being green; fellows who had never seen the ocean, but who were young, healthy and athletic, and who promised to be useful before a great while. Including those aft, we counted thirty-eight souls on board. The ship was got ready in hopes of being able to sail of a Thursday, for Captain Williams was a thoughtful man, and was anxious to get the ship fairly at sea, with the first work done, previously to the next Sabbath. Some small matters, however, could not be got through with in time; and, as for sailing of a Friday, that was out of the question. No one did that in 1798, who could help it. This gave us a holiday, and I got leave to pass the afternoon and evening ashore. Rupert, Grace, Lucy and I took a long walk into the country that evening; that is, we went into the fields, and along the lanes, for some distance above the present site of Canal street. Lucy and I walked together, most of the time, and we both felt sad at the idea of so long a separation as was now before us. The voyage might last three years; and I should be legally a man, my own master, and Lucy a young woman of near nineteen, by that time. Terrible ages in perspective were these, and which seemed to us pregnant with as many changes as the life of a man. “Rupert will be admitted to the bar, when I get back,” I casually remarked, as we talked the matter over. “He will, indeed,” the dear girl answered. “Now you _are_ to go, Miles, I almost regret my brother is not to be in the ship; you have known each other so long, love each other so much, and have already gone through such frightful trials in company.” “Oh! I shall do well enough--there'll be Neb; and as for Rupert, I think he will be better satisfied ashore than at sea. Rupert is a sort of a natural lawyer.” By this I merely meant he was good at a subterfuge, and could tell his own story. “Yes, but Neb is not Rupert, Miles,” Lucy answered, quick as thought, and, I fancied, a little reproachfully. “Very true--no doubt I shall miss your brother, and that, too, very much, at times; but all I meant in speaking of Neb was, as you know, that he and I like each other, too, and have been through just the same trials together, you understand, and have known each other as long as I can remember.” Lucy was silent, and I felt embarrassed, and a little at a loss what to say next. But a girl approaching sixteen, and who is with a youth who possesses her entire confidence, is not apt to be long silent. Something she will say; and how often is that something warm with natural feeling, instinct with truth, and touching from its confiding simplicity! “You will sometimes think of us, Miles?” was Lucy's next remark, and it was said in a tone that induced me to look her full in the face, when I discovered that her eyes were suffused with tears. “Of that you may be _very_ certain, and I hope to be rewarded in kind. But, now I think of it, Lucy, I have a debt to pay you, and, at the same time, a little interest. Here are the half-joes you forced me to take last year, when we parted at Clawbonny. See, they are exactly the same pieces; for I would as soon have parted with a finger, as with one of them.” “I had hoped they might have been of use to you, and had quite forgotten them. You have destroyed an agreeable illusion.” “Is it not quite as agreeable to know we had no occasion for them? No, here they are; and, now I go with Mr. Hardinge's full approbation, you very well know I can be in no want of money. So, there is your gold; and here, Lucy, is some interest for the use of it.” I made an effort to put something into the dear girl's hand as I spoke, but all the strength I could properly apply was not equal to the purpose. So tightly did she keep her little fingers compressed, that I could not succeed without a downright effort at force. “No--no--Miles,” she said hurriedly--almost huskily; “that will never do! I am not Rupert--you may prevail with him; never with _me_!” “Rupert! What can Rupert have to do with such a thing as this locket? Youngsters don't wear lockets.” Lucy's fingers separated as easily as an infant's, and I put my little offering into her hand without any more resistance. I was sorry, however, to discover that, by some means unknown to me, she had become acquainted with the arrangement I had made as respected the twenty dollars a month. I afterwards ascertained that this secret had leaked out through Neb, who had it from one of the clerks of the counting-house who had visited the ship, and repeated it to Mrs. Bradfort's black maid, in one of his frequent visits to the house. This is a common channel of information, though it seldom proves as true as it did in this instance. I could see that Lucy was delighted with her locket. It was a very pretty ornament, in the first place, and it had her own hair, that of Grace, Rupert, and my own, very prettily braided together, so as to form a wreath, made like a rope, or a grummet, encircling a combination of letters that included all our initials. In this there was nothing that was particular, while there was much that was affectionate. Had I not consulted Grace on the subject, it is possible I should have been less cautious, though I declare I had no thought of making love. All this time I fancied I felt for, and trusted Lucy as another sister. I was shrewd enough to detect Rupert's manner and feeling towards my own sister, and I felt afraid it was, or soon would be, fully reciprocated; but as to imagining myself in love with Lucy Hardinge, or any one else, the thought never crossed my mind, though the dear girl herself so often did! I saw Lucy's smile, and I could not avoid noticing the manner in which, once or twice, unconsciously to herself, I do believe, this simple-minded, sincere creature, pressed the hand which retained the locket to her heart; and yet it made no very lively impression on my imagination at the time. The conversation soon changed, and we began to converse of other things. I have since fancied that Grace had left us alone in order that I might return the half-joes to Lucy, and offer the locket; for, looking round and seeing the latter in its new owner's hand, while Lucy was bestowing on it one of the hundred glances of grateful pleasure it received that afternoon, she waited until we came up, when she took my arm, remarking, as this was to be our last evening together, she must come in for her share of the conversation. Now, I solemnly affirm that this was the nearest approach to anything like a love-scene that had ever passed between Lucy Hardinge and myself. I would gladly pass over the leave-taking, and shall say but little about it. Mr. Hardinge called me into his room, when we got back to the house. He spoke earnestly and solemnly to me, recalling to my mind many of his early and most useful precepts. He then kissed me, gave me his blessing, and promised to remember me in his prayers. As I left him, and I believe he went on his knees as soon as my back was turned, Lucy was waiting for me in the passage. She was in tears, and paler than common, but her mind seemed made up to sustain a great sacrifice like a woman. She put a small, but exceedingly neat copy of the Bible into my hand, and uttered, as well as emotion would permit--“There, Miles; _that_ is _my_ keepsake. I do not ask you to think of _me_ when you read; but think of _God_.” She then snatched a kiss, and flew into her room and locked the door. Grace was below, and she wept on my neck like a child, kissing me again and again, and calling me “her brother--her dear, her _only_ brother.” I was obliged actually to tear myself away from Grace. Rupert went with me to the ship, and passed an hour or two on board. As we crossed the threshold, I heard a window open above my head, and, looking up, I saw Lucy, with streaming eyes, leaning forward to say, “Write, Miles--write as often as you possibly can.” Man must be a stern being by nature, to be able to tear himself from such friends, in order to encounter enemies, hardships, dangers and toil, and all without any visible motive. Such was my case, however, for I wanted not for a competency, or for most of those advantages which might tempt one to abandon the voyage. Of such a measure, the possibility never crossed my mind. I believed that it was just as necessary for me to remain third-mate of the Crisis, and to stick by the ship while she would float, as Mr. Adams thinks it necessary for him to present abolition petitions to a congress, which will not receive them. We both of us, doubtless, believed ourselves the victims of fate. We sailed at sun-rise, wind and tide favouring. We had anchored off Courtlandt street, and as the ship swept past the Battery I saw Rupert, who had only gone ashore in the pilot's boat at day-light, with two females, watching our movements. The girls did not dare to wave their handkerchiefs; but what cared I for that--I knew that their good wishes, kind wishes, tender wishes, went with me; and this little touch of affection, which woman knows so well how to manifest, made me both happy and sad for the remainder of the day. The Crisis was an unusually fast ship, faster even than the Tigris; coppered to the bends, copper-fastened, and with a live-oak frame. No better craft sailed out of the republic. Uncle Sam had tried to purchase her for one of his new navy; but the owners, having this voyage in view, refused his tempting offers. She was no sooner under her canvass, than all hands of us perceived we were in a traveller; and glad enough were we to be certain of the fact, for we had a long road before us. This, too, was with the wind free, and in smooth water; whereas those who knew the vessel asserted her _forte_ was on a bowline and in a sea-that is to say, she would sail relatively faster than most other craft, under the latter circumstances. There was a strange pleasure to me, notwithstanding all I had suffered previously, all the risks I had run, and all I had left behind me, in finding myself once more on the broad ocean. As for Neb, the fellow was fairly enraptured. So quickly and intelligently did he obey his orders, that he won a reputation before we crossed the bar. The smell of the ocean seemed to imbue him with a species of nautical inspiration, and even I was astonished with his readiness and activity. As for myself, I was every way at home. Very different was this exit from the port, from that of the previous year. Then everything was novel, and not a little disgusting. Now I had little, almost nothing, to learn--literally nothing, I might have said, were it not that every ship-master has certain _ways_ of his own, that it behooves all his subordinates to learn as quickly as possible. Then I lived aft, where we not only had plates, and table-cloths, and tumblers, and knives and forks; but comparatively _clean_ articles of the sort. I say comparatively, the two other degrees being usually wanting in north-west traders. The Crisis went to sea with a lively breeze at south-west, the wind shifting after she had got into the lower bay. There were a dozen sail of us altogether, and in our little fleet were two of Uncle Sam's men, who felt disposed to try their hands with us. We crossed the bar, all three of us, within a cable's length of each other, and made sail in company, with the wind a trifle abaft the beam. Just as Navesink disappeared, our two men-of-war, merchantmen altered, hauled up on bowlines, and jogged off towards the West Indies, being at the time about a league astern of us. This success put us all in high good-humour, and had such an effect on Marble in particular, that he began to give it as his opinion that our only superiority over them would not be found confined to sailing, on an experiment. It is very convenient to think favourably of one's self, and it is certainly comfortable to entertain the same notion as respects one's ship. I confess to a little awkwardness at first, in acting as an officer. I was young, and commanded men old enough to be my father--regular sea-dogs, who were as critical in all that related to the niceties of the calling, as the journalist who is unable to appreciate the higher qualities of a book, is hypercritical on its minor faults. But a few days gave me confidence, and I soon found I was obeyed as readily as the first-mate. A squall struck the ship in my watch, about a fortnight out, and I succeeded in getting in sail, and saving everything, canvass and spars, in a way that did me infinite service aft. Captain Williams spoke to me on the subject, commending the orders I had given, and the coolness with which they had been issued; for, as I afterwards understood, he remained some time in the companion-way, keeping the other two mates back, though all hands had been called, in order to see how I could get along by myself in such a strait. On this occasion, I never saw a human being exert himself like Neb. He felt that my honour was concerned. I do really think the fellow did two men's duty, the whole time the squall lasted. Until this little incident occurred, Captain Williams was in the habit of coming on deck to examine the heavens, and see how things were getting on, in my night-watches; but, after this, he paid no more visits of this sort to me, than he paid to Mr. Marble. I had been gratified by his praises; but this quiet mode of showing confidence, gave me more happiness than I can express. We had a long passage out, the wind hanging to the eastward near three weeks. At length we got moderate southerly breezes, and began to travel on our course. Twenty-four hours after we had got the fair wind, I had the morning watch, and made, as the day dawned, a sail directly abeam of us, to windward, about three leagues distant, or just hull down. I went into the main-top, and examined her with a glass. She was a ship, seemingly of about our own size, and carrying everything that would draw. I did not send word below until it was broad daylight, or for near half an hour; and in all that time her bearings did not vary any perceptible distance. Just as the sun rose, the captain and chief-mate made their appearance on deck. At first they agreed in supposing the stranger a stray English West-Indiaman, bound home; for, at that time, few merchant vessels were met at sea that were not English or American. The former usually sailed in convoys, however; and the captain accounted for the circumstance that this was not thus protected, by the fact of her sailing so fast. She might be a letter-of-marque, like ourselves, and vessels of that character did not take convoy. As the two vessels lay exactly abeam of each other, with square yards, it was not easy to judge of the sparring of the stranger, except by means of his masts. Marble, judging by the appearance of his topsails, began to think our neighbour might be a Frenchman, he had so much hoist to the sails. After some conversation on the subject, the captain ordered me to brace forward the yards, as far as our studding-sails would allow, and to luff nearer to the stranger. While the ship was thus changing her course, the day advanced, and our crew got their breakfast. As a matter of course, the strange ship, which kept on the same line of sailing as before, drew ahead of us a little, while we neared her sensibly. In the course of three hours we were within a league of her, but well on her lee-quarter. Marble now unhesitatingly pronounced her to be a Frenchman, there being no such thing as mistaking the sails. To suppose an Englishman would go to sea with such triangles of royals, he held to be entirely out of the question; and then he referred to me to know if I did not remember the brig “we had licked in the West Indies, last v'y'ge, which had just such r'yals as the chap up there to windward?” I could see the resemblance, certainly, and had remarked the same peculiarity in the few French vessels I had seen. Under all the circumstances, Captain Williams determined to get on the weather-quarter of our neighbour, and take a still nearer look at him. That he was armed, we could see already; and, as near as we could make out, he carried twelve guns, or just two more than we did ourselves. All this was encouraging; sufficiently so, at least, to induce us to make a much closer examination than we had yet done. It took two more hours to bring the Crisis, fast as she sailed, on the weather-quarter of her neighbour, distant about a mile. Here our observations were much more to the purpose, and even Captain Williams pronounced the stranger to be a Frenchman, “and, no doubt, a letter-of-marque, like ourselves.” He had just uttered these words, when we saw the other vessel's studding-sails coming down her royals and top-gallant-sails clewing up, and all the usual signs of her stripping for a fight. We had set our ensign early in the day, but, as yet, had got no answering symbol of nationality from the chase. As soon as she had taken in all her light canvass, however, she clewed up her courses, fired a gun to windward, and hoisted the French _tri-color_, the most graceful flag among the emblems of Christendom, but one that has been as remarkably unsuccessful in the deeds it has witnessed on the high seas, as it has been remarkable for the reverse on land. The French have not been wanting in excellent sailors--gallant seamen, too; but the results of their exploits afloat have ever borne a singular disproportion to the means employed--a few occasional exceptions just going to prove that the causes have been of a character as peculiar, as these results have, in nearly all ages, been uniform. I have heard the want of success in maritime exploits, among the French, attributed to a want of sympathy, in the nation, with maritime things. Others, again, have supposed that the narrow system of preferring birth to merit, which pervaded the whole economy of the French marine, as well as of its army, previously to the revolution, could not fail to destroy the former, inasmuch as a man of family would not consent to undergo the toil and hardships that are unavoidable to the training of the true seaman. This last reason, however, can scarcely be the true one, as the young English noble has often made the most successful naval officer; and the marine of France, in 1798, had surely every opportunity of perfecting itself, by downright practice, uninjured by favouritism, as that of America. For myself, though I have now reflected on the subject for years, I can come to no other conclusion than that national character has some very important agency--or, perhaps, it might be safer to say, _has_ had some very important agency--through some cause or other, in disqualifying France from becoming a great naval power, in the sense of skill; in that of mere force, so great a nation must always be formidable. Now she sends her princes to sea, however, we may look for different results. Notwithstanding the fact that an Englishman, or an American, rarely went alongside of a Frenchman, in 1798, without a strong moral assurance of victory, he was sometimes disappointed. There was no lack of courage in their enemies, and it occasionally happened that there was no lack of skill. Every manifestation that the experience of our captain could detect, went to show that we had fallen in with one of these exceptions. As we drew nearer to our enemy, we perceived that he was acting like a seaman. His sails had been furled without haste or confusion; an infallible evidence of coolness and discipline when done on the eve of battle, and signs that the watchful seaman, on such occasions, usually notes as unerring indications of the sort of struggle that awaits him. It was consequently understood, among us on the quarter-deck, that we were likely to have a warm day's work of it. Nevertheless, we had gone too far to retreat without an effort, and we began, in our turn, to shorten sail, in readiness for the combat. Marble was a prince of a fellow, when it came to anything serious. I never saw him shorten sail as coolly and readily as he did that very day. We had everything ready in ten minutes after we began. It was rare, indeed, to see two letters-of-marque set-to as coolly, and as scientifically as were the facts with the Crisis and _la Dame de Nantes;_ for so, as we afterwards ascertained, was our antagonist called. Neither party aimed at any great advantage by manoeuvring; but we came up alongside of “The Lady,” as our men subsequently nick-named the Frenchman, the two vessels delivering their broadsides nearly at the same instant. I was stationed on the forecastle, in charge of the head-sheets, with orders to attend generally to the braces and the rigging, using a musket in moments that were not otherwise employed. Away went both my jib-sheet blocks at the beginning, giving me a very pretty job from the outset. This was but the commencement of trouble; for, during the two hours and a half that we lay battering _la Dame de Nantes_, and she lay battering us, I had really so much to attend to in the way of reeving, knotting, splicing, and turning in afresh, that I had scarcely a minute to look about me, in order to ascertain how the day was going. I fired my musket but twice. The glimpses I did manage to take were far from satisfactory, however; several of our people being killed or wounded, one gun fairly crippled by a shot, and our rigging in a sad plight. The only thing encourag'ng was Neb's shout, the fellow making it a point to roar almost as loud as his gun, at each discharge. It was evident from the first that the Frenchman had nearly twice as many men as we carried. This rendered any attempt at boarding imprudent, and, in the way of pounding, our prospects were by no means flattering. At length I heard a rushing sound over my head, and, looking up, I saw that the main-top-mast, with the yards and sails, had come down on the fore-braces, and might shortly be expected on deck. At this point, Captain Williams ordered all hands from the guns to clear the wreck. At the same instant, our antagonist, with a degree of complaisance that I could have hugged him for, ceased firing also. Both sides seemed to think it was very foolish for two merchantmen to lie within a cable's length of each other, trying which could do the other the most harm; and both sides set about the, by this time, very necessary duty of repairing damages. While this was going on, the men at the wheel, by a species of instinctive caution, did their whole duty. The Crisis luffed all she was able, while _la Dame de Nantes_ edged away all she very conveniently could, placing more than a mile of blue water between the two vessels, before we, who were at work aloft, were aware they were so decidedly running on diverging lines. It was night before we got our wreck clear; and then we had to look about us, to get out spare spars, fit them, rig them, point them, and sway them aloft. The last operation, however, was deferred until morning. As it was, the day's work had been hard, and the people really wanted rest. Rest was granted them at eight o'clock; at which hour, our late antagonist was visible about a league distant, the darkness beginning to envelope her. In the morning the horizon was clear, owing to the repulsion which existed in so much force between the two vessels. It was not our business to trouble ourselves about the fate of our adversary, but to take heed of our own. That morning we go' up our spars, crossed the yards, and made sail again. We had several days' work in repairing all our damages; but, happening to be found for a long voyage, and well found, too, by the end of a week the Crisis was in as good order as if we had not fought a battle. As for the combat, it was one of those in which either side might claim the victory, or not, as it suited tastes. We had very ingenious excuses for our failure, however; and I make no doubt the French were just as ready, in this way, as we were ourselves. Our loss in this engagement amounted to two men killed outright, and to seven wounded, two of whom died within a few days. The remaining wounded all recovered, though the second-mate, who was one of them, I believe never got to be again the man he had been. A canister-shot lodged near his hip, and the creature we had on board as a surgeon was not the hero to extract it. In that day, the country was not so very well provided with medical men on the land, as to spare many good ones to the sea. In the new navy, it was much the fashion to say, “if you want a leg amputated, send for the carpenter; he _does_ know how to use a saw, while it is questionable whether the doctor knows how to use anything.” Times, however, are greatly altered in this respect; the gentlemen who now compose this branch of the service being not only worthy of commendation for their skill and services, but worthy of the graduated rank which I see they are just now asking of the justice of their country, and which, as that country ordinarily administers justice, I am much afraid they will ask in vain.